Boris is jumping on the bandwagon.
Boris Johnson has called for the presumption of innocence to be reversed in cases where Britons travel to Iraq or Syria and said he wants the jihadist who beheaded an American journalist to be killed in a bomb attack.
The Mayor of London, who has overall responsibility for the Metropolitan Police, said legislation should be introduced so that anyone visiting those countries would be automatically presumed to be terrorists unless they had notified the authorities in advance, and joined growing calls for Britons fighting abroad to be stripped of their citizenship.
Sigh…
Yes, sure, those who engage in terrorist activities should be dealt with harshly – once they have been tried and found guilty in a court of law with sufficient evidence to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. There is a very good reason for the presumption of innocence and there is a very good reason why we should preserve it rather than give the state (by far the most insidious enemy for it pretends to be our friend) any more powers.
William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!
Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
William Roper: Yes, I’d cut down every law in England to do that!
Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!
How many times do these cretins have to be reminded?
I love the bit in ‘Witness’ where the little Amish boy is being talked to by his grandfather on the subject of guns. The boy says he would only use his gun to shoot the bad men. His grandfather asks how he would know these bad men, can he look into their hearts?
This then leads into the main Amish principle, “Be ye separate!” If only we could!
What clowns thought it would be a good idea to import this alien religion and culture and to elevate it to ‘that which cannot be challenged’ status?
“…What clowns thought it would be a good idea to import this alien religion and culture and to elevate it to ‘that which cannot be challenged’ status?..”
Err, that’d be the Labour Party, who would import anything at all if it voted Labour.
Indeed.
Tbh, I believe islam has proven time and time again that it has no place in a civilised society. Guilty or innocent, I don’t think we can trust them anymore.
This isn’t about Muslims, nor is it about trust – it is a Trojan horse for a frightening piece of repressive legislation that would sooner or later be used against the rest of us.
Robert Bolt as I recall. Had the privilege of listening to a speech by him at my (his? May have been an old mate of the Head at the time ) old Grammar school in Egham, Surrey many years ago. Strode’s Grammar. Funny what you remember sometimes.