Manchester Arena Explosion

[chrisp65]

1 hour ago, limpid said:

If it's just for meetings, is there a reason they can't use video conferencing and collaborative working tools? It means you wouldn't have to reschedule because of third party factors (and save significantly on travelling time and avoidable carbon emissions).

Yes there are very good reasons it can't be conf calls. 

One Client is a bit governmenty, so obviously they can't have unproven cutting edge future sci fi  tech like skype.

One is work on a grade 1 listed building and it's basically a crim offence to instruct the wrong work, so you need to be present not remote purely for personal arse covering porpoises. Porpoises was deliberate!

Another client is an international concept designer and have proven incapable of selecting materials they haven't physically seen and touched. 

Another client recently melted their I.T. during an I.T. stress test they ran.

Happily the half arsed non-trendy company from out in the sticks does have the ability to conf call, does have join.me and has heard of dropbox, we use it internally between offices in Brum, Sheffield and Edinburgh to 'talk to each other' about some of our giant international clients.

 

But to be fair to the Clients I've used the word meetings in it's broadest meaning. The meeting is usually on a building site where brickies, plasterers, scaffolders, chippies and sparkies etc. can't work remotely. There's no substitute for being able to stand on site with the Client, point, and show them the size of the hole that need filling. 

 

 

[snowychap]

59 minutes ago, brommy said:

I think there's lots of people who don't know what goes on behind what is immediately visible.

As per the others' comments, I didn't. Interesting to have it spelt out.

Edited May 27, 2017 by snowychap

[chrisp65]

34 minutes ago, brommy said:

 

I think there's lots of people who don't know what goes on behind what is immediately visible. Most companies have set security procedures according to the 'threat level'. Within minutes of the recent increase to 'critical', all our staff (several thousand) had emails detailing the additional security measures. These included a ban on visitors to all UK sites unless security staff had advance notice in writing, the visitor presented photo ID (passport or driving licence) and the visitor was escorted at all times. In reality most visits were cancelled. It's clear to see why strict security measures are eased back to more sensible levels when possible.

Something utterly unrelated to my work that was quoted to me yesterday evening as an example:

The guy that delivers bread to prisons - he has 'x' number of prisons to visit every couple of days (toast or sandwiches for 650 people is a lot of bread) - once the threat level goes up, they ain't just letting the van straight in when he rocks up outside and toots.

It takes an extra 30 minutes per site to get in and out. That's put 2 hours on his day. that means he can't meet his contract without renting another van and another driver. But that driver needs to be vetted and approved, just to deliver bread to a prison, so his pay is higher than just any old Joe. So now the contract is running at a loss and HMP Anytown is up in smoke because the guys didn't get their hotdogs.

You suddenly realise how many people deliver bread to prisons, laundry to barracks, newspapers to airports, toilet paper to police stations, clean the county court windows, service the boiler in the bank of england, fix the coffee machine at Sky News HQ...all unknown people rolling up outside with a van who's tight gig economy schedule has just been shredded.

 

 

[snowychap]

24 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Yes there are very good reasons it can't be conf calls. 

One Client is a bit governmenty, so obviously they can't have unproven cutting edge future sci fi  tech like skype.

One is work on a grade 1 listed building and it's basically a crim offence to instruct the wrong work, so you need to be present not remote purely for personal arse covering porpoises. Porpoises was deliberate!

Another client is an international concept designer and have proven incapable of selecting materials they haven't physically seen and touched. 

Another client recently melted their I.T. during an I.T. stress test they ran.

Happily the half arsed non-trendy company from out in the sticks does have the ability to conf call, does have join.me and has heard of dropbox, we use it internally between offices in Brum, Sheffield and Edinburgh to 'talk to each other' about some of our giant international clients.

 

But to be fair to the Clients I've used the word meetings in it's broadest meaning. The meeting is usually on a building site where brickies, plasterers, scaffolders, chippies and sparkies etc. can't work remotely. There's no substitute for being able to stand on site with the Client, point, and show them the size of the hole that need filling.

And then there's the biscuits.

