Select committee calls for a Poverty Commission

The Treasury Committee has recently called for a Poverty Commission to be set-up to tackle the issue. In the report,  Budget Measures and Low -Income Households, the Committee believes that the government should focus on all forms of poverty:

The problem was with the tax system, and required a tax solution’, it concludes that, in the longer term, ‘reforms should be centred on the greater challenges faced by the government in combating child poverty, pensioner poverty and in-work poverty.

The report also looks at the impact of the abolition of the 10pence tax band, they welcome the government’s attempts to compensate those who lost out but highlight the fact that 1.1 million households will continue to lose out.

After 11 years of New Labour there are still a huge number of people stuck in poverty. Do we really need a Poverty Commission when the answers are so bleeding obvious?

Tax Credits and sure start are the crumbs falling from the table. Where were the policies of building the housing people needed, providing free universal childcare, making sure that the public sector created the kind of jobs that need to be done…keeping hospital wards clean springs to mind. Only the public sector can make sure that the jobs created come with training that makes sure that people move into better paid jobs that create real value for society.

A real labour government could have done this with 11 years of solid majorities. It would now be looking at another 11 years of solid majorities.

Reactions to the report from CPAG and CAB.

Jury condemns excessive use of restraint

I wrote about the opening of this inquest recently. The jury returned a seven page narrative verdict that described the prolonged use of restraint as “excessive” and catalogued other series of failings by the hospital. Kurt Howard died while under a section at Cefn Coed Hospital in Swansea in 2002. His family had to wait 6 years for an inquest.

Deborah Coles from Inquest argues:
“Evidence heard at this inquest is a damning indictment of the treatment of a vulnerable mentally ill young man who died a horrific death while being restrained. The scandal is that six years after Kurt’s death there is still no mandatory training on the use of restraint in psychiatric hospitals as recommended by the Rocky Bennett Inquiry in 2003.  Excessive levels of restraint continue to be used in psychiatric institutions behind closed doors.  The government must enforce national guidelines and implement compulsory training on restraint before further vulnerable patients die.”

Sexism, tennis and Justin Gimelstob

I meant to write about this Friday evening when I first read about it…..

So Justin Gimelstob shoots his misogynist mouth off by launching into a nasty vicious tirade about women tennis players with one of his main targets being Anna Kournikova. It seem he divides up women tennis players as either “bitches” or “sexpots”. And the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) were “appalled” by his rant, forced him to apologise and to donate an undisclosed sum towards the women’s sports foundation.

Yet Gimelstob, in his rather pathetic excuse of a apology, states: I am extremely disappointed in myself. I take full responsibility for all the words that came out of my mouth.

He indulged in a vitriolic misogynistic rant that objectified women tennis players (“great body but her face is five”), insulting their so-called lack of social skills and intelligence. And yet this pathetic excuse of an apology has been accepted by the ATP.

If he had said this in a workplace about women co-workers then he would be facing a possible disciplinary for this fundamentally attacks and undermines equal opportunities and is degrading and belittling to women.

Was this an appropriate and effective sanction forcing him to apologise and donating cash? It seems to me the ATP let him off the hook. I think the sum of money shoulda been made public. Funny how the “P” in ATP stands for “professional”…something that Gimelstob most definitely lacks.

Mental health and beyond

Marjorie Wallace (Saneline) has joined the foray into the latest discussion regarding mental health services in Britain today. This after the new president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Professor Dinesh Bhugra will deliver a damning indictment of the services in his inauguration speech on Wednesday.

Wallace reiterates the same old myopic argument she has been using for years about how it was wrong to close psychiatric hospitals and instead focus on community mental health teams. I have always thoroughly disagreed with Wallace and the politics of Sane and this latest from her makes no difference. Mental health has always been at the bottom of the financial pile and a Cinderella service. Yet what kind of mental health system do we want? Wallace always harps on about on about the old days (would she really mean it with the good old days?) of the psychiatric system where it meant those who would relapse had the knowledge that they could admit themselves to hospital whenever things became intolerable, and return home when they felt ready.

But were these hospitals or the political ideology of the mechanisms of these places something that ought to be championed? A sense of loss and a desperation to reclaim these old asylums? My own view is that the psychiatry, then and now is still rooted in a need for social control, conformity and coercion (the changes to the Mental Health Act, for example). Is the mental health user at the centre of the treatment, is her/his needs understood when vocalised? Or is it based on a very paternalistic notion that shrink knows best? And indeed the over emphasis of medication that acts like a panacea for all society’s ills. The commodification of mental distress under this society means any old pill is chucked at us as a quick fix. A bio-chemical and deterministic understanding ever presence in mental health and psychiatry. Science has advanced in many ways yet psychiatry is still wedded in a type of medievalism. A kind of taking a sledge- hammer -to -the -television- when- it -isn’t- working -to -fix -it mentality (a case in point is the use of ECT).

