"Hypocrisy" from Danny Alexander, who just happens to be my MP

I've previously given our local MP, Danny Alexander, now a member of the Coalition government (from the LibDem wing of course), a fairly easy ride when commenting on his expenses at the time of the Telegraph revelations two and a half years ago, but rank hypocrisy and 'jumping on bandwagons' makes me heave! Here we have our Danny jumping on yet another bandwagon criticising those who make perfectly legal arrangements to minimise their tax liabilities:



- when, as Guido Fawkes has helpfully reminded us, he 'flipped' his properties, using what what can only be described as quite imaginative arguments, prior to the eruption of the expenses scandal in order to save himself rather a lot of tax.

As I wrote in 2009 (first link above) I expect he is no worse than very many other MPs, of all politcal parties, not to mention other well-known figures or obscure citizens for that matter, but it sticks in my throat to see him (and indeed David Cameron, the Prime Minister, last week) taking to the airwaves to lambast people like Jimmie Carr (horrible left-wing hyposite that he is, too) exploiting perfectly legal - for the moment at least - loopholes in the law to minimise his tax liability.

It is NOT moral, or in any way sensible, to maximise voluntarily one's tax liability to the State, merely so that it can squander it - this is NOT (surprisingly enough from me - Ed) a political rant against any particular political party. What it is, though, is a very clear statement of my view that one is obliged to pay only what the law prescribes as being due in tax, not a penny more nor a penny less. There is no question of 'morality' being involved - we are a country governed by the rule of law, not the moral prejudices of partisan individuals or newspapers.

So, Mr Alexander (and Mr Cameron or any Labour [or SNP] politician for that matter), I think you should think more carefully before taking yourself to television studios to try and profit from the 'tabloid-style' prejudices being whipped up just now. Your own tax affairs and those of quite a few other politicians are by no means clear-cut, depending upon who is doing the interpreting of what is 'moral' or 'immoral'.

For myself, I prefer to look at what the law says. Period.

Super Injunctions and the "right to privacy"

(Please see UPDATE at end)

The current controversy, farce, call it what you will, about the "right to privacy" which people may or may not have in different circumstances and whether it should be possible to injunct not only mention of the underlying subject of the injunction, but the very fact that an injunction has been granted (in other words a 'super injunction'), has continued to grow. All of this is relevant to the Common Law of England and Wales; as was shown yesterday a Scottish publication has published some information subject to an injunction under English law, on the grounds (which seem pretty incontrovertible) that as Scotland has it own legal system, Scots Law, persons in Scotland are not subject to rulings by English courts, unless similar injunctions ('interdictions' in Scotland) are applied for and granted by a Scottish court. This is no different, in legal terms, from a US or French publication choosing to ignore a ruling in an English court. And vice versa or course. The fact that both England and Wales and Scotland are part of one political entity, the United Kingdom, is just one of the curiosities of British life.

Anyway what I have written above relates solely to the mechanics of what is going on, not to the underlying merits of the various cases and, going beyond that, the willingness of those subject to various laws to acquiesce in their effects.

Now I am not going to name the footballer named yesterday by a Scottish newspaper, and which I had already known for quite some time of course as it has been mentioned or alluded to regularly on the internet for many days. However, it is alleged that this footballer has been having an adulterous affair with a lady not his wife; the lady has been named (she is not the beneficiary of a super injunction), but I am not going to mention her name here either. So far as I am concerned whom the footballer or this lady whoose to have sexual intercourse with is a matter of complete indifference - the fact of me knowing or not knowing about it does not affect me in any way at all, nor does it affect 'national security' so far as I can see. They are breaking no law. Some people may consider the footballer, as a married man, a 'sinner' or morally flawed for having had sex outside marriage. For me, I simply do not care - it is a matter for the two individuals concerned and the wife and children of the footballer.

However, we British and indeed most nationalities have rather hypocritical attitudes to matters concerning sex. Most of us would be horrified if our own personal sexual life was plastered across the front page of a newspaper, but are 'titillated' to read of the goings-on of the rich and famous in this area. A few countries do seem to have a more 'sophisticated' view (or 'debauched' if you take a different attitude) of such personal matters where they have no effect on public affairs. The former head of the IMF, a French citizen, is currently undergoing legal process in the US because of the differences between the US and France relating to such issues - although it is clear that in that case it is not simply a matter of sex, but the exercise of power in a sexual context by one person over another, something which is tolerated in most societies, at least historically but probably contemporaneously too, far more than most would care to recognise or acknowledge.

