Tag Archives: return

Iain Duncan Smith is to give his ignorance to post-Brexit government reform

The pick of the Tories: Iain Duncan Smith is a creature of odious habits and even worse politics.

The former Tory leader whose ‘reforms’ of social security have led to the deaths of thousands upon thousands of people has been appointed to lend his ignorance to the government again.

Iain Duncan Smith will chair the new Taskforce on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform.

The title of the organisation creates the acronym TIGRR – tiger, get it? But Duncan Smith is no kind of tiger. As benefit claimants know from his time as Work and Pensions Secretary, he’s a little bitch.

This Site has its own acronym for him – RTU. It stands for “Returned To Unit”, the message of shame on the record of armed forces personnel who fail training for promotion up the officers’ ranks – as he is said to have done.

The government has claimed that the TIGRR will “identify and develop proposals across a range of areas that will drive innovation and competitiveness, reduce barriers to start-ups and scale-ups, create opportunities for innovation to make the most of cutting-edge technologies, and support growth and dynamism right across the UK economy”.

But with RTU at the helm it is more likely to reduce competitiveness with new schemes that will be massively expensive while helping nobody (like Universal Credit), create barriers that stop people getting what they need (as he did with all benefits, particularly those for the sick and disabled), and abandon cutting-edge technologies for paper and ink (as DWP workers were forced to do when his plan for Universal Credit to be fully computerised fell on its ass).

He didn’t even help his own government! All his so-called “reforms” created more expense and none of them saved any money at all.

Labour has said it is ready to fight over any reforms that could be harmful – particularly to employment rights.

While This Writer has nothing personal against Andy McDonald, I remember when the party under Ed Miliband, in the dying days of its previous right-wing, neoliberal incarnation, voted in support of RTU to harm benefit claimants and I have a doubt.

The simple fact is that the appointment of this death machine should tell us everything we need to know about what his organisation will do. And it won’t help anybody.

Source: Iain Duncan Smith appointed post-Brexit government adviser | The New European

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POLL: is the Supreme Court right to refuse Shamima Begum’s bid to return to the UK for trial?

Shamima Begum: she won’t be allowed to return to the UK and fight for her citizenship.

The Supreme Court has ruled that Shamima Begum should not be allowed to return to the UK to fight for her citizenship to be restored.

Its members unanimously overruled a decision by the Court of Appeal that said she would not be able to make an effective appeal from the camp in northern Syria where she is currently living.

The Home Office had appealed against the decision on the grounds that allowing her to return would create “significant national security risks”.

The Supreme Court agreed:

Lord Reed said: “The Supreme Court unanimously allows all of the home secretary’s appeals and dismisses Ms Begum’s cross-appeal.”

He said the Court of Appeal’s judgment “did not give the home secretary’s assessment the respect which it should have received” given the role’s “responsibility for making such assessments” and accountability to parliament.

Lord Reed added the Court of Appeal had “mistakenly believed that, when an individual’s right to have a fair hearing… came into conflict with the requirements of national security, her right to a fair hearing must prevail.”

He said the right to a fair hearing did “not trump all other considerations, such as the safety of the public”.

Ms Begum has proved extremely divisive among some members of the UK community.

She was enticed abroad to join Islamic State, aged just 15, and married a Dutch IS fighter – with whom she had three children. They have all died.

After IS largely collapsed, she found herself in a refugee camp and appealed for the UK’s government to return her to this country, so she could rely on the National Health Service to care for her and her last child, before that child died.

But then-Home Secretary Sajid Javid instead stripped her of her UK citizenship, citing the by-then-20-year-old’s still-apparent enthusiasm for the bloodthirsty regime she fled the country to join.

Some said she had been groomed and did not know what she was doing; some said she knew exactly what she was about.

The Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), a semi-secret court that hears national security cases, ruled that Mr Javid was right and Ms Begum could appeal for citizenship to Bangladesh, to which she may have a claim to nationality through her mother.

The Court of Appeal overruled that judgement and now the Supreme Court has reversed that decision.

Some are now saying that Ms Begum is now in legal limbo. She isn’t – she can still make her appeal from Syria, using lawyers in the UK.

But is that a reasonable course of action? Let’s have a poll:

Source: Shamima Begum cannot return to UK, Supreme Court rules – BBC News

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IS bride may face arrest if she comes to UK and begs courts to restore her citizenship

Shamima Begum: set to be arrested?

