Threat Level – Severe My Arse

Most of the time, ministerial announcements do not raise the average citizen’s interest level one jot. Sometimes those announcements gain a flicker of recognition because they might affect you. And then there are the occasions when the Prime Minister stands there and says something that sets the bullshit detector howling long and loud. Young Dave just did one of those.

No Dave, that's a mic, not a frigging missile

So what has Cameron announced? Well, “new laws will be introduced to remove extremists' passports” [not sure he can do that] , and there are “fears over UK jihadis returning from Iraq and Syria”. But his own Home Secretary says “there's no evidence to suggest that an attack is imminent”. Dave seems not to care about what Theresa May thinks: “A terror attack on the UK is now 'highly likely'”.

And what is Cameron’s assessment of the scale of this threat? It is, get this, a “greater and deeper threat to our security than we have known before”. Really? Greater, perhaps, than the Spanish Armada? More significant than the Dutch venturing up the Medway and trashing a number of our ships and forts? More deadly than the Kaiser and his gang sending Zeppelins to chuck bombs out over London?

Does the Prime Minister think that ISIS, or whatever they want to be called this week, is a more severe threat than the Third Reich, which sent us the Battle of Britain, the Blitz, V-1s, V-2s, a submarine threat that came close to cutting off the nation’s food supplies, together with the side order of total war in Europe, north Africa, and much of the rest of the world?

Perhaps Cameron thinks that a bunch of hotheads with shoulder launch missiles and pick-up trucks is a more potent threat than Soviet Russia’s Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, which were estimated to be capable of vapourising much of the country at less than five minutes’ notice? Does he think, maybe, that the self-proclaimed Caliphate could inflict more damage than last winter’s storms?

What Young Dave has said there is a great big steaming pile of fresh and highly pungent weapons grade bullpucky. We’ve already got every sodding airport in the UK in a state of lockdown, ports likewise, and armed Police can even be seen patrolling around central London and major rail stations across the country. This is just a cheap attempt to make the Government look half competent.

ISIS, as Sunny Hundal has pointed out, has shown no sign of being even remotely interested in exporting its particular brand of terror. It wants to establish a Caliphate in the Middle East, which, the last time I looked, was no nearer to the UK than before the threat level got raised. This is just a cheap attempt by Cameron to get himself onto tomorrow’s front pages – and Douglas Carswell off them.

Hello Dave. Stop treating us like paranoid children and do some proper governing.