democracy

I’m still reeling from Rishi Sunak’s shameless, dangerous speech

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Caroline Lucas

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/03/sunak-speech-protest-tories-friday-no-10-caroline-lucas

Rishi Sunak giving a press conference outside No 10 on 1 March 2024. Photograph: Aaron Chown/PA

The prime minister’s address on Friday was a masterclass in gaslighting and made a new art form of rank hypocrisy

“We must face down the extremists who would tear us apart,” Sunak declared to the country on Friday evening. And perhaps never were truer words spoken – at least not by this morally bankrupt prime minister, who is rapidly proving to be one of the most dangerously irresponsible leaders this country has ever faced.

I am still in disbelief at the sheer chutzpah of Sunak wheeling out the No 10 lectern and calling on the whole nation to tune in to an emergency address. Because what came next was not the announcement of a major natural disaster or attack. It wasn’t, as we saw from other world leaders that day, a condemnation of open gunfire against starving people trying to reach aid trucks in Gaza, or a statement of solidarity with Russian protesters against Putin. It wasn’t even the calling of an election.

Instead, what Britain got was a masterclass in gaslighting. Sunak’s performance made a new art form of rank hypocrisy, as he pretended not to know that the very extremism he criticised was being actively driven by his party and peddled in his speech.

Caroline Lucas Green Party MP for Brighton Pavilion. Official image by David Woolfall Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.
Caroline Lucas Green Party MP for Brighton Pavilion. Official image by David Woolfall Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

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By choosing to give that inflammatory speech, Sunak has shown that he is prepared to lurch even further to the right in a bid to stop defections to the Reform UK party. The mask has well and truly slipped: this was yet another step in the culture war right from the very top. The hard right of his party will have been overjoyed to see Sunak the strongman, cracking down on dissent, stifling protest and taking aim at immigrants and Muslims.

Ultimately, that speech was a dark moment in British politics. Democracy is indeed under threat from extremists. The problem is, they’re running the government itself – and we need to wake up and stand up to the seriousness of the threat that they pose.

  • Caroline Lucas is the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/03/sunak-speech-protest-tories-friday-no-10-caroline-lucas

Response to Rishi Sunak's extremism speech at Downing Street 1 March 2024. Second version of this image with text slightly altered.
Response to Rishi Sunak’s extremism speech at Downing Street 1 March 2024. Second version of this image with text slightly altered.

Sunak’s extremism speech 1 to 5

Continue ReadingI’m still reeling from Rishi Sunak’s shameless, dangerous speech

Demonising Peaceful Protest Demonstrates the Level of Political and Moral Bankruptcy in Parliament

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https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/demonising-peaceful-protest-demonstrates-the-level-of-political-and-moral-bankruptcy-in-parliament/

Sir Lindsay Hoyle MP was elected Speaker of the House of Commons in November 2019.

The fact that Westminster is content to play cynical games while Palestinians suffer is beneath contempt writes Lindsey German

The shameful scenes in parliament where Labour manoeuvred to stop a principled motion calling for immediate ceasefire in Gaza are bad enough. But even worse is the justification of many Labour MPs for the coercion of the Speaker: that they were fearful of intimidation and violence from demonstrators over Gaza.

Firstly, this is a lie: the protests that take place at MPs’ offices are overwhelmingly peaceful and no threat to MPs or their staff. They are a longstanding and valid form of expressing disagreement and concern over issues in a democracy. But such is the state of politics in Britain that they are now equated with intimidation of MPs. Perhaps these MPs – highly salaried and privileged in comparison with most of their constituents – should have reflected when they stood for office that being involved in politics of necessity involves disagreement and controversy at certain times.

There is a huge movement in support of the Palestinians across Britain and real anger that politicians have for the most part stood by as we witness a genocide in Gaza. None of these protests would take place if the MPs concerned had taken the very minimal step of backing an immediate ceasefire.

But there is also a second and more important question: why MPs are so self-centred to highlight the minimal inconvenience to them while people are starving in Gaza, while over 12,000 children have been killed and where the population is being ethnically cleansed? And why did the Labour leadership refuse to accept an amendment which talked about the collective punishment of the people of Gaza? The Labour position on Gaza has been a disgrace from the beginning and this is why they are facing a wave of protest.

