‘The decision not to give permission for the Ushakov medal to be accepted was made in accordance with the current British rules on the acceptance of foreign awards and only after very careful consideration of all the information provided by the Russian Embassy.
‘However, it was found that this information did not show that the intended recipients had given specific service to Russia within the last five years as required by those rules.’
He goes on to explain that the government would reconsider any cases where it could be shown that the intended recipients had given service to Russia more recently.
Why bother to speak if all you can spout is the party line. “The Rules Are The Rules”. We have heard that time and time again. What we need to hear, from you Mr. Hague, is that the government has seen sense, has relented in this stupidly rigid stance and has decided to let the survivors collect these medals.
Change the bloody rules Mr Hague.
The rules were set by faceless bureaucrats, by people who did not have to face the conditions that the medal recipients had to face. Lets apply some common sense.
There is something seriously wrong, with so called justice in this country.
Just one of the comments regarding this article in the Mail.
A seventeen year old thug beats up a fifteen year using his victims own crutches and the CPS have stated that prosecuting the thug is not in the public interest.
How can this be ?
We the public want these thugs removed from the streets.
We the public want to be able to walk the streets without the risk of un-provoked attack.
We the public want our police to have the support of the CPS, to not feel that their efforts are to no avail.
We the public want our justice system to start clamping down on the thugs that plague our streets.
And most of all, we the public, want justice for the victims of crime.
15 year old Angus Whittall needed 12 stitches for a gash in his mouth and suffered severe bruising to his head and neck.
The thug that caused these injuries just gets a wrist slap, a “final warning”. The implication there is that he has done this before. He is still out on the streets and able to do this again.
The law is pathetic.
The CPS has too often let the public down, has let the police down and most of all they have let down Angus Whittall and his family.
Between 1941 and 1945 British warships escorted 78 convoys carrying thousands of aircraft, anti-aircraft guns, trucks and tanks, fuel, food, tools and other vital supplies through the Barents Sea to the Russian ports of Murmansk and Archangel in a voyage Winston Churchill described as ‘the worst journey in the world.’
The Foreign Office has blocked plans by the Russian government to honour Arctic Convoy veterans with a medal for valour.
Commander Eddie Grenfell at The Royal Naval War Memorial on Southsea Common Picture: Malcolm Wells (112873-1909) Ref The News
The convoys kept Russia supplied to keep fighting the Nazis on Germany’s eastern front, and have been credited with ensuring Hitler did not triumph.
But while the Ushakov medal has been handed to veterans from Australia, Canada and the United States for their role in the convoys, the British government is refusing to allow it to be given to British veterans.
Ushakov Medal
Apparently “rules are rules”
Under UK law, citizens are allowed to receive foreign medals and awards only if the British government gives them permission, and only if the award relates to the recipient’s activities within past five years.
A spokesman for the Foreign Office said: ‘The rules on the acceptance of foreign awards state that for permission to be given for an award to be accepted, there has to have been specific service to the country concerned and that service should have taken place within the previous five years.
‘Additionally, permission cannot be granted if they have received, or are expected to receive, a UK award for the same services.
‘All British Veterans of the Convoys were eligible for the World War Two Atlantic Star. Additionally, a lapel badge (the Arctic Emblem) was introduced in 2006 and some 10,000 have been issued.’
This unbelievable, bureaucracy gone mad and it is a slap in the face for the veterans.
It is time that the faceless civil servants in Whitehall woke up and its time that our government stopped dithering with regard to recognising the exploits of our servicemen.
How can there ever be a time limit on recognising the sacrifices our servicemen make.
For once I am in complete agreement with Mike Hancock. He said
‘It is absolutely ridiculous and shameless. This country can’t even give them the medal but we can stop them from getting a medal from the people they went to help. It’s an absolute disgrace on his (Hague’s) part and it’s a slur on this country.
It seems that our government can waive this rule when it suits them which makes this decision much more of a slap in the face for the arctic veterans.
Veterans of a conflict in Malaysia in the 1960s were allowed to wear the Pingat Jasa Malaysia Medal, given to them by the Malaysian government in recognition of their service.
Not only was that conflict 50 years ago, but the veterans of it had also previously been given a medal from the British government.
A spokesman for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office accepted the rules had been waived once, but said that it had to treat all World War Two veterans the same or else be faced with thousands of medal requests.
Seems all the civil servants are worried about is a sudden increase in their workload.
Despicable.
It is time to get a sense of perspective and give these folks the medal they deserve.
The greatest joy in the life of animal enthusiast David Brown was the wild habitat he owned opposite his cottage that was home to foxes, badgers, hedgehogs and squirrels.
So when he wrote his will, Mr Brown chose to leave his property to the RSPCA – a charity he trusted.
But the RSPCA repaid his trust by selling the land to property developers, and last week, to the horror of his former neighbours, the habitat was flattened – in just 12 hours.
