Excellent.
H/t Old Holborn.
Sunday, 14 March 2010
Sunday morning titter
It really did happen. In Worthing.
A bag-snatcher on a bicycle pinched a bag of poo from an elderly dog-walker in Worthing.
A bag-snatcher on a bicycle pinched a bag of poo from an elderly dog-walker in Worthing.
The thief rode past the pensioner near the Post Office in High Street, Tarring, and grabbed a bag she had been using to clean up after her dog.
A spokeswoman for Sussex Police said: "A male on his pushbike came past her and snatched the bag, perhaps thinking that there was something of value inside.
"The lady was not harmed and clearly the thief stole nothing of value."
Well, I'm not sure about that. What if he managed to sell it in the bars and clubs of Worthing, with the sales line: "Hey, I've got some really good shit, man"?
The suspect was described as a black teenager.
I thought they weren't allowed to say that these days?
Some of the comments to the story are priceless, by the way.
Helmet Law
The Filthy Smoker, guesting on Devil's Kitchen, has a good rant about liberty and proposals for minimum pricing of alcohol. He brings into the argument a speech in Parliament by Ivan Lawrence MP in 1979, when the House was debating the introduction of compulsory seat-belt wearing. The law on the compulsory wearing of crash-helmets by motorcyclists was passed in 1973, and the seat belt law raised similar personal liberty concerns.
I would always wear a helmet on a bike, for reasons of comfort and efficiency, as well as safety. And I learned to drive wearing a seat belt (even though it was not compulsory then), and I don't feel comfortable in a car unless I am wearing one. But I don't believe they should be compulsory. I agreed with both measures at the time, on the basis of 'regrettable necessity', I think, but now I have changed my mind. The speech from Ivan Lawrence, which I quote here in full (source) sums up why, and it's worth reading. Emphasis is mine.
I am wholly in favour of seat belts, of encouraging people to wear them, and of insurance companies and courts applying sanctions to encourage their use, but I am against the Bill because it abuses the criminal law and the criminal process. Why should any citizen be forced by criminal sanction to wear something which could in some circumstances kill him? That has never been a legitimate principle of our criminal law. Why should anyone be forced by criminal sanction not to hurt himself? That was never, at least until the crash helmet legislation, a principle of our criminal law. Where will it end? Why make driving without a seat belt a crime because it could save a thousand lives, when we could stop cigarette smoking by the criminal law and save 20,000 lives a year? Why not stop by making it criminal the drinking of alcohol, which would save hundreds of thousands of lives?
When will we realise that laws not only cannot cure every evil but are frequently counter-productive? Here the harm done to our criminal process may well exceed any good that the law can do. We can see that in advance, so why do we persist with it? If there was a law which made it a criminal offence to smoke or to drink alcohol, neither of which, of course, do I advocate, just think of the amount of bereavement that would be saved, the number of hospital beds that could be put to better use, and the time and energy of our doctors and nurses which could be more usefully employed. Yet we do not consider doing that. What is it about the motorist that requires him to be singled out and subjected to this sort of legislation?
The Bill would also be an abuse of our criminal law because it would be an abuse of our criminal process. We can foretell that there will be widespread evasion of a law such as this. If there was 20 per cent. evasion among the 26 million people with cars, that would involve millions of British subjects evading the law. That could only drag the law further into disrepute. The Bill would irritate the police—and they are the defenders of the liberties of the subject. How many times would they be forced to stop motorists who would subsequently be found to be exempt from the seat belt law because they were too big, too small, too pregnant or too disabled, or because they fell within one of the other exemption categories? How irritating would this be to motorists who are stopped in these circumstances, and how much harm would this do to the relationship between the police and the public?
How much harm would it do to the legal system to have our courts even more overcrowded than they are now? Would not people feel that the legal system was once again failing and that the system of justice was yet again slowing down?
The harm to justice caused by this legislation will be far more substantial than we think. When will we realise that every little infringement of liberty, for whatever good cause, diminishes the whole concept of liberty? If life is the only criterion, why did we sacrifice so many millions of lives in two world wars? Why did we not in the Second World War lie down and say"Because millions of people may die, we should let our liberty be taken away before the onset of the Nazis "? The answer is that more important than lives is the concept of liberty.
Since I have been in the House I have seen the cogent arguments and the telling pleas of hon. Members on both sides of the House persuading and succeeding in persuading the House that it is only a very little piece more of liberty that we are withdrawing and for such great benefits and advantages. As a result we have far fewer of our freedoms now than was ever dreamed possible a few years ago. In the end we shall find that our liberties have all but disappeared. It might be possible to save more lives in Britain by this measure—and by countless other measures. But I do not see the virtue in saving more lives by legislation which will produce in the end a Britain where nobody wants to live.
In retrospect, that was a very far-sighted speech. At one time, the criminal law was used to prevent people from harming each other, and in that it is completely justified. Today, the criminal law is used to 'protect people from themselves' and even to prevent people offending other people's feelings. It's interesting to put your mind back to 1979 and see how differently we regarded the law in those far-off days. The remarks about tobacco-smoking (and now alcohol use) were prescient, too.
