Tories spar over UK's delayed Online Safety Bill Conservative lawmakers in the UK rounded off the week with a war of words over a proposed – and now delayed – internet content law. Introduced in its current form last year by the Tory-run British government, the Online Safety Bill is supposed to tackle the spread of illegal material and shield people from harm in cyberspace …
fucks off. Oh no, I said a bad word, does that mean I'll be arrested now under this shit law? On no, I did it again I called it a shit law.
Nadine is a fuck whit (ooo I did it there as well. The Register will have to start censoring). Several people, including MPs I believe, have pointed out to her, that the way she behaves on Tweeter, under her own new law, she'd be guilty herself.
"Fraudulent advertising will need to be tackled"
Thats YouTube dead then. The whole bill is a stupid fucking idea that is unworkable. All those big tech companies, that are mainly American, will pull out of the UK. If you don't like their practices, simply don't fucking use them.
I use Odysee as an alternative to YouTube as there is no censorship on it. And the dick parking fine company can't, falsely flag my video for removal on Odysee. However, YouTube is still easier to use, so when I can use adblock I use YouTube, but when I can't and my fav subbed content is only on YouTube I have to watch via that. My long winded point....the amount of scam adverts that come up before a video, the ones with the computer generated voice talking about a clearly bogus product, is shocking. I report them whenever I see them but fuck all is ever done. YouTube consistently blame AdSense for these, ignoring the fact they fucking own AdSense. It seems all they care about is profit. As long as that advert is paid for & they still get their cut everytime its played, they appear to not give a fuck.
But there is the question. Does the government now sue YouTube over this? Google (YouTube) has very deep pockets. They could also, to be spiteful say "It will be too costly for us to police this so we are pulling out of the UK market. The UK will no longer be allowed to visit YouTube.com".
And worse of all, we might be shut out of archive.org. a site that is so good and important, even very tight with money me, donated to it, granted it was only £5 but still.
A bunch of big game publishers are butt-hurt that their back catalogues are dumped onto archive.org. I'm sure they will be involved in lobbying to influence the law in their interest. Political donations and whatnot. (That thing you should almost always vote against at shareholder AGMs).
Some forgotten warez CDs from 1993 I am sure are of interest to a few old-school computer nerds for tracking down very-long forgotten titles, probably not available through any other means.
Really the whole legal exercise is quite pointless, the more the grip is tightened, the more VPN use will occur as a trivial way to bypass it.
Still, as long as people keep voting for the current government, things are not going to improve.
Starmer may be a bit boring, but he's also actually a decent person - look at his career.
And frankly, a dead ferret would do a better job than literally everyone left in the Tory Parliamentary Party, if only because it wouldn't be selling us up the swanny while rolling their mates in cash and honours.
Labour isn't perfect, far from it. But they're also not blatantly corrupt and historically have proven far better fiscally than every Tory government.
The Tories have had 12 years. They've made the place worse in every single one of them.
Of course, what we actually *need* is to ditch FPTP and get an actual representative democracy, where you can vote for the candidates you actually agree with instead of being forced to vote tactically against the one you despise the most.
"Fraudulent advertising will need to be tackled"
That's a newspeak for any content that government disagrees about or is against current narrative.
YouTube will be doing just fine. It may be a problem from smaller services that will not be able to keep up with censorship or being up to date with the narrative.
Google is a WEF partner, so they are protected from any enforcement.
I think we all need to remember that Political Advertising (in the UK at least) is not covered by the Advertising Standards Authority. So, purely for example you understand, someone could write pretty much anything on the side of a bus in order to 'win' a plebiscite without the ASA ever taking offence at any gross misrepresentation of these inconvenient things some of us call 'facts'.
There was, in fact, a time when nothing was regulated on the Internet in terms of content, and when some pretty smart but perhaps optimistic people argued strongly that the 'net existed outside of the law, and thus couldn't be regulated.
Then of course people started making money on the 'net, and such notions disappeared. Perhaps not surprisingly the first laws governing the Internet involved intellectual property - can't have Napster allowing people to "steal" music can we?
What fascinated me in these discussions is how very, very fast things always escalate from "should we moderate some kinds of content?" to "I should be allowed to be an asshole on any platform, anywhere." And how companies like Facebook can be allowed to on one hand present stuff that is arguably dangerous and unlawful, but on the other have a desperate and chilling fear of pictures of nipples.
I really do not understand the people who insist that Donald Trump should be allowed onto Twitter or Facebook even if they don't want him there. Surely as privately owned companies they have very right - or even obligation - to establish policies and remove those who don't respect them.
No shoes, no shirt, no service.
And it's not because Trump irritated me on Twitter - I didn't follow him, and blocked many who did, so his being there didn't impact me.
The problem with laws such as these is that they seem to be written by people who honestly don't understand the Internet, or by corporations that only want to protect their own vested interests. I suspect that a forum of Reg readers could draft a set of basic laws that could manage what happens on-line, but we're not the people invited to the table.
In all seriousness, is there anyone in the pool of Boris replacements that you would trust to manage what you do on-line?
"In all seriousness, is there anyone in the pool of Boris replacements that you would trust to manage what you do on-line?"
I wouldn't trust a single one of them to be able to navigate themselves through a sodden brown paper bag, unless of course it contained several large stacks of cash, in which case I would expect them to rip the paper bag to pieces in their overexuberance to reach said stacks.
But YMMV
I really do not understand the people who insist that Donald Trump should be allowed onto Twitter or Facebook even if they don't want him there. Surely as privately owned companies they have very right - or even obligation - to establish policies and remove those who don't respect them.
The issue is that these companies have become so massive that they've effectively cornered the market when it comes to the online public square. Banning Trump from Twitter was also an overtly political and hypocritical move since there are other extremely unsavoury characters associated with the likes of the Taliban and ISIS that remain on the platform.
