More money goes down the drain in the Madeleine McCann case on top of the £13.5 million of British taxpayer wonga chucked away on absolutely no results
This morning – continuing the pointless pattern of the Mirror and MailOnline to “note nothing new” in the case of ‘disappeared’ Madeleine McCann we highlighted last week – The Sun shared an “exclusive” about the investigation that frankly wasn’t worthy of a single column inch.
After beginning with the bashfully bold headline “Madeleine McCann’s parents to find out this year if they’ve won legal battle against ex-cop” Goncalo Amaral – whom currently is owed a “six-figure sum” believed to be circa £750,000 by Gerry and Kate McCann after he beat them in court in February 2017 – the paper then concluded without an actual “when” and the non-news that “the judges will now give a verdict by the end of the year.”
Of this diatribe of drivel, one could say: “Thanks for that,” but more realistically anyone rational would ask of The Sun instead: “Couldn’t you have asked your contributor to instead go looking for a missing person where there is a genuine chance of that person actually being found?”
Meanwhile, on Sunday, the Mirror – a red-top reliable for prattling on about “non-news” about a situation that could have been avoided perhaps if two doctors hadn’t left their toddlers unattended so they could live it up in a restaurant with their mates – shared that the prosecution team that named Christian Brueckner (AKA ‘Christian B’) exactly one year ago just as the British government began their ‘coronavirus distraction technique,’ have actually not spoken to Gerry and Kate McCann once during the ensuing period.
Asked if they had genuinely made any progress in the case, prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters “angrily hit back at critics” and illustrated the weakness of his work in declaring: “I don’t care who believes what… We are missing important important information. We want no stone unturned. Whether there will be an indictment in the end, I cannot foresee at the moment.”
The Mirror concluded: “Brueckner, serving seven years for raping a 72-year-old woman in Praia, has not been interviewed,” whilst elsewhere the Daily Record added Wolters pathetically offered: “Our appeal for witnesses still stands.” We respond: “Where on earth do you think these people are given the millions already offered in rewards that have never been claimed?”
Clearly, on top of the £13.5 million of British taxpayer money wasted on this case already, that’s another chunk of change down the drain whilst other families of missing people shamefully get little to no help at all. Enough is enough; it is time to close down the investigation into ‘missing’ Madeleine McCann.
— Madeleine Case Tweets🌐 (@McCannCaseTweet) March 8, 2018
Elsewhere on social media this weekend, the matter of Kate McCann being photographed with bruises on her wrists in the days after her daughter disappeared was again discussed. This tweet from 2018 was once again referenced.Christian Brueckner (AKA ‘Christian B’, pictured left with his ex-girlfriend Naskcije Miftari) was brought to public attention just as the British government began to suffer “very bad news days” at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic last year. The narrative of him being the evil, paedophile suited Boris Johnson’s government a treat as it helped shift the headlines – for a period – away from their appalling handling of initial lockdowns. This weekend, equally, Johnson has managed to do something similar by marrying his latest ‘baby mama’ Carrie Symonds and in doing so, cynics quite correctly argue that he has used the ‘distraction technique’ to get his bad week courtesy of Dominic Cummings off the front pages. Unsurprisingly, social media manipulated imagery from the wedding by using images such as those pictured (centre and right).
In December 2017, when £11 million of British taxpayers’ money had been spent towards the search for ‘missing’ Madeleine McCann, 86% of viewers of ITV1’s ‘Loose Women’ said the public purse should cease to fund the investigation. Now, in May 2021, with that sum at £13.5 million (aside from the millions in private money also), it is time to allocate resources to the search for missing people who actually can be found, we would suggest.
Evidence suggesting Jeremy Bamber was OUTSIDE White House Farm with police whilst movement was seen inside on the night of the murders there could provide him with an alibi
After we highlighted that the legal team working for Jeremy Bamber – convicted of the murders of five members of his family on the night of 7th August 1985 – had sent new evidence to the Criminal Case Review Commission (CCRC) in March and discussed this also on Shaun Attwood’s True Crime Channel in April this year, interest in a case where so many issues point towards a potential miscarriage of justice has piqued.
Just as with the Menendez case in California – where two brothers were jailed for killing their parents in spite of being sexually abused by them for the majority of their lives – what is now making a difference to Jeremy Bamber in the public eye is the proliferation of podcasts and social media output about a case where Essex Police clearly messed up.
Featured first in the Essex County Standard and Daily Gazette yesterday, chief reporter Rebecca Jones remarked “new alibi evidence could see [Bamber] freed.”
Continuing of a meeting on Wednesday where 50 supporters gathered on Zoom to “discuss fresh evidence relating to his case,” Jones added:
“During the meeting Yvonne Hartley, co-administrator of the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign (JBIC), told the dozens of supporters in attendance about Bamber’s ten alibis which were sent to the CCRC.”
