radiofree.asia

Category: Editorial

  • We should not allow assisted dying to sacrifice disabled people on the altar of the economy

    Prime minister Keir Starmer appears to be gearing up to fast-track new legislation to legalise assisted dying. This could see parliament holding a vote within weeks on this. However, the bill remains highly controversial – namely for the enormous danger it poses to chronically ill and disabled people.

    Assisted dying: Starmer to fast-track bill

    Currently, it is a criminal offence in the UK to aid someone in taking their own life via assisted dying – also known as assisted suicide or voluntary euthanasia. However, this could be about to change – and fast. The private members ‘Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults Bills [HL]‘ would allow terminally ill adults with a life expectancy of less than six months to seek medical assistance to end their own life.

    Now, as News Hub has reported:

    Keir Starmer is privately preparing to push the legislation through by Christmas, much sooner than initially thought.

    Moreover, it detailed that:

     Although Sir Keir Starmer had avoided setting a specific timescale for a vote, a successful Private Members’ Bill ballot, which enables backbench MPs to introduce legislation, has sped up the process.

    Supporters of the bill have argued that giving terminally ill patients the choice to end their life is the empathetic and right thing to do.

    However, many also oppose the bill. Notably, many chronic illness and disabled campaigners have repeatedly resisted and spoken out against it.

    This is because, in a system that predominantly demonises chronically ill and disabled people, they argue it is a slippery slope.

    Crucially, this has been the case in other countries that have legalised it. While the current bill would legalise assisted dying for terminally ill people only at this point, it could pave the way to expanding the provision. And it could do this to dangerous effect.

    The Netherlands extended assisted dying to people with mental health problems, including children.

    Meanwhile, Canada extended its medically assisted in death (MAID) policy to chronically ill and disabled people. Most alarmingly, Canada offers this as an option to those who cannot afford care. There are anecdotal accounts of poverty and a lack of healthcare options driving disabled people to take their lives under MAID.

    All for the economy

    Moreover, even without these extensions, the current bill already plays into problematic narratives. Specifically, this is the idea that terminally ill patients are a drain on the economy.

    In fact, as the Canary’s Steve Topple previously highlighted, the poorly-worded framing of one such petition used this argument. Until change.org removed it due to an influx of complaints, this read:

    For those without compassion and reading this asking what the benefit besides letting people end things on their own terms, perhaps look at this as a way to save the NHS and DWP millions of pounds every year.

    Of course, if that rhetoric is also familiar, that’s because it should be. It’s this precise message that has been on the lips of DWP boss Liz Kendall as she has declared her war against the post-pandemic “economic inactivity” of long-term sick people.

    And behind the back-to-work bluster on reducing the benefits bill is the implication that chronically ill and disabled people cost too much money to support.

    Already, we’re seeing the results of this callous economy first mantra. First, Labour refused to scrap the two child limit on benefits that’s entrenching staggering levels of poverty.

    Then, it cut the winter fuel payment for millions of pensioners. It did this knowing it would likely kill thousands of elderly people this winter, as shown by the party’s previous estimations. Even the government’s own equality analysis identified how this will disproportionately harm disabled people. Specifically, it will cause 1.6 million of them to lose out on the vital support.

    What’s more, Labour is also staying wedded to a Tory-esque sanction regime for social security. The Tory-led DWP’s ruthlessly punitive benefit system has caused tens of thousands of deaths on its watch. Now, Labour look set to pick up where the Conservatives left off with this.

    In other words, Labour is implementing all these deadly policies in the name of saving money. Therefore, it’s easy to see how the government and right-wing actors that equate dignity with work, will push dignity in dying for those who can’t.

    No safe assisted deaths in a cruel, capitalist system

    The reality right now is that while the government and NHS are failing to provide access to adequate care, legalising assisted dying will put chronically ill and disabled people at risk. So long as that same system continues to vilify them, there’s every chance it’ll directly – or subliminally – push people to end their lives.

    In a compassionate, caring society, terminally ill people could choose to die with dignity. At the same, chronically ill and disabled people would have sufficient medical research, treatments, and support to live with dignity.

    There’d be no danger that the government or healthcare system would coerce them to end their lives. Currently however, we live in a cruel, capitalist society where it’s perfectly plausible that could happen.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • ‘Kill the Canary – before it kills us’: how Starmer’s top Downing Street aide plotted ours and Corbyn’s downfall

    In a bizarre turn of events, the Guardian/Observer has revealed that Labour Party PM Keir Starmer’s top Downing Street aide Morgan McSweeney plotted to ‘destroy the Canary‘ – before ‘we destroyed the Labour right’. It shows not only how him and his closest cronies tried to kill us – but also how they brought about Jeremy Corbyn’s downfall. The intention all along? To install Starmer as Labour leader, and eventually PM.

    Morgan McSweeney: creating fake antisemitism crises

    You can read the Observer piece here. It is extracts from Taken as Red: How Labour Won Big and the Tories Crashed the Party by Anushka Asthana. In it, she describes how McSweeney – he of Liz Kendall failed leadership bid campaign fame – rose up the ranks in Labour. He got to the point where, after 2017’s near-election victory for Corbyn, McSweeney was determined to finish Corbyn off. So, he began rallying his troops.

    The group (now known as supposed think tank Labour Together) included Trevor Chinn (executive committee member of pro-Israel lobbying group the Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre (BICOM) and hedge fund manager Martin Taylor. Labour Together was born – and MPs on its side included Jon Cruddas and Steve Reed.

    As Asthana wrote:

    One of McSweeney’s obsessions was the Canary, an alt-left website that had seemed to appear from nowhere and grown to a peak of 8.5m hits a month. Moreover, Corbyn supporters trusted the site equally to the Guardian, their other favourite source of information.

    And so McSweeney had an aim – to schmooze the Guardian and kill the Canary.

    “Destroy the Canary or the Canary destroys us,” he told the Labour Together MPs.

    So, the antisemitism ‘crisis’ was created. At the time, much of the Canary’s traffic – as well as huge swathes of the voting public’s exposure to news – came through pro-Corbyn and left-wing Facebook groups, as well as people’s feeds.

    So, McSweeney and his cronies went searching through these groups for anything they could deem antisemitic.

    As Asthana wrote:

    They then farmed out the posts they uncovered to journalists who were themselves reporting on rising evidence of antisemitism on the left.

    That is, Labour Together was actively infiltrating or monitoring members of the public’s social media to try and destroy Corbyn – firstly by trying to “shame” people out of these Facebook groups, thus reducing the spread and impact of left-wing conversations. However, that didn’t work – so McSweeney and his cult came after the Canary.

    ‘Kill the Canary – before the Canary kills us’

    As Asthana wrote:

    As part of a “Stop funding fake news” campaign, they took screenshots of articles they felt had either racist or fake content, then posted messages on Twitter aimed at brands that were advertising on the websites’ pages. Unquestionably, the readership of the Canary took a hit.

    That part is incorrect. It wasn’t our readership that took a hit. That had already happened due to (oddly) Facebook changing its algorithms to de-prioritise news and groups on people’s feeds. A coincidence? Maybe. What McSweeney did hit was the Canary’s advertising revenue. However, at the time support for us surged and we had more financial supporters than ever before.

    It goes without saying none of our content was racist or fake. An independent investigation by government-approved media regulator IMPRESS found nothing the Canary published was antisemitic.

    However, what McSweeney did achieve was to tarnish the Canary’s reputation. Of course, he also achieved his ultimate goal of destroying Corbyn’s leadership and getting Keir Starmer into power. Now, McSweeney sits at the top of 10 Downing Street as head of political strategy.

    Of course, the Canary already knew most of this. As John McEvoy reported for us in 2019, Stop Funding Fake News was his and Lisa Nandy’s project:

    Between its founding and the 2019 general election, SFFN targeted the Canary – which the campaign acknowledged was its largest target – more than any other website, with 176 individual posts on Twitter. The operation has been scaled down since the election, with 42 individual posts targeting the Canary in a greater amount of time.

    However, it seems no-one else cared – until now.

    The Labour Party: an election victory off the back of lies, deceit, and nefarious tactics

    In short, we now know Keir Starmer is only in Downing Street because McSweeney and his collaborators actively worked to destroy not just Corbyn but an entire movement across the country – by infiltrating Facebook groups, orchestrating smear campaigns, and trying to destroy independent media.

    The man at the centre of all this is now holding many of the cards in government. He was aided and abetted by people like Lisa Nandy, Tom Watson, Liz Kendall, Rachel Riley, Steve Reed, and numerous other political and public figures.

    Yet, these people are now the “grown ups” in charge of politics in this country – and are influencing chains of events across the planet.

    What Asthana’s revelations about McSweeney show are a number of things.

    Firstly, they underscore the lack of surprise anyone should have that Starmer’s government is attacking poor, older, and disabled people. McSweeney and Co quite literally sought to destroy members of the public and journalists’ careers and lives to get Labour Together into power in the party. Going after some of society’s most vulnerable people once in government is hardly a leap.

    Secondly, it shows that no-one in Starmer’s team should be trusted – because they all turned on a dime and sold Corbyn out in one way, shape, or form. Moreover, McSweeney hid £750k of donations to Labour Together from the Electoral Commission. Fiscal responsibility, and all that.

    And finally, it shows once again the importance of independent media.

    Sleep with one eye open, McSweeney

    Despite having the weight of a now-government fighting against us, the Canary is still here. McSweeney certainly didn’t destroy us – although it has been touch and go (not all due to him). It also didn’t destroy Corbyn and everything he, us, and so many of you stand for.

    If anything, McSweeney started a chain of events that will be near-impossible to undo: the collapse of the two-party system in the UK as well as public trust in politics.

    However, mark our words.

    The Canary will now hold Starmer, the Labour Party, and this government fully to account with more fervour than ever before. That includes McSweeney.

    If you want to follow us while we do that – please subscribe to our daily news emails here.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • GB News – yes, GB NEWS – just exposed Wes Streeting’s Labour NHS cronyism

    When they were still in power, we all agreed that the Tories’ cronyism scandals were very, very bad. Of course, when we say ‘we’, we’re not including the right-wing media outlets which ran cover for their Tory chums – the same outlets which are now going after the Labour Party and its own NHS cronyism scandals; specifically Wes ‘twunk on a ship’ Streeting. The interesting thing is that outlets like GB News aren’t wrong in what they’re saying:

    GB News makes Streeting squirm

    This is what GB News host Camilla Tominey asked health secretary Wes Streeting:

    Why have you been inviting Alan Milburn to meetings in the Department for Health, and apparently – according to the Sunday Times – sharing official sensitive documents with him, when he’s completely unelected; he’s unappointed; he’s unaccountable to the electorate, and yet he’s got a multi-million pound stake in a consultancy firm which advises on health matters?

    Oh shit, that sounds bad – let’s see how Streeting answered:

    Alan Milburn has an outstanding record as health secretary under the last Labour government.

    Oh, okay – so he’s not just some random multi-millionaire with a vested interest in privatising healthcare; he’s a multi-millionaire with a vested interest in privatising healthcare who leveraged his political connections to get where he is today.

    So that’s fine.

    That’s not an extra level of corruption.

    It’s not NHS revolving-door cronyism, or some other phrase we just made up.

    Streeting spoke more on GB News, of course, although he didn’t really say more, besides this denial:

    I have chosen to share papers with him and every other attendee of meetings, nothing commercially sensitive, nothing inappropriate

    Given that Streeting clearly has no idea what is or isn’t appropriate, it’s hard to take this seriously.

    Alan Multi-Milburn

    So who is Alan Milburn, and why is he so controversial, particularly surrounding the NHS?

    As Peter Geogehan of Democracy for Sale recently summarised:

    – Milburn is reportedly Starmer’s pick for new role ‘driving NHS reform’, but his private consultancy paid out £8 million+ to the ex Labour health sec and family

    – Cash came primarily from private healthcare interests

    – Milburn advises PWC; US private equity firm Bridgepoint (owner of one of England’s largest external providers of NHS services); confectioner Mars and more

    – Milburn’s company AM Strategy Ltd paid out £1.27 million in dividends last year, bringing the total dividends it has paid out to more than £8.36 million since 2016.

    – The company is majority owned by Milburn, with his wife and two sons holding minority stakes.

    – AM Strategy held more than £4.9 million in cash. The company has a single staff member.

    Okay, so he’s a rampant privatisation fetishist – at least he’s not a Tory!

    Oh actually, hold on a minute, Canary contributor Dr Julia Grace Patterson recently drew attention to the following:

    Perhaps you’re able to ignore all of the above and convince yourself that Milburn and Labour still have the best interests of patients and the NHS at heart. If that’s the case, you may be shocked to discover he’s actually proposed we go after long-term sick people as part of Labour’s grander ambition to do xenophobia:

    Hypocrisy!

    Getting back to the GB News angle, what you need to understand is that although much of the content produced by right-wing media is propaganda at best and bullshit at worst, it’s not always false. If these outlets can support their own side with the truth, then truth is their weapon of choice.

    We’re sure many Labour supporters will be shouting ‘hypocrisy’ right about now given GB News’ track record, and they can do that – they can. However, we suggest it might be more productive in the long term if they DEMAND THEIR OWN PARTY STOPS DOING CRONY CAPITALISM.

    Featured image via GB News

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • The people praising Labour’s David Evans says all you need to know about him (and them)

    Labour Party general secretary David Evans is to stand down from his position after conference season:

    To the Starmerroids and centrist mums and dads, he has been central to the ‘rebirth’ of the party and its electoral success. To the rest of us, he is a capitalist stooge who has broken democracy in Labour and entrenched the centre-right’s grip on the party.

    David Evans: popular with Zionist shitlords

    David Evans, who assumed the role of general secretary of the Labour Party in May 2020, has had a tenure marked by significant controversy and internal strife. Appointed by Labour leader Keir Starmer, Evans’ role has been critical in shaping the party’s centre-right direction. However, his leadership has not been without its share of scandals, many of which have intensified the ideological divisions within the party.

    Before becoming general secretary, Evans had a long history with the Labour Party, having previously worked as assistant general secretary under Tony Blair. His appointment by Starmer was widely seen as a move to consolidate centre-right control over the party’s apparatus and steer it away from the left-wing policies associated with Jeremy Corbyn.

    So, far many his departure is a sad moment. Among those is ‘Zionist shitlord’ himself Luke Akehurst:

    But as someone pointed out, Corbyn left Labour with plenty of cash:

    One of the most significant and contentious issues during Evans’ tenure has been antisemitism within the Labour Party. Evans cemented the false notion that Labour was riddled with it – and that Jeremy Corbyn was a raging racist antisemite.

    In particular, the suspension of Jeremy Corbyn from the party, following his comments on the EHRC report, sparked outrage among his supporters and intensified the party’s internal divisions. Then there was the Forde Report – dismissed by the party – that found institutional racism in Labour and a weaponising of antisemitism.

    The Labour Purge

    All this came against a backdrop of the continuing Labour ‘purge’ – where David Evans’s henchpeople were suspending left-wing members, Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs), and as we saw at the general election, deselecting left-wing candidates.

    Evans’s intentional smashing of democracy and the left wing of the party alienated a significant portion of the membership, leading to accusations that he corrupted the party’s democratic processes.

    Authoritarian and an attempt to silence the grassroots of the party would be an understatement. Many members saw this as an overreach of the general secretary’s powers and as a way to stifle debate and prevent the expression of dissenting views. The suspension of CLP meetings has led to widespread dissatisfaction and has fueled claims that Evans is part of a broader effort by the party’s leadership to centralize power and marginalize the left wing.

    Of course, this suits some people:

    David Evans has also faced allegations of mismanagement concerning party staff. Reports have emerged of staff being dismissed or forced out under controversial circumstances, leading to claims of a toxic working environment within Labour’s headquarters. Some have accused Evans of creating a culture of fear and intimidation, where staff feel unable to express their opinions or challenge decisions.

    David Evans: off you fuck

    Or maybe, just maybe, he’s resigning because of this:

    Either way, David Evans’s tenure has been one of disgrace for many – but a success for the centre-right of the party. Anyone with an ounce of scruples will not mourn his metaphorical passing. Good riddance, the Canary says.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Remembering Pits and Perverts 40 years on, as Jeremy Corbyn set to host anniversary gig

    Jeremy Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project is hosting a Pits and Perverts 40th anniversary concert on 16 December. It’s part of their Music For The Many campaign – but will also be raising funds for people devasted by Israel’s genocide in Gaza, as well as refugees over here. But what was the original concert, and what impact did it have?

