Sunday, August 19, 2007

The Soixante-neuf of Liberty

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the arguement of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves".
William Pitt



Or is it ? It appears certain that Gordon B-ruin is going to sign off on ID cards , the contracts are already out and we are right to be concerned . With CCTV and the nascent self propogating technologies I worry that there is too much bourgeois affectation. Some people do not like being filmed driving to fast in sports cars while young women on tough estates would have no freedom at all without CCTV. But is it all about revenue ? The £3 billion Brown is soaking out of landfill tax , for example ,is passed onto us as recycling fines by such weird and wonderful methods as cameras hidden in tins of beans and bricks the fines we pay cover the costs .The EU dimension is terrifying with the emergence of a cross border data base and the sheer technology confuses 'could' with 'should'. The government would ideally like 90 days of detention and while they say Terrorists we are right to think ..‘me’ . I am firmly against
On ID cards the sheer cost is absurd even by the governments highly optimistic measure and I cannot see any benefit while there are great dangers. The Conservative party have given a commitment to rid us of it and it is to their great credit.Census information is sacrosnact until it isn`t as in the case of American Japs rounded up during the war...24 pages they want in 2010

Freedom is not a one way argument though at 40 mph you have a 10% chance of surviving an impact at 20mph a 95% chance. With 35,000 deaths and serious injuries a year that’s a lot of families to tell you that if people will not slow down they will have to made to. In particular young drunk drivers are an annual source of carnage 27% of 17-19 year old males are involved in a crash in first year behind the wheel and every year 100 deaths are killed in accidents involving 17 to 25 year olds usually drunk and usually male. “Those who give up their Liberties in the name of safety deserve neither Liberty nor safety” said Benjamin Franklin but try that glib little sentence on a bereaved mother. I have come to see that speed cameras properly used are a net good the handling has of course been woeful in the best Labour tradition.

I have never been a great fan of Liberty. Libertarians like to sit on a piano Conservatives play it . We need a balance of Liberty and order and there are tempting gains to be had from the national DNA base for example ( see 66).The worry is that like the quangos now costing £190 billion per year the process has its own momentum and the possibilities are not properly discussed with freedom balanced in the mix. . Here are some illustrative facts I have gathered with a number designed to create the pretence this is not an obsessive non funny excavation of data . Sorry it is ….my hopes for readers are low.
Sadly the number of real X ray cameras able to see you naked hidden in lampposts- Nil( Despite the Sun story suggesting otherwise)



Soixante-neuf - Liberty facts

1 The elite fire arms unit responsible for the death of Charles Menzes CO…..?-CO19
2 Armed Met Officers-2060
3 Safety Camera Partnerships budget for operating speed cameras-£95,000,000
4 Gloucestershire Safety Camera Partnership’s budget for advertising-£326000
5 Cost of next census in 2010-£300,000,000
6 Pages of information in 2010 census including religion and income-24
7 Fine you will face for not completing the 2010 census-£1000
8 Number of people in a U-Gov Survey who did not trust the government to keep national database information about them confidential- 66%
9 Numbers opposed to national ID cards on principle ( U Gov)-70%
10 Number prepared to pay no more than £66 for an ID card (U Gov)-85%
11 Number who approve of speed cameras (U Gov)-50%
12 No. times on average each Briton comes under the watch of surveillance cameras
each day-300
13 Number of Surveillance cameras4,200,000
14 Our position in league table of monitoring in the developed world -1
15 Number of countries developing biometric passports -50
16 Annual cost of identity fraud according to Tony Blair-£1.7 billlion
17 a )The amount of the figure £1.7billion not regarded as identity theft by the banks and b) the amount that is an illustrative thin air amount of the rest -£½ billion and 25%
18 Amount of crime prevention budget spent on CCTV by the Home Office-78%
19 No. of recognition reads by speed cameras by 2008-50,000,000
20 Number of civil servants with access to national at base information-400,000
21 Number of recorded prints that Lantern the electronic checker can compares yours with-6,500,000
22 proposed fine for failing to I form the authorities of a change of address under the national ID system-£1000
23 No, of requests made by the Police to see Oyster card movement records-2040
24 Number of unsolved cases for which the Head of the Homicide and serious crime squad of the Met feels we need ensamples from babies to solve-300,000
25 Government est. cost of the ID database-£5.4 billion
26 Independent Estimate -£21 billion
27 Proportion of people who voted for the Hunting ban as their top law to repeal on the R4 Poll-52%

