God knows how Carty and Brown will repent
Every detail of the murder of Tom ap Rhys Pryce seemed calculated to provoke my middle-class anger. With every word, I could feel my heart turning into a bubbling, lid-flipping cauldron of fury, and when I looked at the faces of his killers — Carty and Brown — I felt something I have hardly ever felt in my life.
I simply wanted them to pay. I thought how hard the 32-year-old Cambridge graduate had worked, how happy he was that he was going back to see his fiancée. I thought how she had been due to try on her wedding dress, and of the wedding plans strewn around his corpse.
I thought what a nice chap he sounded, and how brave he had been to fight back with his bare hands in those last dark moments in Kensal Green; and then I thought of Carty and Brown, and how they had stabbed him and kept stabbing him in the head and the arms and the torso, even though he had already given them everything they wanted, which turned out to be nothing but a mobile phone and an Oyster card; and I thought how they composed moronic rap songs about killing and stabbing, and then I looked again at their blank, expressionless, remorseless faces and I am ashamed to say I was overcome with hatred.
I wanted them to die. If you had asked me then and there whether I was in favour of capital punishment for Carty and Brown, I would unhesitatingly have said yes.
Then I read the statement from Adele Eastman, his 31-year-old fiancée, about how she wished she had been at his side to hold him as he died, and the newsprint swam. It was only later, when I had recovered, that I brooded on her generosity and realised that she was right about one thing.
We can be angry about Carty and Brown, and the way knife crime is increasing. We could wish London was run by someone other than this nincompoop Livingstone — and quite frankly the streets of London are now so violent that I would vote for Dirty Harry if the Tories could persuade him to stand.
But it is one thing to be angry; it is another to give way to hatred. Adele Eastman says there “will be no place for hatred” in her boyfriend’s memory, and she is right. The minute we stop to think, we see how ugly our feelings are, and the hopelessness of bringing back capital punishment.
Not only is it barbaric; there is the insuperable objection that innocents might be killed, and in any case it would involve the diversion of zillions of taxpayers’ money to the human rights lawyers. We have to think of some other way of exacting vengeance on Carty and Brown; and as I look ahead at their “tariffs” of 21 and 17 years, I am not filled with hope.
They will not have a nice time in jail. Although they are unquestionably nasty, they may meet people even nastier than they are; and yet there is no guarantee that their punishment will at any stage make them face up to what they have done.
What we all want is for them to understand the sheer horror of their actions. We want them to open their souls and be suddenly harrowed and grief-stricken for the life they have taken away; and we want them to feel this remorse with all the intensity of someone facing his own execution.
Instead of slouching through their term of incarceration, feeling vaguely misused by society, we want them to repent and to change.
It is very difficult to see how this change might happen, except through one route; and that brings me to the current controversies about religion. Bourgeois Britain is going through a bit of a panic about the role of God in society, largely fuelled by nervousness of Islam. Attacks are made on faith schools, or on BA staff who wear the cross, and the idea seems to be that we can only voice reservations about one religion if we bash them all impartially.
That is why Richard Dawkins is having such a soaraway success with an atheist tract called The God Delusion, and why Robert Kilroy-Silk can be clapped on Question Time when he calls all religions “fairy tales”.
Alert readers of this column will know that my own faith is a very feeble tinsel object. I sometimes think there might be some kind of celestial radio signal, but it is about as intelligible as Radio Tirana. There is a smart-aleck schoolboy side to me that exults with Dawkins as he teases the believers and demonstrates the biological absurdity of the incarnation, and I remember my fierce 11-year-old joy at reading the account of how the Darwinians destroyed the Creationists in that debate at Oxford.
My only thought, as I stare at the faces of Carty and Brown, is that, if we throw out religion, then we lose a useful tool in changing lives. You and I lead comfortable existences, full of pleasure and interest, and generally so heavily regulated that we do not face that many moral challenges. We may feel that we do not have much of a spiritual void to fill.
But look at these creeps, the shambles of “sperm fathers” and gang warfare and violence. It’s not so much that they have been deprived of love, but that they have been deprived of authority of any kind, and our feminised paedophile-obsessed culture means there is less and less chance that they will find a male role model in the classroom.
