Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
I suspect that this is national law, not that it makes any difference. All law is a human-created thing. Societies are better and more peaceful when they follow laws that have popular consent.
Laws that have popular consent are laws passed by Parliament and subject to Parliamentary amendment under the principle that no Parliament can bind its successors.
Aka democracy.
International law is not that, which is why it should be subservient to actual laws, and should never be mistaken for a real law. Which is how almost the entire world operates besides us.
I don't know that I would go that far, but at times it feels like there is a kind of fetishisation of what international law or human rights are as if they are inviolable, universal forces of automatic applicability, which as positive as many of them might be I think elevates their status a tad much.
International law is a complex and hotly debated topic. There is a lot of international law about relatively boring stuff that works enormously well. You want international relations to be boring; that's a good sign. Mail carriers delivering to each other, works well. The UN settling dispute over the exact maritime border instead of a war, fantastic.
International law about human rights may sometimes be fetishised in rhetoric, but is nearly always weak and constantly fighting to be heard. In practice, international humanitarian law is much more of an aspiration than a reality. Governments follow international humanitarian law, when they do, largely because their domestic electorates want them to. The idea that it's a threat to local democracy is one of those radical right talking points.
The government is literally - today - using “international human rights law” to impose hotels full of asylum seekers on very very unhappy British communities, even as those communities have ample evidence of crime - including and up to rape and murder of children - stemming from those hotels full of asylum seekers
So the answer is to junk the international human rights laws. Unless you believe the asylum seekers come first
If so, good luck at the next election
Even if Starmer pretends that's what he wants to do, as a Human Rights lawyer himself, there is decades of evidence that he believes the polar opposite. He'd probably be better off being true to himself for once, and we wouldn't have to cringe through the bad acting
Anyway, if we're talking about what I did in the holidays, I went last night for the third (and likely final) time to see Every Brilliant Thing at sohoplace. It has a rotating cast and while I would stick pins in my eyes before seeing some of them (eg Sue Perkins), each time I went I made sure Johnny Donahoe (co-writer) was performing. Well worth 85 minutes of your time if you are in or near London Town.
Your commitment to London theatre is impressive. I live in london and I haven’t been in a decade
This is my bad. And it’s certainly not a boast. I’ve just never enjoyed theatre - not sure why
Prices have become slightly ridiculous over the last 10 years. I used to go a lot before that.
If you want to go to see Sarah Jessica Parker or some other fancy sleb and to be in seat D15 then maybe. Or if you want to see Hamilton (and why would you).
But for most productions you can be in the gods and get a great view of everything for around £20. I mean if you want to stand (to stave off boredom) you can go to see Anna Netrebko's Tosca for £15.
Thanks for the link to the App. When I was a student Mrs Foxy and I would often get random tickets from the Leicester Square booth. They often had free ones for medical students and/or nurses. Some shows were better than others but I don't think I saw any really stinkers.
You are wrong about Hamilton though, it's a great show even if a rather aggressively conservative theme.
I ignored the itinerary which was keen to send to me to some stupid tourist cable car and then a naff sculpture park, and decided on a proper hike
I found a route with a suitably noomy name. The “ Heiligengeistklamm” - LITERALLY the Holy Ghost walk. Way down in south styria. I thought “that’s got to be good”
And it was good and pretty, up a little ravine in the forests, but it was also 30C and I got severely hot and bothered and I was about to give up. But then I saw a sign for a weinbar in the woods so I hiked there. But it was shut! Sleeping dogs and closed doors in the heat. Aaargh!
But then I saw a flag and I realised I was 50 meters from the Slovenian frontier. The old Iron Curtain. But what was once barbed wire and death and watchtowers was turned into millponds and pretty flower meadows asleep in the woods and then I found a “self service honesty bar” where you could just take cold fruit wine spritzer from a fridge in the woods and I sat there in the sun on a log and I gazed at borderless Europe, at peace where there was war. And, verily, it was lovely
And if only any of us had any confidence that you will return one iota the wiser from the experience, we might join you in celebration. Sadly, most of us know that you embarked on the trip already a narrow-minded bigoted poisonous ignorant twat, and will return home precisely the same.
Why don't you try being happy for someone else on holiday for a change.
I think @Leon is an interesting member of this forum, maybe because my wife and I have travelled extensively worldwide, but he does have his views which he is entitled to and whilst I do not agree with him on his pro Reform stance, he does come under extraordinary amount of vitriol from those who do not agree with him
Mind you, he dishes it out himself to be fair
That's what Uncle Jack always says after he's ruined another Christmas lunch - "I'm entitled to my views".
Whilst there is a mod around… do you ever check in on posters who “disappear”? For example SeaShantyIrish who disappeared the day Trump got elected, he could have just keeled over with rage or decided to never discuss politics again but a surprising disappearance all the same.
You guys obviously have an email for everyone who posts so do you/can you drop an email and see if they have just bugged out from politics or disappeared for other reasons.
A bit of a shame and a worry when posters just vanish and not everyone will have arranged for someone to share the good news of, for example, my passing when it happens, with PB. Thanks in advance.
Let’s all talk about Leon. There’s nothing he hates more.
lol. Quite. But check the thread. I didn’t start this!
Sometimes it even bores ME - and I’m a helpless narcissist
To move the subject on, I’ve just read the spectator economics editor’s take on the looming crash, and it is much more ominous and plausible than Allister Heath in the Telegraph
It could hardly be less plausible.
What the spectator guy successfully does - which Allister Heath doesn’t - is lucidly explain the looming peril of “linkers”. As mentioned by @MaxPB above
I confess this is new to me, but it looks bloody grim on the face of it. Barring a near-miracle - productivity boom via technology? - we are headed for the rocks of reckoning
I ignored the itinerary which was keen to send to me to some stupid tourist cable car and then a naff sculpture park, and decided on a proper hike
I found a route with a suitably noomy name. The “ Heiligengeistklamm” - LITERALLY the Holy Ghost walk. Way down in south styria. I thought “that’s got to be good”
And it was good and pretty, up a little ravine in the forests, but it was also 30C and I got severely hot and bothered and I was about to give up. But then I saw a sign for a weinbar in the woods so I hiked there. But it was shut! Sleeping dogs and closed doors in the heat. Aaargh!
But then I saw a flag and I realised I was 50 meters from the Slovenian frontier. The old Iron Curtain. But what was once barbed wire and death and watchtowers was turned into millponds and pretty flower meadows asleep in the woods and then I found a “self service honesty bar” where you could just take cold fruit wine spritzer from a fridge in the woods and I sat there in the sun on a log and I gazed at borderless Europe, at peace where there was war. And, verily, it was lovely
And if only any of us had any confidence that you will return one iota the wiser from the experience, we might join you in celebration. Sadly, most of us know that you embarked on the trip already a narrow-minded bigoted poisonous ignorant twat, and will return home precisely the same.
Why don't you try being happy for someone else on holiday for a change.
I think @Leon is an interesting member of this forum, maybe because my wife and I have travelled extensively worldwide, but he does have his views which he is entitled to and whilst I do not agree with him on his pro Reform stance, he does come under extraordinary amount of vitriol from those who do not agree with him
Mind you, he dishes it out himself to be fair
That's what Uncle Jack always says after he's ruined another Christmas lunch - "I'm entitled to my views".
You seem to want this forum to be uncontroversial
The success of PB is the wide variance of views from across the political spectrum which will involve at times intense debate and not to one's liking
Anyway, if we're talking about what I did in the holidays, I went last night for the third (and likely final) time to see Every Brilliant Thing at sohoplace. It has a rotating cast and while I would stick pins in my eyes before seeing some of them (eg Sue Perkins), each time I went I made sure Johnny Donahoe (co-writer) was performing. Well worth 85 minutes of your time if you are in or near London Town.
