UK Indymedia - UK Newswire Archive

Occupy The Land - Use Proper Law

18-02-2012 20:55

Yet more public money for Peel Holdings

18-02-2012 20:07

Merseytravel has taken the decision to spend 2.4mill per year in rent at the new Mann Island 'Granite' development. The contract ties the public body to the site for 30 years meaning the public body will pay double the present value of the property at todays prices but without owning anything at the end.

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Viva The Greek Revolution!

18-02-2012 19:12

It seems the only way out for the Greek people is open revolt.

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Greyhound racetrack protests continue...

18-02-2012 18:55

Protests continue against brutal and unscruppulous greyhound racing industry in Nottingham

On Friday 17th February, as on every alternate Friday, members of Nottingham Animal Rights picketed the Nottingham race track in Colwick, protesting at the tens of thousands of dogs that are disposed of every year by the British greyhound racing industry - because they fail to make the grade as racers or when their racing days are over.

About 25,000 greyhound pups are registered every year in the British Isles. The number bred is actually many thousands more than this,when taking into account pups that never get registered and those killed by breeders at a very young age.

Although most of these dogs are bred in Ireland, the majority are produced to supply the demands of the British greyhound racing industry.

Thousands of greyhound pups and young dogs are put to death because they fail to reach racing standards. We estimate that over 10,000 are killed annually in the British Isles.

Dogs which actually make it to the track are very likely to experience suffering during their racing careers. It has been estimated that greyhounds running on British tracks sustain more than 12,000 injuries every year and that 10% of dogs that race are already suffering from injuries. Injured toes, torn muscles, strained tendons and arthritic joints are commonplace.

At least 10,000 greyhounds "retire" from racing in Britain every year, at an average age of just 2½ years old. This is either because of injury or because they are adjudged to be no longer good enough to race.

Very few of these dogs manage to find good homes. This is hardly surprising, given a situation where many thousands of ordinary dogs are put to sleep every year because no homes are available for them.

The British greyhound racing industry has admitted that 500 - 1,000 retired greyhounds are put to death every year. This alone would be enough to justify a ban on greyhound racing, but the true figure for retired dogs killed is, sadly, far, far higher. Quite possibly as many as 6,000.

Many ex-racing greyhounds are simply abandoned and a large number are killed, sometimes by extremely cruel methods such as drowning or poisoning, because some owners and trainers are not prepared to pay the cost of having them put to sleep by a vet.

If you want to lend your voice to the chorus demanding that no more dogs die simply for our entertainment, join your local animal rights group.

Nottingham Animal Rights meet fortinghtly, alternately at the Sumac center in forest fields, and at the Navigation Inn on Wilford road (home of Annie's veggie friendly burger shack). Planning meetings start at 19:45, are open and very informal. :)

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Location of Earth First Winter Moot is announced.

18-02-2012 18:24

This years annual Earth First! Winter Moot is being held in Scotland next weekend. The location has just been announced as Glespin Village Hall, in South Lanarkshire.

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Taking on Tarmageddon

18-02-2012 17:29

The busy bees at Oxford based Campbell Road Productions have finished editing the Taking on Tarmageddon film.

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PLM Statement on increased US military presence in the Philippines

18-02-2012 14:53

PLM Calls for an Independent Foreign Policy and a Non-Aligned ASEAN

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Workfare demo shuts Westminster Tesco

18-02-2012 12:55

Right to Work and unemployed activists and supporters occupied Westminster Tesco on Saturday. Police issued warning over trespass and refused to answer why they weren’t arresting Tesco bosses for breaching minimum wage legislation. Defiant protesters demanded that Tesco withdraw immediately from all government schemes that force slave labour on the disabled and unemployed chanting: Tesco bosses hear us say, we won’t work if you won’t pay. And ‘first they stole our ema, now they want to steal our pay’.

Pics: http://www.demotix.com/news/1059514/workfare-protesters-close-westminster-tesco-london

Some background and organising: http://www.boycottworkfare.org

The new social workhouse? Workfare, the labour market, prison
http://libcom.org/blog/new-social-workhouse-16022012

Supermarket giant Tesco must know no shame. As unemployment blights the lives of millions, Britain’s biggest private sector employer is taking on staff — for free.

This is part of the scandal of “workfare” — making people work unpaid or face being thrown off benefits.

Tesco reports that over the past four months some 1,400 people have worked for them without pay. Only 300 got a job with the company.

The Tory government is slashing jobs and then punishing the jobless. And to add insult to injury, they are forcing people to work for free to boost profits for big business.

