It strikes me as interesting today that BBC News 24 is referring to Iran’s detention of 15 Royal Navy personnel as a “kidnapping”, which seems to me to be extremely loaded language.

Iran contests that the boats involved in the incident were in Iranian waters, while the UK and US state that they were within Iraqi territory, so it appears one word against another. If the Iranians are right (and it is very hard to tell in such disputed territory with complex divisions), then they are well within their legal rights to detain the Royal Navy personnel, so to describe them as “kidnapped” in this rather less-than-clear situation seems unfortunate at best.

Most other news organisations – including their own website – are using diplomatic terms like “seized” or “detained” which, in themselves, do not imply that either side is right. So why is BBC News 24 deliberately choosing to do differently? I hope, not least for the renowned journalistic standards of the Beeb, that this wasn’t a decision taken because “kidnapped” fits better on a headline graphic.

Some of their presentation decisions are already irritating and somewhat questionable, but if presentation is the reason for this decision, then standards really have reached a new – very depressing – low.

Image courtesy of dragonhhjh at TV Forum

Not the world’s most pleasant video… I know it’s not big, and it’s not clever, but it most certainly is Gordon Brown picking his nose and eating it at PMQs yesterday. In what I assume must be a Prime Ministerial way, of course, given that he’s after the top job. Mr Brown’s future rival Mr Cameron may be accused of not yet having a grip on the issues, but at least he’s discovered tissues.

[flashvideo filename=”http://sjhoward.co.uk/video/brown2.flv” title=”nologo” /]

Gordon Brown today announced the detail of his tenth, and final, budget. It has an environmentally green donation to African rainforests, a Labour-red increase in spending on schools and hospitals, a Tory-blue tax cut, and probably something Lib Dem-yellow in there too. Frankly, I got too bored wading through it to notice.

It’s the all-things-to-all-men budget. It sticks up for the little guy by cutting income tax, then screws them over to reward big business by increasing tax rates on small companies while cutting corporation tax. It tries to be green by increasing tax on the biggest gas guzzling cars, but then restricts itself to only the biggest gas guzzling cars. It claims to simplify the tax system by cutting the 10% rate on income tax – but confuses everybody by keeping it for savings income.

Perhaps the main message from the budget comes from all of the ensuing media coverage – nobody quite knows whether they’ll be better off or not, because this Chancellor has created a tax system so complex that it’s impossible for any human to get to grips with the changes right away. Yet he still gets his headline tax cuts, despite the fact that it’s likely many people will be worse off. So everyone loves him while also being screwed over by him.

It’s headline-driven sound-bite government. And they said Gordon Brown was different…

I note that on this morning’s Today programme, Hazel Blears announced that the fact 95 MPs refuse to do Blair’s bidding means that he’s gained authority (or, at least, he’s done the opposite of losing it). What world does this woman live in?

Labour have long wanted to reform the Mental Health Act, and made their first attempt with the Mental Health Bill 2002, which failed rather spectacularly. Several further attempts have also proved fruitless. But now they’re having an all-new attempt at reforming the Act.

Firstly, in true modern NHS style, it now means that the range of people empowered to do things is vastly extended. Where the power to detain people and force treatment upon them was previously restricted to a select few with the necessary skill and experience, the Government now wants to extend this power to a great many more people – in fact, pretty much anyone who claims to work with the Mental Health sector who’s been on a short course. And it will be the Social Service – not medics – who decide if someone can be deemed to be an Approved Mental Health Professional.

This is nurse-prescribing gone mad. Of course, Mental Health nurses have long been highly trained in the detention of individuals for short periods, and they play a very important role in this arena. But now the government wants to open this up to any Mental Health professional. Dodgy counsellors will no medical training will soon be able to sign up for a course, then will be able to detain people. That sounds unhelpful.

Just to make it even easier for these poorly trained individuals to know who they can round up, the Government would like to change the definition of a Mental Disorder. Instead of detailed definitions of each kind of disorder, the Government now wants us to accept “any disorder or disability of the mind” as a definition. This is beyond stupidity. Now, anyone who has epilepsy or has suffered a stroke or has any number of conditions suddenly falls under the provisions of the Mental Health Act, and the mountains of bureaucracy that entails. I’m sure that’ll come as a particular delight to overworked GPs, general physicians, and mental health workers nationwide.

And, ho-hum, they feel a need to better regulate these powers. So they’re introducing much greater use of Mental Health Tribunals. Anyone who’s ever tried to organise a Tribunal for a patient will know that it’s damn-near impossible, so to use more of them seems – well, not a great idea.