    Pits and Perverts against the Miners’ Strike backdrop

    This iconic event was organised by Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners (LGSM), a group formed in response to the Tory-induced hardships faced by striking miners during the UK Miners’ Strike of 1984-85. The concert, held in London on 10 December 1984, became a historic moment in the struggle for social justice and mutual support.

    The backdrop of this event was the UK Miners’ Strike, a defining confrontation between the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and the Conservative government led by prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

    The strike, which began in March 1984, was a response to the government’s plans to close down many of the country’s coal mines, threatening the livelihoods of tens of thousands of miners and their communities. As the strike dragged on, miners and their families faced increasing financial hardship, with the government and media portraying them as the enemy.

    It was in this context that LGSM emerged.

    LGSM: an iconic group, which created an iconic moment

    Founded by Mark Ashton, Jackson, and other activists, LGSM was motivated by the belief that the struggle of the miners was fundamentally linked to their own fight against oppression. They recognised that both communities were being targeted by a government determined to crush dissent.

    The LGBTQ+ community, facing rampant homophobia and discriminatory laws, saw an opportunity to forge an alliance with the miners, who were enduring their own form of marginalisation.

    The name Pits and Perverts was derived from a derogatory headline used by a British tabloid newspaper. The term “pits” referred to the coal mines, while “perverts” was a slur aimed at the LGBTQ+ community.

    Rather than shying away from this insult, LGSM embraced it, using it as the title for their fundraising concert, effectively reclaiming the language used against them. This act of defiance was a powerful statement, turning bigotry on its head and demonstrating the resilience and unity of both communities.

    The concert was held at the Electric Ballroom in Camden, London, and featured performances from prominent bands of the time, including Bronski Beat, a group known for their openly gay frontman Jimmy Somerville.

    The event drew a crowd of around 1,500 people and raised over £5,000 (equivalent to about £16,000 today) for the miners and their families. Beyond the financial support, the concert forged a deep bond between the LGBTQ+ community and the miners, one that would have lasting effects.

    Tangible effects away from the concert

    The solidarity shown by LGSM was not merely symbolic. It had real, tangible effects on the strike. The funds raised helped sustain the miners’ families during a period of immense hardship. Additionally, the miners, many of whom had never previously encountered openly gay individuals, were moved by the support they received. This alliance helped break down prejudices and foster mutual understanding.

    As Jackson told the Camden New Journal:

    The protocol was it was free entry for miners. I remember walking through the crowd and this young Scottish miner saw I was wearing a Pits and Perverts T-shirt. He asked if I had something to do with the gig. I grinned. He was gobsmacked. He said – I had no idea you supported us… I put my arm round him and we looked out over the crowd, and said ‘well, now you do’.

    The Pits and Perverts concert of 1984 is often used as a symbol of solidarity, uniting two seemingly disparate communities: the LGBTQ+ community and the South Wales mining community. Of course, they weren’t really that disparate – as there were plenty of working-class LGBTQ+ people in mining communities. As Jackson said:

    We knew of LGBT people in the mining communities, it wasn’t a case of ‘us and them’. I come from Lancashire. A lot of us were from mining areas. They had working-class backgrounds and had family or friends in the mining community.

    Now, Corbyn and the Peace and Justice Project will be reinvigorating that sense of cross-campaign solidarity.

    Pits and Perverts for the 21st century

    40 years on from the original iconic organised by LGSM in solidarity with the South Wales mining community, Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project concert will highlight the importance and invaluable contribution of grassroots music venues and creative spaces in community organising and building unity.

    Corbyn will be joined by the Oozes and many more special guests who we will be announcing very soon. You can buy tickets here.

    The legacy of the Pits and Perverts concert and the LGSM’s broader efforts was profound. It contributed to the eventual shift in attitudes within the labor movement towards LGBTQ+ rights. When the Miners’ Strike ended in 1985, the NUM expressed their gratitude by marching alongside LGBTQ+ activists in that year’s Pride parade in London.

    In the years since, the story of LGSM and the Pits and Perverts concert has been celebrated as a powerful example of cross-community solidarity. It serves as a reminder that the fight for justice often requires us to build bridges between diverse groups, recognising that their struggles are interconnected.

    The event is a testament to the power of unity, demonstrating that when marginalised communities come together they can challenge the established order.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Starmer’s in for a nasty surprise when he finally gets back to work

    When the UK voted the Labour Party into office at the beginning of July, Keir Starmer told us they’d inherited the worst economic circumstances since WWII. They then proceeded to cease all parliamentary activity for over a month for the ‘Summer Recess‘. Some would argue that politicians deserve four weeks off every summer; others would say that a situation so supposedly dire warranted immediate action. As it turns out, these others far outweigh the rest.

    On Monday 2 September, the Labour government will finally return to parliamentary activity. The ‘nasty surprise’ mentioned in the headline refers to the steep drop in polling they’re returning to:

    Given that Labour’s overarching plan is to fix the problem’s caused by austerity with more austerity, the economic situation can only worsen, and their popularity can only continue to plummet.

    In other words, Starmer’s government seems to have fucked it already, and the public are painfully aware of that.

    Starmer: the poll story

    It’s been a bad week for Labour’s polling, with their disapproval levels shooting skywards like a ski jumper:

    Labour’s problems are even worse in Scotland:

    Remember when Starmer promised to clean up corruption? Well it looks like he hasn’t so much washed it away as absorbed it into himself like a super absorbent kitchen towel:

    And guess what? Labour’s actions are not going unnoticed:

    The latest polling is from Opinium:

    Labour have tried to put a positive spin on their appalling polling, seemingly thinking they can trick the public into thinking they’re anything other than a bunch of Billy Bullshitters:

    More nasty surprises for the new nasty party

    It’s not just the public, though; the media is also attacking the new government from all sides:

    Although, admittedly, not all media criticism is worth paying attention to:

     

    Unpopular with the public and barraged by the media – just who is Labour for? Well, it’s certainly not the charities who are incensed by Labour’s plan to freeze your nan this winter, as reported by the Observer:

    The Observer has learned that the country’s leading charity for older people, Age UK, has written to Reeves with a specific proposal it believes will be fairer and that would prevent around two million pensioners being deprived of a payment it says they badly need.

    The UK chancellor revealed plans in July to introduce a means test for the winter fuel payment, where only those on pensions credit would qualify, as part of a push to plug what she said was a £22bn black hole in the public finances left by the previous Conservative administration.

    But many Labour MPs have reported being bombarded with complaints from constituents furious at the plan, which was not in Labour’s election manifesto. Last week, on a visit to Scotland, Reeves was told by a group of anxious Labour backbenchers that they did not believe the plans were fair.

    Labour keeps repeating that this is all the result of having to make ‘hard choices’. Once again, the public isn’t falling for it:

    Is there anyone in favour of Starmer’s Labour? You know, besides alleged slum landlords?

     

    Forensically predictable Starmer

    Who could have predicted that targeting pensioners then going on holiday would enrage the entire country? Not Starmer, it seems – perhaps the least canny political operator this country has ever produced.

    The Tories were hated and unpopular, of course, but they were propped up by the mainstream media. Who does Starmer think will champion his cause? He seems to have made the mistake of thinking that if he caves into the demands of Britain’s wealthiest people, then the right-wing media would reward him. Instead, they’re going to keep pushing him to give more to the rich, knowing that the worst that can happen now is the Tories or Reform form the next government.

    Perhaps the nastiest surprise for Starmer will be that he’s forced to confront his own ineptitude in a manner he never could have imagined when the easily-duped praised his ‘forensic’ intelligence:

    Who could have seen it coming? Certainly not Starmer.

    Featured image via Keir Starmer (YouTube)

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • A Canary journalist has been hacked and surveilled – but by who?

    In recent days, independent journalist Richard Medhurst was arrested and detained under counter-terrorism laws – presumably for his work around Israel and Gaza. However, Medhurst joins a long line of working journalists who the state has targeted. Most recently, independent media professional and Canary writer Samantha Asumadu has also been subject to attempted hacking.

    If you were wondering, the Canary will not tolerate it.

    Samantha Asumadu: highly experienced but under scrutiny

    Samantha Asumadu is a highly experienced journalist, broadcaster, and editor. She has been a working journalist since 2010 when she lived in East Africa. Asumadu has done breaking news reporting for CNN and France 24. She created news pieces for AFP, filmed in the DRC for DW Global, and also directed a documentary for Al Jazeera English.

    Since moving back to the UK, she has written for the Telegraph, the Guardian, the New Statesman, and openDemocracy. She has appeared on BBC Women’s Hour and other BBC radio shows. She’s been a guest on the Trash Future Podcast and hosted guest episodes for the socialist military podcast Hell of a Way to Die including the recent SpyCops Legacy series.

    Asumadu told the Canary:

    I founded Media Diversified (2013-2022) with a mission to challenge the homogeneity of voices in UK news media, and founded the Bare Lit Festival of writing in 2015. In 2022 I was a finalist for Private Eye’s Paul Foot Investigative and Campaigning Journalism Award and the Society of Editors, National Investigation of the Year, Media Freedom Award for my investigation into Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentences. I currently report for the documentary podcast series, Trapped: The IPP Prisoner Scandal. The series was a finalist in the 2024 Sandford St Martin Awards.

    As the Canary has documented, the IPP prisoner saga has been one of the more controversial, yet perhaps underreported, scandals in recent years. Asumadu has undoubtedly helped significantly raise the profile of this story. However, that could have come at a cost – because it may well have attracted the attention of the security services.

    Now, Asumadu has opened herself up to further scrutiny. She said:

    Recently I embarked on a five-part investigative series about state surveillance and government authoritarianism for the Canary. Three parts have been published and there are two to go.

    Her work for us covered the notorious Forde Report into racism within the Labour Party. It also looked at how the state is silencing and imprisoning peaceful activists. Asumadu most recently delved into the links between the recent far-right race riots and the ‘acceptable’ faces of this kind of ideology like Douglas Murray.

    It was then that Asumadu began experiencing issues.

    Targeting independent journalists

    There have been multiple attempts to access her social media accounts, on multiple occasions. However, most concerningly on multiple occasions Samantha Asumadu has had what are called “AirTags” moving with her phone.

    Apple designed AirTags as small tracking devices so people could find their phones, keys etc. However, they have also been used by criminals to help steal people’s belongings. Ergo, it is likely that the state also uses them to monitor people it considers a threat.

    So, it seems at best worrying that at the same time someone was attempting to hack multiple social media accounts of Asumadu’s, she also was being tracked by an AirTag. She told the Canary:

    14 years ago I went to DRC to do a story about blood minerals for DW Global. A mining company started to follow me – worried I was going to find and expose something I expect. Since then I am hyper vigilant. So whilst I don’t always know where a threat is, I know there is a threat. Security services follow both activists and journalists. Activists are hyper vigilant in different ways. They are used to their groups being infiltrated. Thing with me is I am an activist and a journalist. So I am hyper vigilant in both ways. It’s served me quite well so far.

    The Black Writers Guild issued a statement, saying:

    The Black Writers’ Guild is working to support member and award winning journalist Samantha Asumadu. The founder of Media Diversified and host of the Trapped podcast investigating Indefinite Public Prosecutions who has also been widely published in The Guardian and The Telegraph has been the target of multiple hacks to her professional accounts and discovered surveillance devices in her orbit. The Black Writers’ Guild is providing pastoral support as Samantha Asumadu carries out a safety audit. Every Black writer has the right to work freely and safely in Britain.

    Of course, some people will look at this story and think ‘hyperbole’. However, the arrest of Richard Medhurst is a case in point into why Asumadu’s situation is cause for concern.

    Nothing new under the sun

    Medhurst booked his plane tickets on his day of travel. He arrived at Heathrow Airport and almost as soon as he got on the plane six cops got on board and removed him. Therefore, his arrest must have been pre-planned – the implication being that clearly authorities are monitoring non-corporate media journalists’ output.

    This is probably one of the worst-kept secrets going. As independent journalist Alex Tiffin found out, the Cabinet Office under Boris Johnson had been monitoring his social media. Canary journalist’s names (including Steve Topple) cropped up in the data it had been storing on him.

    So, it is highly likely Samantha Asumadu is being monitored, along with countless other independent journalists. It is of course ironic that some of her work has been around SpyCops – when it appears she may well now be the target of state surveillance herself.

    The technique being used – of disrupting someone’s work with the view to intimidate them or put them off continuing is not new. In 1981, a parliamentary debate partially revealed the extent to which security services were intercepting postal mail of individuals/organisations on their radar. As one MP put it:

    It is real James Bond stuff – spy fiction – but it happens every morning of the week. The figures for a recent year show that in London mail sent to 400 addresses was continually intercepted, and mail sent to a large number of other addresses was intercepted on a temporary basis – for example, offices of trade unions whose members were on strike or of an organisation that might be arranging a demonstration. I have no reason to believe that the figures have decreased. If we multiply by six or seven to equate London to the country as a whole, we see that a large amount of mail is regularly spied on and passed to the security services.

    Fast forward to 2024, and the only difference is postal mail has been replaced by apps. Asumadu described it as:

    When I write an investigative or comment article, it’s like zipping up a skirt, trousers, or coat. All the teeth have to be there, perfectly aligned, undamaged for me to zip to the top and finish. Before that I have to painstakingly find each tooth. Whoever has been hacking my accounts has been trying to hide the teeth and smash them if they can’t hide them.

    Samantha Asumadu: watching the watchers

    The end result of this is Samantha Asumadu has been not only put off continuing her work, but also left scared for her safety. The Canary has been supporting her throughout this time. As she summed up:

    Leave me alone to get on with my work. I deserve safety and autonomy as much as any other working journalist in the UK.

    It is unacceptable that security services are targeting independent journalists in the way Asumadu and Medhurst have been. If the state conducted its business in an acceptable manner, then journalists would not have to delve into the murky depths of its most sordid affairs – therefore, security services would not need to monitor their work.

    However, that is not the reality we live in. So, until such time that it is, the Canary will continue to support its journalists, and all those from other independent outlets, in their work. And as for the security services, we have a message for you: you’re not the only ones that can do the monitoring.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • State repression writ large as Palestine Action actionists continue to be held

    Cops continue to hold six Palestine Action activists under counter-terrorism laws after they entered Elbit System’s Bristol factory – a company complicit in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. The group, other organisations, and its supporters have hit back – with protests happening outside two police stations. The Canary’s view? We’re witnessing the state setting a precedent against direct actionists.

    Palestine Action: more action against Elbit

    As the Canary previously reported, Palestine Action activists targeted Elbit’s Bristol site on Tuesday 6 August. They used a repurposed prison van to smash the gates at the site. When inside, they destroyed equipment and machinery that Israel would have used to kill Palestinian people with.

    As of Monday 12 August, Israel had killed at least 39,897 people in Gaza, including over 15,000 children. The toll includes 107 deaths in the previous 48 hours. Israel has also wounded around 92,152 people since 7 October.

    However, also on 12 August, cops had detained six Palestine Action activists for several days under counter-terrorism laws – completely disproportionate when contrasted with Israel’s war crimes and attempted genocide in Gaza.

    ‘We refuse to be intimidated’

    Palestine Action said in a statement:

    Actionists are being detained under the Terrorism Act, allowing the police to hold them for up to 7 days, with possible extension to 14 days, without charge. This comes after six were arrested on Tuesday 6th August for entering Elbit Systems’ Filton, Bristol site, to prevent its manufacture of weapons for genocide.

    The Filton premises are the brand new £35m R&D hub of Israel’s biggest weapons firm. Its June 2023 opening was attended by the UK-Israeli Ambassador Hotevely, and Elbit’s CEO Bezhalel Machlis – who has frequently boasted of the company’s central role in Israel’s military, during the ongoing Gaza genocide.

    Direct action against Elbit aims to disrupt this: targeting the source of colonial violence and genocide against the Palestinian people, undermining Elbit’s profiteering from Israel’s daily massacres.

    As well as detaining them under unprecedented powers, police have launched a smear campaign against the detained actionists, alleging violence against police and security guards. The activists are unable to respond to these claims, and unable to describe for public record the force used against them by police and private security. Palestine Action contends that these statements are designed to prejudice opinion and legal proceedings against activists, and to lay the groundwork for the police’s unjust use of authoritarian powers.

    Now, more than ever, Palestine Action and the #Filton6 need the support of the public, to push back against these authoritarian attempts to protect Israel’s weapons industry. Show the British state and Israeli arms companies that we refuse to be intimidated into allowing a genocide to happen.

    Other organisations have hit back at the cops and the government for allowing their actions.

