The Aged P

Today I am at UKIP’s annual conference  here in London. Earlier this week I attened my first local branch meeting. Yet I am very much a Johnny-come-lately because, although for several years I have sympathised with much that UKIP stands for, I regarded the party as a fringe group which could never win enough votes outside EU elections to even gain a sniff of power – because power is the essence of any political movement, the ability to influence governance either by involvement or pressure.

UKIP also appeared to me to be all about campaigning rather than doing – playing in the haystack rather than trying to find the needle.

Then, as well, I perceived it as a one trick pony, the logical extension of the Referendum Party, using all its energies to advocate an in/out EU plebiscite – then dissolving into dust once one had been held, whatever the result.

This year’s elections changed my mind as well, I suspect, the minds of many others. Diane James achievement in Eastleigh, in particular, initiated a seismic shift in attitude in the minds of those sympathetic to UKIP – and its enemies.

UKIP, its ,members and supporters, is now taken seriously by the political class and their media followers – and that must be a tough call because our political/media establishment is as tightly knit in its symbiotic relationship as any feudal aristocracy or mafia brotherhood. About a thousand families, centred mainly in North London/Notting Hill/Richmond, dominate this nexus, absorbing individual  newcomers and spitting out the has-beens

But now they are faced with a whole group of “outsiders”, most of whom have either never fitted in to the nexus or have existed outside its metropolitan, international worldview.

We lack “connections”. We don’t know anyone from the Guardian or the Telegraph. We know little of Quangos, lobbyists or PR consultants. Our views are not fashionable or politically correct. Most of us probably don’t take exotic holidays or mix with millionaires or celebrities or lobbyists.

But we are not donkeys. We work in a whole variety of jobs. We come from a wide range of educational backgrounds – but we don’t have the contacts or the relatives inside the nexus.

Until now we could be safely ignored, even during elections, for, like sheep we could be herded through certain gates because we bought the myth that the mainstream parties were in competition with each other.

But they are not. They make up a cartel of shifty shadowy figures who, despite their labels, believe in Big Government, high taxes and rule by special interest groups. They are ashamed of our traditional British values and desire to force us into alternative patterns of behaviour for what they perceive to be “our own good”.

However we of the silent majority can challenge the ruling political cartel because, with the emergence of UKIP, we have a political party which has demonstrated the ability to tune with the feelings, convictions and concerns of ordinary folk outside the special interest groups that dominate the cartel……and also, crucially, gain the votes….no wonder they are nervous.

Notice how in the course of this post the pronoun shift from I to us. It marks my own pride in now being just a minor cog in the wheel of a political party that has a golden opportunity to transform our country.

Full credit to those stalwarts who, unlike me, nailed their colours to UKIP’s mast while other fainthearts, like myself, were unwilling to step forward.

You were right – I was wrong.

So remember…never, ever, underestimate the little guy…because one day he could give you a painful surprise…

From his lofty eminence at the top of his pillar on the roof of the offices of The Daily Telegraph, Peter Oborne, the Simeon Stylites of the political media casts his ascetic eye over the comings and goings of lowlier folk and occasionally enriches our muddled lives with exhortations to avoid vice and pursue only virtue.

Such a sagacious utterance sprang from his pen earlier this week when he offered David Cameron the silver bullet that would cause Nigel Farage and UKIP to crash to the ground in a sea of dust and broken bricks.

A vote for Ukip is a vote for a Labour government. Why can’t the Tories get this message across?

Wow – what wisdom…

Only one thing wrong with that, Mr O – many former Tories are turning to UKIP because voting Conservative in 2010 has produced a government that on questions such as the EU, Global Warming, Human Rights, Immigration and taxation has sometimes made “conservative” noises but in terms of action has clearly placed the approval of the chattering classes and their house magazine at the BBC at the top of the agenda.

That’s the trouble of observing the world from the top of a 40 ft pillar – you don’t see much of what is happening on the ground….

Millionaire Nick Clegg is going to use taxpayers money to pay for free school meals for all under sevens in state schools, all 1.5 million of them. Of course nearly 500,000 of them already get free meals as a benefit for low income families so this means that higher income parents will be getting a share of the gravy as well.

I bet those middle class mums at mumsnet will be delighted – an extra £400 to spend per child, all courtesy of £600m from  the hard pressed taxpayer

Naturally the teachers unions are delighted

The National Union of Teachers said pupils of all ages should qualify, adding: ‘Children do not stop being hungry at seven.’