“She said there were multiple grounds which prove Bamber’s sister Sheila Caffell was alive in the farmhouse until the raid team entered the house.”
Quoting Hartley directly, Jones continued:
“Bamber was standing outside the house in the company of police officers when activity was logged as occurring within the house, therefore, he cannot have been involved.”
“He was outside with an officer when he saw someone moving inside the house. He thought it was Sergeant Christopher Bewes who later denied seeing anyone in the house.”
“If this is true and proven, it means he has an alibi because he was outside with a police officer while Sheila was inside with a gun. When police entered the house they found her dead from gun wounds.”
In an email to The Steeple Times, Hartley added on Friday:
“[The article by Rebecca Jones] does have an error as it was Bews, Myall and Jeremy who saw the movement in the bedroom window and this led to firearms teams being called to the scene, however it was good that an article resulted from the meeting.”
“Next time we are presenting lots of information and facts you may not be aware of regarding the telephones in the house, and our guest speaker is Terry Mullins who conducted Jeremy’s lie detector test in 2007, which Jeremy passed with flying colours.”
In January 2020, Jeremy Bamber told the ‘Mirror’: “It is the ultimate alibi that I was in the company of dozens of police officers when it was clear that a person or persons were alive in the house.” The paper continued: “Bamber, who lived in nearby Goldhanger, met officers at the scene at 3.50am. He stayed with them until he was taken away at 9am. His legal team now say a rifle was spotted in an upstairs window by two separate gun police at around 7am, meaning someone in there was alive. Bamber’s lawyers said also in the new evidence are logs showing a firearms team as being ‘in conversation with a person from inside the farm’ at 5.25am. And that a 999 call was made inside at 6.09am. Documents seen by the ‘Mirror’ show a BT operator connected police to an open line at the farm at 05.50am, meaning the handset must have been put back on to make the 6.09am call. When officers eventually broke into the home, they heard a noise upstairs, believing it may have been a person. On inspection, everyone was dead. But Bamber’s team claim the noise could have been Sheila killing herself.”
Fresh hope for Jeremy Bamber 2021 –Some questions Essex Police plainly need to answer…
What happened to a suicide note allegedly left by Sheila Caffell that was initially referenced by police and then disappeared?
Why did Sheila Caffell not have rigor mortis when officers discovered her body?
Why was blood still gaping from Miss Caffell’s body when it was found?
Why are there different accounts about how many bodies were discovered on the ground floor of the farmhouse?
How could Jeremy Bamber be the killer if police officers repeatedly detected movement inside White House Farmhouse whilst he was stood with them outside?
Why was the silencer supposedly used in the shootings not discovered immediately when police entered the residence?
Why did scratch marks supposedly made in the kitchen of the house by that silencer not appear in the first photographs taken at the crime scene? How were they actually made in order that they appeared in later imagery?
How could Jeremy Bamber be the killer if he made a phone call from his Goldhanger home 3.5 miles away moments after his father had called police from White House Farmhouse to say that his daughter had “gone berserk” with a gun?
Nikolay Kalinin concludes that both Dominic Cummings and Boris Johnson’s rotten regime come out of this week disgraced
Dominic Cummings’ questioning at the COVID select committee has undoubtedly provoked a tsunami of responses. Cummings branded the PM he once advised as “unfit for job” and condemned Matt Hancock by saying that he “should have been fired for at least 15, 20 things, including lying to everybody on multiple occasions.”
Cummings claimed during questioning that Hancock lied about people getting treatment during the summer and stated: “We were told explicitly people did not get the treatment they deserved, many people were left to die in horrific circumstances.”
Not only that, but Cummings also stated that Johnson did indeed say that he would rather “let the bodies pile high in their thousands” that enforce another lockdown. If true, this demonstrates that the Prime Minister is absolutely not fit to rule a country whose people he has put in peril as a result of his continued incompetence.
There is no denying that the response of government officials to Cummings’ accusations has been plainly childish, including the response of Liz Truss, who stated that she “hasn’t had time to look at it yet” but also then stated: “I’m not going to engage with the false claims that are being made today.”
Meanwhile, Peter Kyle, Labour MP for Hove has decided to try to kill two birds with one stone by releasing a PMQ video from 25th March 2020 where he told the PM about the lack of COVID tests available in his constituency and how long it took to deliver them, captioning it with the words “They knew. THEY KNEW!”
Not only has Cummings’ dropped a bomb on the government but on ‘Costly Carrie’ too. In stating that his resignation from the role of Chief Adviser was linked “to the fact that the prime minister’s girlfriend was trying to change a whole bunch of different appointments at Number 10 and appoint her friends to particular jobs” – which sounds like a totally legitimate claim, especially considering how desperate ‘BoJo’ was to defend Carrie’s friend Henry Newman who got exposed as the man who leaked info about a second lockdown.