( The next was29% who wanted to repeal the European Communities Act of 1972)
28 The number of requests made to under the freedom of information act and the number that have not been granted- 65852 And 26083
29 Number of separate data bases from national Insurance to the DVLA to be allowed to share information under Labour plans -8
30 The amount by which photographs of homes taken for tax purposes increased from May 2006 to January 2007-514000 to 2,200,000
31 The amount spent on , and the number of , digital cameras in the hands of Council Tax Inspectors -£483,739 and2126
32 Unequivocal commitment by the Conservative party to scrap the ID card scheme-1
33 Number of people held on a DNA database who have never been charged-140,000
34 Number of countries that will have access to the UK DNA database and fingerprints under a EU agreement -27
35 Number of heroic Peers who defeated an enlargement of the mental health bill whereby someone can be detained if it is merely “appropriate “ and not “beneficial”-71
36 The grant Dr. Richard Harvey is working with to perfect a system that will read lips from CCTV footage-£391,814
37 Cost the Government claims of the FOI act-335,000
38 The cost above which all cooperation can be withdrawn under the FOI act ( see cost of ID cards)_£600
39 No. of requests for bugging operations in a year-450,000
40 The cost per check and the number of organisations to be accredited to check data from the ID card scheme to offset the cots of the scheme-60p and 40
41 The accuracy of tax evaluation spy in the sky pictures currently employed in N Ireland to be introduced here after the election- 1 in 1250
42 The number of authorities installing talking CCTV to issue admonishments . Cost £500,000 from the “Respect budget”20
43 the amount of pieces of information required for a British citizen to obtain a passport-200
44 The number of civil servants involved in the granting of a passport-700
45 The number of countries with as many CCTV cameras per head as us -none
46 The number of offences that under EU law you can be locked up for in tn=his country which are not a crime in this country eg Holocaust denial-32
47 The number of years since the freedom to fish at sea was enshrined by Common law to be overturned by David Milliband who will require anyone over 12 to have a licence-800
48 The position of ID cards in the Telegraphs Poll of brainless laws-1
49 The number of ways the state has of entering your home -266
50 The number of statute rights to enter your home in the 1950s-10
51 Cost of a Camera Helmet for a Lollipop Warden Beijing tried in Oxford-£900
52 The amount raised by speed cameras in a year-£1 billion
53 The increase in child road deaths recorded between 2005 and 2006-141 t0 169
54 The number killed or seriously injured in 2006-31845
55 The amount of improvement from the previous year-1%
56 Survival chances at 20mph and 40mph respectively 95% and 10%
57 Landfill tax Councils would have to pay extra over the next four years( hence fines and cameras in tines of beans )-£3 billion
58 The proportion of requests granted under FOI since Jan 2005 and the proportion granted in the last quarter of 2006-59% and 17%
59 Number of forms to be filled in to perform a “Story telling “ act-6
60 Fine for stubbing a cigarette out on the street-£80
61 During the same period this shows the increase in cots deaths as against the amount of people smoking its supposed cause- Up 500% and halved
62 The figure somehow arrived at by the Study commissioned by 33 Coucil sof the annual number of deaths from passive smoking…(There is absolutely no evidence of this )-617
63 This many non smokers living with smokers were studied in the only ever serious research showing no significant risk over 40 years ( American Cancer Society)-35000
64 The height from which the micro drone ( new Police Toy) can film you -1600 ft
65 Number on the Police DNA data base as it stands -3,500,000
66 DNA matches last year for
Homicide -422
Rape-645
Violent crime-1974
Burglary-9000

67No. MPs backing the BMA`s call for 9 PM watershed for alcohol advertising -29
( Thats where it started for smoking)
68 Proportion of pub goers who smoke -80%
69 Amount Budweiser are sponsoring the Olympics for -£80,000,00

42 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for posting this. Very worrying, some a lot more than others, but still a horrible reflection of modern Britain.

Newmania said...

Yet some of it seems to work well

Anonymous said...

newmania said:

Yet some of it seems to work well


Isn't that what the Nazis said about gas chambers? And how long will it be before nulab devise a high tech form of those too?

