Free Republic

The Government has been accused of fixing the outcome of public consultations on health policy after it emerged that reviews were flooded with block votes from groups funded entirely by the taxpayer. Earlier this month the Health Secretary, Alan Johnson, announced that the display of cigarettes and tobacco in shops would be banned in England and Wales from 2011. He added that people wanting to buy cigarettes from vending machines would in future have to show proof of age to obtain a token to activate the machine, and machines could be banned altogether in the future. Mr Johnson boasted that...

Labour faces the possibility of being all but wiped out in the South in next month’s council elections, putting a swath of its parliamentary seats in jeopardy at the general election. Gordon Brown will launch the party’s local and European election campaign today in Derbyshire, one of Labour’s last four counties, all of which could fall on June 4. Although the four in jeopardy are in the Midlands or the North the Prime Minister will be equally worried that Labour councillors could disappear from a string of counties in the South. Labour has seen its local government base fall alarmingly...

The UK's ruling Labour Party which is destroying the UK with endless handouts, mass immigration and constant catering to Islam has come out said that their country's government is "too white and too male to have any sensible debates. One example that they cited was the veil worn by Islamic women.

MPs too scared to talk about forced marriage 'in case they lose Muslim votes' Politicians are too scared to speak out against forced marriage in case they lose valuable Muslim votes, according to a veteran Labour MP. By Martin Beckford Religious Affairs Correspondent Last Updated: 12:46AM BST 02 Sep 2008 Ann Cryer said politicians in areas with high Muslim populations, many of which are Labour heartlands, should be at the forefront of the campaign to stop young couples being made to wed against their will by their families. But she claimed that some politicians are afraid to speak out on...

LONDON - Britain's Conservative Party won a special election that was viewed as a barometer of Labour Party leader Gordon Brown's popularity, according to vote results Friday. Tory candidate Edward Timpson handily defeated his left-wing competitor Tamsin Dunwoody to take the parliamentary seat of Crewe and Nantwich in northwestern England, beating her 20,539 votes to 12,679. The loss in a Labour stronghold could help to erode Brown's authority and embolden his critics within the party. The party had held the district since 1983. Brown is struggling to recover from devastating Labour Party setbacks in local elections earlier this month and...

LONDON (AFP) - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's ruling Labour Party have slumped to their lowest poll score against the main opposition Conservatives for 25 years, according to a survey published Sunday. A YouGov survey for The Sunday Times put Labour on 27 percent, its lowest rating since 1983, while the Conservatives scored 43 percent. If a general election were to take place now, the poll scores would translate into a landslide majority for the Conservatives. Brown's personal approval rating has dropped to its lowest since he succeeded Tony Blair as prime minister in June, the survey showed. It was...

Whatever you made of the Chancellor’s various sleights of hand on Tuesday, lurking beneath his Budget plans was one inescapable fact. The hungry maw of the NHS is swallowing more and more resources, at the expense of virtually everything else. The defence budget is at its lowest since 1930, despite our dwindling troops being dotted across three continents. Prison overcrowding is at such record levels that Jack Straw will have to release even more inmates early in a few weeks’ time. But the health service marches relentlessly on, having hoovered up two thirds of the increase in public spending in...

British Parliamentarians to Push for End to Current Limited Abortion Restrictions Want to allow nurses and midwives to kill unborn children By Hilary White LONDON, September 4, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A group of pro-abortion British MP's from all parties in government will be launching a campaign to sweep away the last formal restrictions on abortion and make it available on demand. They want to allow nurses and midwives to kill unborn children and recommend increasing the number of facilities allowed to abort babies in the first trimester of pregnancy. The Independent reports that the move is planned by a cross-party...