Another argument that's common is, well why don't you build your own Twitter then? Parler tried just that but were subsequently banned from the respective app stores of Google and Apple and had their hosting services cancelled by Amazon.
It's becoming increasingly difficult to find a mainstream platform for those that wish to express right of centre views. This is a dangerous thing because it can lead to people down some very dark avenues followed by eventual radicalisation. Free speech must be absolute. Nobody has a right not to be offended.
>Surely as privately owned companies they have very right - or even obligation - to establish policies and remove those who don't respect them.
But what if Facebook decides not to run any ads for your party in the midterms - cos it hopes to get a better tax deal from the other lot?
Or Google no longer returns any results for your party's candidate
Or the monopoly credit card companies both decide that the democrat candidate is obviously a Maoist who is going to destroy capitalism and so won't process donations.
All within their rights - right ?
The solution is simple: assuming you're a right-wing free-enterprise bootstraps type, start your own business, make a few gazillion dollars, and BUY Twitter. Then do with it what you wish.
Or, if your opinion is so damned valuable and unique: express it in a way that people will line up to read or hear it, no matter where you present it.
Sadly it's usually the case that the people who want easy and free access to a mass audience invariably aren't all that smart pr interesting. And yes, using the phrase "woke" over and over does not count as either.
The truth is that the media has always been controlled by the people who pay the bills to run it. It was no different back in the days of newspapers, magazines, and books.
The only difference is that back then people didn't whine to the hills about how they deserved a giant public audience, they instead mimeographed their own pamphlets and handed them out on street corners.
Finally it's worth pointing out there are a lot of right-wing and reactionary drones making a ton of money from blogs and YouTube. If you can't build an audience for what you're saying, maybe it's just not that interesting.
Erm, you are aware that Fox News and the Daily Mail still exist.
And very large parts of YouTube, Twitter and Facebook are full of content so right-wing that it does a barrel roll.
It doesn't turn up in my feeds very often because I personally go to those places for cat videos and babies burping and falling over, but it's most definitely there.
The issue we've had in the last 30 years is that we've slowly been going in the direction of authoritarianism in the UK for years under the guise of "Think of the children!".
It's no longer up for debate now: It's a very real danger and, it's coming out of the intolerant socialist-type mindset which is culturally dominant in the west these days.
You may approve of that last thing (I don't approve of any ideology which is so over powering, left or right) and may even approve of such laws. Just keep this in mind: The pendulum swings and when it comes back, the "other side" may become as culturally dominent - and you've voted in all the powers they need to shut you and your opinions down and possibly send you to prison.
Also, having rules and laws based off of how someone else feels is insane and absolutely open to extreme abuse.
"intolerant socialist-type mindset"
Sorry, you confused me. For a moment I thought you were suggesting that the far right remnant of the conservative party was socialist. Sorry. Must have totally misread what you wrote, unless of course you're another one who can't actually provide a single instance of "socialist intolerance" while whining about how hard it makes your life.
I don't dispute the authoritarianism you refer to is very real. Social media, bad newspapers and TV content that trivialises every issue to "you're with me or against me" all have a hand in reinforcing authoritarian attitudes, and the first-past-the-post system drives that too.
I dispute your claims that the "socialist" mindset as being responsible for this. Conservative, if not downright right wing politics are actively changing US laws right now to reduce personal freedoms. (e.g. Abortion).
It's a UK conservative govt that's brought forward these badly thought out censorship laws; which blatantly exhibit signs of lobbying by media outfits worried about copyright. Should kids be able to access "dodgy" material? And who defines what is dodgy? How do you authenticate who's who? VPN's and fake authentication will provide routes past. If owning a credit card is a pre-req, kids that really want to access will steal credit cards.
On your last point, rules-and-laws about how someone else feels? Well, we don't allow the Colosseum to host bloodsport-to-the-death anymore because most people feel that's not civilised. In Ancient Greece, Jimmy Saville's now-not-so-hidden disgusting activities were commonplace. And most of us feel that slavery is bad, despite made-in-China slave-labour being the default production method for most of the clothes you're wearing.
The law as evolved is absolutely based upon feeling and cultural acceptances. To pretend it isn't is delusional.
@Binraider
"I dispute your claims that the "socialist" mindset as being responsible for this. Conservative, if not downright right wing politics are actively changing US laws right now to reduce personal freedoms. (e.g. Abortion)."
Didnt they recently increase personal freedoms on abortion by taking away the federally authoritarian imposition of rule through abuse of the constitution and returning it back to the states themselves?
"It's a UK conservative govt that's brought forward these badly thought out censorship laws;"
And the triple lock pensions and other social spending even when claiming do be doing austerity! At lest back under Cameron they didnt hide their moves left to take the centre left space abandoned by Corbyn.
Honestly, don't you have better things to do than troll.
Can you kindly explain how removing personal choice granted at a federal level and turning it over to religiously-motivated nutjobs at state level is increasing personal freedom.
You can't, because it is, to use an intellectual word, Bollocks.
@Binraider
"Honestly, don't you have better things to do than troll."
You are complaining about my comment pointing out your worthless response to my comment as trolling. Maybe if your response had something in it making it not a troll in itself then maybe I would have responded better? But I am guessing you had nothing better to do than troll.
"Can you kindly explain how removing personal choice granted at a federal level and turning it over to religiously-motivated nutjobs at state level is increasing personal freedom."
Thats what you think happened? I guess if your particularly in favour of the specific authoritarian diktat then I guess you might hold that view, but what happens if the next diktat is against your opinion/morality?
What actually happened was the constitution was intentionally abused to claim it supported federal authoritarian control over a topic it had no control over. This was then used to bypass the US governmental system to dictate the law even against the democratic beliefs of the very voting people. The US was intentionally set up to try and limit this kind of federal overreach and the serious breach has now been undone.
