Changing the law on assisted suicide in Britain - NO!

I note that Lord Falconer the ex lord Chancellor believes we need to change the law in order to cover cases where people go to places like Dignitas to end their lives because of a terminal illness and are assisted by their loved ones in achieving this objective. Under current British law this assistance is illegal and Lord Falconer presumably wants to make a change to make it not illegal. I think this is a very dangerous change to make and is typical of this Government. something is wrong, we need a new law. No we don't the old law is adequate. It is illegal to assist people to commit suicide. This is fine. The Director of Public prosecutions still makes the call as to whther to prosecute or not. So, in cases where no good purpose would be served by a prosecution the DPP could choose to not bring a case. But in cases where it is felt that those assisting were doing so for purposes other than assisting their loved ones then the DPP could elect to prosecute. So, if you persuaded your old confused grandmother to go to Dignitas because you fancied moving into her lovely house then a prsoecution would be right. keep the law. the government by seeking to relax this law opens the door to state mandated euthanasia. i think this choice should be the individual's and not the state. No to Euthanasia by the back door is what I say.

Sarkozy wants to ban the Burka!

I saw the announcement that Sarkozy wants to ban the Burka. Not sure why the shortarse wants to ban the burka when in times of stress he could hide under someone else's, but perhaps he hasn't thought it through properly yet. His advisers will help him out there.

It got me thinking though. Did I think banning the burka was a good idea. On balance I am opposed to government dictating how we should live our lives and this seems like yet another instance where some government wants to do exactly that. It's not my country but Brown is desperate for a policy that might win back public affection, so who knows, if it gets passed in France it might be proposed here.

I have heard the argument that it treats women unfairly and I am 100% in agreement that it does. I also read that many women who wear the burka choose to do so. There is an argument they might be forced to choose to do so and that I think is unplesant. I then read a letter stating that Westerners did not understand because wearing the burka empowered women to go out in public which they would not otherwise be able to do. Sounds like an argument for not banning the burka then. Then I realised the whole 'choice' story was a big con job. Women can choose to wear the burka or stay at home and not go out in public. I can see why so many 'choose' to wear the burka then. It is the lesser of two evils. Disguting is the most polite word I can find for that choice.

Do I think we should ban the burka on the back of that? No. Muslim women and men should realise that this is a repressive thing and make the choice to change on their own. We should not be forcing them to do so.

Should the burka be allowed in the workplace? This is a different story. Where communication is vital I believe the burka has no place at all and therefore should not be permitted in most workplaces. If muslim women wear a burka when going out shopping and are easily misunderstood as a result then that is another issue and we should be no harder on them than we would on any other disabled person, becuase that is what their 'choice' is making them. I still think banning the burka is a bad idea.

I hope Muslims eventually see sense about this. I am not holding my breath while I wait.

New Democracy for the UK

I have followed the Telegraph's expose of the way our MPs have misused the expenses system with great interest. I note that none of the 3 major parties has come out of this with any great glory and I would like to suggest that it is pointless for us, the electorate, to select any of the three parties for our votes in any forthcoming elections. I have also noted Lord Tebbit's suggestion that we give our votes to one of the minor parties in the forthcoming European elections and this fills me with dread. I would hate to see Britain travelling down the facist path purely because of the behaviour of some MPs. On the other hand I believe it is now clear that we cannot trust any of the major parties to be entirely clean so I would like to suggest the following:

We, the people, create an entirely new party which would aim to achieve the following after election:
1) Halving the number of MPs in parliament and allowing an increase in the salary paid to those left, but still allowing a reduction in the total cost of MPs.
2) No change to proportion representation as this hamstrings governments. As unpleasant as first past the post can be, it does work.
3) This new party would work to simplify the tax system with the aim of reducing the cost of collection.
4) The Budget would be drawn up on the basis of projected revenue from tax and borrowing and not the current way of setting expendirture and then determining what we need from tax and borrowing.
5) The withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and the recognition that britaion cannot afford to be the world's policeman.
6) Reduce government participation in the economy over time. It is recognised this cannot be achieved overnight.
7) Cancel all proposed expenditure which appears to have no real purpose, such as ID cards and similar endeavours.
8) Focus on the things people need, like Education, Health and care for those who cannot provide it for themselves and reduce expenditure in areas such as defence (Trident replacement etc).

I am certain that if the new party did even some of these things in a first parliament, people would vote for such a party for a second time. We need less government and we need it now, more than ever.

