Conspiracy and the Blog War - Let the battle commence!

Information is power. And, politics is about power. I must admit, the first time that I saw Croydonian on 18doughtystreet.com the internet TV station, I formed the opinion that he was arrogant, a snob, and effeminate in mannerisms. The type I take an instant dislike to. When I saw him again, on Blogger TV last night, I groaned silently. But, then I laughed out loud when I caught a flash of him wearing day glow yellow socks! How can you take such a clown seriously? Still, as Blogger TV is my brainchild, I did not switch off and suffered the rest of the show in silence. I was thankful when it finished 5 minutes early, it just gave me enough time to make a coffee before watching The News at Ten on BBC1, followed by Newsnight on BBC2. There was a right old ding dong of a battle on congestion charges. They say that a change is as good as a rest, I had forgotten how good that programme can be, it was almost worth me going out and buying a TV Licence. There again, I have this thing against Crapita and I don't intend to boost it's profits when there is no need to pay.

On Blogger TV, The Chunt brought up the subject of the Wife in the North and her reported £70,000 book deal. Iain was miffed at the size of the advance, and there was a bit of bitchiness. True, when I read that she had a Times connection, and the Times broke the story, there is a whiff of a possible conspiracy. Still, she writes well and that cannot be taken away from her. Unlike some of the cretins who posted on Croydonian relatively recently.

I was looking for Steve Taylor's blog, pigeon something or other, to provide a link on my site, and searched Google for prisonlawinsideout to see if his reference too me was in that place. It wasn't, but I stumbled upon "Stupid criminal of the year" on Croydonian and he mentioned that it was not a reference too me. The twit istanbultory suggested that my blog must be in the running for worst blog (obviously he has not read Rachel North London's post on her blog where she opined that jailhouselawyer has a top blog). Newmania(c), I was surprised to learn is male, as I had wrongly supposed that the bitchy comments came from a female. In any event, he refers to my blog as "Eugene" and it is a reference to something sung by Pink Floyd. It was lost on Croydonian and I am puzzled too. I know that in prison "The Mad Dog of Pudsey" used to call me Crazy Diamond, and this certainly came from the lyrics of Pink Floyd as we used to smoke dope and play their records in Long Lartin Prison. "Peter Hitchens" before he bottled it to the real Peter Hitchens posted this comment "The axe murderer is now barred from guido no doubt our mr dale has done likewise". As usual The Hitch, who is now my prison bitch, was talking shit. I still post on both of those sites. Croydonian replied "He's already got a lifetime - and life means life...- ban here, in advance of any attempt post". So, I put it to the test and posted a comment.

"Croydonian: You're a bore. Bring it on, tosser!". He replied (haughtily) "Mr Hirst, Do not post here again. Ever. My comment makers find you morally reprehensible and even supposing that I did not, that would be sufficient to bar you. Your repeated threats of making recourse to legal action are out of place in the convivial place that is the British political blogosphere, and I would counsel you to research the outcome of Dering v Uris before filing a libel action that will most probably be struck out at the first instance. You are also a solipsistic bore with the characteristic chippiness of the autodidact. If you choose to ignore this, any comments you make including any emanating from your IP address but with different alias will be deleted". So, I caught him out in a lie. I had to laugh out loud at "the convivial place that is the British political blogosphere". What a numpty, hello, anyone in there, it's a jungle, you fucking muppet! When the idiot has the string of legal victories that I have amassed, it might just be possible that I would seek his advice, but doubtful, as I am the number one in the country in this area of expertise. Talk about teaching your grandmother to suck eggs...It's a matter of public record that I am self-taught, that's why I don't need lessons from someone with a little knowledge.

Anonymous said: "I think I have also tripped up his budding media career, I can't believe Dale was thinking of having the fucker on his programme". And, there I was thinking it must have been something I said. It is true that Iain Dale both announced on his blog and on 18DS that he was inviting me on to discuss the prisoners votes case. Iain Dale has not had the common decency to email me and rescind the offer and give his reasons for so doing. I think that it is time that Iain Dale came clean about this whole affair. I have exposed a conspiracy. Yet more sleaze from the Tory Party! Just as well he was not selected. There is already enough corruption in politics without adding to it by someone heavily engaged in a conspiracy. At the very least, I believe that Iain Dale should offer me a public apology for his ungentlemanly conduct. Is this how Iain Dale repays the man for giving him the idea for Blogger TV, which has proved to be the most popular progamme on 18DS? Besides being a prison law consultant, I am also a media consultant (albeit not in the same league as Max Clifford). It just goes to show how ignorant some of these bloggers and posters are. It's Iain Dale's and the viewers loss. I have a very good relationship with the media (not the RedTops), and they have based their prejudices on one article by Andrew O'Hagan. Admittedly, it was not the best article ever written about me. But, I thought the photo was good and use it on my profile on this blog.

Croydonian posted: "Did the Dalemeister pull him? If so, stout work all round". Anonymous replied: "the axe murderer wasn't exactly candid despite his claim) manslaughter can mean you were unlucky to get into a fight and somebody died, could happen to any of us. A bit different from axeing somebodies mum to death because you felt like it and then not express remorse, he should be either dead or at least in prison". On the contrary, I am very candid and believe that honesty is the best policy. This idiot on the other hand, refers to murderer and then manslaughter and gives the vision in his head which does not match the facts. It is a pity that he did not watch the 15 minute Ch4 News item in which Simon Israel went into the circumstances of my case, or listen to the Michael Buerk programme, The Choice on Radio 4, when he spent half an hour on the subject. I am a very literal person, and when as a child I exposed white lies by adults I lost trust in them. I did not know then that this literal approach was down to my Aspergers Syndrome. In the past I have been accused of being too truthful. I don't believe that anybody can be that. However, I have learnt that the truth can sometimes hurt and that some people prefer to tell or hear white lies. And, that I then get accused of saying something inappropriate. I think that we all do that at times, but with Aspergers it is more common.

