Latest / UK Column Radio / UK Column News - 21st May 2025

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UK Column News - 21st May 2025 · UK Column Radio

0:07
Speaker 1: Hello, Hello, It's Wednesday, the twenty first of May twenty
0:11
Speaker 1: twenty five, just after one o'clock. Welcome to UK Colin News.
0:13
Speaker 1: I'm your host by Grumson. Joining me in the studio
0:16
Speaker 1: today is Charles Mallett by Videolink. We have Vanessa Billy
0:19
Speaker 1: and Sandy Adams. Welcome to the program everyone.
0:23
Speaker 2: Now.
0:24
Speaker 1: Later in the program we're going to be covering the
0:25
Speaker 1: Lucy Connolly case, health and AI and the Middle East.
0:28
Speaker 1: But we'll begin with Brexit without the exit, because the
0:32
Speaker 1: dirty deal is done. And here are the three stooges Kirs. Starmer,
0:36
Speaker 1: our illustrious prime Minister, is flanked by two of the
0:40
Speaker 1: EU's three presidents, because who needs only one, So we've
0:43
Speaker 1: got Oursen vonder Lehn, President of the European Commission, on
0:46
Speaker 1: the left, and Antonio Costa, President of the European Council
0:49
Speaker 1: on the right. Now that the deal will, according to Starmer,
0:54
Speaker 1: deliver on his core mission to grow the economy, back
0:58
Speaker 1: British jobs and put more money in people's pockets. That's
1:01
Speaker 1: so exciting, except there was never that was never the
1:05
Speaker 1: core mission. Its core mission was, as we've been talking about,
1:07
Speaker 1: European defense all the rhetoric about goods to flow freely again,
1:12
Speaker 1: including between Grip Britain and Northern Ireland, is just that rhetoric.
1:16
Speaker 1: So the year propaganda from ten Donning Street, however, is
1:21
Speaker 1: off the charts. This is just one example of it.
1:24
Speaker 1: So on the top there you can see what happens
1:26
Speaker 1: before the UK EU deal and on the bottom after
1:29
Speaker 1: the UK EU deal, and everybody's happy in the sunshine.
1:34
Speaker 2: It's unbelievable.
1:36
Speaker 1: So Starmer said yesterday there's no impediment to e get
1:40
Speaker 1: at EU airports and his regime is working on it.
1:45
Speaker 2: Is basically what he was saying.
1:46
Speaker 1: We've now cleared the barrier and we're getting on with it,
1:49
Speaker 1: so we should be particularly excited about that. So he
1:56
Speaker 1: went on to say that liddies and gentlemen, the Britain
2:00
Speaker 1: is back on the world stage and well, actually, according
2:04
Speaker 1: to the Facts for EU website, what he meant was
2:07
Speaker 1: that Britain is back in the EU cage, and I
2:10
Speaker 1: suspect that's probably pretty accurate. Star Wars triumphalism was, as
2:15
Speaker 1: we said, off the charts in the last two weeks alone.
2:17
Speaker 1: He said, we've delivered trade deals with India and the
2:20
Speaker 1: United States that means jobs saved, jobs, created more growth
2:23
Speaker 1: and a huge vote of confidence in this country. Leading
2:26
Speaker 1: the way internationally made Britain a place where people wanted
2:31
Speaker 1: to do business once again. That's that's his narrative. And well,
2:35
Speaker 1: why was he looking so glum?
2:37
Speaker 2: Then?
2:37
Speaker 1: He was looking so glom in all the photographs and
2:40
Speaker 1: except when people were making a joke. So I don't
2:42
Speaker 1: know whether anybody was talking about fires or anything like that.
2:47
Speaker 1: But anyway, as usual with the EU, with EU related matters,
2:52
Speaker 1: nothing of substance was included in the British Regimes press release.
2:57
Speaker 1: Instead we had nonsense like this, so let's have a
3:01
Speaker 1: look at this. Sorry, UK secures new agreement with the
3:05
Speaker 1: European You need to support British businesses, back British jobs
3:07
Speaker 1: to put more money in people's pockets. In the UK
3:10
Speaker 1: press release also was package will help make food cheaper,
3:13
Speaker 1: slash red tape, open up access to the EU market
3:16
Speaker 1: and add nearly nine billion pounds nine billion pounds to
3:19
Speaker 1: the UK economy by twenty forty as if that's a
3:22
Speaker 1: lot of money over that period of time, and the
3:25
Speaker 1: Prime Minister hills the agreement is good for jobs, good
3:27
Speaker 1: for bills and good for our borders. If you're still
3:31
Speaker 1: not throwing up at this point, let's have a look
3:34
Speaker 1: at what the EU what their position was, because they
3:39
Speaker 1: produced this joint statement and we had to go to
3:45
Speaker 1: this to get the detail of the whole thing. And
3:48
Speaker 1: strange enough, this joint statement doesn't seem to be on
3:51
Speaker 1: the UK government website. And if we compare the language
3:54
Speaker 1: from both sides, here's what the EU said. Then EU
4:00
Speaker 1: will be overfishing in British waters until twenty thirty They
4:04
Speaker 1: will effect we will effectively be rejoining the Single Market
4:07
Speaker 1: for food and agriculture. It's going to tie the food
4:11
Speaker 1: sector in the UK to EU regulation. We're effectively rejoining
4:15
Speaker 1: the Single market for energy and carbon pricing, and we're
4:19
Speaker 1: going to see the return of legislative parody. We never
4:22
Speaker 1: really saw that disappear. So the EU themselves said, well,
4:30
Speaker 1: I'm going to put Urshela on this because although she
4:33
Speaker 1: didn't actually say it, it's coming out of the EU,
4:36
Speaker 1: out of her declaration, so I'm putting the quote against
4:39
Speaker 1: her name. We note the political agreements leading to full
4:43
Speaker 1: reciprocal access to waters to fish until thirtieth of June
4:48
Speaker 1: twenty thirty eight. Actually starmer for his part, lied by
4:52
Speaker 1: saying this, we've reached the deal today on fish, protecting
4:56
Speaker 1: our access rights in fishing areas with no increase and
5:00
Speaker 1: they might of EU vessels that they might that EU
5:02
Speaker 1: vessels can catch in British orders. Anyway, the deal was done,
5:08
Speaker 1: that was done on Monday. Is only the start. Ursula
5:11
Speaker 1: led the cut out of the big during the Q
5:13
Speaker 1: and A session in the press conference.
5:15
Speaker 2: Let's have a listen to what she said.
5:19
Speaker 3: Your second question was on Safe for the UK. Indeed,
5:28
Speaker 3: it's a two step approach towards SAVE. The first precondition
5:31
Speaker 3: is a security and defense partnership that has been concluded
5:36
Speaker 3: today and it opens the door for the UK to
5:39
Speaker 3: participate in the joint procurement under SAFE. Then there comes
5:43
Speaker 3: the second step that is necessary to negotiate a second
5:47
Speaker 3: agreement and here we detail out it's again a process
5:50
Speaker 3: of detailing out budget contribution, reciprocal market access and rules
5:55
Speaker 3: on security of supply. And this will give that's important
5:59
Speaker 3: in the and the UK industrial participation.
6:03
Speaker 2: This is the goal that we have to get.
6:06
Speaker 4: Well and Gibraltar, the Commission and the.
6:12
Speaker 1: So what we have there is the first step of
6:15
Speaker 1: the UK's participation in SAFE as they call it now
6:19
Speaker 1: safe being EU Defense Union. The second part, which is
6:22
Speaker 1: coming soon, will require Britain to make budget contributions, give
6:25
Speaker 1: contracts to EU companies, accept the EU rules and defense industry,
6:29
Speaker 1: foreign policy convergence, and EU supervision of defense projects, which
6:34
Speaker 1: is all exactly what we've been warning about. And you know,
6:38
Speaker 1: if we were ever really out in the first place,
6:40
Speaker 1: certainly takes us right back in. But then the question
6:43
Speaker 1: is what of Nigel Farage. Well, he's away, sorry, let's
6:47
Speaker 1: go back one. He's a way to France for a holiday.
6:51
Speaker 1: Where else would he go at this time other than
6:53
Speaker 1: the EU? The man, in my opinion, is a fraud
6:57
Speaker 1: and always has been. And you know, he is not
7:00
Speaker 1: interested in this issue anymore as far as I can see.
7:03
Speaker 1: He's only interested in echoing what Donald Trump has to say.
7:07
Speaker 1: And as Brian Monteeth says in The Scotsman, this is
7:10
Speaker 1: not a reset, not even a retreat. It's a capitulation,
7:14
Speaker 1: an unconditional surrender that changes the relationship beyond recognition. Well,
7:18
Speaker 1: I understand that set, but I don't think it's any
7:21
Speaker 1: of those, because I think this was.
7:23
Speaker 2: The plan from the beginning.
7:24
Speaker 1: There never was an intention to make Brexit work from
7:27
Speaker 1: any political leader or from any section of the UNI Party.
