Curly’s Corner Shop, the blog!

DUP accused of selling their votes

The blogosphere will certainly not allow this issue to rest and Gordon Brown will rue the day that his government sold our civil liberties in a “Dutch auction” to the lowest bidders!

“It’s all about the moolah” says MEP Daniel Hannan;

So, the Government wins by nine votes because nine DUP MPs vote for them. We can now be interned for 42 days without being accused of anything. In return, the Unionists have won £200 million for their over-subsidised quango province, in which all the politicians are in power all the time.

The liberty which ought to be the birthright of every Briton, including every Ulsterman, is bartered for subsidies. Habeas corpus is abandoned for water rates — and perhaps, who knows, the odd knighthood. And don’t give me the “if you’ve nothing to hide you’ve nothing to fear” routine. That’s simply untrue. Barely a day passes without a report of an innocent citizen whose life has been ruined by the bungling of some state agency.

How sad to see Ulster Unionism which, at its best, is as noble, high-minded and patriotic tradition as you’ll find anywhere in the country, reduced by its leaders to this squalid tussling over cash.

The “duplicitous bastards” cannot use the phrase “no surrender” again says Iain Dale;

Peter Robinson’s leadership of the DUP has certainly got off to an inauspicious start. The phrase ‘no surrender’ is one which can never be applied to them again. Robinson cravely surrendered to a Gordon Brown bribe. We don’t know what they asked for and we don’t know what they got. But it must have been big.

Gordon Brown may be pleased to have won the vote on 42 days, but he couldn’t have done it without the DUP. The duplicitous bastards kept reassuring the Conservatives they wouldn’t cave in, but they were not to be trusted in the end

Guido berates other deals done by the Brownites who thought it was “well worth tearing up the Magna Carta”

Congratulations are due to the honourable member for Glasgow central, Mohammed Sarwar, who has secured, as the price for his voting for 42 days detention, assurances that he can pass his seat down to his son. It seems the Labour Party was only against hereditary peers, but are more than happy with family seats for MPs..

Red Box attempts to unravel the grubby deals done on the night too;

There were cries of “shame” in the chamber directed at them Currently both the government and the DUP deny a ‘deal’ was done over water rates, so the suggestions of a £225 million offer was made are still only rumours. But everyone will be watching Northern Irelands announcements soon.

Devil’s Kitchen lambasts the government’s attempts to bribe, and sticks the knife into Conservative Home;

What gets me is the absolute effrontery of this; not only are they attempting further to destroy our civil liberties but their “concession” is to attempt to bribe us with our own f***ing money!

Martin at DK also attacks the “tawdry, shitty, godawful, crappy wee deal”

Today, we have witnessed of the greatest trivialisations of our heritage that our history might just have ever seen – the individual’s ancient liberty to be free of harassment from the state has descended to the same level of political importance as a deal between the Labour Party and the DUP over Ulster’s water rates.

Chicken Yoghurt on Brown’s win;

Well, at least Brown will have two constituencies of cast iron support tonight – lazy coppers and al Qaeda. He’s made the former’s jobs much easier and he’s doing the latter’s for them. Good effort.

James Cleverly says that the popularity of an idea at a specific point in time can be a poor benchmark for good laws;

Terrorist win by terrorising, this manifests itself in knee jerk actions, throwing away ancient liberties and rushing to pass poorly thought through laws. They lose when we have the courage to defend the fundamentals freedoms of our society.

Mr Eugenides highlights the government’s concessions on Northern Irish abortions;

What an edifying spectacle. Still, at least all those unwanted babies will be born into a safer world, eh?

But never mind; Northern Ireland is free to choose its own laws on abortion and good luck to them. And the voters of Crewe were bribed with £2bn of public money, so forgoing a few hundred thousand in water charges is pretty small beer. No, I’m more concerned about my neck of the woods, where in the name of “security” I can now be locked up for a month and a half without anyone ever telling me what I’ve done wrong, let alone bringing charges.

The defence of senior ministers, that this power is unlikely to be extensively used, doesn’t impress me, either. All that tells me is that the government have forced this measure through to look tough on terrorism (witness Gordo’s pathetic posturing yesterday when Cameron challenged him on it) and a nasty, squalid law now squats is soon to squat on the statute books like a particularly nasty turd. No, not a good day for our democracy, I’d say.

Labour Home shouts “come on your Lordships”

So, fortunately for those of us who feel this 42 days legislation is wrong, the House of Lords will overturn the bill.

And, after it has gone back and forth between the Houses of Parliament, surely the government would not really try to use the Parliament Act to force such legislation through? Hopefully not.

Gordon Brown may have won the vote but he has lost the argument, this clause in the Counter Terrorism Bill is bad law, bad for security, bad for liberty, bad for the UK, and bad for politics.

It must NOT be allowed to stand, The government of the day should be more concerned with protecting our freedoms and liberty than they are in increasing the powers of the state and police against a terrorist threat that is difficult to defend against. In any case they cannot even defend us against Cabinet Office employees determined to lose vital intelligence that might help protect us!

Our own government is a bigger danger than any perceived terror threat.

:: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: ::