However ludicrous it may seem, religion sets boundaries; it suggests to bad and loveless people that they are loved. It provides a framework.
Of course it would be nice if Carty and Brown were not recruited to some militant Islamic group; it would be nice if they turned to the good old milquetoast Church of England. But it doesn’t really matter. We can’t just string these people up. We can’t flog them. We are forced to incarcerate and hope for the best.
Before we go all the way with Dawkins and chuck out religion, we should look at the savage and remorseless faces of Carty and Brown, and reflect that, if we are to have any hope of changing them for the better, then God is a useful card for society to keep up its sleeve.
155 Comments
With all respect, Flo’, isn’t that a bit weak? Indeed, is it even in accordance with this unifying rationality? The natural world does not appear to demonstrate much ‘respect’ for anything. Volcanoes erupt, and hurricanes wreak havoc, and meteors rain down, without so much as a single do-you-mind-awfully-old-boy. Today, for example, the sky unloaded buckets of rain on top of me. Where’s the respect in that?
It may be indeed be weak, idlex, or it may be that in complaining about the rain that fell on you, you’re ignoring the wider picture that the earth needs rain. I imagine it also needs volcanic eruptions to release all of its internal pressure, better an eruption than an exploding planet. I accept that’s terrible for humans and animals in the path of the lava, but remember, I’m not talking about a personal God who might whisk us out of the way of the flow. Though – and this is something I haven’t begun to resolve in my own mind yet – there seem to be natural forces, synchronicity, for example, which like Jung’s golden scarab beetle, might indicate something much more complex going on than the concept of a mere cosmic rationality allows for. I dunno.
As I understand it, respecting the cosmos means struggling to understand it in order to attempt behave respectfully towards it. I don’t expect the same kind of respect from inanimate matter that a conscious being might express, there again, I may be wrong, nature seems to know what its doing to far greater extent than we humans do in many respects. Anyway, I bet nature’s still around when our species is long gone – and perhaps that is part of the wider picture?
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Hmn, yes the site’s running a bit slow. If your post doesn’t seem to be publishing fast enough can y’all bear with it folks and not press post again, just wait and I’ll check it out. Thank you.
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Harry Fulton ,- Thanks to you . I think you would agree with points made by K myself and Boris . In practice the death penalty cannot be used without the belief of the jury in its justice . Does that mean it is wrong or that perhaps we are in a period of moral confusion and cowardice. Certainly we are in period where disengagement with life and death is possible . Many people have noticed that as sexual ostentation has exploded there is no parallel acceptance of death . It is hidden more than ever and as hasty cremations overtake burial its unpleasant reality is more than ever swept under the carpet . In Rotherham (don`t ask ) the crematorium is on a neighbouring hill and you can see the puffs of smoke all day . This is a more realistic understanding of life and reacquainting ourselves with it is overdue .
Whose Afraid of Virginia Wolf
“Birth Copulation Death , how do you like for a declension young man ”
It would make us all philosophers, I suspect, to see mortality like a hedgehog scuttling across the back garden (Hardy) .
Sorry this is a bit long and , no doubt familiar ,but such things were obvious to our ancestors . This is recorded by the venerable Bede and is the best image of life I know
‘”Your Majesty, when we compare the present life of man on earth with that time of which we have no knowledge, it seems to me like the swift flight of a single sparrow through the banqueting-hall where you are sitting at dinner on a winter’s day with your thegns and counsellors. In the midst there is a comforting fire to warm the hall; outside, the storms of winter rain or snow are raging. This sparrow flies swiftly in through one door of the hall, and out through another. While he is inside, he is safe from the winter storms; but after a few moments of comfort, he vanishes from sight into the wintry world from which he came. Even so, man appears on earth for a little while; but of what went before this life or of what follows, we know nothing. ”
This argument apparently persuaded king Edwin that is better to convert on a better safe than sorry basis . Not unreasonably at the time . We have convinced ourselves the cosy hall goes on forever which is far more ridiculous. This delusion makes us bizarrely squeamish about the death penalty
Flo Why so stroppy Flo ?I am not against faith. The sort of faith you have is not readily distinguishable to me from having no faith but looking at the sky and saying “Cooo..init big” and “Blimey its all got to mean something hasn’t it “. If a less complex thing can create a complex thing then there is no need for god and an infinite sequence is required to get anywhere near a maths O level. There was a nice bit of Idlex a while ago when it was suggested that the appearance of order probably disguises chaotic chance . Idlex retorted perhaps the appearance of chaos disguises perfect order.( I am talking from memory ). I find myself this thought inclines me more kindly to religion than any amount of logic. I couldn’t exactly say why. I am unconvinced that “Why” is all that important .