    ‘Release them immediately’

    CAGE International said:

    These courageous actionists were acting to prevent the further arming of a regime currently on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice, the highest judicial authority in the world. Their actions were rooted in a commitment to save innocent lives by disrupting the supply chain of weapons used to perpetuate ongoing genocidal violence.

    In a disturbing display of state repression, the actionists have been held since Tuesday 6 August, under the Terrorism Act 2000 on a seven-day warrant without charge. They are currently detained at Hammersmith and Newbury police stations. This abuse of counter-terrorism legislation is clearly designed to intimidate and silence those who dare to challenge the complicity of states and corporations in war crimes and human rights abuses. Direct action has proven so effective in challenging state-sanctioned atrocities that authorities are resorting to intimidation tactics and harsh legal measures to silence and undermine those who dare to take a stand.

    CAGE International calls for the immediate release of these actionists.

    The actions of these six individuals should be recognised for what they are: a principled and necessary intervention to halt the killing of innocent civilians.

    Hammersmith comes out

    Indeed – many people do recognised them as such. On Sunday 11 August people protested outside Hammersmith and Newbury police stations. Canary writer Samantha Asumadu was at Hammersmith. A significant number of people turned out:

    Cops were protecting the police station:

    Asumadu said:

    “I could hear it before I saw it. Shouts, chants and noise. I hurriedly lit my cigarette and walked toward the music. I got out my mask too; something I haven’t warn since the year after lockdown ended.

    “I doubt it would do any of the people there any good to hide our faces by now.

    “We would have been mapped and tagged years ago if we’d attended a protest – certainly since 2019 when the Public Order Act started making its way through parliament. But probably even before then if we had attended any anti-war, pro-justice protest. And I have attended many since the million-strong one in 2006 at what turned out to be the start of the second invasion of Iraq. 

    “On the mic/blow horn as I twisted and turned into the crowd, sliding sideways in order to get a view, was someone I recognised but wasn’t sure who it was. She gave me a wry smile and carried on speaking through the blow horn. She had half cut dreads that she’d tied up on the top of her head. Kafiri slung round her neck, she urged us to join in with her chant “no justice”.

    Righteous indignation

    Asumadu continued:

    “She soon introduced someone called MC Righteous. I’d heard his name plenty of times back in the early 2010s when people like Lowkey and Akala had made their names. MC Righteous had never hit the big time, but as far as I know he hasn’t also been boycotted or targeted by the state such as Lowkey has, or denounced by historians like Akala has. So maybe there’s  something in being NOT too famous.

    “He got the crowd hyped, even the older types hanging back a bit, and the small woman a in hijab who had brought her chair with her, determined to support the Filton 6 even from the back, even sitting down. “Bun the occupation”. Damn right. 

    “MC Righteous handed the mic to a woman who introduced herself as the mother of the youngest Palestine Actioner, at 20 years old, who had been unceremoniously locked up, supposedly on ‘terrorism’ charges. She said:

    I have never heard of Elbit Systems before my daughter got involved and now I know so much more, I support her actions 100%. But she has an illness, they are not giving her proper medication.

    “As she spoke I began to feel movement at the edges of the crowd of around 150 people.

    The cops shut it down

    Asumadu noted:

    “When I had entered their space I had noticed the numerous police who stood across the road, down the road, and on the road. They hadn’t been too close, but now I felt them over. I happened to be filming when they made their move:

    “What looked like them trying to encircle us, I slipped through with a second to spare and brushed past a policeman which allowed me to make my escape.

    “I crossed to the other side if the road, dodging traffic, and heading towards a sea of blue:

    “I took the above video from across the road, listened for a bit, then decided to walk to a pub not far away in Kensington Olympia. I was disconcerted to see the number of police vans they’d brought and parked on the other side of the road:

    “I took one last look back at the grandmothers, men, women, teenagers, students who had come out to make some noise for the Filton 6 and I felt blessed.

    Standing strong against repression

    As Asumadu summed up:

    “I remembered two years ago the last time I went to A Palestine Action. I was the only journalist there. Whilst only this year I got round to writing about it I had forgotten the photos and video I had taken so did another thread on X:

    “Because one thing I know is Palestine Action are not new to this, they’re true to this. Leaving the pub a couple of hours later having posting some of the photos on Instagram and X/Twitter I went back the way I had come.

    “Expecting to hear them again before I saw them. They had gone. So had all the police vans, and the police. I traced back the exact steps I had taken earlier in reverse but this time I noticed what was to the left of me . Directly opposite the Hammersmith police station is Hammersmith library. Enlightenment, and knowledge standing strong across from repression and hopelessness”.

    Palestine Action: don’t believe the cops

    People also went to Newbury:

    On 12 August, people also went back there:

    Meanwhile, Netpol said:

    Police appear to want to claim Palestine Action is some kind of ‘urban guerilla group’ because it engages in direct action against property. To make this stick, it now needs to portray it as ‘violent’. Anyone who knows the people involved in it recognises this as a fabrication.

    It has been frustrating that some media coverage has failed to challenge claims about alleged injuries to officers during a recent protest. The police have a long track record of lying about protests – look back to the claims made about Kingsnorth in 2008

    Everyone should exercise the greatest level of scepticism about any claims made by Avon and Somerset Police, who invented ‘broken bones’ during the Kill the Bill protests in 2021.

    It is obvious what cops are doing.

    The state is setting a precedent

    For four years, authorities have been unable to stop Palestine Action with standard legislation. Now, under exceptionally dubious justification, they are using terrorism laws to try and convict them. Authorities are also sending out a message to other groups like Just Stop Oil that their direct action will not be tolerated, either. Moreover, the state is once again protecting corporate capital – in this case, Elbit, to which Palestine Action has caused serious disruption and damage.

    However, cops holding Palestine Action activists under counter-terrorism laws also sends a clear signal to the public. In the same few days that far-right racist agitator Tommy Robinson was also detained under counter-terror laws, the state is saying that anyone who does not follow the Western liberal playbook will be face the consequences – regardless of whether they’re on the left or right.

    The fact that many of the far-right ‘thugs’ during the recent race riots got more lenient sentences than the Just Stop Oil ‘Whole Truth Five’ speaks volumes about how the state views the far right compared to what it would label the ‘far left’. Regardless of that, though, and the response to the race riots by the criminal justice system should also ring alarms bells for the rest of us.

    However, the biggest warning comes from cops treatment of Palestine Action. A precedent is being set – and it is not a good one.

    Featured image and additional images and video via Samantha Asumadu 

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Elon Musk is making Twitter dumber – or is it the other way around…?

    When Elon Musk bought Twitter, it was obvious he’d make the platform dumber. Now, people are realising that this process isn’t a one-way street, with far-right agitator Musk seemingly becoming dumber by the second:

    The enworsening of Twitter

    One user succinctly summed up what Twitter is now:

    It’s not just the world’s biggest pusher of porn, spam, and right-wingery; it’s also the biggest pusher of Musk:

    It’s obvious who Musk is designing the app for, given that he openly responds to right-wing influencers like Chaya Raichik:

     

    The enworsening of Elon Musk

    It’s obvious that Twitter is worse under Elon Musk. Given that he was a Twitter addict even before he even bought the site, it only makes sense that Twitter’s enworsening would in turn enworsen Musk.

    Musk tweets constantly every day, which has raised suspicions about how much work he actually gets done at his day jobs:

    Of the many, many tweets he produces each day, most highlight the man’s hastening descent into idiocy:

     

    Another recent endeavour of Musk’s is suing advertisers for not advertising on his platform, because he thinks… what does he think exactly? That he has a legal right for companies to advertise on his website?

    While the cartoon above is funny, companies don’t need to prove it – they can advertise where they want. Again, what is the man thinking? As we’ll argue later, we suspect at this point he isn’t actually thinking at all.

    A vicious spiral for Elon Musk?

    Many are arguing that Elon Musk is a victim of his own website:

    Essentially, Musk is the keeper of the brain rot machine, and the more rotten his brain becomes, the harder he cranks the dial marked ‘WARNING – MAXIMUM ROT’.

    Musk’s spiral into dumb-fuckery has recently seen him stoking the flames of race riots with what he believes to be an “inevitable” civil war in the UK:

    Musk tweeting that civil war is inevitable in the UK

    However, it’s arguable that Musk might actually just be a nasty racist. Because in the next tweet, the South African-born Elon isn’t just saying Muslims control the UK police (a racist and easily disproved point); he’s saying it with a racist analogy which seems to say ‘these Muslims are going to fuck you, you dumb whites – you know, like a gang of Black guys would’:

    A racist meme posted by Elon Musk comparing a white woman surrounded by Black men to a white police officer surrounded by Muslims

    It’s not just the UK government Musk is at war with – here he is using a graph posted by a crypto-shilling account to suggest that the “Biden-Harris Administration is importing vast numbers of voters”:

    As people pointed out, “illegal aliens” can’t vote:

     

    Musk’s war on world leaders has not gone unnoticed, as Politico reported:

    In just the last two weeks on the platform — since rebranded X — the billionaire provocateur unloaded a string of posts that poured fuel on the fire of Britain’s worst anti-immigration riots in decades; shared a doctored video of Vice President Kamala Harris deeming herself the “ultimate diversity hire” for president; and claimed without evidence that the Biden-Harris administration is “importing vast numbers” of illegal aliens to swing the November election.

    Musk’s latest flurry of innuendo, half-truths and lies online is making it increasingly clear that it is the tech mogul — and not just his platform — who poses the greatest challenge to governments struggling to rein in content that can incite extremist violence.

    “Elon is weaponizing this in a way it hasn’t been weaponized before,” Democratic strategist Adam Parkhomenko said of Musk’s posts and hands-off approach to others’ content on X. “It just is sort of questionable why he’s allowed to do what he’s doing.”

    People might be tempted to ask what Musk’s endgame is. Across the world, government’s are eyeing up legislation like the EU’s Digital Services Act, which describes itself as “ensuring a safe and accountable online environment”. In years past, people might have been more worried about government’s stepping in; now, social media is such a cesspit that few would disagree that something needs to change.

    So we come back to the same question: what is Musk’s end game?

    Is he trying to scare regulators into backing down?

    Is he trying to ensure right-wing politicians who are more favourable to him take power?

    We’d like to argue that while there may be some truth to the above, the reality is that he’s algorithmed himself into becoming a tweet-happy dumb fuck who simply can’t keep his keyboard quiet. He’s no idea what is or isn’t in his best interest anymore; he just compulsively replies with whatever he instinctively thinks to whatever he habitually reads.

    He can’t help himself.

    Clownfall

    Users like Elon Musk are the product of Twitter like iPhones are the product of Apple – unthinking tweet machines who flood the site with content that other users can react to. It would be genius if it wasn’t so dumb; if it wasn’t completely devaluing the company and driving away advertisers.

    To be clear, we’re not arguing that Musk needs to be taken down a peg because he dared to criticise Kamala Harris and Keir Starmer – world leaders we have zero respect for.  We are saying his targeted promotion of far-right bullshit is making his own failure inevitable. The only question is whether his version of Twitter is nerfed out of existence by government regulators or whether it goes bankrupt before they can draw up the legislation.

    Featured image via Daniel Oberhaus (Flickr)

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Our newsroom planned for more chaos across the UK. Instead, we got hope

    Amid a major escalation of the largest race riots in 30 years in the United Kingdom, a rare positive story emerged.

    This post was originally published on Al Jazeera – Breaking News, World News and Video from Al Jazeera.

  • Keir ‘Mr Crackdown’ Starmer is coming for the far-right goons – and the rest of us, too

    Following several days of race riots, many have wondered how our new Labour Party PM Keir Starmer will react. Those who are familiar with his record probably had a good idea, as Starmer was the director of public prosecutions during the 2011 riots. His response then gives a good indication of the response he will demand now:

    Crack down on riots

    Robin Murray is a “former winner of the Legal Aid Lawyer of the year award”. Describing his experience from 2011, he continued:

    In the riot courts, there was a judicial bloodbath the next day. Duty solicitors overwhelmed huge delays and ultimately bail refused whilst many were sent to the Crown Court. And who was in charge of the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service]? Keir Starmer. Expect more of the same over the next few days…

    to all clunk heads who think it would be fun to join a far right riot because you can expect your lives to be turned upside down as civil Society at times can react with a savageness that matches your own in order to protect the wider community.

    You will be entitled to legal representation but even the best lawyers will struggle to save you from a judicial system geared up to send you a message. If you riot/ break the law expect ruthless retribution. I merely state this as part of my past experience not as judgment

    I fought very hard with all the skills of many years in the legal profession but the tide of retribution flowing through the Legal system the last time this happened was overwhelming. I felt sorry for a few clients caught up with it who were more stupid than wicked.

    Some were not the main key offenders, but were on the periphery simply and wrongly looting shops where others had smashed the glass. Sam had no prior convictions. All were reminded in custody. So don’t get caught up in this, stay home & don’t ruin your lives. Re-evaluate.

    It seems like we’re going to see a similar response to that of Starmer and the coalition government of 2011, with 24 hour courts on the horizon:

    There is some difference between now and 2011, however, in that Starmer is reportedly more ‘understanding’ of the racist goons who are cutting a warpath across the UK:

    Some have pointed out that Labour’s stance on migration is actually a right-wing position that’s identical to that of the Tories:

    The thing to bear in mind, though, is that this position of promoting racism with one breath and migration with the next has clearly run its course. Sooner or later, a section of the population will say ‘if foreigners are so bad, why are we letting them in?’. That point is now here – on the streets – violently manifesting the hatred our mainstream politicians and journalists have been feeding them for years.

    2011

    The riots of 2011 were far different than the race riots we’re seeing today. As Emily Apple wrote for the Canary in 2018:

    In 2011, riots spread across the UK. They began in Tottenham after a protest over the police shooting of Mark Duggan. During the protests, the police refused to meet with Duggan’s family and friends. According to Paul Lewis, who covered the protests for The Guardian:

    “What happened over the next four hours is subject to debate, but what is clear is that tensions gradually escalated, as police made only limited attempts to talk to the demonstrators.”

    Lewis also reported that it was an incident with a 16-year-old girl that ‘sparked’ the riot:

    “Others present said the spark for the rioting was a specific incident involving a 16-year-old woman, who stepped forward to confront police around 8.30pm, demanding answers, but was attacked with shields and batons.

    “They beat her with a baton, and then the crowd started shouting ‘run, run’, and there was a hail of missiles,” said Anthony Johnson, 39. “She had been saying: ‘We want answers, come and speak to us.’”

    And as the protest escalated, a doubledecker bus was set on fire and missiles were thrown.

    The riots spread across London and the UK during the next few days. There was widespread damage to property and looting, and five people died.

    In a 2013 essay, professor Sarah Lamble wrote:

    The events of August 2011—which began with a peaceful demonstration outside a police station in Tottenham to protest the fatal police shooting of twenty-nine-year-old Mark Duggan and subsequently erupted into five days of rioting, looting, and burning in cities across England, presented the state with a political opportunity.

    Clearly these events were a sign of widespread rage, disaffection, and discontent, and they stemmed from deeper problems that had been brewing for years. But rather than seize the moment to confront these issues, the government chose instead to simply extend its law, order, and moral “responsibilization” agenda.

    She also spoke about how the state ignored its own laws to come down heavy on the lawbreakers:

    Questions were raised about the proportionality of sentencing as well as political interference with the judiciary’s supposed independence, particularly when it was revealed that magistrates had been advised to disregard normal sentencing guidelines for riot-related offenses…

    There were many striking cases: a twenty three-year-old with no prior convictions sentenced to six months imprisonment for stealing £3.50 worth of bottled water; a twenty-two-year-old sentenced to sixteen months for stealing ice cream; a forty-eight-year-old sentenced to sixteen months for stealing doughnuts; a woman who slept through the riots but was imprisoned for accepting a pair of shorts that had been looted by her lodger; and two young men sentenced to four years each for attempting to incite a riot via Facebook, even though their posts did not result in any such action…

    Despite appeals, most sentences were upheld on the grounds that the context of the riots constituted an aggravating factor that warranted additional punishment…

    The consequentialist rationality standard that was so stringently applied to those who participated in the riots did not apply to those doling out punishment. Stiff sentences were publicly justified on the need for deterrence, despite the lack of evidence that longer sentences have any such effect—a fact that even the director of public prosecutions admitted…

    The vengeful state

    The riots across the country have been difficult to watch:

     

    Anyone with more than two brain cells looks at these rampaging goons and wants to see them and their movement obliterated. In that sense, few will shed a tear when judges hand down disproportionate sentences to the hate mobs.

