Tuesday 31 October 2017

Parliament and sexual harassment and the last of George Gently


These days I am dividing my time between trying to influence the kind of future my children and grandchildren will experience as British citizens and my ongoing work of more than decade chronicling my experience in written form together with visual, audio material and documentation, including publishing some of the created written material, and where part of the ongoing work is to measure experience against present experience. For this reason, I halted the daily Blog writing unless an event occurs where I feel compelled to do so

Unexpectedly, Monday 30th of October 2017 became a potentially significant day in my quest to help create a better future as well as unravel what happened in the past.

Given the publicity about sexual harassment involving Members and staff of the House of Commons, the weekend statement of zero tolerance by the Leader of the Opposition and a published letter from the Prime Minister, I assumed there would an urgent statement in the House of Commons in the afternoon and on checking saw that it would be made after the planned questioning of a Ministerial Department at around 3.30.

What I had  not anticipated is that with the authority of the Prime Minister and Opposition Leader, the Speaker not only made a Zero tolerance statement but had already initiated action to ensure that there was one agreed and effective system covering everyone who visited or worked at the Palace of Westminster, and covered all the Members of the House of Commons and the noble Barons(Baronesses) in the House of Lords who operate in effect as one person  independent  businesses in terms of the staff they employ, albeit paid for the greater part by the state and by those who  help fund politicians and pay for staff as well as political campaigning.

The Speaker had already met that morning with the Leader of the Commons and Harriet Harman who has served for four decades as a Member of Parliament, and mentioned that he was having further meetings later, and meeting the authorities that govern the House of Lords on Tuesday morning. The intention is to have the system in place within days when it can be expected it will be presented to both House as a fait accompli although it is presumed there will have to be a vote and appropriate funding earmarked as the intention is to provide for training, monitoring and an independent complaint system in which those making allegations will remain anonymous unless there is reference of an allegation to the police when the normal due process will apply.

It was also evident that because that a similar list was being compiled in relation to Labour Party politicians in Parliament and John Mann the Member for Bassetlaw and several Labour Members hoped the new approach would be extended by the political parties to their constituency offices and throughout local government generally. The ambition is to move from woefully lagging good practice in other settings to becoming leaders in changing the culture where sexually harassment, bullying, racism, homophobic and sexist behaviour is no longer tolerated and to which I was add drunkenness.

Most people will agree that this development is overdue although it should not be used as a means for scalp hunting political or personal enemies and there was a hint of this when one Tory member used the occasion to hit out against John McDonald and later a news broadcast the issue of the Member of Parliament for Sheffield was raised and separately the influence of Momentum on the selection of Parliamentary candidates. There is risk that the issue will be used by those who want to end the power of the Brexiteers and hold a second referendum and by those who want a hard Brexit, in order for the Tories to try and stay in power or Labour to gain power by not rocking  the boat and I suspect everyone will be in accord that everything should be done to prevent the kind of media storm around the expenses scandal which brought all politicians into greater disrepute than ever previously and where some believe was one factor in the Leave referendum vote and the upsurge in physical attacks and threats to politicians. 

My sense that the compilation and circulation of the unredacted spreadsheet list of 36 Conservative Members of  the House of Commons  marks a significant moment in achieving a lasting cultural and regime  change appeared reinforced when the Prime Minister who sat throughout the Urgent Question statement and questioning, occasionally nodding in assent, appeared to have been stunned and shattered  by the development and the potential  impact on being able to hold the government  together over Brexit, lose  her position and the  inevitable consequential General Election would bring a socialist orientated Labour party into power under Jeremy Corbyn.  The possibility that Mr Corbyn could be asked to try and form an administration without a General Election also remains a possibility if Mrs May is defeated on a vote of confidence and must admit she can no longer govern.

Later in the day arising from news programmes, including BBC 2 Newsnight it became possible how the situation has arisen. The list has been compiled by Tory Party staff employed at Westminster. A self-described young journalist (25) (I believe from the Telegraph which was the lead paper in the Expenses scandal) said on Newsnight that she had been working with Parliamentary staff and investigating the problem at Westminster for some time. It would be surprising if the all Party Parliamentary group on sexual equality has not been actively involved and several participants spoke during the urgent question including its chairman co chairman Bernard Jenkin who also appeared on Newsnight with Diane Abbot the other who was also present. Another group with significant interest is that on Women in Parliament.

 I have previous referred to the little known among the wider public existence of these all-party interest groups with members from both Houses of Parliament and where the secretarial function is often provided by outside agencies. There are over 100 groups concerned with individual countries such as Spain, Gibraltar and the British Overseas Territories which also includes Gibraltar which are of special interest to me but surprisingly not Malta and well over 300 concerned with subject group interests where a dozen of concern in relation to my work, although surprisingly that on child abuse is no longer on the register.

The issue of registration, and therefore information publication is important, and my present understanding is that unregistered groups and gatherings for specific purposes do also occurs in addition to the raft of Select Committees, Legislative committee of both Houses. Although it is significant is that the government has so far refused to re-establish the Joint Committee on the security services since the recent General Election although the all-party Interest Group continues to function. It is likely that the Government does not want Labour to have control of this committee, does not want individual Labour Members to be nominated or does not want some issues about current security activities to be raised and where I am engaged in a substantive work related to my own experience which refers to disclosures in the authorised History of MI5 which ended with the departure of Mrs Thatcher from office and the emergence of digital spying.

In between Chanel Four News and BBC News at 10 and BBC 2 Newsday I had looked forward all day to what appears to be the last episode in the series of Inspector George Gently based on the books originally set in Norfolk but in the TV series was moved to Northumbria and Durham. The final episode of the two to be shown in the eighth series was postponed because it concerned potential rise to power of a left wing anti-United States Member of Parliament for the Labour party and potentially into Premiership in 60’s where the series is set   The main ingredients of the final programme is the attempt supposed in hr National Interest to attempt to frame the Member of Parliament fir a  murder  he did not committee  but where had been blackmailed to pay a corrupt senior police officer go remove from the file a witness statement and autopsy  report that the victim had been murdered. When Gently proves the murder was committed by someone else who confesses, he and the head of a Met based corruption it is put under great pressure to continue to pursue the MP. It transpires the reason behind the move is because the MP has established a consortium with European and private money to establish a civil airport, a container   port and a new road structure which in fact could be said to resemble Tees Port and Tees airport with the dual carriage A19 and the Links to the AIM.  The National interest is that the Americans wanted the site for one of their basis. Meanwhile his colleagues taking over when Gently retires later in the month investigate what is shown to be the murder of non-union labour who turns out to be an undercover journalist concerned about government involvement with the company using the non-labour and where, one must surprisingly the journalist had found evidence of the companies promised involvement in the USA airbase proposition. The third element is the discovery that hit and rum driver who killed his wife   was special forces now used   by the secret services to work on arm’s length or off the books action. Gently’s non cooperation led to him being executed and his second in command soon to take over as Chief Inspector always on the right of the Tory Party and establishment supporter sets about finding the evidence on the Gently’s killer despite having been told before his death that he should walk away.
It is sometimes said that real life can sometimes be stranger than fiction and there

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