In no way do I approve whatsoever of the actions of the News of the World and its executives in sanctioning the interception of private telephone messages, but in targeting the mobile telephone of Milly Dowler the then missing schoolgirl they went so far beyond what can be considered acceptable that I am unable to find the words to express my contempt. The fact that over nine years have passed since her disappearance does not make the actions of the NOTW any less deplorable. The then editor and deputy editor have some serious explaining to do as to their role in this mess and why they were not aware, if indeed they were not, exactly how far beyond the bounds their staff were prepared to go to secure a story.
Unfortunately we once again see the hypocritical Labour motormouth John Prescott appearing all over the media calling for Rupert Murdoch’s head, seeking to gain political advantage against the current government without at once acknowledging that at the time of the abduction of poor Milly he was firmly entrenched in power as Deputy Prime Minister in a government which was totally in thrall to the Murdoch press empire. Given the power of his stable of newspapers and Sky TV Labour were at the time delighted to be in receipt of Murdoch’s blessings, after all they had helped secure a second term in office for Blair, Prescott et al.
I do not blame Prescott for not keeping a closer eye on the activities of the NOTW from his grace and favour flat in Whitehall or his country residence provided by the tax payer, after all he was far too busy shagging his diary secretary around then to have any real interest in running the country. There is something about the rank hypocrisy of somebody who knowingly and enthusiastically cheats on his wife yet retains a stance of moral indignation which is positively nauseous in its affront to all that is decent.
I notice that Messrs Brown, Blair, Prescott etc have not sought to assume culpability for the crimes that were committed by their troops during the expenses scandal yet seem it appropriate to go after Rupert Murdoch for crimes committed by his minions. They do not call for the head of a Chief constable when a humble PC is convicted for rape, nor do they go after the head of Terry Leahy when a store manager flogs booze to a teenager so why do they go after Rupert when a humble hack breaks the law and outrages the nation? The editor is the accountable person, not the proprietor unless they have declared that they no longer love Labour which is the big crime of which Mr Murdoch is guilty and for which he will continue to be hounded by the left until such point as he switches his allegiances back to them.
The activity of Prescott in the NOTW scandals of recent months is nothing to do with seeking out the truth, and all about wanting revenge on Rupert Murdoch for having deserted the sinking ship that was Labour under Gordon Brown.
Don’t get me wrong, journalists at NOTW and no doubt other newspapers as well have acted in a disgraceful fashion and those responsible need to be called to account, but to pretend that it is all the fault of Rupert Murdoch tends to undermine your integrity, but if you are johnPrescott you have none to undermine.
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
Tuesday, 28 June 2011
Redressing the balance
There is an inevitability to public sector strikes that will not go away as long as the unions and militant members are able to strike with little or no impunity. It matters little if anything to them if schools and hospitals are closed down because they never have to face up to the consequences of their selfish actions. Schools will not close nor will hospitals as we cannot desert them in favour of more reliable providers; unemployment is not a possible consequence as it was for the private sector strikers of the 1970s and 1980s. As things are at present the power is entirely with the trade union barons on their six figure salaries and it is long past time this balance was redressed.
On Thursday of this week, schools will close because less than 20% of teachers want to strike. This will cause enormous hardship for many families which could involve them in having to take unpaid leave or purchase additional childcare. The victim of this action is not the government, it is the hard working taxpayer and we need the power to fight back.
I do not propose that strikes in the public sector be banned, rather I would like to see anybody who is adversely affected by public sector strikes be given the right to have their quantifiable losses reimbursed by the trade unions who call the strikes. If you have to forego a day’s pay to look after your child because the teachers are on strike, then you should have the right to demand the union calling the strike pay you the wages you have lost. If as a result of a strike on the public transport systems you are unable to get to work, then you can claim the day’s wages from the union.
On Thursday of this week, schools will close because less than 20% of teachers want to strike. This will cause enormous hardship for many families which could involve them in having to take unpaid leave or purchase additional childcare. The victim of this action is not the government, it is the hard working taxpayer and we need the power to fight back.