A YouGov poll conducted after the questioning concluded that although 55% of people do not trust Boris Johnson and how he has painted the government’s handling of the pandemic, a whopping 75% do not trust Cummings’ claims. This is not surprising considering the fact that he was responsible for the deceptive propaganda of Vote Leave and its “£350 million for NHS” claim.
Another poll conducted by Survation has concluded that even after Cummings’ revelations, the Conservatives extended their lead over Labour by 11 points, which is extremely concerning, because this shows that more people would rather trust the words of a man who throughout this pandemic has demonstrated barely any decent leadership and whose utter idiocy has destroyed the lives of many.
Not only that, but this poll shows that the people of Britain seem more likely to support a man whose fiancé wants to undermine the democratic process on which this country stands on and replace it with a rotten regime and controlled cronyism.
It truly feels as if most of Britain’s population are in the ‘Cult of BoJo’ and cannot stop ignoring all the terrible things he and his lackeys have done. If this is the kind of country that we are destined to live in for the next few years, then I’d argue that we are truly doomed.
Dominic Cummings’ grilling this week told the public what they already knew about Boris Johnson’s rotten regime.Boris Johnson comes out of this sorry saga looking more and more like a puppet and one formerly controlled by Cummings and now most definitely in the clutches of his latest ‘baby mama,’ Carrie Symonds.The court of Carrie Symonds (pictured with her “chatty rat” bestie Henry Newman) holds more sway than anything else currently in the ear of our laughable, not laudable Prime Minister.
Nikolay Kalinin analyses the results of a YouGov poll that came out in favour of a republic and elected head of state
Breaking away from the traditionalist views of their predecessors, the youth of today in Britain recently proclaimed support for the abolition of the monarchy and the establishment of an elected head of state, a YouGov poll has found.
According to YouGov, which conducted its survey between 2019 and 2021, more than four in ten 18 – 24 year olds surveyed supported removing the monarch and replacing it with an elected representative. Meanwhile, 31% of 18 – 24 year olds were found to still support the monarchy, a 15-point decline from 2019.
Another key headline was that general support for an elected head of state rose over the past two years, from 26% in 2019 to 41% in 2021.
Nevertheless, backing for the royal family itself actually remains high – three in five support the Queen and her heirs – especially amongst the older age groups. Seven in ten people between the ages of 50 – 64 were found to still be in favour of the monarchy, whilst of people aged 65 plus, that number rose to 8 out of 10.
The results of this poll to me are not surprising. Many young people don’t like the idea of a monarchy and its disconnect from the rest of the population in general. Many also resent spending millions to sustain their palaces whilst more and more people become homeless in the UK every year.
We also have to remember that the government is planning on spending £200 million of taxpayers’ money – which could have been used to fund the NHS or to build more police stations – on a massive yacht named after the late Duke of Edinburgh. I join those questioning how that yacht will benefit the British public.
To young people, the monarchy is a reminder of an age when society was more backward, and to them there is also no need for a sovereign ruler whose very existence undermines the principle of democracy. Young people are also more likely to be critical of what they see as the cult-like attitude of the media towards the monarchy, even having ‘royal correspondents’ who report on their affairs. To them, it’s all so unnecessary and out of place in the 21st century.
Opposition to the monarchy is not leaderless; the pressure group Republic has risen to prominence in the recent years and currently has around 80,000 supporters in the country. Responding to the poll results, the organisation’s CEO Graham Smith stated: “Support for the monarchy has been sustained by the Queen’s long reign. The automatic succession of King Charles will dramatically alter the debate and public attitudes, putting the monarchy on collision course with modern British values. This latest poll is another reminder of the urgent need for a serious, honest and grown up debate about the future of the monarchy and the democratic alternative.”
Still, just as the Martin Bashir scandal and the intense hatred of the British public for ‘MeGain’ rumbles on, the royal family continues to enjoy popularity amongst the older traditionalist crowd. This comes especially as the Queen herself has reportedly been “deeply upset” by Prince Harry’s comments on his upbringing in a “cycle of suffering,” which he revealed on his new Apple TV+ series with Oprah Winfrey.
This dissatisfaction with the monarchy can be easily reflected in Nick Abbott’s radio episode on LBC on 21st May, in which he commented on the negative response to Prince Harry’s comments by stating: “It’s as if though we’re obsessed with time not advancing, and Brexit is a lot like that. We just want to regain some imagined past, some Disneyfication of the nation.”
Will the monarchy survive into the 2030s? Young people don’t seem especially enthusiastic for it if YouGov’s latest poll is to be believed. The scandal of Prince Andrew’s involvement with Jeffrey Epstein and other unsavoury characters hasn’t helped and nor has the behaviour of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, but the Queen remains firmly in the nation’s hearts – that is for sure.
“Replacing the monarchy with a museum” is the desire of some in the UK, but that most certainly is not backed by older British citizens.
