Visceral Loathing Sums It Up Nicely

On a bone-chillingly cold morning in January, it felt as if I had suddenly found at least part of the reason for Keir Starmer’s chronic unpopularity. I was in the Mancunian constituency of Gorton and Denton, where the prime minister and his people’s decision to block Andy Burnham from standing was about to hand victory to the Green party. More specifically, I was in a forlorn covered market about to be regenerated into a “food and drink cluster”, talking to a sixtysomething man nursing a mug of tea.

What a strange thing to go looking for, but that’s the Guardian for you! 

What, I wondered, did he think of the man at the top? He gave me roughly the same answer that I’d heard from a lot of my other interviewees: “I really don’t like him at all.” But like most other people I met that day, he couldn’t quite explain what fired his antipathy, which seemed to make it worse. His face scrunched into a mixture of scepticism and exasperation. “I don’t know why – I just don’t,” he said.

It’s visceral. It defies description.

The most specific answer I got from anyone else was: “He hasn’t done what he said he’d do.” So there it was: as well as a modern tendency to loathe politicians that regularly seems arbitrary, whipped-up and way over the top, a sense that Starmer’s sheer blankness – his painful lack of clarity and the absence of a halfway coherent story about his own government – was making a lot of people dislike and mistrust him all the more.

It is not unreasonable, I think, to see the entire Starmer project as one gigantic volte-face, given what he promised to the 275,000 Labour members who gave him the job of leader: a 10-point leftwing shopping list that included everything from multiple nationalisations to the defence of migrants’ rights.

And in the end, how many of them did he actually provide? 

When Starmer was the leader of the opposition, moreover, the public got a sharp flavour of his seemingly limitless flexibility. In June 2020, he and Angela Rayner were photographed taking the knee in support of Black Lives Matter; by 2022, Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum jubilee had begun Starmer’s passage into an increasingly bizarre world of flags and zealous patriotism. By that point, I could not help but think of a pearl of wisdom beloved of the market traders of the West Midlands: “Never make a mug of your punter.”

He stood for nothing, so he fell for everything. 

His government – and yes, it did quite a few good things, from gradual rail nationalisation to the Renters’ Rights Act, improved rights at work, more NHS funding and finally taking a step back towards Europe – was seemingly locked into regular bursts of confusion and absurdity: witness a reference on the Labour List website to “six milestones, five missions, [and] three foundations”.

And of course to the average Guardian reader, those do look like positive things. Back to the rest of us, and they don’t.

From such murk emerged the endlessly unfolding Peter Mandelson affair, and that was pretty much that. “No 10 symbolises the principles of public life in this country: selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership,” Starmer said in 2022. If you were now to read those words out to the average member of the public, they would surely collapse in contemptuous mirth.

Such qualities, of course, are more important than ever. But in the era of TikTok, Instagram and all the rest (if you are old enough), people now favour leaders who are flamboyant, outspoken, capable of delivering surprises and able to look as if they enjoy what they do. Surreal modern levels of scrutiny also mean that basic consistency – or a talent for faking it – is usually an absolute must.

We’ll see how good bodybags Burnham does in the popularity stakes soon.

Well, Nesrine, If So, It's A Hole He Dug Entirely By Himself

It's not often she makes sense, but I like to highlight it when she does: 

He is in a hole that is too deep to climb out of. The prime minister’s persistent unpopularity is best understood as the result of abundance: there is simply, in Starmer, something for everyone to deplore.In policy, he has taken stances that have established him in the minds of many people as devoid of principle and compassion.

He's still got the shovel in his hands, Nesrine, and there's no sign yet that he's finished... 

On Gaza, Starmer got it wrong from the start. From his early assertion that Israel had the right to cut off water and power, to refusing calls for a ceasefire and then cracking down on protest (a move now judged as unlawful by the high court), the prime minister positioned himself against a huge domestic swell of distress.

'Huge domestic well', Nesrine? Hardly. Only emanating from those people we should really be looking to remove from the country at the first opportunity, the ones we regret ever inviting in.... 

And then there is Starmer himself. Personality alone does not make a politician, and God knows we have suffered enough from big personalities such as Boris Johnson – but you need something. Not necessarily fireworks and charm, but at the minimum just a sense of tangibility.

Starmer is impalpable; not in the sense that he isn’t there, but that he is hiding. He doesn’t dream, he says, nor does he have phobias, nor favourite novels. He communicates in only the most generic terms, in staccato sentences using repetitive themes – “change” or his working-class roots – connected by meaningless “let me be clears” and “make no mistakes”

I agree here, it is strange that someone who was a lawyer could be such a poor public speaker. 

Who is this person’s constituency? Not the left, to which he has made clear in policy and in purges that this is not its Labour party. Not the right, which will never be at home in Labour, no matter how many people it deports or how much capital it courts. And not the centre any more, for which Starmer’s incompetence and lurching from one debacle to the next is becoming increasingly hard to rationalise.

