Wednesday, August 31, 2005

UK Supreme Court

Missed this one - http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2005/20050004.htm

This law establishing a Supreme Court was passed this year. It will supercede the House of Lords and Privy Council. Judges will be appointed by the Queen by Letters Patent which basically means the government will tell her who to appoint making the highest court in the land nother government puppet. Predictably, one of the criteria for selection to be a Supreme Court Judge is diversity.

Letter: Shropshire Star

Country missing from Tour of Britain

On August 30 the cream of British cycling will gather together in Glasgow for the start of the Tour of Britain cycling race.

There are 16 teams competing in the Tour of Britain this year. There are 12 commercial teams and four national teams.

The national teams are Team Ireland, Team Scotland, Team Wales and . . . Team Great Britain.

Spot the missing country?

You'd have thought that with there being no English team, Sport England (the public body charged with promoting and improving English sport) wouldn't be interested in the event.

You would imagine that they would be even less interested when you realise that all the riders in Team GB are, in fact, English because the riders from the other home nations compete in their respective national teams. Not so.

Sport England have practically fallen over themselves to sponsor the event.

I asked Sport England why they were sponsoring a sporting event without an English team.

I was told that the International Cycling Union (UCI) in Switzerland forbids an English team and I was also told that Sport England didn't sponsor sporting events.

My attention has been drawn to an e-mail sent from the British Cycling Federation (BCF) to a member of the public stating that the UCI does not forbid an English team and that it merely requires an English cycling federation to be established but that this has not happened because of the cost.

Perhaps the money Sport England have spent sponsoring an event that has no English team could have been better spent establishing an English cycling federation?

Stuart Parr
Telford

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Mugabe's at it again

The tyrant Mugabe is at it again - this time he's changed the constitution to put certain matters above the law like the government expropriating (posh word for stealing) land off people. He als now has the power to confiscate passports from people who are deemed a threat to national security which includes pretty much anyone who has had the balls to criticise him. He has also reinstated the Senate so he can put his supporters back into government that lost their seats in the recent rigged election.

Twat of the Week: Peter Mandleson

Good old Mandy. He's been out of the limelight recently so he had to do something to get himself plastered all over the Sun.

Our very own EU Trade Commissioner rather generously decided to do something daft, half baked and ill thought out to help the poor clothing manufacturers of Italy and Spain who are struggling a bit at the moment. His solution was to impose unworkable quotas on Chinese textile imports meaning that millions of pounds worth of stock is now stuck in warehouses across Europe unable to be delivered because quota's for the year have already been reached. Having millions of pounds worth of stock in warehouses that you aren't allowed to sell is obviously good for business - nice one Mandy!

Peter Mandleson, for stupidty above and beyond the call of duty, your are this week's Twat of the Week.

Witanagemot Round-up #2

Witanagemot Round-up #2 (trackback) is a bit late on account of Gareth being on his second honeymoon (about a month after the first, lucky bugger). Luckily John at the England Project stepped in and did a sterling job.

Monday, August 29, 2005

Fuel Prices

Fuel Prices are on the increase again with the hurricane heading for the USA predicted to bump the cost up again. People are complaining about the huge profits the oil companies are making.

It is worth noting that 4/5ths of the price of a litre of petrol at the pump is tax while the oil companies receive pence from each litre sold. The only way to cut the unfeasibly high cost of fuel (which also causes an increase in the cost of raw materials and the cost of goods) is for the government to cut the stupidly high rate of tax on it. The increased wealth and reduced costs will lead to more spending and the government will make up most, if not all, of the lost revenue through VAT on high street goods.

All French kids will have to learn the national anthem

When French kids return to school next week they will have to start civic education. They will be taught about French history, the flag and the national anthem. The French government have introduced the compulsorary lessons because they are concerned about the cohesion of French society in the face of multiculturalism. France is a secular state - they have no state religion - and multiculturalism, particularly Islam, is threatening this.

EU pushing for metric UK

The EU is pushing the British government for a firm date on when they will complete the conversion of the UK to metric. They are threatening to take the government to the European Court in Strasbourg if they do not set a date to phase out pints, acres and miles along with other imperial measurments.

Neil Herron has been quoted in today's Daily Mail: "We are ready to roll up our sleeves for the fight. Any government that tries to introduce legislation to remove the British working man's pint will be commiting political suicide. This would be the straw that broke the camel's back. People won't put up with it and there would be mass demands to leave the European Union."

The Department of Transport said that we are within our rights to use miles and they have no intention of getting rid of the mile.

As Neil Herron pointed out in a blog entry a week or two ago, the use of metric measurments on road signs is illegal in this country anyway so this wouldn't be a straightforward step to take.

On a vaguely related note, I did comment to Mrs Sane that Wales appears to have gone metric already. Everywhere we went we got stuck behind some muppet driver doing almost exactly the speed limit but in kilometers instead of miles per hour.

Blair was told Iraq war linked to London bombings

Despite Traitor Blair's public insistence that the London bombings on 7th July were nothing to do with the war in Iraq, it turns out that he was already told the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Micheal Jay, that the war had fuelled fanaticism in this country.

Sir Micheal Jay is the UK's top diplomat and a key advisor on international affairs. He told Traitor Blair that the invasion of Iraq would fuel Islamic fanaticism in the UK and told him that the London bombings were linked to the war.

Yet another example of Traitor Blair lying to the public.

Sunday, August 28, 2005

Twat of the Week: British Gas

I know I said I would post Twat of the Week from my mobile phone but it turned out that it only worked for single text messages which the email address and subject pretty much took up by themselves.

Anyway, Twat of the Week for this past week was British Gas for doing a few hundred English workers out of a job by moving its call centre from England to India.

Bastards.

Thanks to Alfie for the suggestion - keep them coming.

Screen Resolutions

Before I went on holiday I edited the template for my blog to try and squeeze a bit more content onto the page. I reclaimed a few pixels but it still only uses half my screen because I tried to keep it within the confines of an 800x600 window.

I can't imagine there are many people out there now using 800x600 screen resolutions so I'd like to edit the template to fit to a 1024x768 screen resolution instead. I don't want to bugger it all up for any of my regular readers though so please cast your vote below and let me know what screen resolution you need.










What screen resolution do you use?
640x480
800x600
1024x768 or higher


  

Free polls from Pollhost.com

What can I say?

I think there is a very good possibility that we have now reached the point where it is impossible for a white English person to speak to anyone other than another white English person without running the risk of being branded a racist. Actually, by only speaking to white English people, that's probably racist too.

Alan Buchan, editor of the North East Weekly, is due to appear in front of Peterhead Sheriff Court to answer a charge of inciting racial hatred for an article he wrote with the headline Perverts & Refugees. He was summoned to Peterhead Police Station following a complaint, denied a solicitor and wasn't even told why he had been summoned there for interview. At the end of the 2 hour interview he was charged under the Public Order Act 1968 and when he asked for a solicitor he was told "This isn't The Bill mate, you can't have one" and was then fingerprinted and had DNA samples taken. At no point in the article does he say anything about any religion or race either negatively or positively.

Robin Page, a farmer presenter of One Man and His Dog, was detained by the police for making a comment during a speech at a country fair. He said "If you are a black, vegetarian, Muslim, asylum-seeking, one-legged lesbian truck driver, I want the same rights as you." This should appear in a dictionary as a definition of irony.

We also have the case where a Scottish MP was convicted of racially aggravated breach of the peace and fined £750 for calling a Welsh constituent "Boyo".

A Welshman who made racist comments about English people in a pub and then assaulted an Englishman, breaking his jaw, was not convivted of any racially motivated crime by a judge. The Welshman said he hated English people and would spit in a man's face because he was English. The assaulted man had to have 3 plates inserted in his jaw and spent his birthday in hospital. As the Welshman left the bar he apparently said "English parasites".

Today it emerges that a radio ham was locked up by police for discussing Islamic terrorism with an Australian because someone listening in to their conversation was offended. Again, the radio ham didn't actually say anything racist but because someone has complained the police turned up on his doorstep, searched his house and confiscated £5,000 of equipment while he was locked up. The accused isn't even allowed to know who the complainer is.

Add to this the government's new laws preventing the criticism of a religion or race and it's pretty clear that you can't say anything to anyonbe about anything. You can be questioned and charged for racist crimes without the right to a solicitor and the identity of your accuser can be kept from you.

Unfortunately, your average white English person doesn't have these rights. Someone remind me which parts of society are being discriminated again ...

Army recruiting at Manchester Gay Pride march

The Army are going recuiting at the Manchester Gay Pride march.

Warrant Officer Luther Magloire said "We don't care what sexual orientation you are, what colour you are or what your religion is."

Good for them. So how about a recruitment drive for straight white christians? Yeah right.

