Labour Yes launch with Ed-M and Ken this week
The Labour Yes campaign will launch its national campaign on Wednesday 16th March, with party leader Ed Miliband and other senior Labour speakers including Ben Bradshaw, Neil Kinnock, Oona King, and Ken Livingstone.
The rally will take place in central London.
To register for free, click here.
They say:
Labour Yes brings together the many party members and supporters want to see a Yes vote in May’s referendum, alongside winning for Labour in May’s crucial elections.
By making the democratic case for reform of our broken political system, we will reinforce Labour’s positive appeal to the electorate.
David Cameron and the Tories are desperate for a No Vote. They know that it would be a hammer-blow for their chances of dominating the 21st Century like they dominated the previous one.
How popular is Nuclear energy exactly?
contribution by Climate Sock
Caring about international public views on nuclear power shouldn’t be at the top of many people’s to-do list right now. For one, donating to the Red Cross should be a lot of places higher (and that’s also, sort of, what I’m going to write about).
But pretty soon now, once the stories from Japan of individual tragedy and wonderful survival have been played out, much of the media will turn to the question of whether nuclear power is safe. And a part of that reporting will be, whether people think that nuclear power is safe.
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New book details global surveillance networks
Your personal data is included in around 700 databases in the UK* – could you even name ten of them?
With spying a part of everyday life and the rise of hyper-surveillance seemingly unstoppable, the No-Nonsense Guide to Global Surveillance, published this March, is the first study to truly explore the history, breadth and complexity of this multi-billion dollar industry from a global perspective.
Author Robin Tudge argues the the growth of sophisticated surveillance technology to global proportions, from satellite Global Positioning Systems down to the near-atomic level of DNA, that has for the most part – unintentionally created a system that threatens human rights and democracy.
Personal information once held in secure, single-purpose databases is now being ever more rapidly shared, converged and shifted in intelligence centres across borders.
Looking to the near future he cites the Real World Web, trillions of ‘smart dust’ tiny sensors deployed to monitor all data via Wi-Fi about people, the environment, weather and the traffic, like ‘electronic nerve endings for the planet’.
Born in London, Robin Tudge has lived and worked in Moscow, Hanoi and Beijing, and as a journalist has written for scores of publications worldwide. His first book was the pioneering Bradt Guide to North Korea in 2003, then in 2005 he co-wrote the best-selling Rough Guide to Conspiracy Theories.
The book is published by New Internationalist magazine.
Media contact: amanda.procter@oppuk.co.uk
From a press release
Plans to strip away workers rights criticised
Labour’s shadow chancellor Ed Balls MP has sharply criticised the government on reports they are planning to allow small businesses be exempt from offering maternity and paternity leave to employees.
It’s nonsense to suggest that the balanced measures Labour took in government to help parents juggle work and family life are what’s stopping our economy growing. It isn’t working parents who are holding our economy back. What’s holding back the recovery is the Tory VAT rise and cuts which go too deep and too fast, are damaging business and consumer confidence and costing hundreds of thousands of jobs in the public and private sector.
Governments always have to be vigilant and everyone should want to bear down on unnecessary or badly-designed regulation where they can. But the government’s plans will cost jobs if firms with 11 or 12 people decide to downsize to take advantage and it will make it harder for mums and dads to go out to work.
Ministers should not be using the cover of a flimsy growth strategy to strip away the rights of millions of workers. They need to think this one through again and come up with a credible plan to get the economy growing strongly and unemployment falling again.
The Telegraph reported yesterday that companies with 10 or fewer employees could be given the right to negotiate maternity and paternity leave “deals” directly with their workers.
Currently a women is allowed up to a year’s statutory maternity leave if she is an employee, no matter how long she has had the job, how many hours she works or how much she is paid. Her employer is also forced to give her old job back to her, or offer her a similar post, on the same salary and conditions, if she wishes to return.
In defence of LGBT History Month: a reply to Toby Young
contribution by Jules Mattsson
Last week I read two columns by journalist Toby Young attacking my old school for celebrating LGBT history month. His lack of understanding seemed to unite pupils, staff, parents and ex-pupils alike in anger over his claims.
The fact that the sole source for his columns seems to be a third hand blog post maybe gives him the defence of wilful ignorance. LGBT issues do not replace the curriculum, nor are they separate to it.
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Libya and its oil: reason enough not to interfere?
One thing supporters of liberal intervention in 2003 did, as part of their campaign to convince the left they were right, was try and forget that it was a US neo-con Christian with a history in oil deals taking forces into Iraq.