I would always wear a helmet on a bike, for reasons of comfort and efficiency, as well as safety. And I learned to drive wearing a seat belt (even though it was not compulsory then), and I don't feel comfortable in a car unless I am wearing one. But I don't believe they should be compulsory. I agreed with both measures at the time, on the basis of 'regrettable necessity', I think, but now I have changed my mind. The speech from Ivan Lawrence, which I quote here in full (source) sums up why, and it's worth reading. Emphasis is mine.
I am wholly in favour of seat belts, of encouraging people to wear them, and of insurance companies and courts applying sanctions to encourage their use, but I am against the Bill because it abuses the criminal law and the criminal process. Why should any citizen be forced by criminal sanction to wear something which could in some circumstances kill him? That has never been a legitimate principle of our criminal law. Why should anyone be forced by criminal sanction not to hurt himself? That was never, at least until the crash helmet legislation, a principle of our criminal law. Where will it end? Why make driving without a seat belt a crime because it could save a thousand lives, when we could stop cigarette smoking by the criminal law and save 20,000 lives a year? Why not stop by making it criminal the drinking of alcohol, which would save hundreds of thousands of lives?
When will we realise that laws not only cannot cure every evil but are frequently counter-productive? Here the harm done to our criminal process may well exceed any good that the law can do. We can see that in advance, so why do we persist with it? If there was a law which made it a criminal offence to smoke or to drink alcohol, neither of which, of course, do I advocate, just think of the amount of bereavement that would be saved, the number of hospital beds that could be put to better use, and the time and energy of our doctors and nurses which could be more usefully employed. Yet we do not consider doing that. What is it about the motorist that requires him to be singled out and subjected to this sort of legislation?
The Bill would also be an abuse of our criminal law because it would be an abuse of our criminal process. We can foretell that there will be widespread evasion of a law such as this. If there was 20 per cent. evasion among the 26 million people with cars, that would involve millions of British subjects evading the law. That could only drag the law further into disrepute. The Bill would irritate the police—and they are the defenders of the liberties of the subject. How many times would they be forced to stop motorists who would subsequently be found to be exempt from the seat belt law because they were too big, too small, too pregnant or too disabled, or because they fell within one of the other exemption categories? How irritating would this be to motorists who are stopped in these circumstances, and how much harm would this do to the relationship between the police and the public?
How much harm would it do to the legal system to have our courts even more overcrowded than they are now? Would not people feel that the legal system was once again failing and that the system of justice was yet again slowing down?
The harm to justice caused by this legislation will be far more substantial than we think. When will we realise that every little infringement of liberty, for whatever good cause, diminishes the whole concept of liberty? If life is the only criterion, why did we sacrifice so many millions of lives in two world wars? Why did we not in the Second World War lie down and say"Because millions of people may die, we should let our liberty be taken away before the onset of the Nazis "? The answer is that more important than lives is the concept of liberty.
Since I have been in the House I have seen the cogent arguments and the telling pleas of hon. Members on both sides of the House persuading and succeeding in persuading the House that it is only a very little piece more of liberty that we are withdrawing and for such great benefits and advantages. As a result we have far fewer of our freedoms now than was ever dreamed possible a few years ago. In the end we shall find that our liberties have all but disappeared. It might be possible to save more lives in Britain by this measure—and by countless other measures. But I do not see the virtue in saving more lives by legislation which will produce in the end a Britain where nobody wants to live.
In retrospect, that was a very far-sighted speech. At one time, the criminal law was used to prevent people from harming each other, and in that it is completely justified. Today, the criminal law is used to 'protect people from themselves' and even to prevent people offending other people's feelings. It's interesting to put your mind back to 1979 and see how differently we regarded the law in those far-off days. The remarks about tobacco-smoking (and now alcohol use) were prescient, too.
English speakers not required
There is a huge fuss (mainly in the Daily Mail, for whom 'huge fuss' is the default setting) about the decision of a firm in East Anglia to employ only Polish speakers:
British workers have been turned away from jobs in a local factory – for not speaking Polish.
Cooked meat manufacturer Forza AW effectively barred anyone but Poles for applying for jobs on its production line in East Anglia by insisting all staff speak the language fluently.
This is manna from heaven for the 'forriners taking all our jobs' brigade. It certainly does look, from a social point of view, that a tipping-point has been reached, where it is more efficient for an employer to conduct all of his workplace business in a foreign language because he has so few native-born workers.
It's only a problem if you assume that everyone has the right to work wherever they like, regardless of the needs of employers to run profitable businesses. If it suits Forza AW to employ only Polish speakers, why shouldn't they have the right to do so?
I would go further. If they want to employ only women, or only men, or only people under the age of 30, or only people with blue eyes, why shouldn't they? It's their business, and it should be no concern of anyone else who they choose to employ. If you don't like it, set up your own business and employ your favoured group yourself.
No-one has the 'right' to a job where they please. You must have a skill-set that someone wants to exchange for a wage, and if the employers local to you want a skill-set you haven't got, then either acquire the skills, or move somewhere else.
If I lived in East Anglia and I wanted a job packing sausages, I would be learning Polish fast.
Footnote: a spokesman for the Government's Equalities Office said "Under the 1976 Race Relations Act, unless there is a genuine need for a worker to speak a particular language it is against the law to require that they should do so as a condition of employing them." The company seem to have the British mindset pretty well sussed, as they respond with a trump card: "you have to be fluent because the health and safety training is all done in Polish.’
One-nil.Saturday, 13 March 2010
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