Bannockburn or the union

I BELIEVE IN THE UNION with Scotland. If it broke apart, both countries would pay a heavy price. But if the people of Scotland wish to go their own way, then there is little we can do about it, or should do about it. No matter how important many of us on this side of the boarder think the union is, we should not go cap in hand to the likes of Alex Salmond.

                If he wants, for political reasons, to wait until 2014 to give his people a referendum, hoping to capture the nationalist sentiment of the Scottish people on the anniversary of Bannockburn , then let him do so.

                Why David Cameron insists on a date before 2014, and seeks to cause friction over it, is beyond me.

                Where he is on much firmer ground, however, is in his demand for a straight, in or out choice on the ballot paper. For a third compromise question on the ballot paper would be seen by the English as the Scots wanting their cake and eating it: deeper devolution while remaining part of the union, is salami slicing your way to independence – something the late John Smith never foresaw when he  concocted devolution; calling it the ‘settled will’ of the Scottish people.

                At the time, there were those who opposed devolution because they believed that it could only lead to full independence, which, by stealth, now seems to be happening. I myself was not one of those anti-devolutionists. To me, as a lifelong Labour supporter at the time, John Smith was the brightest star in the Labour firmament, and if his life had not been tragically cut short would have made a first class prime minister of the country.

                But, when he died, and Tony Blair eventually became prime minister; his own support for Scottish devolution, became, in part, an affecting tribute to John Smith. At the time we all sneered at those who warned of the break-up of the union…devolution being merely the first stage on the journey.

                The second stage would be Alex Salmond holding a referendum with a third question calling for deeper devolution short of full independence.

                We cannot, therefore, allow such a third question on the ballot paper. When I say ‘we’ cannot ‘allow’ such a question, I do not mean to sound patronising to the Scottish people who I greatly admire and respect. But the reality is, that the English taxpayer would be financing the great third question compromise through their taxes. Therefore, they should have a say on the nature of the ballot paper; and David Cameron speaks for the English when he demands an in or out referendum; leaving the timing to Alex Salmond’s Machiavellian impulses.

IF THERE IS an in or out referendum, and the settled will of the Scottish people is for independence, then, after the understandable celebrating that would follow such a vote; there would be a few realities for the Scottish people to take cognisance of.

                First of all, the national independence they would have felt themselves to have won, would be no such thing. For where would this ‘nation’ stand in relation to Europe? Especially with the current crises within the euro zone, and the determination of the Merkozy to force feed the people of Europe with the gruel of full political and monetary union. Where would Scotland’s new won sovereignty stand, if soon after attaining it they were expected to give it up?

                What would Scotland’s currency be? Would it continue with the pound, or do what no other nation on this planet would do at the moment, and join the euro?

                Alex Salmon dares not face his people with these questions; and in the cauldron of a referendum campaign, neither Tory, Labour, or Liberal Democrat ,will introduce such anti-European questions into the debate either. For the truth is, all of the other major parties in Scotland as well as England, are pro-Europe to some degree or another.

BUT WHAT ALEX SALMOND cannot ignore, is the economic case for remaining within the union, which  the Scottish people will be made well aware of come the campaign.

                Firstly, Scotland could start their new found national sovereignty with a £270 billion debt pile[1]. This figure comprises Scotland’s own debt which could be as high as £189 billion added to which is Scotland’s share of the UK’s national debt which amounts to another £80 billion, which would cost more than £10 billion in annual interest payments. Also, even with the boasted oil and gas revenues of £6 billion, Scotland spends £9 billion more every year than is generated by revenues.

                Scottish Financial Enterprise represents some of Scotland’s largest financial institutions; and they have demanded that Scottish politicians need to provide lucidity when talking of their plans for Scottish independence.

                Scotland’s financial services account for 8 % of Scotland’s £140 billion economy. Owen Kelly, chief executive of Scottish Financial Enterprise said, : ‘Like our members, we believe that this is a decision that needs to be taken by the Scottish people – it's not our job to tell people how to vote.

                ‘However, it is important that some uncertainties are removed. Issues like currency, membership of the EU, regulation and the possible impact on the UK as a single market can be clarified ahead of the referendum. And they need to be clarified so that companies, employees, customers and shareholders can understand the changes that independence will bring.

