ALAN SIMPSON
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Are we the new Number 6? Don’t be under any illusions. This article offers no sanctuary for the advocates of ‘herd immunity’. As an answer to the Covid-19 pandemic, it’s a price too high. A colossal increase in death rates, and overwhelming the NHS, does not even bear thinking about. All the same, the growing…
The government’s educational omnishambles is stealing all the headlines at the moment. It pushes political incompetence to new limits. But behind the debacle lies a bigger crime. Boris Johnson is killing parliamentary democracy faster than the pandemic is killing people. And though Labour is immeasurably more virtuous, the Party struggles to lay a glove on…
Robin Hood Dies: the legend lives on As news hits the press about the imminent demise of Nottingham’s Robin Hood Energy company (RHE), I took a look at the plinth in front of St Mary’s church in the middle of Nottingham. The plinth offers a mythical version of Robin Hood’s demise; slowly being ‘bled’ to…
Tipping or turning: the choice is still ours We are in a bad place; a really bad place. The IMF predicts that the Covid pandemic will shrink the global economy by 5% this year, with a cumulative loss of around $9 trillion. Britain’s Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) records a ‘lockdown’ economic collapse of over…
(Freedom and Democracy) Across the world, sports men and women have been ‘taking the knee’ in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. What troubles me is the prospect of this becoming a trivialised gesture, wrapped up in processes that change nothing. Stripped of specific, disruptive, demands it could slip intothe trough of gesture politics.…
The images of motorway tailbacks, even before Britain’s lockdown period officially loosened, brought two things home to me. The first was that, without clear leadership, crises always take you perilously close to collective insanity. I’m sure none of the families who decided it was a good moment to nip off to the coast (or the…
Transformation Moment
My pamphlet 'Transformation Moment' is intended to support the case for a radical shift in energy thinking; as much about democracy as technology, and about 'systems' rather than just supply.
A sad apology of a plan. Climate stability requires us to cut the regions CO2 emissions by 10% every year, til at least 2030. Circular economics must replace growth obsessions. Expanding airports and new incinerators isn’t the answer. And building a better yesterday’ isn’t vision
I hope we can do better than this!@EMGreenParty @XRDerby @XRNottm we need some real green ideas @AlanSimpson01 https://t.co/DFpuF8Ohdx
Watch. This is one of the most powerful campaign videos I’ve seen.
Can’t see the wood for the trees... 2 years ago Alan Whitehead MP had a book on ‘Local Energy’ ideas blocked by ‘centralisers’ on Corbyn’s corridor. It was revived under Labour’s ‘new leadership’ but remains absent. In the urgent debates about radical CO2 reductions, where is it?
woods
This is the most chilling explanation of what Brexit will do to the UK economy after December.
By @AdamPosen, President of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. #ThisIsWhatYouVotedFor
Dear @Everton
We are due to play @ManUtd soon at Goodison. I am sure I speak on behalf of my fellow blues when I ask , please can we put something on the screens before the game to thank @MarcusRashford for his superb humanitarian work.
Dear MEPs, your vague distant climate targets will have no meaning if you fail to #VoteThisCAPdown and keep supporting the commercial lobby interests.
This is your chance to turn empty words into action. The eyes of future generations are upon you. No more excuses.#FututreOfCAP
Utter genius. Watch and weep with laughter. Then just weep.
As the government knows only too well, in parliament lies are ok, calling them out isn’t.
@wallaceme This is no defence of her, but as an answer to your question she can claim she called him scum because he said something else inaccurate (such as she was speaking for the whole front bench).
Bless all those in the unelected Chamber who believe that government cannot give itself the right to act illegally. If this Bill isn’t stopped or changed, perhaps MPs must look at stopping parliament from functioning at all.
The House of Lords has just voted by huge majority of 226 to indicate its likely rejection of Johnson’s Internal Market Bill provisions for override the Good Friday Agreement & international law
564 peers voted: one of the largest votes in the entire history of the Lords!