UK > History > 2011 > Politics (I)

Jimmy Margulies

New Jersey -- The Record

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14 August 2011

Strikes over public sector pensions

hit services across UK

as 2 million walk out

David Cameron and Ed Miliband trade blows
as 60% of schools in England
are closed and 6,000 NHS operations cancelled

Wednesday 30 November 2011
14.18 GMT
Guardian.co.uk
Dan Milmo, Caroline Davies and Polly Curtis
This article was published on guardian.co.uk
at 14.18 GMT on Wednesday 30 November 2011.
It was last modified at 15.05 GMT
on Wednesday 30 November 2011.

Trade unions and the government have traded blows over the impact of the biggest outbreak of industrial unrest in three decades, as up to 2 million public sector workers went on strike, forcing the closure of 60% of schools in England and the cancellation of 6,000 hospital operations.

Heathrow airport reported minimal disruption as the mass rebooking of passengers helped reduce queues at border control, but the cabinet secretary, Francis Maude, acknowledged that the strikes over pension reforms had disrupted services. The impact includes:

• 19,000 out of 21,700 schools in England and Wales closed or partially closed.

• 6,000 out of 30,000 non-urgent operations cancelled.

• 135,000 civil servants on strike, representing just over a quarter of the civil service.

With the strike only halfway through, the prime minister and Labour leader battled to make political capital out of the unrest. At prime minister's questions in the House of Commons, David Cameron claimed that the strikes had failed to have a significant impact.

"At our borders the early signs are that the contingency measures are minimising the impact, we have full cover in terms of ambulance services, and only 18 of the 900 job centres are closed," he said. "So despite the disappointment of the party opposite, who support irresponsible and damaging strikes, it looks like something of a damp squib."

Ed Miliband said the government must accept blame for the strikes. He asked Cameron: "Why do you think so many decent, hard-working public sector workers, many of whom have never been on strike before, feel the government simply isn't listening?"

Maude said the strikes were irresponsible as he disputed union claims that talks over pension reforms had ground to a halt. One of the main union negotiators, however, the GMB's Brian Hutton, said discussions on the four pension schemes – health, education, civil service and local government – had either stalled or were insubstantive. "In most of the schemes there is really nothing going on at all," he said.

A spokesman for the TUC, which is co-ordinating the strikes, said up to 2 million workers had taken part in the biggest bout of industrial action since the 1979 winter of discontent.

"There has been magnificent support for the strike today. It is the biggest in a generation."

Referring to government claims of a low turnout and deliberate disruption of negotiations, the spokesman added: "The government is clutching at straws. The real question remains, how did this government provoke so many ordinary, decent people to go on strike for the first time in their lives?"

Mark Serwotka, the leader of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS), said reports from picket lines showed a huge turnout, with up to 90% of staff in some government departments, including Revenue and Customs, taking action. "I have been to pickets around central London and spirits are sky-high, with many other unions besides PCS out on strike," he said."

Britain's largest airport, Heathrow, reported no disruption as the busiest time of day for passport control and international arrivals at 7am passed without incident. Some 60,000 passengers normally pass through border control at Heathrow on a normal day, but major airlines including British Airways and Virgin Atlantic indicated that thousands of travellers had rebooked to an alternative date free of charge.

"Due to the effective contingency plans we have put in place with the airlines and the UK Border Agency over recent days, immigration queues are currently at normal levels," said the airport's operator, BAA. British Airways, Heathrow's largest customer, said passenger numbers were reduced compared with an average day while Virgin Atlantic said it was operating at 50% capacity.

The Department for Education said 58% of England's 21,700 state schools were closed, with 13% partly shut. In Scotland it was thought just 30 of the 2,700 council run schools remained open. In Wales around 80% were believed shut and in Northern Ireland more than 50% of 1,200 schools were closed.

NHS managers estimated that some 6,000 out of 30,000 routine operations had been cancelled across the UK, as well as tens of thousands of appointments. The health secretary, Andrew Lansley, said patients who had operations cancelled would still be seen within an 18-week limit.

London Ambulance Service told BBC London it was struggling and people not in a life-threatening condition might not get an ambulance.

The strike saw walkouts by tens of thousands of border agency staff, probation officers, radiographers, librarians, job centre staff, court staff, social workers, refuse collectors, midwives, road sweepers, cleaners, school meals staff, paramedics, tax inspectors, customs officers, passport office staff, police civilian staff, driving test examiners, patent officers and health and safety inspectors.

In Wales unions reported around 170,000 workers on strike, and in Scotland around 300,000.

Up to 1,000 marches and rallies were due to take place across the UK. Four arrests were made ahead of a national rally in London, two for assaulting an officer and two for possession of a weapon.

Unite general secretary Len McCluskey, who was due to address the London rally later, said 30 November would go down as the day when the union movement and workers fought to protect the economic and welfare advances of the last 60 years. Working people were "being asked to pay for the economic mess caused by the greedy City elite whose behaviour this spineless government has repeatedly failed to tackle", he said.

Touring picket lines in London, he added: "The action today has been a brilliant display of courage and concern by public servants who are being demonised by a government that has lost its moral compass."

In Salford, Greater Manchester, around 20 council refuse collectors were gathered around a brazier waving placards, one of which read: "Do we look Gold Plated?". Unite organiser Neil Clarke said: "I don't think George Osborne could find Salford if you gave him a map."

Outside Edinburgh's Royal Infirmary nurses, lab workers and cleaners were joined by the veteran trade union leader Rodney Bickerstaff, a pivotal figure in the 1970s.