                ‘We don't get involved in constitutional issues but believe uncertainty must be removed wherever possible.’

                It is this question of uncertainty that the financial markets fear most. If Alex Salmond wishes to delay a referendum in order to celebrate some kind of  historical, but nevertheless, pyrrhic  victory over an ancient enemy, who he has probably spent his whole life in wishing to defeat in one way or another, then so be it. Let the chippy Scottish nationalist have his day. He can sit at home, believing himself a job well done. But he must, if he believes in Scotland, face up to the unremitting demands of his life-long chipiness toward the English  by accepting his eventual defeat.

               

I BELIEVE THAT the best way forward for both out nations is remaining part of the union. Both countries have helped shape the modern world like no other; and despite our ancient grievances have always managed to rub along.

                The union is needed now more than at any other time in both our nation’s history. If the people of Scotland chose the destiny Alex Salmond as mapped out for them, then they will live to regret their decision – but it their decision, and they must make it on the basis of the head ruling the heart. If they fall into Salmond’s Bannockburn trap, they will have decades to repent their decision.

               

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[1] All  calculations due to Taxpayer Scotland

Housing – A Bolshevik Solution From A Tory?

HOUSING MINISTER Grant Shapps has suggested that the elderly down size their homes to allow younger families to move into them as tenants. The local authorities would play the role of agent by maintaining the properties at affordable prices; and the rent accrued from the new tenants would be handed over to the owner; who is presumably caged up somewhere in a one- up one-down, thought better suited to their requirements.

                I do not know whether Mr Shapps is a Liberal Democrat (LD) member of the coalition, or a Tory – but he certainly fits the job description of a Liberal-Democrat: and if he is a LD, his partners in coalition should have taken action to prevent such kite-flying from ever taking place.

                The Coalition’s two leaders are very wealthy people, both of whom must subscribe to private ownership. I know the Tories did for centuries; but with this lot one can never tell, as they barely scrape the surface  of what conservatism has meant historically.

                With private ownership, it is the purchaser of the property that owns it. They are the sole owners, and there is no law that can deny them that ownership - compulsory purchase of property (in the modern age) being the sole, and limited exception.

                Private ownership and its underwriting in law, is the basis of the free society. If this is challenged in any way by the state, then capitalism is doomed and so is a free nation, and all that this entails regarding free speech, free press, and free anything else.

               

MR SHAPPS’ big idea will hopefully remain just that; an example of an ill-coordinated action of neurons in the brain put down to an enthusiasm for political elevation. His big idea therefore needs to be put once and for all to bed.

                Tories, at one time, would have balked at the very concept of social engineering; being as it was, part of their argument against an overpowering state. Yet Mr Shapps (I have since been told, he is indeed a Tory) blithely proposes such a remedy for our future overpopulated island.

                Such overpopulation, by the way, will  in no small measure be due to the generous influx of immigration made possible by the last government. Without such an influx our elderly would not be asked to make way for younger families to live in their properties.

                Each and every one of us make a purchase on a daily basis; but to suggest we forfeit these purchases by giving them to someone younger than ourselves (I am by the way 61 years old) is ludicrous. But the same principle applies. Whether it is a kilo of apples from Sainsbury’s or a property that has been bought and paid for.

                It is a disgraceful suggestion to even propose that properties, belonging to hard working widows and widowers , that have scrimped and saved to pay off a mortgage,  should now be asked to  vacate their properties in order to help provide accommodation for  someone younger.

                Mr Shapps’ proposal is a none starter, and the sooner he disbands this wretched piece of social engineering the better. A piece of  social engineering, which, by its very nature, is anti-conservative, if such a description still means anything to him.

                After the Russian revolution in 1917, the Bolsheviks set about populating any home larger than a two-up two-down, with the proletariat. But at least they allowed the once wealthy owners to remain living (be it in a single room) in the properties. In an act of class vindictiveness one comes to expect from  socialists, the communists were determined to drag everyone down to the same level, with the exception of commissars and party apparatchiks who retreated to their dachas in country at weekends.

                Mr Shapps’ ill-considered suggestion bares parallels to post-revolutionary Russia. If not in delivery, then at least in the spirit of what the Bolsheviks did. For, as with the UK today, the new Soviet union was faced with a billeting problem, and with typical ruthlessness set about implementing their ‘solution’.   