NHS complaints helpline for immigrants

According to todays Mail on Sunday, the NHS is spending £100,000 on a new complaints freephone helpline available in 5 languages.

It would be reasonable to assume that the translations would be drawn from the list of official languages in the UK - perhaps Welsh, Scots Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, Cornish and Manx?

You would be wrong, though, to expect such a thing in modern, multi-cultural Britain. The 5 languages will be Arabic, Urdu, Punjabi, Bengali and Cantonese. A Scottish NHS spokesman said "Everyone living in Scotland has a right to use the NHS complaints procedure. It is important that everyone understands their rights."

It's about time translations were restricted to only the official languages of the UK. Immigrants coming into the UK should be expected to understand at least one of them and if they don't then they shouldn't be allowed into the country until they can.

Saturday, August 27, 2005

Subtitles

Didn't somebody famous say something clever about walking in another mans shoes?

Here's a little task to give you some idea what it's like for a deaf person watching TV.

Turn the TV on, mute it and try and watch an evenings TV. The news is quite entertaining - try and translate the subtitles into coherent sentences.

Sky have recently cottoned on to the fact that deaf people do actually watch TV and their latest set-top box software lets you turn subtitles on an off without burrowing through menus while you miss your favourite programme. It also shows you which programmes have subtitles from the on-screen TV guide and also carries a limited number of programmes featuring "announce" from blind people (tells you what's happening on the screen to compliment the voices).

The number of subtitled programmes is increasing all the time but it's still nowhere near enough. The quality of them is abysmal, even on pre-recorded programmes. Sunday morning BBC2 is the only time you see most programmes with someone signing in the corner (although Sky Box Office have one or two signed films).

With the masses of spare bandwidth available via digital terrestrial, cable and satellite TV, it must be possible to have someone signing on every programme as a seperate feed like with announce and subtitles. The Disability Discrimination Act says that if you offer a service to a non-disabled person, you must also offer it to a disabled person. Deafness is a disability and is covered by this act. Surely TV broadcasters are breaking the law every time they show a programme without subtitles or a signer?

Wheelie taking the piss

Telford & Wrekin council have wheelie bin taking the piss. Sorry for the trashy puns.

The first ever housing estate built in Telford (Sutton Hill) is, understandably, a bit of a layout disaster. It is full of alleyways, windy roads and paths and more than half the houses aren't even next to a road.

A few years ago, Telford & WQreking council introduced wheelie bins to Telford. They have eventually realised that the housing estates, Sutton Hill in particular, just don't mix with wheelie bins. They are nowhere near the road, the pavements are too narrow, etc.

The obvious solution would surely be to go back to proper bin collections from your garden? No. The Telford & Wrekin solution is to build wheelie bin collection compounds and force residents to drag their wheelie bins across the estate to one of the collection points.

Coming on top of a drop to fortnightly collections for rubbish bins (to allow garden rubbish bins to be collected in the intervening week) and an inflation busting rise in council tax year on year, it's a bit of a kick in the teeth. Particularly when you take into account that the estate is a slum and crime is out of control.

Tour of Britain

Gareth has created a new unofficial Tour of Britain website to collate all the information - minus all the propoganda, fudging and bullshit - in one place.

Please update all your links for Tour of Britain.

I'm back!

I'm back from my holidays in the land of our leaders ... sunny, funny Wales.

Weather was good - the only rain we had was during the night and we enjoyed sunny weather for the whole week.

A couple of things struck me while we were there. Firstly, the number of Welsh flags - they were bloody everywhere! Secondly, the number of road signs in Welsh first and English second. Now I can't fault their efforts at nationalism, even promoting their utterly pointless and dead language. However, the road signs were really confusing. It takes longer to read and digest what is on the signs when half of them are English/Welsh and the other half are Welsh/English. I wonder if anyone at the Welsh Department of Transport has ever done a survey on this. I think I may ask them.

Saturday, August 20, 2005

ASBO would breach human rights

Last post before I go on holiday.

I read in the Shropshire Star last night that a local'ish serial arsonist was in court after torching another two cars. She walks up to a car, smashes a window, pours petrol or something similar into it and then torches it.

The judge wanted to give her an ASBO preventing her from carrying a lighter or matches in public but her solicitor argued that as a smoker it would infringe on her human right to smoke in public. So the court was forced to make an order preventing her from carrying any "accelerants" instead.

Friday, August 19, 2005

On me jollies

I'm off on my jollies for a week tomorrow. I'm taking Mrs Sane, the 4 mini-wonko's and the in-laws to some old manor house thing in Wales.

Before anyone berates me choosing Wales over England, let me just justify my decision.

Firstly, I'm doing my bit for England by putting money into the Welsh economy so they won't have to steal so much off us.

Secondly, Mrs Sane and the mother-in-law booked it all without me getting much of a look in.

Unfortunately, Mrs Sane has banned me from taking my English flag to hang out of one of the upstairs windows. Possibly she thinks I might upset some Welsh people or something, I don't know. All is not lost though, my CEP membership pack came through the post this morning so the car sticker went in the back window earlier today.

Try not to have too much fun without me. I intend to post up my Twat of the Week next week via T-Mobile's rather handy text-to-email service and Blogger's equally handy email-to-blog service.

Comments

I've had a special request from Blue Witch to remove the requirement to register with Blogger before you can post to this blog as she doesn't want anything to do with Blogger (long story apparently and probably quite funny).

I'm happy to try anything (within reason) once so I went to turn it off and discovered that they have a post verification option where you get a picture and you have to type in what you see before it lets you post like on my other blog.

Letter: Shropshire Star

Another letter in the Shropshire Star, this time bringing the "fairer" dentists scam to peoples' attention and having a snipe at my local MP who now ignores my emails. The letter was edited a fair bit so the end implies that I'm just having a dig instead of their being a point to it. I'm going to write them another letter asking for clarification and slip in the university top-up fees rip-off as well.

What does MP think?

From recent stories in the Shropshire Star and information on David Wright's website I see
that be is busy trying to sort out the mess at the PRH.

As Mr Wright appears to now be so interested in our health, perhaps he would like to comment on the Government's new plans to make NHS dental treatment fairer?

The Health Minister recently announced plans to make the system fairer by increasing the cost of a check-up on the NHS to £15 while the cost of a check-up in Scotland will go down to zero from 2007.

I would ask Mr Wright myself but he appears to be too busy posing for the Shropshire Star photographer to answer correspondence from his constituents.

Stuart Parr
Telford

Mo Mowlem Dies

Mo Mowlem died this morning after a long battle against cancer.

She was moved from a hospital where she had been taken after falling unconscious following a fall to a hospice. She left her instructions that she did not wish to be revived.

Mo Mowlam was a good politician and above that, a good person. Her legacy will hopefully be the end of the troubles in Northern Ireland. When other politicians pussy-footed around, skirting the issues, Mo Mowlam went stemaing in. She met with IRA prisoners and secured their support and that of Northern Irish politicians. By all accounts she was blunt, to the point and brutally honest in all her dealings be it with politicians, the media or the man on the street - qualities that are sadly lacking from most of her colleagues.

She aired her views on Traitor Blair's war in Iraq very publically, unafraid to criticise the government or the party she was a member of.

To quote the finest group of musicians ever to grace the planet (Queen): "Only the good die young". The song was a tribute to Freddie but I'm sure he won't mind.

Campaign for an English Parliament

Just a quick message on the Campaign for an English Parliament, more for the benefit of the new readers I seem to have acquired than the regulars.

The Campaign for an English Parliament (CEP) is a not-for-profit organisation campaigning for an English Parliament. They are not a political party themselves, nor are not affiliated to any political parties.

The aims of the CEP are to force the government to give the people of England the same referrendum the people of Scotland and Wales had on how their country is governed and to sweep aside the myths and propoganda eminating from Westminster to educate the people of England on exactly how their country is being destroyed and their taxes plundered.

The (often un-noticed) work the CEP does for the people of England is to be commended and I am proud to support them.

If you are proud of England and disagree with the discrimination that each and every English person suffers at the hands of this traitorous government, I urge you to join the CEP and help support the fight for our country. Membership is only £15 for a year and for this you get a car sticker, membership card, quarterly newsletter and most importantly, you are doing something to save your country.

Thursday, August 18, 2005

Twat of the Week: Benn from Sport England

I forgot to do this earlier in the week so this is a belated Twat of the Week award.

Without a doubt, this weeks Twat of the Week has got to be the Sport England employee known only as "Benn" for this comment.

A Level "cure"

The latest set of A Level results is out and the pass rate was marginally higher. This of course precipitated the usual arguments over whether they're too easy and what can be done to make them harder.

