PanopticonUK

LIARS!

2010-10-21T21:10:00.003+01:00

When Nick Clegg and David Cameron came into power, they promised they would end “the storage of internet and email regulations and email records without good reason”.

This is one of the reasons that I cheered loudly when they beat Labour in the election - their promises to restore the country to the people and to stop the state intruding into our private lives.

Now I am reading stories announcing that they intend to pass a bill to "....preserve the ability of the security, intelligence and law enforcement agencies to obtain communication data and to intercept communications within the appropriate legal framework."

This doesn't specify what exactly will be done but it is widely expected to require every communications service provider to retain records of every web page you visit, every email you send, basically a log of everything you do online!

I thought we had seen the turn around of the police state, now it looks like we were lied to through the teeth of the smarmy faced politicians who asked us to vote for them.

Is this down to the will of the REAL rulers of this country? The people pulling the strings behind the scenes at the European parliament who have supremacy over our own elected politicians!

Cameron and Clegg - Do you have the balls to stand up and represent this country? or are you going to quietly become the puppets of our european overlords?

Constable Teacher Sir

2010-10-05T14:49:00.002+01:00

And so the Jackboots march!

I had been looking forward to a quiet time with Tory/libdem promises to roll back state intrusion, I foolishly believed that we were entering a period when the politicians had recognised that government had exploded out of control during the Labour years.

Today I read of the government plans to give head teachers the power to discipline students "anytime, any place, any where"

The politicians still haven't remembered that PARENTS are responsible for their children and teachers only have the authority of the parents to discipline students during times that the parents have delegated that responsibility such as during school hours or school events.

This government is continuing along the path of the previous incumbents, trying to establish the state as parent of first resort!

I choose to state that I am responsible for my children until they reach the age of maturity and can take responsibility for themselves. Until then the state ONLY has the responsibility and authority to step in if I am failing my responsibility so badly that my children are at risk of harm.

Get on with the job of running this country for the good of the population and GET OUT of my private life and the private lives of my children! You've already trashed the country; you WILL NOT trash the lives of my children.

And there he was, dead

2010-03-11T00:12:00.001Z

Funny how the guy that wrote this blog entry was found dead at his home, no known illness - just didn't wake up....................

http://yannone.blogspot.com/2009/03/violent-overthrow-of-government.html

Paedophiles in charge - Safe in their hands?

2010-02-27T16:04:00.002Z

Isn't it a wonderful thing that we have the likes of Ed Balls to look after us, this pillar of our society? No? I don't think so either!

Ed and his lapdog Graham Badman have concocted a report consisting mainly of unfounded allegations and misrepresented statistics. This report seeks to put the authorities in the position of having prime responsibility for children, over and above the parents. They claim that parents cannot be trusted to look after their children and therefore it is necessary for all children to be seen by an approved professional on a regular basis.....

Are these the kind of professionals they want us to hand our children over to in order to certify that WE are not abusing them:-

Laming’s legacy of failure
Little Ted's Nursery
Headmistress ignores child with broken leg while she finishes lunch
Paedophile leading teenage sexual advice centre
Teacher rapes 5 year old pupil
GP has 6,000 child porn images

Depressingly, these are only a tiny selection of the cases listed on the map put together by the home ed forum.

Go to http://www.home-education.biz/news/23/15/Putting-professional-child-abusers-on-the-map/ or here to see the map.

Will I entrust my child's safety to the so called professionals? OVER MY DEAD BODY!!

Ed and co - if you think that I (and many others) will simply roll over and let you screw up the lives of our children then you'd better think again!

Paaedophiles in charge? - Top dog

2009-10-23T21:29:00.002+01:00

Funny how operation ore never investigated the labour politicians discovered during their investigations into child porn.

Funny how the mainstream press never reported any of it.

Read the links 'nuff said.

http://www.tpuc.org/node/34

Google search for Tony Blair D Notice paedophiles

Paedophiles in charge? - Charity trustees

2009-10-23T20:39:00.003+01:00

The report by the charity commission "Charities Back on Track 2008/9" states that of the 34 cases investigated and closed "Cases included concerns where individuals on the Sex Offenders Register were either proposed, or were acting, as trustees."

These are only the convicted offenders, we do not know how many people actually work for charities and may be in positions of power over children and other vulnerable people. Let's face it - how many reports have we read of children in care being abused, raped or even murdered by those in charge of them? How many other vulnerable people are harmed by those in power over them?

I used to live near an old peoples home and could often hear the anguished calls of the residents when they were too much trouble for the staff to bother to bring them their food or help them to the toilet!

This is why we must not delegate to the state the care of those we love. Children, the elderly, the mentally infirm are best cared for by those that love them, either personally or by staff that we choose (and check up on).

Positions of power will always be sought by those seeking power for their own ends, positions of power over children will always attract paedophiles. Do you think the state REALLY cares for your child more than you do? Do you trust the judges, the NSPCC staff, child protection officer, even the nursery worker?

There is a need for professionals to help families when they need it, but they should be carefully restrained, behave above reproach and always in the best interest of the family instead of striving to meet tickbox targets!

http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/library/investigations/pdfs/track09.pdf

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omEp8JKXMiI

Paedophiles in charge? - UNESCO

2009-10-22T20:53:00.003+01:00

Watching the various activities of our politicians, social services and the many others who claim to be 'protecting' our children, I've often wondered whether there is actually a ring of paedophiles at high level in authority and government.

Some time back I was shown a translation of a German Gov't leaflet advocating that fathers should 'pay particular attention to the vulva and clitoris of their young daughters', that touching children sexualy was 'good'. Naturally enough, the original leaflet has long since disappeared from official sites after the outrage by parents across the world.

Now I have seen a report by UNESCO which (amongst other things) says that children as young as 5 should be taught about masturbation!

I've always advocated that childrens' questions about sex should be answered honestly and openly so that children know that they can freely ask about any matter but this is VERY different to being 'taught' about sex, especially at such a young age!!

If any government official tries to force me to teach sex to any of my children before they are ready to ask questions driven by their own curiosity they may find the UNESCO report shoved where the sun don't shine.

http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0018/001832/183281e.pdf

http://www.tpuc.org/node/151

http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/oct/07101704.html

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/0,1518,497527,00.html

What a load of (Ed) Balls!

2009-09-08T21:15:00.002+01:00

Ed Balls wants to place all parents under suspicion that they MAY abuse their children.

Those that send their children to school are mainly tolerated because THEIR children are seen by professionals every schoolday, those that exercise their legal right to determine their own means of educating their children outside the school system need to be monitored and inspected because he doesn't trust them to care for their own children.

Meanwhile, his own wife admits that when their 2 year old daughter fell out of bed and came down the corridor crying for her mother she ".. had to leap up and slam the door in her face, and then put the duvet over my head so the listeners couldn't hear her .." because obviously a radio interview is much more important than caring for your child!!

Frankly Ed, I don't think I trust you or Evette to properly care for your child, I certainly don't trust you or your underlings to care for mine!

On the subject of education, I was absolutely speechless for quite some time when I read this article in the Telegraph about a training manual produced as part of the Government's National Literacy Strategy, aimed at boosting teachers' grammatical knowledge. It describes what full stops, question marks and commas are for and stoops to the level of having to explain thing such as "In writing, we mark sentences by using a capital letter at the beginning, and a full stop (or question mark or exclamation mark) at the end."

If these teachers have such poor grammar, how did they ever pass their exams and gain jobs as teachers?

Do they seriously expect that I should entrust the education of my children to such incompetent fools? They must be kidding!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2007/apr/07/gender.women
http://m.telegraph.co.uk/article/6142519/
Teachers professional development - grammar for reading course handbook

There is still such beauty in this world

2009-08-23T00:24:00.002+01:00

For all the ranting there is to do about all the bad things our politicians, the bankers and the rest of the elite do to us, I was so pleased to be reminded that there is still such beauty and delight in this world.

Sometimes it is good to shut out the horrors for a while and enjoy the delights of an artist that brings a lump to my throat and utter wonder to my mind. Please look at the work of Kseniya Simonova, a young Ukrainian artist (go to youtube and search for xensand).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtXFIOJh3W8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdOySXIftns

Britain is Dying

2009-08-21T23:15:00.001+01:00

Britain is dying - action is needed now

(Copied in full from IanPJ at http://thejournal.parker-joseph.co.uk/blog/_archives/2009/8/20/4294278.html#cid_1260438)

As I walk about the small town in the South Wales valleys that I now call home, I sometimes reflect on how vibrant and alive this place once was. I am not going back too far with my memories, but today the town is dying.

When I first came here to Blaenavon there was a butcher, a baker, a shop that sold all manner of things including the candlesticks, a number of florists, newsagents, hairdressers, greengrocers selling fresh fruit & veg, a plethora of book shops, cafe's ranging from a greasy Joes to a bohemian meeting place. There was manned Police Station, a Fire Station, 3 petrol stations, 20 public houses, 2 Post Offices, a swimming and sports complex and a population of around 6,500 who had painfully recovered economically from the closure of the mining industry a decade earlier.

In its day it was much larger, with a peak in population in 1921 of 12,500 supporting the string of mines that were present on both sides of the valley, the finest steel works in Britain and an Iron works that today stands in ruins and is supported by Heritage funds as a museum. The largest of the mines, Big Pit, still remains, although unproductive as it is now open to the public as a living museum.

Today however, after 12 years of Labour interference and mis-management in the Economy and the daily lives of everyone who lives here, the town is dying. The Butcher sold up, the baker has gone, the shop that sells everything now sells very little, the book shops are all gone, so are the cafes. The Police station is closed after an experiment to only have it open 2 hours a day, the Fire Station is part time, only 1 petrol station remains, 11 of the 20 pubs are gone, 1 of the post offices has been up for sale for over a year, the Swimming pool originally built with miners funds has been torn down, sold to developers (who intend to build a new police station?) and an increasingly confused population wondering where their next job and income is going to come from.

Pushing them further are the regulations, the interference in their lives, the touring DVLA vans with the ANPR camera, the host of newly installed CCTV poles, the mass of double yellow lines, the cut back in bus services, seeing Heritage grants diverted elsewhere, seeing their public buildings sold to developers, lack of toleration for any minor infraction of the rules, a lack of police presence.

The town itself has for many years been used as a training ground by the utilities companies, with more test holes dug and road patches laid here than anywhere else I have ever seen. Ex miners and their families had retrained as carpenters, electricians, builders, window fitters as they followed government advice and gained work from the rise of the social housing trusts that sprang up in surrounding towns and villages, that work is now dry as the funds are no longer flowing. The majority of those who still work are in public sector jobs or with companies that support the public sector.

That the people of this town have a work ethic goes without saying, given the opportunities they are hard working, given the opportunities they are adventurous as they have proven in rebuilding their lives after the mine closures, but yet again the rug is being pulled from beneath them by the very politicians who say they support them. It is soul destroying to see a town where nearly 40% of the population is on benefits of one kind or another sinking slowly because the disposable incomes have gone, and over the past 10 years the entire local economy has become dependent on government work or companies that provide services to local government or quangos, even then there is only enough to survive the daily payouts.

This situation is not unique to the one place where I live, it is repeated in town after town right across the UK, consequently to look from the bottom up we can see this country dying on its feet. That vital element in the recovery of any economy, the sustainable element, disposable income, has either gone or is diminished to such a level that everything begins to grind to a halt.

The Libertarian Party sees the recovery in a very different light to the other political parties. We do not see that bailing out banks and factories with taxpayer funds is either desirable or sustainable, nor is the latest Conservative idea of community work for benefits (pure communitarian not conservative). We do not believe that central and local government should be the only employers, further increasing the burden on taxpayers to sustain this huge monolithic spending machine.

People here do not want more state involvement, they do not want more debt through bank loans to survive, and the few businesses that are left want to be able to survive and grow on profits, not bank loans, and to do this they need customers.

Libertarians want to see people who are working keep their earnings, not working on half pay, giving them the disposable income to spend in the Butchers, the bakers, the candlestick shop, the pubs and all the other shops in the area. We know that this will mean replacement and replenishment, providing orders and growth to the factories and support businesses, who in turn will need to order and buy more raw materials. This is how the local, and in turn the national economy will recover.

In order to do that, we have proposed along with major reforms in monetary and fiscal policy, a range of far reaching manifesto items not least of which is the initial reduction and then elimination of income tax, not fiddling around the edges of tax policy, but scrapping it altogether. Putting money back into the powerhouse of any economic strategy, purchasing power.

In order that businesses can rise to this challenge, and survive afterwards we also propose scrapping many of the regulatory controls that currently restrict both the opening of new business and the sustainability of SME's. A huge reduction in Corporation Tax, setting it at a 10% flat rate and including a commitment to investigate the possibility of a 5 year exemption from Corporation Tax for start-ups (not deferment, an exemption).

We know that 10 factories paying the headline rate of corporation tax of 28% will not sustain the economy of this area, but 50 factories paying 10% will. Growth will be self sustaining as more people enter the workplace to support that growth, there will be more disposable income being spent, spurring even more factories and business to support and service that spending. The best bit however is that it can be done without reliance on bank lending, as it will be real money flowing up the chain, real profits creating that growth.

When growth is based on turnover in this way, taxation receipts will actually rise through volume, rather than decrease as it is at present by taking an ever bigger percentage of a diminishing pie, allowing everyone to gain and remove the need for government to borrow.

The current level of spending by Government cannot continue, and the Conservative and LibDems are already to committed to either maintain or increase spending in many areas. This is unsustainable.

Only today the PSBR (Public Sector Borrowing Requirement) has been released for July. In one month alone government has overspent and had to borrow the unsightly sum of £8.016 billion.

That means the government was over-spending by more than £258 million per day last month, which is living beyond our collective means by more than £10 million an hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. (H/T Guido) This means that the productive parts of our economy can no longer support such a huge government, the overspending and the restrictive regulations. (To give an example of how desperate these regulations have become, read this, punishment for attempting self help)

I look forward to the day when with the help of the Libertarian Party this small town that I live in can enjoy once again the vibrancy that it once knew, where it and its inhabitants can again be proud and self sustaining and above all self regulating as we diminish the power of the state to interfere and control.

Only scientist could find nothing and claim it as a major breakthrough

2009-08-21T22:09:00.004+01:00

According to Einstein's general relativity, gravitational waves should have been emitted during inflation, when the universe expanded exponentially moments after the big bang. "[Gravitational waves] can tell us how the laws of physics operated at that time," says Vuk Mandic of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. "This is very valuable because we cannot reproduce these high-energy conditions in the lab."

OK, so they are looking for something they cannot reproduce and presumably don't understand, by the sound of it it is something they have never proven to exist.

The latest measurement, made jointly by the US-based Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and VIRGO, its European counterpart, was sensitive to gravitational waves at frequencies around 100 hertz. But they found nothing.

From which, I understand - they didn't find anything, no evidence, no proof, nothing detected!

"This is a milestone," says Mandic, who is a principal investigator with the LIGO and VIRGO collaboration. "It's one indication that gravitational wave cosmology is coming of age."

Huh? You didn't find anything! Zilch, Zero, Nothing! How can this be a milestone?

Harald Pfeiffer of the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics in Toronto, agrees. "It's very gratifying to see the work of the past 10 years paying off," he says.

WTF? You spend 10 years looking, fail to find anything but it's very gratifying - man, you ARE easily pleased!

The hope is that the detectors will eventually find gravitational waves themselves.

Sounds like a really good, scientifically sound plan ....

LIGO probably has the edge over the other detectors. Last month the experiment entered a new, enhanced phase by doubling its sensitivity. Advanced LIGO, which commences in 2014, will be a tenfold improvement.

Tenfold huh, so ten times Zilch is ....... Zilch!

How many millions is this stuff costing? Only scientists could spend 10 years looking for something, fail completely yet announce the failure as a milestone, If I did that I reckon I'd be sacked!

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327222.900-gravity-wave-detectors-home-in-on-their-quarry.html

Children should go to school where they are safe .... Yeh right!

2009-08-18T23:49:00.002+01:00

Messers Badman and Balls wish all home educated children to go to school or otherwise be seen (and left alone with) 'professionals' to ensure they are protected from those nasty parents who may abuse them. Schools are places of safety where the teachers will deal with any signs of abuse - Unless it is the teacher doing the abusing of course!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1207444/Public-school-teacher-facing-jail-having-lesbian-affair-pupil.html

Justice - if you can afford it!

2009-08-16T13:58:00.002+01:00

I always believed that if the state brought false charges against me and I was found to be innocent in a court of law then I had a right to be reimbursed the costs of defending myself.

Now, it seems, the state is bringing so many false charges that it cannot afford to properly reimburse the innocent and will be limiting the rates they are prepared to pay. It can easily cost £4,000 or more to defend yourself against a simple false charge of speeding, can you afford to pay most of that out of your own pocket EVEN IF YOU WIN?

The result is likely to be that most of us will roll over and pay the fixed penalty fine even when innocent - simply because we cannot afford to prove our innocence!

This reminds of the film 'Brazil' where the accused had to pay for their own investigation unless they admitted their guilt, how far off are we now?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206692/The-speeding-stitch-Middle-class-drivers-pay-big-costs-bills-win-court-cases.html?ITO=1490

Ministry of justice

http://www.contracthireandleasing.com/car-leasing-news/index.php/2009/08/16/speeding-fine-stitch-up-for-the-middle-class/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=291QciJA2Wo

Plastic policeman tells boy off for climbing tree!!

