UK Column News Podcast 23rd April 2025

Good afternoon. It's Wednesday the 23rd of April 2025, just after 1:00. Welcome to UK column News. I'm your host, Mike Robinson. Joining me in the studio today is Charles Mallard. Welcome to the programme, Charles. Thank you, Mike. And by video link, we have Vanessa Bailey and Sandy Adams. Now later in the programme, we're going to be covering Israel and Syria, Digital ID and Starling, but we're going to begin today with government borrowing.

Uh, because, uh, in March 2025, the figures were just out, uh, today, uh, the Starmer regime spent more than it received in taxes and other income, uh, and as a result it borrowed £16.4 billion. And that was £2.8 billion more in March 2024, sorry, than in March 2024. And that is roughly 5.3% of GDP. Now, March 2025, if we just put this on screen, March 2025 was the third highest March

borrowing on record. And the next two highest marches were March 2021 and March 2023. So in the last financial year then the public sector borrowed £151.9 billion, as I say, the third highest borrowing in any financial year on record. And the reason? Well they say it's on spending, spending on public services, benefits and debt interest. And all of those increased when compared with last year. But of course debt to GDP is still around the 100% level.

When we look at historically, we see that actually we're really staying levels of jet debt to GDP that we haven't seen since we were coming out of the Second World War and paying down the debt from the from the two world wars and during the 20th century. It is quite incredible how particularly since the financial crisis crash of 2000 and seven, 2008, it has just gone through the roof and it's got nothing to do with particularly with party politics.

And in the meantime, M2 money supply and all the various quantitative easing funds are increasing massively. Sorry. But before we get to that, we've got the projection from the OBR, the Office of Budget Responsibility for the future. And as you can see, we're really only at the beginning of this massive debt cycle at the moment. So just getting started. The question then is why and what is this money being spent

on? As I say, the the British government claiming that it's on benefits and other things. But of course, war spending is increasing, an increasing reason for the rises. And of course, Putin is the excuse. The rhetoric just doesn't change. They repeat themselves ad nauseam. Here's part of John Healey's comments to the House of Commons yesterday.

And despite President Putin's promise of a 38 hour pause in fighting, I can confirm that defence intelligence have found that I quote no indication that a ceasefire on the front line was observed over the Easter period. And 10,000 missiles and drones have been fired into Ukraine during this year alone, including from the Black Sea. So while Putin has said he declared an Easter truce, he broke it. While Putin says he wants peace,

he's rejected a full ceasefire. And while Putin, Putin says he wants to put an end to the fighting, he continues to play for time in the negotiations. I mean, what can we say about that? Look, the the Trump effect is also part of this. And although the the spending on war has been increasing for a couple of years, it's accelerating now. And this of course is because of concerns over reliance on US support.

BAE Systems has announced that they are that they sorry, what they describe as a, a major breakthrough in UK munitions production. They're going to deliver a 16 fold increase in the productive capacity of 155 millimetre artillery shells. And this is when it's new explosive filling factory. This is where they fill the, the missiles is, is going to open in South Wales in the summer. So, uh, well, that's all good stuff. And of course that's because we have basically used everything

in Ukraine already. But in the meantime, HMS Prince of Wales, one of our illustrious aircraft carrier, uh, carriers went to sea yesterday. It was followed out of harbour a few hours later by the destroyer HMS Daubless. And also part of what they're describing here as a a carrier strike group is the Plymouth based frigate HMS Richmond.

And this is the start, they say, of an 8 month mission to demonstrate UK and Allied collective resolve and determination to contain security and freedom in the Atlantic and the Pacific. Would you believe that? Not really, no. Between now and December, they say, the carrier strike group will conduct a series of exercises and operations with air, sea and land forces of the dozen allies in the Mediterranean, in Middle East, Southeast Asia, Japan and Australia.

And this is apparently going to demonstrate the UK's ability to operate fast jets at sea. So that's exciting. And this is the second deployment of the U KS carrier strike group. I'm sure you've forgotten the first one because that happened in the middle of the pandemic,

the so called pandemic. And but this particular mission that starts yesterday, they're calling operation high Mast and they say that it's occurring with a changed world order and even more volatile geopolitical situation. So, well, there we go. Look, I think we need to get a grip on regime spending in the UK. Stopping the war narrative would be a great start. Massively downsizing government would be another step in the

right direction. But just to to end this segment, I want to get a brief comment from Vanessa on this. I wanted to highlight this pretty obscene tweet from David Lammy, the foreign secretary. He's saying that children should never be part of that, should never be the pawns of war. In 2024, I spoke to Ukrainian children who'd been forcibly deported by Russia but were later returned to their families. For the British government to accuse any other country of stealing children is

unbelievable hypocrisy. Lammy even acknowledges in that tweet that Putin was giving the children back. But how many children does the British government give back once it grabs? Not very many. In fact, none probably be a more accurate answer. But Vanessa, what are your thoughts or your comments on that statement from Lammy? Well, I think this refers to the Ukrainian children that were taken from the areas now under the control of Russia, in Donetsk and Lufansk.

