Sunday, August 26, 2007

David Davis accuses Home Office of 'cover-up' on gun crime

Given that the BBC's own graph showed the reality of firearms crimes (excluding airguns) whilst maintaining that gun crime "overall" is down, it really doesn't surprise me that David Davis has written to Jacqui Smith pointing out that the Government is basically lying about the state of firearms crimes, and in particular firearms homicide.

The Home Office's own statistics show that gun-related killings and injuries (excluding airguns) has increased for a factor of four since 1998. David Davis letter to Jacqui Smith quite rightly points out that to therefore say that gun crime is down (simply based on a reduction between this year and last, is both "inaccurate and misleading".

I can imagine what the Labour response to such an accusation will be. It will either be, as Chris Paul tried to imply in the comments here, that if you include airguns in the data set then it's somehow not as bad (which is of course nonsense when you are being very specific about the type of crime - gun homicide has increased four fold). This is bit like the way Labour still insist on saying that because mortgage rates are not 15% that the situation of indebtedness in Britain isn't "as bad" therefore they ignore it.

The other response, at some point, that I would expect, is for someone to say that David Davis is playing party politics with the tragic death of Rhys Jones. That it is shallow and naked opportunism. This is the stock response to anything the Tories say eventually. They'll probably then roll out some 20 year-old statistics showing how it was much worse under the Tories, but that won't of course be playing party politics.

I could be wrong of course, but the arguments that Labour use have become so tried and tested for them that they've become rather easy to predict.

Update: I notice that Bob Piper has posted saying that anyone who blames Labour for the four fold rise in gun homicide is wrong and that you could as easily blame Thatcher as the parents were brought up under her and she was of course a baby eater*. What's funny is that Bob calls the people who link increases in gun homicide over the past ten years to failure of Government - ergo the party of Government - twonks.

Presumably he was deaf from 1993 onwards where his party continually made such connections about the Tory Government (and continued too for at least seven years of Government)? Or perhaps he's just being a tad disingenuous? Either way his post is utterly contradictory. You'll note that he has also made the "party political point scoring" argument.

This is how it works you see. Something tragic happens. You express your dismay at the tragedy and say why you think something has gone wrong, in this case the four fold rise in gun homicide over the last ten years, and your "playing party politics" if you don't support the Government. It's complete and utter bollocks. It's made all the more ironic when it's wrapped up by someone claiming to be taking the moral highground (that would be the same highground that also has a big ostrich hole in it for them to stick their head into).

Having a view contrary to the Government, and officially wearing a badge that says you're on the Opposition's side, means that any argument you make is closed down with glib responses like "point scoring". There is nothing point scoring about saying "err excuse me, I think we have a problem here, and I think you're not being honest about the scale of it".

Incidentally, I don't blame the Labour Party, I blame the amalgam of ideas that have flowed from the Left as whole over the past few years. They may not have intended it, but they've brought about a dominance of nihilism and relativistic sophistry. Is it any wonder that an eleven year-old boy gets gunned down randomly in cold blood as a result?

* It has been noted by Bob that he said nothing about the actual gun figures. This is true, I was paraphrasing his arguments into the context of the wider response that is often thrown back regarding "party political point scoring" or more usually called "opportunism"

27 comments:

Newmania said...

That is just faultless genius Dizzy.A spellbinding post never shrill always reasonable and consequently devastating.Few people are up to this and off the top of my head I can`t think of any.You are a Gulliver strolling amongst the Lilliputians ....and I only popped in to nick some of your research.

Shock and awe old chum , shock and awe.

Bob Piper said...

Perhaps you should take the trouble to read it properly, dizzy. In fact I describe the 'blame Thatcher' argument as 'equally simplistic' and therefore it follows that if people blame(d) the Thatcher government for every ill in society, they too are twonks in my eyes.

My main point was more about Iain Dale blaming Labour controlled inner city local authorities for the rise in gun crime (equally trite) and then failing to point out that they were, errrm, Tory/Lib Dem controlled.

I realise you're a busy man, but a proper reading of the things you are criticising would help the coherence of your argument.

dizzy said...

Actually I did read it properly, and whilst you did indeed point out the problem with "Thatchers Blame" it remains the case that your party has been doing it for years, you seem to be ignoring that, and you're taking the moral high ground and rolling a weak attempt to close down any argument by saying it's party political point-scoring with a tragedy.