So why do newspapers publish such personal information, which has no public dimension? Well, it is really very simple - it helps them to sell more copies, because many people (whatever they may say) enjoy reading about sex or 'famous people' acting in a way that some consider inappropriate. So it is basically about money. In that context it would seem sensible to me that there should be some element of privacy - not to protect a footballer, or indeed his children (that's his job and if he was really concerned about that then he wouldn't have done things which so many people would pay money to read about and which he could have predicted would be the case once the 'lust' was over), but simply because it really is not anyone's business but those involved. Only if society changes such that most people would not care about others knowing of their own sexual behaviour - always provided of course it is mutually consensual and not carried out using coercion of any kind for any of those involved - would it seem to become a matter of such indifference that publication would have no effect on a person's 'reputation', so would be unlikely to increase sales of any publication that chose to print stories about it. The financial imperative would have disappeared, so it is unlikely any newspaper would bother.

Until society does change, and most people's hypocrisy lessens, then individuals probably do require some legal right to privacy for their private life where it has no impact whatsoever on public affairs. The mechanism of achieving such privacy in the internet age with different legal systems and principles applying across borders is not immediately obvious to me.

Then you have cases where a person's behaviour in private does have an impact on public affairs - and sometimes it may genuinely be difficult to differentiate between those that do have an impact on public affairs and those that don't. I cite the case of a former newspaper editor and currently presenter of a major political discussion programme on television (yes, I speak of Andrew Marr) whose name was revealed generally a week or so back as having been involved in an extra-marital affair, despite him having secured a super injunction against such information being made public. Does his extra-marital affair affect the public affairs of the UK? Incidentally his partner in the affair is similarly involved in the media. Evidently it doesn't seem to have affected his role on the BBC, nor does it seem to have proved an impediment to his interview broadcast yesterday with the US President. In fact I knew about his affair (and the name of the partner) some years ago, having read about it in another blog, but I simply did and do not care - except to wonder at how a man so [ahem] ugly could seduce not just one woman (his wife), but a second; mind you his 'mistress' ain't no looker either, even if I have no idea about his wife. Human attraction is a very personal thing - some people go for looks, some for intellect, some for money, some for power, some no doubt go for other 'attributes'. The bottom line is that his affair is not relevant, I suspect, to his job or to public affairs so is no business of mine or anyone else not directly involved. So he had a right to keep this private if he chose to do so, although perhaps his questionning of the former Prime Minister about personal matters weakens his case somewhat - this is why such cases are not so clearcut as some would have us believe.

Similarly with the former CEO of The Royal Bank of Scotland who apparently had an affair with another senior executive of RBS during the period leading up to its financial collapse, with that person having apparently been promoted several times during his tenure. Could there have been, or the legitimate perception that there was, a 'conflict of interest' or defective decision-making associated with his professional functions?

A law, if it is to generally accepted by the people to whom it applies (i.e. all of us) must be founded on common sense and generally regarded as 'fair'; it must also take into account the fact, however regrettable it may be to some, that the writ of an English court (or indeed a Scottish, French or US court) runs only within its own jurisdiction and that if there is prurient interest in private matters which can be published in other jurisdictions then in practice there is little an English court can do about it; the advent of the internet and 'social media' accentuates this situation, certainly, but it has not created it. One of the most famous relatively recent cases of an attempt to prohibit public knowledge of what the rich and powerful were doing happened in the 1930s when the King was having an affair with a divorced person, not a crime of course, but not sanctioned by the Church of which the King was the titular head; the matter was successfully kept out of the British media for some time, but even then the fact that it was widely-published elsewhere (in the US and various European countries as I understand it - all this happened long before I was born) meant that it could not remain secret from the British people forever. Whether the King having an affair with a divorced woman would have materially affected his duties as King is open to debate, as distinct from his role as titular head of the Church of England. Of course my view is that as a secular country, even one with an 'established' church, this should be irrelevant, but many other people think differently - so quite apart from the impracticality of trying to maintain secrecy within Britain, it was obviously a matter which (like it or not) was of national importance, so attempting to keep it secret was quite wrong.

