If there were any reports in the UK media about a story reported in Der Spiegel last month about the alleged use of chemical weapons by the Turkish army against Kurdish rebels, I missed them.

The story states:

“German experts have confirmed the authenticity of photographs that purport to show PKK fighters killed by chemical weapons. The evidence puts increasing pressure on the Turkish government, which has long been suspected of using such weapons against Kurdish rebels. German politicians are demanding an investigation.

It would be difficult to exceed the horror shown in the photos, which feature burned, maimed and scorched body parts. The victims are scarcely even recognizable as human beings. Turkish-Kurdish human rights activists believe the people in the photos are eight members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) underground movement, who are thought to have been killed in September 2009.

In March, the activists gave the photos to a German human rights delegation comprised of Turkey experts, journalists and politicians from the far-left Left Party, as SPIEGEL reported at the end of July. Now Hans Baumann, a German expert on photo forgeries has confirmed the authenticity of the photos, and a forensics report released by the Hamburg University Hospital has backed the initial suspicion, saying that it is highly probable that the eight Kurds died “due to the use of chemical substances.”

Did the Turkish army in fact use chemical weapons and, by doing so, violate the Chemical Weapons Convention it had ratified?”

Had this authentication been available before David Cameron’s visit to Turkey, would he have been quite so positive about fast-tracking the negotiations around Turkey becoming a member of the European Union?

However, given that David Cameron had had a number of meetings with Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to his visit to Turkey and as a prominent member of her own Parliamentary Party, Ruprecht Polenz (the chairman of the Bundestag’s Foreign Relations Committee) has called for an international investigation into the issue, it is more than likely that he HAD been briefed on the matter.  In which case, the only conclusion that one can reach is that David Cameron IS prepared to condone the use of chemical weapons.  I wonder what Nick Clegg thinks.

In the run up to the first Mayoral elections in 2000 I was anything but a Ken Livingstone supporter.  Indeed, I even wrote an article in the Evening Standard entitled “London Deserves Better” arguing that neither Ken nor the emerging Conservative candidate at the time (one Jeffrey Archer – before he went to prison) were suitable candidates to be London Mayor.

But that was before I worked with Ken during his first term as Mayor.  For those four years, I led the Labour Group on the London Assembly and chaired the Metropolitan Police Authority and I saw at close quarters Ken’s commitment to London, his political courage and determination, and his ability to make things happen.

And a lot did happen.  There was the successful introduction of the congestion charge – something that most pundits were convinced would never happen when the provision was first included in the Greater London Authority Bill.  It required vision, drive and an attention to detail.  And Ken showed that he had all three.

There was the transformation of the bus service in London – so that the capital became the only part of the country where there was a shift of traffic away from other transport modes.  And, of course, those four years saw the birth of the Oyster Card – then an innovation, now an integral part of London life.

At the same time, London’s policing was turned round: morale increased; the haemorrhaging of police numbers (which had started under Conservative Home Secretary, Michael Howard) was reversed; Police Community Support Officers were introduced and began their visible patrols all over London, leading to the creation of Safer Neighbourhood Teams in every Council ward in the city; and crime rates that had been increasing for years started to come down.

In Ken’s second term, I was less closely involved.  However, all Londoners saw the leadership that successfully won the bid to host the Olympics and Paralympics in 2012 and that brought London together following the terror attacks in July 2005.  There was also the leadership shown on climate change, which established London as one of the leading cities in combatting the effects of global warming.

All of this was a big contrast with the Boris Johnson Mayorality, where despite the frequent announcements of “new” initiatives that either turn into damp squibs, like the “Story of London Festival“, or are re-packaged initiatives started under Ken’s period as Mayor.  The major so-called success has been the new cycle hire scheme – again originally initiated by Ken – but with the details mismanaged by Boris Johnson and his team – see the analysis by Helen at Boris Watch.

So why should Ken be the candidate in 2012?

The first point to make is that he is the best-qualified candidate.  An effective London Mayor must have a coherent vision for London.  And this means much more than merely stringing together a series of half-worked-through ideas.  Ken has that vision – a vision he has been refining and articulating throughout his political life.  What is more London’s Mayor must be committed to the job.  It should not be regarded as a stepping stone to some different office (as the current incumbent clearly regards it), nor should it be a consolation prize for someone who has failed in their political career elsewhere.  Ken is committed to London and I have already mentioned his political courage and determination, coupled with his ability to make things happen.

