On the Farage point Tower Hamlets council found that more than 35 per cent of residents in the borough did not speak English at home and of those one in four - nearly 9 per cent or over 18300 people - could either not speak English well or at all. This included 35 per cent of women of Bangladeshi origin.
Why shouldn’t that also apply amongst the Asian community in Oldham where you aren’t living in a busy diverse city like London.
Or are Labour controlled Tower Hamlets also guilty of Enoch style politics for pointing out the reality - that many people who have been here some time - most often women in the home - can’t fully integrate into British society including getting jobs as they can’t speak English.
The debate of course should be how we deal with this to help them.
The defence only gets disclosed data potentially significant to the offence. The police may be able to look at various areas to search for these, but it does not seem that is disclosible.
Correct. But the police get to look through the entirety of the data, which is what I said below.
The issues that arise from this are the police/CPS judgment of what is relevant, or 'potentially relevant', and what else they might search for and what use they might make of it. History does not inspire absolute confidence in their ability to carry out the process fairly.
That is an argument for having bloody good investigators not for making their job more difficult.
As an OAP who pays tax, I must say I was surprised, and of course pleased, to find a few years ago that I wouldn't have to buy a TV licence any more, and, if necessary, I wouldn't mind paying tax on the benefit. After all, I'd still be getting 80% of the benefit. Same applies to Winter Fuel allowance. Of course, if I was very close to the lower tax threshold I might think differently.
I was similarly surprised a few months ago when, on reaching my 60th birthday, I discovered that I could get an OAP oyster card entitling me to free travel on all TfL bus and underground and most national rail services within the London fare zones. So now I commute for free - this is worth about £2,500 a year to me - the amount I would have to earn before tax to pay for the season ticket I used to buy.
It's very nice of the taxpayer to provide this to comfortably off people in their late middle age (60 is hardly old these days) but in public policy terms this is absurd.
No politician would dare take it away though. Howls of outrage and appeals to suffering from rationing and having paid for it all our lives. Your age group and above are fantastically grabby and whiny.
Your age group would rather give free housing and benefits to asylum seekers who haven't paid a penny into the UK?
Why today's continuous downer on people fleeing genocide?
Having been accused by an ex partner of a crime, although much less serious than rape - harassment - I think this is a very important change. I wasn't living in the UK but my ex was and we had a very toxic relationship. She reported me to the police for harassment whilst in the course of a rolling argument and I was charged based on her statement and her selected messages.
I never received a summons etc and was finally contacted by the police officer in the UK telling me there was a warrant for my arrest etc after we had resumed our relationship and then subsequently split for good some months later.
To cut a long story short if the police had looked at her phone and her messages to me they would have seen a week after her accusing me of harassment that she had sent me messages for me to come over to the UK to fix things and then messages asking to to marry her etc and move with her to where she was moving to.
They couldn't check my phone because I wasn't in the UK, wasn't arrested and didn't know about it!
It would have saved the police time, the cps time and me huge stress, expense and time in a matter of moments. Eventually I presented enough evidence to the CPS that this was ridiculous and they dropped the charges but it doesn't change the nightmare.....
So checking a victim's messages might just save a few people from bad things in advance.....
As an OAP who pays tax, I must say I was surprised, and of course pleased, to find a few years ago that I wouldn't have to buy a TV licence any more, and, if necessary, I wouldn't mind paying tax on the benefit. After all, I'd still be getting 80% of the benefit. Same applies to Winter Fuel allowance. Of course, if I was very close to the lower tax threshold I might think differently.
I was similarly surprised a few months ago when, on reaching my 60th birthday, I discovered that I could get an OAP oyster card entitling me to free travel on all TfL bus and underground and most national rail services within the London fare zones. So now I commute for free - this is worth about £2,500 a year to me - the amount I would have to earn before tax to pay for the season ticket I used to buy.
It's very nice of the taxpayer to provide this to comfortably off people in their late middle age (60 is hardly old these days) but in public policy terms this is absurd.
No politician would dare take it away though. Howls of outrage and appeals to suffering from rationing and having paid for it all our lives. Your age group and above are fantastically grabby and whiny.