7:31
Speaker 1: And if you think that this is probably not the
7:33
Speaker 1: best idea that has ever been thought up, then you
7:36
Speaker 1: might like to sign the petition, which Veterans for Britain
7:38
Speaker 1: is set up on the gov dot UK petition side.
7:42
Speaker 2: The linkol be in the show notes.
7:44
Speaker 1: And you know, many may many watching this may feel
7:47
Speaker 1: like a referendum on the EU is the last thing
7:50
Speaker 1: they want to see. But I think this has to
7:53
Speaker 1: be resisted and doing nothing is not resistance. But you know,
7:58
Speaker 1: don't worry if Starbar's propaganda that I showed you at
8:01
Speaker 1: the beginning of this support isn't enough for you. Yesterday
8:04
Speaker 1: he was visiting supermarkets to make sure we all believe
8:08
Speaker 1: that food prices will fall because of this fantastic deal,
8:11
Speaker 1: so we can go back to sleep.
8:13
Speaker 5: Now, what do you think, Well, let's say, I mean
8:16
Speaker 5: Hotel California springs to mind, and I think anybody that
8:19
Speaker 5: voted in sincerity to get out of the EU opin
8:23
Speaker 5: union will be scratching their head today. But the promises
8:26
Speaker 5: of more money at the same time as complaining about
8:28
Speaker 5: a twenty two billion black hole and saying that only
8:31
Speaker 5: nine billion will be returned to the economy in fifteen years.
8:34
Speaker 5: Seems like pretty poor return. So I think there's a
8:36
Speaker 5: lot more talk about on it, but it doesn't sound good, right.
8:40
Speaker 1: So let's continue with sort of international things with the
8:43
Speaker 1: British flivvor and what's the litterst on the special Forces
8:47
Speaker 1: killings that we were talking about a week.
8:48
Speaker 2: Or two ago.
8:48
Speaker 5: Yeah, indeed, well, as I said last week the report
8:52
Speaker 5: on extra judicial killings by special Forces. A decision on
8:54
Speaker 5: the appeal of the former Australian Special Forces soldier was
8:58
Speaker 5: to be announced on Friday, and this related to a
9:01
Speaker 5: civil defamation case he brought against the journalist Nick McKenzie.
9:05
Speaker 4: Now.
9:06
Speaker 5: McKenzie had concluded from his protracted investigations that Robert Smith
9:10
Speaker 5: had committed murder while serving in Afghanistan, and Robert Smith
9:14
Speaker 5: therefore alleged defamation against McKenzie. Now the appeal was thrown out,
9:18
Speaker 5: which creates the bizarre legal situation of the Federal Court
9:22
Speaker 5: agreeing on the balance of probability that multiple murder has
9:25
Speaker 5: been committed, but because this is only a civil affair,
9:28
Speaker 5: Robert Smith faces no criminal sanction for now at least.
9:32
Speaker 5: This is what Nick mackenzie had to say about the decision.
9:38
Speaker 2: Massive relief.
9:38
Speaker 6: It's an emphetic result and I want to express my
9:43
Speaker 6: deepest gratitude to the brave ISASR soldiers who have not
9:47
Speaker 6: only fought for the country in Afghanistan, but fought for
9:50
Speaker 6: the Australian public to know the truth that Been Robert
9:53
Speaker 6: Smith is a war criminal. It was always the story
9:57
Speaker 6: of these brave ESSAYSR truth tellers. They saw Ben Robert
10:01
Speaker 6: Smith commit war crimes and they were not prepared to
10:04
Speaker 6: have that covered up. It's a terrifying experience uh to
10:07
Speaker 6: be put before the full bench of the Federal Court.
10:10
Speaker 6: But ultimately, the full bench of the Federal Court has
10:13
Speaker 6: scrutinized our journalism and more importantly, is scrutinized the testimony
10:19
Speaker 6: of SASR soldiers who said what they saw, and the
10:22
Speaker 6: full bench of the Federal Court has found the truth
10:25
Speaker 6: that Ben Robert Smith is a war criminal. You can't
10:28
Speaker 6: ask for a more comprehensive process than the full bench
10:31
Speaker 6: of the Federal Court to have our journalism scrutinized fully thoroughly,
10:37
Speaker 6: to have the testimony of our witnesses, those brave SASR
10:40
Speaker 6: soldiers scrutinized. Yet again, and yet again, the finding is
10:46
Speaker 6: utterly compelling. Ben Robert Smith did do these things. Ben
10:51
Speaker 6: Robert Smith is a war criminal, and I wanna acknowledge
10:54
Speaker 6: his victims. There are Afghan women and children who've lost husbands,
11:01
Speaker 6: fathers because they were murdered on the orders of being
11:04
Speaker 6: Robert Smith. They should not be forgotten in all this.
11:09
Speaker 5: Now, the recent BBC Panorama program called I Saw War
11:13
Speaker 5: Crimes claims to have taken the testimony of Special Forces veterans,
11:17
Speaker 5: though none has been named and actors we used for
11:20
Speaker 5: the filming. Reporting on this has been very limited, and
11:23
Speaker 5: there's been extremely little attention on the long running Independent
11:27
Speaker 5: Inquiry relating to Afghanistan. But in late January, Lord Justice
11:33
Speaker 5: Hadden Cave, who's charged with running the inquiry, requested that
11:37
Speaker 5: witness November one, four one provided a statement which should
11:45
Speaker 5: have been due within forty two days, which would detail,
11:49
Speaker 5: among other things, an overview of the witness's career, his
11:52
Speaker 5: role as an OC, relationships with individuals and partner forces,
11:57
Speaker 5: serious incident reviews, and an alleged confrontation with another witness. Now,
12:02
Speaker 5: reference to this witness being an OC should mean that
12:04
Speaker 5: he was a squadron leader, which means that he's one
12:06
Speaker 5: of a very small number of people who were in
12:09
Speaker 5: that role, and given the situation with the Australian Special Forces,
12:12
Speaker 5: the reference to partner forces should be considered as particularly significant.
12:17
Speaker 5: In response to the request, the mod Witness legal team
12:21
Speaker 5: wrote to inform the inquiry that November one, one four
12:24
Speaker 5: one quote will be relying on his privilege against self
12:28
Speaker 5: incrimination and will therefore not be providing a witness statement.
12:32
Speaker 5: In response. No further explanation was provided end quote. So
12:36
Speaker 5: the so called privilege against self incrimination is a theme.
12:40
Speaker 5: In March of this year, Having Cave released a statement
12:43
Speaker 5: about the obstruction to Obsestro, which is the military police
12:46
Speaker 5: investigation into the extra judicial killings in the first place,
12:49
Speaker 5: which described how Soldier c refused to give oral evidence
12:53
Speaker 5: despite having complied with a request for a written statement.
12:58
Speaker 2: Such refusals to.
12:59
Speaker 5: Give evidence to a bad look for UK Special Forces,
13:02
Speaker 5: as they would appear to reinforce the point they believe
13:05
Speaker 5: themselves to be above the law, not just in relation
13:07
Speaker 5: to killing non combatants, but also with regard to acting
13:11
Speaker 5: in support of an apparently legitimate judicial process. And the
13:15
Speaker 5: reason for making that point is that the privilege referred
13:17
Speaker 5: to relates to a civil or a criminal case, but
13:20
Speaker 5: not to an inquiry, which is by nature inquisitorial rather
13:23
Speaker 5: than adversarial. So as a consequence, Law Justice Haddam Cave
13:27
Speaker 5: has now mandated a response from November one, one four
13:31
Speaker 5: to one, and I'll provide updates on this as and when. Now,
13:35
Speaker 5: not only has there been very limited coverage of this
13:37
Speaker 5: issue in the mainstream, but the enforces hierarchy refused to
13:41
Speaker 5: touch it with a barge pole. And this is a
13:43
Speaker 5: point brought out in a piece in the Telegraph by
13:45
Speaker 5: ex army journalist James Jeffrey, who asks why no general
13:49
Speaker 5: will take responsibility and the answer, as always is that
13:52
Speaker 5: it's not politically expedient for them to do so. And
13:55
Speaker 5: to reinforce the point, I refer to the appointment of
13:58
Speaker 5: General Gwynn Jenkins as first seas, the probability of which
14:01
Speaker 5: I mentioned last week. Now this is important because when
14:04
Speaker 5: he was Director of Special Forces, Jenkins is believed to
14:07
Speaker 5: have ordered Special Forces personnel to lean on civil servants
14:11
Speaker 5: in order to block Afghans from coming to the UK
14:13
Speaker 5: to give evidence in the Afghan inquiry. And again, as
14:18
Speaker 5: to be expected, the counter narrative is being bolstered continually.
14:21
Speaker 5: And here we see the omnipresent Haymister Brettan Gordon writing
14:24
Speaker 5: for the British Forces Broadcasting Services that we should not
14:28
Speaker 5: rush to judgment on the allegation against special Forces, which
14:32
Speaker 5: indeed may be the case, though it's quite clear that
14:34
Speaker 5: he's preparing the ground for public opinion to be such
14:37
Speaker 5: that a criminal trial, where it to go ahead, may
14:39
Speaker 5: well end up being prejudiced.
