Party Election Broadcast

What I think is quite an effective little video about the Green Party (made for the 1999 European Parliament Elections) has recently gone on YouTube. I’ve posted it here for anyone who’s interested.

1982

A comment from one of the placards on the protest yesterday:

“Labour is the only party pledged to end the nuclear madness”
Tony Blair, 1982

Disaffected with Labour? Join the Green Party today.

Went to the ‘Troops Out Now/Anti-Trident Replacement’ demo yesterday. Had a good turnout with estimates ranging from 60,000 (from the StWC) to 10,000 (the police). It was a good chance to see all the stalls from various groups, man our Green Party stall and hand out some leaflets. I think we have several new members from it. I engaged in several interesting discussions with people who were interested about our party and wanted to know more about our policies and how we operate.

The ‘Leaving Labour’ leaflets were incredibly popular and we had very few. People are attracted to the Green Party not only because of our consistently anti-war stance but also for all our other policies: anti-globalization, pro-rights (be they human or animal), pro-’trade unions’, pro-’public sector’. Importantly, we are the only party that makes the vital link between global warming and capitalism and then moves further to show how we need to make the change in how society operates. That change will help to reduce climate change and help to improve other aspects of people’s lives. We take a holistic view of society: rather than trying to apply plasters to the cuts we look at the underlying causes for them.

Encouraging people to think about the Green vision is vital for us: we will only make progress by informing people of our views. Once people know our policies and the reasons behind them, they tend to find them very attractive.

I should link here to an article by Mary Riddell against Trident. Worth a gander and a few thoughts.

Derek Wall on HardTalk

Derek Wall, Principal Speaker of the Green Party of England and Wales, was interviewed on the BBC’s HardTalk tonight. You can find the interview here.

In addition a quick reminder (as if anyone spending much time on this blog wouldn’t already know…) about the  CND/Stop War National Demonstration (No Trident – Troops Out of Iraq) happening this saturday (24th Feb). Meeting 12noon at Speakers Corner, Hyde Park. This is due to be a biggie with similar protests organized in the USA. More details can be found on the Stop the War coalition’s website, here.

David Cameron’s sleek style is just an extension of Blair’s smarm. However, something he does bring to the tory party is the ability to make a party that was so intensly homophobic (e.g., section 28) come across as if it were somehow homophilic. Of course, it is all shallow rhetoric. The membership hasn’t changed, just the media figurehead has been chosen to appear populist.

The Tory party is the same party it was under Thatcher: interested in giving big business a free reign to do what it wants by minimizing unneccesary legistlation designed to protect the citizen. The only difference is that now, New Labour agrees with them!

I often say things like ”Shame on Blair, Shame on New Labour”, but I think the UN Report out today on child well-being in rich countries really should be among the three reasons that Blair Corp. International should hang it’s head in shame for eternity.

It is gross that a society with so much wealth can’t provide for it’s children. And let’s not forget that the children who are not being provided for also have parents who are also suffering. Of course they want to provide the best for their own kids and of course it hurts when they can’t. Instead of really working to cut the gap between rich and poor the Blair government has wasted energy pandering to the rich elite in this country – listening to business more than it listens to the people who elected it.

Let’s not forget that the problem is really about wealth inequality – wealth inequality is bad for everyone. An unequal society has worse health overall: a more equal one will have better health. Surely it is logical to combat wealth inequality. If we won’t do it for the adults (which I think we should) we should at least see justification in the fact that it will help our children, the future of the society we live in!

The problems of reducing problems to economics are highlighted by Lord Lawson’s comments on the Stern Report. In particular he has said that even under the worst case scenario set out by Stern, future generations would only be slightly worse off financially as a result of global warming. As if that could, even if true, be a good reason to let global warming happen…

Save our Libraries

News from Natalie Bennett’s blog, Philobiblion, that the government is planning to introduce charges to use the british library and to begin downgrading parts of it (notably, scrapping the newspaper archives). For a government which claims to want to increase equality of opportunity, this is an incredibly myopic measure. One of the wonderful things about the British Library has always been that any member of the public has access to any book ever printed in the UK – regardless of whether they can afford it.

If this is allowed to go through, I bet they’ll try to introduce charges for using other public libraries making scholarship in the UK even more difficult and even more confined to a rich elite. Libraries are already struggling to stay open thanks to lack of funding from local authorities (some good background in an article I dug out from last June’s Observer, here). Libraries are central to a Green society: they allow the maximum use of resources by those who need them.

More details about the BL closure from that stalwart of equality the Daily Telegraph, here.