In June 2012, ‘The Steeple Times’ featured reader favourite Anton Lorien’s tribute to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. It stands as a testament to the legacy of an esteemed lady whose service to her country is widely believed to have been exemplary.
Nikolay Kalinin delves into Labour’s success in Wales in the recent elections and suggests if the party wants to win nationwide they should pay heed to what went on there
If there’s anything that the Senedd election results can tell us, it is that the Welsh people are amongst the few that have not gone completely crackers and voted for parties that will make their lives worse at this time.
This can be evidenced by the fact that there are now no seats taken by members of UKIP and the Abolish the Welsh Assembly Party, with the former losing all seven of their seats and gaining a miserable 0.8% of the constituency vote and 1.6% of the regional vote. This is an even more shameful result than AWAP, which gained 1.6% of the constituency vote and 3.7% of regional vote.
However, both the Green Party and AWAP had a high chance of winning a regional seat in the South Wales East – where back in 2016 UKIP came second with 17.8% and got 2 out of the 4 regional seats. Nevertheless, both parties fell short by just over 5,000 votes.
The anti-lockdown Reform UK also failed in their goal to “change politics for good,” gaining no seats and once again showing Nigel Farage and Richard Tice that no one cares about their party.
So far, none of the party leaders have said anything about their predicament, meaning that they have truly been defeated in a literal and mental sense, and hopefully they will keep their filthy noses out of Welsh politics for as long as possible.
How was Labour successful? They avoided focusing too much on attacking BoJo and his sleazy Eton pals and ‘Carrie Antoinette,’ and focused instead on positive messaging, even managing to attract the voters who backed UKIP back in 2016.
Welsh Labour’s leadership during the pandemic has also meant that the electorate feels more comfortable with voting for a party which has led the region during one of the biggest public health crises the country has ever seen, with many describing this attraction to the government as “Stockholm syndrome,” which I personally find to be very stupid.
Another conclusion that we can take from the results is that Plaid Cymru’s dreams of a Welsh referendum of independence is going to be very hard to achieve due to the lack of seats they have. They only managed to gain 13 seats, which is only one seat higher than their results in 2016.
The Welsh Labour manifesto has been seen as a big reason why Labour did not gain a majority, since it has been criticised as over-cautious, although looking at it I don’t see anything too tame there. Labour for example wants to keep prescriptions free in the region, open up a new medical school and develop the Young Persons Guarantee that will give everyone under 25 the offer of work, education, training, or self-employment.
Labour’s results in Wales should be a model for Labour as a whole party; there’s some speculation that by 2040, Labour will have enough support for a coalition government, although I don’t see this as possible if Labour keeps going at this rate.
As I previously mentioned in my article about Hartlepool and when I spoke to Nick Abbott on LBC, the reason Labour won in Wales was because they appealed to the former UKIP working-class voters. So, next, it’s time Sir Keir Starmer applied that same tactic nationwide.
Wisdom From Wales – Two contrasting leaders, Mark Drakeford and Boris Johnson, who’ve both had remarkable success in the 2021 elections. Labour First Minister Mark Drakeford was returned with an extraordinarily increased majority and polled nearly 50% of the total votes cast in Cardiff West. Labour also took back Rhondda from the former Plaid Cymru leader, Leanne Wood. Of the success of this pair and Nicola Sturgeon in Scotland also, ‘Unherd’s’ Freddie Sayers remarked: “One factor that hasn’t been much discussed is that these three characters — Sturgeon, Drakeford and Johnson — have for the past year of pandemic been on the television screens almost every evening precisely calibrating the level of freedom people should expect to enjoy. Sometimes our leaders have been generous, allowing us to have a coffee on a park bench with a friend; at other times, they have been pointlessly capricious, such as when Mark Drakeford insisted that non essential items like birthday cards and books were cordoned off in Welsh supermarkets so that people did not shop unnecessarily.”
Sue Homan quite deservedly“slams” decidely deviant disgrace Michael Barrymore for not helping secure justice for her murdered ex-husband Stuart Lubbock
Whilst late last month we reported that Michael Barrymore had been dragged in for further questioning about the 2001 rape and murder of Stuart Lubbock at his Roydon, Essex bungalow, his former agent, Mike Browne, heartlessly batted off questions by cretinously commenting: “The police seem convinced with the evidence they have found but I’ve no idea what it is. They seem sure but I can’t see how it can end in charges after so long.”
Responding to the wicked wall-of-silence from Barrymore and the other 7 still-living guests supposedly present that night – one of whom is presumably the 50-year-old recently arrested in connection with the appallingly sick slaying – yesterday, Stuart Lubbock’s ex-wife, Sue Homan, told The Sun:
“It would have really helped our campaign to have someone with [Michael Barrymore’s] fame supporting us.”
“Barrymore could have reached out to Stuart’s grieving family more to help them get justice.”
