… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Category: politics

  • David Cameron says Atos decision-making must improve

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    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24548738

    David Cameron has said the company that carries out “fitness-for-work” tests on disabled benefits claimants has to improve its decision-making.

    But he rejected an angry call by Labour MP Dennis Skinner, at Prime Minister’s Questions, to “get rid of” Atos.

    The Bolsover MP dubbed Atos a “cruel, heartless monster”, referring to a constituent with cancer who had to wait 11 months for an appeal.

    The man, a “butcher and farmer in Bolsover”, had now died, he told MPs.

    The veteran Labour MP, his face red with anger, told Mr Cameron: “Isn’t it time we put an end to this system, where people that are really suffering should not be allowed an appeal, having to live on £70 a week? Him and his widow.

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  • England’s mental health services ‘in crisis’

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    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24537304

    By Michael Buchanan

    The mental health service in England is in crisis and unsafe, says one of the country’s leading psychiatrists.

    Dr Martin Baggaley, medical director of the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust, spoke out as an investigation by BBC News and Community Care magazine reveals more than 1,500 mental health beds have closed in recent years.

    Many trusts have all their beds filled.

    …

    Freedom of Information requests were sent to 53 of England’s 58 mental health trusts, by BBC News and Community Care, and 46 trusts replied.

    The figures show that a minimum of 1,711 mental health beds have been closed since April 2011, including 277 between April and August 2013.

    This represents a 9% reduction in the total number of mental health beds – 18,924 – available in 2011/12.

    …

    On the morning Dr Baggaley spoke to the BBC, he said a severely distressed patient had been transferred from Croydon to Hertfordshire as there were no beds in London.

    He has 50 patients in beds outside his trust, some as far away as Somerset.

    He said: “We are in a real crisis at the moment. I think currently the system is inefficient, unsafe.

    “We’re certainly feeling it on the front line, it’s very pressured, and we spend a lot of our time struggling to find beds, sending people across the country which is really not what I want to do.”

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  • Lord Neuberger: Legal aid cuts threaten to deny justice

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    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24545584

    Image of Legal aid protestersProposed cuts to legal aid could deny justice to those who need it most, the UK’s top judge has warned.

    Supreme Court president Lord Neuberger said reduced access to legal aid could lead to inefficient claims costlier for the court system.

    If people had to drop claims, it would be “a rank denial of justice and a blot on the rule of law”, he said.

    The Ministry of Justice said the annual £2bn bill for legal aid was “costing too much”.

    …

    “The courts have no more important function than that of protecting citizens from the abuses and excesses of the executive – central government, local government, or other public bodies.”

    Warning of the potential harm from government cuts to the legal aid budget, Lord Neuberger said: “Cutting the cost of legal aid deprives the very people who most need the protection of the courts of the ability to get legal advice and representation.”

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  • Royal Mail offers £300 to postal workers to cross picket lines

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    http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/oct/15/royal-mail-cross-picket-lines-strike

    Image of Postal workers rally

     

    The Royal Mail is offering a £300 bonus to any of its 150,000 staff who cross the picket line in any forthcoming nationwide postal strikes.

    Moya Greene, its chief executive, wrote to all employees before Wednesday’s strike ballot result to offer the sum if they continue working while colleagues are out on strike.

    … <about shares being ridiculously undervalued >

    Greene’s last-ditch attempt to avert the first nationwide strike in four years came as the Communication Workers Union (CWU) said it was confident workers would back industrial action when it announces the results of a strike ballot on Wednesday afternoon.

    Postal workers described her offer as an “act of desperation and discrimination” and a “scab bonus”. Paul Firmage, one of the 371 of Royal Mail’s 150,000 staff to rejected free shares in the privatisation, said the £300 bonus was “yet another bribe”.

    “They are offering people money to be a scab. It is a scab bonus,” he said.”

    The CWU said: “It’s an act of desperation and discrimination. We believe it’s irrelevant and will make no difference to the strike ballot.”

    In a consultative ballot this year 96% of postal workers were opposed to the privatisation, which they said will erode their pay and conditions.

    If staff have voted in favour of industrial action, the first strike could take place on 23 October and would likely be followed by a series of rolling strikes in the runup to Christmas.

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  • Huw Lewis: Breaking link between poverty and academic achievement is priority

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    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-24540930

    The education priority of the Welsh government should shift towards tackling the link between poverty and poor academic achievement, the education minister has said.

    Huw Lewis said the effects of poverty were apparent before children had even started school.

    The comments came in his first major speech since taking the post in June.

    “From tonight, cutting the link between deprivation and attainment becomes our top priority,” he said.

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