tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86526272008-01-09T22:45:05.012ZFredBlogger36125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-26599303843348757772008-01-09T22:28:00.000Z2008-01-09T22:45:05.085Z

We're familiar with people being deported despite being under the threat of death if they return 'home', which is bad enough, but it really does take some doing to deport someone who's actually dying, yet this is what's happened to a Ghanaian woman whose visa ran out: A Ghanaian woman who came to the UK five years ago and became a student is being flown back to the African country, despite being

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-20781631254051099022008-01-07T19:07:00.000Z2008-01-07T19:38:28.484Z

According to a story on today's BBC website, Scotland is freer, or rather less unfree, than England by some margin. The group Privacy International apparently scored Scotland higher than the UK as a whole: The UK as a whole scored 1.4 on the report's scale - the worst of any European country. But Scotland fared much better, with a rating of 2.5. The report quoted a SNP MP: Mr Wishart, the MP for

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-84227613313623064712007-11-06T22:17:00.001Z2007-12-20T12:30:22.280Z

If you were walking on the pavement and your way was blocked by a slower pedestrian, would you shout abuse at them to force them to move aside? Would you stand right behind them breathing down their neck until they moved aside? If another pedestrian moved in front of you without giving notice, would you curse and swear at the top of your voice and give them the finger? The answer, for most folk,

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-16585752015033320462007-08-27T22:33:00.001+01:002007-08-27T22:39:43.849+01:00

Further to my previous recent blog entry on the Camp for Climate Change, State repression of, two letters appeared in The Independent on Saturday 25/8/07 which are worth quoting in full, in case they 'go off' on the Indy site: Heathrow police act like the bad guys Sir: Last Sunday, I witnessed, on the climate change march at Heathrow, what can happen when innocent members of society decide to

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-3343155278536088692007-08-22T00:21:00.000+01:002007-08-22T00:27:18.875+01:00

Today's Grauniad reported that the cops were using an automated drone to spy on crowds at the V Festival. According to the report, the drone is almost inaudible above 30m, and so small as to be practically invisible. So there's just no getting away from the all-seeing eye of the law, it seems. How long before the cops suggest building surveillance into new buildings, Big Brother style, on the

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-18067985503971541612007-08-21T22:53:00.000+01:002007-08-22T00:17:22.825+01:00

There's been much made of the "illegal" nature of this week's Climate Camp protest outside Heathrow, by the right-wing Press, the government, and of course the cops. In an act of serious OTT-ness, the British Airways Authority sought to ban up to 5 million people, including members of subversive groups such as the National Trust and RSPB, from travelling to the environs of the airport [3]. They

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-14062371250717456912007-07-15T22:23:00.001+01:002007-07-15T23:26:34.590+01:00

How long does it take the cops these days to fit up a suspect? Back in the old days they could pick a bunch of Irishmen (and occasionally Irishwomen) up off the street or bash their house doors down, give them some serious verbal and physical in the nick, and have them confessing to any old crime within a few days, after which the courts would lock 'em up for long enough so that, when they were

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-74139910203400924502007-06-10T22:45:00.000+01:002007-06-10T23:45:02.821+01:00

Following on smoothly from Margaret Hodge's neo-fascist call that "indigenous" families should be given housing priority over "immigrants" [1], regardless of housing need, in another shameless policy purloin from the BNP's manifesto Ruth "Opus Dei" Kelly today announced that immigrants should be given less help with translation[2] to "encourage" them to learn English, and that translation

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-36549843054607215722007-05-28T21:37:00.000+01:002007-05-28T22:31:08.075+01:00

As a PS to my previous blog entry, barely two days after writing it John "Big Bampot" Reid suddenly proposes "draconian" new powers to cops, allowing them to stop and 'quiz' people on their identity, what they're doing, and where they're going [1]. No "reasonable suspicion" needed, just random stop and interrogate (or, given the cops' 'previous' in this area - anyone remember 'sus'? - rather

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-24888813273171290592007-05-24T21:21:00.000+01:002007-05-24T23:16:21.383+01:00

That was the headline on today's Daily Mirror, a paper that used to be considered at least a bit on the pink side, if not actually Left, yet now seems to be in competition with its rival The Scum to see which can be more reactionary and hysterical, a competition which The Scum will always win. The subhead was "3 TERROR SUSPECTS ON LOOSE" and the 'story' went on to describe them as "extremely

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1162222974809033692006-10-30T15:10:00.000Z2006-10-30T18:53:32.540Z

Coppers are never satisfied. Even though the 'right' to street protest, for long considered a fundamental part of 'democratic society' and a 'human right', has been more curtailed in this country than anywhere else in Europe (ironically, it's now easier to demonstrate in Red Square than in Trafalgar Square), the cops are now calling for protesters to be locked up for burning flags and for

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1155490263183344122006-08-13T17:25:00.000+01:002006-08-13T18:31:03.233+01:00

Since the "terror alert" that caused such severe disruption to UK airports, and airports overseas [1], Big Bampot (aka John Reid) has been issuing apocalyptic pronouncements about how "four major plots" had been thwarted [2], the head of the Metropolitan Police warned darkly of possible loss of life on an "unimaginable" scale that would dwarf 9/11, and unattributable "intelligence sources" have

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1149772375570131152006-06-08T13:14:00.000+01:002006-06-08T14:12:55.626+01:00