I feel FLO you are trying to say things that are difficult and beyond what you have actually said so far. If so , that how I often feel .My efforts look as poor to me as they no doubt do to you.Blairy smarts a bit though
JAQ , yes I have read the god delusion but as Jack T may recall there as nothing much in it I was not already familiar with. It is a goodish run through of some common false religious arguments but offers no alternative .It is silent on love morality ;loyalty , music sport (even) joy , sorrow and most of that which makes a life .Science can explain why there might be such things if we were replicating machines but it can never explain the experience of being alive and knowing , yes “knowing “these things are more than side effects of replication. I have , thus far been unable to get further than that but in those terms there is something utterly unsatisfying about the book for someone to whom it is nothing new.
I appreciate its rudeness though and take the point that the faithful of various sorts use “TAKING OFFENCE” as an aggressive weapon.
God forgive me I have droned on haven’t I . You have earned a favoured seat in Heaven if you got this far .
Let all the World in every Corner Sing
My God and King
Could something as beautiful ,as Dawkins claims , really have been written about the theory of evolution. NO!!!
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yes I have read the god delusion but as Jack T may recall there as nothing much in it I was not already familiar with. It is a goodish run through of some common false religious arguments but offers no alternative .It is silent on love morality ;loyalty , music sport (even) joy , sorrow and most of that which makes a life. (newmania)
This is precisely what I expected. Thank you for confirming what I already very strongly suspected: that this is not a book worth reading.
It is no surprise that he offer no alternative: he has none. Nor is it any surprise that the book should be silent on love, loyalty, music, sport, etc. Dawkins is a Darwinist, and for Darwin both the natural and the human world were regarded as being constantly engaged in an exterminatory “war of nature”. There is not, nor can ever be, any love or loyalty or music or sport or joy in such a grim vision of life. And that also is why Dawkins himself is as much a humourless and obnoxious zealot as those he now seems to spend all his time attacking.
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Newmania – captivating as ever and yes “the faithful of various sorts use “TAKING OFFENCE” as an aggressive weapon”, exactly.
I think it could be said that there are many religions around today as the popularity of a deity falls then for some it is replaced by football and for others another fashionable cause that must be defended against non-believers. People are ever tribal. I think the political tribes are becoming confused.
I agree with Dawkins on one point – you cannot argue with a martyr who believes the next hall is a better one.
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testing posting speed [Ed]
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Seems to be back to normal PaulD and others..[Ed]
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Idlex – You are unkind. I remember CS Lewis had an affection for the honesty of an atheist and I noticed Dawkins pays him a back handed compliment in return
“CS Lewis , who should have known better…”. He doesn’t claim to have answers he does point out how silly some supposed “answers” have been. Not a worthless activity and in the context of US fundamentalism , quite welcome .
It is thin stuff though and there are many books worth reading first. Incidentally Idlex as a chap of some literary style , who would you recommend as Winter warmer ?
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Flo Why so stroppy Flo ? (newmania)
You mimic Alf Garnet and call me a vicious moo, I respond in kind by saying you’re a silly old git – and I’M the stroppy one. Your wife deserves a medal newmania
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Sorry Flo ; you are to quick for me , very good .
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Gosh, a lot of words being spent here on God – along with a countless millions before them.
It’s simple. God is love. The rest is packaging.
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BORIS is currently featuring on Iain Dales Blog . Please everyone go and suggest that he should be Deputy PM.