I expect the law will have to be 'adapted' to suit the world we now live in, with its ease and speed of communication, not to mention its cross-border nature. In the recent troubles in Iran and Libya, attempts by the local authorities there to restrict information to their own populations was attempted for a while, but quickly abandoned at least partially, just as attempts by the government of the former East Germany to keep its people insulated from outside viewpoints were never very effective; the same could be said of China today. The only country I can think of where a repressive regime has some success in restricting information is North Korea, but that is achieved only by extreme repression, something that is unlikely ever to be possible, or at least not for very long, in even nominal democracies.

UPDATE (Monday 23MAY2011 18.17) LibDem MP John Hemming named in Parliament this afternoon the footballer referred to above as Ryan Giggs; he was chastised for doing so by Speaker John Bercow, no doubt strictly correect according to the law, but frankly his objections would have been pointless last week and even more so now, whatever the "law" says as this particular law is no longer fit for purpose. As someone with no interest whatsoever in football I don't have a mental image of what he looks like. but a quick Google image search reveal this. As a corollary, a short while ago I watched an interview with Alistair Campbell, former spin doctor for Tony Blair, and a former tabloid journalist, not someone with whom I agree very often (or almost ever, really) say something which I thought was pretty sensible - basically that the journalistic attempts to get the name of Ryan Giggs into the public domain in this context are just so much hypocritical hogwash (my words), because there is no public interest in naming him, but it does help to sell newspapers, pretty much one of the points I was making in my own article. The fact that Ryan Giggs was at best naïve and at worst plain silly to pay a law firm good money to try and keep his name out of the public prints, given the salacious nature of his actions and the appetite of the [mainly tabloid-reading] public for 'juicy' stories about well-known people so that UK (in this case English) law can be flouted easily by way of the internet, not to mention print publications in other legal jurisdictions, is just becoming ever more clear.

Betty Bowers on "A Bible-based Marriage"

Very amusing, although shocking - but completely based upon Bible quotations. Hypocrisy ain't quite strong enough a word for some Christians' interpretation of their 'Holy Book'. The kicker is of course at the very end of the video-clip:

The Pope's UK visit and the Foreign Office 'apology'

This story is undoubtedly an embarrassment for the British 'do no evil'(*) Labour government. The whole point of 'brain-storming' sessions is that ANY and EVERY idea may be aired, however bizarre it might be. But in normal groups (and certainly in most private companies that I am aware of) the ones that are completely off-the-wall are briefly discussed and then dismissed and forgotten about - they certainly don't appear in the minutes of such meetings! Evidently in the public sector, which we all pay for through our taxes, things are different; no-one seems to stop and think what they are doing and what they are trying to achieve. 'Evaluation' did not seem to form any part of this particular Foreign office exercise in 'diplomacy'.

Now that is my assessment of this deplorable lapse from a management point of view. It is yet one more sign of how useless Labour is at managing anything, let alone planning for the visit of what is technically the Head of State of a foreign 'country'.

Having written all this though, I do find it difficult in this particular instance to become too exercised about the Foreign Office lapse. The Catholic Church has become an increasiingly ridiculous organisation in recent years; it preaches certain moral codes to its adherents and to the world generally, then proceeds to cover-up for the criminal behaviour of its 'paid agents' (i.e. priests) in many of the countries of the world where it operates; it is only the vociferous action taken in many countries to expose the 'paedophile' behaviour of priests by victims and the civil authorities that has forced the Church, finally, to begin to address the cancer at its heart. That action, in the case of the US, backed up by justifiedly swingeing financial penalties. The Church is, when it comes to the essentials, as interested as any other party in protecting its 'patrimony' and the financial costs of allowing its miscreant behaviour to continue have had to be made too severe for it to contemplate allowing them to be perpetuated - as it had tried, for decades, to do.

A number of the suggestions in the Foreign Office document, whilst completely unacceptable in the context of a Papal visit, neatly highlight the contraditions and just plain 'wrongness' of a number of the policy stances of the Roman Catholic church:
- celibacy for its 'paid agents' (aka priests), with no outlet for the sexual urges of some of these people. There may well be many priests (and nuns) who are capable of channelling these desires into their lives of devotion to their faith, but it seems than more than a few have failed to live up to the standards expected, over decades and probably centuries, although we will probably never know about cases beyond living memory in the majority of cases;
- suggesting a 'Benedict' brand of condoms is quite funny, but it neatly highlights the monstrous banning by the Church of abortions or birth control methods, including condoms, even in cases of rape or to aid in the prevention of disease transmission. Truly evil policies.