Your age group would rather give free housing and benefits to asylum seekers who haven't paid a penny into the UK?
Why today's continuous downer on people fleeing genocide?
I didn't say it was wrong! Just your age group's preference!
The access is unlimited. It has to be, since to decide what is relevant police will often have to look at what turns out to be not relevant. You can't sort the wheat from the chaff without access to the whole pile.
What is the actual change though?
Is it that police can already demand quaint, old fashioned things from alleged victims (e.g. a handwritten diary or letters) and what this is doing is extending the exact same powers to electronic devices such as phones?
Or is it an extension of police powers beyond that?
As an OAP who pays tax, I must say I was surprised, and of course pleased, to find a few years ago that I wouldn't have to buy a TV licence any more, and, if necessary, I wouldn't mind paying tax on the benefit. After all, I'd still be getting 80% of the benefit. Same applies to Winter Fuel allowance. Of course, if I was very close to the lower tax threshold I might think differently.
I was similarly surprised a few months ago when, on reaching my 60th birthday, I discovered that I could get an OAP oyster card entitling me to free travel on all TfL bus and underground and most national rail services within the London fare zones
You can also get a "Senior" Railcard - not as generous as the TFL deal, but not to be sniffed at either for intercity travel.
Kezia Dugdale is taking up the role of as director of John Smith Centre. She will resign as MSP. She is a list MSP, so no by-election needed.
Former MSP Sarah Boyack is next in line. She is currently Head of Public Affairs Scottish Federation of Housing Associations. If she doesn't fancy coming back into active politics, the next person on the list is Leslie Hinds, a Cllr in Edinburgh until 2017 when she retired. Next is Jalal Chaudry. Then Cat Headley who has left Labour last month. So SLAB will make sure one between Boyack, Hinds or Chaudry will accept a (at least) 2 years job
Councillor Hinds was convener of Edinburgh Council's Transport and Environment Committee from 2012-2017. We thank her every day for the deep joy of our non-functional 20mph zones, coming to the rest of Scotland thanks to the SNP and Greens. The fact that they seem to increase deaths from RTAs and pollution and are being scaled back elsewhere in the UK is beside the point.
What the hell is Green playing at? Have the Tories lost the will to live?
This is a good example of why right of centre voters no longer see the Tories as right of centre. If being a Conservative means anything it should follow you believe in a low tax economy and look for solutions outside raising taxation to solve problems.
Raising National Insurance on older voters is better than raising income tax or inheritance tax to pay for social care or imposing a 'dementia tax' and social care has to be paid for somehow
The fact as an uber Tory loyalist you're defending this rather proves my original point. Firstly National Insurance is more regressive than income tax because it kicks in at a much lower level of income than income tax. Secondly "older" voters aged 50 -65 are the sector who have already seen the benefits enjoyed by those born immediately before them i.e before 1954 taken away - these include now receiving state pension at age 66 rather than 60 for women and winter fuel allowance and other benefits being paid out at age 66 rather than 60. I'm not disputing these were not necessary changes but the peer group Green is aiming his proposal at forms a substantial part of what's left of the Tory vote and as can be inferred from Stark's original comment the Tories seem to looking for new ways to accelerate their current collective suicide impulse.
Having been accused by an ex partner of a crime, although much less serious than rape - harassment - I think this is a very important change. I wasn't living in the UK but my ex was and we had a very toxic relationship. She reported me to the police for harassment whilst in the course of a rolling argument and I was charged based on her statement and her selected messages.
I never received a summons etc and was finally contacted by the police officer in the UK telling me there was a warrant for my arrest etc after we had resumed our relationship and then subsequently split for good some months later.
To cut a long story short if the police had looked at her phone and her messages to me they would have seen a week after her accusing me of harassment that she had sent me messages for me to come over to the UK to fix things and then messages asking to to marry her etc and move with her to where she was moving to.
They couldn't check my phone because I wasn't in the UK, wasn't arrested and didn't know about it!