Mr. Johnson the country is in the merde sir and we would appreciate it awfully if you would save it.
Thanks , so kind
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Idlex – You are unkind (newmania)
Well, to be kind to Dawkins, he’s a very good writer on evolution. But he just annoys me with his anti-clericalism.
who would you recommend as Winter warmer ?
Melissa?
And Flo’, I’m actually very sympathetic to your point of view. I just think it’s one that hasn’t made much progress as yet. And it’s only because Christianity seems to be all we’ve got that I feel obliged to endorse it.
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A book Idlex?
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Oh, a book!!!
I dunno. For literary style in fiction, I spent about a year reading almost everything by Patrick O’Brian, continually wondering how he managed to write English that what so evocative of the early 19th century without actually being early 19th century English. I still don’t understand this amazing trick, that he keeps pulling off, page after page, book after book.
As for high literary non-fiction, I’ve never encountered anything quite like Peter Green’s From Alexander to Actium. The content of this large book is considerable, but the English is almost symphonically rich and dense and multi-layered, like Black Forest gateau. It’s really almost a triumph of style of content.
As for myself, I try to write very simply, and perhaps euphoniously. I quite often read books (e.g. O’Brian) almost entirely for their English, and then put them down and think: I wish I could write like that! But I know I never could.
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And having written all that rubbish, I need to correct it, of course!
‘English that what’ in the first paragraph should be ‘English that was’.
And ‘style of content’ in the second paragraph should be ‘style over content’.
So much for my attempts at simple, euphonious English.
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In Japan those two dirt-bags could expect a short drop and a long stop. And on an unannounced date, so no media build up, and no Liberal crowds outside the prison. Just announce the number of executions at the end of each year. But that’s Japan for you, the benefit of the many at the expense of the few. Crime’s very low here, but when it does happen can be horrific. Doubt if the death penalty has much of an influence on heinous crime, but it would make you feel better to know two scumbags like that will be several decades early for their appointment with Satan.
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“It’s simple. God is love. The rest is packaging.”
Oh I’m sorry, I’d forgotten there was such a concise and precise answer to that question. I’m afraid the rest is not packaging however. Are you saying that ‘love’ created the universe? If not then who? Presumeably there is some kind of anti-love in your theology to account for evil in the world?
And what exactly is this love thing anyway? C S Lewis wrote an excellent book on it called the four loves, although even he was struggling with the ideas. Confining God to ‘love’ is just like confining the soul to ‘emotions’, a parallel phrase would be “one’s soul is one’s emotions” – utterly unhelpful.
If you want to go ahead and worship love, then feel free, there are certainly less admirable things to worship. But calling God love and love God serves no purpose at all.
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Thanks Idlex I `ll look into those. On style I like simple elegance but I also like sinewy discursive word wrestling .I once went to a class in poetry writing , which , obviously ,I was dreadful at. The poet was Michael Donaghy , such a kind man he would look at my pitiable efforts and say , in his soft New York accent, “Now Paul , ask yourself …what can. I leave out …. ” I wondered what he was up to and found out some bad news just this minute . How strange
http://www.britishcouncil.org/arts-literature-publications-poetryquartets-donaghy.htm
FLO
See what you mean about Hilton Flo ,Barbara Amiel is slipping the stiletto into Cameron today and I scent blood for the first time
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Newmania – can’t agree, Boris for PM, not deputy. Actually I think Jon Cruddas would be a good choice for deputy leader.
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And Flo’, I’m actually very sympathetic to your point of view. I just think it’s one that hasn’t made much progress as yet. And it’s only because Christianity seems to be all we’ve got that I feel obliged to endorse it. (idlex)
Thanks, idlex, I am to yours and Jack’s too, I feel that my view isn’t that far away from Christianity if you ignore the institutional aspect of it.
Was it you who said ‘God is love, all else is packaging’ or something like that? Taking the very broadest view of love, I think that is probably true.
The Guardian gave what I thought was a quite compelling definition of love one Valentine’s day a few years ago. The article said there are three elements of love and three kinds of love made up of different combinations of these three elements. The elements are:
Affinity
Commitment
Passion
Friendship and Passion without commitment is romantic love.
