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Gordon Brown was bang on the money today in his speech on crime and anti-social behaviour when he said…

…you don’t tackle the fear of crime by cultivating it, by ramping up a public sense of panic, by abusing the figures and claiming our society is broken…

Way to go Gordon. His intervention is a fresh breeze through this debate. Creating fear of crime where none should exist is cynical, dangerous and not worthy of serious politicians. His illustrious predecessor Mr Tony rode to power by kicking off a crime and punishment arms race between New Labour and the Tories, and preying on people’s fears (when he was Shadow Home Secretary he called the murder of James Bulger ‘the ugly manifestations of a society that is becoming unworthy of that name’), so it’s great to see Brown condemning such transparent and tawdry charlatanism and blatant pandering to right-wing tabloidism.

But then, later on in the speech we got…

The next time you hear somebody question the value of retaining DNA profiles from those who have been arrested but not convicted, remember Jeremiah Sheridan. And most of all remember the innocent woman he attacked.

It was futile, one supposes, to expect any kind of consistency or cohesion between arguments when cheap political points need to be scored in an election year. So Brown thought he was well within his rights to use the rape of a disabled woman as a weapon with which to attack his opponents.

In summing up, Gordon says fear of crime is being stoked by the Tories and is a Very Bad Thing. But also, if you don’t back New Labour’s policy on the DNA database, it will mean horrible men will escape justice to continue their reigns of mayhem and terror. Don’t listen to Tory fear-mongering but pay close attention to Gordon’s in case you end up giving comfort to rapists and murderers. Think on.

Trafigura. Gagging. Injunctions. Suppressed reports. Caustic Soda. Freedom of Speech. Carter-Ruck. The Minton Report. The Ivory Coast. Birth defects, miscarriages and deaths…

All you need to know is right here.

(Via Nick Barlow on Twitter)

This ‘anti-police’ line being trotted out by Paul McKeever, chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales, really is a load of bollocks.

Who’s anti-police? Not me. Sure, I’m anti some police covering up their identifying numbers. I’m anti some police using their batons at the slightest provocation. I’m anti some police pushing people over in the streets for the crime of shuffling along with their hands in their pockets. I’m anti some police hammering bits of kids who’ve got their hands in the air and shouting ‘this is not a riot’. I’m anti some police tactics that corral peaceful protesters and passers-by alike for eight hours without water, food or toilets. I’m anti some police shooting a man in the head seven times, smearing his character and doing their best to cover it up.

But anti-police? Does McKeever think me and the likes of me are going to think twice about dialling 999 if someone breaks in tonight? Who of us will think to themselves, as they listen to the burglar creeping about downstairs, ‘hang on, if I phone the police they’re bound to arrive with their numbers covered up and give me a hiding because they’re all bastards. I think I’ll phone the AA instead’?

It’s that same lazy and dishonest thinking that says you’re anti-American if you don’t like the US government cluster-bombing brown children. Or you’re anti-Semitic if you’re unhappy about the Israeli government’s policy towards Palestine. It’s a generalising and a blurring that this thinking demands because an honest examination of the specifics might (and it’s always a small ‘might’, I grant you) lead to accountability and change.

Speaking on the Today programme yesterday, Derek Barnett, vice president of the Police Superintendents’ Association of England and Wales, said this of the policing of the G20 protest:

We ought to put that in context of violence and the circumstances of thousands of protesters with the sole intention of causing damage to buildings and at the worst injuring and killing police officers.

Killing police officers? I might have missed them so can anyone point me towards the news stories of protesters being arrested for the attempted murder of police officers? Or of confiscated weapons being shown to the media? As far as I can see, just three police officers were injured on April 1. Of course their could be more but where is the CCTV and video footage of protesters attacking police officers? Where are the photos of ‘thousands of protesters’ causing damage to buildings? I trust the police are stopping at nothing to catch these people?

Just asking, like.

Rinse and repeat… Bishopsgate Police Station.

(Via Matt and Tim)

Shocked? Stunned? Not a little amazed? No, me neither.

Now a fresh post-mortem examination has found he died of abdominal bleeding, not a heart attack, as first thought.

Now, what I’d quite like to know now is why the police officer now being interviewed on suspicion of manslaughter hasn’t been arrested on suspicion of manslaughter. Why is this suspect on sick leave and not on remand or on bail?

Why is his name not being splashed all over the media as is usual in these instances? Isn’t it police procedure to leak as many details as possible to tame journalists? We’ve had Ian Tomlinson’s drink and marital problems paraded before us, so where’s the juicy lowdown on Officer X? Just what is it about this case that makes it so different from so many other cases of ugly assault and possible manslaughter, I wonder.

