In a nearby town to me there is a revolution going on. The town is Frome and the revolution has people weeping with relief, joy, amazement and love. How do I know? My seriously ill niece moved there. She is unemployable in any conventional sense. Between bouts of relentless illness and innumerable hospital visits, a […]
Tag: food bank
The unholy cult of Milton Friedman and the destruction of Britain
In her book, The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein names the holy trinity of neoliberalism and Friedman economics – The elimination of the public sphere, total liberation for corporations and skeletal social spending. Everything that has happened in Britain since the bankers crashed the global economy in 2008 comes down to those three fundamental principles which […]
In the Tory world stripped of humanity people don’t matter
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,539 Wednesday 31 August 2016. Dear Mrs May, Within the DWP, as Iain Duncan Smith (IDS) casually informed us at a parliamentary hearing, people receiving social security payments are known as ‘stock’ and, infamously, David Freud said, “people who are poorer should be prepared to take the […]
Government has stolen effective protest but only if we continue to allow it to
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,339 Thursday 11 February 2016. Dear Mr Cameron, This is an issue that’s been bothering me for some time – What happened to protest that it is no longer effective in demanding and driving change? Thankfully a wiser head than mine has been looking at this and […]
How do the poor save for a rainy day when every day is a rainy day?
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,315 Thursday 14 January 2016. Dear Mr Cameron, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, just who do you think you are? Professor Henry Higgins? If only the poor was more like you, talked proper and done the proper things, they wouldn’t be such wretches. I am so […]
Cameron’s golden thread of prosperity, law and good governance and democracy
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,265 Tuesday 24 November 2015. Dear Mr Cameron, Do ordinary people really matter so little to you in your ambitions, Mr Cameron? Award-winning director Ken Loach is currently filming in Newcastle and has spoken out about the hardship he has seen. He didn’t pull any punches in […]
In corporate terms, Britain was apparently broken by the janitor
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,251 Friday 06 November 2015. Dear Mr Cameron, It is always difficult to express the depths of corruption and deceit of you and your government, not least because you combine a mixture of low cunning with a breathtaking amount of utter stupidity. To put the deficit, welfare […]
The lies that wouldn’t fool a child, only adults
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,159 Sunday 26 July 2015. Dear Mr Cameron, It is astonishing that Iain Duncan Smith can justify savaging our entire system of social security based on the reaction of people watching poverty porn on television and yet completely ignore the ever growing public outcry against the reality […]
The banking crisis, the goose that laid the golden egg
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,119 Tuesday 16 June 2015. Dear Mr Cameron, Looking back to the banking crisis, I think one of the most remarkable things about it was that it never occurred to the vast majority of ordinary people, including me, that it would become the goose that laid the […]
Cameron forced to take a pay rise, I feel his pain
A letter a day to number 10. No 1,106 Thursday 04 June 2015. Dear Mr Cameron, I see that you have had to accept your pay rise which was forced on you against your wishes and you do not feel able to formally challenge the pay watchdog. If there are to be any cuts to […]
Fear and Loathing in Great Britain 