On the issue of remorse, the first person who opined that I showed no sign of remorse was a police doctor who asked me no questions in relation to the offence and only took intimate samples from my person. People with Aspergers have difficulty with empathy. Its not the same as not expressing remorse. The diminished responsibility, at the time of the offence, meant that I was not in my right mind, that is, mentally off balance. Therefore, full criminal responsibility is not present. I cannot feel guilt for being mentally ill. I handed myself into the police. The Court of Appeal has stated on, at least, two occasions that someone who self reports themselves to the police is a strong indication of remorse. I have seen prisoners cry in the dock, not out of remorse but out of self pity and some people are fooled by this display. One day on the prison exercise yard I was talking to one of the Guilford 4 or Birmingham 6 (I cannot remember which), and brought up the subject of remorse, and he said not to worry about it as it is a middle class thing to make you feel even more guilty. This is the comment that Andrew O'Hagan reported in his article. I would rather he asked do you feel bad about what happened? That would have got a yes, for example, in Erwin James's article, he asked if I had any regrets, I replied yes, killing my landlady. What a lot of people do not understand, is that prison humour is very black, gallows humour. And the first comment from a London gangster in front of an audience who were watching the news report on TV was "You know what they say Hirsty, if you want to get ahead in life...get an axe". Prisoners found it amusing and laughed. Not at the offence, but at the joke. It was funny, I could not be offended at the remark, and I laughed as well. Similarly, when I was in police custody, I made the comment, I bet she's got a bit of an headache. It was wry humour, something to say, inappropriate, admittedly, but it was in response to something the copper had said which permitted a moment of light relief in a tragic case. Whipping myself would not have brought the victim back to life. It was final. Some people read too much into this and miss the main points. When they wheeled a sixteen year old, in a body bag, who had committed suicide, past the breakfast queue, the heavy atmosphere was broken when some wag quipped "Can I have his cornflakes, because he won't be wanting them now?", the tension broke into laughter. It did not lessen the tragedy. It could happen to anybody, it is one of the easiest things to do is kill someone, it is the show of control that is the hardest. I did not kill my landlady because I felt like it. There were deeper psychological and social factors combined with the failure of the Probation Service to do anything about it when I reported that something was going wrong and my head was in bits and I needed to be moved. They ignored the warning signals I was sending. I did not say that I was going to kill her because I did not know at that time that it would happen. They had alternative accommodation, but told me that none was available, it could have been prevented and the change could have benefited me instead I felt trapped and lashed out. It was not her that I was attacking but the situation like in the American film where the actor was stuck in a traffic jam and it went downhill from there.

Verity said: "Well, excuse me if I elbow my way in here, but I was the first one to mention, in tones of revulsion, that Dale was planning to have the chewing gum you can't scrape off the bottom of your shoe on 18 Doughty Street. I mentioned it two days ago before everyone else got in on the act. And then I mentioned it again. You didn't spike the remorseless axe murderer of an old lady's media career alone, PHitch. I'd already got the underpinnings in place when you came in and added some much needed muscle! So sad, really. He was looking forward to his appearance on TV that he mentioned it several times. Oh well, life holds many a bitter disappointment for axe murders who dream of media stardom. Maybe he could go on Big Brother House or Help, I'm a Celbrity". Nasty piece of work. I have more than enough newspaper and magazine articles, radio and TV appearances. I am famous outside of the blogosphere whereas Verity, who? What was different about 18DS is that I have not done internet TV, and Iain had promised to give the prisoners votes case a proper airing on Vox Politix with a panel of guests. It wasn't about me you silly cunt! It was about prisoners human rights. No way would I go on Big Brother even in the unlikely event I was asked, nor on I'm a Celebrity, as I don't watch or like the programmes. My only interest is to push for prisoners rights. I never sought fame, it was the media reporting that did that but I took it on board and kept my feet on the ground. Nor did I envisage that I would make history with the prisoners votes case. That only dawned later when the media kept mentioning how long the legal position had been in place until I came along. The first man since 1870 to progress the issue, that did give me a warm glow inside. I can understand why these small minded people in their small world become envious. They cannot stand it when someone else steps into the spotlight and upstages them. All these grains of sand are worthless and its the nuggets of gold which have value. They are going to be very disappointed very shortly, watch this space...

Iain's Daily Diary - The blog of a car salesman

I make no apologies to those regular viewers of 18Drearyst.com my internet tv station for having the same guests on all the time saying the same boring things. I want to break into main stream television, and my plan of attacking the BBC for its bias has worked and now I get asked to appear on all sorts of TV programmes. I am a bit like a double headed coin, on one side my face appears to the left and on the other it appears to the right.

You might remember that my car got broken into by some druggies who get their supplies from Paul Staines (aka) Guido Fawkes. They cut the roof off my howdy with a chain saw, so I have decided to sell it and have called it a cabriolet. Naturally, I have advertised it under the heading "One careful lady driver".

We found another use for the National Front fridge in the office. Mike Rouse now occupies it and we have buried him under the floorboards.

As you all know I have a zero tolerance to drugs, and once left a party when someone lit up a spliff. However, politics is different and I have no intention of leaving the Conservative Party just because David Cameron is a raging cokehead. The latest opinion poll shows that the Tories have got a substantial lead over Labour, the first time since the Blessed Margaret was evicted from Number Ten. I enjoy being David Davis's comedy scriptwriter, and I believe that I am onto a winner here. There is nothing a megalomaniac likes more than power.

Ministry of Justice

It would appear that Pickfords Removals might be needed very soon to move the Prison Service from within the Home Office to the soon to be set up Ministry of Justice. Today the blogger Dizzy Thinks thinks he has discovered the domain name of the website for the new department. I had to phone my mole in Prison Service HQ, today about another matter, and a few snippets of information leaked out. Although, I hasten to add, nothing has been heard officially yet. I suspect that this means that the hand wielding the rubber stamp has not reached the piece of paper for the press release.

A few weeks back, we had discussed the proposal and I was informed that originally it was intended that Charles Falconer would take over the Ministry of Justice. However, it became clear that this would not be the case because of either constitutional reasons or because of some convention. I asked who might head the new department and it was suggested that Hilary Benn MP was a good bet. And John Reid would head the department of Homeland Security. I have known my mole for over 20 years. If nothing was planned he would have said as much. It is not his job to pre-empt any official announcement. He is in the know, and went as far as someone in his position could diplomatically go without treading on the toes of any minister.

Liana called into see me yesterday morning at 9.30, just as I was having breakfast (a bacon butty, cup of tea and a fag), and brought her's and Lasma's and Edite's washing to shove in my washing machine. When she uses the door knocker, she slams it once, and it always makes me jump, and reminds me of the days when prison officers wore steel toecaps on their boots and would crash against the outside of the cell door as they looked through the spyhole. I greeted her with "fucking hell!". She repeated parrot fashion "fucking hell, fucking hell, awhy? awhy?". I was still reeling from the shock, and thought it was a bit early to be disturbed. Even as a child it took me awhile to get the cobwebs of sleep out of my head when I woke up, unless I was going on holiday or it was Christmas Day or some other special occasion. After breakfast we took Rocky for a walk in Pearson Park, and then Liana went home.