    We need to be aware of the situation we’re in, though.

    Starmer and the riots: he’s coming for all of us

    Starmer isn’t going to crack down on these riots because he recognises a civilised society cannot tolerate the intolerable – he’s going to do it because he’s Mr Crack Down.

    He would have reacted the same way to the Black Lives Matter protests, and to those who protested against the Tories when they repressed our right to protest in the first place.

    He will react the same way to those protesting against climate change, even as climate scientists warn us the effects are outpacing their worst fears.

    When the effects of climate change lead to more migration and Starmer’s policies do nothing to slow down either issue, he’ll crack down on the resulting chaos from every angle, and the resentment will grow in line with the problems his government is failing to fix.

    Starmer is a cop first and foremost, and this fact will inform every action he makes as prime minister.

    Featured image via the Times (YouTube)

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Immigrants and Muslims aren’t the problem. Coke-addled, violent white men are.

    The alleged murderer who massacred three young children while seriously injuring 11 others as well as two adults was not a Muslim. Not that this fact should matter. Nor should the colour of the attacker’s skin. However, in the cesspit that is and always has been the UK, unfortunately it does – as Stella-laced, far-right apes rampaged through Southport on Tuesday 30 July – BeCaUsE tWiTtEr ToLd ThEm He WaS a MuSlAmIsT.

    Of course, Keir Starmer’s Labour Party, Nigel Farage, and Tommy Robinson have all done their bit to get us to this point.

    ‘We were only there to light a fucking British candle’

    Let’s be clear. The Canary has spoken to residents of Southport who confirmed the people fighting cops outside a mosque were mostly NOT from Southport. Their shrivelled dicks were bussed in by Patriotic Alternative and other groups – all promoted by Tommy Robinson.

    Of course, the far-right were only in Southport to light candles and lay flowers. It was some “Arab” or “Asian” (they all look the same, y’know) guy with a “machete” – well, flick knife actually (they all look the same, y’know) – that PROVOKED the far-right to smash up the place.

    Please.

    Robinson’s mates must think we’re all as pig-shit thick as they are.

    Reports from people at the actual vigil say the knife-carrying dude wasn’t near it, and that the far-right protest (which was not at the same location as the vigil) was pre-planned – and that’s where he turned up. Maybe if these guys drunk one less Strongbow a day they could get their stories straight?

    Coke-frenzied bullshit fomenting the far-right Southport madness

    Of course, the coke-frenzied mind bending that goes on in the fash’s brains is dizzying. Some of the shit takes on X include:

    “Cops retreated during the Leeds protests cause they were foreigners“. No, it was because the racist state was embroiled in child removal from a Roma family – and the community rightly sided with the family, not rancid social services. Plus, cops don’t care if a poor community smashes itself up. Why would they? In Southport, the fash parachuted themselves in with the sole intention of kicking off at a mosque with the world’s media watching – hence cops hit back.

    “Children are being murdered. None of us are feeling safe in our own country, in our own towns“. If the inference is that Muslims and ‘foreigners’ doing most of the murdering then official data doesn’t back this up – as it’s still white people killing other people the most, with Brown people being under-represented in terms of murder suspects. But that’s not really what’s being said here, is it? What’s being said is that anyone who isn’t white is a problem.

    These shit takes were both from Stephen Yaxley-Lennon by the way – so yes, our attribution was correct. He, of course, wasn’t even in the country; fleeing to the continent because his latest grift has landed him in hot water with the law. We repeat: pig-shit thick.

    Don’t just blame Robinson – blame Labour too

    Meanwhile, in not unrelated news Keir Starmer took every leaf available from Tony Blair and Gordon Brown’s book and turned up at Southport to offer condolences. His appearance is not unrelated to Yaxley-Lennon’s fash-stirring – because the Labour Party holds some responsibility for Tuesday’s carnage as well.

    Starmer, like every Labour leader in living memory except for Jeremy Corbyn, has done what all politicians do. When in trouble, they attack the left while veering to the right. Doing the opposite would undermine a system (the one that keeps politicians in their jobs) that relies on citizens blaming each other for its in-built inequalities. That is, the system relies on racism, classism, and hate to survive – because it is racist, classist, and hateful.

    Labour has demonstrably swung to the right again in the past four years – using racism to in part win the election. The corporate media, inherently right-wing anyway, have lapped this up – therefore, the likes of Robinson have been emboldened. While most of the media still vilify him, it doesn’t actually treat his ideas with the same disdain.

    Four million people voted for this

    Similarly, while not every right-wing person would agree with everything Robinson says, the undercurrent of racism and prejudice is there among them.

    Light-touch fascist Nigel Farage’s Reform got four million votes at the general election. Out of the woodwork he then crawls after the murders in Southport to foment thinly-veiled racism. Don’t try and tell us these people didn’t know what they were voting for.

    ‘I’m not racist, but…’ just doesn’t cut it any more. You could have argued that back in 2015, the 3.8 million people who voted for Farage’s UKIP did so because our political system had disenfranchised them. Therefore, the flag-shagging alternative seemed to offer something hopeful.

    Fast-forward to 2024, and it just doesn’t wash. Four million people knew they were voting for far-right crankery and racism, probably because these are values they hold themselves – and the carnage in Southport is now in their names too:

     

    Perilous times

    The far-right rampage in Southport won’t be the last incident like this. Overall, Starmer’s Labour has not merely enabled this. It has actively encouraged it, so it didn’t have to swing to the left and, y’know, actually improve people’s lives.

    Meanwhile, the actual left has become disjointed and quite frankly all over the place. A united front from them doesn’t seem on the horizon anytime soon.

    People believe the likes of Robinson and Farage – the result being Southport. But perhaps as worryingly, people believe Starmer too. Yet none of these men really care about the people they claim to represent – in the same way the pot bellied goons on their coke-addled rampage in Southport didn’t care about murdered kids.

    We live in perilous times.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Labour’s winter fuel payment cut WILL kill thousands this winter

    A new government, but the same old callous austerity agenda. The stark “heating or eating” dilemma is about to get much worse for millions of older Britons. Because, less than a month in and the new Labour Party government is already making brutal cuts to welfare. First in the firing line are millions of pensioners – as corporate capitalist eugenicist ‘chancellor of the executioners’ Rachel Reeves does away with winter fuel payments for the majority of them.

    Of course, it means hundreds of thousands will suffer fuel poverty as the cold weather begins to bite. Crucially, for many, Labour’s latest sham black hole budget-saving exercise will be a death sentence this winter.

    Labour cutting the winter fuel payment to millions

    On Monday 29 July, Rachel Reeves announced the government’s plans to restrict the winter fuel payment.

    This is a one-off annual winter payment between £250 to £600 that pensioners born before 25 September 1957 currently receive to help with heating bills.

    Now, the chancellor has declared Labour will stop this payment for millions of pensioners. In particular, anyone not receiving means-tested benefits like Pension Credit or Universal Credit, will no longer be eligible.

    Charity Age UK has calculated that Labour’s move will impact 800,000 older people on very low incomes. Specifically, this is those living on less than £218.25 a week as single pensioners, or £332.95 as couples.

    On top of this, it estimated that around a million more pensioners less than £50 above the so-called poverty line will be “hit hard” by the Labour removing the benefit payment. However, the reality is actually much worse than this. The fact is, Labour’s money-saving move will come at an unconscionable cost.

    In fuel poverty but not on low income

    The intention of course is that people in poverty will still receive the winter fuel payment. Largely, the thinking appears to be that the government can encompass this with those claiming means-tested benefits.

    Of course, there are huge problems with this. Firstly, it assumes that all those who could claim means-tested benefits, do claim them. The issue here is that simply isn’t the case. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) already places huge barriers to people accessing these.

    Specifically, around 800,000 older people entitled to pension credits don’t actually claim them. This means they probably now won’t be entitled to the winter fuel payment either.

    And here’s the other thing, pensioners can be living above what the government classes as income poor, but still experience fuel poverty. This is because there’s a weak correlation between fuel poverty and income deprivation.

    There are many reasons for this. For one, as the End Fuel Poverty Coalition has underscored, some older people on higher incomes live in energy inefficient homes.

    Chronically ill and disabled pensioners may also need to have the heating up, and for longer periods to protect their health. In addition, their energy bills costs can be higher, to power vital medical aids and equipment.

    Pensioners in fuel poverty

    Overall, it’s difficult to calculate the number of winter fuel payment recipients that live in fuel poverty. This is because government data on fuel poverty doesn’t quite marry up with the age group eligible for the winter fuel payment, and only looks at the household level.

    Fuel poverty statistics use demographic data which separates out households by the age of the eldest occupant. For those able to claim the winter fuel payment, these fall across two demographic groups. These are: people aged 60 to 74, and 75 or over.

    If we take just the 75 and over category, since all in that group were over the 67 year threshold for the payment, over 11% of households were facing fuel poverty in 2023. This equated to nearly 450,000 fuel poor households with occupants aged 75 or over.

    Moreover, none of this is to even mention that many more people live in so-called “fuel stress” too. This is fuel poverty by any other name – before the Tories changed the goalposts on this. So, there are potentially many more older people barely affording soaring energy costs now, that Labour’s cut will impact.

    Winter fuel payment now excluding older disabled people

    Then, there’s the fact that many people receive non-means tested benefits. Naturally, the new restrictions mean that they’ll no longer get the winter fuel payment either.

    In short, Labour’s plans exclude a range of pensioners claiming attendance allowance. It means that older chronically ill and disabled people will no longer receive the payment if they’re not claiming that benefit as well.

    But again, this is where the correlation between income poverty and fuel poverty breaks down. Notably, there’ll be lots of chronically ill and disabled people who are fuel poor, but not matching government definitions for overall deprivation or able to claim means-tested benefits.

    In 2023, 13% of households with sick and disabled tenants were fuel poor. Specifically, this was equivalent to over three million households. At least some of these will be pensioners that would have received the winter fuel payment – but now may no longer be eligible.

    Labour killing people already

    Of course, the horrific impact of Labour’s cruel cut is only too predictable. That is, more older people will die this winter.

    Research has tied the winter fuel payment to a significant reduction in deaths. A 2015 study showed that winter fuel payments had slashed excess winter mortality. This is the number of additional winter deaths than those projected. Crucially, it had done so by half.

    In other words, restricting the winter fuel payment will kill thousands more older people. Labour knows this, but is ploughing ahead regardless. Reeves also made this announcement the very week the big five fat cat energy firms are gearing up to declare more astronomical profits.

    It hasn’t taken long for Starmer’s Labour to reveal that it’s not the party of “change” at all. In government already, it has shown its true-blue Tory colours – because as it turns out, it’s actually the party of “continuity” for the cruel neoliberal austerity status quo.

    Practically everyone’s old enough to remember Starmer pledging this:

    Needless to say, that hasn’t aged well.

    The new government is essentially consigning hundreds of thousands of older people to fuel poverty. And it will push more pensioners into it with its disgraceful plans. As a result, many more will die this winter that wouldn’t have – and it’s all on Labour’s hands.

    Feature image via the Canary

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • As The Racket is re-released, Matt Kennard tells the Canary we have an ‘Anglo-American empire’

    Around the re-release of his book The Racket, Declassified UK co-founder Matt Kennard spoke to the Canary about the way the US empire works, and the role the UK plays in that.

    The Racket

    Kennard once worked inside the establishment media and got comments directly from people at the top of the US-dominated global economic system. He then broke away to tell people about what was going on, via his book The Racket.

    After setting up Declassified UK alongside historian Mark Curtis, he dove deeper into the role of British foreign policy in the world.

    And in The Racket’s updated second edition, which came out recently, he described how Britain didn’t simply pass the baton of imperialism on to the USA after World War Two. Instead, he said, it “became a “junior partner” to the US hegemon”:

    The City of London’s role as the world’s financial capital which spreads neoliberalism around the world, the UK’s vast network of military bases, alongside its corporate giants like BP and BAE Systems, showed Britain still served a critical imperial role for its senior partner.

    ‘Establishment journalists allow the Anglo-American empire to operate in secret’

    In The Racket, Kennard spoke about his realisation in recent years that “the infrastructure of the US empire which had colonized so much of the world had also colonized my home country”. And actually, he stressed, Britain “appeared to be more completely under the control of its American ally than any country I’d looked into around the world for this book”.

    He continued by asserting that “The hidden fist of the US empire which I’d seen deployed all over the developing world – the massive American military – was also occupying Britain”. In particular, he said:

    I found the US Air Force (USAF) had 9,730 personnel permanently deployed throughout Britain, a number which was increasing rapidly. Britain, in fact, hosted the third highest level of USAF personnel of any country in the world, ahead of historic US military outposts like South Korea and Italy.

    Kennard explained to the Canary the key role of the US military in Britain, insisting that “UK territory effectively operates as US territory”. He emphasised that:

    The US military presence in Britain is extremely important for the American imperial project. Bombing missions to Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, have taken off from the US bases in the UK. Over 12,000 US military personnel are permanently stationed in our country, across 11 so-called RAF sites.

    But we are not allowed to know anything about what happens there, they are black sites for the US military, which is again a huge boon for it as it can operate in complete secret in a way it can’t at home.

    There is also a massive US intelligence presence, from the CIA at RAF Croughton to the NSA at GCHQ Bude in Cornwall. Probably thousands of American spies are deployed in Britain and again what they do is completely secret.

    It’s unclear if the UK government even knows, or asks to know, what they do. UK territory effectively operates as US territory, there is no discernable distinction between them in terms of governance of military and intelligence matters.

    But perhaps more importantly, how the UK retains importance for its senior partner in this Anglo-American influence is to allow the Americans unrestricted access to its overseas bases, from Cyprus to Bahrain to Gibraltar.

    The US Air Force has been using our base on Cyprus to ship weapons to Israel during the Gaza genocide, for example. But it is impossible to get any information about this. The UK government says it doesn’t comment on allies’ movements, and the Pentagon refuses to answer questions.

    This goes for all Britain’s far-flung overseas bases. This is an Anglo-American empire, which is allowed to operate in secret because journalists don’t touch it.

    ‘The US works non-stop to keep UK politicians loyal to the empire’

    In The Racket, Kennard said “The colonization by the US empire of Britain became particularly clear when the Labour Party elected Jeremy Corbyn leader in September 2015”. Corbyn “was dangerous to the rule of the British establishment, but also the ability of the US to retain the UK as a vassal state”.

    So tolerance of his popularity and power was unacceptable. As Kennard told the Canary:

    The most shocking thing for me was having the Secretary of State Mike Pompeo come to London in June 2019, six months before the general election, and be recorded saying privately that the US government would “do its level best” to stop Jeremy Corbyn get elected.

    I’m not aware of clearer evidence of a foreign power explicitly promising to interfere in the British electoral system. We clearly don’t know what Pompeo meant when he said this, but he was director of the CIA from 2017-18, and in this role had overseen plans to “kill or capture” Julian Assange who had asylum at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

    These stories show the US sees Britain as its 51st state, and works non-stop to keep the political class loyal to the American empire. Another shocking revelation was that Ruth Smeeth (now Anderson) who was one of the most relentless public critics of Corbyn as leader of Labour was a “strictly protect” informant for the US embassy in London. This was revealed by WikiLeaks in 2010.

    Most shocking of all, though, is this interference by the US in Britain is not covered at all by the British media. The Pompeo comments made the papers for a day, but there was no follow up, no investigation of what these promises meant. On the Ruth Anderson revelations, it’s never made the papers.

    ‘Pushing British progressives into a pro-US position’

    Propaganda efforts both in the media and in politics, meanwhile, have sought to corral would-be left-wingers into pro-imperialist worldviews. Kennard mentioned in The Racket both the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the British-American Project (BAP) as organisations active in this campaign. And he explained that:

    The US was integral to building a British political system that made a “different way” next to impossible.

    Speaking to the Canary, he said:

    The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) was set up in 1983 to do what the CIA had up until then done covertly—and do it overtly. The CIA had come along under a lot of pressure in the 1970s, with various scandals and revelations from the Church Committee of 1975. The NED was meant to guard against this.

    So the NED in Britain acts like an overt CIA. It funds media and civil society groups, with the intention of subsuming them into the Atlantacist, pro-US empire political framework of our country. It mostly funds “liberal” or “progressive” groups and uses nice language to describe its projects, words like “freedom” and “openness” and “democracy”.

    These were concepts that were grounded in the cultural Cold War, but continue today.

    NED has funded groups from Index on Censorship (which was next to silent on Julian Assange) and Bellingcat (which is next to silent on US/UK crimes), so its priorities are clear.