As about 50% of us seem to want this grossly controlling intrusion into our privacy which is - uniquely - turning the ENGLISH into the Scots Mafia's Pavlovian dogs, perhaps the solution is to split the country in two?

Those who want to be beastialised by totalitarian government can have that. The rest of us take our chances in a free country.

Woops! I forgot. We already have that system. It's known as the Midlothian question.

I'll take my chances on the roads and streets, thank you. I'm English, my father and millions of others fought for our freedom and I want the freedom they fought for returned to us!

Auntie Flo'

Anonymous said...

the whole point of a properly functioning system of law is to preserve freedom not lose it

find out what libertarians are supposed to believe before you try the straw man argument

libertarians believe in locking up people who destroy others peoples liberty as much or even more then anyone else

starting with socialist governments

note also: just because something may work does not mean it could not work better

Newmania said...

the whole point of a properly functioning system of law is to preserve freedom not lose it




Whoase Liberty ? The woman for whom CCTV has made it sfe to walk out of her front door , the 35000 people with no Liberty at all having been killed or serously injured by speeding drivers .


Of course civil Liberty is important I think my view in the end was that you have to pick your battle.

ID cards no
Speed Cameras yes
Police DNA data base -yes
Intergovernmental data base - NO

It looks like a mixed picture to me Gary ...

lilith said...

Paul, do you think it was OK that the Met didn't take DNA swabs from Levy, Turner et al? Yet they will take it off a 10 year old who has kicked a ball through a window.

Newmania said...

I saw rhgat story Lillith and it did look peculaiar but then there wasn`t much about Levy Turner et all that was not peculiar including Miss Tuners highly lucrative EU job courtesy of Blair. The truth is they were guilty and everyone knows it ..simple as that

I have had swabs taken of me and whiole I am not that keen as I do not intend to commit any crimes it could be wore . On ther othere hand DNA does seem to be a major step forward in crime detection.


Crine detection is ineffect crime prevention as people do not do thibngs if they think they will be caught. Above all this is true of sexula molestation and rape .

In this case i `d rayher catch the rapists and prevent the incidence than have a little more theoretical Liberrtty .

I don`t feel the same way aboit ID cards thought or interlinked government data , still less supernatoonal data bases.

I see what lookslike one subject as several and if you oppose any measure designed to combat crime you strat to look a buit ridiculous (IMHO)

Newmania said...

English, my father and millions of others fought for our freedom and I want the freedom they fought for returned to us!


Flo they did not have the sort of number of cars and the speed of themn or the congestion to cope with. Faced with this technology the relatively powerful governments of that time would certainly have taken action

Newmania said...

EEEK terrible typing sorry

Anonymous said...

newmania said:

Whose Liberty ? The woman for whom CCTV has made it sfe to walk out of her front door , the 35000 people with no Liberty at all having been killed or serously injured by speeding driver


Home Office study found that CCTV doesn't work, newmania, and does not make us feel safer.

From BBC news Feb 24 2005

"CCTV SYSTEMS 'FAIL TO CUT CRIME'"

"Most CCTV fails to cut crime or make people feel safer...
Experts at the University of Leicester studied 14 systems across the country on behalf of the Home Office..."

"Professor Martin Gill, from the university, said: "Overall, areas have encountered real difficulties in using CCTV to good effect."

"The study showed the only crime decrease attributable to CCTV focussed on reducing vehicle crime in car parks."

Inadequate staffing and policing is one reason. Criminals, illegal drivers and general public all know that even if a crime is spotted on CCTV there's almost zero chance of the police responding or responding in time to catch anyone.

That's why the govt want even more grotesquely intrusive and threatening forms of surveillance such as these fling drones.

And, given the authoritarianism of this govt, how long before these flying surveillance drones begin zapping - or taking out - those they misidentify?

What if it was you, or your wife or your child who was zapped or killed by a flying drone.

Still feel safer?

Auntie Flo'

Anonymous said...

Indeed, half of us feel less safe - threatened - as a result of this governmental explosion of technological surveillance.

Auntie Flo'

Newmania said...

I don`t believe that but anyway you cannot argue with the efficacy of DNA for crime detection and prevention Flo . You also cannot argue that we should not all drrive slower especially around school and in built up areas.

Newmania said...

