Comments by "Neil McBeath" (@neilmcbeath954) on "Was Peter Lynch a British political prisoner who died in custody?" video.

  1. Remember Police Constable Savage from Not the Nine O'Clock News? The joke was funny because it was so VERY close to the bone.
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  2.  @Karynec  Neither will 99% of the country.
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  3.  @robshirewood5060  Not by Bobby Sands, they weren't.
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  4. He should not have pleaded guilty then.
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  5.  @robshirewood5060  So I repeat, because my first reply was deleted almost immediately after it was posted, your grandmother is almost correct. Sands was a member of the Provisional IRA was was imprisoned for 14 years for firearms offences. While in the Maze Prison in Northern Ireland he helped organise a number of protests designed to give Provisional URA members the status of political prisoners. After blanket protests, and dirty protests, he finally went on hunger strike. At the same time, a by-election was called, in April 1981, for the UK parliament seat of Fermanagh and South Tyrone. Sands stood for election as the Anti-H Block/Armagh Political Prisoner candidate, and to the horror of the Thatcher government he won the seat. He died in prison, still on hunger strike, just under a month later. This had a number of repercussions. Firstly, the government rushed through the Representation of the People Act, 1981, to ensure that no prisoner serving a long sentence could ever again stand for parliament. But the damage had been done. The British government had allowed an duly elected MP to starve to death behind bars. It made nonsense of the claim that the Provisional IRA enjoyed zero popular support, and it also destroyed the "deterrent" argument used by those who favoured reintroducing capital punishment. .
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  6.  @GeeCeeWU  Loitering with intent to use a pedestrian crossing; i.e. standing in the street while black.
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  7. The silence from the opposition in the House of Commons partly stems from the fact that violent disorder is an offence under the terms of the 1986 Public Order Act. That Act was brought in by the Conservatives in the aftermath of the Miners' Strike.
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  8.  @robshirewood5060  Not quite. Sands was a member of the Provisional IRA who was sentenced to 14 years for possession of firearms. While in the Maze Prison in Northern Ireland he led a number of protests aiming to establish political prison status for himself and other Provisional IRA inmates. Following "blanket protests" and :"dirty protests" he finally went on hunger strike. At the same time, he stood for election to the UK Parliament as an "Anti-H Block/Armagh Political Prisoner" candidate in a by-election for the seat of Fermanagh and South Tyrone in April 1981. Much to the embarrassment of the Thatcher Government, he won the seat but died in prison less than a month afterwards, without having given up the hunger strike. This death had ramifications. The Thatcher government rushed through the Representation of the People Act 1981 to ensure that no prisoner serving a long sentence could ever again stand for parliament, but the damage was done. The British government of the day had allowed a duly elected Member of Parliament to starve to death behind bars. At the same time, it had crippled the belief that capital punishment was a deterrent to crime - people who will starve themselves to death for a cause will not be deterred by execution.
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