Archive for November 2006

EU Constitutional Convention

RegionalAssemblies.co.uk shows us the price we pay for having unelected, ineffective regional government.

The EU is hosting a constitutional convention to decide the future of a European state.  Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have been invited but there will be no English representation because England’s euroregions don’t have law-making powers.

The answer is simple.  Abolish regional government in England and tell the EU that if they must divide the UK into regions then there are 4 of them – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.  If they don’t like it then it’s tough, they need us more than we need them.

Via Toque

That’s right, to make recycling easier …

The recycling nazi’s at Telford & Wrekin Council have launched a 500 household pilot to “make recycling easier” by providing an extra recycling box and dividers so households can sort their recycling themselves.

At the moment, residents of Telford & Wrekin don’t have to sort their recycling – it’s done on the recycling truck – but having to sort it ourselves is going to make it easier.  The council hasn’t offered an explanation as to how this makes it easier but it’s in pilot which means that in a few weeks they’ll release a statement to the press saying “We have received some positive feedback from residents and some concerns which we will address but the scheme has been very successful and will be rolled out across the borough over the next few weeks”.

Remember

Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal

£5 will ensure that a housebound or hospitalised person receives a friendship visit.

£15 could help towards providing skilled advice and an hour’s legal representation at a Disability Allowance or War Pension tribunal.

£75 could help towards providing a fresh start for an ex-Service man or woman so they can them adjust to life outside the Services

£230 could buy an emergency lifeline alarm for an elderly ex-service person or their spouse

£360 would give a frail ex-Service veteran a much needed break at one of our Poppy Homes

£800 could provide a severely disabled person and their carer with a much needed welfare break.

£1000 would give a bed-ridden resident of one of our homes a special mattress to make daily life more comfortable

MI5 tracking 1,600 terrorists

MI5 today announced that it is tracking 1,600 muslim terrorists and 30 terrorist cells.

Meanwhile, muslim groups condemn Nick Griffin being cleared of race hate charges for describing Islam as a wicked faith.

Shouldn’t they be condemning the 1,600 muslim terrorists in this country who want to blow us up because we don’t follow their medievil religion?

50mbit Broadband!

ntl:Telewest are currently trialling 50mbit cable broadband and aim to have it released to the mass market early next year.

This morning we got a leaflet from them offering Virigin mobile phone packages (they’ve just bought Virgin) to tie up with the existing phone/tv/broadband we already have.  We’ve only just changed to Orange otherwise I’d have changed the mobile phones as well as they’re offering a good deal.

Anyway, it’s the broadband that interests me.  50mbit!  BT can’t get anywhere near that even if you live 10 yards from the local exchange.

Griffin Not Guilty

Common sense has prevailed.  Nick Griffin, leader of the BNP, has been found not guilty on race hate charges.

The whole trial was a joke.  His comments were in opposition to Islam – a religion – and the charges were race hate.  The judge said that he was merely expressing his freedom of speech – a right which everyone has, regardless of whether what they say is considered socially acceptable.

I still think Griffin is a tosser but the judge was absolutely and no matter how repulsive Nick Griffin is, he has a right to criticise who and what he wants.

Update:
The Ignorant Jock has said that race hate laws may need to be reviewed.  What has this got to do with the Treasury exactly?  And what changes are going to be made?  To make it illegal to criticise a religion as well as a race?  Funnily enough, this was a clause in the original bill and it was taken out.  The unelected Scottish Lord Chancellor or England, Charlie Falconer, has also said that the laws may need to be looked at.

Twat of the Week nominations

Back by popular demand – Twat of the Week.

Please send in your nominations for this weeks Twat of the Week Award, either by commenting on this post or by email.

Click here for more details and email address.

Tonight on EU TV …

The European Federation is trying to get its grubby mits on our TV and newspapers.

The EU Culture and Education Committee is trying to introduce a directive that will limit advertising on commercial TV to one slot every 45 minutes and and ban all advertising in childrens TV, current affairs programmes, news, documentaries and cultural programming.

These restrictions would bankrupt many small stations and for those stations that survive, commercial programming in Europe would be unviable  The net result?  The only viable stations will be state-controlled and state-funded.

The resolution is supported by a large coalition including the British Labour, Lib Dem and Green Parties with opposition from the Conservatives and UKIP.

Hat-tip: Iain Dale

I want my money back

Next time you open your pay slip and sigh at the amount of money you’ve handed over to the Tartan Taxman, have a think about who gets the benefit of your tax money.  Is it you?  Your family?  Your neighbours?  Not if you live in England it isn’t …

Cash for Peerages: is anyone in the cabinet not involved?

The police have interviewed 5 cabinet ministers over the cash for peerages investigation, including the Ignorant Jock and Fat Turd.  It is believed that most, if not all, cabinet ministers have received letters from the police regarding the investigation.  Except Traitor Blair who, it would appear, is above the law.

