M F

"It is a government and media peddled myth that this bill is about the unemployed. It’s not. This bill will affect millions of employed people as well as millions of disabled adults and children. This bill is not designed to solve the problems of worklessness and benefit dependency as I will explain. this is about money, money for the treasury that none of YOU will see a penny of." - M F

"Properties are being advertised for rent for as much as £100,000 a week over the Olympic period in some well-heeled parts of west London, while tenants closer to the Games sites are finding their rents increasing up to fourfold. One tenant living in east London said a clause had been added to his rental contract last year that said there would be "a minimum increase of 4.0x multiple of the current weekly rent during the Olympics and 2.0x multiple of current weekly rent during the Paralympics"." - M F

They told us we were all going to become rich with the Olympics. - M F

That was predicted 2 years ago already... I'm actually surprised there are actually not too many occurences, all in all. - Iphigenie

I don't expect to come anywhere near London during the Olympics if I can avoid it - unless I somehow manage to become a VIP in between - Iphigenie

"Advice agencies – which provide a lifeline to people in debt, or facing problems with their benefits or housing – are under financial pressure as never before. Demand for services is increasing, at a time when impending changes to legal aid threaten to remove funding for large swathes of social welfare law, and when many providers are also facing cuts in local authority grants. The demand for social welfare law advice is especially acute in London, with its greater levels of poverty (28%, compared with 22% elsewhere in England), higher levels of debt, large numbers of people in temporary accommodation, and substantial migrant population." - M F

At the same time posh restaurants and hotels have never had it so good. - M F

I'm not even sure where the local CAB offices are any more, they have all shut down and they mostly deal with immigration/benefits these days. I used to use it as a teenager after leaving school to help me choose which college was best suited for me. I'm sure if a teenager went there now with a similar request, they'd say go somewhere else. - Halil

"The high street book store Waterstones has pulled out of a government scheme that employed unpaid jobseekers in its stores after a Guardian investigation uncovered the practice at one of its outlets. More than a dozen other high street chains have been taking on unemployed workers for weeks without pay as part of the government's Work Experience scheme and others like it. In a case lodged in the high court, the government has defended itself against claims that the unpaid work experience schemes are contrary to Human Rights Act legislation on forced labour." - M F

Unbelievable! - Spidra Webster

The bit that really got me when I read earlier articles about this is that the placements/scheme are outsourced to be run by external agencies, and as a result statistics and infomation dont fall under the freedom of information. A side effect of the "big society" and public-private schemes that nobody really noticed early on - Iphigenie

Exactly, the Big Opaque Society - M F

In 1775 he wrote: "I am not offended with the Tories, they act according to their nature; the prostitute Whigs offend me more". Sounds strangely familiar. - M F

"How do you help solve unemployment in a city such as Hull, where for a time late last year there were 58 jobseekers for each post, the highest number of applicants chasing every vacancy in the country? The government's solution is the work programme, which David Cameron launched last summer, promising it would be "the biggest, boldest effort to get people off benefits and into work that this country has ever seen". With unemployment at a 17-year high, the pressure for it to succeed could not be greater." - M F

"Exuding kindness and energy, Amanda Knox-Holmes has meetings all day with clients from her 100-plus caseload. First she encourages Mary, 40, a vulnerable, troubled single mum with children in their late teens, to accept an unpaid, 12-week stint of work experience at a care home, as a possible first step towards getting a paid job with them. "You'd get 12 weeks' experience. You will serve food to the old people, you'll do a bit of cleaning, help do activities with the old people. This is an opportunity to gain social care experience," she says. Mary says she has personal experience of caring for old people, and is initially uncertain. "I could get a job out of it?" she asks. "Yes, if you pull the stops out, they will be taking people on," Amanda tells her, and she agrees to sign up." - M F

"A University of Oxford professor has awarded her annual prize for “journalistic misrepresentation” to an outrageously inaccurate and scaremongering story published by the Daily Mail in 2011." - M F

I am shocked that the Mail won this prize. - Eivind

I am shocked too Eivind, my favourite paper, such a reliable source of truth, I bet this professor is a migrant worker who came here to claim benefits, who must have surely worked, paid with our tax money, for that extreme left wing organisation called the BBC, I blame the EU and political correctness gone mad. Or something like that. - M F