Your commitment to London theatre is impressive. I live in london and I haven’t been in a decade
This is my bad. And it’s certainly not a boast. I’ve just never enjoyed theatre - not sure why
Prices have become slightly ridiculous over the last 10 years. I used to go a lot before that.
If you want to go to see Sarah Jessica Parker or some other fancy sleb and to be in seat D15 then maybe. Or if you want to see Hamilton (and why would you).
But for most productions you can be in the gods and get a great view of everything for around £20. I mean if you want to stand (to stave off boredom) you can go to see Anna Netrebko's Tosca for £15.
Thanks for the link to the App. When I was a student Mrs Foxy and I would often get random tickets from the Leicester Square booth. They often had free ones for medical students and/or nurses. Some shows were better than others but I don't think I saw any really stinkers.
You are wrong about Hamilton though, it's a great show even if a rather aggressively conservative theme.
I didn't like the constant exposition. It felt like a history lecture set to music. The best shows imo don't need to be quite so instructive.
I ignored the itinerary which was keen to send to me to some stupid tourist cable car and then a naff sculpture park, and decided on a proper hike
I found a route with a suitably noomy name. The “ Heiligengeistklamm” - LITERALLY the Holy Ghost walk. Way down in south styria. I thought “that’s got to be good”
And it was good and pretty, up a little ravine in the forests, but it was also 30C and I got severely hot and bothered and I was about to give up. But then I saw a sign for a weinbar in the woods so I hiked there. But it was shut! Sleeping dogs and closed doors in the heat. Aaargh!
But then I saw a flag and I realised I was 50 meters from the Slovenian frontier. The old Iron Curtain. But what was once barbed wire and death and watchtowers was turned into millponds and pretty flower meadows asleep in the woods and then I found a “self service honesty bar” where you could just take cold fruit wine spritzer from a fridge in the woods and I sat there in the sun on a log and I gazed at borderless Europe, at peace where there was war. And, verily, it was lovely
And if only any of us had any confidence that you will return one iota the wiser from the experience, we might join you in celebration. Sadly, most of us know that you embarked on the trip already a narrow-minded bigoted poisonous ignorant twat, and will return home precisely the same.
Why don't you try being happy for someone else on holiday for a change.
I think @Leon is an interesting member of this forum, maybe because my wife and I have travelled extensively worldwide, but he does have his views which he is entitled to and whilst I do not agree with him on his pro Reform stance, he does come under extraordinary amount of vitriol from those who do not agree with him
Mind you, he dishes it out himself to be fair
@Leon reminds me of one of those people who provokes everyone in the pub, then gets upset when it kicks off.
Er, when have I EVER “complained about it kicking off”?
I just don’t do it. I never complain. Because I like a good debate and sometimes I like a proper ruck, and - while I may be many evil things - I am not a hypocrite
I dish it out and I’m happy to take it
If you can find a single example of me whining to the mods or asking plaintively for someone to be banned I will buy you a virtual pint of Styrian Riesling and drink it myself in one. So there
Didn't you whine to the mods when one of them insisted you couldn't keep your posting profile private? Get that bottle down you.
Presumably Nigel's admirers in the media have moved on to IMF bailouts and economic apocalypses because they sense his revolutionary speech about the core issue of immigration didn't land quite as well as it might. They'd be unwise to do so though: political history is littered with predictions of 'triple dips' and 'recessions made in Downing Street' that never came to pass. Breathless doom-mongering will make them look silly if everything ticks over okay. No, best to stick with migrants: social media can keep that afloat with trolls and alternative facts far better than an economic Project Fear.
Let’s all talk about Leon. There’s nothing he hates more.
lol. Quite. But check the thread. I didn’t start this!
Sometimes it even bores ME - and I’m a helpless narcissist
To move the subject on, I’ve just read the spectator economics editor’s take on the looming crash, and it is much more ominous and plausible than Allister Heath in the Telegraph
It could hardly be less plausible.
What the spectator guy successfully does - which Allister Heath doesn’t - is lucidly explain the looming peril of “linkers”. As mentioned by @MaxPB above
I confess this is new to me, but it looks bloody grim on the face of it. Barring a near-miracle - productivity boom via technology? - we are headed for the rocks of reckoning
Productivity growth is great for economic output and/or human welfare but it doesn't necessarily help you with a fiscal balance. Consider that our economy was much smaller in the past but we managed to balance tax and spending.
I ignored the itinerary which was keen to send to me to some stupid tourist cable car and then a naff sculpture park, and decided on a proper hike
I found a route with a suitably noomy name. The “ Heiligengeistklamm” - LITERALLY the Holy Ghost walk. Way down in south styria. I thought “that’s got to be good”
And it was good and pretty, up a little ravine in the forests, but it was also 30C and I got severely hot and bothered and I was about to give up. But then I saw a sign for a weinbar in the woods so I hiked there. But it was shut! Sleeping dogs and closed doors in the heat. Aaargh!
But then I saw a flag and I realised I was 50 meters from the Slovenian frontier. The old Iron Curtain. But what was once barbed wire and death and watchtowers was turned into millponds and pretty flower meadows asleep in the woods and then I found a “self service honesty bar” where you could just take cold fruit wine spritzer from a fridge in the woods and I sat there in the sun on a log and I gazed at borderless Europe, at peace where there was war. And, verily, it was lovely
And if only any of us had any confidence that you will return one iota the wiser from the experience, we might join you in celebration. Sadly, most of us know that you embarked on the trip already a narrow-minded bigoted poisonous ignorant twat, and will return home precisely the same.
Why don't you try being happy for someone else on holiday for a change.
I think @Leon is an interesting member of this forum, maybe because my wife and I have travelled extensively worldwide, but he does have his views which he is entitled to and whilst I do not agree with him on his pro Reform stance, he does come under extraordinary amount of vitriol from those who do not agree with him
Mind you, he dishes it out himself to be fair
That's what Uncle Jack always says after he's ruined another Christmas lunch - "I'm entitled to my views".
You seem to want this forum to be uncontroversial
The success of PB is the wide variance of views from across the political spectrum which will involve at times intense debate and not to one's liking
No no, Uncle Jack was a fixture. And that was his catchphrase.
Let’s all talk about Leon. There’s nothing he hates more.
lol. Quite. But check the thread. I didn’t start this!
Sometimes it even bores ME - and I’m a helpless narcissist
To move the subject on, I’ve just read the spectator economics editor’s take on the looming crash, and it is much more ominous and plausible than Allister Heath in the Telegraph
It could hardly be less plausible.
What the spectator guy successfully does - which Allister Heath doesn’t - is lucidly explain the looming peril of “linkers”. As mentioned by @MaxPB above
I confess this is new to me, but it looks bloody grim on the face of it. Barring a near-miracle - productivity boom via technology? - we are headed for the rocks of reckoning
We do have more linkers than most countries iirc.
Presuming this piece is in the actual printed magazine I shall await tomorrow's post as I am an actual subscriber.
I think the doom is over the top at the moment. The IMF are not arriving this weekend and nor is the UK going to end if Reeves has to break the manifesto and put VAT up to 2% and cap how much tax free income pensioners can grab from their lifetime of loot.
Let’s all talk about Leon. There’s nothing he hates more.
lol. Quite. But check the thread. I didn’t start this!
Sometimes it even bores ME - and I’m a helpless narcissist
To move the subject on, I’ve just read the spectator economics editor’s take on the looming crash, and it is much more ominous and plausible than Allister Heath in the Telegraph
It could hardly be less plausible.