His constiturncy appears to be himself.  

Why Have You Told Us For Years That It Is, Then?

And more to the point, why are you telling us something different now?

The list of problems inherited from the Conservatives by Keir Starmer is long, but near the top is how to respond to record levels of net migration.

Is it because Starmer is now getting it in the neck? Well, that's one of the drawbacks of no longer being in opposition - the buck stops where now, Larry? 

Starmer has pledged to reduce the economy’s dependency on foreign workers, yet he will need them if he is to have any hope of hitting the government’s target of building 1.5m new homes in England in the current parliament. The construction industry says an additional 251,000 skilled workers will be required in the next five years and there simply aren’t enough UK-born plumbers, bricklayers and electricians to meet the expected demand. The same applies to the target that 92% of patients in England should be waiting no longer than 18 weeks for elective treatment. There is not the time to train more domestic doctors and nurses, so without the NHS being able to recruit from overseas, waiting lists will not come down as planned.

And are we to believe the government doesn't know this? So, they are lying, Larry. Aren't they?

It is because migration is so complex and contentious that those who highlight the possible downsides of migration need to have their voices heard.

Then why have you shouted them down with cries of 'racist!' for the last few years? And why have you changed your tune now? 

...the list of those concerned starts at the top with the prime minister, who said that the latest figures were “off the scale”. Starmer is right about that. If the OBR is correct, by the end of this parliament migration will have boosted the UK’s population by 4 million in just eight years. The idea that this can happen without economic effects, without political ramifications and without the public noticing is for the birds.

It's because Starmer's in trouble, isn't it? 

The Left Are Responsible For It No Longer Being A ‘Guilty Pleasure’, Adita

Aditya Chakrabortty on the Unite The Kingdom March, which reminds him of the racism of the Seventies:

Back then, racism was a furtive, guilty pleasure: deep down, even bigots knew their bigotry was ugly. No more.

Who is responsible for so misusing the term 'racist' that it's lost it's power, Aditya?  

What was striking about last weekend’s march wasn’t the turnout, easily matched by some of the protests about Gaza. It’s the lack of shame, the brazen insistence on an Englishman’s right to make others feel small.

Aren't you 'an Englishman', then Aditya?  Aren't you Lefties always telling us that if you're born here, no matter your background, you're English? Is that yet another Left lie?

It’s the normalisation of what was until recently considered malicious extremism. And a big driver isn’t the crowds down in the street, but the suits in our supposedly progressive government.Whenever confronted with violent prejudice, Keir Starmer coughs, splutters and takes the coward’s way out. He either pretends not to see racism or panders to it.

A Tim points out, some immigration can be positive, but  the scale of it has changed a tad since the 70s. 

But Aditya believes it's all Starmer's fault. See you do have something in common with those marchers after all!  

Just over a couple of months ago, in small towns across Northern Ireland, migrants were burned out of their homes and a mosque was petrol bombed. The prime minister’s response? First and foremost, he deplored attacks on the police. Muslims deluged with hate and fearing for their lives got only a promise of “every step possible to keep you safe”. Stripped of rhetorical flourish, this is the bare minimum any citizen might expect from a state.

The bare minimum one can expect from a state is surely secure boarders and control over who comes in. 

At the end of last month, Nigel Farage promised mass deportation of practically anyone seeking asylum in this country, even if it meant handing Afghan women over to the Taliban and sending Iranian dissidents to their deaths. To the press, No 10 didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow at the Reform UK leader referring to other humans as a “scourge” or an “invasion”. For the great unwashed, it posted the most extraordinary advert. “Whilst Nigel Farage moans from the sidelines, Labour is getting on with the job,” it read, showing an image of Starmer stamped with “removed over 35,000 people from the UK”. Why vote for the full-fat hatemongers when diet racists will do the job just fine?

I think referring to Labour's pitifully ineffective measures as 'racist' is a fine example of my initial point. 

Starmer might observe how much of the UK would simply fall apart without migrants and their children – from your local hospital to the school to the care home. How universities are facing collapse without foreigns students and their bumper fees. He might even point out – imagine! – that migrants are human too, with their own lives and dreams for themselves and their families. We could get on to the legacy of empire, and about how the climate crisis and poverty force other populations to move.

Why do they move here? There are plenty of other countries, aren't there? 

The Overton window is shifting further and further to the right. The ultimate price for that will not be paid by a politician, but by people far from power: an Ethiopian boy, perhaps, with no family, or an Asian kid looking out the window one evening.

This isn't Ethiopia so why should we care? And of course, by 'Asian' you don't mean Chinese or Thai, do you Aditya? You mean Pakistani. 

'National Emergencies' Aren't What They Used To Be...