2009-08-04T21:59:00.002+01:00

What has this country become?

A 9 year old German boy came over to the UK to visit his cousins, being a nice day they went to play in the park and as kids have done since time imemorial they climbed trees and I dare say they may have been loudly having fun.

A local busybody phoned the police to complain that the boys were being rude and anti-social. Now I would have expected the police to discretely look in and, unless there was a genuine problem, to just walk away leaving the boys to play.

Instead, a PCSO told them to play further away from the houses and issued them with a 'Stop and Account' form, leaving the kids frightened that they were in serious trouble.

When did young kids playing innocently in the park and climbing trees become a crime? I didn't notice that one get on the statute books. These PCSOs behave like jumped up little Hitlers, stories abound of them overstepping the mark, from insisting on taking a baby's temperature, to climbing in through open windows to warn householders of the risk of burglary. How dare these people think we are second class to them.

Unless and until somebody commits a crime, keep your bloody nose out of my business and piss off back to the safety of the police station where you won't have to deal with those nasty big kiddies who dare to allow their sounds of play to be heard above the tweeting of birds and the wailing of sirens!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1203978/Boy-9-left-terrified-PCSO-reprimands-climbing-tree-holiday.html?ITO=1490

WTFF??

2009-08-04T21:13:00.003+01:00

How long before the UK follows this lead, bloody cheek!

Watch the video, all is explained!

Personally, I think I want out........

Communism or Fascism, does it make a difference?

2009-08-02T14:49:00.004+01:00

I've written here in the past likening the activities of the British Government to those of the Nazis just before the 2nd world war, many other blogs have likened it to the soviet union during the communist era.

Communism / Fascism, does it really matter what we call it? The effect on the population was pretty much the same - oppression, fear, loss of liberty, loss of personal choice, intrusion of the state, brainwashing of the population through the schools and youth organisations, running the country for the benefit of the elite instead of the people, having to ask permission or seek licence to do what you previously could freely choose, suppression of dissent.

I read today an article that made me afraid, very afraid. The signs have been there for a long time - we are becoming a police state, it is happening and it is happening FAST.

If I could find somewhere better to go I would have no hesitation in leaving this country, the place I was born and grew up, the place I was once proud to call home.

Unfortunately this seems to be a global movement, people from all across the world are reporting the same things happening in their country. We must ALL push back against this, make it clear to our politicians that it is NOT acceptable, vote for whoever genuinely promises to give us back our freedom, break the hold of the big 3 parties until they see what is happening and once more choose to represent US, the people, instead of seeking to gain greater and greater power for themselves with the money and privilige that goes along with it.

Thank you to DK for posting the article that pointed me to Cory Doctorow's

http://devilskitchen.me.uk/2009/08/no-it-isnt-greener.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/oct/07/database.nation

Legalised Kidnapping

2009-08-02T10:57:00.003+01:00

I have written previously about children being taken from their parents, seemingly in order to meet adoption targets.

Yet another case is that of 24 year old Rachel who was deemed 'too stupid' to care for her daughter. There has never been any suggestion that she would harm her, just that she has been deemed 'too stupid' to provide proper care.

Adding to the outrage, she was not even allowed to instruct her own solicitor to fight her case! Because she was 'too stupid' the court appointed official solicitor was brought in to represent her. Unsurprisingly, it was deemed that it was in her best interest to agree to the adoption (regardless of how much she opposed it), so the solicitor agreed on her behalf - end of court case!

Her only hope now is the European Court of Human Rights, if the case can be heard before adoption proceeedings are completed, otherwise she may never again see her daughter as a child.

These atrocities are heard time after time after time, what sort of country do we live in?

http://www.no2abuse.com/index.php/news/comments/court-takes-child-of-stupid-mother/

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/families/article6396039.ece

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1189836/They-stole-little-girl-says-mother-judged-stupid-care-baby.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5417283/Social-services-in-Nottingham-claim-mother-is-too-stupid-to-bring-up-child.html

http://feministmums.wordpress.com/2009/06/01/no-mother-is-too-stupid/

http://www.itv.com/News/tonight/episodes/Don-tTakeMyBaby/default.html

http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/politics/Lessons-learned-Baby-K/article-877079-detail/article.html

Anyone still think we don't live in a police state?

2009-08-01T16:20:00.003+01:00

The British government is to put the more irresponsible families under CCTV supervision in their homes – just to ensure their children attend school, go to bed on time and eat proper meals. Private security guards will also be sent round to carry out home checks, while parents will be given help to combat drug and alcohol addiction, Children’s Secretary Ed Balls says.

I thought this was a spoof at first but it seems not:-

http://www.medindia.net/news/Irresponsible-Families-To-Be-Monitored-Round-the-Clock-In-UK-55352-1.htm

http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/pns/DisplayPN.cgi?pn_id=2008_0145

http://www.respect.gov.uk/members/article.aspx?id=8678

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/115736/Sin-bins-for-worst-families

WTF??

2009-07-29T00:35:00.002+01:00

How bloody stupid can these do-gooders be??

A school reports concerns over a pupil's smoking, DECCA wade in and hand out packs of Nicorette gum without even informing parents. Surprisingly enough the pupil involved wasn't interested in the gum and passed it on to his friend Aiden who then chewed his way through 45 sticks (the equivalent of 180 cigarettes) in the next 25 minutes and ends up in hospital, doctors say he could have died.

DECCA say "We always make sure clients understand not to give out their gum to anyone else." so presumably this is the fault of the two lads in question and nothing at all to do with the idiots who handed out the drug laden gum in the first place!!

Unbelievable!!

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090721/thl-boy-ill-after-nicotine-gum-binge-d831572.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1200918/Boy-14-collapses-overdosing-nicotine-chewing-gum-handed-school.html

Bouncers (and many others) to be allowed to fine you

2009-07-28T19:40:00.003+01:00

Oops, I forgot that I should be politically correct and should refer to the kind gentlemen known as bouncers by their proper title - Nightclub Doormen.

You see, these gentlemen will soon be part of the establishment, all trained up and certificated you see. That makes them 'authority figures' to be rewarded by our good and caring Fuhrer, sorry - Government, authorising them to impose fines on us if we're naughty boys and girls.

Even better, they will be able to access the police criminal records database to see if you have been naughty before, that way they can pick on you, sorry I mean keep an eye on you to make sure you don't get a chance to enjoy your night out, oops again - I mean to make sure you don't start any trouble.

As soon as they get a chance to provoke you, naughty me - I meant to say that as soon as you cause any trouble they will then issue you with a fine, a bit like a parking ticket and just as difficult to appeal if unjustified.

Ken Frost has blogged on this one at http://nannyknowsbest.blogspot.com/2009/07/nannys-special-police-force-bouncers.html

What Ken hasn't mentioned is these powers can be granted by any police chief constable to any person or organisation deemed suitable, they can then issue fixed penalty notices for many offences such as graffiti, flyposting, dog fouling, littering and public disorder:-

The powers are granted by chief constables under the Police Reform Act 2001 to organisations that contribute towards community safety. They must undergo extensive vetting and training and wear a badge and uniform approved by the chief constable.There were 945 accredited individuals in 2005 but by last year the figure had risen to 1,406.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6727070.ece

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/henryporter/2009/jul/27/bouncers-issue-fines

Another example of why no child of mine will be left alone with officials

2009-07-25T22:56:00.003+01:00

The government like to appoint and force us to use 'experts', they like to ensure that all people dealing with our children have the official stamp of approval showing that they have been checked and approved.

Why then do we keep hearing stories of paedophiles in schools or otherwise involved with children? Why do they keep casting suspicion on ordinary loving parents?

As I keep saying - GET YOUR OWN HOUSE IN ORDER, STOP INTERFERING IN MINE!

http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6017955

http://www.no2abuse.com/index.php/blogs/comments/mps-is-any-child-safe-check-this-list-out/

http://www.no2abuse.com/index.php/news/comments/social-worker-jailed-for-6-weeks-for-the-possesion-of-indecent-images-of-ch/

http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/portsmouth/Under18s-targeted-over-fears-for.5485560.jp

Married then forced to spend 18 months apart

2009-07-24T21:41:00.002+01:00

Doesn't the government love to use the phrase 'if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear', I'm sure there must be occasions when that is true - I just can't think of any at the moment!

Take the story of Adam and Rochelle, she is canadian and aged 19, they met 2 years ago when Adam visited Canada, kept in touch and married when she came over to the UK to see him again.

Sounds like a delightfully romantic story until you read about the official involvement .....

The Home Office messed up their application for permission to marry with the result that Rochelle's visa expired due to the delays, in the meantime new laws were introduced to 'protect' young people from forced marriage which means that even though they received permission and married each other, Rochelle must now leave the country until she is 21 (an "inconvenience" according to officials).

The bizzare thing is that the couple can live together as man and wife in any country except the UK - Adams country of birth. How crazy does that make us?

Who the hell is making up these laws? and what planet do they live on?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/8165684.stm

Dumbledore's Army

2009-07-22T21:17:00.002+01:00

Is this why they are so afraid of home education ...........

They are terrified that a superclass of people are being created, that will number over 100,000 in a very short number of years. These people will be independent thinkers, who have been properly trained in ways that produce (and that historically have produced) the greatest minds. They will be capable, unflappable, unprogrammable, steadfast, quick witted and very very powerful.

100,000 people is an army. The Home Educated army of the future will be, at the very least, able to totally dominate society. They will ascend to all the highest positions in industry, finance and politics, completely shutting out everyone else. And by the way, everyone else will be so dumbed down and brainwashed that it will be easy for even the weakest Home Educated child to shine like Einstein in comparison.

Thanks to Blogdial for putting this up

http://irdial.com/blogdial/?p=2003

United States - Child removed from mother who refused caeserian !!!!!

2009-07-22T19:35:00.001+01:00

Absolutely bloody speechless !!!!!!!!

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/189649-Pregnant-Women-s-Civil-Rights-Violated-in-New-Jersey

Now they are going for the school children as well

2009-07-22T18:24:00.002+01:00

The government has been carrying out a sustained attack on home educators for several years now, many non home educating families may have had little sympathy for our plight, partly because it doesn't affect them, partly because they think we are a bit odd and need to be clamped down on.

I've been saying that it is not a home ed / school ed thing, the government wants to clamp down and take control of ALL our children, their tactics are to identify and tackle small groups rather than take us all on at once - BEWARE, they WILL be coming for you and yours!

The latest move is to enforce Home School Agreements, failure to comply or refusal to sign may be used as evidence in a magistrates court to support imposition of parenting orders and I dare say may even lead to forced participation in a Family Intervention Project ( I say forced - they are not compulsory, but you could face eviction or losing your children if you do not accept their 'help').

We must all put our differences to one side and put this government back in its place as providers of services to us and not dictators!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1201452/Parents-forced-sign-school-contacts-ensure-children-behave.html

http://www.cypnow.co.uk/news/ByDiscipline/Youth-Justice/login/922213/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1201462/Thousands-Englands-worst-families-placed-sin-bins-improve-behaviour.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-448038/The-Colditz-classes-coping.html

Speechless

2009-07-21T21:56:00.003+01:00

I must confess to having been temporarily speechless, there is so much going on at the moment that I can't figure out where to start and how to phrase it.

For the moment I'll just throw in the latest thing I've seen from the Association of Directors of Children's Services who, like ACPO, are not actually an organisation set up with any state authority but are a LIMITED COMPANY.

This distinction very conveniently allows them to fall outside any scrutiny of government bodies, they don't have to answer to the National Audit Office or respond to Freedom of Information requests yet they work "closely with Ministers, government officials, the community and voluntary sectors, local government organisations and other key local and national agencies".

I was first incensed by their statement in their press release welcoming the Badman HE Review - "Registration that links every home educated child to a school as well as some form of monitoring will ensure that every child gets all the help that they need."

I then read one of their 'Notes to editors' - "Directors of Children's Services have responsibility for the well‐being f all children in a local authority area, ensuring that children achieve all five Every Child Matters outcomes"

This is plainly not the case when you read the DCSF extract from the childrens act "The DCS is professionally accountable for the delivery of authorities' education and social-services functions for children, and any health functions for children delegated to the authority by an NHS body. The DCS, together with the LM, has a key role in driving the local children's trust arrangements and the provision of services for children and young people."

More and more we are seeing state service providers seeking to redefine their role in terms of policing others rather than providing services, they then get so wrapped up in their misplaced policing role that they don't provide the services they have primary responsibility for.

They, like many arms of government, are operating well outside their remit. I've sent in a complaint, please send in your complaint as well as we need to remind these people who they are, who we are and what they should be doing FOR us instead of TO us.

I am aware that I am kind of stumbling over my words here but it's difficult to think straight when all I can see is a red mist GRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!

Jaquie Smith admits she wasn't up to the job

2009-07-17T16:37:00.005+01:00

Jaquie Smith admits she wasn't up to the job .... Isn't it about time ministers were given jobs based on their competence and skill instead of as rewards for loyalty or in order to be 'representative' of gender and racial balance.

Far too many of our senior politicians have neither the skills nor experience necessary to run their departments properly, they are given their jobs based on their current level of favour at the time of cabinet reshuffle rather than how suitable they would be to carrying out their tasks.

This argument should be applied all the way from top to bottom, we hear of all women lists for parliamentary candidates or police jobs open to black or asians only, in order to 'reflect their community'.

I am absolutely against discrimination of ANY form. People should be paid according to their capability and NOT their gender or race, they should be appointed to jobs or positions based on their capability and skill and NOT as a reflection of their colour, gender or sexuality.

This goes for positive AND negative discrimination - it shouldn't happen!

If I am working with someone or appointing someone I am not interested in their sexuality, I'm not interested in their colour or religion, all I want to know is "Can they do the job?", "Are they the best person for the job?".

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1200108/Jacqui-Smith-admits-wasnt-Home-Secretary.html

Obama's science advisor once advocated mass sterilisation and forced abortion!

2009-07-12T20:08:00.003+01:00

John Holdren, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, co authored a book in 1977 advocating mass sterilisation through the water supply and staple foods, forced adoption etc etc. Now he's advising the US president on science policy!

Put this together with plans for forced vaccination against the alleged swine flu pandemic and I'm starting to get seriously concerned about their motives.

http://zombietime.com/john_holdren/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Holdren

What next?

2009-07-11T00:07:00.004+01:00

Well, they've all but banned smoking, banned drinking in public, they're trying to ban home education, they've demonised cars, raised concerns about bottled water ...... what will they go for next?

Seems like it may be water, all those nasty people who think that just because the pipe is full of the stuff they can just go and use it as they want ........ without permission or measurement!

Anna Walker has just released a report recommending that all customers should have water meters fitted and those big cisterns (you know, the ones that only need to be flushed once) should be outlawed.

My thanks to 'Counting cats in zanzibar' and 'Ambush predator' for spotting this one.

http://www.countingcats.com/?p=3374

http://thylacosmilus.blogspot.com/2009/07/water-water-everywhere.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5687897/Water-companies-to-snoop-on-pool-owners-as-report-calls-for-radical-reforms.html

http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/water/industry/pdf/walker-call-for-evidence.pdf

Locked up - for playing football with the kids!

2009-07-10T23:20:00.004+01:00

Sounds like a really good thing to do, get your young son's friends together and arrange a game of football twice a week on the local recreation grounds. Nothing competitive just a nice game.

I would say it is just what we need, people within the local community getting together and helping the kids do something constructive instead of hanging around on street corners and getting into trouble.

I'm sure you'll forgive me for thinking that the local council should be encouraging this kind of activity but what do they do - they get the police in and lock him up for 5 hours while they investigate his 'crimes' of not complying with council rules that would have made their informal games impossible.

This is crazy! We need to vote these psychopaths out of office and get people in authority that are interested in supporting their communities.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1198840/Father-arrested-held-cells-playing-football-park-children-council-permission.html

Philip Pullman - a man with principles

2009-07-10T22:06:00.002+01:00

If I wore a hat I would be doffing it to Philip Pullman, he has declared that he will refuse to submit himself to registration on the Independent Safeguarding Authority database.

The implication of requiring this registration is that no adults can be trusted near children without having been registered and authorised.

I do not believe that this process of registration will protect children in any way whatsoever, for ample proof of this fact just google teacher abused pupil or nursery paedophile, these people were all registered and authorised - that didn't stop them did it?

What happened to the old fashioned idea of the regular teacher sitting in on the session where a guest adult may be present, surely that would be ample protection against abuse (provided the teacher can be trusted of course).

It's about time we stopped putting our faith in government databases, vetting and registration, instead we should simply supervise those we don't know well enough to trust and ensure that everyone is aware of their responsibility to report abusive behaviour knowing that their report would be dealt with in a proportionate and sensible manner, neither too sloppy nor too heavy handed.

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/90936-child-safety-checks-are-like-section-28-says-pullman.html

Safe in school - I DON'T THINK SO! (again)

2009-07-10T00:28:00.003+01:00

Our dear caring government continue to attack home educators, they claim that children are safer in school where they will be 'seen' by 'professionals' who can spot early signs of abuse.

Would these be the same 'professionals' who bully, abuse and even try to murder the children in their care?

What makes them think that teachers are more likely to care for the safety and welfare of the children in their classes than their own parents would. There have been many documented cases of teachers and other so called professionals abusing children.