What the spectator guy successfully does - which Allister Heath doesn’t - is lucidly explain the looming peril of “linkers”. As mentioned by @MaxPB above
I confess this is new to me, but it looks bloody grim on the face of it. Barring a near-miracle - productivity boom via technology? - we are headed for the rocks of reckoning
We do have more linkers than most countries iirc.
Presuming this piece is in the actual printed magazine I shall await tomorrow's post as I am an actual subscriber.
I think the doom is over the top at the moment. The IMF are not arriving this weekend and nor is the UK going to end if Reeves has to break the manifesto and put VAT up to 2% and cap how much tax free income pensioners can grab from their lifetime of loot.
Why do countries issue linkers? Can't sell enough ordinary bonds? Surely not...
Meanwhile, in "tradition is the democracy of the dead" news,
Sharon Carby, aged 70, from Bradford, sadly died in July 2024. But that didn’t stop Reform UK six months later picking her as their Croydon mayoral candidate.
There is zero chance of a general election this year or next. Labour has a comfortable majority to prevent it and no sign of significant Labour defections to opposition parties either
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
Anyway, if we're talking about what I did in the holidays, I went last night for the third (and likely final) time to see Every Brilliant Thing at sohoplace. It has a rotating cast and while I would stick pins in my eyes before seeing some of them (eg Sue Perkins), each time I went I made sure Johnny Donahoe (co-writer) was performing. Well worth 85 minutes of your time if you are in or near London Town.
Your commitment to London theatre is impressive. I live in london and I haven’t been in a decade
This is my bad. And it’s certainly not a boast. I’ve just never enjoyed theatre - not sure why
Prices have become slightly ridiculous over the last 10 years. I used to go a lot before that.
If you want to go to see Sarah Jessica Parker or some other fancy sleb and to be in seat D15 then maybe. Or if you want to see Hamilton (and why would you).
But for most productions you can be in the gods and get a great view of everything for around £20. I mean if you want to stand (to stave off boredom) you can go to see Anna Netrebko's Tosca for £15.
That's what I remember it being like but I thought those prices weren't available now, but I'll check again sometime.
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
"Kemi Badenoch: I’d go further than Farage and deport women and children Tory leader says ‘of course’ all illegal migrants would be removed, after Reform UK leader rows back"
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
"Kemi Badenoch: I’d go further than Farage and deport women and children Tory leader says ‘of course’ all illegal migrants would be removed, after Reform UK leader rows back"
Let’s all talk about Leon. There’s nothing he hates more.
lol. Quite. But check the thread. I didn’t start this!
Sometimes it even bores ME - and I’m a helpless narcissist
To move the subject on, I’ve just read the spectator economics editor’s take on the looming crash, and it is much more ominous and plausible than Allister Heath in the Telegraph
It could hardly be less plausible.
What the spectator guy successfully does - which Allister Heath doesn’t - is lucidly explain the looming peril of “linkers”. As mentioned by @MaxPB above
I confess this is new to me, but it looks bloody grim on the face of it. Barring a near-miracle - productivity boom via technology? - we are headed for the rocks of reckoning
Productivity growth is great for economic output and/or human welfare but it doesn't necessarily help you with a fiscal balance. Consider that our economy was much smaller in the past but we managed to balance tax and spending.
Productivity growth absolutely does help you with a fiscal balance, by meaning you can do more with less. Its not all that matters, you can still spend too much even with productivity growth, but it absolutely 100% helps.
Consider that one problem in our economy is the complete absence of productivity growth for many years now. Our tax and spending would be much better off if we had productivity growth in that time. Most "growth" in our economy in recent years has been through growing the population, rather than per capita or productive growth, which is not real growth since our demands expand with our population especially when it comes to infrastructure etc
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
“Accidentally” indeed…
As believable as those men who accidentally fell into a vacuum cleaner whilst doing the housework naked.
"Kemi Badenoch: I’d go further than Farage and deport women and children Tory leader says ‘of course’ all illegal migrants would be removed, after Reform UK leader rows back"
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
Meanwhile, in "tradition is the democracy of the dead" news,
Sharon Carby, aged 70, from Bradford, sadly died in July 2024. But that didn’t stop Reform UK six months later picking her as their Croydon mayoral candidate.
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
Mate, I don’t like to pull an argument from authority, but I’m a qualified lawyer with a masters degree in international labour law who has lived and worked in Paris. I wrote my dissertation on comparative employment law in France, the U.K., Japan and the United States with a focus on implementation of the ILO conventions. I have litigated cross border disputes in France and elsewhere. I’ve actually been, many times, in French courtrooms while cases involving international law have been heard.
I don’t think, I know, and I have knowledge and experience in these matters you don’t. If you have evidence to back your assertions and contradict mine then please post them, as I had the courtesy to do for you, rather than resorting to crude ad hominems and evidence free assertions. Otherwise get back in your box.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
Indeed. It's a curiosity of the DT and of PB rightwingers generally that they disapprove of Labour and SNP politicians actually following the rules on tax. An 'allowance' suddenly becomes a 'loophole'. Remember what happened to poor Ms Rayner.
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
"Kemi Badenoch: I’d go further than Farage and deport women and children Tory leader says ‘of course’ all illegal migrants would be removed, after Reform UK leader rows back"
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
It's the hypocrisy angle that's causing her grief (and her successors)
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
“Accidentally” indeed…
As believable as those men who accidentally fell into a vacuum cleaner whilst doing the housework naked.
I’m sure Trump has appointed a few of them as well, they are just a danger to themselves and Henrys, RFK and Gabbard are a danger to the world.
Just had the misfortune to stumble across some “You-tuber” telling a Doctor why vaccines are bad, cancer is cured by organic diet and prayer and RFK is saving America through free speech and ending pharma lying to us. I don’t know how the doctor sat there so politely. It’s not as if Darwinism will get rid of these idiots and so RFK won’t matter but the problem is these idiots will enable diseases to spread that will damage everyone.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
And people wonder why the police don't fight crime any more.
Pathetic.
Have you read any of the evidence in this case or just the summary from the ever reliable Telegraph? Personally I think the police should be able to do whatever they want as long as it’s to you.
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
I doubt it; that question is horribly leading and yet another tear in Yougov's increasingly tattered reputation.
Reform could (and perhaps will) respond with polling showing a big majority in favour of their policy due to an equally leading question, and therefore polls become weapons of propaganda rather than useful indicators of public sentiment.
How would you have phrased the question?
For an unbiased result, I think I would probably have phrased it:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should seek an agreement with the Taliban to return failed asylum seekers to Afghanistan, claiming the UK would save money even if it has to pay the Taliban to accept them. Is such a scheme acceptable?
If you wanted a pro-policy result, you'd say:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should follow Germany in seeking an agreement with the Taliban to return illegal migrants to Afghanistan, defending the possibility of paying the Taliban to accept them by arguing that Britain would save money and benefit from safer streets. Is he right?
What would actually be a more interesting temperature check of public opinion is to see how many have reached the point where they strongly support deportation even if it puts migrants in danger.
Meanwhile, in "tradition is the democracy of the dead" news,
Sharon Carby, aged 70, from Bradford, sadly died in July 2024. But that didn’t stop Reform UK six months later picking her as their Croydon mayoral candidate.
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
“Accidentally” indeed…
"Motley crew" is woefully inadequate.
Mötley Crüe would probably be a preferable leadership team.
