And when my lips move ... - by Richard... Wednesday, May 19, 2010

And when my lips move ... - by Richard... Wednesday, May 19, 2010

David Cameron revealed yesterday that he is ready to tear up the Human Rights Act amid growing public concern that it is being exploited by foreign criminals.

So proclaimed The Daily Telegraph, telling us that, if he wins the next general election, the Conservative leader will order a review of the law introduced by Labour eight years ago and rewrite the legislation if necessary. The piece continues:

However, if it becomes clear that it was not possible to improve the Act through amendments, Mr Cameron is prepared to abolish it. The Tory leader's aides conceded last night that even if the party scrapped the Act, Britain would still be bound by the European Convention of Human Rights.

As a result, it would still be possible for people to take their cases to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg as a last resort.

A spokesman for Mr Cameron said: "We believe that rewriting or repealing the Human Rights Act would solve most of the problems but if we found there was still a problem with the European Convention, then we would have to look at that.

"David has made clear that if it proves necessary in the long run, he is willing to temporarily withdraw Britain from the Convention so we can negotiate appropriate derogations."

This piece, as you might have guessed, was published a little time ago – on 13 May 2006, almost four years ago to the day. But then, it is only a promise and, like The Boy's referendum promise, isn't worth the paper is isn't printed on.

But why are politicians like Cameron so surprised when we regard them as a bunch of lying shits, and tell them so?

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Lying cheating bastards - by Richard...

With The Daily Mail breaking the news that the Tories are now "watering down" their manifesto pledge on the Human Rights Act, Gerald Warner takes us to taskfor believing what they say in the first place.

People "... take the superficial meaning of their words at face value, without pausing to consider what they really mean," says Warner, his tongue so firmly in his cheek that he must be hideously deformed. Nevertheless, a reader takes him up on his admonition, offering an example of how we have so cruelly misunderstood our noble public servants. 

He tells us that the Tory promise that: "Since we can't have a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, we'll seek a repatriation of powers from the EU, and pass a sovereignty bill, " actually means, "We're not going to seek to repatriate any powers from the EU at all, and while we'll think about a sovereignty bill, we may not bother with that either."

One can certainly see that the texts are so similar in content and meaning that it would be very easy to become confused, as indeed did Warner's reader, who confesses: "Yup, I was well suckered. I voted for Cameron under the impression that his government might actually honour its manifesto commitments for more than a week." He concludes: "How naïve I am!"

Someone who was not confused was Autonomous Mind, who notes:

We have been spun a tale of a new politics being created, one that serves the people rather than the political class. The reality is we are seeing the political class perpetrate a fraud against the public, using the challenges of working in coalition as an excuse for following an agenda that abandons pledges offered to appease the public, while tightening the politicians' grip on the levers of power.

I think he is being far too level-headed. We are seeing the lying, cheating, bastards ... lying and cheating. And Mr Warner's reader? Naïve? That is not the word I would have used.

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The euro is in danger - by Richard...

Says Merkel: "This challenge is existential. And we have to rise to it. The euro is in danger. If we don't deal with this danger, then the consequences for us in Europe are incalculable."

German chancellors, in my experience, do not normally use strident language, yet this is positively apocalyptic. The Germans have a problem ... and so do we. The trouble is, I don't think we (as in the UK) are taking it seriously enough yet.

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Deranged - by Richard...

The kerfuffle yesterday about the refusal to deport Abid Naseer, the alleged ring-leader of an "imminent" al-Qaeda backed plot, might prove to be a turning point in what is going to be the short life of this dire Cleggeron coalition. If it is not, it should be.

The importance of the issue transcends the immediate fate of Naseer. On the line was the Conservative manifesto commitment to ditch the Human Rights Act and replace it with a UK Bill of Rights. In responding to the tribunal's ruling, Teresa May had the ideal opportunity to reaffirm that commitment – but she blew it, expressing only "disappointment".