It would have saved the police time, the cps time and me huge stress, expense and time in a matter of moments. Eventually I presented enough evidence to the CPS that this was ridiculous and they dropped the charges but it doesn't change the nightmare.....
So checking a victim's messages might just save a few people from bad things in advance.....
Thanks for the account. I fear that in the difficult world of relationships there are countless such stories of accusation, counter accusation and truth and lies. The more information the authorities have to try to make sense of it all the better, IMO.
The access is unlimited. It has to be, since to decide what is relevant police will often have to look at what turns out to be not relevant. You can't sort the wheat from the chaff without access to the whole pile.
What is the actual change though?
Is it that police can already demand quaint, old fashioned things from alleged victims (e.g. a handwritten diary or letters) and what this is doing is extending the exact same powers to electronic devices such as phones?
Or is it an extension of police powers beyond that?
The former.
The objections are two-fold: (1) that telling victims this and making them sign a form and implying that if they don't the police won't investigate at all will deter victims from reporting crimes; and (2) it will allow access to all sorts of irrelevant personal information which the defence might get hold of to suggest that the victim has loose morals and therefore was responsible somehow for the crime being committed.
(2) is both right and wrong. The police will get irrelevant stuff but if it is irrelevant it will not be disclosed to the defence. In addition there are rules about what can and cannot be said about a woman's previous sexual history. The concern - that women are judged harshly and unfairly in sexual assault cases is not wholly unfounded - the police in the past have taken a very Victorian approach to female victims and there have sometimes been leaks from the police to the press etc. But hampering investigations is the wrong way to deal with this concern.
(1) is more a question of how this is presented. The police should not blindly refuse to investigate just because a victim hasn't signed a form. But victims need to realise that if you don't co-operate with the police there will be a limit to what they can do and that may mean something cannot be properly investigated and, therefore, no action can be taken against the potential defendant.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Whereas IDS is known for being an intellectual powerhouse, a moderate pragmatist, and incredibly knowledgeable about trade.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Thing is, IDS will have come away from that interview still thinking that he is right. IDS', indeed many fantasy Brexiters confuse the idea of away-from-the-border inspections of compliant goods with measures designed to catch those who are not compliant.
nearly 9 per cent or over 18300 people - could either not speak English well or at all.
"Nearly 9% well or at all" is quite a long way from "Whole streets.....who don’t speak a word of English [at all]."
The figure for speaking little or no English rises to 93 percent of elderly Bengali women over 65 in Tower Hamlets - who have access to extensive free bus and tube travel to get around and experience a city like London and may have been here for many years.
Whole streets where people speak little or no English is therefore potentially not far off reality in parts of Oldham that are entirely Asian given the Tower Hamlets findings if there are (older) women in the household.
Maybe you should be shocked that 93 per cent of elderly Bengali women living streets from the Square mile cant function fully in society. Or perhaps because it upsets liberal sensibilities we can just forget about them?
nearly 9 per cent or over 18300 people - could either not speak English well or at all.
"Nearly 9% well or at all" is quite a long way from "Whole streets.....who don’t speak a word of English [at all]."
The figure for speaking little or no English rises to 93 percent of elderly Bengali women over 65 in Tower Hamlets - who have access to extensive free bus and tube travel to get around and experience a city like London and may have been here for many years.
Whole streets where people speak little or no English is therefore potentially not far off reality in parts of Oldham that are entirely Asian given the Tower Hamlets findings if there are (older) women in the household.
Maybe you should be shocked that 93 per cent of elderly Bengali women living streets from the Square mile cant function fully in society. Or perhaps because it upsets liberal sensibilities we can just forget about them?
Sorry did this all start out with a Brexit discussion? Are these Bengali women Polish Bengali women?
nearly 9 per cent or over 18300 people - could either not speak English well or at all.
"Nearly 9% well or at all" is quite a long way from "Whole streets.....who don’t speak a word of English [at all]."
The figure for speaking little or no English rises to 93 percent of elderly Bengali women over 65 in Tower Hamlets - who have access to extensive free bus and tube travel to get around and experience a city like London and may have been here for many years.