Affinity and commitment without passion is the love of friendship.
Affinity, commitment and passion together are the real thing.
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Boris for PM, not deputy. Actually I think Jon Cruddas would be a good choice for deputy leader.
Yes, Boris for PM! Jon Cruddas is a bit of an unknown to me, what qualities does he have which would make a good PM of him, Jaq?
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Ooh I like that Flo. Spot on!
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Sorry Flo, was distracted and missed your last post which I will address now: Jon Cruddas
Have you seen ‘This Sceptic Isle’ presented by Peter Hitchens? (oh shush you lot in the 1d 9s)
Well in that (yes excellent) prog there was an interview with Jon Cruddas which detailed his politics. Unfortunately I cannot get a link to that prog so I will try the man himself and get back to you. Watch this space!
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Cruddas is on Dale at the moment.Don`t know much about him myself. I `ll have a peek.
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There are , in fact a number of things David Cameron has said that are encouraging
1 A promise to simplify tax ( this means reduce it )
2 A promise to address the constitutional iniquity of the Scottish problem
3 A plan to convert Council rents into Mortgages
4 The expression of moderate Euro scepticism ( he is understandably wary on this)
5 A promise to make the police directly locally accountable
6 A firm line on crime
The truth is I suspect David Cameron is, in his heart, about as right wing as Boris , which is about where I sit. To win he needs Liberal inclined votes and public sector votes. (newmania)
Civil liberty is missing from your list. I know Cameron has spoken about this – one of my major concerns – and a major concern for other alienated Lib Dems peed off with the party’s Europhilia and lurch to the left, with all the damaging implications this can have for community politics and civil liberties. The anger/alienation of many centre-right Lib/erals/ Dems has been compounded, as mine has, by Lib Dem councillors who’ve abandoned community politics and respect for civil liberties to collude with the undemocratic and sinister machinations of nulab council/or/s. Though, in some cases, I think they were just too naive to see through and stand up to the machinations of nulab officers.
Anyway, given the Blair’s heir business, the managerialism, the considerable influence of the spin doctors and how much social control might be needed for some of Cameron’s policies, I worry that we might not end up with appreciably more respect for our civil liberties under a Cameron government than we have now. I’m amazed to find myself thinking this, a month ago I’d have argued with anyone who dared suggest it. I think what underlies this concern is that Cameron’s use of and adherence to spin doctors and the whole machinery that surrounds them is eroding Cameron’s key appeal – trust and credibility, something Lib Dems are acutely sensitive to.
Also, given the background of these spin doctors, as PR men or consultants to the giant corporations, I’m concerned that the considerable influence such companies have under Blair – and the damage this is doing to the 99.97% of companies who are SMEs, who employ almost 60% of UK’s workforce – could be exacerbated by a Cameron government. These giant corporations have been able to bend so much legislation and government into a form which benefits them at the expense of small business. The Office of Fair Trading’s pandering to retail multinationals who’s runaway growth allows them to cripple their small competitors and so many of their smaller suppliers is one example. This is so damaging for UK, to our economic base, our democracy, to community shopping areas and to the nature of our communities. At a time when the multis are making themselves more automated and less labour intensive, SMEs remain labour intensive. UK so needs the 17 million or so jobs in the SME sector. I thought George Osborne might stand up for SMEs, but I doubt now if he’s so inclined, and even if he is, I doubt if the spin doctors would allow it.
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FLO posted this elewhere which I think shows we are much on the same wavelength . Possibly this isbecause we both take an interest in local politics
http://croydonian.blogspot.com/2006/12/owners-getting-some-of-their-property.html#comments
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Well I believe in the death penalty I just think that in order to prevent the execution of innocents it should only be imposed when there is NO doubt about the guilt of the criminal. Convictions would still be acheived on the standard of ‘beyond all reasonable doubt’: in other words there should be no change to the trial and verdict process. But the sentence of death could not be imposed unless there was No doubt about the criminal’s guilt. Such an approach would enable the death penalty to be imposed in a (very limited obviously) number of cases.
