If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
The Blog
We have a model for shared responsibilities and public access that could preserve and improve our green spaces for generations to come. We have legislation that could be easily adapted. All we lack is the will to safeguard what we all value.
Focusing on London policy, as a middle income earner, I myself would welcome an extra £1000 over four years saved if transport prices are lowered under Ken.
The cuts to services for young people being planned and implemented throughout the Country are severe and disproportionate and we will eventually pay a price for it.
The other day an acquaintance of mine told me that she had just begun working for the Citizens Advice Bureau. One of her first calls was from a cancer patient who has become incontinent because of the treatment she was receiving. The reason for the call was because the patient had just been told that she was fit to work and would lose her disability living allowance.
The privatisation of the police service will have a detrimental effect on public safety and the level of service they expect and deserve from us. I don't say this lightly, I am genuinely outraged by what is happening to the greatest police service in the world.
Last week the true impact of the government's cuts became very clear. It is women, children, the elderly and the homeless that are going to get hit the worst.
If, instead of being plain old Stuart Bonar I was swiftly ennobled to Lord Bonar of [my home city] Plymouth, I wouldn't vote alongside Paddy later today, I'd be backing the coalition.
On Saturday, the Shadow Chancellor admitted that if the Labour Party were in government, they would not deviate from the tough decisions that George Osborne and David Cameron are making in an effort to cut the deficit.
Asking peers to accept an arbitrary one year time limit for Employment and Support Allowance payments for cancer patients and others to recover from their gruelling treatment and get back behind a desk or onto the factory floor was always going to be a tough sell, and so it proved yesterday evening.
In 2012 let's resolve to ban the phrase 'more for less' when talking about the future of public services.
I have been watching the debate on the future of public sector pensions with two hats on: the one of a self-made entrepreneur and the other as a member of the Greater Manchester Superannuation fund; a frozen relic of my time in Local Government.
Reading Bill Taylor's excellent and though provoking article on the Harvard Business Review Blog, I immediately thought of all those activities that we do in the public sector either because we can or more likely because we always have done.
In Hackney alone, since January there has been a 80.6% rise in young people on the dole for over six months. These figures are not just a challenge for national politicians, they are a personal tragedy for each and every young person affected. George Osborne has to be prepared to rethink his policies. Otherwise the disturbances this summer may be only a foretaste of what is to come from a generation this government seems to have abandoned.
Government Cuts Could Store up Problems for the Future If Vital Children's Services Aren't Protected
We want the Government as a whole to act now to mitigate the risk of failing to maintain investment in early intervention, which could ultimately lead to greater longer term problems, such as more children being taken into care. By planning carefully, and involving the voluntary sector in ensuring money given to local authorities for early intervention schemes is spent wisely, local and national government can avoid giving with one hand and taking with the other.
Cuts are bad and cuts are annoying, but with the Tories in power and an economic crisis malarky taking place this was always going to happen.
As the Conservative Party conference kicks off in earnest, the Big Society is once again back on everyone's lips. It's been said that the idea is slowly being jettisoned, brushed under the carpet, but as yet nobody is really quite sure.