Early evening I was in the bath and crash went the door knocker. Liana went straight up to my study and not finding me there came back down again. I told her to get the washing out of the washing machine whilst I finished off. When she came back in, she said, "I go home". I replied jokingly "You want sex?", as I stood bollock naked in the bath. I thought she had gone home but I found her waiting in the lounge. "You still here?", I asked rather stupidly as I could see that she was. "I want sex", she said. "No, I want to talk".

I asked her if she was still writing down the hours that she worked at Poskitts, the idea being that when the contract ends I will assist her to claim the unpaid wages. She assured me that she was. And then said that she was now getting paid £5.35 per hour. But before I could give a sigh of relief, she added that she had not been paid in 3 weeks. She said that she kept asking for the money and Poskitts kept saying later, later. I pushed her further and she said she had paid a deposit for the privilege of working, paid for work boots, paid for transport to and from work. It was beginning to look murkier and murkier. She did not give me the £5 per week she owes the council for council tax.

Besides supplying ASDA, she packed carrots for Netto and the market and some for the Prison Service and some to be fed to horses. I get Rocky's meat unfit for human consumption from a local butcher. Liana said that all the carrots except those destined to be eaten by prisoners were decent quality. What Liana described as rubbish are not fed to horses or thrown away but are instead sold to the Prison Service for human consumption, albeit by prisoners. According to the Prison Rules, prisoners food rations are required to be sufficient in both quality and quantity. I think I will be having a word with the Director General of the H.M.Prison Service, Phil Wheatley, and make him aware not only of the Russian/Latvian Mafia connection to the contract awarded by the Prison Service, but also ask if he is aware that food not deemed fit for animals is being fed to humans, prisoners, whom he has a responsibility to care for.

Gingersnaps

I came across this brilliant piece of blogging and reproduce it here in full and supply this link if anyone wants to visit the site and read the comments or see whatever else might interest you from gingersnaps.


On Death Row

With my new job came an entirely new field of work in this journey called my career. I found much satisfaction in being able to minister to patients, families, visitors, and co-workers in my time at Baptist Hospital. Now, I am completely amazed at the opportunity that has been given me to learn more than about a field that I had never dreamed I would be a part of. I am working for an advocacy organization whose goal is to raise public awareness of the flaws in our criminal justice system, namely, in the administration of capital punishment in this state.

I have been reading up on this subject, and am mystified at the poor representation and process of evidence gathering and witness testimony when another life hangs in the balance. This isn’t about the crime the defendant did or did not commit, but the careless manner in which our system chooses who gets the death penalty and who doesn’t and why the death penalty is an option at all.

Disclaimer: I do not pretend to know even the most basic tenants of this subject, as I am only a week into this job and have only begun to research the mission of this organization. I have a lot to learn.

And finally, the entire reason for this post…

Yesterday, I was given the opportunity to go with one of my bosses to visit Abu-Ali Abdur’Rahman at the Riverbend Maximum Security Correctional Facility here in Nashville. This is probably hard for some of you to believe, but I had never been to a jail before in my life, much less the state’s maximum security facility where Tennessee’s most notorious criminals reside.

I have to admit that I was a bit excited about going. I wasn’t really nervous, but my anticipation built as we were driving there, because I knew that I was getting to do something that not many get to…and that’s talk one on one with a man who came within hours of dying by lethal injection. A man who experienced the Death Watch.

I’m not sure what I was expecting, but the front area of the place reminded me of where you get your drivers license. Very, um, “state facility built in the 70s” looking. We got signed in, screened, and on our way to the next set of checkpoints. The only thing I was allowed to take was my ID. Not even some cards that we wanted to take to Abu-Ali. Anyway, we went through our second screening area, and then walked outside through the frigid cold to his “pod”. I think I also imagined that I would be walking past a bunch of cells with men beating on the bars and heckling me (like in the movies), but the only time I saw any other inmates was through a wooden fence where they were having their outside time. It sounded like two guys were having an argument–a lot of yelling. I just kept walking–fast–to get over to Abu-Ali’s pod.

The lobby area was very small, with a guard and a sign-in book. I was overwhelmed at the smell of the building. It reminded me of the way that the rest stops along the Florida Turnpike smelled when I was a kid. I don’t know if that is an antiseptic or what, but it wasn’t very pleasant, and took awhile for me to get acclimated to. The guard radioed back to another guard to bring in Abu-Ali, and we sat in a very small room with 3 chairs, and bars on the windows. On the door going back into the area where the inmates live, there was a hole where they had to reach their hands through to get their handcuffs taken off.

So in comes Abu-Ali with no big presentation of the guard taking off cuffs and shackles…just a guy in a white and blue jumpsuit carrying a very large file folder of papers. My boss introduced me to him, and he gently shook my hand. I was taken aback at how soft-spoken and gentle this guy who was supposed to be a hardened criminal was.

The conversation that ensued was fascinating. He talked to me about a little of his life story. Here is an excerpt from the organization’s website:



“Abu-Ali suffered extreme physical, sexual and emotional abuse at the hands of his parents. As a child, Abdur’Rahman and his two siblings were abandoned by their mother. She put the three children in a taxi, drove them to the woods, and left them. The taxi driver later collected the children and turned them over to the state. Abdur’Rahman was repeatedly beaten with a leather strap by his father, who also struck his penis with a baseball bat. He was made to remove his clothes, placed hog-tied in a locked closet, and tethered to a hook with a piece of leather tied around the head of his penis. At an early age, Abdur’Rahman was described by mental health professionals as “highly disturbed,” “very sick,” and in need of commitment. He has been diagnosed as having Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, and Disassociative Disorder. Abdur’Rahman’s brother committed suicide in 1996, and his sister attempted suicide on numerous occasions and was institutionalized repeatedly for mental illness. Her whereabouts are currently unknown.”

Because of his disdain and disgust at anybody who would endanger a child, Abu-Ali had become a sort-of vigilante, attempting to act as a civil “police” in his neighborhood. He and his partners had entered the home of his victim with the intent to scare him away from selling drugs to the kids in that neighborhood, when it all went terribly wrong.

At this point in the conversation, Abu-Ali said something that I think will stick with me my entire life. In talking about what it is like on the streets and in the ghetto neighborhoods he has lived in, he said that with all of the focus our country has put on fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan and Iraq, he has witnessed and fought the “Taliban” in his own war zone-like neighborhoods. The evil of this world does not only reside in the Middle East. It is in our own backyards….so why are we putting all of our time and money there and not here where our own are suffering and dying everyday?