It seems Shamima Begum is likely to have her wish to live back in the UK after all – as a criminal serving a prison sentence for terror crimes.

The Home Office announced its disappointment that the Court of Appeal had allowed her to come home to beg for the return of her UK citizenship, and said it would appeal against the ruling.

Well, it seems someone has come up with this in the meantime.

Interestingly, a (non-scientific) poll of This Site’s readers has shown (at the time of writing) that roughly three-fifths of those who voted favoured returning her citizenship, against 40 per cent who did not.

So it seems she may have her citizenship restored – only to spend the next few years enjoying it in a prison cell.

Here’s LBC:

Richard Walton, who led Scotland Yard’s counter terrorism unit between 2011 and 2016, said that Shamima, now 20, who fled the UK as a schoolgirl to join IS in Syria, is likely to face arrest and a subsequent terror trial if she takes up the opportunity to return to the UK.

Mr Walton said he believes the appeal court had made a mistake in its judgement yesterday and that the ruling “undermines” the ability of elected officials to keep the public safe.

Mr Walton said: “I think the court of appeal has made a profound mistake. It will set a dangerous precedent.

“Frankly it is alarming to see the court of appeal taking over the Home Secretary’s responsibility of who should be allowed in the UK.

“It has opened the door for her return to Britain and has undermined a statutory power of parliament.

“She is highly likely to be arrested… but it is almost impossible to gather sufficient evidence from war zones.”

It seems to This Writer that, if Ms Begum is indeed arrested on her arrival in the UK, then it presents an opportunity for our security forces.

As a commenter on This Site’s previous story wrote: “If she was a child that was groomed, as some are saying, then we need to know who has been doing the grooming.”

Exactly. Let’s find out who has been encouraging teenagers to betray their country, track them down and bring them to justice.

I think that should be something we can all support.

Source: Isis bride Shamima Begum ‘highly likely’ to face arrest on her return to UK – LBC News

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POLL: Shamima Begum will return to UK to fight for citizenship, court says. Good decision?

Shamima Begum: do you think her UK citizenship should be returned to her?

The Court of Appeal has said former IS bride Shamima Begum may return to the UK to appeal for the return of her citizenship.

Judges said she had been denied a fair hearing because she could not make her case from a Syrian refugee camp.

Ms Begum has proved extremely divisive among some members of the UK community.

She was enticed abroad to join Islamic State, aged just 15, and married a Dutch IS fighter – with whom she had three children. They have all died.

After IS largely collapsed, she found herself in a refugee camp and appealed for the UK’s government to return her to this country, so she could rely on the National Health Service to care for her and her last child, before that child died.

But then-Home Secretary Sajid Javid instead stripped her of her UK citizenship, citing the now-20-year-old’s still-apparent enthusiasm for the bloodthirsty regime she fled the country to join.

Some said she had been groomed and did not know what she was doing; some said she knew exactly what she was about.

The Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), a semi-secret court that hears national security cases, ruled that Mr Javid was right and Ms Begum could appeal for citizenship to Bangladesh, to which she may have a claim to nationality through her mother.

The Court of Appeal has overruled that judgement – but the Home Office has said it will apply for permission to appeal.

Is this a good decision? Let’s be clear – Ms Begum is not being offered her citizenship back; she’s just getting a chance to plead for it, showing that she has learned her lesson.

But has she? Or would we be allowing a viper into our collective bosom?

Let’s have a poll:

Source: Shamima Begum can return to UK to fight for citizenship, Court of Appeal rules – BBC News

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MPs must physically attend Parliament again from June 2. Let’s see how THAT works for them…

Jacob Rees-Mogg: he wants a return to the way Parliament was conducted long ago and he doesn’t care if MPs die as a result.

MPs have voted to end the “virtual” Parliamentary proceedings they have been enjoying since the lockdown started.

From June 2, they will have to attend in order to take part in debates – even though the limit of 50 people in the Commons chamber at any time will remain.

How’s that going to work, then?

Jacob Rees-Mogg, laughably the current Leader of the House, reckons the change will restore sufficient scrutiny of policy matters, but it is difficult to understand his reasoning.

With fewer people allowed in the Chamber, there will be less opportunity for our representatives to have their voices heard.

Rees-Mogg whined that virtual proceedings slowed down debates to one-third of normal pace – but isn’t that better than excluding MPs from debates altogether?

