Do you reject the Lib Dems ?
Student : I do.
And all their works ?
I do.
And all their empty tuition fee promises ?
I do.
Regarding magistrate applicants, does the key quality of social awareness cover the need for local knowledge?
Agree
Disagree
Well obviously 'social awareness' (as opposed to the old-fashioned, outmoded concept of 'legal awareness') is a key competency for the modern magistrate. The question is, should a knowledge of social conditions in a particular location inform that social awareness or not ?
I'd imagine the correct answer is 'Yes'.
An example would be a case where a minority youth is charged with an unprovoked assault on a stranger. Apart from the broader social context of historic slavery, oppression, racism etc by the host community, something that every magistrate should be aware of, should he also be aware of the local context - let's say a recent EDL rally in the area and the concomitant ratcheting up of rhetoric against minorities, resulting in justified local anger, albeit misdirected?
Another example would be a case where a white youth is charged with an unprovoked assault on a (minority) stranger. Apart from the broader social context of historic slavery, oppression, racism etc by the host community, something that every magistrate should be aware of, should he also be aware of the local context - let's say a recent EDL rally in the area and the concomitant ratcheting up of rhetoric against minorities, resulting in unforgiveable racist assaults which must be stamped out?
And those paper claims on the State proved valueless.
"Germany tried to meet the colossal costs of the war by an appeal to the self-sacrificing spirit of the people. 'I gave gold for iron' was the slogan for the surrender of gold ornaments and jewellery. 'Invest in War Loan' ran the appeal to the patriotic sense of duty of all classes. Issue after issue of War Loan transformed the greater part of German private fortunes into paper claims on the State. Our enemies, especially Britain, took another line. They met the cost of war with taxes aimed primarily at those industries and groups to whom the war spelled prosperity. Britain's policy of taxation proved socially more equitable than Germany's policy of War Loans which lost their value after the war was over …"
Dr Rathenau did his best to explain to the Reichstag what was happening to the mark by alluding lengthily to the vicious circle of an adverse trade balance, the consequent necessity to sell German currency abroad, and its resulting depreciation, followed by the fall in the exchange rate and inevitable rise of home prices, leading to increased costs of materials and labour and so to new rifts in the budget. He expressly and publicly denied that the printing press had any role to play in that permanently spiralling sequence of events ...Most successful businessmen, however, stuck happily to the heresy that only by a continually falling exchange rate could Germany compete in neutral markets.
In spite of his robust common sense, the man in the [German] street is beginning to believe what some interested industrialists are telling him, so that he seems almost readily to subscribe to the false doctrine that it is good for trade that a government, by inflationary finance, should habitually spend more than its income… Even the German industrialist knows that the present activity of German industry (destroying the export trade of its neighbours) is a sign of fever and not of prosperity. But, as usual, each class in Germany thinks that the burden of taxation should fall on some other class or classes … Even the best disposed are inclined in a fatalistic way to let things take their course and wait for the world to recover its reason. The big industrialists are attempting to save something from the wreck by turning all the paper marks they can into foreign currencies or, failing that, into real things — land, machinery, and so on, which have an independent value … The incentive to saving is gone just when saving is of vital necessity to the State...
The one real temporary advantage is that Germany's workmen are in employ, but even this is mainly due not to successful exporting but to the misdirected consumption of holders of paper marks who want to get rid of them, and therefore to misdirected production, which actually interferes with the proper flow of exports and to some extent increases the amount of luxury imports. That the government has been or is deliberately pursuing a policy of inflation so disastrous for any government that adopts it is sufficiently disproved. It is partly weakness and inexperience which have prevented greater success.
