Toothless Briton will never solve it's burning issues
With reports out this week, chronicling "Dickensian levels" of child poverty within the UK, I find it quite astounding that this is not enough of a wake up call to start getting very tough on people who add to the problem and I am not only talking about illegal migrants. It's a cold hard fact, but this country is broke to the tune of £2.7 trillion worth of debt. Only due to it's (ever weakening) triple A credit rating, does the UK survive with that debt that now costs us 10% of the Government's yearly budget - c. £105 billion a year, just in interest. This in itself is an absolutely crazy situation. Imagine what £100 billion could do for the NHS and other areas that really need investment.
There are millions of people in the country who take advantage of our soft way of governance but they don't seem to realise, that while they play the system, they are just adding to the problem and creating an even bigger problem for their children and grand children, who will pay an even dearer price for the ever increasing benefits bill.
With 52% of households now relying on a benefit of one kind or another we are in real danger of creating a 2 tier society where one half of the population pays partially, and in some cases, fully, for the other half. That can NEVER work. Tax revenues already fall way short of what the country actually needs to operate. If we continue to sign people off work as "sick" at the rate we are going, tax revenues will fall further and more cuts will have to be made in order to ensure the most basic of services are maintained. And/ or the Government will need to raise taxes for those that ARE working just so we can pay for those who aren't working. This is not to say that there are people who genuinely need help and cannot work because of long term illness, but the point is, with many people getting on disability benefits saying they need more, unless we stop the dishonest claims, there will never be the money to give more help to those that really need it.
As if this domestic situation wasn't bad enough, we now find ourselves having to ask permission to deport illegal immigrants who are costing us billions a year to house and feed, while 4.5 million of our own children struggle with the very basics of life which we hand out on a plate to those that enter the UK by illegal means. This is UTTER MADNESS . Why do we need anyone's permission to eject illegal migrants ?! No other country in the world has this issue. As highlighted in my article below, our nearest neighbours (to the west) west, Ireland, themselves have a policy of immediate deportation THE SAME DAY that illegal migrants come in.
So why are we negotiating with the French to do a deal where we will absorb just as many people as are doing now ?! Can no-one see that this "deal" is the worst deal in history. We're simply agreeing to take a different person in rather than . We simply need to deport people who arrive here illegally. We need to send a clear message to all would-be migrants thinking of entering this country illegally that they will be returned forthwith and if they don't want to declare their country of origin we will send them to a place of our choosing, No accommodation, no cash handouts . Then may, just maybe, we can start to solve the huge problems we have here already, using that £4.5 million per day hotel bill for accommodating these illegal migrants on our own problems and our own people. You cannot have it both ways. We are not the power house of an empire we were in the 16th-20th Centuries. We are far far from that era and wealth and our desire to help everyone, to be "humane" only results in us being inhumane to our own citizens. Once we have paid back the £2.7 trillion of debt, got 2.8 million sick people at least partially working, and another 1.7 unemployed people back to work, then by all means, open up the borders. But for now, we must stem the bleeding or we will be able to help no-one in future, least of all our own people.
G. Hoff
Editor
This week I challenged the panel on Radio 5 live with this question:- "Given that Ireland has an official policy of zero tolerance for anyone arriving in Eire without the correct paperwork, leading to immediate return to their port of embarkation, why is it the UK feels it needs to leave the ECHR in order to be able to deport illegal migrants".
I was met with a list of statistics, hurriedly pulled together by a research analyst in the time between my original text in to the show with this exact question, and my appearance on it 25 minutes later. The statistics showed that although Ireland's asylum applications and illegal arrivals have soared 300% over the last year or so, that only 132 were forcibly deported etc. I pointed out that regardless of the numbers deported that Ireland's policy remains and IS enforced, even if not 100% of the time, and that non-one has challenged it. Furthermore, it was the BBC themselves that exposed it back in November last year. An excerpt from that report by Fergal Keene reads as follows:-
"Expelled the same day: Ireland hardens illegal immigration response:-
The three Gardai - Irish police officers - walk down the rows of passengers on the bus, a few kilometres south of the border with Northern Ireland.
Observing this is the head of the Garda National Immigration Bureau, Det Ch Supt Aidan Minnock.
“If they don't have status to be in Ireland, we bring them to Dublin,” he explains. “They're removed on a ferry back to the UK on the same day.”
