Home secretary James Cleverly has expanded on the Conservative Party’s general election national service proposals. He said the Tories would introduce community service for 18-year-olds who aren’t doing national service.

But the community work Cleverly said they could be doing includes public sector jobs the Tories decimated with austerity. Apparently, we should have unpaid 18-year-olds working as an “on call firefighter” or “special constable”:

James Cleverly, “National Service could be uniformed public services.. Special constable.. On call fire-fighter.. Emergency health responder.. Environmental protection.. Flood defence work”

Cleverly is describing actual jobs, that should be paid for work. Instead the… pic.twitter.com/Jg2E8ju2AF

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) May 26, 2024

Rather than simply funding our public services properly, the Tories are attempting to make young people work in them for free.

Community service thanks to austerity Britain

Take the fire service. From 2013- 2021, the Tories cut central funding for local fire authorities by 30%. Fire Brigade Union general secretary Matt Wrack has said:

More than a decade of Tory cuts has left the fire service overwhelmed, underfunded and badly managed… We have lost 1 in 5 firefighter jobs since 2010, and a large number of stations and fire engines. Response times are now at record highs.

As well as firefighters, Cleverly said 18-year-olds could volunteer in “flood defence work”. But this is another area the Tories have cut in the name of austerity, despite climate change bringing higher risk of flooding in the UK.

Against a backdrop of budget cuts and fewer Environment Agency staff, the Tories abandoned 40% of the houses that it planned to provide with better flood defences by 2027.

The approach makes no sense, given repairing the damage after flooding is a lot more expensive. That’s clear from the Return on Investment (RoI) on flood defence spending.

For every pound the government spends, it could save up to £13 on prevented repair work.

Labour: more of the same at the general election

On the other hand, Labour Party leader Keir Starmer has not committed to reversing Tory cuts. In August 2023, 70 academics called on Labour to break from the austerity orthodoxy:

The maintenance or extension of cuts in the current economic climate will only serve to deepen the poverty and hardship many are already facing.

We believe it is the duty of an opposition to, where necessary, present an alternative vision for the future and when it comes to economics.

Establishment managers in Tory and Labour are both lying that there’s no money left.

On top of that, it looks like the Tories want to make up for some of their austerity cuts by making 18-year-olds work for free. And that’s in some of the most important jobs in the country. We deserve better.

Featured image via BBC i player

By James Wright

Before voters head to the polls in the general election, another likely-to-be damning indictment of the Tories callous cuts to benefits will come to light. Specifically, the government must publish documents detailing the impacts of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) scrapping the Universal Credit uplift that it had introduced during the pandemic.

DWP Universal Credit uplift

In April 2020, the government increased the rate of Universal Credit by £20 a week. However, by October 2021, the Tories ditched the so-called DWP Universal Credit “uplift”.

Naturally, as the Canary consistently reported at the time, scrapping this would hit multiple marginalised groups the hardest. This included numerous warnings that it would further impoverish:

• Almost 3.5 million children in households claiming the benefit.
• Over a fifth of working-age families with children across the country on average. Moreover, in some constituencies, the cut would hit more than three-quarters of working-age families.
• More than 660,000 low-paid keyworkers.

Predictably, despite these warnings from thinktanks, organisations, and campaigners alike, including footballer Marcus Rashford, the Tories ploughed ahead anyway. Moreover, as the Canary had also detailed, the DWP Universal Credit £20 uplift itself was already woefully inadequate.

Notably, a survey of claimants found the paltry increase to the already pitifully low benefit made little difference to social security claimants. In reality then, it didn’t actually do much to lift many claimants out of poverty.

Now, transparency laws will force the government to finally reveal the real-world impact that dropping its DWP Universal Credit uplift had.

ICO orders DWP to reveal report

Notably, the Tory government had previously produced an analysis assessing the impact of its decision to stop the uplift. In particular, this examined the impacts of extending the benefit increase – which would implicitly also reveal the impact of not doing so.

However, it originally refused to disclose this information via the Freedom of Information Act to the Mirror in 2023. As a result, the Mirror pursued this with the Information Commissioner’s Officer (ICO). As the outlet reported:

The government has refused to release an analysis examining the impact of not extending the support. But in a victory for the Mirror, the Information Commissioners’ Office (ICO) has now ordered the Treasury to disclose the details.

Of course, evading transparency laws has been a consistent past-time of successive Tory administrations. For instance, in November 2023, the Disability News Service finally won a protracted freedom of information battle over DWP Universal Credit. This was over another secret report the department had buried for four years on flaws in the DWP Universal Credit system harming vulnerable claimants.

Significantly, the Mirror reported that the ICO issued its decision notice just hours before Sunak called the election. In other words, this was another announcement the Tories could conveniently sweep under the rug of the sudden surge in election coverage.

DWP Universal Credit – a broken system

Given the numerous warnings on the cut’s impact, it’s not likely the report will show anything new. However, the information should always have been in the public domain. With the election incoming, revealing the after-effects of another callous Tory policy is vital now more than ever.

Despite this, neither major party who will ultimately run the country post-election has so far shown a shred of interest in supporting disabled people and those living in poverty.

As the Canary’s Rachel Charlton-Dailey recently pointed out, Labour has launched its campaign and it was tumbleweed on policies for disabled people. Currently, as she highlighted, it hasn’t issued any indication of improving the benefit system. Instead, its focus on “working people” plays into the continuity-Tory back to work blitz.

Moreover, as the Canary also underscored in March, Labour’s shadow work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall has been all over this too.

Ultimately, the impact of the Tory’s cut should be known to the public.

However, while neither party appears to give a shit for disabled people and others its policies push into poverty, it’s a moot point.

Right now, it seems unlikely either will do away with the punitive, wholly inadequate DWP Universal Credit system as a whole – without which, there’ll be no meaningful change for the people its broken social security system has screwed over for years.

Feature image via ODN – DailyMotion

By Hannah Sharland

On Monday 27 May at around 7pm, Greater Manchester Police (GMP) attempted to forcibly gain access and evict the student occupiers of Walid Daqqa (Whitworth) Hall at the University of Manchester; the ongoing occupation against Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the university’s complicity. It comes after cops also moved in at a similar occupation on Oxford University campus.

Cops move in on the University of Manchester occupation

This attempt was blocked by hundreds of students and members of the community who gathered and formed crowds in front of the doors, resisting and deterring the police:

The police responded with violence, including using batons against the protesters and injuring several University of Manchester students:

However, they had no other option but to withdraw after seeing the determination and resilience of the crowd:

This escalation occurred at the end of an emergency protest called by the Greater Manchester community in response to the horrific massacre committed by Israeli occupation forces in Rafah, a designated “safe zone” for the Palestinian refugees in south Gaza.

A spokesperson for the University of Manchester students said:

The student protestors denounce this unwarranted escalation by GMP, particularly the treatment of peaceful protestors, including several instances of physical assault.

The police have yet again proven that they are an oppressive and violent tool of state that aims to silence us while extending endless support to Israel. The student protestors also believe that this confrontation would not have taken place if the University of Manchester had listened to the demands of the student body.

This comes after close to eight months of the escalation of the genocide in Palestine, with at least 35,000 Palestinians killed, and millions displaced by Israel.

Students will not be deterred

Students have been campaigning since October for the University of Manchester to end its complicity with the ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, with three previous building occupations and the recent Manchester Camp of Resistance for Palestine in Dr Adnan al-Bursh (Brunswick) Park, leading to the current occupation of Walid Daqqa Hall. The students’ demands are that the University of Manchester must:

1. End its partnership with BAE Systems.
2. Cut ties with Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
3. Adopt a policy ensuring that all research is ethical and doesn’t contribute towards the arms trade.
4. Not pursue disciplinary action against any students involved in the Encampment, occupations or other protests.

One of the University of Manchester student occupiers said:

The Greater Manchester Community stands together for Palestine. We see the actions of the Police as what they are: defending the right of a state to commit genocide. We refuse to allow our University to follow suit, UoM must Disclose, Divest, Demilitarise.

The Manchester Camp of Resistance for Palestine remains as steadfast as ever in its struggle against the University’s deadly ties, and not amount of repression will deter us.

Featured image and additional image supplied

By The Canary

The media plastered a fake story that Hamas beheaded babies in its 7 October attack across the front pages. But now footage has circulated of actual beheaded Palestinian babies, the media is silent.

Israel designated a new safe zone in Rafah and then bombed it, killing at least 45 Palestinians who were mostly women and children. The bombardment caused a fire that swept through the camp of displaced people. The Palestine Red Crescent Society said many of those Israel killed were “burned alive” inside their tents.

Media double standards

Corporate media complicity in Israel’s genocidal assault became clearer as footage emerged of Palestinian babies beheaded in the bombardment.

The outrage is nowhere to be seen. But when the IDF planted a story that Hamas had beheaded babies in its 7 October attack, the coverage was rampant.

The Times ran the front page “Hamas cut the throats of babies”. The Daily Mail went with “This was a Holocaust plain and simple”. The Independent‘s front page stated “they decapitated women and children”. And the Daily Express’ read “Horror at pure evil beheading of babies”.

The wall-to-wall coverage was also discussed on UK broadcast media. And in the US, president Joe Biden kept repeating false claims that he’d seen photos:

I never really thought that I would see and have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.

Outlets like CNN also repeated the IDF story.

But there is no evidence of the claim, as Israel admitted. Israeli reserve soldier David Ben Zion was a key source of the propaganda.

Ben Zion is a leader of the Shomron Regional Council of 35 illegal West Bank settlements. He called in February 2023 for the destruction of a Palestinian village:

The village of Huwara should be wiped out, this place is a nest of terror and the punishment should be for everyone

He also previously stated Palestinian people have “barbaric DNA”.

Genocidal statements, amplified by the media

This is the type of racist, dehumanising rhetoric fueling Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people. And again media complicity has amplified such statements.

Multiple times on BBC Newsnight the presenter has allowed genocidal language to go unchallenged. Appearing on the show, Israeli politician Danny Danon referred to slaughtered Palestinians as “barbaric animals”.

Former Israeli ambassador Dan Gillerman also called Palestinians “human animals” on BBC Newsnight. Both times, the host did not challenge the claims.

Elsewhere, defence minister Yoav Gallant has said “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly”. And Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said “This is a battle not only of Israel against these barbarians, it’s a battle of civilization against barbarism”.

International Criminal Court top prosecutor Karim Khan is seeking arrest warrants for Gallant and Netanyahu for leading the war crimes against Palestinian people, including intentionally starving them.

The looming arrest warrants cannot come soon enough. Israel has killed 36,615 Palestinian people including over 15,000 children since 7 October.

If the media didn’t treat Palestinian lives as less worthy than Israelis, we wouldn’t already be in this position.

Featured image via Lowkey0nline – X

By James Wright

Climate crisis activists took French fossil fuel firm TotalEnergies to task at its annual general meeting. Unsurprisingly, the climate-wrecking company proved their action warranted, as it announced plans to double-down on fossil fuels.

Activists take on TotalEnergies at AGM

As TotalEnergies shareholders convened for their AGM, Greenpeace activists scaled the building:

WANTED: Patrick Poyanné, CEO of @TotalEnergies is wanted for fuelling the climate crisis

French activists from @greenpeacefr unfolded a 100m2 gigantic banner at the @TotalEnergies' AGM.

Scientists have been warning @TotalEnergies about this catastrophe since early 1970s.… pic.twitter.com/LCpFY6d04v

— Greenpeace International (@Greenpeace) May 24, 2024

They unfurled an enormous wanted poster style banner with TotalEnergies’ boss Patrick Pouyanne’s face:

[ ACTION] Nos activistes sont en ce moment à La Défense car nous recherchons activement le patron de @TotalEnergies, Patrick Pouyanné.

On vous explique tout sur l'AG des #100ansdetrop [Thread 1/10] pic.twitter.com/yZj9PunjH0

— Greenpeace France (@greenpeacefr) May 24, 2024

The banner branded Pouyanne “the leader of France’s most polluting company”.

In March, the company marked its 100 year anniversary. Then too, Greenpeace rained on the corporations celebratory parade. Notably, in a serendipitous ruling, a judge dismissed a legal case TotalEnergies had issued to silence the campaign group.

Meanwhile, several hundred Extinction Rebellion activists gathered near the Paris offices of Amundi. The French asset manager is among TotalEnergies’ biggest shareholders.

The boss of TotalEnergies told shareholders Friday the French energy giant needed to develop new oil fields to meet global demand, as their AGM was picketed by the climate activists.

Predictably, cops came to scenes. As Extinction Rebellion activists occupied Amundi’s offices, French authorities begun issuing a number of arrests. At the TotalEnergies AGM, police quickly acted to protect corporate interests, taking down Greenpeace’s unflattering wanted banner.

Climate strategy and hot air

So while cops shielded the corporate climate criminals from the protesters, inside the AGM, Pouyanne was waxing lyrical about fossil fuels.

First, he claimed that higher oil prices prompted by insufficient fossil fuel output:

would quickly become unbearable for the populations in emerging countries, but also in our developed countries

Of course, TotalEnergies is exploiting oil and gas in a number of these so-called “emerging countries”. For instance, this includes its notorious and human-rights violating East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) in Tanzania and Uganda.

Pouyane purportedly argued that demand for oil was growing in line with the global population. In another predictable display of blatant greenwashing, Pouyanne also promised that TotalEnergies would pursue its “balanced strategy” of developing both fossil fuel and low-carbon energy production.

Unironically, the oil and gas giant boss said that TotalEnergies had provided proof that it was possible:

to be a profitable, or even the most profitable, company while pursuing a transformation

Naturally, at Friday’s meeting, shareholders shored up their profits. Nearly 80% of them approved their company’s woefully inadequate climate strategy. Additionally, over two thirds voted to renew Pouyanne as the company’s CEO.

“Wanted” for crimes against people and the planet

Of course, climate activists and campaigners have repeatedly exposed this as palpable greenwashing bullshit.

As the Canary reported on the 21 May, a new report by Oil Change International revealed the company’s climate catastrophic trajectory. Specifically, its continued emphasis on developing new oil and gas projects will send temperatures soaring well beyond the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°c limit.

TotalEnergies’ latest piety to expanding fossil fuels comes as a group of nonprofits and members of the public have launched legal action against the company. The Canary previously explained that through the case:

they are calling to try the company for involuntary manslaughter and other consequences of climate crisis “chaos”.

Crucially, the case targets the company’s board, including Pouyanne and major shareholders that backed its climate strategy.

As the stakes on climate breakdown grow, fossil fuel companies dig their heels in. However, climate activists and campaign organisations will continue to use all avenues to hold these criminal planet-killing corporations to account.

As climate activists plastered Pouyanne’s ‘wanted’ poster at its AGM, TotalEnergies’ latest shareholder shenanigans only proved their point.

Feature and in-text images via Greenpeace

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

By Hannah Sharland

Unfavourable weather conditions, technical malfunction, sabotage: the crash of the Bell 212 helicopter with the president of Iran Ebrahim Raisi on board continues to be a focal point of discussion on the Middle East agenda. But what is the reality of what happened? And is a theory of US involvement legitimate?

Raisi: what we know so far

The preliminary report issued by the general staff of the Iranian Armed Forces which was supposed to clarify the circumstances of the tragic event, did not put an end to the speculations.

Although the document explicitly states that no impact of bullets or other striking elements was found on the remains of the aircraft, the idea that the presidential helicopter was sabotaged remains on the list of the possible explanations.

However, officials, even Iranians themselves, take great effort to abstain from any statements that could encourage the supporters of this theory.

Perhaps, former Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Jawad Zarif came the closest to a real accusation: he said that the US is responsible for the crash, but only in the sense that Iran is subjected to US sanctions prohibiting sale of aircraft and technologies.

Judging by Zarif’s words, even in their accusations directed to the US Iranian officials actually consider technical malfunction of a decades old helicopter to be the reason of the incident.

Amazingly, Western officials, experts, and media don’t voice any substantial objections. Spokesman of the State Department Matthew Miller stated that Iran often uses its aircraft well beyond the lifespan due to the punitive measures against the country. Washington does not plan to cancel the sanctions, he added.

Miller’s remarks were followed by multiple articles in the US media. The technical malfunction theory was embraced and promoted by the Washington Post, Forbes, Bloomberg, and other publications. Bell Tech corporation, the manufacturer of the crashed helicopter, insisted it had no working relations with Iran as well.

It is the technical malfunction theory, that has apparently become the main lead, solid? We’ll try to look into it by working with the available data.

Technical malfunction? Weather?

On 19 May, Ebrahim Raisi and his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliev took part in an inauguration of a dam on the Araks river at the Iran-Azerbaijan border. After the ceremony Raisi, foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, and Tebriz imam Mohammad Ali Ale-Hashem set for Tebriz.

All of them went aboard of the same Bell 212, although there were three aircrafts available. They flew over a mountainous region of the Iranian Eastern Azerbaijan province. Two helicopters arrived safely to their destination, but the president’s aircraft lost radio contact.

After hours of search and rescue operation that was joined by Turkish UAVs and specialists at the request of the Iranians, the emergency responders located the crash site. All passengers, including imam al-Hashem, who had previously managed to respond to a number of phone calls, were found dead.

It should be noted that Raisi initially planned to visit Armenia that day, while Amir-Abdollahian was to inaugurate the dam with Azerbaijan’s Aliev, but the plan had been changed because of diplomatic protocol.

Poor weather conditions were cited as the initial reason for the crash. Indeed, in the first few hours after the presidential helicopter went off the radar local media reported about an extremely heavy fog in the area.

Back then it was speculated that the pilot could have failed to evade obstruction due to low visibility or simply made an emergency landing in accordance with safety regulations. Experts on aviation later stressed that the pilot even had the right to refuse to take off in such weather conditions.

Iran: elements of doubt

However, Golamhossein Esmaili, presidential chief of staff who was aboard another helicopter, explained to the Iranian media that the weather conditions were actually not so unfavorable as it might have seemed.

There was no fog. Maybe in the ravines there was fog, but there was no fog on our flight route. Clouds were slightly above the helicopter.

There were three helicopters flying the same route. Could it mean that none of the pilots believed the fog to be a risk? Or they decided to shrug it off, as well as the regulation that prohibits multiple high-ranking officials from boarding the same aircraft?

This strange chain of coincidences provided a fertile ground for another theory: the president of Iran was assassinated and became a victim of an internal power struggle. Turkish experts point out that Raisi was believed to eventually succeed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as the supreme ruler. After his demise, the list of contestants is down to Khamenei’s son Mojtaba and the speaker of parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.

Casting internal conflicts aside, it could be that Raisi’s death was orchestrated by external actors.

Israel and the US

Both Israel and the US are in confrontation with Iran. They are also allies with Azerbaijan, providing them with motive as well as capability to strike out at the Iranian leader.

At this point it would be premature to accuse Israel. After the recent escalation between Tel-Aviv and Tehran they reached a fragile balance, one that Israel is keen to secure as it continues its military operation in the Gaza Strip. ‘

This is why the Israeli media just hours after the first reports of the helicopter disappearance hurriedly announced that Israel is not responsible for the incident. Or, perhaps, it was not a statement of denial, but a hint: we didn’t do it, but we know who did.

The US chose another tactic: instead of denials they came up with a fully-fledged theory – technical malfunction – which returns us to the cynical statement by Matthew Miller: yes, the helicopter of the Iranian president crashed because of US sanctions, but the Iranians are to blame.

Could it be that Washington bears not circumstantial but rather direct responsibility for the incident?

Iran-Raisi crash: we won’t know yet

There are some arguments in favour of this theory: US special services could have easily reached out to the aircraft manufacturer to establish weak points of the helicopter and select an appropriate way to attack them.

The conclusion about the absence of bullet impact made by the Iranian general staff adds to the possibility that the helicopter was sabotage by other means to cover the tracks.

What were these means, and who used them – this is what the investigation must establish.

Featured image via CEPA

By Hakan Demir

Over the weekend, several Labour Party MP’s took to X to condemn Israel’s barbaric attacks on the refugee camp in Rafah – oddly just as the general election kicked off. 

Whilst Israel have been unlawfully bombing occupied Gaza since October, on Saturday 25 May they took it to a new level. They brutally bombed a refugee camp in Rafah – a designated safe zone. 

Funnily enough, some of the Labour MP’s tweeting to condemn Israel’s actions, are supporters of Labour Friends of Israel (LFI). 

Labour Friends of Israel

LFI describes itself as:

 a Westminster based lobby group working within the British Labour Party to promote the State of Israel.

As of January this year, LFI had 73 MP’s as parliamentary supporters or officers of the organisation, along with 37 lords and 4 MSPs. Ironically, LFIs website states: 

We promote a vision of peace founded on coexistence, cooperation, and mutual respect and recognition between the Israeli and Palestinian peoples.

Given the current atrocities that the Israeli government is committing both in Gaza and the West Bank it is laughable that MP’s have not called out LFI.

We need to start confronting the Labour Friends of Israel, who funds them and why? pic.twitter.com/NzMQHv793z

— #EastMidlandsSocialist voting Independent!!!! (@cooke550) May 23, 2024

Pure hypocrisy amid the general election

Although many Labour MP’s tweeted in support of Rafah over the weekend, some of them received more backlash than others. First up, was Jess Phillips – Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley:

The images coming out of Rafah are horrendous, for weeks the UK government have claimed to be against it but have done nothing when many of us begged that a message must be sent that these killings would not be tolerated. It’s now too late.

— Jess Phillips MP (@jessphillips) May 26, 2024

However, people were quick to shut her down. Whilst she was one of 56 Labour MP’s that voted for a ceasefire in November, she is still a parliamentary supporter of LFI. 

You have been silent and complicit yourself for MONTHS. Condemn Labour Friends of Israel @_LFI NOW and present a commitment that a Labour government will cut all funding and support for Israel, including LFI, otherwise YOU SUPPORT THIS

— Tiberius (@ecomarxi) May 26, 2024

Are LFI stores of hypocrisy limitless?
Is it just that killing Palestinian kids will be just fine again on July 5th?

— Wise Guy (@OldYesButWise) May 27, 2024

David Lammy also tweeted:

We condemn the appalling strikes on a supposed ‘safe zone’ in Rafah.@UKLabour have opposed an Israeli offensive in Rafah for months. Israel must now comply with the ICJ’s orders.

