Why was my friend jailed over botched attempt to end his own life?
My friend and former colleague Steven Altman has been thrown into jail – for attempting to kill himself.
When I heard the news, I was just gobsmacked. I could not believe it. I had thought we didn’t any longer punish people who were suffering from mental ill-health, for trying to kill themselves.
It appears that the recommendation of the probation service which advised that Steven shouldn’t go to prison has been ignored.
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A radical idea to elect ‘guardians’ to protect future generations
When recycling was first promoted by the Green Party in the 1970s and 1980s, the concept was ridiculed. Now it is taken for granted.
I’m proposing another radical idea: that future generations be formally represented within our existing parliamentary democracy.
The idea is presented in a report entitled ‘Guardians of the Future: A Constitutional Case for representing and protecting Future People‘, launched yesterday at the House of Commons.
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Caroline Lucas launches new Green think-tank
Caroline Lucas MP launched a new Green think-tank, ‘Green House’ this morning.
I chaired the meeting, at which we launched our first two papers.
- Sustainability Citizenship by Prof Andrew Dobson, Keele University, urging politicians to involve people in decision making as morally acting citizens; and
- Mutual Security in a Sustainable Economy by Molly Scott Cato, Green Economist and Brian Heatley, a former senior civil servant. This paper sets out how we should redefine poverty, disconnect welfare from the labour market and reconsider the retirement age.
Both these papers are now available on our website: http://www.greenhousethinktank.org
The Green House Advisory Group, whose membership makes clear that this is far more than just a Green Party initiative.
It is also far more than just a metropolitan organisation. Our board so far includes:
» Michael Meacher MP, the former Labour Environment Minsister;
» Bea Campbell, the feminist, journalist, playwright and broadcaster;
» Tim Jackson, Professor of Sustainable Development at the university of Surrey and author of the influential book Prosperity without Growth;
» Jean Lambert, London’s Green MEP;
» Victor Anderson, a former member of the London Assembly and green economist;
» Mary Mellor, leading eco-feminist;
» Jonathan Porritt, former chair of the Sustainable Development Commission;
» Geoff Tansey, a leading expert on creating a fair and sustainable food system; and
» Simon Thomas, former Plaid Cymru MP for Ceredigion, and member of the Welsh Assembly.
Green House expects to publish further papers this Autumn the food price crisis and the future of banking.
I hope that LC readers will welcome this new development.
Green House is interested in joint initiatives with progressives; contact me offline (or in the comments, below), if you have ideas.
Our website: http://www.greenhousethinktank.org
Could Clegg’s system of choice for Lords Reform kill it?
I am delighted to see that Nick Clegg is proceeding with reform of the House of Lords. It is vital to our being (becoming) a democratic country.
But, Lords reform might be severely hampered if it is perceived to be bringing in a variation of the very system that the British electorate has just voted down. This makes AV-Plus or STV (which is simply AV in multi-member constituencies) extremely undesirable as potential methods for use in elections to the upper house.
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The ‘Yes to AV’ campaign: let the post-mortems begin
We already know the result. Now we need learn the lessons and do it much better next time, when that may be.
Some obvious and crucial points first.. Clegg was of course an albatross.
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Aren’t Labourites against the Alternative Vote being hypocritical?
If AV is a good enough system with which to elect the Labour Leader (and Ed M. wouldn’t have become Lab Leader without it), isn’t it a good enough system with which to select our MPs?
Here’s a real challenge for Labour NO supporters: Put your money where your mouth is, and if you are so against AV, then propose that future Lab Leadership elections take place by FPTP.
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If Libyan rebels want it, why aren’t we calling for a no-fly-zone too?
Why are progressives not getting solidly behind the broadening call for a no-fly-zone to give the free Libyan forces the air-cover they need in order to defeat Gaddafi’s regime?
The most crucial argument in favour is that the free Libyans, at least as manifested in the Transitional National Council in Benghazi (the fledgling caretaker-government-in-waiting), have themselves called for.
I have just been talking with a Libyan friend of mine who is fresh back from Benghazi. He tells me that the people of eastern Libya are strongly united on two points:
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Two reasons why Libdems might not benefit from AV
For everyone, from the BBC and Peter Kellner to Nick Clegg himself, there are assumptions that LibDems will benefit from the referendum in May.
And after all, haven’t the LibDems in the past suffered a good deal from the ‘wasted vote’ argument, which AV would put an end to?
But there are two good reasons why this might not happen.
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Alternative Vote contains FPTP within it
As a #Yes2AV supporter, I am sometimes asked this question: “Will there be an option, in AV, to just vote for one party when not wanting any of the others in at all?”
The answer is YES. Under AV, if you simply place a ’1′ next to your favoured candidate (rather than a cross), then you are voting as if it is FPTP (the current system), and that is completely allowed.
In fact, there is a very important point here: It really is unnecessary for FPTP-lovers to oppose AV at all. FPTP is ‘contained within’ AV.
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They used depleted uranium in Iraq in our name
There’s an important blog-post here on the vast crime of depleted uranium use by the UK and US forces in Iraq.
I questioned Charles Clarke (then my MP) about this in the run-up to the criminal attack on Iraq in 2003.
To my pleasant surprise, he insisted in reply that depleted Uranium would not be used anywhere at all where it could harm civilians, in Iraq, and suggested to me that it was unlikely to be used at all by the British Armed Forces.
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