"These are people who work day in, day out. They wipe noses, they wipe bottoms, they teach unruly kids, work with dustbins and sewage works. They are services which civilise our society," he said.

In Liverpool Inspector Russ Aitken from Mersey Tunnel police was taking industrial action for the first time in 35 years. "I feel angry that I'm paying a 50% increase in pension contributions and I feel angry that I'm going to have to work longer and at the end of it get less."

Outside the Crown Prosecution Service office in Manchester city centre, a handful of lawyers were among those manning the picket line. The average annual pay of a CPS solicitor was £30,000 rising to £50,000, said strikers, but many low pay grade civil servants would get average annual pensions of £5,600 after 40 years service.

Courts across the UK were affected, said Norina O'Hare, who represents the justice and prosecutions sector of the PCS. "We've had a lot of support from judges who are, of course, also public sector workers."

    Strikes over public sector pensions hit services across UK as 2 million walk out, G,
    30.11.2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/nov/30/strikes-public-sector-pensions-impact

Wrong Answers in Britain

August 17, 2011
The New York Times

Nothing can justify or excuse the terrifying wave of violent lawlessness that swept through London and other British cities earlier this month. Hardworking people in struggling neighborhoods were its principal victims. Public support for racial and ethnic coexistence also suffered a damaging, and we fear lasting, blow.

The perpetrators must be punished, the police must improve their riot control techniques, and Prime Minister David Cameron’s government must do all it can to make such episodes less likely in the future. We are more confident about the first two happening than the third.

Mr. Cameron, a product of Britain’s upper classes and schools, has blamed the looting and burning on a compound of national moral decline, bad parenting and perverse inner-city subcultures.

Would he find similar blame — this time in the culture of the well housed and well off — for Britain’s recent tabloid phone hacking scandals or the egregious abuse of expense accounts by members of Parliament?

Crimes are crimes whoever commits them. And the duty of government is to protect the law-abiding, not to engage in simplistic and divisive moralizing that fails to distinguish between criminals, victims and helpless relatives and bystanders.

The thousands who were arrested last week for looting and for more violent crimes should face the penalties that are prescribed by law. But Mr. Cameron is not content to stop there. He talks about cutting off government benefits even to minor offenders and evicting them — and, in a repellent form of collective punishment, perhaps their families, too — from the publicly supported housing in which one of every six Britons lives.

He has also called for blocking access to social networks like Twitter during future outbreaks. And he has cheered on the excessive sentences some judges have been handing out for even minor offenses.

Such draconian proposals often win public applause in the traumatized aftermath of riots. But Mr. Cameron, and his Liberal Democrat coalition partners, should know better. They risk long-term damage to Britain’s already fraying social compact.

Making poor people poorer will not make them less likely to steal. Making them, or their families, homeless will not promote respect for the law. Trying to shut down the Internet in neighborhoods would be an appalling violation of civil liberties and a threat to public safety, denying vital real-time information to frightened residents.

Britain’s urban wastelands need constructive attention from the Cameron government, not just punishment. His government’s wrongheaded austerity policies have meant fewer public sector jobs and social services. Even police strength is scheduled to be cut. The poor are generally more dependent on government than the affluent, so they have been hit the hardest.

What Britain’s sputtering economy really needs is short-term stimulus, not more budget cutting. Unfortunately, there is no sign that Mr. Cameron has figured that out. But, at a minimum, burdens need to be more fairly shared between rich and poor — not as a reward to anyone, but because it is right.

Fair play is one traditional British value we have always admired. And one we fear is increasingly at risk.

    Wrong Answers in Britain, NYT, 17.8.2011,
    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/18/opinion/wrong-answers-in-britain.html

Nottingham police station firebombed

as violence hits more UK cities

At least eight people arrested in connection with attack
– while disturbances flare up in Liverpool, Leicester, Bristol and Leeds

The Guardian,
Wednesday 10 August 2011
Martin Wainwright, Helen Clifton, James Beal and Jessica Shepherd
This article appeared in the Guardian on Wednesday 10 August 2011. It was published on guardian.co.uk at 01.57 BST on Wednesday 10 August 2011. It was last modified at 01.59 BST on Wednesday 10 August 2011.

A police station in Nottingham was firebombed on Tuesday night as violence also hit Liverpool, Leicester, Bristol and Leeds.

Canning Circus police station in Nottingham was attacked by a gang of 30 to 40 men but no injuries were reported, according to Nottinghamshire police. The force said at least eight people were arrested in connection with the attack.

Around the same time, a number of cars were firebombed at a car lot in Carlton Road in the city.

The violence followed the arrest of 10 youths earlier in the evening after a small group of people got on to the roof of one of the buildings at Nottingham High School. In another incident two men, aged 17 and 18, were arrested after rocks were thrown at Bulwell Police Station in the city.

Between 6pm on Monday and 1am on Wednesday, police said they dealt with "well over 1,000" reports of incidents taking place throughout the city and elsewhere, and more than 70 arrests were made. Fires were set in various different locations and police said they had investigated reports that children had been setting trees alight.

Smithdown Road in Toxteth in Liverpool was closed by police after 200 rioters started hurling missiles at officers at about 11.30pm. A Merseyside police spokesman said the youths were "causing disorder and damage" and asked local people to avoid the area. She was unable to confirm reports that firebombs were being thrown.

Police and firefighters were called to reports of vehicles on fire in Birkenhead, while the town centre also saw damage to shops and pubs, with at least one pub set on fire. No-one was inside at the time.

Some 35 arrests were made on Merseyside in connection with the disorder.

A number of blazes were started by people rioting at a young offenders' institution in Bristol, the local fire service said. Up to 10 teenagers at Ashfield set fire to rubbish in one of the wings at about 7.50pm.

