Survival or development? The infant policymaker
Babies haven’t changed much for millennia.
Where now for UK parenting? |
The neoliberals have finally got the dystopia they yearned for.
[Gdn]
"Fuck You Buddy" - aka autonomous individualism,
aka the "autonomous chooser" - is now the norm thanks to thirty one years
of ...
- tri-partisan Thatcherism;
- the vacuous celebrity-pop-oriented consumer culture; [AVNC]
- growing inequality with the so-called minimum wage;
- the near-universal praise of corporate values by the corporate media;
- the near-universal denigration of 'workshy layabouts' by the corporate media; [Tel]
- and the marginalisation of whole groups of people who, for a variety of reasons, are not going to make it to 'autonomy'.
I've checked the log of "What's New" for December (2010) and chosen twelve reports which I believe confirm Thatcher's victory.
Notice in particular that the disabled and elderly are now an "unsustainable" burden on 'society'. [Blog]
Not so many years ago a government in Germany 'solved' this, er, 'problem' with the Aktion T4 programme.
Give it time!
Britain 'more Thatcherite now than in the 80s' says survey
British Social Attitude report finds people less supportive of the welfare state than in the 1980s ...
Gdn 13 Dec 2010Social attitudes survey
Tesco moves to calm Twitter jobs row
Using the Work Programme to undermine the Minimum Wage ...
The advert, posted on the Jobcentre Plus website, said Tesco was looking for a permanent night shift worker in a store in East Anglia, paying just expenses and Jobseekers' Allowance.
Furious Twitter followers riled the advert on the social networking site, questioning how it was possible for a major supermarket to get away with hiring someone in return for no full-time wage.
Jobseekers' Allowance is currently paid at just £53.45 per week for under 25s, or £67.50 for older staff ...
Tel 16 Feb 2012Disabled people face unlimited unpaid work or cuts in benefit
Some long-term sick and disabled people face being forced to work unpaid for an unlimited amount of time or have their benefits cut under plans being drawn up by the Department for Work and Pensions ...
The new policy ... is due to be announced after legal changes contained in clause 54 of the welfare reform bill have made their way through parliament.
The policy could mean that those on employment and support allowance who have been placed in the work-related activity group (Wrag) could be compelled to undertake work experience for charities, public bodies and high-street retailers.
The Wrag group includes those who have been diagnosed with terminal cancer but have more than six months to live; accident and stroke victims; and some of those with mental health issues.
In official notes from a meeting on 1 December last year, DWP advisers revealed they were not intending to put a time limit on the work experience placements.
When asked at the meeting if there was a maximum duration to the placements, the reply was: "There are no plans to introduce a maximum time limit." ...
Gdn 16 Feb 2012 Falling Living Standards
The Work Programme Whither Britain? Log Youth UnemploymentTESCO NIGHT SHIFT
Young jobseekers told to work without pay or lose unemployment benefits
The minimum wage laws are regularly flouted
The Tories need a rethink on the minimum wage
Benefits Britain
What is the problem?
After state pensions and tax credits, housing benefit constitutes the largest proportion of welfare spending: in 2010/11 it was £21.61bn, with 4.9 million claimants.
Some 670,000 households in the social rented sector in England "under-occupy" their accommodation by two bedrooms or more, while some 1.8 million families are currently on the housing waiting list in England.What is the proposed solution?
A benefits cap of £26,000 (or £500 a week) on all out-of-work benefits, including housing benefit, jobseeker's allowance, child tax credit and child benefit, will be introduced on households across Britain from 2013. The cap will eventually be administered as part of the new "universal credit".
Separately, an "under-occupancy penalty" (also known as the "bedroom tax") will be imposed on council and housing association tenants living in homes deemed bigger than are needed.What is the impact?
The Government says 67,000 households will get less money, saving £275m in 2013-14 and £305m in 2014-15.
Inside Housing, has shown how an unemployed couple with five children could easily spend benefits of £500 a week: £102.75 – couple rate for JSA; £24.59 – council tax benefit (Band C); £231.63 child tax credit; £73.90 child benefit. This would leave £67.13 for housing benefit – barely covering rent for a one-bedroom flat in London.
Under the bedroom tax, families would lose around £11 a week if they had one room more than required. Those with two or more extra would lose £20 a week. Tenants would lose an average of £670 a year in HB.