    The British-American Project was founded two years later, in 1985, and its aim was to push back against the anti-imperialist current in Labour which had actually got into the leadership during Michael Foot’s leadership from 1980 to 1983.

    The aim was to cultivate the left away from these anti-imperialist positions by establishing a network, focused on progressive individuals, and putting them alongside military, corporate and intelligence figures.

    It is still very much going 40 years later, and many of the most prominent critics of Corbyn were or are members, including Peter Mandelson, Trevor Phillips, Anas Sarwar, Alison McGovern, Sadiq Khan, and many more. It also focuses on signing journalists up to the American imperial project, including particularly the BBC.

    The NED, as Kennard and Curtis reported in Declassified UK in 2022, had “ploughed over £2.6m into seven British independent media groups over the past five years”. Kennard also outlined in 2022 that the BAP had long “worked on recruiting dozens of influential British journalists from across the media” such as BBC “leading lights Jeremy Paxman and Jane Hill”.

    Change the media, challenge the racket

    In The Racket, Kennard described how the US empire has finely honed its techniques, which it applies around the world (including in the UK) to ensure subservience to elite interests. And the establishment media plays a key role in propping up this system.

    Kennard explained how “liberal and left parts of the mainstream media are as compromised by corporate money and private interests as their conservative rivals, perhaps even more so”. However, the growth of independent media in the age of the internet “scares the establishment senseless”. And that’s the hope we have to wield against the powerful, intricate system of control the empire has set up.

    As Kennard told the Canary:

    I think Britain is one of the most interesting places in the world for independent media. We have loads of exciting and quality outlets now, from the Canary to Double Down to Electronic Intifada to Declassified UK to Middle East Eye to Alborada, which make it much easier to bypass the mainstream media which often acts as just an adjunct to British establishment power.

    Building its capacity and influence is a long-term project but it is a vital task because if we ever get another leader like Corbyn who rises up we need to have an infrastructure in place that can support him and combat the inevitable lies and distortion. During the Corbyn years, the Canary came under wide-ranging attack because it was maybe the only outlet that was reaching enough people to worry the powers that be.

    Corbyn was a lonely figure getting hammered by the billionaire-owned press, and the Guardian, and it was tough to fight back. Next time, we will have an arsenal of independent and rigorous independent media that tell the truth and push back against the attacks which are inevitable in our system, which is a media-sustained oligarchy.

    We need a democracy.

    Featured image via Bloomsbury Publishing and Politics Joe – YouTube

    By Ed Sykes

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • The TUSC is already planting the seeds of working-class growth for the next five years

    The following is a comment piece from the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition (TUSC)

    The first meeting of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) all-Britain steering committee since 4 July was dominated, naturally enough, by a discussion of the outcome of an historic general election and what it could mean for the prospects of a revival of mass working-class political representation in the period to come.

    TUSC: post-general election we still need a mass party of the working class

    The meeting debated the draft review of the election – The 2024 General Election Fact File – prepared by the TUSC national election agent Clive Heemskerk. The file listed the TUSC results and those of the anti-war, anti-austerity independents, the Workers Party of Britain and other lefts in the context of the broader trends revealed by the election.

    With detailed statistics illuminating the shallow levels of support for the new government; the growing alienation from the political institutions of capitalism since the 1990s; and the historic shift away from the Labour Party by workers and others – including those from a Muslim background – as a portent of future movements to come, the report asks: is there any:

    stable social base for the coming second age of austerity, privatisation, war and climate crisis retreats that the Starmer government will attempt to impose on us?

    And what opportunities does that create to build a new mass workers’ party that can unite all sections of our class?

    The report was approved, with a supplement analysing separately the results achieved by the left-wing candidates who ran in Scotland and Wales. It is now available online.

    ‘The terrain has changed’

    The committee also agreed that TUSC should continue to be involved in the discussions organised by the Collective alliance, which will also assess the way forward following Jeremy Corbyn’s successful re-election in Islington North.

    The meeting further agreed to publish a Directory Of Elections in 2025 to help prepare a working-class challenge for the first scheduled elections that will face the Starmer government in May next year.

    Although it is only 31 councils with elections in 2025, they cover a population of over 23 million, with all of them being local education authorities and having responsibility for social care services, libraries, highways, transport and more in their areas.

    Finally, it was agreed that TUSC would resume its series of How Much Reserves Have They Got? reports on the financial capacity of councils to resist making cuts while conducting a campaign for additional central government funding, starting with the councils with elections in 2025.

    At the next meeting – on Wednesday 4 September – plans for more widely campaigning for ‘People’s Budgets’ in the autumn period will be discussed.

    As TUSC national chairperson Dave Nellist concluded:

    The terrain has changed as a result of the general election, but the core mission of TUSC remains: to help develop the self-confidence of the working class that it is an alternative power to the capitalist rulers of society and that it has the capacity to create and build its own democratic mass workers’ party to realise that power politically.

    Featured image via TUSC and the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Starmer and the Labour government MUST support the ICJ ruling on Israel

    The following article is an open letter from the Muslim Public Affairs Committee (MPACUK)

    MPACUK call upon British prime minister Keir Starmer and the Labour Party to demonstrate a firm commitment to international law by adhering to the recent advisory opinion issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) regarding the legal consequences of Israel’s policies and practices in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem.

    Israel: multiple breaches of international law

    On 19 July 2024, the ICJ issued a significant advisory opinion in response to a request by the United Nations General Assembly. The court’s findings underscore the legal ramifications of Israel’s occupation of Palestine and its impacts on the human rights of the Palestinian people. The ICJ emphasised that Israel’s policies in these territories violate international law, including the Fourth Geneva Convention and various United Nations resolutions.

    The court’s opinion highlights several critical points:

    1. Illegality of Settlements: The establishment of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories is deemed a violation of international law. The ICJ reaffirms that these settlements have no legal validity and must be dismantled.

    2. Human Rights Violations: The ongoing occupation has led to widespread violations of Palestinian human rights. These include restrictions on movement, access to resources and the destruction of property.

    3. Israeli sovereignty over Palestinian occupied territories: Israel has no claim to sovereignty or to exercise power over any part of the occupied territories of Palestine. “Israel’s security concerns” cannot override the prohibition of acquiring territory by force.

    4. Obligations of Other States: The advisory opinion calls on all states, including the United Kingdom, to ensure Israel’s compliance with international law and to refrain from recognising or assisting in maintaining the unlawful situation created by these policies. Furthermore, all states are under obligation not to recognise as legal, the situation arising from the unlawful presence of Israel in Palestine, and not to render aide or assistance in maintaining the situation.

    5. Israel has the obligation to make reparations for the damage caused to all the natural or legal persons concerned in the occupied Palestinian territories.

    Labour: uphold principles of justice and equality

    Given these findings, we at MPACUK state, unequivocally, that it is imperative for the UK Government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Kier Starmer, to take concrete steps to become aligned with international legal standards. This includes:

    • Immediate ceasefire: an immediate stop to all military action by Israel. Including the unlawful practice of mass arrests and arbitrary detention.
    • Stop arming Israel: the British Government must stop issuing arms export licenses to Israel, as well as providing any military assistance to Israel.
    • Opening of borders: allowing unfettered access of humanitarian aid to reach occupied Palestinian territories.
    • Condemning Illegal Settlements: publicly denounce the expansion of settlements and order for their dismantlement.
    • Supporting Palestinian Rights: promote the protection of Palestinian human rights through all channels available.
    • Ensuring Compliance: implement robust measures to ensure that UK policies do not contribute to sustaining the unlawful status quo in the occupied territories.
    • Uphold arrest warrants: the British Government must execute the arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court against prime minister Netanyahu and his defence chiefs.

    We urge the prime minister and the Labour Party cabinet to uphold its principles of justice and equality by taking a decisive stance on this critical issue. Upholding international law is not only a moral obligation but also essential for the promotion of global peace and security.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Labour announces new hostile environment policy in the Sun. They’re not Tories, though!

    Back in the bad old days before the Labour Party government, the Tories were widely criticised for their ‘hostile environment’ policy. The criticism wasn’t just that the Tories were targeting what they called “illegal immigration”; the issue was that they and the media were putting overdue focus on the topic to worsen racial tensions and distract from the problems caused by austerity.

    Good job the grown ups are back in charge, eh?

    Same difference

    The hostile environment was spearheaded by Theresa May – first as home secretary and then as prime minister. The woman herself described it as follows:

    The aim is to create, here in Britain, a really hostile environment for illegal immigrants

    Here’s what the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants says of the policy:

    The Hostile Environment deters people from going to the doctor for fear of racking up a huge bill or being reported, detained and deported. It deters undocumented migrants from reporting crime to the police. It deters undocumented migrants from reporting unsafe working conditions or exploitative employers. It reduces the options for renting a home and pushes people into poor quality or even dangerous accommodation, at the mercy of their landlord.

    Hostile Environment policies also make doctors, landlords, teachers and other public sector workers responsible for immigration checks. These policies encourage and incentivise us to be suspicious of each other and undermine trust in our public services.

    There is no evidence that the Hostile Environment achieves its stated aim of forcing people out of the UK. But there is an extraordinary amount of evidence of the damage being done.

    It also notes:

    We are all impacted by the Hostile Environment, which increases racial discrimination and asks us to be suspicious of each other. At JCWI, we believe Britain can do better than this.

    Those most affected are people without status in the UK. Most of the undocumented population in the UK is made up of people who came here legally, but subsequently lost their status, very often through no fault of their own. Some make the difficult decision to leave an abusive partner or an exploitative employer, even though it means they will lose their immigration status. Others grow up assuming they’re British, only to be told that they aren’t, even though they’ve never known any other country. And some fall out of regular status because they can’t afford the skyrocketing fees to renew their visa or to challenge an incorrect decision made by the Home Office.

    No matter our nationality or immigration status, we all deserve to be treated with dignity and humanity.

    Another important point is that the hostile environment led to the Windrush scandal:

    The Home Office told the Windrush generation they must prove they had lived in the UK since before 1973. The Home Office demanded at least one official document from every year they had lived here. Attempting to find documents from decades ago created a huge, and in many cases, impossible burden on people who had done nothing wrong.

    In 2017 it started to emerge that hundreds of members of the Windrush generation had been wrongly detained, deported and denied legal rights. Coverage of these individuals’ stories began to break in several newspapers, and Caribbean leaders took the issue up with then-prime minister, Theresa May.

    The Home Office has argued the Windrush scandal was an accident – but an independent report in March 2020, the “Windrush Lessons Learned Review”, makes it clear – this was the inevitable result of policies designed to make life impossible for those without the right papers. The Home Office has promised to learn the lessons of the scandal, but the only way to stop it happening again, is to scrap the Hostile Environment.

    New government – same environment

    The hostile environment was infamous for its vans. Here’s former footballer and political activist Neville Southall noting that the policy was still alive in spirit in 2023 under Rishi Sunak:

    The vans have indeed stopped, and the Tories are out of power, but read what Yvette Cooper wrote in the Sun, and tell us that the hostile environment isn’t still here:

    Britain is a fantastic country – at our best we are respected and admired the world over.

    But we cannot pretend everything is OK.

    Not when so many young lives are lost to knife crime.

    Not when too many neighbourhoods are plagued by anti-social behaviour.

    Not when so many high streets are hit by a shoplifting epidemic.

    And not when criminal gangs are making millions out of dangerous small boat crossings that undermine our border security and put lives at risk.

    That is the legacy of Tory failure we are dealing with.

    It can’t go on. That’s why the newly elected Labour Government is moving so fast to get on with the job.

    We know this means hard graft not sticking plasters and it will take time to turn things round.

    But Keir Starmer has made clear that politics has to be about serious public service again – whoever you voted for in the election, we want to work with you to renew Britain’s future.

    As Home Secretary, I am leading the work on two important Government priorities: boosting our border security and taking back our streets.

    Labour had two choices:

    1. Admit certain issues are inevitable in an increasingly unequal country – in an increasingly unequal world – and announce plans to redistribute Britain’s wealth so as to prevent further societal decline.
    2. Carry on blaming the symptoms and not the disease.

    Everyone can now see which path Labour has chosen:

     

    Things can only get sensibler

    There is one difference between what the Labour Party is saying on immigration today and what the Tories were saying two weeks ago – namely that Labour is blaming the Tories. While the state of the UK is undeniably on them, Cooper isn’t arguing that the Tories made societal breakdown inevitable through austerity; she’s arguing that their authoritarian framework of of structural inhumanity was insufficiently sensible:

    The Conservatives’ costly Rwanda Migration Partnership has been running for two years, costing hundreds of millions of pounds to send just four volunteers.

    Meanwhile the asylum system is in chaos – the backlog has soared with thousands of people in costly hotels, and the number of enforced removals is down by a staggering 50 per cent in the past decade.

    The previous government’s preoccupation with Rwanda and headline chasing meant they didn’t do the hard work needed to sort out the basics and the chaos just got worse.

    I was shocked to discover the Conservatives had 1,000 civil servants working on the Rwanda Partnership.

    Not any more.

    We’ve moved staff instead into a new Returns and Enforcement programme to increase returns of those with no right to be here and to make sure rules are respected and enforced, starting with an increase in illegal working raids.

    We’ve directed Immigration Enforcement to intensify their operations over the summer, with a focus on employers who are fuelling the trade of criminal gangs by exploiting and facilitating illegal working here in the UK – including in car washes and in the beauty sector.

    And we are drawing up new plans for fast track decisions and returns for safe countries.

    Most people in this country want to see a properly controlled and managed asylum system, where Britain does its bit to help those fleeing conflict and persecution, but where those who have no right to be in the country are swiftly removed.

    For far too long under the Conservatives, we have had just costly chaos – that has to change now.

    Labour: yesterday’s mistakes today

    The Tories and right-wing media framed boat crossings as the issue of the day, and yet they completely failed to ‘solve it’ by the standards that they themselves had set. How did that work out for the Tories you might be wondering? Those who are old enough to remember the election of 2024 will know that the Tories’ focus on ‘illegal immigration’ massively backfired – supercharging the electability of Reform who promised to finish what the Tories had begun.

    Don’t worry, though, because we’re sure the exact same thing won’t happen to Labour at the next election. We’re sure that war and climate breakdown won’t make an increase in boat crossings inevitable. We’re sure that failing to provide safe routes won’t mean more deaths at sea and more misery for everyone.

    Why are we sure of that?

    Because the grown ups are back in charge – that’s why.

    And we’re also certain that ‘the grown ups are back in charge’ isn’t simply the mantra of people who have no actual answers to the very real problems this country is facing.

    Featured image via Keir Starmer – Flickr (image cropped to 1,200 x 900)

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Just Stop Oil 21-year jail sentences are an obscene perversion of justice

    In an obscene perversion of justice, five Just Stop Oil supporters were just handed multi-year prison sentences today for nothing more than attending a Zoom call.

    Just Stop Oil sentences: perverse and obscene

    At Southwark Crown Court, Judge Christopher Hehir jailed Roger Hallam for five years, whilst Daniel Shaw, Lucia Whittaker De Abreu, Louise Lancaster, and Cressida Gethin were each sentenced to four years.

    They were convicted last week of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance in relation to the M25 motorway disruption in November 2022.

    They will join Amy Pritchard who was sentenced in June to 10 months in prison for breaking a window belonging to the world’s largest fossil fuel funder, JP Morgan.

    The sentences exceed those handed down last year to Morgan Trowland and Marcus Decker. They were jailed for three years and two years seven months, respectively, after being convicted of ‘public nuisance’ under the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 for climbing the QEII bridge in October 2022 and suspending a banner saying ‘Just Stop Oil’.

    The law – and Judge Hehir – are an ass

    At last week’s trial, Judge Hehir ruled that climate issues were ‘irrelevant and inadmissible’, dismissing them as mere ‘political opinion and belief’.

    Although the legislation includes a defence of ‘reasonable excuse’ and despite the prosecution acknowledging the imminent catastrophic and irreversible harm from burning fossil fuels, the judge prevented the jury from considering whether the defendants had a reasonable excuse and directed them to ignore any evidence about the climate crisis.

    When the defendants insisted on honouring their oaths to tell the jury the whole truth about their actions and refused to leave the witness box until they had done so, the judge repeatedly had them arrested and jailed throughout the trial.

    The judge also refused the defence request to call Professor Bill McGuire as a witness, one of the world’s leading experts on climate impacts.