That means an increase in freedom, because the federal government does not get to dictate something it has no right to dictate.
Now lets imagine someone gets into power that is an actual nutjob (as you fear in your comment), they would be able to take the abuse of power and consent of the people to accept the abuse of power to abuse things further! If a nutjob is in charge of a single state they do not get to screw up the entire US. This is why when the left talked about packing the supreme court anyone not far left pointed out this opens up for more of the same in future, especially if someone else gets in who is a nutjob.
"You can't, because it is, to use an intellectual word, Bollocks."
Here is an interesting question- at what point is a clump of fertilised cells can be called life? At what point is it murder? At what stage do we consider abortion for personal choice? None of these questions I can answer and in the medical profession they still cant answer. So for you to think you have the absolutist certainty of truth and any question of your almighty intelligence is bollocks doesnt work in your favour.
See, when you post a comment with some actual content you get a better reply. Even if you dont like what is said.
It's a more comprehensive reply, but still one worthy of Alastair Campbell.
You still haven't answered how revoking a supreme court decision that granted personal choice to all US citizens increases freedom. The reason you haven't answered is because it doesn't.
What exactly constitutes murder has been hotly debated for a very, very long time and isn't going to be resolved by you or I on here. It likely never will. But one thing is certain: by removing the right at federal level, it reduces the rights of the fairer sex in multiple jurisdictions.
If you're into that, that's your call. Equal rites, but some folks are more equal than others.
From what I've seen of travelling the length and breadth of the US for decades, it will eventually come to its senses. I have a real love/hate relationship with the country, but mostly tends towards the former.
If it wasn't so ass backwards on just a few issues...!
@Binraider
"You still haven't answered how revoking a supreme court decision that granted personal choice to all US citizens increases freedom"
Erm, read the comment? The one your replying to which I have answered.
"What exactly constitutes murder has been hotly debated for a very, very long time and isn't going to be resolved by you or I on here"
Exactly. Its something even medical professionals cant answer and so the democratic right to elect officials to represent the views of the population and the populations views on mothers vs babies right to freedom of choice and right to life. Instead of dictated by a court that didnt have the right at all to misinterpret the constitution to push their agenda regardless of our opinion of right or wrong on this hotly contested debate.
"But one thing is certain: by removing the right at federal level"
They didnt, solved. They removed the authoritarian bastardization of the constitution which did remove rights at a state level.
"If you're into that, that's your call. Equal rites, but some folks are more equal than others."
Again you shoot yourself with your own words. Equal for mother and baby? Where we know the experts cant even decide the point of which life exists because they are living cells.
"From what I've seen of travelling the length and breadth of the US for decades, it will eventually come to its senses."
I agree. I expect it will blow over fairly well, most states will allow abortion or allow crossing state lines (officially or not) for abortions and any outliers will be happy with their choice bar those who wish the opposite (as it was before).
FYI: My personal views on abortion are relatively pro. There is a solid argument of contraception before it gets that far and also there is a solid argument over equal rights for parents and how men should have more say. But my opinion isnt the same as the next and across cultural and religious lines there will be a wide variety of opinion even just across states.
You make plenty of good points, then stir in this mindless insult about "socialism" which is irrelevant to the story of what an idiotic right wing populist conservative government is trying to pass into law.
Nadine Dorries is a socialist? No, she's just another over ambitious Tory cynic, grubbing for votes amongst the easily influenced, with little thought about any consequences which are nothing to do with how popular this bill might make her.
Dorries is the thickest, of the thickest of the thick. She literally has a room temperature IQ.
She claimed Channel 4 was paid for by the UK public, when it is in fact wholly paid for by advertising revenue.
She claimed that Channel 5 was a success story of privatisation, when in fact it was never in public hands/ownership.
Dorries for those who don't know, was in charge of all the UK's culture, media and sport for the government, and did not know basic things about the UK. That is how far the UK government has fallen.
I'm no fan of Dorries, but I fear you do her an injustice here: She claimed Channel 4 was paid for by the UK public, when it is in fact wholly paid for by advertising revenue.
Where do you think the money for advertising revenue comes from? Each and every product[0] you purchase, actively advertised or not, has a part of its price contributing to the advertising industry...
[0] Except perhaps the chap selling free range eggs from his own hens at the end of the road...
>So we're blaming this on Corbyn as well then? Those perfidious reds, always causing mischief!
Has anyone seen Corbyn and "Boris" in the same room recently?
I mean the rubber face, floppy blonde wig and fat suit are obviously all a costume.
I was still hoping that he would rip it off when he resigned and it would be Sacha Baron Cohen all along
>it's coming out of the intolerant socialist-type mindset which is culturally dominant in the west these days.
I love the way you backed that up with well-sourced evidence.
Perhaps you were leaving the intolerant tight-wing-type mindset and its cultural dominance in the west for another comment?
Or perhaps you have a blind spot...
One of the scariest parts of this (there are many scary parts!) would give Nadine Dorries the final say on what speech is banned...
Given this:
"I am not an MP for any reason other than because God wants me to be. There is nothing I did that got me here; it is what God did. There is nothing amazing or special about me, I am just a conduit for God to use." – Nadine Dorries
And given that the UK is fairly secular in nature (we certainly aren't the US!), I don't want my speech regulated to moral standards set by a self confessed god botherer!
The British public might not believe in G*d but they do believe in the church of England (*) and wouldn't want to offend it - I think the right honourable member has forgotten this.
* which ironically doesn't believe in G*d
** not spelling out G*d just in case the Jews are right. He does have form for having a very thin skin and a tendancy to over-react
TBH "Authoritarianis" is neither left nor right.
The beating you'd get in Pinochet's Chile (a classic US backed LA coup) would be pretty much the same as handed out by some of Putin's "back room boys" for criticising the Ukranian war.