Tony Blair, the British prime minister, could end up swapping Downing Street for a job as the first full-time European Union president, under a plan being actively touted by Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president. Mr Sarkozy is understood to have discussed the idea with other EU leaders ahead of next week’s European summit, Mr Blair’s last major international event as prime minister. His support for Mr Blair taking on a big European job is a remarkable sign of Anglo-French rapprochement since Mr Sarkozy replaced Jacques Chirac as president last month. German diplomats say Mr Sarkozy put his plan to Angela...

LONDON - The British government has stopped using the phrase "war on terror" to refer to the struggle against political and religious violence, according to a Cabinet minister's prepared remarks for a Monday speech. International Development Secretary Hilary Benn, a rising star of the governing Labour Party, says in a speech prepared for delivery in New York that the expression popularized by President Bush after the Sept. 11 attacks strengthens terrorists by making them feel part of a bigger struggle. Extracts from Benn's speech at New York University's Center on International Cooperation were released by his office. "We do not...

LONDON (AFP) - The BBC on Friday said it had been prevented from broadcasting a news item about allegations of corruption in party political funding after losing an emergency hearing at London's High Court. The broadcaster said its lawyers had been locked in legal argument with representatives of the government's most senior legal advisor, Attorney General Lord Peter Goldsmith, for about two hours about the right to air the item. But Goldsmith was successful in obtaining an injunction. The BBC said in a statement that their reporting of the so-called "cash for honours" affair was an "legitimate matter of public...

Tony Blair formally declared Britain's multicultural experiment over yesterday as he told immigrants they had ''a duty" to integrate with the mainstream of society. In a speech that overturned more than three decades of Labour support for the idea, he set out a series of requirements that were now expected from ethnic minority groups if they wished to call themselves British. These included "equality of respect" - especially better treatment of women by Muslim men - allegiance to the rule of law and a command of English. If outsiders wishing to settle in Britain were not prepared to conform to...

LONDON - Police investigating allegations that the governing Labour Party traded honors for cash have requested information from all the members of Tony Blair's Cabinet, bringing the scandal closer to the prime minister's doorstep, British media reported Wednesday. Allegations that Blair offered honors, including seats in the House of Lords, to supporters who secretly lent his party money first surfaced in March and helped fuel public anger just as Labour was preparing for important May local elections. The scandal, and the pummeling the party took in that vote, fed a Labour rebellion that forced Blair to announce in September that...

"If we retreat now, hand Iraq over to Al Qaida and sectarian death squads and Afghanistan back to Al Qaida and the Taleban, we won't be safer; we will be committing a craven act of surrender that will put our future security in the deepest peril." - Tony Blair Just saw Tony Blair's farewell address to the Labour Conference. At next year's conference, the delegates will be addressed by Prime Minister Gordon Brown. I've seen some of these things before, for both the Tories and Labour, and they are always preaching-to-the-choir jobs. They pump up the home crowd and trash...

Tony Blair is now on the ropes at Number 10 Downing Street, and nobody knows whether a Prime Minister from the apoplectic Left wing of Labour will take over the British government...

A SMALL explosive device was sent to an office of Prime Minister Tony Blair's governing Labour Party, police in south-east England said today. The device was found in a package delivered to the office in Cambridge after a member of staff raised the alarm. No one was hurt, police said. "We analysed the package and discovered that it did contain a small explosive device," a police spokeswoman said. "Had it gone off, someone would have been hurt," she said. Police are expected to give more details about the incident at a press briefing in Cambridge tomorrow.

The Conservatives look to be on course for their best local election performance since they last won national power in 1992. On the projected share of the votes if the local polls were held nationwide, the Tories are on 40%, ahead of the Lib Dems' 27% and Labour's 26%. As well as net gains of more than 200 seats, the Tories have won control of councils like Crawley and Merton. But opponents say they have failed to breakthrough in northern cities. Ealing gain There have been Tory wins in areas such as Shrewsbury & Atcham, Bassetlaw and Mole Valley. The...

