British soldier convicted for the death of innocent Irish civilian!

 

A very rare conviction of a British soldier serving in Northern Ireland for the death of an innocent Irish civilian. The ex-soldier, David Jonathan Holden, 53, shot dead Aidan McAnespie, 23, when he was crossing a check point, on 21 February 1988. He was convicted of manslaughter, but as yet to be sentenced. The former soldier, claimed his finger slipped on the machine gun.

McAnespie, was on his way to a Gaelic football match when he crossed the checkpoint at Aughnacloy, County Tyrone. The British army considered McAnespie, a "person of interest" a potential IRA member, but he was unarmed.

Despite crimes of this nature, the British government are pressing ahead with legislation that effectively proposes an amnesty for British soldiers accused of killing or maiming people during the 30-year troubles.

Although the family of Aidan McAnespie (see picture above), welcomed the verdict, it angered veterans groups, who along with Conservative MPs, denounced the prosecution as vexatious.

What some might find curious, is that while Holden is facing a possible prison sentence for manslaughter, countless IRA fugitives who were wanted for terrorist offences during the 30-year troubles, were effectively amnestied by Tony Blair under the Good Friday Agreement in 1988. Many who were convicted of terrorist offences, were also released from prison. Holden is expected to appeal.

Does the benefit system make people risk averse?

 

The Government are looking into why there are so many economically inactive people claiming state benefits when there is low unemployment, record vacancies, and employers are finding it difficult to fill certain vacancies. They seem to think that the way the benefit system is set up, is making people risk averse.

There are many reasons why people may be reluctant to take jobs, but I don't think, that trying to live on just over £77 Jobseeker's Allowance or Universal Credit, is one of them. This is what a single person over 25, would receive each week along with help with rates and Housing Benefit.

Rates of pay are an obvious factor. Some 41% of people claiming Universal Credit are already in work and that includes people who work for the DWP in their Jobcentres. Although, we have a National Minum Wage (NMW) in Britain, a great deal of the work available can be through agency's or temporary or part-time. It has become increasingly difficult for people to obtain decently paid, full-time, secure paid employment, but this varies in different parts of the country. Many people can be working on zero hour contracts and the NMW, for many workers, has become the going rate for a job, rather than a state guaranteed minimum wage.

The lack of employment protection is also another factor. For most people employed after 6 April 2012, the qualifying period for claiming unfair dismissal is now 2 years, unless they're dismissed for an "automatically unfair" reason. This means that employers can dismiss someone at will or on a whim, and there is little that you can do about it.

If you left your job voluntarily, and claimed unemployment benefit, you would have to show just cause or a good reason for leaving your job. If you fail to do so, the DWP could refuse you unemployment benefit for 3 months or even longer depending on the circumstances. If that happened your only option would be to try and claim an hardship payment. If you're sacked, you would have to show this wasn't for "misconduct" which is interpreted very widely and includes conduct that is reprehensible, blameworthy, and wrong. If you can't surmount this hurdle you will be refused unemployment benefit for a specified period.

People in receipt of benefits, may consider it risky to take some jobs because if they're dismissed or leave because they don't consider it suitable, they could finish up without any income, state benefits, and homeless, because that is how the system works to penalize people.

Housing boss sacked over infants death!

 

The death of two-year old Awaab Ishak is both tragic and scandalous. On Tuesday, a coroner found that the infant had died in 2020 because of exposure to persistent black mould on the the walls of the family's rented home and that the landlord had repeatedly failed to fix it, blaming the mould on "family lifestyle."

Gareth Swarbrick, the Chief Executive of Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH), the slum landlords who owned the home, refused to resign over the issue and had to be dragged out of office. 

Rochdale Borough Council are now calling for a charge of corporate manslaughter to be brought against the landlord and for the houses to be taken back into local authority control.

Unions declared illegal and "western agents" by Commie Dictator Lukashenko.

 

Alexander Lukashenko - Dictator of Belarus

The entire trade union movement in the former Soviet state of Belarus, is now facing extinction as courts declare unions to be 'extremists' or "western agents."

Under the Communist dictatorship of Alexander Lukashenko, who is an ally of the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, trade unions have been made illegal and union leaders are being jailed. The International Labour Organisation (ILO), has begun a process that will lead to further sanctions on the government of Belarus. Amnesty international is calling for the workers movement to show international solidarity with the working-class of Belarus.

