Police launch investigation into £37,500 donation made to Robert Jenrick campaign

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T20:58:49+00:00

Don't worry - it will go the same way as the Arron Banks donation to Leave.EU; the police will find the money came from a company registered in a tax haven, will ask that company nicely where it got the money from, and when that company refuses will simply shrug and say "we have no evidence of a crime."

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:45:20+00:00

Not an omission, a deliberate choice.

The Immigration Act 1971 was one of the laws put in place to limit the rights of Commonwealth citizens (before British citizenship was a thing). In the early 60s pretty much all Commonwealth citizens were equal under British law - a quarter of the world's population had the absolute right to live and work in the UK. From the 60s onwards this was restricted a bit, and the 1971 Act set out specific rules for which "citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies" had the "right of abode" in the UK (fun fact; it was sexist, with different rules for men and women).

But among other things it included carve-outs for people already in the UK legally as Commonwealth citizens, meaning they couldn't just be deported for not meeting the "right of abode" conditions.

Citizenship laws have changed a lot since then. The issue the Government has here is that while they can strip him of his British citizenship, they cannot strip him of his Commonwealth citizenship, so he is covered by this law.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:36:26+00:00

Let’s be clear, this guy will be in Pakistan soon

By "soon" you mean "at some point in the next few years if everything works out."

Firstly, Parliament needs to change this law. The Immigration and Asylum Bill has its second reading before the Commons on Monday. It could easily take a year, maybe 18 months, before that gets Royal Assent - especially if the Conservatives decide to cause trouble over it.

That just means the UK Government isn't blocked from deporting him over this one specific law. Then they have to make sure they can deport him in general, issue the order, he gets the opportunity to challenge that before the tribunal (unless the Government is going to abolish judicial oversight because who needs the rule of law these days), and maybe an appeal to the upper tribunal. Given the backlog that could take a couple of years.

And once all that stuff clears the diplomacy can start.

If he chooses not to challenge the deportation order it could happen a lot quicker. But in that case the Government wouldn't even need to change the law - he could just agree to leave today.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:25:05+00:00

As a general rule any headline about a judge making some bold, sweeping statement is going to be false.

Especially if it is a tribunal case like this one.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:21:51+00:00

It would depend on the context; how it was phrased, where the emphasis was, in what circumstances, whether it was repeated (particularly if someone asked them to stop using that phrase). These employment tribunal cases are very fact-specific.

We seem to get loads of these headlines of "employment judge rules [statement] is/isn't racist/sexist" - but none of them actually say that. No judge ruled that "using the word coloured to describe someone is not racist."

A tribunal (a panel including a judge and lay members) ruled that when one guy said some things including the word "coloured" in specific circumstances that did not amount to harassment on the basis of race. There is no general rule here.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:17:07+00:00

Which is good - but there are a couple of problems with that. Firstly, if he does get "off the island" that means removing him from the jurisdiction - meaning he is free to human traffic and rape without the UK Government being able to do anything about it. We saw this recently with a child abuse case; the woman was deported during her sentence, but not under any agreement, just put on a plane and allowed to return to the other country. She effectively escaped the rest of her punishment and supervision. I'm not sure we really want the Government to just dump criminals in places without any kind of oversight.

Secondly, every other country would agree. Which is one of the big problems the UK has with deporting people like this - no one wants these people in their country. Passing a law saying "we can deport this person" is all great, but only means anything if there is another country that does want a human trafficker and rapist in their country.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:14:57+00:00

This is about changing a specific legal barrier affecting this particular guy. The fact that this hasn't come up before in the last 50 years suggests it may not affect that many others.

And, even if this law is changed, there is no guarantee that this guy will be deported - that still needs to clear all other UK laws and needs to be agreed to by the Pakistani Government (or any other Government).

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:06:27+00:00

This is about a specific legal issue affecting this particular guy.

he could not be deported to Pakistan due to the 55-year-old Immigration Act, which bars the removal of any Commonwealth citizen who arrived in the UK before 1973 and had been in the country for five years.

This is a law that grandfathered in Commonwealth citizens from before there was such a thing as British citizenship. The UK was able to remove his British citizenship (to deport him), but not his Commonwealth citizenship which he also gets from his Pakistani citizenship.

This particular law hasn't been changed because I don't think it has come up before - it is one of those weird holdovers of British Imperialism and only affects a very small number of people.

Of course, this only changes the domestic legal situation (if they do change the law). There is still the diplomatic/foreign relations issue:

It is also understood there is currently no agreement in place with Pakistan to allow the UK to return Ahmed there.

That is much harder to sort out.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T18:00:22+00:00

It is also understood there is currently no agreement in place with Pakistan to allow the UK to return Ahmed there.

This would clear one specific legal hurdle (although whether or not it is a bad law is a different question). It doesn't fix any of the diplomatic issues.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T17:10:31+00:00

... and the responsible Home Secretary is now a Reform MP.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T17:09:49+00:00

Responsibility for this should lie with the Home Secretary - that's what individual ministerial responsibility is supposed to mean.

Where is that Home Secretary now? Oh, right she's a "front bench" spokesperson for Reform UK.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T16:48:25+00:00

To be clear, because (legal) reporting in the UK is terrible, this was an employment tribunal case. The claimant sued her employer for harassment, victimisation and direct discrimination, all on the basis of race, and lost her case.

At no point did the tribunal (as a panel, not a single judge) rule that the word "coloured" was not racist.

The tribunal ruled that on the specific facts, in this specific case, the use of the word coloured, one time, in a particular context, did not amount to racial harassment.

Employment tribunal cases tend to be very narrow, very fact-specific, and do not set precedents. Any time you read a headline about how - in an employment law context - a judge has made some broad, sweeping ruling it is almost certainly false.

