Tories Try To Remove Speeches From Internet

[K]

The Conservatives have attempted to hide 10 years of speeches from the internet, it has emerged.

The speeches, news stories, press releases and blogs, which date back to 2000 until the party came to power in May 2010, have been hidden from public view on the Conservative Party website.

They have also removed the record of their past speeches from internet search engines, including Google, according to Computer Weekly.

It means those using the search engine to try to find the speeches on the Conservative Party website would simply get no results.

The removal of such a large collection of speeches will fuel speculation the Tories are attempting to make it difficult for people to hold them to account to pledges made ahead of the 2010 election with the 2015 vote looming.

In addition the archive of information has been erased from the Internet Archive, which is the public record of the internet.

The specialist computer magazine explained that the Tories had used something called a robot blocker to remove the speeches, which effectively hides speeches in a "secretive corner of the internet like those that shelter the military (and) secret services".

In a search for the speeches on the Internet Archive it simply responded: "Page cannot be crawled or displayed due to robots.txt".

Some of the speeches involved are those made by David Cameron and George Osborne in which they campaign to use the internet to make politics more transparent.

Responding to the claims, a Conservative spokesman said: "We're making sure our website keeps the Conservative Party at the forefront of political campaigning.

"These changes allow people to quickly and easily access the most important information we provide – how we are clearing up Labour’s economic mess, taking the difficult decisions and standing up for hardworking people."

Computer Weekly says that the Internet Archive has started to restore some of the files on its searches.

Source http://news.sky.com/story/1168043/tories-try-to-remove-speeches-from-internet

Scum of the Earth trash!!

 

[wiz569]

Source, please

 

[HappyH]

Looks to be widely available on T'Internet, think K may have got it from
Tories Try To Remove Speeches From Internet
Unbelievable!!
HH.

 

[trevortron]

Looks to be widely available on T'Internet, think K may have got it from
Tories Try To Remove Speeches From Internet
Unbelievable!!
HH.

Unbelievable? No, these guys think they OWN the country, not just run it. Well done CW for exposing. Let's hope the tories' 'friends' in the media don't get it conveniently swept under the ever-bulging carpet.

 

[danforth]

I can't really see why people are bothered about this.

All the parties make vague generalisitions in any case, and shamelessly ignore any concrete promises "due to current circumstances" etc.

Useful for party point scoring in parliament, and that's about it.

Even a written manifesto is worthless when the only penalties are to lose the next election after 5 years, and most will still have a well paid job, and perks.

When was the last time you believed a politician. or a priest, for that matter ?

 

[alimac]

off topic but now the same party state recovery is well on the way

well all i can say is come up here & tell me where cos its not here

 

[Firemouth]

I can't really see why people are bothered about this.

All the parties make vague generalisitions in any case, and shamelessly ignore any concrete promises "due to current circumstances" etc.

Useful for party point scoring in parliament, and that's about it.

Even a written manifesto is worthless when the only penalties are to lose the next election after 5 years, and most will still have a well paid job, and perks.

When was the last time you believed a politician. or a priest, for that matter ?

fair point.

but does it not bother you the CON's (how appropriate is that? lol) are, effectively, editing history.
whether the words recorded were lies or not.
if they are recorded, we can point out the words were lies. if they are gone???????????????

 

[trevortron]

fair point.

but does it not bother you the CON's (how appropriate is that? lol) are, effectively, editing history.
whether the words recorded were lies or not.
if they are recorded, we can point out the words were lies. if they are gone???????????????

Exactly! And if they get away with it once, what's next?

 

[danforth]

fair point.

but does it not bother you the CON's (how appropriate is that? lol) are, effectively, editing history.
whether the words recorded were lies or not.
if they are recorded, we can point out the words were lies. if they are gone???????????????

They won't be gone, I doubt if anything can be edited from history now. In any case the opposition (whichever it is) will maintain records.

And you can point out the lies and half truths as much as you want, it may be worth a bit of applause on "Question Time", but that's all.

All the parties lie, and have done for many years. Most of the electorate expect it, don't listen any more, or don't bother voting.

If they don't lie, they won't get elected, so each winner is the biggest liar, and / or the biggest buyer of votes.
Votes bought by unaffordable promises, result in the colossal debt we now have, borrowed without our knowledge, much less consent.
In that sense the promises would have been better broken, but they all have an eye on their 5 year contract.
This is the downside of the democratic system, though I can't think of a better long term alternative.

Whether the speeches are deleted or not, the Manifesto's remain, several hundred pages of carefully worded incomprehensible crap.
I would prefer a few pages detailing in simple language what each party actually intends to do, on each particular issue.
Like any contract, timescales, and penalties would apply. The main penalty would be "top down" barring of candidates for succeeding elections,
depending on the degree of failure. If elected, JFDI would be the prime focus, not looking for "unforeseen circumstances".
Oops, that would get rid of manifestos as well !

