Comments on: David Cameron and Damian Green

By: mikestallard

mikestallard — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 21:53:28 +0000

Apparently there has been a letter posted officially in the houses of Parliament today from the Police saying that they really did say that, although they had no warrant, they were asking for permission which did not necessarily have to be granted.
Apparently, also the Leader of the House has said that there will be no commission of seven to investigate the affair until the Police enquiries have been completed (some time in 2012?)
The plot thickens……
(Information from the Mole in First Post – just Google it).

By: Philip S

Philip S — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 20:09:29 +0000

The Speaker's statement this afternoon beggars belief. The Sergeant at Arms took it upon herself to let the police into the office of an MP, granting them permission without a search warrant. The Speaker did say that he was consulted before the arrest and search took place. Why did he not require a search warrant to be produced?

Senior police officers apparently did not follow correct procedure by notifying the Sergeant at Arms that she could require a search warrant if she so wished. If police did not follow correct procedure, does this make any evidence they obtained from Damian Green's office at the Palace of Westminster inadmissible in a court of law?

Let us hope that the Speaker chooses the seven members of his committee investigating this shambles with more care than he gave to the arrest of an MP. If he does then perhaps the truth will out.

By: Mr Ecks

Mr Ecks — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 12:57:42 +0000

I repeat: AS A MINIMUM Cameron must get the scalps of "Five Bellies" Smith and Gorbals Mick. Anything less and this will be a ZaNuLab victory and will embolden them for more outrages

By: Bazman

Bazman — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 23:35:56 +0000

Got some great quotes has Tony.
"The Tory party is the enemy of democracy" I Like it.

By: Bazman

Bazman — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 23:25:30 +0000

Very sinister by any standards and when 'The Ben' is questioning the arrest of a Tory Minister on TV. It's time to get worried. It ain't a police state yet…

By: Kay Tie

Kay Tie — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 19:35:07 +0000

"And then we see them on TV battering down doors in the early morning, just like the Gestapo." You can watch them battering more than doors: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=jXFMIbkKMMc

By: mikestallard

mikestallard — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 18:35:27 +0000

This is not the first offence. Matthew d'Ancona tells of another in the Telegraph today, and the Mail carries a story of the persecution of a journalist in Milton Keynes for the same thing: giving away secrets.
If parliament surrenders its position to the press, then they have to fight for parliamentary privileges, which means, of course, protection for their sources and the freedom to speak out. At the moment, both seem to be very much under threat from the Police Service.
Mr Blair passed a lot of laws on the understanding that the Police would be kept off the streets and that the laws would not be enforced except against obvious criminals. "You can trust us".
Now the Police and the Local Councils are beginning to flex their muscles and enforce the laws in the drastic ways in which they were written. They do not appear to be on our side any more.
I saw a Policeman striding through Wisbech last Saturday. Looking straight ahead, dressed like Robocop, he was in no way either friendly or approachable. Another couple of Policemen were frisking a man in the street quite openly. And then we see them on TV battering down doors in the early morning, just like the Gestapo.
Do you know what? I am just so glad that I am neither a journalist, a smoker or a Muslim! (Who is next?)

By: Rose

Rose — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 16:12:31 +0000

Another worrying development which is not unconnected with the two political arrests, in that it flows, as they have done, from the reckless and unprecedented increase in the population, is the willingness of socialist local government politicians and their "officers" to obtain compulsory purchase orders – not to build railways, but to enable them to demolish privately owned and occupied freehold houses in order to build new "affordable" ones. There is also talk of seizing people's gardens. People need to wake up about this, as well as a lot else.

By: Andrew Allison

Andrew Allison — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 14:22:32 +0000

Parliament is no longer a place to hold the executive to account. It is merely a place where the whims of ministers are rubber stamped. Now parliamentary privilege means nothing to an executive who wishes to stamp out any criticisms of it actions.

I too feel threatened by a British government for the first time in my life. Real democracy is dead.

By: oldtimer

oldtimer — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 12:46:25 +0000

I read (in one political column) that the fact of Mr Benn being able to complain that we are now living in a police state is, of itself, evidence that we are not – otherwise his remark would have been suppressed.

This seems extraordinarily naive. The descent into a police state is not a sudden one off event – a cliff off which, one day, we will fall – but a slow, barely impercetible process, a slippery slope. What happened last week reveals all too clearly that we are well on the way down that slippery slope and the pace has just accelerated.