Children that I saw at the end of 2022 when I visited eastern Russia, where many of them were living in really good refugee centres, holiday camps, with their parents or without them, with families with psychological care, food, schooling, education, until they could be returned safely, as Lammy has actually admitted to their parents once the Ukrainian forces that Lammy was supporting stopped bombing them. So yes, total hypocrisy. Yeah, absolutely. But let's let's stick with Lammy then.

Yeah, I'm afraid so. But not directly, fortunately.

But the the protracted wrangling over the apparent pursuit of peace in Ukraine continues, despite the latest efforts in London being apparently snubbed by Marco Rubio, the American Secretary of State. Both he and David Lammy have taken to Twitter to put a positive spin on it, as though to suggest that there may really be a desire for peace and not an intentional prolonging of the conflict in order to extract the maximum benefit for the bankers and those with a hand in the

reconstruction game. Now Ukraine and the United States have signed, in principle, an agreement which will tie together the plundering of the country via the of its minerals and its opening up to globalist corporations. Somewhat discordantly, the Ministry of Defence has just announced a new capability which at just 10 PA pop will be able to deal, so they say, with the future drone threat, or specifically a drone swarm. This is how they're describing the latest directed energy weapon.

A radio frequency directed energy weapon really comes into its own in being able to reach out and shut down electronics at range. An RF weapon is using radio frequency energy to get into that target and disrupt or damage its components directly. It is able to interact with the target instantaneously and then leave a lasting effect. The kind of weapon system that this project enables us to work

towards. It's about equipping us for tomorrow's threats and just how effective it will actually be and how it compares with the similar systems elsewhere remains to be seen. But this should certainly be seen in the context of the Carrier Strike Group departure from Portsmouth, which Mike has just been talking about. And last year we reported on the progress of the consortium LED Dragon Fire System, also a directed energy weapon, which was talked up as being a potent piece in the armoury.

What appears to set this latest drone swarm countermeasure apart is that it's being described as bolstering the government's approach to national security under the plan for change. There's no articulation of where the threat by drone comes from, but as the war rhetoric abates where Russia is concerned, government has switched fire to Iran, consistently reported as being a supplier of drones to the Russians. My apologies, I've gone on too far.

There is no shortage of material online to suggest that Iran really does present a credible threat in this regard. And this is fuel to the fire concerning the narrative surrounding the imminent danger that the UK faces from that country. And not only is Iran reported to have a substantial drone warfare capability, but it's believed to have countermeasures in this case built and supplied by a

Chinese company. Now, whether or not this latest bit of kit will be or is already a part of the Carrier Strike Group deployment, not clear. The government's announcement about the Director of Energy Weapons states that it is in response to the changing nature of war. However, as this graphic from the Kiev Independent shows, the

nature of war never changes. Spoils to the victor and the only thing not quite clear at the moment is exactly who the victor will be. It just seems unlikely to be the Ukrainian people. Indeed, Vanessa, let's come to

you then. And, well, we're moving to Israel, but perhaps not a topic that or an aspect of the Israeli conflict that people will be expecting. Yeah, it's very much an aspect of Israeli society. This was a report that was published only a few days ago actually in Hebrew Major in Israel Hayom. I've effectively paraphrased it and and reviewed it, but my sub stacks of people can read further details their goals. Raped in ritual ceremonies reveal the horrors.

Investigative report by Israel Haim. I'll just take one of the testimonies that was contained within the report. This is from someone. All of the testimonials were given a pseudonym to obviously protect their identity. They're mostly talking about religious ritual, ceremonial mass rape of children. And she says it's always a dark place. There are between 6:00 and 9:00 men there. They tie me to a bed, stand in a circle, mumble prayers or blessings. And there is a rabbi who always

leads the ceremony. There's a ceremony and every one of them rapes me. So this is considered to be very prevalent in the ultra Orthodox Jewish circles. Back in 2013, New York, Rabbi Rosenberg also talked about child rape assembly line. So it's not something new. And also recently in the last few days, there has been a video put out by Shoshanna Strook. If I can just have the tweets up. Thank you.

Who's the daughter of the Israeli settlements minister or it struck who You can see in the photograph there who in the video is talking about taking out legal proceedings against her family, including her brother, who when she was a child raped her repeatedly, filmed it and then circulated the video. So as I said this, this is not something new in Israel and all of the reports that I'm basing my account upon, our Israeli reports.

And so this is taken from 2012. This was also relating to the Haredi community, the ultra Orthodox community in Israel itself, talking about a paedophile ring. Within that community, he masterminded systematic rape of over 100 kids. The Nalawat community reels from the largest paedophile abuse case in the nation's history. At least three of the 10 suspects remain free.

And it's also worth mentioning that 80% of the cases that are brought to the attention of the police and the and the legal system in Israel are not finally prosecuted. 60% of those that are consist of abuse by female and male against children under the age of 13. This was a report more recently, I think it's 2022 in Jerusalem. Post 10s of thousands of paedophiles operate in Israel every year. There are multiple reports. If if you put in a Google

search, you will find many more. I've just taken some of the most high profile to demonstrate what I'm talking about. And if we look at the legal failures, this is from an NGO, Humanium. We put out an article October 2024. Failures in Israel's legal system, particularly around paedophilia offenders, exploit Israel's law of return to evade consequences in other countries.