The fact that they are trying to demonise protestors and to paint them as violent extremists shows their political and moral bankruptcy. The fact that they are content to play their cynical and pathetic games while the Palestinians suffer is beneath contempt.

22 Feb 2024

https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/demonising-peaceful-protest-demonstrates-the-level-of-political-and-moral-bankruptcy-in-parliament/

Continue ReadingDemonising Peaceful Protest Demonstrates the Level of Political and Moral Bankruptcy in Parliament

Judgment day for free press

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/judgment-day-for-free-press

People protest outside the Houses of Parliament in London, to step up demands for the release from prison of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, June 24, 2023

Assange’s appeal against extradition to the US set to begin

WIKILEAKS founder Julian Assange’s appeal against extradition to the United States will be heard in the High Court on Tuesday in a final leg of the legal battle for free journalism.

Mr Assange, who exposed US war crimes in Iraq and leaked thousands of military secrets, will face court on Tueday and Wednesday.

He is wanted by US authorities on 18 counts, relating to WikiLeaks’ publication of hundreds of thousands of classified documents.

Mr Assange has been in Belmarsh prison since he was removed from the Ecuadorian embassy in 2019 where he was given political asylum for nearly seven years.

If Mr Assange is denied permission to appeal, he will be at risk of extradition to the US and prosecution under the century-old 1917 Espionage Act, and faces a 175-year prison sentence.

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/judgment-day-for-free-press

Continue ReadingJudgment day for free press

Liberty launches nationwide campaign to overturn Policing Bill

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/liberty-launches-nationwide-campaign-overturn-policing-bill

Demonstrators take part in a ‘Kill The Bill’ protest against The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, on College Green, Westminster, January 17, 2022

RIGHTS advocates have launched a campaign to overturn Tory legislation attacking the right to protest.

Liberty, formerly the National Council for Civil Liberties has condemned the government’s Police, Crime, Sentencing & Courts Act 2022 and the Public Order Act 2023 as part of a clear pattern in which the right to strike and the right to vote had also been attacked.

It has launched an online petition and is gathering signatures for a letter to Home Secretary James Cleverly calling on him to scrap the legislation.

Liberty director Akiko Hart said: “No matter where we live, our backgrounds, or who we vote for, we all want people in power to listen to our concerns and work to build a brighter future for us and our loved ones.

“But this government is clamping down on the ways we speak up on important issues. Most recently it has given the police dangerously broad powers to crack down on protests and arrest demonstrators.”

Ms Hart said Britain’s leaders are “criminalising protesters to hide from their own failings.”

“This is part of a clear pattern of shutting down the ways we can all hold them accountable for their actions,” she said.

“They have also created laws that stop workers from striking and block countless people from voting.”

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/liberty-launches-nationwide-campaign-overturn-policing-bill

Continue ReadingLiberty launches nationwide campaign to overturn Policing Bill

Rishi Sunak Meets Murdochs More than NHS Figures in Latest Lobbying Revelations

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Rishi Sunak Meets Murdochs More than NHS Figures in Latest Lobbying Revelations

Rishi Sunak met media representatives more than any other sector of the UK economy between July and September, analysis by Byline Times shows. 

The Prime Minister met senior executives from Rupert Murdoch’s media empire alone four times in the space of three months, compared to just once for NHS representatives. 

Sunak met Daily Mail editors twice in that time, while meeting housing sector figures once. Several of the meetings were listed as “social”, meaning they are unlikely to have been minuted. That includes meetings with the departing News Corporation CEO Rupert Murdoch, and separately, his son Lachlan who is taking over at the helm. 

Every single one of the PM’s eight media meetings in that time is with right-leaning media outlets. 

Journalism professor and Byline Times contributor Brian Cathcart said: “These depressing figures reveal just how close the connection is between the right-wing billionaire press and our multi-millionaire prime minister.

“Forget democracy and forget parliament: this is where the real power in this country resides, and worse still, what we see is just the tip of the iceberg. Contacts of this kind are maintained at every level of Government and are so intensive it’s impossible to say where press influence ends and Government begins.”

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https://bylinetimes.com/2023/12/20/rishi-sunak-meets-murdochs-more-than-nhs-figures-in-latest-lobbying-revelations/

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The tip of the iceberg
Continue ReadingRishi Sunak Meets Murdochs More than NHS Figures in Latest Lobbying Revelations