As I've said before - GET YOUR OWN HOUSE IN ORDER! Leave innocent families alone and concentrate on taking care (with compassion and respect) of those who genuinely need help.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/beds/bucks/herts/8141950.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/beds/bucks/herts/4478384.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/beds/bucks/herts/4290825.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/nottinghamshire/8142428.stm

http://www.stopbullyingnow.com/teachers%20who%20bully%20students%20McEvoy.pdf

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/sussex/6365797.stm

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/scotland/3834062/Teacher-assaulted-pupils-after-extreme-abuse.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/5051254/Teacher-struck-off-over-sex-with-pupil.html

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?Priest_abuse_pupil_sues_for_%A35m&in_article_id=592435&in_page_id=34

etc. etc. etc.

Some poor 'hidden' abused children....

2009-07-08T00:16:00.002+01:00

Hey! Mr Balls, Mr Badman, Ms Morgan and all the rest who somehow think that home educated children are locked away by their parents, abused and prevented from 'socialising' normally, have look at a short film put together by a bunch of young home educated children and their families.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxkTyV3NaTg

Far from being unusual, this is just NORMAL happy children being themselves and living lives.

Get off their backs and stop trying to destroy the happy family lives they lead!

Could this be the reason teachers will, every 5 years, face losing their jobs?

2009-07-07T23:33:00.002+01:00

Ed Balls has announced plans to introduce 5 years licences for teachers.

Any teacher that does not qualify to have their licence renewed at the end of 5 years will automatically be prohibited from teaching and thus lose their job.

Best of all - the licence is renewed by the head teacher, so upset your boss at your peril! If the head teacher doesn't like you (maybe a personality clash or you have expressed concern at his poor management) you are finished! On the other hand, if the head teacher is your mate or you both subscribe to the same dodgy websites you have a job for life amongst the children..........

The truly concerning bit comes when you look into 'Common Purpose', indications are that they are trying to place their 'graduates' into positions of authority and influence, teaching positions are excellent opportunities to indoctrinate young minds and if the 'old school' teachers can be pushed out when their licence expires then there could be many opportunities for more common purpose graduates.

Read up about them and come to your own conclusions............

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/5700476/Ed-Balls-Teachers-to-be-licensed-to-work-in-schools.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8127085.stm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jul/01/ed-balls-education-white-paper

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196442/Ed-Balls-classroom-lout-plans-branded-sham.html

http://stopcp.com/

http://www.commonpurpose.org.uk/home.aspx

http://cpexposed.com/index.php

http://eutruth.org.uk/cp.pdf

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/common_purpose_70

Another step towards global government

2009-07-07T23:18:00.002+01:00

The UN is now looking at ways to protect its income, in the middle of a global recession they are obviously concerned that contributions from the nations of the world will fall.

Unlike we ordinary people who will have to manage on less money, the UN has decided that it should protect its income and is proposing raising money directly through taxes on the people of the member states. phrases such as "....and initiate a needed dialogue on the transformation of the international financial architecture..." worry me enormously.

http://www.aim.org/aim-column/u.n.-to-emerge-as-global-irs/

http://www.un.org/ga/econcrisissummit/stt_day24.shtml

http://www.heritage.org/press/commentary/ed121803b.cfm

http://www.house.gov/paul/press/press2006/pr061506.htm

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,42529,00.html

http://www.cfif.org/htdocs/freedomline/un_monitor/in_our_opinion/global_taxes.htm

It's the fault of the parents!

2009-07-06T22:50:00.003+01:00

Just been reading an article over on The Times about claims that 1 in 14 children cannot speak properly.

The interesting bit is in the comments - many are quite adamant that it is down to the parents to teach their children to speak and it is the failing of the parents resulting in the speach problems of their children.

I wholeheartedly agree, yet the government has spent years undermining parents, drumming into them that they should leave education to the 'experts' who know better than they do.

The parents that have stood up and taken full responsibility for their childrens' education by not sending them to school and embarking on the journey known as home education are constantly attacked and slandered with wholly unfounded assertions that they 'could' be abusing their children.

Home educators are threatened with state imposed monitoring and control over the education they provide, with insinuations of abuse and thus a need for checking that their children are 'safe'.

Abuse rates amongst home educating families are half that of the general population, the knowledge and abilities of the children are shown generally to be far greater than those that go through the school system yet the government cannot leave them alone, they are determined to drag those children down to the state school standard in the name of giving them 'the same opportunities'.

Hey, Ed, read the article, read the comments and leave them kids alone - it IS down to the parents to teach their children, many want to do just that - let them get on with it!!

A peotic message to Ed Balls

2009-07-06T22:24:00.002+01:00

From one of those poor, deprived, hidden, home educated young people he's so worried about - a poem:

"The Wolves are Running" by Lorien, age 15

I thought those days were over
I thought those days were gone
I thought those days were numbered
When we'd sing a protest song

I simply can't believe
That in a modern world like this
A war is quietly raging
And a Fascist World exists

The words "Lest we forget"
Have left a ringing in my ears
You'd have thought that Britain's children
Would remember all the tears

What did Great Grandad die for?
Why did Great Granny cry?
They laid down their lives for freedom
And we've all forgotten why

Now the children here wear brown-shirts
And they're spying on their friends
On their parents, their community
This poison never ends

We haven't quite got goose-steps
But we aren't that far behind
The lessons from the past
Have been forgotten by the blind

HITLER IS THE BADMAN
And he hasn't lost his B**LS
They're eroding all our liberties
Within those Whitehall walls.

Nazis were never conquered
And now we've become the Jews
They're forcing us to wear a badge
We have no right to choose.

Behind the might of the Red Rose
A swastika is seen.
Be careful here, all Children
They are part of a machine.

And this machine will crush you,
They will force you to comply.
They'll try to own your hearts and minds
And if you resist - Goodbye!

I know those days aren't over
I know those days aren't gone
And my days, they may be numbered
But I'll sing a protest song.
And it will go on and on

And on.

Thank you to Lisa at Renegade Parent for originally posting this and thank you to Lorien for writing it so beautifully.

Monitored to death!

2009-07-06T22:05:00.002+01:00

Ed Balls, Graham Badman, Baroness Morgan et al want state officials to have the power to enter peoples homes (starting with home educators) in order to monitor children to ensure that they are safe and well (obviously their parents cannot be trusted).

Now one might imagine that the credentials of somebody who supposedly is to be trusted to care for a child over and above the love of its parents would be impeccable, rather than the kind of people working for Haringey Council who even after many inquiries and reports are still not properly safeguarding the children they have been given responsibility for!

I believe that many parents would share my sentiments in shouting "OVER MY DEAD BODY", these people and those like them will never be left alone with my children, they will never be given the opprtunity to claim to know better than I do what is best for my children.

Now stop meddling with innocent and happy families, GET YOUR OWN HOUSE IN ORDER, look after the children that you already know to need protection instead of looking to interfere with those who don't need your brand of protection.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1197344/Baby-P-council-failing-children-Ofsted-report-slams-limited-progress.html

Safe in school - I DON'T THINK SO!

2009-07-06T20:35:00.003+01:00

Ed Balls and Baroness Morgan both loudly proclaim that home educated children should be monitored to ensure they have the same 'protection' as children who attend school.

Home educators, who know the truth about safety of children in school versus out of school, have been beating their heads against a brick wall trying to explain to people how false these statements are.

I read today the story of a seven year old girl who was tied up by four boys in school and then whipped with a skipping rope during the lunch break.

I bet the school has one of those completely pointless 'bullying policies' and doesn't believe that they have a bullying problem. Shouldn't break times be supervised? How could this abuse have occurred without being noticed at an early stage?

This alone should be sufficient justification to hold schools up as places where children are at risk rather than places of safety.

The real punchline comes when you read that the parents of the girl were not told what actualy happened, only that she "... had been hurt by some other children".

The dinner lady who had found the child being whipped spoke to the girl's mother and gave the full story is now facing the sack for 'breaching the confidentiality' of the boys who had done the whipping!!!

What sort of crazy mixed up world is this? I think that ALL parents should protest by taking their children out of school and refuse to re enroll them until this whole system is dismantled and rebuilt with the interests of the children foremost.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article6648948.ece

Boys should get cervical cancer vaccine ......

2009-07-06T00:22:00.001+01:00

Merck have announced poor quarterly sales figures.

Experts announce that boys should now receive the HPV (cause of cervical cancer) vaccine as well as girls.

No link between the two of course ........ What do you think?

http://irdial.com/blogdial/?p=1566#comment-34273

http://news.scotsman.com/health/Boys-39should-be-vaccinated39-in.5425635.jp

The child snatchers hide behind the family courts secrecy

2009-07-05T23:33:00.002+01:00

A business consultant was concerned that his children may be at risk of abduction so he arranged with the school to collect his children from inside the school gates.

One of the teachers had 'concerns' so involved the police.

In their usual heavy handed way, the police and social workers turned up and met the man and his wife when they arrived at the school, after refusing to accompany the social worker (who wouldn't show him any form of ID), the police then arrested the couple and detained the man under the mental health act (N.B. he was given a complete discharge in the ensuing mental health hearing) and the children were taken into care.

Now, despite the couple having been exonerated of any accusations of abuse / mental illness etc etc, the children are still in care and the case cannot even be discussed as it sits within the ever secretive family courts system.

What a very neat system the authorities have woven - they can act any way they wish in the knowledge that the family court system will protect them from any backlash, their misconduct cannot be properly exposed or even discussed!

Has nobody here considered the children? If their parents have been found innocent then they should be returned immediately.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5743419/Is-the-state-guilty-of-child-kidnap.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5743507/Couple-lose-custody-of-children-after-school-security-concerns.html

ID cards are dead, Long Live The ID Card!

2009-07-05T12:04:00.002+01:00

I read with great joy reports that Alan Johnson had scrapped plans to introduce compulsory ID cards, closer reading wasn't so encouraging - the database was still going ahead and would be populated by information gathered by the identity and passports service.

Now I have read further and far from being scrapped, the ID cards project is actually being accelerated.

The only claimed concession is that the cards will not be compulsory, this has not changed - the cards were never intended to be compulsory until a significant number had ben issued, what will happen instead is that this card will not be compulsory, you just won't be able to do anything without it!

Just think, once they take steps so that it will be very difficult to open a bank account without your ID card, claim benefits? visit the doctor? use the library? enter government offices? buy age restricted items? (alcohol, tobacco, lottery tickets, glue, cutlery...). How long do you imagine being able to refuse an ID card when all these things will be closed to you?

Yes - purely voluntary as in "you're stuffed without one!"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/5700798/Home-Secretary-abandons-compulsory-ID-cards.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jul/02/editorial-id-cards-register

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/jul/02/identity-cards-fraud-cost

http://p10.hostingprod.com/@spyblog.org.uk/blog/2009/07/alan-johnson-lies-about-id-cards-and-1-2-billion-a-year-identity-fraud.html

http://www.longrider.co.uk/blog/2009/07/02/well-that-didnt-take-long/

Who's Snooping Your Computer?

2009-07-04T23:53:00.002+01:00

Last year the German government passed laws allowing their police to to conduct "remote searches of computer hard drives" using rootkits or remote forensic software, covertly placed in a computer to monitor its content.

Now we hear that "almost all partner countries have or intend to have in the near future national laws allowing access to computer hard drives and other data storage devices located on their territory".

So, not only can the authorities monitor your online activities but they can also hack into your computer and snoop around your hard drive, soon they hope to have the legal power to do that without breaking the law.

The police won't even be restricted to snooping on computers in their own country! They plan to introduce new laws permitting cross border snooping.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/jun/09/remote-access-surveillance-rootkit

Total Traffic Surveillance

2009-07-04T23:05:00.002+01:00

Our dear caring government is backing a project to install devices in new cars to track the whereabouts of drivers anywhere in Europe.

Known as the Cooperative Vehicle-Infrastructure Systems (CVIS) project the system will constantly communicate with nearby cars, roadside devices and a control centre, giving location, speed and direction of travel.

The story given to the public is that the system will significantly reduce road accidents, congestion and carbon emissions.

They are keeping quiet about the other 'benefits' such as the ability to track any car at any time or the ability to easily charge for road usage or even automatic reporting of breaking road traffic laws.

Indications are that the device could be installed in all new cars as early as 2013.

Although this is an European initiative, the British government are one of the primary backers.

Add this to all the other initiatives such as :-

Contact Point (to record details of every child in the UK)
The ID cards database (you thought this had been cancelled? - wrong - it's being accelerated!)
ANPR
Monitoring of all emails sent and every website visited
Control orders (which require no proof and even don't require that you are told what you are suspected of)
and many more........

I don't think there can be any doubt that we are more closely monitored and controlled than we have ever been in history!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/mar/31/surveillance-transport-communication-box

http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/esafety/index_en.htm

http://209.85.229.132/search?q=cache:78rUcadeTegJ:www.cvisproject.org/+Cooperative+Vehicle-Infrastructure+Systems&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk

The CVIS web page is mysteriously offline so the link above takes you to the google cached version.

Forced Schooling Poster

2009-07-03T15:49:00.003+01:00

A quick link to Debs at 'Travelling to Scotland', I just love the 'Forced Schooling' poster which I think highlights the real issue of children being forced into school against their will rather than the gov't view of children being forced into home education against their will (rolling on the floor laughing at the thought if that one .... as if!).

http://tryingtorelax.blogspot.com/

Elected Dictatorship and inconvenient truths

2009-07-03T15:24:00.004+01:00

For a long time now I've thought that NuLabour have been acting as an elected dictatorship, forcing their ideology on the country and ensuring the whole system works entirely in their favour.

The complaints of the people fall on deaf ears amidst increasingly oppressive monitoring and control of the population.

This explains why inconvenient truths such as the rate of abuse amongst known home educating families is less than half that in the rest of the population are ignored in favour of headlines such as 'Home education could be used as a cover for abuse'

Over at 'Sometimes it's Peaceful', Gill has posted an excellent article on this subject, she has also produced some really good analysis of the constant and ongoing attacks not just on home educators but parenting in general.

http://sometimesitspeaceful.blogspot.com/

http://raquel67.blogspot.com/2009/07/just-for-record.html

The Children's Story by James Clavell

2009-07-03T00:37:00.001+01:00

The teacher was afraid.

And the children were afraid. All except Johnny. He watched the classroom door with hate. He felt the hatred deep within his stomach. It gave him strength.

It was two minutes to nine.

The teacher glanced numbly from the door and stared at the flag which stood in a corner of the room. But she couldn't see the flag today. She was blinded by her terror, not only for herself but mostly for them, her children. She had never had children of her own. She had never married.
In the mists of her mind she saw the rows upon rows of children she had taught through her years. Their faces were legion. But she could distinguish no one particular face. Only the same face which varied but slightly. Always the same age or thereabouts. Seven. Perhaps a boy, perhaps a girl. And the face always open and ready for the knowledge that she was to give. The same face staring at her, open, waiting and full of trust.

The children rustled, watching her, wondering what possessed her. They saw not the gray hair and the old eyes and the lined face and the well-worn clothes. They saw only their teacher and the twisting of her hands. Johnny looked away from the door and watched with the other children. He did not understand anything except that the teacher was afraid, and because she was afraid she was making them all worse and he wanted to shout that there was no need to fear. "Just because THEY'VE conquered us there's no need for panic fear," Dad had said. "Don't be afraid, Johnny. If you fear too much, you'll be dead even though you're alive."

The sound of footsteps approached and then stopped. The door opened.

The children gasped. They had expected an ogre or giant or beast or witch or monster - like the outer-space monsters you think about when the lights are out and Mommy and Daddy have kissed you good night and you're frightened and you put your head under the cover and all at once you're awake and it's time for school. But instead of a monster, a beautiful young girl stood in the doorway. Her clothes were neat and clean, all olive green - even her shoes. But most important, she wore a lovely smile, and when she spoke, she spoke without the trace of an accent. The children found this very strange, for THEY were foreigners from a strange country far across the sea. They had all been told about THEM.

"Good morning, children, I'm your new teacher," the New Teacher said. Then she closed the door softly and walked to the teacher's desk, and the children in the front row felt and smelled the perfume of her - clean and fresh and young - and as she passed Sandra who sat at the end of the first row she said, "Good morning, Sandra," and Sandra flushed deeply and wondered, aghast, with all the other children, HOW DID SHE KNOW MY NAME? and her heart raced in her chest and made it feel tight and very heavy.

The teacher got up shakily. "I, er, I - good morning." Her words were faltering. She, too, was trying to get over the shock. And nausea.

"Hello, Miss Worden," the New Teacher said. "I'm taking over your class now. You are to go to the principal's office."
"Why? What's going to happen to me? What's going to happen to my children?" The words gushed from Miss Worden, and a lank piece of hair fell into her eyes. The children were agonized by the cut to her voice, and one or two of them felt the edge of tears.
"He just wants to talk to you, Miss Worden," the New Teacher said gently. "You really must take better care of yourself. You shouldn't be so upset."
Miss Worden saw the New Teacher's smile but she wasn't touched by its compassion. She tried to stop her knees from shaking. "Good-bye, children," she said. The Children made no reply. they were too terrified by the sound of her voice and the tears that wet her face. And because she was crying, some of the children cried, and Sandra fled to her.

The New Teacher shut the door behind Miss Worden and turned back into the room, cradling Sandra in her arms. "Children, children, there's no need to cry!" she said. "I know, I'll sing you a song! Listen!"

