Lynch demolishes the lies about the rail strikes!

 

Mick Lynch - RMT General Secretary

You've got to hand it to Mick Lynch of the RMT, he can think on his feet. He's making mincemeat out of many of the RMT's detractors. Railway bosses, politicians, and hack journalists, have all come to grief when they came up against the redoubtable General Secretary of the RMT. 

The interviews with Piers Morgan and Richard Madeley were ludicrous, laughable. They were both made to look ridiculous by Lynch. Madeley who was once arrested on suspicion of shoplifting at a Tesco supermarket, wanted to know if Lynch was a Marxist. Morgan compared Lynch to the Thunderbird puppet The Hood, a fictional criminal and terrorist and arch enemy of the International Rescue organisation. 

No wonder TalkTV ratings are plummeting with a Muppet like Piers Morgan presenting the program.

Johnson wants to ban strikes and introduce a scabs charter!

 

Thanks to Margaret Thatcher, Britain already has the strictest anti union laws in the advanced capitalist world. But if Boris Johnson, the Conservative Prime Minister, gets his way, it's going to get a whole lot tougher for British workers to take legal industrial action.

The Tory government are proposing to ban strikes in essential public services including the transport sector, and are planning to introduce a scabs charter that would allow agency workers to be used as blackleg strikebreakers. The use of agency workers as strikebreakers was outlawed in 1973. Regulation 7 of the Conduct of Employment Agencies and Employment Business Regulations 2003, currently prohibits employers from using agency workers to cover an employee who is taking part in a strike or industrial action. The Tory government now wants to repeal Regulation 7 because of the series of strikes organised by the RMT union that have brought British railways to a grinding halt.

The strikes on the railways do not involve train drivers who are mainly members of the union ASLEF. Although RMT members are demanding a mere 7% pay rise and a guarantee of no compulsory redundancies, the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, says the union is holding the country to ransom. He accuses the unions of having unrealistic expectations on pay and doesn't think they should be chasing pay rises that match inflation which is currently running at a 11% and increasing.

While the Tory government want to make it more difficult for British workers to improve their pay and conditions by taking industrial action, they are proposing to ban controls on the pay of City bosses and banker's bonuses. Last year, banker's bonuses increased by 27.9%. Pay for Chief Executives in FTSE 100 companies bounced back to £3.6m after having fallen to a mere £2.8m in 2020 during the COVID pandemic.

Mick Lynch, the General Secretary of the RMT, believes that the dead hand of government is all over the current rail dispute and is impeding a settlement of it. He's probably right, but I would remind him, that in 2016, the RMT naively urged its members to leave the E.U. because they believed it would end the attack on seafarer's and offshore workers, and on the rights of British worker's.

In Brexit Britain, we've recently seen nearly 800 P&O seafarer's sacked without notice, who were ignominiously escorted off their ships by P&O security staff wearing balaclavas and carrying handcuffs. The majority of these seafarer's were members of the RMT union. Many of these seafarer's were replaced by agency workers who were paid the minimum wage. The RMT said many of the replacement staff were recruited from India and were working for as little as £1.80 an hour.

Most of the anti union laws introduced by the Tories under Maggie Thatcher, were never repealed by a Labour Government, and it is therefore, much easier to sack British worker's than it is in other parts of Europe. Although P&O managed to sack almost a quarter of its British staff, no French P&O employees were affected. So much for taking back control.

Boris wants high pay rises of City bosses but not British workers!

 

Earlier this year, the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, lambasted Andrew Bailey, the highly-paid Governor of the Bank of England, when he said he wanted to see British workers exercising pay restraint to control inflation. The PM - who has been dubbed by former Spectator journalist, Peter Oborne, the "Billionaire's Bitch" - said he was in favour of a high-paid and highly-skilled economy.

But in true Boris Johnson style, he's now changed tack and is urging below inflation pay rises for the public sector. The PM says he wants to see sensible pay settlements that do not scramble to match inflation. However, Boris is well known for subscribing to the view that there is one rule for toffs like himself, and another rule for the rest of us - the Oiks.