14:42
Speaker 1: Yes, well, that will continue to rumble on and with
14:47
Speaker 1: massive attempts to sweep it.
14:48
Speaker 2: Under the rug.
14:49
Speaker 5: I think very desperate attempts, and I think the appointment
14:52
Speaker 5: of Gwynn Jenkins amidst this controversy absolutely telegraphs that precise intent.
14:58
Speaker 1: Yes, okay, well, and let's come to you now, I
15:02
Speaker 1: welcome to the program. And what's the litterst that's going
15:05
Speaker 1: on in Syria?
15:05
Speaker 7: If we moved there, actually we keep on the theme
15:10
Speaker 7: of British interference abroad and talking about the unelected.
15:18
Speaker 4: Alleged president of Syria, Joe Lani now known as Ahmed
15:22
Speaker 4: al Shada. Of course we can say that his grooming
15:25
Speaker 4: began in Boka, one of the CIA black sites in Iraq,
15:31
Speaker 4: after which he joined Isis and he then formed Al
15:35
Speaker 4: Qaeda or Nosra Front in Syria, which was rebranded then
15:40
Speaker 4: as HTS, but is still adhering to the ideology of
15:44
Speaker 4: al Kaedo. So let's go back to twenty twenty one,
15:46
Speaker 4: and this was a PBS Frontline documentary called The Jihadis,
15:50
Speaker 4: which set the wheels in motion for the grooming of
15:54
Speaker 4: Jolani as political opposition.
16:01
Speaker 8: He waged jihad in Iraq and Syria, accused of terror
16:06
Speaker 8: and torture.
16:07
Speaker 2: You're a wanted man. There's a ten million dollar price
16:09
Speaker 2: tag on your head.
16:11
Speaker 8: A former al Qaeda commander says he's changed speaking to
16:15
Speaker 8: a Western reporter for the first time.
16:18
Speaker 4: How is it that somebody who is going to want
16:20
Speaker 4: to trust you?
16:21
Speaker 8: Now? On Frontline, correspondent Martin Smith investigates the gie Hottist.
16:32
Speaker 4: And so now let's fast forward to twenty twenty five.
16:36
Speaker 4: May the first and the former US ambassador to Syria
16:41
Speaker 4: from twenty eleven to twenty fourteen, we spoke before the
16:45
Speaker 4: Baltimore Council on Foreign Affairs. So let's have a listen
16:49
Speaker 4: to what he had to say.
16:51
Speaker 9: So, starting in twenty twenty three, a British non government
16:59
Speaker 9: organization which specializes in conflict Resolution invited me to help
17:07
Speaker 9: them bring this guy out of the terrorist world and
17:13
Speaker 9: into regular politics, and at first, I have to tell
17:17
Speaker 9: you it was very leary of going. I sort of
17:19
Speaker 9: had images of me in an orange jumpsuit with a
17:22
Speaker 9: knife to my throat. He never apologized, never apologized for
17:27
Speaker 9: the terrorist attacks in Iraq or in Syria. Although there
17:30
Speaker 9: are many fewerds here, never apologized.
17:36
Speaker 4: And just a very quick reminder with this image taken
17:40
Speaker 4: from an article that I wrote back in I think
17:42
Speaker 4: twenty seventeen. Here is Ambassador Ford in Syria with the
17:47
Speaker 4: Free Syrian Army, the alleged moderates Colonel Okaidi in twenty thirteen,
17:52
Speaker 4: and on the right it's the same colonel were the
17:55
Speaker 4: leader of isis part of omer the Chechens, group of
17:58
Speaker 4: fighters who led many of the attacks against the Syrian
18:02
Speaker 4: Arab Army. Ford in fact, was unceremoniously flung out of
18:06
Speaker 4: Syria when it became very apparent that he was there
18:10
Speaker 4: to incite the uprising against the then Syrian government. And
18:17
Speaker 4: I just want to have a look at another section
18:19
Speaker 4: from his talk in Baltimore, So let's have a look
18:22
Speaker 4: at this quick video.
18:24
Speaker 9: It's nut I went to Syria in January. I met
18:30
Speaker 9: Ahmed Shara, the President. Then when I signed the Presidential Palace,
18:35
Speaker 9: I said, never in a million years did I expect
18:39
Speaker 9: to see you here, and he kind of grinned and
18:42
Speaker 9: he said, well, I like to keep surprising you, mister ambassador.
18:47
Speaker 9: He has a sense of humor. I don't normally think
18:50
Speaker 9: of El Kaid as having a sense of humor, but anyway, so.
18:57
Speaker 4: What I found quite interesting though, is that he did
18:59
Speaker 4: say al Kaedo he didn't consider had a sense of humor,
19:02
Speaker 4: so he still obviously considers Jolani to be al Qaedo.
19:06
Speaker 4: So let's have a look. There were a number of
19:08
Speaker 4: articles outlining Robert Ford's visit to Syria, and this is
19:13
Speaker 4: just one of them. My Syria visit, raise of hope
19:16
Speaker 4: and fears for the future. But he also mentions in
19:20
Speaker 4: the article this section which if we can just have
19:24
Speaker 4: a look at the quote, I was delighted to accept
19:27
Speaker 4: an invitation from a British NGO to join them in
19:30
Speaker 4: a visit to a free Syria in the middle of January.
19:33
Speaker 4: So clearly he mentions back in twenty twenty three that
19:36
Speaker 4: it was a British unnamed NGO that organize his talks
19:42
Speaker 4: with Joe Lanni and then he went with them in
19:46
Speaker 4: January of this year to Damascus. And then I just
19:49
Speaker 4: want to bring up the visit of the military Attashe
19:55
Speaker 4: Lieutenant Colonel Smith that Brian mentioned on Monday. This was
20:01
Speaker 4: the visit to Damascus of the Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith
20:06
Speaker 4: military Attashe and where he met with the Defense Minister,
20:10
Speaker 4: alleged defense Minister, mahaff Abul Cashra. And just a reminder
20:15
Speaker 4: of course that mahaf Abukasra his roots lie in al Kaeda.
20:20
Speaker 4: He was an al Qaeda commander before he became a
20:25
Speaker 4: suited and booted member of the al Kaeda government that
20:29
Speaker 4: has been put into power in Syria by an international coup.
20:35
Speaker 4: And then I just want to focus a little bit
20:37
Speaker 4: on this Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith. In November of twenty
20:43
Speaker 4: twenty four, he was in Lebanon with a military Attashe group.
20:47
Speaker 4: We can just bring that up. A UK Defense senior
20:51
Speaker 4: advisor reaffirms Lebanese armed forces as the sole legitimate defender
20:56
Speaker 4: of Lebanon. So bear in mind this was just before
20:59
Speaker 4: the ceasepar between Hesbula and Israel, which then precipitated US
21:06
Speaker 4: into the international coup that toppled the Syrian government, So
21:12
Speaker 4: very interesting timing. And Charles actually pointed out to me
21:15
Speaker 4: yesterday that there was a government report on a later
21:19
Speaker 4: visit to Damascus by Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith, sorry to
21:24
Speaker 4: Lebanon in March of this year also, so he's obviously
21:27
Speaker 4: very active between Lebanon and Syria. And let's have a
21:30
Speaker 4: look at what was said in that meeting. This isn't
21:33
Speaker 4: actually what he said, but it's what was reported from
21:36
Speaker 4: the meeting. The meeting addressed opportunities for technical and military
21:40
Speaker 4: cooperation and mechanisms for developing the army structure to meet
21:44
Speaker 4: modern challenges. So British military getting involved in the so
21:49
Speaker 4: called development of Syria post coup, which of course the
21:53
Speaker 4: British were very much involved in. It was published in
21:56
Speaker 4: very few outlets, mostly Lebanese Syrian, and this in the
22:02
Speaker 4: Jerusalem Post, so Israeli media. The source who works in
22:05
Speaker 4: the ministry's public relations department added that the British visit
22:09
Speaker 4: may serve as a prelude to normalization with the current
22:13
Speaker 4: Syrian government. I would certainly agree with that. And then
22:18
Speaker 4: a reminder that a couple of weeks ago we talked
22:21
Speaker 4: about the fact that there are British private military mercenaries
22:26
Speaker 4: basically on the ground inside Syria and that they are
22:31
Speaker 4: The Syrian director of the Emerald Group was actually appointed
22:35
Speaker 4: again in November twenty twenty four, so at the same
22:40
Speaker 4: time as Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith was conducting meetings with
22:44
Speaker 4: his colleagues in Lubanon. So interesting timing. I mean, that's
22:48
Speaker 4: pure speculation. I obviously don't have anything to tie them
22:51
Speaker 4: together except the timing itself. So let's have a quick
22:55
Speaker 4: look at a summary of what I've been talking about.
