Benefits For Older People Under Attack!

Hard-hitting report demands end to winter fuel payments, free TV licences and bus passes » Government should abandon triple-lock that guarantees pension increases, says Lords committee » Age UK agrees more should be done to help young people – 

Lords committee report says it is time to cut back dramatically on free bus passes and winter fuel payments for elderly people.

A call for pensioners’ benefits – including free TV licences, bus passes and winter fuel payments – to be scrapped or scaled back has been made by a parliamentary committee.

Ministers have been urged to tilt the balance between the generations back towards younger groups because the spending power of retired people has now overtaken many workers in their twenties and thirties.

Help should be stepped up for younger people in the jobs and housing markets, the Lords Committee on Inter-generational Fairness and Provision also argued in a report published today. The peers said that age-based benefits and allowances had been justified to tackle pensioner poverty, but that the time had come to cut them back dramatically.

They said the free TV licences for all over-75s should be phased out, with the Government left to decide whether to subsidise them against a broader measure of household income. Free bus passes and winter fuel payments – currently £200 for under-80s and £300 for over-80s – should become available five years after a claimant reaches pension age, they added.

Their report called for an end to the so-called “triple lock”, which guarantees the state pension rises by the highest of inflation, wage growth or 2.5 per cent. It should be replaced with annual increases to pensions in line with average earnings, the peers argued, while better-off workers over pension age should continue to make national insurance contributions if they are still working.

The committee chairman, Lord True, said benefits needed to be re-balanced towards the young to prepare the country for 100-year lifespans.

“We are calling for some of the outdated benefits based purely on age to be removed,” he said. 

“Policies such as the state pension triple lock and free TV licences for over-75s were justified when pensioner households were at the bottom of the income scale, but that is no longer the case.”

Ministers were condemned in the peers’ report for doing too little to ease the shortage of affordable homes for young people to buy and rent.

The Government was urged to give councils greater freedom to build homes and to tailor policies to meet the housing needs of younger adults.

Peers also argued that ministers should boost funding for further educational and vocational training.

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• i Newspaper
• 25 Apr 2019
• By Nigel Morris POLITICAL EDITOR

Austerity Kills! Deaths of elderly was 'Gerineglicide' says former NHS consultant..

A number of studies that have been carried out in recent years have revealed how mortality figures (the death rate), which had been dropping steadily in England since the 1970s, have been reversed since 2011.  The studies have also claimed that the reversal in the downward trend in the death rate, is linked to government austerity policies and cuts in public expenditure.

In February 2016, the Daily Telegraph disclosed that preliminary data from the Office of National Statistics (ONS), had shown that in just one year (2015), there was a 5.4% increase in deaths in England - equating to almost 30,000 extra deaths.  This represented the largest increase in deaths in the post-war period. Public Health England maintained that the 30,000 excess deaths were "not exceptional" and they claimed that the increase in deaths, was due to the influenza strain in 2015 that mainly affected older people.

This excuse of cold weather and a flu epidemic for the spike in the mortality rate in January 2015, was rejected by the authors of a report that was published in the journal of the Royal Society of Medicine in February 2017.  The researchers - Professor Martin McKee, Professor Danny Dorling, Dr Lucinda Hiam and Dominic Harrison, tested four possible explanations for the 30,000 excess deaths in 2015.  Data errors, cold weather and the flue epidemic, were all excluded. What they discovered was clear evidence of health system failures.  Almost all targets were missed - ambulance call out times and A&E waiting times. Staff absence rates rose and medical posts remained unfilled.  Significantly, many of the excess deaths were among the elderly population, those aged over 65-years-old. Professor McKee said:

"The impact of cuts resulting from the imposition of austerity on the NHS has been profound. Expenditure has failed to keep pace with demand and the situation has been exacerbated by dramatic reductions in the welfare budget of £16.7 billion and in social care spending." 

Another author of the report, Professor Danny Dorling of Oxford University and an advisor to Public Health England, said:

"I suspect that largest factor here is cuts to social services - to meals on wheels, to visits to the elderly.  We have seen these changes during a period when the health service is in crisis, while social care services have been cut back."

There is growing opinion and evidence that it's the elderly who are bearing the brunt of the cuts to NHS funding and social care.  Thousands of complaints have been made about care for the elderly in England. In 2013-14, some 14,888 complaints about care home residents aged 65 and over, were reported to 74 councils.  In February 2015, Claire Savage on BBC5 Live, reported that in West Sussex, 19 people died after suffering "sub-optimal care" at the Orchid View care home in Copthorne.  The Department of Health, called the abuse and neglect of vulnerable people "deplorable."  The neglect of elderly people often results in care home residents being rushed to hospital as emergency admissions.  In 2014-15, some 22,682 care home residents were rushed to hospital as emergency cases.  This was up from 13,906 in 2010-11, an increase of 63%.

