Clive Lewis: he wants us to know that the Public Order Bill is targeting the innocent and protecting those who should be criminalised.
Clive Lewis makes an excellent point in this Twitter thread.
He calls attention to the fact that the Public Order Bill, increasing restrictions on protest, is returning to Parliament today (March 7).
And he points out that the Bill targets the wrong people – by criminalising protesters against environmental destruction in order to protect those who are responsible for causing it.
Here he is:
1/3 Tomorrow, the Public Order Bill returns to Parliament.
As the government takes steps to introduce increasingly draconian restrictions on protest, we must ask ourselves:
Maybe there’s nothing to be done about it right now – but we need to remember for the future.
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Take a look at this – it’s Tory Charles Walker ripping unrestrainedly into Suella Braverman’s latest Public Order Bill:
The clip is from Open Democracy, which has also run an article which states:
The home secretary has tabled a last-minute amendment to a widely criticised anti-protest bill that would allow her to apply for injunctions against anyone she deems ‘likely’ to carry out protests that could cause ‘serious disruption’ to ‘key national infrastructure’, prevent access to ‘essential’ goods or services, or have a ‘serious adverse effect on public safety’. The proposal would also give police the power to arrest anyone they suspect to be breaching such an injunction.
Leading human rights groups say that the Public Order Bill, which is set to reach its final stages in the Commons today, would align the UK’s anti-protest laws with those in Russia and Belarus.
The bill includes new powers, such as protest banning orders, that the government was forced to exclude from its Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act (PCSC) after they were voted down in the House of Lords earlier this year.
Jun Pang, policy and campaigns officer at rights campaign group Liberty, told openDemocracy that the amendment “will effectively give the home secretary the power to clamp down on protests as and when the government chooses. This will have devastating consequences for dissent.”
Other measures proposed in the bill include giving courts the power to issue Serious Disruption Prevention Orders (SDPOs), which can ban individuals from attending protests.
Amnesty International said the proposed law on SDPOs would “go further” than similar legislation in Russia, by giving courts the power to issue them without a conviction. The range of conditions that can be imposed on individuals under the orders include 24/7 GPS monitoring and restricted internet usage.
Labour MPs have raised concerns that the orders, which were previously rejected by the House of Lords for being “draconian”, could be used to prevent workers from joining picket lines. The government is currently embroiled in a months-long industrial dispute with transport workers over pay cuts and could soon face strikes by nurses and teachers.
The bill has also come under fire from anti-racist campaingers for expanding stop and search powers, despite evidence that it is ineffective and disproportionately targets ethnic minorities, particularly young Black men.
Other measures in the bill include a new offence that criminalises the protest tactic of “locking on” where people attach themselves to one another or an immovable object.
Those stopped and found to have items on them – such as bike lock or superglue – which are intended to be used for a “locking on” protest could also be fined an unlimited amount.
The bill also proposes a new offence of interfering with “the use or operation of any key national infrastructure in England and Wales”, or intending to, which includes natural gas sites as well as roads, rail networks and airports. Just Stop Oil activists on Monday shut down the Dartford Crossing that takes southbound M25 traffic over the Thames, in protest against the government giving out new oil and gas licences.
Sadly, the enormous majority given to the Conservatives by former Labour voters who had been tricked into believing they would get better treatment that way meant the Bill has been passed in the Commons, and now goes to the House of Lords, where many of its new powers have already been rejected during a previous attempt.
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You may remember that Keir Starmer ordered members of the Labour Party’s Socialist Campaign Group of MPs to withdraw their names from a Stop the War Coalition statement on the Russia-Ukraine crisis that criticised Nato – in the late afternoon of February 24.
It seems that, while the decision to threaten them with the loss of the Labour whip was his, the idea came from former Conservative MP David Gauke – as former Labour MP Chris Williamson has highlighted:
Just seen this tweet from Tory MP David Gauke. It seems Sir Keir Starmer is even closer to the Tories than I realised and is taking instructions directly from the Conservative Party.@UKLabour is finished, there really is no basis to be a member or to vote for this party. https://t.co/ZxhwIpKw4e
Check the time on it: 3.51pm. Around an hour and a half later, right-wing columnist Dan Hodges tweeted to say that the Labour whips had done exactly as Gauke had suggested:
Understand the Labour chief whip has written to those Labour MPs who signed the Stop The War letter on the Ukraine, instructing them to withdraw their names.