As for suggesting that Pope Benedict should be invited to bless some civil partnerships during his visit, well this is just ridiculous of course, but it does again highlight just how out of touch the policy of the Church is. The suggestion was of course particularly offensive, and presumably designed to be so ('as a joke'), but of course the Church's policies on matters relating to homosexuality are not only outdated, but singularly offensive to millions of British and other gay and lesbian citizems of various countries, including me.

To summarise my whole attitude toward the forthcoming Papal visit, conditions should be arranged such that this visit may occur without undue incident and for those who wish to take part in the various gatherings that will be organised during his visit to do so in safety. So far as I am concerned that is the extent of the government's responsiblity. I certainly do not want our government to acquiesce in deed or word to any of the Catholic Church's teachings which offend against our laws and I do not want it to remain silent should the Pontiff criticise our laws whilst he is actually on British soil; he will be an 'honoured' guest here, but that gives him no special right to intervene in our domestic affairs - we certainly would not tolerate any other foreign Head of State (i.e. American or French, to take two random examples) making negative comments about our laws whilst on a visit here and I don't think an exception should be made for the Pope. The government's first responsibility is to its own citizens (including of course those who adhere to this particular faith, provided such adherence does not offend agasinst the legal rights of other citizens). If the Pope behaves himself whilst here, then he should of course be treated with courtesy, but certainly under no circumstance with 'adulation' at an official level and he should be told firmly that any criticism he makes of our domestic laws whilst he is here will not be tolerated. Any adulation that may be shown should be limited to fellow-adherents of his faith.

There is an excellent French saying which neatly encapsulates my attitude toward this Papal visit: "Faites comme si vous êtes chez vous, mais n'oubliez pas que vous êtes chez moi." ("Treat this country as if if were your own home when here, but don't forget you are [in fact] in my home.")

(*) - irony alert.

Iris Robinson - says it all really!

PS/ Personally it bothers me not in the least that Iris Robinson had an affair with a young man 40 years her junior; both were adults and NO laws were broken in this regard. Good luck to both of them. On the other hand the lady is an unmitigated hypocrite because her own personal beliefs certainly would not condone her 'adultery'. As for the rest, her homophobia, well her personal beliefs are hers and she has the right to hold them - except that her being a legislator (as an MP and an MLA) does concern me a great deal. Then there's her financial probity, or more correctly her lack of it - that I do take GREAT exception to.

Hope she gets better soon ... then she can serve her prison sentence, which is certainly something she deserves.

Prince Harry and his alleged 'racist' remarks

Frankly I do despair sometimes of the tinpot little dictators who form part of the fourth estate in Britain! It is really hilarious when this deplorable rag, owned by a company whose founder is an unashamed republican (nothing wrong with that per se, but both he and his 'organs' do, notoriously, have 'agendas'), tries to come over as 'outraged of Wapping'! Let's face it, this concocted story has little to do with real moral outrage and much to do with getting media coverage and, more importantly, a way of supporting sales of this newspaper. End of ...

Naturally the BBC (and undoubtedly other media outlets) have had great fun with this story, too. They have to find something, anything, to fill their 24-hour news service, after all! And news about the Royal Family, particularly where they have allegedly made a gaffe of some kind, always makes good copy.

In this particular instance the only matter of relevance, in my opinion, is whether Harry's army colleague, Ahmed, was offended by being referred to as 'our little Paki friend'. If he was offended, then Harry needed to make his apology. If he wasn't then this whole story is just media froth. As for Ahmed's relative, shown in this video (scroll down to embedded video of gent wearing sunglasses) his comments seem completely contrived (prompted by the interviewer, it almost seems), when he suggests that cadets shouldn't have nicknames for each other, but should show 'more respect' for each other. What planet is this man living on? I have more to say on that particular subject (nicknames, not planets - lol!) - read on.

Coming back to that News of the World story and the video it publishes: if you watch to the end of the video you will see that the final part includes an off-screen soldier asking of Harry, in a jocular tone, "are your pubes ginger, too?" - Harry seems not to hear clearly what he has been asked (or makes out that he has not understood, at any rate) so the soldier repeats his question, to which Harry responds 'Yes, they are'. His head hair is 'ginger', so it is natural that his genital hair may be ginger, too - and I'm surprised his soldier-colleagues haven't already seen these in the showers, anyway. In other words, these are soldiers (just like any other young men) 'taking the mick' out of each other. That's really all that needs to be said, but you know (probably despairingly - lol) that I have a great deal more to say on the subject, from my own personal experience!

