Ian Hamilton QC

by Ian Hamilton

In the piece below Romeplebian makes a comment and misses the point. He thinks that a single mother who gets away with £10,000 of Social Security money should be punished. presumably by the jail. Here is my reply.

The rich get very rich. Romeplebian’s take home pay is only a tiny fraction of the wages of wealth. So is the sum the single mother obtained from Social Security. The wages of wealth increase. The wages of poverty shrink. Every financial crisis is a means of redistributing any savings the poor may have to the rich. If you have no savings, Romeplebian, even that which you earn will be taken from you in greater taxes and, when it suits the bankers, in periods of unemployment. Your job won’t give you an eight million bonus, but it will give you heavier taxation which will go to the rich. Wait for it trickling down. Wait for pigs to fly. You and the single mother are brother and sister under the skin.

Single mothers and Romeplebian have no hope of sharing in the wealth of this wonderful country. Their only hope is the lottery. That gives them a one in fifteen million chance of joining in the riches around us. The Roman slaves had a better chance of freedom. It was called manumission. Manumission and the lottery have the same purpose. To give hope to the hopeless. Some hope!

Where has the decency of Old Labour gone? Where is the left wing? Where are the Mick MaGaheys, the Willie Gallahers? Where are the sons of those who went to Spain to fight for us all? Where are the people to cry down the rich from the rooftops; the rich who get so rich they have to hide in gated communities, while a wee lassie is jailed for taking a teaspoonful out of a reservoir? Where is hope?

As for Sheriff Dickhead. I satirise him. I don’t blame him. I was a sheriff once. Then I realised I was there to do society’s dirty work. I was so often on the side of the person in the dock that I went back to defending them. They are not all bad. Some, like the single mother just want a little more for their kids. If a banker gets bonuses in millions. If MPs can get ‘expenses’ in thousands and hundreds of thousands who are we to say that this girl was wrong? Throw the first stone if you must, Romeplebian but make sure you miss.

I declare myself on the side of the disposessed. In my dying years I know that whatever talents I had have failed both them and me.

“PS

NO ONE HAS ASKED ME WHAT THE SINGLE MUM’S SENTENCE SHOULD BE.

IT SHOULD BE ONE YEAR’S PROBATION WITH A CONDITION THAT SHE TAKE LESSONS ON HOW TO MANAGE HER FINANCES FROM HER MP. ”

By Ian Hamilton

I read in a local paper how Sheriff Dickhead dealt with a teenage mother of two. She had got away with £11,000 from Social Security.

The report didn’t say if she was a deserted spouse. Dickhead didn’t care. He treated her as one who had given way to her beastly lusts. (Even as a schoolboy Sheriff Dickhead never wanked.)

‘This is a fraud on the public,’ said Sheriff Dickhead. ‘I take the most serious view of this conduct.’

It is not a fraud on the public. It is not a fraud on the vast army of unemployed who pay no taxes. It is not a fraud on those who live in poverty. It is a fraud only on the rich…..some of the rich. The more taxes you pay the more you contribute to the fraud fund. Sheriff Dickhead with his wage five times the national average would feel it sorely.

Cry it not in Chichester! Publish it not in Kent! I have sympathy for a wee lassie who manages to get a little extra for her children. I would do what I could to help her.

The newspaper report told how Dickhead continued the case for Social Enquiry Reports.

‘You needn’t think you’re getting away with a soft option like Community Service,’ said Dickhead oblivious to what it would be like for a mother of two to do Community Service. I expect she was bound for Cornton Vale.

As the frightened young woman went away Sheriff Dickhead said,

‘There is too much of this sort of thing going on. People guilty of such crimes can expect no mercy in this court.’

And then he went home for his tea.

By Ian Hamilton QC

A blogger has been charged with breach of the peace in relation to emails he sent to Mike Russell a member of the government. Beyond these bare facts I make no comment as the matter may be sub judice.