A leaked letter to the multi millionaire Chancellor, little Rishi Sunak, has revealed that the government wants the chancellor to look at removing unnecessary restrictions on City' bosses pay, while urging pay restraint for the rest of us. The leaked letter from the Prime Minister's chief of staff, Steve Barclay, says "If the company does well, directors do well."

In Boris Johnson's Brexit Britain, it's telephone number pay increases for City bosses, and 3% pay increases for railway workers. As living costs soar, are British worker's going to allow themselves to become doormats for Boris's billionaire backers.

Was Jack the Ripper an Anarchist?

 

Was Jack-the-Ripper an Anarchist?

by Christopher Draper

On Sunday 30th September 1888 “Jack-the-Ripper” slashed the throat of Elizabeth Stride in the yard of East London’s “International Working Men’s Educational Club (IWMEC)”. The club’s membership largely comprised impoverished East European Jewish socialists and anarchists and the shadow of suspicion fell upon them as the “Church Times” identified the killer as a “Russian Anarchist.” Author Randy Williams now claims all five Ripper murders were committed by IWMEC’s resident steward Lewis Diemschitz, assisted by club members. While “Ripperologists” weigh the merits of this sensational accusation I’d like to offer an anarchist perspective.

Crime Scene 1888

Founded in 1885 by Morris Winchevsky at 40 Berner Street, Whitechapel IWMEC was the centre of London’s Jewish anarchist movement. The building fulfilled many roles; it was a social centre serving meals and refreshments, the headquarters of Arbeter Fraint (The Worker’s Friend) newspaper, a 200 seat lecture room/theatre and an organising hub for trade unions and the local branch of the Socialist League. For poor politically conscious immigrants the IWMEC was a haven but as far as the authorities and the wealthy, orthodox Jewish establishment were concerned the club posed an unwelcome challenge.

IWMEC occupied a three storey end terraced building with an extensive adjacent courtyard running along the side. Entrance to this yard was theoretically closed off from Berner Street by two large wooden gates but these were often left wide open.

The Victim

Elizabeth Stride was the Ripper’s third victim. Like many fellow East-Enders, Stride was an immigrant, born Elisabeth Gustafsdotter in 1843 in her parents’ detached farmhouse a dozen or miles so west of Gothenburg, Sweden. Despite, or perhaps because of, her very strict upbringing Elisabeth soon found herself with no permanent partner, syphilis and a stillborn child. The social stigma blighted her life prompting her in 1866 to seek a new beginning in England where she worked as a domestic servant. After catching the eye of John Stride, a 47 year old carpenter the “pretty 25 year old” in 1869 married at St Giles in the Fields church, becoming Elisabeth Stride. They ran their own Poplar coffee house for a few years but when the business collapsed their relationship deteriorated and they separated on several occasions. After the Princess Alice steamship sank in the Thames in 1878 with the loss of 650 lives Elisabeth never again returned to John but exploited the event to claim that her husband and mythical children had all drowned on board and she was left bereft of family and income! Scrounging and prostitution became a way of life and in November 1884, soon after learning her estranged husband had just passed away in Stepney Sick Asylum she was arrested in Commercial Street for being drunk and disorderly and soliciting. This became a regular occurrence as her behaviour was increasingly affected by drink and the likely effects of tertiary syphilis causing fits and symptoms similar to dementia.

The Crime

On the evening of Saturday 29 September 1888 Elisabeth left her lodgings at 32 Flower & Dean Street wearing “a rusty black dress of a cheap kind of sateen with a velveteen bodice over which was a black diagonal worsted jacket with fur trimmings”. Although a number of people came forward claiming to have seen her that night there’s no reliable account until around 11.45 pm when a labourer, William Marshall, standing at the door of his 64 Berner Street lodgings saw a man and woman, who he late identified as Stride, having a conversation on the other side of the road. At 12.30 am PC William Smith saw the same couple as he walked along Berner Street. Despite Israel Shwartz claiming to see a man push a woman to the ground by the entrance to IWMEC yard at about 12.45 am he didn’t intervene.