One Herr Harden, whom Lord D'Abernon (British Ambassador) described as an acute if somewhat acid observer, explained to him that 'the followers of the Right were perpetually hunting for the old culprits responsible for the downfall of the empire and the old system, but instead of attacking the generals — Ludendorff and company — who were really the cause, or the old gang of princes and sycophants, they reviled the Jews and assassinated the leaders of the Left together with those who did not take their own perverted view.' More than three hundred assassinations among the leaders of the Left had been perpetrated since the Armistice, Herr Harden said, 'and no one is punished.'All this while hardly anyone had heard of Hitler. The DNVP was the party trebling its vote, and the rhetoric of the right didn't need much tweaking for when people had heard of Hitler.
On August 24 1921, Ludendorff took the march-past of 2,000 war veterans headed by the 39-year-old Prince Eitel Friedrich, second son of the Kaiser. They marched under an archway bearing the inscription 'In Kriege Unbesiegt' (unbeaten in war), and past the royal box in Paradeschritt, Prince Eitel Friedrich throwing his heels as high as anyone else. Then in front of 20,000 spectators there followed a sermon by the Army chaplain which suggested that Germany's greatness could only be recovered by military power, through the monarchy and the Hohenzollerns. There were speeches in the same strain by the three generals present, Ludendorff, Graf Waldersee and von der Goltz. Von der Goltz, who had commanded the Baltic Free Corps, was at pains to attack the 'Jew Government', and thus caused some anti-Semitic incidents in the crowd; but he stole the limelight in any case by producing telegrams of congratulations not only from Admiral Scheer and Grossadmiral von Tirpitz, but from Hindenburg and the ex-Kaiser himself.I'm also reading Lord Carver's history of the Turkish Front in WWI - in which the author wonders what would have happened had Churchill not decided to requisition (or pinch) two ships being built for the Turkish Navy. Up to that time the Ottoman Navy had been trained by British officers, but the Germans seized the opportunity to offer two similar ships to them - under a German Admiral. Admiral Souchon, doubtless prompted by Berlin, then attacked Britain's ally, Russia, in the Black Sea - and Turkey was in the war on the German side.
"Street life - but you'd better not get old,
Street life - or you're gonna feel the cold"
Ireland is no longer on the edge of Europe but is instead an Atlantic bridge. High-tech companies such as Intel, Oracle and Apple have chosen to base their European operations there. I will be asking Google executives today why they set up in Dublin, not London… What has caused this Irish miracle, and how can we in Britain emulate it?
… in a world where cheap, rapid communication means that investment decisions are made on a global basis, capital will go wherever investment is most attractive. Ireland’s business tax rates are only 12.5 per cent, while Britain’s are becoming among the highest in the developed world.
World-class education, high rates of innovation and an attractive climate for investment: these are all elements that have helped to raise productivity in Ireland. It is not the only advanced economy to have achieved this uplift. Last week in Washington the new Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, told me about the impact that the sustained increase in productivity growth had made in generating prosperity in the US…
The new global economy poses real long-term challenges to Britain, but also real opportunities for us to prosper and succeed. In Ireland they understand this. They have freed their markets, developed the skills of their workforce, encouraged enterprise and innovation and created a dynamic economy. They have much to teach us, if only we are willing to learn.
Five thugs attempted to attack a Respect open planning meeting in Oldham. They were completely repulsed, immobilized and Greater Manchester Police were alerted and moved in to arrest. None of those in the meeting were hurt.
The meeting was led by George Galloway and Yvonne Ridley. It was called to consider an electoral challenge in the forthcoming Oldham East and Saddleworth by-election. The consensus of the meeting was that a challenge will be necessary.
"the Gove option will mean that a lot of bright working or lower-middle class kids will look at a potential £60,000 debt and they won't bother - unless they're at Oxbridge or doing a course with a pretty much guaranteed career at the end of it. Outside this small subset of courses, university will be restricted to those whose parents can subsidise them - i.e. the very rich.
That's not all bad - I can see cultural studies departments being disbanded across England and Wales. Economic forces will cut away swathes of courses and institutions, correcting the insane growth of the last 25 years.
But at that kind of cost the idea of education as a good in itself will wither away. Who's going to do archaeology without a private income ?"