And then there’s the question of whether the decision is effectively one to “euthanise” MPs:

Jacob Rees-Mogg has been told by a senior Conservative backbencher that an attempt to return to a “physical” parliament will in effect “euthanise” MPs who are sick, shielding and self-isolating.

Former minister Robert Halfon said the proposals would discriminate and threaten the lives of some MPs.

“Is it really morally just to say in effect to MPs, because you are not Tarzan-like and able to swing through the chamber, beating your chest shouting to your constituents: ‘Look, I am here!’ that you are effectively euthanised from the Commons?

“MPs who are disrupted by this awful pandemic are not just old horses to be sent to the knackers’ yard,” he said.

Some of you may be confused by Mr Halfon’s speech.

It seems he was not suggesting that MPs would catch the coronavirus and die in what some members of the public might consider a mercy-killing (as far as the UK’s citizens are concerned).

Instead, it seems he was suggesting that MPs would be excluded from proceedings, meaning they might as well be dead as far as the good of their constituents is concerned. It’s opaque.

More to the point, perhaps is a letter signed by 35 MPs, arguing that a return to a “physical” parliament could mean that those in high-risk categories including BAME MPs, older MPs or those who are pregnant will be disproportionately restricted.

One very dangerous aspect will be the return of physical voting, in which MPs will be packed into small spaces as they file through the “aye” or “no” lobby. That creates a threat of contracting Covid-19, that could be fatal for some.

But Rees-Mogg was never likely to listen to arguments against it. That is the traditional way in which MPs vote and, as the “Member for the 18th Century”, his emotional tie to it far outweighs any concern for the wellbeing of others.

ADDITIONAL: A reader has just reminded me that MPs were all given £10,000 to facilitate working from home. Are they going to give any of that money back? Ten big ones for just eight weeks’ lockdown seems exorbitantly excessive to This Writer!

Source: MPs told to return to Parliament by June 2 despite health concerns – ITV News

Confusion reigns over who exactly can go back to work and who we can see

Tube commuters after Johnson’s speech on May 10: this is on the Jubilee Line.

Boris Johnson’s speech on Sunday (May 10) becomes more opaque by the hour.

He said all workers who cannot work from home should travel to work if their workplace is open, telling construction workers and manufacturing employees in particular to go back (we know now that the construction industry is part of a Tory plan to boost house buying that flies in the face of common sense).

And it resulted in scenes like this:

Some of these people are going to catch Covid-19. A few may die of it.

That’s what Johnson’s message to the nation contained: death.

And it seems he didn’t even cover all the professions that are expected to go back.

Also endangered are domestic cleaners, who are now expected to go back to their employers’ homes – no matter what those other people have been doing, where they’ve been, what diseases they may have picked up. But they can’t visit their friends/relatives.

Owen Jones has this one right:

His advice to the people who employ domestic cleaners is right on the button.

Edwina Currie got into a proper state while trying to discuss it with Piers Morgan on Good Morning Britain:

Anyway, why is it so important to bring in cleaning staff from outside your home, possibly to spread the infection? Why can’t people just clean their own homes?

That’s what I’ve been doing!

Another comedy addition to those going back to work is film and television production companies. Here‘s Screen Daily:

Film and television production in the UK are permitted to restart providing all involved abide by social distancing guidelines, the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has confirmed to Screen.

The change comes as part of the government’s latest guidelines for the coronavirus pandemic, which include the instruction “All workers who cannot work from home should travel to work if their workplace is open.”

Workplaces that do reopen – including screen productions – should “ensure employees can maintain a two-metre distance from others, and wash their hands regularly”, according to the Covid-19 guidelines on the government’s website.

Here is the appropriate response:

It won’t work, of course.

Also reopening (in England) is the fast food chain McDonalds – creating widespread fear among employees who will be asked to risk their lives in contact with hundreds – possibly thousands – of other people every day.

As one such employee put it in this article:

I’m terrified of returning to work… The amount of customers will be astronomical… and I still don’t know how we will be protected.

I can’t help but think the official advice means that if you’re middle class or above, everyone thinks it’s fine for you to work from home, but if you’re working class like us, it’s no problem and you can go back to work.

Yes indeed – and this means low-paid workers are most at risk:

“The Government’s strategy will put low-paid workers with the poorest employment rights most at risk,” [said Shadow Secretary of State for Women and Equalities, Marsha de Cordova].

