Good Lord!
Is it really 8 years ago since I last looked on this?

I dimly remembered starting a blog and then, after a mere six posts and I suppose like the majority of wannabe bloggers, I forgot about it.

So, what has happened in the past 8 years?
Well, thank God, we no longer have Blair as PM.
However, we still have his malign influence affecting us in the form of Cameron's "New Labour Lite" Party, formerly The Conservative and Unionist Party and we are (finally and at long last, on the run-up to a Referendum on staying in or coming out of the EU.

On a personal note, I am no longer a member of  the Conservative Party as I'm afraid Cameron is more than I can stomach and I am now supporting UKIP and BREXIT, hoping we can correct the mistake we made 41 years ago.

Reading through by posts, I note that two of of them referred to drugs and specifically mentioned Amy Winehouse about whom my fears were so tragically predictive. What a tragic loss of talent because of a desire for some chemically induced thrills.

Other matters? Well, I'm older, not a lot wiser and even more cynical,
I'm still working and getting even more frustrated by management at work. Still, in a year or so I'll be out of it.

On a topical note, I see Angelina Jolie has been bumping her gums and virtue flagging about how the West should do more to help migrants. Perhaps someone might be kind enough to point her towards this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPjzfGChGlE ?

Glasgow Interlude

I had a Travel Shift up here on Monday for the rest of the week working on NetworkRail’s Radio Survey Coach. Arriving with enough time for a walk up to Kelvinhaugh Art Gallery and Museum, I left the hotel and set off along Sauchiehall Street.

As I was nearing Marks and Spencer, I noticed a young lass getting her fiddle ready to do some busking. I paused a while to listen and was delighted to be treated to a lament followed by a reel, all superbly played. After having a chat with her, congratulating her on her skill, for which I was more than happy to drop a couple of quid into her fiddle case, I carried on with my walk.

But it got me thinking. Why is it that the Scots are encouraged to make the most of celebrating their cultural heritage, even to the extent that pubs, wishing to put on live music, can just do without the bother of having to get permission from the licensing authorities? Whilst we in England, not only have to put up with snide comments from our political masters regarding folk singers in a pub near Wells, but should our publicans decide to put on live music events, even unamplified acoustic sessions, they must ask permission from the faceless Twitmarshes of the Local Authorities?

WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT THE DRUG PROBLEM?

My peripatetic employment took me to Croydon last week, where, on Wednesday, 9th of July, I chanced upon a copy of the Evening Standard. Two things in the paper caught my attention. The first was Amy Winehouse yet again behaving badly. The second, to my mind closely linked, was a report that one particular London Borough, can’t recall which one and it’s off the Standard website by now, had found traces of cocaine in almost every nightspot in its area.

So, what are we going to do about the drug problem? Do we legalise the trade and then tax it like tobacco and alcohol? Or do we keep it illegal, but alter our tactics on how to combat the problem?

I will state now, that by penalising the Afghan farmer for trying to earn a living, or victimising the Columbian peasant for producing a crop for which there is a demand is not going to solve the problem and is VERY unfair to some of the poorest people in the world.

So what can we do?

So far as I am concerned, legalisation is a non-starter. This is for several reasons, not least that it will put us out of step with our neighbours and will encourage a more serious form of the “drug tourism” the Dutch have to tolerate after the relaxation of their laws on Cannabis. Such a step will also make the UK a source of hard drugs into other countries.

But the more important question to be answered with respect to legalisation is, “How will the legalised trade be controlled?” Will it be an absolute free for all with currently Class A drugs being available for sale to all and sundry? Or will the sale of newly legalised drugs be controlled with only licensed premises being allowed to sell them and age restrictions placed on who is allowed to buy them?

On both counts and taking the tobacco and alcohol trades as examples, I am not exactly filled with confidence that such a system would work.

If legalisation of the drug trade is a non-starter, then we must recognise that, as long as drugs are “fashionable,” there will be a demand and that as long as there is a demand there will be a supply chain to feed that demand.