We need an immediate ceasefire to end this war, get all the hostages out and get aid into Gaza. pic.twitter.com/qblhfjPDu6

— David Lammy (@DavidLammy) May 27, 2024

The memory of a goldfish

Perhaps David thinks the British public are stupid – or perhaps he conveniently has the memory of a goldfish, because only back in November he made a statement in which he said bombing a refugee camp could be justified, if there was a military objective.

He is also a parliamentary supporter of LFI, and notably, he also abstained on the ceasefire vote in parliament last November along with 140 of his colleagues.:

You, David Lammy, said it was legally justifiable for Israel to bomb refugee camps.

You should be reminded of these words every single day during this election.

Do not vote Labour. pic.twitter.com/iFJ3gVzEPN https://t.co/pNuNhmsVKw

— George Aylett (@GeorgeAylett) May 27, 2024

Last time David was asked to comment on the bombing of a refugee camp he said “war is ugly” and “bombing a refugee camp can be legally justified”.

This was barely a few months ago? Why is this refugee camp bad, while the other was justified? https://t.co/IFcS4twEU8

— Chłoddy (@OfSymbols) May 27, 2024

Not to be mistaken for a man with a heart, the guy is keen to get re-elected. Obviously war crimes can be ignored until there is an election to win:

Last time David was asked to comment on the bombing of a refugee camp he said “war is ugly” and “bombing a refugee camp can be legally justified”.

This was barely a few months ago? Why is this refugee camp bad, while the other was justified? https://t.co/IFcS4twEU8

— Chłoddy (@OfSymbols) May 27, 2024

Many people also pointed out that some of the MP’s now condoning the actions in Rafah have in fact taken dirty money from pro-Israel lobbyists – which Declassified reported on back in November. They revealed that 13 of 31 members of Labour’s shadow cabinet received donations from pro-Israel lobby groups or individual.

One of these was Angela Rayner. When she tweeted on the scenes in Rafah, someone mentioned that she had previously taken money from LFI. Although it is worth mentioning that she is not a parliamentary supporter of LFI:

Angela Rayner takes money from Labour Friends of Israel.
More crocodile tears.https://t.co/98KZSEKdCh

— IainCrawford (@IainCrawford) May 27, 2024

Wes Streeting is another MP who’s actions speak louder than his words. He decided to quote tweet his pal David Lammy:

David is right. The images emerging from Rafah are extremely distressing and underline why so many of us opposed the mere suggestion of this appalling action. https://t.co/EqZbib4MKo

— Wes Streeting (@wesstreeting) May 27, 2024

Now this is particularly laughable, when in January he labelled the South African case at the ICJ a ‘distraction’. Again, he is a parliamentary supporter of LFI:

Never forget Wes Streeting called the South African case at the ICJ a distraction.

These Labour politicians are shameless now that he’s feeling the pressure from @LeanneMohamad he wants to pretend he’s always been on the right side of history.

Ilford North vote him out! https://t.co/eZUJgHQjsw pic.twitter.com/syVFaZLuqb

— Newham Independents (@NewhamIndParty) May 27, 2024

Luckily, their hypocrisy didn’t go unnoticed. 

Wretched hypocrites both.

They gave political cover for genocide and failed to call for a ceasefire for months.

Now they fail to call for a ban on arms sales. https://t.co/P9NKKux6xe

— Alan Gibbons (@mygibbo) May 27, 2024

Words are cheap @wesstreeting – devoid of meaning unless followed by action.

Will you be resigning from Labour Friends of Israel Mr Streeting?

Will you be returning the funding you have received from pro Israeli lobby?

Interesting article by the wayhttps://t.co/H7gegvWIAw https://t.co/sScWU5bUK1

— Trish #freepalestine (@caro_resist) May 27, 2024

Labour friends of genocide

It seems that now Labour has a general election to contest, Its position has quickly changed.  But the fact that anyone within the Labour party has ever, and is still supporting a genocidal state is ridiculous:

So why is there still a Labour friends of Israel when the Israeli regime are committing war crimes and murdering children ? How is it acceptable. They are committing genocide and we the public find it sickening. It’s unacceptable. A huge red line. https://t.co/MaT34CMvkL

— Catherine #Fightfordecency (@dem_cath) May 27, 2024

If Labour really valued Palestinian lives – as it now clearly want us to believe – it wouldn’t have taken the party and its MPs 136 days to call for an ‘immediate humanitarian ceasefire’.

Waiting 136 days to call for a ceasefire, and then only strongly condemning Israel’s actions when a general election is at stake, shows the utter hypocrisy of our potential future leaders. 

By HG

Less than two days after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered Israel to “immediately halt” its genocidal siege in Rafah on Friday 24 May, it brutally butchered 45 Palestinians it had displaced to a refugee camp there.

Social media filled with horrific posts detailing testimonies of this latest abhorrent massacre in the supposed ‘safe zone’. So of course, Western political leaders and corporate media were acting out varying degrees of their usual genocide apologist routine.

Israel airstrike on a Rafah refugee camp

On Sunday, Israel burned 45 people to death in a UN refugee camp in Rafah. It had classified the site a ‘safe zone’ for Palestinians it had forcibly and violently displaced from other parts of Gaza. Despite this, the settler colonial state launched a deadly strike on the camp where Gazans were sheltering away from Israel’s brutal assault.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israel’s strike ignited a fire that tore through the displacement centre in northwestern Rafah. It launched this attack near a facility of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

Palestinians journalists in Gaza, like Hossam Shabat, reported the harrowing reality of Israel’s crime:

About last night’s massacre in Rafah. People were looking for the injured using their phone flashlights. Fathers were desperately looking for their children’s remains with a phone flashlight, parents were using their bare hands collecting their children’s body parts. People were…

— حسام شبات (@HossamShabat) May 27, 2024

Palestinian reporter Hind Khoudary emphasised the fact Israel had designated this a safe zone, but still committed this latest atrocity regardless:

A lethal massacre is unfolding against displaced civilians near the UNRWA logistics base in Tal Al-Sultan, located in the western part of Rafah. Israeli aircraft have shelled several tents in this area, resulting in numerous martyrs and casualties. Many have been transported to…

— Hind Khoudary (@Hind_Gaza) May 26, 2024

Civil defence agency official Mohammad al-Mughayyir said:

We saw charred bodies and dismembered limbs … We also saw cases of amputations, wounded children, women and the elderly.

One survivor, a woman who declined to be named, said:

We heard a loud sound and there was fire all around us. The children were screaming.

Footage from the Palestinian Red Crescent Society showed chaotic night-time scenes of paramedics racing to the attack site and evacuating the wounded.

Mughayyir said Israel’s brutal ongoing siege has led to severe shortages of fuel and “water to extinguish fires”. As a result, he said that this had also compounded the impact of this latest attack – hugely hampering rescue efforts. Of course, Israel has been purposely cutting off fuel and water as an instrument of its mass-scale ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

Western political leaders issue tepid condemnation

This latest massacre comes after the ICJ ordered Israel to stop its genocidal military bombardment and ground invasion in Rafah. Specifically, on Friday 24 May, the ICJ ordered Israel to halt any offensive in Rafah and elsewhere that could bring about “the physical destruction” of the Palestinians.

Predictably, while South Africa spearheaded this effort to hold Israel accountable, Western leaders issued tepid condemnation.

For instance, French president Emmanuel Macron wrote on X that:

these operations must stop. There are no safe areas in Rafah for Palestinian civilians.

Naturally, the EU also continued its handwringing with more hollow words backed up by no real action. Foreign ministers agreed to call a meeting with Israel to get it to explain its actions in Rafag despite a UN court order to halt it. The bloc’s top diplomat Josep Borrell called the strike “horrifying”.

However, as Euronews reported, Borrell said that at the meeting:

there was no unanimous appetite to consider sanctioning Israel for its actions in Gaza

So, after Israel blatantly and brutally violated the ICJ’s order in real-time, the EU all but shrugged its shoulders:

Many on X pointed out that this response revealed shocking levels of hypocrisy after months of complicity in Israel’s crimes:

Some Western leaders are “outraged” with Israel’s attacks in Rafah, yet this outrage never translates into sanctions against Israel. This feigned outrage is just a way to hide their complicity.

— Jairo I Fúnez-Flores (@Jairo_I_Funez) May 27, 2024

Mrs von der Leyen, will you now apologise for projecting Israel’s flag on the EU buildings? Will you now project the Palestinian flag? Or will you repeat your shameful cheering on of IDF tanks before their genocidal assault on Gaza? Just asking… https://t.co/xnK4MLmjaz

— Yanis Varoufakis (@yanisvaroufakis) May 27, 2024

Silence in the face of another atrocity

Of course, some Western war criminals in arms couldn’t be bothered to even acknowledge the attack.

A US National Security Council spokesperson proffered the lukewarm demand Israel “must take every precaution possible to protect civilians”. However, after kicking up a fuss over the International Criminal Court’s recent arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Biden was noticeably, nowhere in sight:

Biden was so quick to express outrage over the ICC wanting arrest warrants for Israel, but is silent while they massacre refugees in tents.

We’ve seen the charred bodies of *babies* and he won’t even condemn it, but you say he’s the lesser evil. What’s more evil than genocide?

— Assal Rad (@AssalRad) May 28, 2024

Similarly, Sunak and Starmer simply couldn’t divert their attention from the election fever for long enough to acknowledge Israel’s latest war crime:

Labour MPs tweeting word for word the comments of Starmer on Netanyahu & Rafah

No calls for boycott, sanctions, arms embargo, arrest warrants or imposing ICJ rulings

Unconscionable that on genocide we do not have MPs of independent thought

They do not deserve your vote. https://t.co/JE6KRhQCcM

— Howard Beckett (@BeckettUnite) May 27, 2024

It was only when a reporter prompted Starmer that he finally spoke about Israel’s abhorrent massacre in Rafah. However, as Unite’s Howard Beckett highlighted, it was more empty demands.

Then, Starmer’s dutiful band of parliamentary stooges repeated his stock response en masse:

Labour MPs tweeting word for word the comments of Starmer on Netanyahu & Rafah

No calls for boycott, sanctions, arms embargo, arrest warrants or imposing ICJ rulings

Unconscionable that on genocide we do not have MPs of independent thought

They do not deserve your vote. https://t.co/JE6KRhQCcM

— Howard Beckett (@BeckettUnite) May 27, 2024

As the Canary’s HG reported today, this was only too predictable, given that many Labour MPs rub shoulders with Israel.

Unsurprisingly, Sunak has uttered not a word of condemnation either. As one poster pointed out, he’s still riding the giddy wave of unfettered corporate press fanfare over his latest hare-brained media stunt.

Israel bombs people sheltering in TENTS in Rafah & the carnage & bloodbath is evident. This is happening now. People have been burnt alive! Meanwhile @BBCNews & @SkyNews are talking about Sunak’s pathetic military service IDEA.#IsraeliWarCrimes#StopGenocideInGaza https://t.co/x7EkuIsNcg

— Dr Fauzia Ahmad (@brisofa) May 26, 2024

Unfortunately, it’s working, as the shill media has yet to press him on Israel’s appalling attack in Rafah.

Corporate media complicity continues unabated

In fact, everywhere, corporate media coverage of the abhorrent attack on the Rafah refugee camp has played up Netanyahu’s narrative.

Starmer’s response to the slaughter of Rafah:

No mention of boycott
No mention of sanctions
No mention of arms embargo
No mention of arrest warrants
No mention of the ICC rulings

He says nothing. It’s just words

A vote for him is a vote for genocide.pic.twitter.com/F6FXtq4Roy

— Howard Beckett (@BeckettUnite) May 27, 2024

Meanwhile, the BBC was laying cover for Israel by splitting hairs between its so-called ‘ground invasion’, and its ongoing indiscriminate airstrikes:

“Their operations so far have not resulted in a bloodbath.”

BBC reports on the day after Israel’s tent massacre in Rafah. pic.twitter.com/plPktpB5qd

— Lowkey (@Lowkey0nline) May 27, 2024

Some exposed the overt double-standards at play, referring back to the notorious ‘beheaded babies’ lie:

“Many of the newspapers… The Metro, The Times, The Telegraph.. leading on these reports… 40 babies died, and some of them had been beheaded.”

None of those papers have shown or mentioned the images of actual beheaded babies from Rafah today.pic.twitter.com/FaWzu01IjP

— Lowkey (@Lowkey0nline) May 27, 2024

Unsurprisingly the journalists who propagated the beheaded babies lie are keeping quiet about the video of a beheaded Palestinian child from the Rafah camp massacre.

We will not forget, we will not forgive.

— Dr. Yara Hawari د. يارا هواري (@yarahawari) May 27, 2024

In other words, Western corporate media outlets unquestioningly parrot Israel’s unproven propaganda. Meanwhile, when Palestinians share graphic video evidence and reports of real Israeli atrocities, the press is silent.

Of course, this is the Western corporate media machine operating exactly as intended to uphold imperial interests:

whenever Israel has a PR crisis because people can see them mass murdering babies and children, beheading them, burning them alive, Zionist propagandists come up with a deranged patently absurd deflection, the point of which is to get you to stop talking about them mass killing…

— (@zei_squirrel) May 27, 2024

Upholding the colonial-capitalist hegemony

Eight months into an atrocious, unrelenting genocide, and the Western political and media establishment continues to spout a spineless, heartless merry-go-round of Israel propaganda. That these apologists for Israel’s crimes barely bat an eye at another gut-wrenching war crime is not surprising.

Ultimately, arbiters of the colonial-capitalist hegemony will always regard Palestinian lives as expendable. More than 35,000 murders later, and a ever-burgeoning horror-show of war crimes – evidently, that fact has not changed.

Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse

Feature image via Associated Press – Youtube

By Hannah Sharland

According to a coalition of non-governmental organisations, Europe’s rivers, lakes and ground water contain “alarming” levels of a pesticide-like forever chemical.

TFA forever chemicals

Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) is a very strong acid that we widely use in cosmetics, non-stick pans, and fire extinguishers. Unfortunately though, it is a type of PFA – which we also know as a forever chemical. There are around 10,000 of these. They are able to remain in the environment and accumulate in the bloodstream, bones, and tissue of various organisms, including humans.

It is not known exactly how long it takes for PFAS to degrade, but estimates are between a decade to well over 1,000 years. 

In recent years, scientists have discovered them in water, air, fish and soil in the most remote corners of the earth. However, concerns have started to grow over their possible impact on human health. 

The new report, which was released on Monday 27 May, found that:

All water samples analysed contained PFAS. More than 98 per cent of the total PFAS detected were TFA, a known degradation product of PFAS pesticides and other PFAS.

In total, the European Pesticide Action Network (PAN Europe) and its members analysed over 24 surface and groundwater samples from 10 EU countries and found PFAS in all of them. 

They said the abundance of TFA in particular represented “the largest known area-wide contamination by a man-made chemical”. This well exceeds limits proposed by the EU.

Alarming levels of contamination

In the EU, the drinking water directive limit is 500mg/l for total PFA’s. Shockingly, 79% of the samples had levels exceeding this. 

PAN Europe said in their report: 

The extent of the contamination is alarming and calls for decisive action.

One of the biggest sources of TFA is the use of pesticides. Additionally, certain cooling systems also release them into the atmosphere meaning eventually, they enter the water cycle through rain.  

TFA is highly soluble in water, this makes it the perfect groundwater contaminant. It is also extremely mobile and good at avoiding soil and other natural filters which ordinarily remove pollutants. This allows them to remain in the groundwater for centuries. 

The EU has committed to gradually ban PFA chemicals as they aim for a pollution-free environment. Additionally, since February 2023 the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has had a proposal for a group ban on the manufacture, use and import of PFAS.

Whilst research is still ongoing to understand the risk PFAS pose to human health, so far it suggests they can cause various types of cancer, risks to pregnancy, and changes to both cholesterol levels and liver enzymes. 

PAN Europe have called the findings a ‘’political failure’’ and called for urgent interventions including a rapid ban on PFA’s and rethink on the threat posed by individual chemicals, such as TFA.

Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse

Featured image via Matti Blume – Wikimedia, resized to 1200×900 under licence CC BY-SA 3.0

By HG

With the Labour Party enjoying a strong lead in the polls ahead of the general election, many people are watching what Wes Streeting says closely about the NHS. After all, he hopes to become our next secretary of state for health and social care in a matter of weeks, and he’s certainly not the quiet, retiring type.

In fact, he has a particular style of communication which has emerged over the past year or so, and I thought I’d explain what I’ve observed.

Wes Streeting: a journalist’s dream – especially for the right

Wes Streeting is a journalist’s dream, because he makes bold statements which lend themselves to the sort of inflammatory headlines which drive a huge amount of outrage, clicks, and ad revenue. Streeting has also been interviewed by a whole range of media outlets in recent months, which allegedly span the range of the political spectrum.

This, in itself, is incredibly revealing. We’re meant to believe that certain media outlets have a politically progressive editorial agenda, when they’re printing very similar content and opinion pieces to some proudly right-wing publications.

I’ve been campaigning for the NHS for almost a decade now, and I’ve learnt that politicians have different styles when they want to convince us that they will save the NHS.

For many years now, politicians have undermined the NHS through the policies they have pushed through parliament, and through budgetary restraints that they have intentionally enacted. Meanwhile, they have enabled the proliferation of privatisation in various ways, and there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that it has helped.

During this time, however, those in charge have been keen to tell the public that they are doing these things to help, and that their actions are in the best interests of the public and the future of the NHS.

The personas of health secretaries

Each health secretary has taken on a different persona; a political personality.

Matt Hancock liked to be seen as a nice guy. He’d tell us that he loved the NHS, and seemed to take every opportunity to associate himself with the service, in a bid to bask in the glow of its public support.

Sajid Javid had a tougher approach; he seemed to like pitching himself as a sensible person who was willing to have the tough conversations that others avoided.

Wes Streeting’s persona is different to both of these, and all of the other recent health secretaries too. In fact, it’s a persona which only seems to emerge in reaction to other things, other people, who he sees as threats.

He is very keen to impress upon us that he is not afraid of any of these imaginary threats, and will fight them (presumably on our behalf?).

Streeting likes to tell us that he’s unafraid of pushing back on trade unions, and he would like you to know that he “won’t give in” to striking NHS workers who are fighting for a fair wage.

He received a lot of attention recently when he attacked “middle class lefties”, who he is concerned are somehow trying to thwart his planned revival of the NHS.

Those pesky trade unions, and NHS workers holding our crumbling health service together, and politically active members of our society who are advocating for an end to profit-creation within public healthcare! If any of these groups feel irksome to you, then don’t worry, Streeting’s on the case!

Streeting: NHS privatisation via the backdoor

However, the case he is actually making, when it comes down to it, is to involve more privatisation in the NHS, which he claims will help to bring down the waiting lists.

The waiting lists are terrifyingly long, even longer than they were when Rishi Sunak pledged to reduce them back in January 2023, with around 7.5 million cases currently awaiting treatment. It therefore makes perfect sense for any new government to tackle the situation.

However, Streeting has the wrong approach.

The private healthcare sector does not have any meaningful “spare capacity” to save the NHS, and the vast majority of doctors working in the private healthcare sector in the UK have NHS jobs too. If Labour wins the next election and expands the workload of the private sector, this will simply result in private healthcare companies poaching (yet more) NHS staff to do the work.

For months now, NHS campaigners have been speaking up about this, because the plan simply isn’t logical, and we haven’t been alone.

Many organisations have questioned Labour’s plans, and many members of the public have been extremely vocal too. Now, even a private healthcare boss has criticised the plans. Justin Ash, the CEO of Spire Healthcare, spoke to the Times to say that Labour’s plans to rely on private hospitals to bring down waiting lists is “unlikely to work”.

Labour needs a rethink

If Wes Streeting wants to be taken seriously as a future health and social care secretary, and truly wants to rebuild the NHS, he needs to have a re-think.

Firstly, he and Keir Starmer need to change their plans, because their bid to increase NHS privatisation isn’t going to help patients.

Secondly, Streeting needs to stop attacking the people who are holding the NHS together, and those fighting for its future too.

I won’t take him seriously until he does.

Featured image via the Canary

By Dr Julia Grace Patterson

And we’re off! This week, of course, saw Rishi finally put his big boy pants on and call a general election – which conveniently buried a load of news about the DWP.

General election shambles

It was an utterly baffling decision for everyone. Not only are the Tories further behind in the polls than ever but the little snake gave everyone just a few hour’s notice. Even poor ole pig fucker David Cameron was getting some bizarre dictator-style welcome in Albania that he had to call off.

And now we’re seeing the absolute shambles that is Rishi’s campaign playing out. In the first few days of the campaign alone we’ve seen him:

• Ask Welsh people if they’re excited for the football they’re not in.
• Visit the Titanic’s birthplace.
• Make his own staff pose as working-class people to ask questions.
• Have a picture taken in front of an exit sign.
• Be confused by bread.
• Build a literal red wall. 

And then just when you thought he couldn’t fail anymore, he announces he’s shipping your kids off to war.

Nothing to see here

Of course, we know what the Tories love doing more than anything else is burying news that makes them look bad, and this is especially true for anything DWP-or disability-related. 

So whilst they’re shitting themselves in public and hoping we don’t go looking at the real issues, here I am to bring them to the front – not the front Rishi wants our teenagers on though.

Human rights watchdog investigating if the DWP are murderers

Way back on Wednesday morning – before Rishi stood in the pissing rain – it was announced that the EHRC would be launching an inquiry into DWP treatment of disabled benefits claimants. There would be a particular focus on DWP benefits deaths, which is interesting when the new policy would cause far more deaths. 

It’s interesting this was rushed out on the same day that the will-he won’t-he tension reached a fever pitch. This meant any reporting on the watchdog holding the DWP to account was as drowned out as Rishi was by Steve Bray’s sound system. 

Only fraudsters are the ones in the cabinet

While the government and especially the DWP have been fearmongering about benefit fraud and cracking down on disability benefits for months, their own figures found that there was almost no cases of disability benefit fraud last year. 

That’s right, the government’s own data found that in the financial year ending in April 2024, there was 0% PIP fraud, while DLA stood at 0.1%. Universal Credit overpayments still stand at 10.9% – however, this is down from 11.4% last year. 

When they made a massive stab-vested song and dance about DWP fraud decreasing in 2023, you have to wonder why they aren’t shouting from the rooftops that PIP fraud is now at 0%. The only conclusion to be reached is that low-or-no DWP benefit fraud doesn’t fit their narrative of how much disabled people are wasting taxpayers money. So nothing to see here.