And she sat down on the floor as gracefully as an angel, Sandra in her arms, and she began to sing and the children stopped crying because Miss Worden never, never sang to them and certainly never sat on the floor, which is the best place to sit, as everyone in the class knew. They listened spellbound to the happy lilt of the New Teacher's voice and to the strange words of a strange tongue which soared and dipped like the sea of grass that was the birthplace of the song. It was a child's song, and it soothed them, and after she had sung the first chorus the New Teacher told them the story of the song.
It was about two children who had lost their way and were all alone in the great grass prairies and were afraid, but they met a fine man riding a fine horse and the man told them that there was never a need to be afraid, for all they had to do was the watch the stars and the stars would tell them where their home was.
"For once you know the right direction, then there's never a need to be afraid. Fear is something that comes from inside, from inside your tummies," the New Teacher said radiantly, "and good strong children like you have to put food in your tummies. Not fear."

The children thought about this and it seemed very sensible. The New Teacher sang the song again, and soon all the children were happy and calm once more. Except Johnny. He hated her even though he knew she was right about fear.

"Now," said the New Teacher, "what shall we do? I know, we'll play a game. I'll try and guess your names!"
The children, wide-eyed, shifted in their seats. Miss Worden never did this, and often she called a child by another's name. THE NEW TEACHER'LL NEVER KNOW ALL OUR NAMES! NEVER! they thought. So they waited excitedly while the New Teacher turned her attention to Sandra. Oh, yes, somehow she already knew Sandra's name, but how could she possibly know everyone's? They waited, glad that they were going to catch out the New Teacher.
But they were not to catch her out. The New Teacher remembered every name.

Johnny put up his hand. "How'd you know our names? I mean, well, we haven't had a roll call or anything, so how'd you know our names?"
"That's easy, Johnny," the New Teacher said. "You all sit in the same places every day. Each desk has one pupil. So I learned your names from a list. I had to work for three whole days to remember your names. A teacher must work very hard to be a good teacher, and so I worked for three days so that I could know each of you the first day. That's very important, don't you think, for a teacher to work hard?"

Johnny frowned and half-nodded and sat down and wondered why he hadn't figured that out for himself before asking, astonished that she had worked three days just to know everyone the first day. But still he hated her.
"Johnny. Would you tell me something, please? How do you start school? I mean what do you do to begin with?"
Johnny stood reluctantly. "We first pledge allegiance and then we sing the song -"
"Yes, but that's all after roll call," Sandra said, "You forgot roll call.
"Yes, You forgot roll call, Johnny," Mary said.
"First we have roll call," Johnny said. Then he sat down.
The New Teacher smiled. "All right. but we really don't need roll call. I know all your names and I know everyone's here. It's very lazy for a teacher not to know who's here and who isn't, don't you think? After all, a teacher should KNOW. So we don't need roll call while I'm your teacher. So we should pledge, isn't that next?"

Obediently all the children got up and put their hands on their hearts and the New Teacher did the same, and they began in unison, 'I pledge allegiance to the flag of -"
"Just a moment," the New Teacher said. "What does PLEDGE mean?"

The children stood openmouthed; Miss Worden had never interrupted them before. They stood and stared at the New Teacher. Wordless. And silent.

"What does ALLEGIANCE mean?" The New Teacher asked, her hand over her heart.

The children stood in silence. Then Mary put up her hand. "Well, PLEDGE is, ah, well, something like - sort of when you want to do something very good. You sort of pledge you're going to do something like not suck your thumb 'cause that makes your teeth bend and you'll have to wear a brace and go to the dentist, which hurts."
"That's very good, Mary. Very, very good. To pledge means to promise. And ALLEGIANCE?"
Mary shrugged helplessly and looked at her best friend, Hilda, who looked back at her and then at the teacher and shrugged helplessly too.

The New Teacher waited, and the silence hung in the room, hurting. then she said, "I think it's quite wrong for you to have to say something with long words in it if you don't understand what you're saying."

So the children sat down and waited expectantly.
"What did your other teacher tell you that it meant?"
After a long silence Danny put up his hand. "She never said nothing, miss."

One of my teachers at the other school I went to before this one," Joan said in a rush, "well, she sort of said what it all meant, at least she said some thing about it just before recess one day and then the bell went and afterwards we had spellin'."
Danny said, "Miss Worden - well, she never told us. We just hadta learn it and then say it, that's all. Our real teacher didn't say anything at all."
All the children nodded. Then they waited again.
"Your teacher never explained to you?" All the children shook their heads.

"I don't think that was very good. Not to explain. You can always ask me anything. That's what a real teacher should do." Then the New Teacher said, "But didn't you ask your daddies and mommies?"
"Not about 'I pledge.' We just hadta learn it," Mary said. "Once I could say it, Daddy gave me a nickel for saying it good."
"That's right," Danny said. "So long as you could say it all, it was very good. But I never got no nickel."
"Did you ask each other what it meant?"
"I askt Danny once and he didn't know and none of knowed really. It's grown-up talk, and grown-ups talk that sort of words. We just havta learn it."

"The other schools I went to," Hilda said, "they never said anything about it. They just wanted us to learn it. They didn't ask us what it meant. We just hadta say it every day before we started school."
"It took me weeks and weeks and weeks to say it right," Mary said.
So the New Teacher explained what allegiance meant. " ...so you are promising or pledging support to the flag and saying that it is much more important than YOU are. How can a flag be more important than a real live person?"
Johnny broke the silence. "But the next thing is - well, where it says 'and to the republic for which it stands.' That means it's like a, like a..." He searched for the word and could not find it. "Like well, sort of a sign, isn't it?"
"Yes. The real word is a SYMBOL." The New Teacher frowned. "But we don't need a sign to remind us that we love our country, do we? You're all good boys and girls. Do you need a sign to remind you?"
"What's REMIND mean?" Mary asked.
"It means to make you remember. To make you remember that you're all good boys and girls."
The children thought about this and shook their heads.

Johnny put up his hand. "It's our flag," he said fiercely. "We always pledge."
"Yes," the New Teacher said. "It is a very pretty one. She looked at it a moment and then said, "I wish I could have a piece of it. If it's so important, I think we should all have a piece of it. Don't you?"
"I've a little one at home," Mary said. "I could bring it tomorrow."
"Thank you, Mary dear, but I just wanted a little piece of this one because it's our own special classroom one."
Then Danny said, "If we had some scissors we could cut a little piece off."
"I've some scissors at home, Mary said.

"There's some in Miss Worden's desk," Brian said.

The New Teacher found the scissors and then they had to decide who would be allowed to cut a little piece off, and the New Teacher said that because today was Mary's birthday (HOW DID YOU KNOW THAT?) Mary asked herself, awed) Mary should be allowed to cut the piece off. And then they decided it would be very nice if they all had a piece. The flag is special, they thought, so if you have a piece, that's better than having just to look at it, 'cause you can keep it in your pocket.
So the flag was cut up by the children and they were very proud that they each had a piece. But now the flagpole was bare and strange.
And useless.

The children pondered what to do with it, and the idea that pleased them most was to push it out of the window. They watched excitedly as the New Teacher opened the window and allowed them to throw it into the playground. They shrieked with excitement as they saw it bounce on the ground and lie there. They began to love this strange New Teacher.

When they were all back in their seats the new Teacher said, "Well, before we start our lessons, perhaps there are some questions you want me to answer. Ask me anything you like. That's only fair, isn't it, if I ask you questions?"
Mary said, after a silence, "We never got to ask our real teacher ANY questions."
"You can always ask me anything. That ' 8 the fair way. The new way. Try me."
"What's your name?" Danny asked.
She told them her name, and it sounded pretty.
Mary put up her hand. "Why do you wear those clothes? Well, it's like a sort of uniform nurses wear."
"We think that teachers should be dressed the same. Then you always know a teacher. It's nice and light and easy to iron. Do you like the color?"
"Oh, yes," Mary said. "You've got green eyes too.
"If you like, children, as a very special surprise, you can all have this sort of uniform. Then you won't have to worry about what you have to wear to school every day. And you'll all be the same."
The children twisted excitedly in their seats. Mary said, "But it'll cost a lot, and my momma won't want to spend the money 'cause we have to buy food and food is expen-- Well, it sort of costs a lot of money."
"They will be given to you. As a present. There's no need to worry about money."
Johnny said, "I don't want to be dressed like that."
"You don't have to accept a present, Johnny. Just because the other children want to wear new clothes, you don't have to," the new Teacher said.

Johnny slunk back in his chair. I'M NEVER GOING TO WEAR THEIR CLOTHES, he said to himself. I DON'T CARE IF I'M GOING TO LOOK DIFFERENT FROM DANNY AND TOM AND FRED.

Then Mary asked, "Why was our teacher crying?"
"I suppose she was just tired and needed a rest. She's going to have a long rest." She smiled at them. "We think teachers should be young. I'm nineteen."
"Is the war over now?" Danny asked.
"Yes, Danny, isn't that wonderful! Now all your daddies will be home soon."

"Did we win or did we lose?" Mary asked.
"We - that's you and I and all of us - WE won."

"Oh!"
The children sat back happily.
Then Johnny's hatred burst. "Where's my dad? What've you done to my dad? Where's my dad?"

The New Teacher got up from her seat and walked the length of the room and the children's eyes followed her, and Johnny stood, knees of jelly. She sat down on his seat and put her hands on his shoulders, and his shoulders were shaking like his knees.
"He's going to a school. Some grown-ups have to go to school as well as children."

"But they took him away and he didn't want to go." Johnny felt the tears close and he fought them back.
The New Teacher touched him gently, and he smelled the youth and cleanness of her, and it was not the smell of home which was sour and just a little dirty. He's no different from all of you. YOU sometimes don't want to go to school. With grown-ups it's the same - just the same as children. Would you like to visit him? He has a holiday in a few days."
"Momma said that Dad's gone away forever!" Johnny stared at her incredulously. "He has a holiday?"
The New Teacher laughed. "She's wrong, Johnny. After all, everyone who goes to school has holidays. That's fair, isn't it?"
The children shifted and rustled and watched. And Johnny said, "I can see him?"
"Of course. Your daddy just has to go back to school a little. He had some strange thoughts, and he wanted other grown-ups to believe them. It's not right to want others to believe wrong thoughts, is it?"
"Well, no, I suppose not. But my dad never thought nothing bad."
"Of course, Johnny. I said WRONG thoughts -- not BAD thoughts. There's nothing wrong with that. But it's right to show grown-ups right thoughts when they're wrong, isn't it?"
"Well, yes," Johnny said. "But what wrong thoughts did he have?"
"Just some grown-up thoughts that are old-fashioned. We're going to learn all about them in class. Then we can share knowledge, and I can learn from you as you will learn from me. Shall we?"
"All right." Johnny stared at her, perplexed. "My dad couldn't have wrong thoughts. He just couldn't....

Could he?"

"Well, perhaps sometime when you wanted to talk about something very important to your dad, perhaps he said, 'Not now, Johnny, I'm busy,' or, 'We'll talk about that tomorrow.' That's a bad thought -- not to give you time when it's important. Isn't it?"
"Sure. but that's what all grown-ups do."
"My momma says that all the time," Mary said.
And the other children nodded, and they wondered if all their parents should go back to school and unlearn bad thoughts.

"Sit down, Johnny, and we'll start learning good things and not worry about grown-up bad thoughts. Oh, yes," she said when she sat down at her seat again, brimming with happiness, "I have a lovely surprise for you. You're all going to stay overnight with us. We have a lovely room with beds and lots of food, and we'll all tell stories and have such a lovely time."
"Oh, good," the children said.
"Can I stay up till eight o'clock?" Mary asked breathlessly.
"Well, as it's our first new day, we'll all stay up to eight-thirty. But only if you promise to go right to sleep afterward."

The children all promised. They were very happy. Jenny said, "But first we got to say our prayers. Before we go to sleep."
The new Teacher smiled at her. "Of course. Perhaps we should say a prayer now. In some schools that's a custom too." She thought a moment and the faces watched her. Then she said, "let's pray. But let's pray for something very good. What should we pray for?"
"Bless Momma and Daddy." Danny said immediately.
"That's a good idea, Danny. I have one. Let's pray for candy. That's a good idea, isn't it?"
They all nodded happily.
So, following their New Teacher, they all closed their eyes and steepled their hands together, and they prayed with her for candy.
The New Teacher opened her eyes and looked around disappointedly. "but where's our candy. God is all-seeing and everywhere, and if we pray, He answers our prayers. Isn't that true.?"
"I prayed for a puppy of my own lots of times, but I never got one," Danny said.
"Maybe we didn't pray hard enough. Perhaps we should kneel down like it' 8 done in church.
So the new Teacher knelt and all the children knelt and they prayed very, very hard. But there was still no candy.

Because the New Teacher was disappointed, the children were very disappointed. Then she said, "perhaps

we're using the wrong name." She thought a moment and then said, "instead of saying 'God,' let's say 'Our Leader.' Let's pray to Our Leader for candy. Let's pray very hard and don't open your eyes till I say."
So the children shut their eyes tightly and prayed very hard, and as they prayed, the New Teacher took out some candy from her pocket and quietly put a piece on each child's desk. She did not notice Johnny -- alone of all the children -- watching her through his half-closed eyes.
She went softly back to her desk and the prayer ended, and the children opened their eyes and they stared at the candy and they were overjoyed.
"I'm going to pray to Our Leader every time," Mary said excitedly.
"Me too," Hilda said. "Could we eat Our Leader's candy now, teacher?"
"Oh, let's, please, please, please."
"So Our Leader answered your prayers, didn't he?"
"I saw you put the candy on our desks!" Johnny burst out. "I SAW YOU... I didn't close my eyes, and I saw you. You had 'em in your pocket. We didn't get them with praying. YOU put them there."
All the children, appalled, stared at him and then at their New Teacher. She stood at the front of the class and looked back at Johnny and then at all of them.

"Yes, Johnny, you're quite right. You're a very, very wise boy. Children, I put the candy on your desks. So you know that it doesn't matter whom you ask, whom you shut your eyes and 'pray' to -- to God or anyone, even Our Leader -no one will give you anything. Only another human being." She looked at Danny. "God didn't give you the puppy you wanted. But if you work hard, I will. Only I or someone like me can GIVE you things. Praying to God or anything or anyone for something is a waste of time."
"Then we don't say prayers? We're not supposed to say prayers?"
The puzzled children watched her.
"You can if you want to, children. If your daddies and mommies want you to. But we know, you and I that it means nothing. That's our secret."
"My dad says it's wrong to have secrets from him."
"But he has secrets that he shares with your mommy and not with you, doesn't he?"
All the children nodded.
"Then it's not wrong for us to have a few secrets from them. Is it?"
"I like having secrets. Hilda and me have lots of secrets." Mary said.
The New Teacher said, "We're going -to have lots of wonderful secrets together. You can eat your candy if you want to. And because Johnny was especially clever, I think we should make him monitor for the whole week, don't you?"

They all nodded happily and popped the candy into their mouths and chewed gloriously. Johnny was very proud as he chewed his candy, he decided that he liked his teacher very much. Because she told the truth. Because she was right about fear. Because she was right about God. He'd prayed many times for many things and never got them, and even the one time he did get the skates, he knew his dad had heard him and had put them under his bed for his birthday and pretended he hadn't heard him. I ALWAYS WONDERED WHY HE DIDN'T LISTEN, AND ALL THE TIME HE WASN'T THERE, he thought.

Johnny sat back contentedly, resolved to work hard and listen and not to have wrong thoughts like Dad.

The teacher waited for them to finish their candy. This was what she had been trained for, and she knew that she would teach her children well and that they would grow up to be good citizens. She looked out of the window, at the sun over the land. It was a good land, and vast. A land to breathe in. But she was warmed not by the sun but by the thought that throughout the school and throughout the land all children, all men and all women were being taught with the same faith, with variations of the same procedures. Each according to his age group. Each according to his need.
She glanced at her watch....

It was 9:23.

Food for thought from Philip Pullman

2009-07-03T00:33:00.000+01:00

Are such things done on Albion's shore?

The image of this nation that haunts me most powerfully is that of the sleeping giant Albion in William Blake's prophetic books. Sleep, profound and inveterate slumber: that is the condition of Britain today.

We do not know what is happening to us. In the world outside, great events take place, great figures move and act, great matters unfold, and this nation of Albion murmurs and stirs while malevolent voices whisper in the darkness - the voices of the new laws that are silently strangling the old freedoms the nation still dreams it enjoys.

We are so fast asleep that we don't know who we are any more. Are we English? Scottish? Welsh? British? More than one of them? One but not another? Are we a Christian nation - after all we have an Established Church - or are we something post-Christian? Are we a secular state? Are we a multifaith state? Are we anything we can all agree on and feel proud of?

The new laws whisper:

You don't know who you are

You're mistaken about yourself

We know better than you do what you consist of, what labels apply to you, which facts about you are important and which are worthless

We do not believe you can be trusted to know these things, so we shall know them for you

And if we take against you, we shall remove from your possession the only proof we shall allow to be recognised

The sleeping nation dreams it has the freedom to speak its mind. It fantasises about making tyrants cringe with the bluff bold vigour of its ancient right to express its opinions in the street. This is what the new laws say about that:

Expressing an opinion is a dangerous activity

Whatever your opinions are, we don't want to hear them

So if you threaten us or our friends with your opinions we shall treat you like the rabble you are

And we do not want to hear you arguing about it

So hold your tongue and forget about protesting

What we want from you is acquiescence

The nation dreams it is a democratic state where the laws were made by freely elected representatives who were answerable to the people. It used to be such a nation once, it dreams, so it must be that nation still. It is a sweet dream.

