Prats of The Week

Tis a Monday morning, time methinks to award my prestigious and coveted "Prat of The Week" award.

This time it goes to the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) in Wales.

Seemingly Nanny's chums in the Welsh branch of the CRE have got their knickers in a right old twist, over the speaking of Welsh.

You may recall a wee while ago that Nanny banned her own minions in the civil service from speaking Welsh, because it was a health and safety risk to their vocal boxes.

However, now the boot is on the other foot; isn't it funny with Nanny how she keeps changing the rules, so that whatever we do or think we are always in the wrong?

The CRE says that it will write to Thomas Cook asking the firm to explain why staff have been asked not to speak Welsh.

Staff at the travel agents' Bangor shop in Gwynedd have recently been told all work conversations must be in English.

Thomas Cook told staff they must conduct business conversations in English, as it is the UK's common language.

They have a point do they not?

I mean, English is what we are all meant to speak isn't it???

WRONG!!!

The Welsh Language Board thinks otherwise, and has said it was "disappointed" and it would ask the company to change its position.

Thomas Cook confirmed the policy applied to all non-English languages, not just Welsh.

A company statement said:

"Thomas Cook requests that all staff speak English

when discussing work-related matters in the work place.

This ensures clear communication at all times

and is respectful to team members who do not speak other languages.

Thomas Cook employs staff from many cultural backgrounds,

therefore the company appreciates its staff

may want to talk to colleagues in other languages

for anything that is not business related".

To my simple mind, that seems a pretty fair and sensible policy.

However, Nanny has a different way of looking at things. The good old boys in the CRE in Wales have warned that the policy might be in breach of the Race Relations Act.

Note how they say "might", in the hope of intimidating Thomas Cook. Threats like this are always a nasty way to do things.

Wales Commissioner, the Reverend Aled Edwards, said the promotion of good relations was their "paramount concern".

Quote:

"The Commission for Racial Equality does have

a power to investigate through its legal committee

and also if it sees fit to start a formal investigation

but I think common sense and courtesy would be the best option."

Common sense and courtesy would dictate, from my perspective, that the CRE butt out of this.

Meri Huws, chair of the Welsh Language Board, said:

"a very surprising decision, in the light of the number

of private sector companies, large and small,

that are choosing to use the language

in terms of marketing, in terms of services

to their customers, and generally in

day-to-day work place activity".

The key point here is that it is up to the companies how they work to best serve the market. Thomas Cook have made their decision in good faith, and should be left in peace.

It can be assumed that the person who doubtless complained about this speaks perfectly good English, I wonder what the real motivation for the complaint was?

CRE Wales, well deserved "Prats of The Week".

Drop them an email, to let them know that they have won: InformationWales@cre.gov.uk

I couldn't find "prats" in an on line Welsh dictionary, but here is part of it in Welsh: "Prats am y wythnos".

White Is Shite

Almost as if the news stories are designed to link together (who could ever accuse media organs of doing that?) it seems that Nanny has legislated against the concept of "white is right".

Nanny's new operational phrase is "white is shite".

That at least is the case for people living in Corby Northamptonshire.

Nanny has decided to denude Corby of some public sector jobs, because its residents are "too white and British".

There you go folks...in Nanny's Britain it is now official policy for it to be illegal to be white and British!

Nanny's much "respected" Prison Service will relocate jobs from Corby to Leicester, where there are more ethnic minorities.

The decision is regarded by most sane people as being utter bollocks, and as such the Commission for Racial Equality may well launch an investigation.

It seems that Nanny, having pushed for people from around the world to move to Britain (to shore up our rapidly declining public sector) is now worried that ethnic minorities are in fact not as "fully employed" as they should be. As such, Nanny is trying to buck market forces and boost the number of ethnic minorities working in the public sector.

When the issue of the movement of 80 jobs in the Prison service to Leicester was raised, the director of finance Ann Beasley replied that the town had too many white British residents.

Quote:

"Our ability to attract a more diverse workforce

- 93.7 per cent of the population of Corby are white British,

compared to 59.6 per cent in Leicester."

Mrs Beasley seemingly went on to imply that Corby's residents are also too stupid to keep the jobs.

The Home Orifice doesn't give a fark, and states quite baldly that attracting a "more diverse workforce" was a "key factor" in moving the jobs.

This is of course a breach of the Race Relations Act 2000.

A spokesman for the Commission for Racial Equality said that if they receive a complaint from any of the workers involved, they will start a full investigation.