I do not propose that strikes in the public sector be banned, rather I would like to see anybody who is adversely affected by public sector strikes be given the right to have their quantifiable losses reimbursed by the trade unions who call the strikes. If you have to forego a day’s pay to look after your child because the teachers are on strike, then you should have the right to demand the union calling the strike pay you the wages you have lost. If as a result of a strike on the public transport systems you are unable to get to work, then you can claim the day’s wages from the union.
Wednesday, 23 February 2011
The problem with the NHS
Not all of them obviously, but some are just so ideologically opposed to reform nothing will ever be achieved until they are either retired or replaced by others prepared to countenance change for the better.
Last night on the TV there was a programme featuring Heston Blumenthal who was going to improve the food at Alder Hay Children’s hospital. During the initial part of the show we were treated to a few cameos of bedridden children complaining about the food being boring and disgusting spiced up with a few shots of parents feeding their children food brought in from outside. Nothing new here, jokes about the awful quality of hospital food have been doing the rounds since God was a boy.
The revelatory moments came a few minutes in when Heston went into the kitchens to meet the team of six chefs and found out that of the six four were engaged in cooking for the staff canteen and two were occupied with cooking for the children. The four who were preparing staff meals were using fresh ingredients to prepare attractive meals such as you might eat at home yet the two who were responsible for the children’s meals were busy tipping frozen chips into fryers and opening tins of beans and spaghetti hoops. Like me, Heston was a bit confused about this as we both thought that the main purpose of a hospital was to look after the sick, instead it seems as if the catering operation at Alder Hay is being run as a welfare club for the staff and when the chefs were questioned on this the reasons they gave boiled down to the fact that it had always been done that way.
Next we met who for me was the star of the show, the catering manager, Jeff something or other, who had been at the hospital for around 30 years, who was convinced in his own minds that there was nothing that Heston could teach him about catering and that in fact it would be Heston who would learn from his interaction with the NHS caterers and not him. He was clearly bitter at having had this imposition foisted on him from above and was set upon a course of action that seemed to involve him sticking his fingers in his ears and going la la la la! However despite Jeff’s best efforts, Heston had at least engaged with the chefs a bit and was able to persuade them to go up to the ward and meet the children they were supposed to be feeding. I was amazed that despite some of them having had tens of year’s service in the hospital’s kitchen, none of them had ever been onto a ward and met a patient to find out what they thought of the food. It was at this point that one or two of the chefs finally realised that there was a problem and more importantly they could help to fix it.
From about here on in the programme got into the happy feely mood with the chefs thinking about and ultimately creating food that the children wanted to eat and Heston coming up with his typical fruitloop ideas. We were treated to a final appearance from Jeff decrying the idea that kids like to eat tasty food and that Heston could learn from him before the programme moved towards its inevitable dénouement with kids happily tucking in to the Heston inspired menu and like Oliver Twist coming back for more and the senior managers (way higher up the food chain than Jeff) agreeing to change their ways for ever.
Anyway to cut out further rambling, the problem with the NHS is people like Jeff. They have been in the NHS since leaving school and who be sheer hard work combined with natural talent have hauled themselves onto the bottom rung of management by their mid fifties and are content to serve out their time doing exactly as their predecessors have done for decades. They are not intrinsically bad or evil, far from it, instead they are happy to sit in their little office doing as little as possible, creating nothing nor thinking about what their job should entail. They are calcified in their outlook and not open to any form of change, their only response being that they know what is best because it has worked for years.
As most people know at heart, the NHS is in desperate need of major surgery, and a good place to start would be to get rid of those who say things cannot change and replace them with people who believe that the NHS should be about caring for patients and not about providing safe unchallenging jobs for people trying to fill out the hours between leaving school and drawing a pension. The people who matter most in the NHS are not the doctors or nurses, not the managers or caterers, not the porters or receptionist, not the Trust board members, not even those in Whitehall and Government; the most important people are the patients and the whole shoddy crumbling edifice needs to be redesigned around them and their needs.