It's straight forward, plain and simple, disingenous bullshit that is entirely self-contradictory and deliberately ignores any criticism that there is a problem.

Sorry Bob, but you're talking bollocks.

Bob Piper said...

Once again you seem more interested in point scoring than the issue. I said that if Labour had done it I thought they were twonks too. I'm not trying to adopt the moral high ground, or close down the argument. You can't have it both ways. Either, as Dale argued it is the fault of inner city councils, in which case the Tory Lib Dem administrations also have to hold their hands up... or it is not and its an attempt to make a cheap political point out of a major social issue and a personal tragedy.

Sadly, it is you who are spitting out your bollocks between wordfs in an attempt to cover up for the fact that you didn't read what I had written.

Don't be embarrassed... it happens to all of us at times. It's like the Labour Government, you just have to live with it.

dizzy said...

I'm point scoring? Are you on crack? I did read your post, you started out making a valid point and then totally contradicted yourself by doing that with you were charging others of doing.

I do like the way you're now seeing your post as an exclusive attack on something Iain said, yet that makes up only the end of the post and instead begins with other comments from elsewhere.

I fully agree that blaming councils directly is weak if one does it with the name of the party in charge there. However you didn't just do that, what you did was whine about party political pointing scoring by making party political points. It was bollocks, and it completely ignored dealing with, or considering the issue at hand.

You started out with the intent of attacking fallacious reasoning and did it with different fallacious reasoning. Simple as that really.

Bob Piper said...

Well perhaps instead of throwing insults you could point to my 'cheap political point scoring'

If anyone is on mind bending substances it is you. You start off misreading what I say, then move on to assert I said something I didn't... and then say I'm scoring cheap political points for saying what I didn't actually say.

You are on the same kick as when Unity made you look stupid before, if you can't respond just say someone else is talking bollocks.

dizzy said...

"Just how fatuous can you get though in search of a few cheap political points to try score around the tragic death of a child?"

This is a prime example of closing down the argument Bob. You are making an attack on the motive of an argument, not the argument itself, in order to dismiss it. And by raising the weak spectre of "party poltical motive" you are in fact yourself doing just that very thing. And that is my point about the weakness of citing "party politics" and attacking motivation rather than attacking an argument.

You keep banging on about Iain Dale being the main angle of your post, but it's pretty clear that the post is far wider than that.

"I wouldn't mind so much if there was some serious attempt at analysis"

What you mean like the analysis in the setence which preceded it that sought to dismiss criticism on the ground of motive? And you wonder why I say you;re talking bollocks?

You are on the same kick as when Unity made you look stupid before, if you can't respond just say someone else is talking bollocks.

I don;'t know if you've noticed this Bob, but my criticism is pretty clearly. You've decided to do a post banging on about party political point scoring as a means of dismissing an argument. Let's take Iain's argument as an example for a moment.

You say that you cannot blame the Council because the argument is weak. Does that mean, therefore, that the Council cannot be too blame in all circumstances? I'd say that claiming that something is wrong because the reasoning behind it is wrong is actually the "stupid" thing here. You're dismissing something which may in fact be true but the means of argument to reach the conclusion are not. That's why you're talking bollocks. It's not just me saying it, I'm explaining why as well.

Your post is a prime example of how the charge of "point scoring" is fucking nonsense. It's as simple as that.

Incidentally, Unity didn't make me look stupid. He took a post I did that was a few lines long and wrote an extrapolated essay of fabrication.

Anonymous said...

"All firearm offences fell by 13 per cent last year, according to the Home Office"

Today's Guardian/Observer is playing the same statistics game.

Daily Referendum said...

Wake up Bob,

After years of Labour lies, spin is the first thing the people look for from you lot.

You can't kid everyone all of the time.

Newmania said...