Milton Pena, worked in the N.H.S. for forty years before retiring in October 2014.  He was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon for 24 years and spent 17 years working at Tameside Hospital.  He believes that the most common terminal event that caused the increase in deaths among the elderly population in 2015-2016, was institutional "Neglect!" Indeed, he argues that what was a blip in 2015 - the spike in the mortality rate - has now become a disturbing trend.  He said:  "The question is not why any particular individual died, but why, after many years of declining mortality, the death rate should increase so much." 

In an interview with Northern Voices (NV) he cited Professor Marion McMurdo, who in a letter to the British Medical Journal (B.M.J), stated that the N.H.S must adapt to ensure that it meets the needs of the population. In the letter, she stated: 

"There is a mindset among hospital Directors, Business Managers and some health professionals that frail elderly patients are 'not our core business'.  Few national providers would make such a blatantly ageist inference that its 'core business' was too tricky to manage, and propose to solve the problem be ceasing to attempt to deal with it."

According to Milton Pena, what is taking place is neither Euthanasia or Genocide, but what he calls "Gerineglicide", the killing of thousands of elderly and vulnerable human beings due to lack of resources from government, systemic failures, and institutional neglect.  He told NV:

"Gerineglicide is many things: poverty, misguided policies and directives e.g. the avoidance of hospital admissions, abysmal lack of bed capacity for the admission of patients with acute severe life-threatening conditions such as pneumonia etc.  Similarly, insufficient staff - nurses, midwives, radiographers, doctors or lack of resources to care for people in their homes.  Keeping elderly individuals with multiple ailments alive, does not make business sense to the mandarins that run health care 'planning and execution' in England. Prolonging the lives of the elderly is not profitable."

Back in 2017, when the Royal Society of Medicine published the paper "Why has mortality in England and Wales been increasing?", only one member of Parliament raised a question in the House of Commons:

"The Minister will be aware that mortality rates in England and Wales have increased by 5.4% in 2015, the biggest increase in the death rate for decades. She will also be aware that mortality rates have been rising since 2011. Has she done any analysis of what has been behind those trends?"

Milton Pena also says  that there has been a deafening silence from most of the professional bodies regarding the excess mortality that spiked in 2015.

After the financial crisis  of 2008, annual funding increases for the NHS fell from 4% a year to below inflation, even as a growing and ageing population increased demand for healthcare.  In November 2017, the New Scientist magazine referred to a 'landmark study' by Jonathan Watkins and colleagues of King's College London that found that after controlling for other economic changes, death rates rose after the cuts, especially among the over 65s.  The team also found that 120,000 more people died in England between 2010-2017, following funding cuts to the N.H.S. than would have been expected if trends in death rates before the cuts had been maintained.  The researchers also said that if this effect continues, a further 75,000 excess deaths could occur by 2020.

Comment on Austerity!

  from Clive Jones

Austerity (definition):  A situation in which there is not much money and it is spent only on things that are necessary.

It is not sustainable and leads to a Catch22 situation if a sustained practice of austerity is attempted. 

i.e. if sustained cuts in policing are attempted, the control of crime is compromised and crime rises, societies' costs rise, quality of life falls and public apathy and intolerence rise.  Resulting in changed political views which affect voting results locally and nationally. In a nutshell society is poorer which is resented.

This dilemma cascades across all public services, NHS, local government, all public and private services.

Government then tends to become more remote by slowing democratic processes by using political instruments and parliamentary acts, to move partial or complete responsibility and introduce more cost or delay public access.

So much energy and economic growth is wasted in this process it damages the economic outlook and public enthusiasm for the real need which is economic growth and social progress. 

This is of course caused by people in authority not being team players at all or having anything but self-worth as their prime consideration or target.  Also having too much reliance on spin doctors to provide scripts for things not necessarily understood but make the right noises or sound bites.

A skill check across the House of Commons might indeed be revealing.

Regards,

Clive

Hyde councillor calls for a volunteer army of unpaid workers!

Rising Star - "SEO Andy" Kinsey

By Steve (Starlord) Fisher

The Town Council roadshow in Tameside is currently being rolled out across the Borough with gusto. I recently wrote on the NV blog about the first Town Council meeting which I attended at the Stalybridge Civic Hall on Wednesday 15 February. Last Monday, I ventured into Hyde to attend the first of their Town Council meetings at the Grafton Centre.

