Category Archives: Viva!

Benefit cuts, sanctions, care cuts are killing us | Flickr – Photo Sharing!

I took this photo on the huge anti-austerity march in central London on June 20 organised by the People’s Assembly Against Austerity, of a disabled campaigner pointing out that welfare cuts for the disabled (driven by targets, not by need) and sanctions for the unemployed (which cut all financial support to some of the country’s most vulnerable people, often for the most insignificant reasons) are leading to preventable deaths, as some of the most vulnerable people in society are driven to destitution, despair and suicide.

Although the weather was indifferent, the turnout wasn’t, and around 250,000 people marched from the Bank of England to Parliament Square to show the many, many reasons ordinary, hard-working British people have for despising the Tory government, who, in May’s General Election, won over 50% of the seats, with just over 36% of the votes, cast, and the support of less than a quarter of those eligible to vote.

via Benefit cuts, sanctions, care cuts are killing us | Flickr – Photo Sharing!.

Cameron is a cock

Andy Worthington posted a photo:

Cameron is a cock

I took this photo outside the Houses of Parliament – by Big Ben – at the end of the huge anti-austerity march in central London on June 20 organised by the People’s Assembly Against Austerity. Although the weather was indifferent, the turnout wasn’t, and around 250,000 people marched from the Bank of England to Parliament Square to show the many, many reasons ordinary, hard-working British people have for despising the Tory government, who, in May’s General Election, won over 50% of the seats, with just over 36% of the votes, cast, and the support of less than a quarter of those eligible to vote.
The Tories’ austerity programme, which has involved massive cuts to the public sector and to the welfare state, including the NHS, and attacks on the unemployed and the disabled, is driven not by need but by a malignant ideology – the desire to privatise almost everything (but not their own salaries, of course) for the benefit of the private sector, often using taxpayers’ money to achieve their ends, and often benefitting them directly, as they are involved in the companies making a profit.
Although the Tories’ austerity policies have been disastrous economically, so that it has cost more to ruin the lives of millions of people than to have left them alone, the message has still not got through to the majority of the British people. I can only hope that events like this will help to wake up the millions of people who stand to have their lives further impoverished by the Tories, and who need to make a stand if we are not to descend into an increasingly divided country, with an ever-growing gulf between the rich and the poor over the next five years.
For my most recent article about austerity, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2015/06/12/photos-london-protes…
And for my most recent photos, see: www.flickr.com/photos/andyworthington/sets/72157652100358663
For my archive of articles about the Tories since 2010, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/category/battle-for-britain-fig…
And for articles since this year’s General Election, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/category/battle-for-britain-fig…
For the People’s Assembly Against Austerity, see: www.thepeoplesassembly.org.uk/
For the Facebook page for the event, see: www.facebook.com/events/460624807433119/
Please also read the economist Paul Krugman’s article, ‘The Austerity Delusion’: www.theguardian.com/business/ng-interactive/2015/apr/29/t…
For my most interesting photos, see: www.flickriver.com/photos/andyworthington/popular-interes…

via Cameron is a cock.

#SaudiCables: What We’re Learning about Lebanon

Wondering who leaked the information and what they thought would come of it?

Hummus For Thought

Screen Shot of one of the leaks Screen Shot of one of the leaks

Wikileaks has released The Saudi Cables which contain “more than half a million cables and other documents from the Saudi Foreign Ministry that contain secret communications from various Saudi Embassies around the world.” We’re going through the leaks on Global Voices Online MENA with a Special Coverage (page not up yet). We divided up the tasks, with me taking Lebanon and Palestine. I’ll also be writing here on the Lebanon stories. The post will be continually updated in the upcoming days and weeks. New updates will be announced on my Twitter Account under #SaudiCables and I’ll be linking to other blogs/sites who are reporting on it at the bottom.

I’m calling on all bloggers and alternative news sources to report on the Saudi Cables to counter the defacto silence that we will hear from most mainstream media outlets in Lebanon and the Arab World. So…

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Greece’s Proposals to End the Crisis: My intervention at today’s Eurogroup

Yanis Varoufakis

The only antidote to propaganda and malicious ‘leaks’ is transparency. After so much disinformation on my presentation at the Eurogroup of the Greek government’s position, the only response is to post the precise words uttered within. Read them and judge for yourselves whether the Greek government’s proposals constitute a basis for agreement.

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