Deepfake nudes and “revenge porn” must be removed from the internet within 48 hours or technology firms risk being blocked in the UK, Keir Starmer has said, calling it a “national emergency” that the government must confront.

Really? Pictures are a 'national emergency'? Even admittedly fake ones, or ones supplied by the 'victim' themselves? Don't we have real life things to worry about? 

Of course, they have to get this through the Commons, and then the Lords, first: 

Companies could be fined millions or even blocked altogether if they allow the images to spread or be reposted after victims give notice.Amendments will be made to the crime and policing bill to also regulate AI chatbots such as X’s Grok, which generated nonconsensual images of women in bikinis or in compromising positions until the government threatened action against Elon Musk’s company.

WE all know the real reason why thin-sknned Starmer has it in for social media, don't we Reader?  

The prime minister said that institutional misogyny being “woven into the fabric of our institutions” meant the problem had not been taken seriously enough. “Too often, misogyny is excused, minimised or ignored. The arguments of women are dismissed as exaggerated or ‘one-offs’. That culture creates permission,” Starmer wrote.

So, Starmer, what are you planning to do about Hampshire Police?  Or would the answer be 'Nothing, because it's not linked to social media'? 

'No Consequences' Britain....

A 'veil of secrecy' was placed over the Sara Sharif scandal yesterday after a court banned the naming of a judge who placed the little girl in the custody of her murderous father. A High Court judge ordered that none of the professionals involved in the family court proceedings could be named, including social workers, experts and guardians.

Of course, they look after their own. They always have done...

They also included the family court judge who made the fateful decision to give Urfan Sharif custody before he beat the ten-year-old to death.

It should surprise no-one, of course, but there's room for some appalling chutzpah from our disaster of a prime minister: 

The extraordinary ban sparked a secrecy row yesterday as Keir Starmer said questions must be answered about the appalling case.

Really, Starmer? Now you think questions are warranted? 

The anonymity ruling effectively prevents full public scrutiny of those responsible for the key decisions which culminated in Sara's death on August 8 last year.

Rather like an injunction does. You know what an injunction is, don't you Starmer? 

Not that he's the only failed politician to decide the public have forgotten all about their previous screw-ups. Lady Dogshit decided to open her trap too:

Yesterday, former victims commissioner Dame Vera Baird KC said: 'This has placed a veil of secrecy over this case. I think it's appalling that we cannot know who was responsible for this obviously extremely damaging order which played a key role in the horrible death of this child.

'This is the judiciary protecting the judiciary. How can the public be confident that the family courts can protect future children if the public are denied the knowledge of who is making such decisions... The judiciary needs to be held to account for the decisions they make. This is an awful case, people got it seriously wrong and the public need to know the truth.' She added: 'It is sinister.'

Bit of a stretch to insist the judiciary should be held to account when you've never been, eh, Vera? 

Get Ready For Starmer’s Next U-Turn

 

What will Keir Starmer and his colleagues learn from the disaster of their attempt to cut benefits?

Nothing! They never learn - every setback is because 'big boys did it and ran away', never because what they were trying to do was wrong in the first instance. 

One policy area in particular is about to return the political conversation to the subject that defined last week’s fiasco: disability. Once again, Labour MPs from all wings of the party are feeling anxious and restless. Campaign groups and charities – not to mention the huge numbers of people who will be directly affected – fear the worst.

Of course they do! It’s how they stay relevant! If they can’t win people to their cause by terrifying them, they will fade into obscurity and who will pay the bills then? 

The education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, wants to reform England’s system of provision for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities, or Send.

And it needs it - the growth in special measures for children attending school has been a meteoric rise; either we really are breeding more and more defective children, or there's a perk to the diagnosis of 'special needs' that parents are latching onto. Whichever it is, the sitaution can't be tolerated for much longer. 

A new education white paper will be published in the autumn. Phillipson says the government needs to “think very differently”. She wants to reverse a trend that took root in the Tory years and prioritise the inclusion of Send kids in mainstream schools.

So everyone's education is affected! Just the sort of thing you'd ecxpect from a Labour government, the one's that cannot let go of the failed concept of comprehensive education (except when it comes to their own offspring, of course!)

One of the big teaching unions has already said that without a commensurate increase in day-to-day schools spending, the plans could put “extreme pressure” on teachers.

How totally unexpected! 

There are whispers about families who currently have EHCPs being allowed to keep them, while in the future, kids with similar needs would be waved away, something that threatens a stereotypical two-tier model, another element with worrying echoes of the benefits disaster.

Why not? We already have a two-tier justice system, what better testament to Starmer's (hopefully short) rreign to have an educational sysyem similarly blighted..? Of course, the likelihood is he'll back down when faced with opposition as he's already done so many times.

Well, It’s Not Like He Has A Coherent Plan For Anything Else, Is It?