You are not to be trusted with laws

So we shall put ourselves out of your reach

We shall put ourselves beyond your amendment or abolition

You do not need to argue about any changes we make, or to debate them, or to send your representatives to vote against them

You do not need to hold us to account

You think you will get what you want from an inquiry?

Who do you think you are?

What sort of fools do you think we are?

The nation's dreams are troubled, sometimes; dim rumours reach our sleeping ears, rumours that all is not well in the administration of justice; but an ancient spell murmurs through our somnolence, and we remember that the courts are bound to seek the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and we turn over and sleep soundly again.

And the new laws whisper:

We do not want to hear you talking about truth

Truth is a friend of yours, not a friend of ours

We have a better friend called hearsay, who is a witness we can always rely on

We do not want to hear you talking about innocence

Innocent means guilty of things not yet done

We do not want to hear you talking about the right to silence

You need to be told what silence means: it means guilt

We do not want to hear you talking about justice

Justice is whatever we want to do to you

And nothing else

Are we conscious of being watched, as we sleep? Are we aware of an ever-open eye at the corner of every street, of a watching presence in the very keyboards we type our messages on? The new laws don't mind if we are. They don't think we care about it.

We want to watch you day and night

We think you are abject enough to feel safe when we watch you

We can see you have lost all sense of what is proper to a free people

We can see you have abandoned modesty

Some of our friends have seen to that

They have arranged for you to find modesty contemptible

In a thousand ways they have led you to think that whoever does not want to be watched must have something shameful to hide

We want you to feel that solitude is frightening and unnatural

We want you to feel that being watched is the natural state of things

One of the pleasant fantasies that consoles us in our sleep is that we are a sovereign nation, and safe within our borders. This is what the new laws say about that:

We know who our friends are

And when our friends want to have words with one of you

We shall make it easy for them to take you away to a country where you will learn that you have more fingernails than you need

It will be no use bleating that you know of no offence you have committed under British law

It is for us to know what your offence is

Angering our friends is an offence

It is inconceivable to me that a waking nation in the full consciousness of its freedom would have allowed its government to pass such laws as:-

the Protection from Harassment Act (1997),

the Crime and Disorder Act (1998),

the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (2000),

the Terrorism Act (2000),

the Criminal Justice and Police Act (2001),

the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act (2001),

the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Extension Act (2002),

the Criminal Justice Act (2003),

the Extradition Act (2003),

the Anti-Social Behaviour Act (2003),

the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act (2004),

the Civil Contingencies Act (2004),

the Prevention of Terrorism Act (2005),

the Inquiries Act (2005),
the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act (2005),

not to mention a host of pending legislation such as the Identity Cards Bill, the Coroners and Justice Bill, and the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill.

Inconceivable.

And those laws say:

Sleep, you stinking cowards

Sweating as you dream of rights and freedoms

Freedom is too hard for you

We shall decide what freedom is

Sleep, you vermin

Sleep, you scum.

www.modernliberty.net

Background

£34bn cost of state-run surveillance databases

Former spy chief says UK is now a police state

COMMENT: that's a bit rich, Dame Stella

Look who's investigating the MP's expenses

2009-07-03T00:01:00.002+01:00

I read today that the police officer heading the investigation into MP's expenses fraud is one Cressida Dick, Deputy Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police.

Funnily enough, she was also criticised for her role in the shooting of Jean Charles de Menzes and played a vital role in the arrest of Damien Green, all high profile cases where the police don't want us to know what is actually going on, don't suppose we'll see the whole truth come out of this investigation either..........

http://tvotr.blogspot.com/2009/07/have-common-purpose-taken-control-of.html

So who's lying?

2009-07-02T23:52:00.004+01:00

The home office claim that violent crime has fallen by 41% since 1995.

The european commission claim that murders, robberies, assaults and sexual offences in the UK have increased by 77% since Labour came to power (1997).

I am assuming we are talking about the same country here, we do live in the UK don't we? So somebody isn't telling us the truth..............

http://lastditch.typepad.com/lastditch/2009/07/uk-is-political-lies-by-home-secretaries-capital-of-europe.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html?ITO=1490

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/5712573/UK-is-violent-crime-capital-of-Europe.html

http://uk.sitestat.com/homeoffice/rds/s?rds.crime0607summpdf&ns_type=pdf&ns_url=[http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs07/crime0607summ.pdf]

Ian Tomlinson was killed by police impersonator ... so say the police!

2009-07-02T22:43:00.002+01:00

City of London police are now claiming that the uniformed police officer filmed attacking Ian Tomlinson shortly before he died near the G20 summit protests may have been a protestor impersonating a police officer!

If they think we are going to believe that load of %&&$ they must be in lala land!

Yet another example of the establishment psychopaths (aka police) closing ranks to protect one of their own and sod the rest of you!!

I wonder if they will close ranks and similarly protect the (highly trained) dog handler who left his dogs to die in his van after he parked it in the sun on one of the hottest days this year. (the lazy ba$&@rd was only a few yards away from the shiny new police kennels where the dogs would have been very comfortable!).

The RSPCA are supposedly investigating, what do you reckon the odds are for a prosecution?

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23714207-details/Police+claim+Ian+Tomlinson+could+have+been+attacked+by+fake+G20+cop/article.do

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196962/Police-dogs-die-left-car-temperature-soars-29C.html

Hello sonny, are you a terrorist?

2009-07-02T22:17:00.002+01:00

They've lost the plot! The heat must have finally scrambled their brains!

That's the only excuse I can find for the 57 page questionnaire the Borders Agency expects children to fill in when they apply to study in this country, questions like -

"Has the applicant ever been involved in, supported or encouraged terrorist activities in any country?"

Of course, they know that any terrorist will hold up their arms, answer "yes guv" and wait to be led away to the cells, won't they?

What a load of bo%^&*ks!! All this document does is alienate good honest people and have absolutely no effect on any potential terrorist. Just another box ticking exercise to justify the ever increasing size of the government payroll.....

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/5710503/Are-you-a-terrorist-The-questions-foreign-pupils-must-answer-to-attend-UK-schools.html

http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecontent/applicationforms/pbs/tier4childapplicationform

http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/studyingintheuk/child-students/

School lunacy

2009-07-02T00:12:00.002+01:00

Once upon a time I thought that schools were meant to provide children with an education and this education should teach them the things they needed to know as adults. Or so they claimed...

Now schools seem to be far more concerned with citizenship lessons and league table positions and of course the petty rules and regulations they like to impose for no valid reason.

Take the story of Akaash Iqbal aged 14, at that age it is quite normal for boys to start growing some facial hair. Akaash had grown a slightly hairy upper lip, the beginnings of a moustach, his school sent him home with instructions not to return until he had shaved it off!

Isn't his education rather more important than a clean shaven upper lip?
By what right do the school insist he be clean shaven! Facial hair or not is a personal decision and the school has no business to dictate in this matter.

Quite rightly, his family and friends are standing by him and he is refusing to comply with such an unreasonable instruction.

Then there is the story of RA Butler School in Saffron Walden, Essex prohibiting pupils from bringing suncream into school "for fear that they will share it with others who are allergic".

In this hot weather, government advice is "use sun lotion of at least factor 15 that protects you against UVA and UVB rays", the school rule is contravening goverment advice and putting children at increased risk of skin damage or even cancer.
How many pupils 'may' be allergic to sunscreen? what are the chances that an allergic child will borrow sunscreen? What are the likely effects on an allergic child?

Seems to me yet another insane H&S ruling where a known and present risk is dismissed in favour of catering for the possibility that there may be some other small risk.

All in all, more cause for dismay at the sort of people who are preparing our children for adult lives.

Far too much interference and petty rule enforcement instead of just getting on with the job they are supposed to be doing!!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196726/Boy-14-banned-school-having-moustache--father-says-hes-young-shave.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196768/Pupils-banned-bringing-sun-cream-school-case-children-allergic.html?ITO=1490

Government Debt - OUR DEBT

2009-07-01T12:52:00.004+01:00

I was going to take a break for the day after my earlier rants, then I read this article in The Spectator.

I think they are spot on in their belief that Brown et al are operating a 'scorched earth' policy.

I believe that, with cynical disregard for the effect it will have on the people of this country, Labour are spending like crazy using money they don't have in order to mask the effects of the recession until the next government comes in. At that point the sham will fall apart and we will start paying the price - big time!

Read the article, decide for yourself:-

http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/3729558/in-browns-debt.thtml

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article6613502.ece

Sound familiar?

2009-07-01T12:14:00.002+01:00

Education played a very important part in Nazi Germany in trying to cultivate a loyal following for Hitler and the Nazis. The Nazis were aware that education would create loyal Nazis by the time they reached adulthood. The Hitler Youth had been created for post-school activities and schools were to play a critical part in developing a loyal following for Hitler - indoctrination and the use of propaganda were to be a common practice in Nazi schools and the education system.

Enforcing a Nazi curriculum on schools depended on the teachers delivering it. All teachers had to be vetted by local Nazi officials. Any teacher considered disloyal was sacked. Many attended classes during school holidays in which the Nazi curriculum was spelled out and 97% of all teachers joined the Nazi Teachers' Association. All teachers had to be careful about what they said as children were encouraged to inform the authorities if a teacher said something that did not fit in with the Nazi's curriculum for schools.

Meanwhile, Ed Balls proposes that teachers should be licenced to teach and have to renew their licence every 5 years, any teacher that "does not come up to scratch" (interprete as required...) will lose their licence and be forbidden from teaching.

http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/Nazis_Education.htm

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article6611074.ece

No Apologies!

2009-07-01T11:53:00.007+01:00

I make no apologies for my current thread of likening the actions of our government to those of the Nazis pre war, I don't think the aim is the same but I do believe that they have learned to use the same tactics.

I am convinced that Labour wish to impose their ideology on the population and have recognised that they will have a hard fight to impose it on the adult population but it is much easier to indoctrinate the young as they go through the school system. Hence the push to ensure that an 'approved' curriculum is taught to all children and obedience is instilled, if necessary by punishing the parents. Doesn't that sound pretty extreme to you - do as you are told or we punish your family!

We have suffered far too long at the hands of excessively strong government who have sought to impose their will on us instead of serving us, we need an election NOW and a government that recognises its role as servant to the people and not as masters of the country!

Spot the difference

2009-07-01T11:29:00.002+01:00

NuLabour have plans to compell teenagers to carry out community service:-

"We are working towards ensuring that, in time, every young person gives at least 50 hours of service to their community in their teenage years."

Hitler introduced his Reichsarbeitsdienst (RAD):-

The RAD was formed in July 1934 as the official state labour service.........RAD members were to provide service for various civic, military and agricultural construction projects.

http://www.schoolhistory.co.uk/year9links/nazigermany/work.pdf

Far from being a benign government working for US - the people of the UK, our current government seems much more concerned with indoctrination and control, focussing, naturally, on the young as they are much easier to deal with and will accept greater gov't control if they have grown up not knowing freedom and self determination.

http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/hitleryouth/hj-prelude.htm

Carolyne Willow in the Guardian

2009-07-01T02:21:00.001+01:00

Quick link to an article by Carolyne Willow.

Not much I can add to this at the moment......

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/26/response-home-education-children

Brown and Balls - confused with Hitler and Goebels?

2009-07-01T01:45:00.004+01:00

Several people I've spoken to have likened the current government to Hitler's fascists or the former Russian communist party, both of whom sought total control over the population and intrusive surveillance / monitoring.

Regardless of my personal thoughts on this score I was quite surprised to read this article by Melanie Phillips telling the tale of Ed Balls trying to bully a Spectator journalist to withdraw an article accusing him of lying about the economy and then his visit, with Gordon Brown to Fulham Cross school where both the local MP and the council leader were snubbed with attempts to keep them away whilst Balls and Brown paraded for the press.

For similarities with our current government and the Nazis perhaps visit Wikipedia and look up Gleichschaltung. Any of it sound familiar?

http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/3727551/the-schools-secretary-forgets-where-he-is.thtml
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/3725688/talking-balls.thtml
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/centreright/2009/06/how-not-to-be-prime-ministerial-on-a-pm-visit.html

First they came for the home educated, then they came for the schooled children....

2009-06-29T11:45:00.002+01:00

Home educators have been (and still are) under attack by the government in their attempts to brainwash all children into becoming standardised adults according to the design of ministers and their advisors.

Now the attack is being widened to include schooled children, having discovered that a national curriculum and standardised lessons don't actually work they are instead proposing to bully parents into doing their dirty work for them.

Under new plans, schools will be given more power to deal with 'problem' pupils by applying to the courts for parenting orders backed up with fines up to £1,000 if this fails to curb the problem behaviour.

What a cheek! They force the children into school, create an environment which leads to the social problems they supposedly despise and then punish the parents for failing to control their children in school - a place where the parents are not supervising the children and the whole regime is run by the school staff!

GREAT - THEY FAIL YOUR CHILD AND YOU GET PUNISHED!

Write to your MP and express how you feel about this, I'm sure it won't be the last brilliant idea to come from Ed Balls and co - What next?

READ more at:-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/5673632/Parents-of-unruly-children-face-1000-fines.html

OFSTED worried about sexualised children

2009-06-28T14:00:00.002+01:00

OFSTED are worried at increasing numbers of primary school pupils showing sexualised behaviour.

What a surprise, I don't think! The government has been foisting ever increasing amounts of sex education on children, they recently announced that sex education should be compulsory for all children from the age of 5.

Can't these people understand? Are they so isolated from reality in their ivory towers that they don't realise that if you push sex at children then you will arouse curiousity and of course the children will want to experiment.

Children will mature and develop awareness about sex at different ages and over a long period of time. Like most things, sex education is best driven by the child and not pushed at them by teachers following a standard curriculum regardless of the child's maturity or preparedness for the lessons being pushed at them.

The state should stay out of the minutia of children's education and let teachers get on with what they've been trained to do - teach children according to the skills they have been given as teaxchers and according to their knowledge of what their pupils are ready to learn instead of treating education like a factory line which can be standardised and automated according to some grand plan.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/jun/23/sexualised-pupils-primary-schools-ofsted
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/minette_marrin/article4795056.ece
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/apr/27/sex-education-contraception-schools

Yet another child dies through the experts failure to act!

2009-06-27T19:25:00.002+01:00

Whilst the government is seeking to include ever more families in 'tick the box' surveillance and monitoring databases, seeking intrusive monitoring and control over innocent families, they are ignoring the fact that they cannot adequately deal with the known cases of children being abused!

Poor Demi Leigh was known to child protection agencies, neighbours had phoned to express concern about her, her mother was a known drug addict. What did the authorities do? - they decided that the case could be closed, they didn't do their job! The result - Demi died at the hands of her babysitter.

We can never be sure that following the right procedures would have saved Demi but we do know that she wasn't even given that chance, her mother should have been supported and the authorities should have been involved in this little girl's life to ensure that she was being properly cared for.

We now get all the usual "lessons will be learned" rubbish.

We get told after every death of a child that "lessons will be learned", they never are though are they? There will be a bit of a shake up, new procedures will be written and the next child will be failed just as tragically as all the others.

Yet the authorities want to trawl for ever greater numbers of children to check up on, adding to the workload of social workers who cannot cope with the caseload they already have, this will simply lead to more children being failed, more tragic deaths as innocent families are bullied and harrassed to prove that they are not harming their children......

First they come for the home educators,
Then they came for ...... Who's next?.......

The home education review has nothing to do with home education but it has everything to do with drawing innocent families into the child protection system where they will be harmed by officials who SHOULD be protecting children like Demi.

http://www.renegadeparent.net/post/Badman-and-Balls-have-stitched-us-up.aspx
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/8120560.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/8120525.stm

Well the Tories seem to be going in the right direction...

2009-06-27T18:43:00.002+01:00

I'm not a lover of political parties, I would prefer to see parliament comprised of wholly independent MPs who truly have the interests of their constituants and the country at heart.

Having said that, we have a party political system in this country, I don't hold any particular allegiance but must admit that I'm currently hearing good things from the Tories.

I've previously said that the Tories have made some promising noises but nothing concrete, I now read the transcript of a speech by David Cameron where he makes some bold statements:-

The next Conservative government will revoke the unjustified and unreasonable powers that let people enter your home without your permission.
We will change the law that allows councils to snoop on people for trivial matters.
We will review the use of the Terrorism Act's Section 44, and the stop and search powers contained within it.
We will change the Criminal Justice Act 2003 to strengthen the right to trial by jury.
And we will review the operation of the Extradition Act - and the US/UK extradition treaty - to make sure it is even-handed and works both ways.
... the next Conservative Government will scrap the Contact Point database of children's details.
We will scrap the ID Card scheme.
And we will remove innocent people's records from the DNA database.
... because there is no complete list that can tell us exactly what data the government collects, we will create a new 'right to data' so that further datasets can be requested by the public.

All good stuff, I'm sure he can go further if pushed.......

Most of all I want to see all this, and more, written down in the election manifesto and actually becoming reality if they win the next election.