...I think your point on the over use of CCTV is a good one actually .Less but not none and obviously a Police force that actually prosecutes

Anonymous said...

newmania said:

Flo they did not have the sort of number of cars and the speed of them or the congestion to cope with. Faced with this technology the relatively powerful governments of that time would certainly have taken action


In WW2 people and government were united in their determination to defeat a power crazed European psychopath and his deluded, power crazed people. The Germans aimed to invade us and rule much of the world. They were bombing our cities to near oblivion and mass murdering millions of innocents.

That is in no way comparable to the present crime wave and security threat or the threat we face from our own government.

WW2 UK responded with surveillance which had overwhelming popular support and which was controlled at grass roots level - by the people.

What we have now is a near despotic government using pernicious means of surveillance for social control and to fill the coffers of government and its payroll vote.

This is not grass roots control or government by consent as it was here in WW2, this is government that's got out of control.

Auntie Flo'

Anonymous said...

GeneWatch:

Misleading benefits claimed for police retention of innocent people's DNA, says new GeneWatch report (Herald) 27th February 2006

GeneWatch UK today criticised the Government and the police for MISLEADING THE PUBLIC about the benefits of retaining DNA from large numbers of innocent people.

"This policy has not delivered in terms of crimes detected using DNA".

GeneWatch also criticised the Scottish police for an article claiming that 10,000 offences, including 88 murders, had been 'solved' as a result of the decision to keep innocent people's DNA permanently in England and Wales.

This claim is wrong because these are estimates for DNA matches, not successful prosecutions. Many matches between a DNA profile from a crime scene and an individual arise because someone was at the crime scene earlier in the day, or because they came to help or were a victim.

***Only 0.35% of crimes were detected using DNA in 2004/05 and this percentage has stayed constant for the last three years.

Most of these are volume crimes (such as burglaries and thefts). This number is an overestimate of the value of the Database, because only about half were new detections (i.e. had not already been made by other police work) and many detections do not lead to convictions.

***Even if the Database expanded to include everybody in the population, it is unlikely to play a role in more than 0.5% of crimes.***

This is because the number of cases that can be solved using DNA will always be limited by the number of crime scenes from which DNA profiles can be collected and the need for corroborating evidence.

Newmania said...

Flo CCTV is consistently popular and even ID cards are quite well recived ...not when people see the bill however. I think your point on the actual good CCTV does is a goodone but DNA data base and Speed cameras are a different matter esopecially DNA data bases.

You`d rather not be raped surely and I should imagine the overwhelming propovacation of someone ( I assume ) as gorgeous as you are must make you nervous.

I do not disagree with your views though there is a lot of surveillance for its own sake. I would ike to see speed cameras in built up areas only and especially where families are

Newmania said...

This is because the number of cases that can be solved using DNA will always be limited by the number of crime scenes from which DNA profiles can be collected and the need for corroborating evidence.


Good for rape and homicide for example then. I think your stas are misleading in that the vast najority of crimes are not serious wheras DNA will often be present when they are and DNA swabs can be taken from suspects . DEtection is not the piojkt prosecution is ...


Bloody hell Flo where do you get all this stuff ?

Anonymous said...

1% OF DNA TESTS GIVE FALSE RESULTS (0bserver 2/2/02)

First research of its kind into laboratory error rates found EVIDENCE OF WIDESPREAD MISTAKES

DNA testing is widely used to convince juries of a suspect's guilt or presence at the scene of a crime, and was thought to be almost flawless.

The findings will shock British DNA laboratories, which deny that errors exist.

or failed to notice a match.

The statisticians then calculated that a substantial human error had occurred in 12 in every 1,000 tests.

British forensic experts expressed alarm at the errors and stressed they were more numerous than expected.

Auntie Flo'

Anonymous said...

Newmania said...

Flo CCTV is consistently popular and even ID cards are quite well recived ...


Of course it's popular.

What else do you expect? The government CONSISTENTLY MISLEAD THE PUBLIC about the benefits of DNA testing and high tech surveillance and whitewash the huge rate of errors and resultant dangers.

Auntie Flo'

lilith said...

Bravo Auntie. Newmania, how do you feel about your gorgeous baby being on a government database that is supposed to identify children "at risk"? At least 300,000 public servants will have access to it. Your child may even come into a "might be at risk" category because he is mixed race. Mine certainly would as her parents havent lived together since she was 4 and her father is unemployed.