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I couldn’t raise boris-johnson.com at all yesterday. But I see a few people managed to post around the times I was trying. In recent weeks, from my end, it’s getting to be to be a bit of a toss-up whether I can read or post messages.
My guess is that traffic has been rising on this website, and the servers can’t cope. A server can only handle so many people at the same time. So when too many come, some get turned away. Big US blogs like Daily Kos had this problem a year or two back, and solved it by adding extra and better servers.
Not that I know that much about web servers.
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I’ve been unable to log on as well a lot of the time, particularly at night I notice, I figured the server was just down repeatedly?
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I’m sorry about the technical hitches folks, the blog has been attacked of late. All difficulties have been noticed and the team are working on providing you with your usual excellent service. With the addition of the Forum the Boris Johnson blog welcomes your input and strives to make that possible.
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the blog has been attacked of late.
Why? And by whom?
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And how?
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Evil crusty beings who live on cold pizza and biactol, otherwise known as ‘hackers’. Why? Probably because they can and because they have no girlfriend (re-word for gender/pet preference)
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I’ve had problems logging on too. Not surprised about the hackers. Hmmmm…
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So… back to the death penalty then?? Phil said
I’m sure everyone would agree that this is the only civilised option Phil. However, I think the problems encountered were that there was a trial by media in one case and the poor accused was educationally challenged. So much so that by the time the interrogation had finished with him, he would have pleaded guilty to anything. The exposure of this error rocked public confidence and no-one was that sure afterwards. Senior influential politicians were of the liberal view that taking someone’s life was basically wrong and so the 1957 homicide act was binned.
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On this I have to disagree with you Boris.
There are 2 big arguments for the death penalty which do not involve hate.
Firstly that it does discourage murder & that these murderers are so sufficiently lost to humanity that they are in practice beyond reclaiming, certainly at any cost less than a few kidney machines or clean wells for dozens of Zaire villages.
I do believe that the death penalty discourages. I know many social “scientists” disagree but I think those are driven more by their own feelings than scientific detachment.
http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/DP.html for evidence that it does. I know of nobody who says that murderers should not be imprisoned because it doesn’t deter nor have I seen any explantion as to why imprisonment deters but exceution doesn’t.
Secondly is the argument that these 2 & others like them are so far from being morally human that they can only safely be put down like rabid dogs. You do not have to hate a dog to consider it rabid. We can even accept that “society is to blame” in some ways – perhaps they grew up without father figures, perhaps their schooling never gave them any moral sense. Perhaps it is even true that a century ago we could have given them a chance to die for Queen Victoria in Zululand. Nowadays the best role in life they can provide is as a horrible warning.
This brings us to the question of executing an innocent. This is carefully avoided by most supporters of the death penalty but must be faced. If we accept it is a deterance & if executing one innocent deters the murder of 2 is it not moral cowardice to avoid responsibility for that act? An other argument is that juries would be less willing to convict the likes of Barry George if they knew that this would be final & not something which somebody else might reverse after 5, or 10, or 15 years.
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I heard a case on the radio that I think blurs the manslaughter/murder charge: a taxi driver ran over a man then dragged him underneath the car for over a mile after which he was quite dead. He may be out in less than 2 years.
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posted this elewhere which I think shows we are much on the same wavelength . Possibly this is because we both take an interest in local politics (newmania)
Yes, I think that’s true, though with the iron hand of Blair/Browndom tightening its noose around so many aspects of our communities and individual lives these days, it’s becoming hard to separate the local from the national.
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Jaq
There are hundreds of these cases that are murder, yet the killer recieves only a manslaughter charge. Often the murder charge is dropped, on grounds of provocacation, if a man claims his wife was having an affair (yes thats right sharia law british style). It was recently reported that a man who killed an entire family because the teenager daughter rejected him had spent six years in prison for manslaughter-he had battered a woman around the head with a hammer because she would not leave her husband for him!Although there is talk of introducing a charge of secondary murder instead of manslaughter I do not believe this will lead to a real chage in the practice of justice.
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Neil i have some doubts about your whole post but this “is it not moral cowardice to avoid responsibility for that act?”. Is IMHO quite right . Why do you feel we have reached a point where we lack moral courage?
