UK Indymedia - Manchester indymedia

Forced labour for Jobseekers

08-03-2010 13:21

Despite high levels of unemployment due to the recession jobseekers in Greater Manchester will be forced to work up to 40 hours a week as part of the Work for Your Benefits (WfYB) pilot scheme. The region is set to be the trialling ground for a government initiative that will see unemployed people put into mandatory work placements for up to six months just to hold on to their Jobseeker’s Allowance. Read more | 1 comment >>

Hasty Lane Adopt-a-Resident Launch- Manchester - Sun 7th Feb 2010

10-01-2010 16:48

On Sunday 7th February 2010, Hasty Lane tenants threatened by the expansion of Manchester Airport will be teaming up with climate justice campaigners in the public launch of the Adopt-a-Resident scheme. Like at Heathrow, the scheme aims to build solidarity and campaigning links and to send out a message that if the bulldozers come, they will have to deal with people from across Manchester standing together to protect people's homes and to protect the clmate. Read more | 3 comments >>

Still working for a Nuclear Free City?

15-12-2009 14:47

The University of Manchester’s Dalton Institute is to receive over £8 million of investment from the Government to support the civil nuclear industry, in a deal announced this week by Business Secretary Lord Mandelson as part of the government’s plans to create a low carbon economic area in the Northwest. Yet the development will jeopardise Manchester’s status as a nuclear free city.

This latest move by the government aims to boost technical expertise in nuclear power generation while at the same time securing more environmentally sustainable sources of energy. The region already boasts a strong presence in the nuclear sector, employing more than 25,000 skilled professionals in 300 companies across the region, with a reported combined turnover of approximately £3 billion. Read more | 5 comments >>

Northern Indymedia Launches

01-08-2009 00:06

August 1st 2009 sees the official launch of Northern Indymedia by the alt-media monkeys of IMC Northern England. Having revived the dormant IMC Leeds/Bradford and merged with IMC York, the collective is officially launching their new site as a news resource for all those seeking a better world in the grim north and beyond. 9 Months of hard work are culminating in the public unveiling of the new site at Hyde Park Unity Day in Leeds, where there will be a solar powered "Be the Media" centre provided by the collective. The pitch will also include members of the Climate Camp Yorkshire neighbourhood who are helping to launch "The Great Climate Swoop" on the same day. Full coverage of all the goings on will be put up on the new site:

http://northern-indymedia.org

Abolish All Immigration Prisons

17-03-2009 21:17

Last Friday evening, two dozen activists entered the offices of Minister for Immigration and Borders Phil Woolas in Oldham, ‘detaining’ him for about 30 minutes. The campaigners included members of No Borders Manchester, No One Is Illegal and the Anarchist Federation . The action intended to mirror the government’s practice of detaining migrants in ‘immigration removal centres’ without trial or sentencing, for indefinite periods of time. This was the second time since his appointment last year that the immigration minister has become the target of an action by No Borders, after a member of the group pushed a custard pie in his face last October .

On Tuesday morning, 20 anti-deportation campaigners blocked access to the Tinsley House immigration detention centre near Gatwick airport. Activists used d-locks and superglue to blockade the entrance gate for several hours. The action aimed to prevent the forced deportation on a charter flight of approximately 50 Iraqi refugees from the UK.

Groups affiliated to the UK No Borders network are now calling for demonstrations against immigration detention on Saturday 21st March. A protest march will lead from Bedford to the Yarl’s Wood detention centre, which was half destroyed by fire in 2002, following an uprising ignited by the ill-treatment of a sick woman by guards. Transport is available from London. Solidarity demonstrations are planned in Manchester and Edinburgh. The demonstration in Manchester will be going to the newly-expanded ‘Pennine House’ detention facility at the airport. The campaign to close this prison has achieved a high profile recently after the invasion of Phil Woolas’s offices and an intervention during a speech by Manchester City Council leader Richard Leese. In Edinburgh, campaigners will picket the private security company G4S. G4S profits from running immigration prisons in the UK, including Brook House, Dungavel near Glasgow and Pennine House.

Links: Tinsley House blockade | Photos 1 | Phil Woolas Detention | Custard Pie

Over a dozen university occupations for Palestine

22-01-2009 13:00

Students across the country are holding occupations and sit ins in solidarity with Gaza. SOAS shut down a MOD exhibition on their campus whilst students at LSE declared victory after seven days when the university agreed to all of their demands.