The ministers interviewed so far include:

  • Gordon “Ignorant Jock” Brown
  • John “Fat Turd” Prescott
  • Patricia Hewitt
  • Alan Milburn
  • Jack “Demon Headmaster” Straw
  • John Reid
  • David Milliband
  • Alan Johnson
  • Peter “Bigot” Hain
  • Ruth Kelly

The question on everyone’s lips must surely be, how many ministers are involved in this fraudulent abuse of office?  Is the cabinet rotten to the core or simply a bit mouldy around the edges?

Radio Shropshire talking about Englishness

BBC Radio Shropshire are talking about Englishness this morning.

They’re on 96FM in Shropshire or online at BBC Shropshire.

Edit:
Had the following email read out on air:

I don’t feel British any more. I’ve always considered myself English/British but a couple of years ago I started to question what this Britishness was about. Generally, the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish don’t feel British and they’re certainly not encourage to do so by the British government unless they start talking about independence or there’s an election to be won!

I’m very proud to be English. English men and women have achieved many great things. England – Shropshire in particular – is the birthplace of both the industrial revolution and modern democracy, both of which have had probably the biggest impact on society since the Romans.

The first English Parliament was held in Acton Burnell near Shrewsbury and this evolved over the years into the full English Parliament that pretty much every modern parliamentary democracy in the world is based on.

Cecil Rhodes once said that to be born English is to have won first prize in the lottery of life. I wonder what he would make of modern day England? We aren’t allowed our own government, you often can’t describe yourself as English without being branded a racist, we can’t even have our own national anthem.

I don’t think you can define what Englishness is. It doesn’t matter if you’re a second generation immigrant or a direct decendent of an Anglo-Saxon king – if you’re English, you know it.

And this one …

England, Scotland and Wales aren’t one race. Lowland Scots are genetically similar to the English, Highland Scots are genetically different to Lowland Scots and the Welsh share their genes with the Irish, Cornish and Bretons in France.

It’s all a bit of a mish-mash now but there are traditional genetic/ethnic groups in the UK.

Your genes are irrelevant anyway, I know plenty of Black and Asian people who describe themselves as English rather than British. Nationality and ethnicity are two different things.

And this one as well in response to someone who said that Englishness is all about ethnicity (who, it turns out, is a prominent member of Shrewsbury BNP) …

My two step children are half-English, a quarter Scottish and a quarter Irish. At 8 and 6 years old, they know the difference between England and Britain and consider themselves English. I think there is some Welsh in me somewhere along the lines as is the case with a lot of Shropshire families. I am an English nationalist and an active member of the Campaign for an English Parliament. Would those people who say that being English is all about ethnicity deny me my right to call myself and my children English?

Complaint over failed Asylum Seeker poverty

Amnesty International and Refugee Action have complained about the “forced” poverty of failed asylum seekers when the British government stops paying them benefits after 21 days.  They say that the failed asylum seekers are reduced to getting scraps of food from bins and can’t go home because they don’t feel safe.  They want the British government to do something about it.

Bloody lefty liberals strike again.  They are failed asylum seekers because it is safe for them to go home.  They are here because they don’t want to go back home, not because it’s not safe for them to do so.  When their asylum claim is rejected they have to go home.  If they choose not to, why should the taxpayer pay them benefits?  What, in fact, would be the point of an asylum scheme at all if you’re still going to support the buggers when they’ve been told to go?

Hospital staff face parking fees

Hospital staff at the debt-ridden Shrewsbury & Telford hospitals might end up paying up to £120 per year for the privelege of parking at work.

The hospitals are struggling to clear a mountain of debt, hindered by the unwillingness of the Welsh government to pay the going rate for treating Welsh patients, the underfunding of the English NHS to pay for the overfunding of the NHS in the rest of the UK and the instruction from the Minister for Health to pay a few million into a regional NHS bank.

Charging hospital staff to park at work is one of the ideas put forward to help pay the debts, along with cuts to services throughout the county.

Still, as long as Scottish cancer patients can get their expensive drugs it’s worth it isn’t it?

Daily Referendum

Daily Referendum has a poll today on whether we should have an English Parliament.

Go and cast your vote and pass the link on to everyone in your address book.  It may be just another internet poll but every one that shows a majority in favour of an English Parliament is another string to our bow.

Shouldn’t the benefits have been explored already?

Traitor Blair has said that compulsary ID cards are nothing to do with civil liberties and everything to do with modernity.

He says that the Home Office will be publishing an “action plan” in December to “explore the benefits” we will get from ID cards in 10 years time.  Yes, I had to read it a couple of times before I was sure I’d read it right too: the Home Office, having spent millions on the scheme already and introduced new legislation and started handing out the cards with passports, hasn’t even explored the benefits of the cards yet!

People from outside the European Federation wanting to work or have access to services in England after 2008 will have to have the cards but they won’t be compulsary until 2010 for British citizens and the North British government has already said that it won’t require ID cards for public services north of the border.  Not for any particular reason, just because they have their own government and they can do what they want with public services.

Bliar also says that ID cards will help tackle illegal immigration, terrorism and identity fraud.  The Home Office has already admitted that the 7/7 terrorist attack on London wouldn’t have been prevented by ID cards and the Madrid bombers, of course, were actually carrying ID cards when they blew up their trains.