Abu-Ali has become a mentor to the younger inmates. He has gotten his Paralegal degree through a mail correspondence course, and has been appointed the counsel between inmates who have gotten themselves into trouble and the guards. He is a very, very spiritual man who talked about how he converted to Islam, but has chosen to study all beliefs so as to have a more universalistic understanding of God. He condemned what the Jihadists are doing, and quoted scripture from the Koran to back his condemnation up. There was so much he talked about that I wish I could have had a tape recorder. I was completely enamoured with this whole conversation, sitting on the edge of my seat the entire time.

Abu-Ali is a poet and an artist. He shared some of his poetry and articles with me. There is actually a newsletter that the inmates write and publish each week, and he gave me one of those to take with me. Some of his art was amazing. With all of the time they have on their hands, I’m sure that the development of any talent is born out of necessity to relieve the boredom. It was pretty cool to see some of his work.

Finally, at the end of our visit he asked if my boss had those cards…the cards weren’t for him, they were for him to send out to people. He said that in his years there, he hadn’t missed one birthday of the 45 or so people he sends one to. He asked that we really try to get those to him so he wouldn’t miss anyone’s birthday. I thought that to be quite interesting. I am good at discerning a snow job…it may take a little time, but I usually can spot a con artist. At the same time, I always try to see the good in people, no matter what the circumstances. This guy seems to have a truly good heart. He seems like somebody who is a perfect candidate for psychological and social rehabilitation.

So why on earth is this guy on Death Row?

I’m not a Death Penalty abolitionist. In fact, I had never given it much of a thought until the opportunity to work in this field was presented to me. After hearing this guy’s background, case history, and overall story, I have come to question what our system is doing exactly. It seems as if as an entire society, the punishment is not fitting the crime. That goes from Elementary School up. From not enough punishment to it being over the top out of proportion.

As we left the prison, I had to just be silent and process the experience. It has taken me until this morning to put it into some very uneloquent words, but it is what it is.

My visit to Death Row has provoked a spiritual awakening inside of me for something that I never had even given much thought to. Jesus visited the prisoners. He was a friend to the indigent. Don’t get me wrong, He taught justice. However, more so He focused on the spirit of the person, and didn’t hold their past against them.

That is the kind of compassion I want.

~ by Ginger on February 17, 2007.


http://gingersnaps.wordpress.com/2007/02/17/on-death-row/

Mr Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, as I understand it, is searching for his legacy. Putting Iraq aside, might I suggest that he will find it in the "£350m black hole in new prison plan" (Alan Travis, Guardian, 17 February 2007)? In particular, in the prison numbers which have risen from 60,000 in 1997 to the present 80,000. Juliet Lyon, Director of the Prison Reform Trust, claims that the government is turning the country into a penal colony. And, its going to get worse before it gets better because reoffending rates are at a record level.

I have no sympathy for John Reid, the Home Secretary, for the present prison crisis some of which he is to blame for creating himself. In particular, announcing that he intended to create 8,000 extra prison places, at a cost of £44,000 per prisoner per year, that's £352m annually. This is on top of the £1.7bn needed to build the prisons. One of the problems is that John Reid made his announcement before asking Gordon Brown, the Chancellor, whether he could have the money to extend his empire. Brown refused on the ground that he has frozen the Home Office budget for 3 years. The cost of Tony Blair's private war with Iraq and the cost of waging a war on a non-existent terror has left a large hole in the Chancellor's pocket. Reid has been informed that he must meet the costs of these prison places by making cuts elsewhere, for example, in the budgets for the police, probation and immigration.

It is intended that the £1.7bn will be raised from the private sector. There is something distasteful about making profits from imprisonment. Those lobbying for more prison places and a larger prison population and longer sentences are those who stand to profit from the English prison business. The public are not aware that they are paying for two prison systems running in parallel, the public and the private sector. There should only be one penal system. And, surely commonsense suggests that the less people sent to prison the better it is for society? Too many criminal laws and too many prisons are not about law and order. You cannot build yourself out of this crisis, only dig a deeper hole. The answer is to embark on a policy of reductionism.

Paul Staines (aka) Guido Fawkes sue me and see if I care...

Paul Staines (aka) Guido Fawkes sue me and see if I care...

From the blog Paul Staines is a cunt. Hat-tip to the blog's author Guido's executioner.

mercredi 14 février 2007
Tory student leader in ‘ racist ‘ party link / Paul Delarie-Staines of FCS attempts to form pact with British National Party in Hull

The Guardian 31 May 1986

Tory student leader in ‘ racist ‘ party link / Paul Delarie-Staines of FCS attempts to form pact with British National Party in Hull
By David Rose

A leader of the Federation of Conservative Students wrote to an organiser of the British National Party proposing joint ‘direct action’ to disrupt the meetings of leftwing students. Secrecy, he emphasised, was essential: ‘The Reds would simply go wild if they got to hear of a BNP-FCS link. I would personally be in danger of being expelled from the Conservative Party.’

The author of the letter is Mr Paul Delarie-Staines, the chairman of the federation’s 50-strong branch at the Humberside college of Higher Education. Mr Delarie-Staines, who is in his first year of a degree course in business information studies, wrote on May 22 to Mr Ian Walker, a BNP organiser in Hull.

He was, he said, against several of the aims of the BNP, which campaigns for the repatriation of black citizens. Several of its members have been convicted of offences under the Race Relations Act, and others for crimes of violence against ethnic minorities. Its leader, Mr John Tyndall, is a former chairman of the National Front.

Mr Delarie-Staines said he did not share the BNP view on immigration: as a member of the ‘libertarian’ faction of the FCS he advocated the free movement of labour, albeit with the caveat that ‘you come here to work - or starve. ‘

He went on: ‘I share a lot of your objectives.‘ These included a return to leadership and statesmanship, the abolition of the welfare state, and ‘the elimination of Communism in Britain - the mass media, the trade unions, and the schoolroom. ‘

Mr Delaire-Staines continued: ‘Nevertheless, even though we have our differences, I know a lot of BNP people at college do support the FCS (some are members of the FCS). I can certainly envisage some degree of cooperation.

‘For instance, we are moving away from just the normal political debate and towards more direct action - anti-Communist slogans on bridges, disrupting the leftist meetings by posing as leftists and then causing trouble, and also convincing individual leftists of the error of their ways.