This was a much smaller meeting than Stalybridge, with around forty people attending including councillors. It was also far more tightly controlled by Labour councillor, "SEO Andy" Kinsey, (a search engine optimizer), with a special interest in community groups, who chaired and set the tone of the meeting. Unlike the Stalybridge Town Council meeting, there was little that was spontaneous about it, being far more directed and controlled, with a largely passive audience. Much of the meeting was focused on a power-point presentation by Andy Kinsey, called "Community Groups Together." Before beginning his presentation, Andy insisted on laying down some basic grounds rules. We were told that this was not a District Assembly or a councillors surgery.

Andy told me later, when we went into group session with an unidentified councillor on each table, that each Town council was different, and this was the way, they were going to things in Hyde. This was Andy's response when I drew a comparison with the Stalybridge meeting, which was far more involved and democratic in my view. However, councillor Helen Bowden (Hyde Newton), told me that she felt the Stalybridge meeting had been taken over by a few disgruntled individuals.

Although the lead Third Sector (voluntary, community and faith) organisation, 'Action Together', had been billed as attending the meeting, they sent their apologies. Andy's presentation was focused on how community groups, social enterprises and non-profit organisations, could all come together to work unpaid for the betterment of the community, undertaking jobs previously done by council employees. On our tables, we were told to make a list of all our skills and talents which we use in our community groups. This we were told, was necessary to build up a "Skills Database", that would be put on Facebook and called "Doing More Together - Skillshare Hyde."

To me, it seems that the whole object of Town Councils is to pretend that the public are actually invloved in decision making when there is no real autonomy or communities being in control. I very much suspect that this is really a mask to disguise the real intention of co-opting volunteers and community groups to do council work for free. As the Labour leader of Manchester City Council, Sir Richard Leese, said last November, it was the job of the voluntary sector to now "fill-in-the-holes" left by public sector cuts. How about voluntary councillors?

Trade Unionist Disciplined: Alec McFadden case

Below is a campaign statement that has been sent to Northern Voices
by the Campaign to defend Alec McFadden.  Though we have made some
investigations about this problem, Northern Voices does not have enough
information to justify us taking sides at this stage.  In the light of this it has
been decided to publish the statement below in full without comment, which
was sent to us by Liz Epps on behalf of the campaign to defend Alec McFadden.

ALEC McFadden, a stalwart of the trade union movement for over 50 years, has been the victim of a miscarriage of justice which is having terrible repercussions. He needs your support. Alec is known and respected throughout the country for his work as a union organiser, and for his role since 1996 in running the Salford Unemployed and Community Resource Centre which has provided help and assistance to thousands of people. He is a committed campaigner against sexism, racism, fascism and opposition to benefits sanctions. He suffered a serious facial wound when a fascist attacked him with a knife at his home on the Wirral.

Alec organised a very successful Anti- Austerity March in October 2015. At the end of the protest, on 3rd October 2015, the marchers had a meal at Smith’s restaurant in Eccles, Salford where Alec was the compere for the evening with a number of speakers including Rebecca Long Bailey MP for Salford, Steve North Unison branch secretary and the then Mayor of Salford Ian Stewart. Also present were other local councillors and the press.  Five weeks later Alec was informed by Unite (13 November) that it ‘had received a formal complaint from one of our members about your actions during the March against Austerity from Thursday 1st October to Sunday 4th October.’ It was alleged he had breached Unite’s Dignity and Harassment Policy. No further details were divulged. Two weeks later Alec had received a further letter from Unite (25 November) which told him no more than the identity of the complainant and that she had made a complaint which ‘relates to alleged incidents which took place between 1st and 4th October 2015 towards another Unite member’.

Investigation

Unknown to Alec, witness statements were made by the complainant and two supportive witnesses.  On 6 January 2016he complainant and one witness were interviewed by a Unite Investigation panel on 6 January 2016, again without the knowledge of Alec. So Alec had no opportunity to challenge them, nor was the panel able to put any response from Alec to the witnesses, since the panel had not disclosed the witness statements or even the nature of the allegation to Alec.  It had certainly not asked him for his side of the story.

