Tag Archives: mislead

You can’t trust the Tories. But did their lies manage to convince you at the election?

He hasn’t actually said this: but Boris Johnson definitely DID lie to you in order to win the general election, and now we all know it. How can he expect us to trust him or his degraded party?

The Tories lied blatantly to win the 2019 general election, according to research from King’s College, London.

Tactics to mislead the public included  altering a video of Sir Keir Starmer and posing as a fact-checker on Twitter during a leaders’ debate.

The clip was edited to show the current Labour leader, then shadow Brexit secretary, failing to answer a question on the EU when in fact he had responded to it in a live television interview.

The report said the Tories also deliberately shared “poorly formatted and low-quality” posts on social media, including a widely-ridiculed tweet using the comic sans font, to gain attention through critical coverage.

After a public information campaign highlighted five ways of spreading false information last year, the Tory campaign was found to have used four of them.

Fact-checking organisation First Draft found that Labour, the Conservatives, and the Liberal Democrats all published misleading advertising during the campaign – but the Tories were by far the worst.

First Draft said 88 per cent of their most shared online adverts between December 1-4 contained misleading information, compared to 6.7 per cent for Labour.

King’s College researchers said the Tory government’s – let’s not beat around the bush – lies created trust issues for the public, at a time when the governing party is trying to convince us it can be trusted to tell us the facts about Covid-19:

“It wants citizens to believe the message that it is ‘succeeding’ in controlling the epidemic, despite its recent electoral record of using disinformation tactics and admitting it unapologetically.”

The Tories have – unsurprisingly – denied everything, even though they had previously admitted altering the video footage, unapologetically.

And their spokesperson added a few more statements you might consider to be stretching credibility:

“We are delivering on the promises the British public elected us on, getting Brexit done, investing in our public services and levelling-up across the country.“

It’s a good question, isn’t it?

Would Tory voters have done so if they knew how much disinformation the party was using in its campaign? And do they believe what the Tories are saying now?

Sadly This Site can’t do a poll about this – there’s no way of ensuring that only Tory voters would respond.

Source: Conservative Party used disinformation ‘with new level of impunity’ during 2019 general election, report finds | The Independent

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Boris Johnson lied when he said all Covid-19 tests were carried out within 24 hours

One day soon, a Mastermind contestant will do a round on “the life and lies of Boris Johnson”.

There will be a lot of material from which to choose questions. This Writer is thinking of running a daily column. I’ve already got another piece lined up.

This case concerns the following claim, made on June 3:

“We already turn around 90% of tests within 48 hours. The tests conducted at the 199 testing centres, as well as the mobile test centres, are all done within 24 hours, and I can undertake to him now to get all tests turned around in 24 hours by the end of June, except for difficulties with postal tests or insuperable problems like that.”

The claim was – of course – untrue, as Full Fact explains:

When this was said, on 3 June, 19 per cent of tests at regional testing sites and five per cent of tests at mobile test centres were done within 24 hours.

In fact, it turns out that even by the end of June – four weeks later – the government was still failing to turn around every test within 24 hours.

Here‘s the Mirror:

NHS Test and Trace data shows that in the final week of the month only around a quarter of tests carried out at hospitals and care homes were turned around this quickly.

When it came to tests at regional drive through and mobile testing sites nine out of ten tests saw results delivered on time.

Turning around times for home testing performed even worse with just 2% of people getting results in 24 hours.

You may be wondering why the 24-hour turnaround is important. Here’s the reason:

The 24 hour target is key to allowing tracers to get hold of contacts before they start spreading the virus to others.

So one lie leads to another. When Johnson says his contact tracing projects are running at 100 per cent efficiency, you’ll already know it isn’t true.

And of course this means the Tories aren’t controlling Covid-19 – no matter what they say in their press conferences.

Source: New data reveals PM’s testing speeds claims as wrong – Full Fact

‘Build, build, cut’? Or did Johnson simply announce continuation of Budget promise?

Caught out again: but if anyone demands clarity from Boris Johnson, isn’t this the best response we can hope to get?

Boris Johnson seems to have painted himself into a corner with his claim to be putting more money into building affordable homes.