None of these "experts" seems to have hit unpon the theory that maybe, with the internet and computers and all the other technology available to aid learning, people are just actually finding it easier to study and get the information they need to pass their exams? When I went did my GCSE's, any research was done in the library looking through books. Nowadays, I'd be on the internet and doing it in a fraction of the time and probably with better results.

Anyway, the best "cure" for the A Level debate I've heard so far is this. Restrict the number of A grades to a certain percentage of the students. Great solution. That means you could take your A levels next year and actually do better than somebody who got an A last year but because of quota's you only get a B. That's fair.

Greek Air Crash

We found out a couple of days ago that the cousin of a friend of the family was on the Cypriot plane that crashed in Greece the other day. Just found out this morning that he was actually the air steward that was seen wrestling with the controls after the pilot lost consciousness. His picture was in the papers the other day. Kind of makes him a hero I guess.

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Alun Michael, Minister of State for Industry and the Regions

I wrote to Alun Michael, Minister of State for Industry and the Regions, a couple of months back asking him what regions he was responsible for, whether he was responsible for his own constituency and what his views were on unelected ministers lording over other countries.

Here's the email conversation so far ...

From: Stuart Parr
Date: 06/18/05 09:45:36
To: dti.enquiries@dti.gsi.gov.uk
Subject: Minister of State for
Industry and the Regions


Hi,

Please would you clarify something for me? I see that Alun Michael MP is Minister of State for Industry and the Regions. I was wondering if you could clarify which regions these are and whether he is also responsible for this portfolio in the constituency that elected him. If he isn't, would you mind explaining Mr Michael's views on unelected MP's heading up government departments in other countries.

Thank you in advance,

Stuart Parr


From: Stuart Parr
Date: 07/08/05 20:10:09
To: dti.enquiries@dti.gsi.gov.uk
Subject: Fw: Minister of State
for Industry and the Regions

Hi,

I still haven't received a reply to this email.


From: Stuart Parr
Sent: 06 August 2005 18:51
To: dti.enquiries@dti.gsi.gov.uk
Subject:
Fw: Minister of State for Industry and the Regions

Hello,

is it normal to wait over 2 months for a reply without even an acknowledgement?


From: Enquiry Enquiry (IMSV01)
Sent: 15 August 2005 18:48
To: Michael
MPST
Subject: FW: Minister of State for Industry and the Regions

Dear colleague

Is this something you can help with?

Regards

Jo Howes
Night Duty Officer

DTI Response Centre 020 7215 5000


Dear Stuart

I apologise for the delay in responding back to you. Alun Michael has responsibility in Cardiff South and Penarth.

Regards

Narinder

Narinder Kaur (Ms)
APS/Alun Michael
Minister for State Industry and the
Regions

Tel: 020 7215 2875
Fax: 020 7215 6908


Hi,

So he is Minister for State Industry and the Regions for Cardiff South and Penarth? I wasn't aware there was such a cabinet position.

Stuart

Books Direct - shit company

I signed up to Computer Books Direct (part of Books Direct) a few years ago because they had a really good offer on. I have only ever bought a couple of books from them and never buy the Editor's Choice so I had them stop sending them to me.

All was going hunky dorey, they sent me catalogues every month, I checked to see if there was anything I wanted and ordered it if there was.

Then, about 6 months ago, they sent me an invoice showing a charge for a book. I phoned them to explain that I hadn't ordered a book and hadn't received one. They told me it was the Editor's Choice. I told them I didn't want it and hadn't received it. They told it was waiting to be delivered because they didn't have any in the warehouse. I told them I didn't order the book, didn't want the book and not to send it.

Observant readers may be detecting a theme here.

The book arrived a few weeks later so I phoned up and explained patiently that I didn't order the book. I then went on to explain that I didn't want the book and that I had told somebody weeks ago before the damn thing had left the warehouse that I didn't want the book and not to send it. They said they would send a returns label.

Fast forward through about 6 months of invoices, emails and phone calls.

Last month they sent me an invoice saying they were going to add late payment charges for this book. I emailed them and told them that I have asked repeatedly for the books to be collected or a returns label but they have failed to provide the means to return the unwanted and unordered items. They replied to tell me they were sending a label and that they would apply a charge for shipping to my account. I replied informing them that they could go forth and multiply and that if they wanted to take the piss I would be sending them an invoice for my time, effort and phone calls to the value of the book they had sent me which I would then sell on eBay. They replied telling me that they would send a label to return the books for free.

A victory for the little guy. Kind of.

The mother in law came round this morning to pick up the books to take to the post office for me. I didn't have any invoices as Mrs Sane has a habit of throwing any letters of any use away so I couldn't put my membership number on the returns label. Not a problem though I, I'll phone them up. I was surprised to note that the phone menu has changed and now allows you to get through to an operator without running up 50p worth of call charges ignoring the menu system 500 times. My surprise soon turned to dismay when I realised that this change was because they have presumably saved millions by moving their call centre to India so they no longer need to generate as much revenue from phone calls.

To cut a long story short, I batteled with this bloody infuriating woman for about 5 minutes to get my membership number. She asked me (repeatedly) my name, postcode, address, phone number (which I had never given them anyway) and which book I last ordered.

The last point proved to be the difficult one. I explained I hadn't ordered any books and that I didn't know which book they had sent me as it was still sealed in its box. She repeatedly asked me what book it was until I shouted at her. Then she told me that my membership number was on the invoice for the book. I explained repeatedly that the book was sent 6 months ago and all my invoices had been thrown away. After being told to look at the invoice and explaining that it had been thrown away about 10 times, I eventually resorted to shouting at her. In the end I got the reply "Well sir, if you cannot tell me what book you last ordered I cannot give you your membership number because of DPA". I shouted at her a bit more, told her the customer service was bloody stupid and told her to cancel my membership. "But I do not have your membership number sir" she replied, at which point I said something impolite, hung up and threw the phone.

Books Direct - shit company.

Michael Howard wants us to be more British

Source: BBC News

Michael Howard thinks we need to be more British. He says Britain needs a stronger identity. In fact, he goes as far as to say "We should be British first and British last, while staunchly adhering to our respective faiths".

I read it and thought it was an utter load of bollocks so I filled in the comments form and sent it off the the BBC. The first batch of comments have been published, mine is missing yet again. BBC News have never published any of my comments so in anticipation of them not publishing them again, they are as follows:

I totally disagree with Micheal Howard on this. I have two points to make.

Firstly, I am English first and British second. Most Scots and Welsh will also tell you that they are Scottish or Welsh first and British second. This ideal of Britishness that Micheal Howard clings onto doesn't exist any more, it is time he moved on.

Secondly, I believe that immigrants to this country should be making an effort to integrate with out culture. If they wish to remain Indian or Polish or whatever their native nationality is then why come here in the first place? Multiculturalism is segregating society along racial and religious lines. It encourages people from other cultures to live apart from the rest of society and gives rise to the sort of mentality where a British born muslim can feel so removed from the rest of society that he can be convinced to blow up fellow Brits.

Usage logs and stats

I've taken a look at the usage logs and stats for wonkosworld.co.uk today for the first time since registering the domain. I was pleasantly surprised.

In just over 2 months the average number of hits has gone to around 300 per day.

The most popular target is my blog with over 450 hits per week followed by the atom feed with over 130 hits per week.

The top referrer is the CEP - thanks Gareth.

Last week the Sport England don't give a shit about England post got 83 hits in only a couple of days!

My very first VB.NET application - WonkoTimer - was downloaded 38 times last week. It's an alarm/stopwatch thing written in VB.NET. It's a bit basic but it's free and it works. You can try and run it straight off t'internet (click here) - if it works it either means your firewall is configured to almost godlike perfection or your system is wide open and probably sending out 10,000 spam emails a day for some fake viagra company in China.

Anyway, that's about it.

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

Hereward enjoys some dumb animal baiting

I am beginning to think Hereward has a bit too much time on his hands. Today he found the time to partake in a bit of dumb animal baiting with not one, but two government departments.

Two very entertaining transcripts, well worth a read.

English Matador ... sorry, British, no English ...

BBC News is carrying a story about an English matador retiring. The story isn't what's interesting though, it's the number of times the word English and British has been interchanged.

English matador retires from ring

A British matador has performed his final bullfight in Spain after deciding to retire following a knee injury.

Frank Evans, 63, of Salford, was carried from the ring by his fans at the Benalmadena ring, on the Costa del Sol, on Sunday.

He was the only English bullfighter performing in Spain, where he is known as El Ingles.

He is undergoing knee replacement surgery during the winter and has been advised to retire by his surgeon.

Mr Evans, who is one of very few British matadors to have performed in Spain, killed his first bull in 1966 and has fought bulls in Mexico, Venezuela and France.

