Tag Archives: Stanley

Isn’t it time for an investigation into Tory donors that get huge government contracts?

Backhander: have the Tories been funnelling public money to their friends and donors in return for practically nothing? And if so, shouldn’t these people face justice?

Take a look at this:

The claims in the image appear to be accurate.

This is just one of many accounts showing that Tory friends and donors have benefited from government contracts.

The latest apparent beneficiary is Akshata Murty, the wife of the prime minister himself – Rishi Sunak.

Yet all these financial arrangements go uninvestigated.

Personally, I think retweeting the message above might not be enough to achieve the necessary.

By all means do, but consider contacting your own MP as well, to express your own desire for an investigation into connections between Tory MPs and party or personal donors who receive large business contracts – especially deals that, for one reason or another – fall through.

Such bad deals endanger lives – as we discovered during the Covid crisis, when huge amounts of duff personal protective equipment were bought by the Tories from donors and friends, when reliable gear could have been purchased from reputable sources – that didn’t have friends in the Tory government.

It is in the national interest for us to find out for sure what has been going on.

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Fiona Bruce quits as Refuge ambassador over Stanley Johnson ‘one-off’ comment

Fiona Bruce: would she have been better-off staying with Refuge and quitting the BBC?

Neither Fiona Bruce nor the domestic abuse charity Refuge wanted this; it seems to have been prompted by the sense of betrayal felt by domestic abuse victims – over words the BBC obliged her to speak.

Ms Bruce has quit as an ambassador for Refuge after saying on the BBC’s Question Time last week that it’s understood an incident in which former PM Boris Johnson’s father broke his wife’s nose was “a one-off”.

The charity has said survivors of domestic abuse have been in touch over the weekend to described how “devastating” Ms Bruce’s words had been to them.

Refuge’s position has always been that “domestic abuse is never a ‘one-off’; it is a pattern of behaviour that can manifest in a number of ways, including but not limited to physical abuse. Domestic abuse is never acceptable.”

Ms Bruce should have known that – but it seems that she was caught between a rock and a hard place, because she was “legally obliged” by her contract with the BBC to say the words that were given to her during the recording of the programme on March 9.

The BBC explained this in a statement on March 10: “When serious allegations are made on air against people or organisations, it is the job of BBC presenters to ensure that the context of those allegations – and any right of reply from the person or organisation – is given to the audience, and this is what Fiona Bruce was doing … She was not expressing any personal opinion about the situation.”

So it seems the BBC was at fault for telling Ms Bruce to speak words that were at odds with accepted facts about domestic abuse.

That certainly seems to be Refuge’s take on what happened: “While we know the words were not Fiona’s own and were words she was legally obliged to read out, this does not lessen their impact and we cannot lose sight of that.”

Contrast this with the Corporation’s attitude to Gary Lineker, who has been reinstated as host of Match of the Day after (rightly) refusing to retract his comparison of Suella Braverman’s words about Channel migrants with the rhetoric of Germany in the 1930s.

In both situations, the presenters knew (or should have known) what was right, but their bosses wrongly thought they knew better.

The BBC still hasn’t learned its lesson; Lineker is back in his job while an “independent” review of its social media policy takes place. This Writer can guess right now that it will demand stricter restrictions on presenters’ rights of free speech on other platforms.

And Suella Braverman is still othering and demonising Channel migrants.

In her latest Parliamentary appearance, she blamed vulnerable refugees for  the supply of illegal drugs in the UK:

So she hasn’t learned any lessons either.

Source: Fiona Bruce to step down as Refuge ambassador over Stanley Johnson comments | Fiona Bruce | The Guardian

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Time to reform the Honours system after Boris Johnson nominated father for knighthood?

Stanley Johnson: if he really did break his wife’s nose, why does son Boris think he deserves a knighthood?

Serial nepotist Boris Johnson has apparently disgraced the Honours system by nominating an alleged wife-beater for a knighthood: his own father, Stanley.

Johnson has previously made his brother Jo a peer, and unsubstantiated reports have previously suggested he wanted to give honours to his wife Carrie and sister Rachel.

The nomination has triggered a backlash – not just against the nomination but against the whole system of giving titles to individuals who are favoured by people who happen to have been in government. For example:

The allegations against Stanley Johnson are common knowledge…

… and the whole situation stinks of cronyism, as Wes Streeting (for once, rightly) asserted on BBC Breakfast:

Stanley Johnson was also once accused of “inappropriate touching” against Tory MP Caroline Nokes, and against political journalist Ailbhe Rea, in another example of the privilege that high-powered members of the Establishment have over the rest of us; if he had been you or me, the claim would have been “sexual assault”.

What happened about that?

Nevertheless, brace yourself for Johnson Senior to receive the honour.

After all, they gave a knighthood to Tony Blair and an MBE to Rachel Riley.

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Dear BBC: isn’t ‘inappropriate touching’ really ‘SEXUAL ASSAULT’?

Stanley Johnson: in fairness, it doesn’t mean he’s groping someone just because you can’t see his hands.

I wasn’t going to comment on this because it’s only tangentially related to politics.

But the BBC (and other media?) seems determined to reinforce the privilege that high-powered members of the Establishment have over the rest of us, simply in the language that it uses.

So Boris Johnson’s father, Stanley, isn’t accused of sexual assault against Caroline Nokes, and against New Statesman political correspondent Ailbhe Rea – the offences are instead described as “inappropriate touching”.

I think we all know what’s inappropriate here.

It is inappropriate to hide the seriousness of an offence behind alternative wording, simply because the alleged offender is the prime minister’s father.

If he’s guilty of these crimes – and let’s remember that they are crimes, not “innocent fun” or “a bit of slap-and-tickle” – then his privileged position in society should not protect him.

We should expect better behaviour from our news media.

ADDITIONAL: In particular, we should expect better from members of the media who confirm Johnson’s behaviour – but then try to excuse it:

It’s this kind of justification that perpetuates the abuse.

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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