So first, we must find some way of reducing the demand.

The demand can, more or less, be split into two sides, all be it with some overlap. First to deal with is the addict, the person who is physically or psychologically dependant on cocaine, heroin or any one of a range of other drugs.

The social problems caused by drug addiction are manifold, ranging from unemployment because the addict in unable to do their job properly, to theft, often with violence, or prostitution, both as a means of getting the money to pay for the drugs.

The shared use of needles leads to myriad health problems, not least HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis, which together with malnutrition caused by the “Self Neglect” addiction engenders, causes the unnecessary deaths of hundreds every year.

One way of getting addicts out of the demand picture would be the provision of a national network of clinics where they can receive and administer whatever their poison is, on site, in hygienic conditions and under medical supervision. This will, at a stroke, resolve a lot of the problems above, taking the addict out of the clutches of the pusher and out of the illegal supply system.

Tie this in with, where possible, employment protection so that a registered addict who is following a recognised rehabilitation scheme could not be sacked for the drug use and we have the makings of a support system that, though it would not be cheap, could actually have the chance of working and would probably cost less than the current farcical and feeble efforts we have today.

The second category of user is the so called “Social User” who sees the use of drugs as being “fashionable” and this is where the Amy Winehouse connection comes in. As a multiple offender against the laws on drugs, this woman, and many other so called “Celebs” like her, ought to have been jailed ages ago. That she hasn’t is a serious indictment on the way that our society views the use of drugs as a minor peccadillo rather then the serious, life destroying and anti-social activity it really is.

We must find ways of taking the glamour out of drug activity, making such use unfashionable.

As a first step, the “Meejah,” in particular, The News Of The World, must stop irresponsibly publishing photographs of Peaches Geldorf et al “snorting up.” This only serves to show the more impressionable “wannabes” how the rich and famous pass their leisure time, which only adds to the glamour.

If the press have evidence of such activity, let them pass it onto the police for investigation and publish only after a successful prosecution.

Second, crack down hard on the possession of illegal drugs. It is surely no accident that the countries that do have so called “draconian” anti-drug legislation are the ones with the least problem with drug abuse!

Widen the definition of “Possession” to include drug traces or residues found in the body during screening procedures and the reporting of such positive test results to the authorities mandatory.

Penalties for minor drug offenses need not be draconian, but they need to be consistently applied. Publicity and menial work in public, properly supervised, with clothing clearly identifying them as drug offenders, could be very effective.

It seems ironic to me that such a regime would not even get as far as the starting blocks as the shame and ridicule of offenders is deemed by a small number of people with influence to be against their “human rights!” What a shame these people do not have the same consideration for the rights of the parents and other relatives of the addicts.

The Police and The Citizen

Unless there is more to it than meets the eye, the case of ex-soldier Frank McCourt would appear to strike a new low in relations between the police and the public.

Tormented by a pack of young thugs terrorising his wife, as well as throwing eggs, mud and stones at his home, he tried getting assistance using the official so-called “Antisocial Behaviour” reporting hotline, publicised by the council, only to give up after being put on hold for 45min. In desperation, he walked the streets to find the gang and attempted to carry out a citizen's arrest on one of them.

However, when the police finally arrived at his home, instead of even attempting to take action to stop the harassment he and his wife were suffering, they arrested him on a charge of kidnapping! Thus began a 6 months long ordeal that not only concerned a threatened prosecution, but also involved further harassment and intimidation from the relatives of the young scum involved.

The prosecution only ended when, after representations from his MP, Laura Moffat, the authorities, obviously realising that the case was going to make them a laughing stock, dropped the charges.

But, despite their desperate efforts to convict Mr. McCourt, so far as he is aware, other than “working with” the family of the yobs to persuade them to stop their criminal behaviour, no action has been taken against them at all.