Let us trust that at least one affected employee makes a complaint.

A Prison Service spokesman said:

"The key factors that influenced our decision to relocate

to Leicester were the closer proximity to a greater number

of prison establishments, better transport links,

the ability to recruit professional staff

and the ability to attract a more diverse workforce."

This absurd policy will all end in tears, for Nanny and for the people of Britain (whatever their ethnic origin); as it is sowing the seeds of anger, resentment and division.

Prat of The Week

This week's prestigious "Prat of The Week Award" goes to Cymuned, the Welsh rights pressure group.

Earlier this month they came out in favour of a bizarre piece of small mindeness and stupidity, being practiced by a parking attendant at the Royal Victoria Hotel in Llanberis.

Seemingly the parking attendant doesn't much care for English people, that's nice isn't it?

He decided to practice a little bit of racial discrimination, which Nanny heartily disapproves of, and charge English visitors twice as much as the Welsh to use the same car park.

Should you have been in the "enviable" position of being able to speak the well known internationally useful language of Welsh, he would have only charged you £2; those English people who didn't speak Welsh were charged £4.

The car park is used largely by tourists travelling on the Snowdon Mountain Railway. A motorist speaking Welsh asked the cost of parking.

The attendant said:

"Well, it's half price for Welsh people."

Nanny's chums in the Commission for Racial Equality are looking into the dual pricing policy at the car park.

Tourists and residents who do not speak the language, have already accused car park bosses of "blatant discrimination".

Businessman Philip Wesley said:

"I was completely stunned

because I saw the motorist in front being charged less.

When I raised it with the attendant

he told me the driver had a season ticket

and was therefore eligible for a half-price reduction.

He said all this with a knowing smirk."

Another motorist said:

"This is blatant discrimination

not just against the English

but also non-Welsh speakers

who have lived in North Wales all their lives."

However, Cymuned came out in favour of this daft idea.

Aran Jones, chief executive of the group, said:

"This attendant need congratulating, without a doubt.

The idea of charging local people lower prices

for local facilities is not uncommon in other parts of the world.

This is also a price not just for local people,

but people from outside the area who make the effort

to speak a bit of Welsh in a Welsh area.

I am sure tourist attractions,

which are keen to keep attendances high throughout the year,

would see a huge difference in their figures

if they were to charge less for local people,

who would go through the year.

I am 100% in favour of making measures like this

more widespread across the region."

Evidently Jones doesn't travel very much. I don't quite recall ever seeing the good people of Spain, France, Germany, Sweden, Latvia, Lithuania, Korea, Norway, Finland, Denmark etc etc ever operating a dual charging policy to their tourists.

Why not?

Errrrmmm...simple really, they would drive the tourists away if they did that, and damage their local economy.

Clearly Cymuned haven't quite grasped the basic concept of making people feel welcome, and of encouraging tourism to help the local economy.

Fair enough, if they don't want tourists to go there then tourists shouldn't go there!

It's that simple!

Then they will see first hand the effects on the local economy, when the receipts from the accursed English tourists dry up.

I think the Prat of The Week Award is well deserved in this particular case.

Plod's Discrimination

Dear old Nanny really loves to try to re-engineer society, by artificially "skewing" demographics to suit her political dogma. Unfortunately history has shown that whenever governments try to "manage" reality, and impose their view of a perfect society, things go horribly wrong.

Despite the lessons of history, Nanny still keeps trying. A recent case in point being Nanny's chums in the Gloucestershire Constabulary who rejected 108 potential recruits because they were white men.

Now Nanny's coppers have come a cropper (Ha!..come on, I'm doing my best here folks!), they have admitted positive discrimination and have been forced to pay compensation.

Gloucestershire Constabulary claimed that that it had been trying to increase diversity, by selecting only women and candidates from ethnic minorities. That is all very well, but the average citizen in Britain (be he/she black, white, green or purple) would prefer to have police officers who could do their job rather than police officers who fit an artificial racial/sexual specification.

I would also note that discrimination on the grounds of race or sex is in fact illegal.

Don't they teach the police the law then?

Needless to say Nanny's chums, when faced with an employment tribunal in Bristol, had to own up to the fact that they were in fact breaking the law.

Happy with the fact that the police admit that they have been breaking the law?

I'm not!

The tribunal was told that Matt Powell, had applied to join the force in October 2005. A month later, after being told that he had progressed to the second stage of the recruitment process, he left his job as an IT team leader at Filton College to concentrate on his application.