Here’s an idea. Finance this boondoggle from money set aside for teachers salary increases. I’m sure they would be delighted to take one for the kids……

Awaiting his trial David Cameron’s former right hand man and dining companion Andy Coulson is still watching the PM’s back over the growing support for UKIP. He has suggested that Farage and his party can easily be defenestrated via youtube with…

An attack video demolishing UKIP’s dark side, focusing on Farage’s “less pleasant and stranger utterances”

No doubt the posh twentysomething graduate interns at Tory HQ are already working on it so, wishing as always to be helpful to those callow youths, may I suggest this as an example of an obvious Darth Farage vote loser

Surely ordinary folk wouldn’t touch UKIP with a bargepole after watching it?

On second thoughts…..

A deeply unpleasant and worrying story emanating from Burnley and Lancashire County Council.

Receptionist Mahdiya Khan accessed a computer database 60 times to get details of a child sex victim. She was jailed for eight months, but details have only just emerged. Three men have also been found guilty of interfering in the case.

She happened to be the “girl friend” of Mohammed Imran Amjad, 26, who was under investigation for grooming and abusing a 14 year old girl and lending her out for others in his circle to sexually assault.It’s a shocking story but merely the latest in a whole series of cases where Muslim men, usually of Pakistani descent, have groomed underage white schoolgirls and turned them into sex slaves.

However, apart from the obvious tragedy of a serious sex crime  there are a number of other issues arising from this story that give cause for concern.

This case was decided quite a while ago but the details have only come out in the last few days – now why would that be?

It also appears that of the national media only The Daily Mail and BBC published the story – did the others think it of less importance than Simon Cowell’s “lovechild” or Miley Cyrus’s “twerking?

Apart from Amjad several other men were brought to trial but they were freed after the girl said the sex was consensual. But by definition children under 16 cannot give their consent for sex –  it is automatically a form of rape. So why did the courts allow these men to walk away?

A receptionist (not a social worker) can access highly sensitive data sixty times with nothing being flagged? Why were there no safeguards in place – and what does this tell us about all the other databases used by public services? No wonder people are getting so concerned about who will have access to our files.

This information was then used to intimidate the girl and her family into keeping their mouths shut.

Three other people connected to Amjad had also attempted to interfere with the case.His cousin Waqas Khalid threatened to rape the victim and her mother. His friend Qasim Hussain persuaded her to change her statement. His brother, Furqan Amjad, contacted the victim 350 times

Attempting to pervert the course of justice by intimidation and/or bribery show a contempt for the law that deserves exemplary punishment – yet Furqan Amjad was jailed for 15 months, Khalid was fined £300 and Hussain will be sentenced next week.

Oh, and remember receptionist Mahdiya Khan was given eight months in prison – which means she is probably out already.

There is a nasty smell about this whole affair….

Maurice Williams says he wrote “Stay” as a fifteen year old in 1953 after he failed to convince his girl friend of the time not to go home so quickly after a date. Seven years later he put it on a demo cut for his doo wop band The Zodiacs and hiked all around New York trying to arouse interest. Eventually it was picked up by Herald Records and re-cut and released in the Autumn of 1960. By the end of November it was top of the Billboard 100.Subsequent covers by The Four Seasons and the Hollies, amongst others as well as a placement in the 1987 film “Dirty Dancing” have ensured, hopefully, a steady stream of income for Williams and a firmly established niche down Memory Lane.

Oddly enough Williams also penned another classic doo wop number “Little Darlin’”. Released in 1957 it did moderately well in the R & B charts but made little impression on the Billboard 100…unlike The Diamonds cover just a month or so later….

Both Dan Hodges and Guido report that a slither of “Red Princes” are following in their fathers footsteps and offering themselves as Labour candidates for 2015

Dave Prescott is a member of quite an exclusive club, the so called “red princes and princesses”, whose parents are MPs or former MPs, and who will be contesting seats in 2015. Others include Will Straw, recently selected for Rossendale and Darwin; Euan Blair, who is said to be interested in one of the Coventry seats; and Joe Dromey, who was showing an interest in Lewisham.

Joe Dromey’s  mummy, of course, is Harriet Harman.

Have these young men no shame? Each of them has a parent who was at the very centre of the Labour regime that did everything in it’s power to destroy the very fabric of our country.