Read this:

Boris Johnson’s claim to “build, build, build” his way out of the coronavirus pandemic was thrown into confusion amid claims that he appeared to have cut funding for affordable housing.

As he delivered a speech in Dudley, No.10’s website suggested that £12bn would be spent on housing over the next eight years – even though the Ministry of Housing said after the Budget in March that the same amount would be spent over five years.

The PM faced fresh claims that the Tory party was doing favours for its “housing developer mates” after he unveiled sweeping planning reforms to allow high street shops to be turned into housing.

A government spokesman insisted there had been no cut to funding and that the eight year timeframe was a reference to the delivery of the new homes, rather than the five-year allocation of cash for them.

“This is in line with what was announced at Budget – there has been no cut in funding or delay in delivery.”

If it’s in line with what was announced in the March Budget, then Johnson isn’t offering any extra money.

And in fact, it seems he’ll be giving cash to his “housing developer mates” to do cheap conversions of shops into housing.

So it seems clear that Johnson’s speech was, if not riddled with lies as such, at the very least misleading.

It’s what we’ve come to expect from the Tories – and from Boris Johnson in particular.

You can’t ever take him at his word.

Source: Johnson ‘Build, Build, Build’ Pledge Under Fire Amid ‘Cuts’ Confusion | HuffPost UK

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Is Rachel Riley deliberately misleading people or does SHE not understand libel?

Take a look at this:

That’s right – after a neutral judgement on the meaning of words Rachel Riley claims are libellous, she misled the public: “Today I had the 1st judgement of a handful of libel cases. The verdict supported my claim to have been defamed by Laura Murray.”

It didn’t. Ms Riley had launched proceedings over a tweet by Ms Murray and in a neutral judgement, Mr Justice Nicklin said the first and second sentences were statements of fact while the third was an expression of opinion – and all may be considered defamatory in common law.

That’s not a ruling that Ms Murray had libelled Ms Riley. The trial hasn’t happened yet.

But look at her response to Mark, who tweeted: “This is excellent news Rachel. I remember saying on here many months back that you’d almost certainly win your libel case against Murray, and I got a great deal of stick off some know nothing Corbynites, some of whom told me you’d get laughed out of court. Delighted you’ve won.”

She replied: “Turns out many of them don’t have that strong an understanding of libel law. Who’d have guessed. Thanks for your support.”

It seems to me that it’s Ms Riley who doesn’t have that strong an understanding of libel law. Otherwise she would know she hasn’t won the Murray case.

And that’s strange, because she has a solicitor who should be advising her of that. In fact, it is his duty to do so, if she has misunderstood.

But it’s more than a week since her reply to Mark and I haven’t seen any retraction or correction.

So, is she deliberately misleading her fans? I sincerely hope not.​

Of course, Laura Murray isn’t the only person facing a libel lawsuit from Ms Riley. She’s suing me too – and my case has been misreported in the national press.

Unlike Ms Murray, who I understand is well-funded, I could lose my case due to lack of funds. As I’ve said many times, I believe Ms Riley is hoping I will run out of cash – and if I can’t afford to defend myself, I’ll automatically lose.

Considering the implications of her dialogue with Mark, I don’t think you’d be happy to let that happen.

So please…

Consider making a donation yourself, via the CrowdJustice page.

Email five of your friends, asking them to pledge to the CrowdJustice site.

Post a link to Facebook, asking your friends to pledge.

On Twitter, you could tweet in support, quoting the address of the appeal.

On other social media platforms, please mention the campaign there, quoting the appeal address.

There’s only one way to stop this nonsense, and that is to win.

And I can’t do that without your help.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Don’t be fooled: Rachel Riley has not won any of her libel cases

I received an email message today from John Gorniak, courtesy of CrowdJustice.

It said: “The Guardian are running a story that Riley won her case. Is this so and how is it that if she has not they are running this line?”

I think many people may be just as confused as Mr Gorniak at the latest developments.

For clarity: Rachel Riley is suing three people, to my knowledge – myself, Jane Heybroek and Laura Murray. The Guardian report refers to the case against Ms Murray.

It says that Ms Riley has won the first round of her High Court libel claim because a judge had stated that words tweeted by Laura Murray were defamatory in common law, in a judgement on the meaning of the statement.

