"Safeguarding the public"

Do you remember the case of Daniel Driscoll? He's the convicted murderer currently on the run after absconding from an open prison - along with a couple of drug dealers - earlier this month.

Well, it looks like we could soon be hearing about plenty more cases like his:

THE government has quietly resumed the practice of sending high-risk offenders with a history of violence to open prisons, in breach of its own guidelines.

According to complaints submitted by probation officers to their union this month, criminals convicted of grievous bodily harm, domestic violence, robbery and wounding are being moved to open jails.

The National Association of Probation Officers (Napo) has received reports from six of the country’s nine open prisons about a new influx of cases of inappropriate referrals.

Staff at one open prison said that in mid-December they had 25 persistent offenders, all deemed to be high risk to the public.

The use of open prisons to house violent criminals was first announced in October 2006 by John Reid, then home secretary, as a short-term solution to overcrowding.

It was stopped in March this year following complaints from staff about the increasing violence and drug use by the transferred offenders. The government then issued instructions that no violent criminals or sex offenders should be transferred.

It has now emerged that when the prison population passed 81,500 in November, this was ignored and prisoners began once again to be relocated to open prisons.

[...]

A spokeswoman for the justice ministry said: “Our position has always been to safeguard the public.”

What, I ask, does she mean by that? Does she mean that the government will do all it can to safeguard the public? Or does she instead mean that safeguarding the public is simply a vague ideal, something that it would be very nice to be able to do, but which isn't really a priority? Since it's clearly not the former, I can only assume that the message is that while the government would very much like to keep the public safe from violent criminals (by, for example, ensuring that such offenders are kept in high security prisons, rather than in open prisons from which prisoners abscond at a rate of more than one a week), that's just too much like hard work, and that therefore the public can go and screw themselves!

My New Year Wishes

Dizzyfatplonka has tagged me with a quite interesting meme. Simply put, I am required to list eight things that I want to happen in the coming year. So here are the things I look forward to seeing in 2008:

1. A politician swinging from every lamp post in Westminster.

2. The BBC closed down.

3. The wholesale restructuring of our education system - harder exams, (British) history made compulsory to GCSE level, a return to traditional teaching methods, the abolition of soft subjects, fewer university places, the ditching of the new diplomas, and of course, more grammar schools. And the end of the practice of using the education system as a tool for left-wing indoctrination.

4. The creation of a genuine pan-European mass movement against Islamification, building on the foundations already laid by SIOE.

5. An end to mass immigration.

6. British withdrawal from the EU.

7. The death of the nanny state. I especially want to see the repeal of the law against smoking in pubs, the destruction of the massive police DNA database, and the dropping of plans to impose ID cards upon us.

8. I become the owner of a Morgan Aero 8.

Sadly, I think that the only ones that have even a remote chance of occurring are 1, 4, and 8. Because they're the only ones that don't depend on the goodwill or competence of politicians...

I know that some bloggers regard memes as irritating, and that some bloggers love them, so, in order to avoid irritating those in the former category by including them, or disappointing those in the latter category by excluding them, I will simply throw this open to those who want it. Enjoy!

More equal than others

It was with mounting anger, but without much surprise, that I read of yet another instance of state-sponsored anti-white discrimination. This time, it's taking place in the education system.

Among the various sources of funding available to schools, is the "Black Pupils Achievement Programme" (BPAP - not to be confused with the similar but much more expensive "Ethnic Minority Achievement Grant" (EMAG)), funded by the government, and therefore the (generally white) taxpayer, to the tune of £1.3million a year. The BPAP, to which over a hundred schools have so far signed up, was instituted in order to rectify the supposed under-achievement of non-white schoolchildren. As part of the programme, schools are given money to send all their pupils on regular trips to art galleries, museums, and the offices of local companies, in order to inspire them to work hard. All their pupils, that is, except those who happen to be white. They are excluded.

Other aspects of the BPAP include altering the school curriculum to ensure that it reflects the "experiences of African-Caribbean and Muslim pupils". As such, children at those schools that have signed up to the programme will now be studying the topography of Caribbean islands in their Geography classes, and will be analysing rap music during their English classes. Will the lyrics studied include those by performers such as Ice Cube and Public Enemy, who openly advocate hatred of, and sometimes violence against, whites, I wonder?

There are two main issues and two subsidiary points to be made here. First, these classes which are now being restructured in order to fit with the "experiences" of blacks and Muslims presumably include white pupils as well: I assume that even they are not excluded from all education. Well, this being so, I would ask what is being done to reflect the "experiences" of white pupils? This is a pertinent question: at the beginning of 2007 Sir Keith Ajegbo's report on citizenship lessons in schools revealed that white working class children often suffer "labelling and discrimination", especially in racially-mixed areas. Sir Keith wrote that white working class children:

...can feel beleaguered and marginalised, finding their own identities under threat as much as minority ethnic children...