It took members of staff about 50 minutes to extinguish the flames, according to Avon Fire and Rescue Service, who were put on standby in case they worsened. "About seven to 10 people were involved in a riot," a spokesman said. "The prison staff are now dealing with the perpetrators." The fires were said to be small, with the level of damage done unclear.

Some 400 young males aged between 15 and 18 are held at Ashfield after being sentenced in courts across the South West, Wales, the Midlands and the London area.

Meanwhile a gang passing through Chapeltown in Leeds threw stones at cars parked outside the Central Jamia Mosque. A senior member of staff at the mosque, who gave his name as Ali, described the culprits as a large group of rioters.

Leicestershire police said on their Twitter account that their officers were dealing with a group of youths in Leicester city centre.

The violence has been spreading outside of London since Monday night. Police in Liverpool were pelted with missiles and cars were torched on Monday, while looters in Bristol targeted jewellery shops and set a gas main on fire. There has been sporadic trouble in Leeds

In Liverpool, disturbances began shortly after midnight on Monday as pub and restaurant windows were shattered with stones, showering late-night drinkers and diners with glass . Several hundred people, some as young as 10, roamed High Park Street attacking buildings and cars at random before looting a Tesco Express, smashing police station windows and setting a police van on fire.

Cars and wheelie bins were set alight on a trail of destruction that stretched from the city centre to the Toxteth, Dingle and Wavertree areas.

    Nottingham police station firebombed as violence hits more UK cities, G, 10.8.2011,
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/10/nottingham-police-station-firebomb-arrests

Tottenham riot: Sustained looting follows night of violence

Looters use cars and shopping trolleys
to carry away stolen goods as disturbances spread to other areas of Haringey

Sunday 7 August 2011
09.05 BST
Guardian.co.uk
Paul Lewis
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 09.05 BST on Sunday 7 August 2011. It was last modified at 10.40 BST on Sunday 7 August 2011.

There were scenes of chaos in the early hours of Sunday morning as sustained looting spread from Tottenham to other nearby areas of Haringey.

By midnight police managed to secure a 200-metre stretch of the Tottenham High Road, scene of some of the worst rioting on Saturday night.

But as fire engines entered the street, and began putting out blazing cars and buildings, the rioters spread north and west through back-streets. To the north, at Tottenham Hale, Aldi supermarket was ransacked and set on fire. So too was a nearby carpet shop, causing a huge blaze.

Looters turned up with cars and shopping trolleys to carry away stolen goods. Nearby, large groups of youths congregated in the surrounding streets with sticks, bottles and hammers.

Some wore balaclava masks, preventing cars from accessing streets as buildings were broken into. Others used large rubbish bins to form burning barricades across the road.

However some of most dramatic looting took place further west, in Wood Green, and continued into the early hours of the morning.

Earlier on Saturday night two police cars, a bus and several shops had been attacked and set ablaze as violence and looting erupted following a protest demanding "justice" over a fatal police shooting.

Officers on horseback and others in riot gear clashed with hundreds of ­rioters armed with makeshift missiles in the centre of Tottenham after Mark Duggan, 29, a father of four, was killed on Thursday.

On Sunday morning police said there remained isolated incidents in the Tottenham area involving "a small number of people" and officers were still dealing with those situations. Eight officers were being treated in hospital, one with head injuries, following the violence.

But there was still no police presence at Wood Green high street at 4am, even after dozens of stores had been smashed and raided, setting of multiple alarms.

Around 100 youths sprinted around the highstreet, targeting game shops, electrical stores and high-street clothe chains such as H & M.

Glass windows were smashed and the looters, mostly young men masking their faces, swarmed in.

They emerged with handfuls of stolen goods. "I've got loads of G-Star," said one teenager, emerging from a clothes shop. Others came out clasping shopping bags stuffed with goods.

Three teenagers ran down the street with suitcases filled with stolen clothes. Around ten young men stood outside a smouldering Carphone Warehouse, the windows smashed. The theft was casual and brazen, with looters peering into broken shop windows to see if items of value remained.

There were shocking scenes in the suburban back-streets, where residential front-gardens were used to frantically sort and swap stolen goods.

A teenage boy, who looked aged around 14, drove an stolen minicab erratically down a side-street. On the adjacent street, a man who emerged from his home to find his car burnt-out remonstrated with other young men, who ran past carrying clothes.

Passersby, including people returning home in the early hours from nights out, were stunned to discover the lawless mayhem on the streets.

With no sign of any police, buses refused to take passengers through Wood Green high street, and traffic was brought to a standstill.

    Tottenham riot: Sustained looting follows night of violence, G, 7.8.2011,
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/07/tottenham-riot-looting-north-london

Charlie Gilmour, son of Pink Floyd guitarist,

jailed for protest violence

Student son of David Gilmour jailed for 16 months
after admitting violent disorder at student fees demonstrations

Guardian.co.uk
Stephen Bates
Friday 15 July 2011
16.08 BST
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 16.08 BST on Friday 15 July 2011.
A version appeared on p17 of the Main section section of the Guardian
on Saturday 16 July 2011. It was last modified at 16.11 BST on Friday 15 July 2011.
It was first published at 12.43 BST on Friday 15 July 2011.

The son of the Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour has been jailed for 16 months after admitting violent disorder during a student fees protest in central London last December.

Charlie Gilmour, 21, was seen hanging from a union flag on the Cenotaph and later leaped on the bonnet of a Jaguar car forming part of the royal convoy taking the prince of Wales and Camilla Duchess of Cornwall to the royal variety performance that was attacked by demonstrators. He also set fire to papers outside the supreme court in Parliament Square and was seen kicking at a window of a Top Shop branch in Oxford Street and later carrying the leg of a mannequin. Students attacking the store caused £50,000 damage.

