Like many I’m sick and tired of the media’s nauseating Brown/Blair love-in, so this is going to be a Brown/Blair-free zone today.

One of the most appalling crimes that this Government is keeping under the political radar is the trafficking of human beings especially women and young girls for the purposes of sexual exploitation.

It is clear that this sex slavery is rampant in the UK today. Similar to the transatlantic slave trade of over 200 years ago, the “slaves” are brought over and sold for prices such as £4, 500 and £5, 000. The “owners” of today almost always have no concern for the women’s or children’s welfare, with beatings, threats and abuse common. Due to slavery being illegal, ownership is obtained through different means, physical violence, threats against families and the seizing of documents – making it hard for the victim to go to the police without the fear of deportation. They are brought to the country in a variety of ways, sometimes – as with the slaves of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries – after being kidnapped from their homelands.

 However the much more common method of recruiting women for sexual exploitation includes deception by promises of legitimate employment in the UK or elsewhere for instance to be a waitress or hairdresser; or deception through half truths such as employment in “dancing” or “the entertainment industry”.

Earlier this year in the House of Commons at a meeting of the All Party Group on Human Trafficking a fourteen year old black girl told of her experience of immigration. She was flown into this country from Kenya. She was accompanied by a middle aged white man who was not a relative. She travelled on a passport which was not her own and which did not have her photo in it. She was told by the white man not to say anything at Immigration Control. The middle aged white man and the fourteen year old black girl with a false passport were waved through immigration without any questions or checks.

It is very difficult to resolve the situation when the trafficked human beings are already in the UK. What we need are proper border controls, proper checks on immigration and proper border police. There needs to be a really tough control on immigration and one of the most important reasons for this is to end this vile trade.

If you make it difficult to enter this country then the criminal gangs will have to go elsewhere.

Well let’s start at the beginning; or is it the end? Let’s hope that Gordon
Brown proves to be an exceptionally good and talented Prime Minister. The
nation is calling out for a good leader. Unfortunately, going by past
experience, there is little likelihood of this happening.

He doesn’t start very well, as he does it on the back of a lie. In the 2005
General Election, Labour had one clear message: if Labour was returned, Tony
Blair would serve a full term. After only two years in office and with still
three years of the Parliament to go, the Prime Minister is standing down.
Not because of illness, not because of a defeat in the House of Commons but
just because it suits him. A clear breach of Labour’s promise at the last
election. Unless Gordon Brown has the courage and integrity to call an
immediate General Election we can only expect more of Labour’s lies and
spin.

Now to the defection. Quentin Davies is now a Labour Member of Parliament.
Yes, yes, I know you don’t know who he is. And yes I did have to look his
name up to make sure I spelt it correctly.

Still it did confirm one thing. Reading his rambling 18-page back and front resignation letter, only one thing was clear. He hated David Cameron’s Eurosceptic approach to Europe. He hated the idea of letting the people decide on the future of the European
Union. He recognised that Gordon Brown and Labour were the party of the
European superstate.

Of course he’s right on all counts. David Cameron has shown that he is very opposed to the European state, wants a referendum, and wants to bring powers back to Britain.

Mr Davies’s resignation from the Conservatives is good news for us and bad
news for Labour.

It’s fascinating as a new Member of Parliament to watch Tony Blair in action.  Having sat in the chamber in the House of Commons, or more correctly, bobbing up and down for an hour to catch the Speaker’s eye during yesterday’s European Union statement, you can only marvel at Blair’s ability not to answer the question he’s asked. 

 Member after member from both sides of the House asked the Prime Minister why he had refused to call a referendum on the new European constitutional treaty, when he promised faithfully to have a referendum on the European Constitution.  And every time he side-stepped the question and instead made a statement on something entirely different.  If the EU constitution was a “dead parrot”, it’s certainly one that’s been resuscitated and given life by the Prime Minister and the political elite of Europe.

The crux of the Prime Minister’s argument seemed to be that though this was a significant change, as we live in a parliamentary democracy, it should be decided by Parliament.  With a new Prime Minster waiting in the wings, the only conclusion we can draw is that there should be a general election.  Perhaps when the Prime Minister goes to see Her Majesty on Wednesday, he won’t only resign, he will also ask the Queen to dissolve Parliament?

Harriet Harman, Deputy Leader of the Labour Party,  John Cruddas, finishing third in the poll, and Labour forging ahead in the opinion polls; so much for pundits’ predictions.  When we had our long leadership campaign, the established view was that it would be disaster.  Senior Conservatives putting different views and opinions to the public would cause disunity and we would sink in the opinion polls. 

 Instead open debate and new ideas caused us to surge ahead.  The commentators predicted a long Labour deputy leadership campaign would be even more disastrous for the Government with senior Labour ministers slagging off their own Government’s record and criticising the Iraq policy and the Trident decision.  However, open debate and discussion of ideas did no harm at all.  And indeed Labour has moved ahead in the opinion polls.

How right David Cameron was to set up the policy review groups, giving opportunities to all Conservatives to discuss future policy.  Now these policy groups are about to report.  That should give another opportunity for the Conservative party constructively  to debate the direction of future policy.  Open and frank debate about the future will enhance our position with the British public, not harm it.

Politics is not about saying yes to the status quo.  It is about new ideas and policies to improve the quality of life for the British people.

I very much believe in keeping and honouring our traditions. However, I am not so short-sighted to believe that we must keep traditions just for the sake of it. If a tradition does not work in today’s United Kingdom then we must change it for the better.The tradition I speak of is our National Health Service. Over the last ten years the Government has poured billions of pounds into the NHS with the aim of bringing it up to a 21st Century standard. But it has not worked. How can it have worked when as a country we are meant to be elated at the prospect of only having to wait a maximum of 18 weeks for an operation?You mention this to someone in Europe or America and they laugh: well after they ask you what a waiting list is.

Female circumcision  is a barbaric practice which involves the removal, usually with non-sterilised equipment and no anaesthetic, of parts of the genitalia of young girls.

 It is common amongst members of certain communities originating from parts of Africa and some Gulf states, and it is believed that thousands of young girls living in Britain are victims of this abhorrent practice.
 
A few years ago, Parliament decided to pass a law to prevent British girls from being subject to female circumcision either here or abroad. Lots of MPs made worthy speeches condemning the practice and eventually a law was passed which would have any men who arranged for their daughters to be abused in this fashion to be imprisoned.

 Unfortunately nothing else was done. I have asked the Metropolitan Police how many people they have investigated or prosecuted for this offence and they are refusing to say, citing privacy reasons.

I have pointed out that I do not want names and addresses just numbers, but still they refuse. Informally, I am told that the Met have investigated a tiny number of cases, and that nobody has been prosecuted let alone imprisoned.
  
Once again political correctness has ensured that a cover-up is taking place. Most right-thinking people would agree that carving up the genitalia of a young girls with a filthy razor is an unpleasant thing to do. But actually to do anything to stop it might upset thousands of members of minority groups in Britain, who would shout “racism”. So we pass a law, do absolutely nothing and make it as difficult as possible for anyone, including MPs, to find out the truth.
Among other things, our commitment to supporting diversity means turning a blind eye to forced marriages, not doing enough to prevent honour killings, ignoring female genital mutilation and allowing the benefits system to support polygamy.
 
When are we going to have the self confidence to say to minority communities, that we believe that Western cultural values are rather better than those that pertain elsewhere in the world, and that anyone who comes here should respect them or go home?