Keir Starmer has no coherent strategy to tackle entrenched inequalities harming the life chances of millions of people, the government’s social mobility commissioner has said.

Didn't really need the last 12 words, there, did they?  

The Social Mobility Commission (SMC), a government advisory body, said big cities such as Manchester, Edinburgh and Bristol were starting to thrive but that opportunities were “overconcentrated”. In a Guardian interview, the commission’s chair, Alun Francis, urged Starmer to outline a bold vision to tackle “the defining social mobility challenge of our generation”.

Starmer has never been 'bold' in hie entire wretched life, and I suspect has never had any sort of vision eitther. 

Francis praised government policies on devolution and housing, but said welfare reform and other proposals had been “stop-start”. “We’ve got other policies like growth, educational improvement where we’re just not sure where we’re going,” he said.

Down the Tubes, with this wretched mob in charge.  

He also warned that without a “universal view” of what social mobility means, it risked being subsumed by diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) policies – an agenda that Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has characterised as “woke” and promised to dismantle. “To some degree it’s dropped into being a part of DEI because it does have some of those aspects,” he said. “But [social mobility] isn’t really a DEI policy. It’s more about an economic and social policy that’s about bringing the benefits to everybody.”

The #progressives will never give up DEI.  

It's Not A Change In The Law That's Needed...

...it's a change in the attitudes of the public sector:

The DPP revealed the change in tactics yesterday as he responded to the criticism and said he will not hesitate to call for a change in the law.

Pointless. Utterly pointless. Yet more evidence (as if it were needed) that Kier Starmer is as much use as a chocolate teapot...

Ann Clwyd, a Labour MP whose 2003 FGM Act bans girls being taken abroad to have the procedure, said teachers, doctors and police had shown "a lack of sufficient will to confront minority ethnic groups on such an issue".

She added: "It's very nice to get a law through Parliament, but if it isn't acted upon, it isn't worth the paper it's written on."

Starmer's solution? Try a different law!

Mr Starmer said he did not want to repeal existing anti-FGM laws, as that would "send the wrong message", but he conceded "the legislation clearly isn't nearly enough on its own". His FGM "action plan" also pledges to "explore whether evidence to prosecute offences under other legislation is possible and may be easier to support".

He targeted the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act, which creates an offence of "causing or allowing a child or vulnerable adult to die or suffer serious physical harm", as route to tougher action.

Clearly, a man who only has a hammer to solve his problems...

An Association of Chief Police Officers spokesman said: "Detection can be difficult because some children are exposed to the practice before they enter the schooling system. There are dedicated officers working in this area and police will investigate where there is information that such practices are occurring. Officers are working with community representatives to highlight serious health issues that can arise."

Stop 'working with community representatives' and start arresting them!

If it helps to get your outrage on, try to imagine they pinched some 20 year old starlet's bum 30 years ago... 

And stop hiring public health workers from the cultures that tolerate this:

I moved to England in 2011 and, through my work, I have seen women, some Somali, who have needed to have an operation [deinfibulation] to give birth. But when they come back for a second child they have again been sewn up [reinfibulation], so it is possible they are having FGM in the UK. I want to help other ladies. I feel complete but I don't want girls to go through this.

That's a quote from 'Aissa Edon, 30, a midwife working at Ealing Hospital, London.'

What does she do with her information, other than give it to a newspaper reporter? Perhaps a few high-profile trials of those who turn a blind eye will do the trick.

I suggest we start with Aissa.

She's Incapable Of Learning...

In a wide-ranging interview with James Naughtie for BBC Radio 4's Reflections, the veteran Labour MP was asked about a letter she sent to the Observer in April 2023 in which she suggested people of colour experienced racism in a different way to Jewish people, Irish people and Travellers. Although she withdrew her comments at the time and apologised, saying "errors" arose in a draft that was sent, she was suspended from the party and only re-admitted just before last year's general election.

A more cynical move by Starmer it’s hard to envisage….

Asked by the BBC's James Naughtie if she looked back on the incident with regret, she said: "No, not at all." She added: "Clearly, there must be a difference between racism which is about colour and other types of racism because you can see a Traveller or a Jewish person walking down the street, you don't know. "You don't know unless you stop to speak to them or you're in a meeting with them. "But if you see a black person walking down the street, you see straight away that they're black. They are different types of racism."

No, they are still racism - the fact one grouping easier to identify than another doesn’t make a difference to that.only an imbecile would think so!

Oh, right, Abbott is exactly that! 

Asked if she believed she had done anything wrong or had said something in her Observer letter that she did not believe in, she said: "I just think that it's silly to try and claim that racism which is about skin colour is the same as other types of racism. "I just... I don't know why people would say that."