Psychiatry rarely treats people as human beings instead we are reduced to specific criterion, behaviour,  eventual diagnoses and labels. And as psychologist Lucy Johnstone argues psychiatric diagnoses are social judgement lacking scientific objectivity. The psychiatric system is fraught with power relationships and is ingrained with institutional racism, sexism and homophobia. The system reflects the oppression that exists within this society. Mental distress is on the increase due to the fragile and precariousness of life that includes debt, misery, job insecurity, pressures, oppression, poverty and so on yet psychiatry sees this increase in a social vacuum.

I believe in asylums, but my interpretation is different to Wallace’s understanding of the term. I believe there should be safe places people can go to which isn’t based on social control but based on the needs of the mh user who is able to define his/her needs on their own terms and a equal relationship  between staff and user not this imbalance of power that exists between staff and user. That leads to mistrust. RD Laing was right when he said psychiatrists observe as opposed to listen.

I believe in a system that treats people with respect and understanding as opposed to vilification, social control and stigmatisation. And to go beyond a bio-medical understanding of mental distress (I don’t totally rule out medication because I do think there is a dialectical relationship between the social and the biological). There is a hell of a number of people out there who will experience mental distress but it is still hidden. It is not something people feel able to be vocal about. And a system, contradictorily, that desperately tries to “normalise” vulnerable people yet only too happy to turn a blind eye to what the powerful in society get away with.

Workers strike back

I heard two speakers today, at a LRC NC, Jack Heyman speaking on behalf of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) and Clara Osagiede from the RMT representing the LU cleaners who will be striking on the 1st July for 48 hours.

Jack Heyman gave a historical account of their last contract negotiations shortly after September 11th 2001and federal government threatened to bring in the military if they disrupted the flow of cargo. Instead, as Jack said, the troops were sent to Iraq to occupy it (cops used “non-lethal weapons” to violently attack anti-war protesters near the Port of Oakland in 2003). And now the Bush administration is in a much weaker position, the union were in a stronger position and federal government were not threatening to intervene.

And so on the 1st of May this year longshore workers on the west coast of the USA held a one day strike. The ILWU have before taken action to show international solidarity before by refusing to carry military cargo for the military dictatorship under Pinochet in Chile (1978), and boycotts of apartheid South Africa. The demands of the ILWU were simple: end the wars, occupations in Afghanistan and Iraq and for an immediate withdrawal. Iraqi dock workers at Umm Qasr and Khor al-Zubair went on strike in solidarity with the ILWU.

Unfortunately the ILWU are facing a lawsuit because the employers deem the strike action a secondary boycott and is illegal. But as Jack argued they are sending military cargo to Iraq and the companies are war profiteers. And now the ILWU need our support and international solidarity with this lawsuit and as John McDonnell rightly described the ILWU as standing firm and as heroes and heroines.

The RMT LU cleaners went on strike this week and will again strike on the 1st July for 48hours. Their demands include a living wage of at least £7.20; 28 days’ holiday; sick pay; decent pensions; travel facilities and an end to “third party sackings”.

Majority of these cleaners are women and migrant workers who are subjected to harassment and bullying. We need to show our support and solidarity to workers. I am appalled with my own union T&G/Unite who have not balloted their own members who work as cleaners. It would have been the politically principled thing to have done and to have joined the RMT members on the picket line. The LRC has organised a rally in support of the RMT cleaners on the 8th July @ 6pm, Portcullis House. The political courage and convictions of these workers should be an inspiration for us all and I will definitely be joining the picket lines.

And Unison council workers voted to strike on the 15/16 July along with Unite members. Again, maybe we will see a summer of discontent?

 

Brown’s first year: crash and burn

 

I somehow doubt that Gordon Brown will be staggering up to the microphone and shouting the lyrics to Ray Orbison’s “It’s Over” sometime soon in relation to the disastrous result in Henley combined with all the other failures and disasters of NL of late. Instead, Brown in a Zen like way hopes to sit out the continual catastrophes without a thought to the possible destruction of the LP and the inevitable loss of the next election.

Labour’s vote fell to about15% of its 2005 result in Henley: 2005 was itself a fall with about a quarter of its previous vote disappearing in the wake of the Iraq adventure.

