Last year, Scotland was reported as having the fastest-rising murder rate in Western Europe. This great record was only marred by the knowledge that six other countries are outstripping it – Bahrain, Jordan, Tajikistan, Armenia and Mauritius.
In terms of the murder rate itself, it shared the coveted European top spot with Finland (liberal criminal justice system + lax gun laws) and Portugal (mass immigration). Glasgow has the highest murder rate of any city in Western Europe (welfare – subsidized, naturally, by English tax-payers). It even manages to outperform Hebron, the largest city in the occupied Palestinian territory. (See you, towel-heed – ya want some, ya bass!)
God, it makes one proud to be half-Scots!
Now, you’d think – given how badly this reflects on our nation – that we’d all be doing our best to help Scotland improve this shameful state of affairs, and its appalling record on crime in general.
Not a bit of it!
Today, the Supreme Court in London ruled that Scotland is violating European law by convicting criminals who have been interviewed without a lawyer present. This ruling will probably lead to 3,500 cases being appealed, and lead to an explosion in legal aid payments. (I know some of my civil libertarian friends will probably approve, but I have to part company with them on this one.)
Of course, Scotland itself is far from innocent in all this. Many argue that its legal establishment has been repeatedly warned for the past five years that it’s out of kilter with European law. And let’s pause to enjoy someschadenfreude – after all, no one’s been more eager over the years to make the beast with two backs with the fascist tyrrany that is the EU than Scotland’s England and America-hating left-wing subsidy junkies.
But no matter how vile, ungrateful and incompetent Scotland’s socialist politicians have proved themselves to be, the idea that a bunch of self-important, unelected, liberal-minded (i.e. simple) Europrats should have the power to make British people – British people! – less safe in their own country is utterly, utterly repellent.
And now Europe wants to tax us, its “citizens”, directly – cutting out the government we elected. And they want to wildly increase the money they spend on themselves at the very moment when its slave-nations are beginning to face genuine economic pain.
I’m sorry to sound like your standard European-integration loathing Little Englander (or Little Norwegianer, come to that) – but I am. Millions of us have been saying for decades, relentlessly and – yes – tediously, that this isprecisely what would happen if we joined the EU, and what would go on happening if we failed to leave.
We were 100% right then. We’re 100% right now.
Whenever our politicians, of whatever stripe, have airily dismissed our fears as ridiculous fantasies – aided, of course, by the BBC – they were either deliberately lying to us, or they were being very, very stupid.
Take your pick.
Give us our referendum. Now!
Err..actually, you're not right now and weren't then. This case is about compliance with the ECHR, not EU law. The ECHR is a Council of Europe Convention which pre-dates the EU. If we left the EU, we would still be bound by it. Sorry to spoil a good rant but you've chosen the wrong example.
ReplyDeleteFriday, October 29, 2010 - 10:33 AM
...and another thing. What do you think happens in Scottish polce stations before the solicitor gets there? "Is it scones you'll be having with your tea, Willie, afore the man from McTavish's gets here, the noo?" Law in England and Wales, with no pressure from nasty foreigners, was changed in the 80s to require a solicitor at interview. This followed a number of cases in which people, some of them innocent, volunteered "confessions" while helping the police with their enquiries, Life on Mars style.
ReplyDeleteIsn't the real scandal that it took a European Convention to force the Scots to adopt standards we have had for 30 years?
Friday, October 29, 2010 - 10:41 AM
Re the ECHR, it’s a fair cop – so let me rephrase that: let’s opt out of the ECHR and have a referendum on EU membership at the same time (the ECHR was only set up to encourage the Germans and Italians not to go bonkers again, but it doesn’t seem to have been particularly effective at preventing the last Labour government - eating away at our rights whenever the fancy took them – what it does seem to do is offer blanket protection to those seeking to take the piss).
ReplyDeleteAs for what the Scottish police do before Mr. McTavish the solicitor struggles out of the pub, I can guarantee they won’t be offering scones to suspects – unless they pay for them. I rather assume they’d be trying to extract a confession without leaving bruises. I’m aware of the dangers of allowing the police to take advantage of vulnerable suspects, but I’m also convinced that the balance between the rights of the innocent and those of the guilty needs to be restored – especially now that our Justice Minister has decided there’s no point in sending guilty people to jail in future.
As I mentioned, I’m not claiming the Scots have been pursuing the right course, or that they haven’t been given plenty of warning – and, to be honest, I wouldn’t particularly mind the Supreme Court telling them to mend their ways on the basis of British law – it’s the idea of hiding behind the ECHR that annoys me.
Friday, October 29, 2010 - 06:05 PM