- From Morocco (Casablanca), the colleague who was known as 'le Noir' ('the Black') to everyone in the office. The young man in question was a VERY good-looking person (think Denzel Washington, or Adrian Lester) who was VERY black, presumably because (as my Morcoccan secretary explained to me when I had queried her about his nickname when I first heard it, soon after I arrived in Casablanca) he descended from sub-Saharan slaves. He was well-liked by everyone in the office and had a great sense of humour himself. He was a very witty and amusing young man. He referred to himself as 'le Noir', too.

- from Oman (Muscat). I had heard often reference to a person known as 'Mr White' - he was head of a central branch department which controlled stationery and various other administrative matters. He had the reputation of being a bit of a 'martinet', as people who are in control of their own little 'empires' often are, particularly when far-flung branches (there were about 30 throughout the country at the time) needed something from him, although on the very rare occasions when I had occasion to become involved personally with my own branch's dealings with him, he was always very polite to me, if still 'officious' (basically I was the 'British management officer', even if quite a young and junior one at the time) - I assumed that he was a long-serving Christian Indian member of staff who was good at his job (which he was). It was MONTHS later when I met him at a bank function (a cocktail party) and realised he was a 'coal black' Omani whose real name was of course Mohamed (Peace be Upon Him) something or other. My ignorance, quite frankly, was perfectly understandable because whenever he picked up the telephone he always responded "Mr White here". When I eventually met him in person it was quite clear he was a sardonic individual who rather enjoyed the joke of his nickname and had adopted it himself; bizarrely, and apparently at his own request, he was referred to as 'Mr White' in the internal telephone directory.

- from Hong Kong. In one of my jobs there (whilst seconded to another bank by my own bank, at the request of the Hong Kong government) I was in charge of quite a large part of that bank, a small part of which was the foreign exchange dealing department. The head of that department was a very clever young Chinese man who, naturally enough (he was a foreign exchange dealer), had a very quick brain and a good sense of humour - he was also VERY good at his job. After a while we became quite friendly and he happened to mention that his wife (also Hong Kong Chinese) was a Catholic, whereas he was a Buddhist. I came to realise, however, that he really had no understanding of what being a 'Catholic' is, or of what being a 'Christian' is, because he was quite unable to understand that being a 'Catholic' meant that his wife was also 'Christian'; the first time he ever mentioned his wife to me he told me that she was a 'Catholic' and he wondered whether I was, too, or whether I was a 'Christian'. I said that I was not really a Christian, although that like most Europeans I had been brought up in a nominally 'Christian' home, but I was a little nonplussed by his question so I said that being a 'Catholic' meant that his wife was also a 'Christian', but that being a 'Christian' did not necessarily imply that a person was a 'Catholic'. I was never able, over several months, to convince him about this; it remained a complete mystery to him, despite the fact that he was a highly-educated, highly-qualified and very intelligent man. He used to ask me about the subject regularly, because he simply could not comprehend what I was telling him - I would never have referred to the subject again unasked, because my personal interest in the Christian religion is almost nil - if I have any religious leanings at all, they are toward Zen Buddhism.

Personally I have never referred to anyone as a 'Paki' or a 'raghead', although I have heard these terms used often, sometimes negatively, sometimes with affection. I've also heard others refer to me by various terms (relating to my sexuality or my nationality) - sometimes in a negative way, at other times neutrally or with affection. Like most Gweilos in Hong Kong I believe I had a rather 'colourful' nickname amongst the Chinese (Cantonese) staff I knew and I have a framed photograph of a rather amusing cartoon which includes an image of me and which illustrates very succinctly what that nickname was, in pride of place in my entrance hall; it's part of who I am, 'warts and all' and I am certainly not offended by what it implies, simply grateful for remembrance of good friends. In these matters context is all - I tend to believe that the context in which Harry has used the terms 'Paki' and 'raghead' do not reflect badly on him at all and this media storm is just another ridiculous 'storm in a teacup' over nothing or very little. The fact that I have wasted so much time discussing this matter in so much detail is a reflection, unfortunately, of just how ridiculous our country has become, specially when the current economic situation means there are much more important things to worry about. One almost wonders whether this whole story has been concocted by the government-supporting left-wing media to try and distract the populace from things which the government would prefer people not to dwell upon too closely, such as how our government has completely messed-up the economy and left this and future generations with enormous debts and the likelihood of higher tax levels to try and pay for the present government's economic mismanangement.