Because it’s the truth, though I can understand why that’s a concept you’re unfamiliar with… 

Abbott was quick to withdraw the remarks, which were heavily criticised by Jewish and Traveller groups, and apologised "for any anguish caused". But she was suspended by the Labour Party pending the outcome of an investigation, with leader Sir Keir Starmer saying her letter "was antisemitic" and should be condemned. Abbott was readmitted to the Labour Party in May 2024, just in time for her stand as a Labour candidate in the general election, even though an internal inquiry into her conduct had concluded four months earlier.

So your initial apology was false? And you're dumb enough to admit to that on air?

"I got tremendous support locally. We had a big rally on the steps of Hackney Town Hall. And in the end Keir Starmer and the people around him had to back off because of the support I had from the community."

If this isn’t racial superiority threats to bring people out on the street, what is?  Maybe Special Branch should be investigating?

And so, she's propmtly been suspended again! If only she’d kept her thick racist mouth shut, eh?

Kier Starmer Must Go…

…because he’s part of the problem, not part of the solution:

Rape is a cruel and degrading crime, and victims are entitled to have their cases thoroughly investigated and properly prosecuted. The role of the Crown Prosecution Service is crucial in meeting these entitlements. Whenever we fall short we have a duty to review our conduct and make necessary changes to ensure we improve in future.

Sounds promising, doesn’t it? Sounds like he’s finally got the message that…

Oh:

In one we made a serious mistake in offering no evidence at a retrial. I publicly apologised to the victim. In another, a woman was prosecuted for perverting the course of justice after making a rape allegation, retracting it and then withdrawing that retraction. In both cases the CPS was criticised, and the Guardian raised legitimate questions about the way we handled them.

Because if the ‘Guardian’ doesn’t criticise it, coming as it does from impeccable left-wing sources, it isn’t worth worrying about, right?

You’ll take no notice of any other criticism coming your way, about the rise in false rape reports and the effect on the accused men of the routine arrest on even the flimsiest accounts.

I believe the CPS should be measured by how it responds to justifiable criticism.

Ah. Right. I see now.
Any other criticism you get you’ll just classify as ‘unjustified’, and then you are free to ignore it!

Prosecuting rape is very challenging: public expectations are high, sometimes unrealistic; cases often turn on the word of an individual; and rape often occurs in private with the victim the only witness.

Which is precisely why the conviction rate is so low, particularly in comparison to other crimes. It isn’t like other crimes.

Usually the victim has to give evidence in court to establish the basis for a prosecution.

‘Usually’..?!?

So what are we going to do? As prosecutors we need to reinforce the so-called 'merits-based approach to rape cases. They should be judged entirely on the merits of the evidence…

Oh oh.

… myths and stereotypes have no place in a criminal justice system underpinned by basic human rights. We can and should challenge them wherever we encounter them, whether that is during an investigation, among our fellow professionals or in court.

Good! Start with the ‘women never lie about rape!’ myth, will you?

No. Of course you won’t:

We must measure our performance more closely too: I have recently introduced core quality standards throughout the CPS setting out the level of service that the public are entitled to expect from prosecutors.

What wonderful managerial bullshit and waffle! Anyone have an English translation?

And from January we are introducing a new quality assurance scheme for offences involving violence against women.

Fantastic! More targets, more pressure on prosecutors to get a result, regardless of whether it’s the right one!

Because, blimey, that never lead to problems in the police force, did it?

We also need to work on our approach in retraction cases. From now, my approval for charging will be needed in these cases, and we will monitor them closely. If the complainant has decided to withdraw an allegation, we must explore the issues behind that, particularly if the complainant is under pressure or frightened.

Or a known, proven liar?

Those who are raped must be confident that their case will be thoroughly investigated and properly prosecuted. Those who rape should know of our resolve to ensure that justice is done.

And those who are falsely accused of rape should just shut up and accept they are the casualties in your ideological war?

What was the point of getting shot of lunatics like Harman and Baird, when Starmer sits there still, waging their war on half the population?

As Mark Wadsworth points out on email, 'the CPS prosecuted 110 of these cases (retractions) this year and got a conviction in 61 cases' which I think is a substantially better result than in ACTUAL rape cases, is it not?

And that doesn't even begin to touch the numbers of false rape claims, because I only tend to get the ones reported in the MSM. How many are quietly shelved by the CPS when they realise they are on to a loser?

Starmer is right, the whole issue of rape needs looking at, but I somehow sense he isn't the man for the job...

Kier Starmer And The Lawrence Woman…

…be afraid. Be very afraid …

In the past few weeks he has started drafting a "victim's law", working in conjunction with Lady Lawrence, Stephen Lawrence's mother, which Labour has promised to pass if elected.

Oh, this is ominous.

Starmer isn't at the stage of making recommendations yet, and will hold his first victims' taskforce seminar on 7 April, but he has a clear analysis of the key problems.

*takes deep breath*

He is troubled by how few victims of sexual crimes come forward and hopes to make changes to the system that will make reporting a crime less onerous.