Alec was then called to attend before the Investigation Panel on 22nd January.  By then all Alec knew was what was in the two letters he had received. He had no idea what was alleged against him.  The Investigation Panel chose not to share with him the statements it had obtained from the complainant and her witness or the notes made of their interviews by the panel. So Alec had no idea of the case against him and no chance to prepare a defence.   When the interview with Alec commenced he was still in complete ignorance of the date, time, place and nature of the alleged ‘incidents’.  It was not until half way through the interview that he was shocked to be told that he was alleged to have slapped the complainant on the bottom at the dinner in the middle of the restaurant.  He was not told that the complainant’s witness had added ‘the lights were quite bright and we were very visible to our fellow marchers and other guests’.  Alec denied the allegation.  The panel asked no further questions about it.  Neither the complainant nor her witnesses were present when Alec was interviewed, and since he had not been provided with their witness statements or notes of the interview, he had no opportunity to point out inconsistencies or contradictions in their evidence.  Nevertheless, the investigation panel found that there was a case for him to answer.

Disciplinary

Next Alec was called to a formal Unite disciplinary hearing on 15th April 2016. Before hearing Alec’s defence or his witnesses, he was startled to be told by the Chair of the Disciplinary Panel: ‘From what has been presented to us, in all probability, some misconduct has taken place.’ This conclusion was based on solely on their reading of the report of the Investigation Panel.

The Disciplinary Panel refused a request that the complainant and her witnesses should attend and give evidence to the Panel because it would be ‘inappropriate.’ So Alec and his representative were denied the chance to question them, put his case to them or explore the serious inconsistencies in their account of the alleged incident. Likewise, the Panel denied itself the opportunity to hear the complainant and her witness in person so as to weigh up the credibility of their account. Even Alec’s offer that the complainant be questioned without Alec being present was refused.

Perhaps, not surprisingly, the Disciplinary Panel reached the same conclusion at the end of the hearing that it had before the case began: ‘that in all probability, Mr McFadden did commit the offence of slapping [the complainant] on the bottom.’ The conclusion was expressed to be based solely on the evidence of the Complainant’s witness, since it said that to disbelieve her statement ‘would be tantamount to an accusation of lying.’ How the Panel could determine whether she was lying or not without hearing and seeing her give her evidence and being questioned about it was not explained. Nor was it explained on what basis the Panel were able to disregard the evidence of Alec and his witnesses (that they had neither seen anything untoward nor heard anyone speak of such a thing during the course of a long evening during which both Alec and the Complainant were present, at one stage sitting next to each other.) The Disciplinary Panel decided that Alec must be banned from office in Unite and attend Unite’s Dignity and Respect Training Course.

Appeal

Alec appealed to an Appeal Panel of Unite’s EC. Again Alec’s rep asked that the complainant and her witness attend, give their evidence orally and be subject to questions from him and the Panel. He emphasised that inconsistent and contradictory evidence of the Complainant and her witnesses should be subject to at least some questioning and scrutiny as no such questioning or scrutiny had occurred at the Investigation or Disciplinary stages. This request was dismissed out of hand and the Panel refused to hear for themselves the evidence against Alec or allow it to be questioned.

Alec provided the panel with even more witness statements of those present in the restaurant including the MP and even the Restaurant manager and staff, all of whom clearly stated they saw or heard nothing of the alleged incident which according to the complainant took place in view of everyone.

Particularly significant was that Alec’s rep also sought to introduce the evidence of a Mr S who had, in August 2016, been told by the complainant that she had not been assaulted by Alec and that she had been pressurised into making the complaint.  The Appeal Panel refused to entertain this evidence on the ground that ‘it was an unsubstantiated account of an alleged conversation with the complainant that had been compellingly and comprehensively rebutted by her.’   This appears to be false.  There was no evidence that Mr S’s account had ever been put to the complainant - let alone that she rebutted it.  As noted, Alec’s request for her attendance had been refused. It was not suggested that she had made a further, undisclosed statement rebutting Mr S – such a statement would surely have been produced had it been made.

The Appeal Panel’s refusal to entertain this crucial exonerating piece of defence evidence can only have been because it fundamentally undermined the prosecution case. That is a travesty of justice.

In the light of that it was no surprise that the Appeal panel upheld the decision of the Disciplinary Panel. When his rep asked how long Alec would be suspended from Office he was told it was for at least 5 years! That is until Alec is 75.

Breach of Confidentiality + Media Smears

If that were not bad enough, what followed will shock and concern every trade union activist. Confidential details of the case, including a statement by the complainant were leaked to the media. This could have only come from someone within Unite.  The angle the media took was to attack Alec and link him to Jeremy Corbyn so as to undermine him.  Alec had been one of Corbyn’s biggest supporters and articles in the Telegraph, Times, Liverpool Echo and Guardian were spun to try to damage Corbyn and denigrate Alec.

