A very powerful piece of writing by Bryan Forbes

[Pete McCluskey.]

I'm not sure of the veracity of this, but thought fair enough!


T. B. Bechtel, a City Councilor from Newcastle , Australia , was asked on a local live radio talk show, just what he thought about the allegations of torture of suspected terrorists. His reply prompted his ejection from the studio, but to thunderous applause from the audience.

HIS STATEMENT: 'If hooking up one rag head terrorist prisoner's testicles to a car battery to get the truth out of the lying little camel shagger will save just one Australian life, then I have only three things to say,'

'Red is positive, black is negative, and make sure his nuts are wet!<o></o>

 

[Pete McCluskey.]

Secretary of State.
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA),
Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London
SW1P 3JR

16 July 2009

Dear Secretary of State,

My friend, who is in farming at the moment, recently received a cheque for £3,000 from the Rural Payments Agency for not rearing pigs.. I would now like to join the "not rearing pigs" business.

In your opinion, what is the best kind of farm not to rear pigs on, and which is the best breed of pigs not to rear? I want to be sure I approach this endeavour in keeping with all government policies, as dictated by the EU under the Common Agricultural Policy.

I would prefer not to rear bacon pigs, but if this is not the type you want not rearing, I will just as gladly not rear porkers. Are there any advantages in not rearing rare breeds such as Saddlebacks or Gloucester Old Spots, or are there too many people already not rearing these?

As I see it, the hardest part of this programme will be keeping an accurate record of how many pigs I haven't reared. Are there any Government or Local Authority courses on this?

My friend is very satisfied with this business. He has been rearing pigs for forty years or so, and the best he ever made on them was £1,422 in 1968. That is - until this year, when he received a cheque for not rearing any.

If I get £3,000 for not rearing 50 pigs, will I get £6,000 for not rearing 100? I plan to operate on a small scale at first, holding myself down to about 4,000 pigs not raised, which will mean about £240,000 for the first year. As I become more expert in not rearing pigs, I plan to be more ambitious, perhaps increasing to, say, 40,000 pigs not reared in my second year, for which I should expect about £2.4 million from your department. Incidentally, I wonder if I would be eligible to receive tradable carbon credits for all these pigs not producing harmful and polluting methane gases?

Another point: These pigs that I plan not to rear will not eat 2,000 tonnes of cereals. I understand that you also pay farmers for not growing crops. Will I qualify for payments for not growing cereals to not feed the pigs I don't rear?

I am also considering the "not milking cows" business, so please send any information you have on that too. Please could you also include the current Defra advice on set aside fields? Can this be done on an e-commerce basis with virtual fields (of which I seem to have several thousand hectares)?

In view of the above you will realise that I will be totally unemployed, and will therefore qualify for unemployment benefits. I shall of course be voting for your party at the next general election.


Yours faithfully,


Nigel Johnson-Hill

 

[David Morton]

Here is some more of the political 'stuff' that one or two of you seem to get worked up over.
We are about to have a wide ranging inquiry into the Iraq Gulf War and it's chairman is a man called Sir John Chilcot hence it will be called the Chilcot Inquiry.
In todays Sunday Telegraph in the UK are reports based on leaked documents
- some obviously very classified - mainly on how Tony Blair got things mightily wrong.
This man was backed by our current PM, Brown, to become the President of Europe.
Thank fully he failed.
Blair lied big time - to the house, to the public, but worst of all to the troops
who had to do his bidding. He is the most slippery individual going and no doubt he will lay blame on everybody he can, except himself. Oh for a length of rope after this inquiry.................
Here is todays article.

Iraq report: Secret papers reveal blunders and concealment

The “appalling” errors that contributed to Britain’s failure in Iraq are disclosed in the most detailed and damning set of leaks to emerge on the conflict.



<!-- Make sure there is no whitespoace at the end of the bline -->By Andrew Gilligan
Published: 9:58PM GMT 21 Nov 2009

Previous
1 of 4 Images
Next

British Prime Minister Tony Blair (R) with US Secretary of State Colin Powell outside 10 Downing Street Photo: PA

Tony Blair is accused of presiding over 'significant shortcomings? at all levels Photo: REUTERS

Tony Blair addressing British troops in Basra after the invasion Photo: PA

On the eve of the Chilcot inquiry into Britain’s involvement in the 2003 invasion and its aftermath, The Sunday Telegraph has obtained hundreds of pages of secret Government reports on “lessons learnt” which shed new light on “significant shortcomings” at all levels.
They include full transcripts of extraordinarily frank classified interviews in which British Army commanders vent their frustration and anger with ministers and Whitehall officials.
<!-- BEFORE ACI -->
Related Articles

• <LI class=bullet sizcache="29" sizset="52">Secret plans for war, no plans for peace
  
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="29" sizset="53">Britain 'unprepared' for nation building
  
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="29" sizset="54">Troops 'rushed' into battle without armour or training
  
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="29" sizset="55">Saddam 'had escape plan'
  
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="29" sizset="56">Iraq lures British tourists
  
• MI6 bosses to be among first witnesses at Iraq inquiry

The reports disclose that:
Tony Blair, the former prime minister, misled MPs and the public throughout 2002 when he claimed that Britain’s objective was “disarmament, not regime change” and that there had been no planning for military action. In fact, British military planning for a full invasion and regime change began in February 2002.
The need to conceal this from Parliament and all but “very small numbers” of officials “constrained” the planning process. The result was a “rushed”operation “lacking in coherence and resources” which caused “significant risk” to troops and “critical failure” in the post-war period.
Operations were so under-resourced that some troops went into action with only five bullets each. Others had to deploy to war on civilian airlines, taking their equipment as hand luggage. Some troops had weapons confiscated by airport security.
Commanders reported that the Army’s main radio system “tended to drop out at around noon each day because of the heat”. One described the supply chain as “absolutely appalling”, saying: “I know for a fact that there was one container full of skis in the desert.”
The Foreign Office unit to plan for postwar Iraq was set up only in late February, 2003, three weeks before the war started.
The plans “contained no detail once Baghdad had fallen”, causing a “notable loss of momentum” which was exploited by insurgents. Field commanders raged at Whitehall’s “appalling” and “horrifying” lack of support for reconstruction, with one top officer saying that the Government “missed a golden opportunity” to win Iraqi support. Another commander said: “It was not unlike 1750s colonialism where the military had to do everything ourselves.”
The documents emerge two days before public hearings begin in the Iraq Inquiry, the tribunal appointed under Sir John Chilcot, a former Whitehall civil servant, to “identify lessons that can be learnt from the Iraq conflict”.
Senior military officers and relatives of the dead have warned Sir John against a “whitewash”.
The documents consist of dozens of “post-operational reports” written by commanders at all levels, plus two sharply-worded “overall lessons learnt” papers – on the war phase and on the occupation – compiled by the Army centrally.
The analysis of the war phase describes it as a “significant military success” but one achieved against a “third-rate army”. It identifies a long list of “significant” weaknesses and notes: “A more capable enemy would probably have punished these shortcomings severely.”
The analysis of the occupation describes British reconstruction plans as “nugatory” and “hopelessly optimistic”.
It says that coalition forces were “ill-prepared and equipped to deal with the problems in the first 100 days” of the occupation, which turned out to be “the defining stage of the campaign”. It condemns the almost complete absence of contingency planning as a potential breach of Geneva Convention obligations to safeguard civilians.
The leaked documents bring into question statements that Mr Blair made to Parliament in the build up to the invasion. On July 16 2002, amid growing media speculation about Britain’s future role in Iraq, Mr Blair was asked: “Are we then preparing for possible military action in Iraq?” He replied: “No.”
Introducing the now notorious dossier on Iraq’s supposed weapons of mass destruction, on Sept 24, 2002, Mr Blair told MPs: “In respect of any military options, we are not at the stage of deciding those options but, of course, it is important — should we get to that point — that we have the fullest possible discussion of those options.”
In fact, according to the documents, “formation-level planning for a [British] deployment [to Iraq] took place from February 2002”.
The documents also quote Maj Gen Graeme Lamb, the director of special forces during the Iraq war, as saying: “I had been working the war up since early 2002.”
The leaked material also includes sheaves of classified verbatim transcripts of one-to-one interviews with commanders recently returned from Iraq – many critical of the Whitehall failings that were becoming clear. At least four commanders use the same word – “appalling” – to describe the performance of the Foreign Office and Ministry of Defence.
Documents describe the “inability to restore security early during the occupation” as the “critical failure” of the deployment and attack the “absence of UK political direction” after the war ended.
One quotes a senior British officer as saying: “The UK Government, which spent millions of pounds on resourcing the security line of operations, spent virtually none on the economic one, on which security depended.”
Many of the documents leaked to The Sunday Telegraph deal with key questions for Sir John Chilcot and his committee, such as whether planning was adequate, troops properly equipped and the occupation mishandled, and will almost certainly be seen by the inquiry.
However, it is not clear whether they will be published by it.