He said he decided to become a matador after reading a book by another English matador, Vincent Hitchcock.

He learnt his trade using a supermarket trolley - fitted with a pair of horns - in his native Salford.

"I retired on Sunday - the orthopaedic surgeon told me it was 90% unlikely that I would go back to bullfighting after surgery," Mr Evans said.

"The crowd were very kind to me on my last fight - it was very emotional."

Being English had helped his career in Spain - where he is regarded as an oddity, he added.

"I have been given more fights than Spanish bullfighters of my standard because I am English.

"It is difficult to make a living out of bullfighting unless you are in the top 10, but I have enjoyed my career."

He plans to continue his business interests in property, construction and importing tobacco.


Mr Evans didn't once say he was British but it doesn't stop the BBC saying it. When will they learn? British is not the same as English.

Monday, August 15, 2005

Israeli pull-out from Gaza in perspective

The Israeli pull-out from Gaza started this morning and protests from Israeli's has so far been peaceful. It's certainly a step in the right direction although it's worth putting the whole thing into perspective.

The Israeli settlers being evicted now who have been living on occupied land illegally for the last however many years account for 1% of the Israeli occupiers in Palestine.

The land the Israeli settlers being evicted now have been occupying accounts for only 2% of all occupied land in Palestine.

Israel will still occupy Palestinian land, air and sea borders.

The wall/fence the Israeli's are building to protect them from Palestinian suicide bombers cuts deep into occupied land and does nothing to protect Palestinians from Israeli tanks and helicopter gunships.

The Israeli's need to stop using the war as justification for the continued illegal occupation of Palestine. If any other country had ignored as many UN resolutions as Israel has, they would have been bombed off the face of the planet by now.

Sport English could do with looking north of the border

Thanks to JohnJo for his reply to my previous post about Sport England directing us to this post at the England Project.

It seems Sport Scotland don't have the same problem with doing their job of supporting Scottish sport that Sport England do of supporting English Sport.

Time to ask Sport England for their comments ...

While you are concocting a suitable response, would you care to comment on the following quote from Sport Scotland?

The quest for Scottish Commonwealth Games medal winners has received a timely million-pound boost.

A sportscotland grant of £1.4m has been unveiled to improve the chances of
success at the 2006 event.

...

"This funding will provide vital support to our top Commonwealth athletes, and along with additional medal enhancement funding it will help to maximise Scotland's medal winning potential for the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne next year."

It seems that Sport Scotland are happy to sponsor a Scottish team regardless of their chances of success whereas Sport England can't imagine sponsoring an English team. Sport England doing something for England? The very thought.

Neil Herron and the Parking Fines saga

Not quite as snappy sounding as a Harry Potter novel but just as entertaining. Neil Herron, metric martyr and bane of every bureaucrats life, has somehow found the time for another campaign!

Since Neil and his fellow metric martyrs got a judgement stating that the Bill of Rights 1689 had primacy over current laws allowing fines to be issued without a trial, he has been collecting parking tickets in Sunderland. So far, they have not pursued him for them and the total has now reached 27.

During Neil's investigations he has also discovered that Sunderland City Council have never actually obtained an order declaring a Controlled Parking Zone (an area where all streets are subject to parking restrictions). The council say they don't need one, the Department of Transport says they do. Without a specific order, Neil contends, the council must place a sign on every single street within the zone to control parking.

Since the story hit the press, Neil has been contacted by other irate drivers offering further evidence and even a traffic warden telling him that the council has never made an order designating any of the city's taxi ranks, that they know the 8,000 fines (at least £240k worth) are invalid and that they conspired with NCP (the contractors providing the enforcement) to hush it up.

Best of luck Neil, give them hell!

Portsmouth by-election

Source: English Democrats

The English Democrats are contesting the upcoming Drayton & Farlington by-election in Portsmouth. Their opponents will be the Conservatives and Lib Dems. Labour haven't even fielded a candidate.

Could this be the beginning of the end? I think Labour will be lucky to come away form the next General Election as the third party.

Sunday, August 14, 2005

Why the House of Lords shouldn't be reformed

I've always been opposed to the House of Lords reforms and I've had to explain myself so many times I thought it was about time I put it down in writing somewhere in one place.

The recent reforms involved the abolition of the hereditary right to sit in the House of Lords. The proposed reforms are for a directly elected House of Lords.

The argument for both of these sets of reforms is that it is democratic. Having someone in a position of power purely by accident of birth, they tell us, is just plain wrong. "They're not accountable to the people", they say. We can't have a modern democracy without both Houses being elected, they inform us.

But, and it's a big but (no jokes please, this is serious stuff), this is just government bullshit.

The real reason the government don't want hereditary peers is simple. They have no control over the political balance in the House of Lords.

When Labour first came to office the House of Lords had a Conservative majority. This simply would not do, things had to change. The undeniable proof (if you needed any) that the government had an ulterior motive was the announcement last month that the Labour Party had finally appointed itself a majority in the House of Lords.

The reforms introduced by Traitor Blair's government mean that Lords no longer sit in the House of Lords by virtue of their hereditary right to do so, but because they have been appointed there by the Labour government. This is democracy in action.

In case you are still missing my point, let's just quickly examine the role of the House of Lords. Basically, the House of Lords is there as a buffer to the House of Commons. They scrutinise proposed legislation, make amendments, offer advice, sit on committee's, etc. In effect, the House of Lords are an oversight committee. Their ultimate purpose is to take the legislation the government want to introduce, decide whether it is for the good of the country or the good of the government and then approve or reject it as necessary.

So, to summarise - the pre-reform House of Lords could have the same party in majority as the government or, equally likely, it could be an opposition majority. The reformed house of Lords has new members appointed by the government currently in power, enabling them to appoint themselves a majority.

The new set of proposals are for the House of Lords to be directly elected by the public. This, the spin doctors tell us, is democracy. This is what happens in civilised countries with modern democracies. It is important that the people who run the country should be elected (I won't go into Labour winning the last election with 60,000 votes less than the Tories, as tempting as it may be).

If you are still don't see the problem with these proposals, let me explain it to you.

Who did you vote for in the last elections? Was it one of the main parties? Conservative? Labour? Lib Dem? If there was an election for the House of Lords on the same day who would you have voted for? If you voted Conservative in the general election, would you have voted Labour for the House of Lords? Of course you wouldn't and herein lies the problem.

A directly elected House of Lords actually has less chance of producing an effective or independent opposition to the government. An appointed House of Lords contains too many members that are there because they display the necessary qualities required by the government - obedience and loyalty. A directly elected House of Lords will merely be an extension fo the House of Commons with carefully placed candidates to ensure government policy passes without a hitch.

The only way to reform the House of Lords to make it better is to reinstate the hereditary peers and repeal the Parliament Act. A House of Lords containing hereditary peers would have the randomness required to ensure that there is a good chance the government will have an effective opposition. The government regularly disregards its obligation to take into account public opinion when proposing new legislation, whereas the House of Lords has a long history of blocking or amending unpopular proposals.

When you have no political ambition and don't have to fear for your job, it is much easier to make the right decision.

Notts Police show solidarity with Muslims

Nottinghamshire Police have taken the bizarre step of spending £2,000 out of their crime fighting budget to buy green ribbons for their police officers to wear to show solidarity with muslims. The ribbons are not compulsorary.

Nottinghamshire Police have seen a huge rise in race-related murders, normal murders and crime as a whole. The head of the Nottinghamshire CID had to move because a gang had put a contract out on him and his family.

That £2,000 would have paid a months wages for an experienced copper who might actually be able to reduce crime.

Witan Blog Roundup #1

Gareth has posted up the first ever Witanagemot Club's roundup.

Witan Blog Roundup #1

Britblog Roundup #26

Tim Worstall's Britblog Roundup #26 is now up.

This blog has had another mention this week re the Sport England thing. thanks for the mention Tim.

Trackback

Saturday, August 13, 2005

Witanagemot

Gareth of Toque and CEP fame has hit on a rather good idea - the Witanagemot.

Gareth tells us that the Witanagemot was an Anglo-Saxon gathering of eminent people. It would include Anglo-Saxon nobles, bishops, etc. and they would be responsible for taxes, charters, etc. and even for electing the king.

If you have an English Nationalist blog, particularly if you've been "outed" in his list, go to http://www.toque.co.uk/blog/archives/2005/08/your_questions.php and check it out.

Israel supposed to pull out of Gaza on Monday

Monday is the deadline Israel set itself for pulling occupying Jews out of Gaza. The Israeli's have been illegally occupying the Gaza Strip since 1967. They will not, however, be pulling out of Jerusalem despite scores of UN resolutions instructing them to do so.