    ‘Disgraceful’

    Today Professor McGuire, Emeritus Professor of Geophysical & Climate Hazards at University College London, said of the Just Stop Oil sentences:

    The trial and verdict were a farce. They mark a low point in British justice and they were an assault on free speech. The judge’s characterisation of climate breakdown as a matter of opinion and belief is completely nonsensical and demonstrates extraordinary ignorance. Similarly to suggest that the climate emergency is irrelevant in relation to whether the defendants had a reasonable case for action is crass stupidity.

    Sir David King, the government’s former Chief Scientific Adviser, said:

    This is so disgraceful. We are all hoping that the change in UK government will also change the situation in our courts.

    Referring to a previous ruling of Judge Silas Reid that the evidence of the climate crisis was irrelevant and inadmissible in a similar trial, Professor James E. Hansen of Columbia University, New York, said:

    The cruelty of such ‘know nothing’ judges is not so much to the defendant, as it is to our children and grandchildren.

    The UN intervened – to no avail

    On 24 June, the first day of the Just Stop Oil trial, the UN Special Rapporteur for Environmental Defenders, Michel Forst, issued an extraordinary public statement, relating to one of the defendants, Daniel Shaw, describing the threat of a two year prison sentence as ‘appalling’ and potentially unlawful under international law:

    I have now received new information regarding the imminent criminal trial of Mr. Shaw that I consider deeply concerning. With Mr. Shaw’s criminal trial set to start today, on 24 June 2024, I have been informed that Mr. Shaw may reasonably expect to face a prison sentence of up to two years (or more) for, in essence, his participation in a Zoom call to discuss a proposed peaceful environmental protest. The imposition of such sanction is not only appalling but may also violate the United Kingdom’s obligations under international law.

    Judge Hehir was made aware of the UN Rapporteur’s statement prior to the sentencing.

    Just Stop Oil will continue the fight

    The naturalist and TV broadcaster, Chris Packham, issued a statement on X, referring to the court case as a “sham”, adding:

    we should not allow our courts to be corrupted by [the might of the fossil fuel industry].

    Today Packham appeared at court in support of the Just Stop Oil defendants, and is expected to make a public call for a meeting with Attorney General, Richard Hermer KC, calling for an end to the silencing and jailing of people who shout ‘fire’ because there’s a fire.

    14,000 people have already signed Just Stop Oil’s petition calling for an end to the imprisonment of truth tellers. You can join them here.

    Featured image via Just Stop Oil

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Rahul Gandhi in Manipur: Hindi news channels presented BJP’s charges of politicking as their own editorial stance

    Even as Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in Moscow to attend the 22nd India-Russia Annual Summit, Lok Sabha Opposition leader and Congress MP Rahul Gandhi visited the violence-affected state of Manipur on July 8. The concurrence of the two visits resulted in an exchange of barbs between the ruling party and the Opposition on diverse platforms.

    While the Opposition accused Narendra Modi of neglecting Manipur and criticised him for not visiting the violence-hit state, the ruling dispensation accused Rahul Gandhi of using the victims of Manipur for gaining political mileage. It is important to note that the Congress leader has recently assumed the role of Leader of the Opposition in the House for the first time, and has been vocal on several issues, including Manipur. 

    Accompanied by his colleagues and supporters, Rahul Gandhi spoke with the victims of the Manipur violence and their families. A tweet shared by the Congress leader contained a video from the relief camp, in which he stated that this was his third visit to Manipur since the violence had broken out. He urged the Prime Minister to visit the state, listen to the locals, and make an appeal for peace. Gandhi assured the victims that he would advocate for them in parliament and pressure the government to intervene in the crisis.

    Recently, Gandhi also visited Uttar Pradesh, where he met victims of a stampede and the mother of the late Indian Army Captain Anshuman Singh. In this case, too, his efforts to show solidarity with the victims and their families have been perceived by the ruling party as a political stunt. 

    Aaj Tak and other major Hindi news channels ran several tickers in live debates on Rahul Gandhi’s Manipur visit accusing him of playing politics and taking advantage of the tragedy.

    Aaj Tak

    As seen on the news channel Aaj Tak, BJP spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia questioned Congress, saying that Rahul Gandhi took up these visits for photo opportunities, but ran away when there was a discussion in Parliament. Anchor Anjana Om Kashyap echoed this sentiment by questioning Congress spokesperson Alok Sharma about whether Rahul’s visit came as a relief for the residents of Manipur or if it was merely for political traction.

    The tickers running on the TV channel during this debate included:

    • Relief for Manipur or political mileage!
    • New commotion, full plan of politics!
    • Who is fueling the fire in Manipur?

    These tickers or were not attributed to any BJP spokesperson. In other words, there was no mention that these were allegations made by a political party. Without attribution, these appeared to be the views or questions of the channel itself.

    Times Now Navbharat

    On Times Now Navbharat, an anchor raised questions about the Opposition’s objections to the Prime Minister’s visit to Russia. He asked whether the Opposition was attacking the government by comparing PM Modi’s visit to Russia to Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Manipur. The anchor attempted to introduce a Hindu-Muslim spin to the debate by questioning why Rahul Gandhi was concerned about the plight of the people of Manipur, but looked the other way when it came to the suffering of “Hindu mothers and daughters in Bengal”.

    The tickers running on the channel during this show included the following:

    • Modi leaves for Russia, why is the Opposition miffed?
    • Does Congress consider LoP Rahul as the country’s PM?
    • Modi in Moscow, Rahul in Manipur, full politics on the visit?
    • Why does Rahul feel so hurt by Modi’s Moscow visit?
    • Third visit to Manipur in 13 months, what about West Bengal?

    News 18

    Anchor Aman Chopra of News 18 said that Rahul Gandhi was on a tour of Manipur and was also being praised on social media. But at the same time, questions are being asked whether Rahul has gone to Manipur to heal its wounds or to find a political opportunity? Has Rahul Gandhi gone to share the pain of the people of Manipur or has this tour of Rahul been a part of ‘violence tourism’? Chopra further stated that this question was being raised because the Prime Minister had said in Parliament that Manipur was being used for political gains. And BJP leaders had said that some people were trying to incite violence in Manipur, who could not tolerate peace. Prime Minister had said that work was being done to add fuel to the fire in Manipur, Chopra added. 

    The tickers running during this program included:

    • Relief for Manipur or an opportunity?
    • Was Rahul’s visit a political opportunity?

    The statements in the tickers were not present as allegations by the BJP.

    It is worth noting that the ruling party’s questioning of Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Manipur was echoed by these news channels, and the charges brought by the BJP were presented as the opinion of the media outlet without any attribution. Generally, taking the questions of the Opposition to the ruling party is considered a duty the media; in this case, it was the opposite. For instance, the BJP questioned why Rahul Gandhi did not visit West Bengal if he was so concerned about the victims. The mainstream media echoed this question, blurring the distinction between the role of a political party and that of a media outlet. Not stopping at that, an anchor on Navbharat Times communalised the issue by bringing in the Hindu angle. 

    The tickers used in these bulletins were particularly problematic as the channels did not specify where those statements had come from. Using statements without quotes or attribution and passing them off as news is unethical. Attributing a quote to whoever it came from is one of the basic lessons of journalism that was ignored in these shows. 

    The post Rahul Gandhi in Manipur: Hindi news channels presented BJP’s charges of politicking as their own editorial stance appeared first on Alt News.


    This content originally appeared on Alt News and was authored by Abhishek Kumar.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • The corporate media is using DWP claimants for clicks over Universal Credit

    Corporate media outlet BirminghamLive has published another misleading article on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) Universal Credit. In particular, the site has played into benefit claimant concerns as the Labour Party take to the helm as the new UK government.

    Its trash article offers little that it claims in its obtuse headline. However, this isn’t the outlets aim. In reality, it’s a clickbait ploy to bolster readership and revenue. Unfortunately, benefit claimants are the butt of this opportunistic churnalism. Though obviously, it’s not anything we haven’t seen before, countless times.

    DWP Universal Credit ‘changes’ under Labour a red herring

    The Canary’s Rachel Charlton-Dailey previously referred to BirminghamLive as  “vile” and part of the “cesspit media” – and did so for good reason. Notably, the site has stolen her content on not one, but two separate occasions. This included Charlton-Dailey’s personal account about the DWP screwing her over on her Personal Independence Payment (PIP).

    The outlet shamelessly used large swathes of her article as quotes, presumably to get around plagiarism accusations. Appallingly, it did so without permission, and practically lifted her work for its piece. Given this, she forced BirminghamLive to take it down.

    However, her experience is characteristic of its broader shoddy journalistic standards. Specifically, BirminghamLive is courting readership with clickbait content – though this is of course nothing new. Essentially, DWP clickbait is the bread and butter of outlets like Birmingham Live. It peddles in fear-mongering stories, with headlines designed to stoke alarm to people claiming benefits.

    One of the latest examples of this is its article titled:

    DWP makes first change to Universal Credit under Labour government

    In this instance, the headline misleadingly implies the article will reveal a change that the Labour government has instigated on Universal Credit. Of course, it’s precisely written so ambiguously to get people on social media to click and read.

    Labour’s manifesto vaguely promised to “review” DWP Universal Credit, but gave no firm details on what this would mean in practice. So readers might naturally infer that BirminghamLive’s article could have something to do with this.

    Instead though, the article details how the DWP is shifting the Universal Credit payment date due to the upcoming bank holiday. True: it’s happening with the new Labour government in power. False: there’s not actually any specific link to the two events. In other words, it’s using the old correlation conflated with causation fallacy to pump out a punchy-looking, but specious article.

    Weaponising DWP Universal Credit claimant distress

    What’s more, the combination of “DWP” “Universal Credit”, and “Labour government” is a search engine’s gold dust. Effectively, in combination, these buzzwords maximise the chances of search engines and news aggregators picking them up and pushing them out. This is called search engine optimisation (SEO) which all news outlets need to utilise to ensure a steady stream of traffic – readers – to their articles and websites.

    In itself, there’s obviously nothing wrong with this. The Canary has optimised SEO in this article. However, again, the BirminghamLive headline is sneakily deceptive.

    Naturally, it also weaponises claimants’ distress from the uncertainty of the new Labour government’s agenda on social security. In the lead up to the election, the party was evasive about its plans for Universal Credit.

    Since the election, the new Starmer-led government has largely stayed silent over the consultation on Sunak’s PIP voucher vanity project. As the Mirror reported, Labour insiders have even indicated that the Labour government will mull over the responses. It has also yet to pledge that it will ditch the Tories’ Work Capability Assessment (WCA) plans, and other harmful benefit reforms.

    All this equivocating has come amid new DWP Universal Credit boss Liz Kendall’s dogwhistle rhetoric over disabled and chronically ill people. As the Canary reported, she couched the number of economically inactive sick people in a speech about the government’s “Back to Work Plan”.

    Of course, it seemed obvious what this implied and where it could invariably lead. That is, that Labour will push disabled and chronically ill people into work at detriment to their health and wellbeing. After a bitter, brutal fourteen years of Tories punching down on claimants with harsh sanctions and reforms, Kendall’s speech raised these glaring red flags.

    It was therefore in the context of all this that BirminghamLive chose to publish the piece with its janky headline.

    DWP and its corporate media mouthpieces

    But then, this is from an outlet that routinely titles stories to demonise claimants too. The lapdog churnalists at BirminghamLive regularly spew out sensationalistic spin on people claiming DWP Universal Credit and other benefits.

    For instance, the Canary previously highlighted its torrid tirade on so-called PIP benefit fraud. Spoiler: there barely were any, and it’s as far from a systemic problem as you can get.

    The point is however, that these articles purposely feed into the vile rightwing narratives inciting moral panic and scapegoating poor and disabled people.

    Of course, none of this is perhaps any wonder given the outlet’s parent company either. Media conglomerate Reach Plc owns BirminghamLive among its enormous portfolio of pseudo-local media sites. Reach also operates a number of national media sites including the Express, the Mirror, the Daily Star, and the Daily Record.

    Who owns Reach? Largely, that would be a shareholder who’s who of major asset management companies and investment banks. Among these are big players in the financial sector such as Hargreaves Lansdown, BlackRock, and JP Morgan. Both Labour and the Tories have big backers from the City.

    What’s more, the degrees of separation between Reach and the DWP doesn’t instill confidence either. Revelations and connections in recent years have unveiled the cosy relationship the client media outlet has built with the department.

    In 2019, a leaked memo showed the DWP planning to employ Reach publications to publish advertorials for its plans. These are paid articles that news sites print in the style of editorials. It likely also churns out press releases planting these narratives from the DWP itself, although this isn’t possible to verify.

    On top of this, people have previously pointed out that a now former senior director of Reach – Helen Stevenson – had worked for the DWP as a non-executive director.

    So, far from publishing journalistic content that informs and uplifts the voices of marginalised communities, BirminghamLive is serving the interests of its capitalist shareholders. And as ever with shill corporate media outlets in bed with the rich and powerful, it’s doing so at poor and disabled people’s expense.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • YouGov just revealed that more Tory voters DIED than switched to Labour at the general election

    In journalism, there’s a saying: when the subject of an article is THAT good, sometimes the headline just writes itself. Well, Canary readers – this is one of those stories. Because a YouGov data analyst has provisionally revealed that of the people who voted Tory in 2019, more of them DIED than voted for the Labour Party at 4 July’s general election. However, while amusing, the Labour election result data from YouGov actually has a serious side.

    Labour election result: more Tory deaths than right-wing switchers

    YouGov junior data journalist Dylan Difford shared some very interesting but also provisional data from the polling company:

    The obvious headline figure from the data is that 1.4 million people who voted Tory in 2019 have since died – while 1.1 million switched to vote Labour in 2024. While that figure alone seems shocking – it’s not entirely unsurprising either. As Novara’s Aaron Bastani pointed out:

    But aside from the facts that a) the Tories’ erstwhile approach of appealing just to older people has literally and metaphorically died, and b) Labour’s shift to the right wing was completely pointless – there’s actually more interesting data to be drawn than that.

    In short:

    • Labour lost more voters to the centre and left than they gained from the right – by about 600,000.
    • The Lib Dems gained more Tory votes than Labour did – showing their strategy of targetting affluent areas paid off.
    • More 2019 Tory voters did not cast their ballots than Labour ones – but only by about 300,000.
    • Far from a Labour wipeout of the SNP, it actually only picked up 200,000 of the party’s 2019 voters.

    A pointless exercise in so-called democracy

    However, in reality these are the headline figures from the YouGov analysis:

    • 12.8 million people who did not vote in 2019 did not vote again.
    • Two million young people voting for the first time actually didn’t even bother.
    • 1.4 million people who voted Labour in 2019 did not vote this time around.
    • Only 300,000 people who didn’t vote in 2019 voted in 2024 for Reform, and 100,000 first time voters did as well.

    YouGov’s analysis ties into what we already know. As the Guardian reported, think tank the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) said the 2024 election had the lowest turnout since 1928 – just 52% of people who could vote, did.

    However, this election was also about ethnicity and class – with the two going hand-in-hand:

    The IPPR report also found that seats where a larger share of the population were older people, wealthy homeowners and white had much higher turnout rates than constituencies where a smaller share of people came from those demographics.

    It calculated that turnout was 11% higher in constituencies with the highest proportion of over 64-year-olds, compared with the lowest. Turnout was also 13% higher in constituencies with the highest proportion of homeowners.

    In terms of ethnicity and religion, turnout was 7% lower in constituencies with the highest proportion of people from minority ethnic backgrounds, compared with the lowest, and 10% lower in constituencies with the highest proportion of Muslim people.

    So, it seems neither Labour nor even Reform, complete with Nigel’s Farage’s preposterous ‘man of the people’ clown show, gave the poorest people in the UK anything worth voting for.

    Labour and the rest of them: disenfranchising us

    Not that the trend of poorer people not voting is new. As the Canary has documented, since around 2015 poor people have been voting less and less in general elections year-on-year – with the trend even continuing when Jeremy Corbyn was leader of the Labour Party.

    It shouldn’t need us to tell you why this is. The UK’s political and financial systems and their proponents have intentionally disenfranchised the poorest people from our democracy – because our corporate capitalist system does not work in their interests. For it to function, those who it abuses the most need to be subjugated the most – otherwise, the whole thing would fall apart.