Activists promised that the campaign by Right to Work and other anti workfare groups would continue their action, shutting tesco stores down until they withdraw from the scheme and the government drops its slave labour schemes and replaces them with real jobs and training.

Right to Work is calling for a day of action against Tesco stores on Wednesday 22nd February and will also be supporting the national day of action called by Boycott Workfare on 3 march.

As well as taking the fight to the Government when the next unemployment figures are released on March 14 with a Mass Dole queue at the DWP offices in Westminster.

http://righttowork.org.uk/2012/02/right-to-work-occupy-westminster-tesco/

March 3rd London Info:
Meet outside BHS on Oxford Street, 11:30am
http://www.facebook.com/events/168924943221854/

Flyer: http://www.boycottworkfare.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/3rd-March-london-leaflet.pdf

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John Catt’s Judicial Review of ACPO and the Met on 9th February 2012

18-02-2012 12:53

A diverse range of ‘domestic extremists’, including comedian Mark Thomas, braved the cold on 9th February to greet and support John Catt at the start of his epic legal challenge against ACPO and the Met and their secret domestic extremist database. The Aldermaston Women’s Group brought a large banner bearing the words “Domestic Extremists At Work” which took pride of place over the railings of the Royal Courts of Justice. The air was brimming with excitement and some extremely domesticated “grime-busters”, with cleaning materials to the fore, soon set about giving the fatigued looking Royal Courts of Justice a deep clean and a breath of fresh air!

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Greece: Steelwork strikers welcome neo-Nazis

18-02-2012 11:15

Taken from Contra Info:

Aspropyrgos, Attica: Neo-Nazis ‘support’ the Greek Steelworks strikers, and workers’ spokesmen and several other strikers welcome the scum warmly, instead of kicking their ass

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Boycott Workfare National Day of Action, 3rd March, Poundland Picket

18-02-2012 10:16

Picket & Demonstration outside Poundland, on Union Street in Birmingham City Centre calling for them to withdraw from workfare schemes. If they have withdrawn before the 3rd of March, we will picket Tesco on New Street instead. If Tesco have withdrawn make sure you check here to see who else remains.

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Support the Anti-nuclear folk at Langborough Farm!

17-02-2012 22:55

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No Borders Communique to Immigration Prisoners

17-02-2012 21:24

To all our brothers and sisters locked up in Immigration Removal Centres,

You are not forgotten!

This is a communiqué from the 'No Borders Network'

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Power Grab by Guild Managers

17-02-2012 18:58

Recent Trustee Board meeting of University of Birmingham Guild of Students votes to shift power significantly from students to managers.

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Save Battersea Power Station

17-02-2012 18:55

Big Mystery around the historic red brick building on the cover of "Animal" by Pink Floyd.

This legendary backstage perhaps is in danger of disappearing forever.

You remember of those two legendary smokestacks behind the Thames with the cute little pig "Algie" that flyed around it? the pig balloon of the British band during processing to make the cover of their tenth album decided to go and take a trip through the skies of London (unfortunately broke the cable anchor who was staring it at the mainland). The Heathrow control tower issued a notice to all the aircraft in transit by saying that at any moment they could spot a huge flying pig.

The two chimneys of Battersea that was so dear to Algie has been the symbol of an era (Perhaps we can say - without exaggeration - even of the 70s) doing a fine show on the most popular album in rock history. Battersea Power Station is one of the oldest coal power plants in Europe and in spite this of over twenty years lying in a state of total neglect and disuse. Perhaps it will be filled with dynamite and destroyed. In its place, real estate speculators are already imagining shops, a mall, a Pizza Hut, the inevitable Mac Donald, luxury studios and more.

But besides being the emblem of an entire "rock generation", Battersea Power Station is also a big positive symbol. And 'the symbol of an green consciousness intelligent that more than 20 years ago - far ahead of its time - has stopped the coal. It 'is also due to this, if today the British capital is much less "gray smoke of London."

You should never, never demolish one of the constructive symbols (brings a lot of bad luck).

… --- …

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Queer - 24th-26th February 2012

17-02-2012 18:54

QUEER: an exhibition of local artists' work in response to "LGBT History Month" and the first open event to be held at The Black Rose Centre, let's make it a good 'un!

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The Guardian newspaper funds Huxley’s ‘Children:Our Ultimate Investment'

17-02-2012 17:52

The Guardian newspaper funds Huxley’s ‘Children: Our Ultimate Investment’. 'Children: Our Ultimate Investment' includes 'Project Caressing' which instructs toddlers to be tactile with elderly men. Liability issues ended this in the US, but Laura Huxley's 'Children: Our Ultimate Investment' is doing well in the UK.