In January 2006 he received a letter saying that he had been "randomly deselected". He was never given an explanation for his rejection.

In April the Commission for Racial Equality and the Equal Opportunities Commission started an investigation. They reported that the force had unlawfully discriminated on the grounds of race and sex.

The tribunal was told that 66% of white men, who applied to join the force last year, had been turned down. Every ethnic minority candidate who applied had been invited to an assessment centre.

Nanny has agreed to £2500 pay compensation to Mr Powell, and may now expect claims from the other 107 men, who were told by the force that they had been "randomly deselected".

Clive Tomer, chairman of the tribunal, said that Gloucestershire Constabulary had been

"at the very least disingenuous and at worst misleading".

In other words, they had lied.

Happy with the fact that the police lied?

I'm not!

Gordon Ramsey (not the chef), the head of human resources, said:

"We were trying to advance diversity in the force

and we thought at the time that this was lawful,

positive action.

When we found out after an independent investigation

by the Commission for Racial Equality that it wasn't lawful,

we accepted that."

I find that hard to believe that they didn't know that discrimination is illegal.

Do you believe them?

Nanny Bans Tartan Army

In the last couple of days I have written about Nanny banning all things English, and attributed this in part to her hatred of the English.

How wrong I was, evidently she is just as anti Scots as she is anti English.

Nanny's chums in the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE), the body that ensures that we all live in harmony with each other (just like the old Coke advert of the 1960's), have started to fret about the effects that the World Cup (I believe it starts tomorrow) will have on the Scottish persona.

Seemingly Nanny is worried that the Scots will offend their neighbours in the South, during this forthcoming "bung fest", by being a tad anti English.

Evidently the CRE (Scotland branch-isn't that racist in itself?) has received complaints about perceived anti-English sentiment in the last fortnight or so. Nanny won't stand for that, and issued a proclamation through the CRE:

"Scotland's public figures need to ensure [the World Cup] remains a force for integration, rather than a cause of division."

That's all very well, but in case Nanny hasn't realised it yet, the "bung fest" is in fact entirely based on stoking up nationalism and patriotism; that's why teams are divided into countries!

Whilst dick headed comments from so called "leaders" of the Scots, such as Jack McConnell (First Minister) who said that he would not be supporting England, can hardly be called bright; it is hardly a matter for the CRE, let Neanderthals such as McConnell dig their own political graves by allowing them to expose their childlike immaturity and bigotry to a wider audience.

The CRE, by making an issue out of it, will merely ensure that the "piss" is well and truly taken out of the English now. After all, why on earth should we give a toss about what a "bung fest" supporter shouts when he is drunk?

Ali Jarvis, a CRE director, said:

"Racism occurs when any person is stereotyped, harassed or discriminated against on the basis of their colour,

race,

ethnic or national identity.

Using the World Cup as a pretext for hostility against any nation or race,

including the English, is racism."

Herein lies Nanny's problem, she doesn't understand football. It's purpose is not to unite people, but to divide them along tribal lines; in effect, it is war by another means. Were Nanny to really understand the nature of the game, she would ban it.

Notwithstanding the sheer brilliance of the logic of my argument, Nanny will of course ignore me. The CRE is already getting into a bit of a funk over two complaints that it received, one from an Englishman living in Scotland over the sale of "anyone but England" T-shirts.

The other was from a Scot who objected to a newspaper article in which a shopkeeper spoke of selling out of Trinidad strips from Scots, "out of pure hatred for the English team". Trinidad and Tobago play England on 15 June.

Ms Jarvis added:

"We've been monitoring exchanges in the media (Ken says-good grief has it come to this!)

and noticed an anti-English tone to some of the views expressed,

for example in the letters pages.

In one newspaper, someone wrote on Monday that they were not supporting England.

By the middle of the week,

someone else wrote in to say all English should leave

and they were a scourge on Scotland."

Grow up, get a life, and let the children play at war. Sensible adults with well balanced lives should simply ignore this, so what if people wear these shirts?

I lived in Edinburgh for four years, as a student, and had a great time. There were occasions when I encountered anti English sentiment, but so what?

People can be jerks, it is as simple as that; no amount of interference from Nanny will change that.

Incidentally, my favourite anti English joke (note: I am English) from those days goes as follows (best enjoyed when read in a Scottish accent, preferably West coast):

When God created Britain, he took all the perverts, child molesters, deviants and other bastards sent them down South and called them the English!