Gilmour, now short-haired, dressed in a suit and accompanied by his mother, the writer Polly Samson and his stepfather, had earlier buried his face in his hands when the court was shown video footage of him at the demonstration shouting: "We'll eat fire and ice and destruction because we're angry, very fucking angry. We refuse to do anything we're told. They broke the moral law. We're going to break all the laws. Arson!"

He admitted the offence of violent disorder, but denied hurling a rubbish bin at the vehicle, though Judge Nicholas Price, sentencing at Kingston crown court, said he was satisfied that Gilmour had been responsible. His mother wept as he was sentenced.

The court was told that the public school-educated second year Girton College, Cambridge, history undergraduate – who had said he did not realise the significance of the Cenotaph – had drunk whisky and taken LSD and valium in the hours before the demonstration.

His barrister, David Spens QC, told the court that Gilmour was an intelligent and gentle young man who had turned to the substances over previous months after being rejected by his biological father, the poet and artist Heathcote Williams. Spens said: "For a period of time starting around August 2010 he was, by his own admission, on something of a continual binge, taking a range of illicit and illegal drugs. It seems this was borne more out of unhappiness than hedonism, precipitated by the emotional rejection after meeting Heathcote. In his own words, he spent most of the week, effectively every week, tranquilised out of his mind.

"This young man has had to cope with the pain and considerable emotional upheaval of having a biological father who rejected him for no good reason and has continued to reject him throughout his life. By the time of the protests, his dependence of drugs had spiralled out of control."

Arguing that Gilmour should be spared a jail sentence, Spens said that he had stopped using drugs, cut down his drinking and started a course of psychotherapy. "He abhors violence, having been the subject of serious bullying in the past on a number of occasions. He came to London for one reason and that was to join legitimate protests, not to cause trouble or behave violently."

He added: "He had consumed a considerable quantity of drink, some LSD and in addition to all that he had not slept for 48 hours. In the course of the afternoon and the early evening he consumed both valium and whisky before he ever went to Regent Street and thereafter Oxford Street. If the drugs and alcohol were the immediate cause of the violent conduct, underlying that there was a deeper cause which helps to explain how he ever got himself into this situation.'

"He has undergone real punishment by being brought to the realisation of how his conduct can impact on others. He is not somebody who is going to reoffend. He has learnt his lesson."

Gilmour had spent the day with protesters in Parliament Square, before moving on to Regent Street and Oxford Street. After being photographed swinging from the Cenotaph – which he described as a "moment of idiocy" – he was caught on camera alongside the royal convoy.

Gilmour admitted sitting on the bonnet of the car for some 30 seconds "obstructing the view of the driver", while waving to fellow demonstrators. He refused to give evidence because, Spens said, he was "thoroughly intoxicated" and had "no recollection" of the events.

Gilmour, of Billingshurst, West Sussex, admitted swinging from the flag on the Cenotaph although he was not charged with that. He was arrested four days after the demonstration after publicly apologising for swinging on the war memorial. He admitted that he had been in Oxford Street when the shop window was smashed and had picked up the mannequin leg. The hearing was delayed to enable him to take his end of year exams.

Passing sentence Judge Price accepted that Gilmour's antics at the Cenotaph on Whitehall did not form part of the violent disorder, but accused him of disrespect to the war dead. "Such outrageous and deeply offensive behaviour gives a clear indication of how out of control you were that day. It caused public outrage and understandably so."

The judge dismissed his excuse that he had not known the significance of the Cenotaph: "For a young man of your intelligence and education and background to profess to not know what the Cenotaph represents defies belief. You have shown disrespect to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice, to those who fell defending this country."

"It has been long established in this country that citizens have the right to demonstrate and march against or in favour of causes. The rule of law requests that those who demonstrate or protest do so peaceably. What you did went far far beyond proper protest."

    Charlie Gilmour, son of Pink Floyd guitarist, jailed for protest violence, G, 15.7.2011,
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jul/15/charlie-gilmour-jailed-david-son-pink-floyd

Andrew Lansley scrambles to save coalition's NHS reforms

Health secretary makes the rare step of making a Commons statement on his bill
as it passes through parliament

Tuesday 5 April 2011
The Guardian
Nicholas Watt , Sarah Boseley and Polly Curtis
This article appeared on p1 of the Main section section of the Guardian on Tuesday 5 April 2011. It was published on guardian.co.uk at 00.05 BST on Tuesday 5 April 2011. It was last modified at 01.21 BST on Tuesday 5 April 2011.

The health secretary, Andrew Lansley, is to launch a last-ditch attempt to rescue his controversial NHS reforms by accepting that the membership of new GP-led consortiums needs to be widened.

Lansley will on Tuesday agree with the broad principles of proposals made by the health select committee, chaired by John Major's last health secretary, Stephen Dorrell, although he will resist many of the detailed recommendations.

Lansley was forced to announce to MPson Monday that he would amend his plans, during a "natural break" in the passage of the heath and social care bill. His reforms would hand 60% of the NHS's £103bn budget to new GP-led consortiums.

Government sources said he was studying carefully proposals by the committee, which warns that GPs should not be the sole commissioners of care in the NHS. In a report it calls for GPs to share commissioning powers and responsibility with nurses, consultants, public health experts and patients.

Lansley, who met David Cameron in Downing Street on Monday, took the rare step of making a statement to MPs about the progress of a bill which has still not completed all its stages in the Commons.