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Victory at Connexions as Unison Campaign Secures Jobs and Services

17-02-2012 15:59

Over 100 staff at Connexions had good news this week after hearing that Birmingham City Council have backed down and withdrawn the threat of redundancies, stating that there will not be any more cuts to this vital service in the coming financial year. We hope that whoever is in power following the council elections in May will provide a continued commitment to Connexions.

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Breaking news on Robert Green campaigner in Scotland.

17-02-2012 15:41

Robert Green sentenced to 12 months imprisonment today.

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Occupation of Barnado's HQ against child detention

17-02-2012 14:55

Tens of No Borders activists are currently occupying the headquarters of Britain's largest children charity, demanding that it “quits the child detention business”.

The latest protest at Barnardo's offices in Barkingside, Essex, started at 1pm in a bid to force the charity to stop providing its services at a new detention facility near Crawley, Sussex, to hold families facing forcible deportation.

Anti-detention campaigners argue that by agreeing to provide welfare and social care services at this 'family detention centre', named Cedars, Barnardo's is used to legitimise the continued use of detention for children, which the government promised in 2010 to stop doing. [1]

The converted school is officially described as 'pre-departure accommodation', but campaigners argue it has all the characteristics of a detention centre but the name. With a 2.5m perimeter fence and 24-hour security, it is run under the Detention Centre Rules by notorious security company G4S, which runs three other immigration detention centres. [2]

Jo Taylor, one of the activists taking part in the protest, said:

“Barnardo's involvement with Cedars makes its motto, 'Believe in children', sound like a cynical joke. The charity seems to also believe in locking children up. Many of Barnardo's staff and customers will be appalled to know about this involvement, and that's why we're here.”

In July last year, Barnardo's set some 'red lines' for its involvement in the scheme, in what appears to have been a desperate attempt to reassure critics of its controversial decision. [4] The conditions included withdrawing services if more than 10 percent of the families deported in the first year of the trial went through the centre; if any family has stayed at the centre more than once or for longer than the one week maximum; or if disproportionate force is used with a family on route to or from the centre. [3]

Campaigners say many of these conditions have been breached repeatedly. Many families have reported suffering from trauma and being subjected to verbal abuse and physical assaults by the security guards. At least one family is known to have been held at the centre for over one week.

Hours before the protest started, a Kurdish woman with two daughters, aged 2 and 11, was due to be forcibly deported to Turkey, where she would have faced persecution and possible death. [5] The family had been arrested three days before in a dawn raid, described as “horrific”, and transferred to Cedars. Thankfully as a result of campaigns against the deportation the family have been released and are on their way back to Gloucestershire.

The protest coincides with a week-long 'convergence' of No Borders activists from across Europe in London. The event's callout had called upon supporters to “take action against various aspects of the border regime in London and the surrounding areas.” [6]

This is not the first time that Barnardo's has been the target of protest over child detention. Since Cedars was opened, campaigners have picketed and leafleted staff and customers at various Barnardo's charity shops, as well as its headquarters in Barkingside, Essex. [7]

-ends-

For further questions, please contact:

Email: noborderslondon[at-]riseup.net

Tel: 07438 185537

Notes for editors:

[1] In May 2010, the new coalition government 'committed' to ending child detention for immigration purposes as part of a "new, compassionate approach to family removals." However, while families with children due to be forcibly deported are no longer held in normal immigration detention centres, they are instead placed in new secure facilities, euphemistically named 'pre-departure accommodation'. The first such centre to open in late summer was Cedars in Pease Pottage, near Crawley, West Sussex. For more on this and other planned family detention centres, see

http://www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=3881.

[2] Families and children held at Cedars are arrested and administratively detained under the provisions of the 1971 Immigration Act. They are subject to the Control and Restraint Techniques used across the detention estate. Detained children are only allowed out of the facility under strictly controlled circumstances. This clearly amounts to a continued use of the detention of children for immigration purposes. For more on this, see http://london.noborders.org.uk/node/473.

[3] See

http://www.barnardos.org.uk/news_and_events/media_centre/press_releases.htm?ref=70802

[4] See

http://www.barnardos.org.uk/news_and_events/current_news.htm?ref=67322

[5] See http://www.ncadc.org.uk/campaigns/perihan/.

[6] The No Borders Convergence 2012 (13th – 18th February) is a week-long event featuring workshops, meetings and actions against the border regime. The callout and programme can be found at

http://london.noborders.org.uk/convergence2012.

[7] For more details on previous protests against Barnardo's, see

http://london.noborders.org.uk/taxonomy/term/173.

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