When Israel was first conceived by the United Nations, nestled comfortably amongst their mortal enemies who had pledged to wipe them off the planet if the country every came into existence, Jerusalem was designated an international city to be governed under a United Nations mandate and would form part of no country.

During the predictable and inevitable war between Israel and it's arab neighbours, Israel occupied parts of Egypt, parts of Syria, the whole of Palestine and half of the city of Jerusalem. The other half was occupied by Syria and later lost to the Israeli's.

When the war ended, rather than adhering to international law, Israel continued to illegally occupy the territories it had occupied during the war. The United Nations has since issued UN resolution after UN resolution instructing Israel to move out of occupied territories and improve its human rights record. If it wasn't for the American's vetoeing half of them, there would have been even more.

As part of a peace agreement with Egypt, the Israeli's gave back the Golan Heights which they had occupied since the war. Now, under a "roadmap" brokered by the Americans, they have agreed to pull out of the Gaza Strip. They will, however, continue to control its airspace, territorial waters, borders, trade, etc.

Will the Israeli's stay true to their word for once or will they stitch up the Palestinians like they usually do? I guess we'll find out on Monday.

Bush is bored ... time for another war

It looks like George Bush is bored again. He's appeared on Israeli TV basically threatening to go to war with Iran if they don't stop their nuclear power station weapons programme.

Bush is worried that another country with a relatively stable government that hasn't been to war with anybody for a while might get nuclear weapons.

Double standards anyone?

Friday, August 12, 2005

Reply from Tessa Jowell

Regular readers may recall this email I sent to Tessa Jowell regarding the Olympics. Imagine my surprise when I saw a reply pop into my inbox. Imagine my utter disbelief when I read it and it didn't try and bullshit me into believing that the Olympics would be of any tangible benefit to anyone outside of London.


Thank you for your email dated 6 July 2005 to Tessa Jowell regarding your concerns about the 2012 Olympic and Paralyampic Games. I have been asked to reply.

I fully appreciate your concerns about the funding for the Olympic Games and would like to advise you that the Government decision to support a bid was made after a thorough examination of the costs and benefits. The Government and the Mayor have agreed a funding package of up to £2.375 billion to help meet these costs. The first £2.050 billion of the funding package will be met from up to £1.5 billion from the lottery and up to £550 million from London Council tax (this equates to a £20 per year increase on Band D council tax from 2006/07). If you would like more detailed information about the Council Tax element of the funding package you may wish to contact the GLA directly either at City Hall, The Queen's Walk, London, SE1 2AA or by e-mailing mayor@london.gov.uk.

The costs of staging the Games themselves will be met from associated revenues – such as ticket sales, sponsorship and broadcasting rights. But major expenditure is also needed to prepare the sites and create the venues needed for the Games. Since the bulk of this expenditure will be in London, and will produce benefits – and a legacy – accruing to Londoners, a contribution from Londoners is not unreasonable

Major sporting events, such as the Olympic Games, can have significant benefits in many areas including, health, regeneration, transport, employment, and sports. The Manchester Commonwealth Games showed what a successful major sporting event is able to do for a city and the nation, with £127 million investment in sports facilities which were put to community use after the Games, the reclamation of a 146 hectare derelict site, improved transport and the creation of 3500 new jobs.

The Olympic Games held in London will engender a “feel good” factor across the whole country, just as the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games did. More than 200 nations will compete in the 2012 Olympic Games and around 150 nations in the Paralympic Games. There will be an opportunity to host training and preparation camps in the months leading up to the Games. The BOA has for many years established multi sport holding camps to prepare their athletes for the games. Team GB, for example based itself in Queensland before the Sydney Games – delivering up to A$6M in the local economy. In addition to attracting investment to the towns where visiting teams chose to train, the prospect of hosting teams for many months before the Games could act as a catalyst for developing and refurbishing existing UK sports facilities. Facilities after the Games will be distributed on basis of need and
in line with Sport England’s facility strategy

The Olympic Torch tour in 2012 is likely to involve every major city and town in the UK. This will be preceded by a three-year cultural and educational programme which can be used to build community support and involvement. L2012 estimates that up to 70,000 volunteers would be required to help run the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012. This would require the biggest volunteer recruitment drive in UK, providing a unique boost both to sport specific, and general, volunteering in the UK. Thousands of UK companies could be involved in meeting the needs of the Games, ie construction, manufacturing, catering, merchandise, services etc.

The Secretary of State visited Much Wenlock earlier this year, and acknowledged the town’s contribution to the revival of the Olympics. This contribution was also recognised by Baron de Coubertin and much more recently by Juan Antonio Samaranch. We have already been talking to L2012 about how we could recognise the historic link of this community to the Olympic Games, and we will be taking this forward with the London Organising Committee of the Olympics Games in due course.

I hope all this information is helpful.





Kim McCarthy
Olympic Games Unit

Bakri is now Persona non Gratis

The Home Office announced today that Omar Chewbacka Mohammed is no longer welcome in this country. His indefinite leave to remain in the country has been revoked because his presence is not considered to be condusive to the public good.

No shit Sherlock!

Sport England don't give a shit about England

I had an email today from Sport England which incensed me. Really incensed me. I was so angry I was shaking and gritting my teeth as I typed my reply.

It all started off a week ago with an innocent ... ish ... enquiry into the funding criteria from Sport England.
Hi,

Could you please explain to me the basic criteria for obtaining funding from Sport England?

Specifically, does the event have to take place in England? If the event is taking place in England but has more than one national team, does it have to have an English team?

Can you please advise what the conditions of Sport England's National Lottery funding are? Is the funding awarded with the condition that Sport England only spend it on projects for English sport?

I look forward to your response as soon as possible.

Regards,

Stuart Parr
They replied, presumably as soon as possible ...

Dear Mr Parr

Thank you for your email.

We currently have The Community Investment Fund available for application.

To apply your project must adhere to the following basic criteria:

1. The project must require more than £5000.
2. Your organisation must be a non-profit making organisation.
3. There must be a recognised sport involved.
4. The project must benefit the community and ideally be open to the community.
5. We do not fund football only based projects.

Please visit our website www.sportengland.org to read the regional criteria for your region.

To see if you are eligible for the fund you need to complete an Online Enquiry Form which is on our website www.sportengland.org which is the first stage of application.

Hard copies of the forms are not available but we are happy to complete the form on your behalf.

Please contact us on 08458 508 508 and a member of the team will be happy to do this for you.

You will then need to submit some supporting information, which we will process into an Applicants Statement within 15 working days.

The next stage will be for you to send the Applicants Statement to your regional Sport England office where it will be assessed over a period of 12 weeks.

We hope that the above information is to your satisfaction. Should you require more
details, please call us on the number below or reply directly to this email detailing exactly what information is required.

Thank you for contacting Sport England.

Reshma
Sport England Contact Centre
08458 508 508

My region? Ok, I'll let that one pass, I need to stay focused.

My questions still remain mysteriously unanswered ...

Hi,

Thanks for getting back to me. What about the location of the event and participation of an English team? If the event attracts nation teams but there is no English team, does it still qualify?

You missed off my question about your own funding as well.

A straightforward request you'd think ...
Dear Mr Parr

Thank you for your email.

Sport England do not provide funding for events. The Community Investment Fund is predominantly for improving existing or developing new sporting facilities.

We hope that the above information is to your satisfaction. Should you require more details, please call us on the number below or reply directly to this email detailing exactly what information is required.

Thank you for contacting Sport England.

Reshma
Sport England Contact Centre

08458 508 508
Still not answered my questions, time to dumb down ...
Hi,

You seem to be dodging my questions. I'll number them below for your convenience ...

1. To obtain funding from Sport England (assuming sponsorship means funding) for a national sporting event, is it a requirement for an English team to be part of that event?

2. What are the conditions of Sport England's funding? Is the funding received on the condition that it is spent on English sport?

Can't make it any more straightforward or easier than that.
Even the work experience kid could answer 2 questions right?

Dear Mr Parr

Thank you for your email.

Sport England do not provide funding or sponsorship for events regardless of whether or not the event is taking place within the UK or has an English National Team taking part.

The additional criteria for the Community Investment Fund is as follows:

1. The project must require more than £5000.
2. Your organisation must be a non-profit making organisation.
3. There must be a recognised sport involved.
4. The project must benefit the community and ideally be open to the community.
5. We do not fund football only based projects.

We would advise you to contact www.sportbusiness.com the Sports Development Officer in the Leisure and Services Department of your Local Authority and local companies or business for possible sponsorship to fund this event.

We hope that the above information is to your satisfaction.

Should you require more details, please call us on the number below or reply directly to this email detailing exactly what information is required.

Thank you for contacting Sport England.