Ind 12 Feb 2012 Alternatives to Welfare IDS: Welfare Reform
Marginalised Home Page
Not fit for purpose: crisis in Britain's prisons worsens
Read the blogs and you will understand why this report appears on this page
Overcrowding in prison "warehouses" is causing violence behind bars as tensions soar among inmates, prison officers warned last night.
New figures show that the population of Britain's jails has jumped by 1,000 in the past three weeks ...
The Independent disclosed last month that officers had warned the Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke that the combined pressure of prison closures, budget cuts and a shortage of officers risked riots in jails.
The prison population in England and Wales stood at 87,668 yesterday – a rise of 407 since the previous Friday and more than 1,000 above the total just three weeks ago.
Jails are 1,730 below capacity and, at the current rate, the country's prisons could be full by early March.
Two new jails, in south-east London and in the West Midlands, are due to open that month in an attempt to relieve the pressure.
The sharp increase over the last five months has been mainly fuelled by convictions after the August riots, with 2,200 fewer people behind bars before the disturbances ...
Ind 28 Jan 2012 Coalition Log Prison and Probation Whither Britain? Log
Marginalised by 'Standortkonkurrenz'
Rich and poor: deserving and undeserving
Lord Carey's attack upon his fellow bishops for resisting the government's welfare reform legislation breathes new life into that most unhelpful of distinctions.
According to Lord Carey, we now have a "bloated" welfare system that "rewards fecklessness and irresponsibility".
In contrast, the former archbishop offers his own story of how hard work and diligence led him from a Dagenham council estate to Lambeth Palace.
By so doing he reinforces the view that there are a whole category of people who are responsible – and thus to be blamed – for their own misfortune ...
Gdn 27 Jan 2012 Corporate Media IDS: Welfare Reform Third Meltdown Log Whither Britain? Log
Blog The Myth of Full Employment 'Unsustainable Burdens'Carey 'call for the humane treatment of Pinochet'
Child Poverty Map
Deserving vs Undeserving
Former Archbishop Carey under fire over arms trade comments
Joseph Merrick
UK Foodbanks
Well, hallelujah!
David Cameron shrugs off welfare battles to soar in poll
The war between the 'squeezed middle' and 'benefit scroungers' is going rather well ... for the 1 per cent
The Tories are on 40%, up three percentage points from December, while Labour has drifted down one to 35%. The Liberal Democrats are on 16%, up one.
The Tories' standing is their highest since before the general election in the Guardian/ICM series – they last stood at 40% in March 2010.
Their lead is the biggest since the eight-point edge they enjoyed in June 2010, a few weeks after Cameron moved into Downing Street ...
Asked how Labour's harder line on the cuts affected the likelihood to support the party, the overwhelming majority, 72%, said it made no difference one way or the other, as against just 10% who said it made them more likely they would vote for it ...
No 10 believes the benefit cap, which will mean that a household on out of work benefits will not be able to receive more than the equivalent of a gross annual salary of £35,000, is strongly supported by voters ...
Gdn 23 Jan 2012
Phone hacking: glimpsing the truth at last
The bigger truth - the mirror this affair holds up to Thatcherite Britain, with it's louche libertarian 'fuck you buddy' culture - is as yet unexplored, unremarked upon.
It will be for the police and Crown Prosecution Service to deal with the lies and the obstruction of those who were trying to get at the truth.
As is the manner in which very senior politicians - of all parties - fawned on Murdoch, treating him as some omniscient, god-like figure.
That the Murdoch papers still sell - and are still key opinion formers - is a massive indicator of the educational failure in Thatcherite Britain.
But the dramatic eve-of-court climbdown by News International gives an indication of the company's mindset and modus operandi.
Despite his public displays of contrition (the "humblest day" … "We are sorry") Rupert Murdoch remains a street fighter.
The aggression and denials continued right up to the courtroom door, and it took some bravery from a determined group of claimants – as well as some skilful lawyering – to force the most powerful media company in the world to back down and reluctantly tell part of the truth ...
Gdn 19 Jan 2012 Corporate Media Rupert Murdoch Whither Britain? Log
Rupert Murdoch ... Corporate State The 'Fuck You Buddy' DystopiaWe hacked emails too
Judge orders search of NoW computers
NoW publisher accused of cover-up
Leveson inquiry live
Phone Hacking
Welfare reform: deserved defeats
Sweeping rhetoric blasted the welfare reform bill through the Commons unscathed, but more forensic scrutiny in the Lords is exposing exactly who will be hit.