In a sign of nervousness in Downing Street, which fears that the public backlash is jeopardising Cameron's work in persuading the public that the NHS is safe in Tory hands, Lansley will accept some of the broad principles in the health select committee report.

"Some of the ideas suggested by the committee are in sync with the government's thinking on how, for example, others might be involved in the GP consortia," one Whitehall source said.

But Lansley will not accept all of Dorrell's ideas because he believes they would put too many groups in the new GP-led consortiums. "It is wrong to assume that the health select committee is telling the secretary of state what to do," the source said. "This is an evolutionary process."

Dorrell admitted that his reworking of the bill "is not minor tweaking". He said: "We believe it is crucial to get the reform of NHS commissioning right if the service is to confront the massive financial challenge it now faces. Our report contains a set of practical proposals to strengthen the health and social care bill and make it better able to meet the government's objectives.

"Our proposals are designed to ensure that NHS commissioning involves all stakeholders – GPs, certainly, but also nurses, hospital doctors, and representatives of social care and local communities. We believe this broadening of the base for commissioning is vital if we are to achieve the changes that are necessary to allow the NHS to deliver properly co-ordinated healthcare."

The signals that the government was prepared to accept some of the principles behind the Dorrell report came as Lansley acknowledged that people have "genuine" concerns as he announced that the government would table amendments to the bill.

Amid fears in Downing Street that Lansley has failed to explain the thinking behind his reforms, the health secretary said he would use a "natural break in the passage of the bill" to offer reassurances that the government's sole intention is to improve the NHS.

The bill completed its committee stage last week. No date has been fixed for its report stage, the penultimate hurdle before it goes to the House of Lords.

In a sign of Lansley's isolation no full voting member of the cabinet, apart from ministers on other business, sat with him on the frontbench. Lord Tebbit, the former Conservative chairman, criticised the plans in the Daily Mirror.

Lansley will outline the amendments at a joint appearance later this week with the prime minister and Nick Clegg. The health secretary told MPs the amendments will make clear there will be no backdoor privatisation of the NHS; Lansley told MPs: "Choice, competition and the involvement of the private sector should only be a means to improve services for patient, not ends in themselves. Some services like accident and emergency or major trauma clearly will never be based on competition." the private sector will not be allowed to cherry-pick the most profitable parts of the NHS; and there will be greater transparency and accountability of the new consortiums. Lansley said: "People want to know that the GP commissioning groups cannot have a conflict of interest, are transparent in their decisions and accountable not only nationally but locally, through the democratic input to health and wellbeing boards."

Under the committee's proposals, the GP consortiums would become NHS commissioning authorities and would no longer be merely the province of GPs. GPs should take a majority of the seats on the authority, says the report, but there should also be places reserved for a professional social care representative, an elected member of the local authority, a nurse, a hospital doctor and a public health expert.

This wider membership is necessary to ensure commissioning bodies, which have responsibility for spending large amounts of taxpayers' money, "comply with the highest standards of governance and accountability", says the committee.

It would also help break down the barriers between primary, hospital and community care, with the commissioning authorities responsible for commissioning all of it, as well as forging closer links with social care.

    Andrew Lansley scrambles to save coalition's NHS reforms, G, 5.4.2011,
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/apr/05/andrew-lansley-scrambles-to-save-nhs-reforms

Anti-cuts march draws hundreds of thousands

as police battle rioters

Turnout for generally good-natured rally exceeds organisers' expectations,
but mood marred by violent minority

Mark Townsend , Tracy McVeigh , Jamie Doward and David Sharrock
Saturday 26 March 2011
19.18 GMT
Guardian.co.uk
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 19.18 GMT
on Saturday 26 March 2011.
It was last modified at 19.20 GMT on Saturday 26 March 2011.

More than a quarter of a million people have marched through central London to deliver a powerful message about the government's cuts in public spending. The generally good-natured mood was soured by violent and destructive attacks on symbols of wealth including the Ritz, banks and a luxury car dealer and an occupation of Fortnum & Mason.

Trades unionist organisers said that the turnout had exceeded their expectations, estimating that hundreds of thousands had travelled in coaches and by train from as far away as Edinburgh to vent their anger at the government's cuts by marching through London to a rally in Hyde Park.

Dave Prentis, general secretary of Unison, the public service trade union, said the turnout was "absolutely enormous and showed the anger of ordinary working people".

But, it seems inevitably, the day was marred by a violent minority of anarchists who went on the rampage, smashing windows and attacking property around Oxford Street, the capital's premier shopping street. Prentis said he regretted that the actions of "a few hundred" risked diverting attention from the message that the "political heat is rising on the government".

At one stage 13 shops in Oxford Street were closed following skirmishes between activists and riot police. Topshop – owned by Sir Philip Green, who has been accused of tax avoidance – and the bank HSBC had windows smashed, while paint and bottles were thrown at a Royal Bank of Scotland branch. A dozen police officers were surrounded and beaten by a masked mob in Sackville Street, off Piccadilly.

By mid-afternoon the main focus of police activity was a sit-in at the upmarket grocers and royal warrant holders Fortnum & Mason, organised by anti-tax evasion activist group UK Uncut. Hundred of riot police sealed off the area as they tried to clear the store.

Scotland Yard said ammonia was thrown at officers. Commander Bob Broadhurst, the Scotland Yard officer in charge of policing the protests, said the TUC had done an excellent job in ensuring that the march was "very professional, very well prepared". But he said a hardcore element had been intent on souring the atmosphere.