A WOMAN who was dragged from the street and raped at knifepoint by a foreign criminal freed from jail has called on Charles Clarke, the home secretary, to resign. Her attacker was allowed to go free by immigration officials who could have deported him after he finished serving a three-year jail term for robbery. The 40-year-old mother, who has been mentally scarred by the ordeal and has undergone intensive counselling, said her attacker "did not deserve to be alive". She said: "It has taken me a long time to get beyond this. It is something that will always be there....

Tuesday, March 28, Israelis headed to the polls to choose their newest Prime Minister. As I write this, there is just one hour left before polls close. Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is expected to win, and a low voter turnout demonstrates that few Israelis anticipate any other outcome. Yet, a great deal is at stake in this election as the three candidates have very different ideas about matters vital to Israeli security. The Labour Party leader, Amir Peretz is willing to offer huge concessions to the Palestinians for peace, but under Arafat that approach failed, and seems even more...

If Britain's prime minister is not thinking about stepping down, he shouldONCE upon a time Britain had a long-serving Labour prime minister, one who had won four general elections. He showed no signs of quitting. But suddenly, on March 16th 1976, Harold Wilson surprised everyone by announcing his resignation. Thirty years later, today's even longer-serving Labour prime minister, Tony Blair, also shows no sign of quitting, even though on the eve of the Wilson-resignation anniversary he was forced to rely on the votes of the Conservative opposition in order to get his education reforms through the House of Commons. Unlike...

The Prime Minister has spoken out about the Mohammad cartoon controversy, saying she does not think it is a freedom of the press issue. Helen Clark says the New Zealand press is free, and politicians do not dictate what it can and cannot print. She says it is a question of judgement. She does not think the publication of the cartoons does anything to bring communities together in New Zealand or around the world. Helen Clark says the New Zealand government's position is very strongly in favour of respecting all religions and working to bring communities together, not drive them...

New Zealand diplomats in the Islamic world have been warned to take precautions against possible threats to staff and property following the publication here of controversial cartoons of Mohammed. Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade officials have reacted "with concern" to the publication of the images, and were yesterday monitoring Muslim reaction for signs of retaliation against New Zealanders overseas or our trade interests. Yesterday The Dominion Post ran the 12 caricatures, originally published by a Danish newspaper in September. Dominion Post editor Tim Pankhurst said the publication was a test of Islamic tolerance. The Press ran two of the...

Ethnic Affairs Minister Chris Carter has warned that the decision by two newspapers to publish cartoons depicting the Muslim Prophet Mohammed, undermines New Zealand's reputation as a tolerant country. The Dominion Post and the Christchurch Press re-published the caricatures, originally printed by a Danish newspaper, one of which pictures Mohammed with a bomb in his turban. The cartoons have caused outrage across the Islamic world and Chris Carter says they could affect trade, New Zealand's troops in Afghanistan and even the situation of the Auckland student currently held hostage in Iraq. He says publishing them was a disappointing decision. The...

A YEAR after he left the Labor leadership, Mark Latham was back in strife yesterday. In a classic Latham snap, the disgraced former MP with a history of violence threw a punch at a news photographer and stole his camera. Sydney's Daily Telegraph was preparing a story to mark the first anniversary of Mr Latham's political demise when he attacked photographer Ross Schultz. Stunned shoppers in the Sydney suburb of Campbelltown looked on as Mr Latham emerged in a fury from a Hungry Jacks restaurant, where he was munching on hamburgers with his young sons, Oliver and Isaac. Schultz, who...

DAVID CAMERON’S debut as Tory leader has given the Conservatives a surge of support that has put them ahead of Labour for the first time in 18 months, a Sunday Times poll shows. The YouGov poll of more than 2,000 people, carried out since Cameron was declared leader of the party on Tuesday, reveals that the Tories have turned a two-point deficit to a one-point lead. Cameron’s victory has pushed the Tories up to 37% of the vote, two points up on last month, while Labour is down one to 36%. The Liberal Democrats have also been squeezed, down two...