Both sides believe that actual democracy (y'know, where ALL the people decide what's good for them) is FAR too dangerous to let people actually express their view on who should govern.
If you agree with this view then you are also an authoritarian.
Just to clarify: I tend to associate the type of repression we've seen in recent decades with socialism and the left ("let's treat everyone like children in case they hurt themselves" type tyranny disguised as compassaion), but you are of course correct: Both ideological sides are very capable of suppressing freedom (of thought, speech, moverment) and democracy, although I'm far more warey of the left *at the moment* not because of who is in charge politically, but because culturally that is where society is (overton window). Maybe I should have been more clear with where I was coming from on that.
To be clear: If more right-wing ways come back (pendulum goes too far the other way) then I'll be as critical of them in the same way. The answer is the centre and balance with a bit of variance, because the extremes of both sides lead to disaster: History proves that along with what is happening in the US, if nothing else.
BTW thank you for your calmer take on what I posted.
Yet you still cant provide an example of "the left" doing anything that impinges on you. I assume you're American and have swallowed the right wing media hysteria about BLM and Antifa.
In the UK, "the left" are so dangerous they threw a statue of a slaver trader (that locals had been asking to be removed for years) in a dock, from which it was rescued shortly afterwards and can be seen in a local museum for free. Meanwhile right wing "patriots" gathered around the statue of churchill (that wasnt threatened), did nazi salutes and peed on the cenotaph.
In the USA the confusion between church and state (although separate according to the constitution (funny how that gets ignored by the second amendment nuts) has become worse - a legal precedent allowing women to get an abortion (within strict medical limits) has been removed by half the country on spurious religious grounds, the rape of a 10 year old resulting in pregnancy was deemed by some to be perfectly allowable. To be clear, this isnt "the left" - its the extreme right wing fundamentalists that people who worry about BLM (how dare they have rights?) seem to find quite acceptable.
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Trump’s freedom of speech was never affected by the twitter ban. There are plenty of other outlets and he even tried to roll his own.
If Trump gets any kind of trouble for inciting those loons to try and occupy the Capitol building then there may be some overlap with his freedom of speech there.
But free speech doesn’t begin and end with twitter or any single social sewer platform.
You see sad sacks and whingers claiming free speech when their pointless comment, that mostly gets ignored anyway, was moderated from some online forum somewhere.
But nobody is threatening these people with the law or prison for what they are saying, they are just coming up against a "my house my rules" policy. It's not against somebody's free choice if I refuse to allow them to smoke cigarettes in my house. They are free to go and stink somewhere else. So if a sewer like Twitter or Faecebook doesn't want your comment, then you are similarly free to go and make your comment somewhere else.
While on a technical level, you could go and comment elsewhere, some countries have laws against certain types of comments.
In the UK, "Hate speech" is a criminal offence for example.
The departing PM wasn't convicted or charged of it, but is very definitely on tape making comments that could have lead to such charges.
>In the UK, "Hate speech" is a criminal offence for example.
But the bar is relatively high and usually sensible.
The courts take a rather different view of shouting "Boris is a lady-part" outside the pub, compared to a national figure going on TV and saying "I call on my followers. Rise up. We start the extermination of the methodists at dawn tomorrow"
Even online I think the courts accept a difference between fruity comments on el'reg and people sending 1000s of messages/emails/Facebook posts to a teenage girl telling her to kill herself.
that the article didn't mention the responses that those tweeting in support got.
Nadine Dorries: Encouraging others to take their own life is what comes under that definition. It’s a huge problem, especially with young people. You really define that as ‘hurt feelings?’
Response: That's already illegal. You can get 14 years of imprisonment. Here's a little info as you appear to be a little unaware: https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/suicide-policy-prosecutors-respect-cases-encouraging-or-assisting-suicide
Collins: This is completely wrong @KemiBadenoch - tell me where in this bill there is any provision that requires the removal of legal speech
Response: https://twitter.com/jamesrbuk/status/1547335143597146114 (section 151 4 says: “Harm” means psychological harm amounting to at least serious distress)
Lucy Powell: Educate yourself before you preach if you want to be PM.
Response: basically boils down to: have you actually read it?
It really does seem that most who support it don't understand what it says. Perhaps they're too close to it, and so only see their own interpretation.
Section 151 really is quite bad though (https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/cbill/58-03/0121/220121.pdf), well intended or not, this is not a well written law.
I wouldn't count on it. Ms Badenough has made many stupid statements and done many stupid things. Though not as many as Mad Nad. Obviously.
Mind you, an empty crisp packet would have more clue about internet stuff than Dories. Or the days of the week. Or how to walk and chew gum at the same time.
Badenough is pro-Brexit, Anti-ECHR and Anti Green.
This means she is only interested in short term gain at the expense of everyone else.
Rather like almost all of the other candidates. It is really coming to something when the only credible contender the conservative party can find is Rishi.
Sir Graham Brady would be wise to conduct a stitch up to make sure Rishi gets the job.
But for the electorate at large rather than just the party membership, we all have a duty to out the lot of them.
"It is really coming to something when the only credible contender the conservative party can find is Rishi."
It's also really coming to something when you're forced to redefine the meaning of credible in this way.
IMO none of the candidates are fit for high office because they were/are all enablers for the sleazy lying shagger. They knew about his many flaws for years and chose to do nothing about it.
Badenough is pro-Brexit, Anti-ECHR and Anti Green.
That's just for a start
only credible contender the conservative party can find is Rishi.
I think that's pushing things a bit. Sunak only looks less shit than the rest and was only popular when he was handing taxpayers' (obviously not is own) cash out.
What the Tories need is the equivalent of Labour's John Smith to do a hatchet job on the loons and keep the recent intake of rich city whiz kids in line. In the absence of that the next crisis is only a matter of time, which is why, I think a lot have kept their distance from what is obviously the poisoned chalice of a toxic party.
