Elections Aftermath: Was our 2019 Vote & the EU Referendum Rigged? #TORYRIG2019

[SA]

Kim
I do not have time at present to research all of this and what you have written is very interesting. But I can’t help but feel that there is a lot of chaff here. I doubt it very much that Boris Johnson or Cummings collaborate or collude with Putin, it makes no sense whatsoever. If Cummings was in Russia between 93 and 97, that was during the Yeltsin years when the Oligarchs were truly in power curving up and stealing the soviet industries and concerns. It therefore is more likely that the connection is with either émigré dissident Russian oligarchs, or with semi-dissident ones. My reading of what Putin is trying to do is that he has targeted those oligarchs who seek to meddle with politics but co-exists with those who keep strictly to business. The blurring of the line of Russian connection both here and in the US is a very clever way of attributing Russian state influence to any Russian influence, including oligarchs living in the west.
I am sure that a lot of manipulation is going on about the Russia report and I am also sure that the attempt at smearing Corbyn at this stage is part of the stratagem. The big problem we face now is that we have a lawless governement with a huge majority and little internal division because of the fear of deselection and a very pliant media.
Another point I wish to make is that the media is not a monolithic structure with the same purpose and methods. The Murdoch press for example is very clearly atlanticist, pro brexit and extremely anti Russia, whereas the Guardian and the BBC are extremely anti Russia but not so atlanticist, again with a line between the two.
The report publication will be of great interest because it will be twisted to mean everything to anybody.

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

SA: I think that the demonization of Russia has been significantly overblown by this Tory Government. Along with similar demonization plots that are massively manipulated to serve one purpose: promoting fear among our population with the Skripal case being a prime example. However, I am fairy certain that the Russia Report will provide confirmatory evidence that Russian oligarchs have provided massive amounts of funding to the Tory Party, which always begs the question what do they expect in return? A fair portion of these wealthy oligarchs probably believe there’s more money to be made by aligning with the US than the EU and would therefore have been pro Brexit. This could be a major concern for the Tories, that the report might undermine public belief that the Brexit vote was legit; the Daily Express today hints at this fear. The Daily GasLamp have delved into cyber influences a good deal and feel the greatest danger from ‘sock puppets and bots’ is not from Russia, but either our own UK Intelligence Services or that of the US and Israel as both have huge capability for such PsyOps. The rabid far-right agenda of Steve Bannon funded by Robert Mercer poses a far greater threat to British democracy, but there was a dangerously destructive cluster of toxic anarchists surrounding Cummings during his three years living in Moscow.

Is Cummings finally coming unstuck? He just suffered a major failure when his compliant pick for the Intelligence and Security Committee, Chris ‘failing Grayling’ was piped to the post by the far more appropriately qualified, Julian Lewis. He was so furious over this that most believe it was on his direction that Lewis had the Tory Whip removed; it was the typical angry, vengeful act of this ultimate control freak who, just this once, lost control. This must be a very worrying time for him now as the revelations of the Russia Report could spill out into the media within days, potentially exposing his own unsavoury Russian connections and the dodgy oligarch money used to help the Tories fund the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Sensing imminent danger he cranked up the anti-Labour propaganda mill to try and deflect any potential scrutiny or bad press. He could be in the firing line over Vote Leave and forced to submit to questioning despite thinking he’s above the law. He will need a suitably large feline to block this mess out!

The Canary picked over Cummings’s finances like vultures devouring an exposed carcass. Dodgy deals and his undue influence are exposed in the Canary Article, “Dominic Cummings’ luck may be about to run out as concerns of impropriety pile up.” They reveal that, “Downing Street special adviser Dominic Cummings is facing fresh questions about possible impropriety. This regards a payment of more than a quarter of a million pounds he made to a company central to the pro-Brexit campaign. That company, Faculty, is now the recipient of government contracts worth millions. Add these concerns to the other allegations raised against Cummings and we find a picture of someone whose very public role should without question be subject to official investigation.” Whether Cummings can manage to hold out without being forced to testify to a Parliamentary committee will depend on public pressure in response to any revelations from the Russia Report, but that will be either negated or ramped up to fever pitch by the biased BBC and our equally biased mainstream media.

The Canary assert that, “As Vote Leave director, Cummings played a pivotal role in the Brexit campaign. Indeed, he’s credited as having thought up the ‘£350 million a week for the NHS’ bus stunt. Faculty was previously called Advanced Skills Initiative (ASI) and under that name produced advertising for Vote Leave. Much of Vote Leave’s advertising was subsequently criticised as dishonest.” Honest messaging is an area of politics that urgently demands far stricter control. They say, “Vote Leave was found to have breached spending limits in its campaign and subsequently fined £61,000 by the Electoral Commission. The latest revelation claims that Cummings paid just over a quarter of a million pounds during 2018 and 2019 to Faculty. The money that Cummings paid to Faculty came from a company, Dynamic Maps, set up in October 2017 by Cummings and listed as a computer consultancy. Ben Warner, brother of Faculty co-founder and CEO Marc Warner, is now a data and technology adviser to 10 Downing Street.”

There was a major furore when it was revealed that according to the Canary, “Cummings, Ben, and Marc Warner attended Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) meetings, which, it’s claimed, early on in the coronavirus (Covid-19) epidemic considered ‘herd immunity‘ as a workable strategy. The government was forced to abandon that strategy as pressure grew over the likely outcome of tens of thousands of deaths. But by that point, valuable lockdown time had been lost.” The Canary also reveal that, “Cummings chaired a meeting on the coronavirus with representatives of big tech companies. Also present were UK chief scientific adviser Patrick Valance (who backed the herd immunity strategy) and NHS chief executive Simon Stevens. The companies included ‘Google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and Palantir, alongside smaller British companies, such as food delivery service Deliveroo and Babylon Health’.” Cummings is revelling in that Covid gravy train latched onto by the Tories.

The Canary point out that, “The unaudited financial statement for Dynamic Maps for the period ending 31 October 2018 confirms that as it is a small business the company is not required to have its accounts audited. But as Cummings is a public figure it would be right that he explain what the £260,000 paid to Faculty was for and where that money came from. However, a clue to this might be found in an October 2019 article by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. It reported that Babylon Health employed Cummings as a consultant and that he was paid for his services via Dynamic Maps. Babylon was awarded a contract with at least one Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) to provide its GP at Hand app. The app was endorsed by health and social care secretary Matt Hancock. According to the Canary, “responding to queries by the Guardian, lawyers acting for Faculty have declined to explain why the firm received the payments from Dynamic Maps. Altogether Faculty has been awarded 13 contracts, worth £3m, by the UK government.”

Last year the Bureau of Investigative Journalism reported that, “In August this year, shortly after Boris Johnson entered No 10 with Cummings as his top adviser, Downing Street and the Department of Health announced a new £250m fund for boosting the use of artificial intelligence for diagnoses and data analysis in the NHS. Although the money has yet to be allocated, Babylon welcomed the announcement. There are no rules requiring special advisers to disclose previous private sector roles, but MPs said Cummings’ undisclosed advisory role raised serious questions about potential conflicts of interest.” They quoted the Labour Shadow Health Secretary, Jonathan Ashworth’s, concern at the time, “The links between Dominic Cummings in the heart of Downing Street, the health secretary and this AI health firm are increasingly murky and highly irresponsible.” He said, “Mr Cummings’ work for this company raises serious questions about a potential conflict of interest given the firm could be in line to receive public money from this new £250m AI fund.”

The Canary say, “It’s reported that Public First, a small research company linked to Cummings and government minister Michael Gove, has been awarded without competitive tendering a government contract worth £840,000 on Covid related projects. There’s also the development of a new ARPA (Advanced Research Projects Agency), worth at least £800 million. Reportedly, Cummings’ WhatsApp profile includes the statement, ‘Get Brexit done, then ARPA’. Cummings is a survivor and his fate appears very much linked to that of Johnson (and vice versa). But for both, by closely aligning themselves to the coronavirus strategy and the deaths that arise from that strategy, as well as to Brexit and its eventual outcome their futures will be determined by those consequences.” The Russia Report threatens to reveal additional worrying connections to infamous anarchists that might still render Cummings a major security risk despite his top level clearance, while other dubious financial deals could emerge from this file once it is exposed.

In a Guardian Article she wrote way back in the first week of September, before the Covert 2019 Rigged Election, it was obvious that savvy Investigative Journalist Carole Cadwalladr had Dominic Cummings sussed. Cadwalladr wrote, “In the past two weeks, he has emerged from the shadows and burned himself on to the nation’s consciousness. As Boris Johnson’s chief adviser, he’s helped mastermind some of the most audacious – and outrageous – moves ever committed by a British Prime Minister: an attempt to suspend parliament, and the expulsion of 21 moderate MPs from the Conservative party. Moves that led the mild man of British politics, the former Prime Minister John Major, to call him a ‘political anarchist’ who was ‘poisoning politics’.” He certainly didn’t stop there as he feels at liberty to break the law with impunity and has continued to exert his malign influence to remove those he does not approve of and install compliant ‘yes men’ in all the key roles; he must have been seething over the ISC Chair going to Lewis!

Cadwalladr noted that, “For experienced Cummings watchers, it’s an odd moment. Here is a figure that many of us – MPs, journalists, lawyers, MEPs and members of the public – have been shouting about for years. And, in a plot twist none of us saw coming, he is wreaking chaos again, but this time in the full scorching glare of the public eye. Or as Ian Lucas, the Labour MP for Wrexham, says: ‘It’s good that everyone’s talking about him. They’re just talking about him for all the wrong reasons. What we need to be talking about, he says, is ‘his deliberate, systematic conspiracy to commit electoral fraud and the fact that he has refused to come before parliament and answer questions about it’. The colourful tales about Cummings are all noise drowning the key fact about him, which should be front and centre in every report: that this is the man who – according to evidence published by the Electoral Commission – played a central role in a scheme that resulted in Vote Leave being judged to have broken the law.”

Cadwalladr states that this was, “A scheme that constitutes the greatest electoral fraud perpetrated in Britain for more than a century – one that Cummings has refused to come before parliament to answer questions about. So that is where we are now: where the man advising the prime minister in parliament was previously judged to have been in contempt of that same parliament. Lucas serves on the committee for the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, which wrote to Cummings once again last week to demand that he appear. Lucas describes the situation as insane: ‘The people at the heart of Vote Leave who cheated and broke the law are now running the country. And no one is interested. I’m staggered that as an MP, I feel powerless about it, and you as a journalist have been shouting about it and nobody is interested, not even the BBC. Who never even covered this’.” This is even more alarming when we consider that Cummings promised 80 new Tory seats and he delivered a Tory ‘landslide victory.’

Back when Cadwalladr was investigating Vote Leave’s Brexit triumph, she said that, “Cummings, it turned out, was outraged at my suggestion that Banks and co had helped swing the referendum – especially, at the idea that they’d done something clever with data. Because Cummings was the self-appointed data genius, the savant whose interest in quantum physics had, in his own estimation, been the crucial factor that led the Brexit campaign to success.” Multiple times I have suggested that not only does Cummings hold the key with his VICS, Voter Intention Collection System and weapons grade PsyOps to how the Covert 2019 Rigged Election was stolen, but if he was ousted from power he could turn Whistleblower and expose exactly how it was done, thus bringing down this Tory Government. That might sound farfetched were it not for his massive ego as revealed by Cadwalladr.

Cadwalladr reported that Whistleblower Shahmir Sanni, “alleged that Vote Leave had deliberately used AIQ to break electoral spending laws,” and that those allegations were, “proven and admitted by Vote Leave. This money – nearly three-quarters of a million pounds – was spent in the crucial last four days of the campaign. The period which, by Cummings’s own reckoning, tipped the vote in Vote Leave’s favour: when it served 1.5 billion ads to just seven million people it had identified as ‘persuadable’ or ‘shy voters’.” We now know a lot more about how those ‘persuadable’ individuals were identified via illegally obtained personal data ‘mined’ on Facebook and how these vulnerable people were targeted with a barrage of fear-mongering PsyOps messages in the run up to the Brexit vote. As they have clearly documented on the Daily GasLamp if it was illegal to steal that personal data it was equally illegal to use that same data to manipulate the vote in a Referendum or an Election. Cummings should be prosecuted!

Sadly our Electoral Commission is totally powerless to prevent corruption in an election and we still remain open to Industrial scale electoral fraud: “A Watchdog that cannot watch is just a dog!” The police and the justice system seem disinterested in ever looking into even the most blatant instances of vote rigging so we must demand change to “Rescue our Watchdog” as we need a thorough investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Cadwalladr reports that, “A group of MPs and MEPs are now seeking a judicial review of the conduct of both the Vote Leave and Leave.EU investigations.” I have to wonder if that has now been abandoned after Boris Johnson forced us to proceed with Brexit; a decision that was according to polling, against the will of the majority in the UK. Has everyone just accepted that the end of January was a point of no return? Certainly Johnson and his evil minder Cummings are counting on this, but if the result is proven illegal surely the EU courts must consider the EU citizens stripped of their rights?

Cadwalladr expressed her dismay, writing that, “It seems absurd now: our electoral laws rest on a gentleman’s agreement; an agreement that Cummings threw a stick of dynamite at. His decision to do the same to our famously unwritten constitution should have surprised no one. The ‘noise’, the anecdotes and the tall Westminster tales are flares he sends up before he drops his bombs somewhere else entirely. It’s not his genius that we should be debating – it’s our own stupidity. There is smash-and-grab of our democracy going on in real time. And this silence is complicity.” I just watched a three part BBC documentary on “The Rise of the Nazis” that showed how Germany was transformed from a democracy into a dictatorship under Adolf Hitler in just six months! All of the exact same disturbing pieces are falling into place here, the lies and propaganda, the ‘othering,’ control of the media, the marginalization of our Parliament, pledged attacks on the Judiciary and Gypsies already identified as targets for state persecution.

Cummings would never have been so foolish as to trust Boris so there had to be a plan B in case Johnson succumbed to pressure and threw him under the bus. Boris Johnson needs to be liked, that is his narcissistic weakness; while Cummings is universally despised, he just wants to be admired for his evil genius and seriously feared. He owes no real allegiance to the Tory Party; they provided a vehicle to seize control. Cummings has the mentality of a devious serial killer who ultimately wants to reveal how clever he has been in getting away with his crimes. His lack of trust will have led him to plan a way to distance himself from the criminality while still taking credit for masterminding the entire Covert 2019 Rigged Election Tory ‘landslide victory;’ if they oust him from his position of power he has all the evidence to take them down as his revenge. Johnson knew he dared not fire his puppet master or it would signal his own demise. This is why I say: Cummings is the grenade, oust him and you pull the pin! DO NOT MOVE ON!

[SA]

Kim
Another great analysis from you, but just a word of caution Carole Cadwalladr has done a good job on exposing the Brexit campaign and is obviously a staunch remainer. But she also worked with the Integrity initiative that helped to demonise Corbyn, exactly on his supposed links with Russia. Just because she is an enemy of my enemy I afraid does not make her a friend. Here are two links for you.

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

SA – Thanks for the heads-up on Cadwalladr; I had once thought she might champion our Investigative Journalistic cause, but perhaps not. Your post prompted me to do more probing; you may be interested in this World Socialist Web Site Article entitled, “Britain’s secret propaganda ‘Integrity Initiative’ targets Russia,” where Cadwalladr is outed. In the run-up to the Russia Report release, and in anticipation of possible legitimacy claims over Brexit, I am currently looking into a number of articles that divulge more about the monster in the midst of the Tory Government, the master puppeteer Dominic Cummings. Meanwhile, I want to post my not so brief account of Starmer’s stumbling at last Wednesday’s PMQs dispatch box as, once again, he failed to focus on the poorest and most vulnerable citizens abandoned by the Tory Covid support strategy or articulate a particularly strong opposition.

Of all the gaping holes in the Swiss cheese Tory support package I would not have zeroed in on the airline industry as topping the list of most urgently deserving causes or the most seriously in need of help; Why? Realistically aviation will need to very seriously downsize for us to meet climate crisis objectives: fewer flights or radically redesigned plains still years away from taking to the sky! However, that was where Keir Starmer began his questioning at this week’s Prime Minister’s Questions. He said, “Over the past few months, we have supported many of the economic measures announced by the Government, but the decision last week not to provide sector-specific support to those most at risk could end up costing thousands of jobs. One of the sectors, aviation, has already seen huge redundancies: BA has announced 12,000 redundancies; Virgin 3,000; and easyJet 1,900. If the Government’s priority really is to protect jobs, why did the Chancellor not bring forward sector-specific deals that could have done precisely that?”

The PM replied, “No one should underestimate the scale of the challenge that this country faces. That is why the Chancellor has brought forward a range of measures, which, by the way, the right hon. and learned Gentleman supported last week. They include the job retention bonus and the kick-starter programme for young people. We are also doing a huge amount to support the aviation sector. One of the companies that he mentions, Virgin, has now come out of the Birch process after extremely difficult, but in the end productive conversations. That is the work of this Government: getting on, helping companies through it and helping our people through it. If I may say so, Mr Speaker, the right hon. and learned Gentleman has to work out whether he will support or oppose the Government’s programme to get people back into work. Last week, the shadow Chancellor said here in this House of Commons that she supported our programme. This week, he says that he opposes it. Which is it?”

Johnson’s “now he supports me now he doesn’t” ploy, was getting old and increasingly annoying. It was as if both MPs were locked in a perpetually repeated dance, destined to fulfil specific roles and stick to exactly the same script week after week without the slightest variation. Starmer responded, “This is just such rhetorical nonsense. It is perfectly proper and right for the Opposition to set out the parts of the package that we support the Government on and to highlight where there are problems. The problem with the Prime Minister’s dismissal of this is that, since the Chancellor set this out last week, around 10,000 people have lost their jobs. The Prime Minister should focus on them, not the rhetoric. The Office for Budget Responsibility yesterday projected 3.5 million unemployed next year.”

But BA got a second question as Starmer asked, “I want to press the Prime Minister further on the situation at BA, which is a huge employer and the national flag carrier. Alongside the 12,000 redundancies already announced, BA is trying to force through the rehiring of the remaining 30,000 workers on worse terms and conditions. That is totally unacceptable and it is a warning shot to millions of other working people. The Prime Minister sent an email to BA staff in which he said: “I have already made it clear that firms should not be using furlough to cynically keep people on their books and then remove them or change their terms and conditions.” That was on 2 June. It is now six weeks on. Will the Prime Minister now personally intervene and make it clear that actions such as those at BA cannot be allowed to stand without consequences for landing slots?”

Johnson responded, “We have been absolutely clear that we want our great companies across the country to support their workers and keep them in employment where they possibly can. I have made that point clear on the Floor of the House just in the past couple of weeks. Let us be absolutely clear: British Airways and many other companies are in severe difficulties at the moment, and we cannot, I am afraid, simply with a magic wand ensure that every single job that was being done before the crisis is retained after the crisis. What we can do—and what we are doing—is encourage companies to keep their workers on with the job retention scheme and the job retention bonus, as well as a massive £600 billion investment programme in this country to build, build, build and create jobs, jobs, jobs. That is what we are doing.”

Starmer wanted to highlight the callous fiddle BS were perpetrating as it was a loophole other Corporate giants would also exploit. He asked, “The Prime Minister knows exactly what I am talking about: it is the rehiring of 30,000 people at BA on worse terms and conditions, and he should call it out. Yesterday, the Government’s expert advisory group published a report on the challenges this autumn and winter. It was asked to do so by the Government Office for Science. The report assessed the reasonable worst-case scenario for this autumn and winter, including a second Covid spike and seasonal flu, and it set out strong recommended actions to mitigate the risks. The report was clear: July and August must be a period of intense preparation—i.e., now. Could the Prime Minister make it clear that he intends to implement the recommended actions in the report in full and at speed?”

The PM responded enthusiastically, it was great that the public had accepted the need for a new ‘Boris Spike’ as there were so many more to be culled from the worthless masses. He said, “Not only are we getting on with implementing the preparations for a potential new spike but the right hon. and learned Gentleman will know that the Government are engaged in record investments in the NHS of £34 billion. The House may not realise that, just in the last year that the Government have been in office, there are now 12,000 more nurses in the NHS and 6,000 more doctors. It was thanks to their hard work, and the hard work of the entire NHS, that we were able to prevent our health service from being overwhelmed this spring. We will take steps to ensure that it is not overwhelmed this winter either.” These were mostly the retired NHS staff who had been coaxed back to work to help deal with the crisis; they certainly did not represent any new Tory Government investment, but he was cashing in on their pluck.

Starmer questioned preparedness, the necessary expansion and improvements in track and trace. He asked, “That is the whole point of this report, which sets out the reasonable worst-case scenario and tells the Government what they need to do about it, so I am surprised that the Prime Minister is not committing to fully implementing it. It is vital that the Government learn the lessons from the mistakes that have been made and act now to save lives for the future. One of the key recommendations in the report, commissioned by the Government Office for Science, is that testing and tracing capacity should be significantly expanded to cope with increased demands over the winter. The reality is that trace and track is not working as promised, as it stands today, and the report makes it clear that it needs to be significantly expanded to cope with the risks of autumn and winter. What assurance can the Prime Minister give that the system will be fit for both purposes in the timeframe envisaged in the report—i.e., by this September?”

Vacuous Boris bragging was in order when he replied, “Once again, the right hon. and learned Gentleman attacks the test and trace operation, which is working at absolutely unprecedented scale: 144,000 people across the country have now agreed to self-isolate to stop the spread of the virus. He keeps saying that the test and trace operation is failing to contact enough people and failing to get enough people to self-isolate. Actually, it is doing fantastic work: 70% or 80% of contacts are found, and it is getting through to the vast majority of people who have the disease. I can certainly give the House the assurance that our test and trace system is as good as, or better than, any other system anywhere in the world and yes, it will play a vital part in ensuring that we do not have a second spike this winter. Instead of knocking the confidence of the country in the test and trace system, now is the time for him to return to his previous script and build it up, that is what he needs to do.” He craved praise why didn’t Starmer comply?

Starmer was picking holes in the worthless outsourced Government Track and Trace program; not difficult it’s like Swiss cheese! He said, “The problem with the Prime Minister quoting the 70% of people who are contacted and asked to self-isolate is that that has gone down. It was 90% just a few weeks ago and every week it has gone down, so I would not quote the latest figure, looking at the trend. But I have to ask, in the light of the last few questions: has the Prime Minister actually read this report that sets out the reasonable worst-case scenario and tells the Government what they need to do about it in the next six weeks? Has he read it?”

Johnson was immediately on the defensive, saying, “I am of course aware of the report and we are of course taking every reasonable step to prepare this country for a second spike. I may say to the right hon. Gentleman that it is up to him, really, to get behind what the Government are doing or not. He has previously supported our plan. He has previously come to this House and said that he supports our measures. He now says, I think, that he does not support them. I think what he needs to do is build up the confidence of the people of this country cautiously to get back to work and cautiously to restart our economy, which is what we are trying to do, instead of endlessly knocking the confidence of the people of this country: knocking their confidence in test and trace, knocking their confidence in the safety of our schools and knocking our confidence in our transport network. Now is the time for him to decide whether he backs the Government or not.” Being aware of it isn’t necessarily reading it, but that’s semantics!

Starmer was reverting to his standard line of questioning; “who’s a naughty boy then?”He said, “It is perfectly possible to support track and trace and to point out the problems. Standing up every week saying, ‘It’s a stunning success’ is kidding no one. That is not giving people confidence in the system. They would like a Prime Minister who stands up and says, ‘There are problems and this is what I am going to do about them,’ not this rhetoric about ‘stunning success’ when it is obviously not true. This afternoon, Prime Minister, I am meeting the families of the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group, a group of hundreds of families who have lost loved ones. They say this: ‘We won’t let the deaths of our loved ones be in vain. And we won’t allow the Government to risk a second wave of deaths without learning from their mistakes.’ They will be listening to the Prime Minister’s answers today, so what would the Prime Minister like to say to them?”

Johnson replied with more vacuous bluster, bragging and expansive numbers in an effort to convince the House and the UK public that he was excelling at his job despite the horrific reality of his failure. He said, “I join with, I think, every Member of the House in mourning the loss of everybody who has died in this epidemic. I can assure the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and through him the victims and their families, that we will do absolutely everything in our power to prevent a second spike in this epidemic. That is why we are taking the steps that we are. That is why we have set up, as I say, an unprecedented test and trace operation. That is why we are investing massively in our NHS and our frontline staff, as I say, in the last year, recruiting 12,000 more nurses, as part of a programme to recruit 50,000 more, and preparing our NHS for winter. We will do absolutely everything we can to protect our country and to stop a second spike.”

It was always worth ending his sparing with Starmer but demanding praise, unqualified support and full cooperation while objecting to any criticism or scrutiny. He said, “What the right hon. and learned Gentleman has to decide is whether he wants to back that programme or not. One day he says it is safe to go back to school. The next day he is taking the line of the unions. One day they are supporting our economic programme. The next day they are saying our stamp duty cut is an unacceptable bung. One day they are saying they accept the result of the Brexit referendum. The next day, today, they are going to tell their troops to do the exact opposite. He needs to make up his mind which brief he is going to take today. At the moment, it looks like he has got more briefs than Calvin Klein. We are getting on with delivering on our agenda for the country, getting this country through this pandemic and taking it forward.” Considering the grave tone of the question he was responding to the ‘briefs’ quip was sick and insensitive.

The Speaker, was probably offended by the PM’s disgraceful ‘Calvin Klein briefs’ sick joke in response to Starmer’s request for a respectful message to pass on to bereaved families; he cautioned Johnson over the Commons requirement for him to face and address the Speakers chair not grandstand like a clown in a PR stunt aimed at tabloid headlines. Speaker Hoyle furiously called “Order. Can I just say to the Prime Minister that we are going to work through the Chair? The audience is not that way, it is this way.”

The SNP’s Ian Blackford asked about devolved Governments powers, he said, “Tomorrow, this Tory Government will publish legislation for their biggest power grab since the Scottish people voted overwhelmingly for the Scottish Parliament in 1997. Westminster’s plan to impose an unelected, unaccountable body to rule on decisions made by the Scottish Parliament will not be accepted. The decisions of the Scottish Parliament must and will be decided by the Scottish people. We also reject any attempts to impose lower standards from one part of the United Kingdom on Scotland. Knowing that this Tory Government are prepared to sell out the food and agriculture industry to his pal, Donald Trump, will the Prime Minister confirm that his Tory Government are once again ignoring the wishes of the Scottish people and launching their hostile agenda against devolution?”

Johnson replied, “On the contrary, what we are doing is possibly the biggest single act of devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in modern memory. The right hon. Gentleman should be celebrating the 70 or more powers that are going to be transferred to the elected people in Scotland. What he wants, by contrast, is trade barriers between England and Scotland, and nobody being able to use sterling in Stirling. He talks about unelected and unaccountable people, but what he wants to do is hand the powers that we would give back to Scotland from this Parliament to Brussels, which is neither elected nor accountable.”

Ian Blackford pressed his case, saying, “Of course, the document that we will see tomorrow is going to talk about the benefits of the single market. It is a pity that the Prime Minister does not understand the economic value of the European single market and customs union. This Prime Minister often states the need to respect referendum results. He should respect the decision taken by the Scottish people in 1997. We know that this Government are undertaking a full-scale assault on devolution: a Brexit settlement that Scotland rejected is being imposed on Scotland; an immigration system that Scotland rejected is being imposed on Scotland; and a decade of Tory Government that Scotland rejected has been imposed on Scotland.”

Blackford said, “It is no wonder that the First Minister’s approval rating is three times that of the Prime Minister. Effective leadership and respecting the will of the people, contrasted with the bumbling shambles coming from Westminster. Scotland has the right to have our decisions made by those we elect, not by bureaucrats appointed by Westminster. Will the Prime Minister guarantee that his plans will not be imposed on Scotland, and that Scotland will have the chance to choose for ourselves?”

The PM repeated his initial denial, saying, “First, I must repeat my point. It is extraordinary for the right hon. Gentleman to attack unelected bureaucrats for any role they may have in Scotland when his proposal is to hand back the powers that this place is going to transfer to Scotland back to Brussels, where they are neither elected nor accountable to the people of Scotland. So I really do not know what he means. As for his point about respecting referendum results, the House will recall that there was a referendum on the issue of Scottish independence and breaking up the Union in 2014. They said at the time that it was going to be a once-in-a-generation event. I think they should keep their promises to the people of this country and to the people of Scotland.”

Lib-Dem Sir Edward Davey, was calling for accountability when he stated and demanded, “Under this Prime Minister, we have suffered one of the worst death rates in the world and Europe’s worst death rate for health and care workers. Previously, he has refused my demand for an immediate independent inquiry, saying that it is too soon, even though, back in 2003, he voted for an independent inquiry into the Iraq war just months after that conflict had started. If he still rejects an immediate inquiry, will he instead commit in principle to a future public inquiry: yes or no?” The PM offered one of his empty pledges, saying, “As I have told the House several times, I do not believe that now, in the middle of combating the pandemic as we are, is the right moment to devote huge amounts of official time to an inquiry, but of course we will seek to learn the lessons of the pandemic in the future, and certainly we will have an independent inquiry into what happened.”

Tory Katherine Fletcher had the sheer gall to claim her constitutes had said, “Thank God that other lot didn’t get in, because I can’t imagine how much trouble we’d be in right now.” She asked the PM to confirm that he will continue the Tories shambolic pretence at “throwing the kitchen sink at fixing it?” The Speaker quipped, “Come on, Mr Plumber” before her typical Tory ‘stroking’ elicited a barrage of vacuous Boris bragging, “…not only the kitchen sink, but every part of the kitchen. We are going to build, build, build…” Considering the shocking death toll and the fact that Tory failures cost the lives of more Healthcare workers in the UK than any other country, Johnson’s unjustified crowing was a sickeningly distasteful reminder of the appalling cost of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. We must continue pushing for an Investigation to restore justice and democracy to the UK and end the ongoing carnage of Cummings eugenics ‘Slaughter of the Sheeple’ by ejecting him and this Tory Government from office. ‘Pull the pin!’

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Tory panic is at fever pitch as evidenced by their furious attempts to vault the public off into the wrong direction with ‘nothing to see here’ plot alternatives and fervent insistences that the Russia Report has nothing relevant to expose, will be “underwhelming” and just a “damp squib,” but their protestations are riddled with guilt. The Torygraph ran a front page story on how it was the SNP who were assisted by the Russians in their Independence Referendum which makes no sense as it holds no particular strategic objective for the Russians. It was the Scottish IndiRef where it’s believed the Tories first trialled their postal votes rigging scam and the results were found to have been so egregiously manipulated as exposed by the Dunoon Report. It is being trailed as ‘old news’ and no longer relevant, blunting the impact of what could have been acted on with regard to the corruption that warped the Brexit result. The publicly available redacted version was released today, but a classified version will remain under wraps.

The press conference from the Intelligence and Security Committee was exceptionally well presented with the new Chair, Julian Lewis, very sensibly deciding to hand over much of the presentation to the two committee members who had served on the former committee and would remain in place on the new committee. His humility and deference to Labour’s Kevan Jones and the SNPs Stewart Hosie would not have occurred if Johnson and his controller had manage to gag the committee by placing a large bucket of whitewash front and centre with Chris ‘failing Grayling’ as their compliant Chair. Jones was emphatic with regard to Johnson’s deliberate delays picking off each feeble excuse offered by the PM and countering with, “not true;” basically he lied, he lied and he lied. Hosie was equally scathing and emphatic in his revelation that the reason no interference was found was that no one bothered to look. He stated that this was astounding given that there was clear evidence of interference in IndiRef and the US 2016 Election.

I will be going through the Russia Report for more indications of what I think the fallout might be, but I wanted to get my post online with material I had been working on while awaiting the start of the press conference. What better to distract the masses than an above inflation public sector pay rises, as if they finally deserve to stop being punished with austerity pay freezes. But it will still have to be carved out of their existing overstretched budgets. Among the public service workers who felt left out were notably the Carers, who have worked so hard and felt so completely abandoned by this Government; Pharmacists were also not in the deal. This positive headline might just dominate the media for the short-term news cycle. The Health Select Committee will also be meeting today to examine the handling of the Covid 19 crisis. Undoubtedly, this will add to the spread of news coverage, but I doubt it will take the heat off Boris Johnson or this corrupt Tory Government. Will the compliant BBC and right-wing media offer robust scrutiny?

Another headline grabber was the fact that Government borrowing has soared to over 35 billion pounds, nearly five times more than the same period last year. On the BBC News this morning Grace Blakely a Research Fellow at IPPR’s Centre for Economic Justice commented on the level of borrowing. She revealed that the majority of Rishi Sunak’s bailout package is going on “Corporate Welfare” that it is “propping up some businesses that otherwise might not be credit worthy, especially with this extension of the furlough scheme, this top up for businesses who keep workers on until January. Your giving businesses a little bit of money; a lot of them, it won’t convince them to keep workers on when actually, probably the best way to deal with this crisis would be to create, for the Government to create jobs itself, green sustainable jobs, rebuilding the economy for everyone.” She suggested that these indebted businesses should be taken into public ownership, touting Labour policies Starmer, with his lack of courage, is so eager to abandon.

However on the pre press conference BBC News, Dame Vivian Westwood stole the show with her bizarre protest dressed as a canary in a cage suspended outside the Old Bailey. Sadly, her core message during the on-air interview with Victoria Derbyshire was not as succinct as it could have been, but she made a valiant, attention getting, attempt to plead for the release of political prisoner Julian Assange incarcerated in Belmarsh awaiting extradition to the US on ‘Trump-ed’ up hacking charges. To be fair there was just far too much information re Assange’s defence for her to possibly articulate in such a brief interview when so much has been deliberately kept from the public up to this point. How sad that it takes such a whacky stunt to get Julian’s plight noticed. It confirms a strategy I learned many years ago; that dramatic and unusual spectacles have a way of irresistibly magnetizing media attention to a neglected cause just as toppling Colston’s statue did. In future protests, we must use whacky stunts to gain media attention.

The Intelligence and Select Committee pushed for a belated Investigation into Russian Interference in the Brexit vote which was rapidly refused by this corrupt Tory Government even before a formal request could be made. Surely, this must be the focus of Keir Starmer’s demands at tomorrow’s Prime Ministers Questions, sadly I fully anticipate Labour’s Tory enabling Leadership will let us down again. The key message made clear in the Russia Report was that we cannot quantify the threat of foreign intervention if we refuse to investigate. It represents the exact same reason that I am still Petitioning for a Comprehensive Investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. I will be scanning the report to see what more was said about the committee’s recommendations regarding the Electoral Commission, which was touched on very briefly by Stewart Hosie at the press conference. Just like the malign foreign influence that was known about well before the Brexit vote, the vulnerability of our Electoral System to Industrial scale fraud has been ignored for over a decade; it must be exposed to close this loop hole and correct injustice ASAP. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

When the Russia report was finally allowed to land yesterday it came down with an almighty crash as the new independent and fair minded Chair, former Tory Julian Lewis, graciously deferred to two opposition MPs, Kevan Jones for Labour and Stewart Hosie for the SNP, giving them the opportunity to conduct a blunt presentation of their findings. While this made perfect sense as both had served on the previous Intelligence and Security Committee, who had drafted the report, and both were to continue to serve on the new ISC, I very much doubt it would have occurred had Johnson/Cummings pick Chris ‘failing Grayling’ been planted in the chair to deliver ‘damage control’ for the PM. Of course, I say former Tory as Julian Lewis had the Conservative Whip removed, probably by Cummings in a fit of peak, but that now means the Tories no longer have a majority on this crucial nine MP committee so Boris Johnson’s dictatorship took a nasty hit. Despite several attempts to negate the report by cramming the air waves with positive news of public sector pay rises the Tories failed to blunt the impact.

A Byline Times Article elaborated on this pathetic crusade with the headline, “THE RUSSIA REPORT Pro-Brexit Spin Operation Goes Into Overdrive,” as “Sam Bright explained how Brexiteers are desperately trying to warp the findings of the Intelligence and Security Committee’s long-awaited report into Russian influence in British political and public life.” Saying, “After an unprecedented nine month delay, the report into Russian interference in UK democracy was published this morning, with Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee announcing yesterday that ‘advance copies will not be available’.” He then remarked that, “Yet, in keeping with the privileged status of right-wing media in the UK, the Telegraph this morning splashed details of the report, while pro-Government blog Guido Fawkes even managed to release the full document half an hour before the committee presented its findings to MPs.” I must say reading of this bias dented my initial confidence in the independence and integrity of the new ISC.

Sam Bright concluded that, “…the instigators of Brexit have been given more than enough time to construct their version of events. And, as usual, they have relied on half-truths, verging on outright distortion.” He said, “Byline Times readers won’t be surprised to learn of the main culprit in this effort to massage the facts. In response to the report, Leave.EU – the group operated by the ‘Bad Boys of Brexit’ Arron Banks and Andy Wigmore – posted a graphic with the following quote: ‘HMG [Her Majesty’s Government] had not seen… evidence of successful interference in UK democratic processes or any activity that has had a material impact on an election, for example influencing results’.” Saying, “This, they claim, proves that there was no Russian interference in the 2016 EU Referendum. ‘Intelligence report kills Kremlin conspiracy,’ they cried – seemingly unconcerned that they have wilfully misread and misinterpreted the report.” This fake news was resoundingly debunked when Hosie tore into their argument with a truth bomb!

As I noted the other day SNP committee member Stewart Hosie was “scathing and emphatic in his revelation that the reason no interference was found was that no one bothered to look! He stated that this was astounding given that there was clear evidence of interference in IndiRef and the US 2016 Election.” It formed the most impactful component of his presentation that despite these recent examples providing probable cause for serious concern over the need to protect the integrity of our democracy no defence was in place and after the result he described it as a “hot potato” no one wanted to touch. Both during press questions and in later news interviews there were repeated attempts to claim that Intelligence services should have initiated a probe off their own bat. However, Labour MP Kevan Jones rightly insisted this was not their job and that our Intelligence and Security Services implement the instructions of Government Ministers. They aren’t entitled to make decisions independently and should not be scapegoated.

Although the article relays how, “In reality, the report highlights credible ‘open source’ evidence that Russia used media channels such as RT (Russia Today) and Sputnik, along with social media bots and trolls, to influence the referendum,” in his latest blog post Craig Murray questions the ‘credibility’ component of that claim. Sam Bright quotes the report claim that, “Open source studies have pointed to the preponderance of pro-Brexit or anti-EU stories on RT and Sputnik, and the use of ‘bots’ and ‘trolls’, as evidence of Russian attempts to influence the process.” However, I feel it is somewhat inappropriate to lump the TV station RT and Sputnik in with ‘bots’ and ‘trolls.’ While, ‘bots’ and ‘trolls’ lack honesty and transparency in their manipulative manoeuvres online, RT and Sputnik should have just as much right as the BBC and ITV to broadcast an alternative perspective. In reality the BBC, once the reliable news source affectionately called ‘Auntie’ has recently morphed into a right-wing Tory mouthpiece spouting toxic propaganda!

