[Closed] Boris Johnson and the presumption of guilt...

Do we think that is an ok thing to do?

I don't, no.

Should Boris be able to air this view outside of his elected role or when he is an elected role?

Yes, absolutely. Why not?

- Do we think that is an ok thing to do?

On the one hand, it's the opposite of what we, as a country and a legal system, believe in, so a resounding no. On the other, you could argue that, outside humanitarian assistance, the people that travel to places like that in times of trouble are [i]probably[/i] going to be up to no good.

- Should Boris be able to air this view outside of his elected role or when he is an elected role?

There is no reason that he can't. However, I do think that he should learn to think more about what he says before he says it. Sometime just being able to is not the reason to do something.

Interesting choice of tags.

He should be allowed to say it but he seems to be doing it more to promote brand Boris rather than in the hope it'll happen.

Excellent idea and in this case totally justified.

Boris like anyone else is free to view his opinion. Specifically he is Mayor of London and doesn't want these people returning to London.

There where press (Sunday Times / Indepedent) reports over the weekend "identifying" the murderer of John Foley as a Maida Vale local whose father is currently detained in the US as a member of Al-Q.

Tags all based on things I have read said about it!

[i]Excellent idea and in this case totally justified[/i]

There's going to be a lot of journalists coming back from the middle east banged up until they can prove their innocence...

Of course he should be allowed to say it.

And it's a terrible idea. Think of all the other 'anti-terror' legislation that was only going to be applied in "very limited circumstances" that ended up being used to stop people taking photos of police officers at protests, or to record people putting the wrong type of yoghurt pot in their recycling bin.

Stuff like this shows him for the nasty piece of work that he is. The more the 'lovable buffoon mega-LOLZ-have-I-got-news-for-you-BANTER!' facade slips the better.

There's going to be a lot of journalists coming back from the middle east banged up until they can prove their innocence...

[i]those who had gone without permission.[/i]

you'd need permission to leave the country?

An incredibly stupid and ill thought out soundbite from one of the most despicable self serving politicians out there, but oh-so-typically expected of the floppy haired toff to spout off such crap, gets him in the headlines for being hard on home-grown terrorism and the right wing **** wits love him, such as jambalaya up there ^

Boris is your standard man of no principles playing to the audience.
One thing that should link conservatives is the consistent rule of law, and he has gone out of his way to undermine it.

He's just doing it to boost this support among foaming at the mouth, daily fail readers.

What he's proposing hasn't a cat in hells chance of making into law, as he well knows.

Its all just careful PR with Johnson, he's electioneering for his next job as PM

Putting out some nice juicy right wing bollox for the easily led reactionary types

What if you have family there, do you need permission to visit your own family?, aid workers, doctors etc
At one point were we not proposing sending weapons and soldiers/advisors ourselves to support the rebels against Assad and Borris himself called for a second vote to help the rebels

As a confirmed supporter of Israels apartheid in Gaza in unsurprised that jambalayas solution is to stop all travel to and from the country, just extend the concrete wall from Gaza all the way round the middle east eh?

Two possible ways of doing it:

A - change the law so that you can prosecute under an existing "terrorism" offence, and if the prosecution can prove that the accused travelled to Syria, then they are to be found guilty unless they prove that they were doing something else;

B - change the law so that travelling to Syria without pre-authorisation is itself an offence (probably with confiscation of the passport being the main sanction).

A reverses the presumption of innocence, and is also basically absurd as almost by definition if you needed to use the rule then you wouldn't have any actual evidence of a substantive crime.

B does not reverse the presumption of innocence, but just creates a technical offence which is not linked to any other bad behaviour. You couldn't give people serious time for it.

They'd go for B I think, A would certainly be challenged under the Human Rights Act.

[i]change the law so that travelling to Syria without pre-authorisation is itself an offence[/i]

So ISIS would just send all it's British volunteers to Northern Iraq and no offence would be committed.

Boris explicitly said those who had gone without permission. I would imagine it would take a journalist about 5 mins to pursued the immigration authorities they had good reason to be there.

Why should anyone have to ask for permission to leave the country? He's basically proposing exit visas a la USSR / Cuba! And how are you planning on defining "journalist"? Article published in the Times or the Mail or at least one appearance on Sky? How about Al Jazeera? They certainly sound dodgy and muslamic... What about aid workers? How should they prove their innocence to the authorities?

Should Boris be able to air this view outside of his elected role or when he is in an elected role?