Yet this stinking piece of terrible legislation is getting very little media coverage because of public embarrassment about Mental Health.

There is one glimmer of hope – It’s hard to deny that most of the Cabinet have “disorders of the mind”, so we can wait till they pass the new legislation, then lock the lot of ’em up. If Yates of the Yard doesn’t get there first…

To all those people that are complaining about Patricia Hewitt distancing herself from the recent (predictable) problems with Modernising Medical Careers, and saying she’s hiding behind Lord Hunt – you’re missing the point. She doesn’t care.

Patricia Hewitt has said publically that she thinks the NHS has too many doctors and nurses. If doctors are choosing to go abroad – good riddance! That’ll help to balance the books, so Ms Hewitt can pay for more managers.

After all, if doctors are starting to complain about things, then something’s clearly wrong: They’re not being worked hard enough if they have time to make a fuss. We clearly need more managers.

A true landmark vote in the Commons tonight gave a result that surprised many – including Iain Dale, Dizzy, and (errr) me. A vote in favour of a 100% elected House of Lords. Of course, quite how (if?) that’ll work remains to be seen, and it’s not quite what I would’ve gone for, but it’s probably a positive move. Are we on the brink of true bicameralism?

An interesting, but much more parochial landmark also passed tonight – over 100,000 spam comments caught by Akismet on this blog alone. Again, I’m not quite sure what that means for the future of humanity, but it’s interesting. On the one hand, it shows that spam is well and truly alive – but the fact that the filter caught it shows that their tactics aren’t quite so strong any more. It’s an interesting dichotomy – an increase in spam being used to mark its decline.

I’ve uploaded more stuff over on the Work pages for the first time in a while. I think it’s worth highlighting this piece, about the public health effect of speed cameras, which I think from previous posts that some of my readers might find interesting. It’s hardly crucial seminal research, but I think some people might find it an interesting read.

So there you go – three utterly different topics in one barely coherent post. It’s a while since I’ve done that.

The BBC’s Cash for Honours injunction has been lifted – no doubt there will be more on the One O’Clock news and The World at One. Tune in now!

The Attorney General is a government appointee. He attends Cabinet Meetings, and is a very political figure. Indeed, Lord Goldsmith is a Labour peer.

Simultaneously, the Attorney General has supervisory powers over prosecution. He is the chief legal advisor of the Crown. He (largely) calls the legal shots in this country.

Now, his two worlds have spectacularly collided, and this staunch Labour supporter is being asked to preside over the case of corruption within the Labour Party. If that’s not a major conflict of interest, I’m not sure what is. Yet he refuses to step aside and ‘butt out’ of this affair, despite the fact that any fool can see that him being involved is not in the interests of true Justice being done.

The Government continues to use the slightly meaningless defence that “it’s always been that way” – well, yes, but never have we seen corruption to the heart of the governing Party quite like we have at the moment. It’s a new situation, and as new situations arise our uncodified Constitution is able to adapt – this is, and always has been, its great strength. Its great weakness is the virtually unchecked power handed to the Government of the day, and perhaps this is something that needs to be reformed in the world of corrupt politics.

Lord Goldsmith will be the last Attorney General of his kind. This situation has destroyed the credibility of the office. I’m not sure why, but that just feels like a significant blow in the downfall of the Labour Party: A 730 year old office falls apart because of the corruption of one small group of people.

I’m not sure whether to be depressed at the erosion, or to celebrate the wonderful versatility that this country’s unique constitution provides. It’s probably not for me to judge. But it seems worthy of a mention.

The Attorney General has obtained an injunction against the BBC, preventing it from broadcasting an item about the Cash for Honours inquiry. Obviously, this isn’t something I’m ‘in’ on. But with a little summation, it’s not difficult to work out what’s going on.

Iain Dale reveals this much:

So this now leads the BBC Ten O’Clock News but Nick Robinson can’t say what the injunction is all about. Let me help. I understand it is to do with an email that incriminates someone in a fairly drastic way. I do not know what the terms of the injunction are, but isn’t this an injunction which the Labour Party should have asked for rather than Her Majesty’s Government?

I am aware of the identity of the individual who is the subject of the email, but I think if I name them I’ll probably be banged up at Heathrow on my return! And, dear reader, you wouldn’t want that, would you?!

A quick look at Guido’s labelling, and the picture the BBC originally put up with it’s report, and I’d imagine we know fairly well where we are.

It’s starting to get exciting.