And this is where the abuse of Israel's law of return, which basically affords citizenship to anyone who, who either converts to Judaism or is already Jewish, they can immediately be given refuge in Israel, regardless of whether they have paedophile or child abuse or rape allegations facing them where they are, including high profile Hollywood, Hollywood film makers. And then of course, we have to relate this to what's going on by the Zionist forces against

Palestinians in custody. This is a report again, another recent one by the OCHR, Israel's escalating use of torture against Palestinians in custody, a preventable crime against humanity, UN experts and let's have a look at one section of

that report. Countless testimonies by men and women speak of detainees in cage like enclosures, tied to beds, blindfolded and in diapers, stripped naked, deprived of adequate healthcare, food, water and sleep, electrocutions including on their genitals, blackmail and cigarette burns. In addition, victims spoke of loud music played until their ears bled, attacks by dogs, waterboarding, suspension from ceilings and severe sexual and gender based violence.

And that includes mass rape of children. There is again extensive witness testimony of that also by female guards in the in the Zionist prisons. And of course, we have the very recent case of the sodomization of Palestinian prisoners at state a man, one of the most notorious prisons in Israel. But coming again to a more recent case, this is an Israeli CEO of a cybersecurity company, Itai Levi, who has been arrested for sexually assaulting at least five children under the age of four.

Now, again, this hasn't been reported, of course, in mainstream media. It's been picked up by Middle Eastern media, some Turkish media and also on social media. So this is by suppressed news. Israeli cyber CEO arrested for sexual abuse of five children under the age of 4. Itai Levy. He's the COCEO of the cyber firm Cornelius. This is actually spelt wrong in in the tweet and he's an Israeli resident.

The investigation began after a child under the age of 4 signal to his parents that he had been and following a forensic interview. Police search Levy's electronic devices and uncovered hundreds of disturbing files, including child pornography and images of abuse. Authorities suspect at least 5 victims or under the age of 4.

The investigation is ongoing and I just want to have a look because we've been talking about the Zionist infiltration into all sectors of society in the West, but particularly in the UK and the US and the EU. So what is Cardinalios, the company that ATI Itai Levy founded and he was formerly the CEO. His name has now been removed

from the website. It is a cyber security outfit that was founded back in 2014. It doesn't yet to my knowledge have operations in the UK, but it does have operations in the US in California and in New York, in Moldova and Poland. I then went to Itai Levy's LinkedIn profile and there are quite clearly says he was the Co founder and he is the CEO of Cornelius. And if we have a look at his actual resume on LinkedIn, this is where it becomes quite extraordinary. So he's not some low profile

cybersecurity founder. He worked extensively with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs providing again, cyber and information security. And he was a a network engineers, He worked as a representative in Toronto, Canada. And of course he served with the Israeli offence Forces. So again, you know, the, the, the, what is happening here is what we're seeing is something that is now coming to the surface, but in my opinion has been prevalent in Israeli society for decades, if not

longer. And not only in Israeli society. It has been picked up in America and even in the UK. Back in 2023 Yuval Karen who was a high profile rabbi with one of the progressive synagogues, Southgate Progressive, was picked up and received a suspended sentence for having 1694 indecent images of children on his electronic devices. 189 were category A which means extreme child abuse. Again, very influential person in in the Zionist movement in the UK and also we shouldn't remain.

We shouldn't forget Labour peer and MP Greville Jenna. Who faced allegations of 33 cases of child abuse was investigated under the independent child abuse Investigation and those were children of course under his care in the care homes in Leicestershire. He was again a very high profile figure in the Zionist movement in the UK who died before he could be successfully

prosecuted. He also apparently developed dementia which prevented him being fully prosecuted for the crimes he was accused of. So I, I think what I'm trying to say here is when we're looking at the infiltration of all sectors across UK society, whether it's health, surveillance, cyber education, are we also not only absorbing members of, for example, Unit 8200, but are we also absorbing very questionable individuals who potentially have crimes in,

in their background of child abuse, rape, sexual harassment, which is something that largely goes unpunished in Israel, which is known and is recognised as a haven for paedophiles. Any thoughts? Well, I mean shock mostly. I mean it's well, very well articulated when I said but but extremely disturbing and and you know, as we see there, we see here exactly the same. I mean, like you described with the the judiciary just turning as much of A blind eye as they

possibly can. And particularly with the sentencing. I mean, you know, what you describe most obvious recent example, I suppose is Hugh Edwards. But but absolutely not dealing with it. I mean perpetuating it. Yeah, 100%. And it is something which is right at the core of many societies, not just in Israel but in the UK as well, Vanessa. So this is something that we have to face and and recognise and deal with. But we'll be, we'll talk about that much more, an extra, I'm

quite sure. So Sandy, let's come to you now

and back to the UK. And we've been hearing about levelling up for a very long time. The government, of course, would like to convince us that this is about lifting the standards of the poorest in the country. My personal view is quite the contrary. It's about lowering the standards and destroying the middle class in a sense, in many ways. But what are your thoughts on what's actually behind the

levelling up agenda? Yeah, I mean, I, I got into this really because I was looking last week at the Freeport and that is all part of the levelling up agenda, so they say. And I see it as something very different. And it's interesting how they, they, the narrative of, of levelling up is really about equalising certain areas of, of, of, of, of the UK from the poorest areas to the richest areas and just sometimes somehow

making that equitable. But actually, you know, this isn't really, umm, you know, I was looking at the levelling up and regeneration Bill. And in that, in that bill, they, they have, umm, I think it's, it's, it's 12, umm, 12 different, different, uh, I suppose they call them, uh, their, their missions, mission statements of, of, of how they're going to level it all up.