Yes, of course ! then people can learn from the man himself what he is really all about, 16-17 stone of prime bellend cheddar arranged vertically, just make sure whenever you hear someone praising him that you counter their praise with your own view !

I think it's a great idea to always presume Boris Johnson is guilty of something.

somafunk - Member

An incredibly stupid and ill thought out soundbite from one of the most despicable self serving politicians out there, but oh-so-typically expected of the floppy haired toff to spout off such crap, gets him in the headlines for being hard on home-grown terrorism and the right wing **** wits love him, such as jambalaya up there ^

Brilliant ! 🙂

So ISIS would just send all it's British volunteers to Northern Iraq

"The Secretary of State shall have power by regulation to designate "Terror-Tourism Zones of concern" for the purposes of this section either by reference to the borders of internationally-recognised states or by reference to a particular part or region"

Sorted. 😉

@waswas - have you actually read what Boris said ?

you'd need permission to leave the country?

So ISIS would just send all it's British volunteers to Northern Iraq and no offence would be committed.

The proposal is you would need to have permission to travel to Syria or Iraq. You don't need permission to leave.

He's just doing it to boost this support among foaming at the mouth, daily fail readers.

Personally I ask myself why the fact that 500 UK citizens have traveled to join ISIS wasn't a news item 6 months ago. These people haven't just left in the past few months, they have been travelling over the past 12 months and this has been well known to the security forces.

[i]Sorted.[/i]

No opportunity for future abuse of power there, then...

[edit]

[i]The proposal is you would need to have permission to travel to Syria or Iraq. [/i]

and what about next week when ISIS are in Kurdistan or wherever? Do immigration give anyone who they think might be a Muslim the third degree every time they head off for a holiday in Southern Spain in case they're going to travel on to somewhere else?

I've read what he said. It seems to be a classic example of 'SOMETHING MUST BE DONE' law making.

@somafunk, I think you'll find it was the Labour party under Gordon Brown who introduced the emergency detention legislation. That legislation was actually more broad ranging and restrictive than Boris's proposal.

@ben, we are all "guilty of something"

Is this presumed guilty argument also going to be applicable in divorce and paternity cases, or does Boris only want it in areas that will not affect himself?

its an interesting one this, though would, as stated above be too tricky to implement in practice what with legitimate family visits....

Just a nonsense soundbite really, but why stop with Syria and Iraq? why not include for example ****stan- lots of Al Queda's guys in the afghan were based/trained there....

Jambalaya - The reason we weren't hearing about it is that It didn't suit the previous narrative we've had for the war in Syria.

Up until a month ago we didn't view them as Islamic nut jobs, but as plucky freedom fighters battling the evil Assad. Dave and chums were going to send the RAF in to help them, remember?

What Boris is proposing would be against international law. He knows this. It's just dog whistle stuff for the kind of harrumphing, right wing imbeciles who have their opinions spoon fed to them by mid-market tabloids.

The proposal is you would need to have permission to travel to Syria or Iraq. You don't need permission to leave.

So if you travel via, say, Italy you're OK? How many of these people fly direct to their destination anyway?

What Boris is proposing would be against international law.

That I doubt - the Soviet Union, Cuba, North Korea and others have been doing it for years.

...have been doing it for years.

So if I murder someone it wouldn't be against the law because "others have been doing it for years" ? Cool, I'll remember that.

A look at the current arrangements shows why they won't protect Britain or enable us to prosecute the people who travel abroad to commit acts of terror / brutality:

1. Anyone can travel to the war zones in Iraq and Syria
2. They can pretty much do anything they want, safe in the knowledge that the collapse of the police and justice systems in those countries means their crimes are unlikely to ever be detected, let alone evidence collected, proper investigation taking place or a prosecution
3. We can't investigate or prosecute them on their return due to the lack of evidence - and we can't collect evidence because their crimes are largely undetected.

So basically that lands up with a reported c1500 britons who have committed heinous crimes abroad returning with no real risk of prosecution, and potentially with enough freedom to plan similar brutal acts here.

There's no reason for anyone who is not a journalist / aid worker or has family members there to visit Iraq or Syria. Telling our border agency that you're going to a war zone and why you are going shouldn't be seen as a big deal as it simply enables the return of people to be tracked and potentially investigated. That makes us safer but more importantly means that we can investigate the acts our own countrymen may have committed abroad.