DWP snooping thrown out of the Lords on a technicality

This last one is a bit of good news for disabled people. For the past few months the DWP and government have been trying to push through the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill. 

The proposed bill would allow the DWP to snoop on the bank accounts of anyone in receipt of benefits and anyone connected to them. It would mean the government scrutinising what you spend your benefits on and using that to take them away.

The bill had already passed through the Commons, but thanks to the rules around general election season it has fallen foul to ‘wash up’ season and been binned off. Let’s hope it’s gone for good

They don’t want you to talk about it – so let’s shout instead

Whilst Rishi and his lot come up with the shittest ideas possible and Labour come back with even shitter banter, it’s important that DWP news like this doesn’t get forgotten. 

One of my favourite things about disabled people is our sense of humour. When you’ve been in the gallows for as long as us there’s nothing else for it. But in amongst the laughing at terrible Tories and endless memes, we also need to keep informing people of theirs and the DWP’s incompetence and lies.

The Tories are trying to make disabled people the enemy of the electorate, but we’re louder and funnier than you fuckers.

Featured image via the Canary

By Rachel Charlton-Dailey

British pacifists have said they will refuse to join or in any way support the military under the Tories’ plans to reintroduce National Service ahead of the general election, if the scheme is ever implemented.

National Service: the backlash begins

In the first major announcement of his general election campaign, Rishi Sunak said a future Tory government would introduce the scheme in 2025, forcing 18-year-olds either to join the military for 12 months full-time or to work one weekend per month in their community with organisations such as fire, police and the NHS.

Labour have called the scheme ‘unfunded’ and criticised the Tories for cutting military spending, without raising any objection to the principle of reintroducing national service.

Members of the Peace Pledge Union (PPU), the UK’s leading pacifist organisation, have lambasted the plans, pointing out that they are designed to whip up support for the armed forces and an increasingly aggressive UK foreign policy.

Although the Tories claim that the plan does not amount to conscription, the PPU has accused them of attempting to introduce ‘conscription by stealth’.

The PPU has pledged to resist National Service and to support future conscientious objectors, warning the government that the scheme would be met by waves of resistance from young people.

In anticipation of the backlash, the home secretary James Cleverly has said 18-year-olds who refuse to participate would not be sent to prison.

Earlier in the year, the head of the British Army called for a ‘citizen army’ to prepare for a future land war with Russia and referred to the British public as a ‘pre-war generation’, provoking speculation about a return of conscription.

At the time, the Tory government were quick to deny any possibility that conscription would be reintroduced.

A general election gimmick, or a dangerous policy shift?

Geoff Tibbs from the PPU said:

Sunak’s announcement signals a dangerous shift in politics. Conscription has quickly turned from a distant historical memory into a very real possibility, which we need to resist at every turn.

This is a transparent attempt by the government to whip up everyday militarism and nationalist fervour in support of their reckless foreign policy, ahead of the general election. With the UK’s military spending and nuclear arsenal growing fast, this move sends another provocative signal to Russia and China, which can only make the world more unsafe.

The PPU, founded in 1934, has opposed conscription in the UK and around the world for ninety years. Many of its original members were conscientious objectors in the First World War and many went on to become conscientious objectors in WWII.

As the British section of War Resisters’ International (WRI), the PPU stands in solidarity with people refusing National Service in the many countries worldwide where conscription is in force, including in Russia, Ukraine, and Israel.

The PPU recently marked International Conscientious Objectors’ Day (15 May), along with many other peace organisations in the UK and around the world, to raise awareness of the struggles of conscientious objectors and to send them a message of solidarity.

Featured image via the Canary

By The Canary

The Tories have a huge problem in this general election – namely that people don’t want to vote for them. Could they have an even bigger problem than that, though?

NEW: Labour have 13 candidates left to select for the general election – the Tories have 190

[@patrickkmaguire]

— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) May 25, 2024

Oh dear.

It looks like even when people do want to vote Tory they might not have a Tory to vote for.

Titanic success in the general election

Former PM Boris Johnson famously coined the term ‘Titanic success’:

"Brexit means Brexit and we're going to make a Titanic success of it". Boris Johnson. #BorisDay #BorisJohnson #NextPrimeMinister pic.twitter.com/PYddzvOOya

— Stefan Simanowitz (@StefSimanowitz) July 23, 2019

We all suspected Rishi Sunak would make a Titanic success of this election, but so far it’s looking worse than that. To expand on the analogy, the Titanic is setting sail despite missing nearly 200 crew people.

This slow-motion shipwreck is a situation Sunak brought upon himself by knee-jerk calling an election without warning MPs:

“This is not the launch that the Tories wanted.”

Tory MPs are “furious” that Sunak has called a snap general election, Tim Montgomerie tells #TimesRadio. “They weren’t expecting this. They don’t think the timing’s right”.

https://t.co/BH4TIW6x1n@Montie | @JPonPolitics pic.twitter.com/emz6HSVDsD

— Times Radio (@TimesRadio) May 22, 2024

As a result of the unexpectedness, they haven’t had time to line up replacements for all the Tories we knew were stepping down – nor to stand in seats which are currently held by rival parties. As reported by the Independent:

Party chiefs are desperately appealing to prospective candidates to put themselves forward for seats – many of which they are projected to lose heavily – with the Conservatives expected to still be putting up batches of adverts for constituencies into the weekend.

The same general election article reported a funny quote from “political commentator Sir Anthony Seldon, a biographer of six prime ministers”:

Surprise is always a smart tactic for a general, but it’s the enemy who should be surprised, not your own side. The Conservatives are going to have to move PDQ to fill their remaining empty seats to show that they are truly a national party.

Hilariously, this is one of the last things Seldon tweeted:

The grown-ups/cavalry are returning. Is Rishi Sunak, a PM who knows his history, resorting to the tradition of former PMs Arthur Balfour and Alec Douglas Home by appointing former PM David Cameron For Sec? Peter Carrington was the last For Sec in the Lords, outstanding he was too

— Sir Anthony Seldon (@AnthonySeldon) November 13, 2023

As Seldon is a historian, he’s no doubt familiar with the phrase ‘time makes fools of us all‘. An equally true (if less pithy) saying is ‘you’re gonna look like a fucking goon in six months if you say something supportive about the current Tory prime minister‘.

Back to Sunak’s general election candidate crisis, the problem may actually get worse, because Tory MPs are still standing down:

Resignation letters are funny.
“I’m good at my job. Here’s the good things I’ve done whilst being good at my job. I’ve turned this resignation letter – addressed to one individual – into a public report card, written by me. And I’ve concluded that I’ve been really good at my job” https://t.co/8IcpPayp91

— richard bacon (@richardpbacon) May 25, 2024

Tories. All posture, but when reality come knocking, gone like a fart in a gale. https://t.co/UufCSFQ0mj

— Duncan Jones (@ManMadeMoon) May 24, 2024

Strange that these Tories are afraid of failing in this election. After all, they’ve spent the past decade and a half failing the country!

Send in the clowns

Finding a good candidate is hard work, but the Tories are going to struggle to find any candidate given the impossibly short timeframe. This means candidates won’t be vetted properly, and that means we’re going to get one or two absolute weirdoes slipping into parliament – the sort of weirdoes with more skeletons in their closet than the Natural History Museum.

Now, some of you might be thinking: ‘can these freaks be any weirder than the Tories we’ve had over the past 14 years?‘

To that we’d say that if this period has taught us anything, it’s things can always get weirder.

If Sunak continues struggling, maybe he could declare National Service for all 55-year-olds to stand as a Tory MP? After all, that can’t be any worse an idea than this:

James Cleverly says that National Service will be "compulsory" but then says there won't be any criminal sanction for those who simply refuse.

How's that going to work then? pic.twitter.com/epFihfjCWT

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) May 26, 2024

Featured image via Number 10

By The Canary

Given the Tories’ historically poor polling, we all knew this general election was going to be a mess. What we didn’t realise was the wheels would come off Rishi Sunak’s campaign so quickly that he’d have to revert to National Service to try and save himself:

BREAKING: Sunak is going to take a day off the trail tomorrow in a highly unusual move so early in the campaign. He will spend it at home in talks with his senior aides. But the Tories insist this is NOT a campaign relaunch. https://t.co/gZ1Sb5JBYk

— Kiran Stacey (@kiranstacey) May 24, 2024

Nor that Sunak would return from his break to somehow make things even worse:

Rishi Sunak had a terrible start to his campaign, took an unscheduled day off to work with his team and came up with the single worst policy of modern times. Fair play.

— Liam Thorp (@LiamThorpECHO) May 25, 2024

The policy in question? Mandatory/voluntary national service for Gen Zers:

NEW: Rishi Sunak has pledged *mandatory* National Service for *every 18 year old* if he wins the election

— they will *have to* do either a year-long army placement or one weekend a month volunteering for a year

First ‘bold’ manifesto policy, but it will be highly controversial

— Alex Wickham (@alexwickham) May 25, 2024

If you’re confused by the mandatory/voluntary part of the announcement, don’t worry – so are the people announcing it.

Before we get to the confusion, however, let’s investigate if this policy – in any form – is appealing to anyone:

Who is this for?

The Tories are clearly targeting older voters with their new proposal:

'Gen Z think they can do nothing and get benefits – bring back National Service': Pensioners slam 'lazy and entitled' work-shy youngsters who moan they can't get jobs because Covid left them without social skills https://t.co/dONRVp086W pic.twitter.com/qxoChWwVTU

— Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) March 14, 2024

As many have speculated, the policy would go down less well if it was expanded to everyone:

Lots of people on here tonight suggesting national service for let’s say 68 year olds as well as 18 year olds

Would older voters support “compulsory volunteering” if it involved them?

— Darren McCaffrey (@darrenmccaffrey) May 25, 2024

As the generation which incorrectly thinks they fought in World War II, boomers are often ridiculed. To be fair, though, they’re not all frothing goons – just 99% of boomer opinion columnists. A 2023 poll from YouGov did find that compulsory military service was most popular with those who wouldn’t be compelled, but it did fall short of a majority – even among the 65+ bracket:

The same YouGov poll covered a number of national service options:

As you can see, all ‘compulsory’ options were unpopular (the exception being ‘one month of community service’, and even that was opposed by half of those with an opinion).

The polling also broke the above brackets down by age:

The policy seems to purely be about giving nasty Tory voters a reason to bother voting – something which is far from guaranteed in this election. Going off the record number of Tory MPs stepping down, these people can’t even stomach voting for themselves:

BREAKING: Tory MP Sir David Evennett is 76th to step down.

More Conservative MPs are stepping down this than in the 1997 general election.

Sky's @joncraig has the latest.https://t.co/hGv7aXZC4j

Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube pic.twitter.com/BHOE490gcY

— Sky News (@SkyNews) May 24, 2024

BREAKING: Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove will stand down at the General Election in July.

This adds to the growing number of Tory MPs stepping down this year, which is more than the number that did so in 1997https://t.co/KaZ7VX2mdC

Sky 501 and YouTube pic.twitter.com/frTYFRcX5u

— Sky News (@SkyNews) May 24, 2024

While we’re sure there are tens of thousands of voters who would spitefully vote Tory to punish young people for the crime of being young, they might not buy into this particular policy. After all, the Tories have only just announced it, and it’s already descended into farce:

Sunak team clear to me this am no-one going to jail over this: “This about giving young people from all backgrounds skills & experience – not a criminal record”

Frame it as ‘opportunities for young people’ but making it mandatory gives it punitive feel for those who might not… https://t.co/PHEYkuSa4w

— Beth Rigby (@BethRigby) May 26, 2024

Compulsory or optionally mandatory?

When national service was first announced, several outlets reported on it being ‘mandatory’:

Presumably, they were briefed on it being mandatory. Interestingly, however, it wasn’t described as such in Sunak’s general election announcement video (a video in which Sunak looks so dead behind the eyes that you’d feel sorry for him if he wasn’t a Tory):

Opportunity. Community. Security.

This is why I would introduce a bold new model of National Service pic.twitter.com/bNXTLwwBXV

— Rishi Sunak (@RishiSunak) May 26, 2024

The Conservative Party’s account also didn’t mention it being ‘mandatory’:

We'll introduce a bold new model of National Service.

To up-skill the next generation, make our nation secure & build a stronger national culture. 

Whether in the Armed Forces or volunteering in our NHS, every young person will do their duty to build a secure future for the UK. pic.twitter.com/qgLTv022RN

— Conservatives (@Conservatives) May 26, 2024

Nor did the Tory MPs retweeting it:

We're taking bold action to get more young people the opportunities they need for life.

Whether it's delivering prescriptions, working as a lifeguard, or supporting your community during storms, national service will help young people give back to the society that raised them. https://t.co/aZ6RYpNwhP pic.twitter.com/pJe1azPEKE

— Gillian Keegan MP (@GillianKeegan) May 26, 2024

On Sunday 26 May, home secretary James Cleverly said the following (as reported by Huffington Post):

Asked what the punishment would be for people who refused, the home secretary added: “There’s going to be no criminal sanctions, nobody’s going to jail over this.”

There’s a word for a ‘mandatory’ act which you’re not mandated to do, and that word is ‘voluntary’.

So where is the ‘mandatory’ part coming from?

In our opinion, this policy was dreamed up in the last few days, and the Tories have messed up announcing it. If this was a general election policy they’d put some time into, it would have its own launch page. They would also have promotional materials which didn’t look like ten-minute Photoshop jobs.

Our best guess is that one or more of the following are occurring:

• They originally decided on it being mandatory but are in the process of backtracking.
• It was always voluntary, but people have gotten confused and reported otherwise.
• It was always mandatory, but they’ve not figured out if they can legally make that fly.
• They still haven’t decided which it will be.
• It’s a ‘Schrödinger’s national service’ type situation, and we won’t know if it’s mandatory or voluntary until the first 18-year-old signs up.

James Cleverly says that National Service will be "compulsory" but then says there won't be any criminal sanction for those who simply refuse.

How's that going to work then? pic.twitter.com/epFihfjCWT

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) May 26, 2024

James Cleverly says that 18 year olds could volunteer (mandated) to be emergency health responders

Back of a fag packet stuff to say the least #BBCLauraK pic.twitter.com/t1wSnaxJw3

— Sam Webster (@SamInNotts) May 26, 2024

"We force people to do things all the time".
New Tory campaign slogan revealed by James Cleverly to Laura Kuenssberg this morning. pic.twitter.com/XyVQzyYVDv

— RyanMcGoverne I Photo I Paint I (@RyanMcGoverne) May 26, 2024

Media response to National Service

Sunak’s proposal is even unpopular with goons like the Daily Mail‘s Dan Hodges:

Rishi Sunak’s plan for compulsory national service is the most insane policy proposal ever launched in an election campaign by a major political party.

— (((Dan Hodges))) (@DPJHodges) May 25, 2024

ITV‘s Robert Peston, however, described the policy as “brave”:

Presumably that’s ‘brave’ in the historical sense: i.e. ‘the general/aristocrat/moron bravely sent his troops over the front line and into a massacre‘.

Journalist (and sibling of Boris) Rachel Johnson, meanwhile, may have exposed what the Tories are actually up to:

Rachel Johnson who broke lockdown rules to play tennis,

"I like it.. It's got a lot going for it.. We need a national service, we haven't got enough people to pick our fruit" pic.twitter.com/ndb8AvatoG

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) May 26, 2024

Blitzed spirit

We’re not even a week into this election yet, and Sunak is already acting desperately. This time next Sunday, we might be looking back at national service as the most sensible policy proposal he ever had.

Maybe things really can only get better?

They certainly seem to be getting funnier anyway.

Featured image via Rishi Sunak – YouTube

By The Canary

We have arrived at that place. A general election. The one where our two main political parties are campaigning to see who’s going to be burying the bodies of the people their policies kill.

The Tories have proven over the last 14 years that they don’t give a shit about anyone who is disabled, trans, not British, mentally ill, young, old or poor. Basically, if you’re not an Oxbridge educated, racist, corrupt prick who likes to avoid paying their taxes – you’re pretty screwed. 

Meanwhile, the leader of the opposition has made more U-turns than a drunk guy on a unicycle. From scrapping the two-child limit, tuition fees, and renationalising our public services, to blocking new oil and gas exploration in the north sea. 

But here’s the thing. As a proud Gen Z, people have told countless times over the years that I have to tolerate, or even be friends with, people who have opposing political opinions to me. Honestly, I’ve always agreed. I’ve never even thought about it too much. Everyone disagrees sometimes, right?

Who lives and who dies

However, recently a sense of hopelessness has struck me. Somewhere along the line, we moved away from discussing – and even disagreeing – about politics, to disagreeing on fundamental morals and human rights. 

When did our politicians stop asking ‘how are we going to solve this issue?’ 

Why is the new default ‘should we even bother trying to solve this issue?’ 

Why do the looney tunes in charge get to decide who lives and who dies? How does the colour of my skin and where I was born mean my life is more valuable than children in the Middle East? 

Basic human rights should not be a political issue. Clearly they are – now more than ever before – but they shouldn’t be. It’s so much more than politics. It’s literal life and death. 

Sneaky and calculated or downright cruel?

Currently, our main two political parties are condoning the murder of Palestinians in the name of colonialism. There are literal disabled people dying because the government doesn’t give a shit about systematically screwing them over. Meanwhile Labour made zero mention of disabled people in their pre-election pledges. 

If one of my close friends told me they were voting Tory – I wouldn’t be angry. I’d be sad, but mainly disappointed. To me, that says they’re okay with Israel needlessly killing Palestinian children. It says they’re okay with systematically excluding disabled people. It says they’re okay with young people literally killing themselves because they can’t access mental health care. 

As someone who has personally experienced homelessness, it tells me they don’t have a problem with thousands of people sleeping on the streets every night. That becomes even more of a problem when you realise that homelessness is a political choice. Which they proved during Covid, bringing everyone inside practically overnight.

And getting really honest for a minute – voting Labour isn’t much better. Unless it’s tactical to keep the Tories out. Because whilst they might appear on the surface to be a little less cruel – many of their policies will have the exact same impact as the last 14 years of Tory hell. 

Not so Great Britain

At some point, politics stopped being about politics. The muppets in charge changed the game. From being about who could create the most well-thought-out policies and making the country a better place to live in. To one which they trivialise suffering and question people’s value. 

Maybe it’s naive of me to expect any less from a bunch of overpaid pillocks. But I don’t believe its naive for Gen Z’s to dream of a country where the core values of our politicians – and consequently the people voting for them – are not questioned every two minutes. 

By HG

“You’re joking. Not another one? Oh for God’s sake… I can’t stand this”.

Brenda, Bristol.

It’s another general election

Twenty points behind in the polls, an absolute drubbing at the local elections that were held just three weeks ago, and half of their candidates are yet to be selected. Don’t let anyone tell you that an expensive private education and a job with Goldman Sachs somehow makes Tory prime minister Rishi Sunak more intelligent than your average Joe Bloggs.

Sure, polls can narrow, and local election turnouts are usually considerably less than the turnout at a general election, but even the most ardent of Tory voter knows there is very little prospect of Britain voting for a man that can’t even announce a general election without it turning into a rain-drenched farce.

Unlike the previous two general elections, Keir Starmer will be the main beneficiary of a massive anti-Tory vote.

But this isn’t an election like we experienced in 2017 and 2019. This isn’t really a battle of red versus blue. This illusion of democracy is no more than a baton handover.

I supported and voted for Labour at the last two general elections. But the thought of supporting and voting for this grotesque variant of the Conservative Party leaves me feeling like a half-cut Speedo-clad Nigel Farage has just jumped in my bath and offered to scrub my back without using his hands.

Eating breakfast? You’re very welcome.

Who are the Tory enablers?

If I was to put a penny in a jar for each and every time a new New Labour patriot called me a “Tory enabler”, or told me I was gifting Sunak “another five years of Tory rule”, I would most probably have enough to fund Starmer’s ten pledges, six fixes, five missions and the utterly fraudulent Great British Energy facade, twice over, before the polls close on 4 July.

Let’s be honest, it takes some serious brass neck from these centre-right Starmer supporters to call us “Tory enablers” when they have opened their arms to three Tory MPs.

One sold-off the UK’s blood plasma supplier to an American private equity firm, another attacked footballers for supporting free school meals for hungry children, and the other voted to cut £20 a week from the pittance that is Universal Credit, yet it is *US* that are enabling another Tory government because we refuse to support these fucking Tory parasites?

Before the Canary saved me from the bloggers scrap heap I used to regularly remind people that they wouldn’t get the Tories out of power until they get the Tories out of the Labour Party.

And less than six weeks away from when Keir Starmer gets his chance to prove he will put the security of Israel before the needs of the British people, my reminder is as true today as it ever has been.

It isn’t compulsory to vote Labour or Conservative. We do have other choices — candidates with socialist values that stand against genocide. You don’t have to give your vote to Keir Starmer to stop the Tories. To stop the Tories, you need to stop Keir Starmer.

By the way, did you know Keir Starmer was the former Director for Public Prosecutions? Oh, and did you know his dad was a toolmaker?

Enter Collective… and some chap named Corbyn

One individual attempting to break the duopoly, some chap named Jeremy Corbyn, announced his candidacy for the Islington North constituency, this week.

Jeremy is supported by Collective — a mass movement that will eventually transform into a new political party, one that can take on both the Tory-Labour establishment and our rigged political system to restore democracy and hope for all.

Remember what hope used to feel like? That burning desire to build a Britain where opportunity is available for all? We didn’t need two flags behind us, or an expensive podium in front of us to show how much we cared about a just and decent society. Our patriotism was in our actions. We didn’t need to create division because our message of hope would go on to bring people together.

I am absolutely delighted to see so many strong and principled socialists standing at the general election on 4 July.

Jeremy isn’t the only independent candidate that will be standing on an anti-genocide platform. Andrew Feinstein, Claudia Webbe, Tasnime Akunjee, Tahir Mirza, Pamela Fitzpatrick, and many other first class candidates — all supported by Collective — will be taking the fight to the Tories, both red and blue.

Talking of genocide…

Apparently I should speak with Hamas to negotiate hostage releases

If the propagators of the Israeli state insist there are “no innocent Palestinians”, by their same logic there are no innocent Americans, no innocent Brits, and there are certainly no innocent Israelis.