Her name is Badenoch.
I've seen nothing saying she's anti-ECHR. Braverman was the candidate that said she'd withdraw from that, Badenoch (and the others) have not.
I'm also confused that you think she's anti-Green, although if you mean the Green Party then as a member of a different Party I think that's understandable.
What I'm most bewildered by though is why you think Sunak is credible. He's a high tax socialist with the fiscal control of a Labour chancellor, being supported by people that still want to overturn the democratic will of the people of the UK.
However you're criticising Badenoch for being pro-Brexit, and at the same time recommending electoral fraud to achieve the outcome you want. Sorry but we left the EU and we aren't going to adopt their corrupt manipulation of democracy.
All of which is off topic, but since you made an unwarranted unsubstantiated personal attack it felt appropriate to provide a different viewpoint.
I find the whole Tory party utterly abhorrent, which my last statement about doing away with the lot of them I hope made abundantly clear. Apologies if it did not.
I consider Rishi the most credible candidate from a bad bunch, and I utterly hate the guy. Closing down mandatory COVID testing on SEN schools occupied by the most vulnerable in society; fined for partying in the middle of lockdown while business were being fined tens of thousands for trying to stay alive, tax dodging, cronyism... You name it, he's a Tory all over, and a bad one at that.
An electoral stitch up has been openly talked about on Radio 4 by the conservative party chair to avoid the need to go to the party membership. This is not me advocating it. This is the Tory party administrators saying this.
Badenough's anti green rhetoric has been widely documented, for example in the following article https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/10/green-tories-fear-next-party-leader-could-ditch-net-zero-strategy
Calling Rishi a Socialist is just recycling the rubbish that comes out of Rees-Mogg's gob that would see all mere mortals reduced to serfdom. High tax? Yes. Is that a bad thing? Debatable. High tax and not re-investing it back into people would be terrible.
So, before calling out my comments as unsubstantiated personal attacks, perhaps you should consider doing some research on very widely available sources about these disgusting individuals that are squabbling over the fate of the countries government.
Roll on a General Election. No more than 2 years to go, unless they change the rules on a whim to try and defend their own interests again.
We, ordinary working class brits have had it with the right wing populist nonsense.
We, ordinary working class brits have had it with the right wing populist nonsense.
Why do you think that left wing populist nonsense would be an improvement? A government committed to doing what's best for the country is ideal, but as we've just seen, opposition parties prefer to run a personal vendetta than to do what's best for the UK.
I don't, because all "populist" (assuming you mean cult-of-personality) governments are terrible.
But sending the Tory party the way of the Whigs would undoubtedly be good for the country.
As would an electoral system that encouraged coalitions. Large majorities are ****ing dangerous, no party of any colour or stripe should ever be permitted one.
> sending the Tory party the way of the Whigs
What, turning them into the LibDems?
> As would an electoral system that encouraged coalitions. Large majorities are ****ing dangerous,
At least majorities allow governments to make changes. Coalitions just stagger from one crisis to the next, with the junior partners calling the shots. I wouldn't use Italy (or France at the moment) as an example of effective government.
Exactly.
Tory/LibDem coalition - nothing achieved
Cameron government, small majority, got some things done
May government, no majority, nothing achieved.
Johnson big majority - Brexit completed.
Some may not like what the majority governments did, but at least they got done what they were elected for.
Dispute again.
Tory-Lib Dem coalition got you the massively overdue rise in personal tax allowances. Cameron also got you your vaunted Brexshit referendum. British media (Murdoch, specifically) doesn’t like cooperation, he prefers control so coalitions are anathema to him and his minions.
I’d take PR over the flip-flop option we have on our electoral system any day.
"Johnson big majority - Brexit completed."
Nope. If this had been completed, Liar Boris and his enablers wouldn't be putting a bill through Parliament to rip up the Northern Ireland protocol. If Brexit had been completed the UK would have a trade agreement with the EU. It hasn't.
"Some may not like what the majority governments did, but at least they got done what they were elected for."
That's remarkably similar to the excuses made for the WW2 era dictators: some people didn't like those dictators but at least they made the trains run on time.
BTW I doubt Tory voters realised they'd get a liar for Prime Minister who repeatedly broke the law. Or a government that was too incompetent to deal with the COVID pandemic and was content to 'let the bodies pile high'. Or made the country a laughing stock with both its allies and enemies. Or they'd get a cabinet of Z list duffers with less intelligence and ability than plankton.
Nope. If this had been completed, Liar Boris and his enablers wouldn't be putting a bill through Parliament to rip up the Northern Ireland protocol.
The NI protocol is a reasonable attempt to manage a thorny problem, and it would work if the EU would treat it as they do other border agreements. If they won't operate it in a fair and reasonable manner it isn't workable.
If Brexit had been completed the UK would have a trade agreement with the EU. It hasn't.
Cobblers, of course it has, and has had since day one. There are plenty of EU products for sale in the UK, and vice-versa. We're not in the single market, but we most certainly do have a trade agreement.
As for the COVID response, the repeated lockdowns were a fiasco. We're beginning to learn the true cost of them.
There are plenty of EU products for sale in the UK, and vice-versa. We're not in the single market, but we most certainly do have a trade agreement.
You don't seem to know what a trade agreement is. These generally involve products and services of one country being accepted by another => paperwork, import duties, checks and so on can be eliminated or minimised. That no longer exists for UK-EU trade. It ended because of the most damaging and stupid Brexit possible: leaving the single market.
EU goods are still on sale in the UK and vice versa of course. Though since there's no trade agreement, a mountain of paperwork, border delays, customs checks and import duties now applies. That mostly goes unseen by the general public - apart from the delays and higher costs. However, you can experience these needless hassles (that could have been easily avoided) for yourself by ordering more than a few quid's worth of stuff from an EU supplier or posting an expensive present to a relative to someone in an EU/EEA country.
