Westministers: Happy New Year?

[RedToothBrush]

And so we enter a New Year full of hope that things might just be about to recover from our national nervous breakdown... or perhaps not.

As we have Damien Green ejected from his role as Deputy PM over allegations of inappropriate conduct towards woman and use of porn at the end of last year, 2018 sees a bright new progressive dawn with the appointment to the role of universities regulator of Toby Young. A man who has deleted 20,000 tweets including many which are inappropriate and offensive to women, is a fan of eugenics and hates the working class and disabled.

Meanwhile the NHS is facing a crisis which is totally unexpected to the government and couldn't possibly have been planned for by a man who has over seen it for over five years. Which naturally bodes really well for Brexit planning.

We are apparently planning to join the TPP. Never mind geopolitics we can move the UK to the Pacific region.

We still are not ready for trade talks because the Cabinet can not agree on anything. Not that it sounds like they have actually discussed anything along these lines yet.

Rumours are that the Cabinet - including arch leavers such as Gove - are leaning towards supporting May and a softer option, despite the disgust of Johnson, who once again is the subject of malicious chatter about his sacking in a forthcoming Cabinet Reshuffle.

There is talk of further Tory Party war with the revelation that membership of the party has dropped to a core of just 70,000 hardline authoritarian men, most of whom are over 60. Tory HQ now wants to (perhaps with some good reason to prevent the loons) rewrite the constitution and limit the power of local associations to select candidates. The Tory party is now lining up to be a power struggle between internal authoritarians, who don't like democracy voices or structure.

Meanwhile the Labour Party membership now apparently overwhelmingly looks upon staying in the customs union and single market favourably and is in favour of a second referendum. In opposition to the leadership who are utterly committed to Hard Brexit. Much to the annoyance of Lord Adonis who is pitching a fit about government corruption and incompetence and being accused of being elite because he going skiing. Unlike of prominent Leavers who are in touch with the working class.

And finally Nigel Farage has got a meeting with Barnier. Farage, unlike Clegg, Clarke and Adonis, will not be accused by the Right Wing Press of undermining the government's negotiating position because...

It appears that we are in for another year of Brexit nonsense then.

We've not even heard mention of Gibraltar yet.

Remember the old adage that any law you make you should imagine what the worst opposition could do with that.

I do wonder if Corbyns relative inaction is a plan to get the powers Theresa May is stockpiling for himself to create Jerusalem on earth ?????

God denial law" ? Or an "Allah denial law
If you can't see why, I can't help you there.

"Jerusalem" or Scandinavian style welfare state. Shouldn't be difficult to tell the difference.

Nick Timothy‏Verified account
@NickJTimothy
My latest in the @telegraph: Justine Greening had to go. Now Damian Hinds must breathe life into school reform, cut tuition fees and give us world-class technical education:
www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/01/10/did-not-get-justine-greening-fired-deserved-go/

Jo Johnson‏Verified account
@JoJohnsonUK
So wrong, this stuff re Justine Greening - she supported me in every single reform we undertook of our universities, was a terrific colleague and faultlessly loyal.

Laura Kuenssberg
‏*@bbclaurak*

1. Those not obsessed with SW1 machinations, look away now but this turning into a bit of a rumpus this morning
2. PM's former chief of staff adamant he had nothing to do with Greening's departure from govt, but some of her colleagues furious he's making claims about what she did or didn't do in govt, after the point at which he was meant to have cut off contact with the Number 10
3. Tricky as he is basically working as a columnist + journalist now, but his every move winds up some MPs who feel they were promised by May that he would be persona no grata in Downing Street as one of conditions of staying on after election mess + they are deeply suspicious
4. Eg @Anna_Soubry 'Disappointed & surprised the man who helped lose us our majority & was sacked from No 10 is still in charge...' - this is proper beltway territory but it matters because it affects MP s relationship with the PM, and when there's no majority that is crucial
5. Here ends this nerd fest.....
6. Sorry, one more... Number 10 insiders adamant PM does not and would not have contact with Nick T these days, and he doesn't speak for govt in any way shape or for
7. But that's not what a lot of MPs believe and sources suggest he does still have contact with some advisers and ministers - at v least there's a perception problem in the Tory ranks that he still holds sway - right now, here endeth this nerd fest

