ONCE A THATCHER.......

Carol Thatcher has been sacked from her freelance post on the One Show over offensive remarks regarding a tennis player. Seems she was following in the footsteps of her dad - and possibly mother. There is no excuse for her vile remarks -which she did not have the decency to unconditionally apologise for. It'snot about being "pc" her comment was unequivocally racist. Well done, BBC.

AN EVENING OF HORRIBLE CONTRASTS.....

Tonight I attended a concert hosted by Calderdale's Music Service in Halifax. Young people from all over the borough. Primary school children, older kids. It was great. I was particularly touched by a multi-cultural choir singing theuir hearts out in Urdu and English. Their sheer happiness in singing was self-evident - likewise a special needs choir . All led by someone who is clearly a truly inspirational teacher and musician. Stopped off for a glass of wine in Hebden Bridge - where confronted by people giving it large about asylum-seekers and basically coming out with racist crap. These were not your classic BNP stereotypes but supposedly "decent" middle-class people. I sometimes despair. I also think that this Government's obsession with the notion of "Britishness" and closing our borders at every opportunity is fuelling such bile. And that it must be countered at every opportunity.

FUELLING RACISM IN WEST YORKSHIRE

Ann Cryer should be ashamed of herself for lending credence to statements about the Pakistani community by Phil Woolas. Oldham MP Woolas, an erstwhile leftie so I'm told, said inbreeding was to blame for birth defects in Asian children. So Cryer chipped in with claims that Pakistani culture was "medieval." It's not the first time she has come out with claptrap more suited to the BNP . Not, for a minute, that I'm suggesting she is racist. But the comments were ill-judged , wrong-headed , insulting and a gift to the far right. Not impressed, Ann.

NEW IMMIGRATION POLICY AN UTTER DISGRACE

New Labour's utterly disgusting dog-whistling on immigration continues . The BBC reports that unskilled workers from non-EU countries will be banned from taking jobs for the "foreseeable future." Apparently, this exercise is designed to reassert "British values" ( as in British jobs for British workers) and no doubt it will be heartily applauded by the Daily Mail electorate it's designed to appeal to. The BNP will be pretty pleased, too.
Under the new rules announced by the Home Scretary, which come into force in 100 days' time, spouses who apply for entry to the UK may also have to sit English language assessments.
An Australian-style points-based immigration system , on the lines approved by right-wing ex-PM Howard, chcuked out of office a couple of days ago, comes into force in April .
Immigration Minister Liam Byrne , who let's just say is one of the least appealing members of this Govt, says the system is geared towards the the top tier of highly skilled migrants, "key contributors" to the UK economy. Who also happen to be , er, white. This grandstanding to the right makes me sick to my stomach. The number of unskilled workers from outside the EU is already restricted, with only about 12,000 permitted to take jobs in the UK in the past year under existing sector-based and agricultural schemes. That will now be reduced to zero, with all migrant jobs in the low skilled sectors expected to be filled by workers from Bulgaria and Romania. Try telling me that's not racist, illiberal and a betrayal of everything the labour movement stands for.

DOG WHISTLE POLICY ON IMMIGRATION COMES HOME TO ROOST

The current furore over immigration figures is a mess of the Government's own making. In pandering to the right, and using racist rhetoric like "British jobs for British workers" Gordon Brown has dug himself into a hole entirely of his own making.
Free movement around the EU isn't something to be condemned.Neither, frankly, is the number of people coming to this country in search of employment because we need them. The problem is that all to often unscrupulous employers pay below minimum wage levels and exploit the workers in all kinds of other ways. But does this Government act to tighten up the labour laws and stop such scandalous working practices ( which fuel the right) No, it doesn't. The "flexible" labout force , after all , is one of Brown's big mantras. You can't have it both ways, The media, meanwhile, is whipping up a storm of bigotry and prejudice. Even the BBC. The fact is without the thousands of migrant workers coming to this country the economy would be in serious trouble. The building trade ( once staffed almlst entirely by migrant Irish workers ) and leisure industries rely very much on foreign nationals. The other weekend I went to the Lake District - almost every pub and cafe I went into was staffed by workers from Eastern Europe. Good luck to them. But let's ensure they have proper wages at the proper rates That means tightening up enforcement and trade union legislation - which this Govt is reluctant to do.

JACK STRAW FUELS RACISM - AGAIN

I thought maybe Jack Straw had learned from his comments over Muslim women wearing the veil, which caused much mischief, and anguish for Muslim communities. But this was obviously naive of me. Today, on the Today programme, he has been using the worst stereotypes imaginable to explain why black boys apparently under-perform at school. This, says Straw, is because their fathers are absent. Something endemic, he says, in black culture.
Really? A quick head-count of the couples I know ( where I live is a white, largely lower middle-class and middle-class community) sees very few people now co-habiting with the person they originally married (or set up home with). Many more women I know are single; most not by choice; some are gay and lesbian parents.
Society, whether Straw likes it or not, has changed irrevocably. It may not be anyone's ideal. I would probably accept that children are better off with one stable home and two stable parents. But most kids learn to make the best of their circumstances and singling out young black men in this way is wrong, unhelpful, and frankly, racist.
Some years ago, I did a report on GCSE achievements in Manchester's young black community.It was my job to put the best spin possible on the results. We found that one of the major issues affecting these youngsters was not their sex, but whether or not their parents ( one or two, it didn't matter) had jobs, and what their economic circumstances were. This far more than sexual irresponsibility ( which is what he means) is surely to blame for community problems.
Jack Straw should keep his stereotypical views to himself. All they do is fuel organisations like the BNP. Which, to be fair, is surely not his intent.