"Unfortunately we've had in the region of 500 plus – I would call them criminals – people hiding under the pretence of the TUC march who have caused considerable damage, attacked police officers, attacked police vehicles and scared the general public. Unfortunately, because of their mobility and the fact they are aware of some of our tactics, we have been unable to contain them and so we have had these groups wandering around the central London area."

Broadhurst said they had learned lessons from the student protests last year, which were heavily criticised for the use of "kettling". "We've worked hard on communication, making people aware by using text and Twitter and a better informed website. We've made a small number of arrests – around a dozen – and we have good video evidence which we can use in the coming days and weeks."

The main group of the marchers demonstrated peacefully and walked along the pre-planned route from Embankment to Hyde Park. Steel bands, choirs and dancers performed while the mass of people, many with their children in tow, blew horns and whistles as they passed alongside Parliament.

Labour leader Ed Miliband told protesters at the TUC rally in Hyde Park that the government was wrong to make such deep cuts in public services. He was heckled by a small number of protesters when he said "some cuts" were needed, but most people applauded his speech.

Miliband said: "Our struggle is to fight to preserve, protect and defend the best of the services we cherish because they represent the best of the country we love. We know what the government will say: that this is a march of the minority. They are so wrong. David Cameron: you wanted to create the big society – this is the big society. The big society united against what your government is doing to our country. We stand today not as the minority, but as the voice of the mainstream majority in this country."

Len McCluskey, general secretary of Unite, Britain's biggest union, told the protesters they were bearing witness to services closing, old people going without care, libraries, swimming pools and parks going to "ruin" and young people heading for a life on the dole.

"But you represent a spirit of resistance in every workplace and community that says we are not going to have our way of life killed so that the rich and greedy can live as they please," he said.

    Anti-cuts march draws hundreds of thousands as police battle rioters, G, 26.3.2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/mar/26/anti-cuts-march-police-rioters

Clashes with police overshadow British anti-cuts rally

LONDON | Sat Mar 26, 2011
1:53pm EDT
Reuters
By Stefano Ambrogi and Tim Castle

LONDON (Reuters) - Black-clad, masked youths clashed with police, smashed windows and started a fire in central London on Saturday when more than a quarter of a million Britons marched in protest against government spending cuts.

Breakaway groups splintered from the main rally and threw flares and smoke grenades and broke into a branch of HSBC bank in the center of the capital.

Hooded figures climbed on to the roof of luxury food store Fortnum & Mason while other protesters started a fire in the center of Oxford Street, the capital's main shopping street.

The clashes, although sporadic, rippled across the center of the city, and overshadowed a rally called by unions to protest against unemployment and public spending cuts, tax rises and pension reforms introduced by the Conservative-led coalition.

Union leaders and police said over 250,000 people joined the biggest rally in the capital since protests against war in Iraq in 2003.

The coalition, in power since last May, is pushing ahead with a tough debt reduction programme to virtually eliminate a budget deficit, running at about 10 percent of GDP, by 2015.

Prime Minister David Cameron's government says it is cleaning up a mess left by the previous Labour government and that failure to act would expose Britain to market turmoil.

VIOLENCE CONDEMNED

Treasury minister Justine Greening condemned the violence.

"It's a real shame and totally unacceptable that this minority of people are committing criminal acts," she told Sky News.

Police were pelted with paint and what they said were light bulbs filled with ammonia by protesters in clashes which mirrored violence late last year over higher student tuition fees. Police said they had arrested nine people.

"Unfortunately we have had a group of approximately 500 criminals committing some disorder, including throwing paint at Topshop in Oxford Street and at the police, and scaring the public who are trying to shop," London Police Commander Bob Broadhurst said.

"That has been concerning but we are on top of it."

Many European countries have seen mass protests in recent months as governments slash public spending to try to help their economies to recover from the global financial crisis.

Unions and the opposition Labour Party say the government measures are bringing misery to millions of Britons with unemployment at its highest level since 1994.

Labour leader Ed Miliband told marchers in Hyde Park that the government was taking Britain back to what he said were the divisive politics of the 1980s when Conservative Margaret Thatcher was prime minister.

"There is a need for difficult choices, and some cuts," Miliband said. "But, this government is going too far and too fast and destroying the fabric of our communities."

(Writing by Olesya Dmitracova and Keith Weir; editing by David Cowell)

    Clashes with police overshadow British anti-cuts rally, R, 26.3.2011, http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/26/us-britain-protest-idUSTRE72P0YN20110326

David Cameron sparks fury from critics

who say attack on multiculturalism

has boosted English Defence League

• Prime minister is accused of handing PR coup to the far right
• Jack Straw calls David Cameron's comments 'ill-judged'


Share Toby Helm, Matthew Taylor and Rowenna Davis
Guardian.co.uk
Saturday 5 February 2011
21.38 GMT
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 21.38 GMT
on Saturday 5 February 2011.
A version appeared on p1 of the Main section section of the Observer
on Sunday 6 February 2011.
It was last modified at 21.38 GMT on Saturday 5 February 2011.
It was first published at 21.00 GMT on Saturday 5 February 2011.

David Cameron was accused of playing into the hands of rightwing extremists today as he delivered a controversial speech on the failings of multiculturalism within hours of one of the biggest anti-Islam rallies ever staged in Britain.

Muslim and anti-fascist groups questioned the prime minister's judgment and sensitivity to the issues, saying he had handed a propaganda coup to the hard-right English Defence League as 3,000 of its supporters marched through Luton chanting anti-Islamic slogans.

Some of crowd were jubilant, saying that Cameron "had come round to our way of thinking". Paul Bradburn, 35, from Stockport, said Cameron was "coming out against extremism".