(This is an absurdity. The case will never go before a jury and it is plain daft to think that any sheriff will be influenced by anything I write in my blog. However I fear our absurd laws of contempt. I make it clear that I comment only on the process of the law. I do not comment on the case.)

I saw this coming. A few months back I wrote about it. Here’s what I said.

“There is no better way for the government, any government, to silence its critics such as this blog than by directing the Lord Advocate to prosecute one of us for almost any crime you care to name. The cost of the defence and the worry of it would be enough to silence most of us. Do not close your mind. We live in dangerous times.”

Here is the danger simply stated.

Who advises the government on matters of law?…………………….The Lord Advocate

Who brings prosecutions in this country?……………………..……….The Lord Advocate

Who employs the Lord Advocate?………………………………………The Government*

Who pays the Lord Advocate…………………………………………….The Government

Who can sack the Lord Advocate?……………………………………….The Government*

Who can find a nice job for the Lord Advocate if she is sacked?…………The Government

Who stands between us and the arbitrary authority of the Government?……The Lord Advocate if you believe in fairies.

How can the Lord Advocate protect us? By being totally independent of the Government as I have suggested should be the case elsewhere in this blog.

How does she protect us? By telling any Government minister who comes to her with a trivial complaint to go and chase himself.

How likely is she to do this if she relies on the Government for her job? Your answer is as good as mine but one thing is clear. No one should be put in the position of having the whole weight of the law in their hands to protect their employers or any one of them. The very least she should have is security of tenure.

You will note how carefully I have framed every word in this article. In a free society I shouldn’t have to. I should be free to criticize any officer of government who wields power. I therefore affirm the following:

In the whole matter:-

Elish Angiolini the Lord Advocate smells as sweetly as the perfume she buys across the counter in Boots the Chemists.

Mike Russell the Minister smells as sweetly as his aftershave and I will bring any girl who has ever kissed him to testify to this.

It’s the system that stinks.

*Subject to ratification by Parliament

CAUTION

The first comment to this posting raises a criticism of Elish Angolini the present Lord Advocate.

I should be grateful if those posting comments would remember that the Lord Advocate, despite her title, is an employee of the Government, not a member. It is not for her to solve the mystery of her job description which baffles us all. Kenny MacAskill, the Minister of Justice is the person responsible to the electorate for defining her position, not Elish Angiolini whom I feel is often unfairly blamed for making the best of an impossible position.

The position holds many anomolies. For example if Westminster and Scotland should be involved in litigation who represents whom? If Westminster wishes a search warrant, as Mrs Thatcher did in the Spycatcher case, would Westminster expect the Lord Advocate of Scotland to act? If Westminster believes that someone, for example myself, should be prosecuted for suborning soldiers from fighting in England’s wars and the Lord Advocate refuses to prosecute what remedy does Westminster have?

In all these matters the Advocate General is powerless, but Kenny MacAskill is not. It is for him to define the Lord Advocate’s duties and to seek amending legislation if necesary yet he remains silent.

Please respect Elish. To attack her is unfair and if she is personally attacked I may have to remove the comment which would be a pity as this is an interesting and important subject.

Ian

By Ian Hamilton

There is no limit to the shame of this English Parliament. Its silly procedures and outdated traditions are a scunner to the whole United Kingdom. It’s fit only for the seventeenth century for which it was created. It has lost control of itself. Most of its Honourable Members are crooks. It has found no way to punish their corruption or to recover the proceeds of crime from these Honourable Gangsters.

Worse! It has taken us into war. I err when I use the word war. We are not at war. This government merely sends our troops into other states hitherto recognised by us. Their orders? Take what you can when convenient. What is being done in our name is as feckless as it is illegal. It alienates the whole of Islam.