Bright says, “It makes the argument that neither Government officials nor intelligence agencies have attempted to verify the validity of this available evidence. In this regard, the Leave.EU quote above omits an important phrase.” The report states that “HMG had not seen or sought evidence of successful interference in UK democratic processes or any activity that has had a material impact on an election, for example influencing results – meaning that the Government hasn’t tried to ascertain the scale of Russian influence in 2016, and therefore the committee cannot draw a firm conclusion.” So he notes that, “The authors of the report instead recommend that a comprehensive study should be carried out by the Government and intelligence agencies to determine the facts.” This request was shot down in flames even before the ISC had an opportunity to lodge a formal request. The foot dragging Tory Government had already been trailing their “out of date, must move on” stance for several days trying to rebury the report.

The report goes on to say: “We have not been provided with any post-referendum assessment of Russian attempts at interference. This situation is in stark contrast to the US handling of allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, where an intelligence community assessment was produced within two months of the vote, with an unclassified summary being made public. Whilst the issues at stake in the EU referendum campaign are less clear-cut, it is nonetheless the Committee’s view that the UK Intelligence Community should produce an analogous assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU referendum and that an unclassified summary of it should be published.” Although Russia has continued to be blamed for the DNC leaks in the US it is far more likely that the files were downloaded onto a memory stick and released by a Democrat Whistleblower annoyed at the unfair tactics used to sink the campaign of Bernie Sanders: WikiLeaks will not divulge their source, but say it was not Russian.

Sam Bright decries the “spin pushed out by the Telegraph,” that he says has asserted, “the report concludes there is no direct evidence of Russian influence in the 2016 Brexit referendum.” He says this set the pre-release tempo where, sight unseen, many jumped to the conclusion that, “it was going to be a damp squib.” He adds, “Perhaps they would have reacted differently had the Telegraph more accurately reported that the committee is actually calling for an investigation into Russian influence on the Brexit vote as there is credible evidence to suggest that foreign actors did try to warp public opinion.” Although Bright does use the expression “foreign actors” I believe the ISC may have failed to realize that not only might those “foreign actors” not be confined to Russian operatives, but they might include malevolent domestic sources of interference in our democratic process. This remains the perennial blind spot that no one is willing to contemplate, but an investigation might well inadvertently expose disquieting facts.

Labour MP Kevan Jones began the presentation of findings from the Russia Report by explicitly detailing the timeline that was deliberately sabotaged by Boris Johnson. With each pathetic excuse the PM had proffered, Jones countered with an emphatic, “not true!” His string of emphatic “not true” exposures landed a heavy blow before and analysis of the report really got under way, graphically screaming the obvious dishonesty of Johnson: he lied, he lied and he lied! This was a powerful echo of exactly what the former Chair, Dominic Grieve had said in his Newsnight interview: “Boris Johnson personally blocked, for ‘bogus’ reasons, the imminent publication of a cross-party report on Russia meddling in UK politics by Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee.” There’s now absolutely no question that Johnson lied profusely to keep this report under wraps; as sharp Investigative Journalists wade through the quagmire of dirty money and undue influence this dishonest PM has incentivised a search for the reason why?

What has Johnson managed to get away with so far and will it be his badly managed cover-up that exposes his deceit and finally undoes the worst harm of his continuing disastrous premiership? That depends on the diligence and integrity of our media that have not proven themselves worthy of out trust for a very long time. It will take a dedicated investigative sleuth chasing down all of the leads in the unredacted publication of this document, but there is a prize winning scoop in hounding the PM; he attached a massive target to his own back! Intense public pressure demanding that this Tory Government must abide by the recommendation of the ISC, “that the UK Intelligence Community should produce an analogous assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU Referendum.” We cannot afford the woefully impotent opposition of Keir Starmer in full enablement mode. Expect more “will of the people,” bile to be spewed by the hard core Brexiteers as they cling to their precious self-destructive project: do not move on!

In the Byline Times Article entitled, “the RUSSIA REPORT Puts Johnson on the Spot, they start into the can of worms this report has opened up and how Johnson is now in the crosshairs. They report, “With its calls for an inquiry into Russian interference in Brexit, Peter Jukes reports on why the Prime Minister wanted to suppress the Intelligence and Security Committee’s report and what it reveals about Putin’s ongoing war on the West.” He describes, “…the overall picture is one of the UK being penetrated by Russian hackers and a ‘muddy nexus’ of criminal gangs and spies, its citizens being killed by Russian nuclear weapons and nerve agents, while the country’s security services were asleep at the wheel and its political classes entranced by a vortex of Russian dirty money and billionaire oligarchs.” While it’s clear that Byline Journalists swallowed the Salisbury Red Flag incident and Hillary Clinton’s cover story of how the Russians sabotaged her Presidency, this article contains some really important information.

Kevan Jones was not the first to dub our Russia-corrupted capitol “Londongrad;” it has been the dirty little not so secret for a very long time; the report just documented the sordid details. Jukes describes it as, “Londongrad: Co-Opted by Greed” and says, “The report is blunt about the corruption of the UK through the influx of wealthy Russian oligarchs from the late 1990s onwards. ‘There are a lot of Russians with very close links to Putin who are well integrated into the UK business and social scene, and accepted because of their wealth,’ the report explains. It traces this lax attitude back to previous administrations which emphasised the economic benefits of the ‘opening up of the UK to Russian investment… to the extent that the UK now faces a threat from Russia within its own borders’. Though the report does not name these ‘Russians with very close links to Putin’ any reading of the works of Byline Times, Catherine Belton’s Putin’s People or Luke Harding’s Shadow State will reveal who they are.

Jukes goes on to name a few, “Now departed, sanctioned or awaiting extradition to the US, former big players in the UK political and commercial scene include Roman Abramovich, Oleg Deripaska and Dmytro Firtash. Others, apparently independent of Putin a decade ago, now apparently support his more belligerent stand since the Ukrainian Maidan independence movement and the annexation of the Crimea in 2014. These include figures close to the Prime Minister such as Alexander Temerko, who said he plotted with Johnson when he was Foreign Secretary on how to bring down Theresa May; and the former London KGB officer who owns the Evening Standard and the Independent, Alexander Lebedev. Boris Johnson regularly partied at Lebedev’s properties in the UK and Italy and met him soon after the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury in 2018.” It was widely reported that on one such jaunt to Italy, then Foreign Secretary Johnson, ditched his security team which left him unacceptably compromised.

Jukes reports that, “Like the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Committee report on disinformation and fake news last year, the ISC recommends a British equivalent to the US Foreign Agent Registration (FARA) Act, to flush out potential intermediaries working on behalf of foreign powers. But it concedes that this would only be ‘damage limitation’ because the infusion of dirty Russian money into British life is already so toxic and vast.” Despite being too little scrutiny applied too late it is necessary. The SNPs Stewart Hosie described the unworkable fragmentation of responsibility between agencies as a, “complex wiring diagram of responsibility.” The report states: “A large private security industry has developed in the UK to service the needs of the Russian elite, in which British companies protect the oligarchs and their families, seek kompromat on competitors, and on occasion help launder money through offshore shell companies and fabricate ‘due diligence’ reports, while lawyers provide litigation support.”

Another important input from the ISC was presented by Hosie who exposed the fact that there was currently no requirement for members of the House of Lords to document the source of donated funds as was required by MPs. I latter heard the term “Lords Onboard” applied to Peers corrupted by unregulated foreign money to accomplish specific objectives through their unelected position in our second Chamber of Governance. Jukes reports, “Most of the domestic wealth of Russia is held overseas by a handful of oligarchs close to Vladimir Putin. As the money laundering capital of the world, London has been the main recipient of this dark money stolen from the Russian people. Just two known cases – the Moldovan Laundromat scheme and the Deutsche Bank ‘mirror trades’ scam – saw £20 billion poured into the UK through shell companies and LLPs in the past decade alone, effectively corrupting large swathes of the service industries which process them and, of course, buying undue political influence.”

In highlighting, “The Missing Brexit Threat Assessment” Jukes points out that, “It has taken Parliament more than 14 years to recognise the true nature of the Russian President’s regime. With the KGB-trained Putin now ensconced for life, conducting wars in Ukraine and Syria, and funding far-right parties across Europe to destabilise any institutions that can challenge his interests, this is – as the report makes clear in its remarks on MI5, MI6 and GCHQ – a deadly oversight. The lethal nature of the threat from the Kremlin should have been obvious with the assassination of Alexander Livtinenko in 2006. A former colleague of Putin’s in the Russian security service, the FSB, Litvinenko had become a British citizen and was exposing Kremlin links to crime syndicates based in Spain when he was assassinated using a lethal and rare isotope of Polonium manufactured in a Russian state facility.”

According to Jukes, “Apart from the Lebedev and Temerko connections, Johnson had a wealth of other contacts with wealthy Russian oligarchs as Mayor of London. In the past few years, the Conservative Party has been a major beneficiary of donations from Russian expatriates.” Sam Bright’s article had revealed that, “The report doesn’t spell out which political party has received this Russian cash – but an openDemocracy report handily details the £3.5 million raked in by the Conservatives from Russian funders since 2010.” That OpenDemocracy report is a must read. Jukes documents that, “…several senior Brexit-supporting businessmen such as Jim Mellon and the Chandler brothers made extensive fortunes in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and some senior parliamentary figures, such as Jacob Rees-Mogg, still have major investments there now.” It is so hypocritical for any MP to rant about the evil enemy Russia while rolling in the profits from their Russian investments.

Jukes exposes a few more dodgy links like, “Johnson’s controversial chief advisor Dominic Cummings spent three years in Russia in the late 1990s, and his brother-in-law Jack Wakefield was a director of Firtash’s foundation until a US grand jury indicted Firtash for corruption. Both the Conservative Party and Nigel Farage’s UKIP were targeted by two alleged Russian spies, Sergei Nalobin and Alexander Udod. Nalobin met Johnson and senior Conservative Brexiters. Udod met Leave.EU founder Arron Banks at a UKIP conference and invited him to, what turned out to be, multiple visits to the Russian Embassy in the run-up to the EU Referendum where lucrative diamond and gold deals were discussed.” He then shares a shocking point, “The Russian Ambassador at the time, Alexander Yakovenko, returned to Moscow last year to be awarded the Alexander Nevsky Order of Merit from Putin. He is reported to have told colleagues: ‘We have crushed the British to the ground. They are on their knees and will not rise for a very long time’.”

Jukes admits that, “…all these connections could be innocent, and given the Kremlin’s penchant for disinformation, the claims of disruption have a destabilising effect if true or not. But the only answer to the high public concern about these suspicions is a clear and unambiguous investigation.” Johnson is adamant he will block that! Jukes asks, “Is he afraid that it would expose that he and his Vote Leave colleagues were beneficiaries of Russian interference?” As I wrote the other day, “We cannot quantify the threat if we refuse to investigate: that was made clear by this report. It represents the exact same reason why I am still Petitioning for a Comprehensive Investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election.” Also, “Just like the malign foreign influence that was known about well before the Brexit vote, the vulnerability of our Electoral System to Industrial scale fraud has been ignored for over a decade.” Johnson has been severely compromised by the Russia Report, he is a vulnerable target; time to take the Tories out!
DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Just yesterday we had a perfect opportunity to go in hard against the Boris Johnson and put this corrupt Tory Government under serious pressure over the Russia Report. They were literally on the ropes, terrified of an attack on their precious crash-out Brexit project via a delegitimizing inquiry into Russian interference in the vote. The timing was perfect with potentially several days worth of scathing news coverage; a chance to dominate the news cycle with questions swirling over why the PM deliberately buried this document for ten months and what he might be trying to hide, all dredged out of him in a final scorching Prime Minister’s Questions before the Summer recess. But no! Starmer the enabler had other plans, focused on placating his Zionist minders by dredging up the fake anti-Semitism smear again. Just what we all needed, another ten rounds of self-harm from Starmer’s massive own-goal by capitulating in a defamation case that Labour was poised to win as the evidence would have debunked the defamation case.

The alarming signs of Starmer’s deceitful lurch to the right are coming thick and fast. He is wilfully abandoning pledges that he made only months ago when he was running for election. Unashamed of tricking Labour members with false promises of unity he had no intention of sticking to; by stealth he is eliminating all the popular Labour policies voted for at conference. He has tried to further sully, vilify or totally erase all traces of Corbyn from the Party whose membership rose to 500,000 under his transformative leadership. The Biased BBC and far-right media are being as supportive as possible to try to normalize his deception and lack of integrity. They keep pandering to his ego with compliments like dressing up Starmer’s pathetically repetitive “who’s been a naughty boy” stunts at PMQs as “forensic questioning.” He is the perfect bland Blare clone to con the public into thinking Labour will stand a better chance in five years time, while compliantly enabling the Tory Party during their progression to Elective Dictatorship.

Starmer has launched an all out purge of the Labour Left. After granting a shadow cabinet position to his nearest rival in the Labour Leadership election; Rebecca Long-Bailey had barely got her feet under the desk before Starmer found a lame excuse to fire her from the post. On what grounds? More of those handy, all-encompassing, anti-Semitism accusations as the pretext for her sacking was a supportive tweet about o pro-Corbyn article by Maxine Peake that Starmer managed to obscurely misinterpret as containing an ‘anti-Semitic conspiracy theory.’ Kerry-Anne Mendoza put it best in her video expose in the Canary Article: “Keir Starmer Unmasked” where she rips into the new Labour Leader for his unconscionable betrayal of Long-Bailey other Labour Left MPs and the entire Labour Membership. So volatile is the subject of exposing the teaching of Israeli aggression tactics that the Canary had to offer a correction to the original video due to determined efforts by Zionists to reinterpret the truth of her statement.

In Kerry Anne-Mendoza’s video message in support of Long-Bailey she refuted the so called ‘trope’ that had been incorrectly labelled “fake news!” Starmer is caught on camera making the following statement about when his staff make mistakes how he takes responsibility, he said, “I never turn on my staff, you should never turn on your staff that is how I will lead our Party and our movement.” I did not take him long to ditch that firm assurance as he dedicated himself to weaponizing a tired rehashed of the fake anti-Semitism ‘problem’ to eliminate Left leaning MPs from the Party. Despite an apology and Maxine Peake’s unnecessary retraction of a truthful statement, the freight train of vindictive injustice had already left the station; Starmer was just looking for an excuse. For the people caught in this Labour witch hunt there is no grovelling apology or admission of inadvertent wrongdoing that can serve as a defence; such false admissions to not appease they just pour petrol on the excoriating fire.

Was there any other reason for Starmer’s the harsh and unforgiving overreaction that shocked so many of Labour’s supporters? In the Skwawkbox Exclusive: “Long-Bailey sacked after massive row over schools return – as news emerges that Starmer’s support for return has seen infection rate double;” exposed the real reason for this popular MPs removal. Starmer backed Boris Johnson’s push to get children back to school while Long-Bailey supported the Teaching Unions with their legitimate resistance due to lack of preparedness, unsafe conditions and lack of a promised Track and Trace system to decrease risk. Skwawkbox included a Link to evidence and a graph that fully justified the Teachers concerns noting, “Howard Beckett, whose union Unite had warned both the Tories and Labour that it was too soon, tweeted the new figures: 44 Coronavirus outbreaks in schools in England, a doubling of the infection count. We warned the front bench of both main parties that this would happen.”

Keir Starmer wanted to make his mark not just by demoralizing and purging the Labour Left, but also by embracing and pandering to the Israeli Lobby and the powerful Board of Deputies who demand zero tolerance on criticism of their Zionist ‘apartheid’ project of persecuting the Palestinian people. However when Keir Starmer read the leaked Labour Report containing shocking evidence of Party Members who had deliberately tried to sabotage Labours electoral chances, faced with real traitors to the Socialist cause he decided he should, “never turn on my staff!” In the Canary Article entitled, “MPs demand Keir Starmer publishes the leaked Labour report ‘officially’ and ‘in full” serious alarm was raised. They say, “A group of Labour MPs has called on the party to publish a ‘truly shocking’ leaked document. It allegedly throws light on internal processes and communications from former senior Labour staff members about Jeremy Corbyn, key shadow ministers, and pro-Corbyn Labour members.”

“The Canary has seen a copy of the leaked document, which party lawyers have said is a draft. The 851-page report is detailed and extensive. It also includes material from what seems to be a cache of WhatsApp messages and emails from former senior Labour staff members. The document suggests sustained, open hostility to Corbyn’s leadership and Corbyn-supporting MPs and members. It indicates that internal ‘factionalism’ may have played a ‘critical’ role in the investigation of antisemitism allegations under Corbyn’s leadership. The summary states: This report reveals a litany of mistakes, deficiencies, and missed opportunities to reform, develop and adapt a clearly failing disciplinary system.” They claim that, “According to Sky News, which reported on the leaked document on 12 April, Labour lawyers ‘intervened’. They reportedly blocked submission of the report to an ongoing Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHCR) investigation into antisemitism.” Thankfully Craig Murray corrected this omission.

Acting swiftly, “On 13 April, the Socialist Campaign Group (SCG) of Labour MPs issued a statement calling for Labour to publish the report “in full officially”: Here the Canary have placed a copy of the letter sent by MPs to Starmer details their demands for the urgent action he should take in response to the report. Sadly, his disgraceful response in a joint statement with Deputy Leader, Angela Rayner, shows a far stronger commitment to determining who leaked the report and who initiated it in the first place than addressing the incredibly toxic content! According to the Canary, “Labour mayor for the North of Tyne Jamie Driscoll issued a response to challenge Starmer, stating: We don’t need an inquiry into why the report was published, or how it found its way into the public. The case has been made in its quarter of [a] million words. The accusations stand in need of answer. All those who stand accused must be brought up on charges. They should get a fair hearing, with representation. But we must know the truth.”

The Canary list a string of dirty tricks and unconscionable behaviour that the report uncovered including genuinely toxic comments that are far worse than the tangential false assumptions and tenuous connection that have been used to expel Labour Members on fake anti-Semitism charges. They report that, “Driscoll also highlighted further allegations in the report, which, he notes: ‘cites a vast amount of primary source material’.” I believe this refers to the WhatsApp messaging. The Canary clarify that, “The SCG, which includes former shadow cabinet members Diane Abbott and John McDonnell, also makes a similar point, saying that there may be ‘cases to answer on bullying, harassment, sexism and racism’ within the document.” Diane Abbott has received more racist and sexist abuse than any other MP in Parliament and was the target of many of the attacks, but, although they contacted Starmer, Rayner, and the Labour press office for a response prior to publication; answer came there none!

The Canary lament that we were “Denied us a Labour government” documenting that, “According to Lavery and Trickett, the report: shows that some of the most senior employees of the Labour Party held its elected leadership in contempt, despised their own party members and even acted in a conspiratorial manner that undermined our 2017 general election campaign. These were people at the top of the party with extensive knowledge and experience of elections. Their jobs were paid for with party funds. Yet, they entered the 2017 election hoping we would lose and setting up a shadow operation to protect their chosen sons and daughters… In the end, we lost the 2017 general election by just a handful of votes. It is possible that the actions of these party staff denied us a Labour government that would have transformed millions of lives.” There were rumours at the time over the deliberate misdirection of funding toward safe Labour seats that almost exclusively belonged to right wing of the party.

“Allegations which The Canary has seen in a copy of the leaked report include those referred to by both Driscoll and the SCG on “the role of Labour Party factionalism. The report uses this context to highlight internal relationships ‘critical to understanding’ the handling of antisemitism complaints between 2015 and 2018. It also notes that this is crucial to understanding how the ‘disciplinary process functioned’ and Corbyn’s actual role in those processes.” While Labour’s former general secretary Iain McNicol suggested that “trawling 10,000 emails rather than challenging antisemitism in the party is deeply troubling,” this was exactly the tactic used to bogusly ensnare members with indirect connections to an aberrant follower in a Labour Left witch hunt. In contrast the threats of physical violence towards Corbyn: ‘hanging and burning’ are tangible death threats. The Canary contends that, “It is telling that the party’s own lawyers appear to have ruled that this information was unsuitable for submission to the EHRC’s ongoing investigation.”

Starmer appears to be learning lessons from the Tories: if you promise an ‘urgent investigation,’ but stall for long enough people will forget about it and move on. Another Tory tactic has been employed: engage the wrong team to avoid the correct answers. Despite the toxicity of the conduct exposed in the report the Skwawkbox Article, “Excl: leaked report whitewash continues: Starmer using forensic computer investigators – on those who compiled report,” reveals the deliberate cover-up. They say, “Such conduct would normally result in suspension of membership – and employment for those still employed – pending investigation at the very least. However, the party has instead spent a large sum on forensic computer investigators – to examine the machines of the staff who ordered and compiled the report. The name of the firm is apparently CMP – and the amount is in six figures.” In reality the report was compiled as a direct legal response to the EHRC investigation, but EHRC cannot ignore its submission by Craig Murray.

This Skwawkbox Article documents how you can submit evidence, “The ‘Forde Inquiry‘, into the leaked Labour report alleging racism, abuse, misdirection of funds, obstruction of complaint processes and undermining the party’s election campaigns by former senior party staff, is now calling for evidence. Labour staff have been asked to make their submissions to the inquiry, but members can – and must – also do so, to ensure that the impact of the actions exposed by the report are on the record. Labour members and activists should contribute whatever evidence or testimony they feel is appropriate, but the SKWAWKBOX recommends that particular emphasis should be given to:
• the impact of senior staff conduct on the results of campaigning efforts
• resources withheld or letters into HQ ignored
• treatment of/response to BAME members
• members suspended for years, while staff allegedly delayed cases for political ends
• deprivation of voting rights in leadership and other elections resulting from suspension
• ‘stitched up’ candidate selections
Along with any other allegations made in the report. Submissions must be made by email to [email protected] no later than 5pm on Friday 24 July.”

The most recent Skwawkbox Article on the Inquiry states that, “‘Forde Inquiry’ into leaked Labour report fatally compromised by ‘grovelling’ apology in court case Labour’s lawyers said it would win – NEC members.” They say, “Party’s ‘unreserved’ withdrawal of ‘bad faith’ comments means Starmer’s inquiry into revelations of leaked report is meaningless, according to senior elected representatives. Some of the most senior elected officials within the Labour Party’s governance structures say that the party’s ‘grovelling’ apology this morning to ‘whistleblowers’ who feature in the infamous leaked internal report is so fatally compromised as to be meaningless. Labour has made an ‘unreserved’ apology for suggesting that ‘whistleblowers’ involved in last year’s widely-criticised Panorama programme were not reliable: We unreservedly withdraw all allegations of bad faith, malice and lying. We would like to apologise unreservedly for the distress, embarrassment and hurt caused by their publication.”

Skwawkbox relay how, “The apology comes after the party’s lawyers said they were confident of winning the case brought against them, but Keir Starmer was determined to issue the apology – and agree a settlement said to be in six figures with the former staff. Members of Labour’s National Executive Committee (NEC) directly elected by Labour members are furious about the decision…” One told Skwawkbox, “how can anyone think the Forde Inquiry isn’t fatally compromised when we’ve ‘unreservedly’ withdrawn any suggestion of wrongdoing against some of the people mentioned in the report it’s supposed to be investigating?” In agreed another added that, “at least one of the union representatives on the NEC had fought against the move,” describing it as “a disgrace when we’re still supposed to be investigating the revelations of the [leaked] report. Howard (Unite’s Howard Beckett) argued forcefully against it [during yesterday’s NEC discussion], but Keir was determined to ignore everyone regardless.”

Now for me this last disastrous act of party-sabotage by Starmer, functioning more as a Tory Trojan Horse that as Labour Party Leader, is personally extremely distressing due to past experiences that have devastated my life after I blew the whistle on negligent practice in surgery that I witnessed during my retraining. This was the final straw for me and I have started drafting a letter to my Labour MP who is a member of the Shadow Cabinet. I will also try contacting Jeremy Corbyn to urge him to Crown fund for a defence as John Ware and co are now coming after him. I have been so deeply affected by this it will take a few days to draft my letter but here is what I want to say on the matter.

As a genuine Whistleblower who had my retraining and my entire career sabotaged by retaliatory lies, it was excruciatingly painful to hear today that the Labour Party has decided to reward John Ware for his disgusting smear documentary on Panorama. I took my own defamation case to the High Court Queens Bench in London seeking to remove the false allegations made by the John Radcliffe Hospital in order that I could complete my training and resume my career. My case was thrown out, not because it lacked merit or evidence as it never got that far. Few students realize that Universities have ‘Absolute Privilege” plus there was a similar level of protection that permitting the Hospital to lie under oath defaming me.

That was when I realized that there was absolutely no recourse to Justice in this country unless you are excessively wealthy “might is right!” It has been a stark reminder of that fact watching the Johnny Depp strut in and out of the High Court dragging out his personal feud with his ex-wife and airing his dirty laundry in the public limelight at a leisurely pace due to a worthless Sun Article that was gone and forgotten the next day. Rich people get longer than a solitary day in court, feathering their nest is a serious priority; in my case they said “the candle wasn’t worth the wick” because I had not demanded huge sums of money. I didn’t even get cease and desist rights! I faced lawyers representing the NHS Trust and another five from Oxford Brookes completely alone and representing myself. They must have been so proud of their work, especially when I was ordered to pay all £36,000 worth of their expenses. They destroyed my life and if not for the need to care for my mother I would have ended my life that day.

Now after watching the Labour Party despicable campaign of self-sabotage bending over backwards to grovel over every insult and chunk of fake news hurled at Jeremy Corbyn by his own MPs parroting the far-right Tory manipulators, Keir Starmer the enabler commits the most grotesque own-goal in recent history with the worst possible timing that will undoubtedly take the heat off Boris Johnson and the revelations of the Russia Report. The Panorama program from John Ware, a man with a serious axe to grind, has been thoroughly debunked with well documented evidence available on Labour Friends of Israel Website and elsewhere. Rewarding him and the lying Labour saboteurs for this thoroughly biased evidence free ‘Fakeumentary’ makes me want to vomit.

After my case was thrown out I tried to fight back. I stood alone outside the High Court in London, wearing my OR gown, with a Petition protesting the gross injustice that criminalized me, with a sign that said, “When is a law not a law? When it’s a colander!” To this day a University still has the right to lie about a student’s conduct, reliant on ‘Absolute Privilege’ to thereby abort their training, demonize them and destroy their career as they did with me. The Labour Party is sending a strong signal to genuine Whistleblowers who like me have had their career sabotaged and lost everything to abide by a solemn duty to the public to tell the truth and expose wrongdoing. Many Whistleblowers have taken their own life in despair as they are rendered destitute by this gross injustice. These charlatans posing as heroes will be exposed and when they are their testimony under oath will constitute perjury for which they could go to jail and I very much hope they do.

Each time Labour back down and concede to these escalating false allegations you embolden the perpetrators. Ware and the sham Whistleblowers involved in the Panorama Documentary will go after Corbyn as if they have not done enough to break the man. They will screw the Labour Party for as much money as they can extract with Starmer draining the coffers to burnish his pro Zionist credentials. Meanwhile Boris Johnson can breath a huge sigh of relief that Starmer came through for them delivering a mortal blow not to him over the obscene funds drenching the Tory Party or interference in the Brexit vote, but to his own Party. The Russia Report could have pealed the Tory Party wide open like a can of anchovies, but Starmer foiled that. He needs to go as he is destroying the Labour Party. Bad enough the we suffer the huge setback of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election and cannot get an investigation under way, now we will fail to get the interference during Brexit investigated and we do no even have an opposition. I despair; Please DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

As a failed, crushed, demonized, ostracised formed Whistleblower I am absolutely sickened that the Labour Party would choose to reward a group of faux outrage charlatans intent on fabricating complaints to deliberately defame the really decent anti-racist, anti-austerity, anti-war, pro democracy, pro environment, pro Palestinian, pro migrant, thoroughly peace loving, humanitarian who is Jeremy Corbyn. When I lost everything, I was on the verge of suicide, but many do not survive. I will be writing to my Labour MP to voice my rage over this grotesque injustice and I would encourage others to do the same.

I feel passionate about this so I was more than happy to contribute to a Crowdfunding appeal made on behalf of Jeremy’s defence Fund. It was set up yesterday and 24hours ago, it had surpassed £55,000 now it has more than doubled that to over 100,000 and still climbing. We really need these fake Whistleblowers exposed in Court and prosecuted for perjury to stop others trying this get lucky scam in future. Real Whistleblowers face a life devastating experience. The GOFUNDME Website is awaiting your visit. This is not just about Jeremy it is about allowing those who speak up for the oppressed Palestinian people to voice legitimate concern without being targeted,

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Last night I posted a Link to the Crowdfunding page for Jeremy’s Defence Fund, to which I felt really strongly motivated to make a donation yesterday. When I was first alerted to the existence of the GOFUNDME page the donations had already surpassed the modest £20,000 ask, but now the total is over £200,000! Why champion this cause? I respect the man, but I am not a fanatical ‘Corbynista;’ I actually vote for the Green Party. But, this isn’t just about Corbyn; it goes way beyond that. We might finally have an opportunity to fully expose and discredit all of the poison propaganda press, dirty tabloid rags and the biased BBC in the High Court while we still have the remnants of a justice system left in place. This might, not only obliterate the fake anti-Semitism attacks on Jeremy Corbyn, and the Witch-hunt targeting progressive Left, Palestinian supporting, Labour MPs and other influential public figures, but this could also have amazing consequences for reducing the sheer volume of rabid lies spewed at us on a daily basis.

Crying wolf will not prevent anti-Semitism or genuinely protect Jewish people from potential persecution. The Zionist lobby have, through the Board of Deputies, forcefully imposed rigid restrictions on our Freedom of Speech just to prevent valid criticism of the atrocities and persecution being committed by the state of Israel. We are conveniently encouraged to forget that in fact Palestinians are also a Semitic people; so their persecution and the theft of their land by the Israelis is equally anti-Semitic! If South Africa could achieve a peaceful solution after the horrors of Apartheid, this must be possible in the Middle East. It will never be accomplished while powerful foreign Governments arm and equip the Israelis to encourage the subjugation and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. This is a unique opportunity to eliminate the powerful stranglehold over our politicians exercised by the Zionist Lobby as their toxic manipulation of both major political parties will be fully exposed in Court and we can finally demand a radical change of direction.

In a recent Skwawkbox Article entitled, “As BBC prepares unprecedented smear-fest, here are 40 ‘Labour antisemitism’ facts it may not mention,” they attempt to disseminate the real facts on the much maligned former Labour Leader, Jeremy Corbyn. They say that, “This article was originally published in February. As the BBC’s Panorama programme prepares what is expected to be a regurgitation of Murdoch press smears against Labour and its leader Jeremy Corbyn, it is being republished. Labour members and supporters will be more than familiar with the scale, intensity and sheer volume of Establishment smear campaigns against Corbyn, but the latest campaign is expected to plumb new depths. The information below will help to correct the record. To correct the imbalance caused by poor mainstream journalist, below are forty facts about the issue that will rarely, if ever, appear in the so-called ‘MSM’:” I have taken the liberty of republishing the Skwawkbox list in full with all of the evidentiary Links.

1. In October 1936, Jeremy Corbyn’s mother participated in the battle of Cable Street indefence of British Jews after British fascists had staged an assault on the area. Corbyn was raised in a household passionately opposed to antisemitism in all its forms.
2. In 23rd April 1977, Corbyn organised a counter-demonstration to protect Wood Green from a neo-nazi march through the district. The area had a significant Jewish population.
3. On 7 November 1990, Corbyn signed a motion condemning the rise of antisemitism in the UK.
4. In 2002 Jeremy Corbyn led a clean-up and vigil at Finsbury Park Synagogue which had been vandalised in an anti-Semitic attack.
5. On 30 April 2002, Corbyn tabled a motion in the House of Commons condemning an anti-Semitic attack on a London Synagogue.
6. On 26 November 2003, Jeremy Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion condemning terrorist attacks on two synagogues.
7. In February 2009, Jeremy Corbyn signed a parliamentary motion condemning a fascist for establishing a website to host antisemitic materials.
8. On 24th March 2009, Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion praising British Jews who resisted the Holocaust by risking their lives to save potential victims.
9. Nine years ago, Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion praising “Jewish News” for its pioneering investigation into the spread of Antisemitism on Facebook.
10. On 9 February 2010, Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion calling for an investigation into Facebook and its failure to prevent the spread of antisemitic materials on its site.
11. On 27 October 2010, Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion praising the late Israeli Prime Minister for pursuing a two state solution to the Israel/Palestine question.
12. On 13 June 2012, Corbyn sponsored and signed a motion condemning the BBC for cutting a Jewish Community television programme from its schedule.
13. 1 October 2013, Corbyn appeared on the BBC to defend Ralph Miliband against vile antisemitic attacks by the UK press.
14. Five years ago Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion condemning antisemitism in sport.
15. On 1 March 2013, Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion condemning and expressing concern at growing levels of antisemitism in European football.
16. On 9 January 2014, Jeremy Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion praising Holocaust education programmes that had taken 20,000 British students to Auschwitz.
17. On 22 June 2015, Corbyn signed a Parliamentary motion expressing concern at the neo-nazi march being planned for an area of London with a significant Jewish population.
18. On 9 October 2016, Corbyn, close to tears, commemorated the 1936 Battle of Cable Street and recalled the role his mother played in defending London’s Jewish community.
19. On 3 December 2016, Corbyn made a visit to Terezin Concentration Camp when Jewish people were murdered by the Nazis. It was Jeremy’s third visit to such a camp, all of which were largely unreported in the most read UK papers.
20. Last year, a widely-endorsed 2018 accademic report found ninety-five serious reporting failures in the reporting of the Labour antisemitism story with the worst offenders The Sun, the Mail & the BBC.
21. On 28 February 2016, five months after becoming leader, Jeremy Corbyn appointed Baroness Royall to investigate antisemitism at Oxford University Labour Club.
22.On 27 April 2016 Corbyn suspended an MP pending an investigation into antisemitism.
23. A day later, Corbyn suspended the three times Mayor of London after complaints of antisemitic comments.
24. On 29 April 2016, Corbyn launched an inquiry into the prevalence of antisemitism in the Labour Party. In spite of later changes in how the inquiry was reported, it was initially praised by Jewish community organisations.
25. In Corbyn’s first seven months as leader of the Labour Party, just ten complaints were received about antisemitism. 90% of those were suspended from the Labour Party within 24 hours.
26. In September 2017, Corbyn backed a motion at Labour’s annual conference introducing a new set of rules regarding antisemitism.
27. In the six months that followed the introduction of the new code of conduct, to March 2018, 94% of the fifty-four people accused of antisemitism remained suspended or barred from Labour Party membership. Three of the fifty-four were exonerated.
28. When Jennie Formby became general secretary of the party last year, she appointed a highly-qualified in-house Counsel, as recommended in the Chakrabarti Report.
29. In 2018, Labour almost doubled the size of its staff team handling investigations and dispute processes.
30. Last year, to speed up the handling of antisemitism cases, smaller panels of 3-5 NEC members were established to enable cases to be heard more quickly.
31. Since 2018, every complaint made about antisemitism is allocated its own independent specialist barrister to ensure due process is followed.
32. The entire backlog of cases outstanding upon Jennie Formby becoming General Secretary of the Labour Party was cleared within 6 months of Jennie taking up her post.
33. Since September 2018, Labour has doubled the size of its National Constitutional Committee (NCC) – its senior disciplinary panel – from 11 to 25 members to enable it to process cases more quickly.
34. Under Formby and Labour’s left-run NEC, NCC arranged elections at short notice to ensure the NCC reached its new full capacity without delay.
35. Since later 2018, the NCC routinely convenes a greater number of hearing panels to allow cases to be heard and finalised without delay.
36. In 2018, the NEC established a ‘Procedures Working Group’ to lead reforms in the way disciplinary cases are handled.
37. The NEC adopted the IHRA working definition of antisemitism and all eleven examples of antisemitism attached to it.
38. A rule change agreed at Conference in 2018 means that all serious complaints, including antisemitism, are dealt with nationally to ensure consistency.
39. Last year, Jennie Formby wrote to the admins and moderators of Facebook groups about how they can effectively moderate online spaces and requested that any discriminatory content be reported to the Labour Party for investigation.
40. Since last year, no one outside Labour’s Governance and Legal Unit can be involved in decision-making on antisemitism investigations. This independence allows decisions free from political influence to be taken.

It is entirely incomprehensible to me that so many fellow MPs who attended debates in the House of Commons all failed to notice that Jeremy Corbyn had signed over a dozen Early Day Motions on behalf of the Jewish community specifically to protect their rights and interests. One can understand why Tory MPs might jealously try to denigrate a charismatic opposition Leader, but the oafish insults from Labour MPs like John Mann warranted official legal action. Did long standing verbally abusive Labour MP Margaret Hodge suffer selective amnesia when she aggressively defamed Corbyn in the Chamber? It was a disgusting rant that many believe should have seen her suspended from the Labour Party. I have embedded all of the original included Links with the exception of ones that go to the exact same source document, Labour Link on Jeanie Formby’s transformational efforts in tackling the ‘anti-Semitism problem’ as General Secretary: 29 – 37 and the last three points are all covered by the Link at point 28.

The Skwawkbox Article, “Crowdfund started by supporter Carole Morgan rockets,” will undoubtedly get the word out to well beyond just the Labour Left supporters, as so many fair minded people in the UK are sickened by the relentless vile propaganda and hateful messaging that has sabotaged Corbyn’s progressive team with unsubstantiated vicious lies. They report that, “A crowdfund started by a Jeremy Corbyn supporter to fund any legal costs faced by the former Labour leader has raised more than £120,000 in less than its first twenty-four hours – in spite of initial uncertainty whether it was genuine. Thousands of donations of £5, £10 or £20 quickly built momentum and more continue to come in. Carole Morgan set up the fundraiser, but was not widely known – but Islington North Labour Party has confirmed that Corbyn’s team is now in touch with Ms Morgan and everything is in order.” It really is high time to draw a line in the sand and say absolutely no more of this Far Right filth.

John Ware and co must honestly believe that, not just the media, but the public as a whole are behind them to take such an extraordinarily dubious gamble. It is one thing to bluster through a documentary segment or cry crocodile tears in a TV interview and quite another to tell boldface lies under oath in Court risking the severe consequence of jail time! Are these thoroughly selfish people so completely detached from reality that they didn’t hear about the massive Corbyn support rallies up and down the land? Were they so brain-dead that they totally bought into the Corbyn hatred propaganda and thought vast swathes of the exploited working poor really voted for the moronic toff when he crawled out of his refrigerated hiding spot to parrot three meaningless words, like a robot with well charged batteries? People are angry; they have been cheated and lied to for far too long and the blatant abuse of our court system for personal gain and to demonize an honest charismatic Labour Leader through this case is the very last straw.

