It is a pleasure to have borders. I also like the idea of living on an isolated island protected by saltwater. It is the sea and the Navy that have protected us from conquerors and tyrants for centuries.
I have been to 56 countries. In addition, I lived with my family in two other nations. The world is not scary to me and there are many things I can learn from people around the globe. It is a place I enjoy.
Different people live in different areas. People choose to live in different ways. They can do this because of the borders that are reinforced by mountains, deserts and seas. The US-Canadian border is a reminder of two different ways to live free in North America.
So I cannot say I agree with the recently retired head of the UK Border Force, Mr Paul Lincoln, that ‘bloody borders’ are ‘just such a pain in the bloody a***’. We know now that Mr. Lincoln, the man in charge of the enforcement of the country’s borders and who earned a substantial salary to do so, doesn’t believe in borders.
PETER HITCHENS: So now we know one reason why an apparently simple job, keeping people out of a sea-girt country, unless they arrive legally, has proved so difficult for so many years. More than 1,000 illegal migrants arrive in this country each day, despite worsening weather conditions and rougher seas.
This is not surprising. There are already police chiefs that don’t believe the penalty for crimes should be punished, teachers who hate education and bishops without faith in God. However, this one is more precise. Lincoln was only able to do one thing, but he did not believe in it.
It isn’t the first time this has been revealed by our ruling class. Andrew Neather from New Labour, an apparatchik in the New Labour Party, confided that his group had a ‘driven political purpose’: mass immigration was one of the ways that the UK Government wanted to “make the UK truly multicultural”.
He recalled coming away from high-level meetings ‘with a clear sense that the policy was intended – even if this wasn’t its main purpose – to rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date’.
We can all agree that it worked. The junkyard has seen old-fashioned, conservative patriotic politics since the late 90s.
We now know why it has been so hard for years to keep people from entering a country with a lot of seas, even if they have arrived legally. Even though the weather is getting worse and the seas roughen, over 1,000 illegal immigrants are still arriving in the country every day. The policy is not believed by those in charge.
Lincoln said only what many of the elite thought. If you were a student at a US university over the last 50 years, then you know borders are bad and unimpeded free movement is an ideal. You also know that racism and stupidity are driving objections.
PETER HITCHENS: I cannot say I agree with the recently retired head of the UK Border Force, Mr Paul Lincoln, that ‘bloody borders’ are ‘just such a pain in the bloody a***’
This idea spreads even further because the university graduates have moved into other institutions, such as the BBC, schools and police. It has captured a large portion of Tory Party’s graduates, particularly since David Cameron’s Blairite takeover.
But they are aware that it isn’t popular. Therefore, they lie. They promise to lower illegal immigration but never achieve their targets. Other targets are set for illegal immigrants to be deported, but they don’t achieve them. With slogans and false claims that illegal migrants are at real risk, they send stupid vans around the suburbs. While a handful of token victims do get sent home, it is likely that they will be extremely lucky.
This is the typical feature of our politics. It claims that it will take on all forms of crime and won’t even try to bring it up. While it claims it will improve state education, it stubbornly continues to support the comprehensive schools that have destroyed it.
This chasm between the promises and reality will cause serious problems if normal citizens don’t find peaceful, rational, and responsible political outlets in countries like ours.
This is an innocuous warning about what lies ahead, given the mild but restrained rise of Donald Trump.
‘Terrorism’ is not the issue – cannabis is
An insane man takes his life in a taxi. What are we to do? Terrorism, Government and media are all topics that get us into an uproar. On the streets, armed men are stationed. MI5 is called. Alarms are sent. It is so absurd.
Which terror group has ever heard of Liverpool Women’s Hospital and wished to destroy it?
Look around you. Look around. It would be amazing if the Liverpool bomber who was sectioned for carrying a knife on the streets, didn’t become a drug user, if anybody bothers to check (probably won’t).
It’s becoming harder and more difficult to discover the truth as the police have stopped applying the drug laws. It is clear that the authorities don’t know what is happening and have no clue how to fix it.
Because they believe that cannabis is safe and harmless.
Reparing a horrible mistake
Grant Shapps (Transport Minister, e-scooter lover) has been acting up like Thomas The Tank Engine’s character and waving an e-scooter whistle and waving the green flag.
The man was opening a train line through Devon. It runs across Dartmoor. I had been allowed to take a look at his train controls by a kind driver when I was 12.
I am filled with anger at the tiny restoration of an isolated line. This should not have been shut down. It’s not enough. It was beautiful. I sometimes wish that I could travel on it again fifty years later. This was a large express line connecting London to Plymouth. The other route that runs along the coastline is washed away every year at Dawlish.
Restoring these lines, which are numerous, will do more good than stupid high-speed vanity programs like HS2. This country has been ruled by the car and the truck for far too long. They have spread noise, dirt, and ugliness all over the country. It was a grave mistake to close down railways in 1960s. There has never been an easier time to correct it.
We can now thank Archbishop Justin Welby. These were words that I didn’t think I would write. But, three weeks ago, I told him what to do on this page. Mr Welby finally acknowledged that he had been wrong about Bishop George Bell, not to be confused with the terrible Peter Ball.
His silly assertion that Bishop Bell still looms large over him, which was a presumption of guilt by the CofE when he was accused of child abuse incredibly long ago, has been withdrawn. A series of extensive investigations has disproved the charges against him.
We can now hope that the far-from-great current Bishop of Chichester will follow suit, which I forgot to mention, and who must avenge the injustices done his truly distinguished predecessor.