Piper has a point in that taking the death of a child and using it nonsensically as a Party political football would be disgusting. There is a line to be drawn for the Conservative Party but for a leering Labour Party gargoyle to whine is a rare treat for the connoisseur of insouciant cant .
David Cameron has had much to say about our “Broken Society” and Iain Duncan Smith’s Report bears directly on the atomisation and brutality of life in our country It is the oppositions duty , when coverage is available, to draw conclusions . .This death does seem to be symptomatic of social problems about which Conservatives have already developed a narrative. Social incoherence , breakdown and the new bestial gang structures .These are themes which he has been crying into the uncaring wilderness about for a year .It is a specific circumstance and among others it adds to a picture that is part of the Conservative case . It reflects legitimate concerns across the county especially in London. About gang crime .
Contrast Cameron’s measured contextual response with the behaviour or Tony Blair and sideshow Brown over the Bulger story. Tony Blair used the Jamie Bulger Murder with no sense except to harness uncomprehending distaste for a meaningless tragedy . The following are excerpts from Nick Cohen’s assault on the depravity of the Blair / Brown media machine. Their exploitative twaddle should never be forgotten as one of the low points in the political history of this country.


Tony Blair hijacked the murder of James Bulger for political ends, and so put justice in jeopardy
Special report: James Bulger

Nick Cohen
Sunday June 24, 2001
The Observer
There's no alternative to saying it bluntly. Tony Blair robbed the grave of a dead toddler in the spring of 1993 and exploited the suffering of his family to create a dangerous and hypocritical political style. ........
________________________________________

________________________________________
...........Thatcherism..... Its clean little secret was that its crime policies were quietly sensible..... Conservative Home Secretaries tried in their muddled way to be straight with the public. Douglas Hurd, Kenneth Baker, David Waddington, Kenneth Clarke and Michael Howard refused to fill the prisons to please the tabloids.
.....

In the weeks before James Bulger was killed, I got a draft of a torrid speech by David Maclean, a junior Minister in Howard's Home Office. The justice system was 'on the side of the criminal', Maclean had intended to rage, and vigilantes had a point. The police must have the power to drive offenders from the streets like 'vermin'.
We're used to such tosh today, but at the time Ministers didn't talk like that. Howard was appalled and Maclean's speech was rewritten. Instead of playing Dirty Harry, Howard required him to deliver a worthy lecture on crime prevention which, as I remember, made much of fitting good window locks......... After James Bulger's murder, Blair went to Wellingborough and announced that the killing was 'a hammer-blow against the sleeping conscience of the country'. It was a daring move. He was using a dead toddler as a symbol of the state of Britain under the Conservatives. Only under Labour, he said, would we find social peace by accepting we 'couldn't have rights without responsibilities'. Roy Hattersley, Blair's predecessor as Labour's home affairs spokesman, would never have used the death of a child for political advantage. Nor would most serious Conservatives. There were reasons for restraint beyond good taste. The premise of the Wellingborough speech was demonstrably false. James Bulger's murder 'said' nothing more (or less) about the state of Britain than that a horrible crime had taken place. It wasn't a symbol of anything. About 20 juveniles are convicted of murder or manslaughter each year. Nearly all are 14 or over. Killers as young as Jon Venables and Robert Thompson are incredibly rare, which is why the criminal-justice system has such difficulties knowing whether to punish or treat them. .... They don't 'tell' the conscience of the country anything.
..............


In the current case it is not just a far fetched emotive metaphor about ?” The conscience of the country” it is an exemplar of societal and family breakdown which remain central themes of Cameron`s message . It would be an abstention from his duty and the Conservatives not to point to the story they were already telling.
So the parasitical Labour hanger on Piper , who has never had a job , is right to mention moral boundaries . David Cameron has observed them and his words are using sentiment when it is “ Justified by the plot “ so to speak . Blair’s behaviour was more akin to gratuitous nudity or violence .

If I could take Piper seriously at all I`d probably call him a hypocrite , as it is he`s just a tired old clown who may eek out his days entertaining the children with his nonsense. Who cares. Straw and the droogs attempts to play moral judo and lock down debate by claiming any sort of political analysis is unworthy .It is farcical from them but even in honest hands , not theirs ,it would be a misrepresentation of a subtle distinction.

David Cameron has thus far been the Little Bears porridge and got it just right ….. The news today that King Ken broke down in tears whilst apologising s to Jesse Jackson about slavery , gives you some idea what the Labour Party’s view of restraint .

Is there no depth to which they will not sink….noone is saying “when” so far

Ralph said...