For more information about the programme and to watch it on Channel 4 version of iPlayer
Last night on the TV there was a programme featuring Heston Blumenthal who was going to improve the food at Alder Hay Children’s hospital. During the initial part of the show we were treated to a few cameos of bedridden children complaining about the food being boring and disgusting spiced up with a few shots of parents feeding their children food brought in from outside. Nothing new here, jokes about the awful quality of hospital food have been doing the rounds since God was a boy.
The revelatory moments came a few minutes in when Heston went into the kitchens to meet the team of six chefs and found out that of the six four were engaged in cooking for the staff canteen and two were occupied with cooking for the children. The four who were preparing staff meals were using fresh ingredients to prepare attractive meals such as you might eat at home yet the two who were responsible for the children’s meals were busy tipping frozen chips into fryers and opening tins of beans and spaghetti hoops. Like me, Heston was a bit confused about this as we both thought that the main purpose of a hospital was to look after the sick, instead it seems as if the catering operation at Alder Hay is being run as a welfare club for the staff and when the chefs were questioned on this the reasons they gave boiled down to the fact that it had always been done that way.
Next we met who for me was the star of the show, the catering manager, Jeff something or other, who had been at the hospital for around 30 years, who was convinced in his own minds that there was nothing that Heston could teach him about catering and that in fact it would be Heston who would learn from his interaction with the NHS caterers and not him. He was clearly bitter at having had this imposition foisted on him from above and was set upon a course of action that seemed to involve him sticking his fingers in his ears and going la la la la! However despite Jeff’s best efforts, Heston had at least engaged with the chefs a bit and was able to persuade them to go up to the ward and meet the children they were supposed to be feeding. I was amazed that despite some of them having had tens of year’s service in the hospital’s kitchen, none of them had ever been onto a ward and met a patient to find out what they thought of the food. It was at this point that one or two of the chefs finally realised that there was a problem and more importantly they could help to fix it.
From about here on in the programme got into the happy feely mood with the chefs thinking about and ultimately creating food that the children wanted to eat and Heston coming up with his typical fruitloop ideas. We were treated to a final appearance from Jeff decrying the idea that kids like to eat tasty food and that Heston could learn from him before the programme moved towards its inevitable dénouement with kids happily tucking in to the Heston inspired menu and like Oliver Twist coming back for more and the senior managers (way higher up the food chain than Jeff) agreeing to change their ways for ever.
Anyway to cut out further rambling, the problem with the NHS is people like Jeff. They have been in the NHS since leaving school and who be sheer hard work combined with natural talent have hauled themselves onto the bottom rung of management by their mid fifties and are content to serve out their time doing exactly as their predecessors have done for decades. They are not intrinsically bad or evil, far from it, instead they are happy to sit in their little office doing as little as possible, creating nothing nor thinking about what their job should entail. They are calcified in their outlook and not open to any form of change, their only response being that they know what is best because it has worked for years.
As most people know at heart, the NHS is in desperate need of major surgery, and a good place to start would be to get rid of those who say things cannot change and replace them with people who believe that the NHS should be about caring for patients and not about providing safe unchallenging jobs for people trying to fill out the hours between leaving school and drawing a pension. The people who matter most in the NHS are not the doctors or nurses, not the managers or caterers, not the porters or receptionist, not the Trust board members, not even those in Whitehall and Government; the most important people are the patients and the whole shoddy crumbling edifice needs to be redesigned around them and their needs.
For more information about the programme and to watch it on Channel 4 version of iPlayer
Thursday, 11 November 2010
Pulling the Woolas over our eyes
Well, it appears as if Phil Woolas is on his way out of the door, and I for one am not upset. He is undoubtedly the architect of his own misfortune and really has nobody else to blame; he was ultimately responsible for publishing lies about his opponent and has thereby lost the right to represent the constituency of Oldham. I seriously doubt he will be missed in Westminster, he never struck me as particularly good at his job when he had one and given the alacrity with which Harriet kicked him out of the Labour Party I suspect this view is shared by the party hierarchy.
