Saturday, September 26, 2009

Brighton On The Rocks

The Supreme Leader is taking a break from saving the world in a UN kitchen to bore the pants off the Party unfaithful at his Brighton on the Rocks leaving party, leaving a Party that has lost the will to live.

The London to Brighton old crocks rally is underway as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed Brown bounces along, with just a stop-over to save everyone from cancer.

Hard up for a headline, BBC On-Line News had 'the gang's all here to rallying round the PM'. Yeh, sure. Then it was 'Brown heading for the conference'. Stand by for a quick update with 'Beaming Brown in Brighton' after he puts on his slap.

Are there any hairy-arsed hacks working over the weekend? Even Lester Piggot would have to ride flat out to keep up with all the jockeying for position to be first past the post-Brown post.

Old timer, 'no time two loos' Prezza, is rallying downtrodden troops on the terraces with a rousing chorus of 'Old Faithful', slagging off everything and everybody.

You old bruiser, you.

"They're a bloody party of whiners, when what we want is a party of campaigners," whined Prescott. "Stop banging on about women's rights." Right on Brother John. Shame about the sisterhood.

It's a one horse race and boy do they know it. The Tories are set to romp home. Opinion polls show delectable Dave has fulfilled his lifelong ambition as heir to Blair and now better liked than his own Party. New Labour has lost it. Get over it.

As Cohen predicted: “The campaign will be a massacre. Four weeks of Cameron, whom you can’t help liking even if you disagree with him, vs Brown, whom you can’t help disliking even if you agree with him”.

As usual, Brook's Times photofit (top) hits the nail on the head. Conference coup talk and the Scotland scandal are waiting in the wings. The great bird of events, old chap, is waiting to drop him in deep do-do.

There's not much for the lamentable leader to live up to. Liability Brown has only to upstage clapped out Clegg's scintillating speech. And make promises he won't have to keep. A fag-end government with a lame duck leader has lost the right to be listened to.

No doubt his minder, Steely Sarah, will be on hand to guide him to the podium before twittering off. Whatever you do luv, don't take him for a walk on the beach.

"If Kinnock wins today, will the last one to leave please turn off the lights" was the Sun's plea to voters in '92. We don't want a repeat of that headline, now do we?

What to sing at the end? Linking arms with a rousing 'we'll keep the lighter-shade-of-pale red flag flying here' doesn't have the same ring to it.

How about 'Always look on the bright side of life'? It worked for the lads on HMS Sheffield.

Like the man on the Clapham omnibus no-one is taken in by the great big grin and the conference spin. The Orange Party won't be at Brighton watching fish rot.

Besides, you don't have to sit through Beaten Brown's resignation speech. Ever helpful Polly Tonybee over at the Guardian has written it out for him in big letters. A bit long winded even for Polly Filler. A short 'So long and thanks for the fish' would suffice.

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Friday, September 25, 2009

Liar, Liar, Pants On Fire

Shameless Scotland's Tongan maid has come out of hiding set to spill the beans and clean up on the scandal, leaving Bunkered Brown and his shamed law officer to clean up the mess. A sordid start to the leaving Party conference.

The Mail today splashed the big tease: Did Baroness tell the truth? Housekeeper 'denies showing Attorney General her passport'.

Cut to the quick. Tongan Tapui is close to calling the attorney general a liar, just as Brown's leaving Party conference kicks off at Brighton-on-the-Rocks.

The Orange Party has said once, nay twice - this whole charade stinks to high heaven. There's something very fishy lurking in the undergrowth.

Shamed and shameless Scotland gets off Scot free despite breaking the law hiring an illegal immigrant. And makes a complete pig's ear of it trying to wriggle out of her £5,000 fine.

Tapui goes to ground while Ms Scotland clings to her job and her ministerial aide quits in disgust, only to find the ex-housekeeper had her door smashed in by border police.

Tapui and hubby were arrested and bailed over immigration irregularities, only to pop up with kind-hearted Clifford, ready to reveal all.

The heat was on after the Mail caught out Scotland employing an illegal immigrant as housekeeper, flying in the face of the Borders Act.

Her dishonourable defence was spun as an honest mistake - she'd checked the "documents". Her 'crime' was to not to take photocopies required by the very draconian law she helped push through parliament.

But if she didn't check the "documents" or they turn out to be dodgy then she's banged to rights.

How come Scotland was cleared to continue working so quickly without anyone bothering to check Tapui's side of the story?

