Straw repels Evil

It's no secret that Justice Secretary Jack Straw and Secretary Of Whatever He Tales A Fancy To Peter Mandelson don't get on, and now the gloves are well and truly off.

Mandelson, who not long ago got involved in a bit of a spat with the eminently dislikable Tory George Osborne (it never came to much, but served very well at taking a bit of the flak being directed at parliament by the media after the expenses scandal) and who has been forced to resign from the House of Commons on two separate occasions, is a bit of a mixed blessing as far as Labour's top brass are concerned - he's an extremely clever politician (he was largely responsible for Labour's election win back in 1997) and always gets what he wants, so if he wants what you want and he's on your side you're onto a winner. Unfortunately, he has one very slight drawback - he's the spawn of Lucifer, the public loathe him (except those in Hartlepool, for some odd reason - they kept voting for him as their MP) and he gives the impression that sooner or later he's going to stab the entire Cabinet in the back and annex the party as his own personal kingdom.

"Argh! What fools we have been!" Jack Straw wards off The Evil One.

Now, if you're a Cabinet minister, you get paid a very tasty £144,520 per year along with all sorts of perks such as the notorious second homes allowance and, in some cases, even grace-and-favour (translation: free) accomodation; so it's no wonder that those lucky MPs who have found their way into the Cabinet are pretty damn keen to stay right where they are (though to be fair, there's an never-proven rumour that some of them want to keep their positions so they can use them in Britain's best interests). Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, while more than happy to let Mandelson prowl the Commons' corridors provided he only drank the blood of those they sought to dispose of, have both given unitentional indications that they consider him a man of whom one should be wary - which could be why Mandelson got a Life Peerage thrust upon him and was shuffled off to the House of Lords, which is the nearest British politics comes to hammering a stake through the heart and burying the body in a welded-up coffin, because unlike Hereditary Peers - who have been able to resign and contest by-elections since 1963 when Tony Benn changed the law and gave up his Viscount title so that he could stand as a socialist (becoming one of the most popular MPs in history) - Life Peers are, or have been, quite literally stuck in the position for life. This was not the first time that a figure considered dangerous by the Government has been quietly got rid of in this way.

However, as we blogged last month, the Government changed all that. In their efforts to revamp the House of Lords, which hasn't been viewed in a very good light by the electorate - who see it as an out-dated and unfair institution - for many years, they brought in new legislation which was very much the equivalent of digging the coffin up, pulling out the stake and saying "Here's my jugular, Vlad - it's party-time!"

The Devil - though he stayed put for the moment - was free to ride out anytime he chose.

Jack Straw seems to be the most worried about the nature of what Labour has unleashed upon the world, because he's just shipped in several tons of industrial strength garlic and is about to hang it from every rafter, wall, ceiling, hook and anything else in the Commons that a bulb of garlic could ever be hung on by announcing he's creating a new law that will force any Life Peer who does choose to resign to go into quarantine for five years during which they will be unable to stand for any elected position. This means that Mandelson would be in his early 60s by the time he once became eligible, close to retirement age and - since the general trend seems be for younger MPs and party leaders in particular (Menzies Campbell, ex-Liberal Democrat leader, was commonly thought to be too old even though he was just 66 when he left the position) - this could well end any chances he has of leading the party.

"Secret Inquests" will not go ahead

Justice Secretary Jack Straw (pictured right - never noticed how much he looks like Ivor Cutler before...) has stated that so-called secret inquests - which would give the Home Secretary the right to name a specially selected coroner to run inquests into Governmental or police actions without the presence of a jury for reasons deemed to be of national security or not in the public's interest. The statement comes shortly after Mr. Straw also suggested that some of the laws - widely considered to be draconian - created by Labour in the wake of the World Trade Centre attacks could be withdrawn. The plans, outlined in Clause 68 of the 2008 Counter Terrorism Bill, would have given ministers the power to keep evidence in inquiries such as that following the death of Charles Jean de Menezes, shot several times with hollow point bullets by police on the London Underground, secret. The Menezes case has shown serious shortfallings in the police's actions that day. The Clause was created in an attempt to end the stalemate which arose during the investigation into the death of Azelle Rodney who was shot by plice in April 2005. In that investigation, coroner Andrew Walker (pictured left) said that he would not be able to continue with the case due to the large number of redactions - crossed out sections of text - in police statements, which are thought to have related to evidence gathered by the use of phone taps and/or bugs. However, Alan Beith, Liberal Democrat MP for Berwick Upon Tweed and chairman of the Commons Justice Committee, said that he was "not comfortable with a situation where a politician is deciding there shouldn't be a jury in a particular inquest," adding that the proposal was dangerous despite Bridget Prentice's - Labour MP for Lewisham and a Minister of Justice - claims that it would affect a mere handful of cases every year.

Daniel Machover, the Rodney family's solicitor, said that "These proposals mean that ministers and those responsible for intelligence gathering will never be held properly to account for the validity of their tactics." Helen Shaw, co-director of Inquest - a group which campaigns for people who have died during legal custody - said that "The public will find it difficult to have confidence that these coroner-only inquests, with key evidence being suppressed, can investigate contentious deaths involving state agents independently."

However, announcing that the proposals would be dropped, Mr. Straw said that they had not got the cross party support required to make them law. A joint committee on human rights made up of MPs and peers had previously advised that the proposals be scrapped, saying that inquests - especially those in which citizens had been killed at the hands of the state - must be "transparent."

In a roundabout way, HMG admit they were wrong

Justice Minister Jack "Evil Headmaster" Straw has indicated that some of the laws made in the wake of the World Trade Centre (no US spellings here, matey) - seen by many as draconian - may be withdrawn.

"There is a case for going through all counterterrorism legislation and working out whether we need it. It was there for a temporary period," he said in response to a question over whether some of the laws are an infringement of civil liberties and stated that the public perception of them could be counterproductive - by which he chiefly means "may cause people to vote against Labour." Labour have passed approximately one law concerning criminal offences for each day that they have been in power since Tony Blair's electoral success in 1997.

There have been several indications of disquiet amongst Labour MPs desperate to guarantee their own success in the next election over the laws, especially since the Tories - who are currently far in the lead in the opinion polls - have announced their intention to introduce a repeals bill which would make it possible to dispose of laws thought to adversely affect civil liberties.

Er, guys? You forgot "repressive..."

Recent Home Office figures have revealed that of the 1,471 people arrested for suspicion of terrorism between 11.09.01 and 31.03.08, only 340 - around a third - were later charged with offences related to terrorism and a mere 196 have been subsequently convicted.

However, there has been no mention of the moves to introduce ID cards, legislation that would force British citizens to carry means of proving they have the right to live in their own country. Well, it's a start, I suppose, even if it is one that to cynics looks rather an attempt to gain some much-needed support amongst voters.