That is not a ruling that Ms Riley has won her case. Ms Murray will now provide defences that one part of her tweet was true and another was her honestly-held opinion and there will be a trial.

While it is true that the judge upheld Ms Riley’s version of the meaning, the difference between it and Ms Murray’s was minor.

It is the interpretation of the facts that matters.

But it is hardly surprising that Mr Gorniak is confused. Consider Ms Riley’s own tweet about the ruling:

 

She made it seem that the judge had delivered a verdict on the case as a whole, and that is not true.

It is also not the first judgement. That came in December when the same judge – Mr Justice Nicklin – said that my article, which Ms Riley claims is libellous – was a “classic expression of opinion”. He went on to say that there were some statements of fact that I would have to support and I do not expect to have any problems there.

But the Daily Mail (for example) then reported the ruling thus: Countdown star Rachel Riley was wrongly accused of being responsible for death threats sent to teenager, libel trial hears.

It wasn’t a trial – just a hearing – and that wasn’t the verdict, but it did hear that claim.

You see how easy it is to subvert the facts?​

Ms Riley clearly has the media on her side. And she has lots of cash with which to pursue these hugely expensive libel cases. Laura Murray is lucky enough to have some wealth of her own.

I don’t.​

That’s why I have to campaign to raise the money I need to fight her claims about me, which aren’t even as accurate as the tweet pictured above.

If any of the above has made you angry about the way a media darling can twist the facts to suit herself, please do as much as you can of the following:

Consider making a donation yourself, via the CrowdJustice page.

Email five of your friends, asking them to pledge to the CrowdJustice site.

Post a link to Facebook, asking your friends to pledge.

On Twitter, you could tweet in support, quoting the address of the appeal.

On other social media platforms, please mention the campaign there, quoting the appeal address.

These cases are making a mockery of British justice. Don’t let Ms Riley get away with it.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Riley libel case: Is this how wealth is used to stifle justice?

I’ve been made aware of an interesting political angle to the libel case brought against me by Rachel Riley:

It seems that right-wing sites on social media can say whatever they like, and their victims are expected to “take it on the chin”, whereas those attacking left-leaning sites are “only too happy to call in the lawyers to extract apologies – and of course money”.

I refer to the right-wing Guido Fawkes blog, which mistakenly claimed that Labour leadership contender Rebecca Long-Bailey had misled the nation about her personal wealth, being married to a chemical industry tycoon.

She isn’t.

In fairness, Guido’s bosses have apologised and deleted the article and links to it.

But it’s not a good look for a site that claims to fight “fake news”.

And according to Zelo Street (whose article forms the basis of this one), Guido boss Paul Staines “claims not to take any notice of legal threats and attempts to prevent him from publishing what he wishes”.

So we have a situation where right-wing organisations can insult people, and mislead the public about them willy-nilly. Is that because they know their targets can’t afford to sue them?

In contrast, when someone else – like me – raises a legitimate issue, I get lumbered with a hugely expensive court action.

The Zelo Street information suggests that I’m right in thinking the case against me is more about buying a verdict than actually serving justice.

But they didn’t count on enough people supporting my CrowdJustice campaign to give me a stab at defeating them.

So far, nearly £50,000 has been raised – but more is needed. When I started, I did not expect to get far, but the stunning amount of support I’ve received has given me a fighting chance.

Please keep the cash coming in, and encourage others to do the same. Here’s a reminder of how to do it:

Please consider making a donation yourself, via the CrowdJustice page.

Email five of your friends, asking them to pledge to the CrowdJustice site.

Post a link to Facebook, asking your friends to pledge.

On Twitter, you could tweet in support, quoting the address of the appeal.

On other social media platforms, please mention the campaign there, quoting the appeal address.

I can disprove the allegations against me. With your help, I’ll be able to afford to.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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‘Fake news’ row as ITV misrepresents Stormzy comment

I have no idea whether anybody running ITV is a billionaire, but this is a story about media misrepresentation so let’s roll out this cracking image again.

I blame the BBC as much as ITV.

After the likes of Laura Kuenssberg spent the whole of the general election campaign bigging up the Tories and belittling Labour – and got the result they wanted, it seems other TV news media are testing the waters to see how far they can mislead the public.