It's been a long time coming, maybe the politicians themselves are starting to realise that they've gone too far and the people will not wear it any longer.

Raed the speech at:-
http://www.conservatives.com/News/Speeches/2009/06/David_Cameron_Giving_power_back_to_the_people.aspx

What has the government got to hide?

2009-06-21T14:56:00.002+01:00

I have just read an excellent article by Ian Dunt at www.politics.co.uk.

He highlights how the politicians have been taking away more and more of our liberties and privacy whilst working very hard to keep their activities secret.

He finishes with some good advice - to get the Tories to pin their colours to the mast and specify what they will do if/when they get into power next year, so far they have made some encouraging noises and general promises but nothing concrete. I don't think we can trust any party to have our best interests at heart over their own so we need concrete committments, we are not prepared to trust vague promises that can be forgotten all too easily.

http://www.politics.co.uk/interviews/legal-and-constitutional/comment-what-has-the-government-got-to-hide--$1304954.htm

Virtual courts and chain gangs......

2009-06-20T22:55:00.002+01:00

Jack Straw recently announced a pilot scheme for 'virtual courts'. The idea being that instead of the accused attending a proper magistrates court, the whole thing could be dealt with in extra quick time via video links, I suppose the next logical step is to dispense with the hearing altogether and automatically find the defendant guilty without all this inconvenient legal process we hear about.

Alongside this, the use of chaingangs... sorry that should be "intensive Community Payback" will be extended to even more unemployed offenders across England and Wales where they will have to carry out demanding work for at least 18 hours a week. This will ensure a significant loss of liberty and free time for more offenders, who must now wear branded orange jackets so the public can see that justice is being done.

So I suppose they think that wearing a 'branded orange jacket' will embarrass offenders into not committing crime in the future ..... in my experience this will be seen as a badge of honour amongst the gangs, afraid Jack Straw has no concept of how to deal with people, has he actually ever met any ordinary folk or is his world confined to the lofty atmosphere of Westminster?

READ MORE at:-
http://www.justice.gov.uk/news/newsrelease120509a.htm

Now I'm sure I'm seeing things

2009-06-20T20:20:00.003+01:00

Been mootching around the net a bit today and came across a SOTT article linking to a CNN broadcast floating around youtube.

I'm sat here shaking my head and finding it hard to believe that people in Toledo, Ohio have been issued with parking tickets for parking their car on their own driveway!

A local law makes it illegal to park a vehicle on unpaved surfaces, so those people with gravel drives were automatically breaking the law even when they were on their own property!!

We need to reign in our politicians NOW before it is too late and we find ourselves subject to similarly obscene regulations!

WATCH AT:-
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/187021-Parking-In-Your-Own-Driveway-Illegal-in-America-2009

How long before they do the same over here?

2009-06-20T20:06:00.002+01:00

Applicants for jobs with the city authorities of Bozeman, Montana are having to provide details of any websites, online groups, blogs & social networking sites that they participate in together with all their usernames and passwords so that the city can carry out 'background checks' on them!

Armed with this information the authorities would not only be able to access a person's entire online life but also the personal information of facebook friends etc.

Obviously they don't consider any privacy to be permissable at all, which kind of contradicts the Montana Constitution, Article 2, Section 10 of which, reads "the right of individual privacy is essential to the well-being of a free society and shall not be infringed without the showing of a compelling state interest."

Yet more hypocracy from the politicians?

How long before we see this happening over here?

READ MORE at:-
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/187147-City-in-Montana-requires-job-applicants-to-hand-over-all-social-network-logins-and-passwords-for-background-checks

Adoption targets - Another tick in the box?

2009-06-20T16:16:00.005+01:00

It looks like social workers in London are still at it, having failed dismally to protect baby Peter from abuse they have now gone over the top and taken a pair of twins away from their parents before they even left hospital.

Reading the article, it sounds like this couple didn't have much of a clue about looking after little babies but then how many other new parents find themselves in the same position, with this tiny bundle totally dependant on them but not quite sure how best to go about it? Parents like these need support and advice, the kind of thing that luckier parents would have had from their parents and grandparents.

Instead, social workers have waded in, removed the children, and placed them with foster parents, and following one of the infamous secret family court hearings may now be put up for adoption.

One of the accusations made against the mother - she seems to have an "anger problem"! BLOODY RIGHT she does! If somebody tried to take my children away I'm sure I'd have a major "anger problem".

I suppose these babies will bring the council a couple of steps closer to meeting their adoption targets and they'll get a nice fat bonus from the government, pity about the family but think about the managers performance related pay - that's all that matters, doesn't it?

About time we had a big change in the way this country is run!!!!

What we need to happen, is for these children, and others like them, to sue the authorities for the damage done to them and the loss of their natural families. Afraid that is the only language the people in power understand - hit them in the pocket using the courts they so love.

Read more at:-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1194332/They-took-away-twins-Id-joked-birth-spoilt-body.html

Education - The bigger picture

2009-06-19T16:33:00.000+01:00

Home educators are quite rightly up in arms over the recent review carried out by Graham Badman and used by Ed Balls to justify imposition of draconian measures for monitoring and control over how parents will be permitted to educate their children.

However, I've had a nagging feeling that this is part of a divide and conquer strategy that seeks to ensure that ALL children are indoctrinated according to the policies of the state regardless of the culture and beliefs of the family.

I now read about the 'apprenticeships, skills, children and learning bill' which gives 153 instances of new powers to Ed Balls and John Denham as the two secretaries of state in the bill's sponsoring departments.

Whilst politicians are paying lipservice to voters by promising devolution of power from the centre to the people, this bill gives central government more control than ever before over what and how our children are allowed to learn.

The bill gives the secretary of state the right to define, for example:-

the content of certificates for apprenticeships

to stipulate which courses, other than maths, English and ICT, students aged 16 to 19 should be entitled to study

to direct a local authority to "provide information about accountable resources held, received or expended" by its schools

to specify the maximum amount of compensation that an employee is entitled to should his or her employer be found by an employment tribunal to have illegally denied him or her the right to training

to stipulate, for qualifications for young people aged 19 or over, the minimum level of attainment in literacy and numeracy needed "to operate effectively in day-to-day life".

the power to set "minimum requirements" for qualifications including, potentially, the ability to specify which textbooks pupils study.

It gives 22 powers to the secretary of state in relation to a new quango, the Young People's Learning Agency for England, including the right to direct its actions, and 32 similar ones relating to the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency, which is to replace the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority.

Ofqual supervision

Even Ofqual, which is being set up to be independent of ministers and will report to parliament, will have to be aware of 15 powers given to Balls and his successors in relation to its work. These include the ability of the secretary of state "to direct areas of government policy to which Ofqual must have regard in performing its functions" and to appoint the first chief executive.

Ed Balls will be able to direct local authorities to issue "warning notices" if he believes standards are unacceptably low, to replace governing bodies and even to intervene when local authorities are deemed unlikely to be effective in improving schools "which may in the future be low-performing" (not necessarily low performaing now but may do so in the future!).

Never before have politicians had so much power, not only to deal with current issues but increasingly to determine that there may be a FUTURE problem and wade in to deal with it as they see fit. Sounds increasingly like Orwells concept of 'mind crime' with big brother overseeing everything we do, say or even think!

We have to oppose these efforts to micro manage our lives and take away our freedom to live our lives or even to think 'wrong thoughts'.

READ MORE at:-

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/jun/02/education-bill-ed-balls
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/feb/25/schools.edballs
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/mortarboard/2009/mar/13/lords-balls-red-tape

Health and Safety Madness

2009-06-19T16:32:00.000+01:00

A poll by Teacher's TV has revealed some of the insane rules imposed in schools in the interest on "Health & Safety".

One of the craziest is one school requiring its pupils to wear safety goggles before handling Blue Tack, others include:-

Teachers barred from sending troublesome pupils to standin the corridor as this is a fire risk.
The three legged race is banned as "too dangerous"
No footballs in the playground
Shaving foam is not allowed to be used in art projects in case pupils drown in it.
Egg boxes cannot be used for art projects in case children catch salmonella.

Is there no common sense left in this country?

Read more at:-

http://www.teachers.tv/node/35404

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1194055/Pupils-wear-goggles-handle-Blu-Tack-health-safety-reaches-ridiculous-new-heights.html

Is this Britain or Stalinist Russia?

2009-06-19T16:31:00.000+01:00

If you read this quote:-

"If a family wishes to cremate their loved one in anything other than a shroud, the funeral director should contact bereavement services so this can be discussed to clarify what type of garments the family wish to use."

You might be forgiven for thinking that it applies to some communist dictatorship and is not something you need be concerned by.

In fact, the quote comes from Kirklees council who claim to be concerned about emissions from the cremation of the deceased, thus, if you wish to see your father or son cremated wearing his favourite football strip or your child taking her favourite teddybear on their last journey you are likely to be 'refused permission'.

How dare these jumped up little Hitlers interfere in our most personal and private matters in this way, how much pollution do they really think clothes or a soft toy are going to create especially when compared to thematerials used to make the coffin in the first place. This is gross intrusion to deal with a tiny problem with emissions, how sad that our council employees are taking this opportunity to bully families at their most vulnerable.

Read:-

Ken Frost's comments at http://nannyknowsbest.blogspot.com/2009/06/nanny-bans-clothes.html

The Daily Mail at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1193306/I-wouldnt-seen-dead-Council-forces-relatives-cremate-loved-ones-anti-pollution-eco-shrouds.html

Review proposals breach the Human Rights Act

2009-06-13T19:18:00.001+01:00

Bishop Hill, raises an excellent point:-

Since the Human Rights Act states:-

...the State shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions.

Is it the intention of the government to breach the Human Rights Act? Since to implement the findings of this review takes away the freedom of parents to provide an autonomous child centred education.

Let me get personal

2009-06-13T15:46:00.003+01:00

Time perhaps to get personal and real.....

We home educate, our children went to school for a time BUT THE SCHOOL SYSTEM FAILED THEM!!

Our children were suffering constant major meltdowns all the time they were in school, we tried working with the school and various specialists but got frustrated that nobody would recognise that the system was damaging our children and it was even implied that it was somehow our fault, that we were doing something to prevent them learning in school!

Our children came out of school unable to read, write or understand maths, our youngest had become so harmed that it has taken us 5 years to get over her phobia of reading to others.

Our education has been totally autonomous, our children learn what they want to learn - we do not push them in ANY direction.

Yes there have been times when we have doubted ourselves, we have feared that we maybe should be pushing them - will they grow up to resent our approach?

I can honestly say that those fears are a thing of the past, within a few months of leaving school barely able to read a sentence our eldest was devouring Harry Potter books, he now reads newspaper articles and criticises their misuse of punctuation. He has played in the junior chess world championship, he writes visual basic programmes for fun and finds higher level GCSE maths papers "easy" - if he was still in school he would have another 2 years before looking at them. Our youngest is enjoying drama and is currently rehearsing for her 3rd public performance, she has come from being unable to read (and terrified to try) to touch typing with a speed and accuracy that few professional typists could match.

Far from being "hidden away at home" our children are out in the community, I am able to bring them in to work to interact with a wide range of adults, they meet many people when we visit museums or are just out and about living life.

There is NO distinction in our family between 'education' and life, we DO NOT plan our activities in advance. If our children want to find out about something we will help them do that in whatever way seems most appropriate at the time. Their education is full and rich with variety, completely tailored to THEIR 'age, aptitude and ability', which just happens to be exactly our obligation under the law.

If the authorities think that we are going to impose some other system on our children, which I think will restrict them or even be harmful to them, they had better think again! I am completely prepared to go to prison over this issue and so is my other half, how many home educators does this government anticipate locking up?

My message to the government - PUT YOUR OWN HOUSE IN ORDER.

Our state schools are failing so many children, it hurts to see so many leaving school with such poor education that they are consigned to menial jobs and the prospect of having to spend yet more of their precious lives seeking the knowledge and learning the skills that should have been nurtured in them during their childhood.

Our children will never EVER attend school unless THEY choose to.

Badman Review of Home Education

2009-06-13T00:03:00.001+01:00

The home education review by Graham Badman has been released, it would seem that we have been stitched up again!

Whilst home educators have been nervously awaiting the outcome of the review, it seems that it has been presented to all and sundry within the establishment, garnering support before being launched on the people it will affect most.

The review can be downloaded at http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/_download/?id=6080

and Ed Balls response can be downloaded from http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/_download/?id=6081

We have not read the report properly yet but the little we have looked at so far has been very disturbing, essentially following the government trend to deal with people outside the established legal process by shifting the rules so that you become guilty of breaking a law you have no defence against; for example:-

The current position is that the LEA can determine (reasonably or maliciously) that you are not providing a satisfactory education and issue a school attendance order which you have the right to challenge in court. It is then down to the court to decide whether your education provision is satisfactory or not!

The new position (as far as we can see) is that you will have to apply to be registered as a home educator in order for your child not to be registered to a school, if the LEA decide that they don't like your education provision then they will simply revoke your registration as a home educator and your child will be enrolled with a school, if you continue to home educate then your child is truanting and you can be sent to prison! No recourse to the courts, no need to prove you have done anything wrong, they have decided, they have acted, you are now guilty and can be punished!!

Before any changes can be implemented, the government must now carry out a consultation, this can be viewed at :-

http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/consultations/index.cfm?action=consultationDetails&consultationId=1643&external=no

We need to take action NOW and do everything we can to tell this government that their proposals are outragous and totally unacceptable, many home educators have declared that they will not comply with the new rules even up to the point of being prepared to go to prison if necessary. We believe that the goverment may be opening the floodgates to legal action by home educated children for the harm done to them by the interference of state officials.

Hopefully it will not get that far and the state will recognise the mistakes they are making BEFORE the damage is done.

Suggested action:-

Respond robustly to the consultation.

Write to your MP.

Write to the DCSF.

Talk to people around you.

Contact the media.

If you have a blog, put your feelings online.

A British Constitution?

2009-06-09T19:46:00.002+01:00

I've been wondering on and off for some time about the idea of a written constitution similar to that of the US.

There have been times when I've thought that our quirky system of common law seems altogether too haphazard and unpredictable, liable to the whim of senior judges. I've thought that perhaps if our 'rights' were enshrined in a written document then we could always hold any future government to account should they attempt to remove those rights.

Today I've been doing a bit of reading over at the Devil's Kitchen and came across an entry debating that same point. (For those of a tender disposition - he does tend to the odd swear word or several).

I'm now pretty convinced that it would be a tall order to put in place a written constitution that preserved our rights rather than restricted them and perhaps our system of common law is the best we can come up with so far ..... go read and think at http://devilskitchen.me.uk/2009/06/british-constitution.html ....... things are never simple are they?

Welcome to animal farm

2009-06-08T22:50:00.003+01:00

What concerns me even more than our MPs ripping us off through their expenses (and goodness knows what other scams), is the way they seem to think that we ordinary people are some sort of subhuman species that need to be managed in much the same way as pets or zoo animals.

We are subject to or threatened with compulsory vaccination, compulsory ID cards, recording and monitoring of our every move financially, on the road or online.......

Now we have a new children's minister - Dawn Primarolo, who is responsible for children's well-being, safety, protection and care; family policy including parenting support; teenage pregnancy strategy; Sure Start, childcare and early education, the Every Child Matters agenda, and extended schools.

Reading her job description I would expect her to be a person who cares about the health welfare and wellbeing of children, putting their needs first...... imagine my surprise to read the article from the Daily Mail where she advocates "Why we should sterilise teenage girls ... temporarily at least". Saying "At what age? Well, doesn't 12 until 17 sound rather sensible?".

Who does she think she is? Better still - Who or what does she think we are? If I were a girl aged between 12 and 17 I would be seriously concerned about the prospect of being forced to take drugs to prevent my getting pregnant. What about the many women who have adverse reactions to the pill? what about our human rights to refuse medical treatment should we so wish?

HOW DARE this woman think that she can treat us like farm animals!

As I have said before, the politicians need to remember that THEY are OUR servants not the other way around, if any politician dares to force my children to take any "compulsory" medication they had better be ready for my reaction because they might find their needle stuck somewhere they'd rather not have it!

Police State? A quiz

2009-06-06T21:41:00.002+01:00

Over on the off-gridder site there is an interesting article for those who doubt that we are living in a police state, makes me think that Communist Russia had nothing on our beloved NuLabour.........

Take a look at http://off-gridder.com/2009/05/28/police-state-britain/

TRUST US, HONEST!

2009-05-27T22:53:00.004+01:00

The government wants us all to trust them:-

Trust them to tackle crime.
Trust them to run the economy.
Trust them to maintain our sovereignty within Europe.
Trust them to be honest and ethical.
Trust them to keep our personal data (that they demand from us with menace) safe secure and confidential.

Crime - The crime rate from 1997 to 2006 has soared with the number of rapes doubling, serious woundings rising by more than 50% and convictions at an all time low.

Economy - Need I say anything here? We have just crashed into what some believe may be the deepest recession in living memory.

Sovereignty - 75% of our laws are now made in Europe, even our MPs are complaining that they are powerless.

Honest and Ethical - Shall I just say two words - MP's Expenses!

Personal Data - The NHS have reported 140 serious data breaches in the first 3 months of this year, affecting the personal and confidential details of tens of thousands of people.