The government suffered one important defeat just before Christmas and went on to lose three straight votes on Wednesday – and there's a way to go yet.
All three causes that triumphed were worthy winners: protections for disabled young people who could never work; for cancer patients; and for all of those with serious health problems who face having their entitlement cut off cold after just one year ...
Underlying all of these disparate problems, of course, is the drive to reduce the deficit with undue haste, as well as the deliberate decision to concentrate the pain on disability and family benefits, as opposed to sharing the suffering more evenly across pensions and certain other services.
No government could create a good news story out of this unbalanced retrenchment, but this administration has compounded the difficulties by neglecting the details at every stage.
Iain Duncan Smith speaks passionately about creating a simpler new universal credit for claimants, but the very principles which will govern the new system are not always thought through, which is why the rights of disabled young people were casually swept away for the sake of a few million pounds, prompting the first of Wednesday's defeats ...
Gdn 13 Jan 2012We need some tough love to get people off welfare
The Torygraph's favourite neoliberal fascist wants 'benefit scroungers' to run their own businesses.
Just outside the House of Commons lies a sandwich shop which exhibits the most intractable problem in politics.
Hitler would have put 'benefit scroungers' in concentration camps where hard work and starvation went hand-in-hand.
This option is not yet open to the Fraser Nelson's of the right, so, fomenting the incipient warfare between the 'squeezed middle' and 'benefit scroungers' is the only option.
This leaves the 'one per cent' free to exploit the loopholes in the tax system, safe in the knowledge that the 'squeezed middle' are attacking the wrong target.
Pret A Manger is a brilliant British success story, with its formula of soups, sandwiches and sushi having been rolled out across the country and even taken to New York. But as customers of its London shops know, Pret has another characteristic: its ever-cheerful staff are almost exclusively immigrants.
In a city with 770,000 on benefits, this is a sign that something in the economy is deeply broken ...
The country will never become more equal if the poor are trapped in a new, workless class.
The real problem with youth unemployment over the years is not that predatory Poles stole jobs from young Brits.
The real scandal is that mass immigration allowed Labour ministers to ignore welfare reform and grow the economy with these imported workers – while keeping at least 4.5 million people on dole of various kinds ...
There is much debate in Westminster about the definition of “fairness” but in these swing seats its meaning is all too clear: those who work should be better off than those who do not.
This explains why Cameron feels bold enough to threaten to force welfare reforms past the Lords, invoking the rarely used device of “financial privilege”.
He is on the right side of public opinion, and Labour knows it. And without welfare reform, there is little point being in government ...
Tel 12 Jan 2012 Welfare 'Reform' Whither Britain? Log
Marginalised by Standortkonkurrenz The Myth of Full EmploymentCentre for Policy Studies
The 18th Brumaire of Iain Duncan Smith
Brazil's success heralds the new world order
From 2028, barring any dramatic lurch, the standard of living of the average Brazilian will begin to be greater than that of the average Briton.
This historic shift will have huge implications for our body politic, our sense of identity as a nation and our role in the world.
Ind 29 Dec 2011 Global Risks 2012 Whither Britain? Log
Dystopia 2018The hollowed-out city invites lawlessness
Ed Miliband risks Tory trap on public spending
The hollowed-out city invites lawlessness
If you go to Oxford Street on a weekend afternoon, you may find yourself swept along in a mass that is not always friendly and hustled into the road accidentally-on-purpose, while keeping tabs on close-knit posses of youths for whom shopping does not seem a natural leisure pastime.
You might also catch yourself wondering where the boys (and girls) in blue are – notching up overtime at the football?
If you have known Oxford Street for some years, you might notice something else: the depleted ranks of what the Blair-Brown government called Britain's hard-working families ...
You do not need to immerse yourself in the intricacies of so-called gang culture to draw two conclusions.
The first is that visible policing, whether of city estates or of public spaces, such as Oxford Street, is absurdly inadequate ...
The second is that established, middle-class, family Britain is in retreat from the capital in a way that risks an American-style hollowing out ...
Look at the last election results for London and the South-east. Look at the extent of de facto racial segregation in London's schools.
Bear in mind that more than half of all children born in London are to foreign-born mothers, compared with 25 per cent nationally.
