There is no place anywhere, ever for female genital mutilation (FGM). But somehow Britain has become the 'capital of FGM' in Europe.

Better news is that the UK Government has now pledged up to £35 million towards the global eradication of FGM. Curiously however...

To some it may seem heartless, but surely it's obvious: If we really, seriously want to eradicate female genital mutilation (FGM) we have to move beyond the moralising - essential as it is - and follow the money. And we must understand the market.

Culture change is difficult

As a teenager in the 1960s I was thrilled to gain a scholarship to attend American High School for my Senior (final school-age) year. The transition from Birmingham UK to Arizona USA was stark, but everyone did their very best to make me welcome; and thus it was, hardly had...

It's has been quite a week on the human rights front for big news, both national and - has anyone noticed? - international.

Not often do we see massive steps towards gender equality coming thick and fast; but that's what's happening just now.

Consider: In the UK,

This week we learned that the UK Coalition government wants to deregulate farm workers' wages, permit support allowances for only two children in any family, and lower subsidy (?investment) levels for green power plants.

It's commonplace that the Coalition abandoned intentions to be the...

In May this year an e-petition demanding an end to female genital mutilation (FGM) in Britain was submitted to the UK Government website. I was lead author of that petition, which can be viewed here.

Well over 20,000, perhaps 25,000, under-age British girls are...

The political conference season is one point in the year when it's quite reasonable to feel confused. So many claims and so much talk; but with what real effect, for whom?

Perhaps though we can learn more about politicians and their parties than we first imagine, if we ask...

After years of posturing and shadow boxing, it looks like the 'War of the Rurals' has finally begun.

This very week will, extraordinary intervention excepted, see the beginning of a massive badger cull authorised by DEFRA to eradicate Bovine (cattle) TB - aka...

'Summer Holidays are for Fun not Pain' declared the (London) Metropolitan Police Force as school broke up for the Summer 2012 break... A strange but necessary message because, horrifically, thousands, of young British girls are forced to undergo female genital mutilation (FGM) whilst school is out;...

Just a few days after this year's Slavery Remembrance Day, on 23 August, we will mark also the centenary legacy of the black British music composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, who died one hundred years ago, on 1 September 1912.

Only 37 years old at his...

Every year upwards of 20,000 young girls in Britain are at risk, or already victim, of female genital mutilation (FGM, or 'cutting'). Yet never has there been a successful court case in the UK against the perpetrators of this barbaric child abuse. Nor has there ever been any...