Another day, another innocent guy shot by cops in London, without warning. At least he's still alive, so compared to the Brazilian guy Jean Charles de Menezez who was executed at point-blank range on the Tube, he can count himself lucky. The cops and spooks, including chem and biowarfare spooks from Porton Down, the UK's own WMD factory (but like, hey, you can trust us), haven't found even a

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1147556334688430902006-05-13T22:07:00.000+01:002006-05-13T22:38:54.730+01:00

I don't read the Daily Mail, but couldn't help seeing the front page yesterday when I was sat in the dentist's waiting room, and there at the top of the page, in the very masthead was a real whopping porkie, a blatant lie with feckin' bells on it. "Learn Spanish in a week!" the banner blarted, continuing: "No reading, no writing, no effort". All in aid of pushing an 8-CD Linguaphone Spanish

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1147553827004024432006-05-13T20:33:00.000+01:002006-05-13T21:59:20.140+01:00

The government's Chief Brief - aka the Lord Chancellor, Charlie "Tony Blair was my flatmate" Falconer - has called for criminals to be locked up for good for the sake of "public safety". Not that he was anything like as honest and direct, of course, saying, in a wonderfully English euphemistic way: "I think there is real concern about the way the [Human Rights] act is operating," Lord Falconer

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1140722103006066382006-02-23T18:10:00.001Z2006-02-23T19:16:14.733Z

A useful, if depressing, snapshot of the current situation in our surveillance State was posted to Indymedia UK today, originally published in the wonderfully-named Porkbolter, a local activist mag for Worthing, of all places. In case the link 'goes off' I've copied the article in its entirety below, followed by some comments I made. Formatting in original, underlines are not links. TONY Blair

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1139153193535107422006-02-05T14:45:00.000Z2006-02-05T15:26:33.616Z

One of the local no2id sites has a link to a story in the Grauniad printed last September, by and about a French guy who was arrested by paranoid cops in a tube station because he was wearing a jacket "too warm for the season" (now where have we heard that before?) and carrying a rucksack. This led to the tube station being evacuated and part of the line being closed down. He was taken to a

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1134061878219047602005-12-08T17:01:00.000Z2005-12-08T18:00:53.656Z

The following news item appeared on Indymedia UK today, and should serve as a reminder that real, active political struggle is alive and well in other European countries. Compare and contrast with the bland McPolitics of the Blairite era, in a nation where trades unions are toothless, 'politics' is shorthand for court intrigue in Westminster and Whitehall, and the populace has been hypnotised

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1132141674544992242005-11-16T11:22:00.000Z2005-11-16T11:47:54.583Z

From the "beyond satire" file. Back in May, but only reported in the Press last month, a woman was arrested under the Terrorism Act in Dundee for walking on a public cycle path between Broughty Ferry and Dundee through the dockside. She was held in a cop shop for several hours as a "terrorist suspect" before being released, and only recently was informed that the Procurator Fiscal wasn't going to

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1130245618763744552005-10-25T13:29:00.000+01:002005-10-25T14:06:58.783+01:00

The authoritative Canadian Center for Research on Globalization last month published an online article [1] reporting disturbing indications that US and UK special forces were responsible for at least some of the supposed 'suicide bombings' in Iraq. Whilst no direct evidence of this has yet been found, various eyewitness accounts cast strong doubt on the standard line of crazed Islamicist suicide

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1127832072470491342005-09-27T15:38:00.000+01:002005-09-27T15:44:41.610+01:00

I was on holiday in the Lake District the week before last, and on my last day, which was (for a change) a glorious sunny day with clear sky and stonking views (though a perishing North wind), I thought I'd clomp up Great Gable from the Honister Pass. At the summit of the pass is a slate mine with a shop and large car park, which is the most obvious way up Great Gable and saves a couple of

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1124275981856597462005-08-16T21:00:00.000+01:002006-02-05T15:44:27.786Z

Channel 4 News tonight reported on a leak from the independent investigation into the shooting in cold blood of the poor Brazilian guy, Jean Charles de Menezes, that the Met had mistaken for a terrorist. The leak showed that: he had not been wearing a heavy unseasonable overcoat, but a plain denim jacket he didn't vault over ticket barriers, but instead used an electronic ticket to pass

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1120471688735541082005-07-04T09:58:00.000+01:002005-07-04T11:08:08.760+01:00

Today's Grauniad reported : Voting should be compulsory in Britain as a way of ending political alienation, restoring community and addressing the dangerous issue of "serial non-voters", Geoff Hoon will say today." Hardly surprising, given the liberal authoritarian nature of the NuLabor regime. A central feature of liberal democratic ideology is "democratic legitimacy" - that is, a government

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1120062529739661932005-06-29T17:10:00.000+01:002005-06-29T17:28:49.756+01:00

MPs yesterday 'debated' (ie they blew hot air then did what their whips told them) the introduction of identity cards. Of course, the NuLabor regime bulldozed the measure through, and it's a nailed-on cert that we'll have to carry the things in the not too distant future. (It's also a nailed-on cert that the implementation will be a cock-up of staggering proportions, and will open up a whole new

Fredtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8652627.post-1119262322421729892005-06-20T10:09:00.000+01:002005-06-22T18:27:56.573+01:00

Following the smoking bans imposed in Ireland and, earlier this year, Italy, it looks like England is the next place where fags will be banned in pubs. The Scottish Executive has already announced a total ban in Scotland to start next year (although who's going to enforce it in some of the howffs on Sauchiehall Street is another thing - best break out the riot gear, boys) and Wales is also on its

Fred