Reshma
Sport England
Contact Centre

08458 508 508

So sponsorship doesn't involve giving them money? I'm confused ...
Hi,

So sponsorship doesn't involve funding? If a sporting event is sponsored by Sport England then Sport England isn't giving it money? There is also no problem with Sport England sponsoring an event that doesn't have an English team? This doesn't in any way go against the reason for Sport England's existence? I was under the impression that Sport England was for there to further English sport? Does Sport England have any sort of constitution or guidelines?
Pregnant pause ...

Dear Mr Parr

Thank you for your email.

Sport England does not provide any form of sponsorship. Funding is available for projects based within the UK, to redevelop existing sporting facilities or building new sporting facilities. No funding or sponsorship is provided for any events.

For further information on Sport England, please visit the following link to our website:

http://www.sportengland.org/national-framework-for-sport.pdf

We hope that the above information is to your satisfaction. Should you require more details, please call us on the number below or reply directly to this email detailing exactly what information is required.

Thank you for contacting Sport England.

Reshma
Sport England Contact Centre

08458 508 508

They don't sponsor anybody? Wait a minute ...
Hi,

I'm a little confused. On the Tour of Britain website they say that Sport England is one of their sponsors. Is this incorrect?

You say that funding is available for projects in the UK - not exclusively in England? There is a Sport Scotland and Sport Wales already so why would Sport England be funding events that are outside of England?
Worm your way out of that one then ...
Dear Mr Parr

Thank you for your e-mail.

It has been necessary to pass your enquiry onto a specific department. Please be assured that a response will be with you shortly.

Sport England would advise cycling operates on a British basis and only competes at England level for the Commonwealth Games.

Thank you for contacting Sport England.

Benn
Sport England
Contact Centre

08458 508 508
enquiries@sportengland.info
Hmmm, I wonder if Reema is on holiday or if Benn is the designated "counter trouble-maker" co-ordinator. Interesting that they say cycling only operates on a GB level when we already know that it isn't ...
Thank you but you are, however, wrong about cycling. You will find that there is a Scottish and Welsh cycling team and the Northern Irish team competes with Team Ireland. The English riders are not allowed to ride in Team England because the UCI doesn't allow one. English riders have to cycle in Team Britain which consists of only English riders. This is the point of my enquiry. There is no English cycling team so why is Sport England sponsoring a cycling event?
Here's the reply that got me angry. Send your children out of the room before you read it.

Dear Mr Parr

Thank you for your email.

Firstly let me just clarify that Sport England is not funding the GB team to compete in the Tour of Britain. I am not sure why this assumption has been made.

As previously stated, the Scottish and Welsh teams are additional teams permitted by UCI and classed not as national teams but regional teams. The GB team would also be the first call for any athlete be they English, Scottish or Welsh, after which sponsored teams would take precedence before riders are selected at a home nation level..
Sport England does not wish to fund an England team entering the tour of Britain. I am not sure how you would justify putting a team into the event which would not be competitive either individually or collectively. An England team that is not competitive would have limited impact on the sport, and potentially be detrimental.

There is however the opportunity to capitalise on the tour of Britain to expose opportunities to get involved in the sport of cycling, and to raise the profile of recreational riding. Sport England is in the process of agreeing how we can capitalise on this opportunity, and will make an announcement when this is agreed.

We hope that the above information is to your satisfaction. Should you require more details, please call us on the number below or reply directly to this email detailing exactly what information is required.

Thank you for contacting Sport England.

Benn
Sport England Contact Centre

08458 508 508
enquiries@sportengland.info

Angry is an understatement. They wouldn't want to support an English team even if there was one! What a bunch of tossers!

Hi,

Thanks for getting back to me.

Yes, I understand that Sport England is not funding the GB cycling team. Sport England is, however, sponsoring a cycling event that does not have an English team. How does this fulfil your mandate of developing English sport? You may as well sponsor the Tour de France for all the good it does for English sport.

That is my first point. My second point is the subject of the competitiveness of an English team. To say that Sport England would not wish to fund an English team because it wouldn't be competitive is astonishing coming from a body that is charged
with improving English sport.

Firstly, the British team presumably has a good chance as it is the first choice of British riders according to you. As Team GB consists entirely of English riders, it therefore follows that all the best British riders are English. Going on this, I fail to understand how an English team would be worse for English sport than not having one at all.

Secondly, Sport Scotland and Sport Wales don't have a problem supporting their own national teams which, by your own admission, are inferior as the second choice of British riders. They obviously understand the value of a national team to get people interested in a sport.

Tell me, please, how much interest there was in the recent British Lions rugby tour as compared to the English Rugby World Cup winning team. I'll tell you now, the British team attracted less support throughout the whole of the UK than the English team alone in England. How much support is there for a British football team in the 2012 Olympics? There are national campaigns against it and the Scottish FA immediately said no.

Sport England is a disgrace to this country and a disgrace to English sport. Scotland and Wales don't need Sport England's support, they have their own bodies. English sport needs an organisation behind it that is interested in England only, not the whole of the UK. Why would a British cycling event that has no English team inspire an English youngster to take up a sport that his or her country is not represented in?

Sport England's attitude towards English sport is absolutely disgusting and I will be making my views known to the Minister for Culture, Media and Sport and anyone else who will listen. When the English people see what blatant disregard Sport England has for the English people I can only hope that those responsible for policy are as quick to resign as they are to disregard their own country.

Stuart Parr
Very Angry and Proud Englishman

People linking to this entry:
Blog of Kev
Campaign for an English Parliament
Cross of St George
England Project (trackback)
GavPolitics
Raised by Chaffinches (trackback)

Tell me if you link this entry.

Bakri says he's coming back ... then he's arrested

Following on from this.

Omar Chewbacca Mohammed (who is known as the Tottenham Ayatollah and not the Tottenham Taliban as I mentioned earlier) did a runner to Lebanon a few days ago, apparently because the police said they were going to investigate him under treason charges.

Once he was tucked up safely in Beirut, he said he would be back in 4 weeks (just inside the limit so the DSS keep paying his benefits). Apparently, he's due to have an operation on the NHS. Can't remember what but it's lifesaving which is a shame.

Anyway, not long after he says this, the Lebanese police arrested him for what his spokesmen said was an informal interview.

Meanwhile, the government can't seem to decide whether he can come back or not. One minute Fatty Prescott is saying he can come back whenever he wants, next minute he's saying of course we can stop him coming back.

Thursday, August 11, 2005

Equality for homo's

I read something in the Shropshire Star last night about Shropshire County Council setting up a group for it's gay and lesbian employees as part of it's drive to give equality to homosexuals.

They will be allowed time off during work hours to attend meetings for the group.

I wonder if their heterosexual "equal" colleagues will be given the same time off as well?

Scum to be deported

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4141000.stm

The Home Office has announced that 10 foreign nationals who are "threats to UK security" have been deported pending deportation.

They are to be deported, it appears, to Jordan who have agreed not to persecute them. One of the scum is Abu Qatada who was held at Belmarsh for 2 years without charge and has already been sentenced to life imprisonment in Jordan on bombing charges in his absence.

Wednesday, August 10, 2005

EU does u-turn over Barmaids getting their baps out

Following on from the report that the EU wants barmaids to cover up their cleavage in case they get skin cancer from sunburn when they go outside collecting glasses, it now appears that they have done a bit of a u-turn and will exempt bar and restaurant staff from the legislation.

CAMRA complained, as did the Mayor of Munich who threatened to boycott the Oktoberfest beer festival and the EU announced that they would not extend the legislation to pubs and restaurants.

There is, of course, an alternative reason that they changed their mind. You've guessed it - it's all thanks to The Sun!

Lets have large ones all round to celebrate, folks - The Sun has saved Britains busty barmaids.

EU killjoys have backed down over plans to make our girls cover up by banning low cut tops.

The Brussels bureaucrats surrendered in the face of The Sun's double-barrelled attack.
For christs sake, is there anything The Sun haven't claimed responsibility for?

Put an end to the bullshit - Boycott the Sun!

Citizenship Days

The CEP points us to this article from the Scotsman on Sunday at the weekend.

The government proposes that all teenagers swear a new oath of alleigence when they turn 18 to boost Britishness. The article also quotes Mark Leonard, director of foreign affairs at the Centre for European Reform, saying that immigrants should integrate more and "Everyone who lives here should have to learn the language". It also mentions the only sensible things Blunkett ever did as Home Secretary which was to introduce citizenship lessons for immigrants if they want a passport and saying Asians should speak English at home.

Unfortunately, the above quote by Mark Leonard is the only sensible thing he said - the rest of it is all about British this and British that, how can we improve Britishness, etc., etc. He's even written a book about being British. How nice.