[chrisp65]

Just now, snowychap said:

And then there's the biscuits.

never underestimate the lure of the biscuit

[blandy]

1 hour ago, brommy said:

I think there's lots of people who don't know what goes on behind what is immediately visible. Most companies have set security procedures according to the 'threat level'. Within minutes of the recent increase to 'critical', all our staff (several thousand) had emails detailing the additional security measures. These included a ban on visitors to all UK sites unless security staff had advance notice in writing, the visitor presented photo ID (passport or driving licence) and the visitor was escorted at all times. In reality most visits were cancelled. It's clear to see why strict security measures are eased back to more sensible levels when possible.

This definitely. We pretty much have to do all that all the time, anyway, but there were more searches of vehicles, more people being stopped and checked on their way in to work. Traffic jams resulted, obviously..etc. etc.

[veloman]

1 hour ago, chrisp65 said:

 So now the contract is running at a loss and HMP Anytown is up in smoke because the guys didn't get their hotdogs.

 

 

 

A significant number of prisoners would not be eating hotdogs I think !

[Xela]

1 hour ago, chrisp65 said:

 There's no substitute for being able to stand on site with the Client, point, and show them the size of the hole that need filling. 

Sorry.

[mottaloo]

Fnarr ! 

[turnbull]

At Twickenham today the extra security was conspicuous by its absence before the game, just the usual frisks and bag checks.

However I did see a number of armed police after the game and there were extra security personnel stopping and searching anyone trying to get into the ground.

I guess the main focus was on Wembley, understandable I suppose and let's face it, the cops are spread pretty thin these days.

[a m ole]

have we discussed the Christian man in Portland, OR, who murdered two men trying to stop him from attacking two Muslim teenage girls, yet?

what is the Christian community doing to stop this radicalisation? Christianity is a problem etc

[Xela]

19 minutes ago, a m ole said:

have we discussed the Christian man in Portland, OR, who murdered two men trying to stop him from attacking two Muslim teenage girls, yet?

what is the Christian community doing to stop this radicalisation? Christianity is a problem etc

Awful events but is there any evidence he is a Christian and carried out the attacks following the ideology of a Christian terror group intent on wiping out non Christians?

He deserves to rot in hell for what he has done, of course, and I feel for the families of the victims but its not a Christian terrorist attack. 

[peterms]

54 minutes ago, Xela said:

Awful events but is there any evidence he is a Christian

Well, there's this.

Quote

Jeremy Joseph Christian, 35, reportedly slit the throats of two passengers

But more seriously, he seems to be one of the fairly large group of white supremacists who support Trump and who want to preserve what they see as the way of life of the masterrace, which generally involves Christianity even if they are not themselves religious.  Perhaps a bit like the way the stereotypical Muslim terrorist here isn't especially well informed about Islam.

Edited May 28, 2017 by peterms
sp

[a m ole]

1 hour ago, Xela said:

Awful events but is there any evidence he is a Christian and carried out the attacks following the ideology of a Christian terror group intent on wiping out non Christians?

He deserves to rot in hell for what he has done, of course, and I feel for the families of the victims but its not a Christian terrorist attack. 

There's evidence that he associates as a christian, yes, following the ideology of far-right extremism and exclaimed "all muslims should die" during the attack.

Your last line is quite poignant.

[jon_c]

Replace the word "Christian"in these arguments with the word "White"

"White" extremists, "white" radicals, wanting to eradicate non-"whites". These things exist. (Hell one of them is chief strategist to the White House)

 

[Xela]

44 minutes ago, a m ole said:

There's evidence that he associates as a christian, yes, following the ideology of far-right extremism and exclaimed "all muslims should die" during the attack.

Your last line is quite poignant.

It is a race/religion hate crime, of course it is. Is it terrorism? Was it premeditated and carefully planned attack or just a vile person spouting race hate who attacked people who tried to intervene. Perhaps I have different view of what terrorism is, maybe incorrectly? 

The difference makes no odds to the families of the victims of course. 