Unbelievably, given that I'd single handedly torn down the UK's biggest barrier to mass deportation on the grounds of human rights, Nicky switched to another caller and no-one was able to answer the question as to how Ireland were able to enforce this policy and the UK were not.
Fear not. I have found the answer myself. In Ireland, the judicial system answer to the Government whereas in the UK, the judicial system controls the Government, in practise. There are also many more human rights lawyers in the UK, with a lot more experience, who know how to play the system (whilst earning vast sums of money in many cases). Where other countries are able to draw black and white line policies on immigration, in the UK, and other litigiously prone countries, the lawyers are able to paint a great big grey line in the middle and spend an inordinate amount of time arguing these cases.
It astounds me that we allow this to happen. The tail should never wag the dog, but we let it, with the argument that Britain is a shining bastion of fairness, open to all, etc etc. But this is not realistic and while these lawyers prolong the process using every tool in their very deep box of weaponry, we the taxpayer fund a £ 5 million A DAY bill for accommodating these illegal migrants.
I am astonished that no-one ever bats an eyelid at Australia's policy on anyone coming to the country without the right paperwork, given that they are subject to similar laws on human rights as we are under the European Convention. Their policy is simple. If you enter the country illegally, you will NEVER be given asylum there. Your application and circumstance will simply not be looked at if you try and come in through the back door. No exceptions. Furthermore, they patrol their huge sea border (at the pinch points) and actively turn back boats that they catch. Have we heard a murmur of criticism ? No.
So why is it, with a minuscule sea border to patrol, that the UK is unable to engage in the same tactics ? There can only be one answer which is that the Government, despite it's promises and assertions, does not have the will or the guts to really protect our borders properly.
In addition, the lawyers will continue to run rings around the system and many judges will continue to rule in the illegal migrants' favour, with the statistic already at 59% of asylum applications are being granted.
What the asylum sympathisers fail to recognise is that every single extra person that arrives here adds another person to the current problems we have in the UK with shortfall in services we experience everyday. We HAVE to get our house in order before we take any more in. Enough is enough. Imagine what the NHS could do with an extra £5 million a day ? When we have this country working properly again, by all means, open the border up again, with strict guidelines for entry, as they have in many countries that are not vilified as racist, anti-humanitarian and all the other visceral slander that gets spat at people like me just because we care more about the people in the country now, many of whom are impoverished, than we do about those who don't live here, have no god given right to settle here and have never paid a penny of tax here.
G Hoff - Editor
26th November 2024
Misdirected "tough decisions" threaten to de-stabilise the UK Government
While the Government continues to draw blanks, a petition calling for another general election reaches 2.6 million signatories
Labour's attempts to play tough with the public finances are all well and good in trying to achieve their long term goals, but they are focusing on the wrong elements.
Firstly, before they start to try and raise more taxes for the treasury, they need to look at how they can save money. £12 billion in overseas aid to start with. No other country, with £2.7 trillion of national debt, would dream of giving away money to another country. It's utterly brainless if you look at the situation objectively, which, as a responsible Government, you should.
Then there is the unbelievable figure of £258 billion we spend on benefits. Now, £137.4 billion of that is the state pension, and that's a given. But what about the rest ? It's a well known fact that the UK benefits system is widely abused by some people and I have recently p heard of someone who successfully claims £2,500 a month in various benefits from unemployment to disability, yet he is not disabled in any way and is quite capable of working. So, let's say conservatively, we could save 10% of the benefit budget (excluding pensions) , there's another £13 billion.
Then we have the biggest elephant in the room, illegal immigrants (and i stress the word "illegal") who cost the taxpayer £6.4 billion a year, while we house and feed them, despite the fact they entered our country illegally, citing asylum as their excuse but 95% of them are not in need of asylum. They are purely economic migrants , hoping for a better life, but they do not realise the more they come, they are just adding to the problem. Some serious propaganda needs to be done in the main countries where these illegal immigrants are coming from. They will NOT have a better economic life here. Period. They are just making things worse for those already in need. 18 million in Europe are starving already and 14.4 million people in the UK are below the poverty line...
I was watching BBC News about the protests in Ireland against immigrants, and the border patrol officer being interviewed was very clear. "People who enter Ireland illegally are processed the SAME DAY and sent back to the UK mainland, THE SAME DAY. No exceptions".