The second point is the breadth and clarity about what he would want to achieve for London and Londoners in the next Mayoral term.  This includes:

• the visionary proposal to make London the world’s first ‘Smart City’, utilising cutting-edge technology to the full;
• introducing electric buses to cut emissions;
• managing the tube upgrades more effectively so as to minimise disruption;
• refocussing housing investment on affordable housing;
• reinvigorating London’s cultural life with a commitment to live music;
• protecting and promoting jobs in London by engaging directly with the world’s great economies and capitalising on London’s diversity and diaspora to make this a reality;
• making the Living Wage a condition of procurement; and
• rebuilding the consensus on major infrastructure projects in London to strengthen not only London’s economy but to benefit the UK as a whole.

Can he win?  ConservativeHome clearly think he can, pointing out that “London isn’t the most hospitable territory for the Tories” and that it “won’t be easy” for Boris Johnson.  And as Steve Hart’s detailed analysis has shown the 2008 election:

“took place on a very bad night for Labour  …..  one of the worst nights of local election results since before the second world war, with Labour polling 24%.  …. On this terrible night for Labour Ken Livingstone actually increased his first preference votes from 685,541 in 2004, to 893,877 in 2008. This was not simply a consequence of a higher poll. He actually increased his share of first preference votes by 1.3% from 35.7 per cent to 37 per cent (the London wide Labour member vote increased by 0.32 per cent to 27.12 per cent, which was 10 per cent behind Ken?s vote).

Any reasonable interpretation of these results would suggest that on virtually any other Thursday of the last five years, Ken would have been likely to win. Ken?s share was higher than Labour achieved on General Election night in London – when the national results had Labour 10 per cent better than in 2008. On this alone, it is clear than Ken was outperforming Labour by a wide margin and also that, to a lesser extent, London Labour outperformed the rest of the country.”

The message is that Ken has consistently out-performed Labour in the elections he has stood in and as Steve Hart concludes:

“The evidence that Ken is a substantial electoral asset across London is substantial, whereas the only evidence regarding Oona is that she has lost a safe seat; and nothing whatsoever suggests that Ken?s rival for the nomination is an asset in any other part of London.”

Now this does not mean that Ken Livingstone is without his flaws – indeed no political leader with any flair ever can be.  Nor does it mean that I agree with all the judgements he made during his terms as Mayor (I disagreed, for example, with his decision to extend the original Congestion Charge zone westwards rather than creating a separate zone).  However, I am clear that having Ken Livingstone back as London’s Mayor would be good for London and Londoners and that Ken Livingstone is the candidate best-placed to win the Mayorality for Labour and to get rid of the current ill-focused and chaotic regime.

The latest journal from the Royal United Services Institute contains a perceptive article, entitled “Terrorism: The New Wave“, which was widely reported last Friday.

It follows concerns I raised in the House of Lords last month:

“Lord Harris of Haringey: My Lords, what is the rate of conversion to Islam within prisons and what steps are the Prison Service taking in terms of monitoring radicalisation and external speakers who come into prisons?

Lord McNally: I do not have precise figures on conversions, but I know the background to this question of whether or not there is radical Islamisation in prisons. The studies that I have been shown reveal no conclusive evidence of this, although there are examples which give rise to concern. The staff and the wider Prison Service keep a close eye on imams in prisons. Bringing them in to lecture, preach and minister within prisons has been one of the benefits, but we must make sure that it is a positive influence, as the noble Lord suggested.”

The RUSI study warns that one of the key threats from this next generation of terrorists comes from within the ranks of the 8,000 Muslims currently serving prison terms who are at risk of being converted to extremism by hardcore inmates jailed for terrorist offences.

The report cites estimates by prison probation officers that up to one in 10 Muslim inmates are being successfully targeted while inside jail, leading to the creation of a new generation of potential attackers who are due for release in the next decade and whose previous convictions do not relate to terrorism.

The report suggests that radicalisation is taking place in British prisons at a rapid rate, especially in the eight high-security establishments where most terrorism offenders are detained.

However, newspaper reports the study’s findings as being dismissed by the Coalition Government:

“The Ministry of Justice said it did not agree that radicalisation was widespread within the prison system. A spokesman said: “We run a dedicated expert unit to tackle the risk posed by those offenders with violent extremist views and those who may attempt to improperly influence others.”"

The response smacks of complacency.  I trust the complacency does not extend to one of the other major findings that large-scale and co-ordinated attacks such as the 7 July bombings are likely to be replaced with terrorist assaults by highly motivated but poorly trained lone individuals whose lack of connection with any major terrorist organisation will make them more difficult for police or MI5 to detect.