As I have said before, appeasement doesn’t work, “Each time Labour back down and concede to these escalating false allegations they embolden the perpetrators. Ware and the sham Whistleblowers involved in the Panorama Documentary will continue chasing after Labour for more and more money until they bleed the Party dry. Starmer should have known this gross injustice would backfire, but he has brought this mayhem upon himself. He has awakened the lion from slumber and they are many in their number! Starmer will soon regret his vindictive actions trying to decouple from an exceptionally popular progressive former PM in this futile attempt to make his own mark: Starmer could easily be reduced to a dirty smudge on the Chamber floor! This is a unique opportunity to unpick all the toxic lies that lend a crutch of legitimacy to the Covert 2019 Rigged Election result; remove that crutch with a full investigation of malign influences, foreign and domestic, that manipulated Brexit and the last election and this Tory Government could fall. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Although he failed to mention how Johnson had lied, cheated and bullied his way into office through illegal manoeuvres, trickery and the Covert 2019 Rigged Election, Gareth Davies reminded us all of the ghastly fact that Boris Johnson had managed to cling on to power that has caused so much misery in just a year of his premiership. He said, “Can I start by congratulating the Prime Minister on his one-year anniversary as Conservative Party Leader? As we look at our long-term economic recovery…” he swiftly vaulted from compliments to pay back with a demand for funding of his pet local project. The PM was happy to oblige his Tory colleague, “Yes, indeed I can, which is why we have pledged not only £5 billion in funding for gigabit-capable broadband across the country…” He bragged neglecting to think how the impact of having Trump force him to back away from the Huawei deal might put a serious crimp in his plans. That decision was going to cost him dearly and set the UK 5G back, but pledges were cheap!

Keir Starmer started by saying, “May I start by welcoming reports this week of significant progress in the vaccine trials in Oxford? We all know that there is a long way to go, but I want to record my thanks and admiration for everyone involved in this huge effort.” The narcissistic PM was bound to take this as a personal compliment as if he was hands on in the lab, nothing could succeed without Boris! Seeking to distance himself from his nemesis Corbyn, Starmer said, “Under my leadership, national security will also be the top priority for Labour, so I want to ask the Prime Minister about the extremely serious report by the Intelligence and Security Committee, which concludes that Russia poses ‘an immediate and urgent threat’ to our national security, and is engaged in a range of activities that include espionage, interfering in democratic processes, and serious crime. The Prime Minister received that report 10 months ago. Given that the threat is described as ‘immediate and urgent,’ why on earth did he sit on it for so long?”

Playground bully Johnson responded, “Actually, when I was Foreign Secretary, for the period I have been in office, we have been taking the strongest possible action against Russian wrongdoing, orchestrating, I seem to remember, the expulsion of 130—153—Russian diplomats around the world, while the right hon. and learned Gentleman sat on his hands and said nothing while the Labour party parroted the line of the Kremlin, when people in this country were poisoned on the orders of Vladimir Putin.” Right the unproven ‘False Flag’ attack that was so poorly orchestrated that the TV depiction of events resembled a Steven King movie. The supposed documentary was so farfetched that it actually highlighted the incredulity of the plot, with a happy ending as the ‘victims’ conveniently disappearing without a trace.

As a qualified Lawyer Starmer should have known better than to pretend he had not recognized at the time that what Corbyn was demanding was a fully justified legal obligation and requirement under international law, but he was so desperate to trash Corbyn that he indignantly bleated, “I stood up and condemned what happened in Salisbury, and I supported the then Prime Minister on record. I would ask the Prime Minister to check the record and withdraw that—I was very, very clear.” He started into a schoolyard slapping match with bully Boris while begging for a retraction. Starmer simply will not learn, Johnson doesn’t do retractions or apologies, ever! He said, “The report was very clear that until recently the Government badly underestimated the Russian threat and the response that it required. They are still playing catch-up. The Government have taken their eye off the ball—arguably, they were not even on the pitch. After the Government have been in power for 10 years, how does the Prime Minister explain that?”

It was bully Boris’s turn to slap back’ this was going nowhere. He just had to lie and start bragging, Johnson ridiculed, “I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s questions are absolutely absurd. There is no country in the western world that is more vigilant in protecting the interests of this country or those of the international community from Russian interference. In fact, we are going further now, introducing new legislation to protect critical national infrastructure and our intellectual property. I think that he will find if he goes to any international body or gathering around the world that it is the UK that leads the world in caution about Russian interference.” Mentioning Corbyn had riled Starmer so he tried another smack with, “I do not wish to contradict him, but he sat on his hands and said nothing. The previous Leader of the Opposition parroted the line of the Kremlin that the UK should supply—I did not hear him criticise the previous Leader of the Opposition. If he did so, now is the time for him to set the record straight.”

Bully Boris’s blows were smarting putting Starmer on the defensive; had he totally forgotten that he was the interrogator here hence the name Prime Ministers Questions? He hit back with, “I was absolutely clear in condemning what happened in Salisbury, not least because I was involved in bringing proceedings against Russia on behalf of the Litvinenko family—that is why I was so strong about it. I spent five years as Director of Public Prosecutions, working on live operations with the security and intelligence services, so I am not going to take lectures from the Prime Minister about national security. There was an Interruption as the Speaker, tiring of the petty squabble, intervened; Order. I think someone wants to go for a cup of tea—we do not want an early bath. Keir Starmer,” he said sarcastically.

Now he was being slapped down by the chair Starmer changed tactic it was time for the enabler to let it go and just try to appease Johnson, he said, “The Prime Minister says that he will introduce new legislation. I want to make it clear to him that we will support that legislation and work with the Government. It is not before time. The Prime Minister says that the Government are vigilant. Eighteen months ago, the then Home Secretary said that we did not have all the powers yet to tackle the Russian threat. He said that the Official Secrets Acts were completely out of date. Other legislation has been introduced in that 18-month period. This is about national security. Why have the Government delayed so long in introducing that legislation?” He was sounding repetitive.

The PM was on a roll, so more bragging, “This Government are bringing forward legislation, not only a new espionage Act and new laws to protect against theft of our intellectual property, but a Magnitsky Act directly to counter individuals in Russia or elsewhere who transgress human rights. Let us be in no doubt what this is really all about: this is about pressure from the Islingtonian remainers who have seized on this report to try to give the impression that Russian interference was somehow responsible for Brexit. That is what this is all about. The people of this country did not vote to leave the EU because of pressure from Russia or Russian interference; they voted because they wanted to take back control of our money, of our trade policy, of our laws. The simple fact is that, after campaigning for remain, after wanting to overturn the people’s referendum day in day out, in all the period when the right hon. and learned Gentleman was sitting on the Labour Front Bench, he simply cannot bring himself to accept that.”

The Speaker objected to Johnson’s grandstanding and interjected much as he had the week before, “Can I just gently say to the Prime Minister, as I did last time, he may have to go to Specsavers? The Chair is this way, not that way. If he could address me, we would be a lot better.” Noting that Johnson was already braced for an attack on how the Russia Report called into question the validity of the Brexit result, with a cowardly reply that missed a perfect opportunity and seriously let down the British voting public, Starmer steered well clear of demanding an investigation into the referendum vote. He just quipped, “I see the Prime Minister is already on his pre-prepared lines.”

Starmer continued, reverting to a vague repetition of what he had already asked with a “could do better” tone he said, “This is a serious question of national security. He sat on this report for 10 months and failed to plug a gap in our law on national security for a year and a half. One of the starkest conclusions in the report is that the ‘UK is clearly a target for Russia’s disinformation campaigns’. The report also highlights that this is being met with a fragmented response across Whitehall and across the Government. The report refers to this as a ‘hot potato’ with no one organisation recognising itself as having the overall lead. That is a serious gap in our defences. This is not about powers; it is about responsibility, Prime Minister. So, how is he going to address that gap and make sure the UK meets this threat with the joined-up, robust response it deserves?”

World beater Boris came out swinging, “There is no other Government in the world who take more robust steps to protect our democracy, to protect our critical national infrastructure and to protect our intellectual property, as I have said, from interference by Russia or by anyone else.” However, Boris had so wanted to Bully Starmer over Brexit, he was clearly disappointed as he was fully prepared for a good old slugging match on that one. Johnson just couldn’t let it go, declaring, “Frankly, I think that everybody understands that these criticisms are motivated by a desire to undermine the referendum on membership of the European Union that took place in 2016, the result of which the right hon. and learned Gentleman simply cannot bring himself to accept.”

The public wanted and fully expected Starmer to demand an investigation into the Brexit vote as it was more than justified, but Starmer was determined to chicken out. There was also the obvious question about the Russian connections flooding dirty money into the Tory Party, but Starmer was too spineless to ask about that either; he meandered on with, “There is a serious gap in our Official Secrets Act, laying bare for 18 months, and that is all the Prime Minister has to say about it. One way the Government could seek to clamp down on Russian influence is to prevent the spread of Kremlin-backed disinformation. Obviously, social media companies have a big role to play, but the report also highlights ‘serious distortions in the coverage provided by Russian state-owned international broadcasters such as RT’. The High Court has ruled that Russia Today broadcasts pose actual and potential harm. Does the Prime Minister agree that it is time to look again at the licensing for Russia Today to operate in the UK?”

Bully boy Boris knew Starmer’s weak spot was any connection to Corbyn and here he was backing himself into a corner by bring up RT so Boris could land a brutal volley of punches. He attacked, “I think this would come more credibly from the Leader of the Opposition had he called out the former Leader of the Opposition when he took money for appearing on Russia Today. He protested neither against the former Leader of the Opposition’s stance on Salisbury nor against his willingness to take money from Russia Today. The right hon. and learned Gentleman flip-flops from day to day. One day he is in favour of staying in the EU; the next day he is willing to accept Brexit. The Leader of the Opposition has more flip-flops than Bournemouth beach.” That was the silly line he wanted to deliver for the tabloid rags, stupid people loved that stuff. I certainly hope they do not shut down RT anytime soon it is far more interesting and informative than watching Tory propaganda on the BBC!

Tory Alexander Stafford was ready to back up the PMs Brexit barrage declaring, “Last week, the Labour party bravely abstained on a vote that attempted to tie us into the EU indefinitely, further highlighting the increasing detachment of Labour from its old heartlands, such as Rother Valley. Will my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister confirm that we on this side of the House remain fully committed to delivering our promises to the British people and to restoring our full economic independence on 1 January, so that people in Thurcroft, Maltby, Dinnington and across Rother Valley get the Brexit bonanza and level-up that we so deserve?” Eager as he was Stafford was not in line to speak, but Johnson had choreographed this Brexit one, two punch ahead of time and he quipped, “I certainly can give my hon. Friend that assurance. That is what the people voted for and that is what we will deliver.”
The Speaker intervened saying, “I am going to bring Keir Starmer back for one more question. Keir Starmer.”

Starmer hated those silly gags saying, “Pre-prepared gags on flip-flops. This is the former columnist who wrote two versions of every article ever published! In case the Prime Minister has not noticed, the Labour party is under new management. No Front Bencher of this party has appeared on Russia Today since I have been leading this party.” Starmer exposed his weakness again before asking, “Finally, I want to ask the Prime Minister about the appalling persecution of the Uyghur Muslims in China. We have all seen the footage of the Uyghurs being herded on to trains and heard the heartbreaking stories of forced sterilisation, murder and imprisonment.” Enable… “We support the Foreign Secretary, the Prime Minister and the Government in their strong and clear condemnation of China for that in recent weeks. What further steps will the Prime Minister take? In particular, will he consider targeted sanctions against those responsible? Will he lead a concerted diplomatic action with our international partners to make it clear that this simply cannot be allowed to stand in the 21st century?”

Johnson replied, “That is why the Foreign Secretary, only this week, condemned the treatment of the Uyghurs. That is why this Government, for the first time, have brought in targeted sanctions against those who abuse human rights in the form of the Magnitsky Act. I am delighted that the right hon. and learned Gentleman now supports the Government, but last week, of course, he did not support the Government. I am glad he is with us this week. I do not know how many more questions he has got since you allowed him to come back, Mr Speaker, throughout this session.” Enabling really didn’t work it just magnified Starmer’s limp questioning and left him open to attack over whether was he supportive or not and accusations of flip flopping.

Bully Boris had Starmer on the ropes and he was going for a knock-out punch bringing up Corbyn to get Starmer riled and possibly get a good final PMQs headline before summer recess. While Starmer had failed to mention Brexit, letting down the voting public Boris wanted to batter Starmer with insults focused on Brexit plus dredge up anti-Semitism and Corbyn, “We have been getting on consistently with delivering on our agenda. A year ago, this was a Leader of the Opposition who was supporting an antisemitism-condoning Labour party and wanted to repeal Brexit. I represent a Government who were getting on with delivering on the people’s priorities: 40 new hospitals, 20,000 more police, 50,000 more nurses. And, by the way, we have already recruited 12,000 more nurses, 6,000 more doctors and 4,000 more police. We are delivering on the people’s priorities. We are the people’s Government. And, by the way, we are the Government who support the workers of this country as well, with the biggest ever increase in the living wage.” Boris bookended the session with lying empty pledges,

It was SNP Ian Blackford’s turn to pipe up, he asked, “Yesterday, the Tory party held a political Cabinet, with the Prime Minister in a panic about the majority and increasing support for Scottish independence. Apparently, their great strategy amounts to more UK Cabinet Ministers coming to Scotland. Can I tell the Prime Minister that the more Scotland sees of this UK Government, the more convinced it is of the need for Scotland’s independence? A far better plan for the Tories would be to listen to the will of the Scottish people. Before his visit tomorrow, will the Prime Minister call a halt to his Government’s full-frontal attack on devolution?”

It was a legitimate question, but all Johnson had to do was act clueless and lie so he claimed, “I really do not know what the right hon. Gentleman is talking about. The only Bill I can think of that is before the House, or will be coming before the House, and which I know enjoys cross-party support, is the UK internal market Bill. Although that is a massively devolutionary Bill, which gives huge powers straight back from Brussels to Scotland, its principal purpose is to protect jobs and protect growth throughout the entire United Kingdom to stop pointless barriers of trade between all four parts of our country. Anybody sensible would support it.”

Blackford was persistent despite his pestering being totally futile, he presented a bold case for the Scots, saying, “Anybody sensible would realise from that answer that the Prime Minister simply does not get Scotland. In 2014, the people of Scotland were promised devolution-max, near federalism and the most powerful devolved Parliament in the world. Instead, we got a Tory Trade Bill that threatens our NHS, an Immigration Bill that will devastate our economy, and a power grab that will dismantle devolution. Scotland’s powers grabbed by Westminster, workers’ rights attacked, the rape clause and the bedroom tax, our NHS up for sale—the overwhelming majority in Scotland’s Parliament, its MPs and its people oppose all those measures. How can the Prime Minister claim that this is a Union of equal partners when his damaging policies will all be imposed upon Scotland against its will?”

Johnson had this covered; act dumb and just lie, he replied, “I hesitate to accuse the right hon. Gentleman of failing to listen to my last answer, but it is clear that the UK internal market Bill is massively devolutionary, with 70 powers passed from Brussels to Scotland. It is quite incredible. Of course, its purpose is very sensible, which is to protect jobs and growth throughout the entire UK, but just on a political level it seems bizarre that the Scottish nationalist party actually wants to reverse that process and hand those powers back to unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats in Brussels. Is that really the policy? I do not think it is sensible.”

Johnson, had probably started into the session thinking he would be in for a real fight due to the Russia Report, but he need not have worried; his main protagonist really excelled in his ineptitude and lack of resolve. The PM had tried to taunt and bait Starmer into demanding an investigation of the Brexit vote because he was ready for that challenge, but the new Leader of the Opposition seemed more concerned about proving he was not like the old Leader of the Opposition: so no challenge there, great! Blackford was heavily focused on Scotland as though they had already secured independence; did he know about the dark tunnel ahead? None of these MPs seem to realize how radically different things will be in a few short months; the debating chamber will be purely ceremonial theatre, a place for the PM to play to the gallery and create media spin. Opposition MPs will have no real power to alter policy anymore after the dictatorship is solidified when the UK is fully uncoupled from EU interference. We have so little time left to rescue our democracy by investigating the Covert 2019 Rigged Election and ousting this corrupt Government from power: DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Emboldened by his latest victory at Prime Ministers Questions, where Starmer voluntarily abandoned the massive opportunity of the revelations exposed in the Russia Report, Johnson took immediate advantage by refusing any further investigation into foreign interference that might have delegitimized his cherished project for crash-out Brexit. His Russian oligarch donors were also spared scrutiny as the Labour Leader’s catastrophic own-goal was exemplified by Keir Starmer’s crusade to hang the albatross of anti-Semitism around Jeremy Corbyn’s neck. The BBC vaulted towards a rehash of the fake news, now officially endorsed as ‘the new truth’ by his disgraceful, cowardly capitulation to John Ware and the lying defamers seeking to crush the progressive Left of the Labour Party by demonizing its iconic former Leader. This group hoping to capitalize financially on Keir Starmer’s treachery, and abandonment of the Labour Party membership, are not honourable, heroic Whistleblowers, but dishonest poison “Dartblowers.”

Attacks on Tory Party funding and Russian interference in UK politics were neutralized by Johnson’s faithful Trojan Horse, Starmer misleading the Labour opposition; as the BBC and mainstream media hammered Labour over the grossly unjust Court settlement, Johnson was determined to cram the air waves with junk news over facemasks. The PM has also had time to select a new target for redirecting blame over his shambolic mishandling of the Covid 19 crisis. It was bound to cause controversy, falsely accusing Carers of not following instructions to essentially blame them for the ‘Holocaust in Care’ caused by his Tory Government’s decision to direct Hospitals to ‘seed’ the Care Homes with infected patients by failing to test prior to transferring them. He fiercely resisted offering an apology so that he could still double-down on that lie in future. Now, feigning a Damocles conversion during his ICU PR stunt, dramatically spun as a ‘brush with death,’ Johnson has latched onto a new target for deflecting responsibility: obesity.

Healthy foods often cost more than the struggling working poor can afford; hence obesity is more prevalent in poor communities. Those juggling several zero hours contract jobs don’t have the time to expend on the luxury of cooking healthy meals; they grab junk food on the go and race to the next job. Tackling poverty and rampant inequality would genuinely help to combat obesity, but as unemployment spirals out of control driving more people to use food banks to survive, ‘Fat Shaming’ will be the new stick that this disgraceful, heartless Tory Government will use to beat the poor. To avoid exposing a deliberate cull of the ‘economically inactive’ with the disastrous Tory policy decision adopting Cummings’s eugenics program of ‘Herd Immunity,’ failing to contain the virus early on, ignoring WHO guidelines, garbled messaging, and the chaotic early release from lockdown, will require a scapegoat. The high incidents of Covid 19 deaths in the UK will be blamed on gluttony, laziness and other purely preventable lifestyle choices.

In Medical studies it has already been determined that among people in certain ethnic communities the incidence of conversion to Type 2 Diabetes occurs at a much lower BMI, which may account for their increased susceptibility. In a data heavy British Journal of Cardiology “overview” entitled, “Diabetes and cardiovascular risk in UK South Asians” it reveals that, “Diabetes occurs at a lower body mass index (BMI) in this group due to altered body composition.” They advise that, “South Asians should be encouraged to maintain lower BMIs lifelong and to keep as active as possible.” However, as the Medical profession grapple with the question of why certain minorities are at higher risk of contracting and dying of Covid 19 it would be grossly misleading and truly grotesque if Boris Johnson latched onto the higher rates of diabetes in ethnic minorities to blame the souring UK death toll of his reckless Tory Government policies on the lifestyle choices of innocent victims including dedicated NHS staff and Carers.

While ‘sin tax’ gets a bad rap despite pragmatic policies to curb significant health risks that negatively impact our NHS, they do work; mine would place a tax on the toxic combination of salt and sugar when hidden in the same food. For Johnson this is just another gimmick that will capitalize on his Hospital stay and a brief precautionary placement in ICU, where he was never put on a ventilator let alone at deaths door! The very real danger is that this obscene ‘Fat Shaming’ othering agenda could herald rationing of access to our ‘free at the point of service’ NHS, softening up the UK public for the introduction of a costly US insurance based ‘for profit’ Medical system where the poor and the needy are excluded to maximize the profits of giant US Healthcare Corporations. Do not kid yourself, this process of exclusion based on BMI is already well underway in certain areas of this country and will rapidly become the norm with Jonson’s campaign of ‘othering’ heavily promoted in the disreputable, Murdock owned, Tabloid press.

The other day I received this alarming email from the European Movement UK alerting me to the extremely worrying very recent decision votes in the House of Commons that threaten our NHS, as well as our food and animal welfare standards in regard to all upcoming Trade deals. The email read as follows: “After more than a year and a half of delay, the Russia Report was finally released to the public this morning. The report’s conclusion that the government ‘did not take action to protect the UK’s process in 2016’ highlights the need for greater oversight over our democratic processes, and we wholeheartedly welcome the report’s recommendation for a post-referendum assessment of Russian attempts at interference, similar to what happened in the United States. The people who were most in favour of Brexit love to speak about British sovereignty – yet fall remarkably silent when presented with concrete evidence that a foreign power has interfered in our democracy on multiple occasions.”

Initially this appeared to exclusively target lack of scrutiny over the Brexit Referendum vote, but the remaining message focused on the ramifications of that deeply flawed decision as the alert notice continued by exposing the extent to which this Tory Government has lied to the public and betrayed our trust. They said, “It is shameful that the government has been so reluctant to act in the face of such a blatant threat from a hostile actor.” They add that, “This is not a partisan issue – the extent of Russian influence poses a significant challenge for us all, and it must be tackled in order to protect our democracy. But the Russia Report isn’t the only thing that we should be talking about today. Last night, parliament voted on amendments to the Trade Bill. They began by voting down New Clause 17, an amendment designed to prevent the NHS being subject to any form of foreign control by 340 votes to 251. New Clause 17 also sought to:
• Protect NHS staff from having their wages slashed by any future trade deal
• Regulate medicine prices
• Protect patient data from being ‘sold off’

They pointed out the disgraceful hypocrisy of Boris Johnson and his Tory Government by reminding us that, “The Conservatives clapped for the NHS – and then put it on the negotiating table. Pretty bad, right? But wait – there’s more! MPs also voted against New Clause 11, which sought to protect food standards and animal welfare. We’re not done yet! Perhaps most alarmingly, MPs then voted against ensuring that parliament would have a vote on any post-Brexit trade deal. They literally voted against giving themselves a say. Angry? So are we. But here’s the good news – the European Movement has more than 120 groups across the country that are leading the fightback. Join us:. Together, we can hold the government to account. Kind Regards, Hugo Mann, CEO European Movement UK.”

I do not doubt that Boris Johnson can get forty new Hospitals built in the UK by private US Healthcare Corporations eager to cash in on the UK market after crash-out Brexit. However this will happen while our precious NHS is totally denuded of funds and left to wither in the vine as the impoverished resource of the destitute. While drug and alcohol abuse remain the obvious consequence of desperation and despair they will be set as exclusionary factors in the new agenda to prioritize the wealthy and demonize the poor. It represents a devious Tory Government policy of targeted extermination of the ‘economically inactive’ Cummings’s ‘Slaughter of the Sheeple,’ to reduce the burden on the state that might ultimately try to call for taxation of the wealthy elite.

Later on I received this Petition appeal in my inbox that I would like to share with you all as it concerns protecting our precious NHS. “Last chance to protect the NHS from trade deals: Boris Johnson has betrayed the British people. He promised to ‘take back control’ and ‘keep the NHS off the table’, but over 300 of his MPs have voted against parliamentary scrutiny and NHS protection in the Trade Bill debate. We have one last chance at stopping Donald Trump and his healthcare cronies. We need the House of Lords to step up now and protect our NHS. Members of the House of Lords, please amend the Trade Bill to give parliament a say over trade deals and protect our NHS.” Sign the Petition.

A Canary Article entitled, “The NHS is now on the chopping block. And it shows why reforming capitalism is an exercise in futility.” They point to previous article where they reported on how, “Tory MPs defeated an amendment which would have committed the government to protect the NHS from privatisation in a new trade deal with the US” and then noted that, “This raises the obvious question of whether we’re about to see the end of the NHS’s founding principle of ‘free at the point of service’. But there’s also a more elementary question worth exploring – whether it’s even possible to maintain social reforms like universal healthcare when economic decision-making remains in private hands. With corporate power over political systems becoming more entrenched and the media serving as its mouthpiece, the answer to this question increasingly seems to be a resounding ‘no’.” The increasing likelihood of our NHS becoming fully privatized by this Tory Government is easily obscured by Johnson’s expansive empty pledges.

The Canary warn, “Never trust a Tory…” and go on to elaborate on the most recent betrayal that was barely mentioned by the compliant BBC or our far-right media, “On 20 July, Tory MPs voted down an amendment to the Trade Bill introduced by Labour’s shadow trade secretary Bill Esterson. The measure would have prohibited parliament from voting in favour of a trade deal with the US that ‘undermines or restricts’ the NHS’s principle of universal care. It also contained provisions that would ensure the UK’s ability to set its own medicine prices. This would be an alternative to the US-style system in which the government doesn’t negotiate directly with the drug companies.” Although opposition parties voted for the amendment, it wasn’t vociferously challenged in a bold public statement from the enabling Trojan Horse, Starmer, or anyone in his right lurching Shadow Cabinet.

The Canary further warn, “Tory MPs claim that the NHS is ‘safe in their hands’, but there are many reasons to doubt the sincerity of this claim. Not least of these is that the Conservative Party has been notorious for attempting to privatise the system by stealth.” But they are equally scathing about the Blairite alternative revealing that their position, “is that the solution is to offer a ‘credible’ centrist alternative which pledges to safeguard the NHS and increase public investment – sometimes called the ‘Third Way’. They say, “Social democracy holds that the negative effects of capitalism can be redressed in the short- to medium-term. This can be done through the provision of social protections and public services, but without immediate nationalisation of large swathes of the economy or the pursuit of widespread economic democracy.” They clarify that, “Blairites are neither socialists nor social democrats because, unlike the latter, they don’t view reforms to capitalism as incremental stepping stones towards its replacement.”

The Canary contend that Blairites, “believe that social reforms can continue to exist over long periods under capitalism.” This is the direction that the delusional team supporting Keir Starmer believe will give them electoral credibility in an election in five years time. There are three major problems with this assumption. Firstly, the ‘Tory Light’ approach has been tried before and it spectacularly failed to inspire citizens to even bother coming out to vote! Secondly, it is dependent on that massive Tory majority in Parliament not deciding to radically change the rules to extend their time in power or thirdly comprehensively further corrupt the weak electoral process to significantly enhance the industrial scale fraud that stole the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Of Blairites, the Canary say, “they would have us believe that if the Tories do succeed in dismantling public healthcare in the UK, it would simply form part of an ongoing ideological tussle – one between the ‘pro-public services’ Labour Party and the ‘pro-market-based solutions’ Tories.”

The Canary contends that, “The major rivals to this idea, of course, are traditional democratic socialists like Jeremy Corbyn. Corbyn, along with a small number of key allies in parliament such as John McDonnell, has always rejected the ideological tenets of Blair’s Third Way. Corbyn and his allies have continued to argue that building a society that works for all must ultimately involve not just cosmetic reforms, but a fundamental break from capitalism. According to socialists, this is because social democratic reforms are ultimately unsustainable within a largely privately-owned and managed economy. Rather, we believe that these reforms can only be maintained within a socialist economy and society.” This article reveals a few interesting historical insights into predictions made by Marx and his protégées, the brief window of opportunity for reform that delivered, “Keynesian stimulative government spending that no capitalist government would ever replicate in peacetime,” and the increasing power of Corporations.

The Canary report that, “In advanced capitalist economies, large corporations end up dominating the economy to such an extent that they have more power than governments. In fact, corporate power has become so concentrated in some countries that they have arguably caused a form of state capture. This is where the state acts at the behest of private business interests rather than the public.” They point to the US as the most extreme example, sadly a route this Tory Government is determined to drag us down. “Socialists believe that these private interests will always work to undermine social democratic reforms like universal healthcare,” before turning to the role of the media. Citing, “Marxist theorist Antonio Gramsci argued that under capitalism, society’s dominant class builds consent for the continuation of the status quo via a process he termed ‘cultural hegemony‘. …this means that society’s major cultural organs and mass media characterise what is in the interests of that dominant class as ‘common sense’.”

The Canary note that, “The classic example is Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party. At first, Corbyn was presented as an eccentric aberration from British politics.” But, “following the 2017 election, in which Corbyn presided over the biggest increase in Labour’s vote share since 1945, it became evident that his policies had significant public support.” They say that realizing Corbyn could actually become PM they, “quickly went into panic mode. With the UK media overwhelmingly controlled by the ruling class, thanks to majority corporate and billionaire ownership, it then launched an all-out disinformation campaign to stop Corbyn and the political insurgency he represented. In doing so, it literally turned reality on its head. Corbyn, a lifelong anti-racism campaigner and early supporter of the anti-Apartheid movement, got branded a dyed-in-the-wool racist.” What is described as a, “manufactured and politically-motivated smear campaign based on bogus accusations of antisemitism,” could seriously come unstuck in court.

The Canary conclude by warning that, “Make no mistake, aiming solely for cosmetic reforms to capitalism is akin to trying to stop a haemorrhage with a plaster. Tinkering on the edges will only hasten the impending dystopia of climate chaos and the decimation of the few social protections and public services that we still have left.” They then ask if those of us who wish to avoid the dystopian nightmare that lies ahead ‘should limit ourselves to struggle only within the established constitutional frameworks…?’ If the left is not going to get a fair shake at democratically enacting our policies due to a media and cultural landscape that poisons the minds of the masses, then perhaps it’s time we turn to extra-parliamentary forms of struggle – before it’s too late.” The continuation of the protests that erupted after the killing of George Floyd in the US has emboldened more than just the ‘Black Lives Matter’ activists, because the social unrest ranges well beyond just the issue of racial injustice to the growing inequality in general.

Covid has been a war of sorts. It continues to fuel, greatly intensify and swell the number of people protesting. It’s not a great time to strike while hanging onto a precious job is so precarious, but I genuinely believe the sheer volume and dogged determination of our peaceful protests is deeply unnerving to this Government. If the protesters were violent, destructive vandals or looting the PM could order a tough crackdown, but our non-violent solidarity, will lead to increased provocation to get people to act out so Johnson can crack heads. We must show restraint to deny him that victory. I note the GOFUNDME Page for Jeremy’s Defence Fund now tops £283,000; not bad for a guy everyone supposedly despised! This must go to Court to finally debunk all the disgusting smears against Corbyn, Labour and discredit the biased BBC. We will be in a far stronger position to challenge the legitimacy of both Brexit and the Covert 2019 Rigged Election to demand Comprehensive Investigations to expose malign influences foreign and domestic. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

The Russia Report exposed at last, but we didn’t learn much. We might not have a Foggy Bottom, but we sure have a wet arse! With the disgraceful enablement of Keir Starmer’s sickening own goal drowning out the headlines with another round of fake anti-Semitism smears, this corrupt Tory Government triumph in completely sidelining the Russia Report, but just what did we find out? The call from Starmer to shut down RT was another treacherous lurch in the wrong direction to eliminate free speech at a point where the Tories are getting set to criminalize an innocent Journalist Julian Assange, silencing a genuine Whistleblower and press freedom. The Labour Leader has deeply betrayed the membership by selling out to the “Poison Dartblowers” who will bleed the Labour Party dry for the radical Zionist cause to solidify the far-right Tory dictatorship of Boris Johnson. To get a totally balanced picture of what was presented I wanted to know what the demonized Russian broadcaster RT had to say about the Russia Report.

RT started into their News segment on the Russia Report by airing a number of the telling statements made by the two presenters, Labours Kevan Jones and the SNPs Stewart Hosie. They avoided the initial rebuke drummed home by Jones where he exposed the time line to emphasize the repeated lies over the delay in presenting it as “not true.” RT started with the question from Jones, “…Who is protecting the British public from interference in our democratic process? Well in a nutshell we found no one is.” At this point it would be fair to say that logically the UK shouldn’t be predetermining a presumed enemy to myopically focus all intelligence resources on combating that one perceived threat to the exclusion of all other potential malign influences not just foreign states, but rogue internal influences and the dodgy money that fuels them. Likewise we should not be zeroing in on just the corrupt funding supplied by Russian oligarchs, but cracking down on all political donations to eliminate undue influence across the board.

But I digress with my personal rant on getting dirty money out of politics. When Hosie was next up RT didn’t feature his lengthy diatribe against the Russian state and assumptions of hostility that, like the Skripal case, were credited as valid without much substantiating evidence. Choosing not to dignify such flimsy claims by airing them on RT they cut to Hosie’s comment that, “The UK Government took its eye off the ball, because of its focus on counter terrorism.” Jones remarked that, “We found the defence of the UK democratic process is a ‘hot potato’” While Hosie stated that, “The Government had badly underestimated the response required to the Russian threat and is still playing catch-up.” Jones said, “The outrage isn’t that there was interference; the outrage is that no one has wanted to know if there was interference.” A press questioner was featured asking, “What is the worst example you can give of Russian interference?” To which Jones answered, “Well that’s the question that we want to have answered.”

The RT News Anchor announced that, “The British Prime Minister is planning to boost funding for the Security Services and put forward a new espionage act in response to the Russia Report. The document’s publication was delayed by the Government for a year and a half before it was finally released this week.” Although the length of the delay did appear considerably stretched it didn’t materialy alter the point being made in her brief intro before handing over to RTs Daniel Hawkins, who she reported, “has been looking at what’s inside.” Hawkins cut to the chase saying, “To get a very brief summary of the long-awaited Russia Report we can go straight to page 13 of the document,” when text from the report appeared on screen documenting the finding that, “The written evidence provided to us appeared to suggest that HMG had not seen or sought evidence of successful interference in the UK democratic process.” The subsequent style of the presentation flipped between direct quotes on screen and Hawkins comments.

Considering the serious implications of the Russia Report Hawkins appeared rather flippant when he said, “Seems to be enough, so if you’re short on time or don’t want to read heavily redacted intelligence and political spiel: stop watching now. Otherwise let’s go on.” Text reveals that, “Open source studies have pointed to the preponderance of pro Brexit or anti-EU stories on RT and Sputnik and the use of ‘bots’ and ‘trolls’ as evidence of Russian attempts to influence the process.” RT was not avoiding the direct attacks targeting their programming. There is no outraged denial attempted by the accused Russian broadcaster at this point as they doggedly stick to the evidence presented in the report with another segment of text quoting, “We have sought to establish whether there is secret intelligence which supported or built on these studies. In response MI5 initially provided just six lines of text.” The Russian Government, whatever their motives or intentions must have been amused by the lack of substance in this regard.

RT accurately identified, “Brexit and the failure of journalism” as if to point out that the British hardly needed RT, Sputnik or Russian interference to sway the public when their own state broadcaster and mainstream media was so persuasively feeding propaganda to the masses. However, Hawkins did not elaborate on that blatantly obvious own-goal and instead focused on what was or rather was not in the report itself. He said, “The reports also seemingly surprised by the limited response of the Intelligence services. But not because those agencies may have more important priorities such as protecting lives by preventing international or domestic terrorism or serious crime.” There is a list of the Agencies concerned on screen so that the viewer can freely evaluate if this task should have been within their remit: “Military Intelligence UK MI5 – Secret Intelligence Service MI6 – GCHQ”

Next to appear on screen was a newspaper headline, “The Guardian: BREXIT BIAS? BBC FACES A DIFFICULT BALANCING ACTIN POLARISED NATION.” If Hawkins was sounding distinctly cynical I can fully understand why as he revealed, “Apparently more resources are needed to keep track of Social Media and RTs editorial coverage; Brexit polarized millions with several broadcasters coming under fire, but it’s still Russia that poses the risk and the Security Services that aren’t doing their job.” It was a bold “put up or shut up challenge” that I agree with, given the exposed reality of our intelligence operations. The onscreen quote points out, “This is about the protection of [the UKs Democratic] process and mechanism from hostile state, which should fall to the Intelligence and Security Agencies.” I would add that perhaps this dearth of Intelligence Agency protection obscures a far deeper secret, that internal manipulation and the interference of both the US and Israel would be exposed by more stringent scrutiny.

Hawkins does not make such speculation which for me adds to the neutrality and objectivity of his reporting as he admits, “After all Moscow’s been waging information campaigns targeting UK politics through digital media, wealthy individuals, organizations and almost any other means.” A supporting quote appears on screen, “There has been credible open source commentary suggesting that Russia undertook influence campaigns in relation to the Scottish Independence referendum in 2014.” Hawkins said, “The Report warned the threat of Russian influence is a ‘hot potato’ that intelligence and other agencies shirking the responsibility of taking the lead in tackling it and reassuring the public amid widespread allegations.” Again Hawkins cleverly leaves us to draw our own conclusions as to why the Intelligence services should strategically avoid an essential element of their most important duty in defending UK democracy; I concluded that our democracy is under significant threat from within as well as malign foreign powers.

The next statement to appear on screen directly referred to Brexit, “There have been widespread public allegations that Russia sought to influence the 2016 Referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU,” Hawkins adds, “Though again the impact of such influence remains elusive.” The onscreen text backs him up, “The impact of any such attempt would be difficult – if not impossible – to assess, and we have not sought to do so.” Wow! Really, my take: it’s only the single most important decision the UK has made in the last four decades with the potential to negatively influence our future for decades, also possibly breaking up the UK and possibly destabilizing the EU, so why bother? If it was massively corrupted, no matter who accomplished this goal, obviously those who will suffer the most must just choke it down. Johnson and his evil minder have emphatically decreed that crash-out Brexit is unstoppable; Starmer the enabler will help deliver the poisonous consequences to the working poor as the Tories launch austerity 2.0!

I digress with my rant; back to RTs as Hawkins reports, “State agencies haven’t looked closely enough at open source information, according to the report, they lacked retrospective assessments and intelligence agencies in particular need a more important role in future.” I would say that will focus on PR spin to protect the Tory Government rather than to defend an open democracy in the UK. The onscreen text reveals that, “The committee was struck by the relatively small proportion of **** work that is carried out by the Agencies in relation to Russia.” Hawkins adds that, “In any case, if they should consider other threats to be a higher priority, they can always fall back on trusted Russia experts to lead the way.” Text confirms the identity of one such dubious ‘expert’ with the quote, “We are grateful to… Christopher Steele for …very substantial expertise on Russia.” They show a picture of Christopher Steele Former MI6 intelligence officer, it must be a recent shot as he is wearing a mask!

While Hawkins refrains from openly attacking his credentials he informs us that this MI5 operative was, “Christopher Steele author of the infamous anonymous ‘Golden Shower dossier’ and contributing to the Institute for Statecraft and the Integrity Initiative.” He goes on to describe the so called ‘Integrity Initiative’ as, “a project founded to tackle the Russian threat, receiving state funding to advise the state that Russia is a threat.” From what I have learned about Steele and these two dubious state funded organization they represent the very antithesis of ‘integrity’ set up to blindside the public with bogus information on false flag incidents and flood the media with pro Tory Government propaganda. The Integrity Initiative has been called out by the Skwawkbox for violating its claimed charitable status due to rampant disregard for impartiality and direct targeting of the former Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn. Hawkins does not elaborate on the sordid details of their claim to ‘integrity’ once again leaving us to draw our own conclusions.