    So, while the funny side of the YouGov polling is that more 2019 Tories died than voted Labour in 2024 – what is actual dead is the idea of UK democracy, if it was even alive in the first place.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • A national disgrace: Glasgow’s child homelessness crisis represents a UK-wide Tory failure

    On 15 July, news emerged from Glasgow that 3,000 children are currently homeless. While this is a particularly harrowing statistic for Scotland’s largest city, this homelessness crisis is not confined to Glasgow or Scotland. It is a reflection of a broader, more pervasive issue that plagues the entire UK. The responsibility for this crisis does not lie squarely with the SNP. Because it’s the Conservative Party which has failed to address the systemic issues that underpin child homelessness.

    Glasgow: a microcosm on UK homelessness

    The stark reality in Glasgow is a microcosm of the UK-wide homelessness crisis. Across the nation, hundreds of thousands of children are without a stable home, a situation that has profound implications for their health, education, and future prospects. The Conservative Party, which was in power at Westminster for 14 years, bears sole responsibility for this dire state of affairs. Austerity measures, cuts to social services, and a failure to invest adequately in social housing have all contributed to the rising tide of homelessness.

    For Scotland in particular, successive Tory governments also cut block grant funding – meaning by 2021 it was worth around 2% less per person. However, the news about Glasgow’s homelessness crisis came at the same time the Herald revealed the Scottish government had cut its affordable housing budget.

    However, thanks to botched devolution, Scotland is still tied to the rest of the UK. Decisions politicians and others make at Westminster, in the Bank of England, and the Treasury and other departments still impact north of the border.

    Meanwhile, under Tory leadership local authorities across England have seen their budgets slashed, leading to a reduction in support services that are crucial for vulnerable families. The Bedroom Tax, Benefit Cap, and Universal Credit system have disproportionately affected low-income households, pushing many into precarious housing situations. These policies have created a perfect storm, leaving hundreds of thousands of children without a safe place to call home.

    Labour: more of the same?

    The recent change in Westminster government, with the Labour Party now at the helm, has brought renewed hope for tackling homelessness. However, its plans will not go far enough. Broadly, the party has pledged to do very little different to the Conservatives – and has made only vague statements around social housing.

    Another key criticism of Labour’s approach is that it does not address the root causes of homelessness.

    While building more social housing is undoubtedly necessary, it must be accompanied by broader reforms to the welfare system, healthcare, and education. Homelessness is a complex issue that requires a multifaceted response. Without addressing the underlying economic and social factors that contribute to homelessness, Labour’s plans risk being little more than a sticking plaster on a broken leg.

    Moreover, Labour’s plans must contend with the legacy of austerity and cuts that have left local authorities struggling to provide basic services. Reversing these cuts and restoring funding to essential support services will be critical in providing the safety net that vulnerable families need. This includes mental health services, addiction support, and employment programs that can help families break the cycle of homelessness.

    A Starmer government will not end homelessness

    The homelessness crisis among children in Glasgow is a national disgrace that demands urgent action. It is a stark reminder of the failures of both the Conservative Party and the SNP to protect the most vulnerable members of society.

    The new Labour government must rise to the challenge and implement bold, comprehensive measures to address the root causes of homelessness. This includes not only building more social housing but also reforming the welfare system, investing in support services, and tackling the broader social and economic inequalities that drive homelessness.

    Sadly, it is unlikely it will do this.

    The plight of 3,000 homeless children in Glasgow is a tragic reflection of a much larger problem that affects the entire UK. It is imperative that all levels of government work together to create a society where no child has to experience the trauma and instability of homelessness.

    Featured image via Envato Elements

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Reeves’ speech accidentally showed the Tory sleight of hand that will define the Labour government

    New chancellor Rachel Reeves has already started as the Labour Party means to go on: courting big business while making flimsy promises to the rest of us – ones that sound nice on paper but in reality are little more than sound bites. It shows that, as many predicted, Keir Starmer’s government is now on the centre-right.

    Moreover, though, it shows that independent media is needed more than ever – as no other outlets are calling the new Labour government properly out. One particular Tory-esque sleight of hand sums the situation up perfectly.

    Rachel Reeves: the ghost of Tory past

    We’re not going to dwell on the detail of Rachel Reeves’ speech too much. However, there was excitement over Labour’s housing building plans – with much of the corporate media running with this. As most outlets reported, Reeves confirmed Labour will get housebuilders to construct 1.5m new homes in the next five years.

    Of course, what most – if not none – of the corporate media failed to point out was this is exactly the same target as the Tories had. So, what else is different? Well – not a lot.

    Labour will reintroduce mandatory house building targets for councils – another Tory policy that was only stopped in 2022. It will build on the so-called ‘grey belt’ – something the Tories wouldn’t do. Oh, and it’s pledged to recruit 300 planning officers – again, another Tory-esque policy (think new police officers), because it won’t make up for the 3,100 that were lost in the past decade.

    The point being, there isn’t a fag paper between the new Labour government and previous Tory ones.

    Moreover, the chancellor has said that none of this housing will be built by, or funded by, the government. It will be built by the private sector.

    The myth of social housing

    Rachel Reeves and deputy PM Angela Rayner have made a point of stressing that they won’t let construction companies just build homes for sale, but ‘affordable’ and ‘social rent’ properties too – but have not so far given any detail. Once again, this is all very Tory noises off.

    However, there’s a far deeper problem here which none of the media picked up on. But why would they?

    Social housing is broken. Most housing associations are terrible, leaving residents in squalor while turning a tidy profit – despite their alleged not-for-profit status. New social housing is cheap and shoddy, old social housing is falling apart, and the sector is riddled with institutional racism and classism.

    If – even IF – Reeves had said ‘we’re going to get housing associations to build 100,000 new social rent properties each year’, this still would be a disaster. The sector is at best not fit for purpose – and at worst, a parasitic scourge on 21st century Britain.

    However, none of the corporate media would have picked up on that; they barely picked up on the lack of concrete commitments to social housing more broadly. Why? Because the majority of journalists working in the industry would have never lived in social housing.

    Reeves’ tepid commitments around house building are just one example of how the new, mandate-less Labour government is not a functioning political force at all. Prisons are another. Instead of building more, or releasing people early – why not address why people commit what the system defines as ‘crime’ in the first place?

    Mr Brittas! Mr Brittas!

    The Labour Party, including Rachel Reeves, is now like a group of corporate middle managers – think the Brittas Empire if you’re old enough to remember, but set in Westminster.

    They’re charged with merely steadying the ship – sorry, Wes – to a point where the P&L is looking OK-ish again, because the board of directors know the company’s model is failing but have to prevent too many losses otherwise the shareholders will revolt.

    That company is, of course, Western corporate capitalism – and we are all the shareholders.

    But none of the corporate media can say that – because the clue is in their name. So, it’s down to independent media to call it out.

    In fact, the role of outlets like the Canary in the next five years is probably going to be more important than it was under the Tories, or even when Jeremy Corbyn was running the Labour Party. As Extinction Rebellion summed up:

    it’s the system that needs to change, not the government.

    Labour will merely be managing our decline under corporate capitalism: a short-sighted and 20th century-style focus on growth; an obsession with work, and a disdain for anyone who is not productive in the capitalist sense.

    All those ideas should have been consigned to the dustbin of history post-2008. Yet here we are, watching Labour repeat the same mistakes again.

    Independent media: holding Reeves and the rest of the corporate capitalists to account

    So, outlets like the Canary will literally need to be those little birds in the coal mine once again: showing up the system’s flaws, while showcasing the alternatives – much like we did with our #CanaryCandidates series: interviewing 25 independent MP candidates in the general election.

    However, we can’t do this without your support. Please. We’d urge you to donate as much or as little as you can every month, so we can get on with the work of holding the Labour Party – and the failing system it is wedded to – to account. Someone has to – because the corporate media won’t.

    On that, the Canary team is taking a break until 15 July. Most of us live with, or are affected by, chronic illness – and we need to recharge our batteries. However, when we come back we’ll have some new features to introduce, and a renewed vigour to make sure that the truth about how the system, and administrations like Starmer’s one, are destroying us is exposed.

    So, if you can support our mission to disrupt power like Rachel Reeves’, then please do so here.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • A loveless landslide: Starmer’s Labour ‘win’ is a loss for millions of marginalised people

    So there it is folks, a Labour Party win that Stevie Wonder could have seen coming has taken place.

    Arise, Sir Keir Starmer, wettest wipe of them all, the most-dead eyed of robocops.

    Before we dive into why none of this is cause for celebration, let’s take a quick look at what Starms has said on his campaign trail.

    He got the support of shitrag, the Sun:

    He continued his transphobia by saying trans women don’t belong in single-sex spaces:

    Not for the first time, he joined in on a right-wing talking point by blaming refugees on small boats, and wouldn’t even commit to establishing safe routes for said refugees:

    And, it’s hard to forget his deeply racist comments on Bangladeshi people in the UK:

    If you only came into existence when sad sack Sunak called the election, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Starmer was the right-wing candidate. The Labour leader is beyond merely pushing Labour to the centre. Actually, he’s churning out right-wing policies that are an insult to an actual working-class movement.

    Labour: a muted reaction

    As the old adage goes, elections aren’t won – they’re lost. It’s not so much that Labour won, as much as the Tories lost. And, as Sky News’ Sam Coates pointed out:

    Voters everywhere seem to dislike existing governments of all stripes – Tory in Westminster, SNP in Scotland and Labour in Wales – and there have been massive drops in support for all: the single biggest dynamic in this vote.

    We’ve had over a decade of food banks, callous deportations, the Windrush scandal, the Grenfell tragedy, tens of thousands of dead disabled people, cost of living crisis after cost of living crisis, soaring energy prices, PPE scandals, ministers partying while people died from Covid – do we need to go on?

    The Tories have removed themselves from government. And Labour? Well, do any of those statements from Starmer above suggest he’s remotely interested in helping the most vulnerable in our society? Do they fuck.

    As economic justice campaigner Richard Murphy explained, it’s not that Labour won – it’s that the Tories lost:

    Red Tory vs Blue Tory

    Functionally, there is no longer a difference between Labour and the Tories:

    Ultimately, what it comes down to is:

    To his eternal shame, Starmer has chosen the dogwhistles of transphobia and small boats – exactly the same as self-professed right-wingers:

    Don’t get us wrong, it’s still hilarious that this shower got the boot:

    However, we have endless rage for charlatans like Jess Phillips – who was busy smirking at Corbyn’s loss in 2019 whilst now claiming in 2024 that politics “has got caustic and nasty”:

    Yeah, it’s hard when the electorate respond to your words and actions innit, Jess?

    The thing that we kept coming back to last night, though, was Palestine.

    Gaza

    Just as he has with almost every other vulnerable group in the country, Starmer has failed to stand with Palestine, as Hamza Yusuf reported:

    Keir Starmer is a friend of Israel. It would be an easy task to use his unstinting support for Israel as it continues to pulverise Gaza as the exclusive evidence of that.

    Yusuf continued:

    The now infamous endorsement on LBC of Israel’s collective punishment of Palestinians as Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant declared a total siege and cut off all water, food and power was reprehensible.

    The decision to whip his party to vote against a ceasefire when Israel had already killed more than 10,000 Palestinians and to later reprimand an MP for daring to suggest the killing on an industrial scale in Gaza amounts to genocide is unforgivable.

    Starmer has, in his own words, said:

    I support Zionism without qualification.

    This hasn’t gone unnoticed:

    Last night, our Twitter feed was a mix of election reaction and horrific footage of a young child in Gaza with half her face blown off:

    Nobody expected the Tories to support Palestine, but it shouldn’t be unreasonable to expect a Labour leader to do so. However, that’s exactly the kind of leader Starmer is: cowardly, right-wing, and terrifying.

    Nothing but us

    Often minorities and other vulnerable groups are told – ‘vote tactically now, your turn will come’.

    The truth is, there is no help coming. There is nothing but ourselves.

    If there’s one thing we can learn from the Corbyn era it’s that the British public were given a rare offering of a political vision that would actually serve the most vulnerable in society. It turned that down – because saying “wait your turn” is actually just “never”:

    Mainstream media, and right-wing members of the public who are reluctant to call themselves so, will delight in asking people to vote tactically, to hold their nose, to wait their turn. Doing so is exactly what liberalism is about – having no political vision beyond #ToriesOut maintains the status quo and keeps things ticking over while the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer:

    The political circus is one small part of what we actually can – and need – to do for each other.

    These rich and privileged wankers don’t care about us. They’ve shown that time and time again.

    It’s heartening to have independent campaigns but parliamentary politics will never be the source of our freedom. Mutual aid, unionism, and abolition is.

    We move.

    Featured image via YouTube screenshot/Guardian News

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Leanne Mohamad and Faiza Shaheen should have won against Starmer’s racist party

    This election, pro-Palestine candidates sent a resounding message to the Labour Party in seats spanning the country. Five independents – including Jeremy Corbyn – stood on a platform calling for the end of Israel’s abhorrent genocide in Gaza, and won. However, the night also brought two particularly heart-breaking election losses. Independent candidate Faiza Shaheen who Labour despicably cast out in its left-wing selection purge lost to living incarnation of evil Iain Duncan Smith.

    Gallingly, the same happened with Labour’s private healthcare ghoul Wes Streeting. Independent candidate Leanne Mohamad came just hundreds of votes shy of turfing the Starmerrhoid out.

    Needless to say, both trailblazing, community-rooted independents should have won. Now, we have Labour to blame for both soul-less sycophants returning to parliament.

    Independents: Leanne Mohamad causes Streeting’s lead to crumble

    Leanne Mohamad was a force of nature in Ilford North against Labour’s NHS privatisation poster-boy Wes Streeting.

    The now secretary of state for Health and Social Care has bandied about his bolshier than Blair privatisation plans throughout the election run-up.

    What’s more, the Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) supporter has done his lobby-bought best to disparage efforts to hold Israel accountable for its ongoing genocide in Gaza.  As the Canary’s HG reported in May, two-faced Streeting started out condemning South Africa’s case against the genocide-mongering coloniser  with the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Then, in another breath, election wheels in motion, he suddenly changed his tune:

    Strong whiff of grift, it was time for someone to stand up to Streeting. That person was the dazzling Leanne Mohamad. After an electric grassroots campaign, Mohamad came a mere 528 votes away from knocking Streeting from his undeserved parliamentary soapbox:

    Significantly Mohamad swung the vote enormously – with Streeting dropping over twenty percentage points. Alas, her fierce and principled campaign put her at 32.2%, to Streeting’s slim 33.4% victory.

    As the Guardian’s Owen Jones pointed out, Labour hadn’t banked on Mohamad bringing the margin so close:

    One person on X felt the narrow defeat hammered home how Streeting seizing the seat once more, was mostly just luck:

    Streeting’s win certainly wasn’t down his glistening personality. Of course, Mohamad’s loss stings, but in just two months of campaigning, it’s still an astounding achievement. Graciously at least, Streeting’s seat is now a marginal – and Mohamad now has five years to swell her support:

    Labour shafting Faiza Shaheen – again

    While Mohamad was laying the groundwork for a Wes 2029 wipe-out, Starmerite shills were busy twisting the truth in Chingford and Woodford Green.

    Independent Dr Faiza Shaheen lost her bid to oust former Conservative Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) monster Iain Duncan-Smith.

    Shaheen placed a close third, with 25.7% of the vote. This was a painful 79 votes behind Labour’s Shama Tatler, who garnered 25.8%. Duncan-Smith took the seat with 35.6%.

    Unsurprisingly, a brigade of blithering, blathering white men blamed Shaheen for Duncan-Smith’s reprisal:

    Wallowing in irrelevance, former New Labour minister Ed Balls waded in with his opinion no-one asked for:

    Also among them, iPaper columnist Ian Dunt:

    Shockingly, corporate media hack Paul Brand offered the same astonishingly trash take:

    In a nutshell:

    Parachuting in and then whining when the vote falls flat

    Of course, it was a staggering revision of recent history. Plenty of people on X called out this shameful gaslighting:

    Surprisingly, unceremoniously ditching your hard-working, principled political candidate and baring your racist ass for two-months non-stop wasn’t quite the show-stopping vote-winner Labour thought it would be.

    In reality then, if anyone ‘split the vote’, it was Labour:

    Crucially, those votes should have – likely would have – been hers, had Labour not shafted Shaheen at the outset of the election. Particularly so, given it was Shaheen who has put in all the legwork in her constituency for the unworthy party:

    Not to mention, as Tribune Magazine’s Taj Ali reminded everyone, Labour parachuted in the party plant:

    Shaheen herself detailed the disgraceful campaign Labour launched against her:

    There’s a lot to celebrate at this election. However, Mohamad and Shaheen sit at the sharp end of craven corporate careerist Labour’s shtick.