Then ask whether the killing of Seydou Diarrassouba, at Foot Locker on Boxing Day, was a tragic accident, or – if these social trends continue – a sign of things to come.
Ind 28 Dec 2011 Street Gangs Whither Britain? Log
A Very Neoliberal Catastrophe Dystopia 2018Ed Miliband risks Tory trap on public spending
Ed Miliband risks Tory trap on public spending, says shadow minister
"A patriotic appeal to the nation to improve growth and living standards"
This report takes on greater force after reading the long intro to the Seldon & Lodge book "Brown at No 10". The war between Blairites and Brownites goes on, to the detriment of the contesting of the coalition's austerity-driven, 'little Englander', Liliputianism.
In a pamphlet for the Policy Network thinktank, established by Lord Mandelson, McClymont writes:
"Labour can sidestep the electoral trap being sprung by the Conservatives by refusing to be driven back to its core support.
"A patriotic appeal to the nation to improve growth and living standards, not a simple defence of the public sector and public spending, is crucial to foiling Conservative attempts to render Labour the party of a sectional minority."
The warning by McClymont, whose pamphlet is jointly written with fellow Oxford historian Ben Jackson, comes days after a Guardian/ICM poll found that Labour is struggling on the economy.
It found that 44% of respondents rated Cameron and George Osborne as better placed to "manage the economy properly".
This compared with 23% for Miliband and Ed Balls, a 21-point advantage for the Tories, almost twice the 11-point advantage Cameron and Osborne enjoyed in October ...
Gdn 28 Dec 2011 Ed Miliband Whither Britain? Log
A Caring and Compassionate Society? A Free Market Train Wreck Dystopia 2018
Green Investment Bank The Third MeltdownTories say they want to leave EU and prefer Boris to Cameron
Displacement Activity: Chris Grayling making less seem like more
'Most' unemployed have a criminal record
Propagating the belief that 'most' people on benefits are criminals is the obvious subtext to the concurrent reports in the Express and Torygraph.
Closer inspection of the reports - especially that in the Telegraph - demonstrates that the stats are somewhat, er, 'elastic'.
The report starts off by asserting that a third of those on benefits have a criminal record.
Later in the report the number drops fo 26 per cent; so one-in-three becomes one-in-four, which leaves 74 per cent without a criminal record.
But by this time the mud has stuck, and 'Thatcherite Britain' has been drawn into another Tory scam to smear those on the bottom rungs of the Darwinist ladder. [TB]
The aim ...... Britain needs a rehabilitation revolution, and particularly to help former offenders into sustained employment ...... is wholely laudable, but the likelihood of the coalition funding (a) a rehab 'revolution' is risible; and (b) as a the concurrent report in the Telegraph makes clear, with 23 applicants chasing every job, ex-cons are unlikely to be in the front of the queue.
But the myth of full employment is re-emphasised; the third face of power does it's job.
Displacement Activity1.2M Criminals Get Benefits
Third of unemployed are convicted criminals
Power: A Radical View
Tories say they want to leave EU and prefer Boris to Cameron
Some 54 per cent of Tory members say their ideal vision of the relationship is for the UK to leave the EU and sign up to a free trade agreement ...
Meanwhile, 24 per cent of Tory members favour a more flexible relationship with the EU, with continued co-operation on key policy areas.
Some 10 per cent say the UK should maintain its current relationship but ignore European laws which are not in the country's interests, while 5 per cent believe Britain should leave the EU and not seek any agreements with it.
Another 3 per cent think the Government should maintain the current relationship but not sign up to any more changes, and 2 per cent favour further integration with the EU while keeping the pound.
Only 1 per cent want to join the euro and hand tax and spending powers to the European Parliament.
Ind 28 Dec 2011 A Two Speed Europe Whither Britain? Log
Cameron in command: politics in the slump
A comprehensive programme for government is not yet required – but Labour does need to come up with a couple of meaty proposals to convey the direction of travel.
A full-blooded national infrastructure bank, for instance, could make the point about selectively investing in order to grow and in turn repay the debt.
A new companies act, meanwhile, could demonstrate how the predatory practices that Mr Miliband condemns are actually going to be tackled.
History has demonstrated that there can be no assumption that the left will win in a slump but, from the Popular Front to the New Deal, it has come out on top when it has given frightened voters a glimpse of how different things could be.MumscheGdn 25 Dec 2011 Ed Miliband What is to be done? Log
26 December 2011 12:25PM
This would be the time for a new, true leftwing party to form.
