Many people were shocked to learn of the ‘grooming’ trials going on in the north. Clearly a crime that until now largely ‘slipped under the radar’ it has the potential to stir up many passions, some ugly. Some wish to sweep it under the carpet to hide community divisions, some wish to use it to increase those divisions. How we ensure this doesn’t happen is a debate for another day. Today however we turn to our resident poet, Jasan, to reflect upon the ‘good and bad’ actors in this drama.

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Nazir Afzal – the Law Man

and the Nasty Nine of Oldham

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“They ripped away all my dignity and all my last bit of self-esteem and by the end of it I had no emotion whatsoever because I was used to being used and abused daily,” a victim’s statement.”

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Nazir the law man – a man of virtue
While the nasty nine were sexual predators
In their hands suffered shameful torture
Countless girls – hell’s wrath be on these tormentors

Dangle morality forever between prayer and pleasure
Tangled amid sin and prejudice – the truth
Nazir and nasty nine give a tool to measure
The good and evil these isles have given birth

Nazir and Nasty nine, both in this melting pot
Called Britain which still holds its head high
Standing tall to be just and apt
In that light may this sad saga pass-by

May the law and justice forever reign supreme
For the guilty to be punished as the law dictate’
Yet, prejudices may not throw peace to the fire
And let not the guilt of a handful mire
This nation into the evil minds of the extreme

Jason

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© All rights reserved. Requests for permission to reproduce or translate-whether for sale or non-commercial distribution, should be addressed to E.Jesuthasan, e-mail jason_jesuthasan@yahoo.com

Our resident poet reflects upon a ‘New Deal’ for Britain. Entitled a New Front, he takes a critical look at post war (post colonial) Britain’s international diplomacy and relations in comparison to China (Whilst we would much prefer to be more like Switzerland than China our political elites still like to pretend we are a ‘world power’, much to the cost of our young men and exchequer – Ed).

He says “Contrast China, a communist nation (a pauper and in isolation almost up to 1990), with Britain in a post war, post colonial era, but still a world power ostensibly able to take advantage of the world it had ruled up to early ’50’s and had many colonial friends to do deals with.

Yet Britain failed, while this ‘Red Nation of the east’ in the last 20 years has done deals with more than half of the planet on minerals, agriculture, you name it, and wielding incomparable power in the international arena to the astonishment of every other nation including Britain

I always thought that if only Britain had used its old links to better effect, it would have done much better and the blame lies with both Labour and Conservative rulers of Britain.

If China could inherit half the earth through deals, I honestly and strongly feel that Britain could have done better.

© All rights reserved. Requests for permission to reproduce or translate-whether for sale or non-commercial distribution, should be addressed to E.Jesuthasan, e-mail jason_jesuthasan@yahoo.com.

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Scottish Referendum Update:

The Battle Lines have yet to be drawn.

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WITH THE referendum on Scotland’s future constitutional status currently scheduled for the autumn of 2014, the campaigns for and against independence and for further devolution have understandably not exactly got into top gear as yet but we can see the way that the various political parties are leaning in this debate. Their stances can be briefly summarised as:

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Scottish National Party: Full-blown independence from the rest of the UK. Some internal debate has been sparked over possible compromises such as letting the Trident submarine base remain on the Clyde and Scotland becoming a NATO member.

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Labour: Opposed to independence and instead favours strengthening devolution and supports the recommendations of the Calman Commission.

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Conservatives: While the Tories have softened their position on devolution, (they campaigned against the establishment of a Scottish Parliament), they are still much in favour of keeping the Union. At their Scottish conference in Troon in March they launched Conservative Friends of the Union to campaign for saving the Union.

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Liberal Democrats: They are against independence and their Scottish leader is not in favour of a multi-option referendum. The Scottish Lib Dems are reported to be working on their own proposals for reform of the constitutional position.

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The smaller parties also have their viewpoints on independence. The Green Party support a multi-option referendum and further decentralisation, UKIP are against independence and point to the various bad consequences that they see arising from the SNP’s Independence in Europe policy and the BNP also highlights the SNP’s pro-EU position plus the SNP’s well known pro-immigration views.