Police hypocrisy over disclosure of information

The police often tell us, when the subject of ID Cards comes up, and the centralised database apparently necessary to make the system viable, that "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear."

Now we see clearly the hypocrisy of the police when it comes to the police themselves being required to reveal operational information, by no less a person than the Scottish Information Commissioner.

The case involves Northern Constabulary, the force responsible for policing my part of Scotland and relates to the death of a man in Wick in February 1997. His body was found in the harbour and the police stated that his death was accidental. The family did and do not accept this conclusion. A review of the police investigation conducted by Central Scotland Police Chief Constable Andrew Cameron, published in February 2007, criticised some procedures followed by Northern Constabulary; only parts of the report were published, however, with sensitive parts being 'blanked out' at the request of Northern Constabulary.

Now the Scottish Information Commissioner has ruled that Northern Constabulary must reveal the names of officers based in Wick at the time and the force is appealing against this decision on what seem to me to be the most far-fetched, wrong-headed and vexatious grounds:

"The appeal is based on the grounds of the law, in relation to the disclosure of personal data, covered by the Data Protection Act 1988 and requests that the decision should accordingly be quashed."

How can it be in conravention of the Data Protection Act to reveal information about who was on duty? The strong suspicion must be be that the police do have something to hide.

The smoking ban ... and Parliamentary hypocrisy

Through the good offices of the enterprising Trixy we have a fabulous example of Parliamentary hypocrisy in relation to the smoking ban; apparently when passing the law to ban smoking, our parliamentarians conveniently voted themselves an exemption! And these jokers wonder why they are held in such contempt by most of the rest of us?! The location is the Strangers' Bar - be sure to read the scrolling captions as they emphasise the extent of the parliamentary treachery involved:



(thru the devil's kitchen, but read also this fabulous parody on the Resistance is Useless blog)

PS/ Full disclosure: I am not a smoker. I have never smoked. I never will smoke. I was oppposed to the blanket ban on smoking on 'libertarian' grounds. I might have supported it had the ban been drawn up with flexibility and choice in mind and not just, as this exemption shows, the completely hypocritical manoeuvrings of our parliamentarians for their own benefit.

Cormac Murphy O'Conman on 'Straight Talk'

I'm just watching Roman Catholic Archbishop Cormac Murphy O'Connor on Straight Talk with Andrew Neil. Not yet online, but there is a link to the schedule for this interview here.

His answers on the subject of the covering-up of paedophilia by Roman Catholic priests and Bishops were disingenuous to say the least. The only reason these odious hypocrites were forced into cleaning up their act is because the secular legal process, particularly in the US, caught up with their lies and prevarications and extracted huge financial penalties. They had no alternative but to change, or go bankrupt.

Welsh ex-Councillor unwilling to stay weaned off public 'teat'

I thought this was some kind of April Fool's joke when I first read it, but it seems that eight local authorities in Wales took part in a Welsh Assembly Government scheme in 2004 to try and persuade (aka 'bribe') long-serving councillors not to stand at elections again, as a way of bringing in 'fresh blood' and 'fresh thinking'; payments of between £16,000 and £20,000 were made to Councillrs who applied for grants under the scheme. One of those who applied and received money was a Carmarthernshire councillor called Eunydd Thomas.

However now Mr Thomas has decided to stand for election again, citing pressure on him by his supporters who wanted him to. Amazingly a Welsh Assembly Government spokesman is quoted as saying:

"The assembly government made it clear when it launched the Past Service Award Scheme that only councillors retiring at the 2004 elections, and who had no intention of seeking public office at this level again, should apply for an award. "However, for legal reasons it was not possible to include in the regulations a provision which would prevent a recipient of an award from standing in a future election."

What that last sentence states, in terms, is that the Welsh Assembly Government embarked on a scheme to use public funds to achieve an objective (itself of dubious merit, in my view) in the knowledge that it did not have to legal power to enforce the terms of the scheme. Instead the scheme was to rely on the honesty and integrity of those applying for pay-outs under the scheme. I ask you! We're talking about 'politicians' here, even if they are of the relatively-lowly status of councillors! One might think that such people are, as a category, more honororable than people who stand for higher levels of government, being mostly amateurs known personally to many of the people who elect them. However, the truth is that they are just fallible human beings like the rest of us.