Bob,

Labour can't keep claiming credit for everything that goes well and blaming others for things that go badly.

That argument has got very stale.

Labour have been in control of the police, and the legal systen for over ten years, and has had large enough majorities to force through any laws it wanted, yet gun crime is soaring.

Your party has failed to deliver yet again.

Bob Piper said...

daily referendum and ralph... I agree with both of you. I make no attempt to say the Labour Government shouldn't accept its share of the responsibility, and if you read what I wrote, rather than what dizzy wants you to believe I wrote, you will see that. I actually say that the increase of wealth inequality which has continued under the Blair-Brown regime is partially to blame in my opinion.

Hardly the words of a Labour spin doctor.

I won't bother to respond to the other muppet. As usual he jumps in like a Dalette on heat with nothing much to say. However, I'm 'eeking out my days as an elected Labour councillor with a bloody good majority and with a Government in power... he is settling down to a life of mediocrity in opposition. Who's sad..,. eh?

dizzy said...

So it's all because of the pseudo-scientific approach to capital, social structures and wealth distribution.

Alternatively read as the, "If only these youngsters had more money thrown at them they wouldn't be shit stains" approach.

Newmania said...

You don`t respond to me Piper because you do not understand what I have said ,which is largely what Nick Cohen said about the mis-use of the Bulger case by Blair and side show Brown.
In this context the request to be above Party Politics is risible . Furthermore , Cameron has a context that is a justification wheras Blair and Brown did not .
I am simply shown the vast moral gulf between the use made of tragedy between the cynical media obsessed Labour Party and a reasonable opposition..
You have nothing to say. ...love the juxtapositon of Labour Coucillor (guffaw) and mediocrity...oo that stung.

Oh god are they ever going to say anyhthing that isn`t "Take money from hard working people and give it to layabouts , that will do it ".

I know you are justifiably wary of me Piper and please believe me , I am enjoying your respectful silence . I shall continue your education at my leisure.

Mountjoy said...

David Davis is absolutely right that the Government is covering up gun crime. Basically, the Government has failed to get a grip on gun crime. I do hope Jacqui Smith will act on this matter, but I won’t hold my breath.

Bob Piper said...

Fancy being told by a fucking insurance man that I am wary of him! What a joker.

Garry said...

I don't agree with everything Bob's written but Bob's specific point regarding Mr Dale does seem to stand up.

Iain, in a post about gun crime clearly motivated by the murder of Rhys Jones, wrote that "Local Labour politicians have been more interested in protecting their local inner city fiefdoms than tackling the terrible social deprivation that exists within them."

The problem for Iain is that Liverpool council has been controlled by the Lib Dems for the last 9 years. But Mr Dale prefers to keep the "Labour weak on law and order" narrative clean and avoid complicating his post with such trivial details as facts.

That aside, I agree that the government has twisted the figures to their advantage. When Smith claimed that gun crime is down, she wasn't lying. She just wasn't telling the whole truth.

Newmania said...

Piper -Thought you couldn`t leave that .... neee-aint I dispickibil


Curious
Its not a question of weakness IMHO. Blair and Side-kick Lurcio Brown has been ever so quick to please the Daily Mail by getting rid of juries and circumventing the law in any number of ways. Brown has gone on with this "tough" sounding rhetoric.

The frame work for the law to be applied has not been there notably as in the absence of prisons . More importantly the creation of an underclass dependent on others to earn their living for them ( Like Bob Piper for example ).This has been morally corrosive as was predicted by Frank Field when he was supposed to be the vanguard of a genuinely new labour government.
When Brown got him fired the Old Labour Party took over here leaving Blair to posture abroad with equally dire consequences. That is why Piper and Unions and the other Old Labour employees love Brown despite his " New Brown " clothes . They know better , he is alreadt quietly dropping academies and NHS privatisation ...pathetic as it was
This is the other side of the coin from the great boast about "lifting children out of poverty". Labour have , as usual been quick to throw money around but have not understood the importance of self reliance work and especially fathers in families.
Anyone living amongst these estates knows exactly whats been going on and thats despite endless CCTV asbos and moutains of cash spent on the problem. Gun crime is a symptom of the whole Labour sicknessand especially black on black which is prevalent here.

