I do apologise if my posts still seem to be spluttering incoherence on this one. My ghast is truly flabbered. Not helped by KB saying this morning that it doesn't really matter because councillors deal with bins and parking and stuff. I wonder if this lack of judgement, along with that comment, will cost her with the leadership?
Addressing the point of others - yes, I agree, Shahid Butt should never have been allowed to stand either. We really need to review how we manage that and who should be able to stand, but that's going to bump into democracy and the forgiving types.
Have standards in public life really fallen this low? There was someone else, I forget who, who prompted me to say "is it too much that we have a basic threshold for those who are standing for election, that we need an outright rule that they shouldn't have any criminal convictions, at least for anything violent". I'm aware that that probably rules out a handful people.
Next, even if you do believe in redemption, there is simply far too much baggage for this guy. And actually, I read his own explanation on his website and to be honest, it doesn't feel reassuring in any way.
if you actually look at the list of his crimes, they are extensive. But when you look at the detail, it's even worse. I actually remember the whole situation with Luciana Berger reporting it to the police because she received in excess of 2000 threatening messages over the course of a weekend.
Worse than that, obviously there's information everywhere that may not be verified, but I think it's pretty well known that he's done well out of cryp* trading (are we allowed to type out the whole word yet? it used to get your post stopped) and so on. It does make me wonder if there's some corruption at play here.
I wouldn't want him standing for anything in public life, even if it was 25 years after his prison stint. I suspect he got through Reform vetting because he's able to say that he's got a clean criminal record for the last seven years.
Anyway, I shouldn't even have to think about him - the really depressing thing here is Kemi Badenoch. No point standing up in the Commons and going on about a lost "lost" mobile phone now is there?
Ironically, if these basic standards are now out of the window... is there anything to stop me voting for a different party on the right?!!!! In my case, there probably is - but many others will not feel the same way.
She might get away with this because it's happening in silly season, some people sadly won't care, but I actually think they will. I think the story will grow legs over the next few days.
I feel that there is very much trend for forgiving men who did something dodgy in their youth. I very much dislike this trend.
I don't really understand people anymore to be honest. But I have seen it in real life as well. There genuinely seems to be a thing that any kind of issue up to the age of 30 is forgiven. Because we've also got this horrible problem with extended adolescence crashing into this.
I think it sends a message that you can pretty much get away with anything and still not be locked out from any public position. And I think that's really bad.
if he was actually sorry for what he had done, he would not be standing for this role. But being sorry, really is nowhere near good enough in a situation like this. Society needs to stick with punishment for these people.
It's one thing to be a misogynist antisemite.
It's another thing entirely to commit this catalogue of crimes and spend the amount of time he has spent on personal serious intimidation and inciting violence.
I appreciate people like this have to be given jobs because they've got to make a living - although he seems to be doing very nicely out of his investments - but there is absolutely no need to give them more opportunities is there?
I'm just going to be wandering around muttering "what the fuck" about this all day