Previously, on the 5th May, Homan shared another article from The Sun and tweeted:
“So, after reading this. I’m assuming @mrbarrymore will be getting in touch soon, so we can both work on getting #Justice4Stuart Yes? No? Thoughts below pls. Michael Barrymore hopes for justice over death of Stuart Lubbock in his swimming pool 20 years ago.”
Responding to the tweet, another campaigner for #Justice4Stuart, ‘Agent 007’ answered:
“He’s only ‘hoping’ I’m afraid Sue, I don’t think he’ll go as far as ‘helping.’ He’s spent 20 years trying to make this disappear… I dread to think who’s advising him… Oh, it’s his pound shop solicitor.”
Now, today, we join all calling on Michael Barrymore and the others present that fateful night to finally do the decent thing and join those helping work towards a second inquest. It is time these miraculously quiet individuals finally assisted Essex Police and it is time each and every one of them responds to the police plea advertised as follows:
“Nine people went to the party at Michael Barrymore’s house, but only one of them – Stuart – ended up being violently sexually assaulted and murdered. We know not everyone at the party was responsible for what happened, but someone was. We also know that not everyone at that party may know what happened, but someone does… 19 years – still no justice: Help us get answers for Stuart. Someone knows.”
Pictured top: Michael Barrymore (left) in a decidedly dodgy shirt and Stuart Lubbock and Sue Homan in happier times on their wedding day in July 1993.
Of their marriage, in 2001, Miss Homan told the ‘Daily Mail’ – “He always wanted to settle down and have children. Stuart was devastated when we broke up. We had grown apart and I had grown up. I realised that I was too young to settle down.”
“Stuart was a lovely, lovely man who would do anything for anyone. He worked hard and adored his children. I just cannot believe that he is dead, no one can.”
Hoping v Helping 2021 – A decidedly drunk Michael Barrymore pictured (left) with a decidedly drunk and since convicted racist bigot Marie-Claire, Baroness von Alvensleben and with another of his equally vile friends, the thankfully now croaked paedophile Sir Jimmy Savile (right).Hoping v Helping 2021 – The scene of the rape and murder of Stuart Lubbock on 31st March 2001: Michael Barrymore’s then home, 4 Beaumont Park Drive, Roydon, Harlow, Essex, CM19 5HB.Hoping v Helping 2021 – A now 50-year-old Jonathan Kenney. This one-time estate agent turned estate agent was a lover of Michael Barrymore at the time of the murder of Stuart Lubbock and claimed to be the first to have discovered the body. In March this year, ‘The Sun’ reported: “[Kenney now] works as a coach driver and is in a long-term relationship with someone else,” though other reports elsewhere cited him as being a driving instructor.Hoping v Helping 2021 – As he faces certain death soon from terminal cancer, Stuart Lubbock’s crusading father Terry Lubbock deserves an answer to the question he has never stopped asking. That question: “Who killed Stuart Lubbock?”
Nikolay Kalinin shares his thoughts on Labour’s electoral hiding in Hartlepool
On Friday, came the result that everybody expected: The Labour Party lost the Hartlepool by-election to the Conservatives and for the first time since the constituency was created in 1974, a party other than Labour has the seat.
The outcome is both surprising and not surprising; after all, back in 2016 nearly 70% of Hartlepool voters supported leaving the EU, and the successful COVID-19 vaccine rollout has ensured that the government has the majority of public support. Yet in 2017, the Corbyn led Labour managed to retain the seat, even gaining the majority of the vote, and in the 2019 election Labour retained the seat, even though the party was seen as the biggest opponent of Brexit.
The truth is that there’s no single reason why Labour lost the by-election; Lord Mandelson for example has attributed Labour’s defeat to the “two Cs – Corbyn and COVID,” while casting Brexit as a secondary issue: “Believe it or not, not on one door that I knocked did a single voter mention Brexit to me. The one thing they did raise with me however is Jeremy Corbyn – he is still casting a very dark cloud over Labour,” Mandelson remarked.
Labour’s defeat and Jill Mortimer’s win also lies in the absence of the Brexit Party, now named Reform UK; back in 2019 the party split the vote, gaining 25.8% whereas the Conservatives gained 28.9%, which was instrumental in allowing Labour to win with just 37% of the vote. Had the Brexit Party not run that year, the Conservatives would have definitely won.
The disconnect between Labour and the electorate can be evidenced in Friday’s episode of BBC Radio 5 Live Breakfast, where several callers voiced their dissatisfactions with the party; one Conservative voter and small business owner stated that Labour “have taken Hartlepool for granted” and “chose a guy who was a devout Remainer.” Another caller added that Labour “needs to work on actually speaking to the working classes again” and connect with “small business owners, self-employed, Deliveroo drivers” as they “are the new working class.”
