Was Blunkett Made Home Secretary Because He Is Blind - Rather Than Despite It?


Summary

What if Blair, for reasons of his own, wanted to introduce horrendously fascist legislation into Britain. What if he knew that under normal circumstances such legislation would be opposed by every thinking citizen. But what if he gave the job of introducing this legislation to a blind man?

Very few people would dare criticise a blind man. The real issues would be ignored, and Blair's fascist proposals would get through, because no one would dare point out the truth about the blind man's policies. It would be as politically incorrect to criticise the policies proposed by a blind man as it would be to criticise the blind man himself.

I believe that Blunkett was appointed Home Secretary not despite his blindness but because of it.



I cheered until I was hoarse the night the utterly loathsome and contemptible Blunkett finally agreed to resign. What joy to see one of the most self-righteous and sanctimonious members of the New Labour gang whining and whingeing. What a joy to see an arrogant New Labour Time Lord brought to his knees by his own hubris. What joy to see the Blairites reminded that they do not (yet) totally own Britain.

I cheered because it was Blunkett who introduced into Britain the concept of `guilty without trial'.

It was Blunkett who introduced the principles of the Spanish Inquisition into British life. It was under Blunkett that innocent citizens were imprisoned without trial and it was Blunkett who introduced the idea of detaining suspects indefinitely.

The Law Lords in Britain have ruled that this policy is unlawful. Blunkett did not, of course, resign because of that - though he should have done.

It was Blunkett who ended the centuries old double jeopardy rule that stopped people being tried twice for the same offence. It was Blunkett who changed the law to allow juries to hear evidence of bad character (though New Labour, it seems, wants to do away with juries completely - particularly when they prove inconveniently impartial.)

One senior Law Lord has even suggested that one of Blunkett's laws (the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act) is a bigger threat to the nation than terrorism itself.

Lord Hoffman has said about Blunkett's law: `It calls into question the very existence of an ancient liberty of which this country has until now been very proud: freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention. The real threat to the life of the nation, in the sense of a people living in accordance with its traditional laws and political values, comes not from terrorism but from laws such as as these.'

That is Blunkett's true legacy: to be more of a threat to Britain and Britons than terrorists.

It was the snivelling, whingeing Blunkett, the one who shed buckets of tears when he lost his chauffeur driven car and the perks and privileges which enabled him to impress his mistress, who helped create a world safer for criminals and more dangerous for honest citizens. It was Blunkett who introduced the idea of forcing every citizen to carry an ID card. It was Blunkett who introduced secret files into Britain. It was Blunkett who introduced repressive, oppressive policies into Britain.

If Blunkett had had an ounce of integrity in his body he would have resigned from public life the moment he started legal action to get control of his former mistress's children. It was absurd and embarrassing to see the Home Secretary taking personal legal action against ordinary citizens and dragging his office through the courts. The absurdity and embarrassment was subsequently enhanced a hundred fold when questions were asked about the Minister's integrity and his willingness to abuse his position.

Blunkett, now yet another ex Labour Minister suspected of being a less than punctilious custodian of the truth, exhibited appalling judgement in his private life and allowed that misjudgment to spill over into his public life.

Inevitably, Blunkett's defenders claimed that his private life had nothing to do with his public responsibilities. But Blunkett's private life says a great deal about his sense of justice, his understanding of the word `morality' and his New Labour sense of self-importance and unrelieved arrogance.

At the end, Blunkett left office claiming that he was going for his child's sake. There was talk of a return to big time politics. As he abandoned his chauffeur driven car and the power to get visas for nannies he cried; it was difficult to avoid the feeling that here was a man so shameless and so manipulative that he was simply turning on the tears to get more sympathy.

Prisoners appearing before prison parole boards are expected to show some sense of understanding their crime, and some genuine remorse. Blunkett would surely not satisfy these requirements.

Blunkett's tears were, I suspect, not shed for the nation he has betrayed, nor for the family he has attempted to destroy, but for himself. He won't find it quite so easy to bully and swagger his way around London as a piece of back bench detritus.

When Blunkett finally threw in the towel and resigned, Blair, unconvicted but serial war criminal and the nation's best known liar, told the former Home Secretary that he had left Government `with your integrity intact and your achievements acknowledged by all'. Only an unregistered, unconvicted war criminal and serial liar could have come up with anything quite so obscenely false and genuinely seem to expect anyone other than Guardian editorial writers to accept it as truth.