 

[Him Her]

Not that I have extensively researched this but, if insomnia is your problem, The British Library has been archiving stuff since 2004 (including Tory speeches) - UK Web Archive

Labour did similar, probably they all did, so what? Just makes sourcing the information ever so slightly harder is all!

Anyway, I had a look, readily accessible from my armchair

 

[hatab]

hansard reports all the day to day goings on in the house of commons and lords

Hansard - UK Parliament

if it was said by any idiots that gets elected there what ever their bias then its a matter of record and available to search and read.

a non story.

 

[eon]

Unbelievable? No, these guys think they OWN the country, not just run it. Well done CW for exposing. Let's hope the tories' 'friends' in the media don't get it conveniently swept under the ever-bulging carpet.

fair point.

but does it not bother you the CON's (how appropriate is that? lol) are, effectively, editing history.
whether the words recorded were lies or not.
if they are recorded, we can point out the words were lies. if they are gone???????????????

Exactly! And if they get away with it once, what's next?

Shame some are not as concerned about vote rigging, hospital and police cover ups or the handing over our sovereign powers to the EU, the real threats to our democracy. Instead of going OTT about the torys editing/hiding some of their OLD public statements.

I wonder if such a fuss would be made if it was liebour who did this, but considering they have done all the above and no one said anything about that i guess they wouldn't say anything about them wiping a few documents from the internet!!!!

 

[Firemouth]

hansard reports all the day to day goings on in the house of commons and lords

Hansard - UK Parliament

if it was said by any idiots that gets elected there what ever their bias then its a matter of record and available to search and read.

a non story.

Hansard only list speeches made in the house of commons.
not those made outside, which is what are being "edited", as such these listing are the only "official" records of such speeches.

And YES eon, i'd make just as much fuss if it were Labour who had done this.
Err which they have, kinda. they no longer have speeches before 2010 on their web site. however, all the speeches are still available (unlike the cons) via https://archive.org/index.php
unlike the cons Labour have not blocked speeches with a text bot. so whilst its true Labour no longer have them on their site, anyone can view them at any time.

 

[Firemouth]

Shame some are not as concerned about vote rigging,

sorry to, kinda, necro post but in light of the official investigation of the emails SAID to prove "vote rigging" revealing nothing of the kind!
BBC News - Falkirk row: Police say 'no evidence of criminality' in Unite emails

 

[eon]

sorry to, kinda, necro post but in light of the official investigation of the emails SAID to prove "vote rigging" revealing nothing of the kind!
BBC News - Falkirk row: Police say 'no evidence of criminality' in Unite emails

And do you think thats the only time they have been accused of vote rigging? and this is not restricted to liebour candidacy votes either.

Birmingham, Blackburn with Darwen, Bradford, Burnley, Calderdale, Coventry, Derby, Hyndburn, Kirklees, Oldham, Pendle, Peterborough, Slough, Tower Hamlets, Walsall and Woking

All have had investigations into vote fixing in recent years, and guess who stands accused?

 

[Firemouth]

And do you think thats the only time they have been accused of vote rigging? and this is not restricted to liebour candidacy votes either.

Birmingham, Blackburn with Darwen, Bradford, Burnley, Calderdale, Coventry, Derby, Hyndburn, Kirklees, Oldham, Pendle, Peterborough, Slough, Tower Hamlets, Walsall and Woking

All have had investigations into vote fixing in recent years, and guess who stands accused?

consistent reference to accusations and no thought give to proof.

AS USUAL.

 

[eon]

consistent reference to accusations and no thought give to proof.

AS USUAL.

There is only you that needs proof and in asking for that proof you undermine your own argument when proof is provided.

Vote rigging in Birmingham, did i mention Birmingham in my previous post?

At the height of the skulduggery was a "vote-rigging factory" set up by Labour activists in Aston and run from a disused warehouse. There, the three candidates - Mohammed Islam, Muhammed Afzal and Mohammed Kazi, who maintained their innocence and described yesterday's judgment as a "dark day for democracy" - and their supporters altered bags stuffed with ballots to ensure that they were elected.

Labour activists had 'vote-rigging factory' to hijack postal votes - Telegraph


OOOO the same vote rigging scandal where the judge upheld convictions after appeal.

A judge investigating vote-rigging in Birmingham's local elections has ruled there was widespread fraud and has ordered new elections.
Election Commissioner Richard Mawrey QC upheld allegations of postal fraud relating to six seats won by Labour in the ballot of 10 June last year.

301 Moved Permanently


yet more allegations, and guess what they are ALL liebour affiliates.

Labour denies allegations of rigging during candidate selection in Tottenham - News - Tottenham Journal

I will find more if you want me to? cause i know you wont belive what i posted and next you will be telling me its tory propganda.

OOO if i could only take your uneducated stance over that of cold hard facts i too could defend the corrupt actions of the liebour party.

 

[Him Her]

The LibDems tried to join the rush to remove old speeches from their website(s) until the webmaster pointed out there were not very many and none of them were interesting anyway.

At that point they all got diverted when some woman complained that a 'Billy Bunter' type had just tried to tempt her into a dark corridor with half a Crunchie.