Carpe diem

All things London. RT not an endorsement

[Sharron Davies HoL MBE @sharrond62]

Shout out to our fabulous cabbies

[Maggie Oliver @MaggieOliverUK]

Day 2 of our JR today.

Still consumed in legal arguments as the govt says they don’t HAVE to do anything. Public enquiries have no legal obligation to implement any recommendations!

That’s true of course. But what arrogance! How insensirive and dismissive of all survivors and victims who believed the promises made to them - that retraumatising themselves to bring change were just empty words! Empty promises!!

And of course it begs the question, why are we going into yet ANOTHER public enquiry …. That’s the real question here …. And why spend billions of public Monday in public enquiries….. it seems as though it’s just another way to avoid action and accountability and kick the ball down the road!!! 😡😡😡

But we The Maggie Oliver Foundation are fighting this to the death and doing our best to expose the hypocrisy and lies of successive governments!

We and our incredible legal team Howe and Co can but try…

[Maggie Oliver @MaggieOliverUK]

Day 2 of our groundbreaking Judicial Review today.

Still consumed in legal arguments as the govt says they don’t HAVE to do anything. Public enquiries have no legal obligation to implement any recommendations! And by NOT bringing in the recommendations of IICSA they argue there in “NO DETRIMENT” to anyone!!!! Just unbelievable, disgusting, offensive and totally contemptuous….

They don’t have to act on recommendations, that’s of course true. But what arrogance! How insensitive and dismissive of all survivors and victims who believed the promises made to them - that retraumatising themselves to bring change were just empty words! Empty promises!!

And of course it begs the question, why are we going into yet ANOTHER public enquiry …. That’s the real question here …. And why spend billions of public money on public enquiries….. it seems as though it’s just another way to avoid action and accountability and kick the ball down the road!!! 😡😡😡

But we @TMOFCharity are fighting this to the death and doing our best to expose the hypocrisy and lies of successive governments!

We and our incredible legal team Howe and Co can but try….

[Susan Hall AM @Councillorsuzie]

Oh isn’t this the truth! Well said Sharron!

[Sharron Davies HoL MBE @sharrond62]

My heart genuinely breaks for those children repeatedly abused by rape gangs, whilst large sways of our politicians, including those right at the top, look the other way, whilst waxing lyrical about justice being rightly dished out to Russell Brand. We live in such unjust times

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

@_Nazir07 @grok ......and. The kids got mother and father. Not 4 wives and bastards!

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

@BritToSwiss @sageuk You do not need any paid software. Look into a free bridging system. Bridging between Excel sheet and HMRC

[Sharron Davies HoL MBE @sharrond62]

Beyond contempt! So people who go to work & pay their taxes get their bank accounts snooped on but those that claim off the state don’t. Please make it make sense… every day a fresh hell

[The Maggie Oliver Foundation @TMOFCharity]

Today is the day. David vs Goliath. Today we go to the High Court for our landmark judicial review against the Government. We have been shocked at the arguments being advanced by the Home Secretary in defence of its failure to implement key recommendations made by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). These arguments include, that The Maggie Oliver Foundation does not have standing to bring this challenge on behalf of children, that the Government is under no obligation to implement child protection measures, and that the public at large cannot rely upon promises made by the Prime Minister and Ministers that are made in Parliament.

The Government's legal defence raises fundamental questions about public trust, accountability and whether promises made to survivors following public inquiries mean anything at all.

At the centre of the judicial review are 20 key recommendations issued by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) proposed to better protect children across the UK from sexual abuse. These include properly collecting data relating to child abusers and victims of abuse and exploitation, ending the use of pain-inducing restraint techniques on children in custody and regulation of staff in children’s homes.

We are concerned that more effort and public money appears to be going into defending a challenge designed to ensure these critical improvements in child protection are made than into implementing them.

The simplest example of this is this – if the Government had implemented the first recommendation of the IICSA, there would have been no need for a further three-year, £65 million public Inquiry (The Statutory Independent Inquiry into Grooming Gangs).

WHO IS ALLOWED TO ASK THE QUESTION?

The Secretary of State is a challenging whether The Maggie Oliver Foundation and our founder and Chair, @MaggieOliverUK , have standing to bring the case at all.

This raises a deeply troubling question.
If organisations representing survivors and working every day with the consequences of child sexual abuse are not entitled to ask why promised child protection measures have not been implemented, who is?

The Government is trying to exclude from the debate the very people closest to the consequences of these failures.

For years survivors have been told to come forward. Speak up. Tell the truth. Many have done so at enormous personal cost, but now the Government says they, and those who represent them, cannot object to failures to protect children. Their voices must be silenced.

This challenge was never about politics. Governments of all stripes have let down children. It is astonishing that the Government's first argument in this judicial review is that victims can have no voice.

If organisations representing survivors, and survivors themselves, cannot ask why promised child protection measures have not been implemented, who can?

IF GOVERNMENT DOESN'T HAVE TO ACT, WHAT IS THE POINT?

A central plank to the Government's defence is that ministers are under no legal obligation to implement recommendations made by public inquiries.

If that is right, why spend hundreds of millions of pounds on public inquiries if Government is just going to ignore what they find? We genuinely struggle to understand how anyone can think that is acceptable.