22:57
Speaker 4: So in twenty twenty one, we had the PBS interview
23:02
Speaker 4: with Joe Lani, the jahadest where they definitely sort of
23:05
Speaker 4: trimmed his beard and put him in a suit and
23:08
Speaker 4: tried to legitimize him as political opposition. In twenty twenty three,
23:12
Speaker 4: a British NGO unnamed and Robert Ford visited Joe Lanni
23:18
Speaker 4: to again continue the grooming project. In March and September
23:23
Speaker 4: twenty twenty four, November, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith in Lubanon,
23:28
Speaker 4: just prior to the ceasefire that led to up between
23:31
Speaker 4: Israel and Hezbollah, that then was led to the coup
23:37
Speaker 4: in Syria. Twenty twenty four, again Emerald PMC Syria Director
23:42
Speaker 4: was appointed at the same time that Charles Smith was
23:44
Speaker 4: in Lebanon twenty twenty five January visit by Robert Ford
23:48
Speaker 4: and again this unnamed British NGO And in twenty twenty
23:52
Speaker 4: five again Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith visits visits Damascus with
23:57
Speaker 4: a view to during a British military footprint alongside al Qaeda.
24:05
Speaker 1: Thank you for that, Vanessa will bore Foreign Office related
24:07
Speaker 1: news letter on so thank you for that, Sandy, let
24:12
Speaker 1: me welcome you to the program. And of course the
24:14
Speaker 1: other news that's come out in the last day or
24:16
Speaker 1: two is apparently a deal has been done on the
24:20
Speaker 1: at the World Health Organization, which Britain is absolutely part of.
24:25
Speaker 10: Yes yesterday, twentieth fifth May, in Geneva, the World Health
24:29
Speaker 10: Organization's member states quietly adopted the first ever International Pandemic Agreement,
24:35
Speaker 10: a global treaty that would reshape how public health, national law,
24:39
Speaker 10: and everyday freedoms operate in the future. Slovakia's abstention followed
24:44
Speaker 10: a challenge initiated by Prime Minister Robert Fico, who called
24:48
Speaker 10: for a formal vote rather than allowing the treaty to
24:51
Speaker 10: pass my consensus. Fico was known for his vaccine skepticism
24:56
Speaker 10: and concerns over national sovereignty. He instructed is delegation to
25:00
Speaker 10: oppose the agreement. Who is not led by elected officials,
25:05
Speaker 10: you know, the Director General, doctor ted ros Gibusis, holds
25:10
Speaker 10: office through diplomatic negotiation, not public vote. His record simply
25:14
Speaker 10: during the early COVID response sparked curious concerns about neutrality
25:19
Speaker 10: and transparency. We have to remember that there was no
25:24
Speaker 10: vote from the people on this, no heated debates, no
25:27
Speaker 10: parliamentary oversight, no public referendum. Instead, it was adopted by consensus,
25:34
Speaker 10: literally the backdoor method of agreement that allows governments, including
25:38
Speaker 10: the UK, to silently nod their approval without needing to
25:41
Speaker 10: explain themselves to the people they serve. And this is
25:44
Speaker 10: what we're finding across the board. The foundation of this
25:48
Speaker 10: treaty is the Who's One Health Framework, an ideology that
25:52
Speaker 10: links human health to animals, the environment, even agriculture and
25:56
Speaker 10: land use. Under a broad lens, almost anything can be
25:59
Speaker 10: re rounded as a health threat. Climate change, farming practices,
26:03
Speaker 10: land ownership, all potentially within the scope. This fits in
26:08
Speaker 10: obviously with the border UN twenty thirty seventeen Goals agenda,
26:13
Speaker 10: and while the WHO cannot directly overall national laws, the
26:17
Speaker 10: treaty even creates binding international obligations. Governments can now use
26:22
Speaker 10: it to justify emergency laws, sweeping powers, social restrictions, all
26:27
Speaker 10: under the shield of international compliance or global coordination they
26:32
Speaker 10: call it. Even more troubling is who pays for the
26:35
Speaker 10: WHOSE bills. As of twenty three the largest funders weren't
26:40
Speaker 10: democratic governments. They were private powerhouses, the Bill and Melinda
26:44
Speaker 10: Gates Foundation, GAVEY, and various UN agency backed by corporate interests.
26:49
Speaker 10: These donors now help set global health priorities without a
26:53
Speaker 10: single vote cast by the public. Among the treaties more
26:58
Speaker 10: alarming features is pose Pathogen Access and Benefit.
27:02
Speaker 4: Sharing PABs system.
27:04
Speaker 10: This would give the WHO rights to collect pathogen samples
27:07
Speaker 10: from any country and control their distribution under equity rules.
27:11
Speaker 10: I mean, what could possibly go wrong? The treaty also
27:15
Speaker 10: pushes for digital health certificates, a polite phrase for what
27:19
Speaker 10: could soon become global digital IDs linked to your vaccination status.
27:25
Speaker 10: Not every country was on board, as I mentioned earlier. Obviously,
27:30
Speaker 10: you know Slovakia but notions like Poland, Russia, Italy, Iran
27:34
Speaker 10: also were raising the alarm during the negotiations. Theirjections were
27:40
Speaker 10: loss of sovereignty, a vague legal language, and the growing
27:44
Speaker 10: power of unelected institutions. In the UK, meanwhile, the silence
27:50
Speaker 10: has been deafening. There's been no real debate in Parliament,
27:53
Speaker 10: no public consultation, no clear explanation from the Prime Minister
27:57
Speaker 10: or Health Secretary. Britain simply slid in to the agreement
28:00
Speaker 10: without your voice, without your vote or your knowledge. In
28:03
Speaker 10: some cases, this treaty marks more than a shift in
28:06
Speaker 10: health policy. It signals a deeper transformation, the move from
28:10
Speaker 10: national government governance to a transnational management system. Decisions that
28:15
Speaker 10: affect your life are increasingly made by technocrats, foundations and
28:19
Speaker 10: global agencies, and people can't elect. You know that these
28:23
Speaker 10: are people that you can't elect and you can't remove.
28:27
Speaker 10: So when COVID began rapid emergency powers, top down mandates, censorship, surveillance,
28:36
Speaker 10: the WHO Treaty now locks all those things into place. Internationally,
28:40
Speaker 10: emergency governance is becoming the new normal. So here's a question.
28:45
Speaker 10: We almost ask if governments can sign binding global treaties
28:50
Speaker 10: without asking their people who's really in charge during the
28:53
Speaker 10: next crisis, and there will be one, otherwise they wouldn't
28:55
Speaker 10: be doing all this. The answer increasingly is that that
29:00
Speaker 10: you know you didn't vote for these people, and you
29:03
Speaker 10: you know that you and they cannot hold you to account.
29:07
Speaker 10: I mean when I read the treaty, the takeaway for
29:10
Speaker 10: me reading it, and you can find it online is
29:13
Speaker 10: the Pandemic Agreement does not include any provisions that would
29:17
Speaker 10: give the World Health Organization powers to impose domestic public
29:21
Speaker 10: health decisions in the UK. The sovereignty of states is
29:25
Speaker 10: one of the guiding principles of the agreement, So bearing
29:29
Speaker 10: that in mind, you know, knowing that we're getting these
29:32
Speaker 10: concerns is globally locally that are not representative of the
29:36
Speaker 10: people they serve. This is all basically relying on our
29:40
Speaker 10: compliance and we have to remember that.
29:44
Speaker 2: What do you think, sadly, thank you, thank you for that.
29:48
Speaker 2: I think that's absolutely right.
29:50
Speaker 1: I mean that the UK government did release a press
29:53
Speaker 1: release to say that they had joined this, that they
29:57
Speaker 1: had signed and so on, but they, as you say,
30:00
Speaker 1: there was very little of any real mainstream coverage and
30:03
Speaker 1: certainly the implications haven't been discussed in the mainstream media
30:07
Speaker 1: and there is no national debate or discussion about it,
30:11
Speaker 1: So you know, I don't know, I don't know what
30:13
Speaker 1: your thoughts are.
30:15
Speaker 5: Well, it's nothing to do with health. I mean, I
30:16
Speaker 5: think that's the first thing to point out. And this
30:19
Speaker 5: is exactly what we saw in twenty twenty and people
30:23
Speaker 5: were blindsided by and large by what happened in the
30:27
Speaker 5: name of health, and this is just an extension of that.
30:29
Speaker 5: Of course, we mustn't forget that. That's where this is
30:32
Speaker 5: traced back to in the immediate term. And I think,
30:34
Speaker 5: you know, we can talk more about this in extra
30:36
Speaker 5: but this says an awful lot more about the way
30:39
Speaker 5: that wider government of society is while I say working,
30:44
Speaker 5: I mean it's obviously it's not working, because Sandy described
30:46
Speaker 5: as completely back front. So I think that you know,
30:49
Speaker 5: this should absolutely send a shivered own down people's spines
30:53
Speaker 5: if they're considering that we do live in a in
30:56
Speaker 5: a society where we, as the people who pay for
30:59
Speaker 5: and vote for elected representatives, are in any way in
31:02
Speaker 5: charge of what happens to us.
31:04
Speaker 1: Yes, thank you, Okay, let's move on. If you like
31:07
Speaker 1: what the UK colann does, we do need your support.