What did Tapui get up to when she wasn't cleaning that made her such a heavy-handed target? Hubby started life as a 'British born solicitor' now demoted to a 'Serb'. Was the UK marriage certificate a bit of a sham?

Just what is the country's top law officer playing at? Isn't there some kind of vetting for such a sensitive job and potential security risk, before hiring someone left all day to sniff around with top secret files lying around?

Bunkered Brown tried to keep a lid on the whole sordid scandal. The last thing Billy-no-mates needs is for his crony to be drummed out of office with an almighty mess back home, while he scurries around saving the world from the corner of a UN kitchen, carving out a cushy G20 job.

Hattie and her equalities police too are keen to keep Scotland in situ, banging on about women's things and putting her up as a shiny example.

In Cronyland nobody is kicked out of a job no matter what the sleaze or scandal - unless you cross the boss.

However it is played out, Scotland is toast, not just because she broke her own law but because she's been exposed as a £170,000 expenses cheat. In the public's mind, the sham of one rotten law for us and one bendy rule for the ruling elite has been confirmed.

Watching New Labour self destruct is a delicious spectator sport. When new revelations make a splash, spare a thought for the maid a-milking who'll be caught in the eye of a media storm and a dirty tricks campaign with a big bucket of whitewash.

Like so many poor souls enticed over here for a better life, it seems her only 'crime' was to travel half way around the world to end up cleaning up the crap of the political elite.

And then to find herself unwillingly at the centre of a political storm.

The public has a right to hear Tapui's side of the whole sordid saga and if she makes a few bob out of it, so much the better.

Top picture: Loloahi Tapui, husband Alexander Zivancevic and publicist Max Clifford. Mid graphic: Red Rag

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Thursday, September 24, 2009

'Shriti The Shriek' Eats Shoots And Leaves

Billy-no-mates Brown's ruthless enforcer is set to eat shoots and leave the sinking ship of government. Fancy-titled Shriti Vadera will be sorely missed by Downing Street's tight cabal of henchmen - but not by the civil servants around her. The departure of 'Shriti the Shriek' leaves Blustering Brown's sinking ship lost at sea.

The unelected business minister and Gordon goat has been set up for an obscure G20 job, according to the Guardian, before presumably working out her purdah and heading back to a plumb job in the City or top job in Brussels.

Has the rat jumped the sinking ship? More likely Brown slipped her the wink before sailing off to save the world with a New G20 World Order?

What with new twists in the Shameless Scotland scandal and Billy-no-mates trying too hard to be Obama's new best friend, it's another black day for the struggling Supreme Leader.

Famous for shooting herself in the foot to howls of derision, with crass comments about elusive 'green shoots of recovery', Vadera was at the centre of the Tube PFI shambles and secret government wheeling and dealing with pals in the City over the trillion pounds bank bail-out con.

As Mandy's minister, Vadera was forced to hastily retract ludicrous headline grabbing nonsense that she saw "green shoots of recovery", after leaving voters bothered and bewildered.

Vadera was employed at investment bank UBS Warburg, for over 14 years before reducing colleagues to tears as "ruthless and rude" business minister, key member of the Brown inner circle, policy enforcer and 'Shriti the Shriek'.

A long time key ally of Brown, from his time as chancellor, the new PM was quick to get plain Shriti Vadera to Downing Street, handing her a life peerage a month after slipping unelected into the top job.

Vadera joined a growing list of unelected, unaccountable and untouchable New Labour cronies at the heart of government. All escaping commons scrutiny. All presided over by all-powerful unelected Pussycat Peter bent on getting Blair the EU presidency.

But top civil servants "flatly refused to allow her to cross the threshold of No 10 as policy enforcer" and "no Permanent Secretary could stand her", according to the Sunday Times.

Vadera's departure leaves Billy-no-mates Brown floundering around and Downing Street spinners still running around like headless chickens looking for the Shriek's elusive green shoots legacy and the elusive headline.


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Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Scotland Aide Quits In Disgust

Shameless Scotland's bag-carrier has shown the way and quit in disgust as his spineless minister sticks it out and ducks the flak. The MP delivered a broadside on Bunkered Brown's woeful lack of leadership as much as over the shamed attorney general.

The Labour MP's bold bombshell has come like a breath of fresh air in the shabby Westminster word of back-scratching.

Hesford, unpaid aide to an elected minister as well as unelected Scotland, says in his letter of resignation that he "cannot support the decision which allows her to remain in office," winning a round of applause around the land.

Shamed and shameless Scotland is still hiding behind a smokescreen despite breaking the law and handed a £5,000 fine over employing an illegal immigrant. And making a complete pig's ear trying to wriggle out of it.

