Guardian Injunction and Twitter #Trafigura

Wow, if you are on Twitter you cannot fail to have noticed the trending topic of the Guardian injunction, Trafigura and Carter-Ruck.

This all relates to a Parliamentary Question by Paul Farrelly, number 61 if you want to scroll down. The Guardian has been gagged from identifying the MP who asked the question, the wording of the actual question and where the question can be found.

This is utterly ridiculous, as my link shows above this information is actually in the public domain anyway so why should a newspaper be gagged, and why has someone done this. Whatever happened to free speech?

The Spectator reports the story, Twitter keeps the story moving minute by minute and shows the popularity by the trending topics. In this electronic age the story moves so quickly but it also shows the hunger of those of us on the Internet to be fed these stories.

There are now many blog posts on this around the place, here a re a few of my favourites;

Mark Pack blogs the most republished Parliamentary question ever? Trafigura and the Ivory Coast.

Rob Fenwick blogs The #Trafigura question #CarterRuck don't want you to see

Caron Lindsay blogs Why is Twitter going mad about Trafigura?

Identity Theft - will we ever learn?

This morning while having major panic stations about Zennor (our cat) I hadn't noticed Roger had turned BBC Breakfast over to the dreaded GMTV.

Gordon Brown was doing his interview and then they went to a piece on identity theft.

They had a reporter and an outside broadcast unit going through peoples rubbish on a street.

Some people had heeded the constant advice and shredded documents but they were very much in the minority.

Some had torn statements up in to 4 or 6 pieces, hardly challenging to piece those back together for a thief.

There was one carrier bag with bank statements, mobile phone bills and other bills where their identity was there waiting to be stolen and used fraudulently.

A cross cut shredder can be bought for £20 from Argos, and most supermarkets and shops.

It can be really traumatic to have your bank account plundered, but imagine having your identity stolen or copied?

That would be a nightmare! So, will people please listen and heed these warnings, go out tomorrow and buy a shredder and protect yourself properly.

Stephen Gately on Twitter

Early this morning the world learnt we had lost Stephen Gately, who tragically died in Majorca while on holiday with his partner. Both Stephen Glenn and myself did blog posts on this.

On the paper review on BBC1, the presenter read out Stephen's last tweet.

I logged onto Twitter to see, and noted that he had 6,867 followers. At 6pm I tweeted that this had now gone up to 9,262, it is now 9pm and there are over 10,006 followers.

I appreciate people will wish to pay their respects but just following Stephen on Twitter doesn't achieve that. Stephen RIP.

Houses of Parliament security breached - erm, again!

Yet again the security has been breached at the Palace of Westminster, this time by over 40 protesters from Greenpeace - BBC says more than 40 and Greenpeace say 55.

I have no issue with where they are from or which organisation (as I agree with the core part of the Greenpeace message) but in this day of age Greenpeace are showing terrorist organisations how easy it is to attack our national UK Parliament.

Given it was a weekend there are less staff on duty but all this will mean now is another review of security, another raft of new measures being brought in and more money wasted on security.

How many times does this need to actually happen though before the senior people in charge of the security are fired and new people brought in, because it is obvious time after time they are not able to do the job properly.

In 2004 activists from Greenpeace scaled Big Ben, pro-hunt protesters stormed the House of Commons Chamber and Fathers 4 Justice threw purple powder at Tony Blair and then last year activists from Plane Stupid occupied the roof and now today over 40 people have again got in and occupied the roof.

It isn't just the security of the Government of the day that is at risk but also all of the staff who work there whether it be for MPs, Peers, cleaners, caterers or administration staff - who is standing up for their security?

Being gay in the military is a go-go - when?

So, on the day of a major march through Washington by gay rights protesters, Nobel Peace Prize winner President Barack Obama announces his intention to lets gays serve in the US Military and that he will scrap the "don't ask, don't tell" policy which currently exists and therefore allows gays and lesbians to serve their country.

Though he has not set out any timeline for this, so I am somewhat sceptical about the timing of this announcement given the timing of the march!

Mr Obama asked the audience at the lesbian and gay fundraising dinner to trust his administration.

He went on to say; "I appreciate that many of you don't believe progress has come fast enough. Do not doubt the direction we are heading and the destination we will reach".

Barack Obama has been criticised for not delivering on his election promise to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, which limits how local and federal bodies can recognise gay partnerships and determine benefits.

In his speech at the dinner, President Obama did call on Congress to repeal the act and he also called for a law that would extend benefits to domestic partners.

I believe a President, Prime Minister or political party is judged on results not on the content of good speeches.

Stephen Gately

I had the BBC News on this morning in the absence of Match of the Day, as I woke up a little later than normal and wasn't really listening while mooching around making coffee when I heard the paper review and Stephen Gately had died.

I couldn't believe it, he was way too young, exactly how I felt last year when I was told of Neil Trafford's tragic death last year.

I then sat and listened and it appears that after a night in Majorca where Stephen and his partner Andrew were on holiday, they returned home and he never woke up this morning.

He was only 33, although he had lived an exciting life, he was born in Dublin in March 1976 and as everyone knows was a member of the very successful boy band, Boyzone. All of their albums hit the number one spot as did six singles and after the band split in 2000, although this was an amicable split unlike their counterparts in Take That, Stephen went solo and had a top ten album and he then went onto star on stage as Joseph which I think he did amazingly well.

Stephen had a really varied career including commentating on Match of the Day for an Ireland game - that is something I had really forgotten.

Stephen's top 3 hit, New Beginning was used by the Liberal Democrats in the 2001 General Election campaign. I still have the copy, and of course all of the Boyzone albums and singles!

Only last year Boyzone reformed and have been a hit again since. They released a new single "Love You Anyway" and then a compilation album in October last year. Then in December 2008 they released a second single called "Better", the accompanying video generated a lot of controversy because it showed a lot of romantic couples including two men embracing, it was condemned by many including the Reformed Presbyterian Church.

In 1999, just ten years ago Stephen came out, but on the front page of The Sun, it was rumoured that a former member of the band's security firm was going to out him, so he went first as it were. Stephen was aged just 23 at this point and also admitted that he had been in a relationship since 1998 with Eloy de Jong, who was a member of a Dutch boy band, Caught in the Act.

Stephen and Eloy split up in 2002 and through mutual friends Elton John and David Furnish he then met Andrew Cowles who Stephen went on and had a civil partnership with in London in 2006.

I cannot begin to imagine what Andrew is going through now and I couldn't begin to imagine life without Roger in the same way.

It is always a tragedy when anyone dies, but when it is young it makes it so much harder to deal with, Stephen was just 33 and still had so much of his life ahead of him, our thoughts are with Andrew, the band and his family at this awful time.