[0762]

It is in the interests of democracy within these islands to release the Russia report following Johnson's GE win. We all know the document exists and grave concerns have been raised re external interference in the UK's democracy. That document has not been published for dubious reasons. It should be published now so that we can all see where things are. Surely if the UK wants to pretend it is a beacon of best practice to the world, credibility begins at home and that also means not crassly handing out tax payers money to people earning over £110,000 pa as recently suggested by officials of the Brexit Party/govt - that is a joke and an insult to swathes and swathes of poorer and vulnerable people within our population!!! The ruthless nature of this Brexit obsessed govt is epitomised in one shameless action within Johnson's Withdrawal Agreement Bill with one of the omissions covering the Dubs amendment which I recently read up on as I didn't know too much re the subject of the UK's involvement in assisting unaccompanied refugee children to find secure refuge with identified family members in the UK. So Johnson scrapped the Dubs Amendment that sought to enable such lone youngsters to come to a safe haven - NO SOONER HAD JOHNSON WON THE RECENT GENERAL ELECTION THAN HE RUTHLESSLY STRIPPED THE DUBS AMENDMENT (NAMED AFTER LORD ALF DUBS) FROM THE EU WAB. Apparently government ministers met with Lord Dubs, the initiator of the amendment, in an attempt to argue that it would weaken the government's negotiating hand in EU trade talks??? Frankly, as cynical political moves go, it doesn't get much more distasteful than this and speaks volumes about the politicians who are running the UK! As Dubs pointedly observed, it quite simply reveals a govt more than happy to "barter unaccompanied child refugees for something else", and he will fight to reinstate it in the House of Lords. However, it is hard to see past the sheer cynicism of Brexit-obsessed Tories on this issue. If the Tory govt's cynical scrapping of the amendment and the lies and harm that accompany it is what they are capable of in just a few weeks, what more harm will they inflict in the next few years?????