In the letter, which apparently caught Blinkered Brown on the hop, Hesford says: "In my view the facts of the case do not matter. It is the principle which counts, particularly at a time when the publics' trust of Whitehall is uncertain to say the least. We have to be seen to be accountable." Quite.



Resignations of ministerial bag-carriers are now part and parcel of a fag-end government. Lower down the pecking order, they're not fully paid up members in the New Labour crony loop.

But the resignation letter speaks volumes about the current mood of backbench MPs. It's the issue of Bumbling Brown and the vexed question of his lack of leadership which caught the eye of the Orange Party.

"Could I just mention matters of policy where I believe leadership is vital," prime minister. Ouch.

"Generally, I would urge you to move as quickly as possible to withdraw from Afghanistan and to signal a change in our position over Trident replacement."

Hesford is blowing with the wind. Storm clouds are gathering ahead of next week's leaving Party conference. Backbench MPs are not happy bunnies. Scotland it seems was the last straw.

Useless Brown's empty gestures about maybe cutting the odd Trident sub doesn't cut any ice. His unwinnable Afghan war has become a shameful, bloody legacy.

As the Orange Party poignantly posted yesterday, shamed and shameless Scotland should do Macavity Brown a big favour and quit to save him more embarrassment.

Instead, not only the struggling Supreme Leader's bunkered support for Shameless Scotland but the whole issue of his lamentable leadership is back festering away in the spotlight.

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Living In Brown's Yellow Submarine

Blustering Brown has sunk to new depths offering up a Trident sub as a fig leaf to make him feel important. Strutting aimlessly alone saving the world, the empty gesture is as much use as a coal-fired sub. It takes a leader with guts to scrap Trident, not a spineless posturing has-been living in a Yellow Submarine.

Coming up with a cunning plan, the wannabe commander-in-chief is to tell the UN he is willing to cut the number of Trident missile-carrying subs from four to three, a day after being anointed smug saviour of the world.

Only he's not a presidential head of state. Billy-no-mates Brown is a two-bit prime minister of a fag-end government, snubbed by Obama and set to be out on his ears in a few months time. Only ordering some poor soul to press the button is in his gift, for the time being.

The struggling Supreme Leader is thinking about, maybe, perhaps, getting rid of one sub - when three can easily do the job of blowing up the world.

Pseudo-liberals seem blissfully content looking for the 'sky of blue and sea of green', welcoming the move as some first faltering step towards scrapping Trident or the road to unilateral nuclear disarmament. This is nothing of the sort. This is empty gesture politics.

If deluded Brown thinks this will appease the Party Left or steal a march on political rivals, he's living in a Yellow Submarine. One of the best things about iTunes is you can delete all the Ringo rubbish from Beatles albums.

Scrapping one of four subs doesn't save 25%. More cash would have to be spent on maintaining the overall 'deterrent' capability of the remaining fleet. One sub is always out of action anyway for maintenance. The new breed of subs would be quite capable of taking up the slack after scrapping the spare.

You can't play football on deck so what do these guys on nuclear subs do all day apart from skulking around 'deterring' and watching Das Boot on DVD?

Captains have to read doomed Brown's droning drivel in a "by the time your reading this letter" before they can press the button. Maybe that's what's needed to tip them over the edge?

At the beginning of the year, with a warning of things to come, ex-generals thundered in The Times branding the Trident missile system completely useless and the £20 billion replacing it a waste of money, particularly in the current economic crisis.

With the new Vietnam looming in Afghanistan, they argued that rather than spending £20 billion renewing Trident, more should be spent on the armed forces.

"Nuclear weapons," they said, "have shown themselves to be completely useless as a deterrent to the threats and scale of the violence we currently face, or are likely to face - particularly international terrorism."

But hey, what do tin-pot generals know? With hindsight, it seems quite a lot.

Replacing Trident was one of war-mongering Blair's legacy leaving presents, giving the go-ahead to replace the system with a brand spanking new US baby, now heartily backed by Blinkered Brown.

Once again it raises the thorny question: what's independent or a deterrent about the UK's independent nuclear deterrent?

There's nothing independent about the UK's reliance on a US system with politicians quite willing to sell their souls to the US arms trade.

Trident has only one mission and that's to get a seat on the UN security council top table. It's a lot of money to fork out to join the big boys club. Whether it's three subs or four makes no difference to Iran or to the nuclear arm race.

Trident and the whole US-owned submarine missile system is a Cold War legacy. It is not a weapon for now, where the direct threat to the UK comes from home grown radical Islam.