I CAN NOW SEE A TIME WHEN home ownership will mean nothing of the kind; and that time  will begin if and when Mr Shapps’ idea reaches fruition. If the elderly are ‘invited’ or ‘encouraged’ to volunteer for the abandonment of their homes, then what is the incentive to own one in the future? What will the homeowners children, who hope to inherit such properties make of Mr Shapps’ big idea for managing the increase in the nation’s population, that his profession, rather than the biological impulses of the nation’s people, will be responsible for creating?

                We need hundreds of thousands of new homes, above and beyond those currently under construction; appealing to homeowners to downsize is not only anti-conservative, but in terms of the nation’s requirements, not worth the candle. So think again minister – at least you should soon be proficient in kite flying, if little else.

Widow Twankey takes on the perfect pantomime villain

POOR OLD MILLIBAND has had something of torrid time recently. Seen as a weak leader without an alternative to the Coalition’s austerity measures; and facing an increasing level of backstabbing from his own backbenchers, the Great Helmsman  had to do something to prevent himself becoming a total laughing stock and facing a leadership challenge.

                So over the Christmas period when the limelight no longer demanded his public presence, Ed Milliband put his thinking cap on. He had to come out fighting after the Christmas break and show the country that they were wrong in their negative assumptions about him.                 First of all, he needed to persuade the electorate that he could ‘do tough’. Secondly, he had to demonstrate this new found quality in his character. He needed a stooge that he could take on; a figure more unpopular with the public than himself who he could do battle with.

                Step up Len McCluskey of the Unite union. It was, you will remember, the unions that handed him his leadership. They did so because they shared the public’s assessment of him as someone who was weak and could be like putty in their hands; on top of which they liked his anti-New Labour rhetoric.

                Now this is where it gets clever; so clever in fact that it makes one wonder whether dear old Ed Ball’s was not the author of what was to follow. In need of an economic policy to challenge austerity, they had to settle for supporting the Coalitions austerity package, including the freeze on public sector wages. They had to settle for this because, as the Great Lady herself once said, ‘There is no alternative’.

                Those around the Labour leader knew what the unions would think of such a ‘betrayal’ of their generosity to Ed. They calculated that the ensuing ruckus would give Ed the chance to prove his strength as a leader to the public. Like Kinnock taking on Militant, Ed would slay the union dragon at the next party conference; and between now and then enjoy taking swipes at the likes of Mr McCluskey and his 19^th century brethren.

THE GUARDIAN ALLOWED Len McCluskey to give vent to his feelings, as the Labour hierarchy hoped one union leader would do. The bait was threaded onto the hook, the line was cast, and all that was needed, was to wait.

                Mr McCluskey issued the various time honoured threats to the Labour leadership that they see as betraying them. Betrayal slips off a trade union leaders tongue as regularly as a pronoun does the rest of us.

                McCluskey warns of a leadership coup by New Labour and also warns of withdrawing support for Labour. What he means is financial support - for Labour does not need any other kind from them. The unions have always threatened but never struck. The unions are weaker today than at any other time in their history, and their only channel to power and influence is via the Labour Party; and the two Ed’s have calculated this to be the case. The unions need Labour. Labour will not disappear without the union’s financial support. As in America, the private sector will support the political parties.

                If  Tony Blair got one thing right with New Labour, he proved that the private sector would be willing to support the Labour Party; and even more so if it were detached from the likes of Mr McCluskey.

            In his diatribe in the Guardian, Unites’ general secretary gives vent to his prodigious contempt. He writes 'Ed Balls' sudden weekend embrace of austerity and the Government's public sector pay squeeze represents a victory for discredited Blairism at the expense of the party's core supporters.

'It also challenges the whole course Ed Miliband has set for the Party, and perhaps his leadership itself.

'Unions in the public sector are bound to unite to oppose the real pay cuts for public sector workers over the next year.

'When we do so, it seems we will now be fighting the Labour front bench as well as the Government.

'The political elite which was united in promoting the City-first deregulation policies that led to the crash is now united in asserting that ordinary people must pick up the tab for it.’