Those are the rules, don’t blame me, I didn’t make them up. Although international law doesn’t look kindly upon the perpetrators of collective punishment, apparently.

These are the same dangerous genocidal maniacs that appear on my timeline underneath my posts telling me to “speak with Hamas”.

SPEAK WITH HAMAS? Do these deluded gaslighters with a thing for ethnic cleansing think I’ve got a direct line to Mr Qassam?

“Hi Al, it’s Rachael of the Swindon martyrs brigade here, you know, Corbynite leftist, lives near the magic roundabout? Home of Diana Dors? 10cc? Billie Piper?… Anyway, my friend @DavidBunchanumbers on X wants me to tell you to release the hostages. Are you down with that?”

Be in absolutely no doubt, Gaza will still haunt the conscience of the world long after the genocide comes to an end.

For seventy-six years Israel has been allowed to kill and maim under the Western colonialists shield of impunity. Until last Monday.

Gaza should be front and centre of your general election vote

In seeking an arrest warrant for the baby-killer-in-chief, Netanyahu, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has trampled upon the myth that Israel is beyond accountability. There has been no greater criminal in Israeli history than Benjamin Netanyahu and the chief prosecutor is absolutely correct in his decision to request a warrant for the butcher of Gaza.

The ICC is facing incredible pressure from the United States to drop the warrant request. They have bullied and threatened the court, not only ensuring the absolute death of the illusion of Western moral superiority, but equally ensuring the ICC simply cannot cave in to the American and Israeli threats and demands, because this will only result in the end of the very existence of international law itself.

War criminal Netanyahu responded to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling demanding Israel stop the invasion of Rafah by bombing a number of displaced Palestinians living in tents.

This is what Israel thinks of international law.

Collective-backed independent candidates will put the Gaza genocide front and centre of their respective campaigns, and rightly so, because the Israeli monsters will continue to act with the full support of the pro-Israel lobby funded Labour and Conservative establishment cabals.

We must, and we will hold them to account.

Featured image via Rachael Swindon

By Rachael Swindon

The Canary receives a lot of emails from members and subscribers, on various topics – which the team are really grateful for. We always aim to respond. However, we thought what a waste it was that we’re the only ones that get to read your opinions and musings on politics, society, and the world. So, in December 2022 we decided it was time for a weekly letters page – exclusively for members. Since then, thanks to the response from so many people we’ve opened up our letters page to everyone who reads the Canary. Now, we’ve got a general election coming up – and the Canary wants you to be involved.

Letters to the Canary: a general election

It’s fairly straightforward. We want letters of no more than 400 words on a subject that fits Canary values and is related to news and politics. Ideally, we’d like your thoughts on our articles or something that’s currently in the news – as we want the page to spark debate.

We now know we’ve got ANOTHER general election on Thursday 4 July. At the Canary, we’ve come straight out of the blocks already, slapping down what the corporate media and politicians are coming with – from Keir Starmer lying to Boris Johnson schmoozing with neo-Nazis via the BBC’s love-in with Richard Tice.

Elections are also perhaps the time when the corporate media goes into propaganda overdrive – just ask Jeremy Corbyn about this. Therefore, in the next six weeks it’s all the more important that independent media is speaking truth to power – cutting through the misinformation (or disinformation, depending on your viewpoint) being spread elsewhere.

Our readers are an important part of that – and we’ve never actually a letters page up and running during an election before. So, why not write us a letter and help us to be a force for truth and change in 2024?

Get involved

Please note that caveats apply as they do for our writers:

1. We will not publish anything that we consider discriminatory, abusive or containing hate speech.
2. Sending a letter for publication does not guarantee we publish it.
3. We won’t be paying for letters.
4. The Canary reserves the right to edit your letters as we see fit.

You’re free to swear if you wish, and also free to respond to other members’ letters as well. To give you an idea of what other people have written, you can read previous editions of the letters page here.

So, off you go! Email your letters to membership@thecanary.co – then every Saturday we’ll publish a selection of them. Our platform is also your platform. Get writing and we look forward to seeing what you come up with!

Featured image via the Canary

By The Canary

Late last night (Friday 24 May 2024), a group of several dozen students occupied the Whitworth building on the University of Manchester campus. It was over Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza and the university’s complicity in this.

University of Manchester: under occupation

Students have barricaded all entrances to the building::

Banners are also being flown:

Protesters are linked to the nearby Encampment of Resistance for Palestine and are demanding that the University promises no disciplinary action for student activists and opens negotiations with the camp about their demands. They say the University of Manchester must:

• End its partnership with BAE Systems.
• Cut ties with Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
• Adopt a policy ensuring that all research is ethical and doesn’t contribute towards the arms trade.
• Not pursue disciplinary action against any students involved in the Encampment, occupations or other protests.

Despite the encampment now reaching its 25th day, the university has refused any communication with the camp and has instead chosen to continue to prioritise it’s profitable ties with companies and institutions directly involved in the genocide being carried out in Gaza.

Over the last 25 days, over 500 students and community members from across Manchester have taken part in the camp to force the university to negotiate on their demands. The encampment in Manchester is just one of over 30 across universities in Britain, prompting Rishi Sunak to summon vice-chancellors from across the country to a meeting at Downing Street to discuss the encampments last week.

At the University of Manchester, a student has been suspended for involvement in an earlier occupation for Palestine and another student had their visa revoked by the Home Office.

Divest from Israel or face the consequences

Occupiers said:

The University must realise that targeting of student activists with disciplinary action will not dissuade protesters. We are witnessing a genocide and nothing that the University can threaten us with compares to the suffering of the Palestinian people. The student body has already voted overwhelmingly in favour of Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions and our movement is only growing.

Tel Aviv University – whom UoM has a research partnership with – helped develop the Dahiya Doctrine, which calls for the mass targeting of civilian infrastructure. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem is built on illegally occupied land, with exchange students from UoM sent to live in these settlements.

BAE Systems is Europe’s largest arms company and is involved in producing F-35 and F-16 jets, which are used against Palestinians in Gaza. The University of Manchester has no policy regulating whether research could be used to harm lives or for other unethical purposes, and has received at least £15m in research funding from arms companies in the last five years.

The occupiers said:

We have taken the Whitworth building to escalate our pressure on the University to end its ties with the genocide in Palestine. We have full control of this building which is due to hold hundreds of students for exams next week. We will not leave until the University commit to not disciplining any student protesters and enter negotiations on the other demands.

If students are concerned about the potential impact of this action on their exams they should direct their complaints to the University, which continues to value its profitable links to genocide over the welfare of its students.

Featured image and additional images suppled

By The Canary

On Sky News, Keir Starmer tried to defend the fact he lied his way to the Labour Party leadership with yet another lie. He claimed that the “money is not available” to invest:

Starmer pitching NHS patients vs students & saying he can either cut NHS waiting lists or scrap tuition fees, but not both

You could raise Income Tax on the top 5% like you promised & do both. You could reverse Tory cuts to Corp Tax like you promised & do both. But you’re not pic.twitter.com/KvhjbDI75N

— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) May 24, 2024

Starmer: misrepresenting our potential

The policies Starmer has U-turned on include nationalising a number of public services and scrapping tuition fees. But Starmer could deliver such policies and address NHS waiting times.

In the UK, various public services were nationalised until Conservative Margaret Thatcher privatised them. And we didn’t formerly have university tuition fees, until Labour’s Tony Blair introduced them in 1998.

In such cases, we’ve gone backwards. And there’s no reason Starmer couldn’t reverse such changes.

The UK government operates a fiat currency that is not linked to a gold standard.

Rather, it has value because we all agree that it does. So government spending largely depends on the physical reality of society: resources, manpower, and expertise.

When it comes to military spending, Starmer presents government spending as resource-based. This shows his priorities.

As it turns out, people are already using resources and manpower to run services like electricity and water. But we are paying huge dividends to shareholders in the process, rather than owning the services ourselves.

Rebalancing capitalism

Taxes on wealth and passive income could help rebalance society.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies estimates that scrapping tuition fees would transfer cost from students to our collective funds at £9.5bn per year.

But even a small wealth tax of 1-2% on assets over £10m would rebalance the economy to a less unequal place by up to £22bn per year.

Such a tax is popular: 77% of Conservative voters support it along with 86% of Labour voters.

Starmer could also address capitalist excess in UK society through equalising capital gains with income tax rates. This would rebalance the UK by £15.2bn per year.

And it’s unclear why people living off investments should pay less than those working.

There’s no reason Starmer cannot invest in first class public services, education, and cut NHS waiting times. It doesn’t make sense to say there’s not enough money, given the UK operates a fiat currency.

Featured image via Saul Staniforth -X

By James Wright

Two activists from Palestine Action were unanimously acquitted of criminal damage against arms manufacturer Elbit by a jury in Leicester Crown Court after a deliberation of just one hour and 40 minutes.

Palestine Action: occupying Elbit

For six days from 19 May 2021, four people from Palestine Action occupied the roof of UAV Tactical Systems, an Elbit drone factory in Leicester:

The action was taken urgently in response to the ongoing bombardment of Gaza at the time.

Whilst on the roof, the activists spray painted messages including “Shut Elbit Down” and “Free Palestine”, damaged a skylight to reveal a military drone inside and sprayed the building in blood red paint:

In total, it was claimed that the knock on costs of extra security since the action amounted to £40,000 of losses per month, totalling £1.6m.

Three days into the action, two of the four came off the roof in order to ration supplies. The jury heard from one defendant about how the two which remained on the roof and were subsequently charged, resorted to drinking rainwater in order to maintain the disruption for as long as possible in order to save lives in Palestine.

The defendant explained how the factory, which is majority owned by the Israeli weapons firm Elbit Systems, was used to assemble drone equipment for the Israeli military and the ways in which Elbit’s drone are deployed in Gaza. Between the defence and prosecution, the agreed facts of the cases included the factory’s export licenses of drones to Israel for use by the state of Israel.

He spoke through reports by drone wars and human rights watch which explained the numerous war crimes which have been conducted in Gaza using Elbit’s drones, leading to deliberate massacres of the Palestinian people.

Not guilty – obviously

The jury also heard of how hundreds from the local community supported the action, several of which were arrested for attempting to throw water for to the activists on the roof.

Cops eventually forced the activists down:

The defence argued that the action taken was necessary in order to save lives and prevent the greater property damage in Palestine. In her closing speech, Mira Hammad from Garden Court North Chambers told the jury that:

The consequences of failing to act would mean the death of children, parents, grandparents in Palestine

and prioritising Elbit’s right to property over Palestinians right to live is a:

smokescreen of dehumanisation.

Clearly, the jury agreed.

Featured image and additional images via Palestine Action

By The Canary

UK cops arrested 16 people at a protest organised by a pro-Palestine student group at Oxford University. It comes as students across the UK stand their ground over Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Cops move in on Oxford camp

Thames Valley Police said the individuals were arrested Thursday 23 May on suspicion of aggravated trespass, while one was also held on suspicion of common assault. Cops were breaking up a sit in in support of Palestine – and doing it violently:

Thames Valley Police assault Oxford University students in an attempt to break up their sit-in for Palestine. pic.twitter.com/ydDdBRAjnM

— Lowkey (@Lowkey0nline) May 23, 2024

Students at The university of Oxford had the police called on them by their own university today because they were holding a peaceful sit in demanding the university disclose and divest from Israeli interests. pic.twitter.com/8MlcwMCEnq

— Eye on Palestine (@EyeonPalestine) May 23, 2024

It follows protests in recent weeks at more than a dozen UK universities, including at world-renowned Oxford and Cambridge, emulating similar actions on campuses in the US and elsewhere.

Demonstrators opposed to Israel’s genocide in Gaza have made various demands, including that universities sever academic and financial ties with the country.

In Oxford, the arrests came after students entered a university administrative building on 23 May morning, claiming they had “exhausted all other avenues of communication” with administrators.

UK universities not budging on Israel’s genocide

A spokesperson for the Oxford Action for Palestine (OA4P) group said:

Instead of engaging in dialogue with her students, the vice-chancellor chose to evacuate the building, place it on lockdown, and call the police to make arrests.

We demand the administration meet with us to negotiate immediately.

Videos posted on social media showed people sitting on the ground in front of a police van being dragged away by officers, as onlookers chanted “shame”:

BREAKING: POLICE ASSAULT OXFORD STUDENTS AND STAFF OUTSIDE UNIVERSITY OFFICES pic.twitter.com/cyMdn9BXFH

— Oxford Action for Palestine (@OxAct4Pal) May 23, 2024

The university’s union, which represents academics, lecturers and staff, condemned “bringing in police to violently arrest” students who were “engaged in peaceful protest”.

Meanwhile, on Friday 24 May pro-Palestinian students successfully disrupted a meeting of Falmouth University’s board of directors. The students are demanding that the university withdraws its money from Barclays:

Barclays bank has over £2bn in shares and provides £6.1bn in loans and underwriting to nine companies whose weapons, components, and military technology are being used by Israel in its attacks on Palestinians.

In 2022-2023, Falmouth Uni had £24.3m pounds invested in Barclays.

A spokesperson for the action said:

As students, that is our money, and we refuse to see it used to fund companies directly implicated in genocide. The board of directors has power to change this. We refuse to allow this institution, that we invest and give so much money and time in, continue its complicity in genocide.

Featured image via Oxford Action For Palestine – screengrab

Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse

By The Canary

A think tank has given a briefing on just how bad poverty and destitution are in the UK, as the general election is launched. It shows the depth of the problem. The think tank says ‘all political parties’ must recognise this – and act.

‘Unacceptable levels of poverty’

The UK has unacceptably high levels of poverty. All political parties must recognise the seriousness of the current situation and tackling hardship must take its rightful place as a key issue in the election campaign. Our political leaders must be serious, specific and ambitious in telling the British people what they plan to do to solve the urgent problem of people facing avoidable hardship.

Think tank the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) has outlined the following details on the situation.

Overall levels of poverty in the UK are high and have been for decades

More than one in five people in the UK were in poverty in 2022/23. This is around 14.3 million people and includes 4.3 million children, 8.1 million working-age adults, and 1.9 million pensioners.

Poverty is deepening.

Around six million people (or 9% of the population) in the UK were in very deep poverty in 2022/23. This includes 1.6 million children, 3.9 million working-age adults, and 600,000 pensioners. Thirty years ago, around one in three people in poverty were in very deep poverty, by 2022/23 that stood at over four in 10.

Destitution is rising fastest of all

Nearly four million people experienced destitution in 2022, including around one million children. This is almost two-and-a-half times the number of people experiencing destitution in 2017 and nearly triple the number of children.

Our social security system is not protecting people from destitution: 72% of people who are destitute are in receipt of benefits. Destitution is the most severe form of material hardship. Living in destitution means you can’t afford to meet your most basic physical needs to stay warm, dry, clean and fed.

Living in poverty worsens people’s health

Men living in the most deprived areas can expect to live 9.7 years fewer than men in the least deprived areas and women 7.9 years fewer. Those in the most deprived areas can expect to live more than 18 fewer healthy years than those in the least deprived areas. In every English region outside London, life expectancy has fallen in the most deprived group.

Swing voters want to see an end to hardship

JRF research on swing voters shows they are concerned about hardship. People feel that addressing these issues should be a top priority, but that politicians are not taking the issues seriously enough.

Most voters saw very little distinction between Labour and the Conservatives on this agenda, with neither party demonstrating compassion. People want to see tangible and actionable plans for how politicians are going to reach their stated goals, not just what those goals are.

Political parties must share their plans amid the general election

Our social security system should offer adequate support to anyone in need of help, but right now it is not even protecting people from destitution.

Katie Schmuecker, Principal Policy Adviser at JRF, says:

We need to see some urgency from all political parties on the need to deal with hardship. Almost four million people, including one million children, have experienced destitution in a single year. This means they have been unable to keep themselves warm, dry and fed.

They can’t wait for promises of economic growth and they shouldn’t have to. We’re one of the richest countries in the world, so failing to tackle hardship right now is a choice. We need our politicians to tell us what they will do straight away to help families who can’t afford life’s essentials, as well as their long-term plans to tackle poverty.

There isn’t one single policy choice at the general election that will solve this deep level of hardship but pledging that people will always be able to afford the essentials like food, and household bills, through the social security system is a good place to start.

Featured image via Unsplash

By The Canary

The media outrage is nowhere to be seen. But former prime minister Boris Johnson has welcomed a delegation from Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov Brigade to UK parliament.

Johnson said:

My message to you is very simple. Thank you to the heroes from the Azov Brigade who have honoured us with their presence tonight

EXCLUSIVE: Active Measures has obtained footage of former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson praising Ukraine's neo-Nazi Azov Battalion.

Johnson additionally calls for the Ukrainian government to be authorized to use Western weapons inside Russian territory. pic.twitter.com/CuK5SQjX0R

— ACTIVE MEASURES (@ActiveMeasures8) May 23, 2024

In 2015 a spokesperson for the Azov Brigade downplayed comments from an Azov drill sergeant that half the unit are Nazis. Andriy Diachenko said only 10 to 20% are in fact Nazis.

Former leader of the unit Andriy Biletsky and said in 2010 that Ukraine’s purpose was to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade… against Semite-led Untermenschen [subhumans]”.

At the meeting in parliament Johnson was pictured holding an Azov banner that shows the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel symbol.

In November 2014, then Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Arsen Avakov brought the Azov regiment into Ukraine’s National Guard. That’s part of the official armed forces.

And in 2016, the US lifted a ban on its funds being used to train Azov.

In parliament, Johnson continued:

Give the Ukrainians what they need. Give them the weapons. Give them the authorisation to use those weapons outside their own borders. It’s absolutely ludicrous that Ukrainians should be forbidden from doing what Putin is doing himself… why on earth shouldn’t Ukrainians be able to attack Russian forces mustering on their borders?

While Vladimir Putin is responsible for invading Ukraine, in February 2022 then UK prime minister Johnson scuppered a peace deal that could’ve ended the war.

Indeed, foreign secretary David Cameron said in April 2024 that the war is “extremely good value for money” because it depletes Russia.

It’s outrageous that Johnson has welcomed a neo-Nazi delegation to parliament. And it’s unclear where those commentators and groups who frequently allege antisemitism against critics of Israel are now.

Featured image via RT – screengrab

By James Wright

On 12 May 2024 there were Catalonia elections to the Catalan Parliament. The Spanish and international press only highlighted the fact that Puigdemont did not come first.

The winning candidate, Salvador Illa of the PSC (Catalan branch of the PSOE), is hardly mentioned, because he does not seem to have won because of who he is, but because he is in charge of the state campaign to try to electorally defeat Catalan independence, a movement that has won every election since 2012 with an absolute majority.

And from ‘Catalan independence has lost!’ they want to conclude ‘Catalan independence is over!’, even though it is not clear that Illa will be able to form an anti-independence government (because he would need the participation of ERC, a pro-independence party). And ERC may rather support Puigdemont to form a pro-independence government or, if there is no agreement, we will go to new elections.

Catalonia’s elections: results don’t match the reality

The PSC (pro-Spanish social democrats) got 42 MPs, Junts (pro-independence social democrats and liberals) got 35 MPs, 20 for ERC (pro-independence social democrats), 15 for the PP (pro-Spanish right-wing), 11 for VOX (Spanishist extreme right), six for the Comunes (nationally undefined left), four for the CUP (pro-independence left) and two for Aliança Catalana (a new extreme right-wing pro-independence party, in line with what is happening in Europe, but contrary to the anti-fascist tradition of the pro-independence movement).

Despite the fact that an amnesty law is about to be passed to defuse the ‘lawfare’ (judicial dirty war) that Spanish nationalism has been using against Catalan independence, there has still been persecution in these elections.

Puigdemont has had to campaign from Northern Catalonia (currently in French territory), unable to tour Catalonia because he would have been arrested, and also unable to participate in televised debates. And despite this disadvantage (which in other countries would have annulled the elections due to the lack of equality between the contenders), Puigdemont’s result has been very acceptable: he has surpassed his previous result by 100,000 votes and has come within seven seats of the winner.

Pro-independence movement holding ground

The pro-independence movement as a whole has maintained the votes of the previous elections, but has lost 700,000 votes compared to 2017. This loss was mainly due to ERC, which had already been losing votes for some time and has now lost 170,000 votes compared to the previous elections, but 500,000 compared to 2017.

The electorate has punished the Catalan government of ERC for changing course, for wanting to stop the emancipation movement, for talking about postponing independence for more than 20 years, and for continually submitting to the designs of the Spanish government. This electoral setback has pushed the ERC leadership to resign and announce a process of self-criticism and redirection.

Therefore, anyone who wants to see in the loss of the absolute majority of the pro-independence movement that this movement is over will have difficulty understanding what is to come, because the yearning for freedom is still alive, and this has only been an electoral turbulence due to the difficulty of agreeing on how to manage Spanish hostility.

So this electoral defeat, therefore, is not the defeat of those who are still at loggerheads with the state, but of the party that had relegated the struggle for independence to the management of domestic affairs.

Catalonia elections: the anger is rising

And stretching this feeling of anger, many voters do not forgive that, in general, all pro-independence parties did not dare to undertake independence in 2017 (for fear that Spain would provoke a bloodbath), nor that, having had 52% of the votes in the Catalan Parliament, they have been inhibited from moving towards independence.

Returning to the present, it remains to be seen who will end up forming a government in Catalonia, but even if the pro-independence parties are unable to do so, it will continue to advance because (unlike what they think in Madrid) the parties are not the driving force behind independence, but rather it is a transversal social movement born of a real and historically omnipresent yearning in Catalonia.

However, given that this struggle also needs institutional force, if the electoral penalty serves to break the deadlock and causes the movement to advance together, the road to independence will once again be inexorable.

Featured image via Òmnium Cultural

By Jordi Oriola Folch

The BBC has a long and torrid history of subverting democracy in the UK and globally under the guide of impartiality. From the Western-instigated Iranian coup in the late 1950s, to the second invasion of Iraq in the early noughties, to the destruction of Jeremy Corbyn in the last decade – the BBC has been instrumental in them all. Now, with another general election it appears that once again, it will be subservient to the right-wing status quo – as an interview with Reform’s Richard Tice showed.

BBC general election: where’s Nigel when you need him?

On BBC Breakfast on Friday 24 May, Tice appeared early on to promote his party’s guff. And guff of the highest order it was.