And there's productivity is increased research and development, public transport, broadband, AI, education, gap skills training, all these things that sound very, very worthy. And, and actually, you know, they, they use it really as a, as, as a way of, of, of making it sound like an inclusive and non partisan, you know,

wonderful thing. But actually it's really a strategy that reframes decades of de industrialisation and austerity and regional neglect and, and, and use it really as a, as a way of, of, of, of calling it benevolent intervention. And we know it's not. So I, I was looking at these, these missions and how the office of, of government have criticised it really, because they, they've actually said that, I mean, it was brought in really by Boris Johnson in 2022. The, the, the whole thing.

And he, obviously this current government is still promoting it. And there are 5, there's various ways that the, the government of the Institute of Government have have said that this isn't working. You know, this is, this is rubbish. And they've said, you know, the missions are not ambitious enough. They, you know, they're, they're too ambitious to be realistic and they've managed somehow to put into this whole thing, uh, almost like a get out clause.

If it's too difficult for them, uh, then they can, they can actually reframe it and even get rid of it. So I'm wondering, is it all just something that they've presented to bring in the corporatisation of these free ports, these free zones so that they can have these big corporate entities controlling these free zones without any, any worry about taxation or, or, or they've got free imports and exports from

these zones. And it, it really is, it does look as though it's some kind of cover up really. They're, they're presenting it as something that's really wonderful for the people. But actually, you know, these, uh, the criticisms of the, of, of the, the, the, uh, institute of government, uh, they've got about 5 criticisms of them.

So you just wonder what, what is really going on here And, and even, umm, some of the MPs, and I think it was Lisa Nandy said this gives the government permission to tear up their missions on a whim. The bill is more aimed at dealing with housing and planning than it does on

levelling up and democracy. And then we've also got Patricia Gibson, she's an SNP politician and she said the government have given themselves the power to move the goal posts and to change targets that look as though they can't be met. And that's absolutely true. And then you've got a lady from the House of Lords, Baroness Sue Heyman.

And she said it's a, it's a strange mishmash, a Christmas tree bill, that one can hang anyone, anything on it, you know, and you can actually hang anything on this, this bill. So it, you realise then that actually it, it's all about corporate governance and replacing government with private corporations. And, and that's really the, the be all and end all. And I looked quite deeply into into these. Obviously we've, we've got the, the, the free ports and the free zones here.

I think we've got, we've got a map of the free ports which and the free, the free zones and the free ports. And I was just looking at all the companies that are going into these these areas. And of course it's all green technology. It's all green tech. You know, these free ports have been taken over to have literally every all, all power to do whatever they like in

these areas. And you know, we've got Murray, which is Murray UK, which is the one in Plymouth, which is all about underwater AI systems and marine systems. And it's all it's in, it's in partnership with with Plymouth, the university. And then we've got Pensana on Humberside, which is mining rare earth. It's a rare earth processing plant for EV batteries and AI

technology. And we've also got SEAHI don't know how you pronounce all that, but it's it's making wind turbines and and that's owned by the Chinese along with British steel, which I believe is Co owned by the Chinese anyway. And then we've got Teesside. Teesside works and they're, they're building net 0 power and northern. I think it's endurance partnership. So all of this is really about bringing in, um, technocratic

governance. It's and and, and built and, and, and building up that, you know, hollowing out Britain and using all this using all this green tech which is going, which is failing anyway. Nobody's buying EV batteries. So where is this? What is the whole thing with this? Is it just control of the ports? But they seem to be using these big, big corporations And I, I really feel that Britain, it's, it's bargain Bates and Britain,

it's up for the highest bidder. Whatever millionaire wants to come in and buy up and use this these these free zones can come in and literally anything can go through those ports. And that's what I'm particularly worried about. These levelling up white papers are closely tied to free ports and investment zones, which are effectively special economic zones with reduced regulation, tax breaks and often outsourced

governance. You know, they can become private enclaves of corporate control and they undermine national sovereignty, labour rights and environmental protections under the guise of growth. So we've got all of this going on and you know, the, the levelling up, it's a velvet glove really on. It's an iron fist of centralised technocratic transformation. It cloaks economic zoning, data driven governance.

And it really, you know, it's using the language of fairness and, and, and opportunity, which it's not, it's, it's not what it says it is. And at the end of the day, we've, we've really got to think about what, what this really means. It's not about lifting people out of poverty. It's it's more about lifting control and out of parliament and local democracy and placing it in the hands of central planners and global finance and

technocrats. So there's an awful lot about housing with all of this, you know, and particularly in, in, in areas that are deprived and they're saying, Oh yes, this is gentrification, this is making it all good. But this is all tied up also with, with, with other programmes that are going on. I mean, the, the housing is out of control and they're allowed to have free, free access to planning and free access to police and crime commissioning.