Race and Cultural Studies
Critical Theory and Philosophical Aesthetics
Contemporary Literature and Culture
Cultural History
Women’s Studies
English and Cultural Studies
Media Arts
Women’s and Gender History
Visual Cultures
Memory Studies ( I forget what that is - LT)
It seems that the Irish government were given incorrect information, not once but several times, on the extent of the financial damage - on the basis of which they guaranteed the banks and most of their debt.Mr. Bacon suggested the government buy loans from the banks at discounted prices, effectively handing them cash and easing doubts about their viability. By insisting on steep discounts, Ireland would be less likely to lose money on the purchases. On the flip side, bargain prices would trigger losses at the banks—which the government would probably have to patch with more capital. The taxpayer would foot the bill either way, but at least Ireland would understand how big it was.
The approach "has the merit of certainty and clarity," Mr. Bacon argued. But, he added, it would only work if "the projection of the extent of impairment is accurate in the first place."It wasn't.
The British magazine Punch used to depict Irish people as thick-browed, ape-like, half-humans, concerned only about one dimensional matters like eating and drinking. We railed against the racist stereotype. We were wrong. We are, after all, a shamelessly base people that clearly cannot sit at the same table as the more civilised peoples of Europe.
Does anyone ever wonder if the endless process of ethnic cleansing we call emigration, might have had a devastating affect on our gene pool, in a form of natural selection? Have we exported the good genes, and retained the genes for selfishness and stupidity?
Meanwhile, we have a government with a majority of 2. This arithmetic depends on the green party, who don't have a lot to contribute in the way of sound financial management (!) and 2 independents. One of these independents has told the Government that he will only support the budget (December 7th) if it includes MORE money for Kerry, while overall it must cut total public spending by more than 10%. There's a by-election next thursday, which the government will lose. They know this, which is why they delayed holding it for 17 months and were eventually forced to by a legal action brought to the courts by that well known champion of democracy, Sinn Fein. There are 3 more by-elections which are also long overdue for the same reason, and despite the judgement about the first one, the government is using the delays inherent in the court process to delay holding these three till after the budget. The boss, Brian Cowen, has an opinion poll rating of just 11% and a track record as finance minister 2002-2007.
The combined resources of the GAA, the FAI and the IRFU could have created a 100,000-seater super-stadium. But instead, the lords of IRFU settled for an almost studio-sized ground at their old haunt on Lansdowne Road: with not the 83,000 spectators at the present Croke Park -- which was filled for every home international including Italy -- and certainly not the 100,000 of some future all-code Croke Park, but with just 50,000.
Which other sporting organisation in the entire world has built a stadium that is known to be 30,000 seats below market demand?
| General Election 2010: Oldham East and Saddleworth[9] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
| Labour | Phil Woolas | 14,186 | 31.9 | −10.7 | |
| Liberal Democrat | Elwyn Watkins | 14,083 | 31.6 | −0.5 | |
| Conservative | Kashif Ali | 11,773 | 26.4 | +8.7 | |
| BNP | Alwyn Stott | 2,546 | 5.7 | +0.8 | |
| UKIP | David Bentley | 1,720 | 3.9 | +1.8 | |
| Christian | Gulzar Nazir | 212 | 0.5 | N/A | |
| Majority | 103 | 0.2 | −10.2 | ||
| Turnout | 44,520 | 61.2 | +4.4 | ||
The Tory vote went up by 3,000 – presumably 3,000 ex-Labour voters. The Tory increase is all the more impressive given that UKIP increased their vote by 900-odd – presumably patriotic ex-Tories. The BNP added 400 votes - probably mostly ex-Labour, too.
The swing to the Tories of 8.2% was more than twice the national average of 3.8%.
So what did 2010 Tory candidate Kashif Ali (11,773 votes, 26.4%) have that 2005 Tory candidate Keith Chapman (7,901 votes, 18.2%) didn’t have ?
