UK
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Statement by English PEN and Index on Censorship on the government’s counter-extremism strategy
In its new strategy, the government is proposing measures that may criminalise legitimate speech and shrink the space for open debate throughout society. The UK already has legislation dealing with criminal offences in this category, including the Terrorism Act and the Public Order Act, and there is no need for new laws that may seriously… Continue reading
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The NHS Needs Emergency Funding Now!
It’s official: unless £2bn is urgently given to struggling hospitals, A&E waiting times will go up, cancer treatment will be delayed, and it’ll be impossible for hospitals to provide beds for people in need this winter. Continue reading
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The NHS winter is coming – what’s the one thing all progressive politicians must do to save it? By Caroline Molloy
All week we’ve been waiting for the figures that would show just how bad the scale of the NHS financial crisis was. The regulator, Monitor, had been ‘leaned on’ to delay publication til after the Tory Party Conference. And no wonder. The figures that were finally released today were bad. Really bad. NHS Trusts and… Continue reading
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New Labour Party shadow chancellor seeks to reassure big business at party conference By Chris Marsden
Newly appointed shadow chancellor John McDonnell outlined his and Jeremy Corbyn’s new economic prescriptions at the Labour Party’s conference yesterday. It was an exercise in appearing as “sensible” and “safe” as possible to Britain’s ruling class, while still making verbal feints towards the anti-austerity sentiment in the working class that catapulted Corbyn to the leadership… Continue reading
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RISE: Scotland’s Left Alliance By Ken Ferguson
The long dominant Labour Party, which opted to campaign against independence — alongside the Conservatives, loathed by the big majority of Scots voters, and the now virtually demolished Liberal Democrats in the Better Together alliance — reaped the whirlwind at the UK general election in May. Continue reading
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Labour values, the NHS and me By Marcus Chown
Last week I received an e-mail from the Labour Party telling me it had reason to believe I did not support its aims and beliefs and it was excluding me from voting in the leadership election. I have voted Labour in every election since I was 18. I have been a full member of the… Continue reading
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Army plots against British PMs are not new By Jonathan Cook
Jeremy Corbyn,Photo by AP Photo There has been some debate about the significance of a warning issued this weekend through Rupert Murdoch’s Sunday Times by a British general that the army would “mutiny” and use “whatever means possible, fair or foul” should the new Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn ever get near 10 Downing Street. Continue reading
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Nasty party’s racist policies damage the NHS By John Lister
Nurses forced to leave Britain, new charging systems being set up even for emergency care – Tory policies are damaging the NHS, writes John Lister in an article from the latest Keep Our NHS Public newsletter. The NHS is already suffering as a result of racist changes to the rules governing non-EU staff, even as… Continue reading
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Corbyn can afford to sidestep the media but not their power By Des Freedman
The attacks on the Corbyn camp from parts of the British establishment have come in thick and fast – entirely as expected, given that his overwhelming success was partly predicated on a desire to challenge establishment rule. His resounding victory on the weekend was greeted by headlines arguing that he was a ‘danger to Britain’… Continue reading
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The NHS stays centre stage as the political ground shakes By Tony O’Sullivan
As Labour’s newly elected leader throws down the gauntlet on undoing NHS privatisation, the Tory ideological and financial attacks on our health service are escalating. Continue reading
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The Trade Union Bill is an attack on the NHS, our services, and all that it means to be British By Caroline Molloy
Tonight, David Cameron attempts to drive through a bill which will make it ‘close to impossible’ for trade unions to take any lawful industrial action. Senior Tory MP David Davis this weekend complained that parts of the Trade Union Bill (which gets its second reading this evening) resemble something General Franco would have come up… Continue reading
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An Arrest Warrant for Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu When He Arrives in London on September 9 By Prof Michel Chossudovsky
Below is the Response of the Petitions Team of the British parliament concerning the petition, calling for Netanyahu’s arrest, signed by more than 107,000 British citizens and residents. Was pressure exerted on the petitions team to issue this abridged statement and endorsement of PM Cameron? The petitions team is not only in violation of its… Continue reading
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Help stop the bee deaths
In 48 hours, I’m meeting with the government minister in charge of bees – Liz Truss. She’s my MP – I’m going to talk to her about toxic bee-killing pesticides, and why they need to stay off our fields. I’m Paul, a 38 Degrees member from Norfolk. Can you help raise a million voices behind… Continue reading
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Is Jeremy Corbyn’s foreign policy socialist? By Chris Marsden
For most working people, sympathy will rest with Corbyn. But the crucial issue to be understood is that none of this imparts a socialist character to his policies. Nor does it mean that those looking to him as a means of opposing war will find the answers they are seeking. Continue reading
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Media Lens: ‘Bullying’ – BBC Political Editor’s Bizarre Term For The Public Resisting The Establishment
The BBC’s Nick Robinson has made a career out of telling the public what leading politicians say and do; sometimes even what they ‘think’. This stenography plays a key role in ‘the mainstream media’, given that a vital part of statecraft is to keep the public suitably cowed and fearful of threats from which governments… Continue reading
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Purge of Jeremy Corbyn Voters Unmasks Britain’s Labour Party By Jonathan Cook
If Corbyn wins, it would be the first time in living memory that the UK has had a Labour leader who is actually of the left. It is a prospect terrifying our supposedly liberal media, including the BBC and most of the Guardian’s senior staff, from Polly Toynbee to Jonathan Freedland. Continue reading
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What does the “Jeremy Corbyn phenomenon” represent? By Chris Marsden and Julie Hyland
A new “one member, one vote” system for the leadership contest was meant to help consolidate the party’s right-wing course, based on the assumption that the electorate—or, more properly, the narrow social layer to which all the parties pitch their rotten wares—shared the party’s concerns and prejudices. This appears to have backfired. Continue reading
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Unilever’s Toxic Mercury Spill in India: Tweet the CEO
They dumped tons of toxic waste, devastated an entire town and poisoned thousands of their own workers. That’s Unilever: a huge UK corporation that makes billions of pounds in profit. But they aren’t paying up for a massive toxic mercury leak they caused in the Indian town of Kodaikanal. Continue reading
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More dead bees? Thank the Barbarians!
Fresh batches of bee-killing pesticides are on their way to British farms right now. [1] Prime Minister David Cameron could stop these toxic chemicals before they are spread across our fields and wreak havoc on bees. But he’ll only do it if enough of us pile on the pressure. Continue reading
