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The Havering Post

August 27, 2019 at 10:12 pm · Filed under Politics, Uncategorized ·Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Havering Post.  Double-sided A4.  Colour.  March 2019.  Available in pdf form from Facebook/Independent Havering: https://www.facebook.com/groups/499768197023360/

THE HAVERING POST is a local publication produced in support of several Residents Association groups & independent parties in the London Borough of Havering.  Havering would have been part of Essex before it was transferred to London by the London Government Act 1963.  This same act effectively created what is now known as Greater London as it abolished the administrative county of Middlesex and also absorbed parts of Kent, Surrey and Hertfordshire.

The Facebook site of Independent Havering – https://www.facebook.com/groups/499768197023360/about/ – informs us that it is ‘a pressure group campaigning to maintain and improve our borough’s quality of life.  It aims to lobby and hold national and, especially, local Government and bodies to account for their actions.  In the event of a future independent/RA Council it would aim to work closely with them to ensure promises are delivered but also have their ‘back’ if so.’

The Independent Havering group appears to be very well organised with lots of local ‘grassroots’ support.  In fact, the last local council elections (held in May 2018) nearly saw them sweep away 17 years of Tory rule in the borough.  Bizarrely four Residents Association councillors, who were elected on a anti-Tory ticket, later jumped ship to support the Tories.  One later went on to join the Tory Party itself.  Even more bizarrely, all Labour councillors seem to support the Tory administration!

It should come as no surprise then, that issue 1 of the Havering Post (HP) examines the question of ‘democracy denied’ at both a local and national level.  Refreshingly, however, as well as pointing out how democracy can be turned on its head, it also notes that future issues will ‘look at Proportional Representation, a ‘None Of The Above’ (NOTA) option on ballot papers, Referendums, Preferendums and Voter Recall.’

As noted above, the Havering Post (which is written to a Daily Mail standard) looks at national and local cases whereby the electorate has been cheated.

As its national example it cites the case of what used to be known as The Independent Group (TIG).  It was founded earlier this year when disgruntled pro-EU Tory and Labour MPs quit their respective parties.  Counter Culture readers may recall that, at the time, these MPs came across as very ‘high and mighty.’  However, as the HP notes, despite being elected as Labour or Tory candidates they ‘all refused to resign their seats and intend to stand as candidates for TIG in any subsequent by-elections.  In doing so, they have shown that they have no morals or honour.’

The paper then looks at the denial of democracy in Havering itself.  As described earlier, several Residents Associations (RA) and Independent groups had united under the ‘Independent Havering’ banner and were really giving the Tories a run for their money.  Thus began the political shenanigans.  As the Havering Post notes:

‘Things were so tight that the local Tories had do some horse trading.  It appears that some Residents Association and Independent councillors were approached by the Conservative Party and were offered positions to help them to set up a Havering Council Administration. In the event, four of them jumped ship.  Known as the ‘Back Stabbers’, they are Michael-Deon Burton (who even joined the Tory Party), Brian Eagling, Martin Goode and Darren Wise.’

The rather thoughtful (and insightful) remarks of one local voter are also quoted.  In part, he or she declares that:

“It’s not like they defected half way through their term, but on the first day. This cannot continue – some judicial review needs to be put in place to stop councillors swapping sides. I am totally disgusted. They have no morals.

I find it a personal insult to hear that some people in the RA and Independent coalition feel it is OK to lie to us, your electorate, by way of selling their soul to the Conservatives, just so they can form a majority party to lead our council. 

I can assure you I will personally do my best to make sure that the people in those wards know full well what they voted for. If we the electorate wanted to be lied to, we would vote Labour or Conservatives.’”

The idea of some legislation being brought into place (to stop elected officials jumping ship) is interesting.  The HP declares that those who switch sides ‘are guilty – at the very least – of betrayal and bad faith. Some may say that they’re also guilty of deliberately deceiving voters.’

Whatever the case, those with honour ‘would do the right thing’ and promptly resign their seat and fight a by-election under their new colours.  To date, none of the Havering ‘Back Stabbers’ nor the TIG MPs have done so.  Depending on the circumstances, it sadly doesn’t really say much for the calibre of those elected officials who turn their backs on their policies, manifestos and the people who campaigned so hard to get them elected.  Is it any wonder why so many people feel disconnected from the political system?

To sum up, the Havering Post provides a robust defence of real democracy.  It highlights the failings of democracy (giving local and national examples) but presents a well-argued case for more – and not less – democracy.  This is particularly apt given present circumstances whereby the establishment ignores the democratic will of the people, if it goes against the interests of the establishment – à la Brexit!

Hopefully issue 2 will be in the offering soon.  No doubt it’ll concentrate on local affairs, but as stated earlier, future issues ‘of the Havering Post will examine other ways in which we can make both national and local politics more representative of the people. Thus we’ll look at Proportional Representation, a ‘None Of The Above’ (NOTA) option on ballot papers, Referendums, Preferendums and Voter Recall.’  What’s being proposed here seems to be a purer form of democracy based on participation as opposed to representation.  Here, popular participation (a form of personal self-determination whereby voters exercise action and responsibility) will replace the current system of handing over power and responsibility to others.  With the political air full of doom, gloom and negativity, it’ll be refreshing to read something that’s extremely positive and forward looking.