Female Labor Party politicians are tired of sexist media coverage and being rated for the way they dress. They have decided to fight back against the 'fashion police' by turning to the traditional regional Norwegian folk costume known as the "bunad" when they are to appear at dinner with King Harald at the palace next week. The newly elected parliament is invited to dinner at the place next Thursday, November 3. To avoid the usual focus on their choice of ball gown, the young women representing the Labor Party have their strategy ready. "This is a good-natured feminist protest. And...

A South Auckland family whose home was purchased by a Labour MP say the sale was unfair and they want their case to be included in a government inquiry. An inquiry was ordered into Mangere MP Taito Phillip Field's involvement in a visa awarded to a Thai overstayer who was working for him. Now another case has come to the fore - this one involving New Zealand citizens. The Cole family have spoken out about the distress they have suffered since selling their Otahuhu home to Field. After mother Fale died of cancer and father Sione was diagnosed with Parkinson's...

June 02, 2005 Left-wing misogyny is alive and well Cristina Odone The party’s feminist agenda allows Labour men to get away with sexist behaviour TWO YEARS ago I attended a meeting at a well-known bastion of the left-wing intelligentsia. There were a dozen representatives of the Malaysian media and three senior members of the Labour establishment. There were two Malaysian women, but the rest of those gathered were men. I was seven months pregnant and arrived slightly late and very out of breath. There were no chairs left, and slowly I huffed and puffed my way to the window sill,...

Another satire about New Zealand. Before we start, let me say a few words about what this satire is all about. The leftist Labour Party is currently in power in New Zealand. It touts itself as a party providing responsible governance to the country, but the reality is very different. Helen Clark, the Leader of Labour and Prime Minister, defamed Police Commissioner Peter Doone with fabricated leaks back in 2000 because she was interested to install a political puppet in his position. ( http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1401391/posts ) Jonathan Hunt, the former Speaker of the New Zealand Parliament and now High Commissioner to...

New HampshireThe day after the election, the BBC reported that the Iranian government was interested in buying MG Rover. This was a useful reminder of what one might call the internal contradictions of Blairism. It would be difficult to imagine circumstances in which the mullahs would buy, say, General Motors, yet here was George W. Bush’s alleged poodle presiding over a land where what’s left of the native automobile industry is happy to become a wholly owned subsidiary of the Axis of Evil. I’ve no idea what MG Rover makes these days, but no doubt it will soon be changed...

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair urged his restive Labour party on Wednesday to unite behind him after a third straight election victory, but he failed to silence critics who want him to resign early. Growing disillusionment with Blair, especially over his handling of the Iraq war, cost his center-left party more than half its majority in last week's election. That has sparked calls from some within Labour for Blair, who has said he will serve a full term of four or five years but not stand again, to quit sooner rather than later. Blair told his parliamentary...

On election day, I happened to be motoring through the leafy lanes of Warwickshire, and thinking, as I do every couple of years or so, well, maybe I ought to get out the car and pick up some local colour and so forth. And, just as the thought occurred, I passed a Porsche dealership and a riding club and I realised, oh, no, I'm in Solihull. Nothing against Solihull, I hasten to add, but let's face it, it's not exactly the liveliest posting on anybody's election battleground map. "Conservative since the dawn of time," as the chap on the BBC's...

Labour MPs have engaged in a fierce war of words over Prime Minister Tony Blair's future in Downing Street. Some backbenchers ignored appeals from Cabinet ministers to rally around Mr Blair, issuing new calls for him to quit No 10 sooner rather than later, but one colleague, former welfare reform minister Frank Field, hit back - branding their behaviour "unforgivable" and "treacherous". Foreign Secretary Jack Straw became the latest Cabinet minister to come to the Prime Minister's aid, insisting that Mr Blair was a "genius" who had been the Labour Party's "salvation". Mr Blair's position has been called into question...