The sorry tale of the Londoner who took an ageing fleet of ambulances on an "aid mission" to Syria only to find out the hard way that one of his helpers was a would-be suicide bomber illustrates perfectly the need to control who is going where.

http://www.thirdsector.co.uk/british-suicide-bomber-abdul-waheed-majeed-travelled-syria-charity-aid-convoy/governance/article/1281139?preferredformat=mobile

It isn't going to happen.

This is Boris making a statement to gain the support of right wing nutjobs without the risk of it becoming law and actually embarassing him.

A really clever move by him.

No opportunity for future abuse of power there, then...

Far easier and cheaper to prevent these people returning to the UK than trying to keep track of them and their activities once they are back.

No opportunity for future abuse of power there, then...

I dislike the idea enormously, it's a fairly grotesque violation of people's basic freedom of movement and likely to be spectacularly ineffective. But that's how you'd do it without reversing the presumption of innocence.

The single stupidest thing is identifying which countries are a problem. Enormous numbers of British people travel to Nigeria every year. Nigeria has a ghastly Islamist insurgency which (before we got excited about the Islamic State) was the Worst Thing In The World. Presumably, British people may go, or may have been to Nigeria to fight. The resources neededto pre-clear all visits to Nigeria would be huge.

People go to Kenya all the time. Cross-border movement of people between North Kenya and Somalia is very common, across a border which is open for vast distances. We simply can't monitor everyone who goes to Mombasa and may or may not get on the bus to Mogadishu to do a bit of terrorising.

Offences exist that can be used to prosecute people who are actually demonstrated to be fighting abroad. That, plus some fairly careful monitoring of people who come back, and ideally some fairly strenuous consular efforts to rescue the inevitable idiots who have disappeared off to Iraq and realised they don't like it at all.

[i]The sorry tale of the Londoner who took an ageing fleet of ambulances on an "aid mission" to Syria only to find out the hard way that one of his helpers was a would-be suicide bomber illustrates perfectly the need to control who is going where.[/i]

so would someone previously unknown to the security services driving an ambulance in an aid convoy be considered ok to travel to Iraq/Syria under the Boris law or not?

the Soviet Union...have been doing it for years

Edit: 😉

(1) Up until a month ago we didn't view them as Islamic nut jobs, but as plucky freedom fighters battling the evil Assad. Dave and chums were going to send the RAF in to help them, remember?

(2) What Boris is proposing would be against international law.

(2) No it would not be.

The Soviet Union are breaking international law? But what if someone who lives there wants to travel to Siam, Prussia or Tanganyika?

🙄

Well, duh. The point I was (I thought obviously) making was that international law doesn't stop the use of exit visas controlling whether you're allowed to leave the country, and that they've been used in recent history. (And it's nice you've snipped the Cuba and North Korea part of what I said...)

Dave and chums where considering action to support the Syrian Free Army

So going abroad to be a medic in the FSA/SFA would be okay? What about fighting for them?

And what if I go to Iraq as a private security consultant to protect staff at an oil refinery?

so would someone previously unknown to the security services driving an ambulance in an aid convoy be considered ok to travel to Iraq/Syria under the Boris law or not?

How do you prove that you haven't done something?

So going abroad to be a medic in the FSA/SFA would be okay? What about fighting for them?

But how do you know they've been there's, does the IS caliphate have its own passport stamp yet?

Can you even fly to Damascus from the UK at the moment ?

Its an unworkable law Boris is just milking the right wing idiot vote

[i]If they got permission first that would be OK for them to return[/i]

I'm not sure prospective suicide bombers are that worried about returning...

Jambalaya - Given how the police in this country have rampantly abused the anti-terrorism laws they've already got, to stifle legitimate protest for instance, do you think they could be trusted with the kind of powers Boris is proposing?

If so, then you're being hopelessly naive. British law has the burden of presumed innocence built in for very good reason! We need to keep it that way! Despite what authoritarian, right wing half-wits think

Nope, in my book I wouldn't allow those people (mdeics etc) back either without checks.

What kind of checks? How do you realistically propose to verify that a medic has been working in Kurdish-held rather than IS-held territory? Or that s/he never picked up a gun while out there?

Stupid idea.

Standard issue problem reaction solution to help justify surveillance and slowly erode liberties...

To be fair to Boris, he packaged it quite well, by using a statement many people will agree with:

'Jihadi John should be killed in a bomb attack'

Must say, it's quite strange how the rapper who they are beginning to portray as Jihadi John was 1st publicized a few days before the beheading (which is being variously portrayed as staged and over a year old by some MSM sources).