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
That's quite heavily overegged afaics in "is facing the sack", and all the implications, imo. There are a lot of ifs and maybes. The BBC reports it thusly:
The IOPC investigation concluded the officer should face a hearing over "the accuracy of accounts he provided to colleagues" and potential "inconsistencies and evidential conflicts". ,,,they concluded the officer also had a misconduct case to answer regarding his driving and the language he used in relation to the boys at the scene of the crash. They said they believed a police disciplinary panel "could find that his driving at the time was outside his level of training and authority", contrary to professional practice and the force's policy, and that "there may be inconsistencies and evidential conflicts in the information given by the officer which potentially breach police standards of honesty and integrity https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3e070wxx2o
"Panic in the markets will force Starmer into an early election We are careering towards a fully-fledged debt crisis. Labour’s chances of survival are narrowing by the day Allister Heath" (£)
They have always been the paper of choice for retired colonels in Tunbridge Wells, but used to try to stick at least some facts in.
To add my consensual and calming voice to the debate, I agree that Heath sounds a tiny bit histrionic here. Not for the first time
Thing is he’s a very smart guy. He’s also not a liar. I don’t believe he’s making this up - he thinks this is the case
But I’ve read that piece twice now and each time I get to the bit where he says “and now the government collapses and calls an election” I don’t see the logical progression
In the end Labour MPs WOULD back massive cuts and tax rises if they were enforced by the IMF (or the markets) because the alternative would be a suicidal election handing power to Farage
So it’s not going to happen, even if we have a fiscal crisis of enormous proportions
Heath is not the only one making this point about a fiscal crisis in the autumn leading to a Government collapse. Micheal Simmons (economics editor) makes the same point in the Spectator.
All this frothing at the mouth at the prospect of an IMF bailout does rather smack of wishful thinking. It’s a possibility, not an inevitability at this point in time, although obviously it would be much better if the possibility was a lot more remote than it actually is.
Speaking of which, I’m about to dive into the Odd Lots podcast interview with Liz Truss. Will report back on any gems.
IMF bailout is just another version of 70s nostalgia. The mechanisms for debt relief and debt management were very different back then, but because it happened once it’s embedded in the collective boomer memory.
It’s like standpipes in the streets. Because they had them in 1976, every time we get a severe drought now people start talking about standpipes.
Or the winter of discontent. Powercuts.
Race riots. Mullets.
Oh.
On 76 I recall that the appointment of a minister for drought did the trick and brought the rain. As I watched the rain pour down over the last couple of days i ideally wondered who Starmer had appointed…
Anyway, if we're talking about what I did in the holidays, I went last night for the third (and likely final) time to see Every Brilliant Thing at sohoplace. It has a rotating cast and while I would stick pins in my eyes before seeing some of them (eg Sue Perkins), each time I went I made sure Johnny Donahoe (co-writer) was performing. Well worth 85 minutes of your time if you are in or near London Town.
Your commitment to London theatre is impressive. I live in london and I haven’t been in a decade
This is my bad. And it’s certainly not a boast. I’ve just never enjoyed theatre - not sure why
Prices have become slightly ridiculous over the last 10 years. I used to go a lot before that.
If you want to go to see Sarah Jessica Parker or some other fancy sleb and to be in seat D15 then maybe. Or if you want to see Hamilton (and why would you).
But for most productions you can be in the gods and get a great view of everything for around £20. I mean if you want to stand (to stave off boredom) you can go to see Anna Netrebko's Tosca for £15.
Thanks for the link to the App. When I was a student Mrs Foxy and I would often get random tickets from the Leicester Square booth. They often had free ones for medical students and/or nurses. Some shows were better than others but I don't think I saw any really stinkers.
You are wrong about Hamilton though, it's a great show even if a rather aggressively conservative theme.
I didn't like the constant exposition. It felt like a history lecture set to music. The best shows imo don't need to be quite so instructive.
The Trump administration is preparing to conduct a major immigration enforcement operation in Chicago as soon as next week, according to multiple sources familiar with the planning
I doubt it; that question is horribly leading and yet another tear in Yougov's increasingly tattered reputation.
Reform could (and perhaps will) respond with polling showing a big majority in favour of their policy due to an equally leading question, and therefore polls become weapons of propaganda rather than useful indicators of public sentiment.
How would you have phrased the question?
For an unbiased result, I think I would probably have phrased it:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should seek an agreement with the Taliban to return failed asylum seekers to Afghanistan, claiming the UK would save money even if it has to pay the Taliban to accept them. Is such a scheme acceptable?
If you wanted a pro-policy result, you'd say:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should follow Germany in seeking an agreement with the Taliban to return illegal migrants to Afghanistan, defending the possibility of paying the Taliban to accept them by arguing that Britain would save money and benefit from safer streets. Is he right?
What would actually be a more interesting temperature check of public opinion is to see how many have reached the point where they strongly support deportation even if it puts migrants in danger.
Meanwhile, in "tradition is the democracy of the dead" news,
Sharon Carby, aged 70, from Bradford, sadly died in July 2024. But that didn’t stop Reform UK six months later picking her as their Croydon mayoral candidate.
I doubt it; that question is horribly leading and yet another tear in Yougov's increasingly tattered reputation.
Reform could (and perhaps will) respond with polling showing a big majority in favour of their policy due to an equally leading question, and therefore polls become weapons of propaganda rather than useful indicators of public sentiment.
How would you have phrased the question?
For an unbiased result, I think I would probably have phrased it:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should seek an agreement with the Taliban to return failed asylum seekers to Afghanistan, claiming the UK would save money even if it has to pay the Taliban to accept them. Is such a scheme acceptable?
If you wanted a pro-policy result, you'd say:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should follow Germany in seeking an agreement with the Taliban to return illegal migrants to Afghanistan, defending the possibility of paying the Taliban to accept them by arguing that Britain would save money and benefit from safer streets. Is he right?
What would actually be a more interesting temperature check of public opinion is to see how many have reached the point where they strongly support deportation even if it puts migrants in danger.
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
That's quite heavily overegged afaics in "is facing the sack", and all the implications, imo. There are a lot of ifs and maybes. The BBC reports it thusly:
The IOPC investigation concluded the officer should face a hearing over "the accuracy of accounts he provided to colleagues" and potential "inconsistencies and evidential conflicts". ,,,they concluded the officer also had a misconduct case to answer regarding his driving and the language he used in relation to the boys at the scene of the crash. They said they believed a police disciplinary panel "could find that his driving at the time was outside his level of training and authority", contrary to professional practice and the force's policy, and that "there may be inconsistencies and evidential conflicts in the information given by the officer which potentially breach police standards of honesty and integrity https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3e070wxx2o
PS I'm at roughly 70-75% the fault of the parents, 20% the fault of the tearaways themselves, 5-10% the fault of the polieman.
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
“Accidentally” indeed…
As believable as those men who accidentally fell into a vacuum cleaner whilst doing the housework naked.
I’m sure Trump has appointed a few of them as well, they are just a danger to themselves and Henrys, RFK and Gabbard are a danger to the world.
Just had the misfortune to stumble across some “You-tuber” telling a Doctor why vaccines are bad, cancer is cured by organic diet and prayer and RFK is saving America through free speech and ending pharma lying to us. I don’t know how the doctor sat there so politely. It’s not as if Darwinism will get rid of these idiots and so RFK won’t matter but the problem is these idiots will enable diseases to spread that will damage everyone.
Idiots.
Already happening in the UK< as remarked earlier today, alas. In particular, it's not just the antivaxxers' offspring that will be at risk but also other - and completely uninvolved - children given the nature of herd immunity versus individual immunity.
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
Mate, I don’t like to pull an argument from authority, but I’m a qualified lawyer with a masters degree in international labour law who has lived and worked in Paris. I wrote my dissertation on comparative employment law in France, the U.K., Japan and the United States with a focus on implementation of the ILO conventions. I have litigated cross border disputes in France and elsewhere. I’ve actually been, many times, in French courtrooms while cases involving international law have been heard.