WHY OH WHY therefore, is it so difficult to the UK to do the same. We do not owe these people anything and even if we did, we can't afford to give it to them so why do we get embroiled in the whole issue when we cannot even house and feed to population we have here already ? People say "well, its not as simple as that" but i would retort "It really is that simple - you just need to grow a pair and look at Ireland and Australia" (as examples of how illegal immigrants should be dealt with, just as we would be if we entered their countries of origin without the correct paperwork. .. "
There are many other budgetary departments one could audit and find money in, but overall, every Government department is run incredibly in-efficiently and as Trump has done in the USA, we need to appoint an efficiency Tsar here, to crack the whip and get the civil service operating with a degree of pride and effectiveness.
The final issue that Labour cannot seem to get their head around is that their budget decision to raise treasury money by increasing employer N.I. is going to (already has) affected businesses taking on more workers and expanding, which would have driven the growth that Labour have talked about for the last year or so. In order to grow, you need to make it easy and viable for employers to recruit but as it is, it's just got even more expensive and there is still far too much legislation, compliance and regulation, in all industries which further strangles our ability to grow. Just watch Trump rip apart these 3 key business inhibiters when he get's into power and the rapid growth the USA will achieve as a result. We need to follow suit, tout suite !
Giles Hoff - Editor
13th November 2024
The NHS in crisis and why the entitled citizens of the UK are sucking the system dry preventing investment in treating and researching really serious illnesses
It's incredible to me that so many people have no concept of economics, common sense and taking responsibility for oneself.
Over the last few months, I have made a conscious effort to read, listen and watch news, particularly regarding UK issues.
A common theme running through many of the breakfast news channels and phone in's is this sense of entitlement that so many people appear to have, even if this country weren't in the worst economic shape in its entire history.
The amount of screen time given to relatively minor issues is astounding. The other week on BBC breakfast, they apportioned 15 minutes of prime time TV to the subject of stuttering and how the UK was so terrible at catering for those with a stutter, especially on voice activated phone lines. Now, I have a couple of friends with stutters and its tricky sometimes, but they both do very well in life although arguably, their's was not as severe as the lady who was the main subject of the story.
Either way, it's estimated that 1% of the adult population has a stammer, and that's of any level, so in terms of severe stammering, it's more like 0.25% (in the same way that 16.1 million people registered as disabled in the UK is a total nonsense when you talk about real life changing disability. A quarter of the UK population is NOT severely disabled. In terms of severe disability it is 7.45% of the population).
I digress, but am just proving a point. Someone can register with a stammer, but it does not necessarily impact their lives badly.
The point is, campaigners for these minor conditions constantly lobby the Government for more money to "research this" or "invest in infrastructure/ technology to help what is a tiny minority of people. All these campaigns draw away funds and attention from really serious conditions that are lacking research, or, money for the latest drugs that the NHS has to refuse people on the basis of cost (or cost versus benefit).
Stammering is a none lethal condition and definitely, in my opinion, is somewhere near the bottom of the pile for the NHS to worry about. However, I would go even further and include very rare diseases in the same category. If they are so rare, then apportioning research to them from Government coffers really isn't appropriate right now - they have far more high priority issues to attend to, inside the NHS and elsewhere.
Whilst I have enormous sympathy for those who randomly contract rare diseases, and we'd all love a cure for every disease (I know I would but there is zero investment from the Government into my disease which has over 500,000 sufferers in the UK) the reality is, we have to accept there is no money (right now) for non-essential research and care, hence there are so many charities now because every time someone dies of something unusual, another charity is born to try and "find a cure" or "pro-long the life of the sufferers". Please do not misunderstand me - charity work is all good and thank God for some of them dealing with really hard hitting issues like homelessness and child poverty, but more and more philanthropy is needed, at least whilst the Government balances the books which will take a generation or 2...
Added to this, you have the added pain of litigation against the NHS, an institution that never existed before 1948, and was created to help care for the sick and elderly. As with many facets of society, we have forgotten where we started and lost all perspective of what this great institution is there for.
Let's take an example.