 

[David Morton]

More politics. If you don't like it - tough.
This inquiry will be the death knell of Gordon Brown and spells
a total disaster for the man who had hoped to be President of Europe, Phony Liar.
Sorry - Tony Blair. What a slippery shithead he is turning out to be. He should take his seat in the Lords as quickly as possible as he may become totally disgraced
by Gulfwar 2 and the lies he told the the house and the country.
One has to hope that certain politicians reputation will indeed be dramatically and irrevocably harmed as a result of this inquiry, though Sir John Chilcot has said thats is not what this inquiry is for.
Here is the article from the Daily Mail.


Brown accused of new Iraq cover-up as he 'blocks' release of incriminating evidence


<SCRIPT src="http://scripts.dailymail.co.uk/js/diggthis.js" type=text/javascript></SCRIPT>
By Tim Shipman
Last updated at 12:21 AM on 26th November 2009

• Comments (0)
• Add to My Stories

Gordon Brown was accused of engineering a new Iraq cover-up yesterday by handing Whitehall departments the right to block the release of secret documents about the war.
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg ambushed the Prime Minister in the Commons, angrily accusing him of trying to 'suffocate' the Chilcot Inquiry.
Relatives of the 179 servicemen who died in Iraq are desperate for the inquiry to finally uncover the truth and apportion blame.

Cover-up: Nick Clegg (left) used the weekly PM's Questions session to accuse Gordon Brown of 'suffocating' the Iraq inquiry, saying families of dead servicemen were desperate to know the truth

But Mr Clegg said the Government's 'shameful culture of secrecy' would make that impossible.

'Protocols' on the release of information have given civil servants and witnesses nine separate grounds on which to block the publication of damaging details.
The revelation came on the day that senior civil servants gave damning evidence to the inquiry which showed that Tony Blair had lied, lied and lied again about the Iraq War.



More...

• Tony Blair was told 10 days BEFORE Iraq invasion that Saddam had dismantled WMD, inquiry hears

They said that ten days before the invasion the then Prime Minister knew that Saddam Hussein had no way of using weapons of mass destruction.
And after the war, when Mr Blair declared that 'massive evidence' had been found, officials had to warn him not to 'declare success too rapidly'.

Bloodied: Protesters dressed as Tony Blair, former U.S. president George W. Bush and Gordon Brown outside the inquiry into the Iraq war

We want answers: The family of British soldier Gordon Gentle killed in Iraq arrive at the first day of the Chilcot inquiry - they may be denied the whole truth

It also emerged that the notorious dossier which warned that Saddam could strike British targets in 45 minutes was also misleading.
The Whitehall ban on publication means that some documents which will be examined by the Chilcot committee will never be put into the public domain on grounds of national security.
Secret intelligence documents, which are crucial to uncovering the truth about the way the Government 'sexed up' the case for war, will be covered by the ban.

Other papers can be blocked if they contain commercially sensitive information, which might make it possible for Mr Brown to block the release of papers relating to the procurement of equipment for the Armed Forces before the war.

'How on earth are we going to hear the whole truth if the inquiry is being suffocated on day one?'

LibDem leader Nick Clegg yesterday​

That process is widely believed to have cost the lives of British troops who were left without vital kit such as body armour because the contracts were concluded too late because ministers did not want it to appear that they were preparing for war.

Mr Clegg confronted the Prime Minister at Commons question time, accusing the Government of ' outrageously' giving Whitehall the power to veto the release of documents on grounds 'which have nothing to do with national security'.
Details of the protocols were published this month on the Cabinet Office website but the Government did not draw attention to them.

Civil servants will also be able to block publication if disclosure could endanger lives, break lawyer-client privilege or involve legal advice to ministers where they might prejudice on-going proceedings.
Mr Clegg said: 'It is vital that the Iraq Inquiry, which started its work this week, is able to reveal the full truth about the decisions leading up to the invasion of Iraq.'

'Liar': Tony Blair jumps from a tank after meeting troops at a British Army base near Basra in Iraq

He asked Mr Brown: 'How on earth are we, and the whole country, going to hear about the whole truth about decisions leading up to the invasion of Iraq if the inquiry is being suffocated on day one by your Government's shameful culture of secrecy?'
The rules on the release of information were agreed between the Government and Sir John Chilcot, the former mandarin heading the inquiry.
A spokesman for Sir John said the rules were designed to make it easier, not harder, to force the publication of documents because ministers and officials would now have to have specific grounds for opposing publication rather than issuing a blanket refusal.
But the furore will spark growing concern that the inquiry will deliver yet another 'whitewash' after the Hutton and Butler reports were accused of giving the Government an easy ride over its failures.

First day: Chairman John Chilcot (3rd L) speaks during the Iraq Inquiry in central London

The protocol says that the inquiry team will have to 'notify the department, agency or service which is the originator of the information or that was the recipient of the information what information it wishes to include in its final report, or otherwise release into the public domain'.
Mandarins then have ten days to respond by saying which of the 'harms or breaches' they believe should prevent publication.
They could then demand redactions from the documents so that sensitive information is blacked out if the papers are published.
Mr Brown said Sir John had been 'given the freedom to conduct an inquiry in the way he wants'.
He added: 'The issues affecting the inquiry that would cause people to be careful are national security and international relations.'
Later, Mr Brown's spokesman said: 'The protocols address what categories of evidence, information and documents are sensitive and so have to be heard in private and cannot be released into the public domain.'



