Brexit: Theresa May's Bunker Buster

Brexit has proven to be Theresa May’s own personal Waterloo. Not so much because of the epic disaster it has turned into for her but because it has exposed her as the pedestrian politician she really is. Had David Cameron not resigned after the EU Referendum vote she would not have found herself catapulted into the role of prime minister. Had that not happened she would have continued her mediocre error prone stewardship in a ministerial capacity. 

As it is Theresa May assumed the role of prime minister promising; "Brexit means Brexit", "no deal is better than a bad deal" and the UK was about to take world trade agreements to a whole new level. What we are now left with is an ineffectual leader who has both failed to rally her own troops or put up much of a fight against her foreign opposition.

What we have seen is a prime minister who threw away her parliamentary majority, attempted (unsuccessfully) to conceal her true intentions during Brexit negotiations, and really has ended up broken and on her knees at a time the nation needs strong leadership. Theresa May has at every step of the way in the Brexit journey sacrificed sound management for political expediency. She came up with a deal that she didn't canvas support for before presenting it to the EU because she knew it was unlikely to be found acceptable by Westminster factions but she knew she could get agreement with the EU on it. This was despite the fact that she knew she had to come back to Westminster to have it ratified. Her strategy seems to have been to present Parliament with a 'fait accompli' then blame everyone else for not agreeing a deal. This was even though she knew her deal would not be agreeable to anyone.

I don't think Theresa May can be blamed for leaping at the opportunity to be prime minister. However, her almost total lack of a sense of duty that should come with the role has been startling. At every turn she seems to have opted to try and secure her position rather than secure the nation's best interests. Her initial cabinet appointments were designed to curry favour with the Brexiteers in the Conservative Party. At the early stage of negotiations with the EU she opted to go for a transitional post exit arrangement rather than embrace the nettle of actually negotiating new trade tariffs with EU. Even if she had agreed some indicative interim tariffs at that time it might have provided some reassurance to the public and economy about what to expect. Instead, she was swayed by the Business sector to go for a transitional period and remain in the Custom Union. She hadn't factored in the issue of what would happen to border arrangements in Ireland after the end of the transitional period.

Had Mrs May paused to think about the need to make some tough choices it might have occurred to her that the Republic of Ireland needed to maintain the trading status quo even more than the UK did. That is something she could have used as leverage in the negotiations rather than falling to her knees leopard skin pumps in hand begging for a transition period. By restricting her own options May allowed the Republic of Ireland to secure a veto when in fact it should have been pleading for a reasonable compromise.

At this point the British Government has run out of both ideas and time to negotiate an acceptable withdrawal from the EU. Theresa May has to take a huge part of the responsibility for that. Not only did she make a lot of wrong choices but she also appointed a lot of incompetent and uncommitted ministers. For a woman who has been the consummate political operator it appears that Theresa May’s political capital has finally run out. Unfortunately neither the nation nor history will judge her kindly and that is the tragic legacy of her long and dogged political career.

London Policing Twenty Years on from the Macpherson Report

It has been twenty years since the Macpherson Report into the London Metropolitan Police handling of the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence. Doreen Lawrence, Stephen's mother' has suggested that gains in the aftermath of the Macpherson Inquiry report have not been built upon. However, Cressida Dick, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, claims that the Met has made great progress and come a long way.

Since the Macpherson Inquiry there has been the Tottenham Riots in 2011 following the police shooting to death of Mark Duggan. The riots subsequently spread to the rest of London and nationwide. There was the shooting of Azelle Rodney in 2005. Rodney was shot to death by a police marksman while in a car with two associates. An inquiry later found the shooting unlawful. There was the shooting to death of John Charles de Menezes in 2005 following the July 7 terror attack. He was shot in a case of mistaken identity and the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police was later found guilty and fined for a failure of duty of care. In 2008 Sean Rigg died in police custody as a result of being restrained by police officers. Olaseni Lewis died on a mental health ward following prolonged restraint by police officers. Dalian Atkinson, an ex England international footballer, died in 2016 after being tasered by police officers whilst in mental health crisis. In 2017 Edson da Costa died after he subdued by CS gas following a car stop by police. In 2017 Rashan Charles died after being restrained by a police officer who suspected him of swallowing a contraband substance.

In 2017/2018 twenty three people died in police custody or following police interventions. This was the highest figure recorded in ten years.

In the consideration of where the Metropolitan Police is twenty years after Macpherson there has been a lot of talk about how much the proportion of officers from minority ethnic groups has increased (from 3% to 14%). There has also been mention of race awareness and community engagement training being carried out. The suggestion is that it is now a different police force. However, is it a better police force in regards to its strategic approach to police minorities, or managing minority police officers?

It is possible that structures and image awareness in the Met has changed but have attitudes moved on all that much? People from minority groups are still having negative experiences of policing in London on a daily basis. And a lot of police officers still see Black people as threatening, and likely to offend. Senior police officers are less likely to show any confidence or offer insightful guidance when dealing with cases involving people from minority ethnic groups. It is unclear whether the progression of minority ethnic officers in the force has significantly improved; or whether minority ethnic officers generally feel well supported, free from prejudice, and empowered in their jobs.

While some things have changed since Macpherson it is clear that the Metropolitan Police really cannot beat its chest about how well it has done in managing issues of race in minority ethnic communities or police officers. There is in no doubt that it could do more and do better. The real issue is how much does the Met itself know that that is the case.

New What?