"The most generous interpretation of Luke MacKenzie’s comment yesterday about the UK Uncut protest is that “unwashed” is his favoured term of abuse and dismissal for protesters generally rather than disabled protesters specifically, but this is ultimately a pedantic distinction. Whether he was abusing disabled people for being disabled or simply abusing protesters – many of whom are disabled – for objecting to being made worse off, the general sentiment is the same: kicking people when they’re down. This would be nasty enough behaviour from anyone but it’s particularly arrogant coming from an elected representative of the party leading the government that’s making the cuts. Disabled people getting even poorer? Diddums. Suck it up, losers." - M F

Exactly. I was not too impressed with Diane Abbott although I feel that Twitter was not the perfect medium for what she wanted to say, whether I agree with that or not. But this guy's tweet cannot be misinterpreted I think he meant what he wrote. - M F

"Thus the memorable political conflict of this week was not over that contraction in GDP, which should have registered as devastating proof that the government's economic strategy is not working. It was over plans to cap benefits at £26,000. The timing may have been a function of the House of Lords' timetable, but the strategy of the cap itself is clear. Rather than training its guns on the masters of high finance who caused the crash and had to be bailed out with billions in taxpayers' cash – the scroungers at the top – the government is channelling our rage towards those on benefits, the "scroungers" at the bottom. If it hadn't been for Stephen Hester and that pesky £1m bonus, it would have been a great success." - M F

"Take your pick. UK conservation is in crisis, or it has never been in ruder health. Believe the government and English and Welsh rivers are the cleanest they have been in a century, fish are returning, protected areas are in fantastic condition and the air is clean. Yet for others, the ecological health of the nation is worsening by the day as resources to protect nature and people are slashed, the forestry estate and national nature reserves are put up for sale and thousands of people who have spent lifetimes battling to protect Britain's most beautiful places and wildlife face redundancy." - M F

"Liverpool's world heritage site waterfront will be "irreversibly damaged" unless urgent modifications are made to a multibillion-pound skyscraper scheme, a delegation from Unesco has warned." - M F

such an amazing waterfront :( - Iphigenie

"Twitter is much more than a social network and has no time to waste worrying about newcomers like Google+ as it becomes more important as an information service and builds its advertising business, co-founder Jack Dorsey said on Sunday." - M F

I've never really used Twitter as a social network but as a source of information is still the best in my opinion - M F

I hardly ever use twitter, and it's never a primary source of info. - Halil

"When low supermarket wages are supplemented by state benefits, it allows obscene profits to be made at taxpayers' expense" - M F

I've been saying this for years, yet it is not discussed very often, too busy blaming the single mother on the dole or the person with depression on benefits - M F

because they are easy scapegoats/targets, it'a always easy to blame the weak who are unable to defend themselves...and people like DM readers lap it up like cats do with cream! (i could use another analogy, but don't want to turn peoples stomachs) - Halil

"But the problem with SOPA and a similar bill in the Senate—“PIPA”—isn’t that it is an effort to combat online piracy. The problem is that the effort as pursued endangers a broad range of human rights enjoyment by making it harder to share and access information and speech. It would create a powerful and unprecedented market incentive to censor user generated content. And their passage would signal very clearly to countries around the world that it is OK to sacrifice some rights in the name of some other good." - M F

+++ - درویش پارسی

#SOPA - درویش پارسی

"submitted by reddit to blog." - M F

"When Chancellor George Osborne announced the biggest public spending cuts in decades in December 2010, he declared: "It is a hard road, but it leads to a better future." Thirteen months on and the effects on local authorities across the country have been keenly felt, with councils having to make difficult choices in all areas of service provision. A perhaps unexpected flashpoint for council taxpayers and local authorities has been over library services." - M F

In a downturn when people cannot afford much and income is squeezed, then anything that makes worthy activities available free are crucial. Libraries are one of them, so are parks, public footpaths, free museums etc. Else adults and children are left with TV... - Iphigenie

"Two years after Haiti was devastated by a magnitude 7 earthquake, international aid donors have delivered only about half of the billions of dollars promised for reconstruction, according to UN data. Just $2.38bn (£1.5bn) – 53% – of the $4.5bn pledged for recovery programmes in 2010-11 has been delivered, figures from the UN special envoy for Haiti show." - M F

"Slicing through the air above the dank and dripping Victorian tunnels by London Bridge is a new symbol of extraordinary confidence. The glinting Shard of Glass has become the tallest building in Europe, rising higher than Canary Wharf's main tower, Frankfurt's Commerzbank and the Ostankino television tower in Moscow." - M F

I can see it everywhere i go :( - Halil

"I have to ask myself why no one seems to give a crap about the Welfare Reform Bill when it so could easily affect anyone at any point in the future. If you get ill in any shape or form you will have your sick benefit limited to 12 months, that is of course if you are actually classified as sick enough to get it. At the end of that 12 months you will be entitled to means tested benefits. Now this sounds very reasonable until you discover that if your partner or parents, whoever is looking after you, earn more that £7,500 you won't get benefits." - M F

