Conservative minister for defence people, veterans and service families Dr Andrew Murrison tried to put forward the Tory line on crime to a BBC Question Time audience in Bristol – and failed miserably.
He wanted them – and the rest of us – to believe that crime has fallen by half since the Tories slithered into office in 2010. But to do that, he had to ignore fraud.
Vox Political has already pointed out that, in fact, crime has increased by 50 per cent over the relevant period – watch as host Fiona Bruce quotes the same figures back to Dr Murrison.
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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:
Suella Braverman says police chiefs have told her "that drug supply… is now connected to people who came here on small boats illegally" pic.twitter.com/62XtYBhb70
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Further to This Site’s analysis of Jacob Rees-Mogg’s response to a wine importer whose firm is jumping through many more hoops to get, after Brexit, the same result as before, let’s have a couple more perspectives on it.
The first is highly in-depth, courtesy of A Different Bias:
The second is a more personal view, examining a small business owner’s frustrations with Brexit – after being told that European businesses would love to trade with him, but Brexit made it impossible because the bureaucracy involved had increased too much:
None of this helps Rees-Mogg, and there’s a very good reason for it:
He was talking nonsense.
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The director of a company that imports wine from the EU explained to the BBC Question Time audience how terrible bureaucracy has become since Brexit, and how much more difficult it is to do business.
He pointed out that there have been no benefits from Brexit – the promised money for the National Health Service never materialised and the Tories had to increase the amount we all pay in National Insurance in order to provide any more.
Tory panellist Jacob Rees-Mogg tried to fudge his way through by claiming that bureaucracy had been eased by his government’s decisions – but the businessman, who has experience of the reality, said in fact matters have been made 15 times more complicated:
Rees-Mogg clearly subscribes to the Michael Gove attitude that “we’ve had enough of experts”.
It’s because experts are going to hand his backside to him any time he tries to cross them.
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In denial: Julia Hartley-Brewer denies the science on BBC Question Time. David Lammy (left) facepalms.
Broadcaster Julia Hartley-Brewer has made a few claims about climate change on the BBC’s Question Time on October 27 and, being a denier, you can guess that she wasn’t talking about time running out for us all.
Novara Media explains in this video clip:
Here’s some more information, courtesy of DeSmog on Twitter:
Hartley-Brewer’s claim @IPCC_CH’s climate models have been “exposed as complete nonsense” is false.
Hartley-Brewer dismissed the UK’s record heatwave (“It’s called weather”).
In fact, @IPCC_CH says it is “virtually certain” (99-100%) that “intensity & duration of heatwaves” has increased, & that “human-induced greenhouse gas” is the main cause.https://t.co/WTIsTn3Wx3 4/
Who’s convincing you? Julia Hartley-Doodah, or the science?
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Straight-faced: Maria Caulfield presented the appearance of someone who genuinely believed Boris Johnson has not broken Covid-19 rules and lied about it – but the Question Time audience took a markedly different view.
So much for Tory insistence that the “heat” has gone out of the Partygate scandal!
Maria Caulfield, the Tory minister for patient safety and primary care, tried to repeat the mantra that Boris Johnson “didn’t believe there was any wrongdoing” in Downing Street when MPs and civil servants participated in lockdown-busting parties that he himself had forbidden in TV broadcasts.
Speaking on the BBC’s Question Time, she was greeted with mocking laughter from the studio audience when she said,
“I think misleading parliament, to be found guilty of that, it has to be a deliberate misleading, not inadvertently misleading.”
She insisted that Mr Johnson “has been very clear that there were wrongdoings around the Partygate situation” and “has apologised for that” and “made changes already to No 10”.
Pressed by another audience member on the fact that the prime minister had “held his hands up now, but only because he was found out”, Ms Caulfield claimed: “He genuinely did not believe that there was wrongdoing.”
She was right that Johnson isn’t among those who have been fined for attending Downing Street parties – but failed to mention that only a first tranche of culprits have been punished. More will follow.
And the process has been delayed in some cases because it seems some senior civil servants and/or MPs are challenging a decision to fine them.
This could be because there is a question over whether the fines signify a criminal offence has been committed. If a challenge results in a court hearing that finds people guilty, they will definitely be guilty of a criminal offence.
So it could be that Ms Caulfield is simply spitting into the wind and her words may soon come back to haunt her if it turns out that she has been defending a criminal prime minister.
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Time of her life: Therese Coffey danced (badly) and sang (off-key) as her government removed the Universal Credit uplift that has been a lifeline for millions of people.