Could it be that the formerly Labour Muslim votes were never heading to the Lib Dems, but, on grounds of "friendship, family ties or tribalism" (as the anti-Woolas Muslim Public Affairs Committee put it) to their Tory co-religionist ?
UPDATE - apparently Mr Kashif was parachuted in by CCO against the local party's wishes :
Traditionalists have been angered by Mr Cameron’s plans to take control of shortlists to impose women and ethnic minority candidates to boost their numbers in Parliament. Constituency party chair Mrs Barbara Jackson, an active member for 30 years, claimed two candidates were removed from the selection list at the last minute and others weren’t allowed to stand.
She claimed Mr Ali had threatened management that he would recruit family as members to take over the association if he was not selected.
Mrs Jackson said she had been labelled racist for complaining, but added: “They paint it as a race issue but it’s nothing to do with race. I won’t give in to bullying tactics from anyone no matter what the race, colour or sex. I’m still a Conservative but I’m very disappointed with the party. “The way they have done it is just wrong because the electorate deserve a choice. They have decided who our candidate is and that’s it, full stop. The constituency should be guiding the candidates, not the other way round. Very able people in our constituency have been rejected. Why they think it’s acceptable I can’t understand. It’s an exercise in ticking boxes and positive discrimination. They want women and Asians.”
I'm really disappointed that the Conservatives, especially Michael Gove have not given a proper context for the mess the government have inherited on this, and defended the Conservative principles which should underlie their long term policy.
In my view the story is roughly this:
1. The crisis has sprung out of the Labour target of 50% of school leavers going to university and the resultant big increase in the number of places and of universities, a lot of which were specialist colleges, not universities at all.
2. This led to a lowering of standards and by default a false promise to many students that their degrees would be as valuable as degees had been before. This is has been repeatedly shown up by employers telling us about the poor quality of graduates
3. Another result is constant interference in university admission policy, forcing universities not to choose by ability, something which has the potential to destabilise the whole system of excellence which is what universities are really there to pursue. There is now no level playing field for students and that is really unfair on them.
4. We would not have had these high fees (which the Conservatives should be dead against in principle) if universities hadn’t sprung up like weeds and ended up costing a fortune. Labour’s social engineering project was never costed properly
5. We have a situation where a lot of students at university shouldn't be there at all. Universities are there to develop intellect and show the importance of all the different academic subjects as contributors to society. Learning is brilliant in its own right and doesn't need any other justification. They are not and should not be seen as giving a simple passport to employment. It's something neither they, nor the government, can guarantee in any case.
6. The best way forward is admit what universities are for, turn a lot back to high standard technical colleges supported by industry and designed to help get their students into specific jobs, and leave the top academic universities to raise standards and just take the best in order for Britain to compete effectively in the world at that level.
7. The government should vigorously pursue adoption and improvements in the much talke about apprenticeship schemes (see letters to the FT today for example.) More kids will see the benefit of getting into employment by other routes
8. In the short term, and because of this mess we are currently in, universities should have additional tests for borderline applicants so they can see the potential of students who could do well at university but who have been to rubbish schools, then balance those test results against their A level results. This is far better than pursuing the social engineering agenda of getting unsuitable kids into university and spinning them nonsense stories about their future prospects.
9. But most important of all the Conservatives have got to say that university students are not better than others and that the route to being a successful citizen of Britain does not depend on going to a university. Lots don't but are equally important members of society with lots of ability and a good chance of doing well at work. Let's change this culture.
9. If we can do this we should be able to get rid of university fees in the end and the burden they are placing on our young people. The public is not unhappy about government paying for universities
Labour go somewhat insane, proclaiming that 50% of school leavers should be at uni – i.e. anyone over average intelligence. Every teacher training college in the land becomes a university (no longer a live-at-home student body), and the school leaving age is raised to 18. Ironically, the main beneficiaries are the middle classes, who can now get their more average children through Uni. You find former Polytechnics which are now much more middle class than a university was 25 years previously.