You have in effect the Tory Party, then you have Tory-light, then you have a party that is propping the Tories up.
And then you wonder, why turnout at elections is so low... Because there isn't much choice or an alternative, is there?
So - for god's sake, the UK needs a real alternative that speaks to the disaffected!
Westminster council to draft 'civic contracts' for benefit recipients
Unemployed people will have to prove they are actively volunteering in the community in order to qualify for certain welfare benefits and social housing under "civic contract" proposals drawn up by a Conservative local authority.
In measures aimed at ending what it calls the "something for nothing culture", Westminster city council also proposes that working families who "play by the rules" should get priority for social housing, while existing tenants who fall foul of the law should be evicted ...
The proposals include:
• Means-testing social housing tenants so that households earning above average local incomes will pay higher rents.
• Giving priority access to borough's 22,000 social homes to groups such as volunteer police officers, Territorial Army members, nurses and ex-service personnel.
• Giving social housing allocation credit points to families who adopt or foster children; and deducting points from housing applicants found guilty of antisocial behaviour or families whose children persistently truant from school.
• Reducing council tax benefit for households whose members are convicted of persistent antisocial behaviour or criminality ...
Gdn 12 Dec 2011 Dave's 'Big Society' Con
Yes, Cameron got it right
MoS 11 Dec 2011Europe is locked in a dance of death with its banks
... the summit made some progress by pledging additional resources to be channelled through the International Monetary Fund.
But these hardly cover the borrowing needs for Spain and Italy for a few months, so remain insufficient to convince investors.
Only the ECB, with its capacity to print euros, can provide the size of support needed, but it continues to play a game of chicken with EU leaders and is refusing to blink.
In the absence of sufficient public support, troubled EU economies continue to face gut-wrenching austerity ...
Obs 11 Dec 2011Firms fear Cameron's veto will steer UK into economic dead end
Sir Martin Sorrell, boss of the multinational advertising group WPP, summed up the concerns of many business leaders when he told the Observer:
"Intuitively, it can't be helpful. I'd rather be inside the tent." ...
Manufacturers, whose fortunes lie at the heart of the Cameron-Osborne plan for revitalising the economy, and many of whom are heavily reliant on demand from the EU, also express caution ...
In theory, decisions about trade rules, financial regulation and so on are meant to form part of the architecture of the single market, and therefore be decided by all 27 member states; but industry fears that, over time, the core everyone-but-Britain group will inevitably shape the direction of policy.
Julien Seetharamdoo of Coutts ... warns foreign direct investment might eventually suffer if Britain distances itself from the EU.
"The immediate impact won't be particularly significant; Europe will still be the UK's main destination for exports and we are still part of a free trade area," he says.
"But it could have an impact on the degree to which foreign companies will want to invest in the UK.
"Japan and the US have always viewed the UK as a springboard into Europe." ...
Gdn 10 Dec 2011 A Two Speed Europe Coalition Log Whither Britain? LogTories take poll lead after EU veto
Clegg rages at Cameron's 'spectacular failure''
Eurozone Crisis
'Poorest have been abandoned'
And, it might be added, so has the possibility of a green future.
When George Osborne stood up to deliver his "emergency" budget in June 2010, he proudly announced that despite the drastic austerity measures the Treasury was taking to tackle the deficit, he would keep up the battle against child poverty.
The market gets no signal that - to quote Alistair Darling - "We must end our oil dependency"
On Tuesday he abandoned that pledge, dipping into the pockets of some of Britain's poorest families to pay for a rash of public building projects and a fuel duty freeze ...
Analysis by the Resolution Foundation shows that the burden of these changes will fall overwhelmingly on the bottom end of the earnings distribution, with the poorest 30% bearing as much as half of the cost ...
The cash saved will be used to pay for a freeze on fuel duty to placate exasperated motorists; a cap on rail fare rises; and to help fund scores of infrastructure projects, from the Kettering bypass to a new bridge across the Thames.
Ian Mulheirn, of the Social Market Foundation, said:
"For a government that's keen to burnish its fiscal credibility, caving in to the motoring lobby seems like an unfortunate use of the £1bn savings." ...