For example, he repeatedly called both the Tories and Labour’s positions “socialism” – which is a flat-out lie and demonstrable nonsense. Yet Tice said:

They’re both forms of socialism. They stand for high taxes, high regulations, big state, zero growth.

BIG STATE??? Is this guy for real? Well, clearly – as he said it again a few minutes later.

'If you want socialism you'll get socialism if you vote for the two main parties'

Reform UK leader Richard Tice responds to questions on #BBCBreakfast that his party will take votes from the Conservatives allowing Labour to winhttps://t.co/ZOJ7RtZHpz pic.twitter.com/6GtQkSa3C7

— BBC Breakfast (@BBCBreakfast) May 24, 2024

If you really needed it explaining, socialism is, according to Britannica:

socialism, social and economic doctrine that calls for public rather than private ownership or control of property and natural resources. According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work in isolation but live in cooperation with one another. Furthermore, everything that people produce is in some sense a social product, and everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it. Society as a whole, therefore, should own or at least control property for the benefit of all its members.

This conviction puts socialism in opposition to capitalism, which is based on private ownership of the means of production and allows individual choices in a free market to determine how goods and services are distributed.

This. Is. Not. What. The. Tories. And. Labour. Are. Promoting.

We cannot believe it even needs saying – yet the BBC Breakfast host let Tice say it twice anyway.

STOP THE VOLCANOS

Nina Warhurst did, however, manage to challenge him on immigration. However, what she didn’t challenge him on was this preposterous nonsense:

'The idea you can stop the power of the sun or volcanos is simply ludicrous'

Reform UK leader Richard Tice told #BBCBreakfast his party would scrap 'net-zero' targets designed to tackle climate changehttps://t.co/ZOJ7RtZHpz pic.twitter.com/LuV9VMesvg

— BBC Breakfast (@BBCBreakfast) May 24, 2024

We’re the first to admit capitalist Net Zero is a scam (but an actual, egalitarian shift to renewables isn’t) – but so is adapting to ‘climate change’ as fossil fuel-funded Tice called it. Again, this should not need explaining – but we’ll do it anyway. Tice liked to quote the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and according to Carbon Brief it thinks:

Humans emissions and activities have caused around 100% of the warming observed since 1950

But STOP THE VOLCANOS, says Tice.

Yet once again, Warhurst let him peddle this unquestioned.

Reform UK: the BBC’s general election pet?

Bear in mind, Tice leads a party that can’t even get their own candidate’s surnames right:

Lee Anderson spells his name wrong on his campaign leaflet.

Makes a video of it with Lee Andersin MP for all to see his 30p Lee stupidity.

Don’t RT we wouldn’t want Reform UK‘s only living MP to get embarrassed. pic.twitter.com/OqpMhkHAlX

— BladeoftheSun (@BladeoftheS) May 23, 2024

Despite all of this, the BBC passed this unhinged maniac and his unhinged party off as something serious and credible. In fact, Reform is just a collection of old, white racists dressed up as the sensible right.

Like the BBC did with Farage, it already appears hellbent on pushing Tice as the alternative candidate. The corporation is as toxic as Reform – and will be a disaster for the rest of us during the general election.

Featured image via BBC iPlayer 

By Steve Topple

The following article is a comment piece from the Peace and Justice Project

It’s confirmed! Jeremy Corbyn is standing as an independent candidate in Islington North at the general election on 4 July.

Jeremy has proudly represented his constituency for over 40 years and has built a reputation as a committed local member of parliament who stands up for democracy, equality, and peace.

In the past, Jeremy has been elected as a Labour MP on huge majorities. But this general election will be different. He is running as an independent candidate without major party support, so it is absolutely vital that we get organised and mobilise our movement to get him re-elected.

We believe that Jeremy will win, but it won’t be easy. That is why we’re asking for your help.

You can sign up here to help Corbyn win in Islington North.

Watch Corbyn’s video below, explaining what he stands for, and share the video widely:

But it’s not just Jeremy who is standing up against the political establishment and the despicable suffering inflicted on our country.

The Collective is a political grouping organising campaigns around the Peace and Justice Project’s 5 Demands to build a real alternative to the misery faced by millions.

The Collective includes Andrew Feinstein in Holborn and St Pancras, Pamela Fitzpatrick in Harrow West, and Leanne Mohamad in Ilford North.

With the Conservatives in government and Labour in opposition, it has become clear that neither has the policies or political will to bring about real change or an alternative to the misery faced by millions – but our movement does.

With Jeremy Corbyn and the Collective, we will build hope for the many.

Featured image via the Canary

By The Canary

BBC Question Time (BBCQT) on Thursday 23 May was the first episode of the general election. The programme clearly was starting as it means to go on – with no voices away from the political centre or right. However, the audience were at least on point – with one member taking just 30 seconds to expose the charlatans in the Labour Party; leaving its MP who was on the panel open-mouthed and floundering.

Not ANOTHER general election

As the Canary previously wrote:

General election? NO! Not another one!

Yes, it’s the fourth general election in under ten years and no-one except politicians and the corporate media seem to really want it. What a fucking time to be alive. You don’t need us to list all the ills of the main political parties – but we have a choice on 4 July between:

• Literal neo-fascists.
• Far-right Tories.
• Right-wing Tories with red rosettes.
• Centre-right Tories with orange ties.
• Sometimes Tories with some other decent people but all of them wearing green cardigans.

The Canary’s advice to you is don’t vote for any of the first three on that list at the general election.

Oh course, if you did want to know what the main parties have to say then BBCQT should potentially be the place to go. Except in the case of Labour on 23 May, it wasn’t.

Labour: ‘that’s a very good question that I’m not going to answer’

Bridget Phillipson is Labour’s shadow education secretary. Clearly, answering questions wasn’t something she was taught at Oxford Uni, where she went – because she swerved almost every one of them.

On increasing universities tuition fees, she would not answer – just calling it “unpalatable”:

BREAKING: Labour refuses to rule out an increase in university tuition fees.

Bridget Phillipson, Shadow Education Secretary said on BBC Question Time: "We need to look at all of the options"pic.twitter.com/UOYOdamhVa

— Stats for Lefties (@LeftieStats) May 23, 2024

The, on whether or not a Labour government would arrest Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes and genocide in Gaza, she would not answer  because it was a “hypothetical” question:

Bridget Phillipson is asked, if the ICC prosecutor is successful in his application for an arrest warrant against Netanyahu, would the next Labour govt enforce it given the opportunity.

Phillipson says that's a hypothetical question and she refuses to answer #bbcqt pic.twitter.com/OESBBS8Alg

— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) May 24, 2024

Phillipson could not answer how Labour would pay for sorting out our disastrous privatised water system – the implication being the party would let water companies force customers’ bills up:

Labour’s Bridget Phillipson says the water companies need to be “held responsible” for their “total failure” to invest

pic.twitter.com/q8KuxKlzpk

— Simon Gosden. Esq. #fbpe 3.5% (@g_gosden) May 24, 2024

Hell – even arch capitalist Tim Montgomerie declared the government should nationalise the water companies.

The Labour MP would not answer whether her party would tax rich people more as well – unlikely given they’re now its target voting cohort:

Fiona Bruce, "To the woman's second point. What about taxing millionaires and billionaires?"

Bridget Phillipson, "We need a fairer tax system overall, I completely agree.. There are a number of changes we would make to the tax system to make it fairer.. We would end non doms..… pic.twitter.com/H7wY65KNow

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) May 23, 2024

All in all, Phillipson’s performance stank of New New Labour PR: soundbites with no substance and certainly no policies that set it apart from the Tories. Already, this fact isn’t lost on voters. Recent polling shows the majority of voters either:

a) Don’t think either Labour or the Tories represent change.

b) Don’t have a clue which party does.

BBCQT audience on it – as were the Lib Dems

However, all this wasn’t lost on one BBCQT audience member – who then rallied the support of a large part of his fellow observers. Enter this guy to sum the situation up to rapturous applause:

I used to vote for the Labour Party. And you’ve not answered any questions… Tonight you’ve said nothing. You’ve juts given us vague answers. Just answer the question.

Phillipson grinned inanely like some coked-up Cheshire Cat – because claiming she’d ‘tried her best’ and the rolling some guff about breakfast clubs off.

However, those 30 seconds exposed Keir Starmer’s vacuous Labour Party for the right-wing con it really is.

It comes to something when the Lib Dems are showing up the Labour Party – but that’s exactly where we were at on the first BBCQT of the general election:

There's a look of envy if ever I saw one

Daisy Cooper talking about upholding the rule of law and supporting the ICC, something Bridget Phillipson cannot say so openly because of Labour's current position on the subject pic.twitter.com/M3wE3QE5pN

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) May 23, 2024

Featured image via BBC iPlayer

By Steve Topple

The BBC has exposed how an insidious group of predatory charlatans have been gaslighting long Covid patients. It revolves around a pseudoscientific treatment known as the ‘Lightning Process’.

It would be shocking, were it not for the experience of those with another post-viral disease. This is because it isn’t the first time these quack practitioners have scammed vulnerable patients. The reality is, they’ve been grifting off of the devastation myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME) has caused to the lives of the millions who live with it for years.

The Lightning Process strikes long Covid patients

The ‘Lightning Process’ commercialises a raft of psychological treatments. Primarily it taps into the realms of ‘neurolinguistic programming (NLP)’ – essentially, brain training that purportedly teaches away negative thoughts. Crucially, its proponents promote that it can cure chronic illnesses. In fact, the programme is so-named precisely over the claim that in its three short days of training, patients can be cured.

So, think: affirmation culture meets dubious science in a perfect storm of ableist gaslighting. In other words, this dazzling purported panacea peddles the pseudoscientific and palpably trash idea that patients can think themselves better.

Now, a BBC expose has found its adherents have been offering the so-called training to people living with long Covid.

In an undercover investigation, health and misinformation reporter Rachel Schraer revealed how Lightning Process coaches told patients that:

almost anyone can recover from long Covid by changing their thoughts, language and actions.

Schraer’s podcast included a series of secret recordings from training sessions she participated in over Zoom. As the accompanying BBC News article explained:

Over three days on Zoom, the course taught the ritual that forms the basis of the programme. Every time you experience a symptom or negative thought, you say the word “stop”, make a choice to avoid these symptoms and then do a positive visualisation of a time you felt well.

You do this while walking around a piece of paper printed with symbols – a ritual the BBC was told to do as many as 50 times a day.

However, Schraer scrutinised the controversial scheme – platforming the experience of ex-Olympic rower Oonagh Cousins. Notably, the Lightning Process had approached her to offer a free place on the course. She told the BBC that during the programme:

They were trying to suggest that I could think my way out of the symptoms, basically. And I disputed that entirely…

I had a very clearly physical illness. And I felt that they were blaming my negative thought processes for why I was ill. They tried to point out that I had depression or anxiety. And I said ‘I’m not, I’m just very sick’.

Shocking history of abuse in ME

Ostensibly, the Lightning Process appeared to be banking on bagging another celebrity poster-child for its contentious training.

Already, it boasts endorsements from public figures like actress Martine McCutcheon and right-wing corporate journalist Esther Rantzen, among others.

However, its star-studded list of shills conceals an insidious history of patient gaslighting – just as Cousins and Schraer found. Specifically, the Lightning Process has been abusing people living with ME for many years.

During the podcast, Dr Binita Kane told the BBC that:

There are decades of evidence in ME to show that there is pathological reasons why there is energy limitation, that there is an underlying problem in the energy-making factory of the body”

Alongside this, Schraer acknowledged that there is an overlap between ME and long Covid.

Largely however, the brief nod to ME skipped over the turbulent and torrid history of the Lightning Process for the chronic illness. Yet, as Lightning Process acolytes crawl out of the woodwork to flog it to the latest generation of post-viral patients, its past is more important than ever.

Snake-oil salesman

The mastermind behind the Lightning Process is osteopath, tarot card and aura-reader Phil Parker. Parker founded the approach in the 1990s and has promoted it for people with ME for decades. Since then, its influence has spread across the globe, with various practitioners picking up the programme for patients with ME.

And, in the spirit of its affirmation wellness guff – it thrives on confirmation bias through selectively curated patient testimony. It has plastered its website with platitudes to its own success from patients that purportedly recovered from chronic illnesses after the course.

However, there is no real evidence base for its claims. Moreover, there are numerous anecdotal patient accounts of harm. This includes a 2012 survey in Norway where by a large majority, ME patients reported that the programme had either not helped, or actively made their condition worse.

Despite this, junk science studies have painted a veneer of reputability for the medically unproven approach. Unsurprisingly, it has ‘scientific’ support from the echelons of the ME psych lobby. That is, notorious PACE trial supporter, and all-round endorser of bunk psychosomatic interventions for ME – Esther Crawley – has propped up this dubious training programme.

You can read more on the PACE trial here.

Notably, Crawley led another contentious study known as the SMILE trial. This assessed the impacts of the Lightning Process on 56 children with ME between the ages of 12 and 18

Of course, the study compared a cohort of young ME patients on ‘conventional’ treatments – which then involved other harmful psychologising interventions like graded exercise therapy (GET) and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). The Canary has covered extensively why they’re problematic – you can read more on this here.

Notwithstanding this, unsurprisingly, the study was flawed in a number of other ways too. As such, scientists and patients have slammed the study. An open letter to the medical journal that published the study led to a lengthy editorial correction.

Long-term ME journalist and advocate David Tuller who coordinated the letter said it best:

it was a dung-heap of methodological and ethical violations. It has now been slapped with a correction that seems almost as long as War and Peace.

In truth, when I downloaded the correction into a Word doc, it came out to 2,849 words. That was accompanied by a 983-word “editor’s note” that offered tortured logic to explain why this disastrous study only required “clarifications” rather than retraction. Since the study would never have been published in the first place had the investigators been honest about the conduct of the study, it is disturbing that Archives of Disease in Childhood has allowed them to republish their original and obviously biased findings.

Lightning Process in clinics?

Stopping short of retracting the study? It’s the same old story – as with the flawed PACE trial – and forms another damning branch of the ever-growing medical scandal around ME.

However, there is some tentative good news. That is, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) came out against the Lightning Process in its 2021 ME guidelines.

Nor is there a hint of the Lightning Process in the latest British Association of Clinicians in ME/CFS (BACME) guidance that clinics use. As the Canary has previously detailed, Crawley originally founded this organisation. Currently, multiple clinics across the country utilise their documents – in some cases to devastating effect for patients.

However, in a 2019 survey it conducted on ME services, some reported that they used NLP – which the Lightning Process often falls under. Its latest 2023 survey dropped any reference to this. Even so, it seemingly did not survey for this, instead ambiguously referring to “other” approaches.

Yet while BACME doesn’t appear to openly endorse the approach, a number of its board members are trained in NLP. This includes occupational therapists Charlie Adler and Marina Townend. Notably, both work at NHS ME clinics. Worse still, in 2019, BACME chair Anna Gregorowski led a review of treatments for young people with ME, which concluded that:

The Lightning Process has been shown to be effective when added to medical care.

And, as the BBC reported, the new NICE guidelines also haven’t stopped ME and long Covid services in Scotland from pushing the Lightning Process either. This is because NICE guidelines do not automatically apply there. However, it is supposedly updating its equivalent guidelines to be in step with NICE.

Preying on people living with ME

So, what’s in it for Parker and his adoring apostles? It’s an easy way to make a quick buck of course – all at the expense of the chronically ill community.

Moreover, people who’ve participated in its cultish programme have gone on to become coaches. In other words, it’s a glorified health fad-turned-pyramid scheme – as some patients have been pointing out for years.

Naturally, Parker himself has also been turning a tidy profit from his exploitative scam. He operates a number of companies tied to his Lightning Process approach. Collectively, these had net assets of nearly half a million pounds in 2023.

Essentially then, he’s preying on sick people largely unable to work, scraping by on paltry state benefits to make a fortune.

Chronically ill people as the cash cow: long Covid is next

All this goes to show, snake oil salesmen preying on desperately sick people is nothing new. Lightning Process con-artists continue to make a killing off of chronically ill people without shame nor consequence.

Yet the alarming reality is, that’s not just a metaphor either. The widespread psychologisation of people living with ME has killed people – and is killing patients now. Moreover, patient-blaming abuse from Lightning Process itself has pushed some patients to attempted suicide.

That long Covid patients are the new cash cow for this crooked cult of charlatans peddling vacuous crap is no surprise. Where poorly researched and stigmatised health conditions tread, the psych lobby and its capitalist vultures follow, to pick off those society has shunted to the margins. Evidently, gaslighting psychologising treatments can strike twice – but no shockers there.

Feature image via Matti Blume/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1200 by 900, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

By Hannah Sharland

This article was updated at 6:10pm on Thursday 23 May to reflect an error. It originally stated that Rishi Sunak was at a McVitie’s warehouse. However, McVitie’s has informed the Canary, other outlets, and social media users, that it is in fact not their factory but a distribution centre. We would like to profoundly apologise to McVitie’s for associating them with Sunak’s preposterous stunt. 

It’s just a day after prime minister Rishi Sunak announced the general election and his campaign has already been exposed as a sham. Sunak took two pre-planted questions from Tory councillors posing as workers from a William West and Sons warehouse.

On top of that, his security escorted Sky News reporter Darren McCaffrey out of a launch event at the ExCel centre.

Lack of real Tory support

On 23 May, media outlets broadcasted footage of a man wearing a hi-vis jacket who said to Sunak:

the biggest issue is going to be immigration over this election campaign… your Rwanda plan is it going to see results and stop the small boats coming?

Neither broadcasters nor Sunak acknowledged that the man is actually Conservative Party Leicestershire County Councillor Ross Hills:

“If I’m re-elected as your prime minister those flights will go to Rwanda, we will get that deterrent up and running”

Rishi Sunak has started his campaign in Derbyshire and answers a question regarding his small boats plan.https://t.co/pZk91T6sKY

Sky 501 and YouTube pic.twitter.com/7JxMLPQjKz

— Sky News (@SkyNews) May 23, 2024

Hills confirmed to Byline Times that the Tory leadership had asked him to appear at the event.

And the charade didn’t stop there. Another person wearing a hi-vis jacket at the warehouse said to Sunak:

You’ve talked a lot about the economy, specific to everybody, the cost of living crisis… What’s been done and what sets you apart for the future to benefit that pound in the pocket?

But that turned out to be Erewash Conservative Councillor Ben Hall-Evans.

However, it later emerged that the warehouse in question wasn’t a McVitie’s one, as earlier reported. The company rightly panicked about being associated with this sham, and clarified this on social media:

Hi there, we’d like to confirm that this not a McVitie’s site or a McVitie’s organised event.

— McVitie's (@McVities) May 23, 2024

Hiding from the media?

Sunak’s security also dragged Sky political correspondent Darren McCaffrey out of an election launch event at ExCel:

Hours after announcing the General Election

A Sky News reporter is physically dragged out of Conservative party campaign launch at Excel

Remember when all of the journalists ignored the cancelling of Sangita Myska and Belle Donati? It seems like more journalists are being… pic.twitter.com/g30RGWQnq2

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) May 22, 2024

This raises the question of whether Sunak will continue to run a similar campaign to Theresa May’s in 2017. The Canary reported:

Across the country, from Harrow, to Bristol, to Cornwall, only nodding faithfuls are allowed into May’s events.

Take Harrow, London, where the sitting Prime Minister reportedly refused to take questions from anyone other than handpicked journalists.

Keir Starmer: targeting Tory voters

Keir Starmer, meanwhile, has long been targeting Tory voters with similar rhetoric on immigration and refugees as Sunak and Tory councillor Hills.

Both Starmer and Sunak have denounced the other as offering an “amnesty” to refugees.

In a similar vein, Starmer has welcomed three Tory MPs into the Labour Party after they defected.

The latest to join – Natalie Elphicke – characterised refugees as terrorists. Starmer said he was “delighted” Elphicke now sits on the Labour benches.

Starmer has lost support among many in Labour over his domestic and foreign policy positions. He abandoned all the pledges he made to become Labour leader.

And he has ignored the International Court of Justice ruling that it’s “plausible” Israel is committing genocide against Palestinian people.

Prominent commentators Owen Jones and Grace Blakeley have joined those refusing Labour over its positions. Dozens of Labour councillors have resigned from the party.

It’s important we use this general election to reject the warmongering austerity establishment in both Labour and Tory.

Featured image via Sky News – X

By James Wright

On Wednesday 22 May, Rishi Sunak made his moist announcement about the upcoming general election on 4 July. However, there was no British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter anywhere to be seen. The Tories are starting as they mean to go on – somewhat delulu – and by making it very clear they don’t give a crap about disabled people.

A general election already NOT for disabled people

As the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) pointed out:

Where’s the British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter @10DowningStreet?

Calling a #GeneralElection is one of the biggest moves our country can make – deaf people deserve to have that information at the same time as everyone else. This is not good enough! (1/2)

— RNID (@RNID) May 22, 2024

Unfortunately for anyone who has been paying even the slightest bit of attention, this comes as no surprise. The Tories have made their stance on disabled people very obvious over the last 14 years – that wasn’t going to change because they want re-electing:

That is not a surprise. @RishiSunak has already shown his contempt for disabled people by the barbaric welfare reforms.

— Sarah Boyle (@SarahBoyle75396) May 23, 2024

Obviously, the Tories weren’t thinking about anyone other than themselves and bankrolling their corrupt pals:

They don’t care about the disabled community. The Deaf community wouldn’t have crossed their minds.
Get them out! https://t.co/r8k0Ff44vI

— PB (@PhilippaB) May 22, 2024

The conservatives are well known for their hatred of disabled people, from slashing disabled people’s benefits and completely screwing them over – to literally causing deaths. The lack of shits they give could not be clearer:

Of course he has, he’s a tory. They hate disabled people.

— Matty (@rodsof5wizards) May 23, 2024

Complete ineptitude

Some people presumed the Tories might have learnt lessons from the pandemic – unfortunately for them, it seems their complete ineptitude has no bounds.

Throughout the COVID lockdowns there were requests for a #BSL Interpreter. No lessons have been learnt. #Accessible information is needed for everyone. @10DowningStreet this needs to be addressed. #WheresTheInterpreter https://t.co/hKhaiNKYc3

— Sharon (@SharonBishopSLT) May 22, 2024

We have already established that Keir Starmer is a Tory in a red tie. So of course, X users were quick to point out that whilst he launched his campaign on dry ground, he also didn’t have enough brain cells to include a BSL interpreter:

Disappointed to see that @Keir_Starmer also launched his campaign without a British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter.