Fantastic! That’s just what we need, a way for Chantelle to report that Wayne has besmirched her honour even quicker.

He is particularly struck by the tiny percentage of people who came forward to make allegations of abuse against Jimmy Savile during his lifetime.

Because there’s no way there could be any other reason, like, say, the fear that you might have to prove your allegations in court when you were sued.

He is also concerned about the difficulties victims face once they decide to report a crime, particularly if they do not resemble a model victim, according to age-old preconceptions about how victims should behave.

Quite! The vital demographics changes have to be accounted for, don't they? How else can Chantelle present herself as a shrinking violet in court who has never even held a man's hand when the defence can counter that in court with her own Facebook profile?

He doesn't blame the police for not pursuing the cases. "I think they were trying to do their best, but genuinely thought: 'We are not going to win this case, because of all these factors.' That's because these issues are always probed at trial, and still are. These will classically be the lines of cross-examination." He concluded that the criminal justice system "has been set up for the model victim but not real victims".

And by 'real victims' it seems he means women. Where in his single-track mind gay men or lesbians fit in, heaven knows. Perhaps, like Queen Victoria, no-one's ever explained this to him?

"Those assumptions are very deeply entrenched. If you go to a police station to report a burglary, the first question is not usually 'are you telling the truth?' And yet that is very often the starting place when it is a sexual offence."

Well, that’s because there’s no point reporting your car’s been stolen if the police can see it sitting there on your drive. Or that there’s been a forced entry when there’s no sign of broken glass or a jimmied doorframe.
But the very nature of many sexual allegations is that the accuser and accusee are alone. It's 'he said, she said'...

Another key problem he has already identified is the adversarial nature of the legal system, which often allows multiple cross-examinations of witnesses, and which can be so brutal in its treatment of victims that they many afterwards they would never voluntarily go through it again (making further prosecutions in gang-related cases, for example, impossible to pursue). He argues that the 200-year-old system might have served its time.

This is a genuinely frightening glimpse into the mindset of the wreckers and the forces behind so many of our crumbling, no longer fit for purpose institutions.

"The big question here is whether the adversarial system is suitable for these kind of cases," he says, although he will not be drawn on what an alternative system might involve. "When you put that altogether there is a problem. Most people don't have the confidence to come forward. If you do come forward, there's the risk that assumptions will be applied that don't hold water. Then if you get through charge, and go to trial, you have victims who say they would never repeat that. "

How else can the system work but in a 'you must prove your case' fashion? Does he want to see juries abolished, and rape cases tried before judges (who have had all the necessary 'training') alone? I fear that'll be the proposal...

Starmer met John and Penny Clough, the parents of Jane Clough, a nurse who was stabbed to death by her ex-partner while he was on bail, charged with raping her. "If they listened to some of the victims, some of the campaigners, they would come up with a much better system. We just want to change it for the better. It isn't working. It is weighted in favour of the defendant. The victim comes nowhere. Look at the Ministry of Justice spending – of the entire budget, only 1% is spent on victims' services."

What was I saying in the preceding post about victims and their role in the judicial system?

It’s Not Housing So Much As Who You’re Putting In That Housing

 

Over the week to come, journalists will repeat three things until they, and you, are sick: that local elections fall next Thursday; that the results will decide the fate of Keir Starmer; and that he is set to do badly. But just how badly, and where? Last week, Starmer’s own party dropped a big clue. The most popular politician in Britain came down from Manchester to spend the whole day campaigning in London.

In case you wondered, Reader, they were talking about Andy Burnham. 

As Andy Burnham went from Haringey to Brixton, he rallied Labour’s footsoldiers. “Don’t go into the last two weeks with your shoulders down,” he told them. “Get your shoulders up.” “Ah,” wrote lobby reporters, “now the King of the North is making incursions down south, such is his ambition.” But his visit is more telling than that, and more profound in its implications.

Oh? Do tell! 

...consider Burnham’s itinerary. Lambeth, Haringey, Southwark: these rank among the reddest patches of the UK’s entire electoral map. The country’s last bastion of Labour support, London, is starting to collapse.

I wonder why? I look at the demographics of those area and they aren't falling to Reform any time soon. But the Islam Green Party is in with a chance.

Even as they knock on doors and post leaflets ahead of next Thursday, Labour people have already written off whole swathes of the country. They know they’ll get smashed in Scotland and Wales, where in the assembly elections the governing party will be battling simply not to lose too badly. But London is a different story; even in the wipeout of 2019 it remained deep red.

The Greens look set to bloody Labour Southwark and Lambeth: the training ground of Morgan McSweeney, Steve Reed, Ali McGovern and much of the rest of the faction that runs the Westminster party.

Depends how many of them are in the cells ahead of May 7, doesn't it?  

