The New Irish Question

Abortion and same-sex marriage in a 32-County Republic, such as already exist in the 26-County Republic?

Or no abortion and no same-sex marriage in the United Kingdom, even though those things exist in the rest of the United Kingdom?

Ireland in general is a strange place, even by the standards of these Islands. But Northern Ireland is a very, very, very strange place, indeed.

Sleeping Dogs Lie

So Andrew Newton has still been living in this country under the extremely unusual name of Hann Redwin, by which he has been known to the public record since 1994. He has even been ringing in to Jeremy Vine for advice on how to get mould off his acrylic shower curtain. But the Police thought that he was dead? Pull the other one.

You could not write, certainly not with the expectation of getting it past an editor, such details as that Newton went to Dunstaple instead of going to Barnstaple, or that Jeremy Thorpe was married to the ex-wife of the Queen's cousin, or that Noman Scott's wife's sister was married to Terry-Thomas, or that George Carman's second wife had left him for George Best; Carman's son from that marriage has, by the way, been a Lib Dem parliamentary candidate twice in recent years. You might just about get away with the first of those and with one of the other three, but even that would be unlikely. Yet they are all true. The only disappointment is that John Le Mesurier was "not the actor".

There are serious points here, though. Thorpe's dislike of Emlyn Hooson was not just that of an English toff for an uppity Welsh grammar schoolboy, although there was that. Thorpe had taken a Third in Law and never been more than a moderately successful barrister, whereas Hooson had taken silk at 35 (so that he is still one of the youngest QCs ever), he was a member of the Bar Council, and so on.

And George Deakin is still alive. The protection against double jeopardy was a vital liberty the abolition of which was of only questionable value even in the Stephen Lawrence case. That abolition ought to be reversed, and it certainly ought not to be given effect in this instance.

#WeStandWithLush

Without an unpublicised donation from Lush, then Dave Smith and Phil Chamberlain would never have been able to write the definitive Blacklisted. This is not going to go away, Hillsborough is going to trial, and Shrewsbury and Orgreave are both going to be yanked out of their very shallow graves in the next hung Parliament, at least if it contains even only one or two of us who will insist on that:

We are victims of what has become known as the “spycops” operation, and their legal representatives and supporters. In many of these secret undercover operations the police have admitted to violation of human rights, abuse of police powers and causing significant trauma, including inhuman and degrading treatment breaching article 3 of the European convention of human rights.

We are pressing for the current public inquiry into undercover policing to ensure that there is full disclosure of what took place, including who was targeted, by whom and how. Without this full disclosure there is no way of knowing the full extent of what happened during the dark years of this secret policing operation.

The cosmetics retailer Lush has used its facilities to help us as victims press for full disclosure and reform so that this never happens again (Lush under fire from police over ‘spy cops’ campaign, 2 June). This is not an attack on police; it serves to help all those in the police service who wish to uphold the highest standards of policing. For this we thank Lush for its support. We condemn those who have misrepresented Lush and our campaign and especially those who have sought to intimidate Lush staff. #WeStandWithLush