At 1am Lewis Diemschitz arrived at the yard with his pony and cart after a long day spent south of the river selling costume jewellery at Westow Hill Market near Crystal Palace. As he entered the yard his pony shied to one side and he noticed in the darkness a bundle lying near the wall. Lighting a match to illuminate the darkness and realising it was a woman’s body, he rushed into the club seeking assistance. A number of members rushed out and by the light of candles saw the woman’s throat had been cut and so ran for the police.

On their arrival the police found Elisabeth’s body was still warm and concluded she must have been attacked not long before 1am. Either Diemschitz interrupted the killing or he was himself the killer.

Events seemed to confirm the former conclusion when “Jack’s” fourth victim, Catherine Eddowes was discovered just forty-five minutes later in Mitre Square by PC Edward Watkins of the City Police. She too must have been killed immediately before her corpse was discovered for she’d only been released from police custody (for drunkenness) at 1am and had then been seen alive at 1.35am. The killer must therefore have completed his foul work between 1.35am and 1.45am and Diemschitz had an unassailable alibi as he remained throughout this period in the IWMEC yard alongside police officers attending to Stride’s corpse.

Diemschitz the Ripper?

Randy Williams refuses to accept this simple explanation and instead turns the evidence on its head, insisting that Diemschitz artfully constructed this perfect alibi by murdering Stride but employing two fellow club members Isaac Kozelbrodski and Samuel Friedman to commit a Ripper-style murder elsewhere! The simpler scenario is that Diemschitz interrupted “Jack’s” handiwork and his unsatiated bloodlust caused him to attack another woman a mile away to complete his grisly mutilations. In place of this psycho-sexual motivation Williams offers a risible conspiracy theory -

Diemschitz and his associates “committed the killings as a form of Socialist/Anarchist propaganda…they wanted to discredit the British Empire by showing the world the poverty, famine, homelessness, disease and prostitution that was going on such a short distance from Buckingham Palace.”

Anarchism Misunderstood

Williams equates anarchy to chaos fuelled by violence and identifies an international anarchist mastermind who orchestrated this grand plan from on high – a celebrity who did actually appear at the club on occasions, a name familiar to many in Victorian society but for work of a very different order – Peter Kropotkin! If Williams had actually read Kropotkin writings he might have realised how ludicrous his conspiracy appears to the unbiased observer. Kropotkin enjoyed an international reputation as a geographer and scholar and as an anarchist urged upon England a constructive, environmentally balanced and pacific path to a cooperative society. As the contemporary critic Georg Brandes observed, “Seldom have there been revolutionaries so humane and mild…He has never been an avenger but always a martyr. He does not impose sacrifices upon others; he makes them himself.” Kropotkin was certainly critical of British imperialism but never suggested the remedy was murder and mayhem.

Evidence Misrepresented

Williams’ “evidence” is riddled with errors and inconsistencies; in one place the double murders occurred six miles apart, elsewhere “all crimes took place within 10 minutes walking distance from the club” but it’s most important to counter his characterisation of the anarchist trio as inherently violent criminals. William backs up his character assassination with two vital pieces of evidence. Firstly the 1886 conviction of Friedman for what amounted to rape and secondly the 1889 conviction of all three for assaulting police and members of the public.

A “Samuel Freeman” was indeed imprisoned for indecent assault in 1886 but the name was neither identical nor uncommon and the conviction wasn’t in Whitechapel but Warwick so why has Williams assumed it’s the same man? The 1889 convictions rest on Victorian class, race and political prejudice for far from the trio committing assault they were merely attempting to defend themselves and fellow members as the club building was attacked and broken into by a stone-throwing mob. Many witnesses testified in favour of the defendants but to no avail.

In Conclusion

There’s always money to be made in discovering “the real Jack-the-Ripper” and as the list of the already nominated is so extensive Randy Williams has resorted to barrel-scraping. If you enjoyed Dan Brown you’ll love Randy Williams.

Operose Health accused of prioritising profit before patient safety

 

My GP practice which is privately owned by Partners, uses 'Nursing Practitioners' to see patients as well as GP's. The practice stopped having walk-in surgeries at the beginning of the COVID epidemic in March 2020. Everything is now done through a triage system. I recently rang the practice and the receptionist asked if I was prepared to see someone other than a doctor. I gather that this is becoming increasingly common at many GP practices. Remote consultations by telephone are also becoming more common as they replace face-to-face appointments.