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So, broadly speaking, we have on the one side the SNP putting a case for total political separation from the UK and on the other the various other parties calling for either the enhancement of devolution or no change at all. How will this play out when the starting gun is fired on the referendum campaign proper? Have any alliances been formed to unite parties with common or similar stances?

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While the SNP is alone in its call for independence, it is most likely quite comfortable in campaigning by itself. It has recently received substantial financial contributions from Colin and Chris Weir of £1m and from Sir Brian Souter of £570,000. These two donations are listed in The Sunday Times Rich List 2012 as the number one and number two largest donations to political parties in 2011. Alex Salmond is a respected politician and able campaigner and so the SNP has the resources to go it alone in the referendum campaign.

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The other parties that might be generally categorised as unionist have yet to form common cause. As mentioned, the Conservatives have launched their own campaign group which is open to non-party members although this may be more of an acknowledgement of the virtual pariah status that the Tories enjoy in Scotland! At their last leadership contest one candidate stood on a platform of re-naming the party and it is unlikely that Labour and the Lib Dems would view a public coming together with the Tories as anything other than extremely problematic. It is early days yet so it will be interesting to monitor the developments in the anti-independence camp.

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The National Liberal Party in Scotland continues to add its small voice to getting Devo-Max onto the ballot paper. In addition to the areas mentioned in Glen Maney’s recent report (See Scottish Voters Warming To Devo-Max Option As Third Choice! Of 20/04/2012) leafleting has also been undertaken in the Glasgow suburbs of Bearsden and Mount Vernon and the Lanarkshire towns of Hamilton and Motherwell. There are plans to add other towns to this list over the closing period of the consultation process. Watch this space!

Our resident poet Jason reflects upon the latest Media-Westminster scandal over the allegations of a tie-up between the Culture Secretary and News Corp.

© All rights reserved. Requests for permission to reproduce or translate-whether for sale or non-commercial distribution, should be addressed to E.Jesuthasan, e-mail jason_jesuthasan@yahoo.com

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IN EARLY MARCH we published an article entitled New Alternative Publications On The Way! At the time, it gave details of three publications that were due to be released – or were in the early planning stages and would be due out later on this year. The three publications were the Isle of Wight Voice (Issue 1), Fourth World Review (Issue 154) and New Horizon (Issue 2).

All members and supporters of the National Liberal Party will know by now that the Isle of Wight Voice came out earlier this month.

As our article Get your FREE copy of the Isle of Wight Voice! notes, its main article consists of an interview with Glen Maney – the National Secretary of the National Liberal Party. It highlights the dire jobs situation on the Island.

It says that Cameron and Clegg are doing nothing to alleviate the economic and social problems there. They seem to be more interested in the internal affairs of Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya than looking after fellow Britons on the Island.

Glen Maney has told us that the Isle of Wight Voice has gone down a storm on the Island. Therefore, don’t be surprised to read of plans for Issue 2 in the near future!

In the meantime, why not get hold of your copy today? Simply e-mail natliberal@aol.com and ask for your FREE pdf copy of the Isle of Wight Voice (Issue 1).

The next alternative publication due for release is Fourth World Review.

Issue 154 of 4WR will consist of four major interviews. All were conducted by Wayne John Sturgeon (who, along with Graham Williamson, is the Joint Editor of the magazine). Those interviewed include Kevin Craig of Vine and Fig Tree, Henry Law of the Land Value Taxation Campaign, Dr. Vernon Coleman, the well-known anti-EU activist and author and Frank Taylor of the Runnymede Project

One major confirmed article (to date) is Panjaab – A Forgotten Palestine! A Small Nation Versus Indian Superstate by Jagdeesh Singh. On a similar theme, 4WRs new series, Raising a Voice for Small Nations, will also includes updates from Sri Lanka and Sicily.

There are also several book reviews planned.

We can also reveal that 4WR now has a Facebook page. It can be used for 4WR-related announcements and debates. Why now check it out? If you’re on Facebook, simply type in Fourth World Review in the ‘Search’ bar at the top of your home page.

Once Issue 154 is ready we’ll let you know. In the meantime, those wishing to obtain a copy of Issue 153 of 4WR should simply e-mail John Papworth at papworthjohn@yahoo.co.uk and ask for a FREE pdf copy.