‘Perhaps members of the BNP would care to join us in our anti-leftist activities. We can arrange a meeting to discuss possible joint future activities. ‘

Other examples of Mr Delaire-Staines work reached the Guardian, including a number of songs. One, entitled FCS Bootboys, reads: ‘Gas them all, gas them all, the Tribune group trendies and all. Crush Wedgwood Benn and make glue from his bones, Burn the broad left in their middle class homes.

‘Yes we’re saying goodbye to the Left, as safe in their graveyards they rest. ‘Cos they’ll get no further, we’ll stop with murder, the bootboys of FCS. ‘

In a letter to a friend, Mr Delaire-Staines said that he had been on a ‘community arts course - well. not exactly community arts, more spraypainting a bridge at 3am. Quite good fun really, ducking out of sight of passing police cars’

Mr Delaire-Staines told the Guardian that he had not meant violence by direct action at leftist meetings, only ‘causing as much noise as possible’. He said that he had tried to forge links with the BNP because ‘we share their anti-Communist view’.

He added: ‘They’re not far-right. They’re just racists, they believe in one colour. ‘

Mr John Barrow, the national chairman of FCS and a Lambeth councillor, said that Mr Delaire-Staines was ‘a bit silly. I wouldn’t hold it against him. I’m sure he’ll grow out of it.’ After hearing extracts from the letter to the BNP he added. ‘He’s absolutely right that he’s in danger of being thrown out of the Conservative Party.’

Mr James Goodsman, the Conservative Central Office official responsible for the FCS, said: ‘If the evidence comes my way I will certainly look into it.

Tee hee hee...

I have often wondered how Supermarkets can price their products so cheaply. Yesterday I came across a clue. The carrots that Liana packs for Poskitts via Deepmist Ltd employment agency, and for which she is paid £4.00 per hour, £1.35 per hour below the National Minimum Wage, are destined for the shelves of ASDA. It would be nice of ASDA to tell its customers why that's ASDA price!

UPDATE (Sunday): I think it was brazen of the Russian/Latvian Mafia to publish the warning too me (on Draugiem.lv)to remain silent on this affair, especially as it was accompanied by a couple of photos of those issuing the threat. It has strengthened my resolve to expose this further...

Just before Christmas I put out my wheelie bin the night before the morning the council send a lorry to collect the waste. The next day I went about my business. When I checked the emptied bins, mine was missing. So, I telephoned the council to report this absence and inquired whether it could have ended up in the back of the wagon along with the waste. I reasoned that nobody would steal a full wheelie bin. Several days went by before the council phoned me back and conceded that my wheelie bin had mistakenly ended up in the back of the wagon and that they would order me another one. When the new one arrived, I painted my address on this like I had done with the previous one. I missed the first collection day after Christmas, but put my wheelie bin out in time for the second week. I couldn't believe that it had gone missing the second time! I phoned the council who said that I would have to pay for a replacement. I refused to do this on the ground that it is not my fault if my wheelie bin keeps doing a disappearing act. The following week, I am taking my dog for a walk and lo and behold amongst the emptied bins I see my first wheelie bin. I recognised my writing where I had painted the house number, even though the remainder of it had been rubbed off. I reclaimed my wheelie bin, and repainted the missing address. This week I keep an eye out, and when the dustbin men had emptied my wheelie bin I rushed straight out and collected it. A little later, I go out to take the dog for a walk and there before me is my second wheelie bin still with my address painted upon it and belatedly being wheeled out of the back of the house that backs onto the front of my house. I confronted the tenant that he was in possession of a wheelie bin with my address painted upon it. His solution was to offer to scrape my address off the wheelie bin as if that was the problem! I got the impression that he has been released from a mental hospital and that he is now being cared for in the community.

This just in from BBC News Scotland.

Court rules on prison voting ban

Prisoners are currently banned from voting
Legal action is being considered which could stop the Scottish Parliament election from taking place because prisoners are excluded from voting.
It follows a ruling at the Court of Session in Edinburgh that the elections would be incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights.

The UK Government had set up a consultation process following a European Court ruling in 2005.

But legislation would not be introduced before Scotland's elections in May.

It is understood that a number of prisoners are already undertaking legal action to prevent the poll from taking place.

Not compliant

Three judges at Scotland's supreme civil court issued a declaration that the blanket ban on convicted prisoners voting was incompatible with their human rights.

A former prisoner, who was denied the right to vote in the last elections for the Holyrood parliament, took his case to the Registration Appeal Court in Edinburgh.

Lord Abernethy, who heard the appeal with Lord Nimmo Smith and Lord Emslie, said the May elections would take place in a way which was not compliant with the European Convention on Human Rights.

The judges said they had come to the view that they "should make a formal declaration of incompatibility to that effect".

It is accepted by the government that there will be no amending legislation before the Scottish parliamentary election in May 2007

Lord Abernethy

The appeal arose after a serving prisoner, William Smith, had his application to be included on the electoral roll in 2003 rejected.

Lord Abernethy said Mr Smith's case was "of far-reaching importance".

"It is accepted by the government that there will be no amending legislation before the Scottish parliamentary election in May 2007," he said.

"We fully understand why the Government does not at this stage wish to rush forward with amending legislation but the fact remains that the Scottish parliamentary election in May 2007 will take place in a manner which is not Convention-compliant."

In 2005 a prisoner in England, John Hirst, who was serving life for manslaughter, won a decision over voting rights at the European Court of Human Rights.

I was disturbed in more ways than one last night, when at 8.45 Liana slammed the door knocker as I was at my computer waiting for Blogger TV to come on at 9 on 18doughtystreet.com the internet TV station. She brought me a bag of carrots from the food factory where she is now working. I told her they looked like giant dildos. I am not sure that she understood. She said she had been working 13 hours with only 1 hour for lunch. And that she is working 6 days a week, and refused to work 7 days when she was asked to. That's a long day taking into account travelling time etc. And having to pay for the transport to and from work. Then she dropped the bombshell, that she was only being paid £4 per hour! That's at least £1.35 below the National Minimum Wage. She just said by way of explanation, "Russian Mafia". I would like to pursue this abuse, but it is hard enough for her to get work in the first place and there is a danger that if I chased this matter up she would find herself out of work again and unable to claim any State benefit. The irony is that we live in Hull where William Wilberforce the anti-slavery campaigner lived. It appears that nothing has really changed...