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I would just like to add my “outrage” to those who are having problems . I have lost several posts which were brilliant . Now they are lost forever but I assure you the wit and perception was life changing . I am now sulking and will not be back until its fixed
AND THERE IS NO POINT IN BEGGING !!!
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Firstly that it does discourage murder – Neil
And your evidence of this is…?
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BTW Flo , I am off to a “sustainable communities” bill meeting in a day or so.I very much support this legislation and other Conservative attempts to re-empower ?(ugh ) local politics
Some early fire from the Brown camp reacasting his socialist past today . Dave had better get his story straight before the Broon starts clunking .By that I mean lying of course
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How ironic that Carty and Brown come from religious backgrounds. This was one of Boris Johnson’s more incoherent rants.
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BTW Flo , I am off to a “sustainable communities” bill meeting in a day or so.I very much support this legislation and other Conservative attempts to re-empower ?(ugh ) local politics.
Making Government account to local communtites for how public money is spent in their area and giving councils new powers to redirect the cash towards local people’s priorities, is a great idea.
The government’s version, the local government white paper, also promises to give more power to local residents to shape service deliveries and priorities, yet we know that in reality this is a purely cosmetic exercise which will mean more power for nulab supporting officers, especially those with a direct line to the government, more power for quangos and more power for whole range of public service cliques who are collectively misrepresented at ‘the people’.
Take the so called decriminalisation of parking fines. The government has claimed to have given communities via their LAs the power to control and resolve parking issues and to determine parking fines themselves. Yet, in reality, the government still rigidly controls the form such measures will take by beating LAs, especially those in the South and in Conservative areas, with the big stick of restrictive, discriminatory and punitive – funding allocations, which, along with the preponderance of nulab council officers, pressurise (and bribe) councillors into ignoring the wishes of their communities and applying this power in the most irrational and restrictive manner.
The end result of decriminalisation in my town is that my council (i.e. the nulab officers) are now introducing punitive measures to stop almost all parking, business and customer, in the, currently thriving, smaller shopping areas. Non trade parking will be allowed to park for a few hours in costly, miniscule, car parks which hold only a quarter of the parking spaces necessary to keep our community shopping areas alive . Most businesses need constant access to their vehicles yet will be barred from the tiny car parks and will have nowhere to park at all. Shop workers on low wages, in the unlikely event they can find a space in the car parks, will be forced to pay such punitive parking rates that it won’t be worth while working. Our community shopping areas will become ghost towns.
So what do you know, the only benefactors of this punitive policy will be the out of town supermarkets with their free parking spaces and their nulab donor Chief Execs.
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Yes FLO and its the same all over. NuLab claim increased numbers of small businesses but it is a blatant lie.
In fact they have made the qaulification for Labour only Sub Contractor onerous so as to force labourers to become fully self employed. By introdcing huge red tape and Employenment legislation straight from the EU and Unions they force everyone to be their own business when they are in fact employees without security
THEN- They announce a growth in business start ups . Real SMEs have plummteted
New Planning regulation will put “A Tescos in every Village”. Lovely. No more shops .
These things matter and it is here the conservative Party has to stop kissing its blow up Milton Friedman
Nighty night
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Exactly, newmania! Why do none of the parties wake up to the plight of the 4 MILLION SMES and our staff who comprise almost 60% of the workforce?
Doesn’t any party want all of our millions of votes at the next election?
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That’s 16.8 million workers employed by SMEs, Boris -just in case you’ve lost your calculator
Our jobs and businesses are under repeated attack from nulab.
We are desperately in need of a political champion.
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K said “I do not believe this will lead to a real chage in the practice of justice.” – am with you totally, it is those who administer the law who seem increasingly removed from justice. I think when the Home Office feels it has to intervene then there is something seriously wrong with our criminal justice system. Couldn’t be them tinkering in the first place could it??
Newmania – so sorry about your difficulty, this was discussed yesterday and we will continue to do what we can to provide service. You could compose comments in Word? and if BJ commenting fails email us your comment.
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