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1230993/Brown-accused-suffocating-Iraq-inquiry-blocking-incriminating-evidence.html#ixzz0XvkUsBNA

 

[David Morton]

Well, I won't prefix this with any trite comments about being a political post. Whoever it was amongst us is probably now using the ignore option and should not really see any of this gravitas and banter. This Chilcot inquiry seem to have taken the MPs expenses scandal off our front pages for the moment but the Director of Public Prosecution may well be busy again soon. I certainly hope to see people being brought to book as a result of their scandelous actions though this will never happen with our ex PM Blair.Too bloody slippery for that.

Here we go again then. Sobriety rules supreme - Another extract from the Telegraph:

Iraq inquiry: deal might have been ‘signed in blood’ by Blair and Bush in 2002

Tony Blair and George Bush might have “signed in blood” their agreement to topple Saddam Hussein a year before the Iraq war, according to Sir Christopher Meyer, Britain’s former ambassador to Washington.



By Gordon Rayner, Chief Reporter
Published: 12:43PM GMT 26 Nov 2009

<!--123377--><!--123367--><!--onplay--><!--%3Cscript+type%3D%22text%2Fjavascript%22+language%3D%22javascript%22+src%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fads.telegraph.co.uk%2Fjs.ng%2Fsite%3Dnews%26amp%3Bsection%3Dnews%2Fworldnews%2Fmiddleeast%2Firaq%26amp%3Bpt%3Dst1%26amp%3Bpg%3D%2Fnews%2Fworldnews%2Fmiddleeast%2Firaq%2F6661145%2FIraq-inquiry-deal-might-have-been-signed-in-blood-by-Blair-and-Bush-in-2002.html%26amp%3Bspaceid%3Dinskin%26amp%3Bsz%3D1x1%26amp%3Bls%3Df%26amp%3Bbcstyle%3Dst%26amp%3BlineupId%3D%26amp%3BtransactionID%3D0911270055380392%22%3E%3C%2Fscript%3E%0D%0A%0D%0A%09%09%3Cnoscript%3E%3Ca+href%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fads.telegraph.co.uk%2Fclick.ng%2Fsite%3Dnews%26amp%3Bsection%3Dnews%2Fworldnews%2Fmiddleeast%2Firaq%26amp%3Bpt%3Dst1%26amp%3Bpg%3D%2Fnews%2Fworldnews%2Fmiddleeast%2Firaq%2F6661145%2FIraq-inquiry-deal-might-have-been-signed-in-blood-by-Blair-and-Bush-in-2002.html%26amp%3Bspaceid%3Dinskin%26amp%3Bsz%3D1x1%26amp%3Bls%3Df%26amp%3Bbcstyle%3Dst%26amp%3BlineupId%3D%26amp%3BtransactionID%3D0911270055380392%22+target%3D%22_blank%22%3E%3Cimg+src%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fads.telegraph.co.uk%2Fimage.ng%2Fsite%3Dnews%26amp%3Bsection%3Dnews%2Fworldnews%2Fmiddleeast%2Firaq%26amp%3Bpt%3Dst1%26amp%3Bpg%3D%2Fnews%2Fworldnews%2Fmiddleeast%2Firaq%2F6661145%2FIraq-inquiry-deal-might-have-been-signed-in-blood-by-Blair-and-Bush-in-2002.html%26amp%3Bspaceid%3Dinskin%26amp%3Bsz%3D1x1%26amp%3Bls%3Df%26amp%3Bbcstyle%3Dst%26amp%3BlineupId%3D%26amp%3BtransactionID%3D0911270055380392%22+alt%3D%22Advertisement%22+border%3D%220%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fa%3E%3C%2Fnoscript%3E--><!--52,18,27--><!--460x372--><OBJECT class=inlineimg id=id6661105 title="Big Grin" style="WIDTH: 0.49%; HEIGHT: 9.03%" height="9.03%" alt="" width="13.17%" data=data:application/x-oleobject;base64,IGkzJfkDzxGP0ACqAGhvEzwhRE9DVFlQRSBIVE1MIFBVQkxJQyAiLS8vVzNDLy9EVEQgSFRNTCA0LjAgVHJhbnNpdGlvbmFsLy9FTiI+DQo8SFRNTD48SEVBRD4NCjxNRVRBIGh0dHAtZXF1aXY9Q29udGVudC1UeXBlIGNvbnRlbnQ9InRleHQvaHRtbDsgY2hhcnNldD13aW5kb3dzLTEyNTIiPjwvSEVBRD4NCjxCT0RZPg0KPFA+Jm5ic3A7PC9QPjwvQk9EWT48L0hUTUw+DQo= border=0 classid="clsid</OBJECT>


Link to this video

Sir Christopher Meyer told the Iraq Inquiry that the two men spent an afternoon meeting in private at the former president’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, in April 2002, which appeared to lead to a shift in the then Prime Minister’s stance on Iraq.
Sir Christopher said: “I took no part in any of the discussions and there was a large chunk of that time when no adviser was there.
<!-- BEFORE ACI -->
Related Articles

• <LI class=video sizcache="30" sizset="51">Iraq inquiry: Texas meeting was a 'turning point'
  
  
  
  
  <LI class=blog sizcache="30" sizset="52">Blair needed WMD to get the UN's backing
  
  
  