The choice of Paul Williams as Labour’s candidate for Hartlepool was also a factor in the party’s undoing in the by-election, since his choice once again evokes a disconnect between Labour and the voters they are trying to appeal to; not only was Williams an MP for another constituency – namely Stockton South – but he also opposed Brexit when most of the voters in his seat voted to leave the EU. You shouldn’t choose a Remainer to represent a Brexiteer constituency, just like you shouldn’t choose Priti Patel as ambassador for a mental health organisation, would be my conclusion.
Even Sir Keir Starmer seems to agree that Labour has been disconnected with the voters, as he reacted to the election results by saying, “Very often we’ve been talking to ourselves, instead of to the country, and we’ve lost the trust of working people, particularly in places like Hartlepool. I intend to do whatever is necessary to fix that.”
To a lesser extent another reason for Labour’s defeat is the fact that their previous MP, Mike Hill, was a sexual predator, which makes me wonder: “Why was Stephen Crabb, Conservative MP for Preseli Pembrokeshire, not forced out of his seat considering he was shown to be a degenerate with an unrestrained sexual desire.”
So, what is my overall analysis? Labour’s defeat in Hartlepool and the collapse of an important part of the ‘Red Wall’ was brought on by a wide range of factors, ranging from the time of Corbyn’s leadership, the successful vaccination rollout by the Conservative government, and also the issue over EU, which suggests that Brexit is still a prevalent issue among the British public.
Many would blame Corbyn for where the party is now, and I can agree that he dragged Labour down in 2019, but the truth is that Sir Keir might actually drag them down even further; whereas Corbyn tried to appeal to the “new working class” of young workers – which was essential in getting more young people to vote in 2017 – Starmer has decided to go after the older homeowners who are more likely to vote Conservative.
If Labour wants to regain the seat and have a chance at challenging ‘Bosie The Clown’ and his sleazy Eton friends in 2024, they must connect with their core working-class electorate, no matter whether they voted for Brexit or not. The ‘Wallpapergate’ sleaze scandal seems to have no impact on the government at all, so it’s probably best if Labour now instead dedicates its time to connecting with those that actually could get them elected.
Pictured top: Sir Keir Starmer campaigning in Hartlepool with wannabe MP for the Paul Williams.
A Hiding in Hartlepool 2021 – Jill Mortimer didn’t win over voters in Hartlepool. Labour, in fact, lost them.
Susie Dent shares the fascinating origin of “going to the polls” just as Count Binface looks to get more votes than Laurence Fox in spite of the latter having a ludicrous £5 million campaign pot
With voting underway across the country, “that woman in Dictionary Corner” Susie Dent this morning shared with her 753,000 followers on Twitter the origin of “going to the polls” this morning:
Origin of the day: the ‘poll’ in ‘going to the polls’ originally meant ‘head’, referring to the counting of heads or votes. A ‘noddypoll’ was an incompetent fool, a ‘clod-poll’ a blockhead, and a ‘tadpoll’ (later ‘tadpole’) a ‘toad-head’.
“It has been a very long, and very tedious, London election campaign, but for some of the capital’s voters, perhaps bewildered by the multitude of different voting systems employed and vast number of candidates for Mayor or the London Assembly, there has been one bright spot: Count Binface.”
“In elections that were postponed from 2020, among the various races-within-the-race for City Hall, there is a fascination among those who long ago tired of the lies of Tory Shaun Bailey or the deadly dull platitudes of Sadiq Khan (did you know: his father was a London bus driver?), the idea that a geezer with a bin on his head could attract more votes than the spittle-flecked campaign of Laurence Fox has lightened the mood these past couple of weeks.”
“And what’s more, unlike so much of so many of the pointless political campaigns, Binface is actually doing some good, by raising thousands of pounds for homelessness charities.”
Elsewhere on social media yesterday, Count Binface himself shared an amusing video based on Whitney Houston’s I Wanna Dance With Somebody asking his followers to make him their first choice today. The Steeple Times’ editor Matthew Steeples duly obliged when he headed to St Columba’s Church of Scotland in Pont Street, SW1 this morning and casted a protest for Max Fosh as his second choice also.
LONDON! Here's my final pitch to be your mayor, and/or the UK's next Eurovision entry. Make me your first choice vote, and together we will crush the loopy candidates. (You know who I mean.) #VoteBinfacepic.twitter.com/lZ7BpqE7Qv
Going to the Polls – Count Binface morphed into Whitney Houston to share his final pitch to be the next Mayor of London “and/or the UK’s next Eurovision entry.” He urged: “Make me your first choice vote, and together we will crush the loopy candidates. (You know who I mean.)”
Origin of the day: the ‘poll’ in ‘going to the polls’ originally meant ‘head’, referring to the counting of heads or votes. A ‘noddypoll’ was an incompetent fool, a ‘clod-poll’ a blockhead, and a ‘tadpoll’ (later ‘tadpole’) a ‘toad-head’.