Operose Health, is a UK subsidiary of the U.S. health insurance group the Centene Corporation. It now runs 70 surgeries with nearly 600,000 patients making it the biggest GP provider in the NHS. An undercover investigation by BBC Panorama, has found that the company uses less qualified staff known as 'Physician Associate', to see patients rather than doctors, without adequate supervision. Former Operose employees who spoke to Panorama - a dozen doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and other staff - said they believed patient safety were being put at risk by prioritsing profit before patient safety.

Government Cost of Living Tsar says PM lacks intelligence!

 

Tweets made by Boris Johnson's new cost of living tsar, David Buttress, show that he was once a fervent critic of the Prime Minister. Social media sleuths have discovered some of these historic tweets which reveal that the former Just Eat CEO, was no big fan of Boris Johnson. 

On January 11, as Partygate allegations began to emerge, Buttress tweeted: "Why is it that the worse people often rise to the highest office and stay there...Boris has to go, he just as to. You can't survive judgement like this." 

David Buttress has accused the Prime Minister of gambling and playing fast and loose with the UK economy. He also thinks Boris Johnson lacks the intelligence to be Prime Minister. On 23 January, he wrote on Twitter: "Never confuse an expensive education with intelligence or integrity. I don't think Boris is particularly blessed with either, imagine if he had not had the many privileges he has experienced. Does anyone believe he would be PM on merit? Not a chance mate. 19 PM's from Eton." 

Downing Street said that the tweets (many have now been deleted), were "not relevant" to Mr Buttress's new position. If David Buttress is a man of the world, then surely he must realise, that it's not only the cream that the rises to the top, but also the scum. The ancient Greeks, always said that in a democracy the people get the government they deserve, and they deserve what they get.

Tames Council Chief Executive Resigns!

 

Steven Pleasant - Chief Executive of Tameside Council

One suspects that there's far more to the sudden resignation of of Steven Pleasant than a mildly derogatory tweet about Conservative voters.

There has been a recent change of leadership within Tameside Council and the council have received another scathing report by Ofsted into children's services. Andrew Gwynne, the MP for Denton and Reddish, wants the government to intervene and to take control of children's services, out of the hands of Tameside Council. Two cabinet members who have responsibility for children's services, Councillor Oliver Ryan and deputy leader, Councillor Bill Fairfoull, continue to hold the portfolio.

Steven Pleasant, who was paid £220,000 a year as the Chief Executive of Tameside Council, spent most of his adult life working for Tameside Council, and he would have known that as a senior local government officer (Chief Executive) and the Returning Officer, that he was in a politically restricted post and not allowed to show political bias. So why did he send the infamous tweet that cost him his job? This looks like he's bailing out. Is Tameside Council about to go belly up?

Sir Patrick Vallance says it was 'Disappointing' that No.10 broke Covid rules!

 

Sir Patrick Vallance

The government's chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, says it's 'disappointing' that No.10 broke the rules on Covid. Yet, it seems that the Director General of the COVID Task Force, Kate Josephs, who was in charge of writing the laws on COVID, also broke her own rules and regulations. She was also fined by the police and found to have broken the law. 

According to the report by Sue Gray, on 16 December 2020, a Cabinet Office official on behalf of Kate Joseph, sent an invitation to 40 members of staff inviting them to a farewell bash for Kate in the Cabinet Office at 70 Whitehall. Sue Gray wrote: "There was beer, crisps, and wine...Social distancing guidance was not observed." 

That same day, London was moved into Tier 3. Indoor gatherings of two or more people from different households continued to be prohibited, unless an exception applied, such as a gathering which was reasonably necessary for work purposes. Government guidance issued on 30 November 2020, advised:  "You must not have a work Christmas lunch or party where that is primarily a social activity and is not otherwise permitted by the rules of your Tier." 

Although the invitation stressed that people were not to travel into London if they wouldn't otherwise have been in the office, the leaving do for Kate Joseph, clearly broke the rules. The social gathering was a party and wasn't reasonably necessary for work purposes. Indoor gatherings of two or more people from different households were banned and Kate's leaving do was not an exception. 