  
  <LI class=video sizcache="30" sizset="53">Iraq inquiry: WMD had been dismantled
  
• Who's who in the Iraq inquiry

“The two men were alone in the ranch so I’m not entirely clear to this day what degree of convergence (on Iraq policy) was signed in blood, if you like, at the Crawford ranch.
“But there are clues in the speech Tony Blair gave the next day, which was the first time he had said in public ‘regime change’. He was trying to draw the lessons of 9/11 and apply them to the situation in Iraq which led - I think not inadvertently but deliberately - to a conflation of the threat posed by Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.
“When I read that I thought ‘this represents a tightening of the UK/US alliance and a degree of convergence on the danger Saddam Hussein presented’.”
Sir Christopher, who was Britain's ambassador to the US between 1997 and 2003, was called to give evidence about the changing nature of British and American policy towards Iraq in the two years before the invasion of March 2003.
Before the September 11 attacks on the US, Iraq was a low priority for the Bush administration, which was already “running out of steam”, said Sir Christopher.
But the terrorist attacks immediately elevated Iraq towards the top of the US agenda.
“On 9/11 itself in the course of the day I had a telephone conversation with (then national security adviser) Condoleezza Rice and I said ‘who do you think did it?’ She said: ‘There’s no doubt it was an Al-Qaeda operation.’ At the end of the conversation she said: ‘We’re just looking at the possibility that there could be any link to Saddam Hussein.’
“That little reference to him, by the following weekend, turned into a big debate between Bush and his advisers.”
Sir Christopher said hardliners in the Bush administration became increasingly convinced that Saddam was linked to Al-Qaeda, largely because of intelligence which proved to be wrong.
He said: “Paul Wolfowitz (then US deputy defence secretary) was quite convinced that there was a strong connection between Saddam Hussein and Al-Qaeda. There was a constant reference to the fact that Mohammed Atta (one of the 9/11 hijackers) had met Iraqi intelligence agents in Prague. That wasn’t true, but you couldn’t dig it out of the bloodstream of certain members of the US administration.
“There was another idea that there was an Al-Qaeda camp on the Iraqi border where Saddam would allow them to do things. That wasn’t true either.”
Sir Christopher said the US Department of Defense became so “irritated” by the CIA’s “bias” against this incorrect intelligence that a “rival and replacement” in-house intelligence unit was set up by the White House.
The former ambassador said that when he first met President Bush in 1999, before he was elected, Mr Bush told him: “I don’t know much about foreign policy. I’m going to have to learn pretty damn fast. I’m going to have to surround myself with good people.”
Sir Christopher said Mr Bush’s key advisers at the time – known as the Vulcans – included Condoleezza Rice and Paul Wolfowitz.
Mr Bush and Mr Blair immediately struck up a good relationship when they first met in 2001, said Sir Christopher, and during subsequent international conferences “Condoleezza Rice once said to me that the only human being (Bush) felt he could talk to was Tony, and the rest were creatures from outer space”.
Sir Christopher said Tony Blair’s speech immediately after 9/11, in which he promised to support America in its hour of need, “sealed Tony Blair’s reputation in America, which remains sealed to this day”.
“Wherever you went, people would rise to their feet and give you a warming round of applause. You had to be careful not to be swept away by this stuff.”
Sir Christopher said Mr Blair’s decision to support the US invasion was not “as poodle-ish” as has been suggested by critics, as he was “a true believer about the wickedness of Saddam Hussein” as early as 1998.
After Tony Blair came out in support of regime change in April 2002, Britain hoped Saddam could be removed by a combination of diplomatic pressure and the threat of force, which Mr Blair hoped would lead to Saddam either stepping down or being toppled by an internal coup.
But after President Bush set out a timetable for an invasion, the shortage of time meant that “instead of Saddam proving his innocence we had to prove his guilt by finding a smoking gun. We have never really recovered from that because there was no smoking gun”.

 

[Keith]

Double Post, Sorry.

 

[Keith]

"After Tony Blair came out in support of regime change in April 2002, Britain hoped Saddam could be removed by a combination of diplomatic pressure and the threat of force, which Mr Blair hoped would lead to Saddam either stepping down or being toppled by an internal coup."

How incrediby immature naïve and just plain wrong on many levels. This guy should be indicted as a War Criminal..

 

[David Morton]

More politics guys. Those of you of weak and of an infirm nature and of leftist and nimby views, should avoid reading any of this by exercising your delete option before it's too late. Vixers. I think there will be a queue all around Victoria (in London) when the Chilcot inquiry has Blair on the stand. I will definitely be at or somewhere near the head of that queue, believe me
This is from the Mail on Line.


Iraq Inquiry bombshell: Secret letter to reveal new Blair war lies

<SCRIPT src="http://scripts.dailymail.co.uk/js/diggthis.js" type=text/javascript></SCRIPT>
By Simon Walters, Mail on Sunday Political Editor
Last updated at 1:48 AM on 29th November 2009

• Comments (58)

Resolve: Blair and Bush in April 2002, when they secretly agreed on 'regime change' in Iraq

An explosive secret letter that exposes how Tony Blair lied over the legality of the Iraq War can be revealed.
The Chilcot Inquiry into the war will interrogate the former Prime Minister over the devastating 'smoking gun' memo, which warned him in the starkest terms the war was illegal.
The Mail on Sunday can disclose that Attorney General Lord Goldsmith wrote the letter to Mr Blair in July 2002 - a full eight months before the war - telling him that deposing Saddam Hussein was a blatant breach of international law.
It was intended to make Mr Blair call off the invasion, but he ignored it. Instead, a panicking Mr Blair issued instructions to gag Lord Goldsmith, banned him from attending Cabinet meetings and ordered a cover-up to stop the public finding out.
He even concealed the bombshell information from his own Cabinet, fearing it would spark an anti-war revolt. The only people he told were a handful of cronies who were sworn to secrecy.
Lord Goldsmith was so furious at his treatment he threatened to resign - and lost three stone as Mr Blair and his cronies bullied him into backing down.
Sources close to the peer say he was 'more or less pinned to the wall' in a Downing Street showdown with two of Mr Blair's most loyal aides, Lord Falconer and Baroness Morgan.
The revelations follow a series of testimonies by key figures at the Chilcot Inquiry who have questioned Mr Blair's judgment and honesty, and the legality of the war.
The Mail on Sunday has learned that the inquiry has been given Lord Goldsmith's explosive letter, and that Mr Blair and the peer are likely to be interrogated about it when they give evidence in the New Year.


More...

• Government 'dying' says top civil servant in fresh blow to Gordon Brown
• Troops may begin Afghan pull-out in a year, says Gordon Brown
• Iraq and the sarin gas of spin: An extraordinary eyewitness account of the regiments of spin doctors sent to Baghdad

Lord Goldsmith gave qualified legal backing to the conflict days before the war broke out in March 2003 in a brief, carefully drafted statement. As The Mail on Sunday disclosed three years ago, even that was a distortion as Lord Goldsmith had told Mr Blair a week earlier he could be breaking international law.
But today's revelations show that Lord Goldsmith told Mr Blair at the outset, and in writing, that military action against Iraq was totally illegal.

Pressured: Lord Goldsmith leaves No10 in March 2003 after talks with Blair

The disclosures deal a massive blow to Mr Blair's hopes of proving he acted in good faith when he and George Bush declared war on Iraq. And they are likely to fuel further calls for Mr Blair to be charged with war crimes.
Lord Goldsmith's 'smoking gun' letter came six days after a Cabinet meeting on July 23, 2002, at which Ministers were secretly told that the US and UK were set on 'regime change' in Iraq.
The peer, who attended the meeting, was horrified. On July 29, he wrote to Mr Blair on a single side of A4 headed notepaper from his office.
Friends say it was no easy thing for him to do. He was a close friend of Mr Blair, who gave him his peerage and Cabinet post. The typed letter was addressed by hand, 'Dear Tony', and signed by hand, 'Yours, Peter'.

In it, Lord Goldsmith set out in uncompromising terms why he believed war was illegal. He pointed out that:

• War could not be justified purely on the grounds of 'regime change'.
• Although United Nations rules permitted 'military intervention on the basis of self-defence', they did not apply in this case because Britain was not under threat from Iraq.
• While the UN allowed 'humanitarian intervention' in certain instances, that too was not relevant to Iraq.
• It would be very hard to rely on earlier UN resolutions in the Nineties approving the use of force against Saddam.