I don’t think, I know, and I have knowledge and experience in these matters you don’t. If you have evidence to back your assertions and contradict mine then please post them, as I had the courtesy to do for you, rather than resorting to crude ad hominems and evidence free assertions. Otherwise get back in your box.
"Mate" you can make all the appeals to authority you want, but that doesn't make the argument right. You can have your degree, but that doesn't mean (and I can quote plenty with similar experience in authority to substantiate this if you like) that your position is unquestionably true.
If you want a list of some more times that the French have put their own domestic laws and interests ahead of international laws, then here you go, here's a few for starters.
1. Banning British beef for years, violating EU rules, even after British beef was deemed safe by the EU. 2. Violating WTO rules, in breach of WTO rulings, to provide subsidies to Airbus. 3. Banning GMO crops despite EU approval. 4. Nuclear testing in the Pacific in violation of international law and ICJ disputes. 5. Repeatedly exceeding EU CFP fisheries quotas. 6. The sinking of the Rainbow Warrior. 7. Interventions in former colonies without UN mandates. 8. The ECHR has repeatedly ruled, across 11 separate cases, against confining families with children in France's administrative detention centres. French authorities have continued the practice refusing to implement all 11 rulings against them.
There's many more examples too. France puts its own policy first when it wants to do so.
I ignored the itinerary which was keen to send to me to some stupid tourist cable car and then a naff sculpture park, and decided on a proper hike
I found a route with a suitably noomy name. The “ Heiligengeistklamm” - LITERALLY the Holy Ghost walk. Way down in south styria. I thought “that’s got to be good”
And it was good and pretty, up a little ravine in the forests, but it was also 30C and I got severely hot and bothered and I was about to give up. But then I saw a sign for a weinbar in the woods so I hiked there. But it was shut! Sleeping dogs and closed doors in the heat. Aaargh!
But then I saw a flag and I realised I was 50 meters from the Slovenian frontier. The old Iron Curtain. But what was once barbed wire and death and watchtowers was turned into millponds and pretty flower meadows asleep in the woods and then I found a “self service honesty bar” where you could just take cold fruit wine spritzer from a fridge in the woods and I sat there in the sun on a log and I gazed at borderless Europe, at peace where there was war. And, verily, it was lovely
And if only any of us had any confidence that you will return one iota the wiser from the experience, we might join you in celebration. Sadly, most of us know that you embarked on the trip already a narrow-minded bigoted poisonous ignorant twat, and will return home precisely the same.
Why don't you try being happy for someone else on holiday for a change.
I think @Leon is an interesting member of this forum, maybe because my wife and I have travelled extensively worldwide, but he does have his views which he is entitled to and whilst I do not agree with him on his pro Reform stance, he does come under extraordinary amount of vitriol from those who do not agree with him
Mind you, he dishes it out himself to be fair
@Leon reminds me of one of those people who provokes everyone in the pub, then gets upset when it kicks off.
Er, when have I EVER “complained about it kicking off”?
I just don’t do it. I never complain. Because I like a good debate and sometimes I like a proper ruck, and - while I may be many evil things - I am not a hypocrite
I dish it out and I’m happy to take it
If you can find a single example of me whining to the mods or asking plaintively for someone to be banned I will buy you a virtual pint of Styrian Riesling and drink it myself in one. So there
I can certainly remember you asking for the Nats/nits/gnats to be banned. Or was that SeanT?
The competition to be worst US gov appointment is fierce. Kennedy made a play for the title today but Gabbard is making a fierce bid for it.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
“Accidentally” indeed…
To be honest after that "cabinet meeting" the other day getting anywhere near the top or bottom of the list (depending on perspective) will require something more than betraying state secrets and putting peoples' lives at risk. RFK is planning tens of thousands more deaths from Covid without vaccines. Witless is supervising genocide in both Gaza and the Ukraine. Pam Bondi is doing her best to destroy a Constitution that has survived more than 200 years and a civil war. Gabbard is barely at the races.
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
That's quite heavily overegged afaics in "is facing the sack", and all the implications, imo. There are a lot of ifs and maybes. The BBC reports it thusly:
The IOPC investigation concluded the officer should face a hearing over "the accuracy of accounts he provided to colleagues" and potential "inconsistencies and evidential conflicts". ,,,they concluded the officer also had a misconduct case to answer regarding his driving and the language he used in relation to the boys at the scene of the crash. They said they believed a police disciplinary panel "could find that his driving at the time was outside his level of training and authority", contrary to professional practice and the force's policy, and that "there may be inconsistencies and evidential conflicts in the information given by the officer which potentially breach police standards of honesty and integrity https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3e070wxx2o
PS I'm at roughly 70-75% the fault of the parents, 20% the fault of the tearaways themselves, 5-10% the fault of the polieman.
We clearly don’t have all the details (but when does that stop pb?) Imsuspect the police officer has been a bit naughty in what he said about the events and the kids, rather than much else. I have huge sympathy for anyone who loses their children, it must be heartbreaking. But yes, don’t let the little fuckers have these e-bikes in the first place.
The kids themselves are not able to fully appreciate risk, so society needs to do it for them.
I also blame those who showed a distorted view of the ‘chase’, much discussed on here at the time.
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
A police officer is facing the sack for following two boys on an e-bike shortly before they died in a crash.
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
That's quite heavily overegged afaics in "is facing the sack", and all the implications, imo. There are a lot of ifs and maybes. The BBC reports it thusly:
The IOPC investigation concluded the officer should face a hearing over "the accuracy of accounts he provided to colleagues" and potential "inconsistencies and evidential conflicts". ,,,they concluded the officer also had a misconduct case to answer regarding his driving and the language he used in relation to the boys at the scene of the crash. They said they believed a police disciplinary panel "could find that his driving at the time was outside his level of training and authority", contrary to professional practice and the force's policy, and that "there may be inconsistencies and evidential conflicts in the information given by the officer which potentially breach police standards of honesty and integrity https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3e070wxx2o
PS I'm at roughly 70-75% the fault of the parents, 20% the fault of the tearaways themselves, 5-10% the fault of the polieman.
We clearly don’t have all the details (but when does that stop pb?) Imsuspect the police officer has been a bit naughty in what he said about the events and the kids, rather than much else. I have huge sympathy for anyone who loses their children, it must be heartbreaking. But yes, don’t let the little fuckers have these e-bikes in the first place.
The kids themselves are not able to fully appreciate risk, so society needs to do it for them.
I also blame those who showed a distorted view of the ‘chase’, much discussed on here at the time.
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
Anyway, if we're talking about what I did in the holidays, I went last night for the third (and likely final) time to see Every Brilliant Thing at sohoplace. It has a rotating cast and while I would stick pins in my eyes before seeing some of them (eg Sue Perkins), each time I went I made sure Johnny Donahoe (co-writer) was performing. Well worth 85 minutes of your time if you are in or near London Town.
Your commitment to London theatre is impressive. I live in london and I haven’t been in a decade
This is my bad. And it’s certainly not a boast. I’ve just never enjoyed theatre - not sure why
Prices have become slightly ridiculous over the last 10 years. I used to go a lot before that.
If you want to go to see Sarah Jessica Parker or some other fancy sleb and to be in seat D15 then maybe. Or if you want to see Hamilton (and why would you).
But for most productions you can be in the gods and get a great view of everything for around £20. I mean if you want to stand (to stave off boredom) you can go to see Anna Netrebko's Tosca for £15.
Thanks for the link to the App. When I was a student Mrs Foxy and I would often get random tickets from the Leicester Square booth. They often had free ones for medical students and/or nurses. Some shows were better than others but I don't think I saw any really stinkers.
You are wrong about Hamilton though, it's a great show even if a rather aggressively conservative theme.