There is one more bruise the Greens in London keep punching, especially intriguing because it is about policy. Front and centre of their campaign is the need for a fair housing system.

And who for?  That's more the point.

The Morning After…

Well, as I write this, it’s 5:15am, I'm just sipping my morning cuppa, and enough of the results are in that we know that, as predicted, Labour have suffered crushing defeat in their traditional heartlands, and Starmer’s political career is now measured in days, if not hours.

 TGIF! 

It's not all good news (it never is), the Green Party looks to have picked up too many seats for my liking, and what replaces Starmer is poroably even worse. 

Update: sadly, my area remaind solidly Labour despite (or perhaps because of?) the huge demographic change it's endured over the recent years?

Arse Man And The Waspi Women...

No, not the next Marvel flop, this is once again a Starmer broken election promise:

Labour was accused of hypocrisy last night after abandoning a vow to compensate women hit by increases in the state pension age. Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall said government would not pay a penny to the 3.8million ‘Waspi women’ who were told they would have to work five years longer to receive their pension.Senior Labour figures, including Sir Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Ms Kendall, all backed the women’s campaign in opposition.

Well, of course they did. They wanted their votes. Now they've got them. 

In 2022, Sir Keir signed a pledge calling for the women affected to receive ‘fair and fast’ compensation. Last year, he said they had faced a huge injustice’. But on Monday, the Prime Minister said the Government could not afford the estimated £10.5billion cost – which would have seen a payout of up to £3,000 to each of the more than 3million affected.

Just like the pensioners who have lost their winter fuel payment, these women will hopefully never vote Labour again.  

Maybe Kier Starmer Isn't As Bad As I Thought...

Sir Keir Starmer has been accused of not listening to the Labour party’s adviser on race relations.

Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon, who is the mother of murdered black teenager Stephen Lawrence, is reported to have told a private meeting of Labour’s ethnic minority MPs and peers on Tuesday: “I wish Keir listened to me.”

It's to his credit that he doesn't, Frankly, we've all heard rather too much from you. And we've certainly spent far too much taxpayer money on you, yet I see we are about to waste even more. 

It is alleged Baroness Lawrence complained of “gatekeepers” around the Labour leader who had prevented her work,The Times reported, and said she no longer knew how to respond to complaints about the party from black and minority ethnic voters.

The way she always responds, I assume - excuse them anything if they are black. 

Her remarks — at a behind-closed-doors meeting of the black, Asian and minority ethnic section of the parliamentary Labour Party — come amidmounting disquiet about the treatment of Black and Asian Labour MPs and voters including long-standing investigation into Diane Abbott, Britain’s first black female MP.

She's not being investigated for the colour of her skin, but for the content of her character. A wise man once had something pithy to say about that. 

And Are The Children So Very Different From The Adults?

A deep distrust of the police and a lack of youth opportunities fuelled the involvement of hundreds of “disempowered” children in last year’s riots across England, a report has found. Dame Rachel de Souza, the children’s commissioner for England, said young people were not primarily motivated by “far-right, anti-immigration or racist views” or by online misinformation, contrary to what she called the “prevailing narrative”.

She concentrated on the children because it's her job, but really, if she'd spoken to most of the adults involved in Starmer’s so-called ‘far right riots’, would the results have been any different? 

Instead, she said, many were driven by a hatred of police and saw the riots as a chance to retaliate. Others were “driven by curiosity or the thrill of the moment”.

Probably not. Despite the pontificating by the thin-skinned weirdo in No 10, hardly any of the protesters were 'far right', most of them weren't political at all. 

De Souza told the Guardian she was concerned about the “dangerous” treatment of children who received “unusually severe” punishments as part of the robust crackdown on rioters ordered by Keir Starmer last summer.

Again, she’s concerned about the children because it's her role, but surely the adults received equally harsh and unusually severe punishment too?

“I thought I would hear far more about [far-right influencers like] Andrew Tate. That’s not what I heard at all,” she said. “There was quite a group of the children who were there because they hated the police and they were clear about that.”

No need to wonder why, either. But it doesn't seem to have been the usual disaffected youth, not entirely:

These children – who included “star pupils”, army cadets and trainee electricians – saw the riots as “an opportunity to retaliate against the police” after previous bad experiences with officers and general community distrust, she said. One of the children charged said they joined a riot after hearing that the police would be there. They said: “We went down to see what it was. There’s a tradition in [my city] of people versus police. We had an opportunity.”

One wonders why any city in England would have a tradition of being against the police… 

Yes, Starmer Can Claim To Be 'Tough On Crime'...

...well, apart from that whole Jimmy Savile thing, Frances. Oh, and the Rotherham thing too...

Some 371 people died in prison custody in 2021 – the equivalent of more than one a day. Many of these deaths were coronavirus-related. Tragically, 86 took their own lives, up from 67 the previous year.