So all of that is being taken away from Westminster. And again, it's all part of devolution to take this all out of Westminster and put it in the hands of private corporations. Deeply disturbing. So I think that's probably about it, but I'm just deeply concerned about all of this. It's it is a a recipe for disaster and it takes away national sovereignty and puts it in the hands of private corporate billionaires. Thank you, Sandy. OK, if you like what the UK column does, you'd like to

support us, support.ukcolumn.org is the place to go. There are options to help us out there. You can make a donation. Remember, if you do do that, that absolutely helps us, but it doesn't give you access to UK column News Extra if you, if you want that, you need to take out a monthly membership and you can, or an annual membership or

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Share links are provided, but of course, share on other platforms as well if you possibly can. And that helps us deal with the censorship regime that we are operating under at the moment. Now tomorrow at 1:00 PM, Dan Rasmussen Mccarry will be speaking to Professor Dennis Hayes.

And Professor Hayes is director of academics for Academic Freedom. He's a visiting professor at the University of Buckingham and emeritus professor of education at the University of Derby. And they are looking deeply into the situation in Britain's universities and freedom of speech issues and these types of things. So join us at 1:00 PM tomorrow for that. A reminder that a couple of previous interviews here that are now on the UK Column website.

Nigel Farage and the destructive Toryisation of Reform UK.

This is Job W, who I believe South Derbyshire was, was working for Reform but resigned sometime a couple few weeks ago to quite a bit of controversial comments about Nigel Farage and what he's doing with Reform. And I think if you watch this video, this interview that Brian hosted, you'll find that actually it's a bit of a modus operandi for, for, for Nigel Farage. He's been doing this going back to the very beginning of his leadership of UKIP, for example.

Exactly the same types of tactics keep people diverted, stolen by the state. We were talking about the UK government stealing children from families. We have yet another interview covering this. Have a look at that on the UK column website now. Stand on the Light is taking place in May in Cumbria. Details on screen details will be in the show notes. If you can possibly get along to that, if you're north north of England or want to travel further afield, there's lots

going on there. Are we attending? We are. We absolutely are. So we'll see you there. OK, fantastic. Sandy, briefly dissident, meet up in the Southwest. Yes, we've got the the dissident meeting. This is really about questioning about whether whether to pay your taxes or not because we're living in such an undemocratic society. And where is our money going?

And bearing in mind we, we are living at the moment with, with we don't know, you know, our, our, is our money going to, to fund wars, you know, these, these wars abroad. And so we're, we're having this tax rebellion. I'm going to be speaking about devolution because we've had no say in devolution at all. I mean, it hasn't really been to, to put all of our hands into the, into these Mayors for Climate Change and, and to have them in our regional assemblies

now. I think it's, it's just appalling because their, their main thing will be net zero. And we, we don't have any choice. We don't want this. That's it. So we're going to be there. I'm going to be there. Thank you. Brilliant. And that's on Sunday, the 27th of April in Exeter's. Details will be in the show notes.

Vanessa, let's come back to you then. And what's the latest in Syria? Well, one of the latest stories in Syria. Of course, the whole situation's incredibly complex and I think you and I will be talking about that very soon on another podcast.

But this is about the fact that of course we've always reported at UK column and I have consistently reported that Israel since 2011 has been supportive of the various armed groups, including Al Qaeda and ISIS in Syria to overthrow the former Syrian government and leadership.

And here we have further proof of that just prior to the attack on Aleppo. The Jolani forces were talking about normalisation with Israel as as one of the conditions that they be allowed to advanced as quickly as they did. Very recently, Jolani meets with Israeli puppet Mahmoud Abbas, who is the leader of the Palestinian state in the occupied territories, but is also responsible for many of the reprisals against the actual Palestinian resistance in the

occupied territories. But interestingly, very recently, I think in the last two days, there were two US Congress members who paid what is being termed as an unofficial visit to Syria as the US mulls sanctions relief. Sanctions, of course, that were imposed as a collective punishment on all the Syrian people, while being described as targeting only the Syrian leadership.

So to US lawmakers, Marlon Stutzman, Republican congressman from Indiana, and Corey Mills from Florida, also Republican, came to Syria and met with Jelani. You of course, may well know him better as Ahmed al Chara. That's his rebranding to try and avoid the labelling of him as leader and founder of al Qaeda in Syria and of course, for the terrorist crimes that he committed and is continuing to commit against the Syrian people. So let's have a listen to what Cory Mills said in an interview

with Arabic media. I think it was actually during his visit to Damascus. Let's have a listen. Having share a border with one another, it's important for Syria and Israel to have strong relationships. I think that the president and the leadership has demonstrated their willingness to work with Israel as they looked at preventing Hashar Shabi from transitioning weapons out of Iraq, through Syria and into Lebanon.

I think that, you know, the president, the president's been very clear that he looks to establish and maintain a strong relationship, that he wants to be a good neighbour. And so I think that this is very re encouraging for the American people and for the American president who put in place the historic and monumental Abraham Accords.