I didn't like the constant exposition. It felt like a history lecture set to music. The best shows imo don't need to be quite so instructive.
The Fifth Step at sohoplace is very good.
I think Martin Freeman, and arguably Jack Lowden, can seriously be considered as among the very best British actors.
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
I view all laws as guidelines. I almost always conform. Only if there is a clear and convincing reason do I not. I suspect that I am not alone.
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
It becomes increasingly and painfully obvious that no one who was vaguely normal or employable would choose to be an MSP. As a class they have so many of their number who are, by any reasonable definition, quite simply mad.
Things that would make modern life better: proper enforcement of ebike laws.
(This is true of both the US and the UK.)
Having somewhat recently been knocked off my feet and thrown into traffic by an ebike deliveroo person somewhat recently (in a hoodie who sped off right away) - you get my vote.
If I'd been a bit older or (sadly) much younger I'd probably have been killed.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
I view all laws as guidelines. I almost always conform. Only if there is a clear and convincing reason do I not. I suspect that I am not alone.
I won't knock it. Such a mindset keeps me gainfully employed after all.
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
Have they got the blue tents outside his hoose yet?
Tiny countries tend to be corrupt. An independent Scotland at 5.5m is probably big enough to escape that. But being an MSP today is a position of such irrelevance it probably attracts the wrong sort.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
It's the hypocrisy angle that's causing her grief (and her successors)
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
In England at least, the saving on NI and the lower rate of income tax on dividends is almost exactly balanced out by the fact that dividends don't reduce corporation tax whereas salaries do. The way to reduce the overall tax take on this sort of personal company is to find a way to justify rolling up the profits and eventually just paying CGT on them on a wind up, ideally claiming entrepreneur relief.
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
Mate, I don’t like to pull an argument from authority, but I’m a qualified lawyer with a masters degree in international labour law who has lived and worked in Paris. I wrote my dissertation on comparative employment law in France, the U.K., Japan and the United States with a focus on implementation of the ILO conventions. I have litigated cross border disputes in France and elsewhere. I’ve actually been, many times, in French courtrooms while cases involving international law have been heard.
I don’t think, I know, and I have knowledge and experience in these matters you don’t. If you have evidence to back your assertions and contradict mine then please post them, as I had the courtesy to do for you, rather than resorting to crude ad hominems and evidence free assertions. Otherwise get back in your box.
"Mate" you can make all the appeals to authority you want, but that doesn't make the argument right. You can have your degree, but that doesn't mean (and I can quote plenty with similar experience in authority to substantiate this if you like) that your position is unquestionably true.
If you want a list of some more times that the French have put their own domestic laws and interests ahead of international laws, then here you go, here's a few for starters.
1. Banning British beef for years, violating EU rules, even after British beef was deemed safe by the EU. 2. Violating WTO rules, in breach of WTO rulings, to provide subsidies to Airbus. 3. Banning GMO crops despite EU approval. 4. Nuclear testing in the Pacific in violation of international law and ICJ disputes. 5. Repeatedly exceeding EU CFP fisheries quotas. 6. The sinking of the Rainbow Warrior. 7. Interventions in former colonies without UN mandates. 8. The ECHR has repeatedly ruled, across 11 separate cases, against confining families with children in France's administrative detention centres. French authorities have continued the practice refusing to implement all 11 rulings against them.
There's many more examples too. France puts its own policy first when it wants to do so.
😂
FFS. None - literally none - of what you posted proves your point. Many prove the exact opposite! They are examples of French State policy breaching the country’s law. A few expressly state that. That you are too stupid to understand that policy and law are distinct and concepts I cannot help. A government policy breaks the law. Quelle Surprise as some might say. It happens in every country.
That you are too stupid to understand that I cannot help. Read a book for the first time in your life, try to understand the difference between a substantive law and an executive action, and then come back to me.
"Kemi Badenoch: I’d go further than Farage and deport women and children Tory leader says ‘of course’ all illegal migrants would be removed, after Reform UK leader rows back"
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
Have they got the blue tents outside his hoose yet?
Tiny countries tend to be corrupt. An independent Scotland at 5.5m is probably big enough to escape that. But being an MSP today is a position of such irrelevance it probably attracts the wrong sort.
Though even (especially?) in this irrelevant wee place, there seems a disproportionate interest in their doings.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
Have they got the blue tents outside his hoose yet?
Tiny countries tend to be corrupt. An independent Scotland at 5.5m is probably big enough to escape that. But being an MSP today is a position of such irrelevance it probably attracts the wrong sort.
Though even (especially?) in this irrelevant wee place, there seems a disproportionate interest in their doings.
I would be happy if Scotland had roughly the same press profile as any other geographic grouping of 5.5m people in the UK. But it's a nation - and so it punches above its weight institutionally. With the BBC, for example. "Scotland xxxxx" will always matter more than "Yorkshire xxxxx", identically-sized populations notwithstanding.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
It's the hypocrisy angle that's causing her grief (and her successors)
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
In England at least, the saving on NI and the lower rate of income tax on dividends is almost exactly balanced out by the fact that dividends don't reduce corporation tax whereas salaries do. The way to reduce the overall tax take on this sort of personal company is to find a way to justify rolling up the profits and eventually just paying CGT on them on a wind up, ideally claiming entrepreneur relief.
I don't think that's right.
Basic Rate example £10,000 paid via dividends Subject to 8.75% dividend tax = £875 Total tax £875
£10,000 paid via salary Subject to 20% tax = £2,000 Subject to 8% Employees NICs = £800 Subject to 15% Employer NICs = £1,500 Total tax £4300 Subtract 25% corporation tax of £2500 Net total tax £1800
So its £875 versus £1800 - nearly twice as much tax if done on the books as salary.
A massive distortion to encourage people off the PAYE books. Please feel free to correct me if I've made a mistake.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
It's the hypocrisy angle that's causing her grief (and her successors)
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
In England at least, the saving on NI and the lower rate of income tax on dividends is almost exactly balanced out by the fact that dividends don't reduce corporation tax whereas salaries do. The way to reduce the overall tax take on this sort of personal company is to find a way to justify rolling up the profits and eventually just paying CGT on them on a wind up, ideally claiming entrepreneur relief.
I don't think that's right.
Basic Rate example £10,000 paid via dividends Subject to 8.75% dividend tax = £875 Total tax £875
£10,000 paid via salary Subject to 20% tax = £2,000 Subject to 8% Employees NICs = £800 Subject to 15% Employer NICs = £1,500 Total tax £4300 Subtract 25% corporation tax of £2500 Net total tax £1800
So its £875 versus £1800 - nearly twice as much tax if done on the books as salary.
A massive distortion to encourage people off the PAYE books. Please feel free to correct me if I've made a mistake.
Class 2 and 4 NICs on those dividends too, if self-employed, no?
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
It's the hypocrisy angle that's causing her grief (and her successors)
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
In England at least, the saving on NI and the lower rate of income tax on dividends is almost exactly balanced out by the fact that dividends don't reduce corporation tax whereas salaries do. The way to reduce the overall tax take on this sort of personal company is to find a way to justify rolling up the profits and eventually just paying CGT on them on a wind up, ideally claiming entrepreneur relief.
I don't think that's right.
Basic Rate example £10,000 paid via dividends Subject to 8.75% dividend tax = £875 Total tax £875
£10,000 paid via salary Subject to 20% tax = £2,000 Subject to 8% Employees NICs = £800 Subject to 15% Employer NICs = £1,500 Total tax £4300 Subtract 25% corporation tax of £2500 Net total tax £1800
So its £875 versus £1800 - nearly twice as much tax if done on the books as salary.
A massive distortion to encourage people off the PAYE books. Please feel free to correct me if I've made a mistake.