BEFORE the NHS was created, you were 9 months pregnant and were in labour. If you were lucky, you might have had a midwife and/ or a doctor come around to your house. Due to inexperience or lack of equipment, the midwife or doctor is unable to untangle the umbilical cord wrapped around the baby's neck and it dies within minutes of being born. Whilst very upset, the mother accepts that this is not the fault of the midwife or doctor, or anyone else, and after grieving and burying her baby a few days later, gets on with life.
Fast forward 80 years.
Same scenario, but this time in a hospital (where it seems, in public opinion, no-one is allowed to die) . Months afterwards, a court case is brought against the hospital trust, citing negligence. An enquiry ensues, at great financial and time cost. A year later, the verdict is "no wrong doing" on the part of the NHS, as it should be. Even if the verdict had gone the way of the parents, people need to start thinking really hard before they bring such cases or better still, the Government need to ban all litigation against the NHS which, to all intents and purposes, is a free service. The fact people think they can sue an institution that is there to help them is totally wrong. However, the elephant in the room is simply that people cannot accept that death is a part of life.
No-one is born with the God-given right to live until they are 80+. No-one has the right to expect perfection from the NHS and even if someone is found to be partially/ unintentionally negligent, put yourself in the shoes of these doctors and nurses who are massively overworked and, in the case of nurses at least, hugely underpaid. They are human and human's make mistakes sometimes and you cannot ruin people's lives because someone died on their watch while they were doing their best to help them....
Society's inability to accept death, particularly what is perceived to be an "untimely death", really needs to get a grip of itself.
People die, everyday, of all sorts of diseases, from accidents, suicide and old age but no death is any more "tragic " than another. They are just simply "deaths". Some people draw a very short straw and die young from terrible diseases which they did not deserve. It's unfair, but life is, and it always will be.
In order that we can afford all the things people are demanding, there is going to have to be a huge shift in attitude and understanding of "life" and an acceptance that you cannot save everyone, from death, or pain, or delay death, ad infinitum (which is really cruel in many cases).
The hotly debated subject of legal suicide is a great example of where people's opinions are exactly that, but you cannot ever tell me or someone else suffering from a debilitating disease, that they are not allowed to end their own life.
It's hugely hypocritical in many cases. Most of us are pet lovers, but we would never see our animals suffer like we do our relatives. Why is it any different for humans ? This obsession with keeping everyone alive, at any cost, is simply ridiculous and very cruel in my opinion. Just because you have a heartbeat, it does not mean you are "living".
Take my Great Aunt for instance. Sharp as a tack and as fit as a fiddle until she was 90. The dementia set in and a series of strokes saw her spend her last 6 years in a home, stuck in a room, being force fed 3 times a day, with no clue of where she was, who she was, let alone who any of us were. Utterly pointless. If they'd just not resuscitated her after her 6th stroke, she could have had dignified death. And let's be really frank - the money ! All her life savings went on that home, approximately £290,000. She died with £20,000 to her name after a distinguished career in the Home Office and for what ? Just so someone could tick a box, take the money and say she was "alive". And, by the way, that money was never destined for the family, it was all going to charity. Think what they could have done with that ? I am not saying she wanted to die - she was far too gone even at 91, to have any grasp of her faculties and make such decisions, but if you could have got inside that head , knowing her as we did, I can guarantee she'd have said "for God's sake, put me out of my misery".
But no, we carry on spoon feeding people, through a tube, and administering drugs, just to keep them alive, when really, they would be better off left to drift away. That is their choice of course, but the majority of people I know never want to go to a home, EVER, and would rather just die in peace at home or take themselves to Switzerland in cases where they were very ill and in a lot of pain.
I think part of the problem is the families of those that are elderly or terminally ill. They are the ones who need help because they simply cannot deal with death, but eventually they are going to have to, so why string it out, just so Grandad is still breathing, still physically there, sat in the corner at Christmas, probably thinking "get me out of here !"
This is not an age debate either. I know many people in their 80's who are as fit as they were at 60 and will go on, with their brains and bodies intact, until they eventually have "a short illness" and die in relative peace and pain free. Equally, there are those who suffered or simply dropped dead of a heart attack or an aneurysm well before what is deemed to be a good age by modern society...