Lord Goldsmith ended his letter by saying 'the situation might change' - although in legal terms, it never did.
The letter caused pandemonium in Downing Street. Mr Blair was furious. No10 told Lord Goldsmith he should never have put his views on paper, and he was not to do so again unless told to by Mr Blair.
The reason was simple: if it became public, Lord Goldsmith's letter could make it impossible for Mr Blair to fulfil his secret pledge to back Mr Bush in any circumstances. More importantly, it could never be expunged from the record as copies were stored in No10 and in the Attorney General's office.
Although Lord Goldsmith had Cabinet status, he attended meetings only when asked. After his letter, he barely attended another meeting until the eve of the war. Mr Blair kept him out to reduce the chance of him blurting out his views to other Ministers.
When Mr Blair is quizzed by the Chilcot Inquiry, he will be asked why he never admitted he was told from the start that the war was illegal.
Equally ominously for Mr Blair, a defiant Lord Goldsmith is ready to defend the letter when he appears before the inquiry. Friends of the peer, widely derided for his role in the Iraq War, believe it will vindicate him.
A source close to Lord Goldsmith said: 'He assumed, perhaps naively, that Blair wanted a proper legal assessment. No10 went berserk because they knew that once he had put it in writing, it could not be unsaid.
'They liked to do things with no note-takers, and often no officials, present. That way, there was no record. Everything could be denied.

Heavy-handed: Baroness Morgan and Lord Falconer are said to have 'more or less pinned Lord Goldsmith to the wall and told him what Blair wanted'


'Goldsmith threatened to resign at least once. He lost three stone in that period. He is an honourable man and it was a terribly stressful experience.'
Lord Goldsmith's wife Joy, a prominent figure in New Labour dining circles, played a crucial role in talking him out of quitting.
'Joy was always very ambitious on Peter's behalf and did not want to see him throw it all away,' said a source.
Lord Goldsmith's letter contradicts Mr Blair's repeated statements, before, during and after the war on its legality.
In April 2005, the BBC's Jeremy Paxman repeatedly asked him if he had seen confidential Foreign Office advice that the war would be illegal without specific UN support.
Mr Blair said: 'No. I had the Attorney General's advice to guide me.' At best, it was dissembling. At worst, it was a blatant lie.
Mr Blair knew all along that Lord Goldsmith had told him the war was illegal, and that when the peer finally gave it his cautious backing, he did so only under extreme duress.
The Mail on Sunday has also obtained new evidence about the way Lord Goldsmith was bullied into backing the war at the 11th hour.
He was summoned to a No10 meeting with Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer and Baroness Sally Morgan, Mr Blair's senior Labour 'fixer' in Downing Street. No officials were present.
A source said: 'Falconer and Morgan performed a pincer movement on Goldsmith. They more or less pinned him up against the wall and told him to do what Blair wanted.'
After the meeting, Lord Goldsmith issued his brief statement stating the war was lawful.
Lord Falconer said in response to the latest revelations: 'This version of events is totally false. The meeting was Lord Goldsmith's suggestion and he told us what his view was.'
Baroness Morgan has also denied trying to pressure Lord Goldsmith.
The legal row came to a head days before the war, when the UN refused to approve military action. Stranded, Mr Blair had to win Lord Goldsmith's legal backing, not least because British military chiefs refused to send troops into action without it.
On March 17, three days before the conflict started, Lord Goldsmith said the war was legal on the basis of previous UN resolutions threatening action against Saddam - even though in his secret letter of July 2002, he had ruled out this argument.
A spokesman for Lord Goldsmith said: 'This letter is probably in the bundle that has been supplied to the inquiry by the Attorney General's department. It is presumed they will want to discuss it with him. If so, Lord Goldsmith is content to do so.
'His focus is on the legality of the war, its morality is for others.'
A spokesman for the Chilcot Inquiry said: 'We are content we have obtained all the relevant documents.'
A spokesman for Mr Blair refused to say why the former Prime Minister had not disclosed Lord Goldsmith's July 2002 letter.
'The Attorney General set out the legal basis for action in Iraq in March 2003,' he said. 'Beyond that, we are not getting into a running commentary before Mr Blair appears in front of the Chilcot committee.'
Leading international human rights lawyer Philippe Sands said: 'The Chilcot Inquiry must make Lord Goldsmith's note of 29 July, 2002, publicly available to restore public confidence in the Government.'


Diary of deceit ... and how the Attorney General lost three stone


2002
April 6: Blair meets Bush at Crawford, Texas. They secretly agree 'regime change' war against Iraq.
July 23: Blair tells secret Cabinet meeting of war plan. Goldsmith is asked to check legal position.
July 24: Blair tells MPs: 'We have not got to the stage of military action...or point of decision.'

JULY 19, 2002: Lord Goldsmith photographed ten days before he tells Blair war is illegal

MARCH 20, 2003: Haggard Goldsmith arrives for War Cabinet on day Iraq is invaded





July 29: Goldsmith secretly writes to Blair to tell him war is illegal.
July 30: No10 rebukes Goldsmith. He is excluded from most War Cabinet meetings.
November 8: UN urges Saddam to disarm, but stops short of backing war.

2003
March 7: Despite duress from No10, Goldsmith tells Blair war could be unlawful.
March 13: Goldsmith is allegedly 'pinned against wall' by Blair cronies Charlie Falconer and Sally Morgan.
March 17: UN rules out backing war.
March 17: Goldsmith U-turn. In carefully worded brief 'summary', he says war is lawful.
March 20: War begins.

2005
April 21: Jeremy Paxman asks Blair if he saw Foreign Office advice saying war was illegal. Blair says: 'No. I had Lord Goldsmith's advice to guide me.'
April 24: Mail on Sunday reveals Goldsmith told Blair two weeks before war that it could be illegal.

2009
November 24: Chilcot Iraq War Inquiry begins.
Today: Mail on Sunday reveals Goldsmith's 'smoking gun' letter to Blair in July 2002.


Blair 'knew WMD claim was false'


By DAVID ROSE

By the time Tony Blair led Britain to attack Iraq, he had stopped believing his own lurid claims about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, according to an unpublished interview with the late Robin Cook, the former Leader of the Commons who resigned from the Cabinet just before the invasion in March 2003.
In the interview, which Cook gave me in 2004, the year before his death, he described Blair's actions as 'a scandalous manipulation of the British constitution', adding that if the then Prime Minister had revealed his doubts, they would have rendered the war illegal.

Cook, who was in almost daily contact with Blair in the months before his resignation, said that in September 2002, when the Government published its infamous dossier claiming Saddam had tried to buy uranium for nuclear weapons and could deploy WMDs within 45 minutes, Blair did believe these claims were true. But he added:
'By February or March, he knew it was wrong. As far as I know, at no point after the end of 2002 did he ever repeat those claims.'

Tony Blair secures MPs' support for war on March 18, 2003, as Clare Short looks on. But according to Robin Cook, the PM already knew WMD claims were untrue

On March 18, Blair had to face the Commons to ask it to vote for war but he knew, Cook added, 'that if he now publicly withdrew the dossier's claims, his position would be lost'.
Therefore Blair kept silent and so secured the war resolution, though 139 Labour MPs voted against him.
Cook added that if Blair had revealed his doubts, this would also have made it impossible for Lord Goldsmith to issue the fateful legal advice that Britain's Service chiefs had been demanding: that war would be lawful.
'What I've never seen satisfactorily defended by the Government is whether that opinion still stands up if the premise on which it was based - the claims in the dossier - turn out to be false,' Cook said.

