Ghetto Fabulous?

Yes, I am showing my age.

Denmark's "parallel societies", until 2021 officially called "ghettos", are wholly compatible with membership of NATO. They are wholly compatible with membership of the EU. They are wholly compatible with the hallowed European Convention on Human Rights. They are the work of a Social Democratic Government. And they are wanted here by the Labour Government. On all five points, of course they are.

Although there are others, related to economic deprivation, the first criterion for being designated a "parallel society" (ghetto) is that more than 50 per cent of the inhabitants originated or "descended" from "non-Western countries". Those are everywhere apart from "all 27 EU countries, the United Kingdom, Andorra, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Norway, San Marino, Switzerland, Vatican City, Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand". No Ukraine, then.

Having been so designated, an area may be liable to mass eviction and demolition in the manner of Sharpeville, District Six, or the West Bank, and at the very least all children from the age of one upwards will be required to undergo at least 25 hours per week of instruction in "Danish culture". All criteria would easily be met by Birmingham Ladywood, but thankfully Shabana Mahmood held that by only 3,421 votes over Akhmed Yakoob, who has since come third in the West Midlands mayoral election with far more votes than the winning candidate's margin of victory, and with more than twice as many as the fourth placed candidate. He is now being paid the supreme compliment of a lawfare prosecution by Keir Starmer's Crown Prosecution Service.

Bleat all you like about the victories and the coming victories of the Gaza Independents, or about Zohran Mamdani as you do about the far from unimpeachable Sadiq Khan, but New York will no more become Sharia-compliant than London has, whereas Donald Trump has today played host to Ahmed al-Sharaa, lately the second-in-command both of Al-Qaeda and of IS, and now installed as President of Syria. 

Meanwhile, Nicolas Sarkozy has been released, but at least France has attempted any reckoning over Libya. Successive British Governments transformed Manchester into the world centre of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group that went on to bomb Manchester Arena. Britain invaded Libya in order to install such people as its new regime, as France did to cover Sarkozy's tracks. From the ensuing civil war, the Royal Navy rescued both Salman Abedi, who went on to carry out that bombing, killing himself in the process, and his brother Hashem, who went on to be a key figure in the planning of that bombing, and who in April of this year threw hot cooking oil over, and stabbed with makeshift knives, three Prison Officers at HMP Frankland, members of our community here in County Durham. And then there was Libya and the then Prince Andrew. The lawyers made Andrew Lownie take most of that out. But Tarek Kaituni. Remember that name. Tarek Kaituni.