There are those who really packed a lot in to their lives but sadly were dead before their time. Take the racing drivers of the 1950's and 60's. It was such a dangerous sport back then, but they loved it, knowing they could come a cropper at any moment. One by one, so many lost their lives on the track, but no-one said how tragic it was . It was life and by the way, they knew it was dangerous and would never have thought to sue the governing body of the sport for not protecting them ! Hundreds of spectators were killed in those days as cars often careered into the flimsy stands, or in the case of the Mille Miglia, people were just stood on the side of the road with not even a hay bale to protect them. But that was their choice. No-one complained or sued. It was accepted.
I could cite many other examples of death by misadventure, brain tumours, regular car accidents, but I think i have made my point.
We need to accept that death is part of life, that it's rarely fair and in cases where it is an unusual cause of death, we should not seek to change things or stop it happening again at the expense of other causes that are much more prevalent. Otherwise, we will never tackle the bigger problems that exist today, with ever lengthening operations lists, 3 year waits for mental health appointments, child poverty, homelessness and much more.
G. Hoff - Editor
MPOX & PRISON SPACES
23rd August 2024
In another week where a lot of benign news has been circling around, some more serious issues have come to the fore, with the usual lack of perspective...
MPOX is back in the news. Yes, "back" because despite mainstream media attempting to scare monger us by renaming the decades old virus Monkey Pox, as MPOX, it's the same virus. That the clade b strain is more dangerous some some previous variants, there is no doubt, but really, the WHO need to be more responsible in their approach.
Declaring a worldwide public health emergency over a virus that has killed 457 odd people worldwide is simply irresponsible. Yes, it is spreading but the survival rate is at least 96% and there is a vaccine....
Have they learned nothing from COVID ?
The world cannot possibly afford any more lockdowns/ slowdowns/ restrictions for a host of reasons, but, primarily, the following:-
1. Economically, the world cannot afford to stop again. It's a global economy and stopping production and trade costs 100's of millions of jobs worldwide and the associated fiscal impact on those people/ countries runs into trillions of dollars.
2. Mental health damage to our children and many adults
3. The increase in deaths from other much more prevalent diseases that will then go undiagnosed and untreated. In the UK alone it is estimated that 250,000 people will die in the next 3-5 years because they were not diagnosed or missed treatment due to the disproportionate attention that was placed on COVID-19. And a lot of those people will be in their teens, twenties, 30's, 40"s and 50's.
So, WHO, I implore you to reign in your overhyped assessment of this virus. It's almost as if you want these diseases to occur so you can have something to say but you have a very serious responsibility to maintain calm and a balanced approach to such diseases because some countries and some citizens will react very conservatively to such statements.
PRISON SPACES
The issue of a lack of cells has been hot in the papers since the beginning of the week as the amount of rioters being convicted far surpasses the Governments pledged "extra 500 places for rioters". In order to maintain this promise, we are now letting other offenders out of prison early but that was already happening because our prisons are due to run out of space in September (yes, thats next month...). It should be noted that the most serious offenders are exempt from this scheme, but still....
Given that we are now letting people with good behaviour out on parole after serving only 40% of their sentence (this is standard. It was 50% 12 months ago) then what sort of message are we giving the criminals of this country ? basically, whatever sentence you're handed, you'll be out in less than half that time and that will include the rioters since this does not fall into the serious offences category.
So, what can we do about this ? Apparently, we cannot build more prisons because even if we had the money to build them, we would have no-one to run them. Apparently... Yet there are 1.44 million people unemployed. The prison service is already primarily run by very unexperienced men and women in their 20's because no-one else will work there, yet we are happy for some older adults to sit at home and claim unemployment benefit. Absolutely crazy.
So, let's suppose we let this idiotic situation exist, which it seems we will, then what other solution is there ?
Well, it will take some time to have an effect, but I think if we had a more feared police force then that would be a start. There would be some kind of deterrent for minor crime at least, particularly if the police were given more powers to hand out justice on the street. "What does that mean ?!" I hear people fearfully asking.
Well, let's take the case of the rioters as an example. In any other country they would have been shot with rubber bullets, certainly the moment they attacked a police van. Tear gas would have been used without question. In many countries, batons would have been used freely. And what do our police do ? Very little unless they are physically attacked (because the law so much leans towards the criminal in this country and they live in fear that if they put one foot wrong, they will be criminalised themselves). There was virtually no attempt to stop the rioters vandalising cars, shops and houses. It's a case of "sit tight until they actually physically attack us" but even then they mainly hid behind riot shields and let people hurl objects at them.