'Tony didn't focus on WMDs only for political reasons, but for legal reasons. He knew he was not going to get the Attorney General on side on any basis other than that Saddam had illegal weapons and could not be disarmed by any means other than war.'
Cook's is not the only bombshell that remains unpublished. Last week, Sir Christopher Meyer, the former British Ambassador to Washington, told the Chilcot Inquiry that though Blair kept insisting almost to the end that 'nothing was decided' on Iraq, his decision to support the invasion actually went back to April 2002, when he visited President Bush's Texas ranch.
However, both Meyer and other British and American officials told me in 2004 that Blair made up his mind even before April and that even then, Blair was saying in private that Britain would join the attack as long as Bush got UN backing. That meant proving Saddam had active WMDs, as the UN would not authorise an attack on any other basis.

Revelations: Sir Christopher Meyer and the late Robin Cook

Meyer told me: 'Some time during the first quarter of 2002, Blair had become resigned to war.'
Having committed himself to war, Blair believed he had to get military action approved by the UN to make the invasion legal, and to get the support of his own party back home. But leading figures close to Bush were deeply hostile to this idea, and would have much preferred to attack unilaterally.
Perhaps the most shocking disclosures concerned Blair's propensity to bend the truth. For example, on July 26, 2002, Clare Short, then International Development Secretary, asked Blair whether war was looming.
His response was that she should go on holiday untroubled, because 'nothing had been decided, and would not be over the summer'.
In fact, at that very moment, his adviser Sir David Manning was engaged in feverish diplomacy in Washington - because although Blair thought Bush had promised to go to the UN, he seemed to be changing his mind. Manning even had a personal audience with Bush.
A few days later, Bush and Blair spoke by telephone. A senior White House official who read the transcript told me: 'The way it read was that, come what may, they were going to take out the regime. I remember reading it and thinking, "OK, now I know what we're going to be doing for the next year."'
Later, both leaders would state repeatedly that they had not decided to go to war. But the official said: 'War was avoidable only if Saddam ceased to be president of Iraq. It was a done deal.'
Yet the hawkish neo-conservatives at the Pentagon were still fighting hard to avoid the UN route, which would require a narrowing of focus on to WMDs. The crunch came at a summit at Camp David on September 7, 2002, when, most unusually, not only Bush but the neo-con vice president Dick Cheney met Blair. Cheney's role, Meyer said, was solely to try to persuade Bush not to go to the UN.
In desperation, Blair, according to another White House official, told Bush and Cheney that he could be ousted at the Labour conference later that month if Bush ignored the UN. Afterwards, the official said, he and his colleagues pored over the party's constitution, discovering that it was most unlikely that this threat would materialise.
But by then it was too late: a week after the summit, Bush spoke at the UN General Assembly, and announced America would be seeking what became Resolution 1442 - the resolution that, in Lord Goldsmith's eyes, allowed British soldiers to kill Iraqis without being prosecuted for murder.
But not all who once saw Blair as a friend have forgiven him. 'Blair was absolutely the reason why we went to the UN, because it was believed that his political fortunes absolutely demanded it,' said David Wurmser, formerly Cheney's chief Middle East adviser. 'It really was a political concession to Blair - and also a disastrous misjudgment.'






Read more: Secret letter to reveal new Blair war lies | Mail Online

 

[David Morton]

One Hundred mark is reached:

From Times Online
<!-- BEGIN: Module - Advert:Top --><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--//Get recommendationsvar wlrcmd= "";var WlRnd = Math.floor(Math.random()*99999999999);var WlProtocol = location.protocol.indexOf('https')>-1?'https:':'http:';var WlUrl= WlProtocol +'//rc.newsint.newscorp.individuad.net/Get/newsint/JS/GetRcmd.js?ord=' +WlRnd;document.write('<scr' + 'ipt language="JavaScript" src="' + WlUrl + '"></sc'+ 'ript>');//--></SCRIPT><SCRIPT language=JavaScript src="http://rc.newsint.newscorp.individuad.net/Get/newsint/JS/GetRcmd.js?ord=97701987658"></SCRIPT><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--//Retrieve yaoo Cookie Valuevar yahoo = "no";var IsYahoo="no";if (GetQueryString("yahoo")=="yes" || get_cookie('YH') == "yes") IsYahoo="yes";if (IsYahoo == "yes" || get_cookie('YH') == 'open') {set_cookie ("YH", "yes", "", "" );yahoo = "yes";} else {set_cookie ("YH", "no", "", "" );yahoo = "no";}window.onunload = setYahooCookie;//--></SCRIPT><!-- For Travel Search --><!--SECTIONarameter parameter="dart.server" /--><!-- END: Module - Advert:Top -->
December 7, 2009


British soldier becomes the 100th to die in Afghanistan this year



<!-- END: Module - Main Heading --><!-- BEGIN: M24 Article Headline with landscape image (d) --><SCRIPT type=text/javascript src="/tol/js/m24-image-browser.js"></SCRIPT><!-- BEGIN: Module - M24 Article Headline with landscape image (e) --><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--/* Global variables that are used for "image browsing". Used on article pages to rotate the images of a story. */var sImageBrowserImagePath = '';var aArticleImages = new Array();var aImageDescriptions = new Array();var aImageEnlargeLink = new Array();var aImageEnlargePopupWidth = '500';var aImageEnlargePopupHeight = '500';var aImagePhotographer = new Array();var nSelectedArticleImage = 0;var i=0;var aImageAltText= new Array();//--></SCRIPT><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--aArticleImages = '/multimedia/archive/00640/funeral_mason_640498a.jpg';//--></SCRIPT><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--aImageDescriptions = "The recent funeral of a corporal killed in Afghanistan" ;aImageDescriptions = aImageDescriptions.replace(/&quot;/g,"\"");//--></SCRIPT><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--aImagePhotographer = "David Cheskin/PA" ;aImagePhotographer = aImagePhotographer.replace(/&quot;/g,"\"");//--> </SCRIPT><!--Don't Display undifined test for credit --><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--aImageAltText = "The coffin of Corporal Thomas Mason is carried from Trinity Parish Church, in Cowdenbeath, following his funeral" ; aImageAltText = aImageAltText.replace(/&quot;/g,"\"");//--> </SCRIPT><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--aImageEnlargeLink = '/multimedia/archive/00640/funeral_mason_640498a.jpg';i=i+1;//--></SCRIPT>

<!-- Remove following <div> to not show photographer information -->(David Cheskin/PA)



<!-- Remove following <div> to not show image description -->The recent funeral of a corporal killed in Afghanistan



<!-- Remove following <div> to not show enlarge option --><!--


--><SCRIPT type=text/javascript><!--fCreateImageBrowser(nSelectedArticleImage,'landscape',"/tol/");//--> </SCRIPT>


<!-- END: Module - M24 Article Headline with landscape image (e) --><!--CMA user Call Diffrenet Variation Of Image --><!-- BEGIN: M24 Article Headline with landscape image (d) --><SCRIPT type=text/javascript src="/tol/js/m24-image-browser.js"></SCRIPT><!-- BEGIN: Module - M24 Article Headline with landscape image (d) --><!-- Print Author name associated with the article --><!-- Print Author name from By Line associated with the article -->Johnny McDevitt