RUSI, which is very well-connected and whose reports are normally highly respected, has produced a timely and important contribution to the discussion of the terrorist threat faced by the UK.  Its conclusions should be taken seriously and not brushed aside by the Government.

The Washington Post reports that the US Deputy Defense Secretary has publicly acknowledged what is being described as the most significant breach of U.S. military computers.

The cause was a flash drive inserted into a U.S. military laptop in the Middle East in 2008.

And the consequence was that the malicious code, which had been placed on the drive by a foreign intelligence agency, uploaded itself onto the network run by the U.S. military’s Central Command. Apparently, the code spread undetected on both classified and unclassified systems, establishing what amounted to a digital beachhead, from which data could be transferred to servers under foreign control.

This disclosure was apparently part of a deliberate strategy to raise the awareness of the US Congress and the American people of the cyber-threat being faced by the USA.  Apparently, the Pentagon’s 15,000 networks and 7 million computing devices are being probed thousands of times daily and the US Government’s concern is that cyberwar is asymmetric and that traditional Cold War deterrence models of assured retaliation do not apply to cyberspace, where it is difficult to identify the instigator of an attack.

The problems faced by the Pentagon are no doubt faced – on a smaller scale – by the UK Ministry of Defence and the British armed services.  I do not, however, detect a similar openness about the threat by the UK’s Coalition Government – perhaps because the strategy to address the problem is nothing like as well-developed as it should be.

Regular readers (you both know who you are) will be aware that I have from time to time been somewhat flippant about Deputy Mayor Kit Malthouse AM, Chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority (aka the Dog-Catcher-in -Chief). 

However, I am with him – and on occasions ahead of him – in the belief that more needs to be done about the growing problem of dangerous  bred/trained-for-attack dogs in London.  I therefore support the initiative that he is taking today petitioning the Government to take action to resolve the problem.

The GLA is calling for:

• an increase in the penalty for owning a banned breed, to bring it more inline with carrying an offensive weapon
• the extension of the law to include private land, particularly to protect people who have to visit other peoples homes as part of the work
• changes to the part of the law that allows well behaved banned breeds to remain with their owners, so that the process is much quicker, making it better for the dog and saving the police money.

Last time I asked there was little sign that the Coalition Government was planning to move on any of these points.  However, Kit Malthouse has (or at least he would like us to believe that he has) the ear of the Coalition Government.  No doubt, therefore, this initiative will  produce speedy action.  We’ll be waiting……

I have been hearing increasingly lurid stories about the incompetence and insensitivity of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority in the way in which they “administer” MPs’ expenses.

However, I have now heard from two sources a story so outlandish that I felt I should investigate further.

IPSA Bulletin No6 explains helpfully:

“We have received a number of queries about maternity pay and other similar costs, therefore we wish to make it clear that IPSA will pay any necessary expenditure on maternity, paternity or adoptive leave for MPs’ staff. We will also pay for the cost of cover to replace the staff member on leave, provided the cover meets the normal Scheme rules. This is paid from the contingency fund – not because we are exercising discretion on whether to make these payments, but so that these payments do not impact on your capped staffing budget.”

The issue is what constitutes “necessary” expenditure.

This is “helpfully” clarified in the Expenses Rules, specifically rule 12.14 on contingency payments.  This requires that IPSA will only provide such payments for luxuries like maternity cover if they (IPSA) are satisfied that the MP could not:

“reasonably have been expected to take any action to avoid the circumstances which gave rise to the expenditure or liability”.

MPs are being faced with a form which in essence asks them to clarify what steps they took to prevent a staff member’s pregnancy.

Will relationship counselling be sufficient?  Or should the counselling extend to contraceptive advice?  Or even the provision of condoms for the MPs’ staff?

No wonder that so many staff who work for MPs are enraged and affronted.

I suppose nothing should surprise me about the LibDems, but I was taken aback by their reported reaction to a mid-year cutback in local health services.

My local newspaper, the Hornsey and Crouch End Journal, reports today that there is “Fury as GP walk-in services scrapped“.

The story relates to a decision by the local PCT to abandon a service providing drop-in health services for people who cannot get an appointment to see a GP at the new Hornsey Central Neighbourhood Health Centre, opened only a year ago, having been built at a cost of £12 million.

And who is quoted as being “extremely concerned” about the decision but local LibDem MP and junior Coalition Government Minister, Lynne Featherstone, alongside local LibDem councillor, David Winskill.

