Stop the government snooping on every Email and Facebook message

From Open Rights Group

The government has announced that it will be spending up to £2 billion into new ways to snoop on email and web traffic.

This Kafka-esque “Intercept Modernisation Plan”, was stopped near the end of the last government, but was quietly revived in the 2010 Spending Review. While billions of pounds are being slashed from education, welfare and defence, the government plans to waste vast sums trying to snoop on our emails and Facebook communications.

We need to tell the government to stop this wasteful, intrusive plan for wholesale snooping on our daily lives.

Please sign the petition at http://action.openrightsgroup.org/ea-campaign/clientcampaign.do?ea.client.id=1422&ea.campaign.id=8227

Paul O'Grady on Osborne and the cuts

York Stop The Cuts - Right To Work Demo

Around 200 protesters turned up for the first public demo called by York Stop The Cuts - Right To Work.  There were speeches from Hugh Bayley MP, Cllr Dave Taylor, Father Tim Jones and representatives from PCS, FBU and UCU.

It is unfortunate that many of the public still support the cuts, but I believe this is because they don't realise yet how badly it will target their public services.  It is not until swimming pools and libraries start closing, social services are cut, unemployment rockets and there are fewer police on the streets that the public at large will become motivated to oppose these cuts.

We must all work to build are local groups to oppose the cuts and build for the London demo next year.

We're all in this together?

As expected the comprehensive spending review has attacked the poorest in society and set the blue-print for decimating our public services.  As a result of the review we are expected to see:

• Up to half a million public sector jobs go by 2014-15
• £81bn cut from public spending in the next four years
• £7bn extra welfare cuts

Source BBC News

The Con Dems insist the private sector will create jobs to absorb those who have been made redundant, but there is little evidence to support this dangerous gamble, in the short term there is likely to as many if not more private sector job losses from companies reliant on public sector spending.  So the end result is that we are likely to see the highest UK unemployment figures this country has seen in decades.

What is most grating is George Osborne constantly telling us "We're all in this together".  The Con Dem cabinet loaded with millionaires will not feel the pain from the cuts they are inflicting on the low paid.  Neither will the bankers who caused this state of affairs feel the pain, as many will still rake in huge bonuses, while the dole queues get longer.

And I hope no one forgets that the Lib Dems are responsible for propping up the Tories and allowing these cuts go through, cuts which go far beyond what is needed and have far more to do with right wing ideology.

There will be demos across the country this Saturday against the cuts.  Find your local demo here.

Lib Dem broken promises

Looking back at the 2010 Lib Dem manifesto, you immediately see that many of their election pledges have not been met:

• Saying no to the like-for-like replacement of the Trident nuclear
  weapons system, which could cost £100 billion. We will hold a full
  defence review to establish the best alternative for Britain’s future
  security.
• Scrap unfair university tuition fees for all students taking their fi rst
  degree, including those studying part-time, saving them over £10,000
  each. We have a financially responsible plan to phase fees out over
  six years, so that the change is affordable even in these difficult
  economic times, and without cutting university income. We will
  immediately scrap fees for final year students.
• Reject a new generation of nuclear power stations; based on the
  evidence nuclear is a far more expensive way of reducing carbon
  emissions than promoting energy conservation and renewable energy.
• Rule out the like-for-like replacement of the Trident nuclear weapons
  system. At a cost of £100 billion over a lifetime it is unaffordable, and
  Britain’s security would be better served by alternatives. We support
  multilateral nuclear disarmament and will ensure that the UK plays a
  proactive role in the arms reduction talks starting later this year

If you read the manifesto you will find plenty of other policy statements which will not come to pass.  They also made a U turn on delaying the cuts.  And who can forget this election poster:

Again, the Lib Dems are now supporting the rise in VAT.


The question is, what have the Lib Dems got out of this agreement?

From the looks of it very little.  They have got a referendum to allow some minor tinkering with the electoral system to bring us AV.  But there is no certainty they will get a yes vote with their Tory partners campaigning against it.

At the end of the day, all they've achieved is the chance to say they are in government and a few seats at the cabinet table.  They may well regret this at forthcoming elections, as who is going to believe them when they have committed a u-turn on so many of their election pledges?  And it is clear they can no longer pretend to be a party of the centre left, when the policies their cabinet are selling are clearly centre-right.

Is this the beginning of the end for a public higher education system?

Two stories about HE have made the press this week.  The first is the Browne report which proposes tuitions fees starting at £7000 but with no upper limit, it would therefore be no surprise if we see much higher fees, especially from the Russell Group universities.


Then today we see a leaked letter from Universities UK which has been sent to universities warning them to expect cuts of £4.2bn to teaching budgets and £1bn to research budgets a result of the comprehensive spending review.

The result of both these proposals could be an end to the higher education system as we know it.  It would not be a surprise if we see a drop in student applications from those who do not wish to saddle themselves with debts at more than double the current level.  We could also see some universities going bankrupt due to budget cuts and decreased public funding.

What is most worrying is that this clearly looks like the final step to a privatised university system.  If these changes are implemented universities will need to start funding some arts and humanities courses purely from student fees, as funding is to be withdrawn from all but science, engineering, medicine and modern language degrees and with variable fees we are already very close to seeing a private market in HE with only one more step needed to make the system completely funded by tuition fees and private research funding.

UCU and the NUS have organised a joint national demo called "Fund our future:Stop Education Cuts" on 10th November 2010.  Details at http://www.demo2010.org/