It is time for a step change! We should have a general election NOW and vote for MPs who will promise to be open and honest, and not just declare it but lay their dealings open to scrutiny by the public. We need politicians who will seize power back from the beaurocrats in Brussels and hand it back to the people of this country.

Enough empty rhetoric.
Enough lining of pockets.
Enough of the 'old boy' network.

We need a political establishment that remembers what it is for - to represent the PEOPLE of this country and to work for the benefit of the people instead of dipping their grubby little fingers in our pockets!

84 year old man and his daughter stopped by anti terror police thanks to ANPR

2009-05-25T22:49:00.004+01:00

Quite amazing timing coming on the heals of my blog about the ANPR network currently being implemented:-

An 84 year old man and his daughter appeared tonight on the BBC TV programme "Who's watching you?" to tell their story of how they were pulled over in Central London and searched by a police anti-terrorism unit - and threatened with arrest under the Terrorism Act if they did not explain where they were going.

What they hadn't realised was Sussex Police had put a marker against their car on the Police National Computer after they attending three anti-arms demonstrations against EDO MBM Technology in Moulsecoomb.

They hadn't commited any crime, they hadn't been arrested, they had just attended a demonstration. That was enough to get them marked down as potential terrorists and harrassed by the police whilst going about their lawful lives.

This is the kind of thing we must STOP right now! Our government (and the police acting on their behalf) should not be harrassing innocent people, this routine monitoring and surveillance of innocent people should not happen in what I always believed to be a free country.

Write to your MP demanding that they vote to dismantle this police state that we have become.

Read the newspaper story at http://www.theargus.co.uk/search/4393086.Brighton_pensioner_slams__police_state__after_terror_police_tag_car/

Watch the programme at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00ktdzj/Whos_Watching_You_Episode_1/

More Big Brother

2009-05-23T18:26:00.003+01:00

Some time ago I read about plans to link every available camera up to automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) equipment in order to record our every movement.

Naiively, I thought this would take a long time to achieve as the sheer cost and complexity of the system required to build this network of ANPR surveillance would be prohibitive.

Now I read on the BBC site :-

A national network of cameras and computers automatically logging car number plates will be in place within months, the BBC has learned.

Thousands of Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras are already operating on Britain's roads.

Police forces across England, Wales and Scotland will soon be able to share the information on one central computer.

Officers say it is a useful tool in fighting crime, but critics say the network is secretive and unregulated.

Now I'm starting to get seriously worried, we already have levels of surveillance and monitoring that we have never experienced before and now we face the threat of the majority of our car journeys being recorded and checked in case we break some law or other.

I am not opposed to surveillance as part of an investigation into a crime or suspected crime, I DO object most strongly to routine monitoring and checking to see whether there is any crime they can pin on us - there are now so many laws I cannot honestly hold my hand up and say that I have not broken any laws today, I just don't know!!!

Measles outbreak - are we doomed?

2009-05-22T23:44:00.003+01:00

Measles outbreak in Wales the worst in more than a decade

It seems that we have reason to be afraid, measles is sweeping across Wales and threatening death and brain damage to thousands of children ........ or so the authorities would have us believe.

We have had letters, leaflets through the door, exhortations that we must urgently submit our children to be 'protected' by a jab of the MMR vaccine.

Now let's look at the figures - Llanelli is supposed to be one of the major centres of this outbreak, with a population in the region of 60 to 70 thousand people I reckoned that there must be hundreds of cases in the town .... the figures I have found say 6 !! Yes, that is 6 confirmed cases with another 19 probable and 18 suspected.

Let us be generous say that all 43 cases are actually cases of measles, that is less than 0.066% of the local population infected! I don't know about you but that doesn't sound like much of an epidemic to me.

What is puzzling me is the response of the authorities, four children attending a nursery in Burry Port have been treated in hospital but the nursery is following guidelines and staying open, this doesn't square with advice offered in other cases of infectious diseases where the recommendations have been to isolate and avoid known hotspots, this suggests that either measles is not as contagious as they say or they actually want it to spread! Why else would you want parents to continue to send their children to a location known to have been involved in cases of a contagious disease?

The National Public Health Service (NPHS) claim that ".. the only way this will stop is for people to come forward for the MMR vaccine".

I don't want to get embroiled in the debate over whether the MMR is safe or not but why aren't they prepared to offer the single vaccine as a means to spread the immunity? there is no mention of mumps or rubella outbreaks so why not recognise the unease people feel over the MMR and offer a more acceptable vaccine?

What is it that makes them so keen to get the MMR into their target of 95% of the population? Is it just money making for the MMR manufacturers or is there something more sinister? Why can't we choose the single vaccine? Surely, if there is an option which will increase the rate of vaccine take up during an 'outbreak' shouldn't it be offered?

I don't have all the answers, but something doesn't add up here!

I'm Back (and a rant about rules)

2009-05-22T19:36:00.004+01:00

Sorry folks to have been away so long, went down with a nasty dose of flu that just wouldn't go away and haven't had the energy to pick myself up off the floor. Nothing to do with swine flu or anything sufficiently exotic for us all to get excited about pandemics........ I'll leave that kind of rubbish to the gov't, maybe they should have called it torreodor flu 'cos then I could make all the jokes about bullshit etc.

Anyhow, I wanted to say how much I appreciate reading Ken Frost's Blog "Nanny Knows Best", I do truly think he 'gets it'.

In work I have been quietly arguing with people about all the health and safety rules, I really do think that introducing rules to cover everything we do actually makes our workplace more dangerous, I have noticed that people are just following 'the rules' and not thinking for themselves - it comes as a complete surprise then when they have an accident because 'they followed all the rules'. Unfortunately the usual response is to introduce more rules - doh!!!

Recently I got thinking (aha, now I know where the headache came from), and realised that this over prescription of rules is actually at the heart of many of the problems troubling our society - people have stopped thinking for themselves, they no longer consider whether what they are doing is right or wrong, they only want to know whether there is a rule that says they can't - if there is no rule then it must be OK!!!!!!

This thinking is highlighted by the recent claims of so many MPs - they didn't do anything wrong when they made their expenses claims - they didn't break any rules.

Maybe I'm being simplistic here, but I always believed that MPs had an obligation to be honest and ethical, Surely they shouldn't need 'rules' to tell them that it is not right to claim for mortages you don't even have, for expensive 'duck islands', for moat cleaning, for multiple second homes, for porno films etc etc etc.

Just WHAT do they think they are doing? I always understood that expenses were there to reimburse you for money you spent in carrying out your duties, not perks to be exploited to the maximum!

My dad always said "rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools", I think he had a damn good point and it's about time that this collection of fools did the honourable thing and resigned en mass in order to give us the opportunity to either believe their claims to behave ethically in the future or to replace them with somebody we think we can trust.

Please read Ken's blog on the matter at http://nannyknowsbest.blogspot.com/2009/05/system.html

Risk Assessment

2009-03-05T16:27:00.004Z

I have come across a poem which I like very much, as it is the author's intellectual property I'll just post an intro and a link so you can go read it yourself - it's well worth a click.

Since September 11th 2001, 70 people in the UK have been killed by terrorists.

In the same period, 400 people in the UK drowned in their own bathtubs, and 500 people were killed whilst doing DIY.

This poem is called: Risk Assessment.

I used to like bees
I’d watch them bumbling through the leaves
And hum along with their good vibrations
Until I learned that they killed more people last year than THE TERRORISTS did.
Now I write letters to the Daily Mail
Demanding strict border controls on the entrances to hives
And random police raids on patches of lavender.

READ it at:-
http://adaisythroughconcrete.blogspot.com/2009/01/just-or-bust-risk-assessment.html

Response to those who claim "If you are innocent you have nothing to fear"

2009-03-05T13:13:00.002Z

I came across this blog today written by a guy who innocently wandered into whithall and had the temerity to make conversation with a police officer - this was obviously highly suspicious and resulted in him being arrested by 7 armed policemen, strip searched and held in a police cell, all the usual DNA samples / fingerprints etc and finally, when released without charge, told that “Had you not have been so compliant, I would have shot you, and you would have died”

I have also been reading the story of Stephen Clarke who was arrested in Manchester for allegedly taking photos of sealed sewer gratings. Despite the fact that taking photos of sewer gratings is not illegal and the fact that he didn't actually take any photos! He still got arrested and held for 2 days, DNA samples taken etc etc.

We really must call a halt to this police state in Britain, we used to be a democracy which valued liberty and freedom, now we have already become a police state where we can be locked up without true justification, we are at risk of being shot by armed psychopaths wearing police uniforms, and if a witness attempts to record the event on a camera / mobile phone then they can be arrested as well.

HOW DID WE GET TO THIS STATE?

READ MORE at:-

http://ministryofparanoia.com/2008/my-arrest-story/

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/03/03/manchester-man-arres.html

It might be enforceable in a court of law this contract, but it's not enforceable in the court of public opinion that's where the Government steps in

2009-03-01T18:40:00.003Z

So Sir Fred Goodwins exorbitant pension is completely legal but that's not good enough for Harriet Harman.

Forgive me for being naive but I always thought that laws were enforced in a court of law and not in "the court of public opinion," as threatened by Harriet Harman.

I'm not a fan of fat cat executives being rewarded for failure whilst ordinary employees suffer, but I do think that the law should be applied consistently - either the contract is legal or it isn't. If Sir Fred's contract is legal then he is entitled to his pension and we should be asking ourselves 'who made this contract?' Shouldn't they be getting a slapped wrist at the very least!

That's the scary thing about this government, the law doesn't matter provided they can win round public opinion.

READ MORE at:-

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7917361.stm

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/UK-News/Sir-Fred-Goodwin-Pension-Harriet-Harman-Hints-At-Law-Change-To-Get-RBS-Pension-Back-From-Banker/Article/200903115231857?lpos=UK_News_Top_Stories_Header_2&lid=ARTICLE_15231857_Sir_Fred_Goodwin_Pension%3A_Harriet_Harman_Hints_At_Law_Change_To_Get_RBS_Pension_Back_From_Banker

Sir David Ormond on Data Mining

2009-03-01T18:05:00.002Z

Our goverment try to reassure us that this is not a police state, that we have nothing to fear from the increasing amount of information about us being held on databases, yet Sir David Ormond is quoted as saying :-

A significant challenge supporting the National Security Strategy will be how the intelligence community can access the full range of data relating to individuals, their movements, activities and associations in a timely, accurate, proportionate and legal way,

....or Protint. This is personal information about individual that resides in databases, such as advance passenger information, airline bookings and other travel data, passport and biometric data, immigration, identity and border records, criminal records, and other governmental and private sector data, including financial and telephone and other communications records. Such information may be held in national records, covered by Data Protection legislation, but it might also be held offshore by other nations or by global companies, and may or may not be subject to international agreements. Access to such information, and in some cases the ability to apply data mining and pattern recognition software to databases, might well be the key to effective pre-emption in future terrorist cases.

Well that's OK then, if it's to pre-empt future terrorist cases then I've got nothing to worry about have I..............................

READ MORE at:-
http://p10.hostingprod.com/@spyblog.org.uk/blog/2009/02/sir-david-omand-on-protected-information-data-mining-of-personal-sensitive-data.html
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/177604-Spying-on-60-million-people-doesn-t-add-up

And they expect us to submit our children for vaccinations!

2009-03-01T17:22:00.002Z

Today I read an article in the Telegraph saying that safety regulators will be telling parents not to give their children a range of over the counter cold remedies as the dangers outweigh any benefits.

These remedies have been available for many years and supposedly approved as safe for children yet we find that they are linked to many deaths -

Reports submitted to regulators show that, when cases involving people of all ages are considered, dozens have died after taking medication containing the ingredients and more than 3,000 people have reported "adverse reactions". Diphenhydramine, which is used in Benylin Children's Coughs and Colds, was mentioned in reports of 27 deaths, while chlorphenamine, an ingredient in Tixylix Cough and Cold, was mentioned in reports of 11 deaths.

There has been much debate recently about the safety of vaccines such as the MMR and officials refuse to allow parents to choose alternatives or threaten to bring in social services if the parents refuse to have their children vaccinated.

They claim that there is no evidence the vaccines are unsafe, I dare say that there was previously no evidence that cough remedies were unsafe, do you feel confident that we are being told the unbiased truth?

Are you prepared to take a chance with your children?

NSPCC - Nothing new really

2009-03-01T16:46:00.003Z

Recently the NSPCC has outraged home educators by attempting to link home education with child abuse, making comments implying that Victoria Climbie was linked to home education.

Rooting around the internet, I have come across an article from 1999 entitled Why this NSPCC advert is harmful to children in which Colin Pritchard (professor of psychiatric social work at the University of Southampton) says 'The NSPCC are playing games'.

The NSPCC's message has to be 'children are at risk'. To put it at its baldest, the NSPCC needs cruelty to children to be seen to occur because, without that, it has no raison d' tre.

So, it seems the NSPCC has been playing this game of false accusations for a long time. It is about time this organisation stopped trying to line its coffers by claiming child abuse in every direction and either got down to truly helping children at a practical level or simply shut up shop and stopped accusing innocent families of horrific actions.

The NSPCC by their own actions are putting children at risk, they are demonising normal loving families and making ordinary people afraid to help children in case they get accused of abuse or paedophilia!

READ the article at:-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,3890641,00.html

Philip Pullman in The Times

2009-03-01T02:42:00.002Z

Philip Pullman wrote the following article for The Times online but it seems to have disappeared into the memory hole, I have reproduced it here before it gets lost for good:

Are such things done on Albion's shore?

The image of this nation that haunts me most powerfully is that of the sleeping giant Albion in William Blake's prophetic books. Sleep, profound and inveterate slumber: that is the condition of Britain today.

We do not know what is happening to us. In the world outside, great events take place, great figures move and act, great matters unfold, and this nation of Albion murmurs and stirs while malevolent voices whisper in the darkness - the voices of the new laws that are silently strangling the old freedoms the nation still dreams it enjoys.

We are so fast asleep that we don't know who we are any more. Are we English? Scottish? Welsh? British? More than one of them? One but not another? Are we a Christian nation - after all we have an Established Church - or are we something post-Christian? Are we a secular state? Are we a multifaith state? Are we anything we can all agree on and feel proud of?

The new laws whisper:

You don't know who you are

You're mistaken about yourself

We know better than you do what you consist of, what labels apply to you, which facts about you are important and which are worthless

We do not believe you can be trusted to know these things, so we shall know them for you

And if we take against you, we shall remove from your possession the only proof we shall allow to be recognised

The sleeping nation dreams it has the freedom to speak its mind. It fantasizes about making tyrants cringe with the bluff bold vigour of its ancient right to express its opinions in the street. This is what the new laws say about that:

Expressing an opinion is a dangerous activity

Whatever your opinions are, we don't want to hear them

So if you threaten us or our friends with your opinions we shall treat you like the rabble you are

And we do not want to hear you arguing about it

So hold your tongue and forget about protesting

What we want from you is acquiescence

The nation dreams it is a democratic state where the laws were made by freely elected representatives who were answerable to the people. It used to be such a nation once, it dreams, so it must be that nation still. It is a sweet dream.

You are not to be trusted with laws

So we shall put ourselves out of your reach

We shall put ourselves beyond your amendment or abolition

You do not need to argue about any changes we make, or to debate them, or to send your representatives to vote against them

You do not need to hold us to account

You think you will get what you want from an inquiry?

Who do you think you are?

What sort of fools do you think we are?

The nation's dreams are troubled, sometimes; dim rumours reach our sleeping ears, rumours that all is not well in the administration of justice; but an ancient spell murmurs through our somnolence, and we remember that the courts are bound to seek the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and we turn over and sleep soundly again.

And the new laws whisper:

We do not want to hear you talking about truth

Truth is a friend of yours, not a friend of ours

We have a better friend called hearsay, who is a witness we can always rely on

We do not want to hear you talking about innocence

Innocent means guilty of things not yet done

We do not want to hear you talking about the right to silence

You need to be told what silence means: it means guilt

We do not want to hear you talking about justice

Justice is whatever we want to do to you

And nothing else

Are we conscious of being watched, as we sleep? Are we aware of an ever-open eye at the corner of every street, of a watching presence in the very keyboards we type our messages on? The new laws don't mind if we are. They don't think we care about it.

We want to watch you day and night

We think you are abject enough to feel safe when we watch you

We can see you have lost all sense of what is proper to a free people

We can see you have abandoned modesty

Some of our friends have seen to that

They have arranged for you to find modesty contemptible

In a thousand ways they have led you to think that whoever does not want to be watched must have something shameful to hide

We want you to feel that solitude is frightening and unnatural

We want you to feel that being watched is the natural state of things

One of the pleasant fantasies that consoles us in our sleep is that we are a sovereign nation, and safe within our borders. This is what the new laws say about that:

We know who our friends are

And when our friends want to have words with one of you

We shall make it easy for them to take you away to a country where you will learn that you have more fingernails than you need

It will be no use bleating that you know of no offence you have committed under British law

It is for us to know what your offence is

Angering our friends is an offence

It is inconceivable to me that a waking nation in the full consciousness of its freedom would have allowed its government to pass such laws as the Protection from Harassment Act (1997), the Crime and Disorder Act (1998), the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (2000), the Terrorism Act (2000), the Criminal Justice and Police Act (2001), the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act (2001), the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Extension Act (2002), the Criminal Justice Act (2003), the Extradition Act (2003), the Anti-Social Behaviour Act (2003), the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act (2004), the Civil Contingencies Act (2004), the Prevention of Terrorism Act (2005), the Inquiries Act (2005), the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act (2005), not to mention a host of pending legislation such as the Identity Cards Bill, the Coroners and Justice Bill, and the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill.