Incidentally, if the UK had remained in the single market, there would be no need for that fucked up kludge called the NI protocol because there wouldn't be a trade border between NI and Ireland.
"Incidentally, if the UK had remained in the single market, there would be no need for that fucked up kludge called the NI protocol because there wouldn't be a trade border between NI and Ireland."
And that is where Brexit = impossible comes in: You need a border <somewhere> between Rep Ireland and the "UK".
They don't want one in Ireland, and they (DUP) don't want the one in the Irish Sea - BUT until you get one of those borders accepted Brexit will never be completed.
@David Hicklin
"And that is where Brexit = impossible comes in: You need a border <somewhere> between Rep Ireland and the "UK"."
Brexit is far from impossible and there is a border, it already exists. It exists between Rep Ireland and the UK.
"They don't want one in Ireland, and they (DUP) don't want the one in the Irish Sea - BUT until you get one of those borders accepted Brexit will never be completed."
Rep Ireland has the choice of a border in Ireland or a border in Ireland. This is where the sovereignty bit of them not being in the position to automatically dictate to the UK but having to come to agreements for UK cooperation. Personally I think its an issue for the Irish to decide but the EU need to be told where to shove it first (as they are trying to inflict harm to NI).
Brexit is barely even started, several major parts of it are not yet in force. The consequences of those will be turning up next year.
And a successful negotiation doesn't have one party threatening to rip up the whole thing before the ink is dry on his signature.
Large legilslative majorities create tyranny, because they can ignore everyone else entirely. Always have, every time.
Think on this: If Corbyn had the same majority Boris had, what would he have done and would you have liked it?
In FPTP, the balance is such that governments often do lurch radically from left to right and back, while also travelling ever towards authoritarianism.
"tory/LibDem coalition - nothing achieved"
- The allocation of 0.7% of GDP to International Development, both in practice and as law
- “triple lock” on the State Pension
- Free school meals for infant-school children and in the first three years in primary school in England
- Same sex marriage legislation
- 15 hours free child care for disadvantaged children
- prohibition of the export of chemicals to where it is known they may be used to carry out the death penalty
Lets ignore the things that the coalition prevented the tories doing.
"Cameron government, small majority, got some things done"
He had a small majority, but still a majority. He fell victim to the fear of the rise of populism and nationalism, opened the door to the disaster of brexit purely for political expendiency. Hi list of successes are few, but then he was a tory.
May was backstabbed by her own party, notably the ERG and Johnson, her deal with the EU (basically the same as Johnsons but a little less crap) was rejected by her own party, and the culture of blaming the EU for everything in UK politics that went wrong continued
Johnson brexit completed - well, mostly. Although apparently the deal he "created" (nicked off May) and signed, trumpeting it as an oven ready deal, was crap. The flow of industries to the EU continues. Trade deals continue as rollover deals from within the EU, for now. We have a few minor trade deals, and a deal with Australia (underlining our green convictions by shipping stuff around the world) that effectively undercuts our agriculture.
Strong government is not the same as good government - Johnsons majority has allowed him to wreck the UK. No doubt you see that as a good thing.
Not to mention Israel.
Fortunately they all agreed "Bibi" had to go.
OTOH Germany has done (and continues to ) do rather well, once they've actually formed the coalition.
So perhaps the Devils in the details of the voting system?
"I wouldn't use Italy (or France at the moment) as an example of effective government."
Ah yes the old "oooh but italy" argument against PR. It's feeble, quite frankly.
How about Germany, Belgium, Czech republic, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Slovakia, Eire, Iceland, New Zealand, Finland, Ukraine, Switzerland, Austria, Portugal, Netherlands, Poland or Japan? They (and loads more) have some form of PR and don't seem to have collapsed into political chaos or be run by minority extremist parties (unlike the UK...)
I occupy the centre-left
All of it?
What exactly does that mean, anyway? Blair & co? They're gone. Labour is hard left with a centrist facade until they get elected, the LibDems pretend to be centrist, but are more left wing than Labour these days. There might be a few centre-left politicians around, not many parties.
"Labour is hard left"
No it fucking isn't. Starmer has turned them into Tories who wear red rosettes. His Labour Party opposes nationalisation of key public services. It's against better employment rights. It supports the so-called independent nuclear deterrent. It's against Scottish independence. Only today, Starmer said he won't reverse the NHS privatisations and outsourcing that have taken place. These policy stances are not left wing at all. They're Thatcherite.
Oh certainly, Starmer isn't, that's why the likes of Abbott and Long-Bailey tolerate him as leader. He's a harmless face that might make them electable in a way that Corbyn never would.
Should they actually win an election I give Starmer a year before he's ousted by hardliners, and then it'll be the disaster of the 1970s all over again.
This post has been deleted by its author
"opposition parties prefer to run a personal vendetta"
A personal vendetta? Well that would be the Daily Mail version of reality certainly. I assume you mean that labour (who i have never voted for btw) have consistently called out Johnson and his cronies for breaking the law (that they themselves created), cronyism, fraud, corruption, etc etc? Do you think a government (and I include all those standing for PM in that) that is so blatantly corrupt and criminal should NOT be called out?
> overturn the democratic will of the people of the UK."
That old chestnut.
Tony Blair became PM in 1997. The Labour party had won the election. Why the hell have the Tories been allowed to take power, overturning the democratic will of the UK?
Views change. The polls today are overwhelmingly different. Old gammon's have died off, leaving the rest of us worse off through no fault of our own, all because old little-Englanders want to live in the past.
And even some of the most loyal brexitters aren't so stupid as to still believe brexit to be a good idea, when the facts are there to prove otherwise.
