Adam Bostock

Ideas Innovation Science Future Humour Democracy Peace
Rule 0: We cannot be absolutely sure about anything!
- and I'm not even sure about that :D

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

" You are what you do. "

It's not about genes, ethnicity, or history.
It's about behaviour.

[DepressedBergman @DannyDrinksWine]

British Motor Corp, owners of the Mini, refused to donate any cars for "The Italian Job" (1969). The chief of Fiat Motors offered to donate all of the cars needed, including Fiat 500s in place of the Minis. Peter Collinson, the director of the movie decided that, as it was a very British movie, the cars should be British Minis.

Fiat still donated scores of cars for filming, as well as the factory grounds. The authorities refused to close the roads, but the Italian Mafia stepped in and shut whole sections of Turin down for filming. The traffic jams in this movie are real, as are people's actions during them.

(Source: IMDb)

P.S: On this day, 56 years ago, "The Italian Job" (1969) premiered in London, UK.

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@Gracie_Blue89 Him and all the Labour front bench are a disaster.
Only a GE will save us.

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

SEVEN WHISTLEBLOWERS. ONE DEAD WOMAN. ONE KNIGHTHOOD FOR THE MAN WHO IGNORED THEM

In 1999, seven care workers at a BUPA care home in Bromley reported abuse of vulnerable elderly residents.

They followed every rule. They submitted formal evidence. They did everything the law required.

Edna had no family. She was entirely defenceless. Seven people risked everything to speak up for her.

Every one of them lost their job.

Edna died.

The man who received the evidence and chose to act on none of it became Sir Des Kelly OBE, a government advisor on elderly care, head of the National Care Forum, and a welcome contributor to CQC @CareQualityComm policy on the very sector where his inaction let an abuser harm more people.

You genuinely cannot make this up.

These seven became known as the BUPA7. They were the first people in UK history to use the Public Interest Disclosure Act (PIDA), the law that was supposed to protect whistleblowers. The law that failed them so badly that other workers across the country saw what happened and quietly decided it was safer to say nothing.

That silence has cost lives. It still does.

Eileen Chubb @CompassnInCare, one of the BUPA7, has spent every year since building Compassion in Care and supporting over 13,000 whistleblowers. She has seen the exact same pattern repeat itself across the NHS, social care, finance, construction, and local government.

Report wrongdoing. Lose your job. Watch the wrongdoing continue untouched.

Even if a whistleblower wins at an employment tribunal under PIDA, nobody is legally required to fix the problem they reported. The abuse can just carry on. The risks remain. The tribunal hands out a payout and everyone goes home.

Mid Staffs. Gosport. Rotherham. Bristol Babies. Winterbourne View. In every single one of these cases, someone knew. Someone spoke up. And the system destroyed them for it while the wrongdoing continued.

Robert Francis produced his Freedom to Speak Up review in 2015. Joint investigations by Compassion in Care and @PrivateEyeNews later revealed that the CQC @CareQualityComm lied to the public for years, falsely claiming it had closed 100 care homes when the real number was two.

The same CQC had invited Des Kelly's input into its policy on the sector he had already failed so catastrophically.

Nothing meaningfully changed.

Eileen Chubb is calling for Edna's Law. A law that would make it a criminal offence to ignore a genuine whistleblower, put wrongdoers in front of a criminal court instead of an employment tribunal, protect whistleblowers as protected witnesses, and force corrective action on the actual wrongdoing.

The State would prosecute. Not the whistleblower, who is currently expected to become a legal expert and fight experienced barristers alone.

The petition has 7,417 signatures. It has been running for a while.

It is addressed to Sir Keir Starmer @Keir_Starmer.

If you want to protect the public, you protect the people willing to protect the public.

Sign the petition. Share it. Write to your MP.

Because the alternative is just waiting for the next inquiry. The next preventable scandal. The next name we will all say we should have done something about.

Sign the petition

https://t.co/bmEI8vHq7w

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@MarcZinnendorf @drhingram https://t.co/YYeOltIToh

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@drhingram Even before this nasty action, an online poll on X showed 95% do not trust the police.

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@drhingram Even before this nasty action, an online poll on X showed 95% do not trust the police.

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@LeoKearse The extreme left have a limited understanding and vocabulary, so they just adopt a limited list of phrases and words instead: { far right, racist, division }

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@BROKENBRITAIN0 They need similar treatment in prison.
That wasn't the law, that was a bunch of thugs!

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@Nigelj08223326 @Johnnypapa64 @geoffshumba @Andy3055948 @Keir_Starmer @elonmusk @realDonaldTrump Since when has free speech been "tyranny"?

Actual tyranny is when a government silences speech. Did you know the UK has the world's highest number of convictions for speech? More than Russia, China and North Korea. 12,000 in one year - now that's tyranny.

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@Oli_RestoreWSM Bruce's Biased Clowns (BBC)

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@stuey_beef There's a petition to make inspection of complaints of the police a routine thing, by an independent body. Only a fraction get sent to the IOPC.
https://t.co/pXpHPGW3rB

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

They're at it again: Full force of the law.

[Matt Cartoons @MattCartoonist]

My latest cartoon for tomorrow's Telegraph
Buy a print of my cartoons at https://t.co/ILFJjPmckx
Original artwork from https://t.co/bVPAkgE34y

[Alan @A1an_M]

What Britain needs is a flag which is for everyone British, regardless of sexual orientation, sex, eye colour, skin colour, hair colour, blood type, hair curliness, political views, religion, jam first or cream first, milk first or tea first, aitch or haitch, neurodiverse or neurotypical, Scots, English, Welsh or Northern Irish, or non-Brits who enthusiastically embrace Britain in every respect.
A flag we can all be Proud of, every month. A flag that unites us all.
Maybe we should design a flag like that?
Oh.

[kira 👾 @kirawontmiss]

Before AI we had Zach King

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@LadyRebecca_1 I hope they get similar treatment in prison.
Is the poor bloke okay, or in hospital?

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

The Labour dictatorship to go "further and faster": bills up even more, more businesses bankrupted, more unemployment, the final economic collapse, oh and no meat for you!
Of course, Labour will be toast by 2040 - we can spare the energy for that, can't we lads & ladies? 😉

[Toby Young @toadmeister]

Ed Miliband has signed the UK up to a legally binding 87% CO2 emissions cut by 2040. Paul Homewood says this can only be achieved by the devastation of industry and sharp cuts in the standard of living. Read his article in the Climate Skeptic. https://t.co/bGOg3zigaP

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

Bruce's Biased Clowns (BBC)
are in trouble with OFCOM and the Electoral Commission.
See the comments, if you haven't worked out why:

[BBC Question Time @bbcquestiontime]

Tonight, Question Time is in Makerfield for a by-election special

Joining Fiona on the panel are Andy Burnham, Michael Winstanley, Jake Austin, Sarah Wakefield, and Robert Kenyon

Watch at 9pm on @BBCiPlayer, @BBCSounds & the @BBCNews channel, 10:40pm on @BBCOne

#bbcqt

[Women For Restore @W4Restore]

@bbcquestiontime @BBCiPlayer @BBCSounds @BBCNews @BBCOne Defund the BBC.

Disgraceful and nothing short of election interference.

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

@SeddighEllie @GBNEWS We've passed the "enough" phase. What comes next is the shocking bit.

[Adam Bostock @AdamKBostock]

Read the comments, Brits are pissed off.
Boiling point yet?

[GB News @GBNEWS]

BREAKING🚨Surrey university plunged into terror as Saudi ex-student 'shoots man with crossbow'
https://t.co/Tr5KcoRql2