Lukashenko, is one of a number of European political leaders who share Putin's intolerant nationalist ideology or favour his racist, and homophobic, outlook. Others include, Viktor Orban of Hungry, and the Italian right-wing politicians, Matteo Salvini of Lega Nord, and Silvio Berlusconi, of Forza Italia. Other fans of Putin, include, Nigel Farage of the Brexit Party, and the French far-right politician, Marine Le Pen, the leader of National Rally, formerly Front National. Alternative for Germany (AfD), Austria's Freedom Party and Belgium's Vlaams Belang, also share Putin's conservative social values and legitimize Kremlin policies.

Locals call for property tycoon's palace to be requisitioned to house the homeless.

 

Nicholas van Hoogsraten outside Hamilton Palace

If anybody is deserving of the title of Britain's biggest shithouse, it must be the convicted criminal and property speculator, Nicolas van Hoogstraten. I've been reading about his exploits for years. This totally amoral man, who regards most people as "moronic peasants", treats people like doormats or toilet paper, and he's become both notorious and immensely wealthy because of it.

In 1968, he was convicted and served a 4-year prison sentence for paying a gang to attack a business associate. In 2002, he was sentenced to ten years imprisonment for the manslaughter of a business rival. The conviction was subsequently overturned on appeal. In 2005, he was ordered to pay the victim's family £6m in a civil case.

I first became aware of Hoogstraten, when he featured on The Cook Report many years ago. I can remember Roger Cook interviewing him while he repeatedly stabbed him with his umbrella. It was hilarious. Hoogstraten is said to have been a personal friend of the odious bastard Robert Mugabe, who he described as "100% decent and incorruptible." Hoogstraten said that Mugabe didn't believe in democracy and that he believed in rule by the fittest. Hoogstraten, who could have fallen out of the pages of a novel by Dostoevsky, now spends much of his time living in Zimbabwe.

Hamilton Palace, which is bigger than Buckingham Palace, was built to be Hoogstraten's mausoleum, and a monument to his venality, arrogance, and vanity. The building, which is in Uckfield, East Sussex, has stood empty and unfinished since Hoogstraten felt out with the builder more than 20 years ago. Local people in East Sussex, have called for the land and building to be requisitioned to accommodate the homeless and refugees.

Union leader says Home Secretary is to use British troops as strikebreakers!

 

British Troops in the 1926 General Strike

Mark Serwotka, the General Secretary of the PCS union, says that the Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, is intending to use members of the British army as  militarised scabs to break any strike by his members in Border Force who have voted massively for "sustained industrial action." 

Historically, all British governments whether Labour, Liberal or Conservative, have used British troops as strike breakers at one time or another. Sometimes, it ends tragically, with people being shot dead. While countries like Spain, Italy, and France, use armed paramilitary police, who live in barracks, there is no such thing in Britain. The police are civilians in uniform who do not carry firearms unless they are part of a designated armed unit. 

In 1893, two miners were shot dead by British troops during a miners strike in Featherstone in Yorkshire. An inquest returned a verdict of "justifiable homicide " 

In 1910, the Home Secretary, Winston Churchill, used troops from the 18th Hussars and Lancashire Fusiliers to break  a miners strike in Tonypandy in South Wales. Many miners were injured in clashes with the police and one miner was killed following a blow on the head, probably by a police truncheon. 

In 1911, during the Liverpool general transport strike, 3,500 troops were stationed in the city. Soldiers from the 18th Hussars opened fire on a crowd on Vauxhall Road, injuring fifteen and killing two. A subsequent inquest returned a verdict of "justifiable homicide " Troops were also used during the 1926 General Strike. 

During the Attlee Labour Government of 1945-51, British troops, as many as 20,000, were sent many times to picket lines to take over strikers' jobs and trade unionists were sent to prison and spied on and intimidated by the security service. 

In 1984, the Conservative Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, secretly planned to use the military to break the miners' strike that resulted in six deaths and 11,000 arrests. In the end she relied on MI5, the capitalist press, the police, and the scab union called the Union of Democratic Miners (UDM), led by the miner Roy Lynk, to crush the striking miners. 

One thing we can be sure of, is that we're not likely to see Labour's deputy leader, Angela Rayner, or Labour leader, Sir Kier Starmer (KC) supporting striking workers on a trade union picket line. Both of them are more at home leading a gay pride parade.

Playwright loses lifetime drama award because of support for Palestinians.

 

Playwright - Caryl Churchill

Leading figures in the British theatre, including Harriet Walter and Juliet Stevenson, have condemned the decision to withdraw a lifetime award to the 84-year-old playwright, Caryl Churchill, because of her support for Palestinians and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.

