UK Election 2015 – time for a major change

With the UK general election almost upon us isn’t time that we had some radical changes? Here are some to think about:

1. Empty properties in London and other major cities, if they are not being lived in by the owners for more than a month per year then the local councils have the right to rent them out at affordable rents to people. This would stop the one percent using our cities and homes as investment vehicles.

2. Corporations, all corporations in retail, food, clothing and entertainment to be limited. Let’s put individuality, small owners, family businesses back into the running of our cities.

3. Commercial property owners of retail space, cap and reduce the rent they can charge allowing non corporate businesses to start and flourish.

I’m sure that there are a few more that we can think of to divide up the wealth in a fairer way.

Let’s break the chains that bind us the ninety nine percent.

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A Time for Change

If we continue in our current way there can only be more war and more poverty. While some large corporations plunder our planet for short term gain the ecological poverty that is caused will affect us all. Above all we need inclusion for every human being not replacement by technology, technology must be used to aid us in reducing our individual workload not replacing individuals. The information revolution must be used to connect individuals and not in some of the vacuous ways we see at the moment in social media. Individuals who buy food and clothes from other countries must be connected with the individuals who grow the coffee and who pick the cotton or sew the clothes that they buy. Only then will we be able to stop the horrendous exploitation that occurs between 1st world consumers and 3rd world producers.

WHO calls on all clinical trials results to be reported – This affects us all

Dear AllTrials supporters
For the first time ever, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has taken a position on clinical trial results reporting, and it’s a very strong position! The WHO now says that researchers have a clear ethical duty to publicly report the results of all clinical trials. Significantly, the WHO has stressed the need to make results from previously hidden trials available. Ben Goldacre said, “This is a very positive, clear statement from WHO, and it is very welcome.” Ilaria Passarani from the European Consumer Organisation BEUC called it “a landmark move for consumers.” It is the position we and hundreds of you wrote to the WHO last autumn urging them to adopt. Well done everyone!
You can read more about the WHO’s statement and responses to it on the AllTrials website, in Science and The Verge and from Reuters.
The WHO has called on organisations and governments to now ensure that all trials get reported. Ben Goldacre has set out some practical suggestions on how to make this happen.
Please help share this exciting news. Can you write about it for a newspaper, journal, newsletter or blog? Make sure to share it on Twitter and Facebook. Here’s a tweet you can use: Great news: The @WHO has said that researchers should publicly report results from all clinical trials. http://bit.ly/1CUd1v6 #AllTrials
Best wishes
Ian
—
Ian Bushfield
Campaigns Support Officer
Sense About Science

La Patriote – A Beer from Fribourg in Switzerland

What’s the general mission statement of a corporate? Produce more, sell more, automate more, use less workers, wipe out the local producers. The Cardinal Brewery started in Fribourg in 1788 and by 1904 had moved to a site near the train station. It remained there until in 2011 those bad old boys from Carlsberg moved the production of Cardinal to another brewery in Switzerland that they already owned. The old building became a museum and a place for start ups. Just what the local community needs right, I mean we are all going to be writing apps for each other at the end of the day aren’t we? But thankfully there are some alternatives to corporate blandness and one of them is La Patriot beer brewed by a local microbrewery, Freiburger Biermanufaktur, with local workers. That sounds rather good to me and tastes rather good too.

Brasserie Bavaria – Lausanne Switzerland

As you can probably guess I’m a great fan of individuality and have a definite hatred of corporate blandness. Yesterday I was lucky enough to visit one of my favourite eating and drinking places in Lausanne Switzerland called the Brasserie Bavaria situated at Rue du Petit-Chêne 10. I’m glad to say that nothing notable seems to have changed. The simple wooden seating is still chipped and scratched and the paintings above the wooden paneling look as yellow as ever probably through age and previous generations smoking in there. The clientele are mixed, from all ages, on their own or as groups of two or more. They drink tea, coffee, beer and wine. They are there to relax, to talk or if they are on their own to read the paper or just watch the world go buy through the large window. And then there is the honesty, none of this paying upfront. You order what you want and the bill is placed on your table. This is a very civilised place.  In the middle is a long table where if it gets busy enough you will have to sit and maybe engage in conversation with complete strangers. How nice is that in the modern time of plug yourself in and shut the world out? It is an amazing place and if you visit Switzerland you would be mad to miss it. If you live in Lausanne then it’s a must as places like these need all the support that they can get in time of corporate creep as they dissolve our individuality.