Tony Blair has been urged to quit as prime minister early into his third term, days after Labour's election win. Despite securing an historic third victory, the government's Commons majority was slashed from 161 to 67. Several Labour MPs have described Mr Blair as a "liability", among them ex-Foreign Secretary Robin Cook. However, senior party figures including David Blunkett and Peter Hain have rallied in support of Mr Blair, urging MPs to "get behind" their leader. Downing Street has said there is "no change" from Mr Blair's statement last year that he would serve a full third term. Some MPs...

Americans are accustomed to thinking of Britain as their most reliable ally, always there in a crisis. Broadly speaking that has been true since 1941 — and mutual. With the exception of a few wobbles like Suez and Edward Heath's refusal of landing rights to U.S. planes supplying arms to Israel in the Yom Kippur war, the Brits have shared a common approach with the U.S. on defense policy, intelligence cooperation, nuclear weapons, trade liberalization, and much else. Margaret Thatcher's backing for Reagan's Libyan raid and Tony Blair's commitment of British forces to the Iraq war strengthened this habitual cooperation....

New antiterrorism measures proposed by Britain's Labour government in late January — including curfews, electronic tagging, and house arrest for terror suspects — were a step in the right direction for a nation increasingly beset by radical Islamists. The fact that British authorities have arrested dozens of suspected Islamic terrorists and terror sympathizers over the past year and thwarted several terrorist plots (including one which involved crashing airplanes into Heathrow Airport and London's financial district) merely underscores Britain's dubious position as al Qaeda's leading European target. Yet, despite the almost-daily reports of terrorist schemes and anti-Semitic attacks coming out of...

LONDON (AP) - Britain's first openly gay lawmaker revealed Sunday that he has been HIV positive for 17 years, saying he was inspired by Nelson Mandela to tell the public he had the virus that causes AIDS. Chris Smith, 53, the governing Labour party's former culture secretary, said he was responding to the former South African president's call earlier this month for more publicity about AIDS to fight the stigma attached to the disease. "What Nelson Mandela said very much struck a chord with me," Smith was quoted as saying in the Sunday Times newspaper. "He spoke about how nobody...

If anybody wondered why the sainted United Nations, France, Russia and Syria joined forces in trying to block the U.S. from ousting the brutal Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq the answer is now becoming clear; they feared exposure of the corruption into which they had dragged the now-infamous Oil for Food program. That program was meant to allow Saddam to sell a certain amount of oil outside of the bounds of the UN sanctions. The proceeds, handled by the UN, were to be used to buy food and medicine and other basic necessities for the Iraqi people, thus keeping the...

Big teddies 'lure children to gambling'By Brendan Carlin, Political Correspondent (Filed: 26/01/2005) Labour wants to reduce the size of Teddy bears given as prizes in seaside arcades to discourage children from a lifetime of gambling. The Tories have condemned the move as the nanny state gone mad and say cuddly toys do not turn children into gambling addicts. Under the same Gambling Bill, which will pave the way for eight Las Vegas-style super casinos with machines offering unlimited money prizes for adults, ministers want to introduce tougher regulations on the humble seaside arcade machines. The plans, criticised in the Commons...

Stop the squabbling, MPs tell Blair and BrownBy George Jones and Toby Helm (Filed: 11/01/2005) Labour MPs delivered a stinging rebuke to Tony Blair and Gordon Brown last night for a new outbreak of feuding that has threatened to derail the start of the party's election campaign. A direct challenge was made to the Chancellor to deny or withdraw his reported claim that he no longer trusted a word the Prime Minister said - an accusation the Tories are preparing to use in their election material. Others called for party officials and ministers who were stoking the personal rivalry to...