Going to the Polls – Boris Johnson was escorted to vote in Westminster by his latest baby mama Carrie Symonds at just before 8am this morning. Whether she had to help the ‘noddypoll’ PM mark his voting card or not is unknown.Going to the Polls – Many Twitter users mocked the ex-actor Fox and remarked of their desire for Count Binface to actually be his ex-wife Billie Piper in disguise.Going to the Polls – The parody Boris Johnson account went further and declared: “To be honest, I don’t care if we take Hartlepool, as long as Count Binface beats that streak of piss, Laurence Fox.” 1,200 clicked “love” in response. Author Emma Kennedy added: “When Count Binface gets more votes than Waitrose Tommy Robinson tomorrow, I look forward to the 3682 5k thinkpieces/profile articles in The Telegraph and Sunday Times telling us what a brave visionary Count Binface is. Also: BBCQT AHOY!” and got 1,600 “loves” also.Going to the Polls – John O’Connell announced: “Duty done. I voted. Now I can freely spend the rest of the day taking the piss out of Shaun Bailey and Laurence Fox, and cheering on Count Binface.”
Nikolay Kalinin suggests that in spite of their crusade against Tory sleaze, Labour’s Sir Keir Starmer is failing to make any inroads and finds himself in a multifaceted mess
A week ago, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer attempted to present himself as the superhero British politics needs in order to rid the country of Tory sleaze. He proffered that his scrutiny at Prime Minister’s Questions and photo-ops at John Lewis illustrated that Labour will annihilate the Tories in tomorrow’s elections simply because the governing party are just ‘no good.’
Yet, the truth for Sir Keir is actually far bleaker and a multifaceted mess, as ever since February the gap between the Conservatives and Labour in the polls has been increasing in the governing party’s favour and this has mostly been due to the UK government’s incredibly successful vaccination programme.
Even after the ‘Wallpapergate’ scandal, it seems like nothing much has changed, as a YouGov poll has projected that on 6th May, Labour is most likely to lose 59 seats in ‘Red Wall’ local councils, whereas the Conservatives are set to gain 90. Furthermore, 38% of people in ‘Red Wall’ council areas have stated that Boris Johnson would “make the best Prime Minister,” compared to just 30% for Starmer.
The by-election in the Hartlepool constituency meanwhile – which has been described as the first litmus test of Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour leadership – has also left many expecting Labour will lose their hold over the area. A poll conducted by Good Morning Britain concluded that 50% of the people interviewed in the area would vote for Conservative candidate Jill Mortimer, compared to the 33% that would vote for Labour candidate Paul Williams.
In even worse news for Labour, another GMB poll concluded that most people in Hartlepool had favourable feelings towards Conservatives (46%), compared to Labour’s 31%. Furthermore, 45% of people expressed negative feelings towards Labour, compared to 31% who expressed negativity towards Conservatives. It seems therefore like Labour is on the path to losing the seat, which has been controlled by them since its establishment in 1974.
Still, there has also been evidence in the last few days that suggests otherwise; a recent UK voting intention poll conducted by Redfield & Wilton Strategies has seen the Conservatives’ lead being slashed by 4%, whereas Labour has gained 4% in the polls, meaning that the gap between both is now a mere 2%.
As expected, Labour London Mayor Sadiq Khan is expected to retain his position as he maintains a fairly stable lead in the polls, with predictions that he’ll get 61% in the first round whereas his hapless Conservative rival Shaun Bailey will achieve a mere 39%.
There’s a dangerously high chance that the Conservatives will be able to use the vaccination success in order to win over the voters in councils and in Hartlepool, who will ignore the fact that their PM has used donated money for his own expenses and didn’t even disclose it.
Why has Sir Keir Starmer, in general, failed to deliver a fatal blow to the Tories in the lead-up to the elections? It’s most likely due to lack of a uniting ideology, but more importantly due to the lack of opposition; because of the government’s role in fighting against COVID-19, it’s possible that the role of Labour as an opposition party has been substantially reduced, as they are actually unable to scrutinise the Tories like they would normally have had had there been no pandemic. In some way, Sir Keir seems to be lacking the appeal that Jeremy Corbyn had as Labour leader, which allowed the party to receive an influx of members after decades of falling membership.
So far, the sleaze scandals have not hurt the Conservatives at all – as a matter of fact support for them has been increasing – and even more surprisingly the Labour Party that has been leading the campaign against sleaze is getting pummeled in the polls. It truly is concerning that a party that has such a large lack of connection with people is leading in the polls, because this should not happen in a country that is supposedly a representative democracy. We’ll just have to wait and see, but a very important first signal will emerge with the results tomorrow.
Starmer’s Multifaceted Mess – Sir Keir Starmer certainly did not help himself when he found himself kicked out of a pub in Bristol in April. His minder’s bullyboy conduct reflected very badly upon him and the fact that his aides had not checked the venue out first shows a shocking lack of coordination on the Labour Party’s part.Starmer’s Multifaceted Mess – Sir Keir Starmer believes: “Another future is possible,” but thus far he has failed to convince he is the man who could deliver such in post-coronavirus pandemic Britain.