The Daily Telegraph is running an E-Poll, is John Reid 'fit for purpose'? Yes 19%, No 81%. This result does not reflect the public confidence in the system that John Reid was hoping to achieve. Over the weekend in the Sunday Telegraph, John Reid announced that he was proposing to reorganise the Home Office. It is planned to have a department for Homeland Security which John Reid is keen to run, and a new department which is to become the Ministry for Justice. It was originally planned for Lord Falconer to run this department. However, it transpires that such a department would require accountability which only a MP can provide, and not someone from the House of Lords. Therefore, who is likely to head this new department from the House of Commons? One thing for certain is that it won't be Hilary Clinton, for obvious reasons. Nor will it be Anthony Wedgewood Benn, again for obvious reasons. Could it just be that a combination of these two might just be a marriage made in heaven for John Reid? I have been advised to: "Watch the news carefully over the next few days to test your cynicism levels". Why don't you do the same?

"Blair wants 'super-Asbos' for violent thugs" is the headline of David Cracknell's article in The Sunday Times, (14 January 2007). It is irresponsible of this "Political Editor", and The Sunday Times, to print such a headline which is clearly untruthful. This becomes apparent upon reading the first paragraph: "Tony Blair is to mount a final assault on Britain's thug culture by introducing restrictions that will curb potential yobs' movements even before they have committed an offence".

I suspect that there is no such thing as a "Britain's thug culture". Even if some smart arsed social scientist proves me wrong in this respect, there is no justification for the State to infringe the civil liberties of innocent youths by placing restrictions on their freedom of movement. There is no such thing as a "potential yob", one either is or is not a yob. It is pure witchdoctory to predict who may offend in the future. The principle of innocent until proven guilty should not be removed nor should the principle be stood on its head. If someone has not committed an offence, then they are innocent and should be allowed to go about their law-abiding business unmolested by State interference.

It is quite frightening that Tony Blair is considering attempting to use the civil courts to impose Violent Offender Orders (VOOs), where the standard of proof is lower than under the criminal law needed for the criminal courts, and yet it is planned to make it a criminal offence to breach one of these VOOs imposed upon an innocent youth and the penalty could be 5 years in prison for not having committed any criminal offence. Our jails are already overcrowded with the guilty, adding to this 80,000 plus with how many innocents? This is plain madness. Tony Blair and John Reid should be locked up in a mental hospital before they do any more damage.

On Wednesday 10th January 2007, it was a busy day for me. At 9am, I did a Radio 5 Live interview for an hour, on the Grand Chamber hearing of Dickson v. The United Kingdom (app.no. 44362/04), in which a convicted murderer claimed that it was a breach of his human rights under Article 8 and Article 12 of the Convention, for the State to refuse access to artificial insemination facilities.

Then at 1.45pm, I was in the magistrates court in Hull, acting as a "McKenzie Friend", for my Latvian friend, Liana, who had been prosecuted for non-payment of council tax. It is strict liability, it is no defence to be destitute. As Latvia is one of the A8 States, migrants are not entitled to any State benefits unless they have worked for 12 months without a break. I think that it is unfair to expect everyone who comes over here from another European State is automatically going to get a job and stay in that job for the required period. I feel that there should be a safety net for the less fortunate. Although the magistrates granted the council a liability order against Liana, it was not for the full amount claimed by the council, nor did the magistrates grant the council and order for £65 costs against Liana. As Liana will only be liable for between £40-50 in council tax, it cost the council using taxpayers money, at least £15 more than the sum claimed to claim this amount. Talk about a waste of money!

At 6.20pm, I did another radio interview on the artificial insemination case, this time it was for Radio London.

Sunday morning at 9 'O Clock, I have another interview with Radio Birmingham. I would have preferred to stay in bed...

Rachel North London, whom I have a lot of time for and respect, highlighted on her blog an issue that is close to my heart. And that issue is bullying on the internet. Bullying in any form is totally unacceptable behaviour. It ironic that last night Rachel appeared on 18doughtystreet.com, the internet TV station, hosted by Iain Dale, to discuss the issue of internet bullying, when Iain Dale allows this type of thing to go on his blog Iain Dale's Diary. I thought it was irresponsible of Iain Dale to try to shrug it off as having nothing to do with him, on the ground that he is ignorant of the law on this issue. However, the legal maxim applies "ignorance of the law is no excuse". He is both the author and publisher of his blog, and is therefore legally liable for its content. He has adopted the its his blog he can do what he likes with it stance. He can as long as it is within the constraints of the law. Nobody is above the law not even Iain Dale. His attitude reminds me of some prison governors and the Home Secretary who believe that they are law unto themselves until challenged in the courts and judges tell them otherwise. But he is not alone with this couldn't care less attitude, Guido Fawkes behaves in a similar vein. Perhaps there should be a test case in the courts so that blog authors are taught the limits of acceptable behaviour on the internet?

I note that on Donal Blaney's blog that he does not allow anonymous posters. I think that this is a good idea. But it is not just the anonymous posters who post malicious and harrassing and libellous communications, there are the likes of "peter hitchens" and "verity" who are particularly bad examples of good conduct on the blogs. They feel that they are safe, however, it is not called the long arm of the law for nothing.

I advocate freedom of speech which is not an absolute right. There is a saying in prison that a few bad examples spoil it for the many. And this appears to be true of the blogosphere. If there is not going to be self regulation, then it should be for Parliament and/or the courts to regulate. Parliament has passed the Protection from Harrassment Act 1997, and the Malicious Communications Act 1988. Perhaps, they should be invoked to see if they are sufficient to stem this growing nuisance?

Shit or bust...

Shit or bust...

I remember the day Phil Wheatley, the then Deputy Governor of H.M.Prison Gartree, walking into the Tailors Shop and as Tip Guilfoyle distracted the Chief Officer, Jimmy Stevens went and put a bucket of shit and piss that the IRA had supplied over Phil Wheatley's head and patted it down for good measure. The alarm bell rang and the Heavy Mob ran into the shop and for a split second I could see that they did not know whether to laugh or cry as the Deputy Governor tried to pull turds out of his ginger beard.

Phil Wheatley's beard has gone grey now and he is the Director General of H.M.Prison Service. That he rose through the ranks did not surprise me. When I asked him at Hull Prison, where he was the Governor, why he had joined the service, he replied "power". He's a minature meglomaniac. He is also a good friend of mine. Once he told me that I was too truthful for my own good. I disagree with him, but I know what he meant. Some people do not like the truth. I found he would not try to defend the indefensible. He said he preferred to apologise and move on and try and see that the same mistake was not made again.