Mermaid of Moorgate said...

"Sadly the number of real X ray cameras able to see you naked hidden in lampposts- Nil( Despite the Sun story suggesting otherwise)
"

I've never hidden naked in a lamp post...

Newmania said...

Flo you are lead by a lamb by stats produced by a protest group and you ignore stats I found in the Daily Mail hardly a pro government source.

'DNA testing is widely used to convince juries of a suspect's guilt or presence at the scene of a crime,'

It cannot in itself be conclusive then but it is a powerful tool . the problem is that when an improvement is suggested those aganst it say ...well it won`t make everything perfect well of course not but they never were and the problem of miscarriage is always used by those whose sympaties are always for the crimninal and never for the victim.

Newmania said...

how do you feel about your gorgeous baby being on a government database that is supposed to identify children "at risk"? At least 300,000 public servants will have access to it. Your child may even come into a "might be at risk" category because he is mixed race


Lillith if he does not start eating his food and stop crying until he gets chocolate he will be at risk :). No I am against blanket DNA swabs and against the state interfering in families except in extreme cases. I am for the continued use of DNA to sove detect and prosecute serious crime however.


FLO- The popularity if CCTV is not because of gevernment misrepresentation of anything it is because of what people see outside their doors. You are deluded if you imagine most of the population even registers government statistics.

Admit it !

Newmania said...

I've never hidden naked in a lamp post...

OK where have you hidden naked then?

Newmania said...

Lilitth why would he be " At risk" is he is of mixed race ..thats the fastest growing group in the country

Anonymous said...

Lilith said...

Newmania, how do you feel about your gorgeous baby being on a government database that is supposed to identify children "at risk"?...Your child may even come into a "might be at risk" category because he is mixed race.

Well said, Lilleth.

The problem is that newmania, like so many others, labours under the false assumption that he and his family will never be victims of such false categorisations or professional error.

Well you're WRONG newmania - you probably already are a victim of the above but are unaware of it. I'm speaking from experience here.

Years ago my son (aged 6) got measles at the end of a school term. He was off school for over a week at the end of term, throughout the 2-3 weeks holiday and for over a week at the start of the new term.

On the day he returned to school, with a note explaining the above and stating that in his GPs view he was now fit for school, he was returned home by his headmistress who accused me of returning my son to school within a week or so of catching measles.

She refused to listen to my objections and trounced off to her car having said that ~ when she and several teachers had ~ inspected my son's body ~ in a corridor ~ they could see that he still had a rash ~ and he was hot, red and sweating - so obviously was still infected.

Later that day my GP laughed his head off he examined my son and gave me a note pronouncing him clear of measles. "was he wearing this string vest when several of them lifted up his clothing in the corridor?", he asked?

When I returned my - decidely nervous - son to school the following day and gave his GP's note to the headmistress the following day, she refused to make the apology I demanded and and whitewashed the school's cock up.

Rattled and because she could think of nothing else to say, she told me "You have no idea of the information I have about you and your family which requires us to take extra care where your son is concerned."

What she was snidily refering to was my - amicable - separation from my husband who suffered from a rare form of cancer.

One last point, researchers in one study found an overwhelming majority of teachers who believed they could jugdge solely from a child's photograph how intelligent they are. The judgement was based on what class or social categorisation the child's appearance suggested they might fit into.

That's the sort of crass stupidity we are up against in much of the public services, n, and that stupidity is what informs the categorisations employed by our surveillance system.

Auntie Flo'

Newmania said...

I would have punched her Flo and then what? You are Labouring under the misprehension tat Liberty is a nartural state . WRONG slavery is and its only by watching the bastards who want to take you stuff if not you life we retain our Liberty. I know weapons can be misused and thats why I say there has to be a balance .

Don`t be too hard on me I am concerned about the proliferation of surveillance I do , on theother hand feel , that to call all those who ask for it state dupes is somewhat smug and there are genuine law and order gains in amongst the comnfusion

It may be a point that by ficussing on CCTV we avert our gaze from the real problme whichbis how did we ever breed feral youth in out estates in the first place

Anonymous said...

newmania said:

Lilitth why would he be " At risk" is he is of mixed race ..thats the fastest growing group in the country

So are the children of single parents, n, yet they are still stigmatised by erroneous categorisations - no matter how goog their single parents are.

newmania said:

FLO- The popularity of CCTV is not because of gevernment misrepresentation of anything it is because of what people see outside their doors. You are deluded if you imagine most of the population even registers government statistics.

