In Terms of Bollocks 7: The Greatest Yet

Jane Hill on BBC World News reporting today on the findings so far of the Met's internal review into the Tottenham riots:

 

"Unprecedented in terms of anything they had seen before".   

Not clear if these were her own words or those of a BBC news editor or of the Met itself, but either way they are an absolute classic; just about the greatest example of "In terms of" bollocks I have seen yet - which is saying something. Delete all but the first word and you have absolutely no change in meaning and perfect clarity.

Not content with that, a little later reporting on the Turkish earthquake, the BBC told us that "Time is running out in terms of finding people alive" = "time is running out for finding people alive"

Any EU referendum should follow re-negotiation, not precede it

Negotiating to see what changes in the terms of the UK's membership of the EU can be secured is surely not something that needs a referendum. It is not a change in our constitutional position; it is simply an exercise to see what change to our constitutional position could be negotiated.  A referendum would be needed only if the Government then decided  to go ahead and implement the changes negotiated.  The only point in having a referendum now would be to ask the single question: should the UK leave the EU now regardless of what changes in the terms of our membership it might theoretically be possible to negotiate?

The Tory backbenchers getting their knickers in a twist about this should change their motion to that end - if in fact getting out is really what they want.  There is no point even in changing the motion just to one calling on the Government to start negotiating now without a referendum, because it is crystal clear that changes to the treaties are going to have to be negotiated anyway to pave the way for the federalisation of the Eurozone.  The time for an in-out referendum will be after those negotiations are concluded.  The Tory leadership is absolutely committed to holding a referendum then anyway, so the backbenchers should just be keeping their powder dry and waiting to demand then that the referendum question includes the get-out option.

Why is it only euro-sceptic Tories who can't see this? 

Theresa May Right about the cat; Ken Clarke past his use-by date

Read the judge's judgement in the case concerned and it's clear that Theresa May was absolutely justified in what she said about the cat.  Of course the judge did not say the illegal immigrant could stay because he had a cat; but he did say that he could stay because he had a family relationship with a woman and that he was reinforced in that view by the fact that they had a cat.  The implication is quite clear: if they had not had a cat their claim to be in a family relationship would have been weakened in the eyes of the law.  Whether fatally weakened or not we cannot know, but it is undeniably theoretically possible that in the absence of a cat the judge might have come to a different view. So the message to illegal immigrants from that judgement is clear; if you want to avoid being deported, shack-up with a woman and buy a cat.

The case vividly illustrates just how crazy judicial interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights has become, and how urgent is the need to put things right.  Regardless of whether repeal of the Human Rights Act and the introduction of a new Bill of Rights is the right way to do that, or whether saner interpretation of the Convention by judges can be achieved while retaining the Human Rights Act, Theresa May was absolutely right to use the cat case to try to get Ken Clarke off his backside.  Ken looks to me less and less like a serious politician and more and more like an old duffer past his use-by date.