The real problem with this whole scheme is that it was ever dreamed up in the first place. The only criterion that matters about who should sit as a councillor, MP, MSP, AM, etc, is for the electorate to be able to choose from amongst those who wish to stand for election. I fail to see how it is within the remit of the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG), or any other government, to try and 'pre-select' those who should stand, based on some notion of bringing in 'new blood' or fresh thinking'! I can certainly understand that the WAG's (in the circumstances a curiously apt abbreviation!) legal advisors advised it of the difficulty of barring persons who accepted pay-outs under the scheme - after all, they are not criminals or prisoners or otherwise barred from standing for election and any attempt to enforce such a ban would undoubtedly contravene the Human Rights Act. However, if this bizarre scheme was decided upon, I don't see why a clause could not have been added to the rules to provide that anyone who took a payment, but who then subsequently stood for a similar elected position, would have to pay the money back, possibly plus interest. No-one's legal rights to either be elected or to elect whom they choose would be affected, but the public purse would have been protected from being squandered ineffectively.

Two prostitutes and a bag of cocaine later ...

I've just noticed an extraordinary piece in Jan Moir's Wednesday column (it's on page 3 of the online verion of her column) in the Telegraph. It is almost surreal, although few things surprise me now when it comes to right-wing politicians who profess Christian (in his case, Catholic) values. In the words of Cosimo Mele, 50-year-old MP and a former member of the centre-Right UDC:

"Of course I identify with Christian values, but what have those got to do with going to bed with a prostitute?"

Now I have no particular objection to him frequenting prostitutes (and no doubt a confession to his priest and a few Hail Marys will resolve the issue so far as the Church is concerned), but what about the cocaine, signor? And the hospitalisation of one of the young women involved from a drug overdose? Hypocrisy, matey!

Another hypocrite is exposed

Honestly, and I mean this very sincerely, it gives me no pleasure at all (not even a very mild form of Schadenfreude) to report that yet another religious bigot has been found wanting in the good taste and decency department. Tommy Tester, 58, pastor of a Baptist church in Bristol, Virginia has been charged with indecent exposure and DUI. It seems the poor man also offered blow-jobs to the officers who were sent to investigate. I hope at least that the skirt he was wearing flattered his figure and that the police officers he propositioned were reasonably good-looking. No doubt this was an 'aberration', although perhaps the good Rev. Tester needs to re-assess where he is in the gender spectrum and face up to who he is - I hope he can recover from this scandal and that his Church and his parishioners can give him the time and the space to work out his 'demons', as the good Christian folk they undoubtedly [would wish to persuade the world that they] are.

Junk(ie) government

The Cabinet of our marvellous NuLab government has eight admitted law-breakers in its ranks - these criminals have openly admitted to having used a banned substance (cannabis) in their youth; frankly why anyone should pay a blind bit of notice to what these aspiring authoritarians instruct, cajole and blackmail a far too docile population into doing beats me!

And I'm not just taking a 'pop' at the Labour Party and its cohorts, there are probably just as many in the Conservative proto-government (and LibDem and other Party) ranks who have similarly flouted the law 'in their youth'; a plague on all their houses!

Some of the laws are admittedly silly, probably some of those relating to drugs amongst them, but these are the people (or in some cases their parents) who passed the laws, so they had jolly well better get used to obeying them themselves. Perhaps the only way to bring home to these people just how serious is their contempt for the law is to ban them from public life - harsh, I agree, but perhaps it will persuade a few of those at university today to think about the careers they aspire to have in 10 or 30 years time and to do their studying within the law - or face the consequences.

I'm deeply opposed to capital (and indeed corporal) punishment, but the recent execution of a corrupt senior government official in China who had licensed fake drugs and taken bribes is perhaps something we might consider emulating from time to time "pour encouraqer les autres".

Catholic Church in Los Angeles coughs up USD660mn for decades of sexual abuse

In order to avoid a humiliating exposé of the sexual abuse against children perpetrated by its 'paid agents' (aka priests and other church officials) over several decades the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles has agreed to pay USD660mn (GBP330mn) to 552 people who claim to have been sexually abused - and although now their claims will not be heard in court, it is pretty safe to assume that these claims were so overwhelmingly true that the Church felt it had no option but, finally and at the last moment, to accede to the agreement. It is of course not the first time that criminal activity by employees of this religious 'cult' has resulted in severe financial penalties, but this is the largest sum it has yet agreed to pay. I heard on the radio earlier that the Church will have to liquidate some of its real estate holdings to make the payment.