Whole streets where people speak little or no English is therefore potentially not far off reality in parts of Oldham that are entirely Asian given the Tower Hamlets findings if there are (older) women in the household.
Maybe you should be shocked that 93 per cent of elderly Bengali women living streets from the Square mile cant function fully in society. Or perhaps because it upsets liberal sensibilities we can just forget about them?
I am struggling to get worked up about the mass ghettoes of “93% of elderly Bengali women”, for some reason. This is risible stuff.
The objections are two-fold: (1) that telling victims this and making them sign a form and implying that if they don't the police won't investigate at all will deter victims from reporting crimes; and (2) it will allow access to all sorts of irrelevant personal information which the defence might get hold of to suggest that the victim has loose morals and therefore was responsible somehow for the crime being committed.
(2) is both right and wrong. The police will get irrelevant stuff but if it is irrelevant it will not be disclosed to the defence. In addition there are rules about what can and cannot be said about a woman's previous sexual history. The concern - that women are judged harshly and unfairly in sexual assault cases is not wholly unfounded - the police in the past have taken a very Victorian approach to female victims and there have sometimes been leaks from the police to the press etc. But hampering investigations is the wrong way to deal with this concern.
(1) is more a question of how this is presented. The police should not blindly refuse to investigate just because a victim hasn't signed a form. But victims need to realise that if you don't co-operate with the police there will be a limit to what they can do and that may mean something cannot be properly investigated and, therefore, no action can be taken against the potential defendant.
Right. Thanks. If it is just extending the existing regime into digital info that is, for me, a fair cop. And it is those last two words that are key really. One must hope that the police do not go fishing inappropriately on a woman's e-devices.
Rape is unusual. unique possibly, amongst serious physical crimes in that there is only a small chance of the perpetrator ever seeing the inside of a cell. One of the main reasons for this is under-reporting, and so it's important that this development, logically justified though it is, is not implemented in a way that adds to the problem.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
That doesn't bode well then. The No Dealers are under the impression that the WTO will save us. If it's run by euro-federalists they probably won't have much sympathy.
Thanks for the account. I fear that in the difficult world of relationships there are countless such stories of accusation, counter accusation and truth and lies. The more information the authorities have to try to make sense of it all the better, IMO.
The silly thing is that she had repeatedly lied in her statement and had many opportunities to inform the police but she didn't want to get in trouble herself. I ended up making life harder for myself by only revealing as much as necessary to the CPS to get the charges dropped so that she wouldn't be in any trouble for lying to them!
The police officer was absolutely unhelpful and deeply unpleasant and the CPS weren't much use even when I showed each party evidence from the police where I live that she had done this before.
As you say the difficult world of relationships is never black and white and so anything the police can do in the first instant to ensure this is cut and dry must be done. I missed family funerals and vital business meetings as I couldn't come back to the UK until I had the arrest warrant thrown out on top of the charges - a two minute scroll through her phone and a call to me where I could have sent my message data would have solved the situation rather than the CPS dropping matters two years later with the info I could have given at the time...... instead they relied on her statement and self selected screen shots of messages.....
The idea of Tessy courageously grasping that particular nettle* is pretty hilarious, mind.
*probably thistle, it really hurts when you grasp them
Devomax might be inevitable, independence is not
Wasn’t that promised once already?
Indeed, what happened to “the vow”?
Scottish devolution, sadly, is another one of those areas which a complacent ruling class have deprioritised. They leave all the running to the nationalists.
A reforming, one nation party would be having a grown up debate about devolution - for the nations, *and* the regions.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Think about what you’ve just written in the context of a WTO “clean” Brexit.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Thing is, IDS will have come away from that interview still thinking that he is right. IDS', indeed many fantasy Brexiters confuse the idea of away-from-the-border inspections of compliant goods with measures designed to catch those who are not compliant.
I didn't see the interview, but the extracts quoted on the Guardian live blog (at 13:34) are rather more nuanced than that. IDS actually seems to have the better of the argument in the general case of goods, and Pascal Lamy seems to be concentrating specifically on some aspects of regulatory divergence (GMO foods and chlorinated chickens are the two he mentions). TBH those doesn't sound impossible to reconcile.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Thing is, IDS will have come away from that interview still thinking that he is right. IDS', indeed many fantasy Brexiters confuse the idea of away-from-the-border inspections of compliant goods with measures designed to catch those who are not compliant.