New Regulation for Financial markets

The government has decided it needs to add regulation to Financial markets to prevent a recurrence of the situation which has left the global economy on the edge of collapse. This comes from a bunch of people who would come second to a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest. In 12 years in power they have not demonstrated an understanding of Politics or Sociology beyond the most superficial. How can we then expect them to demonstrate any talent for Economics or Finance? I suppose the one thing they might have working in their favour is they want to limit the pay of people in Financial Markets. This is one way to level the playing fields. If you want the regulators to be able to catch people carrying out illegal or dangerous acts in Financial Markets one way you can ensure the regulators are of similar talent to the people they are trying to police is to limit the pay of the group to be policed. this will ensure that the most talented people get out of that area and look for other ways to make money and you will be left with the mediocre. So Financial Markets will have weaker operators and the regulators will have more chance of catching them. Sounds like a good idea doesn't it? Except when you think, the best minds in the community screwed up so badly the world's major economies will take decades to recover from the problems. How badly could the inept and mediocre have done? For the motives that drive Financial markets (viz: Greed and Fear) will not change. So we will have less able people trying to make money in order to collect their bonuses (albeit not at such high levels as previously) being mediocre they will be even less likely to spot the flaws in their schemes. Well you get the picture don't you? Capping pay hardly seems to meet the need to aim for excellence. Mind you I can see where the government is coming from here. If we aimed for excellence in government and were prpeared to pay for it, not one of our current crop of leaders (or Her Majesty's loyal Opposition) would be in consideration for the top government jobs. Let's aim for mediocrity, it is less noticeable when we fail to achieve it.

Windafll Tax on Energy Companies

I notice that around 80 Labour MPs (News 27 August) have written to the Prime Minister demanding a windfall tax on Energy Companies thus proving that we would get as much intelligent service had we elected 80 wooden rocking horses in their places. Presumably these MPs have such a low grasp of Economics that they fail to realise that the principal shareholders in these energy companies are Pension Funds. That is right, Pension Funds to which their constituents contribute and from which they hope to one day get a pension. The Prime Minister has previously raided these selfsame funds in another ill-advised tax grab and this would be yet another reduction in value for these funds and their members.

The other spectre that is raised by the notion of a windfall tax is of course what would these 80 MPs have us do in bad years for the energy companies. i realise we have set a bad precedent with Northern Rock, but it could be suggested that if these companies had really bad years the Treasury could be called on to bail them out because of windafll taxes paid in superb years.

On the other hand, what else do you expect from 80 rocking horses?

HMRC loses data

I note with interest that our servants, the Government, have shambolically lost private data relating to around 25 million people. These same people seem to think we buy their statement that the same would not be true of the data held for their ID card systems. Why should we believe that this bunch of incompetents would be able to hold anything private. It is for this very reason that I refuse to provide HMRC with my bank account details 'so that they can process refunds more expeditiously'. I assume they mean they would contrive to lose this detail as rapidly as possible so that the criminal elements around could make proper use of it.

What amuses me greatly is that the Chump of the Exchequer stands there and says, the data is lost but it is not likely to be in criminal hands. I only have one question for him: If this data is lost, then how can Mr Darling be certain where it isn't?

We all know the answer to that, so there is no prize for telling me he can't. Still it is one way to solve the debt problems of the Third World isn't it?

Jury Service

I had a call to do jury service a few weeks ago. Never having done it before I looked forward to particpating in the checks and balances which should make our legal system work well and in times past certainly gave it an international reputation for fairness which was second to none.

To be fair, I only sat on one case as a juror so this may not be representative, but the Crown's case seemed to me to be so shambolic as to be laughable. Police evidence was so inconsistent that you had to wonder what the problem was. Fingerprint evidence was not undertaken because it would have been 'too expensive'. On a split decision the defendant was found guilty and it seemed to me this was not based on the evidence but more on the supposition that he looked like a 'toe-rag' and was therefore probably guilty. A view I shared, but I was one of the dissidents who voted 'not guilty' purely because I felt the Crown had not proved its case 'beyond all reasonable doubt'.

Was this a miscarriage of justice? Given the miscreant's history of convictions provided after the verdict makes it seem unlikely, but I can assure you I was not impressed at all. The evidence that was produced was so sketchy that I think you had to find the defendant not guilty because the burden of proof was not there. Any one of us might well have been found guilty by that jury on the evidence provided and my view is that in most cases that would be a miscarriage of justice.

Should we change the system? No. But we should expect the police and the Crown to make an effort to meet the requirements of 'beyond all reasonable doubt'.