Let's hope the cover-ups perpetrated by this sick organisation in matters of sexual propriety toward young people in its pastoral care are a thing of the past! I wouldn't bet on it, frankly, but at least a clear message has now gone out that the secular authorities are no longer prepared to tolerate what has gone on for so long.

It is probably too much to hope for that the hypocrisy of this and other religious organisations in their attempts to dictate to how other people how they should live their lives, is over. The simultaneous flouting of their own rules, and subsequent cover-ups, not to mention their blatant flouting of the criminal laws of various jurisdictions where it operates, has robbed it of much of whatever moral authority it once had.

Charles Kennedy - a basically decent, but flawed, individual ...

... with a wee bit of hypocrisy thrown in for good measure.

Generally I don't care for LibDems - some of their policies are OK, but many are the dilettante posturings of people who know they will never be entrusted (thankfully) with real power - unless they can succeed in getting proportional representation into national politics in the way they have helped to weasel it into Scottish politics; I am no supporter of the SNP, but at least their recent semi-success has released us in Scotland from having a bunch of nonentities (i.e. most LibDems) in partial control of the Scottish Executive.

Right, so much for where I stand. My impression, though, of Charles Kennedy is that he has always been something of a maverick in British politics - he succeeded at getting into Parliament at a very young age, so is definitiely a political anorak. Apart from a year spent working in journalism and broadcasting with the BBC in Inverness, he has never worked outside politics - indeed the whole of his working life has been, in one way or the other, at public expense. Unfortunately there is nothing unusual about this in any part of the UK generally, and certainly not in Scotland in particular. However I think he did represent something a little new when he first entered politics - a person who had no real experience of anything suddenly catapulted at a very young age into national politics, where he has remained ever since. Nevertheless he has always struck me, and the little I know about him as a local MP (for various family members and friends) backs this up, as basically a 'pretty decent kinda guy' (TM - Tony Blair - lol) - but with a certain number of human frailties, notably his tragic over-fondness for alcoholic beverages and his long-term addiction to nicotine.

However, the latest story about him having been reprimanded for smoking in a public place (a train heading for Plymouth) just a few days after the smoking ban has been introduced in England made me wonder how he might have voted on this issue in the House of Commons - here is the damning evidence of his hypocrisy. Bizarrely I had never suspected him of that particular 'weakness' until now - just goes to show he really is very typical of most of the rest of the human race.

For the record, once more, I have never smoked but am not a 'militant' anti-smoker (other than in cars I own where I forbid it as it fouls up the ventilation system irreparably) - I believe in personal liberty and am sceptical of claims about the damage 'second-hand' smoke causes to others. It is true, though, that I have found it more pleasant to visit certain pubs and restaurants since the smoking-ban was introduced a year ago in Scotland, but whether this has justified the reduction in personal freedom which flowed from the change is less clear. What is clear, however, is that Charles Kennedy voted for this extension of the surveillance and 'control it' society we live in, so he must expect to have to live with the consequences, just as every other law-abiding citizen has to.

PS/ This is the nonsense that Charlie-boy voted for; as I mentioned above, he'll just have to live with it!

Freedom of Information Act and MP's self-voted exemption

A petition to the Prime Minister seeking an overturn of the exemption MPs have voted themselves to the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act has been launched. The petition is in the following terms:

'We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to implement a full Freedom of Information Act. There is no justification in Government business being executed in a shroud of secrecy. The Government works in our name, therefore access to ALL business should be free and immediate.'

If you are a British Citizen or resident in the UK I urge you to consider adding your name to this worthwhile initiative. To view the petition and add your signature please visit the 10 Downing Street website here.

(thru Justin at Chicken Yoghurt)

Hypocrisy 101 - 'green' advisor commutes 500 miles by air weekly

A senior civil servant reportedly commutes from his home in Gloucestershire to Edinburgh on a weekly basis where he works for the Scottish Executive as head of the Environment and Rural Affairs Department; he was formerly a member of the sustainability commission and said then that the explosion in low-cost air travel was "unsustainable". The gentleman in question, Mr Richard Wakeford, has declined to comment. The Scottish Executive is quoted as saying:

"The Scottish Executive is committed to attracting talented people to work in Scotland. "We recognise the skills, experience and contribution that people who live outside Scotland can bring to the Executive, and that there may be instances where personal circumstances prevent them from relocating here."