In April, Churchill was named as the recipient of 2022 European Drama award in recognition of her life's work. The prize, worth £65,000, was the biggest in Europe. But earlier this month, the jury reversed its decision and cancelled the award saying they had been "made aware of previously unknown information", namely her signature in support of a BDS petition, and that her play, "Seven Jewish Children", written in 2009, had also be considered anti-Semitic by the Jewish Chronicle.

In an open letter, signed by actors and directors within the theatre, which was published on Thursday, the decision to rescind the award was condemned as modern-day McCarthyism which raised urgent questions about a "pattern of intimidation and silencing."

Qatar World Cup built on a mountain of corpses.

 

The focus in Qatar has been on LGBT and human rights, but we should not forget that the Qatari world cup 2022, has been built on a mountain of corpses.

According to the Guardian, 6,500 migrant workers have died constructing football stadiums since Qatar was awarded the world cup in 2010. Many of these poor migrant workers came from the Asian subcontinent.

Will multi-millionaire footballers like Harry Kane and David Beckham, be leading tributes in Qatar to recognise these victims of Qatari sweated exploited labour, and be demanding that the government of Qatar pay their families compensation.

Tory hack, says we can pay nurses by robbing British pensioners.

 

Journalist, Ben Wilkinson of the Daily Tory-graph, says we can finance a decent pay rise for our nurses by taking it off the pensioners. He says the country cannot afford to retain the triple-lock on pensions.

The state pension in Britain ranks as one of the lowest pensions in Western Europe. We also retire much later than they do in other European countries like France (62), and Spain (65). The new state pension is currently £185.15 p.w. if you're a man born on an after 6 April 1951 or a woman born on or after 6 April 1953. This is less than the national minimum wage for a 40-hour working week. If you're a man born before 6 April 1951 or a woman born before 6 April 1953, you will receive the old basic state pension which is currently £145.85, even if you've paid national insurance contributions for over 40 years.

Wilkinson seems to think that the British state pension is far too generous. He says it would be better to link it to average earnings. He seems to forget that this year, the state pension was only increased by 3.1% because the government wouldn't increase the pension in line with average earnings which had risen to 8%, because they said the statistics on average earnings had been skewed by the Covid lockdown, when workers came off furlough and returned to work. So pensioners got a pay cut because pensions didn't rise in line with in inflation or average earnings. Retaining the triple-lock, was also a 2019 Conservative Party manifesto commitment.

One of the most generous pensions schemes in Britain is the governments own pension scheme for politicians. Liz Truss, the former UK Prime Minister, who almost trashed the British economy, was only 45-days in her job, but when she was ignominiously slung out of office by another Tory coup, she received a severance payment of £19,000 and a lifetime annual pension of £115,000 a year. They obviously don't believe in payment by results in the Palace of Westminster, because if they did, Truss would have got nowt! The House of Commons is more like a thieve's kitchen.

Self-styled Revolutionary Communist, condemns eco-activist protests!

 

Mick Hume - Journalist and former RCP Member

Mick Hume, now writing in the Daily Mail, thinks the eco-activists are running riot and the police have lost control.

Is this the same Marxist, Mick Hume, who was once a member of a tiny but influential Trotskyist sect, called the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP)? He once wrote for their in-house magazine called 'Living Marxism' and also writes for their online journal, 'Spiked' edited by Brenden O'Neil.

Of course, Mick is not the only Commie that took the shilling and can turn on a dime. His former RCP colleague, Munira Murza, co-authored the 2019 Conservative Party Manifesto, and before resigning, was the head of the No 10 Policy Unit, under Boris Johnson.

Dozy Boris, even nominated Murza's former RCP comrade, Clair Fox to the House of Lords, in spite of her support for the IRA and the Warrington bombers who killed two children. She now sits as Baroness Fox of Buckley and runs something called the 'Institue of Ideas'. How laughable that these careerist, charlatans, and opportunists, call themselves Revolutionary Communists.

"Zionism During The Holocaust" - Tony Greenstein.

 

I haven't read Tony Greenstein's latest book, "Zionism During The Holocaust", so I'm not in a position to comment on it. Nevertheless, I'm aware of the stance he takes regarding Zionism and the issue of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict because I've been reading his blog posts for a long time and I am familiar with his views.

Although Tony is Jewish, controversial, conceited, and the son of a Rabbi, some of his critics and detractors have denounced him as being a self-hating Jew and he was even accused of being a "notorious anti-Semite", by an equally notorious Zionist group, called the 'Campaign Against Antisemitism' (CAA). Tony, started defamation proceedings against the CAA, but lost the action. However, it's true to say, that many Jewish people who have pro-Palestinian sympathies and are critics of the Israeli state, frequently face accusation of this kind by the Zionist lobby.