Hawkins just factually reports that, “Moscow’s response was swift as predictable,” as an onscreen quote appears to confirm that they felt there was, “Nothing sensational. Just fake-shaped Russiaphobia,” with the quote attributed to “Maria Zakharova Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman.” Hawkins added, “As was the final conclusion of the long awaited report, showing yet again that any reproachment with the UK, however small, is still beyond the horizon.” The final comment from the report appeared on screen left dangling in our consciousness over what we had managed not to achieve. It said, “Any public move towards a more allied relationship with Russia at present would severely undermine the strength of the international response to Salisbury.” It was this “we stand by our fake news” parting salvo that discredited the supposedly unbiased nature of the cross party, Intelligence and
Securities Committee’s long-overdue exposure of the unredacted portion of the content of the Russia Report.

Having watched the RT response to the report I thought it was remarkably balanced and well focused on the documented evidence or lack thereof in the report. If there was recourse to questionable sources Hawkins left us to investigate further ourselves with just a hint of justifiable cynicism to encourage us to do so. It was a refreshing change from the ‘evidence free’ assumptions fed to the public via the BBC, who blackmail us all into paying for their woefully corrupted version of ‘impartiality’ we now recognize as Tory propaganda! An RT Article challenges this most recent attack on their station and the underlying motivation for it in, “Free press? Labour letter demands RT UK’s license gets REVOKED in light of ‘damning’ Russia report that gave NO examples or proof.” They report, “We have this leaked letter, arguably proof that Sir Keir Starmer wishes to curb the free press and most notably attack an independent, so-called, media regulator, said Ashraf Rattansi, host of RT’s Going Underground, referring to the Labour leader.”

They report that, “We now have the words of… Starmer’s Shadow Department of Culture, Media, and Sports Secretary in a private letter sent to this independent regulator saying, almost telling her urgently, ‘I need to see you.’ To do what? To interfere with an independent regulator? Devastating.” They point out that, “Slamming the letter as an attempt to bully the media watchdog, Rattansi also noted the move may amount to a breach of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which codifies the “freedom to hold opinions without interference.” Rattansi Tweeted, “NEW: Reported letter from Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party arguably interfering with the role of a UK statutory independent media regulator. Is @UKLabour’s @JoStevensLabour breaching Article 19’s ‘right to freedom of expression’ of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?” A qualified, highly experience, prosecutor; Starmer really should know better; this and the abandonment of a case he was advised Labour would win, shows incompetence or malice.

RT could easily have pulled the Russia Report apart due to the numerous expansive assumptions or the credibility of their dubious sources, but they left inquiring minds to delve further into the validity of the accusations. In a 2018 Skwawkbox Article they exposed the focus of the Government funded ‘charitable’ work accomplished by the sarcastically named Integrity Initiative. Video footage of the news coverage on this when the story broke demonstrated the BBCs determination to look the other way as exemplified in the headline, “Video: as huge Integrity Initiative scandal breaks, BBC’s ‘coverage’ ices the cake.” They report that, “Social media is abuzz today with the confirmed news that the Tory government used public money to pay a company staffed by former military intelligence officers to conduct online smear campaigns against the leader of the Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, in what it laughably termed the ‘Integrity Initiative’.” This same politically motivated group supplied ‘evidence’ for the ISCs Russia Report.

The Skwawkbox rightly point out that, “It is a huge democratic and constitutional scandal – as well as confirmation of what Labour supporters have known all along: the Establishment is coordinating smears in desperation to undermine the Labour Party and its leader.” They emphasize that, “Such a scandal, in a genuinely democratic society with a genuinely free media, should be headline news – in fact, not merely headline news but the kind that makes governments fall and generates rolling coverage as the media’s talking heads and experts pore over every detail, cutting away occasionally for footage of the latest government minister being led away in handcuffs.” A segment of the news coverage on this otherwise rather uneventful day exposes the BBC covering for the Tories: “not a single word about the fact that the UK’s government misappropriated taxpayers’ money to pay former intelligence officers to conduct a clandestine operation against the leader of the UK’s main opposition party and likely next Prime Minister.”

In another Skwawkbox Article posted in March of 2019 entitled, “Fresh calls for investigation after Integrity Initiative apologises to Corbyn,” they reported that the, “Founder of Scotland-based ‘charity’ also admitted it broke charity law – and Foreign Office rules. The Integrity Initiative(II), the organisation that received £2 million of state funding yet had interfered in the affairs of other nations such as Spain and listed numerous ‘mainstream’ journalists as resources, has apologised to Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn for negative social media messages about him.” The II’s founder, the Institute for Statecraft (IFS) also admitted that II had broken charity laws and Foreign Office rules by its political output. Referring to tweets, Chris Donnelly, an honorary colonel in military intelligence, said: “we should not have sent [them] because the Foreign Office does not allow us to make any party political comment, nor does Scottish charity law.”

Skwawkbox report that, “The Scottish Sunday Mail, which first exposed II’s activities, commented last week on the number of ‘mainstream’ journalists acting as ‘outliers’ (presumably ‘outriders’) of the previously-opaque organisation and called for an urgent investigation – as did Scottish Labour MSP Neil Findlay, who said: This is a charity registered in Scotland and overseen by the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator, funded by UK Government contributions. It should never have been spewing out political attacks on the Labour Party and the Labour movement. Such clear political attacks shouldn’t be coming from any charity. We need to know why the Foreign Office has been funding it. This cannot be allowed to pass. We need a full inquiry into the actions of this organisation and its links to the Conservative Government.” Has this gross conflict of interest and clear political bias damaged the credibility of the Integrity Initiative? Apparently not or they would not contributing to the Russia Report.

From this it is logical to deduce that the architect of malign interference in the UK democratic process is a lot closer to home than Moscow! Ware and the ‘Poison Dartblowers’ who want to sue Corbyn for trying to clear his name have said they will drop the case if he is thrown out of the Labour Party. But they have already made their deal with Labour to extract blood money. Now Corbyn has a fighting fund of over £305,000 and it is up to Jeremy to call their bluff going to court to seek justice, set the record straight and prevent similar defamation scams in the future. This case could expose the corrupt smear campaign operated by the BBC using public licence fees to deliberately pervert politics in favour of the Tory Party. The propaganda from the Integrity Initiative was damning enough to bring down the corrupt Tory Government when it was first exposed; it cannot be ignored any longer. In Court the truth will provide the public pressure for a full investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election; we must rescue our democracy. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

While China is now the latest target country the US seems intent on crushing, Russia remains the global go-to monster state to be spuriously blamed for all espionage and evil doing; it’s also the choice culprit for red flag events to generate foe outrage over the ‘foreign enemy’ to detract from domestic mayhem by the alliance of badly Governed super powers. Johnson’s Tory Government, already being tooled around by Trump in his cold war ramp-up, will become even more vulnerable to US pressure after the forced self-harm of crash-out Brexit, when we can no longer rely on the EU for trade or allegiance. As always truth is the best disinfectant, which is why it is imperative that Jeremy Corbyn fights the John Ware defamation in Court to expose the BBC and media lies that deprived the British people of a Socialist Government. Ironically a Court case involving the Russia Report’s named key contributor, former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele, has exposed his and his dubious spy sources total lack of credibility.

In a RealClearInvestigations Article entitled, “Meet the Steele Dossier’s ‘Primary Subsource’: Fabulist Russian From Democrat Think Tank Whose Boozy Past the FBI Ignored,” they focus on his work fabricating a link between Russia, Trump and the sabotage of Hillary Clinton’s Presidential campaign. Just like our rush to find the rogue state meddling behind Brexit, lost cause Clinton really didn’t need Russian intervention, as the toxicity of her sabotage of Bernie Sanders and home grown PsyOps did it for her. The now infamous spy Christopher Steele, who created the Institute of Statecraft and the Integrity Initiative to milk our gullible Tory Government of millions by feeding dubious information to anyone who foolish enough to pay him just lost a libel case brought against him by a Russian businessman. They report, “Dossier source Danchenko’s drinking pals fed him a tissue of false ‘rumour and speculation’ for pay— which Steele, in turn, further embellished with spy-crafty details and sold to his client as ‘intelligence’.”

They reveal that, “The mysterious ‘Primary Subsource’ that Christopher Steele has long hidden behind to defend his discredited Trump-Russia dossier is a former Brookings Institution analyst — Igor ‘Iggy’ Danchenko, a Russian national whose past includes criminal convictions and other personal baggage ignored by the FBI in vetting him and the information he fed to Steele, according to congressional sources and records obtained by RealClearInvestigations. Agents continued to use the dossier as grounds to investigate President Trump and put his advisers under counter-espionage surveillance. The 42-year-old Danchenko, who was hired by Steele in 2016 to deploy a network of sources to dig up dirt on Trump and Russia for the Hillary Clinton campaign, was arrested, jailed and convicted years earlier on multiple public drunkenness and disorderly conduct charges in the Washington area and ordered to undergo substance-abuse and mental-health counselling, according to criminal records.”

So why might this be relevant to the Intelligence and Securities Committee’s Russia Report? RealClearInvestigations reveal that, “As a former member of Britain’s secret intelligence service, Steele hadn’t travelled to Russia in decades and apparently had no useful sources there. So he relied entirely on Danchenko and his supposed ‘network of subsources,’ which to its chagrin, the FBI discovered was nothing more than a ‘social circle.’ It soon became clear over their three days of debriefing him at the FBI’s Washington field office, held just days after Trump was sworn into office, that any Russian insights he may have had were strictly academic.” You would think that America, our ‘five eyes’ partner would have given us a heads up on the unreliability of our former intelligence officer and his dubious sources in Russia, but no they vetted him discovered he was unreliable and didn’t bother telling the UK allies. Do not expect to hear this embarrassing fact on a BBC News bulletin as it is being kept under wraps.

RealClearInvestigations say, “Danchenko confessed he had no inside line to the Kremlin and was ‘clueless’ when Steele hired him in March 2016 to investigate ties between Russia and Trump and his campaign manager. Desperate for leads, he turned to a ragtag group of Russian and American journalists, drinking buddies (including one who’d been arrested on pornography charges) and even an old girlfriend to scare up information for his London paymaster, according to the FBI’s January 2017 interview memo, which runs 57 pages. Like him, his friends made a living hustling gossip for cash, and they fed him a tissue of false ‘rumor and speculation.’ Instead of closing its case against Trump, however, the FBI continued to rely on the information Danchenko dictated to Steele for the dossier, even swearing to a secret court that it was credible enough to renew wiretaps for another nine months. One of Danchenko’s sources was nothing more than an anonymous voice on the other end of a phone call that lasted 10-15 minutes.”

If as RealClearInvestigations say, “Steele hadn’t travelled to Russia in decades and apparently had no useful sources there. So he relied entirely on Danchenko and his supposed ‘network of subsources’,” who was he relying on for the information to convince the British ISC that Russia posed a threat? Go figure! In the article they reveal that, “Some veteran FBI officials worry Moscow’s foreign intelligence service may have planted disinformation with Danchenko and his network of sources in Russia. At least one of them, identified only as “Source 5” in the FBI memo, was described as having a Russian ‘kurator,’ or handler. ‘There are legions of ‘connected’ Russians purveying second- and third-hand, and often made-up, due diligence reports and private intelligence,’ said former FBI assistant director Chris Swecker. ‘Putin’s intelligence minions use these people well to plant information’.” Who could blame Putin and his Russian GRU for playing their cold-war enemies like fools?

Our faithful Socialist hero the falsely demonized former Labour MP from Derby North, Chris Williamson, penned an Article in the Morning Star entitled, “The chilling manipulations of the Institute for Statecraft are straight out of the cold war playbook,” back when kicking out the Tories seemed a real possibility. He proclaimed that, “As the prospect of a socialist government is now a real possibility, it seems that vested interests will stoop to all manner of dirty tricks and smears to prevent that eventuality.” I doubt he could have imagined the Covert 2019 Rigged Election result and Johnson’s fake ‘landslide victory’ 80 seat majority. He said “Over the past couple of months, I have been investigating the activities of the Institute for Statecraft and its so-called ‘Integrity Initiative,’ after some of its dubious actions were highlighted in recently published hacked documents. They have registered premises just outside the Scottish village of Auchtermuchty and an office suite in an exclusive location near Temple Station in central London.”

Williamson continued, “In response to one of my parliamentary questions on December 3,” and he quotes Foreign Office Minister Alan Duncan who said that: “The Institute for Statecraft is an independent Scottish charitable body whose work seeks to improve governance and enhance national security. They launched the Integrity Initiative in 2015 to defend democracy against disinformation.” Which sounds like a noble cause, until Williamson reveals that, “The problem is that this ‘charitable body’ hasn’t confined itself to that and has strayed into smearing Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party. These tactics resemble those deployed by the CIA in Operation Mockingbird that was launched at the height of the cold war in the early 1950s. Its aims included using the mainstream news media as a propaganda tool. They manipulated the news agenda by recruiting leading journalists to write stories with the express purpose of influencing public opinion in a particular way.”

Williamson warns that, “Now it seems the British Establishment have dusted off the CIA’s old playbook and is intent on giving it another outing on this side of the Atlantic.” He notes, “Interestingly the mainstream media has been rather tardy in its coverage of the revelations contained in the hacked documents. I would have thought an international network of politicians, journalists, academics, researchers and military officers associated with this British-based project might have merited more than a passing mention on the BBC. But the fact that this charity has gone well beyond ‘defending democracy against disinformation’ and is itself indulging in disinformation against the Labour Party and its leader seemingly isn’t newsworthy to mainstream media editors. Even more so after I discovered, through a series of parliamentary questions, that since 2017 the Foreign Office has given more than £2.2 million to the Institute for Statecraft’s Integrity Initiative.”

Williamson continues his scathing revelations by presenting evidence saying, “Furthermore, a report on the Integrity Initiative by academics David Miller, Paul McKeigue, Jake Mason and Piers Robinson was published last month, which revealed its funding sources also included Facebook and Nato. Their report sets out the activities of the Integrity Initiative and makes for chilling reading. It refers to ‘manipulation of the public sphere, including campaigns to smear and suppress dissenters and block their appointment to public office.’ They cite overt attacks on British politicians, academics and other critics of Westminster government policies, most notably on the leader of the opposition and his staff. The report also states that covert networks or ‘clusters’ of journalists and academics are being established alongside a critical mass of individuals in think tanks, politics, government and the military whose work is mutually reinforcing.”

Williamson outlined steps he was taking and why something needed to be done, “These actions are not the charitable purposes set out in the Institute of Statecraft’s constitution. In fact, they do not amount to any kind of charitable activity at all, which is why I have written to the Scottish Charity Regulator which is now mounting an investigation.” He revealed the Institute of Statecraft’s more expansive malign agenda by revealing, “…the efforts of this state-funded charity are not confined to Britain. I have recently written to the Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez about the campaign launched by the Integrity Initiative last summer against the appointment of Pedro Banos as the director of Spain’s Department of Homeland Security. The group’s Spanish cluster succeeded in blocking Banos’s appointment by relentless public hostility and at least one Tory MP took to Twitter to join in the attacks.”

Williamson questioned, “…precisely why a Conservative MP, who represents the Isle of Wight, should publicly seek to damage a candidate for an internal Spanish governmental appointment is rather puzzling. When I asked Alan Duncan what on Earth a government-funded British-based charity was doing interfering in the internal appointments of a fellow European democracy, he completely failed to answer. In fact, the government has rebuffed most of my questions about the Institute for Statecraft and the Integrity Initiative. Ministers respond by saying things like: ‘Documents and correspondence about projects within the Programme will not be published, as this information could then be used to actively attempt to disrupt and undermine the Programme’s effectiveness’. Consequently, I tried to obtain some answers directly from the people behind this charity and so last month I visited both premises in Scotland and London.”

Of his visit to Scotland he relates, “I arrived at the address in Auchtermuchty after dark, to find it is located at the end of an isolated dirt track. When I reached the building, I was confronted by a semi-derelict mill. I spoke to some of the businesses based there, but none of them had heard of the Institute for Statecraft.” He then says, “When I visited their office in London the following week, the door was slammed in my face when I explained I wanted to ask some questions about their activities. Hardly the response of a state-funded organisation with nothing to hide.” Williamson talks hopefully of “the prospect of a socialist government” honestly believing as so many of us did before the Covert 2019 Rigged Election that it was, “a real possibility, even a probability.” If only we had recognized the worst, “…that vested interests will stoop to all manner of dirty tricks and smears to prevent that eventuality,” but we could never have imagined how ruthless the campaign would be with relentless lies and the BBC violating Purdah

Williamson concluded, “That is why it’s important to expose organisations like the Institute for Statecraft, and the Integrity Initiative, because they are incompatible with an open democracy. Goodness knows how many other bogus charities are lurking in the shadows seeking to influence public opinion and damage the prospects for a socialist Labour government.” He said that he didn’t expect the smears to end any time soon and in the end he too was targeted with an anti-Semitic smear campaign to oust him as an MP. He said back then that he intended to “continue pressing for answers to try to get the bottom of this scandal” and I hope he has not given up. These revelations about Christopher Steele, the Institute of Statecraft and his Integrity Initiative that’s devoid of integrity all support the defence of Jeremy Corbyn and add to the evidence in the leaked report that Starmer refused to send to Equality and Human Rights Commission as evidence, but was submitted by Craig Murray.

The knowledge that the sitting Tory Government in the UK has spent public money to deliberately fabricate disinformation to defame the opposition Labour Party and its Leader Jeremy Corbyn is enough to render the Covert 2019 Rigged Election invalid even without a full investigation into the industrial scale fraud committed with the postal votes. If this was exposed in a foreign country there would be an international outcry over this forcing the Tory perpetrators to face criminal charges. Look at the faux outrage over Venezuela at the UN despite having one of the safest voting systems in the world! The attempt by Starmer to erase Corbyn from the Labour Party in disgrace by settling a winnable lawsuit out of Court using members dues to reward John Ware, the ‘Poison Dartblowers’ and thus vindicating the BBC is the straw that broke the camel’s back. This scandal has reached toxic max we have the right to demand immediate resignations and a full public inquiry. Jeremy’s Defence Fund hit £316.000; so little time left to rescue our democracy. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

I welcome the rare chance that the Ware case might allow a unique opportunity to validate strong criticism of the BBC that’s been lurching further and further to the far-right to fully accommodate this corrupt Tory Government. Changes that have occurred in the few months since the Covert 2019 Rigged Election are really noticeable. The Victoria Derbyshire show was axed and to eliminate criticism of the Government, minimally balanced Politics Live has virtually disappeared. While announcing BBC News bulletins as being broadcast, “around the world” the presentations have become myopically parochial; the only overseas snippets include shots of Brits on Spanish beaches angry over new quarantine restrictions. Rising Covid 19 infection rates abroad make ‘world news;’ this detracts from Tory failures with a high UK death toll. The Paper Review has also pretentiously ‘gone global’ as it helps limit bad UK headlines, until the BBC cut to the US to faithfully transmit Trump press rants that do not need to be brought to you by Coca-Cola!

The relentless reporting over disruptions to summer holidays cruelly drums home a luxury so many working poor cannot afford to even dream of. It paints the false impression that the vast majority of the population are eager to jet of to a sunny vacation spot rather than worry over losing their job, learning to subsist on Universal Credit or face potential eviction. Those foolish enough to be lured into booking a trip to Spain, and lucky enough to have the money to pay for it, will now have to quarantine for fourteen days when they return; it was a sudden chaotic switch in policy, but they really should have anticipated that risk. The current focus on the tourist industry, air corridors and overseas trips is part of the Tory program of convincing the public there is very little risk of infection, they should return to work, their children should get ready to go back to school in the autumn and everything is returning to normal. There is constant confusion over the Tory Governments nonsensical mixed messaging and rules that then backtrack.

Government policies continue to confuse with Tory claims that they are putting safety first while it clearly seems they are mentally preparing the UK public to accept the inevitability of a second wave and a lot more fatalities. The Tories are actually still proactively driving that second wave of infection to further cull the ‘economically inactive,’ weakest and poorest citizens as well as the disabled and elderly in the ‘Holocaust in Care.’ Cummings’s ‘Herd Immunity’ eugenics program is still on track as a ruthless ‘Slaughter of the Sheeple’ will reduce the burden on the state; brace yourself for the next ‘Boris Spike!’ The BBC report that, “the Government is funding six urgent projects to try and understand why people from ethnic minorities are at greater risk from Covid 19. Scientists are being given millions of pounds to analyse data about health and social circumstances as well as genetic risk factors. The research will also investigate whether Healthcare workers are particularly vulnerable.”

BBC Scientific Correspondent, Pallab Ghosh reports, “more than 45,000 people have died from Coronavirus a disproportionate number have been from ethnic minorities the Government has announced a series of studies to analyse the Health social circumstances and activities of these groups to try and understand what’s going on. Research shows that ethnic minorities are more likely to die from Covid 19. Indians are at 1.5 greater risk than the white population. For Bangladeshis and Pakistanis it’s 1.8 and the highest risk is with black people at 1.9. One study will follow 30,000 Health and Social Care workers for a year to assess the factors that lead to them becoming infected and falling seriously ill. They’ll be asked questions about their mental and physical health as well as about their workplace routines.” While this should please the ‘Black Lives Matter’ protesters, I am still concerned that it might become a scapegoating exercise for the Government to blame the victims as the Tories have form with such tactics.

One Doctor says, “If we can find the factors that lead to personal factors that make people at increased risk we should be trying to protect them. Now that might be enhanced occupational risk assessments it could perhaps be enhanced by protective equipment and also in really high risk populations perhaps they shouldn’t be working on the frontline with Covid patients.” Ghosh reports that, “All the studies have to provide results within twelve months and will be shared with Community groups, Professionals Bodies and Health Regulators.” The Doctor responds, “Some of the studies may be able to supply data before the twelve month result in which case, immediately, as soon as we get any results, we will be hearing about them to see if there are changes that we can make to reduce this risk in our minority population.” Ghosh says, “Ethnic minorities are more likely to have jobs that bring them into contact with other people; it is hoped the new research will help them identify the risks and make the changes needed to save lives.”

The waves of bad news kept coming for the Tories today as a new Government report was completed focusing on the Covid 19 situation in Care Homes. MPs say the Government’s decision to allow hospital patients in England to be discharged into Care Homes at the beginning of the Pandemic without Covid-19 tests at the start of the pandemic has been described as “reckless.” The BBC interviewed Labour Co-op MP Meg Hillier, Chair of the Public Account Committee. The Committee said there had clearly been an “emerging problem” with official advice before it was “belatedly” changed in April. It accused ministers of being slow to support Social Care during the crisis. The lack of PPR supplies was even worse than in NHS Hospitals despite the increased vulnerability of Care Home residents. The Government claimed it had been “working closely” with the sector: that would be Health Secretary Matt Hancock’s “protective ring,” and “putting our arms around the Care Homes” otherwise known as the ‘hug of death!’

The Committee said around 25,000 patients were discharged into Care Homes in England between mid-March and mid-April to free up Hospital beds. After initially saying a negative result was not required before discharging patients, the Government later said on 15 April all patients would be tested. In a highly critical report, the cross-party Committee said the initial decision to allow untested patients into Care Homes was an ‘appalling error’. Speaking to the BBC, committee chair Meg Hillier acknowledged there had been limited data about the virus when early decisions were made; however she said there was also a long-term lack of understanding at the Health Department about how the Care Sector works. “The fact that there are people on low pay not taking sick leave, moving from home to home were things that were risk elements – if you had better understanding of any impact of any disease on a Care Home you would have understood the implications,” she said.

Among the many working poor not benefiting from Johnson’s generous Corporate bailouts, newly unemployed families are now turning to food banks so their children don’t starve. So the PM offers £50 towards bike repairs! Oh, what do you mean they haven’t all got bikes? So give them bikes… Boris, you can’t eat bikes! It was worse than a “let them eat cake” moment, but then perhaps a pragmatic aid was there to remind Johnson that he could risk being publicly shamed again by that outspoken young football star if he didn’t focus on the lack of food. It probably annoyed him as it could seriously disrupt plans for his national ‘fat shaming’ agenda, but he was forced to act; pledging to increase access to free school meals to another 1.6 million. Still the humanitarian bar was not set very high among ‘Compassionate Conservatives;’ who can forget Theresa May’s 6.8p per child ‘breakfast club!’ What would that provide? Affordable choices include: half a boiled egg; one slice of toast with 12 baked beans; 37.5 cornflakes in 100ml of milk!

When the increased access to school meals was announced during the BBC news segment they featured football hero Marcus Rashford who had shamed the Tory Government into a U-turn after our new not very Socialist Labour Leader, Keir Starmer failed to stand up to the PM. The BBC News anchor also interviewed Sir Michael Marmot director of University College London Institute of Health Equity and an advisor to the Director of WHO. She asked, “10 years ago you were part of a huge review into food and health and equality and here we are still talking about it, still trying to address problems what do you think of where we are today?” Marmot replied, “I’ve said …overdramatically if you look at the problem of obesity, that we can’t solve the obesity problem without solving the inequality problem.” It was so gratifying to hear this highly respected man endorse exactly the point I had made here just the other day. He said, “Because the nation’s waistline has grown what we have seen is increasing inequalities in obesity.”

He continued, “Children, which I emphasize in this new report, we’ve got this double burden of food insecurity and hunger and obesity in deprived households and that relates to the quality of food as well as the amount.” He was asked, “do you welcome the suggestion that an awful lot more children should be getting free school meals?” Marmot replied, “Very much so, I think we can’t deal with the problem of the nation’s diet without dealing at the same time with the social and economic circumstances in these people. We know for example with lockdown two million households were experiencing food insecurity, my goodness I mean what do you want from a country? First everybody should be able to eat and be out of food insecurity, that’s pretty basic and it means that we need to make sure there’s an adequate supply of food.” Admitting he was among those who have been “banging away at these issues for years” he praised Marcus Rushford’s remarkable accomplishment, I say why isn’t Starmer fighting for the poor?

In reference to Rushford, Marmot said it was, “Great, terrific, but we need to deal with this long term issue of social and economic inequality and dealing with the quality and availability of food. So, extending availability of free school meals and extending the scheme over the summer is very welcome indeed.” He was asked, “Focusing on the availability of food and what type of food people are eating and raising the issue of processed foods, high in sugar, the problem if you’re eating on the go. She said some of the foods that are really bad for you are cheaper than the foods that are much healthier?” Marmot replied, “Indeed you refer to the report I did in 2010, in February this year I did a marmot 2020 I looked back at the last ten years and I cited a figure produced by the food foundation that for households in the bottom ten percent of household income cannot afford the recommended foods.” It also follows that inequality accounts for depravation and the more deprived the area the higher the mortality from Covid 19

A Canary Article, “The Tories getting a Dimbleby to advise them on poverty sums up the problem” says that, Henry Dimbleby, a restaurant owner and son of former Question Time host David, has released a government-commissioned report into food poverty and hunger.” Dimbleby privileged background makes him an almost obscene choice to author such a book as the Canary point out. Describing the book they report that, “It calls for overarching measures to tackle a potential rise in food-related inequalities due to the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. The National Food Strategy Part One deals with the potential rise in food insecurity and poverty due to the pandemic. It states that: Our food system has just endured its biggest stress test since the Second World War. As COVID-19 swept through the UK, the entire machinery of supply and distribution had to be recalibrated, fast.” It also says, “the wave of unemployment now rushing towards us is likely to create a sharp rise in food insecurity and outright hunger.”

The Canary reveal that, “At the same time, the virus has shown with terrible clarity the damage being done to our health by the modern food system. Diet-related illness is one of the top three risk factors for dying of COVID-19. This has given a new urgency to the slow-motion disaster of the British diet. Even before the pandemic, poor diet was responsible for one in seven deaths in the UK (90,000 a year)…That is vastly more than the death toll from traffic accidents (1,780 a year)… and almost as fatal as smoking (95,000)…This is a medical emergency we can no longer afford to ignore.” As the report notes, “during the height of the pandemic, foodbank use rocketed… the number of adults in early April who said they had experienced some kind of ‘food insecurity’ hit 8.1 million. It also says that the majority of ‘new’ foodbank users during the pandemic were young people and those with children.”

The report says: “The UK economy shrank by an unprecedented 20% in April as the country went into lockdown. Every day we hear reports of well-known companies going bust or laying off swathes of their workforce. According to the latest figures, there have been 3.3 million new claims for Universal Credit since March 16th, 9.3 million employees have been furloughed and a further 2.4 million people have applied for the Government’s Self Employed Income Support Scheme. By October, when the furlough scheme comes to an end, the Office for Budget Responsibility estimates that 1.6 million more people will have been made redundant.” The solutions offered include extending free school meals and the holiday food program that Rushford bargained for.

The report’s recommendations are broad, and fall into two areas. Perhaps most urgently, to protect “our most disadvantaged children”, the report says the government should:
• Extend Free School Meals to everyone on Universal Credit. This would mean 1.5 million more children would have entitlement, taking the total to 2.6 million. At present, Free School Meals are only available to children of parents earning £7,400 in work income or less.
• Expand the Holiday Activity and Food Programme provision across England, so all Free School Meals-entitled children would be eligible. In 2019, the programme was available to 50,000 children.
• Increase Healthy Start vouchers’ value to £4.25 and make them available to all pregnant women on Universal Credit (or “equivalent benefits”) and also households on them, where a child is under 4. Currently, they are means tested and only available under certain circumstances.
• “Extend the work of the Food to the Vulnerable Ministerial Task Force for a further 12 months up until July 2021”. The government set up the task force during the pandemic to ensure certain protected groups could get food.

Although the first two items on the list have been agreed concessions for poor children are less of a priority than Corporate welfare for the Tories, but Rushford proved that the shame them into shifting policy tactic can work. According to the Canary, “The report’s second area is around the notion of ‘food sovereignty’. It recommends, among other things, that any trade deals post-Brexit do not compromise UK food standards.” This may be a battle already decisively lost unless the House of Lords take a stand on it as it was voted on in the Commons already. The report includes some evidence, both statistical and anecdotal, of the impact poverty has on food security and health. It confirms that, “Rates of obesity are higher among the poorest people than the richest (36% versus 21% in the most and least deprived deciles respectively). Yet it also claims that poverty alone isn’t a driver for obesity.”

The Canary say, “The report notes socioeconomic-based analysis that claims that while poor people may be obese due to ‘pound stretching’ (poverty), rich people could be obese due to being ‘restaurant eaters’. While this may be true, the report fails to give advice tailored for these individual groups. Moreover, it doesn’t give solutions to the problem of ‘choice’. That is, rich people have the choice to eat in a restaurant every night of the week. But poor people don’t have the choice of whether or not to eat what is considered unhealthy food – whether that be due to finances, time poverty or the social psychology of cheap, tasty food.” The Canary also criticize the authors lack of joined-up thinking when it comes to the logistics working in an impoverished environment. “…stress, and the impact stress has on appetite and energy, lack of equipment (1.9 million people are living without a cooker and 900,000 people without a fridge) poor skills, the cost of energy and a fear of waste that comes from having no margin for error.”

The Canary report that, “Dimbleby himself notes from his experience volunteering at a foodbank: The roll-out of Universal Credit was a recurring theme, as people struggled to make ends meet while waiting five weeks for their first payment. Even after the Government introduced a 100% advance payment to help bridge this gap (in January 2018) many people decided they would rather go without in the short term than have to pay back the advance in the form of lower payments in the longer term. These people’s stories had nothing to do with the food system: they were problems of poverty, mental illness, domestic abuse, and often revised or delayed benefits claims. But the report fails to make the basic recommendation, called for by some charities and thinktanks, of ending the five-week wait for a first Universal Credit payment.” You would have thought that the Tory Government would have enough evidence by now to realize that the five week wait just seriously compounds problems leading to destitution.

The Canary claims that, “the report recommends what are essentially sticking plasters,” they say, “the report fails to acknowledge the elephant in the room. It is inequality and a system which entrenches those divides, which is the reason society’s poorest people can’t eat well. If richer people decide to eat too much unhealthy food and drink a lot of alcohol, it is often and in no small part through choice. Under corporate capitalism, poor people are not afforded that same luxury. Sadly, whatever good intentions Dimbleby may have had have not manifested in his report. And herein lies the problem. Because when you get someone from a rich, privately educated background to comment on issues they’ve never experienced, then the outcome will always be the same. The UK’s poorest people no longer need blunt, crude and top-down measures to alleviate their suffering. They need a system change to banish the scourge of poverty for good.”

Can we really choke down another decade or more of this chaotic Tory Government? If Dimbleby’s privilege make him too far detached from the harsh realities of grinding poverty to really understand the issue at least he has tried to be compassionate. Most Tories are satisfied with the least they can get forced into conceding under intense public pressure before the offer assistance to the most needs. Cummings is warped enough to just accept culling those he considers a worthless drain on society. Covid 19 was going to hit the UK, but it did not need to hit us so hard or catch us so unprepared; those who lose their jobs now or due to crash-out Brexit should remember much of this could have been prevented and we could still derail Brexit. The Ware Court case could expose a huge amount of the corruption aimed at sabotaging the vote in the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. This will hopefully create a surge of public opinion to challenge the legitimacy of the vote, demand a full investigation and heave these Tories out of office
DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

A Canary Article trumpets that, “Chris Williamson is going to take legal action against the EHRC;” is this a long overdue fanfare of change as we launch the fight-back against toxic disinformation? The corruption of the Equalities and Human Rights Commission EHRC, represents a sorry example of the worst kind of ‘mission creep in the subversion of our democratic checks and balances. The organizations and so called ‘watchdogs’ that we currently rely on to adjudicate, providing fairness and exposing corruption, are themselves becoming corrupted by obvious conflict of interest appointment to stack the deck against protecting the public and delivering just decisions. What Williamson has chosen to do is a vital component of exposing and reversing this downward slide towards a totalitarian state by challenging the EHRC in Court while this is still an option. Once this corrupt Tory Government gains control over our Judiciary and ends all future Judicial Review then the UK enters the final stage of establishing full Dictatorship.

You could dress a tiger in a tutu, but it would remain a savage beast! The gradual takeover of all our regulatory bodies with Tory compliant yes-men leaves the shallow façade of a democratic process in place while critically disabling its impartiality and with that the entire legitimacy of its essential function in a fair society and its ultimate purpose for existence. EHRC is touted as representing the fair arbiter of Equalities and Human Rights in the UK; an impressive ‘tutu’ for the tiger preparing to rip the heart out of the valid Socialist opposition that has audaciously challenged the absolute power of this far-right Tory Government. A fully representative Ethnic mix should be an essential component of the makeup of EHRC for their decision making to realistically reflect the ‘Equality’ they claim to represent. Similarly any obvious political affiliations of its serving member represent a clear conflict of interest that renders genuine impartiality unlikely and delegitimizes not only their reports, but selection of who they are prepared to investigate.

The Canary report that, “Chris Williamson, former Labour MP for Derby North, says he’s named in the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) report into antisemitism in the Labour Party. On 29 July, Williamson said he plans to ‘take on’ the EHRC.” Labelling it a “Smear campaign,” the Canary elaborate on the background of the EHRC Report saying, “In May 2019, the EHRC launched an investigation to determine whether the Labour Party had “unlawfully discriminated against, harassed or victimised people because they are Jewish”. Williamson will have received a copy of the draft Report to review for his rebuttal; he obviously believes he has a strong case for claiming defamation that will be provable in a Court case. According to the Canary, “In a press release, Williamson said the report was ‘circulated to those it had named earlier this month’. The investigation has now finished and a report of its findings is due later this year. At this stage, details in the draft report remain confidential.”

“Williamson has assembled a legal team to challenge his inclusion in the draft report. He’s also set up a crowdfunder to raise £10,000 to cover legal costs” to which you can donate funds. The Canary report that, “Speaking about his decision to take legal action against the EHRC, Williamson said: I know that I can rely on the support and solidarity of thousands of people in taking on the EHRC. Many people are alarmed at the way in which this supposedly impartial body is operating. In my view, the EHRC’s conduct has played a leading role in legitimising a McCarthyite smear campaign against the British Left, and was instrumental in the attempts to derail Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. It seems pretty clear that the EHRC lacks independence from the government and has been abusing its legal mandate by attacking the Official Opposition.” EHRC claim to “operates independently,” they also state that: “We use our unique powers to challenge discrimination, promote equality of opportunity and protect human rights.”

In, “Equalities body accused of targeting BAME staff for redundancies” a Guardian Article published more than three years ago, the critical damage being wrought on the legitimacy of this organization was readily apparent, but no action was taken and EHRC has corrupted further. The Tories used ideologically driven austerity as a scythe to deliver strategic cuts that targeted minorities for severance effectively eviscerated the diverse mix of voices and opinions within EHRC. How seriously was the EHRC budget slashed? The Guardian reported that, “According to the National Audit Office, the EHRC’s budget has been cut by almost 70% since it was created. Its current budget will be cut by a further 25% over the next four years.” This permitted a certain level of deniability for the defenestrations with the organization able to claim that cuts were inevitable. Claims of ‘fiscal responsibility’ have been used as an excuse across a slew of Government Departments and Regulatory Agencies to pursue the Tory agenda.

The Guardian reported that, “Britain’s equality watchdog has been accused by prominent race campaigners of unfairly targeting black and minority ethnic employees for compulsory redundancies. The Equalities and Human Rights Commission received a letter on Friday claiming that its ‘credibility, authority and legitimacy’ within black and Asian communities have been damaged by a new cuts programme. It follows a decision by the statutory body to select 12 staff for compulsory redundancies. It is claimed only two of those were white British, while eight were from a BAME background, four of whom were Muslim, and six were disabled. Seven of the 12 were informed of the decision by email last month, according to the letter. The ECHR has rejected this claim, and pledged to increase the number of ‘underrepresented groups’ in senior positions in the commission.” Have they managed to follow through with that pledge in the past three years? It certainly does not appear that they have.

What did that crucial letter say? According to the Guardian, “The letter sent to David Isaac, the EHRC’s chair, claimed there were no visible minorities among the senior management team after the only black director was selected for redundancy, while all but two remaining BAME workers were on the lowest three pay grades. “In our opinion, it is not satisfactory or acceptable simply to say the percentage of BAME workers reflects the percentage in the national population and especially not with main offices in London and Manchester,” the letter said. “But this is not just about numbers: the personal experiences and viewpoints, which a diverse workforce brings, are essential if the commission is to challenge the majority or mainstream beliefs. “In a climate of rising levels of racist and Islamophobic attacks and where the majority opinion in GB seems to be anti-immigrant, anti-black and anti-Muslim, then it is even more important that the commission’s staff can stand firm against prevailing views.”

Among the signatories the Guardian identified, “Lord Ouseley, the cross-bench peer who headed the now defunct Commission for Racial Equality, is among 14 signatories to the letter from established academics and campaigners. Other signatories of the letter include Prof Gargi Bhattacharyya of the University of East London, Hanef Bhamjee from Action for Southern Africa, and Peter Herbert from the Society of Black Lawyers. Operation Black Vote and the GMB Regional Equality Forum also signed.” The Guardian notes that, “They said they were appalled by the way the employees were made redundant on 9 February amid planned industrial action by the PCS and Unite unions, and asked to meet with Isaac. “Sadly, we now have serious doubts about the commission’s credibility, authority and legitimacy with our communities,” the letter concluded.