Best solution is probably for Boris to wait eagerly at the border, his fat fingers poised at the controls of one of the watercannons he purchased with taxpayers money, whilst his buffoonish puppy eyes look oh so innocent for the camera...

How do you prove that you haven't done something?

[i]a convincing alibi backed up with evidence[/i]

So you could keep a blog;

[i]
Day 1: didn;t fight for ISIS. Visited cousin Dave in Syria.

Day 2: still not fighting for ISIS. Cousin Dave took me for a day trip to the countryside. Took some pictures (attached).
[/i]

?

Jambalaya is a Mossad plant sent to swing public opinion and divert attention from deeper manipulations beyond the gaze of the mainstream media.

You'll need a pretty solid alibi to convince me otherwise.

The penalty is verbal tickling and a wealth of inane emoticons 😉 😆 8)

..... and here's us on our basket-weaving course, where we helped disabled children, and definitely not manning an anti-tank gun....

Given the government has suggested that most people going to Syria go to Turkey then sneak over the border, will all British people in Turkey have to explain their movements, or just suspicious beardy muslim types?

As an aside, I saw an interview with one of the British ISIS people and if you can put aside the atrocities and the rhetoric about creating a global islamic caliphate what they're trying to do (carve out a homeland at gunpoint) isn't that different from what people have done for centuries and relatively recently at that. If all they'd done was win parts of two broken countries and ensure the inhabitants were fed and clothed and had utilities, I don't see anyone would have complained. Tremendous own goal all this murder and mayhem really.

Visited cousin Dave in Syria.

Schoolboy error - David is a Jewish name. So fails the "convincing alibi" test.

so this Jihadi John bloke - what religion is he likely to be?

[edit] My cousin Dave is a Syrian Christian, btw...

Schoolboy error - David is a Jewish name. So fails the "convincing alibi" test.

[url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_in_Islam ]Not quite[/url].

I have known one Muslim called David. It still fails the "convincing alibi" test. My cousin Mo would have been more convincing.

[i]My cousin Mo[/i]

Maureen?

I have known one Muslim called David. It still fails the "convincing alibi" test. My cousin Mo would have been more convincing.

Too obvious, you need to be a bit more crafty to get past Boris.

Just a nonsense soundbite really, but why stop with Syria and Iraq? why not include for example ****stan- lots of Al Queda's guys in the afghan were based/trained there....

This is the Crux of it IMO, banning, or requiring British citizens to seek permission to travel to specific war zones/countries is nigh on pointless, anyone determined to get in will simply travel to neighbouring countries with porous borders, and/or acquire themselves a fake passport... where there's a will there's a way.

Imposing Travel restrictions means would be terrorists are that bit more likely to circumvent the system, allowing free travel on their UK passports at least means our border agencies can try track who has travelled where, and can pass that information on to our intelligence services.

Boris's proposal's would actually work against the mechanisms we have for tracking "Home grown terrorist's" travel habits...

It is of course a bit of sound-bite politicising to help him appeal to the right of centre Tory/UKIP floaters, and sway them towards the idea of Boris as PM [Shudders] I'll be interested to see if he weighs in on some other more domestic topics with similarly well thought through freestyle policy making...

Boris is a liability for the Tory party and a Gift to Farage, God bless his fluffy little head...

In my deranged opinion, much of this is an attempt to seed fear and mistrust of brown people in the general populous, to divert attention away from the myriad ills of our governments that spawned these troubles in the first place.

Immigrants, benefit scroungers and terrorists do a fine job of mopping up the blame, whilst Eton bum boys rape the economy (and kids (allegedly))

Uk law has already got rid of innocent til proven guilty for most motoring offences so he is only carry on a noble undermining of uk citizens right. Just what you would expect from a true blue Tory

We have been doing this for years with renditions and Guantanamo.

Raising the rather awkward question of once you've rendered someone into legal limbo, what the hell do you do with them then? As there is no legal process.

The Americans haven't found an answer to that one yet. And neither would we. But thats what happens when you ignore centuries of reasoned legal precedent, then make up stupid, ill-conceived, knee-jerk policies on the hoof. I would imagine that if Boris ever got a sniff of real power (God forbid!), there would be an awful lot of that kind of thing going on

If they got permission first that would be OK for them to return assuming whilst they where there they didn't become known or suspected to have engaged in terrorist activities. If suspected they would have to prove they did not.

Raising the rather awkward question of once you've rendered someone into legal limbo, what the hell do you do with them then? As there is no legal process.