The Prison Service is very inward looking, it does not take kindly to criticism, and gets very embarrassed very easily. It is a shame that Phil Wheatley is getting a hard ride at the moment from the media. The National Association of Probation Officers (NAPO), is pissed off that John Reid intends to get rid of some public sector probation officers and replace them with some from the private sector. Therefore it has decided to embarrass the Prison Service. First it attacked the amount of lifers and rapists who go to open prisons, now it is attacking the amount who abscond from open prisons. How many recalls do the probation officers instigate where the Parole Board has to release them again because the probation service has cocked it up?

It does appear as though Phil Wheatley is in the shit again. Instead of from the head down, this time it is from the feet up. What is interesting from my point of view, is that NAPO is using the same tactics employed by the IRA.

I will ask the question if nobody else will, what is someone as corrupt, or incompetent, or both, as Charles Falconer doing in a public office? I know he is a friend of Tony Blair and that the Prime Minister appointed him to office. However, the Department of Constitutional Affairs is responsible for justice, rights and democracy. In my view, the Prisoners' voting rights consultation paper Written ministerial statement http://www.dca.gov.uk/pubs/statements/2006/st061214.htm by the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs and Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer of Thoroton, appears to be irresponsibly drafted. In other words, it is another dodgy document.

It cannot be comfortable for the government to be taken to the highest court in Europe by a legally unqualified jailhouselawyer, who suffers from a form of autism called Aspergers Syndrome, and to suffer such a humiliating defeat when their qualified lawyers were unable to defend the indefensible. I pay attention to detail. For example, Lord Falconer's opening paragraph is not only outdated but is also nonsensical. He claims that the right to vote in the UK is a privilege. A right is one thing and a privilege is another. In HIRST v. The United Kingdom (No2)(Application No. 74025/01), “The applicant submitted that the right to vote was one of the most fundamental rights which underpinned a truly democratic society. It was not a privilege, contrary to the view expressed by the Secretary of State in February 2001”. The Court agreed with my argument. Having lost this argument, why is the Lord Chancellor regurgitating it here? He claims that his view has the considered support of many, but does not produce any evidence to support his claim. He claims “that persons who are convicted of an offence serious enough to warrant a term in prison have cast aside that privilege and entitlement for the duration of their sentence”. However, “the Court does not consider that a Contracting State may rely on the margin of appreciation to justify restrictions on the right to vote which have not been the subject of considered debate in the legislature and which derive, essentially, from unquestioning and passive adherence to a historic tradition”.

For the first time in history the government was questioned on its blanket ban on convicted prisoners being denied the franchise. It looked around for justification. The best the government could come up with was arguments that the Canadian government had already argued and lost in court. Therefore, it is untruthful to claim that “Successive UK Governments have held to the view that the right to vote forms part of the social contract between individuals and the State, and the loss of the right to vote, reflected in current law, is a proper and proportionate punishment for breaches of the social contract that resulted in imprisonment. That remains this Government's position, and that of a number of other Council of Europe states”. The government lost first in the Chamber, and then lost its appeal to the Grand Chamber, and then has the audacity to claim it still holds those views after two defeats? Before the case, a minority of Member States operated blanket bans on prisoner voting. As a result of the case, these Member States have changed their position. The UK is alone on this one, the odd man out in Europe.

Because the government is in an uncomfortable position, it has resorted to the tactic of procrastination. As the issue has to be debated in Parliament, the consultation process is a meaningless exercise. When the government did not want to give women the vote, it decided to talk about women and the vote rather than give women the vote. This is just history repeating itself. I suspect that the government is trying to drag it out until after the next election. The published consultation document does not consider the principles of prisoner enfranchisement, nor does it include all the options available to the UK. Moreover, the document puts up for consideration the total disenfranchisement for all convicted prisoners, which the Court has ruled out as not being within the terms of the Convention.

Given that the government recognises that it must respond to the Grand Chamber judgment. Why does it not recognise that it should respond with honesty?

This morning I posted the following on Conservative Home.



On the subject of blogs.

Tory A List candidate Iain Dale who has a blog called Iain Dale's Diary, yesterday spat his dummy out and threw it out of his pram. On his blog he operates a system called comment moderation, which allows the blog author the opportunity to read comments submitted before deciding whether to publish or not publish any comment.

Rachel North London, a survivor of the 7/7 bomb attack, also runs a blog. And she questioned Iain Dale's judgment on allowing a comment to be published on his blog which not only attacked me but was off topic. I read this comment by someone claiming to be Peter Hitchins, and posted a moderate response to this rabid attack, which Iain Dale also published.

Oddly, Iain Dale then proceeded to throw out the baby with the bath water in a tantrum one would not and should not expect from someone who wants us to elect him to become a MP. That is, he punished the innocent along with the guilty by banning me from posting further comments. I fought a case and won the right for prisoners to speak to the media. Only to face unfair censorship by Iain Dale. If he behaves like this now, what can we expect if he ever came into real power?

Iain Dale is guilty of publishing a libel on his blog. The least he should do now is apologise to the injured party, and set the record straight. He has allowed his blog to degenerate to the gutter level of that other Tory blog operated by Guido. Unless the Tory Party cleans up its act, it can forget about winning over the electorate. Sleaze is just as dirty in opposition. Perhaps, it is for the best that it is going down the drain.

Posted by: John Hirst | 20 December 2006 at 13:20

I await Iain Dale's response.

I came across the following load of crap in the Torygraph. Although they invited comments, no comments are recorded. I submitted my comment, which they did not publish, so I add it here at the end of this piece of garbage.

Prisoners don't care about their right to vote

By Jonathan Aitken
Last Updated: 2:56am GMT 15/12/2006

Comment on this story Read comments

Of all the troublesome problems and pressures facing Britain's ever-increasing prison population, the one that led to yesterday's judgement by the European Court of Human Rights on votes for prisoners must rank in importance about as high as tiddlywinks does in the Olympics.

The ECHR's advice (and I hope our MPs remember that in constitutional terms it is no more than advice) for the UK Government to give prisoners the right to vote while serving their sentences will no doubt get a full hearing and airing by the chattering classes.

But the criminal classes are likely to be less impressed. I can offer some well-informed guesses about how my old cellmates in HMP Belmarsh might react to the news that their Christmas present from Brussels is to be a new right to put their crosses on ballot papers from behind bars.