The EHCR was established in 2007 to help eliminate discrimination, reduce inequality and protect human rights in the UK after the amalgamation of existing statutory bodies including the Commission for Racial Equality. An EHRC spokesperson denied that those let go were informed by email and claimed there was a lengthy process of engagement before their departure. Then there was that handy Tory austerity card deniability as he claimed, “Like the rest of the public sector, our budget has been reduced.” In 2017 there were pledges of future efforts to be more inclusive, but what of that crucial Tory pledge? The current EHRC board are so true blue Tory I felt rinsed! How surprised I was to discover that the Chair and Commissioners are public appointments made by the Minister for Women and Equalities. This predominantly Tory Government compliant EHRC do not appear to have addressed their dearth of diversity in a commission set up to address important issues of inequality: as such, it must be exposed as truly not fit for purpose.

I was really curious to find out whether they had met that diversity pledge so I did some digging? Sadly, in the whole of the UK they couldn’t manage to find a single person with relevant talent and expertise to represent the Afro-Caribbean community on the EHRC! That is unacceptable. The current EHRC remains overwhelmingly, snow blindingly, white with the solitary exception of Pavita Cooper who is of Asian descent, but well on-side with a declared donation to the Tory Party. While the Jewish community are strongly represented by Rebecca Hilsenrath as Chief Executive of EHCR, and Commissioner, Mark McClain, is from the LGBT community, I could not find a single disabled person on the panel and the only member who showed the slightest hint they might support the Labour Party or Unions was former Fire Fighter Susan Johnson. From their own Bio and registry of interests they are heavily representative of the wealthy elite with multiple Non-Executive Board memberships and Stakeholder declarations.

Serious systemic problems within the EHRC are surfacing elsewhere. In the Skwawkbox Article, “Former EHRC black and Muslim directors say they lost their jobs for being ‘too loud’ about racism” they highlight, “Another Newsweek exclusive puts EHRC’s fitness under spotlight after also revealing donations to Tory party. EHRC now has no black or Muslim directors.” This was “Just a month after its revelations that an Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) director made donations to the Tory party that she failed to declare when she was appointed,” as highlighted in another Skwawkbox Article on EHCR. Skwawkbox note that, “Newsweek has broken another exclusive that the organisation’s only black and Muslim directors say their appointments were not renewed because they were ‘too loud and vocal’ about race issues.”

Skwawkbox report that, “LibDem peer Meral Hussain-Ece and ‘crossbench’ peer Simon Woolley lost their government-appointed positions in 2012. Woolley told Newsweek: We were too loud… Our job as commissioners was to do exactly what they were supposed to do, to raise the fundamental issues of tackling race inequality in education, in health, in employment, within the criminal justice system and I saw that as my central role, but it was made very quickly aware to me that that strong voice was not wanted. They [the government] didn’t want the voices that challenge the big structural inequalities, which of course is the raison d’être of the commission, and then to work out plans to use its powers to demand change. The commission should not be a space for a chit-chat, this is perhaps one of the only bodies that we have in our country to hold our big institutions to account when it comes to racial injustice.”

Skwawkbox revealed that according to Newsweek, “Hussein-Ece voiced a similar view: We were the ones who spoke more about race. Race equality generally was put on the back burner… We were told to apply for the next term because it’s a four-year term, our performance was deemed good, and that we should reapply. When we did reapply, we were told we weren’t even shortlisted.” Of deep frustration to the Muslim community is the rampant Islamaphobia within the Tory Party, they say that, “The EHRC has persistently refused to investigate the Conservative party for racism and islamophobia, in spite of repeated requests by the Muslim Council of Britain and an abundance of evidence. The Tories have reduced the EHRC’s budget from its 2007 level of £70m to just £17.4m today. Sir Geoffrey Bindman, former legal adviser to the EHRC’s predecessor the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE), also features in the Newsweek article as a voice criticising the organisation and the government’s handling of it.”

Skwawkbox report that, “Bindman, who is Jewish, has recently joined the board of http://www.truthdefence.org, an organisation that describes itself as: a collective of activists, lawyers, creatives, journalists, academics and citizens concerned about the spread of disinformation online, in traditional media, and in political advertising and campaigning. We are equally concerned by cases where civil litigation procedures and the principles of natural justice are apparently undermined for politically motivated purposes. Truth Defence has already been vocal in highlighting problems in the media and political treatment of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and has welcomed Jane Heybroek’s stunning victory in court over accusers Rachel Riley and Tracy-Ann Oberman, so the presence of a leading human rights QC and former CRE counsel on its board is highly significant.” This coalescing of solidarity could not come at a more opportune moment as Corbyn is now in the crosshairs, but preparing for the fray with a Fund of £323,000!

The Canary article reported that, “In 2019, BBC Newsnight shared details of a letter that raised concerns about EHRC chair David Isaac. The letter, sent by chief executive Rebecca Hilsenrath, questioned EHRC independence from government. According to Newsnight, it said: David [Isaac] regularly declines to take public positions… Recent examples include the publication of a piece of research into the implications of losing access to EU structural funds, and the stripping of Shamima Begum’s citizenship.” They note that, “Hilsenrath’s criticisms don’t seem politically motivated and she previously criticised Labour’s handling of antisemitism. In response, the EHRC said it took ‘impartiality and independence very seriously’ and that: Our investigation into the Labour Party has robust procedures in place to ensure its impartiality and anyone with a conflict, or perceived conflict of interest, plays no part.” They report that “further questions have emerged about EHRC independence and impartiality.”

The Canary comment on June 2019, Newsweek revelations of Pavita Cooper failure to “declare her donation and fundraising activity for the Conservative Party”. They also say that, “In May, the EHRC refused to investigate Islamophobia in the Conservative Party despite receiving a number of complaints. Meanwhile, the investigation into antisemitism allegations in Labour continued.” On 28 July, a Newsweek exclusive had revealed the complaints of the two former EHRC commissioners who were not reappointed due to their outspokenness on issues of race. They note that, “Baroness Meral Hussein-Ece, who at the time was the only Muslim commissioner and Lord Simon Woolley who was the only black commissioner, both lost their positions in November 2012. There are currently no Black or Muslim board members. Newsweek also reported that Hussein-Ece said: “I don’t think islamophobia or anti-Muslim hate is taken seriously” and called for the EHRC to do more.

In a press release, Williamson said: “Far from being an ‘equalities watchdog’, I’d say that the EHRC has become a right-wing attack dog. It must be urgently disbanded.” The Canary call for ‘Solidarity’ as an earlier Canary Article reported that, “there are serious questions over the way allegations of antisemitism against Williamson were handled. In 2019, he successfully crowdfunded over £63,000 to bring a legal challenge against the Labour Party in the High Court. After winning back legal costs, he established a Left Legal Fighting Fund to ‘assist other activists who have been maliciously smeared and harassed’. It’s also now providing legal support to Black Lives Matter protesters. If the new crowdfunder meets its goal, any recovered costs from the legal action and unused funds will be donated to the Left Legal Fighting Fund to help other activists. Meanwhile, as attacks continue against Jeremy Corbyn and left-wing activists, solidarity is now more important than ever.” BLM protesters should be justifiably outraged by EHRC!

Many of our public ‘Watchdogs’ have been totally neutered, stripped of all their powers due to a steady stream of seemingly minor regulatory changes purportedly to eliminate so called ‘unnecessary red tape.’ The regulatory constraints, mandatory inspections with Health and Safety checks that could have prevented the Grenfell Tower tragedy are but one appalling example of reducing the burden on free marketers to profit from contributing to human misery. The Electoral Commission, supposedly overseeing our once free and fair Elections, represents another glaring example of a purposely toothless agency denuded of its powers by Government policy designed to deliberately reduce its effectiveness in providing scrutiny. “A Watchdog that cannot watch is just a dog” which is why we must “Rescue our Watchdog,” hence my Petition to fully investigate the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. In Court both Corbyn and Williamson stand a chance to expose the truth re Tory propaganda, a challenge that could bring down this Tory Government! DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

There has never been a more crucial time to fight the gross injustice of far-right Tory Government, BBC and Corporate Media political smears and defamation than right now as we appear set to lose a robust Labour opposition under Keir Starmer and solidify the Tory Dictatorship under Boris Johnson. The attack from John Ware against Corbyn has rallied the Left in solidarity raising close to £325,000 so far from those outraged over Starmer rewarding the ‘Poison Dartblowers’ who have lied for personal gain and to demonize the former Labour Leader. Of equal importance, Chris Williamson has set up a legal crowdfunding account vowing to challenge EHRC and set right the grotesque injustice of the fake ant-Semitism witch-hunt that is long overdue for correction. The EHRC has totally abandoned its most fundamental duty to the Muslim and other minority communities in order to protect the Tory Party from justified criticism over Islamophobia, as Johnson and Tory MPs scapegoat the Muslim community for their failures.

So when did it all go so wrong? The delegitimizing and marginalization of EHRC goes back away, to when Tory Ministers first started to overreach with regard to appointments and they still got away with inappropriate or ‘conflict of interest’ choices that were reluctantly accepted. This urgently needs to change as what should constitute a core demand of the Black Lives Matter movement as it is so fundamental to achieving racial equality in the UK. The Tories have got serious form when it comes to stacking the deck against minorities and the poor. In a four year old Guardian Article entitled, “Nicky Morgan under fire for choosing City Lawyer to head equality body,” they report on the, “Obvious conflict of interest in appointing lawyer whose firm works for government as chair of Equality and Human Rights Commission.” They said that, “The education secretary, Nicky Morgan, has come under fire for choosing a City Lawyer with an annual income of £500,000 to chair Britain’s leading equality and human rights body.”

The Guardian said, “Two parliamentary committees have written to Morgan, who is also minister for women and equalities, to warn that there could be a conflict of interest if David Isaac was appointed to the role; his legal firm carries out ‘significant work for the government’. Appearing in front of MPs, Isaac admitted that his salary as an equity partner at law firm Pinsent Masons would ‘dwarf’ the £50,000 he would collect as chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission,” according to, “Harriet Harman, chair of parliament’s joint committee on human rights, said there was ‘obviously a conflict of interest’ as the EHRC often took cases against the government.” She said, “What you should be having for the EHRC is someone who is a champion for human rights … You have to be fearless against the vested interests. You’ve got to be an agent for change.” She proclaimed that, “The lion’s share of his income will be coming from an organisation that has a vested interest. As they say, ‘he who pays the piper calls the tune’.”

The Guardian reported that, “Harman said the issue was not about Isaac, who chaired the gay rights group Stonewall from 2003 until 2012, but about a wider trend for the government to pick individuals with “illustrious careers in business, management, law” rather than proven campaigners. She said she would prefer them to opt for people like Shami Chakrabarti, the former director of Liberty, or Sam Smethers, the chief executive of the Fawcett Society. Isaac was put forward by a Whitehall selection panel and then chosen by Morgan, who asked Harman’s committee and the women and equalities committee, led by Conservative MP Maria Miller, to carry out a ‘scrutiny session’ with him.” Realistically today we know that such quasi scrutiny would no longer be at the discretion of Tory Ministers, but dictated by Dominic Cummings based on his personal warped eugenics prejudices and neurotic paranoia. This is no way to run a country for the good of the vast majority of its people.

The Guardian reported that, “Isaac faced tough questioning from politicians including the former lord chief justice, Lord Woolf. He asked Isaac to envisage a situation in which someone had made an application to the commission and then was disappointed by the response.” He was asked, “Do you think there is any risk that that person, knowing that you are a partner of the sort you are, would say, ‘I know why I have not been helped by the commission: it is because the chairman is actually in a firm of solicitors, and, directly or indirectly, his earnings from that firm are going to be affected by the amount of work the firm gets from the very department of government that he wants the commission to bring an action against’?” Woolf said “that would be a difficult problem to redress.” Isaac told MPs that, “he would not be carrying out any work for government clients during his chairmanship.” He felt “his pledge not do any Government work while Chair of EHRC should have prevented him from being disbarred from entering this role.”

But “Harman argued that conflict of interest was as much about ‘perception’ as anything else. She and Miller have jointly written to Morgan to say that rather than recommend Isaac at this stage, they would like to summon the education secretary and key figures from the appointment process in front of the committees.” Miller told the Guardian it was not a question of Isaac’s ability. “For an organisation like the EHRC it is clearly vital that we have a chair that has no conflict of interest that would call into question their ability to perform the role.” The Guardian had said, “Harman argued that there was a way to mitigate any potential conflict of interest- for example by Isaac stepping down from his role as an equity partner at the law firm temporarily.” To be fair, “a source close to Nicky Morgan hit back saying ‘we are baffled why Harriet Harman wouldn’t prefer someone with direct experience of working with the gay community, who also has experience of working in the business community over two people who lack his breadth of experience on these issues’.”

The undermining of public agencies set up to deliver scrutiny, accountability and justice got underway during the period of Coalition Government led by David Cameron. Few of us were made aware the road we were heading down back then as the issue garnered precious little attention in the media. However, three years ago a Guardian Article entitled, “Labour: new public appointments rules are ‘power grab’ by Tories warned of the consequences of this shift, if as it reported Ministers to have more say than independent commissioner on top job appointments at BBC and other agencies.” According to the Guardian, “Theresa May’s government has been accused of changing the rules on public appointments to make it easier in future for ministers to pick their political allies for senior jobs at the BBC and regulators such as Ofsted.” The Tories wasted no time stacking the deck to minimize public scrutiny, drafting in their cronies to compliantly adhere to the Tory agenda and eliminate any potential for their accountability for bad policy.

The Guardian reported that, “The new code on public appointments will give ministers greater powers over who oversees a raft of agencies, watchdogs and advisory committees, while weakening the involvement of the independent commissioner for public appointments, who scrutinises the system. Labour said the changes, which will come into force on 1 January, represent a ‘power grab’ by ministers and risk returning to the days of patronage and cronyism in public life. Ministers have always had the final say over appointments to senior public sector jobs, advised by a panel that shortlists ‘appointable’ people. However, independent assessors, chosen by the commissioner to oversee the most important competitions, will be abolished in favour of independent senior panel members picked by ministers.” We now have a revolving door of worthless reviews and inquiries that rarely produce actionable changes to be implemented by the Government; they are just kicked into the long grass by demanding further review!

In a convoluted system designed specifically to manage PR damage control by abolishing scrutiny and neutering the regulatory system we entered the zero accountability world that allowed Grenfell Tower to claim the lives of residents whose legitimate safety complaints were easily ignored with tragic consequences. The Guardian reported that, “The members will have to be independent of the departments and not currently politically active, but the commissioner will only have a consultative role. Ministers will also be able to overrule the panel by choosing candidates not deemed to be appointable and have the right to dispense with an open competition without the permission of the commissioner, although they will have to consult with the watchdog and openly justify the decision.”

While the Guardian said that, “The government argues that the decision increases the accountability of ministers,” they quote the concerns of Labour MP Andrew Gwynne who had warned about the greater risk of them “appointing chums and donors to public office”. He also said, “This Tory power grab is divisive and a worrying undermining of the role of the independent commissioner for public appointments.” They said, “The code was welcomed by Peter Riddell, the commissioner for public appointments, as an improvement on previous proposals set out by Sir Gerry Grimstone, a businessman who conducted a review for the government.” Riddell had stated that there had been a commitment to consult him “both about the appointment of senior independent panel members to assessment panels and about cases where exemptions are sought from holding competitions to make appointments.”

The Guardian note that at the time Riddell was reportedly said, “I believe that the real test for the new arrangements will be how they are interpreted by ministers. To preserve the balance between their right to be fully involved in the process and to take the key decisions, while ensuring that appointments are made on the basis of merit, with candidates being judged on a fair and equal basis.” Replying to Labour criticism they said, “Chris Skidmore, the minister for the constitution, defended the new code, saying it ‘rightly places ministers at the heart of the appointments process, given their accountability to parliament for public bodies. The new code introduces greater transparency into the system and reiterates the role of a strong, independent regulator of the process through the commissioner for public appointments. I want to see a process that champions diversity and builds a democracy that works for everyone.” But, we now have the unelected Chief Advisor Cummings forcing Ministers to abide by his selected picks!

In July 2016 the standards committee said: “The committee fears that the changes will remove some of the independent checks and balances of the public appointments process and may have the unintended effect of offering limited protection for ministers who wish to demonstrate they have appointed on merit alone.” According to the Guardian, “It comes after a number of cases in recent years in which ministers have been criticised for appointing allies to senior public positions. Under David Cameron, Philip Dilley, an engineering chief and former business adviser to the prime minister, was given the job of chair of the Environment Agency and David Prior, a former Tory MP and now minister, was appointed as chairman of the Care Quality Commission. There were also criticisms of some of Cameron’s appointments he made on his departure from No 10.” Our lawless PM, Boris Johnson manipulated and controlled by Cummings is intent on abusing this zero accountability system to the maximum degree possible.

Then in late 2017 another Guardian Article entitled, “UK ministers blocking appointments to rights watchdog, say lawyers” as it noted that the Government was, “accused of meddling by vetoing recruitments to EHRC board in attempt to iron out dissent.” It noted that, “The Equality and Human Rights Commission is running short of board members and struggling to fulfil its duties because, lawyers allege, ministers are repeatedly vetoing appointments on political grounds. Several experienced candidates supported by the state-funded independent body are understood to have been blocked in recent months after, it has been claimed, intervention by Downing Street or the Cabinet Office.” They say, “Confirmation is contained in published minutes of its board meetings” which warn that, “current vacancies on the board … [have] presented immediate quorum issues”.

The Guardian reported, “Some former board members allege the difficulties date to the arrival of Theresa May as prime minister, at which point stricter selection criteria are said to have been imposed. The government’s distraction over Brexit may also have delayed appointments. The shortage has coincided with the introduction of a new governance code on public appointments, which is said to have made it easier for ministers to pick their political allies.” With Boris Johnson under the control of Dominic Cummings the major emphasis in appointments will be to manage PR spin as we careen towards crash-out Brexit. Then only need to create a public façade of regulatory control to placate the masses through compliant BBC and Mainstream Media intervention as the Covid crisis becomes compounded by the devastating impact of crash-out Brexit. There will be winners and losers; the wealthy elite being the former while the vast majority of the population suffer immeasurably: equality and Human Rights are simply not on the menu.

The Guardian featured the case of Sarah Veale, “a former head of equality and employment rights at the Trades Union Congress, sat on the board for several years. The EHRC tried to renew her appointment but she was notified of her dismissal in a letter from the education secretary, Justine Greening, this year. Veale, who has been awarded the CBE and previously sat on the boards of the Health and Safety Executive and Acas, the mediation service.” She said: “It was really quite extraordinary. I have been told [the decision not to reappoint] was because a political adviser in No 10 had noticed a tweet I made disapproving of some government policy. They are obviously determined to iron out any kind of dissent. The chair of the EHRC [David Isaac] had specifically asked to reappoint me.” She had added, “There have been concerns about too much political interference. Ministers are meddling in areas in which they have no legal, let alone moral right to interfere. The board may lose out on appointing good people in the future.”

Noting at the time that, “At full strength the board of the EHRC is supposed to have 10-15 commissioners but it is currently down to eight participating members,” the Guardian reported a deficiency in the number of members available to serve on sub committees “…and longer-term risks in terms of the board’s breadth of expertise, and how the commission’s independence of government was perceived.” They said, “several highly experienced lawyers were supported as candidates by the EHRC chair but have not been approved, despite their extensive experience.” They noted, “A spokesperson for the EHRC said questions about appointments were a matter for the government. The EHRC recently asked to be given greater powers, including the right to make appointments to its board. A government spokesperson said: ‘All public appointments adhere to the governance code on public appointments’.”

It is a really sorry state of affairs when UK journalists fail to report important political news stories that we then learn about through foreign press outlets. However the UK news media refuse to keep us informed until shamed into reporting as they are so desperate to provide cover for the corrupt Tory Government. In a Newsweek Exclusive entitled: “Ex-Equalities Commissioners Say Calling Out Racism Cost Their Jobs,” the disgraceful truth emerges regarding lack of diversity in the agency charged with monitoring equality in the UK. Newsweek broke the story of how, “Two former commissioners at the U.K.’s Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), the country’s equalities watchdog, say they were not reappointed to their roles because they were ‘too loud and vocal’ about issues of race. Baroness Meral Hussein-Ece, who at the time was the only Muslim commissioner and Lord Simon Woolley who was the only black commissioner, both lost their positions in November 2012.”

This does not look good just as a controversial report into anti-Semitism is about to be published as it will call into question the impartiality of EHRC as a commission that seriously should be diverse to fully represent the discrimination issues faced by minority ethnic communities in this country. Now that the public Corporate heavy predominantly white panel is in the spotlight people are asking about political motivations for targeting the Labour Party while ignoring copious blatant racism in the Tory Party. This is not going t get any easier as Chris Williamson’s case is bound to increase public scrutiny of EHRC and not a day too soon. Although the leaked Labour Report was not submitted by Labour layers under Starmer’s orders the genie cannot be rammed back into the bottle with a pretence that this evidence does not exist. A full unredacted copy was submitted by Craig Murray and must be taken into account as valid evidence. It will just prove a serious embarrassment for Starmer that he tried to shelve the report.

With Black Lives Matter protests erupting all over the country there we must put serious pressure on EHRC to finally create a more diverse Equality and Human Rights team now, “as the Government Equalities Office (GEO) advertises for four new commissioners for the EHRC,” as this is supposed to be, “an independent body responsible for the promotion and enforcement of equality and non-discrimination laws in England.” Newsweek report that, “The EHRC says its simple goal is to make Britain fairer, with its set of enforcement powers to challenge discrimination, promote equality of opportunity and protect human rights. It has been awarded an “A” status as a National Human Rights Institution (NHRI) by the United Nations.” But the report, “At present, it has no black or Muslim members among its board of ten commissioners, which also includes the chair.” Also, “It currently stands accused of not standing up for British Muslims and being too close to the ruling Conservative Party, both claims the EHRC firmly denies.”

“We were too loud for what the new coalition government wanted,” Lord Woolley told Newsweek. “Our job as commissioners was to do exactly what they were supposed to do, to raise the fundamental issues of tackling race inequality in education, in health, in employment, within the criminal justice system and I saw that as my central role, but it was made very quickly aware to me that that strong voice was not wanted. “They [the government] didn’t want the voices that challenge the big structural inequalities, which of course is the raison d’être of the commission, and then to work out plans to use its powers to demand change.”The commission should not be a space for a chit-chat, this is perhaps one of the only bodies that we have in our country to hold our big institutions to account when it comes to racial injustice.” Baroness Hussein-Ece said “that she too feared that being vocal about issues of race worked against her.” She said: “We were the ones who spoke more about race. Race equality generally was put on the back burner during that period.”

Many of their comments were reported in a recent Skwawkbox Article that quoted from Newsweek, but the mainstream Media have yet to take notice despite the imminent publication of the report on anti-Semitism in the Labour party or more likely because of it. Newsweek report that Baroness Hussein-Ece, “described the decision not to reappoint herself and Lord Woolley at the time as an ‘appalling’ thing to do. ‘We were told to apply for the next term because it’s a four-year term, our performance was deemed good, and that we should reapply’. When we did reapply, we were told we weren’t even shortlisted.” Newsweek note that, “She also said that she was told by the Equalities Office at the time that more commissioners from business backgrounds were desirable. They wanted business people running it apparently, the budget was really slashed and the number of commissioners was slashed as well,” Baroness Hussein-Ece said.

According to Newsweek, “Both former commissioners said they felt the EHRC did not have the resources or budget to carry out its functions effectively, with significant cuts to its budget taking place since it was set up in 2007, taking over the responsibilities of three former separate organizations: the Commission for Racial Equality, the Equal Opportunities Commission and the Disability Rights Commission. The EHRC was founded, it says, to challenge discrimination, promote equality of opportunity and protect human rights.” Baroness Hussein-Ece said: “When I was there, it had more staff, more resources and the ability to take on more work.” Newsweek report that “Lord Woolley claims that replacing the former Commission for Racial Equality and amalgamating the former bodies into one, meant that it was difficult for the EHRC to maintain a focus on tackling racial inequality.”

Newsweek revealed how the budget had been slashed as Woolley said, “When we had the commission for racial equality, we had the budget, a focus to move the dial, we hoped we could, we hoped that with the amalgamated commissions, that we could maintain a focus but we always knew that would be a huge challenge, sadly we were proven right. In 2007, the commission had a budget of £70 million ($90 million). In June 2010, the EHRC’s budget was reduced from £62m ($79 million) to £55m ($70 million). It currently stands at £17.4 million ($21 million). The EHRC now has 206 members of staff. In February 2009, it had 425 fixed-term members of staff. ‘Less budget, less staff, no black commissioners, and I think that, in many ways, the commission couldn’t assert themselves,’ Lord Woolley says. Out of its core funding of £17.4 million for 2019/20, most – over £12 million ($15.4 million) – was spent on administration costs and around £5 million ($6.4 million) on program costs.”

This story featuring in a prominent US news magazine should cause considerable embarrassment to the Tory Government despite keeping the UK press gagged. Newsweek report that, “Sir Geoffrey Bindman QC, who was a legal adviser to the Commission for Racial Equality echoed the concerns of the commissioners regarding the claim that the EHRC lacked the resources to carry out its role effectively.”It has not really tackled the big issue which is now very current which is racial disadvantage and discrimination that exists.”

According to Newsweek, “Sir Geoffrey thinks without government support, it’s difficult for the EHRC to succeed in its stated aims and ambitions of challenging discrimination and protecting and promoting human rights. Ultimately the commission itself and the commissioners are perhaps not most to blame for the inadequacies, it’s much more a question of commitment by the government, willingness to put the sufficient resources in and their belief in the validity of anti-discrimination legislation.” This point was echoed by Lord Woolley. “Particularly after austerity, particularly after the coalition government, it (EHRC) lost its funding, it lost many of its staff and at times it seemed to be frightened of its own shadow,” Woolley said. “Both former commissioners and Sir Geoffrey also said that the EHRC had not done enough to investigate and tackle Islamophobia in the Conservative Party.”

Just imagine how incredibly incompetent and corrupt this Government will look after several years of politically motivated smears are exposed in Court as primarily fabricated by the Tory Party. There is already the hard evidence that they used public money to fund the anti Corbyn propaganda through a fake charity the “Institute for Statecraft” and its so called ‘Integrity Initiative.’ There is also the evidence from the leaked report from the Labour Party that Starmer is trying to bury that blows holes in Ware’s case and demonstrates the collusion of the BBC, plus there’s the Aljazeera video proving Israeli interference. The Courts cannot ignore all of that evidence and with that level of corruption the Government should fall even without the full exposure of an Investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election to uncover the Industrial scale postal vote fraud. Once the British public are fully informed that they have been exploited yet again by the Tories people will take to the streets as, despite Covid 19, they are getting bolder by the day. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

The UK, and our arrogant, overtly racist PM Boris Johnson in particular, habitually fails to examine how their policy agenda might be perceived outside the UK, especially when with regard to relations with the Muslim world. The myopic focus on anti-Semitism while ignoring the growing Islamophobic threats faced by Muslims living in the UK goes well beyond disproportionate. This obvious affront to the large Muslim community is driven by the political agenda. The powerful Zionist Lobby has infiltrated both of our major political parties in their eagerness to protect Israel’s apartheid Government from criticism of their persecution of an equally Semitic indigenous population of Palestinians. A Middle East Eye Article entitled, “Trojan Horse, Prevent, Islamophobia: How the EHRC failed British Muslims” lays bare the most significant failure of the EHRC: “Founded in 2007, the equalities watchdog has consistently let down the UK’s Muslim population.”

Corbyn’s support for a fair and just ‘Two State Solution’ was inconsistent with Zionist goals; the money, power and influence of the Israeli Lobby aided Tories in significantly corrupting our democracy with hateful propaganda. The ME Eye report, “In an interview with Middle East Eye last month, the former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn launched a pointed attack on the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Asked about the equalities watchdog’s ongoing investigation into Labour antisemitism allegations under his leadership, Corbyn said that the EHRC was ‘part of the government machine’, adding that its independence had been ‘taken away’ by the ruling Conservative Party. This is a serious claim because it suggests that the EHRC is not doing the job it was set up to do, namely protecting the rights of people in vulnerable communities. If Corbyn is right, then the EHRC is failing in its duty. It is protecting the government rather than those subject to discrimination.” Their article puts this claim under the microscope.

The Eye clarifies the emergence of the EHRC saying it, “was established in 2006 under Tony Blair’s Labour government as a ‘non departmental public body’. It describes itself as independent of government, though it says it ‘works with government to influence progress on equality and human rights’. It grew out of the Commission for Racial Equality – a longstanding object of contempt and mockery from the right-wing press and publicity-seeking Conservative politicians – which had been established in 1976 following a series of race relations acts passed in the light of changes to citizenship rules. The latter had reduced the rights of non-white Commonwealth citizens who had migrated to the UK, something that has now returned to haunt the country in the form of the Windrush scandal. Urgency to the work of the commission was added by the 1999 Macpherson Report into the death of Stephen Lawrence, a Black teenager murdered in London, and its finding of institutional racism in the capital’s Metropolitan Police force.”

Elaborating on the Labour Government strategy ME Eye report that, “Labour’s initial approach to addressing equalities concerns was to set up a series of commissions addressing issues such as gender and disability rights. In 2007 these were merged into a single commission, the EHRC. Before the 2010 general election, the Labour government proposed a new Equality Act, extending protections against discrimination to other ‘protected characteristics’ – age, gender re-assignment, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, sexual orientation, and religion and belief.” Accordingly they say that, “These would also be part of the remit of the EHRC. Conservative politicians and press were suspicious of these developments. Human rights legislation was frequently blamed for failures to deport criminals or ban alleged extremists.” But, in hindsight perhaps Labour were trying to cram too many important issues under one banner which ultimately made it more vulnerable following a change of Government.

Middle East Eye say, “It was surprising, then, that the new Conservative-dominated coalition government led by Prime Minister David Cameron committed itself to passing the Equality Act 2010. However, it did so with the EHRC beset by financial and governance difficulties and the government seeking to reduce expenditure as part of its austerity programme. This included a so-called ‘bonfire of the quangos’, with the EHRC included in the review of arm’s length bodies under the Public Bodies Act 2011” Around that same time the wholesale assault on so called ‘Red Tape’ was loosely justified as opening up greater opportunities for business by removing unnecessarily burdensome Health and Safety requirements. In reality it ushered in a period of rapacious Corporate greed with the rapidly expanding outsourcing of Government responsibility and accountability offloaded into the private sector; the Grenfell Tower fire was just one horrific consequence of this major change in policy.

There was a concerted effort made by the Tory Government to reduce or entirely eliminate the public scrutiny that provides the vital checks and balances protecting the public from harm and exploitation. Security of UK Elections was similarly compromised when Electoral Services were outsourced while the Electoral Commission fell victim to this evisceration of power; they were denied the ability to scrutinize the ‘management’ provided by IDOX and other private interties. The ME Eye report that, “The EHRC emerged with a considerably reduced budget and a requirement for onerous bi-monthly meetings with the responsible minister. Its annual budget was slashed by 68 percent and subject to Cabinet Office spending approval. At the same time, commissioners were recruited from those with expertise (e.g. from among former civil servants and businesspeople) rather than experience (e.g. from among civil society groups active on equalities). It also increased the number of commissioners with links to the Tory party.”

The Middle East Eye claims that, “This may help to explain why the EHRC at present does not have a single Black commissioner, nor apparently any from a Muslim background” When questioned on this an EHRC spokesperson said, “that religion was a private matter, and pointed out that the current chair, David Isaacs, had said that the organisation would like a more diverse board. These measures laid the ground for greater political control.” I would certainly agree that the focus at EHRC was inappropriate. They say, “Human rights are usually understood as favouring respect for difference and, thus, for multiculturalism within a liberal framework.
This was the position of the Runnymede Trust’s Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain under Bhikhu Parekh, a former vice-chair of the Commission for Racial Equality, which reported in 2000. It argued that national identity should be understood as inclusive of ethnic minorities and should express their right to co-determine the political community to which they belonged.”

Middle East Eye report that, “Trevor Philips, the first chairman of the EHRC (and himself a former chairman of the Runnymede Trust, which had commissioned the Parekh report and chaired its launch), had a different agenda. Philips was concerned about the expression of religious difference by Muslims. By 2005 he was arguing that Britain was ‘sleepwalking our way to segregation.’ The Labour government was expressing similar concerns. Then in 2009, on the 10th anniversary of the Macpherson report, he criticised its central idea of institutional racism. He argued that the phrase obscured a decline of racism in Britain, which was one of the ‘best places in the world to be an ethnic minority’.” When ME Eye put it to Phillips, “that he had a different agenda to Parekh and reminded him of these comments,” he told them: “I do not assent to any of the premises of your questions.” We have heard this British exceptionalism excuse for defending Tory inaction repeated by, detached from harsh reality, BAME Tory MPs.

Middle East Eye report that, “When David Cameron declared, at the 2011 Munich Security Conference, that “state multiculturalism” was dead and that many British Muslims were living segregated lives with values at odds with those that underpinned public life in the UK, Phillips – then still director of the EHRC – once again agreed.” This was inherently divisive as ME Eye claim, “There was no evidence for this claim, which has been contradicted by the government’s own citizenship surveys since the argument was first put forward following urban unrest in northern towns with large Muslim communities in 2001. These have shown consistently that British Muslims show exceptionally strong commitment to the liberal underpinnings of public life, not least because they are beneficiaries of religious tolerance. But there was no defence of Muslims from the EHRC in the aftermath of that Munich speech. This failure was particularly striking since ‘religion and belief’ had become protected characteristics in the 2010 Equality Act.”

Middle East Eye reported that, “Then the EHRC’s own Fairer Britain reports found that Muslims were the most disadvantaged religious minority in Britain. Another EHRC report attributed this disadvantage to ‘skin colour’ and the false perception that they are culturally and religiously ‘alien’ to the mainstream culture.” They say that, “Staggeringly, the EHRC did nothing to address this by taking, or recommending, positive action to address these issues.” When our elected Prime Minister gets away with hurling insults in a national newspaper likening Muslim women to letterboxes for wearing traditional dress it opens up the floodgates for what is now acceptable abuse, because there was no negative consequence for such racist remarks. This was among the numerous other examples of hate speech that should have rendered the PM unfit for public office. Instead he and other rabidly bigoted MPs have been openly encouraged to brand a gentle, non-offensive, man of peace a racist for the crime of speaking up for the Palestinians!

Middle East Eye highlight the so called ‘Trojan Horse Scandal’ revealing that, “More shocking still has been its failure to act over the Trojan Horse affair, which burst into the news in early 2014 with claims about Islamist extremism in Birmingham schools. This involved deeply flawed government reports and, finally, in 2017, the collapse of professional misconduct cases brought against teachers at the school at the centre of an alleged plot. The cases collapsed because of ‘serious improprieties’ on the behalf of lawyers acting for the agency of the Department for Education responsible for teacher standards.” ME Eye contend that, “If ever there was a scandal which cried out for a full-scale investigation by the EHRC, it was Trojan Horse. Instead, in the wake of the affair, the government ratcheted up its Prevent counterterrorism strategy to address ‘non-violent extremism’.” This was a huge error in judgement that ME Eye believe was, “a crucial moment in the government’s relationship with Muslim citizens.”

The highly controversial Prevent strategy has been heavily criticised by leading figures within the Muslim community. It has proven extremely divisive, inhibiting collaboration and community cohesion while increasing suspicion of authorities and the motivation for their often intrusive targeted interventions. According to Middle East Eye evaluation, “The revised Prevent strategy allowed ‘public interest’ in security to trump the right to protection of religious expression on the part of British Muslims.” They say, Supporters of Prevent are entitled to say that freedom of expression is demonstrated by the country’s mosques, Muslim organisations and charities, and, by comparison with some other European countries, the lack of a ban on face covering.” But content that, “critics of Prevent are concerned with the clumsy and often implicit conflation of Islam as many choose to practice it with extremism, and its consequences for public perceptions of Muslims (including within the Tory party and its problems with Islamophobia).”

Middle East Eye report that, “the EHRC had nothing to say about this, even though the issue was squarely within its remit,” saying that they had, “detected a pattern of silent assent on behalf of the EHRC to government policy.” ME Eye cite another example, “In 2016 two parliamentary committees, the Committee on Women and Equalities and the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights, called for a review of Prevent over concerns it was discriminatory against Muslims. Once again, the EHRC was silent – which made it easier for the government to fail to react. Instead Prime Minister Theresa May proposed in her 2017 Conservative manifesto that ‘equalities’ should be used as part of an extended counter-extremism strategy. ‘Extremism’, she stated, ‘especially Islamist extremism, strips some British people, especially women, of the freedoms they should enjoy, undermines the cohesion of our society and can fuel violence. To defeat extremism, we need to learn from how civil society and the state took on racism in the 20th century’.”

As Theresa May entered into her disastrous 2017 snap Election campaign with her robotic fixation on “Strong and Stable” she was seriously challenged by the Manchester Bomb attack. Jeremy Corbyn made a controversial statement that our jingoistic overseas interventions were likely to precipitate terrorist attacks in the UK. The right-wing Blairite hawks within the Labour Party who did not support Corbyn’s progressive agenda were exalted, as were the Tories, believing that Jeremy’s bold anti-war conviction was a real weakness that would sink the party. It did not and May nearly lost. ME Eye say, “In the aftermath of the election she duly set up the Commission for Countering Extremism which has characterised the expression of conservative religious views or political Islam, alongside manifestations of far right and far left ideologies, as involving “hateful extremism”. This was another matter of intense relevance to the EHRC. But yet again the organisation said nothing about religion and belief as a protected characteristic.”

According to Middle East Eye, instead EHRC, “has declared that one of its priorities would be to ensure ‘the education system promotes good relations with others and respect for equality and human rights’, as if this might be in doubt in some publicly funded schools, when its own reports found no evidence that it was. The EHRC was again largely silent throughout the wide and negative reporting about protests by Birmingham parents concerning LGBTQ teaching in primary schools, in which many of the children were from Muslim backgrounds. In its only intervention, David Isaac, the chair of the EHRC since 2016, told the Independent newspaper that head teachers of primary schools should be free to teach children about LGBTQ relationships without consulting parents. But education guidelines stress the need to build ‘positive relationships’ with faith communities. What is more, they do so by invoking the Equality Act 2010, the very piece of legislation which sets the terms of reference for the EHRC.”

It is interesting to note that at the time when David Isaac was selected for a position on the EHRC the Tory Government Minister responsible for the decision was Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan. The appointment had been controversial due to Isaac’s work for the Government through his Law Firm which many felt created an unhealthy conflict of interest. While it may be inappropriate to imply impropriety, an appearance of cautious distancing from a crucial element of EHRC remit on an Education issue is there. ME Eye say, “The Department for Education’s guidelines cite religion and belief as a protected characteristic: ‘A good understanding of pupils’ faith backgrounds and positive relationships between the school and local faith communities help to create a constructive context for the teaching of these subjects… Schools must ensure they comply with the relevant provisions of the Equality Act 2010, under which religion or belief are amongst the protected characteristics. All schools may teach about faith perspectives’.”