And this is England – part 2

As many of you know England can be a very grey and dreary place but on a pleasant summer’s day it can be a great place to be as can be seen in this photograph.  The soft and gentle rolling landscape of farmland gives an idyllic image of life in England. This Shropshire landscape however can be very bleak at other times of the year and especially so for the much undervalued British farmer. I’m a city dweller but I have a lot of sympathy for the small farmer, especially those that don’t own their land and despite the protestations of the supermarkets they are making life very difficult for them. The UK’s farming industry often has the highest rate of suicide and highest rate of accidents and therefore we need to press the supermarkets to pay fairly for what they buy. At the moment this is simply not the case. Copyright Junagarh Media, http://www.junagarhmedia.co.uk.

Word on the Water – A Tale of Corporate Greed – Private Eye 1380

David v Goliath might be the next Hollywood blockbuster, they must be making it after having made Noah etc, but in the real world Goliath Inc, Goliath Corp and Goliath PLC kill and trample all over David the good guy. And here is just another tale of the little guys losing out to the corporate monsters. So let’s start with a couple of photos to illustrate who the good guys are. This is the canal boat, Word on the Water, a floating bookshop and poetry venue. And this is the cat that lives on the boat. The photos were taken near one entrance of Paddington station on the Grand Union Canal. In an article titled, “Paddington bare”, Private Eye explains that the Canal and River Trust have selected British Land to take two new permanent trade moorings and you can guess where :-). They plan to open a floating coffee shop and “Welcome centre” in the two moorings. The article adds that there are already more than a dozen coffee outlets in the area including one on a canal boat. So huge evil corporation that has spent £470 million (how much of that is debt?) buying up the local area versus a small independent business and cultural space. It doesn’t take a genius to work out the ending and it isn’t a Hollywood one. Story copyright of Private Eye. Buy it, you will be amazed.

Bad Pharma – Ben Goldacre finished reading chapter 3

I’m now half way through the excellent Bad Pharma written by Ben Goldacre. A look at the dastardly corporations, institutions, regulators and people that leave doctors as much as patients in the dark about how good certain drugs are. Everyone remembers the terrible effects of thalidomide but does anybody remember about or know the name of the heart drug that instead of helping people probably killed 100,000. This book should be compulsive reading for GPs and anybody who ever has to take any medicine. Ben writes about how medicine and science should work and shows how it doesn’t. Buy it, be horrified and then ask questions. Pharmaceutical

Mark Thomas – Cuckooed performed at the Tricycle theatre in Kilburn 1st of December 2014

We have just been to see Mark Thomas’s new show, Cuckooed, at the Tricycle theatre in Kilburn, London and as usual it is extremely good. This is political and activist comedy at its best and Mark pulls no punches. We have been we think to all of his shows over the last few years and they are always highly entertaining. This show tells the story of a how a very good and close friend spied on a group of activists linked to the Campaign Against Arms Trade for BAE Systems. It is funny, moving, sad and entertaining all at the same time. If you haven’t seen Mark or the show then go and see him. If you live too far away then read one of his enlightening books. http://www.markthomasinfo.co.uk/

Ben Goldacre – Bad Pharma just finished chapter 2

I’m still working my way through Ben Goldacre’s excellent book on the pharmaceutical industry, “Bad Pharma” and apart from being so well researched and written it has some interesting comments. Ben relates the story of how in Thailand there are two million women and 800,000 children involved in the sex trade and how the Thai government decided in 2007 to copy a western company’s drug, Abbott’s, drug for the poor. Abbott’s retaliated by withdrawing 7 drugs in total from the Thai market. His point was that the sex industry serves many western men but his knock out comment for me was, “some of whom you may know personally”. Look around you and maybe you will see some of them.