[Xela]

12 minutes ago, PaulC said:

Not sure this is the right place to put this link. But this makes me feel so sad. 

 

Our friends in Saudi Arabia

 

[a m ole]

10 minutes ago, Xela said:

It is a race/religion hate crime, of course it is. Is it terrorism? Was it premeditated and carefully planned attack or just a vile person spouting race hate who attacked people who tried to intervene. Perhaps I have different view of what terrorism is, maybe incorrectly? 

The difference makes no odds to the families of the victims of course. 

I'm just bringing it up as food for thought, based on conversations had in this thread previously. It may not be classed as terrorism, but I feel it should give a different perspective on who is responsible for what.

[peterms]

Peter Oborne is critical in the role of MI6 in the development of jihadis, here.

Quote

Traditionally, among Britain’s intelligence services, there was a clear hierarchy.

MI6, otherwise known as the Secret Intelligence Service, was foremost. Its staff — mostly privately educated and considered charismatic yet smooth operators, were rated much higher than their socially inferior counterparts in MI5, the domestic intelligence service.

This categorisation was, of course, an over-simplification, and, thankfully, much has changed in the 25 years since I first began working as a political journalist at Westminster.

Inevitably, this week’s terrorist massacre in Manchester has put the spotlight on the work of both MI6 and MI5 in their role to protect the British people from those who wish to do us harm and who want to destroy our way of life.

The attack at Manchester Arena, pictured, has put the spotlight on the work of MI6 and MI5 in protecting the British people, writes Peter Oborne

Indeed, it is hard to praise too highly the work of MI5 in trying to keep the country safe — particularly in the face of the current threat from Islamist terrorists.

But, on the other hand, I am deeply worried about the performance of MI6.

The organisation’s roots go back to the early 1900s when the government was increasingly concerned about the threat to the British Empire posed by Germany. 

Its first chief, Sir Mansfield Cumming, was known as ‘C’ because of the letter he used for initialling documents.

More recently, MI6 was led during the Blair years by Sir Richard Dearlove and his successor, Sir John Scarlett.

Notoriously, Scarlett compiled the dossier on Saddam Hussein’s so-called ‘weapons of mass destruction’ — which, though subsequently proved to be false, gave Blair the justification he wanted to persuade MPs that Britain should invade Iraq.

Under Scarlett, MI6 failed in its duty to warn the Government of the potential pitfalls of its foreign policy actions. 

For his part, previously, Dearlove had been disgracefully suborned by Blair. 

He let his and MI6’s independence be fatally compromised and allowed his organisation to become a propaganda tool for the Labour PM’s clique of war-mongerers.

Britain and the West have paid a huge price for the calamitous misjudgments of Scarlett and Dearlove.

Former MI6 head Sir John Scarlett, pictured, compiled the dossier on Saddam Hussein's 'weapons of mass destruction' which proved to be false. Under his leadership, MI6 'failed in its duty to warn the Government of the potential pitfalls of its foreign policy actions'

The two spy agency bosses were both singled out for withering criticism in the Chilcot Report which investigated the circumstances of the run-up to the war and highlighted a litany of flawed information that MI6 had supplied.

Significantly, the then head of MI5, Eliza Manningham-Buller, said the invasion of Iraq had substantially increased the terror threat to the UK.

I believe that MI6 has failed to learn the lessons from this debacle. Above all, it has made very serious mistakes that have endangered this country’s security.

Often with the connivance of MI6, during the early years of the Syrian War, hundreds of British citizens were allowed to travel abroad to join jihadist organisations. 

The reason MI6 certainly approved such involvement was because spy chiefs had taken it upon themselves to meddle in the internal affairs of Middle East countries.

In the case of Syria, they wanted to get as much help as possible in their mission to topple the Syrian president Bashir al-Assad.

There was a similar policy towards Libya. British citizens — it has been reported this week that among them was the father of the Manchester suicide-bomber — were undoubtedly encouraged to travel to the north African country to fight in the civil war there to get rid of Gaddafi.