Far be it from me to add to the sum total of ‘meaningless emo-porn‘ doing the rounds today.

Instead I’d like to direct you to two very fine pieces on this 20th anniversary. One by Merrick and one by Chris Applegate.

He covered up his police number and gave a woman half his size the back of his hand and his baton.

Let’s have a crack at the first draft of the script:

Investigation… inquiry… suspension… apologies… one bad apple… unacceptable… as you were… until the next time…

(I particularly enjoyed the officer at 4.30 in the video who tells the photographers to turn around and that ‘there’s nothing to see’. He really said, there’s nothing to see. It reminds me of somebody…)

In other news, the Independent Police Complaints commission chief was wrong when he said there was no CCTV in area of Ian Tomlinson assault. So who told him there wasn’t any and why?

Iraq war: Gordon Brown aims to delay inquiry report until after election
‘Gordon Brown will announce by the autumn a “long” inquiry into the Iraq war, indicating that the potentially embarrassing report will be delayed until well after the general election expected next year’

Kneejerk policies a strain on prison system, says charity
‘The government is failing to rehabilitate offenders, leaving charities to pick up the pieces and running the risk of further strain on the overstretched prison system, according to damning research published today.’

Mass arrests over power station protest raise civil liberties concerns
‘Police have carried out what is thought to be the biggest pre-emptive raid on environmental campaigners in British history, arresting 114 people believed to be planning direct action at a coal-fired power station.’

This is my Hillsborough
‘Twenty years after Britain’s worst football stadium disaster, in which 96 people died, Mike Bracken shares his painful memories for the first time – and describes the ongoing fight for recognition of what really happened’

Following on from the photo of the police medic at the G20 demonstrations, Amjamjazz has published more photos in the sequence.

The police could do their image the world of good by releasing footage of their own of officers trying to restrain their more baton-happy colleagues.

The Guardian publishes the video of Ian Tomlinson being attacked, the Independent Police Complaints Commission aren’t happy.

And what kind of independent body is it whose first reaction to the Guardian’s evidence on Tuesday night was to call at our offices (accompanied by a City of London policeman) and ask for it to be taken off the website?

In more innocent times we’d be shocked. These days it’s more to be expected. You can see why the IPCC would be embarrassed enough to take a policeman down to the Guardian to help cover their tracks. They were taking every word of the police’s version of events at face value when the video came out showing the police as liars and the IPCC as shamefully credulous.

Maybe the P in IPCC needs changing from ‘Police’ to ‘Public’ if the organisation is to continue to get confused over just whose complaints it’s supposed to be investigating.

Merrick has some great comment and links on all of it. And there’s this, which is slowly being forgotten in the rush to nail one policeman:

This was not one bad officer taking the law into his own hands. This sort of assault was endemic that day. I saw it hundreds of times with my own eyes, and I was at the more peaceful climate camp protest, and left before it got kettled then attacked with dogs and batons in the evening.

[...]

Every single officer is behaving like the one who attacked Ian Tomlinson. It is not them acting on private motivations, they have clearly had orders to do it.

This one guy is being dished up as the fall guy for what was a widespread policy of police violence on April 1. It’s fortunate there weren’t more deaths or serious injuries.

And where’s the CCTV footage from that day? Where are the police spotter photos and videos? Lets see the official footage of policemen blocking ambulances.

And little by little, the ‘truth’ has dripped out about Ian Tomlinson, the man who died after being struck by police during the G20 riots.

He was (wait for it) wearing a Millwall shirt. He was (now steady yourselves) smoking a cigarette.

He appeared to be (and I’m sorry but you may need to lie down after this) drunk. Well, stone me guv, he had it coming to him.

Read the rest

(Anyone wanting to follow developments in the investigation into the death of Ian Tomlinson more closely should get themselves along to Google News and set themselves up a comprehensive News Alert.)

'Take two of these and come and see me in the morning'

Now, I’ve never had any medical training so can someone more knowledgeable please tell me what the above procedure is called and what it’s used for in a medical capacity?

(I’m extremely late coming to this but go and read up about Section 76 of the Counter Terrorism Act. Put two and two together and see what you come up with.)

(Via Peter Gasston on Twitter and Bristle)

Update April 11: Sorry this is so late but the photo is copyright Amjamjazz and is used without permission. If Amjamjazz wants to get in touch about my using it then my email address is at the top of the blog.

Updated update: April 11: Amjamjazz has been in touch and has given permission for the photo to be used under the terms of Creative Commons. He’s also got his own blog project with some goodies coming soon.