I take a lesson from history. When Hitler declared war on the USA the leaders of the United Kingdom and the United States met in a warship off Newfoundland. After discussions they issued a statement. It is a noble document. It is known to history as The Atlantic Charter. It sets out the war aims of the Allies. Its terms still stand as a statement of international human decency. In the middle of last century politicians could speak for us all.

Compare that with today. We have no statement of war aims. We are not even at war. Our leaders, uncontrolled by parliament, send out our soldiers ill-equipped and with no apparent aims except conquest. Conquest we all know to be illegal and impossible. The Taliban are a religion. They can be infiltrated. They can never be defeated. They are not Islam yet it must seem to millions that the west is on a new Crusade against Islam.

At home the Government cannot protect their actions from people like me who declare that the troops should be suborned into disobedience. Ill equipped, led by generals who don’t know for what they fight, they die brave, needless, roadside deaths. It is not enough to mourn. We must also condemn the politicians who send them.

The politicians look after themselves. They get rich quick. For example Alastair Darling, the Chancellor of the Exchequer made a fortune swopping his nominated home. The Faculty of Advocates, the professional body to which both Darling and I belonged and to which I still belong, started an enquiry into his personal finances. Rather than face it Darling resigned. No reasonable company would employ an ex-lawyer to a position of trust knowing he had resigned from his profession pending an enquiry into his personal finances. Such a person is in charge of the nation’s exchequer. I would laugh if I didn’t lament.

I lament the descent of the United Kingdom Parliament into this  moral abyss. It’s time we left.

By Ian Hamilton QC

The former Head of the Armed Forces in Scotland, Major General Andrew Mackay, warned that the MoD was “institutionally incapable” of succeeding in the region (Afghanistan) because it had failed to adapt the realities of 21st century conflict.

The above quotation is taken from a recent SNP Press release. It misses the point. The point is that no Scottish soldier should be in Afghanistan. Indeed no British soldier should be there.

I assert this principle:-

A democratic country can only go to war when there is a clear mandate from the people to do so. Without such a mandate any instructions to our armed forces to take life is a war crime of which the Government is guilty.

The Government which sent our soldiers to war was elected by only 35% of those voting. The total electorate is much greater. Probably less than one in ten of us want to see this bloodshed in Afghanistan. We do not know the exact figure. The Government has made no attempt to ascertain from the people if it has a mandate to take life in Afghanistan. It clearly had no mandate for Iraq. In time Blair will be prosecuted as a war criminal for Iraq. It is about Afghanistan that we are now concerned.

I want to make a clear distinction here between the squadie who bears the brunt of our illegal assault on the people of Afghanistan. It is he who dies. It is he who sees his mates blown limbless. I have nothing but respect for them. Were I a citizen of Wootton Bassett I too would stand in daily homage to the dead as they are brought home.

But the leaders of the common soldiers are different. We have no clear war aims. We have no clear exit strategy. We know we are supporting an illegal government there. We know that the most likely war aim is to increase the profits of American business and of the arms manufacturers of the whole western world, including the jackals of British industry.

These are our war aims and they are illegal. It is a crime to pursue them. Anyone carrying commissioned rank must know this. Such a person should be reminded that it is not a defence to claim that his actions are in obedience to superior orders. Every officer in the armed forces should be persuaded to disobey the commands of their own immediate superiors. They should be warned that they are guilty of a war crime if they embark their men in aircraft bound for Afghanistan or train them for warfare in that theatre. To warn them they are committing a crime is the duty of us all.

Why are none of our politicians saying what I have just written?

I will tell you why. To say so risks the jail. It is a crime against the law of the land to attempt to suborn members of the armed forces from carrying out the lawful orders of their superiors. But these orders must be lawful. I assert that to order soldiers to take action in an illegal war is not a lawful order. That is my defence.

If I have committed a crime I challenge the Lord Advocate to prosecute me. I don’t think she will. It would mean proving that the Afghan War is a legal war. I don’t believe for a moment that she can prove this or will even try.

But I may be wrong………………………………………

Watch this space………………………………………….