As above, the financial strain of this idiotic ‘all must have degrees’ policy finally catches up. They HAVE to introduce loans and tuition fees, otherwise the 50% non-uni candidates are subsidising the top 50%.
That's not all bad - I can see cultural studies departments being disbanded across England and Wales. Economic forces will cut away swathes of courses and institutions, correcting the insane growth of the last 25 years.
But at that kind of cost the idea of education as a good in itself will wither away. Who's going to do archaeology without a private income ?
Couldn't we just go back to the situation of twenty-plus years back, where the top 5% go to uni, with full grants for those with non-wealthy parents ?
Another potential issue - a £60,000 debt to be repaid from UK earnings provides an enormous incentive to minimise UK earnings. The most efficient way to do this will be to emigrate.
Result - a double hit as the fees remain unpaid and the tax revenue from our grad goes to Australia or Canada. Enough graduates are leaving as it is - and by definition they won't be the duffers, given the points systems used in more sensible countries.
"There are now 3.247 million British-born people living abroad, of whom more than 1.1 million are highly-skilled university graduates, say the researchers. More than three quarters of these professionals have settled abroad for more than 10 years, according to the study by the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). No other nation is losing so many qualified people, it points out. Britain has now lost more than one in 10 of its most skilled citizens, while overall only Mexico has had more people emigrate. Britain's exodus is far higher than any of the OECD's other 29 members. Germany has lost only 860,000 highly-skilled workers, America 410,000 and France 370,000. The OECD found that 27.3 per cent of those emigrating had health or education qualifications, 37.7 per cent had humanities or social science degrees and 28.5 per cent were scientists or engineers."
Mr Gove played down the research suggesting that higher fees would put off applicants.
"I believe that it won't have that effect. I believe that people will make a rational decision on the benefits that accrue to them as a result of taking a university degree," he said.
DC Hussain Sorry, just before we finish, I've just a couple of questions that I've got to ask you. When did this interest of yours for Islam develop?
A I've always been quite religious and I started to listen to Anwar al-Awlaki lectures last year and then I started to get really into it and I listened to everything that … like all of his recorded lectures that he made and that would have been like since November. I've been listening to him since November.
Hussain How did you get introduced to Anwar al-Awlaki?
A He's quite famous and I've started to listen to his stuff.
Hussain How did you come across him?
A On the internet.
Hussain Was that from your own research or did someone recommend him?
A From my own research but everybody listens to him and likes him anyway (my italics - LT).
"Tower Hamlets is Britain’s poorest borough, with less than half its residents in work and an average income of £13,000 per head."
Well, Mr E, you can't say the government aren't trying to help :
After a bit of soul-searching, I've decided to discontinue the blog.
Partly this is due to busy-ness in the real world, but that's only half the story. The other half is a noticeable dropping off in my levels of rage since the prime raison d'etre for that fury were ejected from office in May. I share the scepticism of some readers towards many aspects of the new government's platform, and worry that their reforms will be too timid, their policies wrong-headed, their instincts far from libertarian...
But what I don't have now is that same hate.
Prisoners will be given the vote in general elections for the first time in 140 years after David Cameron conceded there was nothing he could do to halt a European court ruling demanding the change, The Daily Telegraph can disclose. On Wednesday a representative for the Coalition will tell the Court of Appeal that the law will be changed following legal advice that the taxpayer could have to pay tens of millions of pounds in compensation. The decision, which brings to an end six years of government attempts to avoid the issue, opens the possibility that even those facing life sentences for very serious crimes could in future shape Britain’s elections.I don't know what makes me more cross - the way in which the EU spits in the eye of British democracy - no party in the UK could ever win a majority on such a platform - or the fact that Cameron's administration is caving in to them, then whining about how it's not their fault, a big boy made them do it etc.
“This is the last thing we wanted to do, but we have looked at this from every conceivable angle and had lawyers poring over the issue,” a senior government source said.“But there is no way out and if we continued to delay then it could start costing the taxpayers hundreds of millions in litigation.”