A great piece by Merrick on police tactics at demonstrations and the complicity of the media.

It seems clear that the police’s aim is to minimise the number of demonstrators. Having talked up a riot in advance, they discourage many people who are sympathetic to the cause from coming out of fear of injury. Then, on the day, by inciting a riot, kettling the crowd or other methods of physical abuse, they discourage people from coming to similar events in future.

‘They do not help him’

You could watch the Guardian’s footage of Ian Tomlinson’s last minutes all day and never stop coming up with questions to ask. What was going through his head at that point, a man on his way home work? An ordinary man is struck by a policeman and gives out his last in the gutter. Is this London?

James Graham says it for me…

I watched it about 20 minutes ago and my heart is still racing. More than anything, it frightens me. That could have been me, minding my own business. If I had been tripped over in that way by a mob of coppers, however angry I might have been I would have been shitting myself. I think my heart could have taken it, but I don’t know. I have absolutely no interest of putting it to the test – and absolutely no way of preventing it from happening if I ever get unlucky. This is what it feels like to be afraid of the state.

It’s the casualness of it all. Everybody’s strolling. They all stop for a look, sort-of-interested, like they’ve seen a beetle wriggling on its back. ‘They do not help him’. The dogs get more attention.

What are the chances of punishment? You know, real punishment like we could expect? Where’s the outcry across the political spectrum, newspapers, blogs and politicians? Where’s the outrage? Power and those who speak for it will be worth watching in the next few days.

If this shows us anything, then it’s that this could have been any of us. You, me, our dads. It could have been one of the Lib Dem MPs on their way home from being legal monitors of the protest. It could have been a city type dressed down for the day (there’s some currently silent who would have been shouting a little louder had that been the case). It could have been Guido Fawkes staggering home from another bender (ditto).

(Tim Ireland has lots of links.)

The man who died during last week’s G20 protests was “assaulted” by riot police shortly before he suffered a heart attack, according to witness statements received by the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

Read the rest

Thousands of people descend on a city to express their passion. A small minority come for trouble and the police present are attacked with bricks and glass bottles. Twenty-seven people are arrested.

They were Swansea FC supporters having a day out in Cardiff last year.

You probably won’t have read about it. The story certainly wasn’t top of every bulletin on every news network.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown did not warn the offenders that ‘violence and intimidation will not be tolerated‘.

(The idea for this post was shamelessly pinched from the venerable Chris Applegate.)

‘The British government abhors torture and would never authorise it or condone it,’ says our fine, upstanding Foreign Secretary and moral paragon, David Miliband. But if a so-called ally in the so-called war against terror wants to soften a fellow up before we question him, well hey, what are you going to do?

But before we rush to judgment, let’s look at how useful the beatings and medieval torture have been…

Upon his return to England after more than four years inside Guantánamo, Mohamed will be taken to a secure, secret location in order for him to be fully rehabilitated by a team of volunteer doctors and psychiatrists. Mohamed will be kept under a “voluntary security arrangement” which involves reporting to the authorities, but he will not be subject to an anti-terror control order. His lawyers reiterate that he has nothing to hide after US terror charges against him were dropped last year.

So there we have it. That’s what mutilating a man’s genitals gets you – precisely bugger all intelligence and a cascade of revolting stories and testimony which, in a universe with proper system of morality, would see this government tossed into prison or one of the more disgusting circles of Dante’s Inferno. How’s them ‘Western Values’ working for you?

Anyone for justice?

It is necessary to make leaders hesitate before indulging in “the paramount war crime” to quote the judges of Nuremberg, of “unprovoked aggression against a defenceless country”. Unless leaders fear that they might be tried for their war crimes, we will live in an increasingly violent world, where The Geneva Conventions are treated as a joke, the UN is of no account, and death, destruction, torture, and repressive policing are commonplace. At the moment such leaders enjoy more and more trappings of power, and retire with vast sums of money, houses, medals and lucrative contracts. A group of UK Citizens have therefore set up an organisation, “The Blair War Crimes Foundation”, to initially bring one such leader to justice as an example.

Read the letter and become a signatory.

(Via RickB)

Gordon Brown was in the House of Commons yesterday polishing the turd of New Labour’s Iraq campaign. It has to be said, what with his visit to the place this week, that he’s managing to buff that stool with some success. Judging by the reaction to his smudging of history this week from the media and his cunning idea of a placeholder garrison in Basra so a public inquiry can never be held, New Labour may yet escape a full examination of its crimes.