This was more ‘dirty dealing’ than Dirty Dancing:
5.5 million families woke up £1040-a-year worse off as their universal credit was cut.
While they were sleeping, the secretary of state for work and pensions was doing karaoke. pic.twitter.com/8OSEN5lwNc
Therese Coffey seen dancing barefoot singing "I'm having the time of my life" at a Tory conference after-party whilst the £20 per week uplift to Universal Credit officially came to an end.
Government Minister in charge of the largest welfare cut since 1921 celebrates her evening just as the welfare cuts came into effect. pic.twitter.com/Y5mi0xg8Mf
The move not only shows astonishing hypocrisy on the part of the Work and Pensions Secretary…
Member of Parliament for Suffolk Coastal Teresa Coffey. Has claimed more than £201,000 in parliamentary expenses between 2019 and 2020. "While having the time of her Life" she cut the Universal Credit uplift of £20 to millions of people.
The politicians who are taking £20 a week from poor people get £25 a night food allowance when they stay outside of their constituencies for absolutely no reason. If we really can't afford to feed poor people, why the hell are we feeding wealthy MPs?
… it was also utterly illiterate in economic terms:
The maddest thing about the reduction in Universal Credit is it doesn’t even make sense on an economic level!That £20 gets spent in shops, cafes, playcentres, online & in high streets THAT WEEK! It doesn’t get squirrelled away & saved offshore or in high interest pension account
On a national level, the cut tells us much about the Conservative government’s priorities…
So we can afford to spend £44.6 billion a year on defence but we cannot afford to spend 6 billion to keep the £20.00 per week Universal Credit uplift to prevent the most vulnerable people being pushed into poverty.
Why is it always, "We can't afford to feed poor people," and never, "We can't afford this nuclear submarine that could wipe out the entire world but will never be used"?
… but it is on a personal level that the cut will hit home – and this is what the Tories are hoping because it means those who won’t lose cash because of it won’t be bothered by it, and they probably won’t associate it with harm to the economy that will attack them too.
If anyone says politics doesn't matter, tell them about Sophie, a single mum from Coventry, and the cruelty of the Tories' cut to Universal Credit:
“I’m terrified. How am I going to feed my child this winter? How am I going to cope? I can’t stop crying."https://t.co/1tcLqrdBZF
Wondering where the money for Universal Credit has gone? The Tories have given £3.5 billion to their donors and wasted billions more on unsafe, useless PPE.
Here’s a very simple idea – stop giving taxpayers’ money to your mates and stop cutting support for low-income families.
Sir Day-Late-And-A-Dollar-Short does it again! The day the UC cut actually comes into force, he decides it's time to oppose it. If this isn't performative, I really don't know what else it is. Give me strength…. https://t.co/A3O5Q8bK2S
— CrémantCommunarde#TimeToBreakthrough 🕊️⚖️ 🟠🌤 (@0Calamity) October 6, 2021
… and in any case, Labour leader ‘Little Keir’ Starmer has apparently said he would not restore the uplift if elected into government:
Labour are refusing to pledge to restore the £20 weekly amount that the Tories have just cut from Universal Credit.
Meanwhile the Tories and their allies in the media are building a false impression that the cut is a good thing…
Phillip Schofield, Holly Willoughby, Gyles Brandreth and Vanessa Feltz all guffawing and describing Tories dancing and doing karaoke as ‘epic’ and ‘glorious’ whilst people starve and lose £20 a week in universal credit
Some Tories are saying other systems are in place to take the bite off the cut. Nadhim Zahawi has pointed to a £500 million fund available to local authorities…
Minister denies PM 'ignored' universal credit cut as he comes under pressure to offer alternative support https://t.co/sd3NvJc29o
… but councils are facing an economic squeeze of their own; the Tories aren’t giving them enough to run their services properly. In any case, the UC uplift cost around £4.5 billion per year – nine times as much as is on offer in the scheme Zahawi mentioned.
In the iNews article (link above), Tory backbencher Steve Baker says it would cost £10 billion to sort out all the problems created by his own government’s mishandling of UC.
And what of the prime minister?
Boris Johnson once described the quarter of a million pounds he received alongside his salary as an MP, writing a column for a Sunday newspaper, as “chicken feed”. Is that why he doesn’t seem to think the UC cut matters?
• Boris Johnson described his £250,000 a year second salary job as ‘chicken feed’.
• It’s the same as a week’s worth of Universal Credit Uplift for 12,500 families. pic.twitter.com/8gdAs3KTHB
The facts – for those of us who have to work in Johnson’s post-Brexit, passed-out Britain – are enormously different from his distorted viewpoint:
Time for a reality check!