It burdened us with a mountain of debt and brought us into the longest lasting recession of modern times.

It allowed a foreign court made up of a motley collection of European academics to overrule the very fabric of our ancient common law

It willingly saddled us with an inefficient and expensive energy policy without any serious attempt to question the voodoo “science” upon which it was based

It deliberately allowed a massive influx of immigrants from every corner of the globe by reducing our border controls to a mere token

It led us into wars for the flimsiest of reasons without any notion of strategic overview and with an underfunded army leading to the killing and maiming of hundreds, maybe thousands, of our brave servicemen and women.

Rather than seek to place themselves in power over us once again perhaps these young men should atone for their parents’ shame by devoting themselves to the humility of good works by working as minimum wage care assistants or cleaners in homes for the elderly.

As I live just a few miles north of Balcombe the global media frenzy over  this rather nondescript village has been of particular interest – partly because it has become a textbook example of that classic political/media ploy of “How To Lie With Statistics”

The figure of 82% of Balcombe residents opposing fracking in the surrounding area outside  has become a talismanic number in the public “debate” around this issue. It conjures up a heartwarming image of the little people taking on the dark legions of Big Oil and has been much used by outsiders to justify their willingness to “help” the local “community” by orchestrating a series of well choreographed “protests” to show their “solidarity” with the residents.

There is no doubt that a significant number of villagers have their concerns about the issue and they have certainly captured the attention of the media with their noise. But do they really represent a significant majority of Balcombe’s residents?

During August and September the Parish Council conducted a poll to establish the views of the residents on the attitude to fracking that the Parish Council should adopt. A polling card was delivered to every residence in the Parish and, when the poll closed on 10th September, 284 polling cards had been returned. 234 (82%) expressed the view that the Parish Council should oppose fracking, 30 that it should not, 16 had no strong views, and 4 polling cards were invalid.

Wow, that certainly sounds convincing…..until the more attentive observer might spot the absence of what is always the key figure in any survey – how many polling cards were not returned?

It seems to be the case that only 33% of residents responded to the survey. Now this is something which immediately changes the arithmetic of the poll and questions the legitimacy of the claim that well over three quarters of the citizens of Balcombe oppose fracking.

the much quoted “82 per cent of residents” actually should read the “82% of the 33% of residents who responded to the questionnaire”. That means the 66% (those who didn’t respond) plus the 18% of those that did but who are in favour / with no firm opinion are being out shouted by the 26% of villages who are anti-fracking

But then  “82% of the 33% of residents who responded to the questionnaire say frack off” on a placard wouldn’t quite have so much of an impact……

This is a book that a UK cabinet minister thinks you should not be allowed to read. Indeed the author of the book, along with an academic in another Australian university, has been driven out of the halls of learning for daring to question the accepted wisdom on climate change

Or so you might have imagined if you weren’t familiar with the recent treatment by two Australian universities — Macquarie and James Cook — of two eminent scientists working in the field of ‘climate change’. Both have been ostracised by their institutions for reaching conclusions unsatisfactory to the controlling regime.

Heresy….there are some who might even prefer that they be burned at the stake. After all the zealots were content to imply that dissidents should be blown up..

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So on no account should you read this book…..remember YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED….

Wonga, benefit “cuts”, asylum seekers, same sex marriage, women bishops…..wherever you see “Church of England”, “Bishop” etc in the media it will almost certainly be a quote upon one of those subjects…it’s almost as if the Church of England has become one all embracing campaigning charity, obsessed with whatever is issue of the day at BBC/Guardian dinner parties.

The mythical Martian would have a hard time grasping the fact that the C of E was about God and matters spiritual. He/she/it would see it as an institution in retreat, almost too embarrassed to even mention the R word.

Churches are empty and congregations dwindling even though the clergy strive not to offend..

Near where I live is a huge private estate, mainly housing about 5,000 young couples with school age children on comfortable but relatively modest salaries.  – the sort of people who see the church as a major irrelevance. The development plan had a site earmarked for an Anglican church….it was never built because the C of E didn’t fancy the challenge.

Why?

In the past Christians went out of their way to go into areas where they were not welcomed. They flourished when they were being despised and hated – and eventually gained converts simply because of admiration engendered by fighting against long odds.

Isn’t it time the C of E stopped apologising and retreating  and went out into the streets proclaiming the gospel?

Isn’t it time for another John Wesley?