Gdn 29 Nov 2011George Osborne slams 'costly' green policies
George Osborne increases squeeze on poor families with cuts to tax credits
A nakedly regressive package
[George Osborne] took aim at public sector workers – announcing their current pay freeze will be followed by a two-year 1% pay cap – and those reliant on credits, diverting the cash to motorists, rail commuters and small businesses.
The message that "we are all in it together" grows ever more hollow.
If Osborne did not look like a man haunted by the prognosis he was dispensing, that might be because he has seen Downing Street's private polling.
That reveals an electorate that is patient, that never expected things to get better fast, indeed that predicted things would first get worse.
What's more, by thumping margins Britons have accepted the government's core plan A argument – that this is a debt crisis and that the solution is not more debt – and they do not yet blame the current government so much as they blame the banks and Labour ...
Gdn 29 Nov 2011 Autumn Statement Coalition Log Cutting the DeficitChancellor George Osborne dreaming up income
Autumn statement: winners and losers
Borrowing up by an extra £111bn
Public sector job losses to hit 600,000 by 2016
Proof that a lack of growth leads to carnage
Autumn statement: the rest of the package
Public Sector Cuts
The proverbial have taken over the asylum
"Titillation and Diversion": The Role of the Corporate Media in Thatcherite Britain
Leveson Inquiry: tabloids are 'completely outdated', Max Mosley claims
Mr Mosley said that during the court case it had emerged that Neville Thurlbeck, the News of the World’s chief reporter, had told one of the prostitutes to try to film him doing a Nazi salute.Sir Philip Green will not be appearing before the Leveson Inquiry.
Representatives of Goldman Sachs and Vodafone will not be appearing. [Ind]
Those responsible for the Southern Cross care homes fiasco have also been spared any investigation by the corporate media.
All have been safe from the 'dark arts'.
The corporate press only 'investigates' behaviours and lifestyles which come under the Murdoch heading of 'titillation and diversion'.
That's titillation as in investigations into the alleged quirky lifestyles of so-called celebrities, and 'diversion' as in: we're not going to rock the corporate boat by informing the hoi polloi as to the extent of corporate tax dodging.
The wider issue is the massive educational failure which leaves pupils without the attitudes and abilities which go to make up crap detection: a habit of mind which would put 'news' papers like The Sun out of business.
A test recording made by Mr Thurlbeck had been found, said Mr Mosley, and as he showed the woman how to use a pinhole camera: “Thurlbeck said ‘when you get him to do the Sieg Heil, get him to stand back about three metres so you get it all in shot’.”
He claimed Mr Thurlbeck had then tried to “blackmail” the woman by telling her that if she did not sign an interview backing up the suggestion of a Nazi theme, the newspaper would run pictures of her and reveal her identity and those of the other women.
He said: “One of them was a very serious scientist, another had a major position in healthcare, another ran an office and they were all terribly at risk and the thought of this being published in the News of the World was terrifying for them.”
He added: “The idea that it is the job of the tabloid journalist to pillory people whose tastes may be unusual is completely outdated. If that was the case we would still be persecuting homosexuals.
“I think it’s extraordinary that the tabloid press don’t recognise that.”
Tel 24 Nov 2011 Manufacturing Consent Rupert Murdoch: Titillation and diversion Third Face of Power
Crap Detection Tax Dodgers The 'Fuck You Buddy' DystopiaLeveson inquiry: blogger summoned over leak
I used safe houses
Media vilified me ...
JK Rowling: 'I was driven out of my home'
Manufacturing Consent
28 NI staff linked to phone hacking
Lord Hunt: the greater challenge is with bloggers
The phone hacking inquiry must shackle corporate power
Newspapers warned not to target witnesses
Leveson Inquiry
Leveson Inquiry
Tax Research UK
Fiscal squeeze will squash the poor
Child poverty? Going up over the next three years.
Poverty from working-age adults with children? Going up.
Poverty for working adults without children? You guessed it. Going up also.
And these – lest you get the wrong end of the stick – are not increases in relative poverty.
They are increases in absolute poverty: the number of people living on less than 60% of the national income adjusted for inflation.
And they are not nugatory increases either: by 2013-14 an additional 900,000 people will have slipped below the breadline ...