With particular relevance to the present case, he added that:

It makes no sense in our report to focus on minority ethnic pupils without trying to address and understand the issues for white pupils. It is these white pupils whose attitudes are overwhelmingly important in creating community cohesion. Nor is there any advantage in creating confidence in minority ethnic pupils if it leaves white pupils feeling disenfranchised and resentful.

Sir Keith cited the example of a white British girl, who, having heard that her classmates came from such centres of vibrant diversity as the Congo, Portugal, Trinidad, and Poland, declared that she "came from nowhere". I cannot see that the negative perceptions that many native children have of their identity will be improved by such measures as the replacement of white poets with black rappers in the English curriculum.

More generally, I wonder why there is this especial focus on non-whites. While it is true that some non-white groups achieve poorer exam results, on average, than whites, it is also the case that white working class boys generally perform worse than any other group. Their results are also improving at a slower rate than those of other groups. So why are no measures being taken to remedy their poverty of achievement? Indeed, why is it that, so far from being helped, they are being actively discriminated against, in the manner detailed above?

To conclude, I would draw readers' attention to the fact that Trevor Phillips, the man responsible for ensuring that discrimination does not occur in Britain, refused to comment on this blatant instance of unfair treatment. I doubt that he would have been so reticent, had the Education Department been using taxpayers' money to send white children on trips, from which non-whites were excluded. And I would ask whether any reader, having observed the manner in which the present elite is thus discriminating against and failing the white working class, can honestly criticise any member of that class who then votes for the BNP? Because I don't think you can.

Hat-tip: Battle for Britain

Police Priorities

Gangs of thugs vandalising a war memorial and intimidating the elderly? Not a problem.

Lone middle-aged woman confronting a gang of 15 vandals and clipping one of them round the ear? Arrestworthy!

And these people seriously believe that they deserve a pay rise? Personally, I think a collective P45 would be more merited.

Kettle, meet pot

A government campaign will warn bosses that they face large fines and prison sentences if they are caught employing illegal migrant workers.

The Home Office will run radio and print adverts ahead of a tightening of the law on illegal labour in February.

Employers could be fined up to £10,000 for every illegal worker they negligently hire, or could face up to two years in prison.

The immigration minister said firms would have no excuse to break the law.

Liam Byrne said: "Illegal working attracts illegal migrants and undercuts British wages. That's why we're determined to shut it down.

"The message is clear for employers - we will not tolerate illegal working."

Well, I certainly don't disagree with that, and I hope that the advertising campaign, and the new laws, succeed in deterring employers from employing illegal immigrants. But I do wonder whether the government in general, and the Home Office in particular, are not being a tad hypocritical. After all, not only has their repeated failure to tackle illegal immigration probably done more to "attract illegal migrants" than anything any private company - however avaricious - could do, but they have themselves been caught employing illegal immigrants!

Pot, meet kettle

Without wishing to belittle the possible political significance (not to mention the human tragedy) of Benazir Bhutto's assassination, I must say that I laughed heartily when I saw that Gordon Brown has accused her killers of being "cowards afraid of democracy".

Because, for the avoidance of doubt, this is the selfsame Gordon Brown who has in the past few months backed down from holding a general election, and reneged on Labour's manifesto commitment to hold a referendum on the EU constitution. Yes, it's that Gordon Brown. Not another one.

Merry Christmas!

Just a brief note to wish all readers and their families a very diverse Winterval happy Christmas! Best make the most of it this year, because if certain people get their way, there won't be many more...

I will be back around the 27th.

"Donkeys led by Donkeys"

On Wednesday, I wrote that "the government likes to have several cock-ups over illegal immigration on the go at any one time". As I now realise, "several" was something of an underestimate, as two stories over the last two days serve to demonstrate. Yesterday, it was revealed that the Border and Immigration Agency is refusing to deport any of the estimated 4,000 foreign criminals serving sentences of under one year in Britain's jails. Apparently, staff at the agency simply have "no interest" in doing so. Would that we could all avoid doing our jobs whenever we decided that we had "no interest" in them!

And today, it was revealed that since 1999 the government has granted indefinite leave to remain in Britain to approximately 100,000 illegal immigrants. This follows Tuesday's revelation that a further 165,000 illegals look set to be granted a de facto amnesty over the next few years, after Home Office staff lost their files. So, by the time our leaders have finished, over a quarter of a million illegal immigrants will have been granted the right to live in Britain. They will also have the right to bring their families over here - what will that swell the numbers to?

Admittedly, the figures will still be dwarfed by the number of immigrants (over one million in the last two years) that Labour is letting into the country legally...