They are followed by others at King's College,Essex, Warwick, Sussex , Birmingham and over 80 Oxford University students have occupied the historic Bodleian building to demand that the university releases a statement condemning the attack on Gaza and cancel the lecture series at Balliol College inaugurated by Israeli war criminal Shimon Peres. There are also early reports of occupations at Manchester Met, Newcastle, Leeds, Cambridge [Pics], Bradford, Queen Mary, Sheffield Hallam, Nottingham, Strathclyde and Manchester universities. Update Wed 28th: The occupations have started to bring in results as both Sussex and Bradfod students have declared "victory" [See Sussex and Bradford declarations] On the other hand, the Cambridge University occupation is under threat of eviction [more] Update Sun 1st Feb: Nottingham occupation violently evicted [more | video] Update 11th Feb: Golsmiths University and the University of East Anglia are occupied.

In Yorkshire, students have occupied a building at Leeds University whilst the Bradford AGM voted to give the university the weekend to comply with demands to support the Palestinians, or expect action on Monday. On Tuesday morning, around 80 students occupied the university boardroom. The students say they "are enraged and horrified by the unspeakable atrocities that have been committed by the Israeli military on the people of Palestine, and ... will not tolerate the complicity of ... institutions of education in this violence."

Regional features: Cambridge | Nottingham | Sheffield

Northern Climate Rush

13-01-2009 13:59

On Monday 12th Jan 2009 between 1830 and 2100, free expression occurred
at terminal three of Manchester International Airport. A protest was held by Climate Rush in a designated zone away from all passengers and prying eyes with a cordon for the press and some police horses.

Approximately one hundred protesters descended decorously to make their
views on airport expansion known. Edwardian dress was the order of the day,and we didn't disappoint. Top hats and tails, corsets, shawls and a street urchin all made an appearance. Read more >>

Resistance escalates with Airport 'Green' Light

12-01-2009 13:13

Both Heathrow and Manchester airports were targeted Monday with the domestic departure lounges of both airports simultaneously occupied by protesters. In London over 500 people defied airport bylaws by staging a sit-down dinner forcing airport operator BAA to close 18 check-in desks. In Manchester police used powers under Section 14 of the Public Order Act to contain up to 100 protesters on the ground floor of Terminal 3 and there was one arrest.

The Climate Rush actions were timed to coincide with MPs return to the house of commons with the government expected to announce the decision on the Heathrows airport expansion during week. Meanwhile, Greenpeace revealed that a plot of land within the proposed expansion site had been purchased in an attempt to delay the construction.

Despite media speculation that the announcement would be delayed, by Wednesday nght the media were reporting that the expanision plans have been given the green light. After the official announcement on Thursday, 'climate suffragettes' smashed the windows of the Department of Transport and on Saturday 500 flash mobbed at Heathrows terminal 5.

MEDIA CITY – DREAM LAND UK ?

13-12-2008 20:43

A recently released academic paper questions the very basis of Media City and the BBC move as a tool for creating jobs and equality in the community and sorting out Salford’s economic problems. Its author, Brett Christopher, is well out of the way of any vested interests, based at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. Basically, he argues that the benefits cited for the Peel Holdings led project “appears to be an article of faith” which get repeated by its champions and somehow gains credibility.

He writes that “we can perhaps think of the project as a form of `corporate gentrification’…whereby `real estate development becomes a centrepiece of the city’s productive economy, an end in itself’…” Or in plain English, that Media City is more about building loads of luxury apartments, expensive commercial spaces and places for “elite consumption practices” than anything else. Read full article at the Salford Star website.

Oil-money magnates buy up Man City football club

01-12-2008 18:31

Manchester City are joining the Premier League big spenders as their new owners splash the cash in an effort to bring the good times to the Eastlands. They still have along way to go, as Sunday's 1-0 defeat at home to Manchester United proves, but just where has their new found wealth come from? Sarah Irving investigates...

Forced labour for Jobseekers

Hasty Lane Adopt-a-Resident Launch- Manchester - Sun 7th Feb 2010

Still working for a Nuclear Free City?

Northern Indymedia Launches

Abolish All Immigration Prisons

Over a dozen university occupations for Palestine

Northern Climate Rush

Resistance escalates with Airport 'Green' Light

MEDIA CITY – DREAM LAND UK ?

Oil-money magnates buy up Man City football club

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