He added: "The timing of his speech is quite weird as it comes on the day of one of the biggest EDL demos we've ever seen. If he wants to start sticking up for us, that's great."

Matt, 16, a school pupil in Birmingham who was at the march said: "He believes what we believe to some extent."

Downing Street issued a robust defence saying the prime minister was "absolutely unapologetic".

A spokeswoman said the speech had been "in the diary for months". She added: "The idea that he would be blown off course on an issue as fundamental as this by the English Defence League is ridiculous and extraordinary."

Cameron told the Munich Security Conference, attended by world leaders, that state multiculturalism had failed in this country and pledged to cut funding for Muslim groups that failed to respect basic British values.

He blamed the radicalisation of Muslim youths and the phenomenon of home-grown terrorism on the sense of alienation that builds among young people living in separate communities and the "hands-off tolerance" of groups that peddle separatist ideology.

Just a few hours later, EDL leader Stephen Lennon told the crowd they were part of a "tidal wave of patriotism" that was sweeping the UK.

Activists, some wearing balaclavas and others waving English flags, chanted "Muslim bombers off our streets" and "Allah, Allah, who the fuck is Allah". EDL supporters from Newcastle, Scotland, London, West Yorkshire and Sheffield joined Luton-based supporters. There were also flags representing German, Dutch and Swedish Defence Leagues.

Nick Lowles, director of anti-extremist group Hope Not Hate, said the timing of Cameron's remarks had allowed EDL members to claim the government was on its side.

"The prime minister's comments were unhelpful. On a day when extremist groups of varying persuasions were descending on Luton, his words were open to misinterpretation at best, and at worst were potentially inflammatory.

"Whatever the intention, the timing of this speech has played into the hands of those who wish to sow seeds of division and hatred."

Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, said Cameron had handed a "propaganda coup to the EDL and their extremists".

Labour also weighed in, attacking the timing of the speech and rejecting implications from Cameron that it had failed to address issues of Islamic extremism and the complex issues of multiculturalism during 13 years in office.

Former home secretary Jack Straw said it was "ill-timed" and "ill-judged". Former Labour minister Margaret Hodge said: "This is a hugely difficult area. I agree that there are some areas where we need strong assimilation – speaking English and abiding by British law.

"But Cameron appears to suggest we can impose a much wider assimilation with British values and the danger is that this approach will perversely entrench those separate identities that he wants to meld.

"The state has to be very cautious in using its power to mould cultural values. Comparisons with far-right groups on the day the EDL is mounting a demonstration is needlessly provocative.

"It is not merely the Muslim community's responsibility to combat extremism; we all have responsibilities, particularly to ensure that minority communities do not feel excluded."

As the row over the prime minister's remarks intensified, Tory co-chairman Baroness Warsi called for an apology from shadow justice secretary Sadiq Khan after he accused Cameron of "writing propaganda for the EDL".

"For Sadiq Khan to smear the prime minister as a rightwing extremist is outrageous and irresponsible. David Cameron has made it clear that he wants to unite Britain around our common values and he has done so in measured language," she said. "It is right that we make it clear: extremism and Islam are not the same thing.

"And, as David said, it's important to stress that terrorism is not linked exclusively to any one religion or ethnic group."

    David Cameron sparks fury from critics who say attack on multiculturalism has boosted English Defence League, G, 5.2.2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/feb/05/david-cameron-speech-criticised-edl

Student protesters target NUS president

Police escort Aaron Porter away from crowds in Manchester on day of protests
against cuts and rise in tuition fees


Share Tracy McVeigh
Guardian.co.uk
Saturday 29 January 2011
17.45 GMT
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 17.45 GMT
on Saturday 29 January 2011.

As thousands of people joined student rallies in Manchester and London today to protest against public spending cuts and the rise in tuition fees, the National Union of Students leader Aaron Porter had to be escorted by police away from angry crowds calling for his resignation.

Some of the protestors in Manchester turned on Porter – who had been due to speak at a rally in the city – calling him a "Tory too". Porter had previously been calling for unity in the student movement, which has fractured as opinions differ over how best to conduct the demos and sit-ins being organised around the country against the cuts and fee increases.

Eggs and oranges were also thrown by a handful of the protesters at Shane Chowen, the NUS vice-president, when he tried to address the crowd. Up to 5,000 people had gathered to hear speeches from trade union leaders and later some scuffles broke out between the police and a group of about 150 people who tried to force their way into the University of Manchester's student union.

In London the protest remained mostly peaceful, though an attempt by a group to break through police lines and reach the Tory party HQ at Millbank – where angry scenes took place at previous demonstrations – resulted in a handful of arrests.

In their march through central London to Parliament, the protesters chanted slogans including: "No ifs, no buts, no education cuts" and banged drums.

Anger at government proposals to raise university tuition fees to £9,000 from next year and scrap the Education Maintenance Allowance were the main focus of the slogans and placards. One drew an analogy between events in north Africa and the UK and read: "Ben Ali, Mubarak ... Cameron, you are next."

At a potential flashpoint along the route – Topshop in the Strand – students stopped to yell abuse directed at owner Philip Green, whose controversial tax arrangements have attracted fury.

"Pay your tax, pay your tax," they chanted.

The store was guarded by a line of police, keeping protesters apart from the bemused shoppers trapped inside.

Police handed out leaflets in London informing protesters about their right to demonstrate and what to do if trouble flared.

Moritz Kaiser, a 17-year-old sixth former from Oxford, was among those protesting.

"The tuition fee hike will affect my family quite badly and it is unnecessary when you look at how much is lost in tax avoidance," he said.

A dual British-German national, he now intends to head to the continent to avoid the additional bill.