    It’s devastating that two brilliant women of colour standing for their communities, Palestine, and the people Tory Red and Tory Blue continue to marginalise across the country, came just that close, but didn’t win.

    Still, they should be proud of everything they and their communities achieved at this election. They may have lost, but the hope they inspired won above all, despite the corporate media and political establishment that tried to drown it out.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Starmer has just set up a ‘clear’ excuse to make EVEN MORE of those U-turns

    Keir Starmer is famous for two things:

    1. Being the guy people sort of recognise as the man who runs the Labour Party.
    2. U-turns.

    Given the second, everything Starmer says or does should invite the question: ‘how is he setting himself up to U-turn on this later?’

    Starmer has made a lot of promises in this general election, and that means he’s going to be doing a lot of U-turning over the next few years. Our guess is he’ll find two-to-three big omni-excuses for these U-turns, and on Saturday 29 June he unveiled what we predict will be among the biggest:

    The seeds of this U-turn?

    Specifically, the vague and ill-defined term that is “clear mandate”.

    The least clear man in politics

    Throughout this election campaign, poll after poll has predicted a Labour super majority:

    Recent polling suggests Labour could do worse than some of these earlier predictions, but there’s still “no real uncertainty about who’s going to win”:

    Recent reporting, meanwhile, has noted that Labour itself is less certain of these figures:

    A private memo from Labour’s campaign chief, Pat McFadden, sent to candidates on Friday says “up to a quarter of voters are yet to make up their minds”.

    That is way more than most of the polls suggest when they report on undecided voters, estimated to be around five million people.

    But Labour takes into consideration not just the “undecideds” but also, the “uncertains”, which could make up another three million.

    These are people who, if asked, tell pollsters that they have chosen which party to back, but when asked how sure they are about their choice, they swither.

    By the time you factor in turnout, the estimate at Labour HQ is that there are around seven million or so voters who have not yet made their minds up. The final decisions of that huge number of people will clearly have a massive impact on the eventual outcome.

    That’s why, in the next couple of days, as the campaign enters its final phase, Labour HQ will start shifting its message.

    If you’ve spoken to a range of people over this election cycle, you can probably understand where this worry is coming from. People are done with the Tories, but no one is enthused about Labour. There seems to be far fewer support placards on people’s houses than you usually see. And, as the Canary’s Steve Topple previously predicted, it feels like this will be the lowest voter turnout we’ve had in years.

    Given the above, the Labour faithful will argue that Starmer isn’t getting his excuses in early; he’s instead trying to ensure people get out and vote.

    To explain why we think otherwise, let’s look at what the man actually said.

    Let him be clear

    ‘Starmer is just inspiring people to get out and vote’, they’ll tell you.

    If that’s the case, why does his piece in the Guardian contain passages like this:

    I am sure there are some people who would prefer a less sober message. But the Tories have kicked the hope out of people so thoroughly, to expect a chorus of optimism would be like scattering seeds on stony ground.

    Feel inspired to get out and vote?

    What he’s superficially arguing in this depressing passage is that ‘people aren’t responding enthusiastically to us because of the Tories‘, when both he and everyone else knows that people aren’t responding enthusiastically to him because he is a Tory.

    This is the sort of double-talk he deals in. And it’s why we need to pay close attention to the following, which he says after listing all the things he claims to want to achieve in government:

    Yet to do that we would need a clear mandate. With problems this big, Britain needs strong government. Part of the story of Tory chaos is the attempt, under Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, to govern without that mandate. It doesn’t work. If you want change, you have to vote for it.

    What precisely is a “clear mandate”?

    The argument seems to be that Sunak and Truss didn’t have clear mandates because they never won an election, but this would suggest the David Cameron and Boris Johnson governments weren’t chaotic. Lest we forget, Cameron’s majority was swiftly followed by Brexit and then resignation; Johnson’s majority was followed by more chaos than you could shake a Covid swab at (and then resignation).

    Starmer’s problem is that while a parliamentary majority does indeed facilitate change, that’s only useful if you intend to legitimately change things.

    For all Labour’s talk of improving the country, we have the manifesto now, and we know it’s a continuation of Tory austerity. This means that when nothing changes – which it won’t – people will ask Starmer why nothing is happening when he has the numbers to do anything.

    In other words, the greater the majority, the less believable his excuses will be.

    And so he will need a new narrative.

    Starmer chameleon

    It looks almost certain that Labour will get a majority, but it’s not certain they’ll get a “clear mandate”, because it’s unclear what a clear mandate even is. If Labour underperforms and smaller parties do better than expected, the ‘lack of a clear mandate’ line gives Starmer an opportunity to U-turn on his half-decent proposals and to excuse the failures of the rest.

    We’re confident making this prediction about Starmer because we’ve seen it before – specifically with Starmer himself.

    Starmer became the Labour leader on the back of ’10 Pledges’. As soon as he was leader, he dropped these pledges one by one until none remained:

    In Starmer’s latest piece, we can see the excuse he gives for abandoning and U-turning on these early (and popular) pledges:

    And we will break with recent years by always putting country before party.

    This last point cannot be overstated. It is why, over the course of the past four-and-a-half years, we have had to be so uncompromising in changing the Labour party.

    Lying to get into power and then backtracking was an act of putting “country before party”. For reference, here are the pledges he made back then – pledges which would have benefitted the entire country, and not just the minority of wealthy donors and mainstream journalists Starmer is trying to win over:

    Keir Starmer's 10 Pledges

    Expect Starmer to point at Reform’s rise as the reason why he tacks further towards the far-right, with the explanation being that he’s ‘listening to the country’. Just don’t expect him to use any success enjoyed by Greens as a reason to invest in the environment, because that’s not who he is. We’ve seen who he is, over and over again.

    It’s time to start believing the clarity of his actions over the murkiness of his words.

    Featured image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Cops are now tyrannising Just Stop Oil supporters simply for being just that

    The following article is a comment piece from Just Stop Oil

    Over the last 12 hours the British state has acted unlawfully in detaining a total of at least 13 ordinary people sharing food at a community event and at their homes. Their only crime? They are Just Stop Oil supporters.

    Just Stop Oil: being a supporter makes you a suspect

    Being a Just Stop Oil supporter is now enough to make you a suspect. Believing that no government has the right to tyrannise the entire world by encouraging the extraction and burning of fossil fuels, marks you out as a dangerous radical.

    But we will not be intimidated. The painful truth right now is that our politicians and corporations have no intention of acting in accordance with the fundamental interests of either our young people or the country as a whole. Not content with cheering on war crimes in Gaza, our politicians have sat by and allowed the last government to licence yet more oil, making them complicit in the greatest crime in human history.

    Continuing to extract and burn fossil fuels is an act of war against humanity that will result in unimaginable suffering and destroy the lives and livelihoods of billions of people. No one has ever voted for this, there has never been a democratic mandate to destroy the habitable world.

    Just Stop Oil supporters are deeply committed to protecting their families and communities from the tyranny of fossil fuels. If our government refuses to do what is right to protect humanity, then people will step up to do what needs to be done. We refuse to die for fossil fuels and we refuse to stand by while millions are murdered.

    Time to take more action

    That’s why we are joining an international uprising taking nonviolent collective action to defend humanity. Sign up to take action at juststopoil.org.

    We demand that our government stops the extraction and burning of oil, gas and coal by 2030 and that they support and finance other countries to make a fast, fair and just transition. They must sign the Fossil Fuel Treaty to end the war on humanity before we lose everything.

    Feature image via Just Stop Oil

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • In this racist cesspit of a country, calling Sunak and Braverman coconuts gets you arrested

    After being charged with a racially aggravated public order offence, teacher Marieha Hussain appeared at Wimbledon Magistrates Court. What did she do to warrant the cops paying attention to so-called racism? Well, she’s the person who held up a sign calling Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman coconuts. Yep, that’s all.

    And, to pile the ridiculous on to the absurd, police arrested protesters and actual coconuts who showed up to support Marieha. One social media user shared the original image of Marieha’s placard at a Palestine march showing Sunak and Braverman under a coconut tree:

    This is the same country with an institutionally racist police force, systemic racism in healthcare, education disadvantaging Black and Brown children, a racist ruling party, and a racist opposition party. And the coconuts on a placard are the problem?

    Ridiculousness over coconuts

    For the uninitiated, calling someone a “coconut” is a casual way to suggest that someone who is brown on the outside, is white on the inside. In other words, whilst being brown they are committed to whiteness above all else.

    It’s hardly a new term, and documents a social reality that doesn’t often make it into the mainstream.

    It’s a complex articulation of racial dynamics and hierarchies. It’s utterly ridiculous that Marieha is being charged with anything, and in fact a testament to the unintelligent level of racial literacy in the country.

    Professor Kehinde Andrews explains as much in the following video:

    As Andrews says, if you think calling someone a coconut is something to be arrested and charged for:

    You’ve lost your damn mind!

    Many people rallied outside the magistrates court to show their support for Marieha:

    In no time at all, police were even arresting protesters:

    Apparently even the coconuts themselves were in for it:

    But don’t worry – help is at hand:

    Advocacy group CAGE shared more images of arrests:

    Five members of CAGE were arrested:

    And CAGE took a dim view of this racist government’s claims to freedom of speech:

     

    Black Lives Matter summed the whole thing up:

    Insult upon insult

    As Dr. Shola Mos-Shogbamimu argued, we have the right to hold gatekeepers accountable for their white supremacist work:

    The usual characters who love to defend freedom of speech should be up in arms about this. But, they’re not – perhaps because they’re contrarian fuckwits with no real understanding of race, class, and white supremacy.

    But, we digress.

    It’s an absolute outrage that Marieha was ever arrested, never mind charged, for holding up a satirical placard.

    And, for what it’s worth, her message was one that accurately characterised the complex racial dynamics of coconuts like Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman who happily use their skin colour to leverage whatever tokenistic support they can before making decisions that make the lives of Black and Brown people much, much worse.

    They’re rich and powerful coconuts, but they are indeed coconuts.

    Featured image via Unsplash/Tijana Drndarski, Wikimedia Commons/David Woolfall via CC 3.0, YouTube screenshot/Channel 4 News, resized, and coconuts added to fruit

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Constance Marten should NOT face a retrial. She should NOT have been prosecuted in the first place.

    The following is a comment piece from campaign group Support Not Separation

    We are outraged that Constance Marten is to face a re-trial.

    The jury in her first trial was discharged because, after a six-month trial and 72 hours of deliberation, they could not reach an agreement on some of the charges [nb. she was found guilty of concealing the birth of a child and perverting the course of justice].

    Ms Marten is not a danger to the public, she is a mother who deserves to be allowed to begin to recover from what she has suffered: her children removed, the death of her baby, and the long time she has spent in prison, cut off from those who love and support her.

    Constance Marten

    Constance Marten and her husband went on the run with new-born Victoria after their four previous children had been forcibly taken by social services and put up for adoption. When baby Victoria tragically died, her parents were charged with causing or allowing the death of a child and manslaughter by gross negligence.

    We have been outside the Old Bailey on several occasions during the trial (including today) and also attended court to show our support for Ms Marten. As mothers, many of us have experienced the brutality of the family courts which steal our children and we recognise the enormous trauma Ms Marten has been through.

    Ms Marten was repeatedly told in court that she could not re-visit the family court cases involving her four older children, yet this context was fundamental to why she went on the run to protect Victoria from being taken at birth.

    Our experience, backed by research, shows that once social services have removed one child, they expect to remove every subsequent child. Predictably, Ms Marten’s third and fourth children were taken at birth.

    What the public doesn’t know

    Who wouldn’t go on the run to protect their baby with whom they have bonded after nine months in the womb? As a grieving mother, Constance Marten needed support NOT prosecution. Charges should never have been brought and should not be brought again.

    The public doesn’t know that thousands of mothers have our children unjustly removed every year just like her.

    Over 83,000 children are currently in “care” and many are forcibly adopted each year – 90% of adoptions are without the consent of the natural parents. Ms Marten reflected the experience of many mothers when she spoke in court about going to social services for help:

    That was probably the worst decision… having gone through the system of social services I don’t believe they are there to help parents, or children for that matter.

    The public doesn’t know about the lifelong trauma inflicted by wrenching children from their family, first of all on the children, and on their mothers. Mothers are the first protectors, and children without a mother are vulnerable to every abuse especially those in state “care”.

    The public doesn’t know that mothers in the family court are judged “on the balance of probability”, a much lower threshold than the evidence “beyond reasonable doubt” in criminal courts.

    Mothers like Constance Marten need support

    This, and the secrecy surrounding family courts, allows them to remove children without any public accountability. Mothers face sexism, racism, class, and disability discrimination at the hands of professionals who think they know best. It seems Constance Marten’s case was interlaced with many of those.

    The public doesn’t know that while local authorities deny mothers the support we are entitled to, they feed a profiteering privatised child removal industry that charges as much as £50,000 a week (£2.6m a year) for one child in “care”. No wonder councils are going bankrupt while many mothers whose children are removed are driven to suicide.

    The trial of Constance Marten highlighted the desperation she and many mothers feel and our determination to protect our children.

    Separating children from loving mothers is child abuse.

    As mothers, our hearts go out to her.

    Stop stealing our children.

    Featured image via Facebook

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Starmer just lied through his TEETH live on BBCQT over energy renationalisation

    If you happened to be watching TV on Thursday 20 June, it was a difficult toss up between which was more listless and uninspiring: the England team playing Denmark or the BBC Question Time (BBCQT) general election leaders debate. For the Canary’s money, it was the latter – except for one moment where Labour Party leader Keir Starmer lied through his teeth about renationalisation.

    BBCQT: Starmer doing what he does best

    Starmer said on BBCQT:

    When we had the energy crisis two years ago… I asked my team to mock up what the options were.

    What were those options, Keir? Energy bosses in stocks in every major town and city?

    One option was nationalising energy, that would have cost tens of billions of pounds, that money would have been spent on shareholders to buy them off, and not a penny could have been used to lower the bills…

    We’re going to stop Starmer there on his BBCQT sermon. The other option he gave was the Windfall Tax on energy, which the Tories put in, and which has a massive loophole in it which saved energy companies billions.

    What Starmer said about nationalisation meaning ‘buying off shareholders’ and ‘not having any money left to use to lower bills’ is a whopping great lie.

    You can renationalise energy and save the public money

    As campaign group We Own It wrote about renationalising BOTH energy and water companies, in mid-2019 they were all worth around £79bn at market prices. However, it noted that:

    UK law does not say that shareholders should be compensated by being given the ‘market value’ of their shares. It says that parliament can and must decide in each case, and include the compensation in the relevant act.

    And the courts will not override this, because parliament is a better judge of the public interest than the courts, and the most recent judgments against shareholders claims stated that, in the public interest, parliament could decide that rectifying social or economic injustice requires compensation of much less than market value.

    In other words, the government can pay shareholders under a renationalisation programme whatever the hell it wants. It’s the law.

    Being gracious, We Own It quoted research which showed that paying shareholders of water and energy companies what they originally invested – not what their shares were worth – would cost the government just under £50bn.

    On We Own It’s assessment, this would pay for itself in seven years.

    If you want a more up-to-date assessment, Unite the Union did one in 2022. It found that renationalising the WHOLE energy supply – including the grid and North Sea oil and gas – would cost £90bn. But what Unite also said was that, in the year of the crisis Starmer mentioned, this would have immediately SAVED the public £1,800 per household – or £45bn overall.

    Renationalisation would have also had the knock-on effect of lowering inflation during the cost of living crisis by around 4% – yes, four percent. Therefore, the Bank of England may not have had to raise interest rates as much, therefore people’s mortgages and credit payments may not have gone up as much, and so on.

    Oh, and remember – £90bn is only two-and-a-half times higher than the £37bn the government paid for useless test and trace programme during the coronavirus (Covid 19) pandemic.

    Starmer’s lies all over BBCQT

    Starmer said on BBCQT:

    I took the second choice [Windfall Tax]… I don’t think I could have stood here today and said ‘I didn’t do anything about your bills, I’m sorry about that… but I did pay off the shareholders and nationalise energy’… I’m a common-sense politician.

    You’re a liar and fraud is what you are, Starmer. You pledged to renationalise energy. That was a lie. Now you’re saying you couldn’t do it anyway because of ‘paying off shareholders’, which is another lie.

    The truth is, you are a right-wing capitalist who wouldn’t WANT to renationalise energy companies for fear of upsetting business owners who are now donating and supporting your party in their droves.

    Judging by much of the audiences’ reactions to the Labour leader on BBCQT, they knew all this, too.

    Feature image via BBC iPlayer

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.