Meanwhile one Englishwoman has claimed that she was unable to buy an England football top in an Inverness store, because staff told her that stocking such an item would have "offended the public".

David MacDougall, Tartan Army spokesman, summed it up rather well:

"I think in this day and age we might be a bit too sensitive.

People should take this in the spirit in which it's intended

just light-hearted banter and a bit of craic."

Nanny, get a life!

DVLA Spends Your Money Wisely!

It is good to know that Nanny tries hard to spread her "diversity" awareness attitudes to every part of her bloated bureaucracy.

Her minions in the Driver Vehicle Lincensing Authority (DVLA) have been labouring hard to prove to their mistress that they are as aware of diversity issues (ie the fact that everyone is different), as any other part of Nanny's bureaucracy.

As such the DVLA opened a £224K a year diversity unit in 2004.

Now that is rather old news, is it not?

However, the reason that I am writing about it now is that the cost of this daft waste of time and money has only just been unearthed via the Freedom of Information Act.

This Diversity Unit, what a splendid piece of nonsense, consists of nine people which replaced the equal opportunities unit in September 2004.

Aside from the annual cost of this unit, a further £50K is being spent on making the DVLA's 7,000 staff more aware of diversity issues; eg it is introducing systems to let Muslim women customers show their faces only to female staff.

This is all very well, but there are other issues that Nanny's trolls might like to address instead; eg complaints to the DVLA have gone up from 1,468 in 1997 to 4,777. Furthermore, the DVLA admits that it "loses" 734 documents annually.

The trouble is, resolving problems such as incompetency requires time, effort and skill. The fact is Nanny doesn't give a stuff, and prefers to waste her time and our money on pointless "easy" activities such as Diversity Units.

Nanny's trolls in the DVLA said:

"Diversity for DVLA means understanding and valuing

the full diversity of the community it serves."

No, I have no idea what that means either!

What they should have said is that the DVLA will endeavour to improve its appalling performance.

One other point, if the DVLA believes that its staff are not sufficiently "diversity aware", what have Nanny's other agencies such as the Commission for Racial Equality been doing?

Come Play With Me

Carrying on with yesterday's theme of educashun, it is "reassuring" to note that Nanny is still determined to "get 'em whilst they're young".

Nanny is now aiming her anti racist policy at toddlers and pre schoolers. In Nanny's view you can be a racist, even though you are still in nappies.

Herman Ouseley, the former chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, has got it into his head that staff at nurseries need to be on the look out for racism amongst their pre school charges. He is of the belief that to stop prejudice from developing, while children are still three years old, staff need to ensure that different racial groups "play together right from day one".

"Play together right".

Now there's an interesting expression...who decides exactly what constitutes the right sort of playing together?

Well, we all know the answer to that don't we children?

Nanny of decides!

Ouseley (sorry, Lord Ouseley) is of the belief that children may learn to categorise people as early as the age of three. He therefore recommends that nursery staff should "discourage separate play", and "help children to unlearn any racist attitudes and behaviour they may have already learnt".

"Unlearn"???

How very Orwellian of you my Lord!

Ouseley is quoted as saying in the journal, Race Equality Teaching:

"It is important to consider whether patterns of play are consistently based on racial or cultural grounds.

If, for example, Muslim children nearly always play together and seldom play with other children, the question needs to be asked,

'Is there a reason for it that may relate to culture?

Or apprehension?

Or prejudice?'"

Jane Lane, who co-authored the article, is an early-years equality adviser whose publications are recommended by Nanny's Sure Start scheme. She believes that conventional wisdom that toddlers are "colour blind" is wrong.

She says:

"There is a view that children do not learn their attitudes until they are about five.

But people in the early years know that children at a very early age

at the age of three

are categorising people.

I am not talking about white children; I am talking about all children.

Many, many are racially prejudiced, for all sorts of historical reasons."

Margaret Morrissey, the spokesman for the National Confederation of Parent Teachers Associations, disagrees. She notes that children do not generally notice colour until at least the age of six, and that "artificial" attempts to force the issue could be detrimental.

Quote:

"In all the time I have been involved in nursery education, since about 1975, I have never seen children segregating to play."

So there you have it folks, a disagreement between those who actually work with toddlers and those who theorise.

My views, as simplistic as they may be, go along the following lines:

• Children should mix together, irrespective of class, race, sex (up to 11 as single sex schools produce better results) or religion.