31:09
Speaker 1: I want to say a massive thank you to everybody
31:11
Speaker 1: that does support us. But if you go to our
31:14
Speaker 1: support page you can make a donation there, you could
31:17
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31:19
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31:21
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31:25
Speaker 1: Picking something up at the shop of course helps us
31:27
Speaker 1: as well. And if you buy something from Clive to
31:29
Speaker 1: Carl using the link on this page, then we do
31:32
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31:36
Speaker 1: But if you can't do that, please do share the
31:38
Speaker 1: material you find on the uk COLN website. Share links
31:41
Speaker 1: are available and that is massively helpful to get around
31:44
Speaker 1: the censorship regime in this country and around the world.
31:49
Speaker 2: NI Christians in.
31:50
Speaker 5: Cornwall, Yes, indeed. Now this is an interview with an
31:54
Speaker 5: accompanying article. It's about tru Rodioces and it relates to
31:57
Speaker 5: the on the Way Plan, which to all intents and purposes,
32:01
Speaker 5: extends the lockdown policies in an effort to destroy congregations
32:05
Speaker 5: in Christian worship under the false pretext of a lack
32:08
Speaker 5: of funds really diverting money towards the absurd net zero agenda,
32:14
Speaker 5: and how to sort of push up push back via
32:19
Speaker 5: the PCCS, so worth getting into. And then next an
32:23
Speaker 5: article about the steel what's happened with the steel industry
32:27
Speaker 5: and a description of the process by which government may
32:29
Speaker 5: purport to act in support of an entity or industry
32:31
Speaker 5: it whilst actually doing everything in its power to subvert it.
32:34
Speaker 5: So a cautionary tail from a legislative and policy perspective.
32:38
Speaker 2: And we shouldn't pass by the fact that you wrote it.
32:41
Speaker 2: I did write it, yes.
32:42
Speaker 1: Okay, and Jerem tonight it is going to be talking
32:45
Speaker 1: about the Titanic conspiracy. I'm going to be very interested
32:48
Speaker 1: in watching this because my uncle was the man who
32:51
Speaker 1: project managed the building of the massive creans at Harland
32:55
Speaker 1: Wolf Shipyard, where of course the Titanic was built, and
32:58
Speaker 1: while he was there in the sixties, and these the
33:00
Speaker 1: stories of the so called Titanic conspiracy. We're absolutely right.
33:04
Speaker 1: But then, and of course this is well before the
33:06
Speaker 1: Internet ever happened. So watch Germs Interview tonight at seven
33:10
Speaker 1: pm live with John Hammer if you can possibly join.
33:15
Speaker 1: I'm sure the discussion will be interesting. Reminder of standing
33:20
Speaker 1: the Light is taking place this weekend in Garan and Cumbria.
33:23
Speaker 1: So the last chance to get tickets and to go
33:26
Speaker 1: for that. So if you possibly can get along to it,
33:29
Speaker 1: a reminder of the Science Beautiful Festival taking place in
33:31
Speaker 1: Wimborne and Dorset twenty sixth to twenty ninth of June.
33:36
Speaker 1: And just to say that the tickets the ticket competition
33:40
Speaker 1: is now over and the winner is Gogster Joe on
33:43
Speaker 1: Facebook and so well done if you for God's Joe
33:48
Speaker 1: for winning those two free tickets. Look forward to seeing
33:51
Speaker 1: it on at the Science Beautiful Festival in June. Okay,
33:56
Speaker 1: let's move on then to the Citua with Lucy Connolly. Now,
34:01
Speaker 1: Lucy Connolly was jelled for thirty one months back in
34:05
Speaker 1: October as a victim of the British regime to attack
34:09
Speaker 1: on free speech, and yesterday she had her appeal against
34:12
Speaker 1: her sentence turned down. Now, Conley's tweets at the time
34:15
Speaker 1: were pretty reprehensible for sure, but the punishment way overboard
34:20
Speaker 1: in my opinion, particularly when considered against the punishment given
34:24
Speaker 1: for other offenses, and will come on to that in
34:26
Speaker 1: a second. The appeal judges considered that the final judge,
34:30
Speaker 1: the trial judge sorry, had acted correctly and in a
34:34
Speaker 1: sense it's hard to disagree with that. But before you
34:36
Speaker 1: jumped down my throat for saying that, just hear me
34:38
Speaker 1: out for a second, because what we have here, I think,
34:41
Speaker 1: is a perfect example of why juries are important.
34:44
Speaker 2: Because the trial judge could only.
34:46
Speaker 1: Act based on the letter of the legislation, and it's
34:51
Speaker 1: in the legislation we have to look for the injustice.
34:53
Speaker 1: In this case, Connolly pled guilty, but if she had
34:56
Speaker 1: been in front of a jury, she may well have
34:59
Speaker 1: been felt able to challenge the charge. And remember that
35:02
Speaker 1: the jury has the part overturned. Bad legislation which are
35:06
Speaker 1: judged is not other than very exceptional circumstances like incompatibility
35:11
Speaker 1: with the Human Rights Act. But the bottom line here
35:13
Speaker 1: is that the legislation. It's the legislation which is the problem.
35:17
Speaker 1: And therefore, if there's going to be resistance to what
35:19
Speaker 1: happened to her and to others, including for example, Peter Lynch,
35:24
Speaker 1: who was imprisoned under the same kinds of circumstances and
35:26
Speaker 1: hanged himself in prison, then the resistance has to be political.
35:31
Speaker 1: The reaction on Twitter last night was predictable. Perhaps all
35:36
Speaker 1: the tweets were the same, or at least mostly the same,
35:39
Speaker 1: mentioning Hugh Edwards who got a suspended sentence for his
35:42
Speaker 1: crimes and Mike Amesbury, former MP, who punched the constituent
35:47
Speaker 1: and who ended up with a suspended sentence on appeal
35:50
Speaker 1: and the requirement to do some voluntary work and an
35:53
Speaker 1: anger management course. So these comparisons that everybody was tweeting
35:57
Speaker 1: and retweeting last night came from lou husband Ray, who's
36:01
Speaker 1: the Tory councilor in Northampton Time Council. And so to
36:05
Speaker 1: the end, to end this segment, I just want to
36:07
Speaker 1: mention the BBC coverage of all this on this morning's
36:10
Speaker 1: Today program presenter and a Foster.
36:13
Speaker 11: Amid these comments, I note comments by Lucy Connolly's husband
36:19
Speaker 11: Ray in this case and I wanted your take on
36:22
Speaker 11: a couple of those. He said that he thought the
36:24
Speaker 11: system wanted to make an example of her so other
36:27
Speaker 11: people would be scared to say things about immigration. And
36:30
Speaker 11: he also said Lucy got more time in jail for
36:32
Speaker 11: one tweet than some pedophiles and domestic abuses. Get is
36:37
Speaker 11: that the case here?
36:40
Speaker 1: So she couldn't as a BBC presenter, couldn't even acknowledge
36:44
Speaker 1: the fact that the pedophiles that was only one pedophile
36:47
Speaker 1: being talked about on all the Twitter comments that I saw,
36:51
Speaker 1: and that was Hugh Edwards, and because of course he
36:54
Speaker 1: was BBC himself, they didn't want to discuss that at all.
36:58
Speaker 1: I just thought that was pretty pathetic effort by the
37:02
Speaker 1: BBC there. I wanted to mention that in passing, let's
37:05
Speaker 1: come on to Charles to state threats.
37:08
Speaker 8: Yeah.
37:08
Speaker 5: Indeed, now the counter Terrorism Division of the Crime Prosecution
37:12
Speaker 5: Service have charged three Iranian men under the new Ish
37:17
Speaker 5: National Security Act, saying that they sorry, We'll just to
37:22
Speaker 5: animate that, saying it's extremely important that there should be
37:25
Speaker 5: no sorry wrong. We have authorized the Metropolitan Police Service
37:29
Speaker 5: to charge three Iranian men with offenses under the National
37:34
Speaker 5: Security Act, and they go on to say that it
37:37
Speaker 5: is extremely important that there should be no reporting, commentary
37:40
Speaker 5: or sharing of information which could in any way prejudice
37:44
Speaker 5: these proceedings. Now, this prompted the Home Secretary to give
37:49
Speaker 5: a statement with an update on national security, in which
37:52
Speaker 5: he continued to push the point that Iran presents an
37:55
Speaker 5: existential threat to the UK, citing the meaningless statistic that
37:59
Speaker 5: five conducted more and more investigations into Iranians. She went
38:04
Speaker 5: on though to say this, but.
38:08
Speaker 12: We need to go further in strengthening our powers to
38:11
Speaker 12: address national security threats. Security Minister and I both warned
38:15
Speaker 12: the increasing complexity of the threats we face. Threats from
38:19
Speaker 12: extremists and terrorist groups and individuals, including Islamist extremism and
38:22
Speaker 12: far right extremism, continue and vigilance and action against those
38:26
Speaker 12: remains crucial. But malign activities against US by or on
38:30
Speaker 12: behalf of foreign states have grown, and the threats we
38:34
Speaker 12: face have become more complex and intertwined. I five state
38:38
Speaker 12: threats investigations have increased by nearly fifty percent in a year.