Confirmation came from LabourList an hour after that:
11 Labour MPs pull their signatures from a Stop the War statement criticising NATO after being urged to do so by the chief whip: https://t.co/1HLN5xYOCB
So it seems Mr Williamson is right and Labour leader Keir Starmer takes orders from Tories. This could devastate Labour’s credibility with voters.
Gauke has tried to distance himself from the revelation – and insulted Mr Williamson in the process by saying Labour was becoming respectable again. The response is scathing:
My apologies David, I meant to say 'former' Tory MP.
However, I'm not sure an endorsement by a prominent Conservative will persuade many erstwhile and current Labour supporters about @UKLabour's "respectability".
We are days away from a by-election in Erdington, Birmingham, where Labour has struggled to attract campaigners while the left-wing candidate, Dave Nellist, has enjoyed huge support on the streets.
How will this damning revelation affect public opinion and – more importantly – the vote?
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Boris Johnson: after the abjectly-insincere apology for attending a possibly law-breaking event, putting out a party political broadcast claiming the Tories are the party of law and order is the equivalent of making an obscene gesture to the whole of the UK.
Somebody in the Conservative Party must be a comedian.
What other reason could there be for scheduling a party political broadcast – discussing law and order – on the day Boris Johnson apologised to the UK for attending a potentially lawbreaking, lockdown-busting party?
That is what has happened.
He made the apology just after midday on January 12 and the PPB went out at 6.25pm.
No, I don’t have video of it. Sometimes one has to draw the line.
What the fuck has just appeared on my TV screen? The blond liar doing a Tory party political broadcast. Lies from beginning to end. Jesus, this man has NO depths. Fuck off Johnson, fuck right off. Lying, cheating, amoral scumbag. I nearly broke my TV.
That bin-bag of toxic custurd has a f**king nerve. Hours after being publicly shamed and confessing to criminal acts in the Commons, Liar Johnson appears on our TV channels fronting a party political broadcast for the ConServatives pushing a ‘law and order’ agenda. Hypocrisy! pic.twitter.com/WcKMKdtoB9
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Keir Starmer: he’s not doing here what Sophie Duker suggested in the clip – but the look on his face may suggest he has been in the recent past.
This was too good to leave as a throwaway tweet so I’ve taken video and put it on TikTok to test the possibilities of that platform (and as practice for myself).
It’s from Frankie Boyle’s New World Order, in which comedian Sophie Duker (not Dukes, as the software insisted on renaming her) passes judgement on Keir Starmer’s tenure (so far) as leader of the Labour Party.
(To be honest, the clip isn’t that good either – sorry! But I’m sure it’ll get better once I’ve ironed out a few things.)
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Keir Starmer: I couldn’t find a single image of this former Director of Public Prosecutions with police officers.
The ridiculous Keir Starmer never misses an opportunity to make a fool of himself.
Elected as Labour leader on the basis of 10 pledges (all now broken) that didn’t say a word about law and order, he is now trying to remodel Labour as “the party of law and order” because he can see public opinion swinging against the Tories.
Apparently he’s putting the enforcement of criminal justice at the centre of his local election campaign – even though local authorities have no influence over policing. Nice one, Keith!
Also, there’s currently a huge controversy over the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that his Labour Party rightly opposes due to its introduction of a huge number of new offences (many in breach of our human rights) and draconian punishments for them.
Labour can’t stop the Tories from passing it into law. Does his new campaign mean Labour will enthusiastically support the punishment of these new offences, despite opposing their creation?
He also said the new Police Bill was a missed opportunity to stop violence against women and girls – taking his cue from the backlash against the policing of the Clapham Common vigil for Sarah Everard and the numerous protest demonstrations against police misbehaviour that have followed.
It is – but he didn’t say how he would improve that Bill to ensure that the law protects us, enshrines our human rights, and punishes police officers who cross the line into unlawful violence.
In other words, he gassed a lot of hot air at us. It doesn’t mean a thing.
