This 7 April 2016 video is called STOP CAMERON spending British taxpayers’ money on Pro EU Referendum leaflets.
By Paddy McGuffin in Britain:
We need a debate, not 9m leaflets
Saturday 9th April 2016
JOHN McDONNELL dismissed yesterday the need for the government to spend £9 million of taxpayers’ money on pro-EU leaflets.
The shadow chancellor said what was needed was a factual and reasoned debate on the issue.
Tory ministers could be dragged before Parliament to explain the spending of taxpayers’ money on the pro-EU leaflets after a petition opposing it yesterday passed the 100,000 threshold needed to trigger a debate.
A furious row has broken out after a government-produced pro-EU leaflet was sent to every household in the country, at a cost of more than £9 million.
The move was also seen as an attempt to draw attention from the ongoing row over PM David Cameron and other senior Tories’ financial affairs in the wake of the Panama Papers leak.
Downing Street claimed the propaganda campaign was a response to polling which showed 85 per cent of the public wanted more information from the government to help them make an informed choice on June 23.
However Mr McDonnell rejected this assertion, saying: “To be frank, I don’t think there’s a need for leaflets from government.
“I’m also concerned about Project Fear from all sides of this debate. All people want is straightforward, factual information which they can make up their minds on and I think we need to ensure the level of debate is about factual information, reasoned debate.
“I don’t think there’s a need for government leaflets. There’s enough out there from individual campaigns.”
Mr Cameron also faced strong criticism from within his own party over the leaflets.
Justice Secretary Michael Gove, a leading Eurosceptic, attacked the idea of taxpayers funding “one-sided propaganda” rather than the NHS after the PM insisted it was “money well spent.”
The text of the petition reads: “We, the petitioners, demand the government STOPS spending our money on biased campaigning to keep Britain inside the EU.
“The Great British public have waited since 1975 for a vote on our relationship with Brussels. No taxpayers’ money should be spent on campaign literature to keep Britain inside the EU.”
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Friday 8th April 2016
posted by Morning Star in Editorial
DAVID CAMERON’S decision to spend £9.3 million of public funds on misrepresenting the truth about the European Union is a scandal but also an admission of weakness.
Were he not feeling that the tide is turning against his side of the argument, Cameron wouldn’t have needed to act like this.
The Prime Minister claims to be responding to public demands for more information, but his one-sided pamphlet is an attempt to swamp growing opposition to an undemocratic and unaccountable burgeoning EU superstate with a tsunami of partisan propaganda.
Cameron’s pamphlet rehashes Project Fear, suggesting that three million jobs in companies trading with other EU states are at risk, even though Britain has a trade deficit with the EU, making nonsense of the idea that Brussels would cut off trade relations.
It repeats the wild assertion that negotiating Britain’s withdrawal could take a decade.
Why? It is in the interests of Britain and the remainder of the EU to come to a speedy accord to minimise economic uncertainty.
So who would have a bargaining mandate of stringing out talks for 10 years to cause trading chaos?
When Cameron stoops to suggesting that air fares for workers’ annual holidays in the sun could rise if Britain leaves the EU, he really is desperate.
The EU doesn’t set air fares. Airlines do. If they raise prices to outlandish levels, other companies will undercut them.
Cameron has to resort to childish nonsense to justify ongoing EU membership because previous claims that it would bring working people higher employment levels, better pay, pensions and working conditions and greater security have turned to rust.
No country was more pro-EU dream than the Netherlands. It was a model European country in every aspect.
But things have changed. Living conditions have deteriorated. Insecurity has increased. The “social Europe” gains proclaimed in the 1980s have been whittled away.
The dream has turned sour for the Dutch, so they have rejected the EU free trade deal with Ukraine.
The EU elite is intent on constant expansion of the bloc’s borders, disregarding its failure to harmonise relations in the wake of previous headlong enlargement.
Brussels turns a blind eye to rampant corruption in Kiev, the undemocratic banning of the Communist Party and the role of neonazi armed militias.
Why should the EU stance be surprising? It was up to its neck in instigating the Maidan 2014 coup d’etat, rejecting Ukraine’s right to have relations with both the EU and Russia and demanding all or nothing.
Greece stands today as a constant reminder that the EU prioritises the interests of private banks over working people’s standards of life.
The EU Commission and European Central Bank refused all compromises offered by Athens, steamrollering “bailout” agreements designed to rescue foreign banks over the protests of Greek working people.
Even the IMF protested that successive bailouts have left Greece with unpayable debt levels that necessitate yet more loans and associated assaults on workers’ jobs, salaries, pensions, and public services.
The same leaders who crucify the Greek people are happy to force down wages and conditions in other EU countries by means of the “posted worker” directive and case law handed down by the European Court of Justice.