They can introduce a Citizenship Day if they want but by the time my kids are 18 I very much doubt they'll swear alleigence to Britain. They know they're English, they see the Cross of St George and proudly say "that's our flag".

Britain's first 'Citizenship Day' has been pencilled in for this October, to celebrate the value of community and volunteer work.

Tuesday, August 09, 2005

Don't mention the Da Vinci Code

Seriously, don't. The Catholics won't like it.

Somebody is making a big budget film adaptation of the Da Vinci Code but they're coming under increasing pressure to change the plot because it's offensive to Catholics.

Get a life!

Prescott in Panto

Source: Guido

Fatty Prescott was walking to Westminster when he happened across a random brown family. The press just happened to be there so he spontaneously decided to give them a guided tour of 10 Downing Street.

Some people are suggesting that it was pre-planned ... what a silly thought.

Heads will roll - it turns out that they were Hindu's, not Muslim's. You just can't get the staff nowadays ...

Robin Cook to have post mortem

A post mortem is due to be carried out on Robin Cook following his death on a Scottish mountain the other day.

Conspiracy theories abound, the most popular one so far seems to be that the government had him assassinated for being opposed to the Iraq war. Hmmmm, I wonder if Elvis was involved in it somewhere.

Anyway, I look forward to the results of the post mortem which should hopefully answer, once and for all, definitively and without any shadow of a doubt, exactly which species Robin Cook was.

Omar Bakri Mohammed does a bunk

Omar Bakri Mohammed, the "cleric" who supported muslims attacking British troops in Afghanistan and the people behind the 7th July bombings in London, has done a moonlight flit to Lebanon.

Bakri was born in Syria but later moved to the UK where he preached the usual diatribe against the infidels in the west whilst enjoying the benefits of western society in the way of civil liberties and of course, the welfare state.

The Tottenham Taliban, as he was known in his former home town, was claiming unemployment benefits, disability benefits, had a Motability car and lived in a £200k housing association home with his wife and 7 kids (who he has left behind).

The reason he did a runner was apparently because the police were about to launch an investigation into him and there was a possibility he would face treason charges. The only alternative reason offered is by the Sun who suggested that it was because they hounded him out of the country. Our saviours.

Monday, August 08, 2005

Twat of the Week: Alex Neil, MSP



Twat of the Week this week was an easy decision for me - Alex Neil, MSP.

Alex wins the coveted award this week for his services to English Nationalism with a classic "Yeah, but really this is discriminating against Scotland" response to the Scottish bank notes farce.

To recap:

RBS, HBoS and Clydesdale have threatened to refuse to accept Scottish bank notes because they have to lodge funds with the Bank of England to cover the value of Scottish notes they hold every day, whereas Scottish banks only have to do so 3 days a week leaving them free to invest the millions involved to gain interest.

Alex Neil's response was to say that changing the system would discriminate against Scottish banks, the system has worked fine for years and actually the real problem is how difficult it is for Scots to exchange Scottish bank notes which makes for an unfair stealth tax on Scottish people.

So, Alex Neil, for your breathtaking display of the Socttish Parliament's attitude of ignoring genuine discrimination against England and turning it round to suit Scotland, you are this week's Twat of the Week.

I'll stand if you don't mind

I collected my new bike on Saturday and yesterday went for my first bike ride in at least 5 or 6 years. We took the kids with us, 2 of them in a bike trailer which is pretty cool.

We did about 3 or 4 miles in all. The wife and I shared the trailer. It didn't feel like I was towing a trailer and couple of kids at all. Not until it came to hills or kerbs anyway.

I was feeling a bit stiff and sore afterwards (get your mind out of the gutter Mr The-Great) but that was nothing compared to this morning. Let's put it this way - I'd rather stand.

Sunday, August 07, 2005

Plans to ditch Scottish bank notes

Source: Campaign for an English Parliament

RBS, HBoS and Clydesdale Banks are threatening to stop dealing in Scottish bank notes unless Scottish banks are brought into line with English ones.

Under current treasury rules, English banks are required to lodge funds with the Bank of England to cover the value of Scottish bank notes they hold every day. Scottish banks are only required to do so for 3 days a week meaning they have another 4 days a week in which to invest the millions of pounds involved and cream off the interest.

The banks involved have complained that this is discriminatory and rightly so - it's as plain as the nose on your face (or elbow if you're Micheal Jackson).

So you'd expect a Scottish MSP, in the face of such undeniable evidence of discrimination in favour of Scotland, to hold his hands up and acknowledge it right? Wrong.

There is no need to change a system which has worked well for years. This discriminates against Scottish banks. What the Treasury ought to be taking on is the discrimination which makes it so difficult to change Scottish notes in England. What this amounts to is a stealth tax on Scottish banks and their customers. Perhaps this is part of Gordon Brown's grand plan to seem more English than the English to get into No10.

Saturday, August 06, 2005

Robin Cook dead

Former Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, has shuffled off the mortal coil after collapsing on a Scottish mountain.

He looked a bit strange but he wasn't particularly bad at his job considering he was a Labour politician.

More information from the BBC.

Hiroshima

Today is the 60 year anniversary of the Americans nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Makes you think about who is best qualified to decide who should be allowed nuclear weapons. The Americans? They're bleating about the Iranians trying to develop nuclear power stations because it might lead them to developing nuclear weapons yet the Americans are the only ones to ever actually use them on someone else.

The two bombs ended up killing about 140,000 people and even now the cancer rate is abnormally high.

Friday, August 05, 2005

New blogger joins the ranks

My first serious covert - Richard the Great of England has just started his own blog after getting his inspiration from this blog, the CEP and We are the English.

Despite the blog title - Bring Back the British Empire - Richie is an English Nationalist and has a twisted sense of pikey humour to go with it.

His opening quote is by Cecil Rhodes, the founder of what is now called Zimbabwe:
Ask any man what nationality he would prefer to be, and ninety nine out of a hundred will tell you that they would prefer to be Englishmen.

An excellent start.

Tour of Britain

Tour of Britain has dropped off the radar a bit of late but it's time we looked at it again with it only being a month away.

Tour of Britain is being run mainly in England and is sponsored and supported mainly by English organisations and local council's.

The main sponsor of Tour of Britain is Sport England, a lottery funded charity set up to promote and further English sport.

Ok, so what's the problem?

Tour of Britain has a few commercial teams and then has 4 national teams - Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Britain. "Where's England?" I hear you cry. The short answer is, all the English riders are competing in Team Britain because there is NO TEAM ENGLAND!

To be fair to the Tour of Britain organisers, they are constrained by the rulings of International Cycling Union based in Switzerland (UCI) which decided not to allow an English team when they allowed the Scots and Welsh to have one and the Northern Irish to compete with Team Ireland.

However, Tour of Britain have not complained about this discrimination and have done nothing to encourage the UCI to allow an English team.

The other major problem with this event is Sport England's involvement. They are there to promote English sport, not British sport. There is no English team in Tour of Britain and any funds allocated to supporting Tour of Britain by Sport England is a serious misappropriation of charitable donations.

With the Tour of Britain now looming on the horizon and the event starting to filter into the national media, now is a perfect time to start writing to newspapers and bringing this to the attention of the public.

English applications in English shock!

The England project tells us about Radio 5 Live this morning complaining about discrimination in the new application forms for a licence to provide entertainment to the public under the Licensing Act 2003. The discrimination is the fact that the forms are in English.

An English venue applies for a licence from an English authority and the application form is in English! How discriminatory! I mean, you'd obviously expect to go to somewhere like Saudi or India and expect them to translate everything for you right?

Of course you bloody wouldn't and why should we? This is England, our language is English.

There are quite a few official languages in the UK and this should be the limit for translations. If you want to live here and do business here then you should do so in our language. If you can't or refuse to use one of these languages then why are you here?

Official Languages of the UK:

British Sign Language
Cornish
English
Irish
Irish Sign Language
Romany
Scots
Scottish Gaelic
Shelta
Welsh

London Republic

Once again the BBC have shown their true colours. They never support English devolution, they support regionalistation and they actively support the government's programme of Britification.

I saw a post on the Campaign for an English Parliament newsblog pointing to a BBC London article on whether London should declare independence! They claim it would be the 8th richest country in the world and it would stop the flow of money out of London to "the regions".

Obviously, such ludicrous bullshit is like a red flag to a bull so I gave them my feedback and amazingly they published it! In fact, not only did they publish my comments, they published Alfie's comments too.

Thursday, August 04, 2005

The Sun campaigns to put Great back into Britain

I spotted the Sun on a colleagues desk today and the headline "Putting the Great back into Britain" grabbed my attention.

Reading the story I was actually feeling angry that the Sun could completely fail to address the real problems in the UK but still find time to come up with ridiculous durge like this.

This only serves to confirm my belief that the Sun is anti-English and are Labour stooges.

