If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
So why are so many women's refuges being closed down by cuts in local authority spending? In my opinion it's because there are more votes in filling pot holes and keeping up the bin collections than in keeping a place of refuge open for the victims of violence.
The hope and confidence that the government's commitment to the 'Big Society' offered to the VCS in 2010 has ebbed away to be replaced by a cynical dismissal of what now seems to have been little more than rhetoric rather than an substantial set of policies.
Let's start with the important bit. The debt target will be missed. Despite stressing that the deficit has fallen by a quarter under the government's economic strategy, the Chancellor admitted in his Autumn Statement that debt will not be falling against GDP until 2016.
The third sector should not simply accept what is happening to it and to its beneficiaries. It has to be strong and resolute in speaking out for social justice, equality and decency - the essence of the sector.
A blanket ban on support for young adults would leave thousands at risk of homelessness - while any truly compassionate list of exemptions would be so broad as to make the policy redundant. Ministers should ditch this unworkable proposal now.
Look out London: the students are coming. Again. And if police and press reports of the last major student demonstration, back in 2010, are to be believed, a torrid time is on its way.
If we want to preserve quality public-service broadcasting in Britain, we must defend the Beeb.
Losing a home can be right up their with death, divorce and joblessness. Our homes are places we go to escape the world. When they are under threat, it can be horribly traumatic.
After nearly three decades of development activists' and experts' efforts to bring about FTTs, it would be heinous not to use the revenues to contribute to a better future for millions of poor men, women and children.
The voluntary and community sector has always championed the rights and needs of the disadvantaged; fought for equality; and stood up for social justice. Now is the time to advocate these aims as never before. Cuts and many other government policies are taking the country in the opposite direction. Charities cannot ignore this.
Mr Cameron said they are going about the cuts in a way that is 'open, responsible and fair' whilst Mr Osborne has said that cuts to the deficit must be based on the belief that 'we are all in this together'
It's ironic that Team GB's amazing hoard of gold and other Olympic medals has come at just the time when the Coalition government's austerity measures are set to devastate the future of sports funding in Britain.
You see the trouble of getting into political bed with the Tories, and with us being by far the smaller party, is that we get tainted with the same drab, grubby brush they use... but we end up taking more of the flack because people do - or at least did - expect better from us.
After submitting freedom of information requests to every fire service in the land I discovered that arson attacks are on the increase, more firefighters are getting injured and casualties caused by house fires are rising. Incredibly, Eric Pickles, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, who has masterminded the downfall of public services across the country, has shrugged off these alarming facts. He lazily refuses to take any action to reverse the trend preferring to bury his ideologically driven head in the sand.
Figures released on Wednesday by the Office of National Statistics show that the UK economy contracted by 0.7% between April and June. This situation has been described as the worst double dip recession in 50 years. But does this really matter to ordinary people? Yes, of course, it does.
The Great Depression of the 1930s is remembered as one of the worst economic periods in modern history. But statistics show that our current slump is in someways worse.
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