We are now predicted to have the least growth of all G20 countries, apart from Russia. We are also losing £173 million a week, rather that gaining £350 million a week.
https://www.cityam.com/eu-membership-vs-lost-exports-and-trade-forget-extra-nhs-cash-brexit-costs-britain-173m-per-week/
UK growth set to be worst in G20 apart from Russia, OECD warns: https://www.ft.com/content/ee2ce542-eb19-48c1-9a1d-57a8200a47ae
A verifiable disaster, won through lies. You should be ashamed.
> we left the EU and we aren't going to adopt their corrupt manipulation of democracy.
lol. Fortunately we are going to have to adopt many EU regulations if we are to have any hope of surviving the impending recession you voted for.
Also, the only corrupt manipulation of democracy going on here is by your beloved Tories. From illegal proroguing of parliament, lying, breaking the law, corruption, attempts to bypass parliament (so much for sovereignty!)
Congratulations, you have made the UK poorer, and the laughing stock of the world though I suspect in your bubble you haven't seen the many French TV reports about the UK, or the many from the USA, talking about how we've gone from trusted ally to a sideshow laughing stock.
I'd proved links, but it's obvious you are far more comfortable with your head in that sand.
"recommending electoral fraud to achieve the outcome you want. Sorry but we left the EU and we aren't going to adopt their corrupt manipulation of democracy."
Citation of either statement or admit you are, as usual, talking utter shite.
Kemi Badenoch voting record :
*** Consistently voted against measures to prevent climate change ***
*** Voted against financial incentives for low carbon emission electricity generation methods ***
Sounds pretty anti green to me.
Consistently voted for reducing central government funding of local government
Voted for stronger enforcement of immigration rules
Almost always voted for a stricter asylum system
Consistently voted against higher taxes on banks
Voted against measures to reduce tax avoidance
Voted against laws to promote equality and human rights
So, she's a standard tory.
You think Sunak is a socialist? All he did was keep businesses functioning by paying the workforce a percentage of their salary, so businesses actually had a workforce post-covid, and thus tax revenue was assured.
>Badenough is pro-Brexit, Anti-ECHR and Anti Green.
>This means she is only interested in short term gain at the expense of everyone else.
It means she knows what she has to say to get 20 Tory MPs to publicly support her
I suspect she personally believes nothing other than she is the chosen one
My God, I'm having horrible visions of an election manifesto being presented in the form of a massive UML diagram.
I read something today where she claimed that this experience will help her to go back and analyse all the country's problems from first principles and develop appropriate solutions if she becomes prime minister.
It's a shame that the idea of doing this has previously never occurred to her during all the years she's spent on the back benches as a total unknown.
The honest answer is: I ran out of time, and wanted to schedule the story before it became old news.
The tweets are linked so people can see the followups. And the article mentions that sending a malicious message - like telling someone to kill themselves - is potentially a criminal offense.
Also, the point of the article was Tories fighting over the bill, not really the actual bill because it's still in flux. And quite a lot of it will be defined with Ofcom.
C.
Quote #1: "...websites...may have to verify visitors are adults..."
Quote #2: "...the biggest accidental curtailment of free speech in modern history..."
Quote #3: "...messaging apps and other communications services – particularly those with strong end-to-end encryption – will be under pressure..."
Well, well, well....how many impossible things do I have to believe -- all at the same time -- on this sunny Friday morning?
#1: "Authentication" is one thing, but age verification is another thing (and impossible as well!).
#2: Ha...."free speech", but no mention that "free speech" comes with personal responsibility for the "speech". Now...about "personal responsibility"....did I mention authentication? Not only is age verification impossible, personal identity can also be very, very difficult to determine. So the internet needs to match "free speech" with authorial identity. Another impossibility!
#3: Here we go again.....how does this law prevent users from using personal encryption BEFORE any message enters an E2EE channel? Yet another impossible goal!!
It does make me wonder about the education level of our political class.....but then again, none of this is real......it's all political posturing!
>#1: "Authentication" is one thing, but age verification is another thing (and impossible as well!).
Yes.
E.g. How could we verify that Johnson is an adult? The main evidence available seems to be that he play a lot with the kiddies' dressing-up box and lies like a guilty adolescent.
>You can Johnson is an adult because he's wearing a suit.
:)
Upvoted.
You can tell that he isn't because he's wearing a hard-hat and high-vis jacket, which legitimate wearers don't combine with suits, or pose with for his (tripled during his delinquency) official photographer entourage.
how does this law prevent users from using personal encryption BEFORE any message enters an E2EE channel? Yet another impossible goal!!
They may prevent users from posting any content that AI can't make sense of. That of course does not stop users from using steganography and make encrypted messages look like a normal text or photos. But it will be difficult to make a conversation look normal behaviourally. So next step will be flagging content that seems "odd" and having a human to check it. Very expensive but doable. This could also ensure smaller platforms would have to close.
Another step will be making possession of encryption software without license a crime. Then this could be included in normal stop and search routine. You would have to show your devices and police will be checking if you have VPN installed, PGP or other tools.
@elsergiovolador
Quote: "...police will be checking if you have VPN installed, PGP or other tools..."
Really? You think this will be a success for PC Plod? Well:
(1) All the encryption software is on a persistent USB stick....a Live session booted from the USB (nothing to see on the laptop!)
(2) No persistent keys, no published keys, no key exchange -- unlike PGP -- see Diffie/Helman
(3) D/H tokens tell the snooper nothing about the key or the encryption algorithm (could be IDEA, RSA, Blowfish, samba, chacha...or other)
(4) All the network traffic is on a MiFi 4G hotspot...of course registered as a "burner"
(5) ....and no need for a VPN!
Items #2, #4 and #5 all fail to reveal the identity of the sender.
Item #1 reveals nothing when searching a laptop or workstation. And good luck finding that USB stick!