The fact is that Blunkett picked his own judge and jury and Blair found him innocent before the trial, publicly stating, before the enquiry, that it would exonerate Blunkett. And what a trial! If Blunkett and his acolytes really have such bad memories then they are surely all unsuitable for any sort of responsible position. Twenty two witnesses at the enquiry all pleaded amnesia. Not since Ernest Saunders developed (and then miraculously recovered from) Alzheimer's disease has a medical disorder been so useful. Have they all been over-using their mobile phones, perhaps? Civil servants who might have known what happened either kept silent or conveniently forgot the relevant facts. Key correspondence disappeared (it's probably hidden away with Saddam's weapons of mass destruction) but indestructible e-mails which remain (how many more public figures will be brought down by e-mails?) showed that Blunkett's mistress's nanny's visa had been fast tracked. It seems that Blunkett did, therefore, take advantage of his position as Home Secretary. Either he did this deliberately (by telling his staff to do it) or his staff took action on his behalf. It has been claimed that Blunkett's civil servants took action without him asking them to. Just how then did they happen to know the name and all the details of the Minister's mistress's nanny?

The bottom line is that the Immigration service told Blunkett's office that they had pulled the nanny's visa out of the queue. The key words, suggesting that Blunkett's mistress's nanny did get dealt with rather specially, are `no special favours, only what they would normally do, but a bit quicker'. How can anything that is done `a bit quicker' not involve any `special favours'? No one has yet explained this.

If Blunkett was really innocent he must explain why his mistress's nanny's file was marked `restricted' so that it could only be accessed by senior civil servants.

But there are so many questions Blunkett has ignored or forgotten to answer. What a mess it all is. The long running fiasco involving his mistress, her nanny, a pair of visas, one child, one unborn baby and some train tickets would have made a good Whitehall farce.

Why did Blunkett intervene and ask police to investigate when two schoolboys knocked on the door of his mistress's home and ran away?

Why did Blunkett give a railway ticket issued for an MP's spouse to his mistress? Why was Blunkett not investigated by the police for what was surely a misuse of public funds?

Is it true that Blunkett revealed sensitive security information to his mistress? (This is surely the most damaging possibility of all. And yet it appears to have been ignored. At a time when we are losing our freedom in the so-called war on terrorism it has been alleged that our Home Secretary may have leaked secrets all over his mistress's pillow. Did he? Shouldn't someone bother to find out?)

Is it true that Blunkett used his official Ministerial car and driver to take his mistress away for dirty weekends?

Is it true that Blunkett's former principal private secretary at the Home Office and his Home Official PR adviser were sent to his mistress's solicitor when she ended the relationship with him?

The questions go on and on. The Blunkett affair makes the Profumo affair look simple. Profumo apologised and left public life. Blunkett will crawl back into office if Blair doesn't consider him a liability. Blunkett's memory about this whole affair is so bad that it is impossible to conceive of him attempting to run a stall at the village fete, let alone run a Government department. He has changed his story so often that it is, quite simply, impossible to believe a word he says. And yet Blair says he has integrity. (Actually, of course, Blair probably doesn't even know what the word `integrity' means.) On the day the enquiry into Blunkett's `integrity' was published Blair flew to Baghdad in a typical New Labour attempt to deflect criticism and `manage' the news.

Blunkett will, however, be remembered not just for this rather grubby affair but for the way he has removed our freedom and our rights. As part of Blair's New Labour Government he has done more to help turn Britain into a fascist, totalitarian state than any man in history. Blunkett's oppressive policies had less to deal with squashing terrorism than with taking power over the people he was supposed to represent. Has there ever been a Home Secretary who has done more to help criminals and less to help honest, hardworking citizens? Has there ever been a Home Secretary who has done more to remove our liberty?

Blunkett was, I believe, the worst Home Secretary Britain has ever had. But, actually, I don't think any of Blunkett's policies actually originated with him. The man doesn't seem that bright and he certainly doesn't impress me as being either well-read or well-informed. His policies came, via Britain's home-grown unconvicted war criminal, from the EU and America. While he was busy showing off by getting visas for his mistress's nanny we were losing our freedom.

Blunkett's resignation and public humiliation will not, of course, by itself make any real difference to the rate at which our freedom is taken from us. The oppressive fascist policies which he introduced weren't his policies - though I have no doubt that he agreed with them and could not see why they were wrong.

Oppressive, totalitarian, fascist policies will continue to pour into Britain from the EU and the USA (making Britain now one of the worst places in the world to live); allowed in by a Government led by a weak, stupid, greedy vain man who wants to be remembered as a Great Leader but who will be remembered as an Unconvicted War Criminal.

But what Blunkett's forced resignation does do is give us back hope that we can still exert some power over these arrogant and stupid men and women who believe that they are above the law, and that by lying and lying and lying and ignoring our wishes they can get away with whatever they like.

And Blunkett's (temporary) disappearance gives us an opportunity to ask questions about why he was brought into Government in the first place. Why was a blind man, now known to have such poor judgement, made Home Secretary?

Blunkett was, I believe, given the job of Home Secretary not despite his blindness but because of it.

The New Labour theory was, I suspect, that because no one would dare criticise a blind man no one would criticise the blind man's politics. Blunkett is a monument to political correctness.