"I was going to study here, but in Germany it is only ¤500 a year, and you get a free bus pass," he added.

His friend Lucio Pezzella, also 17 and at a sixth form college in Oxford, said the "wrong people were being punished" for the economic plight the UK finds itself in.

"Ordinary people shouldn't have to pay for a crisis brought on by the bankers," he said.

The general secretary of the UCU lecturers' union, Sally Hunt, addressing the rally in Manchester, accused the government of being at "war with young people".

"It is betraying an entire generation," she said.

    Student protesters target NUS president, G, 29.1.2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/jan/29/student-protesters-nus-president

It's not hard to feel a bit sorry for David Chaytor

He should have known better – but so should all sorts of colleagues, past and present,
who will not be spending the next few months in prison

Friday 7 January 2011
16.58 GMT
Guardian.co.uk
Michael White
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 16.58 GMT on Friday 7 January 2011.
It was last modified at 17.29 GMT on Friday 7 January 2011.

A lot of rough justice has been handed out in the scandal over MPs' expenses, and it's not hard to feel a bit sorry for David Chaytor as the ex-MP got an 18 month jail sentence for fraud. But justice it was – and it had to happen.

Why him and the clutch of others who may follow him? Why not others? Reading a summary of the offences described in court today, it seems that this could not have been administrative error, misjudgment or misunderstanding – all three got other MPs pilloried, often unfairly – but a serious assault on public money in excess of £20,000.

Chaytor should have known better. But so should all sorts of colleagues, past and present, who will not be spending the next few months in the slammer. And Chaytor, at 61, will carry the stigma for the rest of his life.

Ditto Michael Martin, the Speaker hypocritically ousted for a failure of leadership which clearly reflected what most MPs wanted him to do: defend the system. Lucky the financial sophisticates, MPs like David Cameron, who kept it simple by maxing out their allowances on a wholesome second mortgage.

In the 30 or so years I have spent around the Houses of Parliament, this is the worse thing to have befallen the British political class as a whole.

Governments and prime ministers come and go, but this was a blow to the entire system and public confidence in it. Decades may pass before it is forgotten.

Around Westminster, we all knew that MPs' expenses had become a bit lax and would occasionally write about some egregious example. The mileage rate for large cars stick in the mind – Scottish MPs were said to take advantage of it.

But we also knew why the system had arisen and that it was part of a wider culture – private sector (Fleet Street, for example), as well as public – that has since been tightened up. MPs were a special case because successive governments of both parties rarely found the courage to brave public wrath by raising backbench salaries at a time of wage restraint or cuts. Voters don't like it.

Tam Dalyell, the Labour ex-MP, recently told me how the Tory chief whip in 1964 – shortly after he was first elected, a relatively wealthy man – had told the cabinet that some Labour MPs lived in poverty and slept on the overnight train to save rent, while some Tories lived in genteel poverty.

Expenses were deployed to ease the strain and Margaret Thatcher fatally allowed mortgages, not merely rents, to be charged against the taxpayer. MPs in all parties have told me that the pre-Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) fees office would ring them and say: "You're not charging enough."

Here lay the fatal misunderstanding which allowed some MPs to regard their out-of-pocket expenses to be regarded as allowances, paid with no questions asked. The Daily Telegraph failed to provide context of that kind when it systematically worked its way through the leaked CDs, tarring the good with the bad and the slightly careless in the process.

The suspicion remains that the Tory hierarchy was happy to deploy public anger against older, non-Cameroon MPs who were "bed-blocking" safe seats, but not against court favourites. And I suspect Cameron's team reacted better than did Gordon Brown's because it had some prior notice.

Never mind – politics is a rough old business and, by the same token, some Tories still think the Guardian went after Jonathan Aitken and Neil Hamilton because they were Tories, not because they were engaged in misconduct.

Ditto Andy Coulson today. Ditto Vince Cable, for that matter. We are still awaiting the Telegraph's expose of what Tory cabinet members think of Nick Clegg's men.

The expenses regime has been cleaned up. Indeed, the hasty creation of Ipsa to police the new system has created a new problem – unfairness to MPs – which is only slowly being sorted out. The danger is that the job will soon only appeal to hair-shirted puritans with no kids or adult kids, or to those of wealthy independent means. It's already started to reshape the 2010 parliament.

For the record, MPs were unpaid until the radical Liberal chancellor David Lloyd George found them £400 a year in 1910, the annus mirabilis of progressive taxation when LG faced down the Lords. According to the National Archives ready-reckoner, that £400 is worth £22,824 today – so MPs on £65,738 have achieved a steady real-terms pay rise.

Ministers have done less well. Pitt the Younger got £5,000 a year as PM in 1800, a sum worth £160,000 today, but £292,000 in 1850, more stable times. The pay was increased to £10,000 in the 1930s when, according to the reckoner, it would be worth £396,000 in today's funny money.

Thanks to Brown's unilateral cut and his own 5% further cut, Cameron gets £142,000, including his MP's salary.

Investment bankers, busy upping their pay again as we speak, would not answer the phone for that sort of salary, but have suffered far less grief for their sins than MPs have. Who was the last British-based banker you can remember getting 18 months for fraud? And many of them are living off taxpayer largesse, too.

If that does not make you a little uncomfortable, consider the Telegraph's owners, the tax exile privacy freaks Dave and Fred Barclay. Then consider that the Telegraph's CDs have been deployed by the BNP to harry targeted MPs, merited or not. It's still going on.

Like I say, rough justice.

It's not hard to feel a bit sorry for David Chaytor,
G, 7.1.2011,
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/jan/07/david-chaytor-mps-expenses-michael-white