I Couldn't Say It Any Better Myself

Despite my modesty. So here's Peter Oborne explaining why Slippey Weasel Jack Straw is not to be trusted or believed.

"People occasionally ask me why I regard Jack Straw as a third-rate politician who has done grave harm to British public life over a long period. The perfect answer comes in his attitude towards the Human Rights Act.

As Home Secretary, ten years ago, it was Straw who pioneered the Bill into law. Yet some months ago he gave an interview to the Mail in which he repeatedly criticised the Act. He labelled it a 'villains' charter', laid into what he called 'ambulance-chasing lawyers', promised to wage war against the compensation culture that it had spawned and attacked judges for being 'too nervous' about deporting terrorist suspects.

He concluded that the Act had been such a travesty that he planned to rebalance it with a 'declaration of responsibilities'.

Last Saturday, however, Straw attended a conference arranged by Liberty, which campaigns (very honourably) for civil rights and is one of the fiercest supporters of the Human Rights Act. Yes, Straw changed his tune again. He told this fashionable, metropolitan audience that the act was 'one of my proudest achievements'.

Such pathetic U-turns go right to the heart of the crisis of trust in British politics. Voters would respect politicians more if they held genuine convictions rather than revealing an oleaginous desire to ingratiate themselves with whatever audience they happen to be talking to at the time."

The Penguin