There are an estimated 3.4 million people in the UK living with lung conditions asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) that are made worse by toxic air. Days of high air pollution can bring about terrifying bouts of breathlessness, coughing, wheezing and other symptoms, which can be fatal. Air pollution doesn’t just affect people…
Last week the Scottish Government published their long-awaited spending review, setting out their long-term spending plans for the first time in over a decade. The picture it has painted is nothing short of catastrophic. It is both a damning indictment of government failure in the past and a stark warning of what lies ahead. Years…
We have heard it before; good things come to those who wait. Well, it would appear the UK government has tested that saying to destruction with the publication of their long-awaited international development strategy. Despite the wait, the paper presented to the media this week has as much substance as a soap bubble. We shouldn’t…
In the early years of the last decade, the deportation of Abu Hamza al-Masri from the United Kingdom to the United States became a national conversation. Despite several requests for the extradition of the radical preacher who called for global jihad, the case spent years travelling up the courts, finally reaching the European Court of…
Last weekend a fascist terrorist opened fire in a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, killing 10 people and injuring three others. Following the modus operandi of numerous previous terrorists, the killer livestreamed the attack online and published a manifesto. Twitch, the Amazon-owned platform used by the killer to broadcast his murderous rampage, took down the…
With the May Day bank holiday celebrated this Monday, many of us will be enjoying a four-day week this week – preceded by a three day weekend. For me, a bank holiday weekend always feels like a relief – for the first time in weeks or sometimes months, I feel like I’ve just about got…
Five years ago today, the two-child limit became part of our social security system. Since then, a child born into a family that already has two children has been ineligible for the child allowances in universal credit and tax credits, with very limited exceptions. The consequences of the policy continue to be devastating for the…
Perhaps to distract from the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s lacklustre spring statement, Dominic Raab has been making the rounds of the right-wing press with his proposal for a new Bill of Rights. Intended as a replacement for the Human Rights Act 1998, the Bill of Rights aims to put an end to the “wokery and…
Government ministers talking about child poverty have been a bit like buses this week – nothing for years then two come along at once. First we had the Chancellor. When presented with analysis showing that his decision not to increase benefits in line with inflation would push 500,000 children into poverty, he made clear that…
They’re arriving with dogs on leads, cats in their arms, or struggling to carry animals in baskets, not wanting to leave any family member behind. PETA Germany is working on the border between Poland and Ukraine and has never seen anything like it. The conditions are dire. People who have travelled for days have had…