Still, some haven’t forgotten and never will. How about this exchange from the debate yesterday:

John Barrett (Edinburgh, West) (LD): The Prime Minister has never detailed what the Government believe to be the number of civilian deaths in Iraq. Much work has been done on that, and the lower estimates are around 100,000. If the Prime Minister cannot give details today of his estimate, will he confirm that the Government will do some work on it, so that we can know the answer to the question?

The Prime Minister: It is not a matter for the British Government: it is for the Iraqi Government to examine what has happened in their country. Only they will be in the position to obtain the full information. I cannot see how from here or from just Basra the British Government could conduct such a survey.

I think we can take from that the Prime Minister really doesn’t want to know. And why would he? Even if he’s a fifth as human as his ‘friends’ and ’sources’ tell us, the true enormity of what he wrote the cheques for would surely help to crush even the most hardened sociopath.

But Gordon’s answer is just insulting though isn’t it? Were you expecting anything else? You have to admire his management of the low expectations many have of him. ‘It is for the Iraqi Government to examine what has happened in their country.’ How very fucking generous of you, Gordon. You’ll be telling us next that Iraq is a sovereign nation.

In other words, it was New Labour’s job just to deliver the cluster bombs, depleted uranium, missiles and bombs. What happens after that? Well, you know. Like a postman, I suppose. You can’t expect to be able hold the postman to account if he delivers a parcel containing a toy that chokes your kid, can you?

And how about ‘I cannot see how from here or from just Basra the British Government could conduct such a survey’? He’s just spent a week telling us how fantastic things are in Iraq, hasn’t he? The surveys published by the Lancet were conducted under far more dangerous conditions. The government and its courtiers rubbished those surveys (despite what the Ministry of Defence’s chief scientific adviser said).

So why not take the opportunity of ‘improved’ conditions in Iraq to rub the Lancet’s nose in it? Gordon would be able to stand up and crow, ‘look everybody, we only killed x thousand men, women and children!’ Or, if he wanted to spin it more sympathetically, he could use a government-sponsored survey to demonstrate his fabled humanity and courage we’ve been told so much about.

Like I said, he really doesn’t want to know.

Courtesy of the mighty Beau Bo D’Or

For those just coming in.

Take a look at these utter bastards…

Two solicitors who took millions of pounds from compensation payouts given to sick miners have been struck off.

[...]

Beresford, 58, said last year to be Britain’s highest-earning solicitor, and Smith, 52, made millions of pounds from personal injury claims for miners under the government’s coal health compensation scheme.

Tribunal chairman David Leverton said: “If ever there was a group of persons who needed the full care and attention from solicitors, it was these miners.

“Mr Beresford described himself as an entrepreneur. Unfortunately, his attitude allowed himself and Mr Smith to put commercial goals before his clients’ best interests.

[...]

The compensation scheme was set up by the government because of British Coal’s lack of safety standards and led to hundreds of thousands of claims from former miners and their families.

[...]

Beresford and Smith’s joint earnings went from more than £182,000 in 2000 to £23,273,256 in 2006, the tribunal heard.

But Timothy Dutton QC, appearing for the Solicitors’ Regulatory Authority (SRA), said charging conditional or contingency fees over and above those set out in the scheme was “unacceptable”.

In one case, the firm deducted a “success fee” from the widow of a miner, leaving her with a total payout of just £217.73, the tribunal heard.

Beresford’s total payout bought him ‘a £1.8 million private jet and a string of cars including a Bentley, a Ferrari and two Aston Martins [...] a stately home and a racehorse’. The average payout to dying and chronically ill miners was two and a half grand.

Now, we’ve just had two weeks of the wannabe hardman Leader of the Opposition and attendant gutter press telling us that Karen Matthews was representative of benefit claimants. We’ve had a peacock Work and Pensions secretary strutting about the place telling us that the unemployed need to shape up or ship out. The most vulnerable in our society have been told, once again, that they are somehow lesser. The headlines have told us day after day that the shiftless and feckless underclass need taking in hand.

So, tomorrow, when not a single front page mentions how solicitors Beresford and Smith ransacked the public purse and cheated dying miners and dead miners’ widows of the insulting pittance they were entitled to – not to mention the faceless bureaucrats who thought the invoices reasonable and paid them – what are we to make of it? That this country’s media and political class are morally in the toilet? That would be a gross generalisation, wouldn’t it? We reserve those only for the poor.

You can bet there’ll be no editorial from David Cameron saying we must intervene with solicitors and their benefactors to prevent them becoming like Beresford and Smith. After all, Thatcher shafted the miners and then her spirit of entrepreneurship, nurtured by her morally vacant New Labour offspring, went back for seconds. You can’t expect the likes of Dave to examine his ideological heritage too closely for its moral failings.