HOW CAN SUCH A DERANGED outpouring be taken seriously? If Ed Milliband is serious in his attempt at breaking his own particular mould, he should look this man in the eye and defy him to do his worse.

                Old Labour  still infects  the public service unions. Capitalism will not succumb to the moronic impulses of the Unite general secretary. For him and his like, they see the crises of capitalism as an opportunity to once and for all bury the system itself. Where Arthur Scargill failed, the likes of Len will conquer.

                I no longer support the Labour Party after 40 years of so doing; and it was in part the likes of Len and his fraternity who dissuaded me from, first of all, retaining my Labour membership; and then voting for them.

                There is however another part of the  McCluskey invective which I find proves my point about the union’s true ambition: 'It leaves the country with something like a "national government" consensus where, as in 1931, the leaders of the three big parties agree on a common agenda of austerity to get capitalism - be it "good" or "bad" - back on its feet’.

                You can see what Len really wants, from this part of his Guardian piece. He uses the phrase ‘…to get capitalism- be it good or bad- back on its feet’. It is capitalism that Len and his fellow public sector union leaders really wish to destroy; just like their Old Labour  comrades from the 1970s.

                They hated Blair’s New Labour because it took from them their ancient cause of destroying capitalism. Until Blair, those well paid general secretaries of the unions fostered the ambition of seeing their ancient enemy capitalism finally brought to its ruin.

                I have as little love for Blair nowadays as the likes of Len McCluskey. But he knew that if the Labour party wished to become the natural party of government , as Harold Wilson once referred to it, then it must look toward the Democrats in America. The party could not remain predominantly dependent on trade union finances; and this is why the likes of Len McCluskey took umbrage to Tony Blair’s New Labour…it left them dangling in the background.

                 

ED MILLIBAND IS playing his last card by taking on the unions and squaring up to that poor old stooge Len McCluskey. He hopes to make himself a strong and resolute leader by divorcing himself and his party from union pressure.

                This pantomime, whilst having been written and produced over the Christmas period - it is being presented out of season. There appears to be no end to the stupidity of these trade union leaders of Mr McCluskey calibre. He has taken the bait, and allowed himself to become the perfect pantomime villain to Ed Milliband’s widow Twankey .

                Milliband must be jumping for joy. He can now take the unions on knowing that, his ratings cannot get any worse, while deploying the only strategy that might make them better.

               

               

               

                 

THE LSE

THE LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS (LSE), is making the news once more. Remember last year when this institution’s relationship with the Gadaffi’s was exposed? It was learnt that the colonel’s son Saif Gadaffi (now under arrest in Libya) was ‘helped’ – perhaps a better word would be guaranteed - to an academic advancement in exchange for £1.5 million of the old man’s money.

                Now some LSE student’s have also disgraced the name of the LSE. While on a ski trip to Val d’Isère, the students indulged themselves in playing a game called ‘Nazi Ring of Fire’.             According to the Daily Telegraph it includes getting drunk; arranging a pack of cards in the shape of a swastika, followed by saluting the Führer and singing Nazi songs.

                Apparently a merry time was had by all – or it would have been the case; had not a Jewish student the temerity to take offence, for which he received a broken nose.

                The LSE is now investigating the whole business. But what would the socialist founders of this university have made of it all? George Bernard Shaw, I would like to think, would have been outraged, but, then again, like the other pioneers, Sidney and Beatrice Webb; he was after all,  great fan of the Soviet Union.

                These fellow travellers may or may not have felt a measure of disappointment with the way the LSE’s students had behaved. But as far as their attitude to the ‘socialist’ Gadaffi was concerned, the colonel was almost a liberal in comparison to Stalin…so why not. I think that the LSE would have been supported by its founders over the Libyan issue.

                Today’s Fabian society, on the other hand, is a different kettle of fish. They will, no doubt, as part of the modern pioneering spirit of political correctness, condemn whole heartedly, the students racist activities. After all, what is good for a football supporter should be equally applied to middle class students attending the LSE - we must wait and see.

DURING THE 1960s and the early 1970s, the LSE was remembered for two things. Firstly, the education of the Dark Continent’s future rulers following  much of Africa’s independence from British colonialism – some of whose leaders, however, advanced to become dictators through LSE tutelage. Secondly, the LSE’s  flirtation with Marxism in the late 60s and early 70s, when its students took the helm of student rebellion.

