Lives torn apart and assets lost: this is what a Labour privatisation would mean : Guardian.

DWPExamination.

The battle under way in the capital should trouble us all. Proponents call it innovation, but I say it’s an assault on the poor.

Tottenham town hall in Haringey, north London, one year after the 2011 riots. Photograph: Peter Dench/Getty Images

A battle broke out on Tuesday in one of the scruffier parts of north London. It didn’t look much: a few dozen placard wavers outside Haringey civic centre, and a restive public heckling councillors as they debated big plans for their future. But this is a battle that concerns all of us. At its heart is a programme that is among the most audacious I’ve ever seen. Haringey wants to privatise huge swaths of public property: family homes, school buildings, its biggest library. All of it will be stuck in a private fund worth £2bn.

It comes with huge risks. It will demolish precious social housing, turf out…

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The still face paradigm, the just world fallacy, inequality and the decline of empathy

Politics and Insights

UNICEF’s reports have consistently put the UK at the bottom of the child well-being league table. See also: UNICEF criticises UK’s failure to tackle child inequality as gap grows.

Source: The Equality Trust 

The still face paradigm and inequality

Before Christmas I read an excellent and insightful article by Michael Bader called The Decline of Empathy and the Appeal of Right-Wing Politics, which was about Edward Tronick’s Still Face experiment in part. Tronick is an American developmental psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. His studies illuminate the importance of trusting relationships and consistent human responses in children’s development and learning.

Tronick’s experimental design was very simple: mothers were asked to play as they usually would with their six-month-old infants. The mothers were then instructed to suddenly blank their face: to make their facial expression flat and neutral – completely “still”  – and to do so for…

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The despicable powers that be and us

Fear and loathing in Great Britain

It was a huge shock to lose a good friend and campaigner on Monday 1st January 2017. I spent the day in and out of tears, but as the day unfolded I was astonished to realise the extent of her reach and the number of lives she had profoundly touched. It was typical of Denise Bellamy to just get on with it, she was at times completely disabled by recurring illness and had a busy family life to boot. I can’t imagine how she did it, but I do feel profound awe and overwhelming of love for a dear departed friend and campaigner.

We’re just a few days into the new year, it’s not even toddling yet, but what has struck me is the force of the opposition to what the Tories are doing to our country and our people. It feels the year has started like a tidal wave…

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2016 proved a black year for personal privacy

eats shoots 'n leaves

In brief, new laws and executive orders have given uintelligence agencies in the U.S. and U.K. unprecedented powers to gather a near-infinite harvest of the digital traces of our lives.

And in the U.S., gleanings once accessible only to a handful of political, military, and diplomatic elites will now be open to a host of law enforcement agencies.

From the New York Times:

In its final days, the Obama administration has expanded the power of the National Security Agency to share globally intercepted personal communications with the government’s 16 other intelligence agencies before applying privacy protections.

The new rules significantly relax longstanding limits on what the N.S.A. may do with the information gathered by its most powerful surveillance operations, which are largely unregulated by American wiretapping laws. These include collecting satellite transmissions, phone calls and emails that cross network switches abroad, and messages between people abroad that cross domestic…

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GPs should do more to take pressure off A&E departments, says May : Guardian.

DWPExamination.

Prime minister wants surgeries to offer a seven-day service, but is accused of trying to scapegoat family doctors for chaos in NHS hospitals.

Many GPs feel they are already struggling with limited resources. Photograph: Anthony Devlin/PA

Theresa May is urging GP surgeries to make more effort to provide a seven-day service as she seeks to deflect blame for the deepening crisis in the NHS.

With pressure mounting on the prime minister, amid growing evidence that hospitals are struggling to cope with surging winter demand, Downing Street issued a statement on Friday saying that surgeries should do more to ensure they offer appointments in the evening and at weekends. GP leaders reacted angrily to the announcement and accused May of trying to scapegoat family doctors for the unfolding NHS crisis.

NHS crisis: 40% of hospitals issue alert in first week of new year

Read more

A Downing Street source said: “Most

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Bangalore police detain six men over New Year’s Eve ‘mass molestation’ Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/04/bangalore-police-investigate-new-years-eve-sexual-assault-india? CMP=share_btn_tw

Bahrain’s torture ‘evidence’ to condemn people to death

Dear Kitty. Some blog

This video is about torture in Bahrain.

From Reprieve in Britain:

Bahrain uses torture evidence to sentence three more to death

January 9, 2017

Bahrain’s highest court has today (9th January) upheld the death sentences of three men, despite allegations that they were tortured into making false confessions. Their executions are now imminent.

Abbas al-Samea, Sami Mushaima, and Ali al-Singace were originally sentenced to death in February 2015.

All three were tortured into signing false ‘confessions’ that were used against them in court.

Mr Mushaima was forced to sign documents despite being illiterate. He is a relative of a prominent opposition politician, but has never been involved in activism.

Mr al-Samea was admitted to hospital for surgery as a result of his interrogation. He is a PE teacher and aspiring photojournalist who had taken pictures at a protest.

The three men’s death sentences were overturned in October…

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New sustainable agriculture development in Detroit feeds 2,000 households for free

ecoliberty

Main Source:Natural News
Date: 27 December 2016
Author: D. Samuelson

(NaturalNews) Urban renewal on a couple of acres in a northern section of Detroit, Michigan doesn’t mean fancy street signs, sprawling apartment complexes or bicycle lanes. It means a vision for clean food and sustainable agriculture to create a new kind of urban development called an “agrihood.” Parcels of land formerly in disarray are being dug up and retrofitted as an urban farm and more under the direction of the 501 (3) (c) group called the Michigan Urban Farming Initiative (MUFI).

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Map of the day: A deadly year for journalists

eats shoots 'n leaves

From the International Federation of Journalists, a map showing nations where journalists were killed in 2015.

The year just ended proved a bloody one for the world’s dwindling population of journalists, and Mexico proved one of the most dangerous of nations for members of the Fourth Estate, with 11 journalists slain, trailing only Iraq [15 killed] and Afghanistan [13 killed].

From the International Federation of Journalists:

93 journalists and media professionals were killed in 2016 according to new statistics published by the world’s largest journalists’ organisation.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), which represents 600.000 members in 140 countries, today published a list of 93 journalists and media staff who were killed in 2016 in work-related incidents. A further 29 died in two plane crashes.

The killings, including targeted murders, bomb attacks and crossfire incidents span 23 countries in Africa, Asia Pacific, the Americas, Europe and the Middle East and…

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Social care crisis means woman dying from cancer is refused pain relief: Council and health trust argued it was each other’s responsibility to issue a prescription for morphine : Daily Mail.

DWPExamination.

• Lack of communication between hospitals and local councils blamed for issues
• A damning report has warned vulnerable patients are falling through the cracks
• Eight anonymous case studies have been highlighted in this latest report
• It comes as government give the green light to councils to raise council taxes

A woman dying in agony from cancer was refused morphine in her final days because her health trust and council each claimed it was the other’s responsibility.

Although the patient, named Gail, was under the care of both authorities, neither arranged the prescription, leaving her in unnecessary pain for almost a week.

Her case is highlighted in a damning report which warns how vulnerable patients are ‘falling through the cracks’ because of the social care crisis.

A woman dying in agony from cancer was refused morphine in her final days because her health trust and council each claimed it was the other’s…

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