Legally they may not be bound by David Browns “wishes” but morally they were.
From the RSPCAs own website
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals – the UK’s leading animal welfare charity. We rescue, rehabilitate and rehome hundreds of thousands of animals each year. We offer advice on caring for all animals and campaign to change laws that will protect them, which we will enforce through prosecution.
The cynical amongst us may believe that people at the RSPCA are motivated by self-interest, that the officers of the RSPCA saw this bequest as a way in which they could help safeguard their inflated salaries.
The cynical amongst us will also be distrustful of the RSPCA since they do not seem to exhibit either sincerity or integrity when they have quite blatantly diverted from their stated intent.
And in their own name ..
Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
How cruel was it to clear this site and deprive the many creatures of their homes and habitat.
I believe the RSPCA have been hugely disrespectful to David Brown and have damaged their own reputation.
The continuing saga of the shall we / shan’t we defense plan.
Apparently this is the plane that the Labour government had ordered but was rejected by the current government. Now, it appears, they have changed their minds on discovering the mind-boggling costs of installing a catapult system to our new carriers.
Personally, I think I would be doing some serious auditing of the costs being put forward here.
A whole carrier can be built for £5.2bn but just one catapult system fitted to one ship will cost £1.8bn !!!
I believe that the shilly-shallying of successive governments has brought the defence of this once great nation to its knees. Yet the government is still committing the support of our forces without the relevent infrastructure being in place.
This is akin to writing cheques on an empty account.
Defence of the nation, protection of the oppressed is not cheap. Face up to it and get on with the job.
Or else, let’s forget about colonialism, worldwide policing, protection of the oppressed and let’s declare ourselves neutral and rely on other nations to protect us.
Carillion are making money hand over fist with the contract that they negotiated with the QA authorities. I was told that the money they collect doesn’t even go into the hospital coffers, is just a contributor to Carillions £212m profits for 2011.
If that is true then it is obscene.
We, the great British taxpayer, who fund the NHS in general and the QA in particular. Most people don’t visit a hospital out of choice. It is usually because we have a health problem or to visit a friend or relative who has a health problem. Yet when we do have to visit a hospital we are fleeced.
Only this week I was talking with a neighbour, whose wife had been in the QA for six weeks pneumonia. He was paying over £8 pounds a day in parking charges.
That is criminal.
My wife works at the QA and she cannot afford to park on site as the parking charges exceed her pay which is why I take her to and from work each day. Yes she can use the staff Park and Ride but the car park on the hill is not very nice, especially during the winter when the paths and steps are icy.
Over the last couple of years the media has been full of stories that indicate just how little the people of this country seem to care about the elderly and infirm. And for those that do care there is the feeling that the authorities cannot be trusted.
Here is an article that seems to promote that view, that once folk take the decision to move into care homes, they have no guarantee that the expected support services will continue. Even if they have signed contracts. This seems to be the experience of Paul Bayliss-Marten
Under the terms of his tenancy – and that of those in the other 69 flats in The Lodge, Lavender Road, Waterlooville – a warden was available from 9am to 9pm.
But that has been suddenly taken away by housing association Guinness Care and Support leaving Mr Bayliss-Marten, 61, with an alarm cord to pull if he gets into trouble.
Guinness announced last month that from April the daytime warden would be replaced by a mobile team during the day which responds when the alarm cord is pulled.
Question:
What happens when the “mobile team” is off-site ?
How will a resident have to wait for the “mobile team” compared to waiting for an on-site warden ?
The casual observer has to ask who is looking after the rights of these folk. Well one organisation, Age Concern (now part of Age UK) had this to say
Chris Perry, director of Age Concern Hampshire, said such changes are on the increase.
He added: ‘Many people take tenancies out on the understanding there is going to be a resident warden.
‘I can understand their concerns but equally from the point of view of the housing association I can understand they can’t have someone on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week.’
Well that’s a nice balanced view but it doesn’t address the underlying problem that these folks have a tenancy agreement which provides for a Warden to be available from 9am to 9pm.
Due to mismanagement by both the previous and current governments, we have witnessed the systematic reduction of our military to a second-rate force on the world stage.
Now they, our current government, are demonstrating that they are hell-bent on delivering second-rate aircraft to the Royal Navy. These aircraft are to be used on the yet to be completed aircraft carriers.
Defence secretary Philip Hammond is expected to announce the UK will revert back to the jump-jet F-35B version of the US-built F-35 planes as opposed to the carrier variant F-35C which was the preferred option in the 2010 defence review.
In 2010, the government said Labour’s original choice of the F-35Bs was an ‘error’ it was ‘determined’ to rectify.
But it now appears the navy will have the shorter-range and less capable aircraft after all.
Why did our government not pay heed to their advisors that were clamoring to keep our carriers at sea using the Harriers as a stop-gap until we actually had a working fleet ?
WrAnTz 