It is only 25 minutes, it is well worth watching - M F

dispatches? yeah it is, ty, bookmarked for later - Halil

you know nothing new, some dodgy people make money out of other people's misery - M F

"As the parent of a defenceless daughter with profound disabilities, such stories disturb me. They should disturb us all. So what lies behind this harsh new mood towards the disabled? Unfortunately, much blame rests on the shoulders of the media and certain parts of government. There has been a new dialogue over disability, characterised by the constant drip-drip of stories implying vast numbers of disability claimants are bogus, that benefits are doled out without proper checks and taxpayers fund free cars for thousands of children with minor behavioural disorders." - M F

"The ownership of the Knightsbridge apartments, which range in price from £3.6m for a one-bedroom flat to £136m for a penthouse, is now under investigation by Westminster city council, which is determined to pursue the monies owed by the secretive owners of the apartments. Council records show that only four owners are paying the full council tax of £755.60 a year plus £619.64 to the Greater London Authority, while five are paying the 50% discounted council tax owed on a second home." - M F

I was really surprised when I read this. It struck me councils need to be given much greater powers to request information and compel others to pay - Winckel

"Enough intro! Onto the winners! The award is shared by two stories this month, both from the Mail. We have 'Truth about Tory catfight: Judge DID rule migrant's pet was a reason he shouldn't be deported' by Nick Fagge (no stranger to this blog) and Jason Groves, and 'Failed asylum seeker who has dodged deportation for a decade told he can stay... because he goes to the GYM', by Sarah Bruce." - M F

A good live webcam here for nature lovers - M F

"Independent labels are understandably up in arms over the Universal/Sony takeover of EMI, with their international organisation Impala registering a formal complaint with the European Commission and pledging to fight the merger to the bitter end. After all, the purchase would hand Universal more than 40% of the market and with it the power to dictate the terms of any deal with a new digital music platform. Personally, I would have preferred Warner to buy EMI, as that would reduce the major labels to three, and those three would have a similar share of the recorded music market. (Ironically, Impala successfully fought a Warner/EMI merger years ago.)" - M F

:( - Son of Groucho

There seems to be a lot of :( these days or is it me? - M F

"Dr Starkey made the argument that the national curriculum should consist of "a serious focus on your own culture" echoing Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove's recent announcement that he aimed to put "our island story" at the heart of Britain's national curriculum." - M F

It's very fashionable to bash multiculturalism but I think tolerance of diversity and difference is one of the most valuable things. Putting everyone into one narrow mold of what is culturally acceptable is what got me to leave Switzerland in the first place. History, especially, benefits hugely from a wide scope - something he clearly doesn't have. - Iphigenie

Google+ Ripples [plus.google.com] is the first data visualization project from the elusive Big Picture Group, organized around (previous IBM Visual Communication Lab pioneers) Fernanda Viegas and Martin Wattenberg. It is a working demonstration how aesthetics and functionality can still be effectively be merged. The 'Ripple Diagram' shows how a post spreads as people (publicly) share it using the Google+ service, with arrows indicating the direction of the sharing. A timeline at the bottom of the diagram allow the ripple to animate, revealing how this post was shared over time. People who have reshared the post are displayed with their own circle. Inside the circle are people who have reshared the post from that person (and so on). All circles are roughly sized based on the relative influence of that person. The diagram can be created based on any public post in one's stream, by clicking the dropdown arrow at the top of the post and selecting "View Ripple". Using the metaphor of... - M F

When Pierre-Laurent Aimard gives the first of two piano recitals at the Southbank Centre, the hall will be packed, and not just because of his keyboard wizardry. At 54, he still has that aura of a miraculous child who has mesmerised a string of great composers. Olivier Messiaen spotted him as a precocious student at the Paris Conservatoire when he was 12, and made him his adoptive son; when he was 19, Pierre Boulez invited him to co-found his celebrated Ensemble Intercontemporain; Gyorgy Ligeti made him the test pilot for his horrendously difficult études; Elliott Carter, centenarian doyen of American composers, is still writing for him today. But Aimard is always up to tricks, whether clowning around with Alfred Brendel (another admirer), or inserting outlandish bits of modernism in Bach performances, or sharing the stage with a bunch of Pygmy drummers to prove that the European avant-garde has no monopoly on complex metrical sophistication. It sounds like a joke that one of the... - M F