But, in a way, it was Blunkett's blindness (the quality which I believe got him the job) which made him the worst and most dangerous Home Secretary Britain has ever had; seemingly incapable of seeing that he had become part of a fascist Government; a Government oppressing, ignoring and betraying the people he was elected to serve. Did he want to be what he became? Was it forced upon him? Did it happen by accident? Or was he, perhaps, unaware of precisely what he was doing?

It was, I suspect, Blunkett's blindness which led to the extraordinary lack of judgement in his private life (the same lack of judgement which he exhibited as Home Secretary) which led to his downfall. The man in charge of our national security was, it seems, busy sorting out visas for his mistress's nanny and train tickets for his mistress when he should have been making the country safer.

(Why, again, has Blunkett not been investigated by the police for having given his special train tickets to his mistress? Ministers are, it seems, immune to prosecution. They can hit people in the street and get away with it, they can break the speed limits and they can misappropriate public funds without even having their collars felt.)

Blunkett will probably never read this criticism (unless his aides advise him to take action to suppress it). Which of his faithful cronies ever dare draw his attention to the truth?

Some of Blunkett's defenders seemed to want him to be judged as a blind man, making a creditable attempt to do the job. But the reality is that if he is judged as anyone else would have been judged he was a disaster as Home Secretary. Surely the whole point of success over a disability is that you can be judged alongside your peers who are not disabled?

It is politically correct to assume (and indeed insist) that everyone (regardless of natural aptitude or any disability) should be given the opportunity to do any job they want to try their hand at. This, as Blunkett has proved very ably, is arrant nonsense.

The (to some unpalatable) truth is we aren't all capable of doing everything. Skills and abilities vary and some disabilities make it difficult to do some jobs properly. People who need to move about in wheelchairs simply do not make the best fire fighters. Even though they may love animals, and might be wonderful at the job, people who are allergic to fur don't make the best vets or veterinary nurses.

The politically correct argue that there is no reason why blindness does not make a man (or woman) unsuitable for high political office. This is dangerous nonsense. A blind Home Secretary can only read or see what other people want him to read or see. Most publications aren't available in braille or on audio tape. Books produced by small publishers and newsletters written, edited and distributed by publishers not working for the media giants must, of necessity, remain unread. Pamphlets and letters sent in by members of the public will only be read if those around the Home Secretary decided to pass them on to him and make them available in braille. Inevitably, this means that the people who make these sort of decisions are the people with the real power. The nature of the job means that a blind Home Secretary will, on the whole, only go where he is led and will, to a large extent, only know what those around him want him to know. This is particularly true of someone who has been blind since birth.

The politically correct who claim that anyone should be entitled to do any job might like to ask themselves these simple questions:

1. Would you sit in a plane piloted by a blind man?
2. Would you allow a blind surgeon to operate on your brain?
3. Would you allow your children to travel to school on a bus driven by a blind man?

If you answered `yes' to those three questions then you're a very special sort of Guardian reader. Special enough to need psychiatric help.

If you answered `no' to those three questions then you have accepted that there are some jobs that some people just aren't capable of doing to the standards society sets.

There are dozens of other jobs Blunkett could not have done. Would you hire him as a mountain guide, juggler, war reporter, sentry, steeplejack, fireman, tank commander, sniper or trapeze artist?

We all have limitations. There are things we just cannot do because of our physical weaknesses, our mental weaknesses or our lack of suitable skills. Just wanting to do something simply isn't enough.

Blunkett was a disaster as Home Secretary. The citizens of Britain are now much more at risk of terrorist attack than they were before he took office. (Blunkett supported the illegal invasion of Iraq and so must share the responsibility for that criminal act.) His daft proposals mean that the streets of Britain are more dangerous than ever before. Criminals, crooks and thugs have prospered under Blunkett. Law abiding citizens have suffered badly.

His Government's fascist policies mean that I believe he has probably done more lasting damage to Britain than Hitler ever did. Any New Labour minister who wanted to keep his job would have brought in dangerous totalitarian policies (the party leader is, let us never forget, an unconvicted war criminal). But I suspect that Blunkett went further than most of Blair's Babes would have gone. His ID proposals for ID cards would have had the Nazis drooling.

I really don't think Blunkett realises just how much damage he has done to the country he has been paid to serve. In a fair and decent world Blunkett's career would now be over. But given the example of the equally loathsome Mandelson (now an EU Commissioner in charge of Trade and Industry) the chances are good that Blunkett will be back.

I suspect that unless Blair can find a suitable blind, deaf mute to use as a pawn, Blunkett will be back in office after the next election.

But if and when Blunkett comes back, let us remember that he isn't fit to be an MP, let alone a Minister.

Nor, of course, is his friend, the unconvicted war criminal Tony Blair.


Copyright Vernon Coleman 2004 Home