Now think about it for a moment. Here we have someone who served his country honourably and loyally for 12 years requesting assistance from the authorities to deal with with a group of young thugs and being ignored. By carrying out a citizen's arrest he was even trying to assist the police by doing their job for them. What sort of mindset is it that then treats him, the victim, as the criminal and the thugs as the victims?

It is often said that there is an unwritten contract between the police and the public in that they protect us from anti-social and criminal activity in return for us giving up some of the rights to defend ourselves and property. As part of this, the police can only operate with the co-operation of the public and for that co-operation to exist, then the public must have confidence in their actions.

This case, and others like it, are not only a grave threat to that confidence, but also a threat to that contract. Perhaps his MP, Laura Moffat, may like to consider this, it is the social policies of the last 6 decades, strongly supported by her own Labour Party, that have, unintentionally, led to this situation.

Truly it is said that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

SPIN, LIES AND FABRICATIONS

SPIN, LIES AND FABRICATIONS

Consider the following statements and decide what have in common:

“There is no such thing as Society.”

“We are the nasty party.”

“Hug a hoodie.”

Each of these phases has been used by the Left and the media to castigate the Tories. But, though each is commonly attributed to assorted Conservative politicians and widely believed to have been used by them, only the first of these phrases was actually spoken by a member of the Conservative party. This was Mrs. Thatcher herself, but the context in which she used it is as remote from the Left’s spin as it could be!

The second phrase was created by selectively snipping the actual words used by Theresa May at the Tory Party conference in 2002 so as to totally twist and distort the meaning of the words she actually did use.

Whilst the third phrase, though attributed to David Cameron, was totally made up by the Left themselves!

“There is no such thing as Society.”
Since giving an interview to Woman’s Own in September, 1987, Margaret Thatcher has been hounded by this one phrase. But in what context was the phrase used?

During the interview she was discussing the nature of society and the way, largely thanks to the Welfare State, people’s concepts of what society ought to do for us have changed. In effect she was challenging the view of Society as a single edifice, the monolithic “They,” as in “They who must do something about it,” whatever “it” may be!

Rather than decrying the actual existence of society, she was suggesting that society is individual men, women and their families and how well that society works depends on us.

In the section of the interview from which her words were taken, she was discussing how the Welfare State has taken upon its self responsibilities that previously were up to the individual, “But it went too far. If children have a problem, it is society that is at fault. There is no such thing as society. There is living tapestry of men and women and people and the beauty of that tapestry and the quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves and each of us prepared to turn round and help by our own efforts those who are unfortunate.”

Can anyone disagree with the sentiment of that extract? She was not denying the existence of society but putting forward the view that society is not a single monolithic structure, it is US! How well society truly works depends not on an army of faceless bureaucrats, but on ourselves and what responsibilities we are willing to accept. That we now fear to intervene when we see something that is not right speaks volumes of the brainwashing that has taken place since the conception of the Welfare State.

“We are the nasty party”
During her speech to the Conservative Party Conference in 2002, the then Party Chairwoman, Theresa May, was discoursing on the image the party had and made the perfectly true observation “You know what some people call us - the nasty party.”

No sooner were these words out of her mouth than the press, that guardian of truth and justice in our country, trumpeted far and wide that the Tory Party chairwoman had admitted that the Tories were the nasty party! Ignoring the nastiness of the Tories, perceived or otherwise, was she REALLY saying that? No, of course she was not. She was merely pointing out that the public’s general perception of the Tories.

It does really speak volumes about the efficiency of the New Labour Spin Machine that so many people believe that she actually did utter exactly those words!

Here you have one of the hallmarks of soundbite journalism and selective spin. Look for the phrase that can be taken out of context and twisted in meaning. Change some words or snip away those you don’t need, but do it to produce what is, in effect, a lie that people will believe. Then push that lie as being the truth. By the time anyone gets round to reading what was actually said it will be too late for any attempt at correcting your version.

“Hug a Hoodie”
Now here is an example of how you can put words into a person’s mouth. Even now, though the initial furore has died down, if you asked people, “Who said “Hug a Hoodie?” they are likely come up with the response, “David Cameron.” Yet, to the surprise of many people, those words never even passed his lips!