                The student protests at the time; primarily over the Vietnam war and America’s involvement, culminated in the Grosvenor Square confrontation outside the US Embassy in 1968. As a Marxist at the time; 1968 was a vintage year for rebellion and revolution worldwide.

                The LSE was then considered the main venue of Left-wing politics. Let us not forget (by this I of course mean my aging generation) that the father of the Milliband brothers, one of whom is now leader of the Labour Party, lectured, as a Marxist, at the LSE. Indeed, Ralph Milliband, at the time, was the intellectual force on the Marxist Left. He wrote for the Left Review and promoted capitalism’s evisceration from history; as any true Marxist should.

                The LSE was the creation of 19^th century socialism, and, it appears, has never managed to distance itself from it, until, it seems, with its current intake. Which brings us back to the ski slopes of  Val d’Isère and its student’s drunken flirtation with anti-Semitism.

                It is my view that the LSE, like many other of our academic establishments, are pro-Palestinian as far as their tutors are concerned. Indeed, in many such other so-called theatres of enlightenment other than the LSE, invitations to Jewish academics have been proscribed, not by the students, but by their lecturers.

                Anti-Semitism grows from the academic targeting Israel; and in the world of British academia, Jews have indeed been targeted by lecturers; and their students interpret this as being fair game if they themselves are taught to believe, not in a two state solution to the Middle East, but in a one state, Palestinian solution

                In vilifying the state of Israel, by their  prohibition of Israeli academics from visiting or lecturing at many of our universities; the academics’  actions can only encourage the behaviour exhibited by students of the LSE on the slopes of Val d’Isère.

                Students are influenced by their tutors and lecturers . They unfortunately see them as mentors, and from their stand on Middle East politics, is it little wonder that some students inherit a casual attitude toward anti-Semitism; an attitude that would not be tolerated if any other ethnic group were similarly treated by the likes of our fledgling bigots in Val d’Isère.

               

Taking On The Public Sector…An Infantile Disorder

PUBLIC SECTOR UNIONS always like to talk of the public service and the their members dedication to it; whose professionalism, they would like us to believe, is second to none. Whether in the classroom, the town hall, or on the wards, the British public are being well served by its public sector workers.

                Like other myths such as the NHS being the finest healthcare system in the world, and the BBC the finest broadcaster; the union bosses estimation of their member’s qualities border on the complacent .

                The last government stood four square behind such self-righteousness and mauled any opposition in parliament to such a cosy view of the public sector. It reached the stage where, despite the NHS’s obvious deficiencies, the Tories feared to offer criticism of a traditionally Labour  institution which, it is true, the public distrusted the Tory’s management of.

                Labour poured billions into the NHS on coming to power; two thirds of which went on the pay and conditions of the medical profession, while one third remained for patient care. They should have been challenged at the time  by the Tories, but, like Labour today, they were trying to regain the public’s trust on an issue that, electorally, they were seen as being antagonistic too.

                Labour has always referred to the NHS as ‘our NHS’ – meaning not the country’s, but their own demesne, handed  them by Aneurin Bevin - and was to be forever remain their own.

                The Labour Party also embraced state education with the same willingness to claim ownership of it. It was they who started the destruction of the grammar schools and replaced them with the comprehensive system of education – class prejudice and an anti-elitism has always been to the forefront of Labour’s ideology. Even New Labour under Blair, could not entertain the continuance of the grammar schools.

                As for private education, it has always been a matter of, do what I say, not what I do as far as Labour is concerned: Diane Abbot, while being the latest adherent within Labour’s ranks to support such duplicity, she is by no means alone. What’s good for the goose,  is definitely not good for the gander.

                The welfare state is yet another spiritual home of the Labour Party. From being, as it was originally intended by a Liberal no less, a safety net for those temporarily bereft of a job to stop them falling either upon the workhouses’ meagre rations, or Madam Bountiful and her charitable prejudices.

                Now the welfare state has taken more and more responsibility upon itself, until the original safety net has evolved into what I describe as a supermarket where there is now row after row of different entitlements to meet almost any human condition, from unemployment and disability to housing… right through to death.

