So Boris appears to believe that it is a good idea to turn a key cornerstone of our criminal justice system on it's head. He wants to make people guilty until proven innocent in a certain set of circumstances.
- Do we think that is an ok thing to do?
- Should Boris be able to air this view outside of his elected role or when he is in an elected role?
(Edited to remove typo)
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...
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.
[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 - MemberAn 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.
@binners this is just what was being posted 12-18 months ago in responce to immigration being an issue, immigration is a mainstream issue just as forming a responce to this terrorist threat.
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.
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.
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...
A price worth paying, no ?
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
The Soviet Union are breaking international law? But what if someone who lives there wants to travel to Siam, Prussia or Tanganyika?
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.
(1) Dave and chums where considering action to support the Syrian Free Army not ISIS, this does show the complexity of supporting "rebels" against the government.
(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?
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.
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?
Nope, in my book I wouldn't allow those people (mdeics etc) back either without checks. I was purely commenting about the Parliamentary vote about intervening in Syria. Nearly 200,000 people have been killed there, I think it was right for the UK to consider action at the time. Parliament voted against it and that decision was respected.
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...