Ooh just seen that Anna Soubry retweeted point 4 of Kuenssberg's thread

Plus there's a gardian article:

www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jan/11/theresa-may-nick-timothy-accused-meddling-reshuffle-justine-greening?CMP=twt_gu

*Guardian

Re: donation bins at NHS hospitals and how schools are having to be subsidised by parents (I think it was bigchoc who posted about it)

School creates playground 'rich and poor zones' separating kids whose parents didn't pay £6 donation for new sports equipment

Headteacher Maria Bull defended the scheme and said a 'couple of times a week' a child whose parents had contributed could invite a friend that hadn't paid to come and play with the toys

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/school-creates-playground-rich-poor-11828453?ICID=FB_mirror_main

Ouch

Laura Kuenssberg‏Verified account
@bbclaurak

1. Tricky as he is basically working as a columnist + journalist now, but his every move winds up some MPs who feel they were promised by May that he would be persona no grata in Downing Street as one of conditions of staying on after election mess + they are deeply suspicious

Anna Soubry MP
@Anna_Soubry
Suggest he’d make a better @TelegraphSport reporter on basis he knows more abt cricket than politics. Happy to fund one way ticket to Oz/NZ

"God denial law" ? Or an "Allah denial law"

If you can't see why, I can't help you there.

and so the condescension inherent in censorship is born ...

"Jerusalem" or Scandinavian style welfare state. Shouldn't be difficult to tell the difference.

Again, condescending ... so you can tell the difference and get the black redacting pen. I can't and get the "simple" truth - Pravda style ?

(With a note that one tool of oppression used in Apartheid SA was the suppression - by criminal law - of teaching English to the non-Europeans).

Franco's Spain also dubbed films, with the 'approved' translation.
Also I believe, but long before my time, the foreign press were full of news of Edward VIII's relationship with Mrs Simpson when it was censored in the UK.

Pain - that playground story is shocking!! My small act of subversiveness when my DC were at school in the UK which requested a "voluntary contribution" of £10 a term (but asked for the DC's names to be written on the envelope so that they could keep a list of who had and had not donated....) was to give the money by putting it into the general school mail box in an envelope simply marked "school contribution", no names

On NHS donations: I understand the slippery slope argument, and how patients and their families should not feel compelled to donate. But there should surely be some mechanism to donate a reasonable size amount of money? A good friend of mine has a baby who has been in and out of hospital all his life. The NHS has been truly brilliant, and I would happily give a large chunk of money to the hospital in question, but there is no middle ground between "box of chocolates for the nurses" and "millions for a new wing" (I explored it a year or so ago, following the first 15 hour life saving operation)

the foreign press were full of news of Edward VIII's relationship with Mrs Simpson when it was censored in the UK.

Plus ca change. The UK media didn't print the topless photos of Kate Middleton out of courtesy, even when the foreign press did (and were no doubt enjoying a sales boost as a result).

There is an obvious reason why "Holocaust Denial" is/would be different to "various different Gods" Denial Laws The Holocaust happened but there is no proof of the existence of god(s). So to deny it is to deny history - and to try to delete the horror, evil and deaths of millions from history. It then risks happening again because we can't learn from history.

Belief in god(s) is faith alone - there is no proof. I'm not dissing faith - I just don't understand it. (I wouldn't even say I was an atheist as that is defining my status as a "lack of belief in something I don't believe in". You could equally describe me as a "a-Flying-Spaghetti-monster-ist" )

There should be no problem with separating education from faith (such as in France, where State schools are exclusively secular); indeed, I wish we would disestablish the Church from the State in the UK. I don't believe it has any place in education - beyond the more general "Religious and Moral Education" (which is what RE comes under in Scotland).