The Dutch, who drank deep at the EU fountain of solidarity and internationalism, have discovered the hard way that they have been misled and they have rebelled.
In the true spirit of EU disdain for democracy, their vote will probably be ignored, emphasising the need for voters in Britain not to be seduced by Cameron’s £9.3m dodgy dossier.
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-dca7-Its-operation-desperation#.Vwp-inra44A
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Saturday 9th April 2016
posted by Morning Star in Features
The Paddy McGuffin column
Ah Panama! A country renowned the world over for four things; hats, cigars, CIA puppet regimes and, of course, rampant tax avoidance schemes as we have been so graphically reminded this week.
I say “reminded” but if one were naive enough to believe the panicked statements being issued by most of the world’s governments amid the fallout of the latest cornucopia of crass calumny and avaricious capitalist grasping, you would think this was the first they’d heard of it.
If it is supposed to be a secret it’s the worst kept one since Victoria’s.
Up until this week the most entertaining news out of Panama in the last three decades was the farcical ousting of US henchman gone rogue Manuel “pineapple face” Noriega by the CIA and his holing up in the Papal embassy in his “lucky” red underwear.
The spooks finally forced him out by blaring rock music at him 24 hours a day and then hilariously spent ages trying to work out how to prosecute him without revealing the extent of their drug-running operations.
Noriega got cocky, seeing himself having carte blanche to do what he wanted. And what he wanted was mainly to bleed the country dry, oppress any form of opposition and line his already bulging pockets with US narco money.
In his arrogance he came to believe he was invulnerable, never a good idea for a US-sponsored despot. They change them like most people change their socks.
This same arrogance and sense of entitlement has now brought the spectacular downfall of at least one head of state (Iceland) and extremely awkward conversations for many more.
The roll call of those implicated in the leaked documents is extending daily with even such, ahem, illustrious figures as Vladimir Putin, Robert Mugabe, the Saudi royal family and, of course, our own David Cameron all awkwardly caught in the spotlight.
Well Cameron is anyway, the rest of them don’t give a damn. After all squirreling away a few ill-gotten billions in an offshore trust is probably the least reprehensible thing they’ve done.
The Saudis will just execute anyone criticising them or threaten to cut off trade links and intelligence sharing; Mugabe probably thinks it’s funny and Putin predictably fell back on the tired old default setting of claiming it was Western propaganda aimed at destabilising Russia.
It’s difficult to know what Putin actually thinks as he appears to have had so many botox injections that if he attempted to blink his eyelids would shoot back up like roller blinds, but you can bet he’s not overly bothered.
There was also the odd comedy name among the list. Mark Thatcher for example… Scratcher’s name almost HAD to be in there somewhere. There isn’t a nefarious scheme on the planet he hasn’t tried to get in on — and spectacularly cocked up — at one time or other.
At time of writing our noble PM had been forced to release three separate statements on the issue, ranging basically from: “Nothing to do with me guv” to “I promise it won’t happen again.”
When you have to start a spurious row over taxpayer-funded leafleting to try and escape the headlines you know you’re in trouble.
The leaflet row, which it was hoped would be the proverbial dead cat at the dinner table in this case turned out to be little more than a mildly stunned hamster.
They’ll have to do better than that.
Clinton bombed a pharmaceuticals factory in Sudan to distract from his fellatio-related difficulties.
Cameron would have to announce the invasion of Scotland to even vaguely hope of worming his way out of this almighty snafu.
Bleating neoliberals claiming that technically such practices are not “illegal” and it is what anyone would have done in a similar situation entirely miss the point.
Slavery wasn’t illegal, neither was apartheid, but they were both deeply morally repugnant.
Just because something is not against the law does not make it justifiable — in cases such as those above it merely means that the law is wrong.
The latest statement from Downing Street claims that Cameron sold all his shares in his father’s hedgefund in 2010 shortly before becoming PM, making around £30,000 in the process.
As an attempted defence this falls short on two glaring points.
First, if, as he and others claim, there was no impropriety involved why did he suddenly ditch the shares when it looked like he was getting the top job and would therefore inevitably come under increased scrutiny over his financial affairs?
And second, why did he in 2013 attempt (successfully) to exclude offshore trusts from an EU crackdown on tax avoidance?
The government said he had felt forcing trusts to reveal who gained financially from them would “distract” from action in more pressing areas.
Yeah, I bet he did.
There is also the small matter of his having denounced others using such schemes as “morally reprehensible.”
Well, what’s good for the goose…
If Cameron had a shred of moral fibre he would follow the example of his Icelandic counterpart.
He hasn’t of course, which is why we should be taking to the streets calling for his head, literally or metaphorically I don’t much care which.