Indifference, incomprehension or dismissive expletives would be their likely responses. By contrast there would be serious interest in almost anything that improved their prison living conditions or their post-release employment prospects. So it needs to be recognised that this issue is much more about the priorities of European lawyers than the anxieties of British prisoners.

Let's hope that Parliament will be given the chance to debate and vote on this judgement by the ECHR for it raises moral, practical and constitutional questions that go deeper than the Whitehall establishment's usual reaction to questionable ECHR pronouncements: "We never refuse to write the Court's judgement into UK statute law."

The moral argument for ignoring the ECHR's advice starts with the commonsense view that prison is meant to be a punishment. A custodial sentence has always resulted in loss of freedom and loss of democratic rights for the duration of a prisoner's sentence. Why change that? Is there any moral imperative for such a change?

According to John Hirst, the former life sentence prisoner now released on licence who won his case before the ECHR: "The human rights court has agreed with us that the Government's position is wrong – it doesn't matter how heinous the crime, everyone is entitled to have the basic human right to vote."

The problem here is that what Mr Hirst and the European judges consider a basic human right is the opposite of what many human rights respecting nations including Britain, the United States and Australia, have long considered to be basic common sense.

The main point of a prison sentence is to show the offender and society as a whole that criminal behaviour results in loss of freedom and most of the rights that freedom offers.

Different societies may wish to argue about precisely which rights should be suspended along with liberty as the cost to the individual of criminal wrongdoing. But the place for this argument to be held is in national legislatures who even in today's EU still have control over criminal laws and penalties.

To pretend that voting is something as "basic" as the right of access to a lawyer is at best special pleading and at worst judicial meddling in the right of EU member states to decide how they will punish their criminal offenders.

The practical reasons for opposing the legislative changes required by the ECHR judgement will be less obvious to outsiders than insiders. But to give an insight into the problems which could be created for prison officers by this new voting right for prisoners, let us make an imaginary visit to the Isle of Sheppey in the General Election of 2008 where the sitting Labour MP, Derek Wyatt will be defending a majority of 79.

I know one part of Mr Wyatt's electorate all too well, the three prisons on the island – HMPs Swaleside, Elmley and Standford Hill – for I was incarcerated in two of them. Between them these jails currently house 2,224 inmates. They probably make up the biggest single interest group in the constituency.

Will Mr Wyatt and his opposing candidates be allowed to canvass the prisoners, to address them at public meetings and to answer their questions? If not will yet more "basic rights" be infringed in the opinion of the ECHR?

But even if some modicum of common sense prevails, these prison voters will be sure to be highly interested, if not highly excited by the promises they are or are not made by the competing candidates via letter and leaflet.

So spare a thought for the prison officers of Sheppey, who already often struggle in a tinderbox situation to maintain order, calm and discipline. Suddenly they will have to cope with the atmospherics of a marginal seat during the run-up to an election in which every vote counts.

"Getting lairy with the screws" (uppity and argumentative – or worse – with the officers) is already an occupational hazard in the prisons of Sheppey. Charles Dickens' Eatanswill by-election will seem tame by comparison to what might happen among the imprisoned voters of Mr Wyatt's constituency.

It is possible that this imaginary Eatanswill/Sheppey situation that I envisage might be avoided by only allowing prisoners to vote in their own constituencies, although this will be easier said than done because so many prisoners are of "no fixed abode" and others are truly local to their neighbourhood prison.

But whatever the circumstances in whatever the prison voting rights are bound to create tensions, dramas and probably excuses for inmate-to-inmate violence at General Election time.

Unworldly judges sitting in European courts have no idea what life is like at the coalface of Britain's overcrowded prison system so they would probably pooh-pooh the previous paragraphs as exaggerated nonsense. Well, wait and see.

But long before that we will have to wait and see what happens in the House of Commons where much Parliamentary time will have to be expended on making legislative sense of this unwelcome Christmas present from the EHCR.

The Lord Chancellor on The World at One gave a dangerous hostage to fortune when he said yesterday, "Not every convicted prisoner is in the future going to get the right to vote … we need to look and see whether there are any categories that should be given the right."

Oh really? So are we going to have the umpteenth Criminal Justice Bill to categorise one criminal offence after another as qualifying or disqualifying a convicted prisoner for voting? Pull the other one Charlie!

Here's a better idea. The real constitutional issue behind the judgement of the ECHR's is the Court's indefatigable drive for uniformity within the EU. Because some nations in Europe have given their prisoners voting rights, Britain should now do the same, is what the Eurojudges are really saying.

Surely Britain's MPs should exercise their constitutional right and reject the ECHR's advice. Even if it would be the first time it happened that would be one "prison escape" which majority Parliamentary and public opinion would really approve of.

Comment on this story

A golden rule of writing is that author's should only write about what they know. Otherwise they are in danger of making a complete fool of themselves. Jonathan Aitkin should have borne this in mind when penning this piece of rubbish, which is best suited for the waste paper basket.

Prisoners do care about their right to vote. The editor might recall that it was the Daily Telegraph which broke the story about my setting up the Association of Prisoners. This was formed as a direct result of the European Convention being incorporated into the Human Rights Act (1998). And, it was a ballot of the members which decided that obtaining the vote was a priority.

Not only have you spelt judgment wrong, Jonathan, in my judgement, it was not yesterday, but 30th March 2004, when the the ECtHR handed down its judgment. Where have you been all this time, on Planet Zog? Twiddlywinks is a game, the Olympics sport. This is the world of politics. Welcome to it! I thought even you would have known this.

The ECtHR does not give advice. It makes decisions which are binding on Member States. Your advice to MPs, I suspect that they do not really want to hear what you have to say on the issue, is so out of date in this modern world and totally inaccurate. Had you given me this advice I would have sued you for negligence! The constitution has moved on from the days when you read it at public school. Grow up!

You are so well informed that this Xmas present comes from Brussels. Sprouts might. The Court is in Strasbourg! Wherever did you get this notion that Britain is a human rights respecting nation? It has the worst record of human rights violations in Europe. Moreover, there are 50 cases in which the UK has yet to remedy the human rights violations found against the State in the ECtHR.

I think it is a bit cheeky to claim that you are an insider. You were only in long enough for a shit and a shave! Even in there you were an outsider, someone not to be trusted. Anyone who tries to let someone else take the rap for their crime is deemed to be as low as a child molester.

Unworldly judges sitting in European Courts? They are far more wordly-wise than yourself Jonathan, and our judges in the main, and most of our politicians. I wish you well in whatever other profession you choose to dabble in. Leave the professionals to do what they know best.