Management By Blackberry

It was a comforting sight on the weekend that Peter Mandelson had studied the rota properly and that, while Gordon Brown was pouring cups of tea at Old People Homes and Harriet Harman was discussing how more women should be involved in the England Cricket team, Lord Mandy was taking the baton of leading the country via Blackberry.

So crucial was it that he took it with him on his luxury, and paid for holiday, in Corfu. Mandy loves his freebies - it's what Government and Politics is all about, after all. Moving in the circles of the rich and famous, holidaying on fabulous yachts, scratching one anothers backs because the world is full of free lunches, after all. Mandy was on a yacht shared between two famous and very wealthy people. The week before it had been the turn of that perennial freebie holiday-merchant, Tony Blair, who had been at the indulgence of the Oracle CEO, Larry Ellison. They had been discussing Middle East peace no doubt or was it how to make more money by being on Boards - whatever, Larry clearly thinks Blair can be of help to him.

This week, Mandy was being hosted by David Giffen who is appropriately co-founder of Dreamworks along with Stephen Spielberg. I am sure there was plenty of dreaming going on under the sunny climate of Corfu where the yacht was anchored. Mandy had arrived inconspicuously by Easyjet as Mandyforce One was no doubt out of commission for a while. The nation breathed a sigh of relief as he turned up, fully charged Blackberry in hand and assumed the role of UK Prime Minister while in a polo shirt and shorts on the back of yacht in Corfu. As Mandy absorbed the rays, 4 British soldiers enjoyed a sunny day of a different kind, courtesy of the Taliban in Afghanistan. They won't be having an indulgent, back scratching holiday as they will be transported back by the Armed Forces equivalent of an Easyjet flight - a body bag. I am sure he got all that trivial news via his Blackberry unless the Dreamworks boat did not have suitable socket to recharge his ebbing power or have the necessary reception to bring bad news, only good.

It's a bizarre sight. On the one hand, we have the current PM serving some kind of self-imposed penance to show us how in touch with the people he is and on the other the same person entrusts the power of one of the most important nations on earth to an unelected official with a Blackberry being entertained by a fabulously wealthy guy on a yacht in Corfu. You couldn't make it up.

Welcome to the world of the 'Champagne Socialists' who move in the dreamland occupied by the rich and famous and tell us earnestly that they are in touch with the people. Tony Blair certainly is - he could hardly wait to wave two fingers at the people in the Commons and Sedgefield and head for the land of plenty in Corporate world and after-dinner circuits where he could rewrite his history and tell us how the Iraq war was really needed even if he lied to get us into it. History which we gladly allow him to rewrite and then pay for in his autobiography even though we lived it and saw exactly what went on.

In a bizarre twist to all that, the man who had presided over the Joint Chiefs of Staff meetings which perhaps wrote or approved the famous document on which the legality and prudency of war with Iraq was based, Sir John Scarlett, is the man we should now believe when he says that MI6 is not involved in torture. The same man who brought the chilling and complete tosh about Iraq being able to deploy, prime and a fire a Weapon of Mass Destruction at British Sovereign territory within 45 minutes in the form of a war document mostly plagiarised from a PhD student off the internet. How everything links as 'Capt. Scarlett' was indeed rewarded with the star job at the head of MI6 and a knighthood for the spectacular failure in Intelligence that led us into a an illegal war with Iraq that cost us £billions just to satisfy the ego of men like Blair. Much like Lord Mandelson, who had been sent to Brussels in a plumb £200k+ a year job because who couldn't be trusted in his dealings in Government even by his pandering boss, Blair - a rough price of failure for the man indeed.

England got stuffed at cricket, too. All in all, it was a cracking weekend.

Whiste Down The Wind

There are quite a few people like myself who felt that the war in Iraq was very questionable and, in particular, the reasons given and used by the Government to go to war were in some way 'sexed up', as the phrase of the time suggested, or exaggerated or downright made up.

Two inquires by Government sponsored Lords, Butler and Hutton, were given cleverly worded remits which never touched the heart of the matter and once again the feeble-minded public were left with the impression that 'You don't really want to know' or 'You are not capable of handling the real information, so leave it to us'. It was at a time when Alistair Campbell's powers were at their peak and Britain seemed to be trapped in some sinister Orwellian plot where propagandists had seized control of Government and we quite literally knew only what we were told.

This week, whistleblowers from the Diplomatic and Intelligence Community, who were previously threatened under the Official Secrets Act but never prosecuted, have come forward and demanded a further, more wide reaching inquiry.

I would imagine they have just two hopes to use the popular phrase - Bob Hope and no hope.

The Facts Emerge

Former diplomat, Carne Ross, still believes 'a lot of facts have still to come to light' and that it is 'disgraceful' that Ministers 'pretend' that the two previous enquiries told the full facts surrounding Britain's decision to join in what has now become a terrible and unwinnable war in Iraq. Ross quit the foreign office over what he saw as the inaccuracy of the information over Saddam's capabilities and weapons. Ross was for 4 years, Britain's expert on Iraq to the UN - so he just might know a thing or two about what he is talking about, or should we just believe the Government hype that he is just a stinking whistleblower and a nutter at that?

The problem is that he is not the only one.