Not just for this latest scandal but for the myriad other hypocritical, vicious, venal and underhand acts he has perpetrated while in power.
This is merely yet another example of why Cameron and his verminous cronies are unfit to run a second-hand car dealership let alone a country.
They can’t even do corruption properly for Christ’s sake, what kind of politicians are they?
Why wait for him to leave under his own steam in a few months?
Come in Number 10 your time is up.
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-3a53-They-cant-even-do-corruption-properly,-what-kind-of-politicians-are-they#.Vwp_KHra44A
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Saturday 9th
posted by Morning Star in Features
THE government is in disarray, lurching from one disaster to another. George Osborne’s “Budget for the rich” collapsed before the ink was dry, with Iain Duncan Smith’s resignation soon after the first in a series of events that show the Tories are weakened and divided.
Their failure to nationalise the steel industry could see thousands of jobs thrown on the scrapheap as families and their communities suffer due to Tory indifference.
Schools face being forced to become academies in the biggest attack on the education system for decades.
The NHS faces its biggest financial crisis since its inception. The fightback shown by the junior doctors is an inspiration, in what is one of the most important industrial disputes in a generation.
On Saturday April 16 they will be joined by teachers, steelworkers and others marching for Health, Homes, Jobs and Education. A big turnout could create a crisis that the Tories can’t recover from.
The Panama Papers scandal has seen the toppling of the Icelandic prime minister. Make sure you are at the demonstration that could help send Cameron and the Tories on their way.
By Steve Sweeney
The People’s Assembly national March for Homes, Health, Jobs, Education is being held on Saturday April 16. Assemble at 1pm, Gower Street / Euston Road, London NW1.
Why I’m supporting the march for health, homes, jobs and education on April 16
FRANCES O’GRADY, GENERAL SECRETARY, TUC
We need a better plan for Britain’s future. Six years of devastating cuts have failed to get rid of the deficit, but have hammered front-line services and held back workers’ wages.
This Saturday’s march is about sending a clear message to government. If we don’t invest in health, education and local government, millions of families will face an uncertain future.
If we don’t build more affordable homes, this and future generations millions will be condemned to a life of soaraway rents. And if we don’t create more decent jobs and protect vital industries, like steel, our economy will continue to be reliant on financial services and consumer debt.
We need a recovery that works for all, not just the wealthiest in our society.
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-df13-Lets-hit-the-streets-to-show-the-Tories-what-we-think-about-their-cuts-agenda#.Vwp_pXra44A
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I’m very angry about this. Regardless of which side of the argument you’re on, taxpayers’ money should not be used to present the Prime Minister’s personal view. You can’t say it’s the Tory view, or even the government’s view, because they are most definitely not of one mind over the EU. What he’s done is wrong. When mine arrives, I’m going to send mine back to Downing Street. Without reading it!
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Other people will do that as well, I expect 🙂
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Saturday, 9 April 2016
Cameron must resign! – demands John Mann MP after tax haven scandal
LABOUR MP John Mann yesterday called for PM Cameron to resign in light of the ongoing scandal regarding Cameron’s father’s offshore bank account, exposed in the Panama Papers.
Mann said: ‘The question is one of honesty here, he has covered this up. Particularly importantly during the 2010 election campaign and he has got to resign. He has no choice. Cameron has been less than honest. He should resign immediately. Most decent people would expect nothing less.’
It was on Monday when the Panama Papers exposed top bosses and bankers and people in positions of power who had bank accounts with billions of pounds on ‘treasure island’ tax havens, most of them British colonies. It was not until Thursday, that PM Cameron finally admitted he had owned shares in the offshore fund set up by his late father.
This is after initially refusing to answer questions regarding his father’s account. On Monday Cameron’s spokeswoman said: ‘That is a private matter.’ On Tuesday Cameron said: ‘I have no shares, no offshore trusts, no offshore funds, nothing like that. And, so that, I think, is a very clear description.’
Later that day, Downing Street said: ‘To be clear, the prime minister, his wife and their children do not benefit from any offshore funds. The prime minister owns no shares.’ He now states that he had £30,000 worth of shares in 2010, but sold them before he entered Number 10 and had paid all UK taxes due on profits from the sale.
A demonstration takes place today outside 10 Downing street at 11am demanding ‘Time for him to resign!’ Organisers say that people going along are invited to dress for the occasion: ‘Because so many UK companies are based in Panama, the British Virgin Islands and other tropical tax haven hotspots, we want to make them feel at home. Hawaiian shirts, tropical colours, sunglasses and (of course) Panama hats. If you’ve got a blow up beach ball, then bring that along.’
