Democratic Manchester City Council!

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

Manchester City Council continue to show, that they are overwhelmingly not acting in the residents best interests, once again ignoring it’s electorate. It has almost total control of the council and acts as a dictatorship. This is to ensure that Bernstein and Leese build their ivory towers, ensuring the City of Manchester, is all fur-coat and no knickers:  Mersey Valley warden service facing the axe.

manchesterclimatemonthly's avatarmanchester climate monthly

Two must-read articles about Alexandra Park, where the chainsaws are moving in… (See our previous editorial on the subject here).

From the Hulme Green Party, “Alex Park protesters take to trees to stop “Felling Vandalism”

Manchester Green Party Chair Deyika Nzeribe commented “The campaign group has done everything right. They got over 2000 signatures asking for the plans to be reconsidered, they got local experts to show how the councils plans to be altered to preserve trees and they have been in dialogue with both the Council and funders the Lottery every step of the way. They have been completely ignored.

To draw a parallel, last week Manchester City Council made a great show of how unfair the cuts to local budgets were and how the government were ignoring them. The council are acting in exactly the same way as the government to this local issue.”

From Nadine…

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Mehadrin: New evidence of mislabelled settlement produce | Corporate Watch

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

I wrote to a number of our North West MEPs about EU’s trade with Israel, and received in reply, what I consider patronising nonsense.  That the only thing that matters is the economic benefits of trading with Israel and not the continuing criminal acts of  the illegal Sate of Israel.  As the article below, points out, the Israelis are still mislabelling produce, so they can sell it in the EU

Mehadrin: New evidence of mislabelled settlement produce | Corporate Watch.

Here is the response from Robert Sturdy MEP Conservative Spokesman,Vice-Chairman, International Trade Committee:

Thank you for your email regarding this subject. I have received a number of emails relating to this issue and have passed them onto my colleague Robert Sturdy who is the Vice-Chairman of the International Trade Committee and Conservative Spokesman on the same subject, therefore he has a better understanding of these issues, his response is outlined below.

Yours sincerely,

Jacqueline Foster MEP

MEP for North West England

Conservative Spokesman for Transport and Tourism

Response of Robert Sturdy MEP

Thank you for contacting me about the Protocol to the Euro-Mediterranean Agreement establishing an association between the European Communities and their Member States, of the one part, and the State of Israel, of the other part, on Conformity Assessment and Acceptance of Industrial Products (CAA).

The EU-Israel CAA, until recently known as ACAA, is a technical framework agreement which aims at facilitating the elimination of technical barriers to trade in respect of certain industrial products, through the mutual recognition and harmonisation of technical standards.  The CAA could be hugely beneficial to the EU as it could significantly reduce costs of imported pharmaceutical products into the EU and save time-to-market conditions (saving 1-3 years for every market product) for imported medicinal products both from Israel and the EU.

Although primarily an economic agreement, I think that it has the potential of not only bringing benefits to European consumers and importers of pharmaceutical products but also of helping to foster stability in the region by facilitating further harmonisation between EU and Israeli Law in the relevant areas. 

From the perspectives of the Conservative members of the International Trade Committee (INTA), we believe that this particular agreement to be purely technical issue that should be judged on its trade merits alone. Furthermore it is simply a protocol to an already existing agreement between the EU and Israel. 

However, this is not to say that the wider issues surrounding the Agreement are not valid. The Conservatives in the European are acutely aware of the ongoing situation in the Middle East and are supportive of peace efforts based on the Oslo Peace accords, the road map for peace and the quartet with a viable two state solution based roughly upon the 1967 borders, with land for peace exchanges taking place. Both sides need to realise their commitments to Human Rights and International Law. The EU can play a major role in bringing peace to the Middle East but it must be seen as fair and impartial. A similar agreement with the Palestinian Authority was agreed a number of months ago and I believe it would be hypocritical of the EU if it rejects this agreement.

Having said this, the Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee (AFET), which has the experience and expertise to give this issue the attention it deserves, has provided an Opinion on the ramifications vis-à-vis the situation in the Middle East which was passed on to all INTA members. Both the AFET and INTA Committees decided to submit a question to the Commission in a bid to address some of their concerns with regards to this agreement. The Commission has offered concrete assurances that the agreement is in conformity with EU legal commitments. 

With regards, to the production of goods in the Occupied Territories, the EU has been clear it will not accept products originating from the Israeli Occupied Territories. This is prohibited under Community law which means that products coming from places (city, village or industrial zone) brought under Israeli Administration since 1967 are not entitled to benefit from preferential tariff treatment under the EU-Israel Association Agreement. This issue has been addressed in the INTA Committee in order to make sure that the CAA is in compliance with existing legislation.

The European Parliament voted in favour of the consent procedure concerning the additional protocol on conformity assessment on the 18th October 2012, with 379 votes in favour. 

We will continue to correspond with civil society from both sides of the dispute and we will continue to monitor developments. Rest assured that the wider political situation, alongside the economic benefits, will not be ignored by the INTA Committee or by the Parliament at large.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Sturdy MEP

MEP for East of England

Vice-Chairman of the International Trade committee

 

Balcombe MP appointed Cuadrilla director to government

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

Lord Browne was previously CEO of BP, and was responsible for the decline of BP’s reputation for safety.  With appointees such as this, is it any wonder the Government is pushing for widespread ‘fracking’, despite all the evidence showing it has harmful affects on humans and the environment?

Balcombe MP appointed Cuadrilla director to government.

