Protesters call on MP Rebecca Pow to tighten waterways regulations

https://www.somersetcountygazette.co.uk/news/23279194.protesters-call-mp-rebecca-pow-tighten-waterways-regulations/

An Extinction Rebellion satirical plaque

PROTESTERS will unveil satirical blue plaques in Taunton claiming to “highlight MP’s Rebecca Pow failure to support the tightening of environmental legislation, to regulate the discharges of the water companies”.

Extinction Rebellion said they “will join a national day of action called Dirty Water to highlight the “shocking state of the waterways”.

The plaques will be unveiled on Saturday (January 28) at sites along the River Tone and the event will finish with a piece of Street Theatre in French Weir.

Reverend Jonathan Morris, a retired priest from the Diocese of Bath and Wells, and a member of Taunton Extinction Rebellion said: “We’ve watched in horror as our rivers and seas have become open sewers since October 2021, when the government, including the Taunton MP Rebecca Pow, voted down a proposal to stop water companies pumping waste directly into our rivers.

https://www.somersetcountygazette.co.uk/news/23279194.protesters-call-mp-rebecca-pow-tighten-waterways-regulations/

9.55 edit: Every UK MP who voted to ALLOW water companies to continue dumping RAW SEWAGE in rivers and the sea

“Lords Amendment 45 to the Environment Bill would have placed a legal duty on water companies in England and Wales “to make improvements to their sewerage systems and demonstrate progressive reductions in the harm caused by discharges of untreated sewage.” report Evolve.

“Despite the horrendous environmental impact of the disgusting practice, shortly before the vote, the Conservative Environment Secretary George Eustice recommended to his fellow MPs that they should reject it.”

“And, owing largely to the government’s 80 seat majority, the amendment was indeed defeated – by a margin of 268 MPs to 204.”

For your convenience, Evolve has collated a list of every single MP who voted to allow water companies to continue the horrendous practice of dumping raw sewage into our waterways below. Make sure you contact them or post on your social media to remind them of their duties. It is 2021 not 1988. Water companies which are highly profitable regional monopolies, some even avoiding UK tax, can not be allowed to get away with this for £.

Steve Double (Conservative – St Austell and Newquay)
Scott Mann (Conservative – North Cornwall)
George Eustice (Conservative – Camborne and Redruth – sewage affecting Godrevy, Portreath, Porthtowan etc)
Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative – Truro and Falmouth – St Agnes, Porthtowan, Falmouth, Perranporth etc)
Gary Streeter (Conservative – South West Devon)
Robert Goodwill (Conservative – Scarborough and Whitby)
Greg Knight (Conservative – East Yorkshire)
Jacob Young (Conservative – Redcar)
Matt Hancock (Conservative – West Suffolk)
James Cartlidge (Conservative – South Suffolk