• People, like it or not, notice differences. Girls and boys notice that they are different. Those who are black, brown or white notice the colour difference and those who wear religious ornaments and clothing will notice and be noticed for their differences.



• To be different is not wrong.



• To believe that you are superior is wrong and destructive.



• Nanny should encourage mixing in, but should not attempt to prescribe as to what constitutes "playing right".



• Nanny should not try to impose social engineering on children, especially when her ideas are based on theories not scientifically proven fact.

Nanny Bans White Police Officers

It seems that the concepts of political correctness are becoming embedded in some police forces, despite what you may have read about racist emails in the Merseyside police.

Unfortunately, Nanny can take the concept of "PC" a little too far at times. Her chums in the Gloucester Constabulary have been reported to the Commission for Racial Equality, over accusations that it has discriminated against 109 white male job applicants during a recent recruitment drive.

The police claim that the decision was part of its programme to boost the number of minority ethnic officers:

"Because of statutory and Governmental requirements, the decision was taken to give priority to females and applicants from minority ethnic backgrounds."

Gloucestershire Constabulary believe that its recruitment profile for officers must represent the ethnic mix of the community, and therefore from the total number of 301 applicants they received, only 192 could be sent to the police officer assessment centre.

Assistant Chief Constable Michael Matthews said:

"It is essential in a democratic policing environment to ensure that under-represented groups are prioritised in our recruitment drives.

This 'positive action'

will undoubtedly mean disappointment for others

who fall into the categories we never have difficulty recruiting from.

However, this is the only realistic way of ensuring we maintain a diverse workforce that reflects the diverse communities we serve."

Up to a point there is some logic in what he says. However, would not the people of Gloucestershire be best served by having the best qulaity officers on the beat, irrespective of their race and sex?

Multi Culturism Works - It's Official!

There are some doubting Thomas's out there who are very skeptical about the value, and effectiveness, of Nanny's multicultural approach to treating minorities.

Even Trevor Phillips, Head of the Commission for Racial Equality, wants multi culturism banned.

Yet, in the midst of all the debate, we can see a perfect example of the success of multi culturism; whereby a member of an ethnic and religious minority has managed to adopt and adapt the customs of "both" cultures, without any real problems.

Our dear old friend Omar Khayam, photographed above centre, proves that you can live in both worlds at the same time.

On the one hand he is a "devout Muslim" attending mosque regularly and supporting various Muslim cultural events (such as the fancy dress party above), and on the other hand he happily dealt in heroin and cocaine.

He also takes a keen interest in international events and politics, especially Danish politics.

Some heartless souls may think that Khayam is a stupid little wanker, with about as much brains in his head as the average amoeba has in their entire body. However, that would of course be rather a subjective judgement.

He has managed to achieve something of a distinction, his actions have managed to ensure that he is ostracised by both the Muslim and non Muslim communities; clearly demonstrating how effective a multi cultural approach can be.

Nanny is in fact so pleased with his progress, that she has invited him back to jail; where no doubt he can help others adjust to living in a multi cultural society.

Of course, it might be argued that it would be a lot simpler and easier for both immigrants and the resident population if multi culturism were abandoned; and people were made to learn the language, leave their isolated ghettos and to adopt the customs and way of life of the host nation.

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

Nanny is a hypocritical old so and so at times.

She is oh so very fond of telling us what to do, and how to live our lives, yet she does not always follow her own rules.

One fine example of this hypocrisy, can be seen in the work of Nanny's chums on the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC).

The EOC is very fond of lecturing companies about equality in the workplace, and about ensuring that they report on their sexual and racial mix.

Yet, surprise surprise, the EOC does not actually follow its own advice.

The EOC annual report for 2004/5, for reasons that are unclear, does not report on its own sexual/racial mix.

This lapse is even more odd, as it was quite happy to report on this in the previous year.

Maybe the reason that it doesn't like to draw attention to the mix, is that fact that the 2003 report showed a remarkably "unbalanced" and unequal organisation.

It seems that in 2003 only 16% of the EOC were made up of men.

That doesn't look very good for an organ that is supposed to promote equality, does it?

The EOC describes itself as "the leading agency set up to tackle sex discrimination" and that "it is committed to challenging discrimination in all its forms and at all levels of society".

When asked about this lapse in reporting this year, the EOC haughtily said that the figures are in the public domain.

In other words, they don't want to draw attention to their own failings.

The failure to publish these figures in its annual report has of course put the EOC in breach of the Race Relations Act, and the Sex Discrimination Act.

I do hope that no one reports them!