Admit it !


Where exactly do you claim I argued that the public register govt stats,n? Fact is, I made no such claim and do not appreciate Blairite style bluffs suggesting that I did, n :)

Of course people are worried about the breakdown of the rule of law in our society. We all know that government stats are lies because we all see their contradiction every day.

What a section of the public do swallow hook line and sinker, however, is the false sense of security the governement deliberately generate around the concept that we can blanket surveillance, mass DNA and mass ID card our way to safety.

In my view our over-reliance on the double bluff of a massive level of ineffective hi tech surveillance is one of the reasons underlying the breakdown of law and order here.

Becauzse there it is used as a substitute for what we really need: a return to old fashioned policing, old fashioned criminal justice systems and old fashioned penalties for crime - more prisons too.

Yet even that will be useless unless we address the underlying problem of the breakdown of our English communties and values. We MUST begin consolidating our communties, establishing trust and common values. And we'll never achieve that while so many of our communities are destabilised by huge levels of inward and outward migration.

Stan Bull said...

An excellent post, Mr N.
Labour certainly has the strangest and most skewered of priorities. A very concrete example. In 1961, at the height of the long post-war boom, there were 31,500 people in prison in Britain. A quarter of a century later that number had risen to 51,000. The prison population has now reached 80,000. There are currently 137 prisons holding men, women and children in England and Wales. But they are too few it would seem. Two rather unappetising options present themselves: sending convicts to police cells-a waste of police time and manpower- or releasing prisoners early. Neither are acceptable measures. Indeed, the government is to consider using prison ships as a way of tackling the growing crisis of overcrowding in jails. This is not a new problem.
Clearly, the government has failed to act on prisons because it has had more important issues to spend tax-payers money on.In August 2006, we learnt that developing the controversial ID cards scheme has cost the government £46.4 million over the past three years. To put that figure in perspective, Kilmarnock Prison which opened in 1999 and is able to hold up to 700 prisoners was built at a cost of £33 million. Last year, it was revealed that the fees paid to experts from PA Consulting to work on the ID card scheme equate to an average weekly wage of £6,360, assuming a 40-hour week. Phil Booth of the No2ID campaign against the scheme described the consultants' pay rate as "absolutely appalling". He said: "The Home Office is shovelling money into a black hole at an ever-increasing rate. Management consultants must be lining up at the trough to get a share of all this spending."The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats have said the money for ID cards - £8 billion, according to the government, but up to £20 billion according to independent estimates - would be better spent on conventional policing and security measures. Labour doesn't get it.
Bizarre.

Newmania said...

I think you have raised some good structural problemms though Flo and somewhat convinced me that the balance between liberty and order is being somewhat skewed if I`m honest.

Clever bugger aren`t you !

Newmania said...

Stan ..yes I quote some of those figures myself . On prisons you are still less likely to be caught sand sentenced to prison in this country if you commit a crime than anywhere else in Europe so our prison populaton is not big enough in my book.
No doubt there are underlying problems but I would like to see burglars banged up in the meantime .

On ID quite right whatever the pros and cons the cost is absolutely astronomical and this alone is enought to kick it out in my view.£20 billion !!!!

On the £190 billion so
pent on quangos ( that Tony Blair was going to have a bonfire of....remember)..jaw dropping .Then you get that tosser Andy Burnham claiming that Redwoods ideas to scrap inheritence tax ..( under "3 billion) would impact on " working families" as it would be reallocated as indirect tax .

This from a government that has increased govt expenditure as part of GDP from 38% top 45% during high growth and public employess to 6,000,000 all with indirect tax.
Where is the shadow cabinet , how can he get away with this crap? Claiming to stand for working famlies ....AAAARGGGGGG!

If you look at Flo`s data some of it is really interesting and her final comment very good I think

Anonymous said...

Newmania said...

You are Labouring under the misprehension tat Liberty is a nartural state . WRONG slavery is and its only by watching the bastards who want to take our stuff...