THE PUBLIC SECTOR UNIONS are the overlords of all of the above, and the Labour Party are their fixers. The unions finance Labour; they have a determining say in who leads Labour; and they can be useful in deploying their members to strike action whenever a Tory government tries to put the public finances back on the right path, as the Coalition are now trying to do.

                The Education Secretary, Michael Gove, is at present trying to rid our schools of incompetent teachers who are capable of literally messing up a child’s future, and it is surely in the interests of teachers themselves, if, as their union representatives tell us, they care about their pupils. But, do they put their members before the children they teach?

                Apparently, only 18 teachers have been sacked for incompetence over the past 40 years[1]. This, in a population of 400,000 teachers, seems an inadequate total when compared to the private sector where bad performance is punished on a regular basis.

                In our schools there is a practice of removing a bad teachers from one school to another. This takes the form of a headmaster in one school writing a glowing reference for a poor teacher who he or she wishes rid of. This teacher then inflicts his or her lack of skill on another body of pupils.

                This occurs because headmasters fear the union representative who may create havoc, if the worthless pedagogue is given the sack.

                In the education sector, it has been easier to land a human on Mars than to sack an incompetent teacher. Today, to remove an ineffectual teacher means months of negotiation with the teachers union before they can sack the idiot.

                Which means that it is easier to pass the bad teachers around the system like pass the parcel; than it is to try and sack them.

THE EDUCATION SECRETARY, Michael Gove has given, with the backing of head teacher’s, the power to fire a teacher within a term, rather than the year it now takes. But of course the unions’ beg to differ. The general secretary of the NAS/UWT Chris Keates has accused  Michael Gove of wishing to destroy the teaching profession as well as state education.

                Gove is on the right track and needs to stand his ground if his prime minister is willing to do so on his behalf. Our education system has been sadly diminished by the last Labour government who ideologically believed in the dumbing down process, in order that everyone should win prizes - whether on the sports fields or in education; dumbing down leaves parents happy and willing to vote for Labour, believing that educational standards remain the same. This was the belief at the time of New Labour… just give the people what they want and make them feel happy, which was Labour’s remedy for clinging to power.

                Time will  tell whether the education secretary’s plans work.  But if past practice is anything to go by, things will carry in the same old way. For teachers, nurses, doctors and social workers, all believe they know better than politicians…so when the politicians pull the levers, nothing changes.

               

               

               

               

               

               

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[1] According to a claim made by the BBC’s Panorama programme in 2010

The folly that is the European Court of Human Rights

WHO SAID SATIRE WAS DEAD? The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has once more grabbed the headlines in Britain for all the wrong reasons. Ten backbench Tory MPs commissioned a legal researcher, Robert Broadhurst, to look into this mock-up of a real court to find out how many of its rulings had gone against Britain since we subscribed to its jurisdiction in 1966.

                Out of 350 such rulings, 271 went against us, while 86 were successful, among whom were rapists, murders and terrorists. The ECHR has 47 judges and, according to James Slack writing in the Daily Mail, 20 of these so-called judges lack judicial experience; and the Mail also reminds us of some of the cases that this farcical institution has found in favour of. I for one can remember the case of the Soviet spy George Blake who got 42 years in Wormwood Scrubs, and who later escaped to the Soviet Union to publish his memoir which we tried to prevent him making money from. The ECHR awarded Blake £4,700, because we breached his right to free expression.

                Today’s Mail lists other calamitous rulings that will no doubt remind its readers of the votes for prisoners debacle. Robert Broadhurst’s findings will sadden more than shock those of us who want to see the repatriation of our democratic right to make our own laws without outside interference – perhaps we should take our case to the  ECHR?

                Given their ability to make stupid and outrageous verdicts ; it would not surprise me if they found in our favour and disappeared up their own arses.

ALMOST BY THE WEEK, the European Union and its many institutions (including of course the ECHR) are testing the credulity of the people of Europe. The institutions are either corrupt or incompetently run by a political has been, who has been placed where they are as part of the gravy train. I can remember when Neil Kinnock embarrassingly lost us the 1992 general election (the Sheffield conference) and was replaced by Tony Blair. Kinnock was rewarded for his incompetence with a commissioners portfolio by Blair. There was nothing unusual about such an appointment, it is the commonplace way in Europe to reward  such political retirees with a generous stipend. Just as our own MPs are shoved off to the Lords once they have finished messing around with the country. Kinnock had the best of both worlds. For when he finished his extravagantly rewarded position as commissioner; he too took to the red benches in a supremely hypocritical act.

