Voting with voter ID

 I voted yesterday. Fortunately, I carry by photo ID in my wallet as I might have forgotten otherwise.  I did try to see if my Labour Party ID would be accepted, but it is not photographic, so it was not. 

Apparently, some who knew better had forgotten theirs, but they had the time and means to go back and collect it before returning to vote.  That is not the case with all.  I voted before I went to work and would not have had the time to vote if I had not done so, or the time to collect by voter ID as I had to get into work by a certain time.  Others had issues with voting which they were not able to overcome.

While the Conservatives point out that Voter ID is in use in Europe, carrying forms of ID is the norm in many European nations, whereas this is not the case in the UK. The idea of compulsory ID cards was discussed in the past, but has been rejected due to concerns over civil liberties. 

Conservatives have mentioned that this is in use in Northern Ireland, but the electorate there wanted this due to a perception that electoral fraud was taking place.  In Northern Ireland, the tongue-in-cheek slogan "Vote early, vote often" has underlined the fact that unscrupulous individuals were always on the lookout for opportunities to cheat. Allegations existed that both sides engaged in this, but one was more prolific than the other and people would turn up to vote to find that someone had stolen their vote! When challenged about this taking place on the mainland, Conservatives have not been able to cite such examples taking place on as significant a scale.

Another thing that is mentioned by Conservative supporters is that we need ID to collect packages from the post office. But the many forms of ID used in such examples are not acceptable to vote. I have collected parcels with my bank card on many an occasion but am not allowed to vote using the same proof, and photographic ID is not needed to open a bank account. 

I suspect many who did not vote in these elections will find out the hard way that voter ID will be needed in the next General Election and we know that those who are more likely to vote Conservative are more likely to have acceptable ID.

Rosie Holt: The Woman’s Hour

My wife and I have gone out a bit this bank holiday weekend. On Friday we went to a comedy show at The Mercury Theatre, on Saturday we went to see Rosie Holt and last night we went to a quiz night at a local pub. 

My son has been out with his friends, and while a trip to the visiting fair was being considered, he and his friends stayed in town instead. 

My daughter has had her first paycheque as she is now working part time where I work. She joked that her views on taxation are now to change and she is going to vote Conservative when she gets the chance. At least I think she was joking. Anyway, she now has enough money to buy her friends decent birthday presents. Not that shopping is on her mind as she has been enjoying the sun by revising in the garden.

I had my annual appraisal and one of my goals was to beat my walking target from last year, which has meant that I have been trying to walk more since then and have been using the weekend to do so. Yesterday my daughter and I walked about with Leia in a new area for the three of us.

Going back to the comedy, Kate McGann started us off on Friday, introducing Jamie D’Souza and then Michael Odewale. My wife had picked seats at the front and while all the front row were asked questions by Kate McGann, it was in a nice way which still got a few laughs. That was a good night and set the bar for Saturday.

On Saturday we went to visit a friend in Ipswich before the comedy show. The town was buzzing as Ipswich had just won promotion back to the old second division. I liked the show more than my wife, but we both did enjoy it. I was surprised to find that I have been blocked on Twitter by Sooz Kempner, for what I do not know. But both were great and the show is worth watching if you are interested in politics and like Rosie Holt.

Now to look up holidays for later this month…

Artificial intelligence

 There has been debate about how artificial intelligence may replace us recently in the media. People who are concerned about this forget that at present, computers need us for energy generation. Even with renewable power, we are still needed to maintain and replace power supplies as well as work on the energy infrastructure.

 What we have to be concerned about is not killer robots, but the control of social media by such creations. We have seen the power of social media with Brexit and the election of Trump. Any form of AI can influence us using that, and that may mean setting one group of us against another. 

Is Diane Abbott a Tory Mole?