If he becomes Prime Minster on 5 July, he should make sure that his first speech to the nation is accessible to deaf people. We hope @vickyfoxcroft supports this. https://t.co/IzhIlmmbGO

— RNID (@RNID) May 22, 2024

Only last week, the Canary’s Rachel Charlton-Dailey covered Starmer’s 10/10 effort in leaving disabled people out of pre-election pledges. As she pointed out, Sunak and his ‘wet wipe army’ see disabled people as their biggest public enemy. Whereas for Labour – clearly ignorance is bliss:

Disappointing but not surprising

— Jo (@cfs_jo) May 23, 2024

Moreover, the Tory government introduced the BSL Act in 2022 for precisely these situations. Although, a fish might have a better chance of remembering that:

Where was the BSL interpreter for this announcement? The BSL Act was passed to ensure that Government departments provided BSL access. Surely announcing something as important as a general election should be accessible to all? Why should voters trust you if they aren’t included?

— Ann Jillings (@AnnJillings) May 23, 2024

We effectively have two power hungry shitbags battling it out in a general election to lead a country even further into disaster. Whilst not giving a shit how many disabled people they leave behind, or kill:

The Tories have never cared about disabled people.

The red Tories won’t either.

— Chris #TransRights (@CWTWheels) May 22, 2024

This! Here’s hoping the next government considers inclusively be an essential rather than a mockery. https://t.co/0LTJa6lTqu

— Heather Longbottom (@HebLongbottom) May 22, 2024

Clearly, neither party can be arsed to do the bare minimum for disabled people. So, why should anyone bother to turn out for them on election day? Hopefully one day, we will have a government we can expect more from. 

Feature image via NBC News and Guardian News/YouTube

By HG

As hundreds of thousands of people across the country prepare for what promises to be the biggest march to protect nature in a generation, new polling reveals that almost three-quarters of the public believe the government is failing to protect our country’s nature, threatening our very life support systems and compounding the biodiversity crisis. But will a general election change that and ‘restore nature now’?

Most of the public think the government is failing nature

A new poll released on International Day for Biodiversity reveals that a staggering 71% of the UK public thinks the government isn’t doing enough to protect the environment for the next generation. Voters from all political sides think nature is not being protected adequately for future generations. The polls found that this includes 56% of Conservative voters, 86% of Labour voters and 80% of Liberal Democrat 2019 voters.

All major nature charities and climate and environmental groups in the UK are banding together to warn political parties today that their commitments to nature are falling far short, risking the lives of wildlife and the people of this country and the rest of the world. Together they are urging the public to join them in London in a month’s time on 22 June to voice alarm at the state of UK nature and demand that politicians Restore Nature Now.

The warning comes ahead of an imminent announcement of the UK’s strategy to meet key international biodiversity agreements from COP15, to halt and restore nature loss and protect 30% of land and sea for nature by 2030.

Restore Nature Now

With low expectations from nature groups that the plans will turn the tide for UK nature, it also comes hot on the heels of a warning from the National Audit Office last week, that the government’s flagship Biodiversity Net Gain scheme may not have the measures in place to ensure its success.

Our politicians have a track record of allowing environment and climate destroying projects such as High Speed 2 (HS2), Road Investment Strategy 2 (RIS2), the West Cumbria Coal Mine, and Rosebank oil field to go ahead. It is clear beyond any doubt that protecting the lives of millions of people in and outside of the UK from climate and ecological breakdown is not a priority.

TV wildlife star Chris Packham will spearhead the Restore Nature Now march in London on 22 June that is expected to draw hundreds of thousands people from campaign groups and nature conservation organisations including Extinction Rebellion, the RSPB, National Trust, Woodland Trust, and the Wildlife Trusts.

Chris Packham, TV broadcaster and environmental campaigner, said:

The vast majority of people in the UK care deeply about protecting the environment for the future. We all want a better world for the next generation, but as this research shows we have no faith that our politicians will deliver the change nature needs.

There has never been a more critical time for nature, wildlife numbers continue to fall and our wild places continue to deteriorate. We have to shout it from the rooftops that we must Restore Nature Now, and politicians from all parties need to hear us roar.

He also pointed out in an X video that ‘things can only get better – right?’

Things can only get better , right ?

In a climate and biodiversity crisis we can’t take that risk . Pledge to march with us on June 22 – nature can’t wait .https://t.co/WEq9l0SaqV pic.twitter.com/AUDRC58vql

— Chris Packham (@ChrisGPackham) May 22, 2024

Nature demands for a general election

Daze Aghaji, spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion UK said:

The people know that the state of nature in the UK, and all over the world, is bad. And we know that none of us can survive if the natural world collapses. If we, ordinary people, know this and see how vital it is to act, why are our politicians not acting with the urgency that is needed? It is time that we all stand together and unite to protect and restore nature now, before it is too late.

Over 170 organisations from across the UK are backing the Restore Nature Now demonstration on 22 June to protest the poor state of nature in the UK and are united in calling on UK politicians to deliver:

– A pay rise for nature – the nature and climate-friendly farming budget doubled.

– Make polluters pay – new rules to make polluters contribute to nature and climate recovery

– More space for nature – to expand and improve protected areas, and ensure public land and National Parks contribute more to recovery.

– A right to a healthy environment –  an Environmental Rights Bill, which would drive better decisions for nature, improve public health and access to high-quality nature.

– Fair and effective climate action – increasing home energy efficiency, supporting active travel and public transport, and replacing polluting fossil fuels with affordable renewables.

All this seems especially pertinent given the general election on 4 July. We will wait and see whether or not the main parties commit to ‘restoring nature now’.

Featured image via Restore Nature Now

By Steve Topple

Cross party MPs and Lords have signed a letter calling on the UK government to respect the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the attempted arrest warrants.

Neither Labour Party leader Keir Starmer nor shadow foreign secretary David Lammy have backed the letter. But Lammy said that Labour:

supports the ICC as a cornerstone of the international legal system . . . whether it is in Ukraine, Sudan, Syria or Gaza

That raises the question of why the Labour leadership has covered for longstanding Israel’s war crimes. Starmer even backed collective punishment of Palestinians on LBC.

And if Labour upholds the ICC, would they support a warrant against its former leader Tony Blair for the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003?

‘Do not undermine the ICC’ on Israel

The letter, organised by Richard Burgon and Imran Hussain, comes after ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan announced he is seeking arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defence minister Yoav Gallant, as well as for three Hamas leaders.

The UK is one of 124 countries party to the Rome Statute of the ICC, including nearly all European countries. But Rishi Sunak has attempted to undermine its authority. He condemned the effort to apply international law to dominant Western-backed state Israel:

This is a deeply unhelpful development. Of course it is still subject to a final decision, but it remains deeply unhelpful nonetheless.

There is no moral equivalence between a democratic state exercising its lawful right to self defense and the terrorist group Hamas. It is wrong to conflate and equivocate between those two different entities.

The ICC’s Khan has documented evidence of Israel systematically starving the Palestinian people and intentionally targeting civilians as a means of collective punishment. Israel has killed over 15,000 children since 7 October.

In the letter to foreign secretary David Cameron, MPs and peers called on him to “condemn any threats and attempts to undermine the independence and impartiality of the ICC in its investigations into crimes in Gaza”.

Western leaders seek impunity

Khan said to CNN that he is facing threats in an attempt to shield Israel from accountability. He also said a “senior leader” told him:

This court is built for Africa and for thugs like Putin

US Republican lawmakers have publicly stated they will retaliate against the court. Congressman Anthony D’Esposito said “there will be serious consequences if they proceed.”

US president Joe Biden, meanwhile, condemned the ICC seeking arrest warrants against Israel as “outrageous”.

In other words, Western leaders are arguing that international law does not apply to the West or its allies.

Under Donald Trump, the US previously put economic and travel sanctions on ICC prosecutors for their investigation into US military torture in Afghanistan.

The letter also points out that threatening the ICC is itself a violation of international law. It outlaws “impeding, intimidating or corruptly influencing an official of the Court for the purpose of forcing or persuading the official not to perform, or to perform improperly, his or her duties”.

The ICC’s statement does not mention Israel’s illegal occupation of both Gaza and the West Bank in Palestine.

Ensuring Western states and their allies face accountability under international law is key to achieving a lasting peace.

Featured image via Oxford Union – YouTube and Janta Ka Reporter – YouTube

By James Wright

Donald Trump drew disbelief after suggesting that standard language from an FBI search warrant executed in 2022 showed that US president Joe Biden wanted armed agents to shoot him.

Trump’s latest incendiary claim was in response to a court filing outlining plans for the FBI search at the Mar-a-Lago club, where he kept classified national security documents after leaving the White House.

The filing included standard FBI wording stating that agents are allowed to use deadly force if someone is in imminent danger.

But Trump, who is running to unseat Biden in November’s election, distorted the statement to say that it showed the Justice Department was ready to shoot him and harm his family.

Trump: distorted or just massively silly?

In a fundraising email, Trump said:

It’s just been revealed that Biden’s DOJ was authorized to use DEADLY FORCE for their DESPICABLE raid in Mar-a-Lago. You know they’re just itching to do the unthinkable.

Joe Biden was locked & loaded ready to take me out & put my family in danger. He thinks he can frighten me, intimidate me, and KNOCK ME DOWN!

The wild remarks add to the pile of false claims made by Trump against Biden, whom he has repeatedly accused without evidence of weaponising the justice system to target him.

Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer called for all lawmakers to condemn Trump’s “outlandish and dangerous” remarks in a speech in the upper chamber of Congress. Schumer continued:

We cannot let this man, Donald Trump, or anybody else, throw these kinds of matches to light flames that could burn our democracy.

David Axelrod, a White House aide under Barack Obama, called Trump’s comments “patently nuts… and dangerously provocative” in a post on X.

Media Matters fellow Matthew Gertz had to explain the incredibly basic facts Trump was having a shitfit about:

The idea here is that Joe Biden ordered an FBI hit on Donald Trump, put the orders in writing, and then… the FBI didn't try to kill Trump — in fact ensured he'd be in a different state when they showed up — and never tried again.

Ok. https://t.co/kxlRx1DVt5

— Matthew Gertz (@MattGertz) May 22, 2024

The stupid spreads

Of course, several of Trump’s staunchest allies joined him in misrepresenting the court filing.

Georgia congresswoman and so-called “bleach blonde bad-built butch body” Marjorie Taylor Greene posted on X that the Justice Department and the FBI “gave the green light” to assassinate the former president:

I made sure that he knew.

The Biden DOJ and FBI were planning to assassinate Pres Trump and gave the green light.

Does everyone get it yet???!!!!

What are Republicans going to do about it?

I tried to oust our Speaker who funded Biden’s DOJ AND FBI, but Democrats stopped it. https://t.co/XSTevEQsNI pic.twitter.com/o0lUjcEdix

— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (@RepMTG) May 21, 2024

Trump has, of course, repeatedly threatened multiple times to use FBI raids for his own gain:

We went through 13,000 of Donald Trump's Truth Social posts, and found that he keeps threatening his enemies with FBI raids, investigations, indictments and jail time.

Here's a roundup, with a call to action to prevent the worst-case scenario: https://t.co/Z7MqDmCEsM

— Citizens for Ethics (@CREWcrew) May 23, 2024

On the day of the raid, he was not even in Florida but at his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey.

The FBI issued a rare statement, saying:

there was no departure from the norm in this matter.

Trump is accused of wilfully retaining national defence information and obstructing government efforts to recover it. He denies 40 felony charges, but the trial has been indefinitely postponed.

Girl, sit down

In a statement to Agence France-Presse, the Trump campaign said reporting of the fundraising email was:

a sickening attempt to run cover for Joe Biden who is the most corrupt president in history and a threat to our democracy.

Okay, girl. Whatever you need to tell yourself.

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

Featured image by Unsplash/Max Letek

By The Canary

Human impersonator – er – UK prime minister – Rishi Sunak has called a general election for 4 July. That means UK political leaders are scrambling to get their campaigns for the next six weeks into gear. What’s the Canary’s position? Well:

What a fucking time to be alive.

As we said, you don’t need us to list all the ills of the main political parties – but we have a choice on 4 July between:

• Literal neo-fascists.
• Far-right Tories.
• Right-wing Tories with red rosettes.
• Centre-right Tories with orange ties.
• Sometimes Tories with some other decent people but all of them wearing green cardigans.

The Canary’s advice to you is don’t vote for any of the first three on that list at the general election.

If you really must vote for the orange ones – then only do so if it means the far-right or red-rosetted Tories might lose.

Cue a word from this legend:

You’ll remember that Sunak replaced Truss after just 49 days. Truss, of course, oversaw the shortest reign in British history, the death of the Queen, sunk the financial markets, and failed to outlast a bit of lettuce.

If we must

If you’re one of our regular readers you’ll know that the Tories are a shower of useless power-hungry fuckwits, and Labour are… a shower of useless power-hungry fuckwits. There is no real choice between the two. As usual, it’s the poorest in society that get shafted by career politicians who wouldn’t know moral responsibility if it slapped them in the face.

Folks on X were busy getting their jokes off because if they didn’t they’d probably cry. One person played the imperial march as journalists reported on the general election:

Someone is blasting out the ‘ Imperial March ( Darth Vaders Theme) on loud speaker around Downing Street as the #Generalelection is being announced pic.twitter.com/5TBSo2RfNI

— Seb Ate (@Mrbaiti) May 22, 2024

That wasn’t the only song making the rounds:

Rishi Sunak shouting over a protestor playing THINGS CAN ONLY GET BETTER in the pouring rain is peak Britain. 10/10.

— Joanna Hardy-Susskind (@Joanna__Hardy) May 22, 2024

A Larry the cat parody account piped up:

Lots of people asking me where I was when Sunak announced the election. I was inside, because it was raining. Only an idiot would have gone out in that… #GeneralElection pic.twitter.com/feRD2YYvvU

— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) May 22, 2024

Larry the cat is the most stable political figure we’ve known in the last few years, always good to hear from him.

Rishi’s soaking didn’t go unnoticed:

the way he’s getting increasingly soaked is killing me… a true pathetic fallacy #GeneralElection pic.twitter.com/fHXzTyOF6X

— Ruby Naldrett (@rubynaldrett) May 22, 2024

Another astute political commentator summed up the mood:

I believe I speak for the nation #GeneralElection pic.twitter.com/3M9aVGoVuC

— Joe (@MrJoeGooch) May 22, 2024

Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place:

voting the tories out / kier starmer pic.twitter.com/FyPLb0gAKg

— eryn (she/her) (@eryn_27) May 22, 2024

Choice between wet lettuce and wet wipe

This will be the first time Sunak has an electoral test – clearly, the sign of a functioning democracy. The wet lettuce told the BBC:

I’m the one that’s prepared to take bold action. I’ve got a clear plan, and that’s how I’ll deliver security for you and your family.

This from the mind that came up with the disaster that was Eat Out to Help Out – you can keep that type of security, sunshine. Remember what a leading scientist thought about that harebrained scheme? We do! Professor John Edmunds of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said:

If we had [been consulted], I would have been clear what I thought about it. As far as I am concerned, it was a spectacularly stupid idea and an obscene way to spend public money.

We don’t know about you, but we feel much more secure already.

By The Canary

A new study warns that half of the world’s mangrove ecosystems are at risk of collapse due to the climate crisis.

Mangroves

For the first time ever the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) – known for its red list of threatened species, has taken stock of the world’s mangroves.

Mangroves are groups of trees and shrubs that live in coastal intertidal zones. In total, there are around 80 species of mangrove. They grow at tropical or subtropical temperatures, close to the equator. Around 15% of the world’s coastlines are covered by mangroves, nearing 150,000 square km.

Due to tidal patterns, mangroves flood at least twice per day. Their dense tangle of roots slows the moment of tidal waters, meaning sediment settles and builds up. As a result, this makes them the perfect habitat for fish and other organisms trying to shelter from predators. 

Crucially, mangrove forests also help stabilise coastlines, reduce erosion from storm surges, and currents. They are one of only a handful of trees that can tolerate salt water – meaning they are a vital part of the ecosystem. 

On top of this, mangrove soils are extremely effective carbon sinks, meaning they lock away huge quantities of carbon and stop it from entering the atmosphere. They are able to store nearly three times more carbon than tropical forests of the same size – totalling 11bn tonnes. 

Crucial habitats at risk

Vitally, the new report has for the first time assessed the health of the world’s mangroves in 36 different regions. Notably, it showed that 50% of them are at risk of collapse, with them either categorised as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered. 

Grethel Aguilar, IUCN director general said that the assessment:

highlights the urgent need for coordinated conservation of mangroves — crucial habitats for millions in vulnerable communities worldwide.

According to the assessment, 20% of these were at severe risk of collapse.

Many things threaten mangroves, including deforestation, development, pollution, and dam construction. However, this risk is growing because of rising sea-levels and the increased frequencies of severe storms. Ultimately, due to the climate crisis. 

‘Disaster risk reduction’

Marco Valderrabano of IUCN’s told AFP that between 1996 and 2020:

A very good study of mangrove change globally that was published in 2022 indicates about 5,000 square kilometres of mangrove were lost.

The climate crisis is the biggest threat to mangrove ecosystems, with a third of them at risk due to rising sea levels.

If estimates are correct, in the next 50 years a quarter of all mangroves are expected to be underwater. The oceans most severely effected are predicted to be; northwest Atlantic Ocean, the northern Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, the South China Sea, and the Gulf of Aden. 

Angela Andrade, chair of the IUCN commission on ecosystem management said: 

Mangrove ecosystems are exceptional in their ability to provide essential services to people, including coastal disaster risk reduction, carbon storage and sequestration, and support for fisheries.

Their loss stands to be disastrous for nature and people across the globe.

Protecting mangroves

Without significant improvement by 2050, the climate crisis will lead to the loss of 1.8bn tonnes of carbon stored in mangroves.

Therefore, looking after mangroves is essential for mitigating the effects of the climate catastrophe. Healthy ecosystems cope better with sea level rises and provide inland protection from the effects of major storms.

Ensuring there is good sediment regulation and allowing mangroves to expand inland will allow them to cope with sea level rises. Importantly, the IUCN also called for the restoration of the mangroves which had already disappeared. 

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

Feature image via Armusaofficial/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1200 by 900, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

By HG

An NHS doctors group has blasted Labour Party front bencher Wes Streeting’s support for sending NHS doctors and nurses to private hospitals for treatment, as new polling shows a majority of Brits oppose outsourcing operations to private hospitals.

Labour NHS plans not in step with public

The comments are in response to shadow health secretary Wes Streeting’s announcement that Labour has struck a deal with Nuffield Health to treat 4,000 NHS doctors and nurses who have back, knee and hip problems per year.

According to new Survation NHS polling for public ownership campaign group We Own It, when asked which of two policies to tackle waiting lists they support, 54% of Brits said “the government should invest money it may have paid private healthcare operators directly into the NHS, to enable it to treat more patients”.

Only 33% said “the government should continue to pay private healthcare operators to treat NHS patients”.

Doctors’ Association UK co-chair Helen Fernandes said:

The NHS should be there for everyone, but it has been chronically underfunded and understaffed over the past decade which has left it struggling to keep pace with demand.

Redirecting public money into the private sector undermines the NHS and does little more than apply a sticking plaster to a gaping wound.

Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting has insisted that a future Labour government will use spare capacity in the private sector to cut waiting lists.

Campaigners warn that this policy puts patients at risk, is inefficient and undermines the NHS as private hospitals depend on NHS doctors for their operations.

Streeting: investment not NHS outsourcing

Helen Fernandes added:

The service needs sustainable investment in its workforce to train and retain more doctors, nurses and healthcare professionals.

And it needs sustainable investment in its infrastructure and capacity so that it is there for everyone, including our wonderful colleagues in the NHS, when they need treatment.

Johnbosco Nwogbo, lead campaigner at We Own It said:

As Health Secretary, Wes Streeting will be in charge of the NHS. His number one job should be to empower and build up the NHS so it can treat everyone, including our wonderful NHS staff who treat everyone else. His job is not to enrich private healthcare.

The private sector has no A&E, they leech resources from the NHS including staff, and they cherry-pick patients, only taking the easiest and only most profitable patients. This is a zero sum situation. If you’re putting money into private hospitals, you’re not putting that money into the NHS and the public knows it.

A recent Oxford University review has shown that outsourcing of healthcare leads to worse quality care for patients.

Featured image via Sky News – YouTube

By The Canary

Ireland, Norway, and Spain have said they will formally recognise the State of Palestine on May 28. This has drawn praise from many countries in the Global South – but prompted a furious response from the genocidal state of Israel.

Most Western governments, including the US, say they are willing to one day recognise Palestinian statehood. However, they refuse to do so until several complex issues, including final borders and the status of Jerusalem, are settled. It’s difficult not to take this as a sign of partisan politics from Fortress Europe who are hedging their interests into the equation.

143 of the 193 UN member countries already recognise a Palestinian state. As Al-Jazeera note:

Most of the Middle East, Africa and Asia recognise Palestinian statehood.

So, what’s prompted some EU states to join the majority of UN member countries?

Symbolic protest for Palestine

By The Canary

Rishi Sunak has finally bowed to pressure from the upper echelons of the Conservative Party and flicked the switch on its life support machine to the ‘off’ position – announcing the general election 2024 will be on Thursday 4 July.

However, a better analogy than this for what will be a fruitless exercise in faux-democracy would be that polling day will see members of the public who do go out to vote shovelling shit around in a pointless display of procedure.

General election: rain on me

Sunak’s announcement was hilarious: outside Downing Street the Great British Weather was pissing on him from a great height, drenching his Savile Row suit and face as he stared glazy-eyed and submissively into the camera while Tony Blair’s insipid 90s theme tune blared in the background.

It was a fitting tribute to the current democratic landscape: a veritable piece of bad political porn that would come up if you searched ‘sissy+sunak+watersports+new+labour’ on Pornhub.

This will be the Canary’s third general election that we have actively covered. It’s highly likely that – aside from 2015’s tedious displays of centrist posturing from all involved (who remembers the Milifandom?) – this will be the most apathy-riddled one in recent memory.

2017 under Jeremy Corbyn was an election that will forever be seared onto the memories of those actively involved. It felt invigorating, exciting, and hopeful. 2019 was different. It felt inevitable, hard, and despairing.