                It was like an atheist becoming a cardinal. Still needs must; after all he could hardly have been expected to take a job at a coal face in South Wales; especially as that horrid woman Thatcher had closed them all down.

               

THE ECHR should not however stand alone in face of popular criticism. For it was our politicians who, in almost Mephistophelean fashion, signed away this country’s ability to make unchallengeable laws on behalf of the people of this island. At least Faust made a trade. Our politicians, on the other hand, did so through their flawed European idealism pure and simple.

                Now our elected representatives have almost been castrated by allowing, what is after all, their primary function to be overruled by the ECHR.

                If, for whatever reason, our elected representatives cannot fulfil their primary function as lawmakers, then why are taxpayers not up in arms? Why are the people still paying those swathed across the green benches to cheat their expenses and live off subsidised food and drink at Westminster? For what other reason are they there; but to act as lawmakers? But if those laws are to be subjected to the consent of any foreign power before they are granted their passage into law; then why should the people bother to elect anyone into such a spineless parliament?

                We need rid of the ECHR in our lives. It is a vacuous entity built upon idealism. Like every other EU  institution it seeks to absorb the nation state into its collective and mould it to its will.

                Our courts and our judiciary should only reflect the laws passed by their own parliament. They should not be forced to disavow them by having to obey judgements from the ECHR, of whom 20 of its ‘judges lack judicial experience’.

                It is an insult to our judiciary that they should have to accommodate such a voice when making their judgements. Our politicians have placed the judiciary in such a position, and, if they value their independence, should readily vanquish their obedience to Europe and the ECHR.

                As things stand at the moment, both our own judiciary and our politicians are enslaved to the European courts; which renders our judiciary mere functionaries, and our politicians as almost worthless.

THE LAW IS THE cornerstone of any country. By its various forms of implementation the people must live. In a democracy, the various parties explain to the people the laws they wish to pass if and when they are elected by the people that they are supposed to represent above all other considerations – which includes other nations and continents.

                When the leaders of the various political parties lay claim to the power that only a democracy can give them, they must not betray the people they lead, by salami slicing away, bit by bit, the people’s independence within the nation state.

                Sadly, this is what appears to have happened regarding our politicians within the UK. First of all we had the Maastricht Treaty  followed by the Lisbon Treaty. Each of which represented a rather thick slice of salami leading to full integration to the European ‘Borg’ collective; and the evisceration of nationhood.

                Parliament is our nation’s spine. From its chamber’s flow the laws that govern the land; and should be regarded as the ultimate body enhancing our freedom or placing restrictions on it, where the consensus agrees through elections.

                 But, today our politicians from all the major parties, have been mesmerized  by this entity of Europeanization. They either signed up to or have supported such a signing to the ECHR, and in doing so, have  pulled the rug from under the feet of democracy, and the people who, above all others, the very word democracy is supposed to apply.

                The ECHR is a mine planted on the hull of the nation state as the precursor to political and monetary union. It seeks to gain predominance over national law in all member countries. But, like the euro, it is somewhat premature. Its appearance has been thrust upon the continent by over enthusiastic idealists who may now today be regretting their fervour  - if not they certainly should.

                               

               

               

               

               

               

SCIENTISTS IN THE FIRING LINE

A NUCLEAR PHYSICIST , 32-year-old Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan was killed by two motorcyclists who attached an explosive device to his car. He is the fourth  nuclear scientist to have been assassinated in this way, and their deaths were meant to deter other scientists from partaking  in Iran’s attempt at creating a nuclear device.

                The West has been threatening Iran for years over its nuclear ambitions. The UN has also made its demands upon president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to resist making an atomic bomb of some description. Economic sanctions have been tried, and are about to be enlarged.

                The timeline is familiar to the way the modern West behaves toward its enemies. I remember the same threats and actions being taken against Saddam Hussein who we believed was also in the process of manufacturing a weapon of mass destruction. But for years, under president Clinton’s leadership sanctions, and an unworkable no-fly zone were about as far as the West were prepared to go, until George Bush Jnr. appeared on the scene.    