The present government is useless in most respects; many and varied are its defects. But its complete inability (or perhaps unwillingness) to deal with immigration must surely rank as the most colossal of its many failures. As for the staff at the Home Office, their general incompetence is a fitting partner to Labour's inadequacy and mendacity: as a commenter (Michael Murphy) at the Daily Mail so aptly put it, they are "Donkeys led by Donkeys".

Scumwatch

The ringleader of the group who committed this crime may have been as young as 14:

A terminally-ill woman in a wheelchair has been assaulted by a group of youths who hit her on the back of the head.

Police said the attack in Woolworths in Biggin Street, Dover, Kent on Saturday, may have been filmed on a mobile phone.

The youths were seen laughing and looking at a mobile phone after the attack on Beverley McFarlane, 41, who has lymphoma, a form of cancer.

A Woolworths spokeswoman said the firm is co-operating with police and all stores had CCTV and security guards.

Mrs McFarlane said she grabbed her bag before being thumped hard in the back.

She said the attack began when one youth banged a tin of chocolates she had on her knees.

She said: "I grabbed my bag, thinking that they might grab my bag, and then another boy came behind me, and thumped me in the back.

"It was that hard it made me cry."

[...]

Staff alerted a supervisor to the incident, who radioed for police backup.

The staff then intervened and asked the boys to leave, after which the incident was "in police hands", [a Woolworths spokeswoman] said.

Of course, the ideal course of action would have been for the staff, assisted by the other customers (who seem to have done nothing whatsoever while this was going on) to secure the boys, by force if necessary, and detain them until the police arrived. But I suppose that then it would have been fifty-fifty whether the police arrested Mrs McFarlane's attackers, or the people who (hypothetically) caught them.

On the plus side, the lowlife responsible for one of the crimes I wrote about back in February has been jailed indefinitely. Of course, had he not been granted early release from prison - despite breaking a fellow inmate's jaw while incarcerated - this crime would never have happened at all:

A crack addict who left a charity worker for dead had been freed early from prison weeks earlier after another violent attack.

Ebanezer Adesina was on licence when he ferociously attacked Roger Hare after the profoundly deaf grandfather asked him to move his legs so he could get off a train.

The 20-year-old was released early from a three-year jail term for robbing two men.

While in jail, he broke a fellow inmate's jaw and was sentenced to serve 15 months concurrently for the attack.

Adesina, who was unemployed, was on the same train as 61-year-old Mr Hare, who was returning home after an evening discussing charity events in London on February 20 this year.

As he stood up to leave the train at West Dulwich station in South London, Mr Hare politely asked Adesina to move his feet so he could pass by.

Adesina remained motionless and as Mr Hare brushed past him, he stood up, swore and started to punch his victim repeatedly.

Mr Hare was struck with such force that he landed head first on the platform, shattering his skull.

Witnesses described him hitting the ground "like a sack of potatoes".

Adesina then calmly stepped over his Mr Hare's unconscious body and walked out of the station, telling a passenger who shouted at him to stop: "What's the point? He's dead already."

Mr Hare spent a week in a coma on a life-support machine.

Yesterday Adesina, from Dagenham, East London, was sent to jail indefinitely at Southwark Crown Court for causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

And a Scumwatch old boy has also found his way to chokey, albeit for only four months:

A thug who blocked the path of an ambulance carrying a dying pensioner to hospital was today jailed for four months.

Michael Boyd, 22, stood directly in front of the ambulance to prevent it making its journey to hospital.

Inside, a paramedic was treating Norman Bell, 84, who had collapsed from a massive heart attach as he played bowls at St Oswald Catholic Social Club in Ashton-in-Makerfield, Wigan, in July.

Mr Bell died the following day.

Magistrates in Wigan were told today that Boyd, a father-of-one from Belvedere Road, Newton-Le-Willows, put his hand on the windscreen of the ambulance then began to swear at the driver and shouted threats that he would kill him.

The driver set off but Boyd continued to shout threats then began to bang on the side of the ambulance.

I should point out that there's no evidence that Boyd's actions contributed to Mr Bell's death. Still, with a sentence of four months (which will mean rather less than that in practice), I have to say that Boyd has got off pretty lightly.

ESL pupils up 73% under Labour

On Tuesday, I wrote about the fact that English is now a minority language in 6.6% of primary schools, and 5.8% of secondary schools. Today I was looking at the BBC News website, when I came across some statistics which put these unpleasant figures in context:

The proportion of primary school pupils in England with English as a second language has risen by 73% in a decade.

Across the country the proportion is 13.5% - up from 7.8% in 1997.

The incredibly rapid increase in the number of such pupils over the past ten years is, I think, further evidence of the extent to which levels of immigration have ballooned under this present government, and of the effect which the de facto open door immigration policy pursued by Labour in particular is having on the country.