There does however seem to be a strand of opinion doing the rounds within the hallowed walls that even if it was right that he should go, the method of precipitating his departure was wrong; that judges should not have the power to interfere with the will of the people who elected him. This argument may have some merit were it not for the fact that his lies undoubtedly had influence over the result. If his majority had been huge it might not have mattered but seeing as more people voted for candidates other than Woolas and the winning margin was so small there was a pressing need to rerun the election without the lies and half truths.
Amongst the “great and good” at Westminster there are many who believe themselves to be beyond the laws that govern normal mortals and that in matters such as lying to the electorate or trousering expenses to which they have no right, they should only be answerable inwards to their fellow MPs. As we have seen with the expenses scandal there seems to be a marked reluctance to recognise the anger in the country about the behaviour of Parliamentarians and their seeming inability to come to terms with this anger. It is long past the time when we need to wrest back power from this self serving elite who are in the unique position of being able to write their own rules. They fully understand that with every erosion of their status, with each clawing back of power their ability to run Parliament as a cosy little club for their own benefit is diminished; their self awarded authority stripped away and they do not like this one little bit.
Parliament has no power other than that given to it by the people and it is for the people to determine the extent of that power, to vary it and reduce it as the people see fit and the mechanisms for doing so are the ballot box and the courts. As Cameron takes us towards fixed term Parliaments the need for the courts to have the ability to challenge Parliament and its members increases. When I hear MPs saying that the Courts do not have the right to look into their affairs the red mist descends, of course they have the right, without the courts who would protect the rights of the citizen against the state.
We have had the unedifying farce of Messrs Morley, Chaytor and Devine parading through the courts claiming that the laws as they apply to mortal man do not apply to Parliamentarians and they should not be subject to the normal court processes that apply to us if we have been accused of theft; thankfully this has now been adjudicated upon by the Supreme Court who have rightly decided that they are not above the law and I look forward to their trials with anticipation. I trust that if found guilty, incarceration will immediately follow.
There does however seem to be a strand of opinion doing the rounds within the hallowed walls that even if it was right that he should go, the method of precipitating his departure was wrong; that judges should not have the power to interfere with the will of the people who elected him. This argument may have some merit were it not for the fact that his lies undoubtedly had influence over the result. If his majority had been huge it might not have mattered but seeing as more people voted for candidates other than Woolas and the winning margin was so small there was a pressing need to rerun the election without the lies and half truths.
Amongst the “great and good” at Westminster there are many who believe themselves to be beyond the laws that govern normal mortals and that in matters such as lying to the electorate or trousering expenses to which they have no right, they should only be answerable inwards to their fellow MPs. As we have seen with the expenses scandal there seems to be a marked reluctance to recognise the anger in the country about the behaviour of Parliamentarians and their seeming inability to come to terms with this anger. It is long past the time when we need to wrest back power from this self serving elite who are in the unique position of being able to write their own rules. They fully understand that with every erosion of their status, with each clawing back of power their ability to run Parliament as a cosy little club for their own benefit is diminished; their self awarded authority stripped away and they do not like this one little bit.
Parliament has no power other than that given to it by the people and it is for the people to determine the extent of that power, to vary it and reduce it as the people see fit and the mechanisms for doing so are the ballot box and the courts. As Cameron takes us towards fixed term Parliaments the need for the courts to have the ability to challenge Parliament and its members increases. When I hear MPs saying that the Courts do not have the right to look into their affairs the red mist descends, of course they have the right, without the courts who would protect the rights of the citizen against the state.
We have had the unedifying farce of Messrs Morley, Chaytor and Devine parading through the courts claiming that the laws as they apply to mortal man do not apply to Parliamentarians and they should not be subject to the normal court processes that apply to us if we have been accused of theft; thankfully this has now been adjudicated upon by the Supreme Court who have rightly decided that they are not above the law and I look forward to their trials with anticipation. I trust that if found guilty, incarceration will immediately follow.