And so I think that looking forward at a strong Israel and Syrian relationship, looking forward with a strong Iraq Syrian relationship, as well As for that in the West is really key. But the message that I heard from the foreign affairs minister as well As for the president is that they look forward to developing and

building strong allies. They look forward to try and partner with the West and that they're not going to allow this to be a safe haven of terrorism for the Iranian regime or a proxy state. But of course, it is a haven for Al Qaeda that is continuing to commit genocide against Syrian minorities. Not only the minorities, even the Sunni Muslim communities, that is the majority in Syria is coming under attack now, particularly if they protect the

Syrian minorities. But what is interesting is that what it became very obvious, these are the conditions for lifting the sanctions on Syria. So they're the conditions that Jolani has to meet, which is effectively normalisation with Israel under the Abraham Accords, which of course were put in place by Jared Kushner, Trumps son in law back during Trump's first administration. And what happened immediately after the visit of Corey Mills and Marlin Stutzman?

Syrian security forces, meaning Al Qaeda rebrands detained Palestinian resistance leaders. They actually arrested leaders of Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the and the Kurds brigades. Now, previously, Jelani had also disarmed and dissolved. All of the Palestinian armed forces in Syria, including the Liwa Al Quds, which were actually part of the Syrian Arab Army itself, and closed all the office offices of the

Palestinian resistance factions. He basically rescinded Palestinian citizenship and basically converted them back into being refugees, something that Syria was always against. He disclosed the positions of Palestinian leaders for targeting by Israel since December 2024, imprisoned resistance fighters. And of course, this is while Israel is conducting ongoing assassinations of resistance leaders in Lebanon, Lebanon, sorry, and Palestine.

So effectively, it's becoming very clear that Gilani, if he wasn't before, is rapidly becoming a stooge for Israel in Syria. Thank you, Vanessa and Charles. Sticking with international affairs, what's Elon Musk been up to in South Africa? That's quite well.

As reported on back in January, the controversy surrounding Elon Musk's Starlink and a place at the table in South Africa rumbles on. Shown here on the map, South Africa in a darker shade, suggesting that it doesn't yet have Starlink. But the question I concluded the report by asking was whether a country does actually want to grant Starlink effective control of almost all communications and, of course, access to all of the data passing back and forth.

South Africa, for now, does not, though this seems to be an inadvertent consequence of its black economic empowerment laws, upheld by the Independent Communications Authority, which prohibits a business from operating in the country unless it is owned to at least 30% by black South Africans. Now Musk is South African by birth, but as he points out on his own messaging service Twitter, he is the wrong colour.

Now the the leaver Musk has attempted to use is the introduction of a Tesla manufacturing plant, apparently bringing prosperity to the country, which for a start is a highly questionable form of incentive. But as an aside, though the Tesla price is widely reported to have dropped fairly sharply in recent months, it's worth pointing out that Musk has not lost his flair for opportunism, and that hitching his waggon to the Trump pony has overall been

very much to his gain. The the mainstream narrative posits that the exclusion of South Africa, or indeed any part of Africa, is is widening what's referred to as the digital divide. And this is what Musk himself says about the importance of foisting the Internet on the entire continent. I, I do think Africa has a lot of potential. And, you know, and I think one of the, the things holding Africa back has been lack of Internet connectivity, which is what Starlink is helping to

solve. You know, with that, people can learn anything and, and, and be sort of part of the global culture. Whereas if you're, if you're not connected, then you're, yeah, I mean, all you can do is like write letters or something. So. So connectivity is essential for Africa and other places to be part of the global culture and participate in AI and other activities. There we have it.

A man in charge of far too much dismissing all previous life on earth which apparently couldn't learn anything and couldn't, sorry, could only write letters because they weren't connected to the Internet. The reason this is relevant is not so much because of the specific outcome for South Africa, but rather because it shows how these projects are designed and funded and pushed out for the benefit of everyone

except the end user. Specifically, this goes back many years and this particular initiative for Africa was well documented in 2017 at the World Economic Forum meeting in Kigali, a place that their global shapers got to work on controlling Africa. And we now listen to Janet Longmore of the Digital Opportunity Trust and what she said about connecting Africa to the Internet.

Dot has a 14 year track record of mobilising the talent of tech savvy young women and men and deploying them to their home communities to build digital literacy skills amongst their peers. And under the Northern Corridor Pilot Initiative, we've partnered with the Government of Rwanda for a very innovative, ambitious programme that we are bringing to this initiative as well. It is called the Digital Ambassadors Programme.

And imagine in your mind thousands of very tech savvy, talented young women and men who will be deployed to their home communities to build digital literacy skills amongst the people. The the core essence of this is a broad collaboration, private sector, international private sector, the government and civil society as strong implementers. The government has vested it in their digital talent policy so it is approved and moving forward.

And the other core essence is reaching and understanding the needs of the user. So women in marginalised communities, people in villages, why are they not connected? And what we have learned and what young people know is unless digital skills are relevant in a local context, people are not going to ick U because it's a high value proposition for them. The very definition of a public private partnership, the DOT.

