Politics
After Budget Tory disability campaigner quits and sabotages party’s website in disgust
By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor A Tory wheelchair user, who has voted Conservative for 40 years, handed in his membership in protest after yesterday’s budget. He claimed the party is “destroying lives.” Graeme Ellis even went so far as to sabotage his own party’s website, in disgust at Osborne’s cruel budget and the damage it will do to disabled people. Ellis a disability campaigner took the entire website of the Conservative disability group with him, in its place he left...
Music legend Bez fined £1,800 over expenses for failed election bid
By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor Probably the most famous dancer in the UK, Happy Mondays member Bez, has be slapped with a £1,800 fine for failing to register his election expenses. Bez, whose real name is Mark Berry, stood for parliament in last May’s general election, with his very own We Are The Reality Party. Maracas-wielding Bez stood for the seat of Salford and Eccles on an anti-fracking ticket. He came way back in sixth place, with a grand total of...
LISTEN – Osborne’s car crash interview why he keeps missing targets
By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor The Chancellor faced some very tough questioning this morning on Radio 4’s Today programme, turning into a car-crash interview, which will be music to the ears of left wingers and probably quite of lot of euro-sceptic MPs in his own party. Osborne was asked why he kept missing his targets on the economy, but he didn’t have an answer. John Humphreys wasn’t in the mood to let him off the hook. Humphreys: My question to...
Farage is starting to sound like Trump
By Harold Stone Nigel Farage dominated Tuesday’s EU referendum debate. Some of us booed him, but that didn’t stop him getting massive applause. “Obama is the most anti-British president America has ever had,” was met with cheers from the audience. “In Brussels,” he continued, “they’re hell-bent on building a European army.” At this point Nick Clegg intervened, raising his voice to be heard over the crowd, “The much bigger danger than this fantasy fear of a European army is Vladimir...
Jeremy Hunt warned NHS now hit ‘crisis point’ with patient safety & care now at risk
By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor The NHS has hit crisis point with safety and patient care now at risk, a damning report will reveal. The report said that hospitals are really struggling because of pressure on them to make “efficiency savings” of £22bn over four years. Added to that spending by acute hospital trusts on agency staff rose 24% between 2012-13 and 2014-15. These extra costs have added a colossal £880million this year taking the total bill to £4bn. The Public...
2016 Budget A ‘Toxic Dose Of Austerity’
The 2016 Budget has been hailed 'a toxic dose of austerity' by Green Party leader Natalie Bennett. Early calculations show that the poorest ten per cent of families see no gain from income tax cuts in the budget but the richest ten per cent get almost £200 a year. Bennett said: "The Chancellor’s repeated claim that the Tories have a long-term economic plan that is delivering a stronger economy is looking more absurd by the day. Let's not forget that this latest...
MPs vote in £1 billion tax credits cut – despite Chancellor’s pledge not to
By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor Conservative MPs voted to slash nearly £1billion from tax credits, even though the Chancellor swore he wouldn’t cut the benefit; that helps millions of hardworking families across the UK. A little-known catch will hit hundreds of thousands of people and was approved in a very brief vote and with no debate. It was a massive U-turn over his attempts to slash tax credits for over 3 million families by £1,300 in a year, however he...
The EU debate pantomime
By Abeer Sharma You would be forgiven for hoping that the upcoming referendum on the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union- the first since 1975- would present a ripe prospect to have a sensible, mature and enlightening debate about how we intend to steer the future direction of our country. Unfortunately (and somewhat depressingly predictably), since David Cameron announced the date of the 23rd June referendum last month, the entire debate is being overshadowed by an onslaught of false statistics,...
PM ‘needed a crib sheet’ to tell him price of milk
By Joe Mellor Deputy Editor David Laws ex-Lib Dem minister has claimed that David Cameron was given a list with the cost of common items of food and the names of hit pop songs; in the event he was asked any normal questions everyone else knows the answer to. The PM was forced to rely on a “crib sheet” to let him know the price of milk and other daily goods, to ensure he didn’t look out of touch with...