Wednesday, 10 November 2010
Labour gets a spine.
Ever since Gordon Brown ascended to the top of the greasy pole, one thing seems to have characterised the Labour Party both before the General Election and afterwards, a seeming inability to come to a quick unambiguous decision. This was first evident when Bottler Brown vacillated over when to go to the country; a decision which arguably cost him his job. This failure on the part of Brown to take the big decision dogged his time as PM and seems to have continued under the omni-absent Ed Milliband who has managed to keep very quiet over Woolas, Livingstone’s support of the non-Labour candidate and the Labour Lords.
It is not my intention to intrude upon the private grief of the Labour Party at a time when the dishonesty of many of their Parliamentarians is making so many headlines so I will restrict myself to praising Harriet Harman for her decisive actions in declaring that liars have no place as candidates for Parliament and kicking Phil Woolas into the long grass. I do so hope that this will set some form of precedent not only within Labour but also other parties so that our future MPs are honest trustworthy folk not given to mendacity and self enrichment.
So once again Harriet, congratulations on injecting a bit of backbone and decisiveness into Labour.
It is not my intention to intrude upon the private grief of the Labour Party at a time when the dishonesty of many of their Parliamentarians is making so many headlines so I will restrict myself to praising Harriet Harman for her decisive actions in declaring that liars have no place as candidates for Parliament and kicking Phil Woolas into the long grass. I do so hope that this will set some form of precedent not only within Labour but also other parties so that our future MPs are honest trustworthy folk not given to mendacity and self enrichment.
So once again Harriet, congratulations on injecting a bit of backbone and decisiveness into Labour.
Tuesday, 2 November 2010
Michael Gove, you are going too far.
This is certainly a strange day for democracy; we hear this morning that those who have been convicted of the most heinous of crimes are to be given the right to vote in elections for Parliament, on the grounds that it is their human right to be allowed the vote. These are the people who have taken away the human rights of others by murdering them or raping them or invading their homes or stealing their possessions, not a thought for the human rights of the victims of crime only the perpetrators.
Now we hear that Michael Gove is proposing to sack teachers who are members of the BNP; why for God’s sake? The BNP is a legally constituted political party the same as the Conservative or Labour parties and as such their members and supporters should have the same rights to express their political opinions as the next person. They are not members of a proscribed organisation and whilst that remains the status quo they should be entitled to the same rights as those who hold different political views. What next, will we be proposing a ban on teachers belonging to Labour or SNP or some other party that the government does not like, I do so hope not but fear that this is yet another erosion of personal freedoms.
Don’t get me wrong, I loathe the BNP and the policies they espouse with a passion, but by withdrawing from them the right to work in teaching or the police or the NHS or wherever all we will succeed in doing is to drive them underground. We need to expose them to the light of open unbiased public scrutiny where the fallacies behind their rhetoric can be demolished and their credibility such as it is destroyed.
Michael, you burst forth into the national consciousness earlier this year promising a massive reduction in central control of our schools with decision taking to be devolved to a local level and now hardly six months into your job you are proposing to dictate to schools who they may and may not hire. Please rethink this awful authoritarian throwback policy.
A teacher is supposed to be a professional, and as such there is no place for him or her to be expounding their personal beliefs in front of a class of children, that is wrong and to be deprecated irrespective of those beliefs and any teacher who is found to be attempting to politicise children should be disciplined but it is wrong to arbitrarily punish somebody for their beliefs if they are making no attempt to preach them.
Please Michael, no more blanket bans on groups of people instead allow local head teachers and boards of governors to deal on a case by case basis, that is part of the reason for having them in the first place.