38:42
Speaker 12: Policing investigations into state threats, led by counter terrorism policing,
38:46
Speaker 12: are up fivefold since twenty eighteen, and as well as growing,
38:51
Speaker 12: those threats are becoming more interconnected, and the old boundaries
38:55
Speaker 12: between state threats, terrorists, and organized.
38:57
Speaker 13: Criminals are being eroded.
39:00
Speaker 12: We have seen malign foreign state organizations seek to exploit
39:04
Speaker 12: any vulnerability, from criminal networks, to our cybersecurity.
39:08
Speaker 13: To our borders to do us harm.
39:11
Speaker 12: In our Manifesto, we committed to stronger action on state
39:14
Speaker 12: based security threats, and before entering government, the Foreign Secretary
39:18
Speaker 12: and I set out plans for the establishment.
39:21
Speaker 13: Of a Joint Unit to pursue and coordinate action.
39:24
Speaker 12: I can announce that the new State Threats Joint Unit
39:27
Speaker 12: is in place, with staff from across Whitehall driving a
39:30
Speaker 12: broader approach across government, building new partnerships with industry and academia.
39:39
Speaker 5: Now she speaks of interconnectedness and it's this message that
39:42
Speaker 5: we're supposed to take away. MI five has had ownership
39:46
Speaker 5: of the Joint State's the Joint State Threats Assessment Team
39:50
Speaker 5: since twenty seventeen. So here's another example of the plan
39:53
Speaker 5: for change translating is very much more of the same.
39:57
Speaker 5: Now since the events in Southport, La sum the conflation
40:02
Speaker 5: of terrorism, extremism and national security has gathered momentum, and
40:06
Speaker 5: not just here in the UK, although there still remains
40:09
Speaker 5: some confusion over the current situation, but in Germany, if
40:12
Speaker 5: AfD is conclusively classified as extremist, then the authorities may
40:16
Speaker 5: invoke powers to surveil them which would otherwise not be available.
40:23
Speaker 5: So it can be no coincidence then that this falls
40:25
Speaker 5: at exactly the same time as David Clues of Unity
40:28
Speaker 5: News Network and Mark Kollet of Patriotic Alternative, neither of
40:32
Speaker 5: which is a prescribed organization, are being reported by the
40:35
Speaker 5: BBC as plotting to infiltrate the Reform Party with Neo Nazis.
40:39
Speaker 5: So this must be looked at as the perfect springboard
40:42
Speaker 5: for rolling out similar powers of surveillance for those organizations
40:45
Speaker 5: which are at that halfway house before prescription. Now by
40:49
Speaker 5: way of context, of course, there's no mention of the
40:52
Speaker 5: fact that the Fabian Society has virtual total control of
40:55
Speaker 5: the government, an organization in pursuit of smashing the system
40:59
Speaker 5: in order to impose a one world government. Now Ever,
41:02
Speaker 5: since Michael Gove cooked up the new version of extremism
41:04
Speaker 5: which bore a striking resemblance to the Criminal Code of
41:07
Speaker 5: the Soviet Union of nineteen twenty four, this has been
41:10
Speaker 5: the telegraphed progression. And as to the National Security Act,
41:13
Speaker 5: I think it must be noted that making the all
41:16
Speaker 5: important link between UK activity and another state is at
41:20
Speaker 5: the heart of it, which is why there have been
41:22
Speaker 5: several references to the Swedish group Foxtrot network, which is
41:25
Speaker 5: always being reported as being controlled by of course Iran.
41:29
Speaker 5: So I think there's no doubt that agenda will develop
41:32
Speaker 5: and will keep you up to speed with exactly how
41:35
Speaker 5: that works out.
41:37
Speaker 1: Vanessa, let's welcome you back to the program and what's
41:41
Speaker 1: the FCD you've been up to?
41:45
Speaker 4: What you mean, more than normal? And I love how
41:48
Speaker 4: they're prescribing someone as near Nazis while supporting neo Nazis
41:52
Speaker 4: in Ukraine. But that's another subject altogether. Well, No, I
41:55
Speaker 4: think my curiosity was peaked by this unnamed British ANDNGO
41:59
Speaker 4: that was basically helping I'm quite sure at the behest
42:03
Speaker 4: of the UK Foreign Office helping Groom Jolani to be
42:09
Speaker 4: legitimate political opposition. So while I was searching for who
42:14
Speaker 4: this NGO might be, and of course we're probably going
42:16
Speaker 4: to be trying to raise an FI on that subject,
42:19
Speaker 4: or at least contact the UK Foreign Office, I discovered
42:23
Speaker 4: this document, the UK Syria Development Partnership Summary July twenty
42:28
Speaker 4: twenty three, And of course this was published under the
42:31
Speaker 4: twenty two to twenty four SUNAC Conservative government. But two
42:35
Speaker 4: items in that document again rose up and sort of
42:40
Speaker 4: presented themselves to me. First of all, is this novel
42:44
Speaker 4: idea of building local resilience in Syria having basically destabilized,
42:48
Speaker 4: destroyed and devastated Syria since twenty eleven on purpose, so
42:54
Speaker 4: allegedly the program objective to address economic stress drivers of
42:58
Speaker 4: violence alongside social norms except etc. You can freeze, frame
43:02
Speaker 4: it and read I would say the nonsense therein. But
43:06
Speaker 4: what's interesting is the program partners, the Food and Agricultural
43:11
Speaker 4: Organization and undisclosed NGO partners. How often do we see that?
43:17
Speaker 4: And also that program is running through to twenty twenty seven,
43:20
Speaker 4: which is interesting because that means basically it's of course
43:24
Speaker 4: under the auspices of the al Qaeda government in place
43:28
Speaker 4: since December twenty twenty four. Then I came across this program,
43:33
Speaker 4: which is Syria Independent Monitoring two, and people might remember
43:38
Speaker 4: that to some degree, the largest arguably non non NGO
43:46
Speaker 4: operating in Idleb in particular alongside al Qaeda is the
43:50
Speaker 4: CIA MI six created White Helmets, started by a former
43:55
Speaker 4: British military intelligence officer in Turkey and Jordan in twenty thirteen,
44:01
Speaker 4: James Lamedur, who allegedly fell to his death from a
44:06
Speaker 4: roof in November Gosh, twenty nineteen. But can I just
44:11
Speaker 4: have that back on the screen for a second, please, Mike.
44:15
Speaker 4: So here we have to provide independent third party monitoring
44:19
Speaker 4: of FDO funded projects in Syria, which of course include
44:22
Speaker 4: the White Helmets and to verify results reported by implementing partners.
44:26
Speaker 4: So the program partners are Cowater and land Old Mills.
44:29
Speaker 4: The program date was the sixteenth of April twenty twenty
44:32
Speaker 4: to fifteenth July twenty twenty three, budget sixteen to eighteen million.
44:38
Speaker 4: And as you and I, Mike were discussing, where are
44:42
Speaker 4: these reports now? These reports are mentioned on the Cowater website.
44:47
Speaker 4: So this is the Syria Independent Monitoring and according to
44:51
Speaker 4: their website, they should be producing reports on independent project monitoring,
44:56
Speaker 4: assessment of FDO, implementing partners, monitoring and a valuation systems,
45:01
Speaker 4: thematic studies, inclusion and accountability to affected populations, reports and
45:07
Speaker 4: lessons learned. Now, as far as I can see, I
45:10
Speaker 4: cannot find hide nor hair of this report in any
45:15
Speaker 4: of the UK Foreign Office documents. I've written to Cowater
45:19
Speaker 4: and land or Mills to ask them where I might
45:21
Speaker 4: be able to find such reports that are funded by
45:25
Speaker 4: British taxpayer money. And presumably they would have investigated the
45:31
Speaker 4: White Helmet activities in Edlebb in particular because these organizations
45:35
Speaker 4: won't be operating anywhere else in Syria until after the
45:40
Speaker 4: coup of December twenty twenty four. So far no.
45:43
Speaker 1: Reply, what a surprise, and of course Foreign Office doesn't
45:50
Speaker 1: like to give replies to anything. But we'll keep you
45:52
Speaker 1: posted on that, keep everybody posted on that. Sandy, let
45:55
Speaker 1: me welcome you back. And this report is we're coming
46:00
Speaker 1: back to the UK and I and so called local democracy.
46:04
Speaker 2: Anyway, the report.
46:05
Speaker 1: Takes a column right back to the very beginning, because
46:07
Speaker 1: what's been going on at Somerset Time Council or kind
46:10
Speaker 1: of council, Well.
46:13
Speaker 10: It would appear that some money has a lot of
46:16
Speaker 10: money has disappeared into a big black hole. The Life Factory,
46:21
Speaker 10: which was supposed to be a community halving Glastnerbury, was
46:23
Speaker 10: meant to be a vibrance based uniting music, arts, youth
46:27
Speaker 10: work and small businesses under one roof, a shining sort
46:30
Speaker 10: of symbol of their regeneration project. And that was the
46:33
Speaker 10: promise of the Life Factory project at the red brick
46:36
Speaker 10: building in Glastonbury. But that promise has collapsed into scandal.