ME Eye say that, “Since a landmark Runnymede report on Islamophobia in 1997, Muslim organisations have sought to establish a formal definition, similar to that for antisemitism. There has been a determined effort to block such a development by lobby groups such as the Henry Jackson Society and Policy Exchange, as well as the National Secular Society.” It might cause less controversy to create an overarching antiracism definition to prevent the Zionist Lobby weaponizing anti-Semitism. ME Eye ask, “Where does the EHRC stand on this issue, which falls squarely within its sphere of responsibility? Once again, it has ducked the question. It has refused to say whether it thinks a formal definition of Islamophobia would be helpful to address the discrimination its own reports show is faced by British Muslims. It resisted pressure to investigate charges of Islamophobia in the Tory party. When the prime minister finally set up an internal investigation, it declared ‘it would not be proportionate’ to initiate its own investigation.”

The Middle East Eye questioned this lack of concern, “in spite of the fact that a YouGov poll last year unveiled the chilling finding that two-thirds of Tory members believed parts of Britain operated under sharia law. Almost half believed in the myth of no-go zones where ‘non-Muslims are not able to enter’, while 39 percent thought Islamist-inspired attacks ‘reflected widespread hostility to Britain among the Muslim community’.” But there is little wonder that such rabid sentiments are rife within the Tory Party given the disgraceful racist remarks made by their leader Boris Johnson. The PM acted with impunity and refused to apologize for the hurt he has caused by normalizing hateful racist insults that precipitated violent attacks on people in the BAME community. It’s not permitted to openly accuse an MP of lying in the Chamber, but equally Labour MP Margaret Hodge should have been disciplined for her disgusting rant in the Commons. I would rather see MPs called out for lying than witness racist abuse in Parliament.

The ME Eye returned to, “the hugely controversial Prevent strategy.” asking the EHRC, “whether it had made a submission to the Independent Review of Prevent that is currently in progress, but had a deadline for submissions by 9 December last year.” They hadn’t done so. Described as, “extraordinary given that the organisation has acknowledged strong views on Prevent.” ME Eye say they, “know this because it has stated them in its annual reports to the UN. Indeed, its last report in March 2020 could hardly have been stronger. It highlighted concerns ‘that Prevent is discriminatory and risks undermining freedom of speech, the right to private life and the right to manifest a religion.’ It is obliged to make this report to the UN, which accredits national human rights institutions under the Paris Principles of 1992, and where the EHRC enjoys an A-Rating. The question arises why the EHRC should tell the United Nations about concerns over Prevent – but keep quiet about those concerns when it comes to the Independent Review of Prevent.”

Middle East Eye claim that, “It cannot be stressed too strongly that the EHRC has a constitutional duty to support and uphold the obligations of the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Equality Act 2010 to protect the freedoms of British citizens. This continuing duty and the powers to conduct inquiries were set out explicitly in the Equality Act 2006. The duty included ‘encouraging and supporting the development of a society in which… there is mutual respect between groups based on understanding and valuing of diversity and on shared respect for equality and human rights.’ For a body charged with tackling discrimination, the EHRC has arrived embarrassingly late at fundamental issues confronting our society.” The Black Lives Matter protests are demanding action, but this Tory Government have responded by kicking the can down the road again pledging yet another inquiry that id destined to produce few if any actionable recommendations. The EHRC is an integral part of this policy of perpetual postponement in issues of race.

Middle East Eye report on the recently announced, “inquiry into the impact of coronavirus on BAME communities which, it says, has revealed ‘long-standing, structural race inequality’ in Britain. This investigation, while commendable, raises the question why the EHRC didn’t react to issues of ‘structural race inequality’ in Britain earlier. Following Wendy Williams’s review of the Windrush scandal, it has announced an assessment of hostile environment policies at the Home Office. Bear in mind that the Guardian journalist Amelia Gentleman and politicians from Caribbean nations were raising the issue in 2018. Amber Rudd resigned as home secretary in April of that year. MPs were calling on the EHRC to investigate in April 2019. Sadly, the EHRC has also repeatedly failed to speak up for the rights of Britain’s Muslim citizens. This means that there is some justice in Jeremy Corbyn’s criticism, irrespective of the outcome of its well publicised inquiry into alleged Labour antisemitism.” They admit to making “many material criticisms of the EHRC in this article.”

Middle East Eye “put all of them to the EHRC in good time before publication,” but say, “The EHRC has chosen to avoid answering any of them.” Instead a spokesperson issued us a blanket assertion: “We have a strong track record of working to make Britain a fair society in which everyone has an equal opportunity to fulfil their potential and participate, without being limited by prejudice or discrimination. “We take our independence and impartiality incredibly seriously. To suggest otherwise fails to acknowledge our past and ongoing work in holding government to account and promoting equality and human rights across a range of issues, including work on religion and belief and racial inequality. “As set out in the Equality Act, commissioners are appointed by the government of the day. All our board members bring a wealth of experience and have a strong track record of working on equality and human rights and corporate issues. Robust policies and procedures are in place to manage any perceived conflicts of interest.”

Middle East Eye say that they disagree with the EHRC rebuttal, stating, “The truth is that on black and Muslim issues the EHRC has served the government’s agenda. It has repeatedly failed to display the teeth or the will to tackle the key issues that ought to have been on its agenda for the past decade.” The EHRC does still have the power to take decisive action against racism with the full support of the UN, but it is dressed to deceive, functioning as a Government enforcer by only unleashing its wrath in an unjust vilification of the opposition: that is why I call EHRC “a Tiger in a Tutu!” In their current iteration the EHRC are not fit for purpose and deserve to face the Legal attack of Chris Williamson; we must Support his warranted Legal fight just as we should Support Corbyn for exposing the truth in Court. With these cases we can expose the corrupt agenda of this Tory Government and demand a full Investigation of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. We must demand justice and remove this Tory Government from office ASAP. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

On Sunday morning the Tory propaganda mouthpiece that was once the respected BBC continued its new theme of presenting not just important UK News, but news from around the world. However, their concept of what now constitutes ‘news’ consists almost entirely of reports on which countries are experiencing spikes in Covid 19: the lockdown in Melbourne Australia which was declared a ‘state of disaster;’ increased cases in India and South Africa and a small cluster of cases emanating from a pub in Scotland. Yes there was news of a Tory MP arrested for rape allegations and the private Space-ex capsule returning to earth, but when will our BBC national news headlines return to earth? There was almost no clarification to justify the very sudden restrictions imposed on several Northern areas of England, except to promote the concept of keeping future lockdowns local and unapologetically targeting cities with large ethnic minority communities literally just a matter of hours before the important Muslim celebration of Eid.

In the Guardian Article, “Tory MP condemned for claim BAME people breaching lockdown most,” they reveal that Tory MP Craig Whittaker stands, “accused of baseless claims after Covid-19 comments aimed at Muslim community.” In “baseless allegations he said, “the ‘vast majority’ of people breaching coronavirus lockdown rules were from black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, particularly those from Muslim backgrounds.” According to the Guardian, “the MP for Calder Valley, West Yorkshire since 2010, told LBC radio there were sections of our community that are just not taking the pandemic seriously’. Asked if by this he meant the Muslim community, Whittaker said: ‘Of course. If you look at the areas where we have seen rises, and cases, the vast majority – not by any stretch of the imagination all areas – it is the BME communities that are not taking this seriously enough’.”

The PM is now desperate to latch onto a way to scapegoat members of the public and minority groups to detract from his shameful and shambolic mishandling of Covid 19. The Guardian say, “Boris Johnson, when asked during a Downing Street press conference on coronavirus whether he agreed with Whittaker’s comments, did not distance himself from them, saying only that it was ‘up to the whole country to get this right’ and ‘I think it’s up to all of us in government to make sure that the message is being heard loud and clear by everybody across the country, and to make sure that everybody is complying with the guidance.” Despite the PM “thanking mosques and imams for spreading the message on social distancing” his targeted, divisive, racist ‘othering’ was clear. “Whittaker’s constituency is among those areas affected by new lockdown rules announced overnight which bar people from meeting others in homes or gardens. The announcement came ahead of Eid,” but he claimed “it had nothing to do with the Muslim celebration.”

In his evidence free attack on the Asian community Whittaker claimed to have been challenging local leaders for weeks, but he ignores the realities of multiple socio-economic factors as well as recognized ethnic vulnerability to Covid 19. Higher levels of type 2 diabetes, heart disease and obesity are greatly exacerbated by the grinding poverty caused by a decade of ideologically driven Tory austerity and deprivation. Poorly paid minority workers are more likely to be forced back to work in frontline jobs or factories with minimal adherence to Health and Safety standards. But ignoring this Tory driven inequality, Whittaker then has the sheer gall to launch an attack on the cramped communal living that is a direct result of Tory cuts. According to the Guardian he said, “It’s not just the Asian community in our area. We also have areas of high multiple-occupancy that are in the same boat. When you have multiple families living in one household that doesn’t specifically have to be the Asian community, but that is the largest proportion.”

Liberal Democrat Councillor for Shadwell in Tower Hamlets, Rabina Khan, offered a stinging rebuttal to Whittaker’s assertions in an opinion piece written for the Independent. She says, “Conservative MP Craig Whittaker’s claims about the ‘vast majority’ of the black and ethnic minority community in his West Yorkshire constituency not taking the pandemic seriously are undeniably one-sided. We should not be playing the blame game, but instead trying to establish why some people believe that the virus does not pose a risk to them. While it is clear that some people in the BAME community are not exercising social distancing, the same applies to white communities.”

Khan reminded us of the fact that, “The prime minister’s top adviser Dominic Cummings broke the rules and then lied about it to the nation.” Johnson’s refusal to even admit that Cummings was guilty of bending the rules created a huge amount of wiggle-room for those intent on putting their own selfish desires above the common good. The PM choosing not to discipline Cummings in any way was disgraceful, but it took a huge risk over public adherence to future messaging. Why was Johnson so insistent that he and his Tory cabal must exonerate Cummings despite his obvious guilt? Johnsons Chief Adviser remains in control of the PM because he holds the key to all the evidence that could expose the Covert 2019 Rigged Election and bring down this Government. As I’ve said here before “Cummings is the grenade, oust him and you pull the pin!” What a shame the spineless new Labour Party Leader, Keir Starmer is so intent on enabling Boris Johnson that he has failed to see the strategic importance of demanding Cummings is fired.

Khan didn’t say, but this was not the only non compliance scandal close to home for Johnson to ignore and quash as he drummed home the message that the wealthy elite did not have to abide by any restrictions to their extravagant free-wheeling lifestyle. His own father, Stanley Johnson claimed he had “urgent business” to attend to at his villa in Greece; essentially preparing the property for excessively privileged wealthy people who wished to ignore the UK lockdown for a get-away in the sun! In an exuberant bout of upper class exceptionalism, Stanley Johnson very publically boasted about how he cheated the system by travelling via another country to Greece rather than being prevented from taking a direct flight. When money is no obstacle restrictions present just a minor inconvenience. Of course Boris Johnson refused to comment on the selfish exploits of his father, further reinforcing the ‘one rule for us’ privilege while quite another set of rules for the working poor restrict civil liberties and are enforced by on the spot fines.

We have had weeks of hype about air-bridges as if it was our moral duty to get on a plane and jet off for a vacation that the newly unemployed cannot afford. Now we are expected to pity those who must cancel or cut short holidays due to newly imposed travel restrictions and quarantine! Khan remarked on the hypocrisy of Whittaker’s blame and shame rant saying, “just look at the footage from Bournemouth Beach during the recent spells of hot, sunny weather and see the large number of white people failing to listen to social distancing advice, selfishly putting themselves, their families and other people at risk. On 25 June, these mass gatherings led Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council to declare a ‘major incident’.” Higher susceptibility to Covid 19 among BAME individuals doesn’t automatically make those in ethnic minority communities any more guilty of irresponsible behaviour than the thousands mindlessly flocking to UK beaches in the hope of turning from alabaster white to sun-scorched lobster red!

Solidarity is building, not just among those in the BAME community, but within the Socialist Left, enraged by the lies Williamson’s campaign to exposé EHRC is gaining support. Among certain BAME cultures I’ve noticed a far stronger bond of intergenerational respect, comradery and support than I see among families in the white British population. Unquestionably an admirable trait that the British as a whole would do well to emulate, it does have the potential to increase risk in a Pandemic situation where isolation is the best defence. However, Khan was scathing with regard to the out-of-touch Tory MP, “Adding to the offence that Whittaker has caused, he uttered his divisive remarks on Eid-Al-Adha.” She was eager to point out that, “Despite lockdown measures this year, Eid-Al-Adha and Hajj were commemorated differently to other years, but they were still celebrated. Like other religions, Muslims made sacrifices in keeping with their faith – making sacrifices makes us more compassionate in a troubled world.”

Khan made an important rebuttal to the callous Tory MP’s insults over housing arrangements saying, “Whittaker also referred to ‘areas of high occupancy being an origin’ of the spread of the virus. Does he think that overcrowded families live like this out of choice? And let us not forget that many intergenerational families choose to look after their elderly parents in their homes, thereby taking the pressure off social care. This is a sector in which the government has failed to protect our older citizens in nursing homes, with 20,000 deaths to date. This fact was left out by Whittaker.” This demonstration of responsibility towards elders is a desirable characteristic that should be encouraged by the Government who currently do so little to assist those who chose to care for their parents at home. Carers allowance should be increased to incentivise the unemployed to consider this option. I cared for my mother for the last five years of her life while I worked on design projects at home; it wasn’t easy, but it was very rewarding.

Khan noted that, “Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Meral Hussein-Ece said, ‘Divisive comments at a time of crisis are unhelpful. Assigning blame onto different communities does nothing to promote good community relations and MPs should behave more responsibly rather than apportioning blame’.” Khan said, “It was also inevitable that the number of Covid cases would rise again after pubs, bars and public parks reopened. If you wander into a park, or past a pub, especially on a sunny day, you will see hordes of individuals, friends and families together – of all ethnicities. Several pubs have had to close again after customers tested positive for coronavirus, and further lockdown restrictions are being reintroduced. Lord Simon Woolley, founder and director of Operation Black Vote and the advisory chair of the UK Race Disparity Unit, said, ‘When the data clearly doesn’t support the rhetoric, the rhetoric is in danger of becoming a poisonous racist rant. Haven’t BAME communities suffered enough without now being blamed for its rise?”

Strange how those two names sounded familiar: where had I heard of Baroness Hussein-Ece and Lord Simon Woolley recently? Both are former members of the EHRC; both considered too loud and too outspoken on racial issues, so ousted from the team in favour of white business heavy-hitters. I wrote only the other day that, “Newsweek report that Baroness Hussein-Ece, ‘described the decision not to reappoint herself and Lord Woolley at the time as an ‘appalling’ thing to do.” But are we hearing from the EHRC Chair or any of the current EHRC Commissioners on this very obvious controversial stoking of racial tensions during the Pandemic in a disgraceful effort to scapegoat the BAME community over their alleged lack of responsibility? No, Sir David Isaac and his now ‘bleached’ board are far too busy picking through the outlandish and obscure fabricated accusations of fake ‘far-Left anti-Semitism’ in the hope of sinking the Labour Party for daring to offer genuine equality, justice and Socialist hope to the British people.

In defence of those under unfair attack Khan said, “They are disproportionately exposed to the virus – despite BAME communities making up only 13 per cent of the British population, 12.3 per cent of NHS staff are from BAME backgrounds and many have jobs on the front line.” Khan had rounded out her rebuttal by insisting that “Maintaining social distancing is not a BAME issue; it is a national and global issue. She warned that, “The MP believes that by speaking out he could try to prevent excess deaths in BAME communities. Perhaps what he needs to consider is the use of his words in preventing deaths: as the World Health Organisation’s Covid-19 guidance states, ‘words matter’ and that certain words could ‘fuel stigmatised attitudes’. He, and everyone else, should take this guidance seriously. If not, as the WHO warns, we risk perpetuating negative racial stereotypes, creating fear and even dehumanising people who have the disease.” It’s such a pity Tory Ministers are so arrogant in ignoring the advice of the WHO.

The Tory assault on the BAME communities is not just confined to blame and shame or the extra punishment of incomprehensible restrictions that can be liberally interpreted by police forces eager to penalize ethnic minorities; there are penalty fines too. Tories fail to comprehend why people are taking to the streets in Black Lives Matter protests as their racist ideology support s targeting of minorities. According to a Guardian Article entitled, “BAME people fined more than white population under coronavirus laws,” they reveal that, “Police in England issue at least 22% of fines for contravening lockdown to 15.5% of population. Black, Asian and minority ethnic people in England are 54% more likely to be fined under coronavirus rules than white people, it can be revealed. Analysis by Liberty Investigates and the Guardian shows that BAME people received as many as 2,218 of the 13,445 fixed-penalty notices (FPNs) under distancing regulations recorded from 27 March to 11 May, while white people were given about 7,865.”

In the article, “The analysis shows BAME people were fined at a rate of 26 per 100,000, while the rate for white people was 16.8 per 100,000. Experts and campaigners said the disproportionality called into question whether the fines were issued fairly, after the Crown Prosecution Service found that scores of people had been wrongly charged and convicted under emergency coronavirus laws. ‘For years there has been extensive evidence that police powers are used to disproportionately and unfairly to target black and Asian communities, so it comes as little surprise that these figures indicate racial profiling has continued and even accelerated under the lockdown,’ said Kevin Blowe, the coordinator of the Network for Police Monitoring.” These statistics are being presented all the time, but Johnson just pledges yet another worthless inquiry to uncover the painfully obvious. Token gestures like removing a few offensive statues is not enough; BAME communities just want the racial profiling, scapegoating and persecution to stop ASAP.

In the Skwawkbox Article condemning, “Tory and centrist MPs covered in shame as north forced again into lockdown. You were warned and rushed ahead anyway,” they say, “Unions, left MPs, media, scientists and mayors warned against haste to re-open schools and force people back to work – and MPs rushed ahead anyway. Boris Johnson, Matt Hancock, Rishi Sunak and their whole party, along with Keir Starmer and his pliant front-benchers are all covered in shame this evening after the government announced a renewed tightening of lockdown across a swathe of the north because of rising coronavirus rates. Greater Manchester, East Lancashire and West Yorkshire will all be subject to increased restrictions from midnight, with Hancock feebly blaming the people for the consequences of political errors. But union leaders, left MPs and media and elected mayors and council leaders have all warned for months that the Tories’ undue haste would lead to a new surge in infections – and in avoidable deaths.”

Skwawkbox report that, “Leicester was a case study in the consequences, with Hancock forced to admit the school return had played a central part in creating the city’s hotspot. Yet Johnson and co continued to speed ahead anyway – and Starmer’s shame is not limited to a mere lack of resistance. The Labour leader played an active role in welcoming and promoting measures to ease the lockdown, particularly the rush to re-open schools. School outbreaks have rocketed, just as the so-called ‘leaders’ were warned.” The Skwawkbox include a graph depicting the evidence supporting their valid criticism. They say, “Even though studies have shown how fast the coronavirus can spread in – and from – schools, only this morning Starmer’s education spokesperson was agreeing with the Tories that there is no need for masks for school staff or pupils. Likewise, when Johnson rushed working people back to their workplaces with barely 12 hours notice.”

Starmer targeted Rebecca Long-Bailey for standing with the Teachers Unions regarding safe school returns and he weaponized an unjust anti-Semitic charge to oust her from her post, the Left is really angry! Skwawkbox report that, “Starmer and his team were near-silent – and Starmer himself answered ‘We’d have to look at it’, when asked on radio whether he would support unions trying to protect workers from avoidable exposure. So when Starmer wanted to make what passes for an attack in centrist minds on the Tories’ actions this evening, he could only focus on the lack of notice given of the changes. He could hardly attack much else when he has been all but in lock-step with Johnson on the substantive measures he and his health secretary have taken. Now, as predicted, infections have risen – and people who needn’t have died will die, while the economy and family life of the north suffers compared to Tory heartlands. Shame on all those who pushed for this and on those who enabled them. Shame on them all.”

In a Skwawkbox Article they report, “Labour’s biggest donor Unite to review funding of party as left continues to rally.” Union Leader Len McCluskey, “warns union’s funding must not be ‘taken for granted’.” They note that, “The Unite union, the biggest single donor to the Labour Party, is to review the funds it provides to the party, in what can only be seen as a warning shot across Keir Starmer’s bows.” Reporting that, “McCluskey has also confirmed he intends to stay in post until the end of his elected tenure in 2022, dashing the right’s hopes of replacing him earlier with someone more pliable or an outright right-winger. McCluskey had been expected to retire next year. The news, both of the review and McCluskey’s stickability, will come as a further boost to a Left already re-energised by the huge success – in spite of right-wing attempts to remove it – of a fundraiser to cover Jeremy Corbyn’s legal costs if he is attacked further in court.” Many of us seriously want this to go to Court to expose the truth regarding the smears.

As I have warned in earlier pieces, the recent initiatives first to tackle obesity and to determine why Covid 19 poses a higher risk to ethnic minorities, are not driven by a principal led PM who cares about the welfare of the public in the UK. These are callous fishing expeditions to identify the best way to spread the blame and exonerate this Tory Government, which, like all other far-right Fascist Parties, benefit from a country whose citizens remain distrustful and divided looking for someone to blame for their distress. The growing social unrest is weaponized by encouraging enraged citizen to direct their anger towards vulnerable minorities to deflect from Government policy failures; while fabricated external enemies detract from the dismantling of democracy and establishing of authoritarian dictatorship. In the mayhem and rioting that the Tories seek to precipitate, creating an excuse for tougher crackdowns on public demonstrations, more military force will be turned against ordinary citizens just as Trump is doing in the US right now.

We must maintain a laser-like focus on removing this Government from office as there will be worse atrocities coming down the pike. It is crystal clear that the Tories do not approve of scrutiny or accountability. They pledged in their 2019 Manifesto to remove Judicial Review and make Judges political appointments in future. They also pledged to abandon the International Court of Human Rights in order to “redefine” what Human Right might still be permitted by their toxic Tory Government that has consistently failed to recognize that the disabled and other vulnerable members of British society are even ‘sentient beings!’ Delegitimizing the Covert 2019 Rigged Election by whatever means must remain a top priority while we still have recourse to Judicial Review, the potential for impartial legal judgements, protected Human Rights and final recourse to EU intervention. A massive public outcry to demand a full investigation of the stolen vote will grow driven by the exposure in our Courts of the corrupt Tory disinformation campaign. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

The public are being deliberately misled with the press fed a string of concocted lies. The political agenda has been moulded and manipulated in this country by Rupert Murdoch for decades. Pathetically in the UK we no longer question why an Australian should be dictating who becomes our Prime Minister in order to secure his own wealth and privilege while siphoning money offshore. He has assisted Tory Governments in being able to use his worthless rags to construct a false narrative that will sway millions of the voting public re their political agenda. Increasingly that has been a message of fear that deliberately exacerbates petty prejudices in order to drive votes in one direction, towards the far-right. Jeremy Corbyn’s emergence represented a real fight-back with the public finally offered a choice for a better future that put the needs of ordinary citizen’s first for a change. That was far too radical for the establishment elite to tolerate so the process of demonizing Corbyn in order to bring him down began: it has been relentless ever since!

In the Canary Article entitled, “How the government scapegoated minorities with its lockdown announcement for northern areas,” they reveal how a very targeted lockdown was deliberately used to stigmatize and oppress the Muslim community with warnings of the Tory blame game in rapid acceleration. They point out that, “For Muslims up and down the country, Friday 31 July would have been a particularly special Eid to celebrate, being able to spend it with family after the last Eid was in stricter lockdown conditions, and coming together as many have lost loved ones to coronavirus (Covid-19). However, mere hours before midnight on 30 July, the government announced that ‘members of separate households are banned’ from meeting indoors from midnight ‘in Greater Manchester, parts of Lancashire and parts of West Yorkshire’.” Despite the local ‘Boris Spike’ pubs were allowed to remain open, but the Johnson and his Tory Ministers would have known that strict Muslims do not imbibe alcohol or really frequent pubs.

Why could they still go to work? Of course, it was only the family gatherings that had to stop; it must have felt like collective punishment to be singled out so definitively. The Canary report that, “This message felt racially motivated. One that perpetuated the narrative that Asians in northern areas especially are a ‘problem’ that requires governing in a different, stricter way.” They say, “This was quickly reinforced by an article in the Guardian which featured a racialised photo of an Asian woman in traditional dress to represent northern areas.” They make a comparison, “if we were to draw parallels, past articles discussing the same region have featured images of white people. Similarly, racialised imagery was used by the Guardian, as well as Sky News and Financial Times, for reporting on Leicester’s lockdown, and is a clear dog-whistle to racists.” This is a well recognized propaganda stunt much used by the Nazis and we must very vocally decry such manipulation of the national mindset knowing where the dangers of ‘othering’ lead.

The Canary report on how, “Tory MP Craig Whittaker went on LBC on 31 July to suggest that ‘it is the BAME communities that are not taking [coronavirus] seriously enough’. Presenter Ian Payne, meanwhile, pointedly set up the question to ask, more than once, whether ‘the Muslim community’ was to blame. Let’s not forget that ‘Muslim’ is a racialised term, with the overwhelming majority of Muslims also coming from a Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) background. This cycle of BAME people being blamed by politicians and the media for the spread of coronavirus, and on a related note, for their disproportionate death rate from the virus, is a malicious, divisive tactic. It draws from colonial prejudices of BAME communities as being dirty and a threat to white British society. It fails to consider the root cause of these higher death rates, such as larger, working class families living together in small housing conditions along with older family members, or the fact that they’re over-represented in certain high-risk fields.”

The Canary emphasizes that, “The hypocrisy and double standards of the media and politicians is that white communities aren’t stigmatised for their response to coronavirus, unlike BAME communities.” They say, “During the past few weeks, we’ve seen plenty of examples of white people breaching government lockdown regulations.” They criticize the mainstream media for totally ignoring this glaringly obvious discrepancy, “Where was this same energy in the media for highlighting the many white people refusing to wear face masks in public, despite it being mandatory? Or for all the illegal raves, and clearly not social distanced beach visits and VE Day celebrations? Moreover, the government was keen to brush Dominic Cummings’ little road trip during lockdown, made while he had coronavirus symptoms, under the carpet. He is yet to be held accountable for his actions.” Not only should Cummings have ousted, but the PM’s father Stanley Johnson should have been conspicuously charged and fined over his trip to Greece.

The Canary voice their outrage over this matter saying, “Despite the Black Lives Matter protests, and all this country has been through in dealing with the virus, it’s evident that the media and politicians are among the biggest perpetrators of racism. This keeps being proven regardless of what they claim otherwise. You’d think that recent events would motivate this country to address and eliminate racism – instead, it keeps getting worse. I want us to be able to unite together. But with the constant dog-whistling and playing on stereotypical tropes, I fear that BAME communities are only being exposed even further to both covert and overt/violent racism. It’s simply not acceptable for an MP to brazenly use divisive language, or for mainstream media to continue their double standards and hypocrisy. And we shouldn’t have to put up with it – speaking out is the only option.” An early warning of deterioration into Fascism is marked by the singling out of a vulnerable minority for hateful targeting; this must not be tolerated.

However, the Muslims and the BAME are not the most endangered minority in the UK under this far-right Tory Government; the Gypsies and Travellers are far more vulnerable to state persecution. On the now infamous page 48 of the Tory Manifesto they set out plans for new laws to criminalize Gypsies and Travellers, seize their caravans and throw them in jail for trespass. The sad fact that the young men convicted of PC Harper’s murder were Travellers provided ample excuse to demonize the Roma community as rife with criminal activity. The Canary Article entitled, “The latest racist attack from The Times is truly chilling,” they expose how this toxic rag have capitalized on the background of the offenders to stir up anti-Gypsy hatred unrelated to the crime. They say “In 2017, a report from the Traveller Movement identified GRT discrimination as ‘the last acceptable form of racism’. An article by David Cameron’s former speechwriter Clare Foges has highlighted just how disturbing and prevalent this is in the establishment media.”

The Canary report that, “On 13 July, home secretary Priti Patel announced that the government will push forward legislation that discriminates against GRT communities even further. The Travellers’ Times reported that lawyers are set to challenge these new ‘hostile’ anti-Traveller laws. It also noted: the criminalisation of trespass and the other threatened laws could also criminalise homeless camps and protest camps and is an attack on the civil liberties of everyone – not just Gypsies and Travellers. Awareness of racial inequality has reached new prominence through the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. Calls have gone out from GRT communities to show solidarity with BLM activists. The government has now been accused of “dragging its feet” on tackling racism. Attacks on GRT communities from Murdoch’s racist media empire and Patel’s intention to criminalise more people highlight the challenges we face. Wherever and whenever it rears its ugly head, racism can and must be challenged in all its forms.”

The Fascist agenda requires an enemy, a scapegoat that the public can blame as things go catastrophically wrong; sadly in terms of raw dysfunction and disaster “we ain’t seen nothing yet!” When crash-out Brexit compounds the colossal economic impact of the Coronavirus it will create the perfect storm, but do we harness the civil unrest or do we allow the Tories to take advantage of the mayhem? We must uncover the truth, force a Comprehensive Investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election and then widely publicise the fraudulent facts exposed. The lawsuit threatened by John Ware in his greedy money grab to take advantage of Labour weakness is the toxic lying straw that broke the camel’s back; we must Support Corbyn to get the truth revealed in Court with him and the fraudster ‘Poison Dartblowers’ exposed and charged with perjury. This coinciding with our Support for Williamson’s exposure of the stacked system of fake ‘watchdog’ agencies like EHRC will hopefully be enough to correct the imbalance and drive this corrupt Tory Government out of office. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Jeremy Corbyn’s GOFUNDME page is experiencing aberrations again with the fund being reduced after approaching a memorable high point. It is likely to get written about again after it passes £330,000, so I think people might be getting those unsolicited refund notices like was occurring earlier on. I am fairly certain that it was up over £329,100 before I refreshed the page as I was gleefully speculating that it might pass £330,000 by the end of the day, but it has scaled back to: £327,980. I am sure that the site is being put under huge pressure by the Zionist Lobby to ditch this controversial fund raiser; we cannot let them succeed in curtailing our right to support the Corbyn case. We need people to monitor the site closely, take screen shots and just keep people fully aware of what is going on so that we can combat the problem.

My eyes were not deceiving me the fund has dropped and this is documented by the Skwawkbox article, Crowdfund organiser to set up trust to administer funds raised for Corbyn legal expenses, (By SKWAWKBOX (SW) 03/08/2020) which shows a screenshot of the page taken yesterday with the donation level at: £328,346. Skwawkbox report that, “The organiser of a hugely-successful crowdfund set up to cover legal expenses incurred by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn will set up a trust to manage the funds and ensure transparency and propriety in how they are used. The fund stands at over £328,000, in spite of repeated attempts by the Labour right to have the page taken down. In an update posted to the page today, Carole Morgan also encourages supporters to sign up to the Truth Defence initiative set up by leading academics and lawyers to foster honesty and integrity in public life and to counter Establishment disinformation and smears.”

Carole Morgan writes, “Hello everyone, How amazing are we! I want to share with you my thoughts on what this fund represents to me, and also to update you on developments. I have always felt that Jeremy spoke from his heart, and we listened with ours and heard the call. I firmly believe there are really only two roads to choose in this life, one is of love, the other of fear. Through this fund we have not only made our voices heard but we have also declared our united hope and belief that a better world is possible.

I wanted to find a way that we could maintain our connection to one another moving forward into the future. To that aim, I have been in touch with the organisers of an initiative called Truth Defence which started around the same time as the crowdfund, and clearly shares our aims and hopes for a better world: https://www.truthdefence.org. It is dedicated to promoting a culture of honesty and integrity in politics and public life, which is exactly the principles that Jeremy stands for. Please join as a registered supporter under this link https://www.truthdefence.org/join or send an email to [email protected] if you want to sign up to be part of our network for free. In the meantime, all funds raised by us to support Jeremy in a potential legal defence will be held in trust for that purpose, and details of that will be announced soon. We really have created something truly amazing and we can go forward knowing that what we stand for is a force to be reckoned with. With love to you all Carole.”

Skwawkbox say that, “The news should further boost support and donations for what has become a rallying point for the left against the relentless Establishment efforts to bury the movement. If you would like to support the crowdfund you can do so here.” Carole Morgan has a prior update that people need to take note of regarding the refund issue. I am not sure why people use strange fictitious names when they donate. At one point there were reports of deeply offensive names being posted which could well have been an intentional disgracing tactic used by those trying to deliberately sabotage this effort; the Zionist have a lot of money to splash about. If you are not comfortable entering your name as a donor then it is possible to opt for an anonymous donation. This cause is far too deadly serious for us to allow it to be derailed by those who might wish to sabotage our efforts. If you do receive an unsolicited refund you can always do as Carole suggests to resubmit your donation.

Carole Morgan updates us, “Hello everyone, I just wanted to send you a little message to let you know how to make a successful donation in case you are having trouble. Please ensure that you use your billing name as shown on your card when making a donation. If you don’t, it is likely that the donation will be failed by your bank or refunded by GoFundMe’s Payment Review Team for security purposes. Don’t worry though, you can easily go back and re-donate using your correct information if it was failed or refunded. If anyone continues to run into any trouble making a donation or has any questions on a refund, feel free to contact GoFundMe for help on making a successful donation: https://support.gofundme.com/hc/en-us/articles/360001972728-Contacting-Support Much love, Carole.”

On the Truth Defence home page it states, “We are a collective of activists, lawyers, creatives, journalists, academics and citizens concerned about the spread of disinformation online, in traditional media, and in political advertising and campaigning. We are equally concerned by cases where civil litigation procedures and the principles of natural justice are apparently undermined for politically motivated purposes. We are seeking to raise funds with a view to launching various actions and projects aimed at resisting such injustices, strengthening the democratic accountability of media and political institutions, and promoting a culture of honesty and integrity in public life.” That objective puts them in virtually the same arena as Chris Williamson’s Left Legal Fighting Fund to which Chris has pledged to allocate any unused money raised, £23,000 so far, to help his legal team fight the EHRC, plus monies recovered if he wins a settlement just as he did when he won all his costs from the Labour Party after taking them to Court.

Taken directly from Left Legal Fighting Fund’s Webpage, Chris Williamson explains the reason he created the fund and their goals, “Our legal system is being abused by wealthy and powerful people to silence, target and crush activists. The Left Legal Fighting Fund is leading the fightback. The Fund began when Jeremy Corbyn’s most loyal parliamentary ally, Chris Williamson, took the Labour Party to the High Court and won after he was unlawfully suspended by the Party at the behest of the Israel lobby. Since then, we have already defended some of the leading lights of British socialism from lawfare tactics used by the racist Israel lobby, which seeks to criminalise pro-Palestine activism and marginalise black, Muslim and Jewish anti-racism activists. In recent weeks, dozens of left-wing Labour Party members have been suspended and harassed as Keir Starmer joins forces with the Jewish Labour Movement to purge the Party. If you’re one of them, we want to hear from you and support you.

At the same time, Black Lives Matter protesters are being harassed by police forces around the country. The Metropolitan Police and Territorial Support Group have been kettling and intimidating peaceful protesters. If you were arrested or harassed at the BLM protests and don’t have legal representation, we want to hear from you. As the protests continue, we intend to arrange on-site legal support and teach-ins to educate protesters about their rights. If you think you can help, get in touch. As well as funding ongoing legal actions, we want to build a war chest so that racist institutions and powerful lobby groups know that they will no longer be able to use lawfare against activists. To secure funding for the medium and long term, we are asking you to consider making a one-off or monthly donation. Our legal action so far has been both proactive and defensive, assisting activists who otherwise would have been left in financial ruin by powerful interest groups. Read our endorsements here to see just how much of a difference your donations can make. Solidarity works. Together, let’s prove it. Please donate today.”

In the Skwawkbox comments I note a tone of scepticism or at least a healthy dose of cautious observation before backing ‘Truth Defence’ campaign unreservedly. I can understand this caution because organizations that sound as if they are in support of truth, justice and accountability with names like the ‘Integrity Initiative,’ but totally devoid of ‘integrity,’ can easily disguise their snake-oil to look superficially palatable while peddling propaganda, sabotaging and robbing the Socialist cause. What I would say is that this is a rapidly developing opportunity and we must seize the vigorous momentum generated by our outrage. Although Carol Morgan might present an easy target for less well meaning people to take advantage of, she is being guided in her decisions by the Corbyn team who will have vetted this newly emerging Truth Defence group with considerable caution before proceeding with any public statement. Their Website is very basic, but probably still under construction; perhaps the bios hadn’t been posted yesterday.

The people involved and heading up Truth Defence are now listed on the site along with brief bios that might have only just been posted today, but a Google search of any of the individuals listed should provide further insight into their background, political leanings and body of work so far. They are listed as follows: “Professor Lynne Segal is a socialist feminist academic and activist, author of many books and articles, and participant in many campaigns, from local community to international. In 1999 she was appointed Anniversary Professor of Psychology and Gender Studies at Birkbeck, University of London.” Next is: “Andrew Feinstein is a former Member of Parliament for the ANC in South Africa and is author of The Shadow World: Inside the Global Arms Trade. He resigned in 2001 when the ANC refused to launch an unfettered investigation into arms trade corruption. He is now director of Shadow World Investigations in London.” Disarming the arms industry is a major objective in creating a safer, fairer world.

The list continues with, “Mica Nava is Emeritus Professor of Cultural Studies in the School of Arts and Digital Industries at the University of East London, UK. She is a cultural historian has published a number of books on modernity, feminism, race and difference.” A legal heavy-hitter is listed next, “Sir Geoffrey Bindman QC is the founder of leading human rights firm Bindmans LLP. He has won awards for a lifetime’s achievement in human rights from Liberty and the Law Society’s Gazette, among others. In 2007 he was knighted for services to human rights.” The team does not appear to be weighed down by representatives of the Legal profession. The last person listed is, “Professor Tony Booth is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Commonwealth Education at Cambridge University, Director of the Index for Inclusion network, and a prominent climate activist. He has been researching, teaching and writing about participation and exclusion in education for more than thirty years.”

Corbyn has attracted followers because people immediately recognize that he’s an honest, thoroughly decent guy. He has not hit back or taken the bait of the ruthless bullies including those on the right of the Labour Party who have provoked him unmercifully when he was the Labour Leader. This is time for “no more Mr nice guy” because if Corbyn waits for a trickster like John Ware to set the terms, the potential Court battle will be played out in the compliant media and it will favour Ware. Jeremy has a decent fund growing by the day and he should bring a case against Ware ASAP so that his opponent cannot stall for time. Once Corbyn can be persuaded to get tough he should go after other people who have defamed him and force them to prove their false allegations in Court. He should also go after toxic detractors like MPs Margaret Hodge, John Mann and others in the Labour Party who have betrayed the membership by sabotaging the Party; they can always be given a chance to settle by donating to the legal fund.