He dismissed criticsm of the cost of the scheme, saying that we have to introduce biometric passports regardless.  He doesn’t say that this is because of yet another EU directive imposed on us by unelected bureaucrats on the continent with the bill falling at the feet of the English taxpayer.  Again.

David Davis, the Conservative Shadow Home Secretary, points out that 95% of benefit fraud – one of the things they British government claim ID cards will prevent – is caused by people lying about their circumstances and not by identity fraud.  The only way ID cards will have an impact on this is if they were used in conjunction with a massive database storing information on our movements, what services we use and where, when and on what we spend our money … oh, they’ve already thought of that already haven’t they?

Microsoft reckons that the ID card scheme will trigger a massive identity fraud offensive.  Anyone managing to break into the system (the “secure” chip on the front of the new biometric passports has already been hacked) will have access to everyone’s details – their DNA, fingerprints, iris scans, date of birth, nationality, ethnicity, name, address, financial transactions, benefits they receive, etc. – all in one place.

David Wright MP wants us to have say on local government

Telford MP, David Wright, is urging his constituents to have their say on local government.

He can be contacted at info@davidwrightmp.org.uk

Might I suggest something like:

Dear David,

I saw your piece in the Shropshire Star inviting people to get in touch and have their say on local government. About time someone asked!

Giving more power to local authorities is a good idea. Great idea in fact. But it mustn’t be touted as the answer to the Scottish Parliament and Welsh and Northern Irish Assemblies. Devolving power to local authorities isn’t the same as having a national government and there is no way a local authority could ever hope to compete with the power and influence the devolved governments in the rest of the UK have.

Also, regional government has to be swept away. Completely. Devolving power to local authorities and then leaving a vast, unelected, unaccountable regional bureaucracy poking its nose into local affairs completely defeats the object. There’s no point devolving transport, environment, etc. to local authorities and then having a city region, regional assembly, regional government office, etc. having their own policies on the same subject which may or may not be of benefit or fit in with the local policies.

Regards,

Stuart

CEP complaint on BBC bias

Mike Knowles, the chairman of the Campaign for an English Parliament (CEP), has written a strongly worded letter of complaint to the BBC over its anti-English bias in general and specifically over this regionalisation “story” which I covered the other day.

On a related note, anyone in the West Midlands who is opposed to – or wants more information on – the regions should visit the West Midlands NO! Campaign.

You know when you’ve been kiwi’d!

Well, predictably we got mullered by the kiwi’s today.

To be fair to England, the second half was pretty evenly matched and if we hadn’t been so desperately behind coming out into the second half they wouldn’t have got the opportunities that allowed them to consolodate.

Out of 29 matches between England and New Zealand, we have won 5, drawn 1 and the kiwi’s have won 23 with today’s scorrline being not only the biggest England-New Zealand scoreline but the biggest winning margin as well.

A disappointing result obviously but a good game nontheless.

Click here for my traditional whinge about the British national anthem being played at the start of the match and being called the English national anthem.

Saddam sentenced to death

Former Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein, has been sentenced to death by hanging for crimes against humanity.

Personally, I expect the sentence to be commuted to life in the next week or two to prevent him becoming a martyr.

The trial has been criticised for the interference of the US government and has been called it a “victors’ trial”.

The current president of Iraq, George Bush Jalal Talabani, opposed the death sentence.

The death sentence carries an automatic appeal but will Saddam exercise that right?  His execution will turn him into a martyr and means that even after death, revenge attacks by his supporters will disrupt the lives of millions of Iraqi’s and maybe even westerners and result in countless deaths in his name.

Whether he appeals or not will depend on his strength – will he throw himself at the mercy of a judiciary and president he has so far refused to accept the authority of or will he face his execution smiling, safe in the knowledge that his death will do far more harm than he could alive?

You’re only supposed to blow the bloody jocks off

Michael Caine is annoyed that England is the only part of the UK that isn’t represented and might end up being ruled by a North Briton that is unaccountable to the English.  He even reaffirms Sean “ILSSMICEBMTLT” Connery’s calls for independence north of the border.

Caine was thrilled when he received the CBE in 1993, and was awarded a Knighthood in 2000. “I am very, very patriotic, so don’t get me started, ” he warns. He frets that his beloved England has been overlooked as the other home nations enjoy devolution.

His friend Sir Sean Connery has become a cheer-leader for Scottish nationalism and Sir Michael is beginning to think he is right.

“I’m a very English man. And that doesn’t mean I don’t like foreigners and I hate all immigrants. I am married to an immigrant but I’m not happy at the moment. Everybody seems to be represented but the English.

“There is a possibility that a Scotsman is going to rule over me. A Scotsman who comes from a constituency where my member of parliament who I elected, has no say whatsoever. And there is an answer, given to me by my friend Sean: give Scotland its independence. Gordon Brown can then be the Prime Minister of Scotland”…..

“And I’m worried about the fact that they (the Scots) cheer for the other side in the football and I think to myself. “Have they really got my interests at heart?”

Hat-tip: Waking Hereward