So when pro-Labour, pro-Corbyn rapper Stormzy was asked if he thought the UK was a racist country and he replied, “Definitely; 100 per cent,” ITV news reported it as “Rapper Stormzy says UK is ‘100 per cent’ racist”.

ITV was, of course, 100 per cent lying.

There is a huge difference between saying that there is definitely racism in a country and saying that everybody in that country is racist – but ITV chose to misinterpret the rapper’s words and go for the latter interpretation, for no particular reason.

This was not a mistake. The headline would have gone through several levels of management before it got onto the screen of anybody’s TV, computer or mobile device and all of those people would have known exactly what they were doing: misleading the public about the words of a left-wing cultural leader.

Note that there is not an iota of apology or explanation in the correction issued by ITV no less than 18 hours after the initial report was published:

In fact it doesn’t make much sense at all.

If you want sense, you have to go to the social media, where the response from anyone with a brain has been 100 per cent damning:

This is right on the nose:

https://twitter.com/LauraCatriona/status/1208434569839546368

The way ITV originally tweeted the link to its report has been removed by that company, but Shappi Khorsandi’s point is clear:

ITV’s misrepresentation has lent itself to satire, of course:

Here, Ash Sarkar makes an important point about the effect of ITV’s claim…

… then goes on to aim a particularly sharp barb at another media outlet:

Who’s that racist who writes for the Spectator, again? Not Boris Johnson – the other one.

And what about Stormzy himself? His response is actually laudable for its restraint:

https://twitter.com/stormzy/status/1208690066337480704

But I fear this is the shape of things to come for those of us on the left.

The mainstream – Tory – media will take every opportunity to mislead the public about the opinions, actions and philosophy of those of us who want a better deal for everybody, rather than a bigger slice of pie for the few who are already grossly obese while everybody else is starving.

They’ll do it in the knowledge that most of the people they are misrepresenting do not have the means to challenge them.

And when they are exposed, they’ll simply change their headlines, happy in the knowledge that the damage is done.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Diplomat’s searing resignation over Brexit confirms Corbyn’s claims about Johnson’s lies

Alexandra Hall Hall: She’s probably smiling because she doesn’t have to lie for Boris Johnson any more.

It’s couched in diplomatic language, but when a diplomat quits over “misleading” arguments and a “reluctance to address honestly” Brexit, you know she’s calling Boris Johnson a liar.

Alexandra Hall Hall’s unequivocal statement that she can no longer “peddle half-truths”, coinciding so closely with Jeremy Corbyn’s release of Treasury documents showing that Mr Johnson has misled the UK on the substance of his Brexit deal, can only confirm it.

Revealed as a liar, his Brexit deal simply the latest permutation of the old story about the “Emperor’s new clothes”, Mr Johnson is left with no options.

Naked and shamed, he can only hope that enough of the electorate are so nauseated at the thought of the Brexit drama dragging on that they’ll support him simply in the belief that he’ll make it go away.

He won’t, of course. He can’t.

And what if someone reminds the public that the fuss over the UK’s membership of the EU only happened because a previous Tory prime minister, in a fit of pride, thought it would heal divisions in his own party; it never had anything to do with any economic or social benefit to the UK.

What a cesspit David Cameron dragged us into! And how humiliating if we allow Boris Johnson to drown us in it.

A senior British diplomat in the US has quit with a blast at the UK government over Brexit, saying she could no longer “peddle half-truths” on behalf of political leaders she did not “trust.”

Alexandra Hall Hall, the lead envoy for Brexit in the British Embassy in Washington, said that she had become increasingly dismayed by the demands placed on the British civil service to deliver messages on Brexit which were not “fully honest.”

“I have been increasingly dismayed by the way in which our political leaders have tried to deliver Brexit, with reluctance to address honestly, even with our own citizens, the challenges and trade-offs which Brexit involves; the use of misleading or disingenuous arguments about the implications of the various options before us; and some behaviour towards our institutions, which, were it happening in another country, we would almost certainly as diplomats have received instructions to register our concern,” she wrote in her letter, dated December 3.

“It makes our job to promote democracy and the rule of law that much harder, if we are not seen to be upholding these core values at home.”