Reviewed by John Jenkins

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Call off the threats

July 31, 2011 at 7:20 pm · Filed under Culture, TV Shows, Uncategorized ·Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The BBC has succeeded in gaining an impressive reputation: it’s respected around the world for its impartiality.  While other broadcasters like Rupert Murdoch’s Sky and Fox channels and Silvio Berlusconi are universally despised for their undoubted political biases, the BBC usually manages to get away with its claim o be a balanced and impartial broadcaster. This claim is not sustained by the facts as revealed by a former Director General of the BBC itself, Greg Dyke, in a speech to a fringe meeting at the Liberal Democrats’ annual conference, only reported by the Belfast Telegraph, the Glasgow Herald and the Guardian media correspondent Roy Greenslade.

In his speech, about MPs’ expenses, Dyke called for a commission to look into the “whole political system”, adding: “I fear it will never happen because I fear the political class will stop it.”

Dyke claimed that he had wanted to make big changes to the BBC’s political coverage but that these had been blocked..

“The evidence that our democracy is failing is overwhelming and yet those with the biggest interest in sustaining the current system – the Westminster village, the media and particularly the political parties, including this one – are the groups most in denial about what is really happening to our democracy…

  “I tried and failed to get the problem properly discussed when I was at the BBC and I was stopped, interestingly, by a combination of the politicos on the board of governors, one of whom [Sara Hogg] was married to the man who claimed for cleaning his moat, the cabinet interestingly – the Labour cabinet – who decided to have a meeting, only about what we were trying to discuss, and the political journalists at the BBC.

  “Why? Because, collectively, they are all part of the problem. They are part of one Westminster conspiracy. They don’t want anything to change. It’s not in their interests.”

He went on to claim that at the BBC,  “In the end, political journalists live in the  same narrow world as politicians do and they don’t see a need to change because they think it’s the world. They just don’t understand that out there it’s very different.”

That’s the hub of the problem.  The bias at the BBC is so ingrained, that it has become as natural as breathing to most of the journalists who work there. This was borne out by an impartiality seminar of BBC journalists hosted by former Desert Island Discs presenter Sue Lawley in 2006.  Andrew Marr admitted to the London Evening Standard that the BBC did not represent majority British opinion, saying, “The BBC is not impartial or neutral. It’s a publicly-funded, urban organisation with an abnormally large number of young people, ethnic minorities and gay people.

  “It has a liberal bias not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias.”  Business presenter Jeff Randall told the same paper that he had  complained to a senior executive at the BBC about the corporation’s pro-multiculturalism stance. He claimed he was told: “The BBC is not neutral in multiculturalism, it believes in it and it promotes it.”

There is evidence that the prevailing ethos at the BBC at best disdains Christianity and seems to want to drive it from the public arena to the private sphere. According to the Evening Standard, Lawley’s seminar discussed a proposed episode of Room 101 in which Ali G would dump a copy of the Bible and the Quran. BBC executives were willing to dump one of these books but not the other.  Can you guess which one?

Former BBC newsreader Peter Sissons, blows the whistle on this in his recent book When One Door Closes. Sissons says, “What the BBC wants you, the public, to believe is that it has ‘independence’ woven into its fabric, running through its veins and concreted into its foundations. The reality, I discovered, was that for the BBC, independence is not a banner it carries ­principally on behalf of the listener or viewer.
“Rather, it is the name it gives to its ability to act at all times in its own best interests.”

You might ask, so what?  After all, we have the option of turning our television sets and radios off if we don’t like what we hear.  What does it matter if the BBC reflects the concerns of a self-affirming political liberal-leftist elite? We can watch other TV channels, tune in to other radio stations or access other news sources online.

That’s true, but the big difference is that we are required to pay for this source of biased news on pain of criminal prosecution. When I pay for a copy of The Guardian, I know what to expect; thoughtful left-liberal political analysis. I expect the Irish News to promote an Irish nationalist agenda, the News Letter to promote unionism and the Daily Express to come up with something new or bizarre about Princess Diana every couple of months. I expect pugnacious conservative populism in the Daily Mail and The Sun and unrepentant Stalinism in the Morning Star.  I pay my money and I take my choice.

No-one is going to send me a series of threatening letters saying that they have no record of me taking The Times and threatening me with court action if I don’t immediately go out and pay for the privilege of reading it whether I actually do so or not. I can choose to subscribe to newspapers, internet and cable or satellite television channels that reflect or challenge my political or religious opinions, prejudices and biases.  I cannot choose not to pay for the BBC and use a television set without risking being taken to court and fined or sent to prison.

We have become so used to this extraordinary state of affairs because we have grown up with it, but in fact it’s a crazy system. A private company acts as if it was some kind of public authority to demand payment with menaces for another private corporation; one that holds the view that the masses who do not share its left-liberal metropolitan views are to be treated with disdain or contempt.  Try ignoring letters from the TVLA and see how it ratchets up the threats and menacing language. Even better, if you have no television set, write and tell them so.  It makes no difference. The threatening letters soon resume.

It’s time for the BBC to put its money where its mouth is. I suspect that the Corporation might have to change its ways were it forced to rejoin the real world and pay its way like any other business.  The smug ‘we know best, so clear off’ response to viewers’ and listeners’ complaints might change if people were not treated as criminals should they decide to withhold payment of their TV licence fee.

Abolish the compulsion element in the licence and replace it with a voluntary subscription and quarterly fund-raising appeals and see what happens. That’s what happens in theUSwith American Public Radio and National Public Radio. Those who agree with the BBC’s political line or who like to be challenged by it will pay to receive BBC radio and television as their counterparts do inAmerica.  Those alienated or offended by it or the indifferent will probably walk away.

 

David Kerr

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