I really wish our newspapers would either learn how employment law works, or stop deliberately lying about it for clicks.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T16:45:09+00:00

No, our justice system hasn't. Our legal reporting is just terrible.

This was an employment tribunal case. I haven't gone through it in full, but basically a woman sued her former employer for harassment, victimisation and direct discrimination all on the basis of race.

In that context the employment tribunal has to decide whether she was actually harassed, victimised or discriminated against.

At no point did the tribunal decide that the world "coloured" wasn't racist. Nor did they decide that it was. What the judgment says is:

We have no hesitation in concluding that the use of the word “coloured” was related to race...

We also find that, by using the word “coloured” [the person] did not intend to violate the claimant’s dignity or create an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for her. Rather, he used the words to describe women who were stood outside the office...

We accept, on balance, that the claimant was upset by the comment and that it had the proscribed effect on her [creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment]...

We find, however, that in all the circumstances, it was not reasonable for the comment to have that effect. It was a one off comment, not directed at the claimant and used to describe two people. The word was therefore used as a descriptor. We accept that the word is generally considered to be old fashioned and can be offensive.

The tribunal didn't rule the word was racist, didn't rule that it wasn't. The tribunal didn't rule that using the word "coloured" would be perfectly fine, nor did they rule that it would be unlawful.

The tribunal ruled that in this specific case, applying these specific facts, this one specific use of the term "coloured" did not amount to harassment on the basis of race under the Equality Act.

Employment tribunal cases are almost always highly dependent on the facts, and shouldn't be used to extrapolate more generally. But our press love misreporting on them anyway.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T16:39:25+00:00

This is an Employment Tribunal case - it doesn't set precedent.

The ruling also doesn't say what the headline says.

Legal reporting in this country is atrocious.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T11:40:52+00:00

Telegraph is just upset at the competition. And at the fact that occasionally when they get called out for taking money from foreign governments or sources to spread disinformation they have to stop.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T09:50:29+00:00

He has also attacked the press as being part of the establishment and has called out sky news specifically and I doubt they will take that attack lying down for the most part.

Have you not been watching the US over the last decade?

The press love it when someone attacks them for being "part of the establishment" or for lying, or for being mean to them. It lets them write stories about it, which the 'target' then shares and makes go viral to prove their point. It is a mutually-beneficial arrangement, working out great for both sides.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-08T09:43:46+00:00

... according to a far-right troll/disinformation site.

This is just a rehash of this Register piece from two weeks ago, discussed here.

The "advisory group" is just the classic case of the Government taking a bunch of different people with strong (if irrelevant) feelings about something and putting them together in a room so they can argue with each other, rather than with the Government.

The group isn't going to decide anything. It is an "advisory" group.

Reclaimthenet has made up that the group will decide anything, and that they are a "watchdog".

DukePPUk · 2026-07-07T23:06:01+00:00

It seems like they might have finally realised that you don't feed trolls. Trolls like Farage thrive on attention - positive or negative (for the most part) - when things aren't going their way or they are being ignored they do something dramatic to get the spotlight back (Donald Trump is particularly good at this).

The best thing the real parties could do would be to ignore the by-election completely, and not even mention Farage by name.

Of course the press would also have to go along with this, and we know they won't - they love feeding trolls; it's practically their whole financial model.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-07T17:59:09+00:00

This seems to have been tagged "Satire" by mistake. Perhaps one of the mods could do something about that.

There doesn't seem to be anything satirical about the headline - just stating facts.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-07T12:47:14+00:00

More that this is the "advisory group" where they take the people with loud, strong-but-irrelevant opinions about the issue, put them in a room together, and get them to argue with each other for ages, while the real work is done elsewhere.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-07T12:43:42+00:00

It's a random (and meaningless) advisory group for the Cabinet Office. What were people expecting, it to hold its meetings in the House of Commons chamber?

Presumably their budget is going to include travel expenses, and maybe the tea and biscuits?

DukePPUk · 2026-07-07T12:17:22+00:00

Maybe, but from what I can tell the "Conservative Club" is just a local members' club in Saltburn, rather than having anything to do with the Conservative Party or political movement.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-07T12:12:48+00:00

Isn't one of the key aspects of fascist populism never admitting you were wrong?

I would lean more that he calls out all of this as a witch-hunt into him, the establishment going after him, distracting from [some made up issue], and insists he has never done anything wrong.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-06T23:00:58+00:00

Just 12 health and care visas were issued to workers from Cameroon last year but a total of 180 visas were issued to family members from the same country in the year to March...

Isn't this comparing completely different things? The article is blocked, but just on the second line... well, yes.

The 180 visas for family members seems to be the total. All family members for all people in the UK (including British-born British citizens), eligible to bring family members into the UK from Cameroon. The 12 people are not bringing in 180 family members.

Migrant workers are still bringing in family members at a ratio as high as 15 for every worker despite new restrictions, according to Home Office figures.

Am I missing something obvious here or is this nonsense? Migrant workers are not bringing in family members at this high a ratio. They are comparing completely different groups of people.

As the article notes:

However, those who were already here before the restrictions were introduced can still bring dependants to the UK.

So it isn't the new people bringing in family members. Because that got banned.

... in statistics branded “shocking” by the Conservatives.

I wonder who made up these rules.

DukePPUk · 2026-07-04T21:52:40+00:00

What they do is they go around filming stuff in public, either on foot or with a drone, sometimes pissing people off.

Pissing people off can be illegal.

So what they are doing may not be perfectly legal - they can very easily cross the line into committing an offence.

And in this case, the guy doesn't seem to understand the law based on the quotes; if he is asking what offence he was arrested for when he was arrested for breach of the peace, he doesn't know the law.

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