If he thought we wouldn’t notice, he was sorely mistaken. Here are a few reactions from Twitter:
SIr Keir Starmer plans to relaunch with a series of stand up comedy gigs. Secretly coached by Jim Davison and the ghost of Benard Manning, the Labour leader will tour working mens clubs in RedWall towns. Tour manager Luke Akehurst said 'Laugh? My side is splitting' pic.twitter.com/OvChYbJyQx
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Doormats: Keir Starmer (left) and his right-wing ACTING general secretary David Evans, want Labour members to have no opinions or policies, for fear of upsetting anybody at all.
Once upon a time, the Labour Party had a mission. It stood for something. Under Keir Starmer and David Evans, those days are gone.
These two muppets are demanding that party members suppress all their political opinions – under pain of suspension or expulsion, let’s not forget – in order to avoid offending literally anybody at all, in any way.
They seem to have lost their way – badly.
As a party of Opposition, it is Labour’s duty to cause offence – at least to the policies of the Conservative government that they have been elected to fight.
They can’t lay out the grounds of any opposition without potentially offending people who disagree on fundamental ideological grounds.
Ah, but there’s the rub.
Starmer and Evans don’t actually have an ideology. Their only interest is in gaining power for its own sake.
As I have stated before, they are like the weathercocks in Tony Benn’s famous speech about “signposts and weathercocks”. To paraphrase: some politicians are like signposts – they point in a certain direction and you always know what they stand for; others are like weathercocks – they blow with the wind, changing their minds with the weather in a vain attempt to pick up public support by trying to attach themselves to whatever is fashionable at the time.
That’s Starmer for you, and Evans. They go any way the wind blows. In the words of a famous song that features those words, nothing really matters to them.
I’ve recorded a short video blog about it which you’ll probably enjoy. Here it is:
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Still the most apt comment on Keir Starmer: his namesake Hardie obviously didn’t say those words but if he were alive today, he might well follow through on the threat.
It’s the new policy from the Labour leadership: do as we say, not as we do.
Why is it permissible for Keir Starmer, David Evans, Angela Rayner, Lisa bloody Nandy, uncle Tom Cobley and all in the shadow cabinet and the NEC to spout any tripe they like about the suspended former Labour leader, while gagging rank-and-file party members?
It isn’t, as far as This Writer can see. Party rules certainly don’t allow for it.
And party members aren’t standing for it.
The edict, mentioned in the Mirror yesterday, is a repeat of what Evans and Starmer said back on October 29 when Corbyn was suspended – and party members ignored it then, too.
There have been petitions and open letters signed by members from CLPs across the UK, and individuals have spoken out on the social media and in their own groups.
They will continue to do so, because the Labour Party was founded on the principle that everybody is equal and, in this case, Starmer and the others have led by example.
They made a huge fuss about Corbyn’s suspension when they announced it; they can’t complain about everybody else making a fuss about it now.
And the way they are tackling the issue has been likened to Russian politics under Stalin in the 1930s:
An MP who was at the meeting… said: “In 40 years I’ve never seen anything like it. It was a bit scary.
“It’s like 1938 in the USSR, with the show trials. I’m not, and never have been, a fan of JC but it makes me feel a bit nervous.”
Starmer will hate this comment. He has already been labelled Keir Stalin over his ham-handed handling of Corbyn’s suspension.
And worse was to follow as Labour – and ex-Labour members took to the social media to hammer him:
I'm trying hard to understand current Labour Party rules. Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner, Margaret Hodge, Ruth Smeeth are allowed to comment on the EHRC report but the MP for Islington for 37 years, and an LP member for 55, is not . Have I got that right? #ReinstateJeremyCorbyn
It is thanks to @jeremycorbyn that I am involved in local politics. Corbyn inspired me, gave me #hope and gave me the confidence to access politics – a working class Northerner who had no interest whatsoever.
All of the above are good, valid comments but I would draw particular attention to the one below. Unlike the others, it comments on the posture adopted by Starmer and his cronies who are currently infesting the Labour Party’s top positions:
Jeremy Corbyn was suspended for telling truth on the EHRC report but the truth is that the current lot couldn’t give a damn about AS or any form of racism for that matter.
It’s the last 5 years of socialism they see as a stain on the party. #ReinstateJeremyCorbyn
That is what rings true, in everything Starmer has done since he became party leader – ironically on a “continuity Corbyn” ticket.