Mr Timms said he was running slightly late when he arrived at the Beckton Globe community centre for his regular Friday surgery. Choudhry, who was dressed in black, had made an appointment for 2.45pm, specifically to see him rather than an assistant, and was the second person he saw that day, just after 3pm.
The MP said: "She didn't go and sit down as she continued to come towards me where I was standing to greet her at that point. I thought she must have been coming to shake my hand. She made as if she was coming to do that. She looked friendly. She was smiling, if I remember rightly. I was a little puzzled because a Muslim woman dressed in that way wouldn't normally be willing to shake a man's hand, still less to take the initiative to do so, but that is what she was doing."
"She lunged at me with her right hand."
Mr Timms pointed at his stomach to show the jury where the knife had gone in.
The Old Bailey heard how the young Muslim woman had plotted for weeks to kill her local MP, buying two knives in case one 'broke' when she enacted her 'punishment' for him voting in Parliament to invade Iraq in March 2003. After the attack, she coolly told police: "I just pushed it in like how it is if you punch someone. I was trying to kill him because he wanted to invade Iraq. I was not going to stop (stabbing him) until someone made me. I wanted to kill him. I was hoping to get revenge for the people in Iraq."
"The Britons were among 34 people arrested during the day, Amsterdam Police spokesman Rob van der Veen said. It is understood the five were held for not producing identification while on their way to the demonstration."
Five Britons were among 34 people arrested by Dutch police as they headed to confront far-right activists showing their support for controversial politician Geert Wilders... The five Britons arrested were among 18 people picked up for failing to carry proper identification. They were fined £60 and freed, police spokesman Rob van der Veen said.
The clue as to why they'll be useless lies in the phrase 'in Japan'. The UK is not Japan. I think they're a great idea - if they'll be honoured. But just as liberalising drinking hours produced more drunk people, but didn't produce a Continental cafe culture, mechanisms for expressing intergenerational solidarity are likely to be more effective in Japan than here. The UK's post-war history is one long tale of ripping off the frugal, the virtuous, the far-sighted, and supporting the spendthrift, the antisocial, those who take no heed for the morrow - pretty much the exact opposite of the previous two hundred years. The chances of a few hundred 'care hours'* clocked up in the next ten years entitling one to corresponding hours in the year 2035 are minimal, unless some kind of cultural revolution occurs.In Japan, the system, called Hureai Kippu, was established in 1991 and has been expanding ever since as a way of helping to manage the country's rapidly ageing population. Literally translated as "Caring Relationship Tickets", it allows a volunteer to "bank" the hours they spend helping an elderly or disabled person in their personal Time Account. Different values apply to different kinds of tasks. For instance, more credit is given for helping at anti-social hours or with personal body care. Household chores and shopping command less.
These healthcare credits are guaranteed to be available to the volunteers themselves later in life, or to someone else in need, within or outside their family. The local and national government has even set up a nationwide electronic clearing network, so that a person can provide help in Tokyo, while their time credits are available to their parents anywhere else in the country.
Duncan Campbell sees the Student Grant demonstrations* and relives his glorious youth at CiF :
That's the same sheer pleasure you'll see on the faces of EDL demonstrators in Preston, a hundred-strong group of football supporters up for a weekend in Blackpool, on the streets of Paris in 1968, Genoa in 2008, or Nuremburg in 1936. Paris in 1789, Athens in 2010 or Rome in 1922.
It's the pleasure of being in a large group - the larger the better - with something to unite you and (preferably) an enemy to hate**. Anti-capitalist in Genoa, anti-Jew in Tsarist Russia, anti-Catholic in London.
It's the intoxicating power of the mob.
* Laban expounded on the Great Tuition Fee Disaster here.
** 35 years ago at West Brom's Birmingham Road end, there was a call-and response chant as follows :
"Who are the people ?"
"WE ARE THE PEOPLE !"
"Who are the ****bags ?"
"THEY ARE THE ****BAGS !"