Yes, but as well as the savings on NI, it appears Sturgeon has made a further saving as dividends are taxed at the England rate rather than the Scottish rate which I understand is 2% higher.
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
I don't have access to the Torygraph but I am not really understanding the "tax loophole". Obviously getting this paid as dividends will save NI which would have had to have been paid if it was taken as earnings (which it is) but that is a consequence of the stupidity by which unearned income is taxed less than earned income. But IT applies to all earnings, whether earned or unearned. Unless she is trying to claim that this payment was made in England maybe? But she is still Scottish resident, at least for the time being.
It's the hypocrisy angle that's causing her grief (and her successors)
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
In England at least, the saving on NI and the lower rate of income tax on dividends is almost exactly balanced out by the fact that dividends don't reduce corporation tax whereas salaries do. The way to reduce the overall tax take on this sort of personal company is to find a way to justify rolling up the profits and eventually just paying CGT on them on a wind up, ideally claiming entrepreneur relief.
I don't think that's right.
Basic Rate example £10,000 paid via dividends Subject to 8.75% dividend tax = £875 Total tax £875
£10,000 paid via salary Subject to 20% tax = £2,000 Subject to 8% Employees NICs = £800 Subject to 15% Employer NICs = £1,500 Total tax £4300 Subtract 25% corporation tax of £2500 Net total tax £1800
So its £875 versus £1800 - nearly twice as much tax if done on the books as salary.
A massive distortion to encourage people off the PAYE books. Please feel free to correct me if I've made a mistake.
But at the top rates, the distortion is reversed, because the 39.35% dividend tax, when added to 25% corporate tax, is higher than the 47% income tax+NI.
So it's complicated.
There's a very strong argument for allowing dividends to be tax deductible for companies, then making them subject to normal rates of income tax. It would simplify the tax system and eliminate one of the largest distortions there is.
But it's a very bold step so probably won't happen.
Making submissions to the Court of Appeal on behalf of Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, lawyers said the “relevant public interests in play are not equal” and are “fundamentally different in nature”.
The Home Office and owners of the Bell Hotel in Essex are appealing against last week’s temporary injunction granted to Epping Forest district council, ordering its closure as asylum accommodation.
In documents submitted to the court, Home Office lawyers said: “Epping represents the public interest that subsists in planning control in its local area.
The [Home Secretary] is taken for these purposes as representing the public interest of the entirety of the United Kingdom and discharging obligations conferred on her alone by Parliament.
“Epping’s interest in enforcement of planning control is important and in the public interest.
“However, the [Home Secretary’s] statutory duty is a manifestation of the United Kingdom’s obligations under Article 3 ECHR [European Convention on Human Rights], which establishes non derogable fundamental human rights.”
They’re talking about local planning v national interest . Which is blatantly obvious for those that can read and don’t have an agenda.
How do other european governments, under the same ECHR obligations, manage to house asylum seekers in tents rather than hotels?
In Ireland they basically ignore it when they are told that they're breaching the asylum seekers human rights.
Not sure that ignoring the law is something we want governments to be in the habit of doing.
"International law" is more guidelines than actual rules.
Implement domestic law, yes. International ones should be subservient to Parliamentary laws.
Government should change not break domestic laws, but international ones aren't subject to Parliamentary amendments which is why they should never be conflated with actual, domestic laws.
You been saying, for years, that international laws are guidelines rather than rules. But it's not really true. Even in the UK. Just because it was a phrase used in Pirates of the Caribbean doesn't make it gospel.
Yes, the UK adopts a dualist approach that means that domestic statute takes precedence over international treaties. 100% agree. However, treaties have always been persuasive (albeit not binding) authority, like decisions from courts at the same level are.
For example, if an Act of Parliament is ambiguous, courts must presume that Parliament intended it to comply with the UK’s international obligations (e.g. Salomon v Commissioners of Customs and Excise [1967]) and in R v Lyons [2002] the HoL said treaties should influence judicial reasoning, albeit they stressed they cannot override clear domestic law.
But other countries don't adopt a dualist approach.
In the monist system, like South Africa and France, international law and domestic law form a single legal order, you can't distinguish between the two. Even in some dualist systems, like your beloved Australia, ratification of a treaty creates a “legitimate expectation” that decision-makers will act in accordance with it, unless there is clear contrary policy (Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs v Teoh (1995)).
So, to say international laws are just "guidelines" is not true. It's a massive oversimplification. They're far more than that, even in dualist systems.
What do you think a guideline is?
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
Mate, I don’t like to pull an argument from authority, but I’m a qualified lawyer with a masters degree in international labour law who has lived and worked in Paris. I wrote my dissertation on comparative employment law in France, the U.K., Japan and the United States with a focus on implementation of the ILO conventions. I have litigated cross border disputes in France and elsewhere. I’ve actually been, many times, in French courtrooms while cases involving international law have been heard.
I don’t think, I know, and I have knowledge and experience in these matters you don’t. If you have evidence to back your assertions and contradict mine then please post them, as I had the courtesy to do for you, rather than resorting to crude ad hominems and evidence free assertions. Otherwise get back in your box.
France certainly has employment laws that massively favour the worker. Any attempt to reduce these is met with fierce resistance; finding hotels & housing for migrants near Calais ? Not so much.
Comments
You are wrong about Hamilton though, it's a great show even if a rather aggressively conservative theme.
It's the fucking holiday season and loads of people are away.
It is hard enough to get the good folk of say Broxtowe to give a flying f about their local council at the best of times, but late August...
You guys obviously have an email for everyone who posts so do you/can you drop an email and see if they have just bugged out from politics or disappeared for other reasons.
A bit of a shame and a worry when posters just vanish and not everyone will have arranged for someone to share the good news of, for example, my passing when it happens, with PB. Thanks in advance.
I confess this is new to me, but it looks bloody grim on the face of it. Barring a near-miracle - productivity boom via technology? - we are headed for the rocks of reckoning
The success of PB is the wide variance of views from across the political spectrum which will involve at times intense debate and not to one's liking
With the added benefit of meeting the approval of anyone riding past on a Lambretta.
Get that bottle down you.
Presuming this piece is in the actual printed magazine I shall await tomorrow's post as I am an actual subscriber.
I think the doom is over the top at the moment. The IMF are not arriving this weekend and nor is the UK going to end if Reeves has to break the manifesto and put VAT up to 2% and cap how much tax free income pensioners can grab from their lifetime of loot.
Jeffrey Epstein's Spotify playlist
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/26VlPFjqFLRrjpvx5WrhtI?si=wlsgIa6MTWWeMxpnpzSOPw&pi=kZH3dVIaRkGmh
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/aug/28/i-turned-down-20m-to-do-terminator-3-i-cant-be-bought-dude-ridley-scott-on-directing-daleks-and-cherry-jam
Sharon Carby, aged 70, from Bradford, sadly died in July 2024. But that didn’t stop Reform UK six months later picking her as their Croydon mayoral candidate.
https://insidecroydon.com/2025/08/27/farage-party-picked-a-dead-woman-to-run-for-croydon-mayor/
To act in accordance unless there is clear, contrary policy is pretty much the meaning of a guideline.
As opposed to an actual rule, whereby you can't break the rule even if there is a clear, contrary policy.
The problem is that many people here and in power fetishise (hat tip kle4) international laws into being actual laws that the government is forbidden to break, even if they have or the voters want a clear, contrary policy.
And you're taking the piss if you think France has a single legal order whereby international laws are treated with the same respect as French laws. If French policy and international law conflict, then France 100% puts its own laws first - as it should.
“Tulsi Gabbard accidentally revealed the name of an undercover CIA agent working as an expert on Russia, according to a report.