Indeed, research by the Middle East Eye website has revealed the extent to which the British authorities, I believe with the encouragement of MI6, released terror suspects in this country from control orders which had previously been imposed on them in order to restrain their movements and stop them from using the internet.

Duly, these people were free to join terror groups in the Middle East and North Africa — organisations with links to Al Qaeda and other terror outfits. 

Of course, as well as being enemies of al-Assad and Gaddafi, these groups were also enemies of the West.

So, while MI5 officers were working day and night to prevent Islamist terrorists inflicting carnage on British streets, MI6 officers were complicit in creating a generation of British-born jihadis who are prepared to do anything, and kill anyone — even young children — in their efforts to destroy this country. 

This brings us directly to the Manchester suicide-bomber.

Along with his father and brother, Salman Abedi fought as a 16-year-old in the Libyan civil war. There have been reports, too, that he received military training in Syria.

There is every reason to speculate that his evil handiwork at the Manchester Arena on Monday night was in part a direct consequence of MI6’s meddling.

There is every reason to speculate that Salman Abedi's (pictured) evil handiwork at the Manchester Arena on Monday night was in part a direct consequence of MI6’s meddling in Middle Eastern and north African affairs

The organisation is open to the charge that it placed what it perceived to be British foreign policy objectives ahead of the safety of British citizens.

Meanwhile, others in government have serious questions to answer. For example, on whose advice was it that the Home Office lifted the control orders on suspected jihadists? 

And why were repeated warnings about Abedi to the police via an anti-terrorist hotline ignored?

The official reason is that MI5 has been woefully overstretched, having to deal with managing 500 investigations into suspected terrorists, involving as many as 23,000 ‘subjects of interest’.

What is certainly true is that the police and MI5 have not been helped by the rogue activities of some of their foreign intelligence partners in MI6.

It is worth pointing out that I’m not the only one perturbed by such behaviour within MI6, which has traditionally been licensed by the government to break the law and carry out illicit acts, on the assumption that it always acts in the British national interest.

Former MI6 officer Alastair Crooke, who worked for the service for 30 years and who has vast experience in the Middle East and Afghanistan, is concerned that some of its operators are not working in the national interest.

He told me: ‘It is not right that, on one hand, domestic police services are straining every sinew to protect our societies by fighting terrorism, while, on the other hand, elements in our and America’s security services have been arming and training jihadists and colluding in terrorism.’

The worry — and it is a profound one — is that if Britain’s two intelligence agencies are working at cross purposes, we will never be able to make our streets safe from terrorists.

 

[snowychap]

Police believe Manchester bomber Salman Abedi largely acted alone

Quote

Police now believe the Manchester bomber acted largely alone in the run-up to his suicide attack at Ariana Grande’s concert.

Soon after Salman Abedi blew himself up at Manchester Arena eight days ago police said they were investigating a potential terror “network”. But now detectives say the 22-year-old shopped alone for most of the components he used to make the bomb, which killed himself and 22 concertgoers on 22 May and injured 116 more.

“Our inquiries show Abedi himself made most of the purchases of the core components and what is becoming apparent is that many of his movements and actions have been carried out alone during the four days from him landing in the country and committing this awful attack,” said Det Ch Supt Russ Jackson, head of the north-west counter-terrorism unit.

Abedi was born in Manchester to Libyan parents, who moved back to Tripoli in recent years, along with his younger siblings. He is believed to have visited Libya just four days before the attack, arriving back in the UK on 18 May.

His father and younger brother, Hashem, have been taken into custody by Libyan authorities.

Police are not ruling out that Abedi may have had accomplices. “It is vital that we make sure that he is not part of a wider network and we cannot rule this out yet. There remain a number of things that concern us about his behaviour prior to the attack and those of his associates which we need to get to the bottom of,” said Jackson.

Police have arrested 16 people so far in connection with the investigation. Three men were released without charge on Tuesday: two men aged 20 and 24 from the Fallowfield area of south Manchester, believed to be Abedi’s cousins, and a 37-year-old man from Blackley in north Manchester. A 16-year-old boy from Withington and a 34-year-old woman from Blackley were released last week shortly after their arrests .

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