For them, it didn’t matter who was going to take out Saddam Hussein, just as long as somebody did; their left wing credentials, they supposed, were still intact. Unfortunately for them they were wrong. So should there be similar concerns about Libya?
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Greens should resist the temptation to celebrate rising petrol prices
Petrol prices are going up. This hits people in the pocket – hard. At a time when most people haven’t had a pay rise in years, this is particularly tough. But, traditionally, greenies have argued in favour of more expensive fuel – right?
We need to put fuel prices up in order to wean our society of oil? Right? Well, I’m not convinced. Greens are often percieved as a party who are not on the side of ordinary people. Green taxes became emblematic of that.
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Unite debate: learning from Wisconsin
What lessons can we learn from the workers of Wisconsin?
A Unite debate
Wednesday, March 16th, 2011
16.30-18.30
the Discus Centre,
Unite House, Holborn, London WC1X 8TN
Last month, workers watched events in Wisconsin with pride. A savage assault on the collective rights of millions of public sector workers prompted outrage across the States, inspired a mass mobilisation of the union movement and saw US unions find a new way to enage with the American public.
As we in the UK work to face down unpopular and unjust attacks on public services, what lessons can we learn from Wisconsin in 2011?
Join us to find out more from one of those Wisconsin protestors, Matthew Macgregor of Blue State Digital.
The evening will be chaired by Professor Keith Ewing, one of the UK’s leading experts on employment law, who will highlight the problems faced by workers in this country as they seek to defend their jobs.
Seating for the evening is limited though so attendance is on a first come, first served basis.
If you would like to attend, please let Martha know asap on martha.campbell@unitetheunion.org asap.
Libdems drop manifesto pledge on tax avoidance
The Libdem manifesto of 2010 said:
We will tackle tax avoidance and evasion, with new powers for HM Revenue & Customs and a law to ensure properties cannot avoid stamp duty if they are put into an offshore trust.
This week, the Libdems said they were going to continue focusing on the issue, saying:
We will tackle tax avoidance and evasion, with new powers for HM Revenue & Customs.
Notice the difference in the two pledges?
Yup, the stamp duty scam has been quietly dropped, Cathy Newman at Channel 4 reports.
And it’s not the only tax pledge to have fallen by the wayside. Vince Cable’s plan for a “Mansion Tax” of 1 per cent on properties worth over £2 million has also disappeared, although he’d already been forced to water it down after a mutiny by colleagues.
And what about other manifesto commitments that Nick Clegg is currently waxing lyrically about?
She summarises:
Try as they might, the Lib Dems haven’t got a great deal to crow about. Agreed, they have secured a referendum on voting reform, but current polls suggest they may well lose the vote on May 5. And yes, they ditched ID cards, but only because the Tories wanted to too.
The increase in the personal allowance is undoubtedly an achievement, but like their other “triumphs”, it was tainted by compromise. The pupil premium wasn’t nearly as generous as they would have liked, and as FactCheck reveals today, promises on tax avoidance have been chiselled away.
The reason why effigies of Nick Clegg are being paraded round Sheffield by protesters is that, for all that the Lib Dems have achieved in government, they’ve given away a lot. The U-turns on VAT and tuition fees are what many will remember, rather than giving a helping hand to mountain rescue teams – important as that undoubtedly is.
Quick, blame the Coalition!
Please don’t be a ‘Jedi’ on the Census again, please
contribution by Adam Wilcox
At the last Census, over 390,000 otherwise sane people listed their religion as ‘Jedi’, which completely screwed up the national religious statistics. There were [allegedly more] Jedi’s in the UK than identifying Sikhs, Jews and Buddhists combined.
By choosing to be officially registered as a Jedi, the true number of non-religious Britain’s was fudged, and this allowed the continued justification of religious influence on policy making. We can’t afford this same mistake again.
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» The real agenda behind Telegraph’s abortion investigation
» How Scotland Yard monitors prying bloggers and journalists
» When disabled people want to work – employers can hold the back
» Revealed: the reality behind Workfare and why it doesn’t work
» Job snob? No, I’ve got the T-shirt
» Why country-by-country reporting matters to our wellbeing
» If Unions want to become stronger, they need to modernise
» Why work “reforms” in Spain are a warning for workers across Europe
» Five things you need to know about the NHS bill
» Bigger. Fatter. Gypsier. More Racist.
» Laziness levels in Britain getting lazier, wails government
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