What I can say, is that like Asa Winstanley, of the "Electronic Intifada" I have always found Tony Greenstein's articles well researched and very informative. Much of what he writes about the history of Zionism and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, I generally tend to agree with. Although he has tendency to skate on thin ice and to stick his neck out, he's generally truthful as far as he sees it, and is uncompromising when it comes to establishing the facts, however embarrassing that might prove for some.

In 2018, Tony was expelled from the Labour Party because they found some of his views and opinions unpalatable. They thought him far too honest. He was accused of "online abuse" but Greenstein says it was because he'd spoken out against the Israeli lobby within the Labour Party.

Jon Lansman, the wealthy Jewish founder of the pro-Corbynite group 'Momentum', described Tony Greenstein as "probably the rudest man in politics". Tony Greenstein wrote that he was outraged by Lansman's comments insisting that he was the 'rudest' and not 'probably the rudest' man in politics.

Tony Greenstein was expelled from the Labour Party when Jeremy Corbyn was the leader. Since the election of Sir Kier Starmer, as leader of the Labour Party, there has been a McCarthyite purge of left-wingers within the party including Jeremy Corbyn and left-wing organizations have been proscribed.

Update: UNITE collusion investigation.

 Representatives of Blacklist Support Group recently met with lawyers carrying out the independent investigation into possible collusion by union officials in blacklisting. The meeting took place at the chambers of the law firm, 33 Chancery Lane, adjacent to the Royal Courts of Justice.

Nick Randall KC, JC Townsend and Paul Heron (the investigation lawyers) confirmed that they are:

- collating documentary evidence already been submitted from various sources. 

- currently interviewing individuals who have offered to provide oral evidence.

- beginning to make contact with a number of people who have previously provided a witness statement, to clarify a number of points. 

- will soon be contacting people who they believe may have information relevant to the investigation. 

- in the future intend to carry out a forensic search of UNITE's electronic database.

Blacklist Support Group are convinced that the lawyers involved are independent from UNITE and Thompsons solicitors. It is only right that this investigation needs to be thorough, and BSG are confident that any report will be based on evidence rather than mere hearsay. BSG continue to encourage anyone who may have relevant information to contact the collusion investigation. 

Blacklist Support Group

book: http://newint.org/books/politics/blacklisted-secret-war/

video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNcgrNs6pB8

facebook: http://www.facebook.com/groups/blacklistSG/

blog: www.hazards.org/blacklistblog

Streeting censored for joke about Corbyn's 'senility'.

 

Shadow health secretary, Wes Streeting, has been severely censured for making a joke about former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, and his alleged 'senility' in old age. Old age is inevitable for most of us, and will come to you Streeting, make no bones about that. But dementia - which is on the increase in Britain - should not be a subject for amusement.

The Shadow health secretary, who has been tipped as a future Labour leader, is in favour of a greater role for the private sector in providing healthcare within the NHS and in reducing waiting lists. Streeting, a Labour right winger, has links with private health providers. He took a £15,000 donation off the hedge fund dealer, John Armitage, who co-founded Egerton Capital. Armitage's fund, owns shares worth £834m in United Health, a vast U.S. private health corporation that has spent millions lobbying U S. politicians to further its own business interests. United Health, has played a key role in the 'Americanisation' of the NHS that began under Tony Blair and New Labour and has continued apace under the Tories.

Although Wes Streeting apologised for his comments, there have been calls for Sir Keir Starmer to sack him. Some people think that he's not a fit and proper person to be Shadow health secretary given his flippant attitude towards dementia and cognitive decline among the elderly.

Italian Government breaks up a 'Rave' but not a Fascist Rally!

 

Neo-Fascism on the rise in Italy

Although displays of fascist sympathy are banned under Italian law, which also forbids the reconstruction of fascist parties, more than 2,000 supporters of the former Italian fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini, converged on his hometown of Predappio, last Friday, for a weekend event.

The government of Giorgia Meloni, whose party, Brothers of Italy, has neo-fascist roots, has been criticized for allowing this to happen at a time when it was more concerned to shut down an un-authorised rave at an abandoned warehouse, on the outskirts of Modena.

The event in Predappio, the Emilia Romagna town where Mussolini was born, was organised by Mussolini's descendants and the neo-fascist group Arditi d' Italia. It was intended to commemorate the anniversary of Mussolini's march on Rome. Fascist sympathisers from across Italy were photographed giving the Nazi salute. The event ended on Sunday with a march to the Mussolini family crypt in the San Cassiano cemetery.