A Facebook group set up to promote the protest says: ‘Iceland wouldn’t put up with their crooked Prime Minister, and neither should we. It’s now clear that David Cameron and his family have benefited hugely from offshore tax havens. All the while he lectures us on how morally wrong it is, and how his government is closing tax havens down.’ The Facebook group went on to allege: ‘He’s a liar and a hypocrite. Time for him to resign!’
Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Owen Smith said there were now ‘doubts about the prime minister’s trustworthiness’, accusing him of ‘speaking out of both sides of his mouth’ in recent days and calling on him to publish details of all his past investments.
http://wrp.org.uk/news/11986
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Thursday 12th May 2016
posted by Lamiat Sabin in Britain
BANKS that have been fined billions of pounds for their part in the 2008 financial crisis are helping bankroll the pro-EU campaign, it was revealed yesterday.
Banking behemoths Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan have each donated £500,000 to Britain Stronger in Europe (BSE), while Morgan Stanley and Citi have both chipped in £250,000.
This “unsurprising” announcement proves that the EU “works in the interests of the elite 1 per cent,” according to former Labour foreign secretary and Out campaigner Lord Owen.
The big finance quartet were ordered to pay the US government around £20 billion for pushing the casino capitalism that sparked the 2008 crisis.
But Electoral Commission figures yesterday showed that it was the Out campaign that attracted the most funding.
BSE executive director Will Straw accused the Leave campaign of having “deep pockets” after the revelation that Brexit campaigners had received more than twice as much cash as Remainiacs.
In total, anti-EU campaigns raked in more than £14 million — around £8m in donations and £6m in loans — between February 1 and April 21 this year.
The biggest single donation of £3.2m was made by Brexit campaigner and financial services company Hargreaves Lansdown co-founder Peter Hargreaves.
The Remain camp took just over £7.5m in donations and loans in the same period. BSE was paid more than £6.8m alone.
BSE’s largest cash gift of £2.5m was made by David Sainsbury, former chair of the eponymous supermarket. He also paid a total of £162,500 to other Remain groups.
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-3832-Fat-cat-banking-giants-bankrolling-pro-EU-camp#.VzTPG-QYMdU
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Wednesday 25th April 2016
posted by Morning Star in Britain
THE Prime Minister’s propaganda for the Remain campaign has had “little effect” on voters, experts said yesterday after polling found the percentage of people who feel well informed about the EU referendum has fallen.
David Cameron blew £9 million in taxpayer’s cash on sending a partisan 16-page leaflet on the alleged benefits of Brussels to every home in Britain last month.
The Electoral Reform Society found that the number of people who had been contacted about the referendum had risen from 25 per cent in March to 63 per cent in the two weeks following the mailshot.
But the proportion of people who felt well informed to make a choice at next month’s poll had slipped from 23 per cent to 21 per cent since then. ??
ERS chief executive Katie Ghose said: “We need a dynamic campaign rather than just one-sided mail-drops — voters want to be able to compare information from both sides so that they know the full story.”
The group is launching its Better Referendum campaign today and voters can find impartial information at betterreferendum.org.uk.
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-dbd0-9m-spent-and-still-nobodys-clued-up#.V0WZfeQYMdU
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Thursday 2nd February 2017
posted by Steve Sweeney in Britain
DAVID CAMERON tried to get Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre sacked over his support for Brexit, BBC2’s Newsnight claimed on Tuesday night.
The programme reported that the then prime minister had been angered by Mr Dacre’s argument that Britain should leave the European Union in the run-up to last year’s referendum and asked him to “cut him some slack” at a private Downing Street meeting.
But Mr Dacre refused to change the newspaper’s editorial line and was infuriated when he heard from a Westminster source that Mr Cameron had pressed Daily Mail owner Lord Rothermere to sack him.
A spokesman for Lord Rothermere refused to confirm or deny the claims.
Lexit convener Alex Gordon said: “This shows very clearly the profound fissures at the centre of Britain’s political Establishment.
“Cameron was asking a pro-EU, pro-Remain newspaper proprietor to sack a pro-lLave editor of a leading national newspaper.
“It is a reminder that the mask of the British ruling class slipped during the EU referendum but they are experts at hiding their divisions for their own self-interest.
“They are weak and divided and a united labour movement campaigning for a left exit from the EU would have them on the run.”
Mr Dacre said in a statement: “For 25 years, I have been given the freedom to edit the Mail on behalf of its readers without interference from Jonathan Rothermere or his father.
“It has been a great joy and privilege.”
A spokesman for Mr Cameron said: “It is wrong to suggest that David Cameron believed he could determine who edits the Daily Mail.”
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-1787-Cameron-tried-to-sack-Dacre#.WJOFsPKbIdU
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