46:40
Speaker 10: Instead of a finished community center, what we've got is
46:42
Speaker 10: a half built shell, angry unpaid local contractors and a
46:47
Speaker 10: serious question where has the money gone. The Life Factory
46:51
Speaker 10: was part of Glastonbury's twenty three point six million town Deal,
46:56
Speaker 10: a central government scheme to level up communities, and nearly
47:00
Speaker 10: two point eighty five, sorry two point eighty nine million
47:04
Speaker 10: of public money was awarded to transform this red brick
47:07
Speaker 10: building building C into a creative hub with radio studios,
47:12
Speaker 10: youth services, therapy rooms and more. Now, looking at those pictures,
47:16
Speaker 10: does it really look as though there's you know, that
47:20
Speaker 10: there's that amount of money being spent on those buildings.
47:23
Speaker 10: I mean, nothing has been done on this building and
47:26
Speaker 10: yet two point eighty nine million has literally disappeared. So
47:30
Speaker 10: in early two thousand and four, Somerset Council, the body
47:33
Speaker 10: responsible for managing the Town Deal funds, froze all payments
47:37
Speaker 10: to the Red Brick project because serious concerns were raised
47:40
Speaker 10: over financial governance or invoicing practices and a total lack
47:44
Speaker 10: of transparency about where the money was going. That triggered
47:48
Speaker 10: an urgent audit by the Southwest Audit Partnership SWAP, a
47:52
Speaker 10: group that investigates how public money is spent, and what
47:55
Speaker 10: they found was damming. The audit uncovered complete collapsing government
48:00
Speaker 10: in you know, if you break it down, there was
48:03
Speaker 10: no match funding was ever secured, despite being a core
48:07
Speaker 10: condition of the grant. There was no fully costed project plan,
48:11
Speaker 10: no clear timeline, invoices couldn't be matched to work. Financial
48:16
Speaker 10: records were missing, procurement rules were ignored, informal staffing arrangements,
48:21
Speaker 10: and no evidence of competitive quotes for even basic checks.
48:25
Speaker 10: The red brick building and its spinoff company, Beckery Construction
48:29
Speaker 10: failed every standard of good financial management. But Somerset Council
48:34
Speaker 10: didn't escape the blame either. They kept signing off payments
48:38
Speaker 10: even when the red flags were already raised. Meanwhile, the
48:42
Speaker 10: contractors were left unpaid. And this is the sad human story.
48:46
Speaker 10: One firm R four Scaffolding said they worked for months
48:49
Speaker 10: in good faith and they never got paid. One subcontractor
48:52
Speaker 10: set around forty people are owed money, a lot of money,
48:56
Speaker 10: and heartbreakingly, a local man named Jonathan Wilkins hold the
49:00
Speaker 10: town council. He lost his wife to suicide in part
49:04
Speaker 10: due to the financial stress this project caused him. Now,
49:08
Speaker 10: this is just awful. This isn't just about paperwork. It's
49:11
Speaker 10: about real people's lives being torn apart by institutional incompetence.
49:16
Speaker 10: You know, Building C still stands half built, it's derelict,
49:20
Speaker 10: it's exposed. Structural engineers now say the wooden frame could
49:24
Speaker 10: soon deteriorate beyond repair if action isn't taken. There's still
49:28
Speaker 10: no roof, no planning permission, no bat license, no contractor
49:32
Speaker 10: nothing in place to finish the job now. A Conservative counselor,
49:36
Speaker 10: Lily Osborne, said they have drawn down a huge amount
49:39
Speaker 10: of money with very little scrutiny. This public money and
49:43
Speaker 10: the public have a right to know what's going on
49:45
Speaker 10: with it. The chair of the Red Brick Building x
49:48
Speaker 10: Mayor and Green Counselor XR member Indra don Francesco is
49:55
Speaker 10: accountable for this project.
49:56
Speaker 4: She said.
49:56
Speaker 10: We are concerned that there was not enough funding left
49:59
Speaker 10: in the bud to get the roof on. Well, that's
50:01
Speaker 10: kind of the first thing you do, isn't it. We
50:04
Speaker 10: did our own internal audit and paused a lot of
50:07
Speaker 10: things like finishing the building, and made a lot of
50:11
Speaker 10: changes and made a lot of savings.
50:13
Speaker 4: Well for who this.
50:15
Speaker 10: Is not just a failed project, it's a public embarrassment,
50:18
Speaker 10: So who's to blame? The audit makes it clear both
50:21
Speaker 10: the Red Brick Building Center and Somerset Council should share
50:24
Speaker 10: the responsibility. The Red Brick team ran an operation with
50:28
Speaker 10: no proper financial procedures, no governance between the main organization
50:32
Speaker 10: and no match funding. The body that was supposed to
50:36
Speaker 10: safeguard the public money approved the payments. I mean it
50:39
Speaker 10: was a total incompetence. Now, interestingly, they've admitted failures. It
50:49
Speaker 10: was the taxpayer's money, your money, my money's spent to
50:52
Speaker 10: regenerate this building. Instead it's vanished into this black hole
50:56
Speaker 10: of bad management and buck passing. The question is now simple,
51:00
Speaker 10: I mean, who is actually going to be accountable for
51:02
Speaker 10: all this? Now? I want to take a good look
51:04
Speaker 10: at the town deal chair a doctor Lynn Sedgemore CB.
51:10
Speaker 10: Lynn is a qualified teacher and has an MSc in
51:14
Speaker 10: Change Agent Skills Strategies. Well no common purpose training there.
51:20
Speaker 10: She was awarded the CB in two thousand and four.
51:22
Speaker 10: She's a Fellow of the Royal Society of Art, a
51:24
Speaker 10: Fellow of the Institute of Directors, and is a chartered
51:27
Speaker 10: marketeer and headed up the Anne Frank Trust UK. Interesting
51:32
Speaker 10: she's married to John Kapper, who was the director of
51:37
Speaker 10: the Beckery Construction Company that was employed to finish the
51:40
Speaker 10: job from May twenty to twenty two to November twenty
51:44
Speaker 10: twenty three. So you know, it sounds like a bit
51:47
Speaker 10: of nepotism going on there or some sort of vesting interest.
51:51
Speaker 10: Lynn Sedgemore CBE is executive director also of the one
51:55
Speaker 10: to five to seven Group of Further Education Colleges and
51:59
Speaker 10: is has advised Whitehall on a range of projects including leadership, innovation,
52:05
Speaker 10: community and interfaith cohesion. The one five to seven Group
52:10
Speaker 10: exist to serve its members and to be at the
52:12
Speaker 10: leading edge of sectum more widely on three levels thought leadership,
52:17
Speaker 10: setting out visionary challenges and radical agendas for how things
52:20
Speaker 10: might be done, practice improvement and policy influence, using the
52:25
Speaker 10: experience of our members to directly inform the views of
52:28
Speaker 10: government and policy makers, government bodies and agencies, academics and
52:32
Speaker 10: other influencers. So the people of Glastonbury are not going
52:36
Speaker 10: to let this one rest. You know, we will find
52:38
Speaker 10: justice for the people who've been devastated by this fiasco.
52:41
Speaker 10: Is absolutely dreadful.
52:44
Speaker 2: Thank you, Sandy, Thank you.
52:45
Speaker 1: Now let's move on back to health matters in fact
52:49
Speaker 1: and well, first of all, bio and tech. Well, first,
52:52
Speaker 1: it was star Wars as well, let's put it this way,
52:55
Speaker 1: it was Star War's announcement of personalized medicine for council
52:58
Speaker 1: treatments that was announced at the beginning of the year,
53:03
Speaker 1: enabled by AI driven data centers. Then it was Operations
53:07
Speaker 1: Stargate announced by Larry Ellison at Trump's inauguration for exactly
53:11
Speaker 1: the same reason. Well now COVID nineteen vaccine pioneers, Bioentech
53:16
Speaker 1: and I say that with deep sarcasm for the avoidance
53:19
Speaker 1: of diet have announced a commitment to a ten year
53:24
Speaker 1: up to one billion pound investment in the UK and
53:26
Speaker 1: this is for new research and AI centers to be
53:30
Speaker 1: established in London as well as Cambridge and Starmar's. Government
53:34
Speaker 1: claims that this demonstrates the benefits of the Oxford Cambridge
53:38
Speaker 1: Growth Corridor. Right Biotech says they will develop the next
53:43
Speaker 1: generation of life changing medicines underpinned by up to one
53:48
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty nine million pounds of government support and
53:51
Speaker 1: this agreement underscores the government's commitment to life science is
53:55
Speaker 1: a key part of the plan for changes is their
53:57
Speaker 1: language that they use driving improvements in healthcare and delivering
54:01
Speaker 1: economic growth. The government is growing about what a great
54:06
Speaker 1: deal this is, citing the Academy of Medical Sciences who
54:10
Speaker 1: report that every one point spent on medical research delivers
54:13
Speaker 1: a return at twenty five p every year forever after that.