Now, in 2024, a millennial gif perhaps sums the general election up best:

Pick-a-Tory

What a fucking time to be alive. You don’t need us to list all the ills of the main political parties – but we have a choice on 4 July between:

• Literal neo-fascists.
• Far-right Tories.
• Right-wing Tories with red rosettes.
• Centre-right Tories with orange ties.
• Sometimes Tories with some other decent people but all of them wearing green cardigans.

The Canary’s advice to you is don’t vote for any of the first three on that list at the general election.

If you really must vote for the orange ones – then only do so if it means the far-right or red-rosetted Tories might lose.

The green ones are tricky depending on who your candidate is – but they’re generally a far safer bet than the previous four.

Ideally, the Canary would urge you to vote for any smaller-party or independent candidates you have in your area.

Let’s be real: your vote might well be one of the millions that is utterly fucking pointless under First Past The Post.

4 July’s general election is likely to see one of the lowest turnouts in history – probably because voters no longer see any difference between the main candidates, and poorer people have generally felt unrepresented by UK politics, and therefore disenfranchised, since the turn of the century – even with Corbyn.

Whatever you do, the general election is irrelevant

So, don’t think anything is going to change – and don’t think that spoiling you ballot or not even voting is wrong. You are more than entitled to do that.

However, do vote for non-mainstream candidates if you can. Labour and Keir Starmer know they have this general election sewn up. We know that it means years more of hell for poor, disabled, chronically ill, and marginalised people in the UK and abroad. The Canary will spend the next six-odd weeks making sure the truth about the Labour Party is known.

But it would be nice if Starmer did not get the huge majority he thinks he will – and if there were some George Galloway-style upsets across the country.

We will work hard to make sure that happens, and that small and independent candidates get the media coverage they deserve.

So, bring on the shit shovelling – as politicians polish turds and the public move the same stinking slurry around on their ballot papers. We’ll be by your side, making sure no mainstream party is let off the hook.

Featured image via Channel 4 News – YouTube

By The Canary

Labour leader Keir Starmer defended whistleblowers at Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) while talking about the infected blood scandal:

Will the Prime Minister now commit to ensuring that those who do silence and gag whistleblowers will no longer be able to work in the NHS?

But while it’s right that the government should protect whistleblowers in this case, Starmer has ignored journalist Julian Assange.

Inconsistent Starmer

According to the UN, Assange is under arbitrary detention in Belmarsh prison in London for publishing leaked files from whistleblower Chelsea Manning.

Yet Starmer is not protecting the right of whistleblowers to be heard through journalists. He is misusing his role as Labour leader through refusing to address Assange’s case.

This is the political persecution of a journalist who faces up to 175 years in prison if he’s extradited to the US for publishing classified files in the public interest.

And in fact, there are questions surrounding Starmer’s role in Assange’s case when he was Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) from 2008-2013.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) deleted records of its then head Starmer’s trips to Washington that appear to concern Assange’s case. It also deleted key emails.

Director of Campaign for Freedom of Information Maurice Frankel told Declassified:

It’s inconceivable that records about a high-profile case, with major domestic and international implications, could properly have been destroyed while proceedings were and remain live.

Emails about where Keir Starmer would lunch in Washington are one thing, but records about discussions between the most senior British and US officials would have been historically significant and possibly relevant for business and legal reasons.

The CPS may have grounds to withhold these from an FOI request – but destroying historically and politically significant records is a different matter. The timing of any destruction is also critical. If they were destroyed while an FOI request for them was being considered that may have been a criminal offence.

Revealing US war crimes

Assange faces extradition to the US for publishing the revelations of whistleblower Manning. These include a video where a US helicopter crew laughed while killing a dozen people in Iraq including Reuters employees.

Other revelations in the 700,000 classified documents show a cover up of the US military killing more unarmed civilians in Afghanistan.

Assange represents a culture of accountability for states worldwide. If he’s charged, the case will set a precedent criminalising journalistic activity such as story hunting and source protection.

It will enable the US to act like a global mafia state, punishing an Australian journalist for his work.

Yet Starmer has not pressured Rishi Sunak to end the disgusting persecution of Assange. That’s despite his warm words on whistleblowers at PMQs. And it looks like the CPS may have covered up Starmer’s role in that persecution.

Featured image via Guardian News – YouTube and On Demand News – YouTube

By James Wright

Today in “that bump under the rug? Oh it’s just important disabled news don’t look at that”, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has announced they are launching an inquiry on the DWP.

The failing department is being investigated due to its the inhumane ways they treat disabled people who claim benefits. This will include the link between vulnerable people losing benefits and their deaths.

The EHRC will examine whether DWP ministers and the policies they were responsible for not only failed to protect disabled people including those with learning disabilities and mental illnesses – but actively harmed them and contributed to their deaths. 

Strongest possible action against the DWP?

The inquiry will focus on benefits assessments and how health decisions are made to award or deny disabled people benefits such as Personal Independence Payment (PIP) as well as the Work Capability Assessment that are used to force disabled unemployed people into work – or worse deny them benefits that allow them to live.

The chair of the EHRC, Kishwer Faulkner said:

We are extremely worried about the treatment of some disabled benefits claimants by the DWP. We suspect the department may have broken equality law. We have decided we need to take the strongest possible action and that’s why we’ve launched this investigation.

Whilst past and current ministers and senior officials will be called to explain themselves, there’s of course a catch. The scope of the inquiry is only from 2021 to now. 

Biggest offenders let off the hook

This means that although Mel Stride will have to answer for his crimes, Therese Coffey’s inhumanity will be limited to just the last year of her stint. This means she still won’t have to reveal the true scale of benefits deaths that she refused to disclose under the loophole of it being the previous minister Amber Rudd’s investigation.

Chloe Smith who was in the role for just seven weeks during the Liz Truss fever dream of 2022 will have to report to the inquiry. Yet Iain Duncan Smith who was responsible for the cruellest policies from 2010-2016 will get off scot-free.

The investigation won’t include the deaths of claimants such as Errol Graham who starved to death in 2018 after his payments were stopped or Michael O’Sullivan who died by suicide after being declared fit for work.

The EHRC has said they may potentitally look at earlier cases in certain circumstances, but this is on a case by case.

DWP want to add more disabled deaths to the list

And while all this happens the DWP are pushing on with their plans to “reform welfare” which will, you’ve guessed it, kill more disabled people. 

Following on from announcing that we can no longer trust doctors to give out fit notes and the ludicrous idea to give disabled people vouchers instead of benefits, wet wipe Mel Stride was at a Jobcentre this week.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t signing on.

Instead he was there to announce that businesses should employ unemployed people. Yes really. He announced that the DWP will be utilising AI to deny benefit claimants instead of just people. That people will be sent to work “Bootcamps” to force people back into work.

He laughably claimed that the plan will show “Fairness for those who can’t work and are in the most need of the state’s help.” 

However, he forgets to include that the DWP, who are already responsible for until deaths, will be the ones deciding who can and can’t work. It’s understandable then that the government are trying to downplay this damning inquiry, and what’s the best way to distract attention

Today? Finally???

It’s a funny old game being a political journalist.

You’re usually always acutely aware that time is of the essence, but today there’s an impending sense that my story is going to become irrelevant as soon as I’ve written it. The reason? Well social media is abuzz with rumours that the general election would finally be called today.

And all the speculation proved to be true as the Prime Miniset pathetically attempted to defend his premiership whilst looking like the pathetic soggy little rat he is. To the glorious soundtrack of Things Can Only Get Better (courtesy of the legendary Steve Bray) Sunak announced there would be an election on 4th July.

No such thing as chance

It feels like no coincidence that the prime minister is finally giving the people what they’re crying out for on the same day that an inquiry is launched into the treatment of the very people his government have spent decades demonising and killing.

Now that the announcement has come, we must do everything we can to hold the Tories – and the next government – to account. We can’t let this DWP inquiry and the treatment of disabled people be brushed under the rug.

Featured image via the Canary

By Rachel Charlton-Dailey

Two new reports have spotlighted the systemic violation of Sami Indigenous rights across Northern Europe.

First, Sweden’s authorities published a scathing report on hate crimes against the Sami community in the Scandinavian country. Now, Finland has also released the findings of a damning new report on rights violations of its Sami Indigenous community.

Both underscore the ongoing battle for Indigenous rights in Europe, against a backdrop of human rights abuses worldwide.

Abuse of Sami Indigenous community

The Sami people live in the northern part of the Scandinavian Peninsula, and across the Kola Peninsula. Their communities span Finland, Norway, Sweden, and Russia.

According to the International Working Group on Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA), their total population is somewhere between 50,000 to 100,000.

On 10 May, the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention (Brå) released its first report on hate crimes against the Sami community on a national level.

As Radio Canada reported:

The deliberate targeting of reindeer in Sami areas is one example that sets these incidents apart from typical hate crime patterns, the report said, with perpetrators— often landowners, hunters or farmers—believing they are limited by reindeer herding rights and don’t want the animals in certain areas.

It was the most common crime we saw in the police reports, Lisa Wallin, the study’s project leader, told Eye on the Arctic. “We saw deliberate hit-and-runs, dogs sent to chase or attack reindeer, or reindeer deliberately run over by snowmobiles or shot.”

These incidents usually happen in remote forested areas of northern Sweden and remain unsolved given the lack of eye-witnessesses, the report said.

Moreover, Radio Canada detailed how the report revealed that institutions subject Sami to “increased racist incidents”. Specifically, it identified this in the context of legal proceedings on Indigenous rights.

Truth and reconciliation

Following this, Finnish authorities have since produced a similar report exposing rights violations.

On 20 May, the Sami Truth and Reconciliation Commission dropped its report on the situation for the Indigenous group across Finland.

The government had established the commission in 2021. Specifically, it sought to investigate historical injustices against the Sami, with the aim of preventing their reoccurence.

Crucially, the report noted that the Finnish state continues to repeatedly violate the Sami people’s right to self-determination. This is at the core of indigenous people’s rights.

Martin Scheinin is a human rights professor who compiled the report. He told a press conference that:

In the Supreme Administrative Court, Sami rights have been given a cold shoulder in many respects

Significantly, he noted how regression had occurred over the past decade. Moreover, the report stated that:

Although Finland is still recognised in the UN as a supporter of indigenous rights, positive developments for the Sami people in Finland seem to have stalled or become less consistent

Electoral rights under threat

Sweden is home to over 20,000 Sami people. Meanwhile, some 10,000 Indigenous Sami live in Finland, speaking three different Sami languages.

In 1997, the Swedish parliament acknowledged the Sami. Similarly, since 1995, the Finnish constitution has recognised the Sami as an Indigenous people with a right to maintain and develop their culture.

However, the commission’s report showed how Indigenous rights are still under threat. For instance, Scheinin highlighted that the Finnish Supreme Administrative Court has since 2011 rejected the Sami parliament’s view on who qualifies as eligible to stand and vote in Sami parliamentary elections.

Finland’s legal definition of who can be included in the Sami electoral roll has been deemed outdated by human rights experts. Notably, this is because it does not correspond with the Sami parliament’s own view of eligibility. Specifically, Sami parliament emphasises a person’s connection to one of the Sami languages as the most important criteria.

Next year, Sweden will release a similar report from its truth commission into Sami Indigenous rights.

Green colonialism

Additionally, courts have “rejected the Sami view and often even failed to investigate complaints” in other cases too. In particular, it has done so in cases concerning the Sami people’s traditional livelihoods such as fishing and reindeer herding and plans for new industrial projects in Sapmi – the Sami Indigenous territory.

Crucially, governments and companies have been ramping up green colonialist projects on Sami Indigenous lands across the region. For instance, Norway’s supreme court ruled that wind farms in Sami lands breached their rights under international conventions.

Meanwhile the race for transition minerals – the raw critical materials for the energy transition – has exposed the Sami to more threats. In 2023, Sweden’s state-owned mining company LKAB discovered more than 1 million tonnes of critical minerals under Sami lands. The community now fears this could lead to violations of their rights.

Feature image via Al Jazeera – Youtube

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

By Hannah Sharland

On 21 May, EachOther and LUSH activists took action over the Tories increasing toxic rhetoric on human rights.

Toxic Tory rhetoric on human rights

Over the past four years, government ministers have increasingly ramped up rhetoric demonising human rights campaigners. For instance, former prime minister Boris Johnson coined the phrase ‘‘lefty lawyer’ to malign law firms fighting the government’s corruption. Meanwhile, Suella Braverman referred to human rights campaigners as ‘tofu-eating wokerati”. There have been other cases of government ministers accusing lawyers of being ‘un-british’ and an enemy of the people.

Now as some politicians try to make human rights a dirty word, activists have gathered at Parliament Square to wash away the stigma.

The activists were from award-winning human rights charity EachOther, as well as high street cosmetics brand LUSH.  Protesters took a shower outside the Houses of Parliament, next to giant boxes of shower powder labelled Human Rights.

LUSH and EachOther countering dangerous disinformation

Their action is part of a new campaign to educate the public and counter disinformation on human rights ahead of the next general election.

As the Canary previously reported, EachOther and LUSH launched the campaign in light of the fact that:

In the last five years, the UK has witnessed an increase in threats to minimise, remove or replace human rights laws in the UK – by the government. These are laws that currently protect all of our day-to-day lives and are there as a safety net should we ever need them.

Over the last decade, the UK government has proposed withdrawing from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) – which is now a genuine threat.

Moreover, as EachOther and LUSH have pointed out, Sunak hasn’t ruled out of the UK leaving the ECHR. Of course, this would be an unprecedented move. Specifically, it would spell the first time a nation party to the ECHR has jumped ship on rules it helped to create.

Now, this alarming rhetoric is on the rise as the general election creeps ever closer.

Since Sunak stated that he won’t allow ‘foreign courts’ – referring to the ECHR – to block the controversial Rwanda migration partnership, there has been growing misinformation about the European Court of Human Rights. The European Convention protects over 800 million people, and the European Court has considered over 800,000 cases since it was formed.

EachOther and LUSH have teamed up to set the record straight.

Protecting rights for future generations

Notably, their campaign highlights that the ECHR isn’t in fact, a “foreign court”. In reality, it was a British Conservative politician and future Lord High Chancellor called Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, who was central to drafting the Convention. Winston Churchill was one of its biggest cheerleaders. Importantly, every member has its own judge, including the UK.

Alongside their action in parliament square, the pair have created a product, shower-powder (showder), called ‘Human rights’, which will be available in UK LUSH stores between 16 May to 2 June. ‘Human rights’ sold out in Oxford street in the first two days of launching. LUSH is donating the total sales revenue (minus VAT) from the product to the campaign.

Additionally, EachOther has published a briefing paper, which outlines the damaging rhetoric used in recent years surrounding human rights.

Editor in chief of EachOther Emma Guy stated:

The majority of the public (two-thirds) say they have little or no confidence that they have a say on the decisions made by the government – this is a growing concern for decision making on human rights issues in the UK. Over the past four years, human rights have increasingly been presented in a negative light.

Guy continued:

The way we talk about certain issues is important because it can be used for political gain, to fuel misinformation or to misrepresent something or someone. Today is the start of reminding ourselves that collectively, we can recognise our rights, invoke them and continue to educate each other about them – to protect them for future generations.

Feature image and in-text image via Anna Fuchs/EachOther

By The Canary

The ex-Post Office boss at the centre of the Horizon scandal broke down in white woman tears during the Public Inquiry into it. Paula Vennells sobbed as she admitted she lied to MPs – or as she said told them ‘untruths’ – but as one trade union summed up, her tears are too little, too late.

Post Office Horizon scandal: the inquiry continues

The former boss of Britain’s Post Office on Wednesday 22 May apologised to the hundreds of staff who were wrongly prosecuted because of faulty computer software, in one of the country’s worst miscarriages of justice. However, Vennells only apologised for what happened – not what she did.

More than 700 subpostmasters running small local post offices received criminal convictions between 1999 and 2015 after the faulty Horizon accounting software made it appear that money had gone missing from their branches.

Giving evidence to a public inquiry into the scandal, ex-chief executive Paula Vennells broke down in tears when recalling the case of one subpostmaster who took his own life after being wrongly accused of a £39,000 shortfall at his branch.

Vennells, an ordained Anglican priest, earlier read out a statement in which she said “how sorry I am for all that subpostmasters and their families and others have suffered as a result of all of the matters that the inquiry is looking into”.

Many ended up bankrupt and shunned by their communities. Some were jailed. At least four people took their own lives.

The High Court in London in 2019 ruled that it had been computer errors, not criminality, that had been behind the missing money.

Vennells give evidence

Vennells, whom many of the victims blame for their ordeal, said in January that she would hand back the CBE (Commander of the British Empire) honour given to her in 2018, as the public outcry mounted.

Being quizzed about her role in the scandal for the first time, Vennells, 65, told the inquiry that:

there was information I wasn’t given and others didn’t receive as well… One of my reflections of all of this — I was too trusting… My deep sorrow in this is that I think that individuals, myself included, made mistakes, didn’t see things, didn’t hear things.

The inquiry’s lawyer Jason Beer suggested to Vennells that she was unable to remember matters that could incriminate the Post Office, but had “no problem” recalling events that placed blame on others. In other words – she’s still lying.

“I don’t believe that’s the way I approach my statement at all,” she replied.

However, people on X disagreed.

White woman tears won’t wash, Vennells

The Communication Workers Union (CWU) were furious at Vennells, posting that her tears were “too late”:

No tears when postmasters were tragically taking their own lives due to stress.

No tears when postmasters were being jailed.

No tears when postmasters had their whole communities turning against them.

Tears now are too late.

Paula Vennells must be held to account. pic.twitter.com/RglT89yAQf

— CWU (@CWUnews) May 22, 2024

Dr Shola Mos-Shogbamimu wasn’t having her BS either:

Paula Vennells is evil. She should be locked up & pay the price for her intentional & depraved indifference to lives & liberties of sub postmasters she prosecuted as Ex-Post Office Boss. PO Profit over lives? PO Reputation over liberty? What a wicked rotten woman. SHE KNEW!… pic.twitter.com/TiA5bWnCtz

— Dr Shola Mos-Shogbamimu (@SholaMos1) May 22, 2024

White woman tears featured prominently:

Many white women cry because their tears elicit sympathy. The post office 'accounting error' sent people to jail or bankrupt, people died prematurely and by suicide. Paula Vennells' tears are irrelevant, the lies *she* told compounded the suffering by delaying an investigation. pic.twitter.com/jrK1Br2cj9

— Dr. Ruby (@PaperWhispers) May 22, 2024

And another X user summed up the situation well:

Paula Vennells epitomises the corruption of the English establishment, hiding in her rotten church, pocketing her millions while honest working people served prison terms, suffered ruined reputations and were impoverished.

Now crying for herself.
Fuck off.#PostOfficeInquiry

— Helen the Zen (@helenmallam) May 22, 2024

Vennells and other Post Office bosses are being accused of pursuing prosecutions against the subpostmasters despite knowing that there were issues with the IT system that introduced errors into the accounting figures of individual post office branches.

Featured image via the CWU

Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse

By Steve Topple

Small island states are leading the charge against the climate crisis. Leaders of nine low-lying island nations have won a historic case at the UN’s maritime court. The group sought to hold countries to account for their greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Now, the ruling means that rich nations will have clean up their act on ocean pollution through climate-wrecking GHG emissions.

Crucially, they have a responsibility to do so for small island nations bearing the brunt of the climate breakdown.

Ocean pollution and the climate crisis

In December 2022, the Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law (COSIS) launched a case at the UN’s maritime court the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS).

A collection of small island states had formed the COSIS coalition at the 2021 COP26 climate summit in Glasgow. This comprises of Antigua and Barbuda, Tuvalu, Palau, Niue, Vanuatu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and the Bahamas.

In September 2023, ITLOS began a series of public hearings. As the Canary previously reported on the it:

The island states are asking the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) to determine whether carbon dioxide emissions absorbed by the oceans can be considered pollution. If ITLOS determines so, nations could have specific obligations to prevent it under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). The international treaty binds countries to preventing the pollution of the oceans.

ITLOS has now unanimously ruled that this is the case. Specifically, it determined that carbon emissions are pollution under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

The UNCLOS treaty binds countries to prevent pollution of the oceans. Crucially, it defines pollution as the introduction of “substances or energy into the marine environment” that harms marine life. However, it does not spell out carbon emissions as a specific pollutant. So, plaintiffs in the case argued it should qualify.

As such, the ruling now obligates nations to reduce their GHG emissions to protect the ocean. Notably, in an expert opinion it said that:

Anthropogenic GHG emissions into the atmosphere constitute pollution of the marine environment

As a result, the court ruled that polluting countries therefore have:

the specific obligation to take all measures necessary to ensure that… emissions under their jurisdiction or control do not cause damage by pollution to other states and their environment

Small island states ‘fighting for their survival’

Ocean ecosystems create half the oxygen humans breathe and limit global heating by absorbing much of the carbon dioxide emitted by human activities.

However, increasing emissions can warm and acidify seawaters, harming marine life and ecosystems.

Soaring global sea temperatures are also accelerating the melting of polar ice caps. This causes sea levels to rise. Naturally, this poses an existential threat for small island nations.

The countries that brought the case called the court decision “historic”. Prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, Gaston Browne, said small island nations were “fighting for their survival”. He emphasized that:

Some will become uninhabitable in the near future because of the failure to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. We demand that the major polluters respect international law, and stop the catastrophic harm against us before it is too late

Global sea surface temperatures hit a monthly record in April for the 13th month in a row, according to the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Rich nations must take responsibility for ocean pollution

So of course, small low-lying islands are shouldering the burden of climate breakdown. Alongside rising sea levels, they are particularly exposed to the impacts of climate-fueled extreme weather. For example, a World Meteorological Organization (WMO) analysis found that small island states had suffered devastating economic impacts from climate-exacerbated extreme weather. During fifty years of climate disasters between 1970 and 2021, for small island states:

one in five disasters had an impact “equivalent to more than five per cent” of GDP, with some disasters wiping out countries’ entire GDP.

Significantly, the ITLOS ruling has now laid out that countries’ climate action may need to go beyond the Paris Agreement for them to meet their legal obligations on marine protection.

Moreover, it found that states with the greatest historic responsibility for the climate crisis must step up and do more. Crucially, they need to address pollution from GHG emissions. The ruling distinguished between those with larger footprints and those least responsible for causing the climate crisis.