The case for and against Trident will no doubt rage on, ad nauseam. The arguments are purely political rather than military.

With an empty UN gesture, Bottling Brown has kicked the Trident political football back into touch.

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Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Shameless Scotland's Toast?

Government law chief, Shameless Scotland, has been fined £5,000 over employing an illegal immigrant, according to Sky News. Macavity Brown is keeping his head down on the latest embarrassment. Do him a favour luv and quit.

It's not looking good for the darling of the New Labour luvvies. Hattie will have to come out fighting the corner for the sisterhood. Bunkered Brown will have to crawl out of the corner sometime.

With Brown's attorney-general in his crosshairs, Guido had reported the UK Border Agency (UKBA) has already served up Shamed Scotland a 'notice of potential liability'. BBC News is on the case.

Now Sky News reports the government's chief legal adviser has been fined £5,000 for breaking employments laws.

Deciding what to do when a scandal blows up in their face is always difficult in New Labour Cronyland.

One law for the masses and one rule for the ruling elite, makes a mockery of meritocracy. But even Blair managed to move Mandy in the Hinduja "cash for passports" scandal.

There are reports that a replacement for Scotland is already being lined up in a cabinet mini-reshuffle, so why wait? Close it down. Move on.

Crime and Punishment and the ruling class. Dostoyevski would have something to say about that.

Blinkered Brown had earlier expressed his "full confidence" in the unelected minister. But how can his attorney general continue to enjoy the confidence of the prime minister and keep her high office with a £5,000 fine on her record?

The heat was on the top law officer after the Mail caught her out employing an illegal immigrant as her housekeeper, which flies in the face of the 2007 UK Borders Act.

The very law which the then home office minister helped push through parliament has been her undoing. Sunday Times revelations over Scotland's £170,000 second homes scam didn't help.

Hiding behind a smokescreen, Shameless Scotland insists she did not knowingly employ an illegal immigrant. But ignorance is no defence in the eyes of this rotten law. Even the UKBA's leaflet warns: “Not knowing is no excuse”. (right)

The Orange Party believes this shady charade stinks to high heaven. Brown's attorney-general has broken the law, been fined and should be sacked.

Shamed and shameless Scotland could do Macavity Brown a big favour and quit now to save him more embarrassment. And save the country from the sickening sight of Billy-no-mates Brown squirming around in no-man's land.

Do the decent thing if only to save the poor soul's skin. Leave the struggling Supreme Leader to 'get on with the job', aimlessly strutting around, trying to save the world.

UPDATE 1.49pm Brown has bottled out sacking Shameless Scotland. Wrong call.

Top graphic: Red Rag

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Monday, September 21, 2009

British Meat For British Bellies

Tesco knows which side its bread is buttered. The supermarket giant is scrapping 'misleading' meat labelling but only after a nudge from the Tories Honest Food campaign. Every little helps in the battle of 'bad food Britain'.

The sham of mislabelled meat to dupe shoppers into thinking they're buying into the Great British brand leaves a nasty taste in the mouth.

How can you trust something that's got a Union Flag plastered on it when the tiny print tells you it is only produced and packed in Britain, not British born and bred.

Labelling meals as "produced in Britain" when the meat has come from abroad is a shameful but entirely legal, dodgy practice.

Selling a chicken dinner "produced in the UK" with poor poultry from Thailand always stuck in the throat. The last thing confused consumers want is a chicken calling itself British because that's the last place the last 'substantial change' was made.

Now Tesco Town has promised to end 'misleading' labelling on its meat products, and declare where it comes from and where so-called 'meat' in ready meals, pizza, pie and sausages is reared.

Spelling out the country of origin comes after pressure from farming groups and the Tories Honest Food campaign.

Every little helps. The Orange Party liked the way the Tories took a few populist issues and worked them up into campaigns back in February. A bit local LibDem 'cracked pavements and dog shit' issues politics but hey, why not, if consumers get a bit of benefit.

Tesco reckoned its Dutch pork or Thai chicken was up to scratch, with animal welfare standards just as high as UK farms. That's not the point. If you put something in your mouth you have a right to know where it's been.


Besides, as the Telegraph points out, evidence submitted to foodie MPs suggested two thirds of all pork imports into the UK, "has not been reared to UK statutory welfare standards and would be illegal if produced in this country".

Politicians occasionally fall over themselves to get a slice of the bacon and bang the drum for Britain. But getting them to do something about bad food Britain and the ravaged farming and fishing industries is a different kettle of fish.