Ross gave secret evidence to the Butler enquiry which has never been revealed - he also believes there are many yet to tell their story. His latest tirade comes after giving evidence to MPs and he has attacked 'a fundamental failure of transparency and accountability in government'.

Like we don't know that? We just let them get away with it.

It will be interesting to see how Gordon Brown will respond to the new onslaught by the whistleblowers without the protection of the smooth Blair rebuffs and having seen his predecessor draw his famous lines under the matter meaning 'shut up, there is to be no more debate'. I suppose he has more pressing matters to mind, like the fact his economic skills and credibility, of which he was so proud as Chancellor, have been cut to ribbons as Britain squirms in the worst economic crisis since The Great Depression.

For once it provides a convenient smokescreen under which he can legitimately run for cover and say the public aren't interested as we are all doomed.

More Whistleblowers

Just last month, Justice Secretary, Jack Straw, vetoed the publication of the cabinet minutes leading up to the invasion of Iraq 'in the interest of national security' that neat catch all phrase which euphemistically means that there is definitely something to hide. Two former cabinet ministers, Clare Short and the late Robin Cook, were dissident enough to sacrifice their careers over the matter at the time - no self respecting minister would normally trash their careers over a trivial matter like the truth. You need to be stupid like David Davies to do that or crooked like Peter, no Lord I think you'll find, Mandelson - those sort always rise again after serving time in the dunce's corner. But those who break with the rule of 'cabinet omerta' are pariahs for the rest of their careers.

A former colleague of David Kelly, the security expert who sadly 'took his own life with his blunt pen knife', Brian Jones became a whistleblower in 2004 and claimed intelligence chiefs ignored warnings from their own people that claims about Saddam's chemical and biological weapons were false. He was surprised at the time that MPs had not 'crucified' the security staff on publication of the reports and to this day only a small number of MPs ever saw through the guff that was written, even though much of the public report which was sponsored by Campbell was subsequently exposed as plagiarised off the web and a pack of lies.

More importantly, Jones was 'surprised' that MPs had not noticed the difference between the Prime Minister's foreword to the document and its contents - then again it was probably written by Campbell with some subliminal messages conjured up by Paul McKenna. I kid you not.

Katherine Gun worked at GCHQ as a translator and was famously sacked from her job before being told she would be prosecuted but the case was dropped. She had seen a memo from the US National Security Agency which asked for British help to spy on 6 countries who were 'dissidents' in the UN. It was later alleged that Kofi Annan himself was also monitored for the same reason. Somehow, again, the public ignored the obvious. Why would we spy on our friends if some sub-plot was not afoot?

Gun, as does Ross and Jones, claims there are many on the inside in the Intelligence and diplomatic communities who feel the same way but are too scared of ruining their own careers to come forward even though there is little likelihood they would ever be prosecuted. I suppose it is difficult to be prosecuted for leaking a downright lie.

Gun calls for a change in the training of spies who are told not to question what they are being told. She also claims there was a patronising view amongst her managers that said 'leave this to us'. If you go on to the MI6 website, which recently advertised for more Field Officers or 'lamplighters' in George Smiley speak, then you get an almost farcical qualification set out that very much mimics a Monty Python interview - but I guess they are just looking for the compliant types.

Whistles Down The Wind

It is difficult to know where to go from hear. The public may argue that three or so whistleblowers is hardly a quorum to start another enquiry. But then again, you are hardly likely in the murky world of secrets to get many who will break ranks by the very nature of the job. You don't go into being spook or diplomat believing every word you hear or see is true and that you should be guardians of the public conscience. The job of spooks is to play the game the way the 'Masters' deem it necessary. Like soldiers, they do not question orders or motives - they are professionals and just 'do their job'.

Today, the numbers of young soldiers dying in Iraq does not abate and the worthiness of the cause of 'democratising' the disparate nation has always been questionable. Middle East politics have always been full of side agendas and laden with greedy eyes on the black prize of oil. How Tony Blair can actually be chosen after his poodle-like sponsoring of the carnage in Iraq at Bush's bidding, says it all. Then again it took him long enough to interrupt his money making to actually pay a visit to Gaza under his role of Special Envoy. It must have been nice of him to pop by after all the violence had ended.

His first question must have been, 'what violence was that then?' as he was busy earning £240,000 for speaking in Barcelona to drunk telecoms executives at its height.

I don't think we will get to the truth of this subject until we are old and grey. When Blair, Brown, Straw, Campbell et al are well into their pleasant retirements, fat on their memoirs, after dinner speeches and Non Executive Directorships. Then again, we will be too old to care by then.

But what will our kids think of our inaction to stop the lies and blunders that has laid down a terrible, violent legacy for them?

There is no doubt that the actions of our Government and the inaction of us, the people, have made this world a far more unsafe place to live in for the future. But like climate change, carbon footprints, consumption of our natural resources and killing people in foreign countries for no reason, if it interrupts our lifestyle and our ability to play computer games extolling the virtues of stealing cars, watching violent TV programs or gun-toting young kids in the street shooting one another, watching binge drinking adults killing themselves slowly or watching the Government spend our future money with panicked abandon, we just don't want to know.

You can whistle down the wind, my friends. We all have our fingers in our ears and are singing 'la la la - I can't hear you'.