Thursday`s Leader column pointed out how May`s
government has enjoyed "a relatively easy start" and has a "comfortable 41%-27%
lead over Labour" (The prime minister has made the call that will shape her
leadership, 01.09.16). Perhaps this would not have been the case had the media
made more of the Tories` "claim that ministers had assessed Saudi Arabia was not
in breach of international humanitarian law" to justify their sales of arms for
use in Yemen, and then, the day before parliament`s summer recess, admitted
no such assessment had taken place, yet there had been no "attempt to deceive"
(UK in denial over Saudis arms sales being used in Yemen, claims Oxfam,
23/08/16). An unbiased press would have lambasted the government for lying to
its people.
We are frequently informed how this government
will get "tough" on irresponsible capitalism, but far less so, if at all, about
the the biggest Tory donor in the second quarter of 2016 being a certain Gerardo
Lopez Fojaca. He is naturally, based in Luxembourg, so that his capital gains
tax is 0%; he is the CEO of a company with links to Russian banks sanctioned by
the EU and US, and he owns companies named in the Panama Papers.
Giving £20m of taxpayers` money to help a firm
provide decent railway services when its profits are £100m, is equally squalid.
If the British people were given the facts, opinion polls would not be so
depressing, and even Labour MPs might realise change is possible.
Paul Mason`s article on the entry requirements for
Britain`s investment banks reminded me of the Barclays` then CEO, Antony
Jenkins, back in February, 2014, saying how payment of, what the majority of
us view as "obscene", bonuses was the only way to "attract the best
people"(G2,Fancy a job in finance? 06/09/16). Stephen Hester over at RBS had
made the same point two years earlier.
It seems it`s not only the shoe colour which
changes crossing the "demographic faultline", that is White Kennett Street;
definition of the most simple of words clearly undergoes serious
re-interpretation too!
I cannot believe John Crace omitted this from his
"new lexicon" (G2, Brick truthers, "facts" and ultrashambles,
07/09/16).
Northern Powerhouse (n)
A political wheeze dreamt up by George Osborne
weeks before the 2015 general election, A promise that the Tories would spend
billions on ultra-fast railways to boost the north of England`s economy, after
five years of decimating government grants to northern councils. With opinion
polls pointing, at best, to the Tories sharing power in a coalition, it was a
pledge, Osborne believed, which would be dropped at the earliest
opportunity.
Ian Cobain`s excellent "long read" highlighted
Britain`s secret and "undeclared" wars, brutalities committed by our troops
obeying orders such as the need to "show a ruthless disregard for civilians",
and the many examples revealing profit to be a far more important determinant of
foreign policy than principle (Britain`s secret wars,08/09/16).
Sadly, such revelations are presumably merely the
tip of this historical nightmare; as the Guardian
has reported in the past, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has
repeatedly failed to obey the thirty year rule, with the result that an archive
containing 1.2 million files going back in British history as far as the Treaty
of Paris, which ended the Crimean War in 1856, exists under lock and key,
unavailable to the prying eyes of historians (Academics consider legal action to
force Foreign Office to release public records,13/01/14). Such manipulation of
history is disgraceful, and all MPs should be urged to do their utmost to get
those files released. Until they are, students of our history will only be
studying the establishment`s biased view of our past, and the involvement of our
soldiers in unreported wars, like the current one in Yemen, will continue, as
will the duplicitous behaviour of government ministers.
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