Item #3 means a random, software generated key for each and every message -- the sender and recipient have no idea about the encryption or the random message key.
So.....PC Plod may not know who is communicating, PC Plod has no access to keys, PC Plod cannot determine the encryption algorithm....so what will the "police...be checking"? Please let me know.
Lets be honest all these 'won't someone think of the children' laws, are written because some lazy parents want to sit back watching TV and just let their kids loose on the internet unmonitored and when little Timmy find some inappropriate content, they can blame the government for not doing enough.
Plus its a good way for the Tories to add on clauses which undermine E2E encryption by requiring scanning for abuse images on messaging apps.
But by the sounds of it it has support from both Tories and Labour MPs so there is a good chance its coming no matter who is is power.
So, this MP thinks that defeating the bill in the British parliament is going to get trump back on twitter?
Trump's tweet telling his followers "Be there. Will be wild!" the day before the Capitol riot was a transparently obvious attempt to get people to join what he hoped would turn into a coup that would end democracy in the USA. If it "cannot be right" that twitter don't want to host that kind of stuff, then how would he feel about someone trying to organise the overthrow of British democracy on social media? I doubt he'd be jumping up and down defending their free speech.
That's supposing anyone can perform meaningful risk assessments anyway, particularly in a subject area such as this where outcomes are so dependent on the mental set of the individual reader/viewer of the content. There are two opposing hazards at opposite ends of the spectrum - [a] that the 'precautionary principle' will impose vast restrictions on generally innocuous material or [b] that the legislation will prove so unworkable that there'll be no effective change. As a basic principle, trying to apply invented rules that haven't evolved naturally by consensus to societal problems usually fails.
The people telling the former software engineer that she doesn't understand the bill, while continually breaching what would be the very provision she's pointing out is horrific...
Oh, and I haven't gone onto Twitter to check but I suspect many people have pointed Damian Collins at Sections 12 and 13 of his own bill: https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/3137
It absolutely demands the removal of legal speech.
This is a WEF mandated bill and is meant to censor people leaking what WEF is up to and other shady stuff that will be going on.
They also need to control your communication, to have data points to calculate your social credit score off of and to flag any agents of change.
Any politician supporting this bill should be sacked and banned from holding any position of power.
"This is a WEF mandated bill and is meant to censor people leaking what WEF is up to and other shady stuff that will be going on."
Yet again (ffs where do you people get your "facts"?) -
Citation, evidence, proof or admit you're talking paraniod crap. Do you still think Bill Gates is putting tracking devices in covid vaccinations (just before they kill you, as part of the "great reset", natch)? What's the next stage of your delusions, the WEF is run by the Rothschilds? Its the jews again?
Pretty simple really, Nadine Dorries thinks it's a good idea therefore it should be nuked from orbit, as should her attempts to sell off Channel 4 and pretty much everything else that's come out of DCMS whilst she's been there.
Only someone like Boris who wanted to make sure his cabinet was full of no one who could have been a threat to him would have appointed such an idiot in the first place. Unfortunately he couldn't unappoint the biggest threat to him, which was himself.
I hope Meta will pull the plug on WhatsApp in the UK over the Online Safety Bill's implicit demand to install a back-door. I can't wait to see the fall-out coming from this!
This bill is a smorgasbord of ill-conceived regulations and at least half of them are catastrophically detrimental to the online privacy of UK citizens.
"at least half of them are catastrophically detrimental to the online privacy of UK citizens"
The other half are catastrophically detrimental to people across the world. For example, client-side content matching could be used by despotic governments to hunt down people with pro-LGBT/religious freedom/democracy views; taking control of the naughty content list either through economic pressure or outright espionage. Given the history of tech giants cozying up to the despots, I doubt their cyber warfare departments need worry about some busy weeks.
In my mind, when the imprisonments and executions start, made possible by this technology, the politicians here (and in other governments) who demanded its development would have just as much blood on their hands.
Even Lucy Powell admitted in a Twitter thread it may need more amending. The Times today had an opinion piece stating it shouldn't be scrapped, but then at the end said the new PM should start again & get it right (so does that mean they want it scrapped?) My guess is politicians know it's not a good piece of legislation, but since the last failure to enact age verification for porn in 2019 under the Digital Economy Act, they don't want to end up being accused of failing to act by campaigners & look like they've wasted years talking without result They'll look foolish if they give into the "free speech" lobby. Even if the bill is dropped (which I doubt), something will replace it.
Or treat the whole excercise as being a caretaker government with no real mandate
Which it is.
Badenoch ( Which voters of a certain age might associate with a former Down South MP played on the Birmingham stage by Ian "Lord Palpatine" McDiarmid) might be the best qualified MP in the House to unscramble a bill about the interwebs (assuming her CV can taken at face value).
But I suspect they will kick it into the long grass following an actual general election.
@John Smith 19 "might be the best qualified MP in the House to unscramble a bill about the interwebs (assuming her CV can taken at face value)."
You are probably right as she has two degrees* Computer Systems Engineering MEng** and also a LLB (Bachelor of Laws).
*I can't see that claim as being false, if it was it would have been all over the UK press. You can be sure some of the UK press would have checked with the universities.
**MEng that's the degree course extended by a year to include the Masters.
> Nick Fletcher, chimed in along the same lines, demanding free speech protections, and argued that "whatever we might think about Donald Trump, it cannot be right that he was banned from Twitter."
I'll be kind and assume Nick doesn't actually know the reason Trump was banned, but that being so, he should have kept his mouth shut.
https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2020/suspension
"You can’t really control either without systemic authoritarianism.
Mind you, that’s probably in the Tory Manifesto."
I believe it was - limiting the power of the courts and HoL etc. In other words, prevent anyone from interfering in Johnsons latest wheeze to to circumvent democracy.
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