He isn’t a socialist. He’s a neoliberal, cut from the same mould as Tony Blair, Iain McNicol and Peter Mandelson. He hates the socialism that swept Corbyn to the leadership and boosted party membership to more than half a million.
And that means if you are a Labour member who joined because of Corbyn, Keir Starmer hates you.
He will try to drive you out. He has probably succeeded in pushing out many of your colleagues already.
He is trying to annul the votes of those who have left from the current NEC elections, in order to gerrymander a victory for hard-right-wing candidates, because he thinks that will send you on your way.
He is proving, every day, that he fooled huge numbers of you; you elected to the head of a democratic socialist party a man who is neither a socialist nor a democrat.
He deserves all the exposure you can heap on him. So to Labour members I say:
Ignore Keir Stalin’s dictat to stay silent about Jeremy Corbyn. If you all speak up, there’s nothing they can do about it.
Expose the inconsistencies in his posture. His closest colleagues have broken party rules and they have committed acts of genuine anti-Semitism. Why has he taken no action against them?
And demand that the party leadership return to following its own rules by suspending all those who have broken them – including Starmer himself.
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Keir Starmer and Jeremy Corbyn: Corbyn would have been well-advised not to turn his back on Starmer.
I wonder how well Keir Starmer thinks his clampdown on support for Jeremy Corbyn is going.
Starmer – or I should say the Labour leadership – issued notice that no party member should comment on the decision to suspend Corbyn’s membership, immediately after it was made on October 29.
So, umm, Starmer sticks out his chin and declares “the members agree with me on Corbyn’s suspension”
He THEN makes sure the members cannot express their opinion
Obviously mainstream media report the first but not the second
A special fast-track complaints process was put in place to ensure that party members who ignored the dictat could be reported as soon as possible – in direct contradiction of the wishes of the EHRC report that Starmer had – that very day – promised to honour.
And Labour members across the country are ignoring it.
Corbyn’s wife, Laura Alvarez, is encouraging part members to sign an open letter to Starmer, calling for his suspension to be lifted:
Labour members, Please sign this letter to Keir Starmer supporting the lifting of Jeremy's suspension. https://t.co/PNeYKJDPez. Please also RT. Thank you.
The web page warns that “your name and CLP will be in the public domain” – meaning anyone signing should be aware that their party membership may be at risk.
Corbyn’s shadow chancellor John McDonnell has supported a Change.org petition, simply calling for Corbyn’s reinstatement:
Other Labour MPs are acting unilaterally. Here’s Claudia Webbe making her own appeal for Corbyn’s reinstatement – and potentially damaging her own career prospects by doing so:
Dear Keir
You stood for party leadership on the vision, the values and the policies developed under Jeremy Corbyn
You stood for party unity, the time to unite is now
Please work with the entire Labour movement to cooperate with and support the reinstatement of Jeremy Corbyn
Starmer said he did not want civil war within the Labour Party – but then, Starmer says a lot of things.
Civil war is exactly what he has caused.
And he has done it at a time when a properly-run Parliamentary opposition party would be attacking Boris Johnson’s inept government for its utter uselessness in the face of a deadly viral pandemic that is spreading uncontrollably across the UK.
Why is Starmer ignoring his duty to focus on his obsession?
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“Punish the rapist, not the victim”: Campaigners against the so-called ‘rape clause’ have been trying to overturn the rule for years.
We’ve been waiting for this for a long time.
The experience of the lady involved in this story shows that the Tories are discriminating unfairly between rape victims.
They’re saying that a person can have two children and still receive the child element of Universal Credit for a third born of rape, only if it was the third, and born after April 2017.
This clearly discriminates against mothers who have had first or second children as a result of rape, because they are then forbidden from claiming the child element of UC for a third child that they wanted.
Both situations involve two children not born of rape and one that is, but only one qualifies for the benefit.
That is unfair.
I hope someone takes a case through the courts. Perhaps this is a job for public interest solicitors like Leigh Day, who seem to have done very well with other benefit-related cases recently?
Then, with luck, we’ll be able to force the Tories to u-turn on this despicable rule that humiliates women who have already suffered too much.
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