A little bit of relevant GP policy (my emphasis):

ED211 Access to learning opportunities should not be restricted by ability to pay nor by gender, class, race or disability/ability. The labelling and segregating of some children, on the basis of standardised tests, must be discontinued.

Virgin Stemcells

Richard Branson is to launch a stem cell bank (reported here by the BBC). Fantastic: capitalist, market economics getting in on something which is about saving lives. Is there anything it doesn’t permeate into?

Of course, some parents won’t be able to afford this technology. Do we really want to see the situation, say 20 years down the line, where parents who couldn’t afford to preserve some cord blood from their kids are left lamenting the ‘what if?’. It is a bit gross and perverse. With such a technology, I think there is an argument for banning it until it is proven to work. Once there is proof, the NHS should offer it for all babies or make the decision that it is prohibitively expenive and keep the ban. That is really the only way to prevent a massive double standard – otherwise it is incredibly unjust.

Morally, it is the equivalent of giving only those who can afford it the opportunity to have their cancer operated on.

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In other news, Hillingdon PCT has proposed to hand over almost all of its functions to the private sector. The Trust’s Chief Exec has been quoted as saying, ““I want to get rid of everything, outsource it”.”

“PCT could slash 90 per cent of staff. A troubleshooter chief executive plans to strip an ailing primary care trust down to its core functions and reduce the number of staff from 300 to 30. Anthony Sumara, who has been interim chief executive of Hillingdon PCT since October, proposes to put three out of four commissioning support services out to tender, and to hand clinical services to a new provider. Under the proposals, the PCT would retain only its core functions like governance and emergency planning, as well as patient and public involvement. The move could see the PCT, which has �54m of historic debt, and is predicting an in-year deficit of �11m, reduced from a staff of ‘300 to 30′, he said. But he said the chances of the board agreeing to the move were 50:50. The Proposal to Procure commissioning strategic outline case was published by the PCT on January 23. It states: ‘Outsourcing the majority of the PCT commissioning functions gives the greatest benefit and the greatest probability of success,’ when compared with three other options: doing nothing, building internal capability and developing synergies with other organisations. If the project gets approval in June the contracts will go out to tender. Mr Sumara told HSJ: ‘I want to get rid of everything, outsource it – and we are distancing the PCT from its provider functions.’ The government’s commissioning framework allows PCTs to choose which areas they wish to outsource. The DoH is expected to publish its list of recommended commissioning experts within weeks. Hillingdon is looking at three of the four main categories identified in the framework: assessment and planning; contracting and procurement; and performance management to ensure better accountability. The organisation is currently working on defining what residual functions a PCT should hold. Mr Sumara said responsibility for monthly emergency planning, managing the outsourcing, governance of money, accountability and development of the market would remain with the PCT. ‘You need a PCT because you need a statutory body to receive the money from government. We are also deciding what will happen to the provider side – should it come under the hospital or become a social enterprise ? We will keep public-patient engagement as we have a better idea on how to engage with the public locally and the voluntary sector than, say, [information analysts] Dr Foster,’ he said. ‘The PCT is not giving up responsibility. We are doing this as part of our recovery and to get some clarity around what a PCT should be doing. It’s commercialising, not privatising and the public don’t care – it’s not about the provider services, it’s about men in grey suits. It will still be free at the point of access.’ The next step is to develop the outline business case for consideration by the board in April 2007 and appoint a dedicated project team. The strategic outline case states: ‘Hillingdon PCT commissioning is currently weak and not fit for purpose. For example, acute providers will continue to over-perform by �9.8m in 2006-07, adding to the historic debt.’ Mr Sumara said: ‘At the moment it is 50:50 whether it will be approved but I do think it will save us money and I do think it will get the go-ahead. I don’t think we are big enough for some companies but they will start with us with a view to providing a service across London.’ Some of the risk factors considered in the proposals include: the supplier’s set-up costs exceeding the potential gains of the contract; the delivery of financial balance for the PCT taking longer than currently planned; the requirement to repay the historic debt making the contract unattractive to outsourced suppliers; and an adverse reaction from the public.” Keep Our NHS Public Website.

I needn’t say much more really. The march towards privatization by this government seems almost unstoppable. Despite the fact that it has been shown not to work in the interests of the public (take the railways with astronomical train fares or british gas cutting off pensioners or royal mail’s struggles as just a few examples).

The private sector will take the easy, profitable cases and leave the rest for the NHS to deal with. The private sector is not interested in doing the best for people in the slightest. It is out to make money, and money it shall make.

More information, here, on the Keep Our NHS Public website.