From the BBC we now learn that the Cleggerons are to set up a "commission" to review the Act but there is absolutely no expectation of any significant change. The Lib-Dims are opposed as a matter of principle to any dilution and for the Tories to honour their commitment would split the coalition asunder.

Thus, effectively, at the very first hurdle, the Tories have reneged on a crucial manifesto commitment – and this will not be the only time they will do so. And someone who sees this with absolute clarity is Mary Ellen Synon in her Daily Mail blog. With a directness that puts this blog to shame, she writes:

The most revolting thing about the way Cameron and Hague have sold out the British to the European Union isn't that they've done it; though that is revolting enough. No, the thing which is really sick-making is the eagerness, the enthusiasm with which they've done it. What has been revolting is the speed with which they have grabbed any excuse to dump every Conservative policy of resistance to ever-greater control of Britain by the EU institutions.

Through the months leading up to the election (or reshuffle, as we would prefer to call it), we have insisted that Cameron is not – as has been claimed for him – a eurosceptic. And neither, we have averred, is William Hague. 

Now we have Mary Ellen Synon stating unequivocally that, "It has become clear that every word of scepticism ever uttered by Cameron and Hague about the dangers posed to Britain by the EU was fake." Writes Synon: " They never meant any of it. The coalition negotiations with the loser-Lib-Dems didn't force them to surrender any of these policies - it is clear now the Tory leadership couldn't hand them over fast enough."

All of this was so very predictable and, now that we are here, the politicians simply cannot resist the temptation to rub our noses in it. Front page of The Daily Telegraph this morning is a headline, "Tell us the laws you want scrapped", trailing a speech to be given by Nick Clegg today.

In his first speech as deputy prime minister, Clegg will apparently promise "the biggest shake-up of British democracy since 1832", "setting out how the state will shrink from people's lives". 

Yet, for all the hyperbole, the tens of thousands of EU laws are totally off limits. Even the Tories' modest plans to repatriate employment and social laws have been abandoned. The great law-making machinery goes on unabated, spewing out its directives and regulations, all the while siphoning up our money. Thus, selling us the idea of the state shrinking when our supreme government is in Brussels and makes the bulk of our laws is a cynical fraud.

It is thus quite difficult to choose between two options to explain what is going on here. If, on the one hand, Clegg believes his own propaganda, he must be so incredibly thick that it is difficult to believe he can knot his tie unaided. On the other hand, if he expects us to believe it, he must surely rank our intellects on a par with slugs.

Looking at the man, his speech and his behaviour, he does not come over as irredemably stupid. And if he does not believe us to be stupid, he is certainly treating us as if we were. That, as some of his best friends might tell him, is not the best way of getting people on side.

In fact, with this agenda, all Clegg can do is waste a lot of time and a lot of our money. His lasting achievement will be only to magnify the contempt we already have for him and his class. And if he thinks the outcome is going to be any different, he is deranged. He is completely off his trolley, barking, flipped ... or whatever description you care to use.

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Don't laugh - by Richard... Tuesday, May 18, 2010

That's your government ... or part of it.

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Ghosts at the feast - by Richard...

The House of Commons met briefly this afternoon to elect a new speaker – the dreadful Bercow again taking the chair. With the Cleggerons cuddled up on the bench opposite, the Harriet Harperson (pictured) took the opportunity to tell us how "very pleased" MPs were that the British National Party failed to win a single Commons seat at the general election.

To roars of approval, she said: "We all have our differences in this House but all of us are united in being very, very, pleased and relieved that there is nowhere on these green benches a member of the British National Party."

Sadly, it seems Harperson has returned to the House after her re-election without having learned a thing. For sure, the BNP did not gain any MPs but its influence was present today in the very structure of the House, having changed its makeup through the UKIP effect.

No mention was made of UKIP but the very fact that the Cleggerons are on the coalition benches is adequate testament to their influence. UKIP and the BNP have actually dictated the shape of this parliament. They, not the tired, discredited majority parties – none of which could manage to form a government on their own – are driving events.

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