This point is also raised in Skwawkbox comments, “My view is that Jeremy ought to counter-sue before Ware either makes his next move or reverts to delaying tactics.” Another said, “You can only fight what’s attacking you,” but focused on, “the first and most important case is the class action, then Press Gang and JVL…You set up a firewall that repels any attack… which just leaves the Class Action.” Another remarked, “throw everything into the first case, win that test case hands down and set such precedents that every other bastard liar settles huge sums to make their cases go away. That way we have the joy of watching socialism’s right wing attackers fund the launch of the most socialist political party there’s ever been.” Another remarked that, “Arguably, the very existence of the fund is, like a wealth fund, an investment in the future: it will deter likudist anti-socialists and uppity class enemies from picking on Jeremy Corbyn, not least, their most enthusiastic supporter, Sir Keir Rodney Starmer KCB QC MP…”

Totally aside from the issue of stolen postal votes there is another truly legitimate reason why this Tory Government should be forced out of office. That is the Tory Government’s documented use of public funds to pay the Institute of Statecraft to task their so called ‘Integrity Initiative’ with creating defamatory anti-Corbyn propaganda to demonize and destroy the Labour Party. Christopher Steele, a discredited former British MI6 Intelligence Officer, created this subversive operation that has no right to function as it does while posing as a ‘registered charity’ and accepting state funds. This highly illegal action has not gained public attention, but it could be brought in as a component of the evidence in both the Corbyn case and Williamson’s case against the EHRC. This is valid evidence of very serious state corruption in support of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election; it should have already justified the PM and Tory Ministers removal from our Parliament in handcuffs! This would be a egregious enough scandal that the UK would openly condemn another nation for not pursuing exactly such criminal proceedings to correct injustice.

With these legal cases we have a unique opportunity to fully expose the truth and potentially force a comprehensive investigation into the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Although the Courts can throw out a case as vexatious they cannot simply ignore copious volumes of hard evidence. There are significant extremely serious false allegation that have been made against Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party that left undisputed constitute a massive injustice to the British people so there is a powerful ‘public interest’ justification for these cases. John Ware’s lawsuits also set a damaging precedent that could render all journalistic critique open to litigation; no book review or critical commentary would be safe in future. Such flat earth thinking threatens to plunge the UK into the creative dark ages with obscene fake news untouchable. We cannot allow John Ware and his cohort of lying ‘Poison Dartblowers’ to be rewarded for keeping this corrupt Tory Government propped into place: expose the truth and this regime will fall. DO NOT MOVE ON! https://tinyurl.com/w4u9dwm

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

In a Novara Media Article entitled, “Lawfare is an Attack on Free Speech and a Threat to Democracy,” they report that, “Journalist John Ware has declared he is suing the former leader of the Labour party, Jeremy Corbyn, along with several ‘alt-left sites and individuals who lie’. Ware himself admits that in launching these libel cases he has broken an ‘unwritten code’ that says journalists, who ‘hold free speech sacrosanct’, shouldn’t sue over criticism. To me, it looks like the most egregious attack on free speech and democratic norms we’ve seen in recent times.” They point to the rapid response in Legal defence funds raised as a clear indication that, “tens of thousands of others feel the same way.” I certainly hope that having chosen this deceitful path to wealth through infamy he will be rendered unemployable, persona non grata for life with the BBC and in wider professional Journalistic circles.

Novara Media say, “The announcement in the Jewish Chronicle, which Ware co-owns, followed a decision by the current Labour leader, Keir Starmer, to settle previous libel claims from Ware and a group of former Labour staffers in relation to the controversial 2019 Panorama documentary ‘Is Labour Anti-Semitic?’ Ware seems to have been provoked by a statement from Corbyn in which the Islington MP publicly disagreed with Starmer’s decision, arguing that it was politically motivated and contradicted advice from Labour’s lawyers, who had suggested the party could win the case. In the same article, Ware also threatened libel action against undisclosed ‘alternative media outlets and individuals’ which he claims defamed him.” They report that, “It is understood that Ware and his solicitor Mark Lewis are already taking legal action against Paddy French, a former ITV journalist who runs the Press Gang website, seeking £50,000 in damages. And he is suing Jewish Voice for Labour and two of the organisation’s officers.”

On the Fundraising Page for Ware v French it says, “We’re raising £100,000 to defend a libel action brought by BBC Panorama reporter John Ware. THE BBC reporter John Ware has issued a claim for libel against Press Gang editor Paddy French. Ware seeks £50,000 in damages over a Press Gang pamphlet criticising the Panorama anti-Semitism programme in July 2019. Press Gang is contesting the action. On July 22 Labour settled a libel action brought by Ware. Labour apologised in open court and agreed to pay damages. The action does not affect Ware v French which is a different case about a different publication. Ware v French will now go to court for the first stage this autumn. This appeal is to help pay the substantial costs of instructing solicitors and counsel to fight the proceedings.

Ware’s action concerns the Press Gang pamphlet ‘Is The BBC Anti-Labour? — Panorama’s Biased Anti-Semitism Reporting: A Case To Answer’ published last December. This was a critical analysis of last year’s Panorama programme ‘Is Labour Anti-Semitic?’ The Press Gang pamphlet weighed up the evidence and took a critical view of the programme. Press Gang has instructed the London solicitors Bindmans. We hope you’ll be able to support this appeal. We’ll keep you updated on this site — but you can also follow events on the website, press-gang.org — and on Twitter (@pguk10). Many thanks. Paddy French NB If you back this project, please note there’s no need to make a contribution to Justgiving: it already takes a small fee from your pledge.”

Ware’s actions have ominous implications for freedom of the press in the UK where it is already one of the easiest places in the world to bring a defamation case valid on not. That is unless you are a student attempting to clear your name after retaliatory sabotage of your career when ‘Absolute Privilege’ grants the University unlimited right to blatantly lie under oath in the High Court: something I discovered the hard way. Well, true as it is, that is another sorry tale, but it is also the prime reason I feel so aggrieved and incensed by Starmer’s payment to the ‘Poison Dartblowers.’ In a recent tweet JVL say that, “JVL and 2 of its officers are being sued for libel by John Ware for comments made re the Panorama programme Is Labour Antisemitic? We are defending the action but our lawyers advise us not to comment about the issues Including not reposting articles that might bear on the case.”

Novara Media contend that, “Although Ware’s actions are among the most extreme, they fit into a pattern of attacks on the left stretching back to Corbyn’s victory in the Labour leadership election in 2015. In the last week alone we’ve seen calls for both Corbyn’s expulsion from the Labour party and the ‘rooting out’ of his supporters. At times it’s felt like there’s a unified attempt to delegitimize the left and push it out of public life completely.” They say, “The left must fight back but it needs to do so carefully. The continuation, indeed, acceleration of the right’s, and indeed the Labour right’s, offensive is pernicious not just for the way it affects the general public’s view of the left, but also for how it affects the left’s view of itself and the task before it. The danger is that we start to adopt the right’s framing of Corbyn’s defeat.” I would robustly insist that the very best place to start is by robustly countering the Tory lie about “borrowed votes,” to explain their miraculous fake ‘landslide victory’ in the Covert 2019 Rigged Election!

Novara Media still feel compelled to endorse this Tory lie as a functional reality by trying to make various excuses to legitimize the patently illogical result of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election when what we really need to do is challenge that result. There is nothing to lose in challenging the result because we already have copious evidence that our Electoral System is “wide open to Industrial scale fraud:” top QCs have said as much for the past decade! The only way to force change is to challenge an Election because those who cheated have no intention of changing the system that favours their corrupt practices and the Tories will not relinquish their power unless forced to do so. The Electoral Commission is totally powerless to enforce the most minimal level of scrutiny because they cannot monitor a private company like Idox when ‘Management’ of our postal votes is outsourced. “A Watchdog that cannot Watch is just a dog!” We need to “Rescue our Watchdog,” so if you have not Signed my Petition already please consider doing so now.

As stated in my previous post and worth repeating here: “Totally aside from the issue of stolen postal votes there is another truly legitimate reason why this Tory Government should be forced out of office. That is the Tory Government’s documented use of public funds to pay the Institute of Statecraft to task their so called ‘Integrity Initiative’ with creating defamatory anti-Corbyn propaganda to demonize and destroy the Labour Party. Christopher Steele, a discredited former British MI6 Intelligence Officer, created this subversive operation that has no right to function as it does while posing as a ‘registered charity’ and accepting state funds.” I have elaborated on the conduct of this disreputable operation in the past as it remains a front for interfering in the legitimate Electoral process of foreign Governments as well as deliberately sabotaging UK Democracy. There are calls for this so called ‘charity’ to be investigated, stripped of its charitable status and potentially prosecuted for illegal conduct.

How many countries have criticized Venezuela at the UN claiming their election was rigged because the US didn’t get the puppet Government they wanted in place? Despite the highly credible assertions of former US President Jimmy Carter, that their elections are among the safest, most well monitored elections in the world, there’s been an ongoing rant about rigged elections to justify crippling sanctions. I must emphasize that, “This highly illegal action has not gained public attention, but it could be brought in as a component of the evidence in both the Corbyn case and Williamson’s case against the EHRC. This is valid evidence of very serious state sanctioned corruption in support of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election; it should have already justified the PM and Tory Ministers removal from our Parliament in handcuffs! This would be an egregious enough scandal that the UK would openly condemn any other nation for not pursuing exactly such criminal proceedings to correct the injustice. Could the UK face sanctions if the Covert 2019 Rigged Election was exposed and the Tories tried to cling to power?

Novara Media claim that, “The most revealing moment in Ware’s libel announcement is his mention of ‘identity politics’ as one of the reasons why the old rules of free speech no longer apply. This linguistic tick locates Ware’s actions within a particular ideology in which the notions of ‘free speech’ and ‘cancel culture’ are key weapons in an ongoing culture war. The key argument in this ideological framing proposes that the left is so uniquely censorious that the only way free speech can be maintained is to remove free speech from the left.” They admit, “This may seem a curious claim as the left doesn’t hold state power in the UK, nor does it in most of the rest of the world. In addition, the UK left despite reflecting the views of around 30% of the UK population has virtually no representation in the media.”

Novara Media say that, “The clear contradiction between the claim of the left’s unique censoriousness and its apparent lack of ability to censor anyone is resolved by a transformation in the definition of free speech so it no longer refers to preventing someone from speaking but becomes enshrined as the right to speak without fear of criticism.” They correctly point out that, “Speech is free if you can afford it.” This was never more obvious than watching Johnny Depp air his dirty laundry at a leisurely pace in our High Court. All that fuss over a marital spat printed in a tabloid sewer rag that would in my youth have been wrapping fish and chips within a day! Despite what was probably just an obscene PR stunt for Depp making headline news as he sought to clear his name, a far more important vindication could prove harder to gain more than a fleeting glance of press attention for Corbyn when he goes to Court. We have to make the Court case a very loud, colourful and outlandish protest spectacle to grab BBC and Media attention.

Novara Media contend that, “The right’s hegemony is articulated through an individualised and privatised conception of freedom in which ever more areas of life are removed from the sphere of public deliberation and into the sphere of private morality. It is for this reason that criticism of the opinions and actions of others comes to seem like an attempt to impose one person’s private morality on to another. On a wider scale, any attempt to use democratic deliberation to change the values animating society also falls into the same category, and so ‘social justice warriors’ become defined as authoritarian hypocrites. The libel law courts, accessible only to the rich or those with the patronage of the rich, are the perfect example of the emptiness of formal freedoms when you lack the resources to exercise them.”

In contrast Novara Media say that, ”The left, on the other hand, is developing a quite different conception of freedom. One that is collective and solidaristic and sees freedom as meaningful only if it can be exercised by all. It’s an idea of freedom intimately linked to the ultimate task of the left, the radical democratisation of society, which involves overcoming the huge inequalities that currently exist. If the UK left can regain this perspective, and so escape the constrained horizon of the Labour right, then recent events look very different. Current attempts to silence the left can be positioned within a wider, global trend to roll back democracy. On the other hand, much of what gets called ‘identity politics’, and which so mobilises the right, can be understood as imperfect, stumbling attempts to construct a democracy accessible.”

What I do not see in the Novara Media article is a sense of urgency or a recognition that we are careening towards a brick wall that could extinguish all hope of democracy in the UK by the end of this year, “defend democracy, extend democracy” will no longer be an option beyond that point! This Tory Government pledged in their Manifesto to remove Judicial Review to insure that they could become even more immune from scrutiny or any level of accountability for their disastrous blunders in policy making. The PM also intends to make top Judges political appointees, or rather Tory appointees, in the near future and abandon the International Court of Human Rights for a more nuanced version of watered down Human Rights after crash-out Brexit. We have a legal system that is already heavily stacked against those who lack private funding, especially since access to Legal Aid has virtually evaporated under Tory rule. Our one saving grace is through supporting Crowdfunding and as they remark: “in this task, Ware’s libel threats are very useful.” DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

My single biggest gripe with the Labour Party over the past few years arises from their refusal to combat the false claims that have reinforced the Tory Party propaganda to do such catastrophic damage to the progressive Socialist movement thus depriving us of a descent Government. It never had to get this bad if only Corbyn had fought back vigorously, bringing legal suits for defamation to Court if necessary, to denounce the growing web of lies. By the time vocal Chris Williamson tried to call the party out for overblown apologetic grovelling the ‘new truth’ had been constructed balanced precariously around rumours and deliberate misinterpretations aimed at targeting Corbyn. He was punished for his honesty, a casualty of the Zionist witch-hunt determined to protect apartheid Israel from criticism. Now it is time for the pack of cards to come tumbling down; perhaps not in time to save our democracy that is now in grave peril. Williamson is determined to challenge the EHRC and we should support his effort to expose the truth in Court.

The Electronic Intifada examines whether EHRC is really capable of a truly independent judgement regarding the conduct of the disciplinary Labour Party in an Article entitled, “Has the UK’s ‘Labour anti-Semitism’ probe been rigged?” They reveal that, “The UK’s official equality watchdog is facing questions over its impartiality after it was revealed that one of its commissioners failed to declare financial links to the ruling Conservative Party. The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) last year launched an investigation into the Labour Party amid accusations that it is institutionally anti-Semitic. Newsweek has revealed that EHRC commissioner Pavita Cooper made donations totalling $4,400 to the Conservative Party. Cooper’s donation was not declared when she took up the role in 2018. Cooper and her husband also hosted a fundraising event for their local Conservative member of Parliament.” As examined in an earlier post, this information is one of several conflicts of interest that tie EHRC to the Tory Party.

The Electronic Intifada report on who initiated the probe, “The investigation into Labour was launched at the request of two pro-Israel lobby groups in May 2019. It is expected to report sometime this summer. The supposedly impartial watchdog also appointed one of the same groups’ leaders to its panel of legal advisers mere days before it announced its probe of Labour. The Jewish Labour Movement’s vice chair Sarah Sackman said she was ‘delighted’ to have been given the post.” The concern is that JLM is openly hostile to Corbyn, but she was, “Delighted to have been appointed to @EHRC panel of lawyers. Really looking forward to working with their fantastic legal team @eprochaska and co. on #equalities #discrimation Sarah Sackman (@sarahsackman) May 16, 2019 A spokesperson for Sackman at her law firm denied to The Electronic Intifada that she had discussed the investigation with anyone at the EHRC at any stage. ‘Her appointment to the panel was entirely independent and unrelated,’ he said.”

Electronic Intefada say, “Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn charged in an interview with Middle East Eye that the Conservative government has in recent years politicized the EHRC.” I wrote an earlier post Middle East Eye. The Tories “decided to take away its independent status and make it part of the government machine,” Corbyn had said last month and last year, “after the EHRC first announced it may investigate Labour’s anti-Semitism ‘crisis,’ activists said it was ‘part of the witch hunt against Jeremy Corbyn’.” They said, “The first of the two pro-Israel organizations that referred Labour to the EHRC was right-wing anti-Palestinian group the Campaign Against Antisemitism. It was founded in 2014 during that year’s Israeli war against the people of the Gaza Strip, in order to shield Israel by smearing critics of its actions as anti-Semitic. In December the group claimed to have ‘slaughtered’ Corbyn after Labour’s general election defeat. The group then attempted to have the video of these disturbing comments removed from the internet.”

According to the Electronic Intifada, “The second group that referred Labour to the EHRC is the Jewish Labour Movement – a Zionist organization affiliated to Labour which acted as a proxy for the Israeli embassy during its long war against Jeremy Corbyn. Labour party ‘risks bankruptcy over antisemitism investigation’ https://t.co/MSwAOm3Kut — Adam Langleben (@adamlangleben) October 12, 2019 One Jewish Labour Movement activist last year tweeted out an article claiming that Labour ‘risks bankruptcy’ – from the same investigation his group had helped instigate. For years the Jewish Labour Movement smeared its own party as anti-Semitic, as a political weapon against Corbyn, the left-wing leader many supporters of Israel despised.”

The Electronic Intifada claim that, “Having insisted that Labour was ‘institutionally anti-Semitic’ under Corbyn, a false allegation that it repeated in its submission to the EHRC, the Jewish Labour Movement has now abruptly decided that ‘we are not going to get the answer to the question ‘is Labour institutionally anti-Semitic’.” Why the sudden about face? Electronic Intifada have logically reached the conclusion that, “With the former leader now safely out of the way and his successor Keir Starmer purging the party of the left, the Jewish Labour Movement no longer needs to destroy the leadership. Left-wing group Jewish Voice for Labour called the Jewish Labour Movement’s submission to the EHRC, ‘gossip, distortion, double standards and presumed guilt’.” Smoke and mirrors will not hold up in Court which is why it is so important to fight these defamation cases by offering support to both Corbyn, whose legal fund is at £329,000, for a case against John Ware and Williamson, with a fund of £23,000, for his case against EHRC.

According to the Electronic Intifada, “Last year, the day after the EHRC announced the start of its formal investigation, the Jewish Labour Movement told its members that ‘a problem of leadership and culture’ meant that Labour had become a party which ‘discriminates against Jews and that it has become an unsafe space for them.’ In an email to members obtained by The Electronic Intifada, the Jewish Labour Movement said that it had ‘retained top law firm Mishcon de Reya’ to represent it to the EHRC – led by James Libson. Mishcon de Reya is the high-profile law firm that has repeatedly represented the government of Israel and other Israeli bodies in the UK.”

Electronic Intifada report that, “Libson himself has been part of the Mishcon legal team in at least two cases against the boycott of Israel. In 2012 this writer witnessed him watching in a London court room as the Israel lobby accused the University and College Union of supposed ‘institutional anti-Semitism’ – the same false charge now brought against the Labour Party.” Thankfully, “The University and College Union was completely vindicated in 2013, when the case against it failed on all counts.” They say that, “The Judge famously dismissed the complaint as ‘an impermissible attempt to achieve a political end by litigious means,’ and threw out claims that opposition to Zionism was inherently anti-Semitic.” This should have created a legal precedent that discouraged future frivolous politically motivated Lawfare. ‘It would be very unfortunate if an exercise of this sort were ever repeated,’ Judge A. M. Snelson warned.” Unfortunately this hasn’t deterred the Zionist Lobby from similar bullying tactics to shut down Boycott Divest and Sanction Campaigns.

Proudly remember how it was the external pressure of boycotts that ultimately secured political change in apartheid South Africa. The Zionist wouldn’t be reacting with legal challenges if this wasn’t an effective strategy, so we must continue to support ‘Boycott, Divest and Sanction.’ Electronic Intifada say, “The second known anti-Palestinian case pursued on behalf of Israel by Libson was that of Moty Cristal. An Israeli army colonel, Cristal sued public sector union Unison as well as the National Health Service after they declined his offer to host a workshop on ‘negotiations.’ The case was ultimately dropped. Former Jewish Labour Movement chair Jeremy Newmark (who resigned in disgrace in 2018 amid serious financial irregularities) was also deeply involved in the Israel lobby’s case against the academics and teachers’ union. In 2012, Newmark told an Israeli newspaper that he and his Israel lobby group of the time – the Jewish Leadership Council – were ‘liaising closely with the government of Israel’ on the Cristal case.”

Electronic Intifada report that, “At a conference in 2011, Newmark told pro-Israel activists to join political parties “and become a voice for Israel.” You can watch his comments in a video that is included in this article, they say, “It was obtained by The Electronic Intifada but was later deleted by conference organizers from YouTube. Newmark was a leading force in the 2015 revival of the Jewish Labour Movement specifically to fight Corbyn. The group’s main strategy was to smear Corbyn and his supporters as anti-Semitic – and it worked. The campaign involved increasingly thuggish tactics over the years before Newmark was forced out.” We have waited patiently for the Tory Government to release the Russia Report in the hope of determining if there was any Russian interference in UK Elections, but we were told that they hadn’t bothered to look. I think this is highly unlikely, but a good reason to keep the issue of foreign meddling in our election quiet is that an in depth investigation would reveal serious interference by Israel!

The Electronic Intifada said that, “Huda Elmi, a left-wing member of Labour’s ruling national executive, last year said the EHRC should be abolished. She later backpedaled. The Equality & Human Rights Commission is a failed experiment. If tomorrow it were to cease in existence, most of the people it was created to support wouldn’t even notice.” She said, “We need to abolish it & bring back separate, well resourced governmental bodies for each equality strand! Huda Elmi (@hudaelmi_) March 7, 2019. As well as the Newsweek revelation, communist newspaper The Morning Star ran a series of exposés last year of a string of conflicts of interest at the EHRC.” They say, “Journalist Phil Miller revealed a litany of the body’s financial ties to the Conservative Party and the government.” We cannot allow the ruling Tory Party to weaponize an organization that is in place to defend Equality and Human Rights; this is expecially important now as this Tory Government are getting set to ‘redefine’ our future Human Rights!

According to Electronic Intifada, “Perhaps the clearest sign so far of the EHRC’s institutional bias against Labour is how it has repeatedly refused to investigate the Conservatives for their endemic bigotry against Muslims, even while investigating Labour for supposed anti-Semitism.” They report that, “Writing for The Financial Times, Trevor Phillips – a former EHRC chair who has himself made Islamophobic comments for years without consequence – insisted that his ex-colleagues should “ignore protests that the Conservative Party should also be investigated for Islamophobia,” because it would be “aiding and abetting anti-Semitism.” Prime Minister Boris Johnson has attacked Muslim women as “letter boxes.” One poll last year showed that almost two-thirds of Conservative Party members consider Islam a “threat to Western civilization.” And 43 percent of those polled said they would refuse to accept a Muslim prime minister. By comparison, even polling commissioned by the Campaign Against Antisemitism confirms that the Labour Party is one of the least likely to have members with any anti-Semitic views.”

It is vitally important that we Support the Chris Williamson Legal Case against EHRC to publically expose the control this Tory Government has over a supposedly independent regulatory body as this toxic manipulation is certainly not confined to EHRC and will get worse. John Ware has fallen eerily silent now that the Funding for Corbyn’s Defence is over £329,000; he realizes bully and bluff will not render a rapid payout. The funding is sufficient to proceed to Court even if Ware tries to drop the case: I hope Corbyn realizes he must countersue to clear his name as the multiple attacks on Labour, will spiral out of control to bankrupt the party. We must also support JVL and Press Gang to prevent vexatious cases trying to gag honest journalism. The Tories still feel threatened the truth will emerge. The entire façade that made their fake ‘landslide victory’ in the Covert 2019 Rigged Election seem credible will go so we can attack the myth of ‘borrowed votes,’ get a full investigation and remove this Tory Government from office. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

There has been so many BBC programs dredging through the alleged huge problem with anti-Semitism in the Labour Party as well as massive reporting in the mainstream media, all of which targets Jeremy Corbyn as the instigator of targeted racism that it will be a monumental task trying to change the narrative. The multiple grovelling admissions of guilt spanning the past four years finally culminating in Starmer’s recent cowardly capitulation to John Ware and the ‘Poison Dartblowers’ certainly helped to firmly establish this fake news. Although the fightback is long overdue there is copious evidence to refute these false charges and expose all of the MPs, organizations, and Media including the biased BBC for pumping out lies that were never fact-checked for accuracy before being spun on behalf of the Tory Government and the extremist Zionist cause of Israel’s persecution of the Palestinians. The single most powerful way to combat the pervasive lies will be in a Courtroom under oath where lying constitutes the crime of perjury.

When Chris Williamson read through the early draft of the EHRC report on anti-Semitism he obviously had a ‘Gotcha’ moment as the hard evidence is all in his favour just as it will be if Corbyn does not back down, but instead aggressively goes after John Ware. Williamson will not get pushed around, but Jeremy doesn’t do aggressive! What might make the difference for Corbyn is knowing that if he doesn’t fight the smears this time, Starmer’s betrayal has left the Labour Party wide open to multiple lawsuits. Corbyn doesn’t need to rely on Labour to pay his Court cost as his fund is now at £329,000! Williamson has raised £23,000 to challenge EHRC; he says, “Despite the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s noble name, the reality of how it has operated since it was established almost thirteen years ago tells a very different story. The EHRC came into existence through the Equality Act 2006, replacing several different bodies to become the chief enforcer of equality and non-discrimination laws in Great Britain.”

Williamson reminds us of the, “bad start, …only two years after it began operating, six out of eighteen members of the EHRC’s ruling body resigned, explicitly criticising Trevor Phillips, the Chair of the EHRC at the time. One of those resigned Commissioners, Francesca Klug said, in evidence to a Select Committee, that: ‘There was an atmosphere that I experienced of intimidation sometimes in holding the Chair to account. There would be those commissioners who would fiercely oppose you if you raised your voice… to disagree with what the Chair had said and that sense of being strongly reprimanded I think did create some atmosphere of intimidation’. Concerns had also been raised about Phillips’s comments regarding race, and about his alleged proximity to the New Labour government. During his time at the EHRC, Phillips had questioned the concept of ‘institutional racism’; called for Britain to ‘scrap multiculturalism’; and said that the country was ‘sleepwalking [its] way to segregation’ with ‘fully fledged ghettos’.”

Williamson reveals that, “Latterly, Phillips has argued that British Muslims are ‘becoming a nation within a nation’; he has said that ‘Muslims are not like us’; that Muslims ‘see the world differently from the rest of us’; and ‘I thought Europe’s Muslims would gradually blend into the landscape. I should have known better’. In March 2020, he was suspended from the Labour Party for his alleged Islamophobic statements. But it wasn’t just Phillips’s comments that caused concern. He had been close, for some time, to a number of high-profile figures in the New Labour government, including Peter Mandelson, who was best man at his wedding. In fact, he was so close to the government that, when a revolt began over his leadership, it was reported that Peter Mandelson and Harriet Harman hatched a plan to give Phillips a seat in the House of Lords, as well as a ministerial position, in a botched attempt to manage the controversy.”

Williamson claims that, “the problems didn’t end with Trevor Phillips.” He defines EHRC by saying that, “The Commission is a quango and, by its very design, lacks independence. Senior figures at the Commission owe their positions to the government, which also pays their handsome salaries. Meanwhile, hardworking junior staff are starved of resources to properly investigate discrimination. In 2017, the Commission was accused of targeting Black, Muslim, and disabled staff for compulsory redundancies. Just recently, it was reported that two former Commissioners, the only Black and Muslim commissioners at the time, said that they lost their positions at the Commission in 2012 because they were considered ‘too loud and vocal’ about issues of race. In recent years, the EHRC’s lack of independence has led to its purpose being subverted in order to attack the British Left, Jeremy Corbyn, and his supporters.”

According to Williamson, “The warning signs came as early as September 2017, when the EHRC’s Chief Executive, Rebecca Hilsenrath, said: Anti-semitism is racism and the Labour Party needs to do more to establish that it is not a racist party. No major political party has ever been singled out by the EHRC in this way. Even the Tories haven’t faced such scrutiny, despite being responsible for some of the most egregious racism exhibited in public life today, targeting Muslims and Black people in particular. The number of alleged cases of antisemitism in the Labour Party are miniscule, and were clearly exaggerated as part of a pernicious smear campaign against Corbyn and his supporters. But that didn’t stop the Commission from targeting the Party. Labour had inflicted a major blow to the Tories at the 2017 general election, and fears about a potential Corbyn premiership had sent shockwaves through the Establishment.”

Williamson alerts us to the vested interests with EHRC saying that, “It should be remembered, that for the vast majority of its existence, the Commission has operated under a Conservative government, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. The Tories have stacked the EHRC with business-friendly Commissioners, none of whom have a history in the anti-racist movement and many who have significant conflicting interests. Most notably, they appear to have personal, financial, or professional interests that would have suffered under a Corbyn-led government.” He goes on to list the conflicts of interest:
• Caroline Waters worked for a time and continues to holds shares in BT, a company whose value would have been threatened by the 2019 Labour manifesto pledge to deliver free full-fibre broadband to all by 2030.
• Suzanne Baxter worked for over 20 years at the outsourcing firms Serco and Mitie, and retains shares in Mitie. Both companies would have been threatened by Labour plans to move against outsourcing.
• Alasdair Henderson stood as a candidate for the Whig Party against Labour in the 2015 general election.
• Helen Mahy is a director of the energy company SSE, a company that Labour had pledged to bring into public ownership.
• Mark McLane is a former executive at Barclays and retains shares in the company, the value of which would have been threatened by the Labour pledge to create a ‘Post Bank’.
• Pavita Cooper even donated to the Tory party and breached the rules by failing to disclose it. Even after it was disclosed, she continued to claim that she had only donated to a personal friend and not to the party proper, a claim that appears to be false.
These conflicting interests could provide part of the explanation for the EHRC’s skewed decision-making processes.

Williamson elaborates on what he sees as an inappropriate intervention by EHRC that was not in the public interest, “For example, in February 2018, Young Labour, which is the Party’s youth movement, proposed a one-day National Equalities conference, open to: women, BAME, LGBT+, and disabled people. The conference was to elect some of Young Labour’s equalities officers. But almost as soon as the conference was proposed, the Commission swooped in to shut it down following an outpouring of faux outrage from Tory politicians. The EHRC said that the conference could constitute ‘unlawful discrimination’ because it was only open to people from groups that suffer discrimination. A pattern of behaviour was emerging in how the Commission interpreted its legal powers: singling out and undermining the Official Opposition on behalf of the Conservative Party.”

Williamson describes the targeted hostility as reaching, “fever pitch in May 2019, when the EHRC opened an investigation to determine whether the Labour Party had ‘unlawfully discriminated against, harassed, or victimised people because they’re Jewish’. The investigation was launched following lobbying efforts by two anti-Corbyn and pro-Israel outfits: the self-styled ‘Jewish Labour Movement’ (JLM) and the so-called ‘Campaign Against Antisemitism’ (CAA). Both organisations are strongly committed to Israel. The Jewish Labour Movement is affiliated to the Labour Party and likes to pretend that it is simply there to represent Jewish members of the Party. In fact, anyone—Jewish or not—can join, so long as they support Israel. The JLM is constitutionally bound to support Israel, to ‘promote […] Zionism’ and the ‘centrality of Israel in Jewish life’.”

Williamson reports that, “One of the JLM’s former leaders, Jeremy Newmark, has stated that the JLM ‘is not a foreign policy group nor is it an Israel advocacy organization [sic]’. This is simply false. The JLM is a member of the Zionist Federation, which is in turn a member of the World Zionist Organisation (WZO) based in Israel and one of the four ‘National Institutions’ that, together with the Israeli government, make up the leadership of the transnational Zionist movement. The WZO congress is the ultimate source of authority in the movement. It has codified the ‘duties of the Individual Zionist’, a document passed first at the 1972 congress. The most recent version in 1991 enjoins each member—including members of the JLM—to be an ‘active member’ of Zionist groups; ‘to endeavour [sic] to implement the program of the Zionist movement’; to ‘contribute’ to Zionist fundraising; and ‘to strengthen Zionist influence within the community’.”

Williamson elaborates on the difference between JLM and the CAA thus, “The CAA, by contrast, is not a formal member of the Zionist movement, but its chair Gideon Falter is a board member of the UK branch of the Jewish National Fund (JNF). Despite its name, the JNF is not an organisation that raises money for all Jews. It is, instead, the State of Israel’s land purchasing ethnic cleansing agency; responsible for encouraging Zionist settlement in historic Palestine; and was, until recently, constitutionally forbidden from selling land to Arabs. The JNF is another of the four of the State of Israel’s ‘National institutions’. The CAA was created in 2014 in order to defend Israel’s reputation as a result of its war on Gaza that year. By Falter’s account he was motivated by criticism of Israel in the media: ‘the fastidious disregard for the facts and the insistence on holding Israel to exceptional, impossible standards’.” This constitutes the illegal malevolent foreign interference in UK politics of a Zionist propaganda entity.

According to Williamson, “Unsurprisingly, Falter appears to have form in using antisemitism as a weapon against critics of Israel. Back in 2009, Falter apparently ‘tipped off the media’ about an allegedly false complaint of antisemitism that he had made against a Foreign Office diplomat, Rowan Laxton. At the appeal against Laxton’s conviction, ‘The judge and two magistrates’ were ‘unanimous in agreeing that he never at any time said ‘f*cking Jews’. The claim that Laxton had made such a remark whilst watching a news report about the Israeli bombardment of Gaza in 2009—something he had always denied—was seemingly bogus. However, by then, the damage was done: right-wing, pro-Israel blogs were quick to reproduce the false allegations.”

Williamson informs us of other “Secret conflicts of interest,” saying, “Among those that have contributed money to the CAA is a little-known charity called the Anglo-Jewish Association (AJA). The Association was created in 1871 and remains involved in the Jewish Colonization Association which began operation in what it calls ‘Israel’ from 1900, though of course no such state then existed. Its charitable objects include ‘promotion of goodwill towards Israel’. The relevance of this is that Rebecca Hilsenrath’s husband, Michael, was Deputy President of the AJA when a £5,000 donation was made to the CAA to contribute to their widely ridiculed ‘antisemitism barometer’, listed under ‘Research’ on the CAA website. The AJA donated to this ‘research’ at some point between July 2015 and June 2016. The precise timing of the donation, however, is unimportant; the proximity between the AJA and the CAA seems clear.”

Williamson claims that, “Contrary to the EHRC’s rules, Hilsenrath did not disclose this conflict of interest arising from her husband’s involvement with the AJA. The CAA first complained to the EHRC about the Labour Party in July 2018. Hilsenrath had oversight of the EHRC’s response until she eventually was relieved of responsibility six months later. At an EHRC board meeting in January 2019, as the EHRC was considering the probe on antisemitism, Hilsenrath disclosed that she ‘was an active member of the Anglo-Jewish Community’. The board decided that there was no evidence of any conflict of interest but that Hilsenrath should recuse herself from determination regarding the matter. As a disclosure of a conflict of interest, Hilsenrath’s statement is inadequate; it is not a conflict of interest to be an ‘active member’ of any ethnic, racial or religious community and as such there is no reason for Hilsenrath to recuse herself on the grounds of being Jewish.”

Williamson asserts that, “A proper conflict of interest statement would have detailed the potential conflicts of interests raised by whatever ‘active’ involvement in the ‘Anglo-Jewish community’ Hilsenrath had in mind, so that each could be assessed. It is notable that neither on appointment nor in the light of the specific investigation into the Labour Party did Hilsenrath do this.” But wait there’s more: “In addition to the stunning revelation that her husband had been involved in funding the CAA, there are other conflicts that have not been disclosed. For example Hilsenrath was ‘co-founder of the Hertsmere Jewish Day School, and then Yavneh College in Hertfordshire’. Both of these schools self describe as ‘Zionist’ or ‘Religious Zionist’. The schools, in other words, inculcate a political outlook as opposed to merely a religious or spiritual one, and one that is inimical to the fostering of a culture of human rights and opposition to racism. It is obviously inappropriate for any official or staff member of the EHRC to be a committed Zionist.”

Williamson reports that, “We can note two other instances, which are problematic for similar reasons. The first is the case of Adam Wagner, who was instructed by the Campaign Against Antisemitism to present its submission to the EHRC. Wagner was already on an EHRC panel of preferred counsel. Wagner has also stated, in December 2019, that he had joined the JLM, making him a formal member of the Zionist movement.” Then he reports on a matter that has already been reported elsewhere as it sounded alarm bells, “Just days before the EHRC declared it would undertake an investigation into the Labour Party, it was announced that Sarah Sackman, vice-chair of the JLM, had been appointed to the EHRC’s panel of counsel.”

Williamson also notes that, “…in 2016, the pro-Israel Jewish Chronicle had reported the appointment of incoming chair of the EHRC, David Isaac under the headline ‘Equal opportunity knocks’. It reported approvingly that ‘there is a strong Jewish presence at the top’ of the EHRC. The piece remained online for some time and was still live on the Chronicle’s website on 28 May 2019, when the EHRC announced the inquiry into the Labour Party, but was deleted shortly thereafter, being gone by 22 June at the latest. An article stating the faiths of commissioners ought to be uncontroversial, unless the Chronicle’s editors considered this as imputing something about their political views.”

For Williamson there is a “clear lack of independence” demonstrated by the EHRCs adamant refusal to investigate Islamophobia in the Tory Party. He says that, “More glaringly, the EHRC has singularly refused to take any action against the Conservative Party over Islamophobia. This is despite repeated calls on the EHRC by the Muslim Council of Britain to open an investigation into widely documented allegations of Islamophobic and racist behaviour by Tory members, including the current Tory leader. Instead, they’ve determined that the Tories are capable of investigating themselves. Yet, we’re supposed to believe that the EHRC is independent and impartial.”

Williamson points out that, “…even Rebecca Hilsenrath has sounded alarm bells about the Commission’s lack of independence. It was revealed on Newsnight, late last year, that Hilsenrath had sent a letter to the head of the civil service, with concerns about the current Chair of the Commission, David Isaac. She said: David [Isaac] regularly declines to take public positions […] Recent examples include the publication of a piece of research into the implications of losing access to EU structural funds, and the stripping of Shamima Begum’s citizenship. The implication, it would seem, is that Isaac’s refusal to take positions on issues that might embarrass the government, shows his reluctance to challenge this Tory regime.” The Begum case was a glaring example of an issue where the EHRC should have made a public statement regarding Human Rights; that Isaac remained silent is a disgrace.

However his background and work beyond EHRC may explain his reluctance to make any statement critical of Tory Government decisions or policies. Williamson reports that, “Isaac comes from a big City law firm, Pinsent Masons, where he continues to work as an equity partner and is paid up to £620,000 a year on top of his Commission salary. The firm enjoys a number of lucrative government contracts. Whilst Isaac is no longer involved in those contracts, it’s difficult to escape the conclusion that this is a conflict of interest. Isaac has also written for the conservative think tank Bright Blue, which has been provided with ‘support’ by the Commission on his watch. The think tank also published an attack piece ‘The Corbynites and antisemitism’ written by Stephen Pollard, editor of the pro-Israel Jewish Chronicle. Isaac’s work with Bright Blue appears to fit into a pattern of Commission bosses working hand in glove with conservative think tanks. Indeed, Trevor Phillips is a ‘senior fellow’ at the Islamophobic pro-Israel think tank, Policy Exchange.”