Alun Cairns (Conservative – Vale of Glamorgan)
Duncan Baker (Conservative – North Norfolk)
Scott Benton (Conservative – Blackpool South)
Stephen Crabb (Conservative – Preseli Pembrokeshire)
David T C Davies (Conservative – Monmouth)
James Davies (Conservative – Vale of Clwyd)
Jamie Wallis (Conservative – Bridgend)
Nigel Adams (Conservative – Selby and Ainsty)
Adam Afriyie (Conservative – Windsor)
Peter Aldous (Conservative – Waveney)
Lucy Allan (Conservative – Telford)
Lee Anderson (Conservative – Ashfield)
Stuart Andrew (Conservative – Pudsey)
Edward Argar (Conservative – Charnwood)
Victoria Atkins (Conservative – Louth and Horncastle)
Gareth Bacon (Conservative – Orpington)
Kemi Badenoch (Conservative – Saffron Walden)
Shaun Bailey (Conservative – West Bromwich West)
Steve Baker (Conservative – Wycombe)
Harriett Baldwin (Conservative – West Worcestershire)
Steve Barclay (Conservative – North East Cambridgeshire)
Simon Baynes (Conservative – Clwyd South)
Aaron Bell (Conservative – Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Paul Beresford (Conservative – Mole Valley)
Bob Blackman (Conservative – Harrow East)
Crispin Blunt (Conservative – Reigate)
Peter Bone (Conservative – Wellingborough)
Andrew Bowie (Conservative – West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine)
Graham Brady (Conservative – Altrincham and Sale West)
Suella Braverman (Conservative – Fareham)
Jack Brereton (Conservative – Stoke-on-Trent South)
Andrew Bridgen (Conservative – North West Leicestershire)
Steve Brine (Conservative – Winchester)
Paul Bristow (Conservative – Peterborough)
Sara Britcliffe (Conservative – Hyndburn)
Anthony Browne (Conservative – South Cambridgeshire)
Fiona Bruce (Conservative – Congleton)
Felicity Buchan (Conservative – Kensington)
Alex Burghart (Conservative – Brentwood and Ongar)
Rob Butler (Conservative – Aylesbury)
Andy Carter (Conservative – Warrington South)
William Cash (Conservative – Stone)
Miriam Cates (Conservative – Penistone and Stocksbridge)
Maria Caulfield (Conservative – Lewes)
Alex Chalk (Conservative – Cheltenham)
Jo Churchill (Conservative – Bury St Edmunds)
Theo Clarke (Conservative – Stafford)
Brendan Clarke-Smith (Conservative – Bassetlaw)
Chris Clarkson (Conservative – Heywood and Middleton)
James Cleverly (Conservative – Braintree)
Thérèse Coffey (Conservative – Suffolk Coastal)
Damian Collins (Conservative – Folkestone and Hythe)
Alberto Costa (Conservative – South Leicestershire)
Robert Courts (Conservative – Witney)
Claire Coutinho (Conservative – East Surrey)
Virginia Crosbie (Conservative – Ynys Môn)
James Daly (Conservative – Bury North)
Gareth Davies (Conservative – Grantham and Stamford)
Mims Davies (Conservative – Mid Sussex)
Dehenna Davison (Conservative – Bishop Auckland)
Caroline Dinenage (Conservative – Gosport)
Sarah Dines (Conservative – Derbyshire Dales)
Jonathan Djanogly (Conservative – Huntingdon)
Leo Docherty (Conservative – Aldershot)
Michelle Donelan (Conservative – Chippenham)
Nadine Dorries (Conservative – Mid Bedfordshire)
Julian Lewis (Conservative – New Forest East)
Chris Loder (Conservative – West Dorset)
Oliver Dowden (Conservative – Hertsmere)
Jackie Doyle-Price (Conservative – Thurrock)
Flick Drummond (Conservative – Meon Valley)
David Duguid (Conservative – Banff and Buchan)
Iain Duncan Smith (Conservative – Chingford and Woodford Green)
Ruth Edwards (Conservative – Rushcliffe)
Michael Ellis (Conservative – Northampton North)
Natalie Elphicke (Conservative – Dover)
Luke Evans (Conservative – Bosworth)
David Evennett (Conservative – Bexleyheath and Crayford)
Ben Everitt (Conservative – Milton Keynes North)
Michael Fabricant (Conservative – Lichfield)
Laura Farris (Conservative – Newbury)
Simon Fell (Conservative – Barrow and Furness)
Katherine Fletcher (Conservative – South Ribble)
Mark Fletcher (Conservative – Bolsover)
Nick Fletcher (Conservative – Don Valley)
Liam Fox (Conservative – North Somerset)
Lucy Frazer (Conservative – South East Cambridgeshire)
Mike Freer (Conservative – Finchley and Golders Green)
Marcus Fysh (Conservative – Yeovil)
Mark Garnier (Conservative – Wyre Forest)
Nusrat Ghani (Conservative – Wealden)
Nick Gibb (Conservative – Bognor Regis and Littlehampton)
Peter Gibson (Conservative – Darlington)
Jo Gideon (Conservative – Stoke-on-Trent Central)
John Glen (Conservative – Salisbury)
Richard Graham (Conservative – Gloucester)
Helen Grant (Conservative – Maidstone and The Weald)
Chris Green (Conservative – Bolton West)
Andrew Griffith (Conservative – Arundel and South Downs)
Kate Griffiths (Conservative – Burton)
James Grundy (Conservative – Leigh)
Jonathan Gullis (Conservative – Stoke-on-Trent North)
Robert Halfon (Conservative – Harlow)
Luke Hall (Conservative – Thornbury and Yate)
Stephen Hammond (Conservative – Wimbledon)
Mark Harper (Conservative – Forest of Dean)
Rebecca Harris (Conservative – Castle Point)
Sally-Ann Hart (Conservative – Hastings and Rye)
John Hayes (Conservative – South Holland and The Deepings)
James Heappey (Conservative – Wells)
Darren Henry (Conservative – Broxtowe)
Antony Higginbotham (Conservative – Burnley)
Richard Holden (Conservative – North West Durham)
Kevin Hollinrake (Conservative – Thirsk and Malton)
Philip Hollobone (Conservative – Kettering)
Paul Holmes (Conservative – Eastleigh)
John Howell (Conservative – Henley)
Paul Howell (Conservative – Sedgefield)
Nigel Huddleston (Conservative – Mid Worcestershire)
Neil Hudson (Conservative – Penrith and The Border)
Eddie Hughes (Conservative – Walsall North)
Jane Hunt (Conservative – Loughborough)
Tom Hunt (Conservative – Ipswich)
Alister Jack (Conservative – Dumfries and Galloway)
Andrea Jenkyns (Conservative – Morley and Outwood)
Robert Jenrick (Conservative – Newark)
Caroline Johnson (Conservative – Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Gareth Johnson (Conservative – Dartford)
David Johnston (Conservative – Wantage)
Andrew Jones (Conservative – Harrogate and Knaresborough)
David Jones (Conservative – Clwyd West)