I didn't see the interview, but the extracts quoted on the Guardian live blog (at 13:34) are rather more nuanced than that. IDS actually seems to have the better of the argument in the general case of goods, and Pascal Lamy seems to be concentrating specifically on some aspects of regulatory divergence (GMP foods and chlorinated chickens are the two he mentions). TBH those doesn't sound impossible to reconcile.
A strange article. On the one hand the author draws on a huge research base about local government and displays a lot of local knowledge about the key issues and personalities that are likely to shape local contests. But on the other it is written as if the current *unusual* national climate will have little impact on next Thursday’s local votes. The individual council analyses are littered with speculation about possible Tory gains, and phrases such as “if the 2018 pattern of voting is repeated” which are surely utterly irrelevant in today’s changed circumstances? This blind spot makes a lot of the detailed commentary significantly less relevant.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Thing is, IDS will have come away from that interview still thinking that he is right. IDS', indeed many fantasy Brexiters confuse the idea of away-from-the-border inspections of compliant goods with measures designed to catch those who are not compliant.
I didn't see the interview, but the extracts quoted on the Guardian live blog (at 13:34) are rather more nuanced than that. IDS actually seems to have the better of the argument in the general case of goods, and Pascal Lamy seems to be concentrating specifically on some aspects of regulatory divergence (GMP foods and chlorinated chickens are the two he mentions). TBH those doesn't sound impossible to reconcile.
Yes I read that also. But this is all predicated on not needing to check compliant goods whereas borders are to catch non-compliant goods.
They are to catch non-compliant goods (and foodstuffs) where you think there's a significant danger to the regulatory integrity of your territory. What I think IDS is saying is that the EU could accept that in practice the UK is not going to be a source of massively dodgy stuff that would represent a danger to the EU. I think he's right in that, i.e. effectively the EU could if it wished accept the 'equivalence' of UK regulations. It's a political decision by the EU not to do so, rather than a universal law of nature that they can't do so.
Personally I think IDS is right, as we've discussed before, but the EU don't seem to be willing to budge on it.
I have worked with Pascal. He is well know to be an ardent Eurofederalist and extremely eccentric. The head of the WTO is a political position and he got it on that basis.
Thing is, IDS will have come away from that interview still thinking that he is right. IDS', indeed many fantasy Brexiters confuse the idea of away-from-the-border inspections of compliant goods with measures designed to catch those who are not compliant.
I didn't see the interview, but the extracts quoted on the Guardian live blog (at 13:34) are rather more nuanced than that. IDS actually seems to have the better of the argument in the general case of goods, and Pascal Lamy seems to be concentrating specifically on some aspects of regulatory divergence (GMP foods and chlorinated chickens are the two he mentions). TBH those doesn't sound impossible to reconcile.
Yes I read that also. But this is all predicated on not needing to check compliant goods whereas borders are to catch non-compliant goods.
They are to catch non-compliant goods (and foodstuffs) where you think there's a significant danger to the regulatory integrity of your territory. What I think IDS is saying is that the EU could accept that in practice the UK is not going to be a source of massively dodgy stuff that would represent a danger to the EU. I think he's right in that, i.e. effectively the EU could if it wished accept the 'equivalence' of UK regulations. It's a political decision by the EU not to do so, rather than a universal law of nature that they can't do so.
Personally I think IDS is right, as we've discussed before, but the EU don't seem to be willing to budge on it.
Well I suppose you have a system of sovereignty and boundaries and regulations or you don't...
Comments
Why shouldn’t that also apply amongst the Asian community in Oldham where you aren’t living in a busy diverse city like London.
Or are Labour controlled Tower Hamlets also guilty of Enoch style politics for pointing out the reality - that many people who have been here some time - most often women in the home - can’t fully integrate into British society including getting jobs as they can’t speak English.