<!-- BEGIN: M19 - Article tools -->

• 9 Comments

<SCRIPT type=text/javascript>gSiteLife.Recommend("ExternalResource", "6947885","http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/Afghanistan/article6947885.ece");</SCRIPT>Recommend? (5)




<!--
--><!-- END: M19 - Article tools -->



<!-- END: Module - M24 Article Headline with landscape image (d) --><!-- BEGIN: Module - Main Article --><!-- Check the Article Type and display accordingly--><!-- Print Author image associated with the Author--><!-- Print the body of the article--><STYLE type=text/css>div#related-article-links p a, div#related-article-links p a:visited {color:#06c;} </STYLE><!-- Pagination --><!--Display article with page breaks -->The British death toll in Afghanistan for 2009 reached 100 today after a soldier from The Royal Anglian Regiment was killed in Helmand.
The soldier died from small arms fire in the Nad-e Ali area this afternoon. Next of kin have been informed.
Lieutenant Colonel David Wakefield, a spokesman for Task Force Helmand, said: “It is with great sadness I must confirm that a soldier from the 1st Battalion, The Royal Anglian Regiment, was shot and killed in Helmand Province this afternoon. He was one of us, one of our fellow soldiers, and we will remember him.”
The total number of British service personnel who have died since the start of operations in Afghanistan in 2001 now stands at 237.
<!--#include file="m63-article-related-attachements.html"--><!-- BEGIN: Module - M63 - Article Related Attachements --><SCRIPT type=text/javascript src="/tol/js/picture-gallery.js"></SCRIPT><SCRIPT type=text/javascript>function slideshowPopUp(url){pictureGalleryPopupPic(url);return false;}</SCRIPT><!-- BEGIN: Comment Teaser Module --><!-- END: Comment Teaser Module --><!-- BEGIN: Module - M63 - Article Related Package --><!-- END: Module - M63 - Article Related Package -->Related Links

• Keep away from our memorials, town tells MPs

<FORM method=post name=relatedLinksform action=""></FORM>

• Guardsman survives brushes with death

<FORM method=post name=relatedLinksform action=""></FORM>

• US helicopter surge to aid British troops

<FORM method=post name=relatedLinksform action=""></FORM>

<!-- BEGIN: POLL --><!--This block will execute if an article of type Poll is attached--><!-- END : POLL --><!-- BEGIN: DEBATE--><!-- END: DEBATE-->


<!-- END: Module - M63 - Article Related Attachements --><!-- Call Wide Article Attachment Module --><!--TEMPLATE:call file="wideArticleAttachment.jsp" /-->Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, Chief of the Defence Staff, said that 2009 has been the 'toughest' since the start of operations in 2001.
Sir Jock said: “Our people face a difficult and dangerous task in Afghanistan, and 2009 has been a particularly challenging year.
“Each death is a sad loss, and we mourn every one. We remember those who have given their lives, the bereaved families and friends who are left behind, and all those who have been injured.
“We also remember, though, what they have achieved through their sacrifice this year. Our Armed Forces have brought security to more of the population of Helmand, and have helped the Afghan National Army to develop its own capabilities to protect the people.
“There is still much to do, and there will be difficult days ahead, but our Armed Forces are making a real difference, and are building the basis for enduring success in Afghanistan.”
Gordon Brown said his thoughts were with the families and friends of all the 100 British personnel who have died this year.
He said: “We will never forget those who have died fighting for our country and we must also honour their memory
"Today we mourn together the 100th British fatality in Afghanistan in 2009."
Bob Ainsworth, the Defence Secretary, said it had been a “challenging year for our Armed Forces in Afghanistan.
“My thoughts are with the family and friends of those brave servicemen and women who have lost their lives in the line of duty there, this year and throughout the mission,” he said.
“All of them are heroes and, in paying our respects and making our tributes, I believe we must keep at the forefront of our minds why our people are in Afghanistan and the progress and achievements they have and continue to make alongside our international partners.
“Our presence in Afghanistan is vital in preventing it from once again becoming a haven for terrorists who would seek to threaten the UK. And, in taking the fight to the insurgents, providing security and hope for the Afghan people and building up their own security forces in ever greater numbers, we will create a stable country that will be able to stand on its own two feet.”
General Sir David Richards, Chief of the General Staff, said: “The death of this brave soldier is a huge loss to his family and friends.
“For those of us in the Army, whilst we grieve for a fallen comrade, his loss hardens our determination to succeed.
“The temptation to judge this essential campaign by casualties alone undervalues the tremendous efforts of our forces and our allies, and the progress they are making.”

 

[Pete McCluskey.]

Gordon Brown snubbed by wounded. Gordon Brown snubbed by soldiers' 'curtain' protest - Times Online

 

[David Morton]

Royal Mail Recall

Royal Mail created a stamp with a picture of the
Prime Minister of Great Britain ... Gordon Brown


The stamp was not sticking to envelopes.
This enraged the Prime Minister, who demanded a full investigation.

After a month of testing and spending of 1.1million, a special commission presented the following findings:

1. The stamp is in perfect order.

2. There is nothing wrong with the adhesive.

3. People are just spitting on the wrong side of the stamp

 

[David Morton]

A political post. Hide your eyes if you don't like it - who ever you are.
From the Daily Telegraph - who inititially published the start of this torid expenses affair:


MPs' expenses: new receipts published by House of Commons

Details of MPs' expenses claims for the last year have been posted online by the House of Commons authorities.



By Rosa Prince, Political Correspondent
Published: 7:43AM GMT 10 Dec 2009

Photo: REUTERS


Covering the financial year 2008/9 and the start of 2009/10, the expenses data published online show that the authorities are continuing to redact full information about MPs' addresses, which led The Telegraph to obtain evidence of some of the worst abuses of the system, including claims for phantom mortgages, in the expenses disclosures earlier this year.
However for the first time they do indicate which MPs have "flipped" their second home designation.
<!-- BEFORE ACI -->
Related Articles

• <LI class=bullet sizcache="30" sizset="43">Picture sessions on expenses amid leadership rumours
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="30" sizset="44">Brian Cox to play House of Commons Speaker Michael Martin in BBC drama about MPs' expenses
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="30" sizset="45">MPs' expenses: Helen Goodman claimed £600 for husband's office advice
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="30" sizset="46">Climate Change Secretary's 831 pints of bottle water
  
  
  <LI class=bullet sizcache="30" sizset="47">MPs' expenses: trolley dash for Harriet Harman
  
• MPs' expenses: Stewart Jackson says people in constituency are 'whingers and moaners'

These include Douglas Hogg, the former Tory Cabinet minister whose claims became notorious after he included the cost of cleaning the moat at his country mansion in Lincolnshire on his expenses.
Keith Vaz, Labour chairman of the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, is also shown to have switched his second home claims between houses in London and his Leicester constituency.
Flipping homes is not in breach of the House of Commons rules.
The published claims, which are estimated to include a quarter of a million receipts, reveal that David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, was sent a final reminder threatening court action for an unpaid council tax bill.
After an 11th-hour U-turn, the totals claimed by each MP in 2008/9 and the first quarter of 2009/10 will be published later today.
Senior MPs had initially planned to withhold the headline figures until after an extensive process of repayments had been completed in January.
That would allow any repayments made following an audit by former mandarin Sir Thomas Legg to be taken into account.
That idea was attacked yesterday by Tory leader David Cameron, who insisted the totals had to be published to show the public that politicians ''get'' the need for transparency.
The Members Estimate Committee, which is chaired by Speaker John Bercow and runs House affairs, decided later to publish the global figures after all.
A spokeswoman acknowledged that the move would be more transparent. Revised figures, taking repayments into account, will be released in January.

