Commons passes bill critics say will breach international law

The Commons has voted to pass the Overseas Operations Bill, a bill that would allow British soldiers to escape prosecution for war crimes and torture.

A group of MPs led by Jeremy Corbyn defied the Labour Whip over the bill and as the Guardian has reported three MPs are no longer on the front bench as a result.

Freedom From Torture has shared Sonia Sceats’s, associate fellow in the International Law programme at Chatham House, tweet saying this is “disgraceful” and it “isn’t over”.

This move has been criticised by a British soldier and Shami Chakrabarti among others.

This is a damaging prospective blow to justice and challenges the aims of the UN Declaration on Human Rights.

This bill still isn’t yet ratified.

Sombre Times

The Guardian has reported that one-third of British professional musicians are considering giving up their careers because of the pandemic.

This information was based on a survey of 2,000 members of the Musicians Union.

The pandemic has been a crippling time for the arts, with many musicians forced to work for free to sustain a profile online as live venues are still closed.

This is not the most tragic news from a pandemic that has caused misery and economic fears for many.

However, it is still deeply saddening.

Surviving in the arts has always been tough, many musicians struggle in good times despite their talent.

Music lightens the load in many people's lives, so losing musicians to supermarket work - as the Guardian reports - is bad for a cross section of society in the end.

We are lucky in Britain to have such a diversity of music on offer, but with the pandemic we can no longer even support venues.

Privacy

In our haste to alleviate boredom during the pandemic, those computer savvy enough have turned to Zoom.

I may be talking to the older generation here, but does anyone remember privacy..?

Now we have newscasters and experts conducting and giving interviews in their living rooms.

Video meetings taking place from home, where all of our work colleagues can see our living rooms, if we’re lucky enough to have them.

Liberty campaigned for a long time to keep private information private and it feels like in the rush to connect we are forgetting the value of neutral spaces and a private home.

In addition to this increasingly jobs require photos and videos with CVs.

Why on earth do they need to see you to secure a job?

The internet has brought us many things, but do we need to broadcast everything to YouTube.

Policing Fun

The new regulation for gatherings have been further restricted to six.

This smacks of hypocrisy.

You can be surrounded by up to 40 people in a cafe or bar, where you spend money.

However, you can not gather that many people together for a birthday party, though they make exceptions for weddings and funerals.

Cases are going up.

However, we are still sending people back to schools and universities with restrictions.

These are admittedly more essential, but fun is important too.

This comment has been revised for accuracy.

Extinction Rebellion Demonstration

Extinction Rebellion amassed at three o’clock outside the Bank of England to commence a Walk of Shame around the city.

Black Lives Matter activists were in attendance as well to speak to the assembled roughly 500 strong crowd of mainly white faces.

Chants of no justice, no peace were raised and there was a sign reading only in peaceful states is peaceful activism a crime.

During the rally outside the Bank of England a passer by cried “get a job losers”.

Undeterred the protesters went on to cry “check your privilege”.

They walked on to the Lloyds building to highlight the Lloyds historical profits made from slavery before singing Power to the People.

By this time seven police vans had amassed to follow the protesters.

By the time they reached the London Wall police started arrests, there were only two in total, seemingly for sitting down. 

The claim being made for arrests were they were being made under Covid restrictions.

Covid-19 now restricts gatherings of over 30 people.

Rule Brittania

To sing or not to sing that is the question.

The issue of the words to Rule Brittania and Land of Hope and Glory came up again recently.

Both glorify the British empire and rule Brittania is said to be a dark reminder of slavery.

There is some question over how offensive they really are, but the creative decision had been taken to play the music without the words.

This was said to be a non-political decision.

However, now the decision has been taken to bring the words back.

Presumably this decision is the final one, but it all seems a bit trivial when people are still being killed by police seemingly because of the colour of their skin.

Though I suspect the fight over Rule Brittania is set to continue.

Misleading Guardian headline

The front page of the Guardian today had a rather misleading headline regarding attainment statistics.

While the headline reads Gap between rich and poor pupils ‘widens 46% in a year’ the main article goes on to mention Black, Asian and minority ethnic students.

The article itself is clear, but can’t seem to decide if it is talking about rich and poor or black and white.

It is dangerous to conflate Black, Asian and minority ethnic attainment with questions of poverty, as they are not necessarily synonymous.

It’s a shame as a study on attainment during Covid 19 would be enlightening.

Click here for an article by the BBC on reactions to Black, Asian and minority ethnic.