According to Williamson, “It seems pretty clear that the Commission lacks independence, is institutionally racist, and has been abusing its legal mandate by attacking the Official Opposition. In our view, the Commission’s conduct played a leading role in derailing Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, and in legitimising a McCarthyite smear campaign that only gets more menacing by the day. It would appear that, far from being an ‘equalities watchdog’, the EHRC has become a right-wing attack dog.” In his arrogance and greed John Ware has unwittingly opened Pandora’s Box thinking he can just bluff his way to even bigger payouts from anyone who challenged his warped perspective. Ware also has form as a dishonest Journalist who has cost the BBC paying damages for his past smear tactic reporting, but what did the BBC expect when he came to them from the Sun Tabloid rag? The details exposed in these Court cases will rock the BBC, exposing ‘fake news’ that will jeopardise the legitimacy of the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

Despite Boris Johnson imploring us all to ‘Move On’ his controversial puppet master Dominic Cummings is in the spotlight again as the public demand that he must be held to account for breaking the lockdown rules we were all subjected to earlier in the year. This is especially important as he himself devised the rules! According to a recent Guardian Article, “Downing Street has been urged to provide proof that Dominic Cummings did not make a second trip to Durham during lockdown amid claims that police failed to properly investigate alleged sightings of the prime minister’s chief aide. Two of four people who claim to have seen Cummings on what would have been a second visit to the north-east of England have complained to the police watchdog, accusing the Durham force of not fully probing their claims.” They say, “Cummings has consistently denied returning to Durham on 19 April, days after he came back to London from a trip that was subsequently exposed in a joint investigation by the Guardian and the Daily Mirror.”

The Guardian report that, “The prime minister’s chief adviser has said that phone data and potentially CCTV would prove he was in London – and the Guardian has been told of one sighting of him on Hampstead Heath that afternoon. However, neither he nor Downing Street has gone public with the evidence they say they have – and which Boris Johnson says he has seen – and pressure is mounting again for full transparency to answer lingering questions about his movements.” We all totally trust the PM implicitly, because we can be absolutely certain he would never lie… Would he? They say, “Cummings’ initial trip to Durham caused widespread uproar and is cited as one of the chief reasons for the public losing faith in the government’s handling of the crisis.”

The witnesses are reportedly, “Clare Edwards, a nurse practitioner, and her husband, Dave, say they saw a man they believe to have been Cummings on 19 April just after 11am in Houghall woods on the edge of Durham. On 25 May they gave statements to police about the alleged sighting, just as Cummings was giving a press conference in Downing Street denying a claim by another witness that he was seen admiring bluebells with his wife in the same woods on 19 April, at about 8.30am. Since then, a fourth witness has alleged they saw the No 10 aide and a companion in between the woods and the home of Cummings’ parents that day, between 11.15am and 11.30am. A further witness told the Guardian that they saw Cummings back in north London, on Hampstead Heath, later the same afternoon.”

According to the Guardian, “Durham police found ‘insufficient evidence’ that Cummings was in Durham on 19 April.” Perhaps they used that familiar Government trick of not bothering to look? “Following that assessment, Clare and Dave Edwards, both 59, made a subject access request under the Data Protection Act, asking the force to show them all the personal information it had about them as a result of their complaint, which they hoped might reveal how it was followed up. Most of the police correspondence about their original complaints was redacted and labelled ‘official – sensitive’. All pre-dated the statements given to police, which Dave Edwards suggests means the police did nothing more with those statements. Edwards said he believed the results, returned last week, suggested that their testimony was not taken seriously.”

On Wednesday the couple complained to the Independent Office for Police Conduct. They said: “Given the high-profile nature of this issue, it is inconceivable that this matter has not been followed up thoroughly. We have no personal issue with Mr Cummings or his family, but we do feel that Durham police’s handling of our complaint is below the standard we would expect from our local constabulary.” The Guardian report that, “The Edwardses asked whether officers checked automatic number recognition cameras for the movements of Cummings’ car that weekend. This information would not typically be revealed under a subject access request, and the force did not answer.” The issue here is that it would not be difficult for Cummings to rule out this possibility if he was put under the normal requirements of being asked to provide an alibi, but he is obviously being treated as a special case. He helped draft the rules that the rest of us are constrained by so it is not as if his own transgressions are irrelevant.

In his revelations to the Guardian Dave Edwards, remains convinced that he saw Cummings among a group of five adults and a child. “He was the dead image of Dominic Cummings. He was standing over a small child on a bike. As I got through the clearing, I said to my wife: ‘Did you see Dominic Cummings there?” Edwards said “He was identical to the TV footage: dark beanie hat, dark-rimmed glasses. If it was mistaken identity, the police could have ruled that out. If Cummings had the evidence, it would be very easy for him to say: ‘Here I am in Costa coffee in London at 10am on 19 April,’ or whatever, ‘so I couldn’t have been in Houghall woods’. He noted that,“I’m not politically motivated, I have nothing against Cummings. But we think what we saw was important given the circumstances of the lockdown, and we feel that our complaint has been airbrushed.”

Clare Edwards had said: “I’m certainly sure that it was Dominic Cummings.” “In her statement to officers, she said she saw a man she thought to be Cummings just after 11.01am on 19 April. She said she was able to be precise after finding a timestamped geolocated photograph she took of the woods moments before seeing the man. The couple remember the date because they had a Zoom party and quiz for their son’s birthday the day before as they were not allowed to meet due to the lockdown restrictions. Clare Edwards also called on Cummings to release evidence proving he was in London at the time.” The Guardian say that, “A fourth witness, who does not want to be named, is convinced that they saw Cummings and a companion between 11.15am and 11.30am that day, between Houghall woods and Cummings’ father’s property. They made a digital note of the sighting, including location data, which was shared with friends at the time.” They say, “That note has been seen by the Guardian and Daily Mirror.”

The witness said: “I do follow politics, so I know what people look like.” Asked whether they were sure it was Cummings, they said: “We know his parents do live locally, so we have recognised them before in the local area. I would recognise him again. At first I could not quite believe that I had seen him. I thought: ‘Why would he be up here?’ But I posted about it on the day. I was sure about it at the time.” People who live in the area would have been more familiar with recognizing Cummings from past visits to Durham so should perhaps be considered more credible.

There was the usual ‘Move On’ language from No 10 where a spokesman said: “Durham constabulary have made clear they are not taking any further action against Mr Cummings and that by locating himself at his father’s premises he did not breach the regulations.” They then backed up their insistence with a word or two from our scrupulously honest and reliable Prime Minister who, “has said he believes Mr Cummings behaved reasonably and he considers the matter closed.” However, the public do not agree! The Guardian report that, “No 10 did not comment on specific allegations that Cummings was in Durham on 19 April. Cummings has defended driving to his parents’ farm from London on 27 March after fearing that he and his wife were falling ill with coronavirus, to seek potential childcare for their four-year-old son. They made a 60-mile round trip to Barnard Castle on 12 April – Cummings said to test his eyesight – and drove back to London the following day.” No one in the UK actually believes this fanciful line of total hogwash.

It should not require the efforts of concerned citizens going out of their way to demand that the police do their job and treat us all in an equal manner. We are really sick of special exceptions for the ruling elite. Cummings was treated like an exceptionally important person and allocated a press conference in the Downing Street rose garden in May really infuriated the public. No prior unelected ‘adviser’ has demanded such privilege before, but this proves Cummings is the power behind the PM. He denied the allegation he had returned to Durham on the 19th. In his statement he had said: “There is a particular report that I returned there on the 19 April. Photos and data on my phone prove this to be false and local CCTV, if it exists, would also prove that I’m telling the truth that I was in London on that day. I was not in Durham.” However although he has claimed that the witnesses were mistaken, he has still not provided that crucial evidence and Johnson must be growing increasingly concerned that the public will not let this matter drop.

The Guardian reported that, “At the end of May, the prime minister was challenged by the Commons liaison committee about whether he had seen the evidence. After dodging the question three times, he said he had, but refused MPs’ requests to publish the evidence or pass it to the cabinet secretary for independent scrutiny. The Guardian asked Downing Street to provide the data to rule out a case of mistaken identity on 19 April, but it declined.” A Durham police spokesman said: “As outlined in our statement of 28 May, Durham constabulary carried out an investigation into this matter led by a senior detective and found insufficient evidence to support the allegation.”

In a welcome move that will undoubtedly win public approval it appears at least some sections of our hapless UK Media are piling on the pressure to demand proper scrutiny and accountability from those dishing out the dictates constraining every aspect of our lives. In another Guardian Article entitled, “Cummings trips damaged UK lockdown unity, study suggests” they claim that the, “Scandal over adviser’s journey to Durham broke trust in lockdown measures and politicians.” They say that, “The scandal over Dominic Cummings’ trips to and around Durham during lockdown damaged trust and was a key factor in the breakdown of a sense of national unity amid the coronavirus pandemic” according to research that suggests, “Revelations that Cummings and his family travelled to his parents’ farm despite ministers repeatedly imploring the public to stay at home, as exposed by the Guardian and the Daily Mirror in May, also crystallised distrust in politicians over the crisis, according to a report from the thinktank British Future.”

According to the Guardian, “The findings emerged in a series of surveys, diaries and interviews carried out over the first months of the pandemic as the public got to grips with profound changes to their habits, relationships and lifestyles. It found that while the start of lockdown forged a new community spirit and softened divisions caused by Brexit, this dissipated as the Cummings scandal emerged, lockdown rules were eased and social tensions resurfaced, especially over how far people observed social distancing rules. While the pandemic has made the UK overall less divided – and revealed an appetite to hang on to perceived gains in community spirit created under lockdown – it warns that tensions could re-emerge in the coming recession over issues such as growing perceptions of a gap between rich and poor.” The privileged few and the exploited peasantry of rising British inequality.

They quote Jill Rutter, the author of the report, saying: “There’s a risk that past divides are re-emerging as society starts to reopen. The shared experience of lockdown made many people feel more connected to their neighbours and local community. Now that sense of togetherness is starting to fray. The good news is that people would rather we kept hold of it.” They say that the study notes: “The perception that the prime minister’s adviser, Dominic Cummings, had broken lockdown rules was a highly salient issue that appeared to damage trust in politicians.” I’m glad to know I wasn’t the only one outraged as they relay that, “Participants in the research grew ‘noticeably angrier’ about politicians after the revelations, although it also served to create fresh consensus. It was not, however, as divisive an incident as might be thought. Most people, irrespective of their political views, appeared to disapprove of Cummings’ action.”

The Guardian report that, “The study was carried out for the /Together coalition, a campaign set up in the wake of Brexit to bridge social divides and build a kinder society. It comprises two surveys of more than 2,000 people carried out in early March and late May and June, and material from online discussion groups and 36 WhatsApp diarists. The start of lockdown heralded a new community spirit, characterised by neighbourly generosity, volunteering, enhanced social connectedness, and ‘acts of kindness from strangers,’ all promoting strong feelings of national unity, the study found. This sense of togetherness and generosity, typified by the weekly clap for carers in support of the NHS and other frontline workers, made people feel ‘part of something that was positive and larger than just their street’ and helped heal deep social divisions over Brexit.” Yep, Boris and his toffs got us to turn of the Brexit tap: that particular strand of political propaganda is no longer needed as a cover for the Covert 2019 Rigged Election.

Delving further into the report the Guardian say that, “by mid-May, this unity had started to dissipate, researchers found, with the perception that ‘some groups of people were not observing social distancing rules’ becoming a major source of division, especially as lockdown rules were eased. In addition to the Cummings revelations, the sense of unity broke down further as differences in lockdown policy emerged between the Westminster and devolved administrations in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. There were also differences in attitudes to, and experiences of, the pandemic between young and old, and home workers and key workers. A major public concern was the division between rich and poor. ‘It was felt that those in power needed to address wealth divides, but also recognise that more work was needed to bring people together in urban areas with a more transient population’.”

It will be a cause of growing concern for Boris Johnson to learn that, “There was widespread support for the Black Lives Matter campaign – including broad support from people of all ethnic groups and ages for action to tackle inequality and racial prejudice in the UK – although there was concern about violence on some of the protests. The study urges the government to invest in the positive bonds created under lockdown, such as in volunteering programmes.” They report that, “Our leaders, whatever their political views, need to make healing social divides a priority, and to commit a practical agenda to make it happen.” The Guardian article included a few telling quotes in response to questions in the report.

One person summed up the overall sentiment of respondents to the question, “Are we more divided or more united as a country?” He said, “More divided, two reasons. The first is the Dominic Cummings saga. The vast majority of people see it as one rule for those in charge and one rule for everyone else and this is now causing issues as many people are flaunting lockdown rules, whilst others are at the opposite end of the scale and worried about government advice and whether to trust them.” So I would say if Boris Johnson thinks we have ‘moved on’ from the Cummings debacle he is deluded. I that the witnesses who have taken a defiant stand, but we hasn’t Starmer or any other MP taken note of this public anger and resentment to demand scrutiny and accountability from this corrupt Tory Government. Cummings holds the key to unlocking the Covert 2019 Rigged Election that would justify a full Investigation and Johnson is afraid that his Government would fall. Cummings is the Grenade, oust him and you pull the pin! DO NOT MOVE ON!

[Kim Sanders-Fisher]

We must keep up unrelenting, very vocal public pressure demanding loud and clear that the PM really has to ditch the Dom! The stubborn and arrogant resistance from Boris Johnson indicates that Cummings clearly has serious compromat on the PM and it probably pertains to the inside scoop on the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Cummings promised 80 seats and he knew exactly where to target and by how much the postal votes would need to be supplemented to win seats: Johnson got his astounding 80 seat ‘landslide victory’ giving him carte blanch in the Commons to ram through crash-out Brexit. But Cummings is not a loyal Tory, he only cares about his own power and if his privilege to dictate to the PM is removed he could turn Whistleblower and bring the whole corrupt cabal down with him by exposing the truth. Revealing the master plan would be a chance to demonstrate how amazingly clever he was in fooling us all; I believe that is part of his really warped psyche.

This scandal is not going away and nor should we let it, but It seems the ‘Dominic Affect’ is not helping our boys in blue enforce any necessary restrictions. In the Guardian Article, “Dominic Cummings undermined lockdown enforcement, says ex-Durham police chief, Mike Barton says chief advisor’s behaviour damaged trust in government and restrictions. Durham’s former chief constable has warned that Dominic Cummings’ lockdown behaviour has made it more difficult for officers to enforce the rules and has been used by some as an excuse for law-breaking. Mike Barton said the decision by the prime minister’s chief aide to drive to Durham at the height of the coronavirus pandemic had “damaged trust in the government and in the rules”. After the trip was exposed by the Guardian and the Daily Mirror, Barton said: “People were actually using the word ‘Cummings’ in encounters with the police to justify antisocial behaviour.”

Speaking to Times Radio, he said: “If the public don’t think the police are operating in a fair and impartial way, you won’t get their trust and you won’t get their support. People who make the rules shouldn’t break them. Otherwise, you can’t expect the little people to do it.” The Guardian say, “Barton, who retired last year after a seven-year stint running the force, also criticised Cummings’s failure to apologise for his actions and the excuses he gave for them during a Downing Street press conference. “His bare-faced effrontery in the rose garden was staggering,” he said. Barton said Cummings’s explanation for his trip to Barnard Castle was worse than childish. He said: “To say that he drove 60 miles with his child in the back of the car, on his wife’s birthday, to go to a beauty spot to test his eyesight, just beggars belief. I wouldn’t have expected a seven-year-old boy who was caught red-handed to have come out with such a ridiculous excuse.”

According to the Guardian Barton added: “So do I think that damaged trust in the government and in the rules? Of course it did. And that’s what the studies are now saying.” They say, “Research published on Thursday suggested that the Cummings lockdown scandal was a key factor in a breakdown of a sense of national unity over the pandemic. Barton also criticised the government for trying to defend him. He said: ‘It ill behoved the government that you had ministers trotting out a defence of Cummings when there wasn’t one.’ A three-day investigation by Durham police found that Cummings probably broke health protection rules by driving to Barnard Castle. But as the investigation was confined to his movements in County Durham, it made no finding on his decision to leave London. Durham police said it would not act retrospectively against Cummings. Asked if Durham police had done a good enough job of investigating Cummings, Barton said: “I don’t know anything about the investigation.” But he added: “If you lose the trust of the public, you cannot police.”

Still in the news and causing an unwanted controversy for the PM, the spotlight is still focused on the rogue Chief Advisor in another Guardian Article, “Two stories, different witnesses. So where was Dominic Cummings on 19 April?” They say, “Witness accounts pile on pressure for PM’s aide to show proof he did not visit Durham a second time in lockdown. The official version is Cummings’s own, and places him squarely in London. While the prime minister’s chief aide notoriously acknowledged a trip to Durham in late March, his denial of a second visit days after he returned was unequivocal.” When Cummings made that haughty presentation at a specially convened press conference in the Downing Street rose garden the public were incensed by it as it proved Dominic Cummings has a super inflated idea of how important this unelected ‘advisor’ is. Right now he is calling the shots and refusing to stand down, but he is a loose cannon in a dangerous position of power who needs to be removed ASAP.

The Guardian report that, “he insisted the witness who said they had seen him admiring bluebells in Houghall woods was wrong, and he had the evidence. ‘Photos and data on my phone prove this to be false,’ he said. ‘And local CCTV, if it exists, would also prove that I’m telling the truth that I was in London on that day. I was not in Durham.’ Cummings has not wavered from that line, and the prime minister later said he had seen evidence himself. A witness in London has now come forward to support that story, telling the Guardian they saw Cummings with his family on Hampstead Heath on the Sunday afternoon. Case closed? Not quite. Since then, three other people have set out their own version of events. Like the first witness, who came forward in May, they say they saw Cummings in Houghall woods near Durham that morning, and say they are as sure as they can be it was him – but would accept they saw a lookalike if he showed them the proof.”

The Guardian report that, “even as those two stories conflict, the only people with the power to reconcile them appear reluctant to do so. When Downing Street was asked by the Guardian to produce the phone data that Cummings said could prove his story, it declined. The new accounts bring fresh scrutiny to how Downing Street and police handled the affair – and drag attention back to Cummings’s nightmarish few days in May, culminating in his unprecedented press conference.” Public fury that Cummings clung on to his job without so much as an apology has abated as people were distracted with other matters, but it is resurfacing in the news as those who have reported sightings feel ignored as if there is a deliberate cover-up.

The Guardian say that, “If Boris Johnson had hoped the affair was behind the government, the Edwards’ account – along with those of two other witnesses – is a reminder of the unanswered questions that have lingered since the Guardian and Daily Mirror broke the story in May. There were concerns over the scope of the police investigation, which was confined to Cummings’s movements in County Durham and did not address why he left London in the first place with his sick wife, or whether hours earlier he had breached the rules by going back to work at Downing Street after tending to her. Cummings says he did not stop on the 264-mile drive north at a time when he and his wife were likely to have been infectious. But Durham police and forces along the route have refused requests to verify this.”

That was a long drive, but Cummings claims they did not stop. Really? While the vehicle might have a monster fuel tank and they could have taken food along for the ride north, but it is hard to believe that none of them including a small child wanted to use a toilet. Who would decide to do a drive like that while both supposedly responsible adults were getting sick and they were caring for a young child? That was totally irresponsible, driving 264 miles for childcare! The Guardian report that, “Police have refused to answer many questions about the investigation, referring inquiries to their 393-word press statement. There are other questions, too. Why did Cummings say he had warned about coronavirus last year, when he altered his blog to make it look as if he had? Was there really no one in London he could ask to look after his son, as he claimed? And were there ‘no taxis’ on 3 April when he drove to Durham hospital to pick up the sick child? Taxi firms in the city insist plenty were available.”

The Guardian has wondered, “is it possible for Cummings to have been seen in Durham and in London on the same day? The London witness who came forward in support of Cummings’s claim said they saw the aide, his wife and their four-year-old son on Hampstead Heath that Sunday afternoon. The witness provided a distant photograph apparently showing them at 3.31pm in a meadow area on the northern edge of the heath. The last alleged sighting in County Durham was at 11.15-11.30am that day, near the Cummings family farm. A typical journey time between the two spots is more than four hours – but that is in normal traffic. In an attempt to replicate the emptier road conditions of lockdown, the Guardian drove from north London to Durham early on a Sunday morning, and back. Travelling in a 17-year-old Honda Civic, the journey one way was completed in well under four hours. So it is feasible that Cummings could have made the trip in that time in his Land Rover Discovery on the empty roads during lockdown.”

The Guardian say, “Such was the furore over the disclosure of his first trip to Durham, it will be difficult for the government to move on fully from the scandal without an adequate explanation. For critics, the episode has become an emblem of the government’s mishandling of the crisis. There is evidence, too, the affair damaged the nation’s unity during lockdown, a charge that may yet haunt ministers if there is a substantial second wave. The PM considers the matter closed. There was no comment on specific allegations that Cummings was in Durham on 19 April. With the new witness accounts, the pressure on Cummings and the government to supply phone and photographic evidence only grows. He is facing at least three legal challenges about his movements during the lockdown.” The Guardian remind us of Cummings’s own words: “I think that people like me who helped make the rules should be accountable for their actions.”

Boris Johnson thinks if he refuses to budge on this issue we will all compliantly ‘Move On’ from the Cummings debacle, but he is delusional. Did anyone spot Cummings on those long road trips? Did he stop at a service station where he was caught on CCTV? His credit card would have a record of where he spent money over that period why can’t he produce a record? We can only hope that more witnesses challenge Cummings story forcing him to prove where he was during lockdown. The public are determined to hold Cummings to account, but we hasn’t Keir Starmer or any other MP taken note of this public anger and resentment to demand scrutiny and accountability from this corrupt Tory Government. I still believe that Cummings holds the key to unlocking the Covert 2019 Rigged Election with the ability to expose critical evidence that would justify a full Investigation. Johnson’s fearful if he ditches the Dom, will Cummings retaliate and bring down the Government? Cummings is the Grenade, oust him and you pull the pin. DO NOT MOVE ON!We must keep up unrelenting, very vocal public pressure demanding loud and clear that the PM really has to ditch the Dom! The stubborn and arrogant resistance from Boris Johnson indicates that Cummings clearly has serious compromat on the PM and it probably pertains to the inside scoop on the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Cummings promised 80 seats and he knew exactly where to target and by how much the postal votes would need to be supplemented to win seats: Johnson got his astounding 80 seat ‘landslide victory’ giving him carte blanch in the Commons to ram through crash-out Brexit. But Cummings is not a loyal Tory, he only cares about his own power and if his privilege to dictate to the PM is removed he could turn Whistleblower and bring the whole corrupt cabal down with him by exposing the truth. Revealing the master plan would be a chance to demonstrate how amazingly clever he was in fooling us all; I believe that is part of his really warped psyche.

This scandal is not going away and nor should we let it, but It seems the ‘Dominic Affect’ is not helping our boys in blue enforce any necessary restrictions. In the Guardian Article, “Dominic Cummings undermined lockdown enforcement, says ex-Durham police chief, Mike Barton says chief advisor’s behaviour damaged trust in government and restrictions. Durham’s former chief constable has warned that Dominic Cummings’ lockdown behaviour has made it more difficult for officers to enforce the rules and has been used by some as an excuse for law-breaking. Mike Barton said the decision by the prime minister’s chief aide to drive to Durham at the height of the coronavirus pandemic had “damaged trust in the government and in the rules”. After the trip was exposed by the Guardian and the Daily Mirror, Barton said: “People were actually using the word ‘Cummings’ in encounters with the police to justify antisocial behaviour.”

Speaking to Times Radio, he said: “If the public don’t think the police are operating in a fair and impartial way, you won’t get their trust and you won’t get their support. People who make the rules shouldn’t break them. Otherwise, you can’t expect the little people to do it.” The Guardian say, “Barton, who retired last year after a seven-year stint running the force, also criticised Cummings’s failure to apologise for his actions and the excuses he gave for them during a Downing Street press conference. “His bare-faced effrontery in the rose garden was staggering,” he said. Barton said Cummings’s explanation for his trip to Barnard Castle was worse than childish. He said: “To say that he drove 60 miles with his child in the back of the car, on his wife’s birthday, to go to a beauty spot to test his eyesight, just beggars belief. I wouldn’t have expected a seven-year-old boy who was caught red-handed to have come out with such a ridiculous excuse.”

According to the Guardian Barton added: “So do I think that damaged trust in the government and in the rules? Of course it did. And that’s what the studies are now saying.” They say, “Research published on Thursday suggested that the Cummings lockdown scandal was a key factor in a breakdown of a sense of national unity over the pandemic. Barton also criticised the government for trying to defend him. He said: ‘It ill behoved the government that you had ministers trotting out a defence of Cummings when there wasn’t one.’ A three-day investigation by Durham police found that Cummings probably broke health protection rules by driving to Barnard Castle. But as the investigation was confined to his movements in County Durham, it made no finding on his decision to leave London. Durham police said it would not act retrospectively against Cummings. Asked if Durham police had done a good enough job of investigating Cummings, Barton said: “I don’t know anything about the investigation.” But he added: “If you lose the trust of the public, you cannot police.”

Still in the news and causing an unwanted controversy for the PM, the spotlight is still focused on the rogue Chief Advisor in another Guardian Article, “Two stories, different witnesses. So where was Dominic Cummings on 19 April?” They say, “Witness accounts pile on pressure for PM’s aide to show proof he did not visit Durham a second time in lockdown. The official version is Cummings’s own, and places him squarely in London. While the prime minister’s chief aide notoriously acknowledged a trip to Durham in late March, his denial of a second visit days after he returned was unequivocal.” When Cummings made that haughty presentation at a specially convened press conference in the Downing Street rose garden the public were incensed by it as it proved Dominic Cummings has a super inflated idea of how important this unelected ‘advisor’ is. Right now he is calling the shots and refusing to stand down, but he is a loose cannon in a dangerous position of power who needs to be removed ASAP.

The Guardian report that, “he insisted the witness who said they had seen him admiring bluebells in Houghall woods was wrong, and he had the evidence. ‘Photos and data on my phone prove this to be false,’ he said. ‘And local CCTV, if it exists, would also prove that I’m telling the truth that I was in London on that day. I was not in Durham.’ Cummings has not wavered from that line, and the prime minister later said he had seen evidence himself. A witness in London has now come forward to support that story, telling the Guardian they saw Cummings with his family on Hampstead Heath on the Sunday afternoon. Case closed? Not quite. Since then, three other people have set out their own version of events. Like the first witness, who came forward in May, they say they saw Cummings in Houghall woods near Durham that morning, and say they are as sure as they can be it was him – but would accept they saw a lookalike if he showed them the proof.”

The Guardian report that, “even as those two stories conflict, the only people with the power to reconcile them appear reluctant to do so. When Downing Street was asked by the Guardian to produce the phone data that Cummings said could prove his story, it declined. The new accounts bring fresh scrutiny to how Downing Street and police handled the affair – and drag attention back to Cummings’s nightmarish few days in May, culminating in his unprecedented press conference.” Public fury that Cummings clung on to his job without so much as an apology has abated as people were distracted with other matters, but it is resurfacing in the news as those who have reported sightings feel ignored as if there is a deliberate cover-up.

The Guardian say that, “If Boris Johnson had hoped the affair was behind the government, the Edwards’ account – along with those of two other witnesses – is a reminder of the unanswered questions that have lingered since the Guardian and Daily Mirror broke the story in May. There were concerns over the scope of the police investigation, which was confined to Cummings’s movements in County Durham and did not address why he left London in the first place with his sick wife, or whether hours earlier he had breached the rules by going back to work at Downing Street after tending to her. Cummings says he did not stop on the 264-mile drive north at a time when he and his wife were likely to have been infectious. But Durham police and forces along the route have refused requests to verify this.”

That was a long drive, but Cummings claims they did not stop. Really? While the vehicle might have a monster fuel tank and they could have taken food along for the ride north, but it is hard to believe that none of them including a small child wanted to use a toilet. Who would decide to do a drive like that while both supposedly responsible adults were getting sick and they were caring for a young child? That was totally irresponsible, driving 264 miles for childcare! The Guardian report that, “Police have refused to answer many questions about the investigation, referring inquiries to their 393-word press statement. There are other questions, too. Why did Cummings say he had warned about coronavirus last year, when he altered his blog to make it look as if he had? Was there really no one in London he could ask to look after his son, as he claimed? And were there ‘no taxis’ on 3 April when he drove to Durham hospital to pick up the sick child? Taxi firms in the city insist plenty were available.”

The Guardian has wondered, “is it possible for Cummings to have been seen in Durham and in London on the same day? The London witness who came forward in support of Cummings’s claim said they saw the aide, his wife and their four-year-old son on Hampstead Heath that Sunday afternoon. The witness provided a distant photograph apparently showing them at 3.31pm in a meadow area on the northern edge of the heath. The last alleged sighting in County Durham was at 11.15-11.30am that day, near the Cummings family farm. A typical journey time between the two spots is more than four hours – but that is in normal traffic. In an attempt to replicate the emptier road conditions of lockdown, the Guardian drove from north London to Durham early on a Sunday morning, and back. Travelling in a 17-year-old Honda Civic, the journey one way was completed in well under four hours. So it is feasible that Cummings could have made the trip in that time in his Land Rover Discovery on the empty roads during lockdown.”

The Guardian say, “Such was the furore over the disclosure of his first trip to Durham, it will be difficult for the government to move on fully from the scandal without an adequate explanation. For critics, the episode has become an emblem of the government’s mishandling of the crisis. There is evidence, too, the affair damaged the nation’s unity during lockdown, a charge that may yet haunt ministers if there is a substantial second wave. The PM considers the matter closed. There was no comment on specific allegations that Cummings was in Durham on 19 April. With the new witness accounts, the pressure on Cummings and the government to supply phone and photographic evidence only grows. He is facing at least three legal challenges about his movements during the lockdown.” The Guardian remind us of Cummings’s own words: “I think that people like me who helped make the rules should be accountable for their actions.”

Boris Johnson thinks if he refuses to budge on this issue we will all compliantly ‘Move On’ from the Cummings debacle, but he is delusional. Did anyone spot Cummings on those long road trips? Did he stop at a service station where he was caught on CCTV? His credit card would have a record of where he spent money over that period why can’t he produce a record? We can only hope that more witnesses challenge Cummings story forcing him to prove where he was during lockdown. The public are determined to hold Cummings to account, but we hasn’t Keir Starmer or any other MP taken note of this public anger and resentment to demand scrutiny and accountability from this corrupt Tory Government. I still believe that Cummings holds the key to unlocking the Covert 2019 Rigged Election with the ability to expose critical evidence that would justify a full Investigation. Johnson’s fearful if he ditches the Dom, will Cummings retaliate and bring down the Government? Cummings is the Grenade, oust him and you pull the pin. DO NOT MOVE ON!We must keep up unrelenting, very vocal public pressure demanding loud and clear that the PM really has to ditch the Dom! The stubborn and arrogant resistance from Boris Johnson indicates that Cummings clearly has serious compromat on the PM and it probably pertains to the inside scoop on the Covert 2019 Rigged Election. Cummings promised 80 seats and he knew exactly where to target and by how much the postal votes would need to be supplemented to win seats: Johnson got his astounding 80 seat ‘landslide victory’ giving him carte blanch in the Commons to ram through crash-out Brexit. But Cummings is not a loyal Tory, he only cares about his own power and if his privilege to dictate to the PM is removed he could turn Whistleblower and bring the whole corrupt cabal down with him by exposing the truth. Revealing the master plan would be a chance to demonstrate how amazingly clever he was in fooling us all; I believe that is part of his really warped psyche.

This scandal is not going away and nor should we let it, but It seems the ‘Dominic Affect’ is not helping our boys in blue enforce any necessary restrictions. In the Guardian Article, “Dominic Cummings undermined lockdown enforcement, says ex-Durham police chief, Mike Barton says chief advisor’s behaviour damaged trust in government and restrictions. Durham’s former chief constable has warned that Dominic Cummings’ lockdown behaviour has made it more difficult for officers to enforce the rules and has been used by some as an excuse for law-breaking. Mike Barton said the decision by the prime minister’s chief aide to drive to Durham at the height of the coronavirus pandemic had “damaged trust in the government and in the rules”. After the trip was exposed by the Guardian and the Daily Mirror, Barton said: “People were actually using the word ‘Cummings’ in encounters with the police to justify antisocial behaviour.”

Speaking to Times Radio, he said: “If the public don’t think the police are operating in a fair and impartial way, you won’t get their trust and you won’t get their support. People who make the rules shouldn’t break them. Otherwise, you can’t expect the little people to do it.” The Guardian say, “Barton, who retired last year after a seven-year stint running the force, also criticised Cummings’s failure to apologise for his actions and the excuses he gave for them during a Downing Street press conference. “His bare-faced effrontery in the rose garden was staggering,” he said. Barton said Cummings’s explanation for his trip to Barnard Castle was worse than childish. He said: “To say that he drove 60 miles with his child in the back of the car, on his wife’s birthday, to go to a beauty spot to test his eyesight, just beggars belief. I wouldn’t have expected a seven-year-old boy who was caught red-handed to have come out with such a ridiculous excuse.”

According to the Guardian Barton added: “So do I think that damaged trust in the government and in the rules? Of course it did. And that’s what the studies are now saying.” They say, “Research published on Thursday suggested that the Cummings lockdown scandal was a key factor in a breakdown of a sense of national unity over the pandemic. Barton also criticised the government for trying to defend him. He said: ‘It ill behoved the government that you had ministers trotting out a defence of Cummings when there wasn’t one.’ A three-day investigation by Durham police found that Cummings probably broke health protection rules by driving to Barnard Castle. But as the investigation was confined to his movements in County Durham, it made no finding on his decision to leave London. Durham police said it would not act retrospectively against Cummings. Asked if Durham police had done a good enough job of investigating Cummings, Barton said: “I don’t know anything about the investigation.” But he added: “If you lose the trust of the public, you cannot police.”

Still in the news and causing an unwanted controversy for the PM, the spotlight is still focused on the rogue Chief Advisor in another Guardian Article, “Two stories, different witnesses. So where was Dominic Cummings on 19 April?” They say, “Witness accounts pile on pressure for PM’s aide to show proof he did not visit Durham a second time in lockdown. The official version is Cummings’s own, and places him squarely in London. While the prime minister’s chief aide notoriously acknowledged a trip to Durham in late March, his denial of a second visit days after he returned was unequivocal.” When Cummings made that haughty presentation at a specially convened press conference in the Downing Street rose garden the public were incensed by it as it proved Dominic Cummings has a super inflated idea of how important this unelected ‘advisor’ is. Right now he is calling the shots and refusing to stand down, but he is a loose cannon in a dangerous position of power who needs to be removed ASAP.

The Guardian report that, “he insisted the witness who said they had seen him admiring bluebells in Houghall woods was wrong, and he had the evidence. ‘Photos and data on my phone prove this to be false,’ he said. ‘And local CCTV, if it exists, would also prove that I’m telling the truth that I was in London on that day. I was not in Durham.’ Cummings has not wavered from that line, and the prime minister later said he had seen evidence himself. A witness in London has now come forward to support that story, telling the Guardian they saw Cummings with his family on Hampstead Heath on the Sunday afternoon. Case closed? Not quite. Since then, three other people have set out their own version of events. Like the first witness, who came forward in May, they say they saw Cummings in Houghall woods near Durham that morning, and say they are as sure as they can be it was him – but would accept they saw a lookalike if he showed them the proof.”

The Guardian report that, “even as those two stories conflict, the only people with the power to reconcile them appear reluctant to do so. When Downing Street was asked by the Guardian to produce the phone data that Cummings said could prove his story, it declined. The new accounts bring fresh scrutiny to how Downing Street and police handled the affair – and drag attention back to Cummings’s nightmarish few days in May, culminating in his unprecedented press conference.” Public fury that Cummings clung on to his job without so much as an apology has abated as people were distracted with other matters, but it is resurfacing in the news as those who have reported sightings feel ignored as if there is a deliberate cover-up.

The Guardian say that, “If Boris Johnson had hoped the affair was behind the government, the Edwards’ account – along with those of two other witnesses – is a reminder of the unanswered questions that have lingered since the Guardian and Daily Mirror broke the story in May. There were concerns over the scope of the police investigation, which was confined to Cummings’s movements in County Durham and did not address why he left London in the first place with his sick wife, or whether hours earlier he had breached the rules by going back to work at Downing Street after tending to her. Cummings says he did not stop on the 264-mile drive north at a time when he and his wife were likely to have been infectious. But Durham police and forces along the route have refused requests to verify this.”

That was a long drive, but Cummings claims they did not stop. Really? While the vehicle might have a monster fuel tank and they could have taken food along for the ride north, but it is hard to believe that none of them including a small child wanted to use a toilet. Who would decide to do a drive like that while both supposedly responsible adults were getting sick and they were caring for a young child? That was totally irresponsible, driving 264 miles for childcare! The Guardian report that, “Police have refused to answer many questions about the investigation, referring inquiries to their 393-word press statement. There are other questions, too. Why did Cummings say he had warned about coronavirus last year, when he altered his blog to make it look as if he had? Was there really no one in London he could ask to look after his son, as he claimed? And were there ‘no taxis’ on 3 April when he drove to Durham hospital to pick up the sick child? Taxi firms in the city insist plenty were available.”

The Guardian has wondered, “is it possible for Cummings to have been seen in Durham and in London on the same day? The London witness who came forward in support of Cummings’s claim said they saw the aide, his wife and their four-year-old son on Hampstead Heath that Sunday afternoon. The witness provided a distant photograph apparently showing them at 3.31pm in a meadow area on the northern edge of the heath. The last alleged sighting in County Durham was at 11.15-11.30am that day, near the Cummings family farm. A typical journey time between the two spots is more than four hours – but that is in normal traffic. In an attempt to replicate the emptier road conditions of lockdown, the Guardian drove from north London to Durham early on a Sunday morning, and back. Travelling in a 17-year-old Honda Civic, the journey one way was completed in well under four hours. So it is feasible that Cummings could have made the trip in that time in his Land Rover Discovery on the empty roads during lockdown.”

The Guardian say, “Such was the furore over the disclosure of his first trip to Durham, it will be difficult for the government to move on fully from the scandal without an adequate explanation. For critics, the episode has become an emblem of the government’s mishandling of the crisis. There is evidence, too, the affair damaged the nation’s unity during lockdown, a charge that may yet haunt ministers if there is a substantial second wave. The PM considers the matter closed. There was no comment on specific allegations that Cummings was in Durham on 19 April. With the new witness accounts, the pressure on Cummings and the government to supply phone and photographic evidence only grows. He is facing at least three legal challenges about his movements during the lockdown.” The Guardian remind us of Cummings’s own words: “I think that people like me who helped make the rules should be accountable for their actions.”

Boris Johnson thinks if he refuses to budge on this issue we will all compliantly ‘Move On’ from the Cummings debacle, but he is delusional. Did anyone spot Cummings on those long road trips? Did he stop at a service station where he was caught on CCTV? His credit card would have a record of where he spent money over that period why can’t he produce a record? We can only hope that more witnesses challenge Cummings story forcing him to prove where he was during lockdown. The public are determined to hold Cummings to account, but we hasn’t Keir Starmer or any other MP taken note of this public anger and resentment to demand scrutiny and accountability from this corrupt Tory Government. I still believe that Cummings holds the key to unlocking the Covert 2019 Rigged Election with the ability to expose critical evidence that would justify a full Investigation. Johnson’s fearful if he ditches the Dom, will Cummings retaliate and bring down the Government? Cummings is the Grenade, oust him and you pull the pin. DO NOT MOVE ON!

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