54:18
Speaker 1: What a business model charles Almost as good as perpetual war,
54:21
Speaker 1: which is the other major business model the current British
54:25
Speaker 1: regime is pursuing. But that means they've covered their costs
54:28
Speaker 1: in four years and everything for eternity is profits.
54:32
Speaker 2: Your profit from then on. Incredible.
54:34
Speaker 5: Absolutely, so they'll be licking their lips at the prospect
54:37
Speaker 5: of going back into the.
54:38
Speaker 2: European Union, but sticking with AI.
54:41
Speaker 5: Sticking with AI. Indeed, yes, now, I was reporting on
54:44
Speaker 5: the situation last week of the deliberate policy of creating
54:47
Speaker 5: water scarcity and the labor mp Bell ribeiro ADI during
54:54
Speaker 5: the UK column News created a rather awkward atmosphere during
54:57
Speaker 5: Prime Minister's questions last week by asking about the the
55:00
Speaker 5: potential impact of AI on the environment. Now, the reply
55:04
Speaker 5: from the Permanent On Secretary made reference to the long
55:08
Speaker 5: term sustainability and the creation of the AI Energy Council.
55:16
Speaker 5: The government expects quote. The council will also look at
55:20
Speaker 5: clean energy like renewables and nuclear, advising on improving energy
55:27
Speaker 5: efficiency and sustainability in AI and data center infrastructure such
55:33
Speaker 5: as the use of water end quote now, as well
55:35
Speaker 5: as the energy operators the council includes Google, Microsoft and
55:41
Speaker 5: Amazon Web Services. So I think we can take an
55:43
Speaker 5: educated guess at which version of sustainability that we are
55:47
Speaker 5: going to get now. At the same time as insisting
55:51
Speaker 5: that we can harness the power of the sun via
55:53
Speaker 5: solar panels, government courses funding research into how to block
55:56
Speaker 5: the same sun, and now as it tells people to
55:59
Speaker 5: conserve water, the government is desperately pushing to create technology
56:02
Speaker 5: that's projected to use as much as two thirds of
56:05
Speaker 5: the whole of the UK's water supply. A recent announcement
56:09
Speaker 5: about AI growth zones has caused some people at last
56:12
Speaker 5: to scratch their heads, and the guidance references the availability
56:16
Speaker 5: of water as being a technical consideration now specifically enough
56:23
Speaker 5: water to satisfy five hundred megawats of AI infrastructure, and
56:27
Speaker 5: the issue therefore becomes rather straightforward. It's one of priority.
56:31
Speaker 5: So what form does the written confirmation from a water
56:34
Speaker 5: supplier take And if there is a water shortage, does
56:37
Speaker 5: a data center assume that priority over the people or
56:41
Speaker 5: animals who might need to drink it? So if the
56:44
Speaker 5: data center is there at all, then presumably there's no
56:47
Speaker 5: point in its existence if it's to be switched off periodically.
56:50
Speaker 5: So with that in mind, I think the question is
56:53
Speaker 5: why does the burden for the provision of water not
56:56
Speaker 5: for upon either the government whose bright idea of these
56:59
Speaker 5: growth zones or indeed the businesses which intend to build
57:03
Speaker 5: the data centers. Now, as has been pointed out by
57:06
Speaker 5: The Guardian among others, it's a mighty coincidence that the
57:09
Speaker 5: data center proposed for Cullhum in Oxfordshire will be just
57:13
Speaker 5: a stone's throw from the proposed reservoir at Abingdon, So
57:18
Speaker 5: as is exactly the case with electricity, the infernt here
57:21
Speaker 5: is that AI will only work if you stop using
57:24
Speaker 5: all of its electricity and water. And finally, it should
57:28
Speaker 5: be noticed that noted rather that Microsoft has trialed successfully
57:34
Speaker 5: and used an undersea storage of data centers for cooling,
57:40
Speaker 5: something the Chinese continue to do now on screen here
57:44
Speaker 5: is Project Natick or Natic in Scotland, and despite the
57:48
Speaker 5: abundance of seawater in Scotland, Microsoft have decided that they're
57:52
Speaker 5: not going to go further with it, and one can
57:53
Speaker 5: only imagine this is because it's easier and cheaper to
57:56
Speaker 5: abstract all of the rest of the water which the
57:59
Speaker 5: taxpayer will be providing. For them, So I think an
58:02
Speaker 5: area that we will have to keep people updated on,
58:04
Speaker 5: such as the government's push and push and push for
58:06
Speaker 5: AI being the answer to absolutely everything.
58:09
Speaker 1: Yes, okay, well let's move on then to the MHRA,
58:12
Speaker 1: because yesterday you'll all be glad to know it was
58:15
Speaker 1: International Clinical Trials Day and to celebrate that. The new
58:19
Speaker 1: Chief Executive of the MHRA, Lawrence Talon, has been reflecting
58:25
Speaker 1: and this is how I reflected. He said, clinical trials
58:28
Speaker 1: don't just help us determine whether a metsine is safe
58:31
Speaker 1: and effective, they lead to better care outcomes for participants overall.
58:36
Speaker 1: He was reflecting this on some kind of MHRA blog post,
58:41
Speaker 1: but he said we want to go further in cementing
58:44
Speaker 1: the UK as one of the best places in the
58:46
Speaker 1: world to conduct trials for both patients and researchers. Last month,
58:50
Speaker 1: he said we began implementing the most significant update the
58:53
Speaker 1: UK Clinical Trials Regulation in over two decades. These reforms
58:57
Speaker 1: will address the research need for more efficient, streamlined and
59:02
Speaker 1: adaptable regulatory frough work for clinical trials, in other words,
59:06
Speaker 1: to make the regulation as lightweight as possible, all at
59:10
Speaker 1: the same time that other areas of regulation are coming
59:12
Speaker 1: down ever stronger on organizations. But anyway, he went on
59:17
Speaker 1: to say, and of course they will help us get
59:22
Speaker 1: cutting edge new treatments to patients and the NHS as
59:25
Speaker 1: quickly as possible, and of course keep the profits rolling.
59:29
Speaker 1: And he didn't specify that, but I'm quite sure that's
59:31
Speaker 1: what he was meaning there. We've also seen some exciting
59:35
Speaker 1: developments in the use of artificial intelligence, which could speed
59:38
Speaker 1: up vital parts of our clinical trial application review from
59:41
Speaker 1: three hours to just thirty five seconds. Brilliant, I mean,
59:45
Speaker 1: what more could.
59:46
Speaker 2: You wish for?
59:47
Speaker 1: And finally he said, of course, it's not just about
59:50
Speaker 1: getting trials set up quickly. It's important that trials in
59:53
Speaker 1: the UK are innovative and inclusive. To to support this,
59:56
Speaker 1: we've recently launched a pilot Inclusion and Diversity plan with
1:00:01
Speaker 1: the Health Research Authority. The next year will be an
1:00:04
Speaker 1: exciting one for UK trials as the government pushes forward
1:00:08
Speaker 1: its Life Science Vision and Tenure Health Plan. Our reforms
1:00:11
Speaker 1: could not come at a more important time. The MHRA
1:00:15
Speaker 1: just gets better and better at Charles, I'm quite sure
1:00:17
Speaker 1: we'll be talking a little bit about that an extra
1:00:19
Speaker 1: as well.
1:00:20
Speaker 5: I think we absolutely will. And we come to the
1:00:24
Speaker 5: last part of today's show, which is the news that
1:00:29
Speaker 5: the Minister of Defense are pleased to announce that they
1:00:32
Speaker 5: have created a method of sticking things together underwater. Yes, indeed,
1:00:39
Speaker 5: could at new underwater glue give the UK the competitive
1:00:44
Speaker 5: advantage in a theater of conflict. It's scarcely believable. But
1:00:48
Speaker 5: at a time where billions of pounds are going out
1:00:51
Speaker 5: the door to fund conflict in Ukraine and we're talking
1:00:54
Speaker 5: about the state threat with Iran, the Minister Defense apparently
1:00:58
Speaker 5: now believes that the answer to everything would be to
1:01:01
Speaker 5: be able to stick things to other things underwater, and
1:01:04
Speaker 5: they are claiming that this in time might well save lives. Now,
1:01:08
Speaker 5: whether or not that would have prevented or been able
1:01:11
Speaker 5: to fix the connection problem we had on the stream
1:01:14
Speaker 5: earlier in the program is something we'll just have to
1:01:16
Speaker 5: leave hanging, but there we go.
1:01:18
Speaker 1: Yes, Okay, Well, look, thank you Charles, thank you Vanessa
1:01:21
Speaker 1: and Sandy, and thanks to everybody what Sorry for the
1:01:23
Speaker 1: technical problems earlier. We'll be back in a few minutes
1:01:26
Speaker 1: for some extra join us for that if you can.
1:01:29
Speaker 1: There'll be an interview going out at one pm tomorrow
1:01:31
Speaker 1: and we'll be back for the news on Friday, see
1:01:34
Speaker 1: you then bye bye bye bye