Marcus Jones (Conservative – Nuneaton)
Simon Jupp (Conservative – East Devon)
Daniel Kawczynski (Conservative – Shrewsbury and Atcham)
Alicia Kearns (Conservative – Rutland and Melton)
Gillian Keegan (Conservative – Chichester)
Julian Knight (Conservative – Solihull)
Danny Kruger (Conservative – Devizes)
Kwasi Kwarteng (Conservative – Spelthorne) (Proxy vote cast by Stuart Andrew)
John Lamont (Conservative – Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk)
Andrea Leadsom (Conservative – South Northamptonshire)
Andrew Lewer (Conservative – Northampton South)
Mark Logan (Conservative – Bolton North East)
Marco Longhi (Conservative – Dudley North)
Julia Lopez (Conservative – Hornchurch and Upminster)
Jack Lopresti (Conservative – Filton and Bradley Stoke)
Rachel Maclean (Conservative – Redditch)
Kit Malthouse (Conservative – North West Hampshire)
Anthony Mangnall (Conservative – Totnes)
Julie Marson (Conservative – Hertford and Stortford)
Theresa May (Conservative – Maidenhead)
Jerome Mayhew (Conservative – Broadland)
Paul Maynard (Conservative – Blackpool North and Cleveleys)
Karl McCartney (Conservative – Lincoln)
Stephen McPartland (Conservative – Stevenage)
Mark Menzies (Conservative – Fylde)
Stephen Metcalfe (Conservative – South Basildon and East Thurrock)
Robin Millar (Conservative – Aberconwy)
Maria Miller (Conservative – Basingstoke)
Nigel Mills (Conservative – Amber Valley)
Andrew Mitchell (Conservative – Sutton Coldfield)
Gagan Mohindra (Conservative – South West Hertfordshire)
Damien Moore (Conservative – Southport)
Robbie Moore (Conservative – Keighley)
Penny Mordaunt (Conservative – Portsmouth North)
Anne Marie Morris (Conservative – Newton Abbot)
James Morris (Conservative – Halesowen and Rowley Regis)
Joy Morrissey (Conservative – Beaconsfield)
Jill Mortimer (Conservative – Hartlepool)
Wendy Morton (Conservative – Aldridge-Brownhills)
Kieran Mullan (Conservative – Crewe and Nantwich)
Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative – Scunthorpe)
David Mundell (Conservative – Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale)
Sheryll Murray (Conservative – South East Cornwall)
Andrew Murrison (Conservative – South West Wiltshire)
Robert Neill (Conservative – Bromley and Chislehurst)
Lia Nici (Conservative – Great Grimsby)
Neil O’Brien (Conservative – Harborough)
Guy Opperman (Conservative – Hexham)
Neil Parish (Conservative – Tiverton and Honiton)
Owen Paterson (Conservative – North Shropshire)
Mark Pawsey (Conservative – Rugby)
Mike Penning (Conservative – Hemel Hempstead)
John Penrose (Conservative – Weston-super-Mare)
Chris Philp (Conservative – Croydon South)
Christopher Pincher (Conservative – Tamworth)
Dan Poulter (Conservative – Central Suffolk and North Ipswich)
Rebecca Pow (Conservative – Taunton Deane)
Victoria Prentis (Conservative – Banbury)
Mark Pritchard (Conservative – The Wrekin)
Tom Pursglove (Conservative – Corby)
Will Quince (Conservative – Colchester)
Tom Randall (Conservative – Gedling)
John Redwood (Conservative – Wokingham)
Jacob Rees-Mogg (Conservative – North East Somerset)
Nicola Richards (Conservative – West Bromwich East)
Angela Richardson (Conservative – Guildford)
Laurence Robertson (Conservative – Tewkesbury)
Mary Robinson (Conservative – Cheadle)
Douglas Ross (Conservative – Moray)
Lee Rowley (Conservative – North East Derbyshire)
Dean Russell (Conservative – Watford)
David Rutley (Conservative – Macclesfield)
Gary Sambrook (Conservative – Birmingham, Northfield)
Selaine Saxby (Conservative – North Devon)
Paul Scully (Conservative – Sutton and Cheam)
Bob Seely (Conservative – Isle of Wight)
Andrew Selous (Conservative – South West Bedfordshire)
Grant Shapps (Conservative – Welwyn Hatfield)
Alec Shelbrooke (Conservative – Elmet and Rothwell)
Chris Skidmore (Conservative – Kingswood)
Chloe Smith (Conservative – Norwich North)
Greg Smith (Conservative – Buckingham)
Henry Smith (Conservative – Crawley)
Julian Smith (Conservative – Skipton and Ripon)
Royston Smith (Conservative – Southampton, Itchen)
Ben Spencer (Conservative – Runnymede and Weybridge)
Mark Spencer (Conservative – Sherwood)
Alexander Stafford (Conservative – Rother Valley)
Andrew Stephenson (Conservative – Pendle)
Jane Stevenson (Conservative – Wolverhampton North East)
Bob Stewart (Conservative – Beckenham)
Iain Stewart (Conservative – Milton Keynes South)
Mel Stride (Conservative – Central Devon)
Graham Stuart (Conservative – Beverley and Holderness)
Julian Sturdy (Conservative – York Outer)
James Sunderland (Conservative – Bracknell)
Desmond Swayne (Conservative – New Forest West)
Robert Syms (Conservative – Poole)
Maggie Throup (Conservative – Erewash)
Edward Timpson (Conservative – Eddisbury)
Justin Tomlinson (Conservative – North Swindon)
Michael Tomlinson (Conservative – Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Craig Tracey (Conservative – North Warwickshire)
Laura Trott (Conservative – Sevenoaks)
Tom Tugendhat (Conservative – Tonbridge and Malling)
Shailesh Vara (Conservative – North West Cambridgeshire)
Martin Vickers (Conservative – Cleethorpes)
Matt Vickers (Conservative – Stockton South)
Christian Wakeford (Conservative – Bury South)
Robin Walker (Conservative – Worcester)
Charles Walker (Conservative – Broxbourne)
David Warburton (Conservative – Somerton and Frome)
Matt Warman (Conservative – Boston and Skegness)
Giles Watling (Conservative – Clacton)
Suzanne Webb (Conservative – Stourbridge)
Helen Whately (Conservative – Faversham and Mid Kent)
Heather Wheeler (Conservative – South Derbyshire)
John Whittingdale (Conservative – Maldon)
James Wild (Conservative – North West Norfolk)
Craig Williams (Conservative – Montgomeryshire)
Gavin Williamson (Conservative – South Staffordshire)
Mike Wood (Conservative – Dudley South)
William Wragg (Conservative – Hazel Grove)
Jeremy Wright (Conservative – Kenilworth and Southam)
TELLER: Alan Mak (Conservative – Havant)
TELLER: Craig Whittaker (Conservative – Calder Valley)