Slavery by despotic governments is in danger of becoming endemic here - but it will NEVER be a natural state,n. And will never be sustainable. The entire history of our country has been a struggle for freedom as much as for survival.

From the warriors alongside Boudicca, Brythnoth(?) and Brian Boru, to the soldiers at Runnymeade and the brave sailors who fought alongside Nelson, to our mothers who slaved in factories and risked their lives in civil defence and our fathers who fought and died in their millions for our freedom one single cry echos down the centuries: we are a free people and we will never accept slavery from Kings, conquerors or despotic governments.

Auntie Flo'

Newmania said...

we are a free people and we will never accept slavery from Kings, conquerors or despotic governments.

No the Kings Peace freed us from the nearest big man with an army. Order can free us anarchy is imprisonment . Its a subtle balance like poem or freedom and rules whithin a culture.
Flo you are writing so beautifully today you are in danger if aquiring a "fan"..careful...


( Must crack on with filthy trade )

lilith said...

Oh Yes Flo, I can believe it.

When I failed to respond within two weeks to an invitation to have my 3 yr old daughter's development checked by the Health Visitor she turned up on my doorstep looking suspicious and accusatory, with an assistant/trainee. She could have bloody rung me first but I guess she wanted to catch me out, abusing my child. I would have let her in, but I found her approach offensive.

She only had to squint at my girl's medical records to see that she was regularly seen by the GP for her eczema. So there was no need for the heavy handed "we are worried about your child" approach.

And, naturally, my girl was horribly advanced....;-)

As a child of a broken home she just achieved 9 A grades at GCSE, 6 of them A* and only missed a star in Greek because she fell asleep for an hour.

Anonymous said...

Also, compare the 1% of those who suffer wrongful arrest or conviction as a result of erroneous DNA testing with the .35% of crimes solved by DNA.


How can DNA serve justice or rid us of crime when DNA testing creates more crimes than it ever solves?

Auntie Flo'

Newmania said...

..and yet Lillith they seem to miss all the children in real danger and then never take any responsibility.There is no consistency

Flo Your DNA figures are taken out of differnt contexts and cannot be compared like that.

lilith said...

Flo, that is a horrible story about your boy. I hated that "We are worried about your child because you are a single parent" look in her headmistress's eyes. She left and went to a school where she was appreciated! Unfortunately it cost 11K a year...

lilith said...

They do Newmania, they do. A 14 year old I know was put into foster care because her Dad had hit her and her Mum was mental. The foster "father" left fags and money under her pillow then fucked her. As it was the only foster family in her city (yes 1 foster family in a small city) the girl was sent home to Mum, where she spent 3 months in bed and screwed up her schooling. An assessment by an "Expert" said she needed no counselling to deal with this trauma. No charges were brought, although the foster parents split and "father" left town. Her social worker once dropped her down town at 10pm with £10, and naturally the girl ran away. When Mum insisted on some help, nothing was done until Mum threatened calling the papers. Then the police found the girl next day in a Heroin fueled household 20 miles away... The Education and Welfare officer assessed her and said she needed home education. And that was it. Just the assessment, no action. So that's how they look after the at risk kids..and this was 9 years ago.

(Story ends happily though no thanks to Social Services' intervention...The little girl is now a lovely woman with a little boy and a sweet fiance...)

lilith said...

This child's social worker was a single parent of 3 children, worked three days a week and had 30 "at risk" kids to "look after". It is all lip service and meetings, meetings, meetings. I dont know how they sleep at night.

Newmania said...

Thats an insight Lillith...I wonder what I am complaining about hwne I hear such things

Mulligan said...

How many high profile cases have the banks of roadside CCTV cameras failed to pick anything up (the car manslaughter on A316 years ago, the hells angel murdered last week etc etc, even the infamous tunnel in paris but that's another story completely).

They only want to detect crimes where it is possible to issue an immediate penalty notice, preferably to people who will pay up without question.

That is why most of our speed cameras are on dual carriageways, with no pedestrians, set at an artificially low 40mph speed limit, and there are hardly any where children cross roads, (because most people obey the limits in those areas and there is little money to be made).

Newmania said...

I agree with that TB..I like them near schools and in built up areas though ..in Lonodn people drive like murderers and i am getting to the point where I am going to get out and punch someone.

Blog Archive