BECOMING A LITTLE PEOPLE

It is now impossible to understand the state of the world. Rational behaviour seems to have vanished entirely. Putin’s war in the Ukraine is, at present, the greatest crime. The conflicts in various places round the world are equally discouraging but make few or no headlines in the media. As to what is going on in the United States and the hearings in respect of the January 6^th insurrection, one is hardly surprised to see the divisiveness created by Mr Trump is continuing to escalate, again fuelled by Mr Trump and his supporters.  How the Department of Justice continues to avoid taking action against him is perplexing. The evidence against him from the date of the riotous attempted coup, you would think, is certainly sufficient to bring him before a court.

 

Be that as it may, the contempt for humanity and the rule of law currently displayed by the British Government is without question the flailing actions of a morally corrupt administration bankrupt of ideas, decency and integrity.   

 

That virtually the whole of the Clergy, most of the population and almost the entire civilised community believe the Rwandan initiative is inhumane, cruel and contrary to the concept of human rights, has no effect whatever on the thought process of this government. To continue to stick to a completely hopeless policy, which is in no way related to achieving its declared intention, is crassness personified. How does deporting asylum seekers from the UK to Rwanda, going to deter the supposed vast criminal gangs from continuing to function and be brought to account before a court of law, or even come close to achieving that aim.  

 

There is no rational explanation for how this will work. To suggest that the prospect of being flown to a Rwandan detention centre will put off refugees from paying for passage in a boat across the channel, beggars’ belief. That it will be so successful as to put the traffickers out of business for lack of clientele is such a lack of understanding of the refugee crisis, that one wonders what world Ms Patel, Mr Johnson and supporters reside in. Do they really believe this is a clever and effective wheeze?

 

On top of this charade of a policy, the Prime Minister of this country accuses lawyers representing individual refugees of aiding and abetting criminal gangs. When asked on the World at One on Wednesday 15 June 2022, the current Attorney General Suella Braverman, stated that it was right for lawyers to act for their clients, as had been the tradition at the Bar since its inception.  She made no comment about the Prime Minister’s comments, save to say that what he was quoted as saying, was not what he meant.  Clearly the Prime Minister says things he does not mean, according to his attorney general. She also supported the Rwandan policy come what may. 

 

Others interviewed were also of the view that the United Kingdom should withdraw from the current Human Rights Convention and decide for itself how it dealt with Human Rights.  They had no truck for the lefty lawyers the Prime Minister accused of aiding and abetting criminals. That is the claim of every country who seeks to do things which are morally reprehensible, and to get around situations it finds uncomfortable and obstructive to their power to do whatever it likes, particularly when human beings get in the way.

 

The fact is that the European Convention on Human Rights is historically based on rights as developed within the United Kingdom from the 13^th Century, through Magna Carta and the 18^th Century, through John Locke and various Scottish Philosophers of the Enlightenment. This is, according to some Member of Parliament, clearly something to be ignored.

 

The international adoption of these principles by Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence, The Rights of Man as declared under the French Revolution, Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man also incorporated in the Constitution of the United States, and ever evolving as part of the British Constitution and common law, is hardly a matter for the present Government of the United Kingdom to be even thinking of moving away from. Yet it does appear to be moving in that direction every day this government is in power.

 

Its persistent threat through legislation against protest or criticism of any kind is more than somewhat insidious. Its isolationist and populist agenda are duplicitous and deceitful. Its assault on the rule of law and those who would defend it, is an outrage and displays a contempt for the ordinary decencies of family life that reminds one of the worst excesses of the French and Russian Revolutions, and I presume you all know what those unfortunate movements led to?

 

Is it any wonder that people appear to be turning away from news bulletins and political analysis of any kind? The outlook is so unendingly disheartening and depressing. Every world tragedy and human atrocity is ceaseless in its insistence that we pay attention to its effects; but, there is such a surfeit of despair and we are frustrated by our helplessness to do anything about it, or can only do very little that would alleviate the suffering.

 

I do not like recording these feelings. I have not been the most active of dissidents; but increasingly I am seeing the British people becoming almost as divided as the citizens of the United States, and so long as this government remains, so long will they be a little people; a silly people; greedy, barbarous and cruel, just as this cabinet has become. 

 

I make no apology for my theatrical references.