Discussion can be found here.

General Election was undemocratic, illegitimate and flawed

Saw this in the Shropshire Star tonight. Finally, someone has noticed that the election ws fiddled and decided to complain about it. The article says the result is being challenged but doesn't back that up with details.


Reformers say MPs victories are flawed

By Sunita Patel

The democratic legitimacy of the last General Election is being challenged today in a new report which shows that not one single Shropshire MP was elected by even a third of his electorate.
A detailed analysis of results from across the country has been carriedout by two organisations, Charter 88 and Active Citizens Transform. According to their findings, Tony Blair’s victory on May 5 was not democratic, legitimate or representative.

That, claim the researchers, was because the Government was elected on a minority of
votes cast and just a fraction of the total electorate — 36.2 per cent - the lowest level of support for a government since the beginning of the democratic era with the Great Reform Act of 1832.

They have launched campaign calling for voters decide on a fair new way to elect MPs.

A breakdown of the results across Shropshire shows Ludlow MP Philip Dunne got the largest backing of his constituency with 32.5 per cent share of the local electorate.

Register

North Shropshire MP Owen Paterson followed at the top end of the table, registering 30.5 per cent, then Wrekin MP Mark Pritchard on 28.1 per cent and Telford MP David Wright with 27.8 per cent of the local electorate voting for him.

Shrewsbury and Atcham MP Daniel Kawczynski recorded the lowest percentage share with 26.2 per cent.

However, Montgomeryshire MP Lembit Opik was the only mid Wales/Shropshire MP to win the support of a third of his electorate.

Nowhere in Britain did any MP manage to attract the support of half the local electorate and only two received more than 40 per cent.

The report also highlights that it took just 26,858 votes to elect a Labour MP but 44,241 to elect a Tory and 98,484 to vote in a Liberal Democrat.

In England, 60,000 more people voted Conservative than Labour, but Labour won 92 more seats.

MPs backing change will introduce measures for reform in the form of Presentation Bills in the autumn.

EU wants barmaids to cover up

The EU wants barmaids to cover up their cleavage in case they get skin cancer from exposure to the sun when they're outside collecting glasses.

This is not a joke.

Presumably nobody from the EU department responsible for this bizarre proposal is aware that the UK gets approximately 14 and a half hours of bright sunlight per year. How utterly ridiculous.

Government admits overselling ID cards

The England Project has noticed a BBC News report carrying a statement by the Labour Party flunky saying it had oversold ID Cards to the public and significantly playing down the impact they would have on crime, fraud and terrorism.

When the government announced that despite huge opposition, it was going to impose ID Cards on the public, they said it would prevent crime, fraud and terrorism.

After the London Bombings, the Home Secretary was asked if he thought ID Cards would have prevented the attack and he said no.

Now this Labour flunky is saying that they also won't have much of an impact on crime and fraud.

So, lets look at where we're at with ID Cards:
  • The people don't want them
  • The people don't want to pay for them
  • The estimated cost is now over £100
  • Experts have said the technology probably won't work
  • The ID cards will be taxed
  • The Home Secretary says they won't prevent terrorism
  • A Labour flunky says they won't prevent fraud and crime
Despite the above, the government says it is committed to bringing in ID Cards.

Democracy my arse!

How to make your own country

Watched this programme last night and it had me chuckling the whole way through.

Basically, this guy heard about Sealand and decided he wanted to do the same thing and set about finding somewhere to make his own country.

For those that don't know, Sealand is an abandoned World War 2 fort in the north sea. It was built illegally in international waters during the war and then abandoned following the end of the war but never demolished. Someone decided to claim it as it was in international waters and then one day (following a few drinks) decided to declare it an independent state. The British Government extended their territorial waters to include the sea where Sealand is located, the guy who claimed it took them to court and won. The British government have never officially said they have no jurisdiction over Sealand but have kind of ignored it. Legally it is an independent country but it's never been recognised as such.

Anyway, I digress. This guy decided he wanted to do something similar and sought advice from a couple of experts.

The one had written a book on the subject and suggested he could claim a bit of land and threaten to blow it up if the government didn't let him have it. His more sensible suggestions were to claim the bit of Antartica that was intended for America because they hadn't claimed it or part of the Pyrenes between France and Spain that are disputed and claimed by neither country.

The other expert was the man who owns the moon. This guy had realised one day that just because an international treaty said that no country could claim any planet or moon, didn't mean that no person could. So he did. He sent a letter to the UN, the Russians and the American government 25 years ago and said if you have a legal problem with this let me know. Since then he's sold over 3 million acres of moon and presumably is very rich.

Back to the story anyway. This guy wants his own country so he tried to buy an island in Ireland but couldn't afford it. He then decided to invade an island in London but the police came. Then he decided he would declare his flat an independent country and install himself as King. He sent a letter to Traitor Blair to ask him if he had a problem with it but heard nothing.

A very funny start to the series. The next episode is on BBC2 next Wednesday at 10pm.

The BBC page for this programme is here.
The website for the programme is here.

Tuesday, August 02, 2005

Shoe to Penis Size Convertor

http://www.i18nguy.com/l10n/shoes-anatomy.html

Funny. I don't like to brag but I take a size 11 shoe.

Letter: Shropshire Star

I've got another letter in the Shropshire Star. This time on Fatty Prescott's regional assemblies and his counter-democracy moves with regard to planning.

The letter is mostly unedited apart form removing Neil Herron's name. Sorry Neil, I tried to plug your campaign but they took it out.

Assemblies not wanted but we have them

Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has recently announced proposals for new powers for his department to force local authorities to release more land for housing developments.

The proposals were put forward because two of the regional assemblies in the south of England kept voting down the number of houses his department said they should allow.

When Prescott first inflicted regional assemblies on England, it was on the premise of bringing democracy closer to the people. I'll say that again - bringing democracy closer to the people.

There has only ever been one referendum on regional assemblies and 73 per cent of the north east region voted against them.

Despite this pretty convincing no vote, the North East Regional Assembly is still here and now plans to incorporate itself and change it's name to give it more "legitimacy".

The Deputy Prime Minister cancelled the other referenda planned for the rest of the country.

We now find ourselves with unwanted, undemocratic and unelected regional assemblies formulating regional policy with absolutely no mandate.

An anti-regional assembly campaigner in the north east has requested a police investigation into the way funds are allocated to regional assemblies.

Local councils vote to give money to them when some of their members are also members of, and being paid by, the regional assembly.

So much for democracy.

Stuart Parr
Telford

Friends of England

I've started another list to compliment the Hit List. I've provisionally called it the "Friends of England" list. Provisionally because it's a crap name and I can't think of anything better. Suggestions for a better name on a postcard.

The Friends of England list is the opposite of the Hit List. The first two names on there (thanks to Hereward and Kevin) are Eaton Corp and Charles Wells Brewery, makers of Bombadier beer. Check out the list for more details.

Free Speech? Peaceful Protest? NIMBY!

Freedom of Speech? Peaceful Protest? You must be confusing the UK with a democracy!

Yesterday was the live date for the government's undemocratic, draconian law preventing unauthorised protests within half a mile of Parliament. If you wish to protest outside parliament you have to request permission from the Police. The Police have the right to limit the amount of time you can protest, to prevent you from carrying placards and to prevent you from using loud hailers. This is if they let you protest at all.

Nepal, which the British government criticised over its human rights records, lifted their ban on public protests in May. The countries that still ban public protests are mainly communist states and those under military rule or dictatorships such as China, Cuba, North Korea.

Democracy my arse!

Cheating Evolution

Famine and drought in Africa. Drought in Spain. What can we do to help? Throw money at it?

A thought occurred to me the other day whilst thinking about this whole situation. Evolution is all about survival of the fittest. Those flaura/forna (humans are forna) that adapt to their surroundings will survive, those that don't will die out.

Surely this is a simple case of evolution, survuval of the fittest? The inhabitents of Africa or even Spain need to adapt to their surroundings, move or do what comes naturally (and I don't mean claim Asylum in the UK). This is just evolution at work.

Monday, August 01, 2005

Twat of the Week: Robert Mugabe

Twat of the Week this week is no contest really. Prescott might be an utter twat but Mugabe far surpasses even the chunky ones efforts at pissing me off.

Why Mugabe? Well, the list is exhaustive. Here are a few reasons ...

Torture
Racism
Decimating the Zimbabwean economy
Illegal land reforms
Artifically creating a humanitarian disaster
Making half a million Zimbabweans homeless and jobless

Robert Mugabe, without a doubt, you are a lying, coniving, criminal and this weeks undisputed Twat of the Week.

I need to give a special mention to Peter Hain who was also a strong candidate for the award. Look down a couple of posts to find out why.