The debate of course should be how we deal with this to help them.
https://www.towerhamlets.gov.uk/Documents/Borough_statistics/Diversity/Language_proficiency_in_Tower_Hamlets.pdf
I never received a summons etc and was finally contacted by the police officer in the UK telling me there was a warrant for my arrest etc after we had resumed our relationship and then subsequently split for good some months later.
To cut a long story short if the police had looked at her phone and her messages to me they would have seen a week after her accusing me of harassment that she had sent me messages for me to come over to the UK to fix things and then messages asking to to marry her etc and move with her to where she was moving to.
They couldn't check my phone because I wasn't in the UK, wasn't arrested and didn't know about it!
It would have saved the police time, the cps time and me huge stress, expense and time in a matter of moments. Eventually I presented enough evidence to the CPS that this was ridiculous and they dropped the charges but it doesn't change the nightmare.....
So checking a victim's messages might just save a few people from bad things in advance.....
What is the actual change though?
Is it that police can already demand quaint, old fashioned things from alleged victims (e.g. a handwritten diary or letters) and what this is doing is extending the exact same powers to electronic devices such as phones?
Or is it an extension of police powers beyond that?
The objections are two-fold: (1) that telling victims this and making them sign a form and implying that if they don't the police won't investigate at all will deter victims from reporting crimes; and (2) it will allow access to all sorts of irrelevant personal information which the defence might get hold of to suggest that the victim has loose morals and therefore was responsible somehow for the crime being committed.
(2) is both right and wrong. The police will get irrelevant stuff but if it is irrelevant it will not be disclosed to the defence. In addition there are rules about what can and cannot be said about a woman's previous sexual history. The concern - that women are judged harshly and unfairly in sexual assault cases is not wholly unfounded - the police in the past have taken a very Victorian approach to female victims and there have sometimes been leaks from the police to the press etc. But hampering investigations is the wrong way to deal with this concern.
(1) is more a question of how this is presented. The police should not blindly refuse to investigate just because a victim hasn't signed a form. But victims need to realise that if you don't co-operate with the police there will be a limit to what they can do and that may mean something cannot be properly investigated and, therefore, no action can be taken against the potential defendant.
Whole streets where people speak little or no English is therefore potentially not far off reality in parts of Oldham that are entirely Asian given the Tower Hamlets findings if there are (older) women in the household.
Maybe you should be shocked that 93 per cent of elderly Bengali women living streets from the Square mile cant function fully in society. Or perhaps because it upsets liberal sensibilities we can just forget about them?
Rape is unusual. unique possibly, amongst serious physical crimes in that there is only a small chance of the perpetrator ever seeing the inside of a cell. One of the main reasons for this is under-reporting, and so it's important that this development, logically justified though it is, is not implemented in a way that adds to the problem.
The silly thing is that she had repeatedly lied in her statement and had many opportunities to inform the police but she didn't want to get in trouble herself. I ended up making life harder for myself by only revealing as much as necessary to the CPS to get the charges dropped so that she wouldn't be in any trouble for lying to them!
The police officer was absolutely unhelpful and deeply unpleasant and the CPS weren't much use even when I showed each party evidence from the police where I live that she had done this before.
As you say the difficult world of relationships is never black and white and so anything the police can do in the first instant to ensure this is cut and dry must be done. I missed family funerals and vital business meetings as I couldn't come back to the UK until I had the arrest warrant thrown out on top of the charges - a two minute scroll through her phone and a call to me where I could have sent my message data would have solved the situation rather than the CPS dropping matters two years later with the info I could have given at the time...... instead they relied on her statement and self selected screen shots of messages.....
Scottish devolution, sadly, is another one of those areas which a complacent ruling class have deprioritised. They leave all the running to the nationalists.
A reforming, one nation party would be having a grown up debate about devolution - for the nations, *and* the regions.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/blog/live/2019/apr/29/brexit-latest-news-developments-voters-likely-to-punish-tories-over-failure-to-leave-eu-may-warned-live-news
Personally I think IDS is right, as we've discussed before, but the EU don't seem to be willing to budge on it.