A 21st Century blueprint for taxing multinational companies « Escape from Europe

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

A blog on how multinational companies can be taxed, so all can benefit from their vast profits, not just the 1%.  Something for UK’s politicians to consider as their New Year resolution?

A 21st Century blueprint for taxing multinational companies « Escape from Europe.

Mad Cycle Lanes of Manchester: Where all the money went on cycling – part 2

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

A blog about how, despite all Manchester City Council’s rhetoric, provisions for urban cyclist is just about non-existent.  Richard Leese, makes out he is a cyclist and uses public transport but I have not witnessed him on either.  But he is a car owner and fought to keep a chauffeured limousine on the councils’ books for him to use.  Also, Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) formerly Greater Manchester Public Transport Executive (GMPTE), does not employ non-drivers.  So, the very people who make decisions about pedestrian, cycling and public transport have no real experience of the issues of this large group of users.  Unless there is a major change in Manchester’s leadership, Manchester will never have a public transport system fir for the 21st Century, or be pedestrian and cycling friendly.

Mad Cycle Lanes of Manchester: Where all the money went on cycling – part 2.

RSA Animate – The Power of Outrospection

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

This video: The Power of Outrospection, may help the environmental movement and the Green Party become more successful in getting their message out there.  It is no good stating you stand for Equality and Fairness, if you do not actively listen.  A paragraph in the Oxford Illustrated History of Britain, p.521, I was looking through recently, reminded of my experience of the Manchester Green Party:

Working people did not feel themselves to be alienated from the propertied classes but they did feel themselves different.  The Liberals reinforced this by their failure to adopt working men as candidates: however broad the agreement on policy matters the middle-class members of the Liberal Associations – the people who called the tune in the constituencies – would not adopt as candidates men whom they would expect to enter their houses by the servants door.

I get the same impression from the environmental movement, who seem to believe their are intellectually superior to the ordinary working person, so they know best.  Even though, it is they who are consuming far more than the average working person.

List of the Harmed | Pennsylvania Alliance for Clean Water and Air

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

When will politicians accept that ‘fracking’ for shale gas or coal-seam methane is harmful to the environment and human health?  Or are they going to continually dismiss the evidence?

List of the Harmed | Pennsylvania Alliance for Clean Water and Air.

Amid stiff opposition, Israel occupation profiteer Veolia abandons big London waste bid in final stage

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

Student at Manchester Metropolitan University should continue there fight to have MMU cancel their contract with Veolia.  Failing that, it is time students started boycotting Manchester Metropolitan University.  Not only for their employment of Veolia but also because of the way they have treated the people of Hulme.  John Brooks the vice-chancellor, conducted secret deals with Manchester City Council, to build a campus on Birley Fields.  This is totally unacceptable behaviour from a Higher Education establishment which boast it serves the community.  It does not, it even tells it’s students, even those live in hall of residence in Hulme, not to go into Hulme.  They claim to be building a green campus when they have felled scores of trees and want to fell another 50.  And their energy plant is to be powered by natural gas, a finite resource, imported and emits CO2.  How is this green?

Amid stiff opposition, Israel occupation profiteer Veolia abandons big London waste bid in final stage.

Police urged to investigate fraud allegations against Osborne

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

Whilst our politicians and media keep persecuting the less unfortunate in our society.  Our politicians themselves keep flaunting the law and enriching themselves at the expense of us.  It was time there was a full and determined investigation of all our politicians.  After our MPs, then Manchester City Councillors.

Police urged to investigate fraud allegations against Osborne.

Posted on by Patrick Sudlow

The continuing sad story of the Britain returning to the ‘Dark Days’ of the Industrial Revolution, where workers found their wages continually cut. Plunging even working families into dire poverty, welcome to 21st Century Britain and the end of a National Health Service.  What is also sad, despite Miliband’s rhetoric, is that Labour will not vote against the Benefits Bill.  Ed Miliband to wage war on George Osborne’s welfare.  

‘Senior Labour figures stopped short of confirming that Labour would vote against the cuts in the Commons in January. But it is understood that unless fundamental changes are made to the coming welfare uprating bill, Miliband will be prepared to give the order.

One senior Labour figure said there were still tensions inside the party, with a caucus of “new Labour” figures believing it will be politically suicidal to leave the party open to charges that it sides with “scroungers” and is in denial over the need to cut the benefits bill’.

Another journalist summed up the situation as Osborne’s war on the poor and the vile stupidity of his workers-vs-shirkers narrative.   Unfortunately as the Guardian hints at, there are millionaire members in the Labour Party who believe in this same rhetoric.  That is why people need to realise they have to vote, to rid us of these two obscene political parties.

SKWAWKBOX's avatarSKWAWKBOX

I’ve spent the last few days looking through the oral testimony given to the Commons Health Select Committee on 13 November, as well as through the lengthy written testimony given to the committee ahead of the hearing by various organisations, on ‘public expenditure’ – basically the state of NHS finances and the progress toward achieving the ‘Nicholson Challenge’ of £20 billion in savings over the period from 2011-2015.

I was initially drawn to this evidentiary session because, among the witnesses, was Tony Spotswood – the CEO of Royal Bournemouth and Christchurch NHS Trust. Spotswood, as revealed in an email exchange I was able to publish for the first time recently, discussed a ‘coup’ plan to bring down the ‘NHS Employers’ organisation (NHSE) with Chris Bown, CEO of the neighbouring Poole NHS Trust.

NHSE is responsible for national negotiations with unions on the pay and conditions of the UK’s 1.7 million…

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