Source: Top British diplomat Alexandra Hall Hall quits with searing Brexit critique – CNN

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Radio station pilloried for misrepresenting Corbyn on killing of IS leader

Bosses at right-wing radio station LBC may well be regretting their decision to misrepresent a comment by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn on the death of IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Here’s the headline – and the relevant part of the interview:

It is clear that Mr Corbyn did not say arresting al-Baghdadi was “the right thing to do” – he said he did not know the circumstances of what happened.

Speaking in terms of international law, he said if it were possible to arrest such people, then that would be the right thing – but that is not the same as what LBC suggested.

And the public were on the case.

Jerry Tresman pointed out: “He didn’t say that at all. Shows how the lazy are influenced by one-line false headlines, when the video of what is actually said is in front of them. He said “if possible they should be arrested” and was referring mainly to previous situations where they were executed.”

Here‘s Andy Mills: “Play it back then change your disingenuous headline….it may not appeal to some of your sheeple but at least you could call it journalism!”

Paul Cracknell: “‘If it would have been possible to arrest him, I don’t know the details of the circumstances at the time.’ Those were his words. You make it sound like he’s saying he should have been arrested after he was killed. Muppets.”

‘GenuinelyInterested’: “LBC are being a little bit economical with the truth. What Corbyn actually said was (and I paraphrase), if (double underlined) it were possible to arrest Baghdadi, then we should have done so, so that he could stand trial in the Hague just like Milosevic. What’s wrong about that?”

Even Matthew Collins: “I’m no Corbyn fan but he actually said (twice) ‘if it were possible to arrest him that would have been preferable’. He did not say ‘he shouldn’t have been killed’ or ‘he should have been arrested’.”

At the time of writing, LBC doesn’t appear to have changed its line. Instead, it appears to have doubled-down on it:

Perhaps there should be stronger regulation of the press, along the lines proposed by the Leveson Inquiry.

But will you vote Labour into office, to enact it?

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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Tory lies about Universal Credit are STILL being used – to harm vulnerable benefit claimants

‘Not all correct’: It turns out that the DWP’s ad campaign didn’t set the record straight… in other words, it was crooked.

A keystone of the Tory claim that Universal Credit makes lives better has been ruled misleading by an advertising watchdog – but is still being used to trick people into signing up for the failed “benefit”.

The claim – that “people move into work faster” under Universal Credit “fails to meet the basic standards of truthfulness and honesty that we demand of soap powder commercials”, according to Paul Morrissey, in a letter to The Guardian.

It was featured in a series of adverts that appeared in Metro and MailOnline.

But not only has it been used 67 times by Conservative MPs defending Universal Credit in Parliament (as well as in countless media interviews), it also indicates that officials in the DWP “seem to have been willing participants in attempts by the government to manipulate the evidence… rather than providing an objective analysis of its impact”, according to fellow scribe Alan Spence.

The claim breached the advertising code under rules 3.1 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation), 3.9 (Qualification) and 3.11 (Exaggeration) – and the DWP has been “neither able to satisfactorily explain its actions or apologise for the harm they will have caused to the people who may have moved on to Universal Credit as a result”, according to Raji Hunjan, CEO of Zacchaeus 2000 Trust, the first anti-poverty charity to complain about the adverts.

She said the ruling had come too late, as the ad campaign has ended.

So Z2K has launched a public campaign calling for an apology from the DWP and an independent investigation into how and why these adverts came to be authorised.

Ms Hunjan wrote: “It is vital that we the public can trust government departments to be telling us the truth, particularly in being clear about their strategies to ensure that the social security system works as a safety net to reduce the numbers of people now living in poverty in the UK.

“Instead of using taxpayers’ money on a failed PR campaign, the DWP must now start engaging meaningfully with the widespread evidence of the impact of welfare reform on pushing people into poverty.”

Do you think it will?

This Writer would rather see punitive action taken against those within the DWP – and the Conservative Party – who thought it would be a wizard wheeze to publish a pack of lies.

I would also like to see the DWP broken up and a return to the more supportive ethos of the former Department for Social Security.

For that, we need a Labour government.

That’s a fact we can all trust.

Source: Untangling the lies told about universal credit | Letters | Society | The Guardian

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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The Livingstone Presumption is now available
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Health Warning: Government! is now available
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