Apparently, neither of these local LibDem luminaries have made the connection between the mid-year cuts ordered by the Coalition Government’s emergency budget and the mid-year cuts announced by the local (soon to be abolished) PCT.

And who supports the Coalition Government locally?

Why the self-same local LibDem MP and junior Coalition Government Minister, Lynne Featherstone, and, of course, local LibDem councillors like David Winskill.

They just don’t get it, do they?

Or maybe they do and they are just two-faced hypocrites.

A couple of days ago Michael Crick floated the story that Vince Cable is being touted round as a candidate for London Mayor in 2012 (and not just as the LibDem candidate but as the COALITION candidate, but then soft-pedalled vigorously the following day.

However, his suggestion does have some real credibility.  Consider the following:

1. Vince Cable is clearly hating his current role in the Cabinet.  His body language oozes unhappiness.  He is visibly miserable about some aspects of Coalition policy and displays none of the relish shown by Nick Clegg, Chris Huhne and the others for ditching major cherished pillars of LibDem orthodoxy.
2. Boris Johnson is desperately seeking a way out of contesting the Mayorality again in 2012.  It has turned out to be much harder work than he expected and it interferes with his extra-mural activities.  What is more, he is terrified of losing and he really, really, really wants to back in the House of Commons making his pitch to be the next Leader of the Conservative Party.  Interestingly, he has still failed to state clearly that he wants to run again.
3. David Cameron would dearly love to remove Boris Johnson’s platform (of course, he’d probably like to remove other things of his as well) which is used to grandstand on issues that undermine the Coalition while strengthening the standing that Boris has in the wider Conservative Party.
4. David Cameron does not want to see a Conservative candidate lose the most high-profile directly-elected position in the country.
5. Both David Cameron and Nick Clegg would like to bolster the Coalition and keep open the possibility of a non-aggression pact for their two Parties in the next General Election.  A coalition candidate for Mayor might just win and would be a big boost to Coalition candidates being fielded in 2015 (or whenever the General Election takes place).
6. The best alternative candidate the LibDems can come up with is Lembit Opik.
7. The best alternative candidate the Conservatives can come up with is Kit Malthouse.
8. Successfully imposing the notion of fielding a Coalition candidate would put Simon “no election pacts” Hughes firmly back into his box.

It all begins to look scarily plausible ….

From 25th September 2009:

The Parliament Education Service runs an annual Discover Parliament Programme aimed at 16-18 year olds studying higher level politics, citizenship and general studies.  This afternoon I met 80 students taking part in the Programme.  They were from three schools in Pinner, Chelmsford and Bristol.

As ever on such occasions, the questioning was lively, sometimes challenging and extremely wide-ranging.  We covered – amongst other things – such topics as:

• aren’t MPs too old (I’d explained that the average age of members of the House of Lords is 69);
• why aren’t 16 year olds allowed to vote or to sit in Parliament;
• what did I think of Gordon Brown;
• should taxes be put up in the current economic situation;
• should the age for getting a driving licence change;
• what were my views about David Cameron, Lord Mandelson and the BNP (interesting grouping);
• what should be done about knife crime and gangs;
• was “kettling” of G20 protesters fair (from a teacher);
• should children be taught more about current affairs;
• did the LibDems have a better record on MPs’ expenses;
• is the threat of terrorism rising;
• should there be limits on immigration;
• was the war in Iraq right; and
• did I think Labour would win the next General Election and when would it be?

As I said, a lively hour – and an exhilarating one too.

Effectively, these Discover Parliament programmes can only take place during school term time and when Parliament is not sitting.  In practice that means they are only possible for about four weeks a year from the early part of September.  A by-product of Speaker John Bercow’s proposal to shorten Parliament’s summer recess might well be to end these programmes. Whatever the merits or otherwise of Parliament sitting in September (something I personally would favour), it would be a retrograde step to lose this outreach work with young people.

I have already explained that I really don’t mind.

However, just in case you really really want to cast your vote for this blog in the Total Politics annual beauty parade, this is what you have to do:

The rules are:
1. You must vote for your ten favourite blogs and rank them from 1 (your favourite) to 10 (your tenth favourite).
2. Your votes must be ranked from 1 to 10. Any votes which do not have rankings will not be counted.
3. You MUST include at least FIVE blogs in your list, but please list ten if you can. If you include fewer than five, your vote will not count.
4. Email your vote to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com
5. Only vote once.
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7. Anonymous votes left in the comments will not count. You must give a name.
8. All votes must be received by midnight on 31 July 2010. Any votes received after that date will not count.

So I’m not asking you to do it, but I really won’t mind if you do……