The national intelligence director blindsided the agency when she revealed the individual’s name on social media in a list of dozens of individuals she had stripped of security clearances last week, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
“Accidentally” indeed…
Tory leader says ‘of course’ all illegal migrants would be removed, after Reform UK leader rows back"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/08/28/badenoch-id-go-further-than-farage-deport-women-children
Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, were killed in May 2023 when they crashed on an e-bike minutes after CCTV showed them being followed by a police van in Ely, Cardiff.
The van was approximately half a mile away from the e-bike, on a different road, when the fatal collision occurred, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said.
Following their deaths, rioting and disorder broke out, leaving dozens of police officers injured, property damaged and cars set alight.
In April this year, the Crown Prosecution Service said the police officer driving the van would not face criminal charges.
However, on Thursday, the IOPC announced that the officer, who has not been named, would still face gross misconduct proceedings over his actions before and after the crash.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/08/28/police-officer-misconduct-hearing-deaths-boys-e-bike-crash/
Nicola Sturgeon is under pressure to explain why she is exploiting a loophole to avoid the higher rates of income tax imposed on Scottish workers by the SNP.
The former first minister has updated her register of interests at Holyrood to state that she withdrew £20,000 from her company on June 30 this year.
She set up Nicola Sturgeon Ltd to handle her non-MSP earnings, including a £300,000 advance from the publisher of her recent memoir, Frankly.
But she took the payment in the form of a dividend, meaning that the money was not liable for the higher rates of income tax she and her successors as SNP first minister have levied on Scots’ wages.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/08/28/nicola-sturgeon-loophole-avoid-higher-income-tax/?recomm_id=1758537b-7995-4008-9677-6a53c6784781
Consider that one problem in our economy is the complete absence of productivity growth for many years now. Our tax and spending would be much better off if we had productivity growth in that time. Most "growth" in our economy in recent years has been through growing the population, rather than per capita or productive growth, which is not real growth since our demands expand with our population especially when it comes to infrastructure etc
We desperately need productivity growth.
But who is a) to the right of Ed Davey, b) has reasonable political heft and c) the nerve to point out where politicians are daring each other to go?
Because it ain't the Good Place.
I don’t think, I know, and I have knowledge and experience in these matters you don’t. If you have evidence to back your assertions and contradict mine then please post them, as I had the courtesy to do for you, rather than resorting to crude ad hominems and evidence free assertions. Otherwise get back in your box.
Pathetic.
Experts calculated that the move would have saved Ms Sturgeon £1,209.60 compared with being paid £10,000 as a salary, which would have been liable for Scottish income tax.
In April, Craig Hoy, the Scottish Conservative shadow finance secretary, branded the move “hypocrisy”.
Although she has not done anything illegal, Ms Sturgeon and her successors, Humza Yousaf and John Swinney, have argued there is a “social contract” in Scotland.
They have argued that better-off workers should pay more income tax in return for Scots receiving “free” benefits from the state, such as prescriptions and university tuition.
Just had the misfortune to stumble across some “You-tuber” telling a Doctor why vaccines are bad, cancer is cured by organic diet and prayer and RFK is saving America through free speech and ending pharma lying to us. I don’t know how the doctor sat there so politely. It’s not as if Darwinism will get rid of these idiots and so RFK won’t matter but the problem is these idiots will enable diseases to spread that will damage everyone.
Idiots.
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should seek an agreement with the Taliban to return failed asylum seekers to Afghanistan, claiming the UK would save money even if it has to pay the Taliban to accept them. Is such a scheme acceptable?
If you wanted a pro-policy result, you'd say:
Nigel Farage has suggested that the UK should follow Germany in seeking an agreement with the Taliban to return illegal migrants to Afghanistan, defending the possibility of paying the Taliban to accept them by arguing that Britain would save money and benefit from safer streets. Is he right?
What would actually be a more interesting temperature check of public opinion is to see how many have reached the point where they strongly support deportation even if it puts migrants in danger.
The IOPC investigation concluded the officer should face a hearing over "the accuracy of accounts he provided to colleagues" and potential "inconsistencies and evidential conflicts".
,,,they concluded the officer also had a misconduct case to answer regarding his driving and the language he used in relation to the boys at the scene of the crash.
They said they believed a police disciplinary panel "could find that his driving at the time was outside his level of training and authority", contrary to professional practice and the force's policy, and that "there may be inconsistencies and evidential conflicts in the information given by the officer which potentially breach police standards of honesty and integrity
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3e070wxx2o
@cnn.com
The Trump administration is preparing to conduct a major immigration enforcement operation in Chicago as soon as next week, according to multiple sources familiar with the planning
France deported an Uzbek Asylum seeker despite an ECHR ruling to halt the expulsion. Courts then ordered the government to facilitate his return and ministers refused to do so.
https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/news/french-minister-vows-to-defy-top-court-echr-on-uzbeks-expulsion/
If you want a list of some more times that the French have put their own domestic laws and interests ahead of international laws, then here you go, here's a few for starters.
1. Banning British beef for years, violating EU rules, even after British beef was deemed safe by the EU.
2. Violating WTO rules, in breach of WTO rulings, to provide subsidies to Airbus.
3. Banning GMO crops despite EU approval.
4. Nuclear testing in the Pacific in violation of international law and ICJ disputes.
5. Repeatedly exceeding EU CFP fisheries quotas.
6. The sinking of the Rainbow Warrior.
7. Interventions in former colonies without UN mandates.
8. The ECHR has repeatedly ruled, across 11 separate cases, against confining families with children in France's administrative detention centres. French authorities have continued the practice refusing to implement all 11 rulings against them.
There's many more examples too. France puts its own policy first when it wants to do so.
Or was that SeanT?
I have huge sympathy for anyone who loses their children, it must be heartbreaking. But yes, don’t let the little fuckers have these e-bikes in the first place.
The kids themselves are not able to fully appreciate risk, so society needs to do it for them.
I also blame those who showed a distorted view of the ‘chase’, much discussed on here at the time.
EXCLUSIVE: Labour MSP Colin Smyth "put secret camera in parliament toilet".
The Daily Record can reveal that Smyth, who has been suspended from the party after being charged in connection with possession of indecent images, also faces charges of placing a camera in a toilet at the Scottish Parliament building.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/labour-msp-colin-smyth-put-35810787
(This is true of both the US and the UK.)
I almost always conform.
Only if there is a clear and convincing reason do I not.
I suspect that I am not alone.
If I'd been a bit older or (sadly) much younger I'd probably have been killed.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/ced06b615efd9582
FFS. None - literally none - of what you posted proves your point. Many prove the exact opposite! They are examples of French State policy breaching the country’s law. A few expressly state that. That you are too stupid to understand that policy and law are distinct and concepts I cannot help. A government policy breaks the law. Quelle Surprise as some might say. It happens in every country.
That you are too stupid to understand that I cannot help. Read a book for the first time in your life, try to understand the difference between a substantive law and an executive action, and then come back to me.
Basic Rate example
£10,000 paid via dividends
Subject to 8.75% dividend tax = £875
Total tax £875
£10,000 paid via salary
Subject to 20% tax = £2,000
Subject to 8% Employees NICs = £800
Subject to 15% Employer NICs = £1,500
Total tax £4300
Subtract 25% corporation tax of £2500
Net total tax £1800
So its £875 versus £1800 - nearly twice as much tax if done on the books as salary.
A massive distortion to encourage people off the PAYE books. Please feel free to correct me if I've made a mistake.
So it's complicated.
There's a very strong argument for allowing dividends to be tax deductible for companies, then making them subject to normal rates of income tax. It would simplify the tax system and eliminate one of the largest distortions there is.
But it's a very bold step so probably won't happen.