Tag Lines

No comments will be allowed on this post, and it will be my last word on these matters at least until the next General Election had been called.

I never applied for a tag. Less than two weeks after I had been sent down, I was informed in writing that I had already been granted one after three months of good behaviour in which I had not yet then engaged. I have been told, most definitely not in writing, that I was classified as a low risk "because we're not really allowed to put zero," since, "You didn't do it the first time, so you're not going to do it a second time, are you?" Quite.

I was well liked and well respected in prison. That is not conjecture or inference; no one in there minces his words. I was well looked after and, as always matters most to me, surprisingly well fed. From the highest to the lowest, the refrain was the same, "Everyone knows you're a political prisoner." I was routinely exhorted to seek political status, but it would have taken more than three months to process the paperwork.

I had either been convicted last year by a misdirected jury, or the concept of conviction beyond reasonable doubt has been abolished, and jurors are now instructed to "disregard" it. Assume the latter, since Peter Hitchens knows of other such cases. And I had wanted to vacate my guilty pleas this year, but I was advised that I would then have no representation, since no lawyer would commit professional suicide by defending harassment, to which there was no defence. The crime consists in having made the complainant feel harassed. If they say that they were, then they were. My barrister confirmed to me at my sentencing hearing that that was the law.

Right before it emerged in court that he had arranged two 10 year Restraining Orders with the judge and the Prosecution, without anyone's having mentioned them to me. Given the opportunity, then I would have blown out of the water the preposterous suggestion that the complainants had no connection to each other, and that one of them was "vulnerable". 10 year Restraining Orders have been imposed on me on the basis of the outright lies of my political opponents, lies that I was denied any opportunity to correct. When the long complete Forde Report is finally published, then one of those opponents will be exposed as a person of the worst possible character, a fact that could have been known in April. This is not over.

In cases of harassment, what matters is that the complainant is well enough connected to have their case taken up by the Crown Prosecution Service. April 2021 was the last month in more than 100 years when that was true of the right-wing Labour machine in County Durham. My sentencing was held days before the predictable and predicted smashing of that machine by the voters, or else there would have been no point, with no one left to placate or protect. Just as my sentencing last year was adjourned until it would have been too late for me to have appealed against my conviction. The bad old North East, indeed.

The covens that run the Catholic Church in practice in this country, using mere bishops and priests as errand boys, are of course right-wing Labourites to a woman, and many an ex-copper would not like the idea of a mixed-race politician or of a mixed-race person, any more than the Labour Right in general would. But the scandalous allegation against me on 2nd March 2020 was recanted under oath at Durham Crown Court on 11th of that month, calling gravely into question my convictions the next day by exposing that key character witness as unreliable, a fact that was not mentioned in closing statements or in summation.

Unless, as is widely assumed, the real reason for them is the content of this book, then the sanctions imposed upon me in my absence on 2nd March 2020 are void. I expect a written apology by 30th September 2021, and for it to be published in full in The Northern Cross. Financially, I would then settle for the reimbursement of my victim surcharges. One would not wish to have to sue the Church. If I were still subject to any sanction by the Church at the time of the next General Election, and if I were to be defeated at that Election, then I would seek to have that result overturned in the courts on grounds of undue spiritual influence.

As my barrister was prevented from putting on the record of the court, the lurid allegations made against me by one of the complainants formed no part of my guilty plea. I deny them in their entirety, and those who would repeat them are free to sue me for calling them liars. They have ensured that no payout would be possible, but I assume that they would welcome the moral victory. My barrister had also wanted to defer sentencing based on equivocation and tu quoque, but he was given no opportunity to state that case.

The instant that Labour lost control of Durham County Council, then I was granted an unsolicited tag for more than 10 weeks of future good behaviour. I invite each and every Member of Parliament for the area covered by Durham County Council, each and every member of Durham County Council, and each and every member of Lanchester Parish Council, to contact davidaslindsay@hotmail.com if they thought that I was factually or morally guilty of any criminal charge that had ever been brought against me. Not legally guilty; Bill Cosby is legally innocent. Factually and morally guilty. No name would be published except at the request of its bearer, but if anyone ever did get in touch, then the readers of this site would be the first to know.

Meanwhile, here I am. Gloria Gaynor and Beyoncé are wannabes. When the cockroaches emerge from the dust of the nuclear apocalypse, then they will find two other survivors. Both of them live in this house, and one of us will put the kettle on. Onwards and upwards to my think tank, to my weekly magazine of news and comment, to my fortnightly satirical magazine, to my monthly cultural review, to my quarterly academic review, to at least one major international book series, and to much else besides, including standing for Parliament at North West Durham in 2024, and possibly including standing for General Secretary of Unite the Union in 2026. Any further official action against me could have no motive except to discredit that parliamentary candidacy, in particular, in the interests of what little remained of the Labour Party in this constituency.

As to those who might contemplate unofficial action, especially but not exclusively in the North East, they should consider that I now had lifetime offers of assistance, with no suggestion of payment, from the persons or close associates of some of the North East's most colourful characters. Perhaps they had never before met someone who spoke like me but who had taken them exactly as he had found them? More than once, I have made eyes light up with the words, "It was someone's paid job to teach you to read, so if they never did it, then shame on them, not shame on you?"

I have been released to find the story already in circulation that the people who had sent me to prison had put a hit on me in there, but that the hitman had taken such a liking to me that he had given them their money back. I do not know that that is not true. And people who pompously professed to "keep an eye" on me should know that I now had people keeping an eye on them. In any event, although it lasted 35 years, and although it had certainly included at least one attempt to murder me, I should like to think that hunting season on me was now closed. But I doubt that very, very, very much, indeed. All that they now have left is to kill me. There is no other way of shutting me up. They must have worked out by now that there never really was.