Millions are spent, years of hearings are had, victims pour out their hearts, findings and recommendations are made, promises are made by Government and then broke – but when someone has the temerity to ask why those promises haven't been kept, the Government's response is we never had to keep our promises.

If that is right, the Government must be open about it, and explain to the public why they hold expensive public inquiries at all.

IICSA took seven years, heard from more than 7,000 survivors, cost more than £200 million and made twenty recommendations intended to protect children. But the Government now says, we have no obligation to fulfil its promises to implement recommendations to protect children.

CAN POLITICIANS DENY THEIR PROMISES MATTER?

We are also challenging the Government's position regarding promises made by the Prime Minister and ministers following publication of IICSA's recommendations.

Repeated assurances that action would be taken have been made by senior politicians across successive governments.

The Government's defence includes arguments relating to parliamentary privilege. In effect the Government say that The Foundation cannot rely upon ministerial promises made in Parliament, and that such promises cannot give rise to expectations about future action.

If the public cannot rely on promises made in Parliament, what can they rely on?

Survivors and the public hear ministers make promises.

They hear repeated assurances that lessons have been learned and change will follow.

They build their expectations around those promises.

Many survivors have spent years believing ministers when they said action was coming.

To now be told that those promises cannot be relied upon is not just a legal argument, it is a fundamental betrayal of the trust survivors (and children across the UK) were asked to place in the process.
Trust works both ways.

Survivors are asked to trust public inquiries with the most painful experiences of their lives.

Governments should not then be able to argue that survivors cannot rely on the promises they receive in return.

WHILE GOVERNMENT ARGUES, CHILDREN ARE STILL BEING ABUSED

Government figures show that approximately 2 million children have been sexually abused since IICSA published its recommendations in October 2022.

That astonishing number must not be lost amidst legal arguments and the Government’s technical defences. This case is about the protection of all British children.

What shocks us most is how much ingenuity and effort has gone into finding reasons not to act.

Imagine if half of the same energy had been invested in implementing child protection measures.

Imagine if the resources currently being spent defending this case had instead been spent protecting children.

How many children might already be safer?

While well paid Government lawyers argue, children are still being sexually abused.

That is the reality we cannot lose sight of.

This case was never about clever legal arguments.

It is about whether promises made to children and survivors mean anything at all.

The Maggie Oliver Foundation will not be silent on that question.

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

Really? So people are not shopping for Christmas?!

[Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan @MayorofLondon]

Retail spending up 28%. International visitors up 42%.

The figures from Oxford Street’s first week of pedestrianisation are hugely promising.

https://t.co/QiHbBpxlha

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

Timed it for Christmas shopping?????

[Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan @MayorofLondon]

The numbers are in: footfall *and* spending are up on Oxford Street.

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

Diyas lit and, in our house, rather too much mithai already eaten. Happy Diwali, wherever you’re celebrating 🪔

[Rob Rinder @RobbieRinder]

My dad & grandad were London cabbies. Dad is no longer here but I know exactly where he would have been today, on Westminster Bridge waiting to take our veterans home. Two generations of my family belonged to this trade. I have never been prouder of either of them. There are some debts a nation can never repay but it can always remember whom it owes.

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

It is an honour to join the National Service of Remembrance at The Cenotaph this morning.

We remember those who never came home, and thank everyone who has served, and still serves, to keep this country safe - and the families who stand behind them.

Their bravery is why we live in freedom, and we owe them more than we can ever repay.

We will remember them.

#RemembranceSunday #LestWeForget

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

@RishiSunak One of the finest PM this Country ever had

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

Some political ideas age better than others.

When I proposed a new model of national service in the 2024 election, it quickly became the butt of jokes. Now France and Germany are taking steps towards it, and in Sweden places are highly prized by teenagers and employers alike.

What I’d seen as prime minister – the constant probing by our enemies, which didn’t distinguish between civilian and military – had convinced me we would soon need some kind of resilience corps. The cyberattacks on European supermarkets, with fridges remotely set to 50C so the food spoils, show this is our new reality. Defence spending won’t stop that. Responsibility for our security can’t just be subcontracted to the military.

In a world in which the government feels obliged to tell us to stockpile tinned goods, our culture needs to change. It will take more than well-stocked cupboards to meet this moment.

A new, universal national service scheme should offer people options. A few might join a small, selective military cadre. Others could serve with search and rescue, St John Ambulance or Meals on Wheels, or train in cybersecurity.

It would make us more resilient and more cohesive, give the almost one million young people not in education, employment or training a sense of purpose, and remind us all that citizenship brings responsibilities as well as rights.

My @thetimes column today 👇 https://t.co/gvrFNCTzRd

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

@RahulGandhi Rahool who?

[Carpe diem @SW1P_BP]

@piersmorgan Happy Diwali Piers!

[Shiksha News Rajasthan @ShikshaNewsRaj1]

🔥 Drone Show 🔥

#AyodhyaGlows #HappyDiwali 🎆

[Abhijit Majumder @abhijitmajumder]

Ayodhya on Diwali.
I want to be born a million times in this land of colours, joy, magic, and moksh.
Jai Shri Ram and Shubh Deepawali to all.