Shadow Business Secretary Ed Miliband [said] “It is the highest-paid workers who will generally carry on being able to work from home and lower-paid workers who are being asked to go back to work.

“We also know from … ONS figures that among men, construction workers have so far been more than twice as likely to die from Covid-19 as the average member of the population.”

The Tory government says it is prioritising safety for everyone returning to work.

But… well, look:

It isn’t happening; it won’t happen. It is the same as all the Tory promises throughout the crisis, about PPE, about ventilators, about testing, about contact tracing. If it isn’t exclusively for the rich, it isn’t true.

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Tory MPs were happy for us to go back to work – but are they frit of returning to Parliament themselves?

House of Commons: here’s a scene that won’t be allowed while the coronavirus crisis continues. But Boris Johnson called for others to go back to work, ensuring that they would be packed like sardines into public transport whether he wanted it or not.

Little did This Writer know, when I reported that Jacob Rees-Mogg wanted MPs to go back to work, that he was going to insist on it.

It seems that, as Leader of the House of Commons, he is determined that MPs should set an example for others who are being asked to go back to their jobs by Boris Johnson:

It’s certainly true that  some MPs aren’t too keen:

Valerie Vaz, Labour’s shadow leader of the House of Commons, said she was “alarmed” by Mr Rees-Mogg’s announcement and asked why parliament should “contradict” the government’s own health advice by returning to “business as usual” in June.

The SNP’s Tommy Sheppard said it was a “fantasy” to believe that physical sittings could resume in June without special procedures being in place.

He asked what should happen to MPs considered among those most vulnerable to coronavirus, or Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish MPs, whose devolved governments have not yet eased any lockdown measures.

Rees-Mogg, of course, instantly seized on this as a way to run down the opposition:

He said: “How can we say to our schoolchildren, ‘you’re safe going back’, some of them, but that we’re not, that we’re going to hide away whilst schoolchildren are going back – is that the right message to give to our constituents?”

Yes!

MPs have every right to be afraid of returning to Parliament, if they can’t be assured that social distancing rules will be maintained, or that they won’t be exposed to a risk of catching the coronavirus from other people working on the Parliamentary estate.

And of course those living in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have those countries’ “no movement” rules to consider; they aren’t actually allowed out to attend Parliament.

Clive Lewis is right about the motivation for Rees-Mogg’s decision:

Yes – but will it trump Tory self-interest?

We’ll find out when we see how many of them turn up after the Whitsun break.

It’s a “win-win” scenario for everybody who isn’t a Tory, of course.

If they don’t turn up, they’re cowards who are afraid to support their own government’s policy; if they do, they’ll probably catch Covid-19 and spend some time in hospital.

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Rees Mogg wants MPs back in Parliament as ‘example’. That’s exactly what they’ll be if they go…

Jacob Rees-Mogg: he probably didn’t intend his words to be the way I’ve interpreted them.

Jacob Rees-Mogg reckons MPs should return to Westminster and vote in person – as an example to all those being urged back to work in spite of the coronavirus.

Good for him!

He’s a complete an utter dunderhead.

Social distancing rules mean there can only be about 50 MPs in the Commons chamber at any time, and many have been using videoconferencing to take part in debates from home.

There is no way anybody should be cramped together like sardines – which is the usual situation during the busier Commons votes – while Covid-19 remains a threat to life.

But in his speech on Sunday, Boris Johnson said he hoped to reopen schools (in England) at the beginning of June, suggesting that reception classes would be among the first to come back.

The problem with that is obvious – it will be impossible to get very young children to understand the need to stay at least two metres away from each other.

So some have responded by saying the following:

So: good for Jacob Rees-Mogg!

He has laid the gauntlet down.

If MPs aren’t returning to Parliament, there’s no reason for children to return to our schools.

Source: Coronavirus: Rees-Mogg wants MPs back to ‘set example’ – BBC News

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This is what Boris Johnson calls winning: the second-worst Covid-19 death rate in the world

Fist flying: Boris Johnson can make all the grand gestures he likes – but his speech would have been better if he had stood there and dribbled at us.

What a disaster: Boris Johnson is back at work.

His health may have improved but his patter is as rotten as it ever was.

