I got an email last week from London 2012, advertising a Cultural Olympiad gig in a park in Hackney. In the footer I noticed something bizarre: The email listed the Olympic and Paralympic corporate partners, and number one on the Paralympic list was Atos. Atos, who administer the deeply flawed disability benefits assessment. Atos, who [...]
Two prospective building sites in London are, I think, totemic of our current economic climate. The Heygate Estate and the Broadgate Estate, though very different, show two sides of the same coin. The Heygate Estate in Elephant and Castle, South East London, was completed just over 30 years ago. Now, however, it has been completely [...]
A doctor who gave medical assistance to protesters on 9th Dec has spoken of the police risking a ‘Hillsborough-type’ disaster on Westminster Bridge: The anaesthetist from Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, who gave medical assistance to the protesters, said that officers forced demonstrators into such a tight “kettle” on Westminster Bridge that they were in danger of [...]
Whenever a modest tax rise is proposed, the rich show their patriotism by immediately threatening to leave the country. It has been an odd sight seeing bankers warning that they will jump ship to Switzerland if forced to pay rates of tax similar to the people who clean their offices: odd that they think this [...]
Here’s the final paragraph from an online Telegraph article on the tube strike: Having trouble getting to work? Please share your tales of travel woe below. For readers who live outside London, this is your chance to gloat about your trouble-free commute. Who said conservatives don’t have a sense of humour? Yes, vent your anti-union anger if [...]
For the last two years or so, I have been engaging in a dastardly plot to destroy the Tory party. Yes, by writing silly outraged-liberal letters to my Conservative MP – to which she must respond – on matters she ultimately doesn’t care about, I’ll hopefully waste enough Tory time and resources to destroy the [...]
Yesterday I went down again to the Heathrow picket lines, to see how the strike is developing, and also to check out the new community garden squatted by Sipson residents and activists. Last time I didn’t write about my journey down there. (Quick tangent: a crack-of-dawn piccadilly line farce complete with hundreds of tourists, Japanese [...]
“Not to find one’s way around a city does not mean much. But to lose one’s way in a city, as one loses one’s way in a forest, requires some schooling. Street names must speak to the urban wanderer like the snapping of dry twigs, and little streets in the heart of the city must [...]
A Progressive Agenda to Stop the Right in 2012 Saturday 30th January 10am-5pm Congress House, Great Russell Street, WC1H www.progressivelondon.org.uk/conference/progressive-london-conference-2010.html An Interview with Ken Livingstone They say never meet your heroes. You’re only ever gonna be disappointed. And having had some bad experiences in the past – a particularly awkward conversation with a very reluctant [...]
Two events, at each end of the last week here in London, have highlighted the real range of activities and viewpoints of the left community in this country. The 7th annual Historical Materialism Conference, held last weekend at SOAS and Birkbeck, offered a fantastic opportunity for over 700 attendees from around the world to discuss [...]
