Jeremy Corbyn , I am afraid, will win no brownie points, let alone votes for his public view that the Falkland Islands should be handed back to Argentina as part of a power-sharing deal.
His view has not only angered members of his own party, but will horrify the families of the 255 British military personnel who died in the 1982 conflict after the Argentine invasion.
His remarks have, unsurprisingly, met with the approval of Alicia Castro, the outgoing Argentine ambassador in London. She warmly described Corbyn as “one of ours”.
Corbyn, and those of a like mind, seem to forget that virtually the entire population of the Falklands want to remain British, and want nothing to do with Argentina.
Some members of the Labour Party were clearly shocked to hear Corbyn’s views at a private party meeting at Westminster.
Shadow Leader of the Commons, Chris Bryant said scathingly: “You can’t make policy on the hoof over the Falklands.”
And the shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn was even more telling. He simply said: “We have not changed our policy on the Falklands.”
Corbyn seems to be making more enemies within his own party than those of his political opponents.
The British parliament should be ashamed of itself for even considering that Donald Trump should be denied entry to our country.
England, as John Bright once said, is the mother of parliaments, yet the House of Commons, earlier this month, disgraced and demeaned itself to the gutter level of those neo-fascist university students who have, in some cases acted almost violently by gagging even eminent figures from speaking on their campuses if their views do not coincide with their own.
This is intolerance writ large, and it is scandalous that Trump, the front-runner in the Republican battle for the White House, should be treated in this way. Trump may have views that are anathema to many people, but he is no criminal – and could be sitting in the Oval Office sooner rather than later.
All right, ban known criminals, people who advocate violence or who try to brainwash others – but Trump could be leader of the free world by this time next year.
People like feminist Germaine Greer and historian David Starkey have been banned from speaking on campuses. These are people with controversial views, but they are always entertaining – and more importantly, they provoke debate, which I would have thought is what universities need.
And for politicians to downgrade themselves to such a level leaves an ugly stain on the present incumbents at Westminster.
• What good news it is that some of Britain’s money-grubbing and bullying charities, that prey on the old and the vulnerable, are to be brought to book.
The methods some of them use to raise money, by, for instance, bombarding people with begging letters – sometimes with dire results – have been condemned by MPs who say they now have a last chance to mend their often cruel ways.
Some of them have been using what are described as “outrageous boiler-room tactics” to raise cash. Charity work is now very often not voluntary, but big business with its leaders strutting around in Armani suits – paid for, of course, by unsuspecting people who want to help the deprived, not finance designer wear from Savile Row.