While turning a blind eye, to the illegal fascist event in Predappio, Italy's new interior minister, Matteo Plantedosi, ordered the eviction of more than 3,000 people from the Halloween event in Modena, a three-day party that was due to end on Tuesday.

Nine-years old's given 'puberty-blockers' in Scotland!

 Nicola Sturgeon - Scotland's First Minister

Opposition is growing in Scotland to Nicola Sturgeon's toxic transgender politics and her Gender Recognition Reform Bill. According to a report this week, children as young as nine, have been prescribed life altering puberty blockers at Scotland's controversial gender clinic, the Sandyford, dubbed 'Sturgeons Tavistock'. A report by NHS clinicians found 79 children aged between nine and 18 were referred for puberty-suppressing medication. Nearly 40% of the children undergoing gender treatment suffered from mental health issues and a disproportionately high number, had autism.

The author, J.K. Rowling has accused Nicola Sturgeon of being a "destroyer of women's rights." Joanna Cherry, the SNP MP, has challenged her Party over "changing the definition of male and female."

In 2020, the House of Commons dropped similar legislation as it was feared that it would make it easier for sexual predators to pretend to be transgender to access women's safe spaces.

Last Thursday, Ash Regan, and six other SNP MSP's, defied a three-line whip to vote against the Scottish government and the Gender Recognition Reform Bill. Many felt that there should have been a free vote on such an important issue.

Scottish Minister resigns over Gender Reform Bill

 

Ash Regan - Scottish Community Safety Minister

Ash Regan, the Scottish Government's Community Safety Minister, has resigned in protest at Gender Recognition Reform in Scotland. In her resignation letter to Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland's First Minister, she said her "conscience" didn't allow her to vote for the proposals.

Critics, like the author J K. Rowling, have panned the proposals as a threat to women's sex-based rights. The Scottish government Bill on gender reform is intended to make it easier for people to change their legally recognized gender. It lowers the age for obtaining a gender recognition certificate from 18 to 16 and drops the requirement for a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria and a report from a psychiatrist.

Critics says the reforms could be abused by male sexual predators who will be allowed access to women's safe spaces.

Hartley Brewer say Eddie Izzard is a Man!

 

Julia Hartley Brewer says Eddie Izzard is a Man

There's a distinction to be made between gender and sexual human biology. Eddie Izzard might dress up as a woman and put lipstick on his lips, and use she/her pronouns, but I don't believe that he claims to be a biological 'woman'. The name 'Eddie', should tell you something. He says he's 'gender fluid'.

Gender is a social construct that can change over time. It also varies between cultures. It's really about how society expects people- men and women- to behave and the roles it expects them to adopt. In 18th century England, fashionable gentlemen, wore wigs and put makeup on, but they didn't consider themselves women, nor did anybody else. Today, we wouldn't consider that 'manly'.

In Shakespeare days, all female roles were performed by men dressed as women, because women weren't allowed on the stage. When Winston Churchill was born, all little boys were dressed as girls from an age of two to eight years old, until they were put in breeches. Moreover, the idea of a English middle-class women going to work for a living, or going to a university, was totally out of the question. Jane Austin knew that and so did Gwendolen Harleth, in George Eliot's novel, Daniel Deronda. They either got married or became governesses, or finished up spinsters.

Starmer refuses to rule out Eddie Izzard on an all women's shortlist.

 

Cross-Dresser - Eddie Izzard

The leader of the Labour Party, Sir Keir Starmer KC, has refused to say whether cross-dresser Eddie Izzard, would get on an all-women Labour Party shortlist. Eddie, a stand-up comedian, who uses she/her pronouns, is hoping to become the next Labour MP for Sheffield Central. 

Rosie Duffield, the MP for Canterbury, has been accused of bigotry and of making 'transphobic' comments about Izzard after she said that she would sooner be arrested than call Eddie Izzard a woman. Some woke Labour Party members are now demanding that Starmer remove the whip from Rosie Duffield. 

Izzard says that the crux of the problem is that "some people aren't up to speed and haven't joined the 21st century", adding:  "trans people exist, I exist." 

The Labour Party under Sir Keir Starmer, seems to have serious existential problems when it comes to the issue of human biology. In the past, Starmer has refused to acknowledge that only women have a cervix. He's said that Rosie Duffield was wrong to say that only women have a cervix. 

When Labour's Shadow Secretary of State for Women and Equalities, Anneliese Dodds, was asked if she could define what a woman was, she said that it all depended on "context." Labour's Shadow Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper, declined to define what a woman was, saying she was not going down a "rabbit hole." 

Several days ago, Eddie Izzard, confirmed that he would not stand on an all-women short list saying, "I'm gender fluid."