                The trouble with using sanctions is that they only effect the ordinary people of the country that has had them imposed upon it. Saddam Hussein cared little for his people’s welfare. He  in fact used their suffering to point the finger at the West for imposing their sanctions; and his propaganda ministry inflated the numbers of his people who were dying because of them: and there were many people in the West that were all to ready to believe that such sanctions had been responsible for well over 100,000 deaths among Iraq’s women and children.

                The West gives one the impression that by imposing sanctions, it does not have to contemplate  military action. We have known for years about Iran’s nuclear ambitions, but have never confronted them, other than by sanctions that Ahmadinejad, like Hussein, can brandish before his people as an attack by the West on them.

                Now Iran threatens the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. It is my humble view that Ahmadinejad has calculated correctly that if the West was going to act militarily, it would have done so by now. So he is upping the ante, so to speak, by threatening such a closure.

                If he miscalculates, then it is the West who has helped him miscalculate by their pusillanimous behaviour. If Ahmadinejad had believed that the West were ready and willing to act militarily, he would not have threatened the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

ISRAEL, ON THE OTHER HAND, has been eager to act militarily against any Iranian nuclear threat, knowing that they would be the first port of call, for Iranian vengeance. But, no doubt America has been involved in persuading Israel to stay its hand, by promising America’s total support if they are attacked by any of their enemies in the region. I cannot think that the Israeli prime minister would have been persuaded, unless, that is, Obama made such a promise.

                This however, does not mean that Israel has had its hands tied. The latest assassination has many in the West believing that the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad were responsible for Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan’s killing, as well as the other scientists.

                If Israel were behind such acts, then they acted in appreciation of their own people’s need for survival. Israel, unlike the West has a more, shall we say, realistic attitude to the Arab world than, for instance, does our own Foreign Office ( and yes, I do know that Iranians are not  Arabs).

                Iran, as well as all the other Muslim nations see Israel as their enemy, followed by the Western infidel. While many Muslim countries have a moderate interpretation of the Koran – Iran certainly does not. But despite this, it is my guess that when push comes to shove, the whole Muslim world will prefer to give their loyalty to a Muslim country, rather than to the West - including those Muslims that have taken up residency in the West.

IF ISRAEL WERE NOT behind this latest scientist’s assassination, I would be much surprised, indeed, disappointed. This man knew what he was taking on and what it could have meant for him; and what it could have meant, did indeed happen. He was as aware as those of his colleagues who suffered his same fate. Which means that he was no ordinary unbiased scientist, but one who (unless he was a scientific mercenary ) believed fully in Iran’s ambition to destroy the state of Israel.

                Long may such assassinations take place. For sanctions are almost meaningless, and the West are loath to intervene militarily. So Israel must do what she has to do to keep the Jewish state fully functioning. Israel will do whatever is needed to protect its survival; just as would America. While, on the other hand, the European nations care little for their national sovereignty.

                Israel must do whatever she sees fit to do in order to defend, not only her boarders, but the very existence of Israel itself. If this includes targeted assassinations of scientists prepared to further the nuclear ambitions of Iran - then so be it.

                Scientists can be as driven by a particular political ideology or religious faith, as the rest of us. Being academically inclined does not make them immune from the assassins grip.

                Iran has chosen its fate as far as the West is concerned. She seeks to take on the Western world in order to impress the Muslim world and gain its support regardless of nationality or religious sect.        

                Everything  Iran dose is directed toward the Muslim world and those Muslims living in the West. Iran also seeks to usurp Turkey’s throne. Turkey has, to Iran’s thinking, betrayed the Koran. Turkey is a Muslim nation that has worked tirelessly to integrate itself into Western civilisation.

                As far as Iran is concerned such  an effort amounts to a heresy, if not a betrayal. Iran seeks the premiership of the Muslim world and it will probe and challenge, at every opportunity, what they believe to be the West’s Christian hegemony over the Muslim world.

                If as seems likely, Mossad is behind this series assassinations in Iran, then they should be given a nod and a wink by the West, and, if not openly encouraged, then at least not discouraged.