Race relations in the UK not getting any easier
Race issues have reared their head in the UK over the past few weeks. Not that these issues aren’t a constant, but it takes a particularly ugly incident to make mainstream commentators sit up and take notice; even the shooting of Mark Duggan may have been swept under the rug, had not London’s youth gone [...]
Police response lacking. Why?
London is burning and the police response has been weak; numerically, tactically and in terms of speed. I’ve been shocked to see shops being looted without a single police officer in sight. Or at times, streets of kids with a single line of just ten or so police, struggling to make any headway and sometimes [...]
Shocked, disappointed but not surprised
Social media has exploded into debate about the Tottenham riots which took place over the weekend. I have been genuinely shocked by the response of the general public, which has blindly echoed the official government and police narrative. Steve Reed of Lambeth Council has described the looting as a ‘Supermarket Sweep’, following up with the [...]
Big Society, Big Problems
David Cameron called the Big Society his “passion” and it is now a cornerstone of the Coalition Government’s legislative programme. This plan to “mend the broken society” and foster local community empowerment –while on the face of it a laudable proposal– has had a life fraught with criticism and setbacks. Ed Miliband quickly accused the Conservatives of [...]
Cameron and Counter-terrorism: Creating a Shared Sense of Identity?
David Cameron’s speech on radicalisation and Islamic terror delivered at the Munich Security Conference outlined the Coalition Government’s standpoint regarding multiculturalism and counter-terrorism strategy. Significantly, only weeks after the Conservative co-chairman Baroness Warsi announced that Islamophobia had become socially acceptable in Britain, Cameron’s attack on multiculturalism appeared to align the Government with the ideology of [...]
Starbucks? I’d rather support local business thanks
The British local business is in decline. As I walk down the high street I see a Starbucks on every corner, a MacDonalds on every block and a Walmart backed supermarket on every other street. I go in, I stand on a conveyor belt of impersonal corporate-training-taught customer service and I collect my cup of [...]
Rich, upper class and elitist…welcome to Whitehall
The secondary school education (age 13 to 18) of David Cameron cost £149,310. The institution he attended was, of course, Eton, known for educating the male children of the rich and powerful, including royalty. With average yearly household incomes at £27,769 and two in five children in London living below the poverty threshold, I ask [...]