Fortunately we are still able to get our money’s worth from his satirical value, as evidenced by this clip that reminds us he once hid in a refrigerator to avoid difficult questions:

He wasted no time getting himself back in the public eye, with an “address to the nation” at 9am today. Most of us were probably still in bed.

And we didn’t miss much. It was a remarkably content-free speech, focusing mostly on the concerns of his billionaire friends who are desperate for us all to get back to work, making money for them.

So he said the UK was almost at the point where lockdown restrictions could start to be lifted, and he would be telling us over the next few days how that might be done – but he won’t actually let it happen until he is sure a second peak of coronavirus infections and deaths can be avoided.

In other words: no change for now.

He said he measures his success by the fact that the NHS has not collapsed, but failed to recognise that it was only in danger because of Tory starvation policies over the last 10 years, when they were preparing the service for US-style privatisation.

The one joy we can derive from this whole saga is the fact that it proves once and for all that the NHS must never be privatised; a private health system simply would not take any precautions in advance of a global health emergency because it would infringe on its profits.

As it is, Tory mismanagement means the death toll in the UK is disproportionately high, and likely to become the second worst in the world behind the United States.

He recognised the contribution of people like Captain Tom Moore, who raised millions for the NHS at the age of 99 by walking laps of his garden – without acknowledging that it was only necessary because of his government’s failures:

What absolute twaddle.

The simple fact is that Tory incompetence has made the impact of the virus far, far worse than it had to be – as acknowledged by these commentators:

Yes, let’s talk openly about this catastrophe.

We could start by mentioning the fact that his government’s offer of coronavirus testing kits for key workers has stalled on every one of the four days it has been running.

According to The Independent:

The kits ran out around two minutes after the service launched on Friday, and people were reportedly told there were none left on Saturday morning after around 15 minutes.

As of 10am on Sunday, home testing kits for England were listed as “unavailable” on the government’s website – two hours after booking slots reopened.

Key workers could no longer order any online by 9.10am on Monday – the fourth day in a row where tests have become unavailable within hours of the booking system opening.

That’s right – today it took just over an hour for the government to run out. This must be a serious blow to the Tory plan, which is to carry out 100,000 tests a day by Thursday.

And nursing staff are starting to refuse to work in places where PPE – Personal Protective Equipment – is not available to an acceptable standard. Who can blame them when so many of their colleagues have caught the coronavirus and died?

Johnson mentioned none of these facts in his speech today, knowing that his bluster would encourage the easily-led:

But some of us are not so malleable:

Johnson is trying to whitewash this calamitous failure as a success. Don’t let him.

Source: Johnson: ‘We are winning but we haven’t won’ – ITV News

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Johnson stumbles again as child poverty cash handed back to Europe unspent

Nobody’s going to be helping this child out of poverty; in fact, the Tory government under Boris Johnson is giving back EU cash intended for this purpose, unspent.

It’s not a good beginning for Boris Johnson, is it?

His Home Secretary is a security risk, dedicated to bringing back the death penalty – and may have breached the ministerial code for a second time, despite having been forced out of the cabinet for her first transgression.

His police recruitment drive won’t restore the 20,000 officers lost since 2010 but will only keep numbers at a standstill.

He made a hypocrite of himself by saying he won’t call a snap election. Despite this claim, the other political parties have put themselves on election alert.

He quietly dropped a Cabinet Office investigation into an MP who grabbed a female climate change protester by the throat, slammed her into a pillar and marched her out of the Mansion House at an event last month, confirming many people’s belief that he is happy with abuse of women.

He pledged to spend £39 billion on a high-speed rail vanity project between Leeds and Manchester, then no doubt wondered why Scottish people booed him when he turned up there offering a share of £300 million to boost growth.

Now this – all in his first week as PM.

More than £3.5m intended to alleviate child poverty and homelessness is at risk of being wasted because the government has failed to spend it, says a House of Lords committee.

The government said there had been “barriers” over spending the money.

But peers have written to complain that after almost six years, the government has failed to deliver spending aimed at addressing “the worst forms of poverty”.

About £580,000 of unspent cash has so far been taken back – and a further similar amount is at risk of being deducted at the end of the year.

While this money is being handed back, food banks are struggling to feed a million children who live below the poverty line, during the school holidays.

As far as I can tell, the only way he could make things worse is by running over Larry the Downing Street Cat in his prime ministerial gas-guzzling limo.

Source: Child poverty cash handed back to Europe unspent – BBC News

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.

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