Will we see hand-wringing from left-wing commentators and fire and brimstone from those on the right? Will James Purnell and his millionaire adviser be cruising TV studios tomorrow with a new government proposal aiming to drag something-for-nothing solicitors back into line? Sure, not all of them are robbing bastards but are there any votes in differentiating? There aren’t when it comes to single mums and the long term unemployed.

Tomorrow you will see the values (or lack of them) of a circulation-chasing media and a vote-chasing government and opposition. How much of either – newspaper sales or votes – can be extracted from the plight of dying and dead miners and their widows? Any advance on fuck all?

Update 12/12 @ 7.45am: Here’s today’s front pages. No inch-high screamers calling Beresford and Smith THE LAWYERS OF PURE EVIL. Call me less than amazed. Am I a cynic or a psychic?

Alex Harrowell is ace on the fabulous lie detectors that are going to stop the underclass dragging us all to the poorhouse:

I wonder if Harrow council is aware that exactly the same technology is being marketed as a “Love Detector”?

In case you hadn’t already guessed, this ‘voice risk analysis technology’ being brought in to trap dole scum is the most spectacular bollocks. It’s a bogeyman to intimidate the vulnerable.

What do we call this then? Double standards? Affirmative action for the rich? Class warfare? Prejudice against the poor?

The black economy is normally associated with dodgy builders or painters and decorators. But white collar professionals are increasingly fiddling taxes, according to an MPs’ report today that discloses that 36 barristers have been forced to return £605,000 to tax authorities. Hundreds of thousands of pounds have been recovered from lawyers, surgeons, medical consultants, and landlords under private deals with the tax authorities.

But this has not become public because none of the white collar tax evaders have been prosecuted, says the report by the Commons public accounts committee.

How many benefit scroungers would it take to defraud the Treasury of £605,000? A damn sight more than 36, I bet. All equal in the sight of the law, eh?

Where are the adverts warning tax dodgers the government are closing in on them? Where are the tabloid editorials screaming that these people are scum? Where are the government ministers? Why aren’t they sitting in TV studios across the country demonising tax fraudsters? Where are the chilling threats of invading their private lives or threatening their children’s wellbeing?

The poor scumbags that are caught committing benefit fraud are paraded through the media like modern day circus freaks. Nobody ever asks why they do it. (Well some do but they’re largely ignored.)

Those caught dodging tax? They’re allowed to make secret deals with the Treasury and swan on down the road. Is anybody asking why they do it? I rather doubt it’s to feed the kids or get out of a damp flat.

Tax evasion, avoidance, dodging or whatever you want to call it costs the country vastly more than benefit fraud. The government lumps the benefit fraud with payment errors to make the number sound bigger. And it’s an exact figure. So clued in are they to the losses through non-payment of tax that the Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs puts the estimate at between £10 billion and £40 billion. A £30 billion margin of error. I mean, Jesus.

It would take every dole fraudster and benefit payment incompetent in the country four years to match the bottom figure. Or somewhere around 16 years if they’re going to be ambitious and go for the £40 billion jackpot.

And guess what? They’re closing 90 tax offices. How’s that for prioritising? It almost makes you wonder if the government’s fuss about the money lost through benefit fraud is really the issue.

That they’re prepared to tolerate theft on a far, far grander scale by the Greater Good, the implication is that all these threats and demonisation is rather about teaching the lower orders to watch their backs and know their place. You can, in other words, stick your class-free society.

Now, where’s the outrage?

Update @ 4.30pm: The vacuous Five Live Drive have just done a facile segment on this. Guess which group of tax dodgers they sent their reporter out to track down. You’ll be less than amazed to hear it wasn’t lawyers, surgeons or medical consultants. No, it was your legendary dodgy builder. The egregious Peter Allen even did his best stereotypical cockney wideboy impression as well.

David Cameron on the Shannon Matthews case:

The verdict last week on Karen Matthews and her vile accomplice is also a verdict on our broken society. The details are damning. A fragmented family held together by drink, drugs and deception. An estate where decency fights a losing battle against degradation and despair. A community whose pillars are crime, unemployment and addiction.

West Yorkshire Chief Constable Norman Bettison on the Shannon Matthews case:

The community had “moral strength and community spirit – within hours of young Shannon going missing, they were out on the streets, knocking on doors, out with the cops searching, printing off leaflets, having T-shirts printed,” he told Panorama.

See also how receiving benefits makes you evil.