 When I made my post yesterday about St Georges Day, I had not realised what Diane Abbott had written about.  She had made another, huge gaffe.  Now the abuse that she gets based on her skin colour and her being a woman is out of order.  But the abuse she gets for her own words, that is a different thing.  Here words are below, but she has apologised for them and stated that they were a draft which she had not intended to send.

"Tomiwa Owolade claims that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people all suffer from “racism” (“Racism in Britain is not a black and white issue. It’s far more complicated”, Comment). They undoubtedly experience prejudice. This is similar to racism and the two words are often used as if they are interchangeable. 

 It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice. But they are not all their lives subject to racism. In pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus. In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships."

I understand that this was a draft, but to forget that six million Jews died due to racism in Nazi controlled Europe, let alone the antisemitism that they have faced in Britain and abroad for centuries is absurd. The Irish and Travellers face racism, though this was worse in the past in the UK.  But this racism for Travellers still exists now.  Looking at pre-civil rights America, yes, these groups were not subject to slavery on the levels that those from Africa experienced, nor were they required to sit at the back of the bus, but racism did exist for the Irish and Jews. I am not aware of Travellers facing racism in pre-civil rights America, but considering the understandable controversy over the joke by Jimmy Carr, to forget that Travellers were executed by the Nazi's based on their race is inexcusable. 

Antisemitism exists today, in the USA and in the UK, including, sadly, in the Labour Party until recently.  Action should be taken about this, and while this was a mistake, it is the level of the mistake which means stronger action needs to be taken than over the words of Angela Smith.  I guess the issue is when or if should she be allowed to have the Labour Whip returned to her.      

My statement pic.twitter.com/Wu2h4nNOvN

— Diane Abbott MP (@HackneyAbbott) April 23, 2023

Being a patriot

Being British is more than being white or ethnically British.  Our nation literally is built on immigration.  Due to this, it is hard to state who is ethnically British.  If you look up Phil The Greek, you will find that he is not ethnically British.  He was married to someone part German.  Which makes King Charles, his son less than 50% ethnically British.

Diversity has brought our great nation success in the Olympics and other areas of sport with people born and bred in our nation, as well as those who have come to our nation after birth. I am glad that we are a diverse nation and I do not want our sports teams to be ethnically British only.  

There are those who wish to divide us based on ethnicity, skin colour and our parents but by doing so, they will be saying that one of the most British of institutions, is not British. Lastly, for the record, the presenters on the featured videos, are in my opinion, British, and while I do not agree with them all the time (and one of them only some of the time), I am glad that they enrich our nation which would be so much poorer without them.

If you cannot stand the heat without being a bully, get out of the kitchen

 

Dominic Raab has resigned. Like Priti Patel, he was found to be a bully on two occasions. The other charges against him were not proven.

Conservatives have rallied round and have stated several things

1 - He was the subject of a conspiracy of Civil Service activists 

2 - He was cleared on the other charges

3 - Gordon Brown did the same (they have cited others as well)

4 - Civil servants are weak.

Basically, bullying in the workplace is wrong. The bar on what was acceptable years ago has rightly, in my view, changed. This applies to public and private sector employees. If activists are ensuring that rules are followed, what is wrong with that?

While Dominic Raab was cleared on the other charges, he was found guilty on two.  That is two too many cases of bullying. That bullying happened under Labour over 13 years ago does not make such behaviour right. The Thick Of It was a drama that showed that the levels of bullying under Labour were unacceptable.

Last of all, civil servants are not weak for being bullied. Like any employee of any organisation they should not be bullied, 

Getting shot for being lost

 Yes, another post about gun control in the USA. In my job, I have to visit people in their homes. Sometimes it can be hard to find the address, not just in new build areas where road signs are absent initially, but also in more rural areas. Most of the time I can ring for directions, but there are times that this has not been possible, or I have not been aware that I have gone to the wrong address. 

I have never been shot for this, something which happens too many times in the USA. I am aware that this is because lax gun laws are valued more than the deaths of innocent lives, and I am grateful that I do not face this risk here.