Guardian 20 Dec 2010
Cutting the Deficit Economic Democracy Inequality Should we care ... ?Latvia provides no magic solution for indebted economies
Child and working-age poverty set to rise in next three years
NHS staff told to give up annual pay increments or 35,000 jobs will go
Coalition wields axe over Christmas as 100,000 jobs to go by spring
A brand of austerity about as progressive as Thatcher's
Victorian Contrasts
Bupa care home staff tormented dementia victims
... the frail residents were bullied, assaulted and terrorised by care workers who recorded their ‘despicable’ behaviour on their mobile phones for fun.
Yesterday the ‘appalling’ video footage of a vulnerable 99-year-old woman and a man of 86 being mistreated by their three carers led to the carers being jailed ...
The judge made a point of stressing that the care home owners and management were in no way to blame for what happened.
Daily Mail 15 Dec 2010 A Moral Indifference LogCare of the Elderly
'Putting People First'
Phone-hacking inquiry left a mountain of evidence unexplored
If the Guardian can find numerous News of the World journalists who admit that the newspaper gathered information by illegal means, why can't Scotland Yard? ...
Guardian 12 Dec 2010 Andy Coulson
Britain's high street chains are named by sweatshop probe
Some of the biggest names on the British high street use Indian sweatshops which pay poverty wages and break labour laws to keep costs to a bare minimum ...
Observer 12 Dec 2010 Corporate Sociopathy
Homelessness on rise, say charities
Official statistics show 12% increase in applicants in last quarter, prompting worry that it could become a trend ...
Guardian 09 Dec 2010 Rough SleepersHomelessness
It's now officially 'unsustainable' to support disabled people
In the comprehensive spending review in October, the coalition said there would be a review of DLA: these plans have now become clearer with its announcement that it intends to scrap the benefit and replace it with personal independent payment ...
Guardian 08 Dec 2010 Crackdown on Welfare Cutting the DeficitDisabled people 'twice as likely' to miss out on careers, courses and holidays
Disabled people claiming benefits face new medical checks
Disability Living Allowance reform
Leonard Cheshire Disability
Disability
Leek harvesting gang 'treated workers as slaves'
Jonathan Kirk QC, prosecuting, said Gurdip Somal ran the multi-million pound business providing agricultural labour to farmers ...
BBC NEWS 07 Dec 2010 Agency WorkersUK gangmasters exploiting £8-a-week workers
Turning the Tide
About the UKHTC
Gangmasters Licensing Authority
Disabled people claiming benefits face new medical checks
Charities alarmed as ministers propose end to automatic right to key allowances ...
Guardian 06 Dec 2010 Cracking down on Welfare
Dementia nursing care needs overhaul
Barbara Pointon, from Dementia UK and the Alzheimer's Society, said: "What's happening with NHS continuing health care is it's getting more and more difficult to get in the first place ...
BBC NEWS 04 Dec 2010 Care of the Elderly Moral IndifferenceAlzheimer's Society
Dementia UK
Shocking accounts of poor patient care
Today the patients association publishes Listen to patients, Speak up for change, a collection of 17 firsthand accounts of hospital care of older patients from across the NHS ...
Patients Association 02 Dec 2010 A Moral Indifference Log Care of the ElderlyCare of Older People
School plans centre to house its homeless pupils
Problems expected to get worse as cuts bite with sixth former spending four months sleeping in park ...
Guardian 01 Dec 2010 Rough SleepersHomelessness
Young and jobless
While the latest government statistics show falls in unemployment and a shorter dole queue, today's analysis of the data suggests the headlines disguise the plight of jobless young people ...
Mark Easton's UK 01 Dec 2010 Youth UnemploymentCost of youth crime rises to £1.2bn a year
Further austerity needed to pay for elderly care, says OBR
Britain faces another round of tax rises and spending cuts within a decade to address the "unsustainable" pressure the country's ageing population is putting on the economy, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility ...
Telegraph 01 Dec 2010 Cutting the Deficit The ElderlyOBR
This week, the Henley Centre published its annual findings for a question it has been asking us for 20 years:
"Do you think the quality of life in Britain is best improved by: a) looking after the community's interests instead of our own; or b) looking after ourselves, which ultimately raises standards for all?"
From 1994 to 2000, the overwhelming majority chose a. But since then, the gap has been closing.
This year, for the first time in a decade, a majority (53%) chose b.
It is easy to read too much into polls. But in this instance, there is evidence of a cultural shift towards selfishness practically everywhere you look. ...
Guardian, 08 July 2006