The point was made elsewhere that as soon as you allow people to become stateless, how do you deport them? So if, say, a German criminal had his citizenship revoked and committed crimes in the UK, where would we "send him back" to?

Jambalaya is a Mossad plant sent to swing public opinion and divert attention from deeper manipulations beyond the gaze of the mainstream media.

You'll need a pretty solid alibi to convince me otherwise.

so this Jihadi John bloke - what religion is he likely to be?

Who would determine it?

The point was made elsewhere that as soon as you allow people to become stateless, how do you deport them

[i]so they return to where they immediately came from [/i]

Calais? I can see the French loving that.

[i]the courts would decide[/i]

but there would need to be, expressed as a law and (if it was a criminal law) beyond reasonable doubt, what proof someone would need to provide that they weren't guilty. Which completely reverses the entire British justice system.

Courts aren't equipped to prove innocence, only guilt.

and where would these people stay whilst the court and (presumably) appeal process was ongoing? You couldn't just turn them away at the border it could take months for a court process to reach a conclusion.

oooh, look;

[i]London Mayor Boris Johnson to seek election as Conservative MP in Uxbridge & South Ruislip[/i]

what a coincidence...

Do I think it is a good idea? No, but if the theoretical alternative is a couple of hundred battle hardened extremists returning to the country determined to try and destroy or destabilise our democratic society, I'm not sure I just want them waived through at passport control either.

Should he be allowed to say it? Yes, of course, we are in some sort of democracy and it has prompted us to debate the idea and him. And mostly agree that we don't like either very much.

Who would determine it?

@kona the courts would decide

@kona - no I meant the courts would be involved in an appeal/challenge for someone who was refused permission to return. No one is being refused permission to travel in the proposal.

Downing Street has distanced itself from Boris's comments. Leaks emerging of the constituency Boris will stand for election at for the 2015 election.

So does STW think Boris's suggestion is more or less "extreme" than the detention orders introduced by the last Labour Government ?

Calais? I can see the French loving that.

[i]No one is being refused permission to travel in the proposal.[/i]

You thought they were a few hours ago?

[i]If they got permission first that would be OK for them to return...[/i]

There's no easy answer to any of this but to strip someone of citizenship, refuse them entry and make them stateless because they can't prove what they were doing whilst out the country seems an unreasonable solution to the problem.

[edit]
[i]that's the system we already have[/i]

but they did have travel documents when they left the country - namely a UK passport. You don't need a visa to come home. If you refuse entry and they've travelled overland through France where would you return them to?

So does STW think Boris's suggestion is more or less "extreme" than the detention orders introduced by the last Labour Government ?

Holding someone during investigations isn't new or unique to the last government. You figure out whether it is more or less extreme than guilty until proven innocent.

All governments exploit the perceived threat from terrorism to introduce draconian legislation, that's certainly been the case since going back to the start of The Troubles.

Johnson wants to now take it to a completely new level.

What he's proposing is to throw out the cornerstone that the entire British justice system is built on. The presumption of innocence, and the onus of the prosecution to prove guilt, beyond all reasonable doubt

So... Ever so slightly more serious than control orders, yes.

Are there any more glaringly obvious criteria you're struggling with?

@wasawas - I have said all along the proposal would be to prevent some returning to the UK, I posted the same view last week before Boris even spoke.

@ernie I am not hung up on the innocent until proven guilty point, I think that's a red herring. Someone prevented from returning to the UK could challenge that decision. So do you think the detention orders are less draconian than the Boris proposal ?

The threat from terrorism is not perceived, its very very real.

@binners, the control orders put you in prison without a trial. Boris's proposal says you are free to remain abroad at liberty as long as you like.

You're really struggling with this idea, aren't you? What that effectively does is render people stateless by removing their citizenship, with the onus being on the 'defendent' to provide proof (whatever that means in these circumstances) that you shouldn't.

At the end of the day, the whole idea of scrapping the very foundations of the entire legal system (and with it the principles of living in a democracy) for the sake of a few hundred nutters, who may, or may not return to this country, is absolutely preposterous, and only a complete idiot would seriously advocate it!

[i]The threat from terrorism is not perceived, its very very real.[/i]

Says who?

A massive industry/military complex who vested interest are served by conflict? A group of "terrorists" making a you tube video? Secret services determined to use the "threat" of terror to massively increase the scope of their powers?

There are very few reliable untainted sources to be able to make any sort of value judgement