Now we hear that Michael Gove is proposing to sack teachers who are members of the BNP; why for God’s sake? The BNP is a legally constituted political party the same as the Conservative or Labour parties and as such their members and supporters should have the same rights to express their political opinions as the next person. They are not members of a proscribed organisation and whilst that remains the status quo they should be entitled to the same rights as those who hold different political views. What next, will we be proposing a ban on teachers belonging to Labour or SNP or some other party that the government does not like, I do so hope not but fear that this is yet another erosion of personal freedoms.
Don’t get me wrong, I loathe the BNP and the policies they espouse with a passion, but by withdrawing from them the right to work in teaching or the police or the NHS or wherever all we will succeed in doing is to drive them underground. We need to expose them to the light of open unbiased public scrutiny where the fallacies behind their rhetoric can be demolished and their credibility such as it is destroyed.
Michael, you burst forth into the national consciousness earlier this year promising a massive reduction in central control of our schools with decision taking to be devolved to a local level and now hardly six months into your job you are proposing to dictate to schools who they may and may not hire. Please rethink this awful authoritarian throwback policy.
A teacher is supposed to be a professional, and as such there is no place for him or her to be expounding their personal beliefs in front of a class of children, that is wrong and to be deprecated irrespective of those beliefs and any teacher who is found to be attempting to politicise children should be disciplined but it is wrong to arbitrarily punish somebody for their beliefs if they are making no attempt to preach them.
Please Michael, no more blanket bans on groups of people instead allow local head teachers and boards of governors to deal on a case by case basis, that is part of the reason for having them in the first place.
Europe, get out of our lives.
Once again we are being subjected to a piece of European interference with our laws about which there is little if anything we seem able to do. They now wish society to extend the right to vote to those who have repudiated the norms of civil society by committing crimes against the laws of the land. They wish thieves and murderers and rapists and drug pushers to have the same rights as law abiding citizens when it comes to electing our representatives in Parliament and on Councils. This is a decision that flies in the face of common sense; after all they are locked up because they are a negative influence upon society at large.
We lock criminals up for the very good reason that they are not fit to live amongst the rest of us by virtue of their anti-social behaviour and as such they should forego the rights and privileges the rest of us enjoy whilst they are incarcerated.
This latest piece of Euro garbage follows hot on the heels of last weeks debacle at the European council when we were effectively told that whilst we here at home must endure cuts in services and higher taxation to help restore our economy, our unelected Euro Politburo need more money for new offices and higher wages and more staff and it seems there is precious little we can do about it under the present treaty arrangements.
I have no desire to live in a country where we must work until we are 66 or even 70 so the indolent French and Greeks can continue to retire at 62 or 60 or whatever, if they want that luxury then they should pay for it, not me or you.
The time has now come for our Parliament to say NO to these increasing demands upon our wallets and NO to these impositions on the way we rule ourselves. Don’t negotiate with them, don’t argue with them, just say no and keep the cheque book in the pocket. Europe needs the UK far more than the UK needs Europe.
Just tell Barroso and Van Rompuy and the others to go and take a running jump!
We lock criminals up for the very good reason that they are not fit to live amongst the rest of us by virtue of their anti-social behaviour and as such they should forego the rights and privileges the rest of us enjoy whilst they are incarcerated.
This latest piece of Euro garbage follows hot on the heels of last weeks debacle at the European council when we were effectively told that whilst we here at home must endure cuts in services and higher taxation to help restore our economy, our unelected Euro Politburo need more money for new offices and higher wages and more staff and it seems there is precious little we can do about it under the present treaty arrangements.
I have no desire to live in a country where we must work until we are 66 or even 70 so the indolent French and Greeks can continue to retire at 62 or 60 or whatever, if they want that luxury then they should pay for it, not me or you.
The time has now come for our Parliament to say NO to these increasing demands upon our wallets and NO to these impositions on the way we rule ourselves. Don’t negotiate with them, don’t argue with them, just say no and keep the cheque book in the pocket. Europe needs the UK far more than the UK needs Europe.
Just tell Barroso and Van Rompuy and the others to go and take a running jump!
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