In my opinion, if we don't stop this weak style of policing, we will be overrun within 5-10 years in the UK, with prisons letting people convicted criminals out to roam and commit burglary, robbery, theft and many other so-called minor offences that go unsolved because the police are already stretched. Shop owners are going to start taking the law into their own hands and will no doubt then end up in court for protecting their own property and goods. Even outside the riots, theft in small shops is rife, and the police do absolutely nothing about it. In some countries, it's acceptable to defend your own private property and business premises with the use of reasonable force and if we were allowed to protect our own homes and businesses, these thieves would simply be sent packing on the wrong end of a baseball bat or a shotgun. But we cannot in this country because woe betide you if you injure someone who has illegally entered your house, where your children sleep... Cases like Tony Martin's in the 1990's have further strengthened the resolve of would-be burglars and it's completely wrong. Once someone crosses the threshold of your property they are trespassing and therefore breaking the law. The fact that Martin went too far shooting at Fred Barras and Brendon Fearon, is debatable, considering he'd been a victim of burglary 6 times previously, most likely by these two.
Equally, the fact that Fearon subsequently received £5,000 of public money in legal aid to claim for damages against Martin (he got some birdshot in his leg) was totally disgraceful, an insult to the public purse and another example of how criminals in this country are far too fairly treated. He would not have been shot if hadn't broken the law and that should have been the end of it. I don't believe in god but if I did, I'd say the devil has well and truly won and is sitting on his perch laughing at us right now, having successfully managed to give criminals protection and leniency and making the victims suffer even more.
I am not advocating this self defence policy, but if we don't start protecting our shop and many other victims, or at least catching and convicting the perpetrators, then this is what will happen, rightly or wrongly. Or, worse, organised crime will step back into one of their founding businesses, protection rackets. So, please can we give law enforcement some more power to give the odd clip around the ear without fear of being done for assault when the person they've clipped is on camera committing a crime....
Otherwise, we wait for those prisons to burst in a couple of weeks and an ever growing line of criminals waiting to be sent away.
G. Hoff - Editor
Previous Articles
14th August 2024
Highlight news topics of the week appear to be Taylor-Swift, a Eurovision spat and potholes. Why are we so obsessed with the benign and is it media driven or driven by public thirst for such trivia ?
I have made a point of listening to the news this week, on various mainstream journalsitic platforms and am gobsmacked by the topics that take up the vast majority of airtime. Whilst the more serious news items are the main headlines, what happens after the news bulletins is interesting. It seems every serious reporting channel now has to have a phone in and its these phone ins that take up the time on the airwaves. Some of them have a place, but even so, are not the most important topics of the day, by far in some cases.
The first was a phone in about potholes. I can't understand why we keep circling back to this subject. We all know the reason the potholes remain unfilled. There is no money in the councils' coffers and it's going to cost £16 billion to fix them all. At the same time, we have people moaning about the inadequacies of the mental healthcare system, the removal of subsidised heating for pensioners, child poverty and a lack of housing. When are people going to understand that this country is, to all intents and purposes, bankrupt ? None of these things will improve until we get the country's finances in order and we will never do that with half hearted policies and letting 16 million people claim disability allowances. So, phone in coordinators, presenters, and indeed the public, can we not waste any more airtime on inane subjects such as potholes when we already know the answer !
We moved Swift(ly) on from the 2 hour pothole debate, to the oh so upsetting news that Taylor Swift has had to cancel three concerts in Austria due to the threat of terrorism. I think the decision was a must given the police intelligence and I have no beef with that, or even that as a news item as its terrorism and that should be reported.
What I cannot fathom, or tolerate is the reaction if thousands of Swifties who proceeded to cry and holla as if the new queen of pop had been assassinated or something.. Swifties - get a grip. Have some perspective. While you were crying because a concert was cancelled (and they weren't financial tears as you will get all your money back, guaranteed) c. 22,000 people died of starvation that same day. So, please, yes, it is disappointing, but it really doesn't warrant tears and anguish.
The final item i found incredulous, especially having not heard about it at the time, was the Eurovision scandal... "What scandal ?" I hear you ask ?!