Doreen Lawrence Core participant in public inquiry

John McDonnell MP

Caroline Lucas MP

Molly Scott Cato MEP

Jenny Jones Green party, House of Lords

Natalie Bennett Former leader, Green party

Jonathan Bartley Green party co-leader

Michael Mansfield QC Core participant

Imran Khan QC

John Hendy QC

Len McCluskey General secretary, Unite union

Gail Cartmail Assistant general secretary, Unite union

Ian Hodson Bakers, Food & Allied Workers Union

Manuel Cortes General secretary, TSSA Union

Steve Hedley Assistant general secretary, RMT union

Matt Wrack General secretary, Fire Brigades Union

Ricky Tomlinson Actor and Shrewsbury picket

Mark Thomas Comedian and political satirist

Owen Jones Columnist and commentator

‘Andrea’ Core participant

‘Alison’ Core participant

‘Jessica’ Core participant

‘Rosa’ Core participant

‘Kate’ Core participant

Carolyn Wilson Core participant

Sukhdev Reel Core participant 

Stafford Scott Core participant

Suresh Grover Core participant

Helen Steel Core participant

Sheila Coleman Hillsborough Justice Campaign

Dave Smith Core participant

Roy Bentham Core participant

Lisa Teuscher Core participant

Joe Rollins Orgreave Truth & Justice Campaign

Mark Metcalf Core participant

Paul Heron Public Interest Law Unit

Jules Carey Bindmans solicitors

Russell Fraser Garden Court Chambers

Harriet Wistrich Centre for Women’s Justice

Kate Ellis Centre for Women’s Justice

Jason Kirpatrick Core participant

Jude Lanchin Bindmans solicitors

Shamik Dutta Butt Murphy solicitors

Dave Nellist former MP and core participant

Lois Austin Former chair, Youth Against Racism & core participant

Hannah Sell Socialist Party and core participant

Dave Morris McLibel defendant

Mike Schwarz Bindmans solicitors

Eveline Lubbers Undercover Research Group

Kevin Blowe Netpol 

Leigh Andrews Spied-on trade unionist

Donald O’Driscoll Core participant

Hannah Dee Core participant

Frank Smith Blacklisted construction worker

Steve Acheson Blacklisted worker

Brian Higgins Blacklisted trade unionist

Dan Gilman Blacklisted trade unionist

John Jones Blacklisted trade unionist

Aaron Bastani Student activist

Ash Sarkar Senior editor, Novara Media

Liam Young Author of Rise: How Jeremy Corbyn Inspired the Young to Create a New Socialism

Maya Goodfellow Writer and researcher

Joe Batty Antiracist activist

Phil Chamberlain Co-author of Blacklisted

Sam Tarry President, Class thinktank

Prof. Rory O’Neill Editor, Hazards magazine

Kim Bryan Community activist

Alec Cutler Community activist

Sian Jones Blacklist Support Group

Marick Badger Core participant, Campaign Opposing Police Surveillance

Police Spies Out of Lives Core participant

The Monitoring Group Core participant

Defend the Right to Protest Core participant

Trial Date Watch: Day 39

More than seven weeks after I had again been due to stand trial, I now no longer have a trial date, even though it is rightly a criminal offence to fail to attend one's trial.

Had I been tried, as expected, on 6th December, then, even had I been convicted, I would already have been released, since I would by now have served three months even of a wildly improbable six month sentence.

The legal persecution of me, which has been going on for over a year, was initiated only in order to deter me from seeking public office or to prevent my election to it, and its continuation is only to one or both of those ends. Amnesty International is on the case.

Until there is anything to add to it, then this post will appear here every day that the post is delivered.

Libel Watch: Day 94

The Leader of Durham County Council, Simon Henig, was so afraid that I was going to be elected to that authority, that he faked a death threat against himself and dozens of other Councillors.

Despite the complete lack of evidence, that matter is still being pursued by the Crown Prosecution Service as part of the attempt by the sacked Director of Public Prosecutions, Alison Saunders, to secure a Labour seat in one or other House of Parliament.

If I am wrong, then let Henig and Saunders sue me. Until they do, then this post will appear here every day that the post is delivered.

Getting The Vote Out

Above all, of course, vote for Consett's finest, Lost Voice Guy.

Functionally

The suspension of the body that selected Labour council candidates in Enfield has fair taken me back, with its tales of application forms that had all been filled in by the same person, of the nodding through of "functionally illiterate placemen", of undisguised racism, and so forth.

Ah, the municipal Labour Right. It never changes, because it never learns. And the then London Regional Director ruled that this process was "robust". He was not from London originally.

Apparently, you no longer need the nomination of your own Constituency Labour Party in order to stand for the National Executive Committee. That was what did for me, a long time ago. Everything else was in place, but I was spitefully refused the home nomination, back in the days when a CLP could only nominate one candidate, on the insistence of the then MP and of the son she never had.

This constituency is now back in the Hilary Armstrong days, with a Member of Parliament who at first sight appears to be a strong supporter of the Leader (Tony Blair then, Jeremy Corbyn now), but who in reality has no interest in politics in the sense of policy or philosophy.

Hilary believed in the political machine of which she was a product, and she believed in her own entitlement within it. That made her functionally right-wing by default, but nothing more than that. She never had an original thought. Most people would have assumed her public persona to have been an act of satire. But it was not.

Likewise, her successor but one believes in the political machine of which she is a product, and she believes in her own entitlement within it. That makes her functionally left-wing by default, but nothing more than that. She has never had an original thought, and she never will have. Most people would assume her public persona to be an act of satire. But it is not.

My crowdfunding page has been taken down without my knowledge or consent. But you can still email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com instead, and that address accepts PayPal.