The Digital Opportunity Trust is but one of many organisations channelling funding from corporations and philanthropists into these sorts of initiatives. And I think it should be noted that she makes no mention of anything else that remote communities in Africa might need rather more than the Internet, like water or food or even electricity. And it's this tone deafness that exposes the motivation for such

a thing in the 1st place. The only reason for wanting to connect all the the people of Africa to the Internet, or indeed anywhere else, is to attempt to take control of their lives and to extract as much capital from them as possible. And this modus operandi is exactly the same as that employed by the Pharmaceutical industry, which has been training up and deploying locals into the communities in order to convince people that they need something which in fact they do

not. And though this has been in the pipeline for a long time, Africa does still have a limited opportunity to attempt to resist this particular invasion. And in this case, the South African situation may be considered as a bellwether. I think 1 to watch in any case. And I think that probably leads us on into. Digital idea. And so you know, we're going to

start off, I'm going to apologise in advance for this. We're going to start off with remarks that were made at the Times Crime and Justice Commission launch event which took place last week because war criminal alleged Tony Blair presented his case for digital ID system that he claims is going to save the UK £2 billion per year. Let's have a listen to some of what he said. We cannot continue with business as usual and change is inevitable. This is where technology like

digital ID becomes critical. My institute's own analysis shows that introducing this in the UK would save at least 2 billion a year, and likely more, by reducing losses to fraud improving. Tax collection and better targeting of state support. Now, if you were watching closely there, he's not looking well.

He seems to be slurring his words somewhat and he doesn't seem to be in the best of health and well, sorry about that Tony, but anyway, Age Verification Providers Association sticking with digital ID. This organisation in the UK has written alongside the Association for Digital Verification Professionals and the Online Safety Tech Industry Association. They've written to the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation, Technology to share

the concerns that they have about the move by the Starmer regime to to compete directly with the private sector digital ID market by extending the scope of the One Login programme. Now we've been talking about One Login for many, many years now. This is the digital ID system that the government has wrote was originally rolling out purely for access to government services, but they're now going to roll this out much more

broadly. So the in their open letter they say we strongly support your department's ambition to make the UKA world leader in digital identity. However, the latest announcement sent shock waves through the sector. We're concerned about the inadvertent creation of a government monopoly of in digital identity, one that could stifle innovation, limit consumer choice and impose billions of new costs on the taxpayer for functions the private sector currently

provides. But Tony says it's going to save us 2 billion in a year. So who's true? Who's right there? But anyway, they go on to say that are they going to suggest that a joint technical working group be established to ensure ongoing collaboration between One Login, thegov.uk wallet and certified identity and private sector wallet providers? So all they're really concerned

about is they get their cut now. In the meantime, A whistleblower has alleged that flaws in the Government's One Login system have come to light three years after it became operational.

The issues have reportedly been confirmed through an internal investigation by the Government Digital Services Chief Information Security Officer. And the whistleblower claims that the potential problems around the information security of One blog login, which were originally reported to the Government Digital Services executives in July 2022 still

have not been resolved. Allegedly some of the work on the £300 million system was outsourced to Romania and this country has been identified as one of the quotes greatest cyber criminal threats in the world by various researchers.

Meanwhile in the United States, there's a massive scramble to get hold of it's digital ID. Well, not wholly digital, but certainly it's new Real ID system because from the 7th of May onwards everyone will need some kind of Real ID enabled driving licence or passport or digital ID in order to take domestic flights within the United States.

Now, Real ID is, as I say, not totally digital, but it's certainly heading in that direction with a host of private digital ID providers queuing up to get involved and, you know, very similar business model being created, it seems in the United States to the United Kingdom. I'm sure that's just a coincidence. Yes. Well, we we shall see. But no, I mean that that's it seems to be the way it goes with

all of these things. Provide the If necessary, provide a physical object 1st and then convert it into something digital which you can never get back out of. Indeed, no, Sandy, let's come back to you and freedom of

speech in Glastonbury. Uh, yes, umm, well, I, as I spoke last last week, umm, Clive, uh, Decal and myself have been, umm, banned from speaking at the town hall in Glastonbury because we're, they've deemed us conspiracy theorists. And, uh, of course there's been a, a groundswell of, of support for us, which I think is really heartfelt.

And I, I'm really appreciative to anyone that has written to the clerk of the town hall and, and, and voice their, their, their dismay at this because actually we have to keep freedom speech alive. And it's almost like a, it's like a mirror of everything else that's going on in our world. And, and you know, if, if you, if you let it happen in your own town, then it can happen anywhere.

And so, but what's, what's been quite interesting is that the, the, the, the ex mayor, who is, she's, she, she, she was the one that, that really got very, very angry with my, my, my efforts to try and get them to debate net 0 in 2023. Umm, she has been very rattled by this and has very hastily come up with a, with some sort of umm, rally for community

solidarity. Umm, and it's on, on Saturday, the April 26th at 11 AM. I'm giving them a plug actually, because I think there'll be a few dissenters there, which, which might be quite fun. Umm anyway, it's at the market crossing Glastonbury between 11:00 AM and 1:00 and it's a

rally for community solidarity. And there's standing up against racism, homophobia, misogyny and, and rejecting everything that that divides us. And you know, whilst I agree with with, you know, I agree there is a lot dividing us. But actually they're falling into that trap. And it's ironic that they're, that they're saying we've got to get, we don't sleepwalk into fascism when they've banned us from speaking at the town hall. I mean it, it's an absolute

parody. I mean it's quite laughable in lots of ways. So join us next Saturday in Glastonbury for an afternoon of powerful talks and live music as we gather in solidarity and resistance. At a time when the world seems to be sleepwalking into fascism, where division is normalised and cruelty is mistaken for strength, it's more urgent than ever to stand together. We're rallying because people need to hear the truth. Unity is not weakness. Compassion is not naive.

