It’s Johnson who should go.
Johnson appointed Cummings and Priti Patel and tries to defend both.
The problem is Johnson; the buck stops with him
Read the long article from the Times (A Murdoch Paper)
ttps://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/three-weeks-of-dither-and-delay-on-coronavirus-that-cost-thousands-of-british-lives-05sjvwv7g.
UK the worst coronavirus managed country in the World barring the US
Henry V111 (Johnson) will get ride of Thomas Cromwell (Priti Patel) once she has completed the Dissolution of the Monasteries (Tory Immigration Bill) for him. May be escaping beheading, but being sent back to Kenya.
It’s hard to be sanguine, enlightened.
“Soil is carefully dug and then brushed away and the bags removed from the ground. Inside are bones but also small items that give a touch of humanity and threads of stories where flesh – and names – are missing. A little note. A half-drunk bottle of water. Prayer beads, a soft toy.”
But the UK is no better: ‘vetting’ all applications for children stuck in Calais wanting to join their parents and relations already in the UK.
There is hope and action from the young
“Texas State University graduate students lift the remains of a migrant from a gravesite at La Grulla cemetery on 17 December 2019 as part of the project Operation Identification. Photograph: Gabriela Campos”
I note that there is the UN
Declaration of the Rights of the Child Law and Legal Definition
But this is ‘none binding’
Surely in an ‘enlightened’ world the UN Declaration of Human Rights should be extended to include the Free Movement of All Peoples.
And be binding.
After all, we live in a so called ‘Global World’
A View on Immigration
A seminal clip
What role does the UK have in taking in immigrants?
Mary Dejevsky argues there is a limit. Any country has a right to decide, up to a point.
I remember at a Nordic Horizons, the Swedish official responsible for handling immigrant refugees from the Middle East said that Sweden takes a limited number of immigrants from Africa but it is limited, and at some point he has to say ‘enough is enough’ and he recalled the heart-breaking task if saying No to a desperate mother and child who if accepted would exceed his Government’s quota.
I dislike Priti Patel ‘of the smirking face’ and I certainly do not like the implications of stopping the free movement to and from the EU to the UK, but I do recognise that controls and documentation are necessary if only to know who resides in the country.
And providing an effective system which was honoured fully would remove cash arising from the smuggling in backs of refrigerated lorries.
And should eliminate the need for forces repatriation.
I would not be against an Identity Card scheme, but this would have to be universal and applied to All including UK existing residents.
But a blanket points system is abhorrent; for instance, it should be bypassed where unaccompanied children are involved who should be given automatic right of entry.
The Queen’s Speech
My Government remains committed to ensuring that
resident European citizens, who have built their lives in, and contributed so much to,
the United Kingdom, have the right to remain. The bill will include measures that
reinforce this commitment.”
But the caveat:
‘Confirming our commitment to the EU Settlement Scheme and giving EU
citizens and their family members who apply a right of appeal against
decisions under the Scheme.’
Could be a Swan Song for Theresa May.
Well not quite!
More like a Swan Song for the Tory party as a whole today.
I cannot support Salvini’s action and his sarcasm, to me, is ‘unfortunate’.
Corriere della Sera and Italian news agencies reported that 108 people were picked up by the tanker Elhiblu 1, and hijacked the vessel when it became clear that it planned to take them back to Libya.
Six nautical miles from Tripoli it suddenly changed course and headed north towards Europe. Migrants in Libya face trafficking, kidnap, torture and rape, according to the United Nations and aid groups.
“These are not migrants in distress, they are pirates, they will only see Italy through a telescope,” said Italy’s far-right deputy PM, Matteo Salvini, who has cracked down on migrants, including closing Italy’s ports to NGO rescue boats, since he took office in June last year.
Salvini said that Italy’s ports would remain close. “Poor castaways, who hijack a merchant ship that saved them because they want to decide the route of the cruise,” he said with sarcasm, according to the Ansa press agency.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/27/rescued-migrants-hijack-merchant-ship-off-libya
There has to be extenuating circumstances for ‘hijacking’ and I see this action is one such.
Nevertheless, the EU must come together and work as a whole, on immigrant entry to Europe. Italy and Greece are on the Frontiers of Europe.
And I despise Theresa May, in particular, for her specific action of rejection of all immigrants coming through Europe to the UK for unaccompanied children.
The Good
MPs have inflicted a fresh humiliating defeat on Theresa May, voting to seize control of the parliamentary timetable to allow backbenchers to hold a series of votes on alternatives to her Brexit deal.
An amendment tabled by former Tory minister Oliver Letwin passed, by 329 votes to 302 on Monday night, as MPs expressed their exasperation at the government’s failure to set out a fresh approach.
The options are manifold and could include “Norway-plus”, “Canada-style”, Labour’s customs union, a version of May’s deal, no deal, a possible second referendum and others yet to be invented.
The Bad
EU citizens living in the UK would be stripped of their freedom of movement, housing and social security rights by Home Office legislation introduced to regulate immigration following Brexit, a parliamentary report has warned.
Despite repeated government reassurances that their privileges will be protected, a study by the joint committee on human rights (JCHR) concludes that more than 3 million Europeans living in Britain would be left in legal “limbo”.
The cross-party committee, whose members are drawn from the Commons and the Lords, argues that EU citizens’ rights should be protected by primary legislation rather than reliant on statutory instruments approved by ministers at a later date.
The JCHR also cautions that Irish nationals’ rights, guaranteed by separate common travel area agreements, would be “diminished”. Their ability to bring in a spouse from a non-EU state, for example, would be limited, the report says.
The Ugly (re The Good but could underline The Bad)
The government issued a punchy statement after the amendment passed, warning that it “upends the balance between our democratic institutions and sets a dangerous, unpredictable precedent for the future”.
Jacinda Arden addressing the New Zealand Parliament: Thoughtful, Inspiring, Compassionate
https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/search;_ylt=AwrC3O.XXpNce0gA8TQPxQt.;_ylu=X3oDMTByMjB0aG5zBGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzYw–?p=Jacinda+Arden+addressing+New+Zealand+Parliament&fr=yhs-adk-adk_sbnt&hspart=adk&hsimp=yhs-adk_sbnt#id=2&vid=9f43eeaae82eb40d6ffa95528fb0e59d&action=view
Theresa May: Testy, Preaching, throwing her toys out of the pram as a spoiled child.
New Zealand has welcomed all; the UK used to, but under May immigrants are anathema.
Marina Hyde earlier today in the Guardian: 13 March 2019
“Fairly sure the world has got the message by now. They are “up to speed” and “across the detail” of the sort of country the UK is. The question of whether Brexit represented a midlife crisis or the descent into senility appears to have been answered. The land that likes to picture itself as a David Niven world war two movie is in fact a look-away episode of The Jeremy Kyle Show. On close inspection, the “beacon of democracy” turns out to be a bin fire.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/mar/13/theresa-may-deal-europe-eu-mps
I used to find it reassuring that the MPs in Westminster were coming around to my view. But I find Marina Hyde’s article now infinitely depressing.
“Once we had an Empire, now it’s gone, brother can you spare a dime”.
Mike Vickers' Blog 