 

[David Morton]

BEWARE Political BEWARE Political BEWARE political BEWARE pillock BEWARE:


MPs' expenses - Telegraph

 

[David Morton]

Be warned. Quite political if it happens in your area:
In the UK ,the roads and the condition of them is invariably the responsibility
of the local counties and even the councils . The people who work in these
departments are basically civil servants and so effectively there wages are paid by
local taxes. ie you and me.....
During the recent inclement weather in the UK the condition of our roads have deteriorated quite remarkably which, I would suggest but I cannot prove it, is a result of the stupid repair option of Suface dressing (the cheapest way of hiding the road problems by spraying wet tar and spreading gravel then letting the traffic roll it all down). Nothing is ever done - especially here in Buckinghamshire - with the underlying problems and now we have main roads that even the former East Germany would not accept.
Now, some of these wankers who work in these departments think the damage to the roads should remain and not be repaired. Get this - one council in Essex thinks the damage on the roads is effectively a traffic calming measure. Tell that to my yougest daughter who works for a minimum wage and needs a car to go to work. Her last MOT test needed two rear springs,a damper, and a newish tyre to be replaced on a 3 year old car.
When will they ever learn. Cheapskating is not the cheapest option. Surface dressing
should be banned,

 

[Ian Anderson]

Dave

I actually hear that story on the BBC News this morning

I agree real stupidity

But an even better one - have you noticed that the amazing speed control bumps that breed and are damn near unmanagable in a GT40 have the most amazing tarmac surfaces that have not broken up at all! Perhaps if they used the same technology on the normal road surface we would not need to complain

Ian

 

[David Morton]

Don't start on Speed bumps. Our Volvo s80 needs a new steering rack, the second one, and new front near side ball joints before the next MOT. All down to speed bumps. Write to your council about all of it - epecially the speed bumps and how do you manage to know where they are in the snow. Traffic calming - bollocks - it makes my blood boil.

 

[Pete McCluskey.]

Don't start on Speed bumps. Our Volvo s80 needs a new steering rack, the second one, and new front near side ball joints before the next MOT. All down to speed bumps. Write to your council about all of it - especially the speed bumps and how do you manage to know where they are in the snow. Traffic calming - bollocks - it makes my blood boil.

In Oz traffic calming speed bumps normally occur because righteous citizens complain about people taking back streets to work to try and avoid traffic congestion. Some speed bumps have disappeared as rapidly as they appeared because "The Lads" have taking to blowing their horns each time they encounter them, particularly in the wee hours of the morning. Maybe you should start a similar custom in the U.K.? :evil:

 

[David Morton]

Brilliant. I think I might also wire up a switch to my number plate lights and then start a campaign.

 

[David Morton]

Political ? - You betcha. Hide your eyes who ever you are:

British soldier killed in Afghanistan, bringing death toll to 250

A British soldier has been killed in an explosion in Afghanistan, bringing the toll of British dead to 250 since the start of the campaign, close to the number who lost their lives in the Falklands War.



<!-- Make sure there is no whitespoace at the end of the bline -->By Heidi Blake
Published: 9:06PM GMT 22 Jan 2010


The soldier from A Company 4 Rifles, who was serving as part of 3 Rifles Battle Group, was on foot patrol when he was killed by the blast in Sangin, in central Helmand Province, on Friday afternoon. Next of kin have been informed.
Lieutenant Colonel David Wakefield, spokesman for Task Force Helmand, said: "It is my sad duty to inform you that a British soldier from A Company 4 Rifles, serving as part of 3 Rifles Battle Group, was killed by an explosion near Sangin in Helmand Province earlier today.
<!-- BEFORE ACI -->
Related Articles

• <!--ACI--><LI sizset="41" sizcache="30">Soldier killed in Afghanistan brings death toll to 186
  
  <!--ACI--><LI sizset="42" sizcache="30">Soldier killed in Afghanistan explosion bringing death toll to 185
  
  <!--ACI--><LI sizset="43" sizcache="30">Six soldiers killed in Afghanistan on Britain's bloodiest day named
  
  <!--ACI--><LI sizset="44" sizcache="30">Afghanistan: eight soldiers die in one day
  
  <!--ACI-->
• British soldier killed by landmine in Afghanistan

"He was on a foot patrol, part of a larger operation to provide security for the local population in Sangin, when the explosion happened. His courage and the sacrifice he has made will not be forgotten."
The soldier's family have asked for a 24 hour period of grace before further details are released.
UK forces are still facing fierce opposition in the Taliban stronghold of southern Afghanistan. Roadside bombs, or improvised explosive devices (IEDs), are becoming increasingly widely used by the insurgents and have claimed most of the British lives lost.
Britain has suffered more deaths in Afghanistan than any other country apart from the United States.
UK troops have been hit particularly hard because they are concentrated in Helmand, an insurgent stronghold and major centre of opium production which is the most dangerous province in the country.
British forces were first officially deployed to Afghanistan in November 2001, when Royal Marines helped secure Bagram airfield as part of the US-led invasion following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Several thousand more troops followed but the human cost remained relatively low until Britain sent a taskforce to Helmand in spring 2006.
The death toll soared last year as UK troops launched major missions over the summer to provide security in Helmand ahead of August's presidential and provincial elections.
There were 39 British deaths in the Afghan conflict in 2006, 42 in 2007, 51 in 2008 and 108 in 2009.
By contrast 179 UK personnel died in Iraq between 2003 and 2009 and 255 died in the 1982 Falklands War.

DM again -
In the UK,Please Please write to your MP to stop this stupid waste of lives. The USA has now lost nearly for times as many.
iCasualties | Operation Enduring Freedom | Afghanistan

 

[David Morton]

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=700 align=center border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>

</TD></TR><TR><TD height=114><TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=680 align=center border=0><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top width=296>

</TD><TD vAlign=top width=384><TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="95%" align=right border=0><TBODY><TR><TD align=left>
This is a NON-POLITICAL personal plea for your help with something very special...
February 12th is the 21st birthday of a very special young man, and this man deserves your support and attention. His name is Fusilier Tom James, and you can read all about Tom by clicking here.
I am asking everyone that reads this Email to send Tom a 21st birthday card.
This is your chance to let this brave young man know that you care and that you wish him all the best. It's nothing to do with politics but everything to do with humanity, appreciation and respect.
Please keep any messages of support and well wishes completely non-political.
It is Tom's birthday in a weeks time and time is not on our side. So please make every effort to send your card as soon as possible to the address below;
Fusilier Tom James
PO Box 5057
Nuneaton
CV11 9FP
Many thanks for your support!


</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR><TR><TD>

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>