A single parent working 3 days a week, 8 hours a day, on £10 an hour, would need to increase their earnings by a THIRD to offset the cut to Universal Credit (h/t @resfoundation)
If @BorisJohnson wants to raise wages by a third, bring it on!
His entire plan – if he can be said to have had a plan at all – appears to be to bleed every last penny out of the UK’s working people and give it to the idle rich, who squirrel it away in offshore tax havens (see the Pandora Papers for details).
It seems the aim is to turn the nation into a zombie economy where working – and working-class – people are worked like slaves to service an ever-increasing national debt, while the super-rich members of his own class live it up on the profits and put nothing back.
“Blatantly Backing Conservatives”: I know this image refers specifically to BBC News. It seems with the arrival of ‘Tory Tim’ Davie, the Corporation’s right-wing bias is spreading to its comedy output. Look out, drama and documentaries!
The BBC has axed Nish Kumar satire show The Mash Report on the grounds that it was biased toward the political left.
Director General ‘Tory Tim’ Davie at first said he would not make big changes to the corporation’s comedy output, saying that comedy had always “poked at authority”.
He seems to have changed his mind.
Of course, ‘Tory Tim’ is at a bit of a disadvantage when referring to political bias, since it is widely understood that he owes his position to Tory intervention:
The Mash Report, a comedy program critical of the government has been axed by the state broadcaster, reportedly for political reasons, and at the behest of a director general appointed by the government. Finally, a stone cold example of what 'cancel culture' looks like.
Mash had been a target for right-wing commentators since 2018, when Andrew Neil singled it out while complaining that the corporation’s comedy output was too left-wing.
Neil is, of course, chair of that ultra-right wing publication The Spectator, so he’s a fine one to complain about bias!
Asked for a comment on Twitter, Nish Kumar responded with this:
Was this something he wasn’t allowed to do on the televised show, and he was taking the opportunity now?
Meanwhile, let’s have a look at the kind of bias supported by a show with similar ratings to The Mash Report. I refer to Question Time. This is an actual question from the March 11 edition:
Do I need to spell out the wrongness of the question and the thinking behind it?
This Writer certainly wishes Kumar, and co-presenter Rachel Parris, a brighter future beyond the Beeb.
As for the corporation’s new comedy output: I look forward to seeing the new wave of diversity heralded by ‘Tory Tim’.
Looking at comedy history, I think we’re about to be deluged with right-wing material that simply isn’t funny.
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Blinding justice: cut jury sizes to seven and save time, says Labour’s David Lammy. Maybe it would, but it would almost certainly prejudice the result of difficult cases.
There is a reason we have 12 people in court juries and the idea of changing that number just to get through court cases faster is an offence to justice.
Labour’s shadow justice secretary, David Lammy, wants to resurrect so-called “wartime juries” of seven rather than 12 members, to speed up the process.
And the only casualty will be justice.
Why not just announce that anybody accused of a crime will be automatically declared guilty? That would save time. And that’s the intention here, right?
“Victims of rape, murder, domestic abuse, robbery and assault are facing delays of up to four years because of the government’s failure to act,” Mr Lammy said.
Right. And so are people who have been wrongly accused of those crimes.
Waiting for justice can be extremely stressful. Trust me – I know!
But it is better to let the wheels of justice grind slow and smooth than to risk even the possibility of injustice.
This plan would open the door to injustice, just to save a bit of time.
So I can’t believe I’m writing this, but I actually agree with the Tories that there should be no tinkering with the system at this time.
The justice system already gets enough flak for failing the public. There’s no justification for laying it open to even more.
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I didn’t see this when it was aired on the BBC’s Question Time last Thursday – and I’m sorry because it was one of the few times that sad rag of a show would have been worth watching.
To mark the 25th anniversary of the Disability Discrimination Act, comedian Rosie Jones, who happens to have cerebral palsy, was asked to comment on what it has meant for herself and other people who have disabilities.
She didn’t hold back. Her comments about the benefits Disability Living Allowance (DLA) and its successor Personal Independence Payment (PIP) were scathing.
And all through, Health Secretary Matt Hancock sat like a nodding dog. At the end, he was even smiling at the torment his government forces people to suffer:
If you didn't hear @josierones on #bbcqt last night, you missed this terrific and powerful speech about her experiences and government's treatment of disabled people.
“I was going to say that disabled people are overlooked, but they are not, they are deliberately ignored…" 👏 pic.twitter.com/1xmANgxxYO
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