Farmers are bogged down by Brussels red tape, a supermarket stranglehold on prices, a government which doesn't give a fig about the industry and competition from imported crap food dressed up and processed by slave labour in the food processing camps. All served up and forced down the nation's throats to make them fat.

The New Labour sandwich of all style and no substance has been around long before Joanna Blythmam launched her gastronomic polemic and showed how a nation has ruined its appetite in Bad Food Britain.

Tories spotted a gap in the market, outflanking a wishy-washy government. The cute video released to coincide with the Honest Food campaign was a little gem.


All supermarkets have a confusing mix of meat labelling. Consumers have a right to clear, accurate information about where their food comes from. Cheap food is one thing but cheap tricks quite another.

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Sunday, September 20, 2009

Another Day Older And Deeper In Debt

Borrowing Brown's disgraceful legacy of debt is a truly titanic amount even after cooking the books but only the tip of the iceberg. Real debt is hidden behind an illusion of smoke and mirrors accounting which would make Derren Brown proud. Can the patient recover from ballooning national debt? As Callaghan was told in 1976, it's worse than that, he's dead, Jim.


A country in the grips of a billion pounds depression make for gloomy reading. The Times thunders unpalatable truths about the dire state of UK Plc: "Public debt hits £800 billion - the highest on record." It's up £16 billion a month - more than the whole of last year.

Boy George Osborne put the cat among the pigeons when he blew Borrowing Brown out of the water with secret treasury documents showing two-faced Brown has misled MPs and the public over spending cuts.

No more nasty Tory Mr 10 percent 'cuts' vs nice New Labour 'investment'. The country's finances are on more of a knife-edge than during Callaghan's Labour government and chancellor Healey's quick turn around to go cloth-cap in hand to IMF moneylenders more than 30 years ago.

Accurate figures regarding the national finances are one of this government's best kept secrets. The government is clocking up debt at a rate of £6,017 a second, according to The Times.

As hapless Darling struggles to balance the cooked books, official figures from the Office of National Statistics show Borrowing Brown has been left to bridge the gap by going cap in hand to the moneymen.

But even this just scratches the surface. Official figures do not tell the whole story. Big government debts do not make even a guest appearance on the public accounting charade.

The public account balance sheet is a masterstroke of smoke and mirrors accounting to massage a political ego. Derren Brown would be proud and so too his namesake, who's on a life mission to hide the truth behind the horrendous scale of borrowing to fool the public with a false sense of insecurity.

Raids on the pension funds pot left the cupboard bare but pensions have to be paid out sometime as the real cost of pension promises come home to roost. With no money set aside, anything between £700 billion to over £1 trillion due to be paid out will have to be found.

The £1.3 trillion of taxpayers cash to bailout high street banks is largely excluded from the public accounts. Anyone who thinks that cash will soon wing its way back to treasury coffers is living in cloud cuckoo land.

But most of all it's the future financing costs of the massive 'off balance sheet' liabilities and the sham of the PFI rip-off schemes which creates the biggest borrowing black hole.

Billions have been borrowed to pay for vanity projects and shiny temples to New Labour which do not appear on public accounts. Building firms riddled with corruption are on a nice little earner building roads, schools, hospitals, prisons and the like, then leasing them back for 25 or 30 years.

Over 800 deals have been signed under PFI since the launch, committing the taxpayer to future spending of around £215 billion. Taxpayers will be saddled with the debt for decades to come.

On top of that there's essential spending that has been put off and put back as the country tightens its belt. Worn out prisons, hospitals, military kit, power stations all need to be built and funded eventually and add to government debt.

The answer is not to bury your head in the sand in the hope it will all blow over. It won't. As anyone seduced into racking up a mountain of personal debt will testify when the bailiffs hammer down the door.

This, the Orange Party would suggest, is the real scandal and the real extent of the public finances sham.

The true scale of debt is unpalatable for any political party. When that real cost is finally unmasked and the black hole of debt laid bare, current talk of savage cuts and tax hikes will sound like a walk in the park. And that raises issues which even the new hero of cuts and chancellor-to-be, Osborne, would find difficult to wrestle with.

The ego has landed. International moneylenders are on the case. Overseas investors are thinking twice before buying sterling assets to prop up the UK trade deficit.

As with the 1976 IMF crisis, borrowing will come but with some very tight strings attached. Salad Days of swanking around when the government thought it could con the public with life's little luxuries like the £9-14 billion London Olympics will feel like a distant sunny memory.

Top graphic: Gerald Scarfe, Sunday Times. Mid graphic, The Times

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