Kate Joseph later apologised for having attended the social gathering but a month later, she was suspended from her £190,000 job as the Chief Executive of Sheffield City Council, and put on "discretionary leave."

Cinemas withdraw film following Muslim protests!

 

Muslim Protestors Outside Cineworld

Although the constitution of India guarantees the right to freedom of expression, it's not uncommon for cinemas to be burnt down by protestors who object to the content of a film. In 2017, a hard-line Hindu nationalist group, called for British cinemas to be burnt down if they showed a controversial Bollywood film called Padmavati.

Cinema chains in Britain are now withdrawing the film 'The Lady of Heaven', because Muslim protestors have denounced it as 'blasphemous'. Cineworld announced that they had decided to cancel all showings of the film to "ensure the safety of our staff and customers." On Sunday night the manager of Sheffield Cineworld told Muslim protestors that the screening of the film had been cancelled. This was greeted with cries of "Allahu Akbar" (God is Great).

The cancellation of the film was criticized by a House of Lords peer as being "disastrous for the arts, dangerous for free speech." The law of blasphemy was repealed in England and Wales in 2008 and in Scotland in 2021. Article 10 of the Human Rights Act 1998, also guarantees free speech and freedom of expression. "Everyone has the right to freedom of expression" in the UK. This right is only limited in certain circumstances, and blasphemy and not liking a film for whatever reason, are not covered.

To him that Hath, Shall't Be Given!

 

Euan Blair

"To him that hath, shall't be given." Who says politics doesn't pay? 

Euan Blair (38), the eldest son of the former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has been awarded an MBE for services to education in the Queen's Birthday Honours list. 

As a teenager, Euan Blair was once found by the police "drunk and incapable" in Leicester Square, after celebrating the end of his GCSE's in 2000. 

After graduating from Bristol University, where he studied Ancient History, he completed a master's degree in International Relations at Yale, and then served as an intern in the U.S. Congress. In 2008, he joined Morgan Stanley's graduate programme. 

His father, Tony Blair, earned £2m a year as a part-time adviser to JP Morgan. Euan Blair  recently bought a £22m home in West London.

Father banned from flight to Jersey because kids didn't have ID

 

A parent was barred from taking his children on a Jet2 flight to Jersey because they didn't have photo ID.

Not very long ago, children didn't need a passport of photo ID, because they travelled on their parents passport. This is just another way of extorting money from the gullible public. A child passport costs £49 if done online and £58.50, if you apply by form, and it's only valid for 5 years.

More than 2 million holidaymakers a year used to travel to specified European countries using a British Visitors Passport. It could be obtained at a local post office for small fee (£12). These were valid for one year and visits were not to exceed 3 months. They were introduced in March 1961 and abolished on 1 January 1996. An adult UK frequent traveller passport, now costs £95 and is valid for 10 years.

As we've now left the E.U., it might be more advantageous to apply for another passport from an E.U. country, if you qualify. British citizens who live in Northern Ireland, are entitled to a passport from the Irish Republic as they live on the island of Ireland. If you're English, and have a parent or grandparent born in Ireland, you can also apply for a passport from the Irish Republic which is an E.U. country.

The former Brexit Party leader and English Thatcherite nationalist, Nigel Farage, edged his bets when he admitted that two of his children, had both German and British citizen passports. They were entitled to German passports because their mother is German. Farage wants his children to have the best of both worlds.

Texas gunman went on killing spree with ArmaLite Rifle - AR-15!

 

The gunman, Savaldor Ramos, who killed 19 children and two teachers at the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, was able to buy from a local gun shop, two AR-15  military-style assault rifles for his 18th birthday. No one, it seems, questioned why he wanted two high velocity military-style rifles and hundreds of rounds of ammunition. 

The "AR" stands for ArmaLite Rifle. The AR-15 rifle is popular in America and has been used in many high profile mass shootings. The powerful semi-automatic rifle is known to cause devastating injuries because of its velocity and rapid rate of fire. 

The AR-15 was dubbed "America's Rifle" by the National Rifle Association. Many of the victims at the Robb Elementary School, could only be identified after DNA profiling  because of the horrific injuries caused by Ramos.