Inconceivable.

And those laws say:

Sleep, you stinking cowards

Sweating as you dream of rights and freedoms

Freedom is too hard for you

We shall decide what freedom is

Sleep, you vermin

Sleep, you scum.

NSPCC reply to AHED

2009-03-01T01:22:00.003Z

AHED (Action for Home EDucation) recently sent an open letter to the NSPCC expressing concern at the comments made by Mr Vijay Patel in the Independent.

The NSPCC has responded by posting a reply on their Facebook page in which they state they have no position as regards home education from an educational perspective. Our concern is for the safety of children. Our view is simply that those educated at home should have the same right to protection as those taught in school. This is what we have asked the government to consider in its current review.

Quite how this fits with Mr Patel's comment "Some people use home education to hide. Look at the Victoria Climbié case. No one asked where she was at school. We have no view about home education, but we do know that to find out about abuse someone has to know about the child."

They go on to say "the NSPCC has a legitimate concern about the safeguarding of all children whether they are educated at home or at school and that will be the basis of our involvement with the Government review."

Most abused children go to school - so where is the evidence that school and official monitoring safeguards children?

Many children such as Victoria Climbie and the Spry children were already known to the authorities yet nothing was done so why are they trying to allege that there is some inherent danger in home education?

Whilst the government tries to convince us that we are all under threat of imminent attack by hordes of terrorists in order to steal our freedom from us, I believe that the NSPCC are using similar methods to claim that children all around us are at risk of abuse in order to justify their "important position" talking to government and seek greater powers to interfere with ordinary innocent families.

Is the NSPCC trying to divert attention away from its own failings and at the same time seeking to elevate its status and raise more money to pay for fancy offices and over priced advertising campaigns.

I have read that their "Full Stop" campaign has cost £3million, how many children has that saved? How many could have been helped if they had spent that £3million on family support centres or other direct help for children at risk.

If you want to make your voice heard, join facebook and comment on the NSPCC pages - they do seem to sit up and take notice when enough people do this, I think they are afraid of losing the money you all give to them.

Is this why the NSPCC are making false allegations?

2009-02-26T13:04:00.002Z

The NSPCC have been very vocal in making completely false and unsubstantiated allegations that home education could be used as a cover for abuse, presenting themselves as an expert authority on protecting children from harm. They very often refer to the Victoria Climbie case as an example of why monitoring and control by the authorities is needed.

Yet it turns out that the NSPCC were largely responsible for the failure to protect poor Victoria, she was referred to them as an urgent case but they were too busy planning a party to check up on her!! HOW DARE THEY FALSELY ACCUSE PARENTS OF ABUSING CHILDREN when they have been complicit in allowing this child to be abused and killed.

When the whole sorry case came out into the open they even altered documents to try to hide their failure.

The NSPCC should be taken apart and all the self seeking career animals chucked out so that we can once more have an organisation that truly cares more for children than its own status as 'an important organisation advising government'.

READ MORE at:-
http://sometimesitspeaceful.blogspot.com/2009/02/hey-vijay.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/1827406.stm
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1382707/NSPCC-accused-of-cover-up-after-Climbie-murder.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1382670/NSPCC-ignored-Victorias-abuse.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Climbi%C3%A9
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/reports/archive/features/nspcc.shtml

Victoria abused by spin AGAIN

2009-02-26T03:30:00.004Z

This article in The Independent made my blood boil:-

Tens of thousands of home-educating parents are in a fury about a government decision to set up an inquiry into home schooling because of fears it could hide child abuse. They say there is no hard evidence, and the investigation smears them all with suspicion. Two thousand parents and organisations have written to the Government in protest at what pressure group Action for Home Education call "vile and unsubstantiated" allegations.

The inquiry is a "clear incitement to hatred of home educators" says Clare Murton, a supporter of Action for Home Education. Many rank and file home educators agree. According to Katie Bell, 45, a mother of two in Croydon, the Government is almost saying that home-educated children are prone to abuse: "It's an attack on our beliefs. If they said something like that about any other minority they would be lynched."

Vijay Patel, policy adviser for the NSPCC children's charity, also sees the need for a review. "Some people use home education to hide. Look at the Victoria Climbié case. No one asked where she was at school. We have no view about home education, but we do know that to find out about abuse someone has to know about the child."

The website is not accepting comments at present, I assume they are expecting a host of outraged responses. This is what I tried to post:-

Mr Patel, you do yourself no favours when you abuse the memory of Victoria Climbie yet again. This poor child has already had responsibility for Contactpoint foisted upon her (though the Children's Database was in fact conceived several years earlier than her death and she was simply a convenient justification for it) and now her name is dragged into justifying the home education review. Victoria Climbie was NOT home educated and was well known to at least SEVEN different agencies. The Spry children were also known to be at risk from their (presumably local authority vetted) carer before they were withdrawn from school as you are very well aware.

Mr Patel you might have a shred of credibility if you held up your hands and admitted these were failures by the agencies concerned and nothing whatsoever to do with home education. As it is, the NSPCC is clearly just a Govt sock puppet for driving forward an agenda that is hostile to parental responsibilty and families and you clearly don't have any qualms about attacking the way of life and the good name of the families of home educated children on behalf of this so-called "children's" charity. Unfortunately for you, in your attempts to drag us through the mud the only one coming up looking grubby is yourself.

READ MORE at:-
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/is-the-government-right-to-be-concerned-about-homeschooling-1631969.html

The Abolition of Freedom Act 2009

2009-02-25T22:35:00.005Z

Don't take the title literally - this is the title on the outside cover of a fabulous report published by University College London Student Human Rights Programme, led by Jonathan Butterworth.

One of the problems with the erosion of liberty in Britain over the last decade was that the public failed to pay attention to what was happening in Parliament. Laws that fundamentally challenged our traditions of rights and liberty and flew in the face of the Human Rights Act (“HRA”) were passed with relatively little debate. Few grasped the impact they would have on our society and Ministers were able to brush aside protests with assurances that their desire to protect us was equal to their respect for civil liberties.

The difficulty campaigners faced was to press home the argument about the scale of the loss. An account was needed to show that the legislative programme, which swept away centuries old rights and transferred so much power from the individual to the state, actually existed. Now we have that evidence and the Convention on Modern Liberty can demonstrate with confidence what Britain has lost and discuss how this crisis of liberty took root in one of the world’s oldest democracies and what to do about it.

This report by the UCL Student Human Rights Programme (“UCLSHRP”) is a concise and approachable inventory of the loss. It is a profoundly disturbing document, even for those who thought they knew about the subject, for it not only describes the wholesale removal of rights that were apparently protected by the HRA and set down nearly 800 years ago in Magna Carta, it also shows how the unarticulated liberties that we assumed were somehow guaranteed by British culture have been compromised. The same is true of constitutional safeguards that were once considered beyond the reach of a democratically elected legislature.

The attack is as broad as it is deep. Over 25 Acts of Parliament and some 50 individual measures are involved. This document is organised around the articles of the Human Rights Act and also draws on the guarantees of Magna Carta, but it is important to remember that many of the freedoms that are disappearing have never been codified, which makes it all the more difficult to keep track of the attack on liberty. Part of the future work of those associated with the Convention must be to continue to monitor and report on these dangerous trends. Opposition can only begin when we are in full possession of the facts. These are what the UCLSHRP provides in this first exhaustive account of what we have lost.

Download the report at:-
http://www.modernliberty.net/downloads/abolition_of_freedom.pdf

This is why we need to fight ID cards

2009-02-25T22:21:00.002Z

An extract from Henry Porter's blog:-

"I'm a barrister, one of 15% from a state school background, dedicated to public interest work. In that spirit I volunteered for the United Nations mission in Nepal in 2007. There I met my now husband who had worked for the UN in his own country, Sierra Leone, since 2003 and then in Nepal where he will complete his contract.

"I don't think it is criminal of me to choose a partner who has always worked hard and had to fight hard to even find a job in his own country during and after the civil war but that's how the UK Borders Agency makes me feel.

"We are starting a family together," she continues. "Our life together is beset, at times, by overwhelming strains imposed by the UKBA. It would be easier for me to have started a family with somebody either in prison or with a criminal record than with someone who works for the United Nations but is a Sierra Leoneon national."

In order to get an ID card to her husband my correspondent had to travel to Nepal when she was 34 weeks pregnant so that he could fly to Britain for the birth of their child. The cards states "Sierra Leoneon. No recourse to public funds" and gives an expiry date.

She points out that the expiry date means he is unlikely to be able to find work in Britain. (Who wants to give employment to someone who may have their card withdrawn?)

"There is no denying that there is a stigma attached to an ID card," she continues. "Nearly every flight I have shared with my husband into the UK has resulted in him being stopped by some agency and then being allowed to continue when it's established he's with me. We have to inform the Home Office of any change of address that is likely." She tells me that the immigration officials have taken to boarding planes and stopping people so that they have no recourse.

She concludes: "Of course, probably the only solution for most of our strains and anxieties is to settle elsewhere, where we are not treated like second-class citizens or criminals, But why should I? I work hard in my country – I volunteer for public bodies. I fought hard to gain my professional qualifications then a career."

Indeed, why should she? And why should we tolerate this expensive and divisive scheme?

The best way to fight it is to join NO2ID. In the meantime we can look forward to the government's response to the information tribunal's order to publish the a Whitehall audit which is believed to be critical about the affordability of the scheme which the Home Office still claims to cost £4.7bn.

I keep being told "If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear", did this woman's husband have anything to hide? did he commit any crime? yet he is still persecuted and treated like a criminal.

We have to stop this abuse of power and make our government start treating people with respect once more.

It is time to resist

2009-02-25T21:59:00.002Z

An article by Henry Porter at The Guardian reads:-

"Once an individual has been assigned a unique index number, it is possible to accurately retrieve data across numerous databases and build a picture of that individual's life that was not authorised in the original consent for data collection," says Sir David Omand in a report for the Institute for Public Policy research.

This is not some wild fantasy. It is the world that we are about to move into and which Jack Straw's coroners and justice bill, the ID Cards Act, RIPA laws and the EBorders scheme have patiently constructed while we have been living in an idiots' paradise of easy money. .......

You may wonder why parliament has not alerted us to these dangers. That is because it is because part of the project, and Labour ministers continue to shelter behind the Human Rights Act, which offers no protection to the British public whatsoever. What we need is entrenched legislation that controls the executive and makes sure that no British citizen will ever be assigned a number so that the state may conveniently watch his or her every move.

Even George Orwell didn't fully foresee the oppressive regime we are falling under, so much for the 'Party of the people'.

From the labour party website:-

Do you feel the same way we do about the kind of Britain you want to live in?

A Britain where the economy is strong and stable; where there is a first-class health service free at the point of use; where education is always a priority ; and where you and your family are treated equally and can feel safe and secure.

This is the Britain we are working hard to build.

Not sure what planet they are living on, it doesn't bear much resemblance to the labour party we have in power at the moment!

Freedom of Information - except when the Government want to keep secrets!

2009-02-25T21:36:00.002Z

I just read the following report in The Times:-

Jack Straw revealed that he was considering a clampdown on freedom of information laws after telling the Commons that he will veto the publication of Iraq war Cabinet minutes.

New restrictions could be placed on the disclosure of the identities of civil servants, the release of Cabinet documents and the publication of advice by officials, it emerged yesterday.

Ministers and officials are considering using the Dacre review to try to introduce new restrictions on releasing information after a huge backlash in Whitehall over the material they are being forced to release by the Information Commissioner and Tribunal.

Seems that the government doesn't like the idea of freedom of information and honesty when it is turned on them! As soon as the people of the United Kingdom start asking questions about how our representatives are running the country and spending OUR money they start blustering and trying to claim exemptions or change the rules to shut us up!

It is about time that this apalling excuse for a government offered us a general election so that we can show them how much we agree with their maladministration, oh of course they know what the result is likely to be don't they - not a chance then I suppose!

READ MORE at:-
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5798995.ece

They really can't stand us having privacy

2009-02-21T17:02:00.003Z

EU's judicial cooperation agency Eurojust will take the lead in finding ways to help police and prosecutors across Europe to wiretap computer-to-computer phone conversations enabled by programs such as Skype.

"We will sit together with all member states to see how this can be done technically and legally," Joannes Thuy, Eurojust spokesman told this website.

One part of me recognises that the police could be justified in being able to carry out surveillance such as wire tapping as part of a criminal investigation, the rest of me sees how these powers are abused on a regular basis to the extent that most of us seem to be under surveillance most of the time.

If the police are investigating a particular person and listen in to the calls made by that person then I don't have a problem. I do have a problem however when they listen in to all calls in the off chance that they may overhear something criminal being discussed. Unfortunately, if they manage to crack skype (and similar) calls, I don't trust them not to listen in as a matter of routine, or for trivial 'offences' such as incorrectly filling in a school application form or dropping a chocolate wrapper.

I can only assume these people went to school!

2009-02-21T14:47:00.003Z

I was just sat here reading about the report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation which highlights that increasing numbers of families below the poverty line now had 1 or more working parent rather than unemployed as was previously the case and was getting annoyed at the gov'ts ineptitude at throwing loads of money at a problem only to make it worse.

Then I suddenly twigged - these people are stupid! The gov't has a target to eradicate ALL child poverty by 2020 but poverty is defined as any household with children where the parents have an income of less than 60% of British median income. Didn't they do maths in school? Don't they understand that as you increase the income of families the median income increases, thus shifting the 60% target further up, didn't they ever think about this policy before spouting it?

I fondly remember the days of my childhood when a single income was generally sufficient to live comfortably, we didn't have the masses of 'stuff' that we have today but I came from a family of 7 children, only my father worked, we didn't have money for extravagance but had the love and full time attention of our mother and enough money to live in comfort. Now, I work with people who perhaps have a combined gross income of £65,000 and still struggle to make ends meet because of the cost of childcare, mortgage repayments, excessive taxes, general high cost of living.

Reduce the burden of paying for excessive government and we may all end up better off, with people employed in wealth creation instead of snooping on the rest of us. We could have mothers spending time with their children and creating strong family bonds instead of children that grow up as strangers who don't think they have any obligation to get on with the rest of the community, causing the gov't to think that yet more money needs to be spent on dealing with this 'problem of anti social behaviour'.

Another step towards global government?

2009-02-19T19:43:00.002Z

A worldwide crackdown on tax havens, from Switzerland to the Cayman Islands, will be spearheaded by Gordon Brown as the world's richest nations use the global economic downturn to close loopholes that are costing them hundreds of billions in lost revenues.

As he embarks on a mini-tour of EU capitals in advance of the G20 summit in London in April, the prime minister announced yesterday that he was negotiating with fellow world leaders the terms of a tough regulatory system on tax and banking that will cover every country.

Speaking at his monthly press conference in Downing Street, Brown said: "We want the whole of the world to take action. That will mean action against regulatory and tax havens in parts of the world which have escaped the regulatory attention they need. The changes we make will have to apply to all jurisdictions around the world."

I reckon that this is how they intend to impose a world government on us, one step at a time, with every step seemingly justified to be in our interest.

Much is said of 'New World Order', my experience is that politicians (and many others) like to become part of bigger, more important clubs. When they have achieved membership of parliament they want to become members of a bigger parliament such as Europe, once they have done that they want to join a bigger club like the G8, G20 or go for the big one - 'one world government'. What they fail to see is that they simply become a little fish in a bigger pond but that won't stop them using us to further their ambition.

Liberty in Britain is facing death by a thousand cuts. We can fight back

2009-02-19T19:29:00.003Z

Timothy Garton Ash wrote the following piece in The Guardian. I believe he is right to highlight the gradual loss of our freedom, not necessarily by big changes but by lots of little ammendments to legislation hidden with other acts such as the information sharing orders hidden with the coroners and justice bill. There is a saying that "If you put a frog in a pot of boiling water it will jump out but if you put it in cold water and gradually turn the heat on it will boil to death", this is what our government is doing to us - they are not marching in with marshall law and concentration camps but slowly, very slowly they are cutting off our ability to protest, cutting off our freedom to choose our own lives, cutting off our ability to remove them from power.

For 30 years I have been travelling to unfree places, from East Germany to Burma, and writing about them in the belief that I was coming from one of the freest countries in the world. I wanted people in those places to enjoy more of what we had. In the last few years, I have woken up - late in the day, but better late than never - to the way in which individual liberty, privacy and human rights have been sliced away in Britain, like salami, under New Labour governments that profess to find in liberty the central theme of British history.

"Oh, these powers will almost never be used," they say every time. "Ordinary people have nothing to fear. It affects just 0.1%." But a hundred times 0.1% is 10%. The East Germans are now more free than we are, at least in terms of law and administrative practice in such areas as surveillance and data collection. Thirty years ago, they had the Stasi. Today, Britain has such broadly drawn and elastic surveillance laws that Poole borough council could exploit them to spend two weeks spying on a family wrongly accused of lying on a school application form. The official spies reportedly made copious notes on the movements of the mother and her three children, whom they referred to as "targets", and watched the family go home at night to establish where they were sleeping. And this is supposed to be modern Britain?