Peres, Barak compromise on June 29 election By GIL HOFFMAN Labor chairman Shimon Peres and former prime minister Ehud Barak tentatively compromised on a June 29 date for the next Labor leadership race on Thursday, following shuttle diplomacy by Labor faction chair Dalia Itzik. The compromise ended a bitter, week-long confrontation between Peres and Barak that culminated with the intervention of Attorney-General Menahem Mazuz and Police Insp. Gen. Moshe Karadi. But Peres said the compromise was contingent on the agreement of the rest of Labor's top brass ahead of Sunday's key Labor central committee meeting. "I will accept any compromise...

A group of dissident spies has launched an unprecedented attack on the SIS, saying it has misused its powers by bugging law-abiding Maori for political intelligence. The SIS's Operation Leaf, they say, has been used to find "dirt" on individuals, and intelligence about iwi divisions, finances and Treaty claims. Now they question the service's leadership and strategy. Spies have never before broken ranks in New Zealand. Now three have done so and say they have evidence of a scandal. Their claim that the SIS has bugged "decent, law-abiding New Zealanders" has been made many times by liberal and left-wing activists....

Blunkett takes aim at crime to outflank the Tories By Philip Webster, Political Editor   Mr Blunkett has put security from outside threats at the heart of the next election campaign. (LEON NEAL) CRIME and drugs will become a key battleground tomorrow for next year’s general election as the Government promises a range of measures that are aimed at making people feel safer in their homes and neighbourhoods. David Blunkett has won places for at least six separate Bills in the final Queen’s Speech before the election in a move agreed by the Cabinet to prevent Labour being outflanked...

Labour's anti-terror pledge21 November 2004Home Secretary David Blunkett has signalled that a third term Labour government would impose sweeping new anti-terror laws amid fears of an al Qaida attack on Britain.Mr Blunkett said officials were looking at a range of measures - from jury-less anti-terror courts to allowing wiretap evidence in trials - which could be implemented if Labour was re-elected at the General Election.He said that civil orders - similar to anti-social behaviour orders - could be imposed against individuals who had not committed an offence but were suspected of "acts preparatory to terrorism".  In an interview with...

His advisers have been telling Mr Blair he will be best served by regime change in Washington. The Prime Minister isn't convinced When George W Bush's poll ratings recently dipped, every Labour MP cheered. Correction: every Labour MP except one. The Prime Minister fretted to one close friend: 'Whenever Bush weakens in the polls, they start mucking about.' Who are these 'they' whose 'mucking about' makes Tony Blair so anxious? They are Iran with its sponsorship of terrorism and its ambitions to go nuclear. They are Syria. They are the psychotic regime in North Korea along with the rest of...

'When ya gettin' rid of him?' Tony Blair has become an embarrassment to Labour's natural allies across the Atlantic - the Democrats Mark Seddon Friday August 20, 2004 The Guardian Out on the stump in Brooklyn with Democrat Congressional hopeful Frank Barbero came a chance to talk to the footsoldiers in an election that all agree is the most important in decades. America is polarised between red and blue - or, as some Democrats whisper, between progressive America and a revived Confederacy. With George, the Vietnam vet turned transit worker, and Jeff Gold, the eternally optimistic full-time organiser, we leafleted...

Women sent back to the kitchen 22/07/2004 10:23 - (SA) Sarel van der Walt London - Proponents of women's rights in Europe are up in arms after a European parliamentarian of the Independent Party of the United Kingdom (Ipuk) said women belong in the kitchen where they "ought to clean behind the fridge properly". Godfrey Bloom, 54, also said: "No self respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place will ever appoint a woman while she is still of child bearing age". Bloom, who made himself available as a member of the parliament's committee for women's rights, said...

Europe is not working properly. I am quite clear about that. The European Union pumps out too many rules and regulations, and is too centralised and inflexible. It has a poor track record on waste and fraud, and is a prime example of the failed "big government knows best" approach to life. For almost a decade, auditors have refused to sign off the EU's accounts because of the level of fraud and corruption in the organisation. Every year, £3 billion goes missing. Red tape is strangling European business. It has a serious impact on jobs and growth. Productivity in the...