We have a charity at our hospital whose aim is "Aims & activities
Fund raising to provide equipment and comforts for patients at the Royal Cornwall Hospital, Treliske, Truro and Volunteers to welcome and guide patients through the Hospital, to provide tea and coffee services to patients awaiting appointments, a library trolley and a Friends Coffee Shop providing tea, coffees and other refreshments"

They buy equipment like incubators for the hospital. I don't have an issue with extra fundraising but it should be voluntary and should not need to be relied on by the hospital or school.

On NHS donations: I understand the slippery slope argument, and how patients and their families should not feel compelled to donate. But there should surely be some mechanism to donate a reasonable size amount of money? A good friend of mine has a baby who has been in and out of hospital all his life. The NHS has been truly brilliant, and I would happily give a large chunk of money to the hospital in question, but there is no middle ground between "box of chocolates for the nurses" and "millions for a new wing" (I explored it a year or so ago, following the first 15 hour life saving operation)

I don't have a huge issue with donations at hospitals. I had understood it was a long established thing in a lot of hospitals where donations go to extra niceness, such as toys for the children's unit. At the hospice my mum was in they had a drinks trolley (because if your dying anyway you might as well have a decent sherry), which was paid for by donations as well as a constant supply of tea and biscuits for visitors.

In fact as a child I remember raising money for our local hospital to get a new MRI machine. We were in the paper. Most hospitals have a charitable wing that accepts donations and has done for ever. Maybe worth seeing if you can hunt out a Friends of type group for the hospital in your case Olennas. It might not go to that unit exactly, but I am sure any donations would be put to good use.

Crossed post with Hollie.

On NHS donations: I understand the slippery slope argument, and how patients and their families should not feel compelled to donate. But there should surely be some mechanism to donate a reasonable size amount of money?

Many years ago, I wrote a short story where a £1,000,000 bequest to a school had to go through so many committees (all of which were funded by the bequest) that it was finally used to pay for an extra mince pie at the Christmas lunch.

politicalscrapbook.net/2018/01/michael-gove-still-defending-toby-young-after-revelations-about-his-links-to-nazi-eugenics-enthusiasts/#more-69464
Michael Gove still defending Toby Young after revelations about his links to Nazi eugenics enthusiasts

Gove told LBC Radio that he had “enormous respect” for Young and that it was a “great shame” that his achievements had been overshadowed.
He concluded: “In judging Toby, I’m inclined to look at the good that he’s done rather than the stupid things he said.”

Let me paraphrase.

"Its perfectly normal and acceptable to hang out with Nazis and talk about eugenics because he's done other good stuff."

I'm sure many people in Nazi Germany were nice to those in their social circle, but a bit of a bastard to those who didn't fit those who didn't fit in with their vision of the world.

Maybe Frasier Nelson and Michael Gove don't recognise the Monster Character of Toby Young for similar reasons. Because they aren't the target of it and they agree with him.

Tom Newton Dunn @tnewtondunn
Michael Gove very pointedly just refused to rule out a second Tory leadership bid. Also tipped Gavin Williamson and Damian Hinds @BBCr4today .

Nigel farage wants another EU referendum?

What

The

Actual

Fuck!!!....?

😡😡😡😡😮😮😮😮😐😐🤔🤔🤔😐

Interesting.

Sam Coates Times @SamCoatesTimes
Justine Greening, the former equalities minister, asks questions of Amber Rudd, the current equalities minister in her first Commons intervention since leaving office

Will try and find out what it was that she asked. But it was something relating to Women and Equalities.

Just what everyone was hoping for.

Peter Stringfellow to take up leadership for Remain.

Or something.

Seriously though, if even Stringfellow doesn't want to support you anymore, who is going to support you?

By the way, just how many Government announcments at the moment are related to the Environment?

Or should I say DEFRA. Or the man in charge of DEFRA.

Interesting that Farage hasn’t suggested a referendum on staying in customs union/single market versus hard Brexit but remain versus leave.

Iain Martin @iainmartin1
Nigel Farage says it might be time for more publicity for Nigel Farage.

I wonder if Nigel is figuring out he may well be lynched once the full horrors of brexit are realised??