For example, an IPCC report highlighted that rich industrialised nations were responsible for approximately 57% of global greenhouse gas emissions between 1850 and 2019. Conversely, the poorest, least industrialised nations and small island states contributed just 0.4% and 0.5% respectively during this period.

The UN maritime court’s ruling echoed UN chief Antonio Guterres’ previous calls for rich nations to take action.

The ‘fates of two global commons’

Importantly, experts have said the ruling could be influential in shaping the scope of future climate litigation involving greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

While the court’s opinion is advisory and non-binding, it will influence how the UN treaty is interpreted around the world. In a press release ClientEarth lawyer Lea Main-Klingst said that:

Next year, states must improve the climate plans they submit to the United Nations – known as their Nationally Determined Contributions – and today’s outcome will be instrumental to push the countries most responsible for the climate crisis to ramp up their ambition.

Amnesty International’s head of strategic litigation Mandi Mudarikwa agreed the ruling was:

likely to inform future climate justice cases in national, regional and international courts

Main-Klingst also said that:

The momentum from today is only set to grow, as 2024 is a year of serious legal reckoning on climate change in international courts.

The Inter-American Court is hearing arguments on how climate change is impacting human rights this month in Brazil and the world’s highest court – the International Court of Justice – will be considering a similar question later this year.

The Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) echoed this. CIEL attorney Joie Chowdhury stated that:

For the first time, an international court has recognised that the fates of two global commons – the oceans and the atmosphere – are intertwined and imperilled by the climate crisis

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) are due to give their rulings on these two other climate cases in the coming months.

Feature image via Youtube – CPDC NGO

Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse

By The Canary

The latest analysis from finance expert, RIFT, has shown that, as a nation, we’re gambling more than ever as we continue to battle against the high cost of living. But while the National Lottery is our preferred shot at instant fortune, it’s the Conservative Party government who are the real winners, collecting almost a billion pounds a year in lottery duty – and over £3bn in total from gambling.

The government: the only winners in gambling – to the tune of £billions

RIFT analysed the latest Gov figures on HMRC tax receipts* which show that during the 2023-24 financial year, HMRC collected £3.389bn in tax receipts from betting and gaming.

While this may only equate to 0.41% of total receipts received by HMRC, it’s a figure that has been increasing steadily since households have been hit by the cost of living crisis.

During the pandemic (2020-21), annual betting and gaming tax receipts fell by -6% in a year to £2.837 bn, as lockdown restrictions reduced the opportunities available to have a flutter.

However, since interest rates started to climb in December 2021, adding to the high cost of living endured by many households, this figure has been on the up as more of us pursue hopes of instant riches.

In 2021-22, total tax receipts from betting and gaming increased by 8.4% year on year, then by a further 7.4% in 2022-23. The latest annual increase of 2.6% in 2023-24 pushed annual betting and gaming tax receipts to the current total of £3.389 bn – the highest total on record.

This trend is also apparent when analysing gross gambling yields across the gambling sector*, with the latest figures showing an 11.8% increase in 2021-22, followed by a 6.8% jump in 2022-23 to a total of £15.122bn.

The National Lottery: funding the government, not just good causes

When it comes to the activity driving this increase in gambling, the National Lottery is the nation’s favourite form of gambling and gaming by some margin.

In fact, of the £15.122 bn gross gambling yield seen in the 2022-23 financial year, the National Lottery accounted for 23%, with just remote gambling via casinos proving more profitable for the gambling industry.

However, with a one in 45 million chance of hitting the jackpot, the average consumer has more chance of being struck by lightning than winning the lottery. So who’s the real winner?

Figures from the Gambling Commission show that in the 2022-23 financial year, there were £8.184bn in total National Lottery sales.

£4.694bn of this contributed to the prize pot, while £1.709bn went towards good causes.

Retailers’ commissions stood at £255m and the licensee, Camelot, retained £544m. However, the biggest winner was the government, who bagged £982m in a single financial year as a result of the 12% lottery duty paid.

The government: profiting off people’s desperation

Bradley Post, MD of RIFT, commented:

Inflation may be easing but households across the nation are yet to feel the benefit and the cost of living crisis has been straining the finances of the nation to breaking point since interest rates started to soar in December 2021.

As a result, more and more of us have been turning to gambling and gaming in the hopes that we might win big and secure some financial security, with the lottery being the game of choice for most.

Of course, the lottery offers some of the toughest odds of the lot and, as the old adage goes, the house always wins. In this case, it’s fair to say that the house is the UK government, with lottery duty bagging them close to a billion pounds a year.

It’s a story we hear all too often unfortunately – the government profiting off the hard earned cash of the UK public in a time of desperation.

Featured image via the National Lottery – YouTube and the Canary

By The Canary

The following article is a comment piece from Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC).

On Tuesday 21 May, John Woodcock (Lord Walney) – inaccurately described by the government as an ‘Independent Adviser on Political Violence and Disruption’ – published his much-trailed report calling for a crackdown on democratic protests. Michael Gove chose the same day to deliver a speech falsely accusing those who have marched for Palestinian rights of antisemitism.

This comes just a day after International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor, Karim A.A. Khan KC, applied for a series of arrest warrants for war crimes, including for the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Yoav Gallant, Israel’s minister of defence.

Woodcock: a paid lobbyist who should be ignored

John Woodcock is a paid lobbyist for weapons manufacturers and fossil fuel companies and a former chair of Labour Friends of Israel. Several of his recommendations are transparent attempts to use the law to further his political disagreement with the recent marches in support of Palestinian rights. Others are extraordinarily draconian – including an effective ban on any protests outside council chambers.

Using police resources to suppress political protests might serve the interests of Woodcock’s corporate paymasters but would seriously undermine long-held democratic principles. This comes on the very day that Liberty has won a court case to prevent an unlawful attempt by the government to overturn the will of parliament and restrict the right to demonstrate.

Everyone who truly cares about preserving democratic freedoms will utterly reject these proposals. This thoroughly compromised report should be allowed to gather dust in the obscurity it deserves.

Palestine protests are not antisemitic

Unlike Michael Gove, the organisers of the recent demonstrations against Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza have a proud track-record of challenging all forms of racism.

Every single one of the fourteen London demonstrations for Palestinian rights that we have organised in the past seven months has been attended by thousands of Jewish people, including an organised and highly visible Jewish bloc and Jewish speakers on every platform.

At our demonstration in Hyde Park last month, Jewish Holocaust survivor, Stephen Kapos, spoke to a crowd of 200,000 – probably the largest audience ever addressed by a Holocaust survivor in Britain.

Anyone who was genuinely motivated by a desire to combat antisemitism, as opposed to cynically shield the state of Israel from legitimate accountability, would celebrate rather than attempt to dismiss these facts.

Those who continue to demonstrate against Israel’s genocide in Gaza, calling for a ceasefire, and for Palestinian human rights and international law to be upheld, are driven by consistent anti-racism. They are exercising precious democratic rights and represent the views of the vast majority of British people who, unlike the government, support these noble goals.

Woodcock: trying to distract from Israel’s horrors

These latest smears cannot be allowed to distract from the horrors that Israel continues to inflict on the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip. The British government must end its complicity with Israel’s criminal violence by halting the arms trade with Israel and give full support to both the ICC and the ongoing work of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), where Israel is currently on trial for genocide.

Ben Jamal, PSC director, said:

The resumption of these baseless attacks by Michael Gove and John Woodcock amount to an admission: apologists for Israel’s genocidal violence and system of apartheid have lost the democratic and legal arguments, but continue to attempt to delegitimise Palestinian solidarity. They will not succeed.

At a moment when Israel is on trial in the world’s highest court for the crime of genocide and the day after its Prime Minister has been threatened with ICC arrest warrants for war crimes, it is grotesque that these smears continue.

The real issues are that the UK government continues to arm Israel, refuses to resume funding to UNRWA, and is attempting to protect Israel from legal accountability. Far from stopping the genocide in Gaza as required under international law, the UK is complicit and actors such as Gove and Woodcock attempt to deflect from that fact.

They discredit themselves, not the Palestinian solidarity movement.

Featured image via

By The Canary

I’m supposed to be writing about something completely different right now, but as I was working on that I got some news that made my blood curdle. The DWP has stopped my PIP (Personal Independence Payment).

An expected DWP PIP review

On 5 April, I received a text from the DWP saying the review into my PIP claim had opened. Even though the review period is four years and it’d only been two since my last review, I had been expecting this. They said the forms would be with me in two weeks. 

As a disabled person who has spent the last 20 years in the DWP system, this news filled me with dread. Once again I would have to dredge up the worst and most traumatic parts of my life, for someone who doesn’t know me or my conditions to decide if I was worthy of support. 

On 20 April I attempted to contact the PIP helpline because the form hadn’t turned up, but I was cut off after 45 minutes. I’d spent the day before across the media analysing the prime minister’s speech in which he declared unemployed disabled people the enemy.

Finally, on 25 April the forms turned up, with the deadline of 4 May. Allowing postage time that gave me just five days to complete the form – which was 40 pages long and required such information as whether I was incontinent. The day before this, a UN report on the government found them to have dangerously failed disabled people.

I sent the forms back on 30 April and heard nothing.

Writing on DWP chaos is my job

Whilst I waited the Tories unveiled their plans to “reform” the very benefit I was applying for.

They said that the financial assistance I and so many rely on (because life is so much more damn expensive as a disabled person) wasn’t practical. Instead, they proposed a system where people are given vouchers. This would work alongside disabled people being required to invoice their expenses to the DWP and have them paid back.

And I gladly ripped their plans to shreds. How are we supposed to wait for something to be paid back when we don’t have the money in the first place? Will our energy suppliers or housing take vouchers? All the while I pushed the nervous thoughts to the back of my mind about the fact that I could lose the benefit that enables me to live my life.

My own terrifying chaos

Then finally on Tuesday 21 May I received word. My PIP was being taken away, because apparently, I hadn’t returned the form in time.

I rang the helpline and waited over half an hour whilst trying not to cry. When I finally got through I tried to explain the situation to the advisor.

“Do you have proof of postage?”

“No, it was a free post envelope, your envelope”.

I was put on hold again, and when she came back she informed me a case manager would call me back. A little while later he did, and informed me my form hadn’t been received until 17 May – almost three weeks after I sent it. He told me that because the case had already been closed they’d have to submit a “mandatory consideration”, an appeal of sorts for them to reopen the case. 

To be clear this isn’t to decide whether they should award me the benefit. No, it’s to decide whether they’ll even look at the forms. The actual assessment could take over a year, as the current wait time is 59 weeks.

My DWP PIP entitlement, lost – and countless other people’s too

There’s no way of knowing whether this was the fault of the failing postal service or that the DWP simply hadn’t read it. I suspect a combination of both. Either way due to government error, I now will be without a vital benefit for around two months.

And I’m not the only one this has happened to.

When I shared my frustrations on Twitter I received dozens of replies and DMs from people all having the same or worse experiences. Forms being sent out past the deadline to return them, returned forms lost, benefits stopped because the DWP sent the forms to the wrong address, the list goes on and disabled people suffer because of the government’s incompetence. 

You have to laugh then (if I don’t I’ll cry) at the fact that the DWP is proposing an elaborate system where they reckon they’ll process thousands of expenses claims a month when they can’t even open the post they already get.

I see every day the cruelty that the DWP and this government subject disabled people to. However, I was truly lost for words that they so casually would just cut my benefits off, all because of their own error. 

The Tories are doing everything they can to blame disabled people for the state of public services, but you only have to look at the state of the DWP to see who’s really harming this country. 

14 years of a revolving door of ministers, slashed budgets, and carving off services to their mates has left the DWP on its knees. And disabled people are paying the price.

Featured image via the Canary

By Rachel Charlton-Dailey

In Sweden, the convenience of disposable vapes like the One vape is undeniable. These gadgets, loved for their simplicity and user-friendliness, have soared in popularity across the nation. However, this surge brings to light significant environmental concerns. As the market for these single-use devices expands, so does the dialogue about their environmental impact. 

The rise of disposable vapes: examining the trend in Sweden

In recent years, Sweden has witnessed a significant surge in the popularity of disposable vapes. This trend reflects broader global patterns but is particularly notable in a country known for its progressive health policies and environmental consciousness. 

The appeal of disposable vapes in Sweden can largely be attributed to their convenience and ease of use. These devices come pre-charged and pre-filled with e-liquid, eliminating the need for users to refill or recharge, making them an ideal choice for those new to vaping or looking for a hassle-free alternative to more complex systems. 

The variety of flavours available and the discreet nature of these devices have also contributed to their widespread acceptance. In city centres and quiet suburban areas alike, it’s not uncommon to see individuals enjoying a quick vape break, reflecting the integration of these products into everyday life.

This rise is not without its challenges, however, as it poses questions about consumer habits and the potential for increased waste. Yet, it continues to reshape the vaping landscape in Sweden, driven by consumer demand for practical and accessible nicotine intake.

Environmental challenges posed by single-use vapes

While disposable vapes offer convenience, they present significant environmental challenges that cannot be ignored. In Sweden, where environmental sustainability is a core value, the increasing disposal of these single-use devices raises concerns.

These vapes, once depleted, contribute to electronic waste, a growing problem worldwide. Unlike reusable vaping devices, disposables are designed for one-time use, meaning each vape ends up in the trash after its lifecycle, compounding the issue of e-waste. This waste includes not only plastics and metals but also batteries and electronic components that can leach harmful substances into the environment if not properly disposed of.

The solution lies in innovation and regulation. Developing more sustainable materials for these products or designing them for easier disassembly could significantly reduce their environmental footprint. Furthermore, regulatory measures could enforce stricter guidelines on manufacturing and disposal practices to ensure that the convenience of disposable vapes does not come at a high environmental cost.

Sustainable solutions: addressing the disposable vape dilemma in Sweden

As Sweden grapples with the environmental repercussions of disposable vapes, one promising avenue is the development of biodegradable materials. In the future researchers might explore alternatives that could potentially replace the plastics commonly used in vape production. These materials, derived from natural sources, will be designed to break down more quickly and safely once disposed of.

Local governments and businesses could also partner to improve recycling facilities specifically for e-waste from vapes. These programmes will not only provide convenient drop-off points but also work on educating the public about the importance of proper disposal.

Hopefully efforts like these will reflect a broader commitment to environmental responsibility in Sweden and elsewhere in the future. By innovating and adapting, Sweden hopes to lead the way in reducing the impact of disposable vapes, setting a benchmark for others to follow.

By Nathan Spears

The Conservative government sidestepped parliament in order to increase anti-protest police powers. Now, on 21 May, the High Court ruled that the government acted unlawfully.

High Court: Tory executive overreach

The government used secondary legislation to change the law so that police can crackdown on protests that are considered ‘more than a minor’ disruption. This lowered the threshold from anything causing a ‘serious disruption’.

The High Court said the government ignored the will of parliament in doing so. The House of Lords had already rejected the provision.

Secondary legislation, known as Henry VIII powers, shifts power to the executive because the law changes face less parliamentary scrutiny and cannot be amended.

Under the June 2023 overreach measures, police have arrested hundreds of protestors including climate activist Greta Thunberg.

Indeed, the Home Office estimated that its lowering of the threshold would increase police intervention in protests by 50%.

The government says it will appeal the High Court decision.

“Victory for democracy”

Campaign group Liberty brought the successful court challenge where the High Court also found the government acted unlawfully by only consulting police groups about the legislation. The government did not consult protest groups.

Liberty’s director Akiko Hart said:

This ruling is a huge victory for democracy, and sets down an important marker to show that the Government cannot step outside of the law to do whatever it wants.

We all have the right to speak out on the issues we believe in, and it’s vital that the Government respects that. These dangerous powers were rejected by Parliament yet still sneaked through the back door with the clear intention of stopping protesters that the Government did not personally agree with, and were so vaguely worded that it meant that the police were given almost unlimited powers to shut down any other protest too.

This judgment sends a clear message that accountability matters, and that those in power must make decisions that respect our rights

CEO of Public Law Project Shameem Ahmad said:

We welcome the Court’s ruling, which recognises that our rights and constitution cannot be unilaterally and arbitrarily undermined by the executive and that ministers must not act outside of the powers granted to them by Parliament.

Attempts to further restrict the right to protest

Suella Braverman, who was home secretary at the time the government enacted the measures, has also called for ministers to gain the power to outright ban protests.

She accused anti-genocide marches in solidarity with Palestine of “mass extremism” and of ‘antisemitic chants’.

Both Labour and Tory leadership are engaged in the smearing of those protesting Israel’s conduct. In Oct 2023, Labour leader Keir Starmer suspended Andy McDonald MP for comments he made at a pro-Palestine march.

The apparently “deeply offensive” words were:

We won’t rest until we have justice, until all people, Israelis and Palestinians, between the river and the sea can live in peaceful liberty. Free, free Palestine!

Starmer also enabled the arrest and charging of three pro-Palestine Youth Demand activists for protesting outside his house.

Establishment managers in both Labour and Tory are seeking to restrict our rights to freedom of expression and assembly. Fortunately, the High Court ruling has quashed the government using executive power to do so.

Featured image via Liberty – X

By James Wright

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has stripped over 180,000 people of their benefits. It is doing so through its so-called ‘managed migration’ process. Specifically, this is where the department is forcing people on old-style benefits like Tax Credits onto Universal Credit.

Moreover, the Canary has crunched the numbers – and this equates to a massive 28% of all claimants who the DWP has so far forced to apply for Universal Credit.

Universal Credit: loss of benefits during managed migration creeping up

Previously, the Canary has calculated the staggering number of people the DWP had been denying benefits to through this. To March 2023, the DWP had stopped benefits for 24% of claimants it was forcing to migrate. Then, this dipped, but still stood at a shocking 20.3% of claimants to September 2023.

Now, the situation looks even worse. Notably, it has shot up past these earlier figures, and even past the department’s own revised forecast. To the end of January 2024 this was 28%. The alarming rise in benefit-stripping sits in the context of the DWP’s plans to rush ahead with the process.

Managed migration: a disaster in the making

The DWP is replacing old-style benefits like Tax Credits and Employment Support Allowance. To do this, the department has been rolling out what it calls its ‘managed migration’ process. This is where the DWP forces those who have yet to move to Universal Credit voluntarily over to the new benefit.

Specifically, this forced migration involves the department issuing notices, with a three month deadline for claimants to make the move. It officially began this process in July 2022. Since then, the department has progressively stripped claimants of their benefits.

The Canary’s Steve Topple has previously calculated the percentage of claimants the DWP has denied benefits to across two prior DWP statistical releases. In particular, he found that it had stopped benefits for 24% of claimants it was forcing onto Universal Credit between July 2022 and March 2023. Moreover, Topple identified that this disproportionately impacted women at 79% of cases.

Following this, he crunched the data up to September 2023. This showed that 20.3% – or 31,720 people – had lost their benefits entirely. Once again, the DWP’s denial of benefits worst affected women, at 82.9% of these.

DWP denying 28% of people benefits

Now, the DWP’s own data has revealed that it is depriving people of their benefits apace. In fact, it has actually ramped this up.

Notably, the Canary found that the data up to the end of January 2024 shows that:

• The DWP has stripped 28% (184,120) of people it has sent migration notices to of their benefits entirely.
• 58% (107,520) of these people ending up without benefits were women.
• 99.9% (183,970) of these, were again, previously claiming Tax Credits.

By contrast to previous releases, the proportion of women affected has dropped. However, they still account for a significantly high percentage of claimants that the DWP has denied benefits to.

Moreover, this data now includes many of the months the DWP has upscaled its roll-out. That is, between October 2023 and the end of January 2024 alone, the department sent out 501,250 migration notices. Notably, this is 60% of the total number it has sent since July 2022 – in just four months.

As a result, the number of people now ending up without benefits has risen exponentially. Topple previously showed how the DWP could have predicted this would be the case. Specifically, he referred to a pilot study the DWP had conducted in May 2022.

Using the data in this – which showed 23% of Tax Credit claimants left without Universal Credit – Topple extrapolated that the DWP could strip 135,000 people of their benefits. Of course, the picture is in fact, worse still, with it already leaving over 180,000 people without any benefits.

Ignoring Universal Credit warnings from the get-go

Despite this, the DWP has routinely refused to heed warnings about the impacts of the shift to Universal Credit.

Before it even began its roll-out, the parliamentary Work and Pensions select committee (WPSC) warned the process could leave many claimants destitute.

What’s more, it told the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in April that ahead of starting the migration, it had:

assumed an overall non-claim rate of 3% for all legacy benefit types, based on what had happened with the earlier move from incapacity benefit to ESA. It did not break the rate down between different types of benefit.

However, the DWP acknowledged that:

before the migration started, it had no evidence to use to assess how many Tax Credit claimants would not transfer to UC.

In November, it then revised its estimate. Specifically, it said that it would leave 26% of Tax Credit claimants without benefits, and 4% on other old-style benefit types. Obviously, this is closer to the current dire figures.

DWP “saving” money from denying people benefits

The PAC report also found that:

The Department has a limited understanding of why some people do not switch to Universal Credit

So, what’s the government doing about it? Purportedly it is planning to conduct a survey. However, the DWP itself admitted that it doesn’t expect many to respond to this. Ostensibly then, it’s just another tick-box exercise, and does nothing to resolve the sky-high rates of people losing benefits.

The Canary contacted the DWP for comment, but it did not come back with a specific response by the time of publication. Instead, it linked to a previous statement by the minister for employment Jo Churchill, which can be found here.

At the end of the day then, this was entirely predictable. As Topple highlighted previously, the DWP’s own trial data showed that this could happen. Moreover, its repeated statistics have only served time and again as red flags for this throughout the roll-out. Of course, it hasn’t stopped the department from ploughing ahead anyway and moving up its timeline to boot.

However, the DWP never intended the migration to improve the situation for benefit claimants. A recent Resolution Foundation report demonstrated this distinctly – showing that even those getting Universal Credit after the shift are £2,800 worse off a year.

Instead then, as I pointed out before, the Tories instigated this precisely to “save money” and scale back the welfare state. In fact, the department estimated that it would save £5bn from claimants it had denied these benefits to in the process. Now, it appears likely it will reap even greater so-called savings from stripping benefits from the poorest, disabled, and most marginalised members of society.

Featured image via the Canary

By Hannah Sharland