Continue ReadingProtesters call on MP Rebecca Pow to tighten waterways regulations

Ministers allow banned bee-killing pesticide to be used for third year running

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/fury-as-ministers-allow-banned-beekilling-pesticide-to-be-used-for-third-year-running-b2269333.html

image of black bees
Black bees

Sugar beet farmers will be allowed to use a banned bee-killing neonicotinoid pesticide this year – for the third year in a row – the government has decided.

Farming minister Mark Spencer made the decision to allow use of thiamethoxam in England under an emergency exemption, just days after the EU outlawed such action.

UK guidance states that emergency exemptions should not be granted more than once.

The Pesticide Collaboration, a coalition of health, environmental, farming and consumer groups, academics and trade unions, said the decision to approve the neonicotinoid for a third year running was “a total failure of responsibility to protect vital species”.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/fury-as-ministers-allow-banned-beekilling-pesticide-to-be-used-for-third-year-running-b2269333.html

Continue ReadingMinisters allow banned bee-killing pesticide to be used for third year running

Nine Palestinians killed by Israelis in the occupied West Bank

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/nine-palestinians-killed-israelis-occupied-west-bank

NINE Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and at least 20 others wounded today during a raid in the West Bank.

The latest surge of violence against Palestinians was the heaviest death toll in years in the occupied territory.

A gun battle broke out when the Israeli military conducted a daytime operation in the Jenin refugee camp that it said had been aimed at preventing an imminent attack on Israelis.