In a policy speech on Youth Crime, made in July 2006, David Cameron made several observations on the conditions that need to be in place before any serious attempt could be made to combat the problem. Included in these observations were two sentiments which not only showed a large degree of compassion, but also had more than an element of truth. “First, we have to understand what it is that makes such a large portion of our youngsters go off the rails and second, all too often the one thing missing from their lives is love.”

There are few people who have worked with Young Offenders who would disagree with the sentiments his words contained. Yet, no sooner were these sentiments past his lips than the jeering voice of New Labour Thought Control, in the guise of Vernon Croaker, then a Home Office Minister, boomed out, “He wants us to hug a hoodie!” Not only was this yet another example of the insidious drip, drip, drip of Spin from the Brown/Blair axis, but it was also a comment of breathtaking arrogance and hypocrisy! This, from those same people whose Left Wing Social Engineering policies, enacted almost non-stop for the past 50 years, created the current situation regarding Youth Crime!

Now these three examples of spin, lies and fabrications do make one wonder how much of the Tory’s image problem is down to the smoke and mirrors of the propagandists of the Left. If, for example, one was to look more closely at the allegations of Tory Sleaze that brought down the Major Government, how much truth would one find? A particularly pertinent question when one considers how many of the smears depended on the input from one Mohamad Fayed? One thing is certain; New Labour’s Spin Doctors would not like you to find out the truth.

Well, she got away with it

According to the headline of today’s SUN, glimpsed in the newsagent’s at Cromford as I picked up my Telegraph, Junkie Amy Whinehouse has been let off from possession of Class A drugs. What a surprise!

And what sort of a message does this send? Is it likely to persuade her to seek the help she needs? I doubt it.

Is it going to hammer home to those impressionable young people likely to emulate her lifestyle that drugs are not a good idea? Certainly not, rather it will give the contrary impression, that doing what you want and to hell with the law has now been given official approval.

Given the absence of any meaningful drug rehab programme, a spell inside might have just done the above. Instead she has been given the green light to continue destroying her life.

But then again, with a Government happy to have a self confessed Pot Head as Home Secretary, what do we expect?

Welcome to my blog

Well, who am I? I’m a member of the Conservative Party and a strong Thatcherite.

So, you will suppose, here is another ex-Etonian, former Oxbridge toff who has made a pile either in Law or in finance.

No bloody chance! First of all, at 56 I am not really a boy. Etonian? WRONG!! Glendale Secondary Modern, Wooler in rural Northumberland more like!

Ah! I’m from a farming background then! WRONG AGAIN! Father was a pitman, mother a pitman’s daughter who, when my parents separated, worked as Cook/Housekeeper for a couple near Wooler.

Oxbridge? Law? Finance? Don’t even think of it. After staying on for CSEs in 1968, I left school and went to the Army Apprentices College at Chepstow, following on with a less than glittering 11½ years in The Royal Engineers. After demob in 1980 I got a job at the BR workshops at Eastleigh, then part of BREL, ten years later getting promoted to a post at Derby.

A couple of promotions later, with my toe on the bottom rung of the management ladder, Mr. Major, in obedience to the EUrine diktat that ownership of the railways and services on them must be separated, committed the gross folly of privatising the Railways and I was out of a job, all be it with a reasonable payoff.

So I then spent 5y studying, first picking up an HND in Mechanical Engineering at Derby, then 3y doing a BSc Physics with Education and Qualified Teacher Status at Sheffield Hallam. I lasted two years in teaching before I finally got the message I was not enough of a masochist to continue in the job.

After that, a couple of years testing a new radio system, best part of a year unemployed, apart from a couple of temporary jobs and back onto the Railway with Network Rail.

So as you see, I have a better working class pedigree than 90% of the Parliamentary Labour Party, my fairly strongly right wing views have been built up over the years and are based on my own observations and experience.

Welcome to my BLOG!