What’s the difference between a new year, a new day, a new dawn, or even a new leaf? Maybe it’s that a new year represents a time to take stock of one’s life; and challenge oneself anew. A new day is a bell to answer the call of a continuing grind. A new dawn is a joyous vision of hope for better things to come. And a new leaf is a promise of redemption.

The not so simple truth is that every second of our lives represents a new beginning. It is a new investment of time in living and pursuing life's goals and obligations. It could be just a thought or maybe the simplest action. What it represents is an opportunity for us that do something good, be someone better, and make the best way of the time and life we have. The value of newness is that we getting to experience something anew or seize upon an opportunity to take a fresh approach to something. The attitude with which we approach things is what in effect gives them that quality of newness.

A new point in time won’t make us perfect even if we pass through it on the crest of great success. And it won't make us failures even if we are confronted by challenges and setbacks. The key to making each moment fresh and relevant is to learn the lessons, step forward with resolution and make it count for us as individuals, for the people around us, and for the world as a whole.

Am I ...?

Who is the real person we are?

Is it who we are born as?
Is it our body?
Is it our mind?
Is it our consciousness?
Is it our soul?
Is it the sum total of our experiences?

How much of who we are is who we want to be and not just how we are created, and conditioned to be? Is there a separation between our principles and values, and how they direct out lives? When we adopt certain characteristics and attitudes to try and improve ourselves do they really define us or just become a reflection of how we want the world to see us; or even possibly how we actually want to see ourselves?

Can we truly be aware of who we really are or is it others' perception of us that defines who we are? As human beings at times we do cultivate idealised versions of ourselves and the world around us. More often than not it is this idealised version of ourselves that we spend a lifetime trying to project. This ideal might consist of standards and values we have learnt, perceptions of what is popular or characteristics we have adopted through trial and error. These are what over time become recognised as our personality. However, very often these can turn out to be just the mask that we unconsciously adopt as the face we show the world.

There are people whose personalities develop along a unique trajectory and are determined by socialisation only to a limited extent. Very often these are high functioning or sociopathic individuals. The ability to form and maintain a unique self identity largely free from normative determination  requires great intelligence and will. It is also a fragile construct which can shatter and fracture a person's psyche at the slightest shift in the balance.

What we are is human; flesh and bone that live and eventually die. Who we are on the other hand, is an infinitely more complex notion. Too often we are just what the world wants us to be. Some of us are outsiders trying to plot our own paths in a world demanding consensus. And there are those of us who are in a cocoon just trying to be who we need to be and survive while the world rages around us.

Minority Policing

One major disappointment I had with Obama's tenure as president of the United States was the fact that he did not do anything concrete to address police procedures in regards to dealing with minorities or reverse the increasing militarisation of the police force and law and order mentality. The culture of suspicion and profiling of minorities can't be resolved overnight but more could have been done to address the establishment tolerance for the use of lethal force against unarmed minorities.

The recent case in Chicago of the police shooting dead a heroic Black security guard who had foiled an attempted armed assault yet again raises issues about how the police are conditioned to respond to Black people. This wasn't even a case of mistaken identity. The police didn't see the assailant they were there to apprehend they just saw someone who they assumed was an assailant for no  reason other than his skin colour. This is further illustrated by the case of the police officer who shot a man in his own home and claimed she mistook him for an intruder after mistaking his apartment for hers!

There have been recent suggestions in the UK for the police to be allowed to require a lower standard of suspicion to conduct 'stop and search' checks. This is mainly targeted at tackling knife crime amongst young Black men. The supposition here is that it would be legitimate to stop almost any Black man because there is a reasonable chance that he may be armed with a knife. This ignores the fact that the proportion of Black men involved knife crime is probably too small to even add up to a whole number. The Met's inability to develop intelligence networks within minority communities is a reflection of how they relate to such communities. It also might be an unintended consequence of how the Met treats such intelligence sources when they do come forward. This sort of oppressive approach to tackling demographic groups is exactly what happens in totalitarian and fascist states.

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Undoubtedly there are some good police officers and some excellent examples of community policing but there is a toxic culture in law enforcement when it comes to the perception of minority groups. This includes how they treat members of the public and fellow police officers from minority groups.

A radical and drastic programme of reform is desperately needed not only to address institutional racism in law enforcement but also to redress a culture of fear and apprehension in the perception of and attitudes adopted towards minority groups. At some point it needs to be instilled in law enforcement that there are no circumstances in which excessive force is an appropriate response when dealing with unarmed and defenceless people from minority groups. It certainly isn't a way to serve or protect them. It can only lead to alienation which creates a vicious circle of fear, overreaction and tragic consequences.

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Parliamentary Privilege and a Jaundiced Judiciary

The recent case of a member of the House of Lords using parliamentary privilege to name Philip Green as the businessman who had gone to court to block the reporting of the non-disclosure agreements (NDA) he had entered into with staff employed by him raises issues of the role of the courts in promoting fairness and equality. It would appear the court decided the NDAs were entered into willingly and therefore should be considered valid and lawful.

I was brought up to believe that courts are meant to dispense justice with the objective of reinforcing social values and norms. It is hard to believe that NDAs entered into as a result of one party’s improper conduct should be considered worthy of protection over any consideration of public best interest. The fact that NDAs are very much the province of the rich and powerful raises the question of how fair it can be in real terms. And when it is used to buy the silence of workers who might have been wronged by an employer then it feels manifestly unfair.