I was previously pointing out how hysterical Labour fastidiousness about discussing tragedy was in the light of the Bulger tidal wave of crap and the infinitely more sensitive Conservative response here.

Now what do we hear ,, the answer is to throw more money at it. With the resources that have and could have been at their disposal it is shocking that no progress has been made. THis is the intellectually bankrupt centralising ghost of socilaism stakling the land ..and the Unions are back as well.

Lets face it , 8,000,000 people working for the state those on benefits and those who hate the coutry and a few Guardian readers is their constituency.... Why would they want to solve the problem. They would be solving themselves out of existence.

Fidothedog said...

There is that old saying that there are lies and then there are statistics.

And what with New Labours record on spin, spin and more spin and that class comment on 9/11 being the perfect day to bury bad news it is hardly surprising that people are cynical about anything that our politicians tell us.

If as they say gun crime is down, then why do we have a steady stream of stories of people being killed by guns here in the UK?

Ralph said...

CH,

If you say something designed to mislead even if it is correct it is still deception.

Bob,

Whatever the cause your party has had ten years with a large majority to sort it out and has failed.

Now one of your local MPs is trying to cover it up.

Shouldn't you as a Labour supporter be having a go at your dishonest MPs and inept leader?

Garry said...

Newmania, whether you describe it as weakness or something else is another point.

The point I was making was that Iain was attacking Labour with the "Anarchy in the UK" meme by blaming Labour councils despite the fact that Liverpool doesn't have a Labour council. If that's not "playing party politics", as well as playing fast and loose with the facts, can someone explain why not.

Ralph - "If you say something designed to mislead even if it is correct it is still deception."

I'm not disputing that. That's why I wrote that she wasn't telling the whole truth. Would you say that that's worse than writing something designed to mislead which isn't correct?

Politicians. Bah!

Newmania said...

CURIOUS-I understand your point but the overarching logic is right which was what I was trying to move onto.
Labour Governments are elected in England overwhelmingly by inner city constituencies and especially those with high dependency , for obvious reasons. New Labour therefore have a vested interest in not solving the social breakdown that goes with benefits and family free lifestyles .

Honestly I understand what you are saying about the Councils in these areas but Labour Councils and MP`s up and down the country depend on these pockets of misery. That is why" Over the country" there has been no attempt to understand how to move forward. the fact that these particular Councils were not Labour is not the real point , there have been seventeen black youths shot in South London so far this year ( which no one seems to care about ). The wealth wordwide capitalism , oil and the citry have poured into this country should have lifted us out of this and it has not .
The inner city problem is across the country , this could have happened anywhere and Labour are maintaining the fertile soil.
That is the sense in which they would rather keep their inner city fiefdoms even if it means the deaths if boys caught in the deliberately constructed cycle of despair. Perhaps this sounds like sophistry but in fact it is the reverse .The is the shocking truth about the Labour Party is that they claim to alleviate misery and so they must have a steady supply. Meanwhile the army of fellow travellers live off the back of it preening themselves for being "Labour Coucillors " .

I `d rather admit to punching old ladies and stealing their purses than own up to living like a maggot on the rotting decay they have maintained . Everyone time there is a death a another little job springs into life and a Labour fairy smiles in heaven.

Bob Piper said...

What a load of rubbish. It is like suggesting that the decline in Britain's rural economy in the post war years is entirely the fault of the Conservative Party's decision to keep them down and make them compliant. These little pockets of rural land owners who only want to be happy enough to pursue their hobbies like chasing the fox and buggering the pigs. Complete and utter unscientific bullshit.

If as you say, Blair was a loathsome little get for trying to exploit the Bulger murder, and I'm quite prepared to accept he was and did, you are an equal bucket of slime for trying to defend the exploitation of this poor kid's death. I'm prepared to accept that too.

No wonder you're an insurance man!

Anonymous said...

"No wonder you're an insurance man!"

Nice priorities, Blackface Bob.

Insurance men are obviously a far greater menace to society than immoral hoodies with guns.....

Anonymous said...

My first, but not last visit here Dizzy, linked in from Iain. Pity about this Bob fellow, seems an archetypal nu-lab numpty, with a huge chip on his shoulder- "chasing the fox, and buggering the pigs". Pathetic really, and no substitute for reasoned argument which he seems short of.