The third publication is New Horizon. This is the National Liberal Party’s ideological journal. Issue 2 will be out within the next couple of months.

We’ll bring you more information about NH in due course. However, we can confirm that it will contain a major article on trade unions. Liberalism and Trade Unions will look at the development of the Trade Union movement in Britain and the Continent. The article covers all forms of unions – from those that are Marxist in orientation to those that are Christian as well as Liberal “unions that also rejected socialism but were non-confessional and sought to unite all workers, regardless of religion or sometimes trade i.e. covering blue and white collar workers.”

The New Horizon article then poses a couple of thought-provoking questions: What should the role of Trade unions be in a (National) Liberal ‘society’? and Where would Trade Unions fit in?

Readers will have to wait until the new issue of NH appears to find out the answers – so keep your eyes peeled for further news!

Whilst on the subject of Trade Unions, we understand that Issue 7 of British Worker should be out towards the end of this month. It’s is the agitprop paper of Solidarity Trade Union.

Solidarity (named after the famous non-communist Polish trade union, Solidarność) describes itself as “an independent, autonomous and free nationalist union formed at the end of 2005.” Its membership is open to all British workers – and it doesn’t discriminate on grounds of race, nationality, ethnicity, sexual orientation, politics or religion.

Intriguingly, it terms itself “a pan-nationalist and inter-nationalist (as opposed to an internationalist!) union.” It is also “libertarian, progressive, free-thinking and non-dogmatic in outlook.”

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The National Liberal Party understands that this new issue may be used to launch two new union campaigns – one encouraging people to ‘Buy British!’ the other around the theme of ‘No Cuts In Jobs Or Services!’.

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Whilst talking about Solidarity, we were recently sent a copy of their publication Scottish Worker. It raised interesting – and legitimate – questions about how far the State should go to protect ordinary working people. Scottish Worker called for more government (ie the State) action to avoid more lay offs and unemployment.

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For anti-Statist groups (like ourselves) this presents something of a dilemma! The NLP is against too much state interference. However, in the case presented by Scottish Worker, we agree that the state has to step in and exercise its authority.

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This leads us on rather neatly to news about the well-respected Third Way Think Tank. Formed in 2005, it has produced Third Way magazine on a very irregular basis. On saying that, the themes covered in 3W have been very interesting – for instance, it has looked at subjects as diverse as Taking Liberties, Tolkien and Politics and Catholic Social Teaching.

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We’ve heard on the grapevine that the Third Way Think Tank hopes to re-launch 3W magazine sometime later this year. We understand that it’ll continue to explore themes, but this new issue will act as some kind of ‘devils advocate.’ Apparently, it’ll ask searching questions of progressive nationalism! We believe that it will attempt to iron out any contradictions that may exist in progressive nationalist thinking and ideology.

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We understand that the Third Way Think Tank will be making an in-depth announcement concerning 3W magazine on their web-site – www. thirdway.eu – in due course.

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In the meantime, the National Liberal Party hopes to keep on providing updates on all of the above (and maybe even more!) alternative publications. Therefore, we’d recommend that you revisit this site on a fairly regular basis.

Read this article in conjunction with:

New Alternative Publications On The Way! (Published on 8 March 2012) http://nationalliberal.org/new-alternative-publications-on-the-way

Isle of Wight Voice – Coming Soon! (Published on 22 March 2012) http://nationalliberal.org/isle-of-wight-voice-%E2%80%93-coming-soon

Scottish Update (Published on 24 March 2012) http://nationalliberal.org/scottish-update

Get your FREE copy of the Isle of Wight Voice! (Published on 7 April 2012) http://nationalliberal.org/get-your-free-copy-of-the-isle-of-wight-voice

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• Follow the National Liberal Party on You Tube. Just click here: http://www.youtube.com/user/NationalLiberalParty

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Our resident poet shares with us his take on the forthcoming referendum on Scotland’s constitutional future, including their right to choose Devo-Max (or independence). –

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© All rights reserved. Requests for permission to reproduce or translate-whether for sale or non-commercial distribution, should be addressed to E.Jesuthasan, e-mail jason_jesuthasan@yahoo.com.