Israeli violence has intensified this month after the country’s new far-right government took office and pledged to take a hard line against the Palestinians.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/nine-palestinians-killed-israelis-occupied-west-bank

Continue ReadingNine Palestinians killed by Israelis in the occupied West Bank

Nearly 20% of Brits already living in poverty before cost-of-living crisis, report finds

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/nearly-20-of-brits-already-living-in-poverty-before-cost-of-living-crisis

Image of banknotes and prepayment meter key

MILLIONS of people in Britain, including 3.9 million children and 1.7m pensioners, were in living in poverty even before the cost-of-living crisis hit, damning figures revealed today.

Around 20 per cent of the population, equating to 13.4m people, were living in poverty in 2020/21, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s annual poverty report found.

The report warned that there are elements in the benefits system that increase poverty, including the two-child limit, five-week wait for universal credit payments and unaffordable debt deductions.

About 7.2m people are skipping meals, showers and heating, it found.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/nearly-20-of-brits-already-living-in-poverty-before-cost-of-living-crisis

Continue ReadingNearly 20% of Brits already living in poverty before cost-of-living crisis, report finds

Revealed: Taskforce to tackle NHS backlog is stuffed with private health CEOs

Original article republished from Open Democracy under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence.

Lobbyists for private health corporations were among those tasked with shaping proposals for NHS recovery plan

Adam Bychawski 19 January 2023, 3.31pm

Sunak met with the CEOs of several UK private health corporations in Number 10 in December.
| No 10 Downing Street

Rishi Sunak hosted a meeting with seven bosses from the UK’s biggest private health companies to discuss how to tackle the NHS backlog, openDemocracy can reveal.

Campaigners have raised concerns that the close involvement of private healthcare corporations in the government’s response to the NHS crisis will benefit shareholders at the expense of public investment.

The government announced the creation of the Elective Recovery Taskforce in December to provide advice on how to “turbocharge NHS recovery from the pandemic, reduce waiting times for patients and eliminate waits for routine care of over a year by 2025”.

At the time, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) refused to give openDemocracy details of the group’s members, or say who had attended its launch at Number 10 led by the PM and health secretary Steve Barclay in December.

A guestlist for the event, obtained by openDemocracy through a Freedom of Information request, reveals that half a dozen CEOs from private health firms were in attendance. 

Guests included the chief execs of the UK’s two largest private hospital operators: Paolo Pieri, the chief exec of Circle Health Group, and Justin Ash, who heads up Spire Healthcare. Also present was Jim Easton, the chief executive of Practice Plus Group, the NHS’s top private healthcare provider.

They were joined by David Hare, the chief executive of Independent Healthcare Provider Network, a lobby group that represents for-profit and not-for-profit private health organisations including Bupa and HCA, one of the biggest healthcare facility companies in the US.

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Revealed: Conservatives took more than £800,000 from private health firms

Private health tycoons have wined and dined senior ministers while cashing in on NHS contracts

The private healthcare executives, which also included CEOs from Horder Healthcare, Newmedica, InHealth and Medefer, outnumbered the five NHS England directors invited to the event.

DHSC said it could not provide openDemocracy with minutes from the meeting because none were taken, and refused to share any papers handed out to attendees.

Separately, the government quietly published a list of members of the Elective Recovery Taskforce on Monday. The 16-person group includes DHSC ministers, six NHS bosses, and Hare.

Other members include Bill Morgan, a private healthcare lobbyist whose past clients included Virgin Care, who was appointed a Number 10 adviser in November, and Paul Manning, an NHS consultant surgeon who is also chief medical officer for Circle Healthcare.

The government said the role of the task force would be to “shape proposals for how the healthcare system can make use of all resources at its disposal, further tackling the backlog caused by the Covid-19 pandemic”. It will conclude its work in March.

Last week, the prime minister said he had signed up to an NHS GP after the Guardian reported that he had registered with a private clinic in west London that charges £250 for a consultation.

The British Medical Association warned last year that the government’s NHS recovery plan would significantly increase the outsourcing of services to private providers and that it “threatens the clinical and financial viability and sustainability of the NHS”.

Tony O’Sullivan, a retired consultant paediatrician and co-chair of Keep Our NHS Public, told openDemocracy: “The head parasites are at the table to maximise future extraction of NHS funds.”

He added: “This is an important disclosure extracted from the government proving the direction of travel – to continue disinvesting in the NHS and increase its enforced dependence on private health care.

“The private sector was bailed out during Covid, has a lucrative four-year £10bn deal ongoing and is also in a position to earn massive profits from patients forced to go privately to avoid NHS queues of 7.2 million.”

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Original article republished from Open Democracy under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence.

Continue ReadingRevealed: Taskforce to tackle NHS backlog is stuffed with private health CEOs