Newmania said...

Piper - Bulger was a one off meaningless tragedy . This is a gang related and gun related crime. Additionally the terms in which the Labour Party which was even , then a Brown Blair project went for the lowest possible assault on the national consciences claiming , in a nebulous way , that this was symbolic of …god knows what. This campaign was so loud continued and significant that Andrew Marr was still commenting on it as part of his recent history . The scale cynicism and stupidity are of quite a different order and prior to Brown and Blair it was unheard of in our democracy. . Deny it as much as you like …noone who remembers the Bulger period could honestly agree with you.Oh and for god`s sake don`t pretend Brown wasn`t complicit , he ran the Party`s strategy

On the rural economy , I `m not at all sure it is right to say it has declined in the post war years there has certainly been something of a resurgence in some areas . The Conservative Party represent its interests , true but a compliant constituency….splutter.. I bet Cameron wishes it was . Its lack of compliance is in stark contrast to the beaten serfs forced to do as they are told by their Party masters .

OK the Labour Party has not stolen money from the inner cities. It has stolen from the working class and lower middleclass who bear the brunt of increases on taxation . This has been something like 38% to 45% state governed expenditure as a share of GDP. With continued growth however this represents a massive shift in resources to the state Now the beast must be fed . By its attacks on property ownership in the estates through criminal service charging by its creation of more homogenous slums by its anti family policy and anti work marginal taxations and centralized Byzantine benefits which are about the same spend as income tax is in revenue, it has created an underclass. Labour themselves recognise this of course , hence the tax credit scheme which tries to bridge the what was once called the poverty trap .

This scheme , in addition to being delivered with the incompetence of the medical provision for the Crimea has failed entirely in its express intention which is to get people back to work . The working population today is larger than ever but that is because the lower middle classes and working classes now need two incomes to afford a house the non working population is also expanding and despite heavy disguise as disablement it is a 1.6 million , there are about 5,500,000 of state dependents . The number of people not working at all in some areas is staggering the worst being Glasgow. The prevalence of gun crime and gang structures is related especially when the father has been removed from the picture.
Having said that whenit finally worls it would be foolhardy to dismatle what was half a good idea quickly .

It is not a question in reality of the Labour Party being evil although as an organisation it is structurally sick, . It is a question of them being wrong . The wrongness is in the belief that the state can provide the social structure and moral purpose that is the answer to crime . They believe that people can be motivated to be better by an identification with the government . Laughable obviously and especially in this country. In order for them to start think about the doctrinal crime are legion . Perhaps there is a point at which charity is harmful ? Should benefits be early and proactive but with a cut off point. Should the incidence of single motherhood which is fine for Polly Toynbee `s chums be something we should consider and should we return to supporting the family .


No one is claiming that these are easy problems to solve , noone wants to pick on the most vulnerable . , David Cameron has called it a multi generational problem but all the Labour Party can ever do is steal form the working and give to the problematical. Meanwhile in London Cuddly Ken is enforcing the construction of new slums which will not ,as he claims , lower the housing list (13000 in my borough) it will attract more of the homeless. Usually a hugely disproportionate share of the 585,000 immigrants per year. Do you imagine he is unaware of the fact they will have to vote for their masters . He in particular bears a personal responsibility for the gun crime epidemic in London. He takes our money and buys voters houses …. Dame Shirley except of a grand scale . Without this Labour would be finished in the South and suspect the motives of him and Prescott for whom he was the front. The housing industry is populated by unreconstructed socialists and the dirty little secret of Labour as you will well know is that most of the Party are in fact doctrinaire collectivists working under cover.
They love handing each other public sector jobs as you also know

You see the future as taxes , state hand outs and state targets Piper , I see it as families work and state enabling I see the gains of socialism and there were many ,as banked . You want to go on until the individual is defeated


BTW - If insurance man is supposed to an insult I `m a bit bemused . Its the biggest employer in the South….you are despising a vast number and I have absolutely no idea why…. It is also an essential service to all industry and indispensable to even the most primitive economy. It is ferociously competitive , skilled and client based. You should try a real job , you would be amazed at what it takes to earn the money to be taxed .Sorry , but I have to earn a living .

Newmania said...

I`d have got away with it but the pig squealed !