Even the Conservative Party is no longer extreme, she says, enough for reformers who believe oppression is a virtue. We must respond not with fear, but with solidarity, courage and a refusal to be silent. Everyone is welcome. So I'm going to be there and a few other people will be there. And I don't disagree with an awful lot of what she's saying, but she's got completely the wrong end of the stick.

And it's, it really is. I mean, how one goes into dialogue with these people, I just don't know. But we'll try. I would like to echo your encouragement of everybody to to attend that event. I think that would be very interesting to attend. So if if you're in the area, head head to Market Cross in Glastonbury on Saturday and yeah, let's see what happens. Absolutely, yeah. Yeah.

OK. Let's come on to I believe women. Women and the Supreme Court Yes, back in November last year, I reported on the case which was brought to the Supreme Court in London by For Women Scotland. Can we just concerning the interpretation of the definitions and the protected characteristics as set out by both the Gender Recognition Act 2004 and the Equality Act 2010.

In essence, what constitutes sex and or gender and what a man or a woman actually is. Now, before going any further, but I think it's worth reflecting on the fact that in a society that's described as both civilised and progressive, we are first of all confused by such definitions and secondly, we require a Supreme Court to try to make sense of it. Nonetheless, the judgement arrived at is not brief. It is very wordy and to an extent it obfuscates its own

significance. But the result heralded is that common sense has prevailed because the two pieces of legislation to which I've just referred are to be read in such a way as to suggest biological sex at birth, which will will determine whether or not a person may be considered a woman or a man in law. But there's rather more to it

than that. The Supreme Court has adjudicated that the language used in these two acts does not contradict that of the Sexual Discrimination Act 1975, which made it clear that sex was inextricably linked to biology and furthermore, that it was binary. So you are either a man or a woman. So with regard to the misuse of the definitions, the Supreme

Court has now stated that quote. We can identify no good reason why the legislature should have intended that sex based rights and protections under the Equality Act 2010 should apply to these complex heterogeneous groupings rather than to the distinct group of biological women and girls or men and boys with their shared biology leading to shared disadvantage and discrimination faced by them as a distinct group.

Slightly confusing language but but in effect saying that the legislation is, is much more simple than it's been taken as as being. Now the fact that this is being reported in news programme at all shows just how far of course the judiciary in particular has been blown.

And the relentless pressure from the outside and the continued insistence that anyone can be any gender and that this overrides the significance of biological sex has undoubtedly been succumbed to. If it were not the case there could not have been the need to bring this to court in the 1st place. And as I say, the judgement is

very detailed. There will be a link to it in the show notes, but to get a better understanding of how well funded activism and political pressure may pervert the course of justice I I would recommend reading it. The other significant detail in the judgement is the impact upon people with what's called the Gender Recognition Certificate who had been led to believe that holding such a thing made you belong to the sex of your choice. This is not the case and it never was.

However, since there are protections for those undergoing what's called gender reassignment, it should be considered a red herring. But of course, given the intensely emotional and vitriolic nature of the debate, it's the grey areas like this which look set to keep the level of tension high and indeed perpetuated. Fortunately for the Labour government, the voting public have terribly short memories, for otherwise they would remember some of the remarks from their upper echelons.

Keir Starmer said not too long ago that saying that only women have a cervix is something that shouldn't be. Ted and David Lammy said that women who value women only spaces where they feel safe from male violence are dinosaurs who want to hoard rights. So that is where we are. It's 2025 and we need the highest court in the land to tell us what is a man and what is a woman. Turns out it was written down perfectly correctly in the first instance. So there we are.

That leads us. Well, David Lammy has, David Lammy has featured quite a bit on this programme today and we're going to have to end with David Lammy as well. We are, and in the spirit of not discriminating, it should be made clear that abject ignorance is no barrier to holding high office. And we look back to 2013, obviously, considering the news that the Pope has died recently.

Back in 2013, the BBC put out a tweet that said live video chimney of Sistine Chapel as conclave votes for Pope Will smoke be black or white? And David Lammy responded on Twitter, not ironically saying this tweet from the BBC is crass and unnecessary. Do we really need silly innuendo

about the race of the next Pope? So there we are, in the incredibly unlikely situation that you're not sure what that refers to. The colour of the smoke coming out of the chimney, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with the colour of the Pope, but nonetheless it has prompted somebody to ask an artificial intelligence boss or whatever it's called to create a fictional image of Lammy himself. Were he to hold that particular office and indeed a bucket of what looks like Kentucky Fried

Chicken, yes. So there we go. With apologies to anybody that's shocked by this image and the many references to David Lammy in this programme. Yes, indeed. Well, look, we've got to leave it there for today. I'm going to say thank you very much to Vanessa and to Sandy for joining us today. Thank you all for watching. We'll be back in a couple of

minutes time. If you're AUK column member for some UK called News Extra, don't forget the interview at 1:00 PM tomorrow and we'll be back at 1:00 PM on Friday as usual for another UK column News. We'll see you then. Thanks for joining us. Bye, bye, bye.