*shrugs* A few - innocent - people took their own lives thanks to the effects of lockdown too. No tears for them, Frances? 

Strict coronavirus restrictions in prisons have left tens of thousands of people locked in their cells for 23 hours a day for months on end.

And millions of - innocent! - people trapped behind their own front doors by government decree. But no tears for them, eh, Frances? 

Prison reform has long been one of those political hot potatoes that few politicians are willing to tackle sensibly, all too aware that they will be accused of being “soft on crime” or “not on the side of victims”.

Rightly so. So what? 

What we really need is reform of the entire prison system, starting with an increase in funding for healthcare and palliative support. Not only is it the right thing to do, it will also save taxpayers’ money in the long run by improving prisoners’ health and helping to nurture future rehabilitated citizens.

But look at the levels of recidivism. Who wants to take the risk that they are rehabilitated? 

Prisons are too often used as a solution to social problems; a civilised – and smart – society would spend its resources on tackling poverty rather than building more cells.

Is it 'poverty' that drives crimes like these, then? Pretty hard to believe, Frances...

As a former public prosecutor, Keir Starmer is in a better position than most to challenge the government to adopt an evidence-based approach to prisons without Johnson being able to accuse him of being “soft” on crime.

Looking at his record, I rather think you've lost the plot, if you could be said to have ever had one.  

Don’t You Mean David Paulden‘s Greens, George?

After all, if it's good enough for Tommy Robinson, why should he be treated any differently?

There’s an obvious way to destroy Nigel Farage’s political momentum. A poll by the research group Persuasion UK, testing various messages, found that by far the most effective line of attack is highlighting his complicity with corporate interests. The message that hit hardest was that Farage’s real loyalties lie with “the rich, the powerful, his mates in big business”, and his “party” (actually a business called Reform 2025 Ltd) “has taken over £2m from fossil fuel lobbyists, polluters, and climate change deniers … He’s not smashing the system. He and his rich friends basically are the system.”

Anyone who accepts this 'argument' must be considered to be someone who hasn't really given any serious thought to the matter. Wouldn't Labour be using it as an attack, would be the first question?

But this is a string Labour cannot yank, as it would pull its own roof down. If there is a defining mark of Keir Starmer’s administration, it is immediate capitulation to powerful lobby groups, especially corporations and billionaires.

Ah, silly me. I forgot this missive came from the man in thrall to the Red Wing of the Labour movement. 

It cannot tell us that the role of the hard right is to shift the blame for decades of economic attacks by the rich and powerful on to powerless people who have only just arrived here. This would mean mentioning capital, wealth and power: topics it avoids like the plague. In other words, the government has flunked the simplest test for a Labour administration: how to respond to an insurgent hard right.

Are this 'hard right' in the room with you right now, George? 

People who approve of Farage will vote for him, emboldened by a Labour party that has told them, in effect, that he is right. People who hate Farage will vote not only against him, but also against a government seen to be handing the country on a plate to him. Unless its MPs rebel and defenestrate Starmer and Rachel Reeves, it is hard to see any trajectory for Labour now, other than electoral wipeout.

Well, give them time, they are surely working their way up to it... 

But You Don’t – You Know Only What She Chooses To Tell You…

So it was a relief to hear the new home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, articulate clearly that weekend what should always have been Labour’s line on both the English and British flags: that, as the English-born daughter of Pakistani-born parents, she sees herself in them and is “all for” their use as a symbol of unity, but not as a means to exclude and divide.

Oh Gabby, What do you think now she's a proven liar..?

“I’m a patriot, not a nationalist,” she told the Sun on Sunday. And, yes, it would have been better had Keir Starmer said something like that from the start.

Perhaps he didn't want to be caught in a lie so quickly, unlike his DEI hire Home Sec?

The outlines are fuzzy, but in Liverpool there are glimmerings of a new politics of belonging: an aspiration to be what Mahmood called an “open, tolerant, generous” country, welcoming to newcomers, while acknowledging that migrants aren’t the only ones sometimes struggling to find their feet in a multi-ethnic nation.

And how do they feel in Manchester now? Probably the same, since vacuous ‘don’t look back in anger’ acceptance of insanity seems to always reign there. 

The biggest challenge Mahmood now faces, one I have not seen before in my lifetime, is the shocking rise of ethnonationalism. It’s the blood-and-soil politics of those who claim Rishi Sunak isn’t really English despite being born and raised here – a charge not levelled at his US-born, Brussels-raised, white-skinned predecessor, Boris Johnson – or that being Muslim is somehow fundamentally incompatible with living a properly “British” life.

It is, because so many of them cannot seem to. 

We are not an island of strangers, in the words Starmer now regrets using: just an island that needs reminding, sometimes, of who we really are.

Actually,we’ve been reminded of who they are too much, Gabby. And we are sick of it!