Assuming that you must be a hard core labour supporter to vote LP in Henley this is yet another indicator that the LP is burnt-out. All the other results are extremely bad. The party finances are shot. Often there is simply no LP candidate to vote for. Certainly the LP is dying as a national party. If there is often no LP candidate and where there is a candidate the LP is even more unpopular than a bunch of Hitlerites then there is a situation that has gone well beyond a reduced vote for a government party in an economic downswing.

To use the rather shallow analytical tools of the media: what is the story being told by NL? More privatisation at home and warlike adventure abroad? If you are right-wing, vote Tory, and get tax cuts as well: three for the price of two. If you are left-wing you need to believe in the fairy story about bringing democracy to Iraq and that you can privatise a society of equals into existence. Oh and you also need to think civil liberties don’t matter. That is one narrow political base.

Heinz: the boycott begins

As we know Heinz bottled it the other day and spinelessly capitulated to the 200 or so complaints in response to their advert that showed two blokes kiss. And now Stonewall and Gaydar Radio have called for a boycott of Heinz, along with a group that has been set up on Facebook to protest at Heinz’s bigoted surrender. Also, there have been calls by MPs to reinstate the advert. Unlike the 200 “Shocked from Surbiton” complaints Heinz received, will they listen to the 2,000 signatures on the online petition in protest at the withdrawal of the advert?

Life does not revolve around the heterosexual nuclear family and the fact that Heinz so readily capitulated to these complaints exposes an ingrained level of homophobia.

I remember years ago (circa..1989) my local FE college in Brighton refused to distribute information about safe sex because it included photos of lesbians and gay men …..kissing. But they were happy to distribute the info including the photos of straights kissing…The info pack was produced by a government department under Thatcher and at the height of Section 28. We had a protest, we argued that the college adminstration were homophobic and bigoted in the way they perceived sex and sexuality, they were indulging in double-standards and upholding heterosexuality as the “norm” while denigrating and rendering lesbians and gay men as invisible.

One idea we had, to make a political statement, was having a same sex kiss-in outside the college. The college got wind of this development and started to distribute the packs (with the info for lesbians and gay men). We didn’t have the kiss-in as we had won but looking back we should have…

Maybe 200 people should protest outside the Heinz UK office having a mass same sex kiss-in. Bring the message home to Heinz. Any takers?

Give it a rest, Nadine….

Nadine Dorries is at it again putting forward another amendment to reduce the abortion time limits. As the F Word post states, the HFE Bill has finished it’s second reading and next is the report stage. So there is a potential problem that the Bill will be ping-ponged between the Lords and the Commons.

Words fail me regarding Nadine Dorries and her determination to reduce and eventually chip away the abortion time limits. But she will obviously do her very very best to scupper this Bill.

Your personal data not safe in their hands: official

Well, there’s been an investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission into HMRC fiasco where two disks that contained sensitive data of up to 25 million people in receipt of child benefit was lost. They state that the Revenue’s process for data handling was “woefully inadequate”.

That whilst individual members of staff were not to blame for the loss, there was a complete lack of any meaningful systems; a lack of understanding of the importance of data handling; and a ‘muddle through’ ethos. The investigation uncovered failures in institutional practices and procedures concerning the handling of data.
It revealed the absence of a coherent strategy for mass data handling and, generally speaking, practices and procedures were less than effective. Staff found themselves working on a day-to-day basis without adequate support, training or guidance about how to handle sensitive personal data appropriately.

What stands out from this report is the lack of training on data handling given to ordinary members of staff and poor office procedures. Seeems like the usual excuse of cheapskating over training, a muddle through mentality and a total disinterest by management in developing the staff (well, that is echoed in many workplace situations). And will they learn any lessons from this?

Shocking truth of homophobic hate crime

A report has just been published showing that one in five lesbians and gay men have been a victim of a homophobic hate crime. And three-quarters of the victims don’t report the crimes because they believe the police aren’t interested. The recommendations include better police recording regarding homophobic attacks (does that also include educating the cops on the seriousness?), and tackling bulying in schools.

Jacqui Smith has said she would ask a ministerial group to tackle the issue. So it seems like a further report of the report. Action speaks louder than words and on this it damn well should.

A friend of mine along with his boyfriend was physically attacked walking home one night. He reported it to the police and he told me that he wished he hadn’t the bothered because the cops didn’t show the slightest interest, no follow-up or investigation and I am sure that is echoed by many other victims of hate crime (including racist and misogyny).

The parent of Jody Dobrowski (he was murdered on Clapham Common in 2006 a victim of a homophobic attack), Sheri says:

“Homophobia is endemic in society. We cannot express this. No intelligent, healthy or reasonable society could”.