Nikolay Kalinin asks YouTube star Max Fosh about why he decided to run as a candidate in the 2021 London mayoral elections
Max Fosh is running a campaign to simply get more votes than ‘Detective Sergeant Ignoramus,’ the actor Laurence Fox, in next week’s London mayoral elections.
However, outside of appearances on his YouTube channel, Fosh has not spoken much about his campaign and his rivalry with Fox, so I decided to get to know him better and asked him 10 questions on behalf of The Steeple Times:
NK: Did you intend to run for London Mayor back in 2020 before the pandemic, or was it only after Laurence Fox announced his campaign that you decided to run?
MF: I decided to run when I saw a BBC News article outlining all the potential candidates, and at the bottom it had the different things that one needs to do in order to become a nominee, which was to get 66 signatures from 33 different boroughs – 2 individual signatures per borough – and to raise a £10,000 deposit. That’s what caused me to run, and I decided my main target was Laurence when I realised: ‘Hey, Sadiq’s going to win this election,’ so I wanted to have my own candidate to run against. I saw Lozza – similar background [they both went to school at Harrow], no experience in politics, he’s got 5 million quid and I don’t – and I decided to see who wins.
NK: Do you feel as if people your age and occupation are not taken seriously, especially by politicians?
MF: I think people my age and occupation are taken seriously, especially when they are pulling in numbers that they are. I mean, Niko Omilana has 5% of the vote, and he’s polling high in the 18-25 year old demographic, so I think we are being taken seriously.
NK: What was your reaction when you saw all these articles about you appearing on sites such as Daily Mail and Metro and, of course, in The Steeple Times?
MF: My reaction was of course: ‘Ooh! How interesting!’ Look, I know my media is online, so any information or any article that’s written about me in the mainstream press is always… well, I wouldn’t say it’s a welcome bonus, but it’s there and as long as more people can read the story of Max Fosh and his mayoral run then that can only be a good thing.
NK: In regards to Laurence Fox, what are you doing in order to get more votes than him besides making videos featuring you pranking him? It’s essential to note that you were tied with him in the ITV opinion poll revealed some time ago.
MF: I wouldn’t say I’m pranking him at all. I’m just positioning myself as a candidate. I’m just trying to utilise my audience to go out and vote and I have to preface this – I said this in multiple videos: I don’t want people to vote for me just because it can be fun. I want people to look at all the candidates running and make a formal decision and vote for whom they think is the best Mayor of London.
Would I be the best Mayor of London? Absolutely not. Would Laurence? Absolutely not. I’m just using my audience and the platform to encourage young people to vote.
NK: Will Laurence Fox in your opinion ever reach his political ambitions of first becoming London Mayor and then MP? What will happen to his Reclaim Party?
MF: I do not have the personal political expertise at all to be able to tell you whether he’ll reach his political ambitions. I mean, I’m not sure what his political ambitions really are; in this election, do I think he’s going to become Mayor of London? Absolutely not. In regards to the Reclaim Party, I really could not say, because it’s not my place to say. That’s more of a question for the party.
NK: How are you planning to react if you fail to get more votes than Fox?
MF: I would shake his hand, congratulate him and retire from politics.
NK: If you were legitimately running for position of London Mayor, what policies would you write in your manifesto?
MF: I am legitimately running for the position; I don’t think you could get any more legitimate than putting your name on the ballot paper. If you would like to see my manifesto, it’s all on laurencefox.org.
NK: Would you ever consider creating your own political party?
MF: No, not at all. I very much intend to retire after 6th May from politics altogether – whatever the result (obviously even if I win, which is an infinitesimal chance).
NK: How do you feel about major media outlets such as BBC, ITV and LBC ignoring your campaigns and instead interviewing and organising debates only between candidates from big parties?
MF: I totally agree with them. There are 20 candidates who are running, and four of them are considered the big players who are going to get most of the votes, so I think the big media outlets should be focused on them. It doesn’t mean they should be ignoring other campaigns, and they haven’t. I’ve been featured in every single nominee list, so I don’t really mind.
NK: Finally, do you think that your and Niko Omilana’s attempts to go into politics will start a trend where Internet personalities will try to run for public office?
MF: I don’t think that it will start a trend, because the trend has already happened; look at the US with Donald Trump, look at Ukraine with their President, so I don’t think this is going to kickstart a new trend; it’s already happening.
Flushing Out Fosh – Max Fosh appeared at Laurence Fox’s campaign launch with a car wrapped with the message: “Don’t Believe Everything You See On A Bus.”
Flushing Out Fosh – Max Fosh’s campaign in the 2021 London mayoral election centres around his use of YouTube as a medium to communicate with his clearly vast audience of 18 to 25 year olds.