Well, apparently, the reason the Dutch entrant and hot favourite was eliminated from the competition was because he had supposedly upset a female member of the camera operator team back stage. Immediately I am thinking another sexual harassment case. The overly confident pop star thinks he can get away with making a pass at someone (who'd have thought ?!). But no, it was not sexual harassment. Apparently, the crime he was accused of was "making a threatening gesture" towards the camera operator by somehow touching her camera as he walked past. He denied to at the time but was still expelled, hours before the final in Malmo. A Swedish judge has now decided that there is no evidence whatsoever to corroborate the camera operator's claim. Well, that's not a lot of use to Joost now, is it ?
I feel bad for Joost Klein, even though the song was, in my opinion, having been subjected to it on the radio, totally abysmal, even by Euro Pop standards. It seems anyone can make any kind of accusation against someone now, with no evidence whatsoever, and it will be taken seriously. If she had accused him of rape, then okay, one would HAVE to take that seriously and if proved untrue, put her in jail for lying. But to be expelled from a singing competition because you hit a camera (unintentionally so it seems) is just mad.
And there you have it, the world again, shows us more evidence that it HAS gone totally mad !
G. Hoff - Editor
7th August 2024
Manchester Airport thugs and UK rioters are lucky they live in the UK...
On the 27th April 2006, Kenneth Callaway became embroiled in an argument with employees at an airline ticket counter in Cleveland. When the police came to intervene, he grabbed one of the officers firearms and shot him, only to be shot and killed a second later by the other officer. From the point of police intervention, this took a matter of seconds. Naturally, the police officer who delivered the fatal shots to Mr. Callaway was not charged with anything.
Wind forward 13 years to Chile. During a peaceful protest, police chose to break it up with tear gas and rubber bullets, blinding a 22-year-old psychology student, after he was hit in the face by rubber bullets.
The airport incident is admittedly rare, but only because very few people are stupid enough to walk into an airport armed and even less so, disarm a police officer. However, clearly it happens and this is the risk our armed airport police officers faced on July the 23rd. Frankly, I am amazed they only drew their tasers, given the ferocity of the attack, whatever may have caused it. Once a gun gets into the wrong, untrained, hands, then the public are very much in danger. Luckily for those 4 men, the British police are trained to appease, rather than to shoot first and ask questions later. If this had been in the USA, they would be dead or seriously injured and I very much doubt there would have been any case for the police to answer.
The issue for our police force is that, even our armed police, are relatively ineffective, because of the training they receive and the ethos of the British constitution. Our police force's raison d'etre is to "keep the peace". In the USA, they are "law enforcers". Those two objectives are quite different and hence, so are the operational procedures of the two police forces. Don't get me wrong, I'd rather our police were peace keepers, but in the same way Neville Chamberlain tried to keep the peace with Hitler, with dire consequences, there are a handful of people that need to be dealt with in a very different way because, like Hitler, it's probably the only way they understand. Brute force.
Listening to our Prime Minister on the news just now, after a weekend of rioting across the UK, I'm doubtful the people involved will be punished, as he so vehemently declares. 90% of them are wearing balaclavas. Only a handful have been physically reprimanded and the likely hood of the police tracking down the masked participants is very slim, and frankly, they have better things to do. What would be a more effective solution would be if our police force were feared, by those who should fear it. I would take a bet that if these rioters knew that they were going to be peppered with rubber bullets and tear gas, they'd think twice, but the reality is, the worst that will happen on the ground is the police will just stand their ground, behind riot shields. The reaction to the Manchester Airport debacle has further assured our anarchic compatriots that our police will not show much, or any, outward aggression towards them, despite the fact they are breaking the law.
Add to the fact that we absolutely do not need any more court cases on the already overloaded system when we have rape victims still waiting for trials to take place after 3-4 years. So, instead of arresting people, charging them, holding them and sentencing them (to what will probably amount to some community service, hardly a punishment) we need to get tough on the streets. We need to take back the streets from rioters (as well as thugs, organised crime, shoplifters etc) and make the trouble makers actually think before they don the balaclava "Do I want to risk losing an eye tonight" ? Otherwise, there is simply no deterrent and I guarantee they will not get the punishment they deserve going through the lengthy and fairly toothless British "justice" system, despite Keir Starmer's statements.
G. Hoff - Editor