The TUC

In September 2016, the TUC informed Alec that in addition to the sanctions imposed by Unite, the TUC also banned him from holding his elected position representative to and as chair of the TUCJCC. That is not an ‘office’; it is certainly not an office in Unite and besides Alec’s position on the TUCJCC is also because he is a member of Unison.  More significantly still, the TUC has no power to prevent Trades Union Councils nominating who they wish to represent them on the TUCJCC, the TUC has no disciplinary powers over members of affiliated unions and had held no hearing to allow Alec to present a case before imposing such a penalty.  But the penalty imposed by the TUC went yet further than that imposed by Unite: Alec was barred from unofficial pre-meetings of the TUCJCC and from attending any TUC event, including those open to the public!

Questions have even been raised about Alec’s employment.

Facebook Lies

Now new evidence has emerged from the Facebook postings of the complainant.  She has changed her mind again and decided to revert to claiming that the incident did take place and she has broadcast details of the allegation along with grossly offensive comments about Alec.  Even more disturbingly, having linked to an article about an (unrelated) Employment Tribunal case against UNITE for sexual harassment she made the following comment in relation to her own case:

‘In my experience the equalities officer was invisible, the questioning that I was subject to would not be out of place among rape apologists, the concern for the person making the complaint was non–existent’.

This is a quite remarkable claim since one of the most unjust features of this drawn out disciplinary process is that the complainant was never questioned about her allegation - let alone in the manner she describes.  She was never present to face any questions put to her by Alec, his rep or the Disciplinary or Appeal Panels which took the decisions.  Before the Investigatory Panel the notes show that she was never asked even to describe the alleged incident; her prepared statement was simply accepted as fact. The sole questions about the alleged incident were: ‘…you had to ask him to move is this when the incident happened? And if so what kind of a slap was it?’  To which the answer was ‘Yes.  It was a hard slap; I was shocked and carried on walking…’  The allegation that the Unite Investigation Panel were behaving like ‘rape apologists’ is both a very serious allegation and one that is totally refuted by the notes.

This Facebook posting casts further serious doubt on the credibility of the complainant.

Unfortunately there is no further appeal under Unite rules and Alec appears to have no alternative but to take his case to the Certification Officer, given the appalling consequences that he is facing.

Every trade unionist should fight to root sexual harassment out of our movement and ensure our events are safe places for all members. But there is also no place in our movement for those who make false accusations against individuals and the union, then broadcast false and wholly misleading details of the matter on social media. More than that, no-one should be convicted without a fair trial.

Defend Alec

Alec has a long and proud record of promoting and encouraging women to get active in the union movement, he has never been subject to these kind of accusations in over 50 years of service in the movement.  Natural justice is a requirement of Unite’s disciplinary rules (rule 27.2) but Alec has been denied it.  Here, that denial was in refusing Alec the right to question those who made allegations against him and in refusing to hear a witness who had vital evidence for his defence.  The witness statements of many respected people present at the restaurant where the alleged incident took place have been simply ignored or discounted.  He has had confidential details of an internal union matters leaked to the press where it was spun to attack Jeremy Corbyn.  He has now discovered that his accuser has put on social media claims which are clearly both untrue and bring the union into disrepute.

He has been removed and suspended from office for over 5 years and the TUC has tried to remove him from elected positions that are completely unconnected to his membership of Unite.

Questions for Unite

We call on the Executive Committee of UNITE and the General Secretary to review this case as a matter of urgency.  As trade unionists we fight on a daily basis against injustice; we cannot allow this to happen to Alec.  Please support our call for a review of this decision and an investigation into the scandalous claims made by the complainant and the manner in which confidential information was leaked to the Tory media to be used to attack both Alec and Jeremy Corbyn.

Email: defend.alec.mcfadden@hotmail.com   10th October 2016

Printed and Published by defend Alec McFadden campaign

Councillors join-in anti-Austerity Show!

That'll Show Them Won't It? Councillors to Join Major Anti-Austerity Demonstration on Saturday 16th April     Almost 150 Councillors from across the country have signed a letter slamming the Government for massive funding cuts and and will be joining the tens of thousand of people who will be marching in London for the People's Assembly's Health, Homes, Jobs and Education' demo on Saturday April 16th. The letter followed George Osborne's ill-fated budget which piled on more misery for millions as the Government laid out plans to cut support for disabled people while offering tax breaks for big business and the wealthy.  Read the FULL STORY HERE TUC General Secretary Frances O'Grady has also sent us a video message of support. Check it out online HERE. It looks like it's going to be an absolutely massive demonstration, keep sharing the Facebook Event. Assemble: Saturday 16 April, 1pm,  Gower Street march to Trafalgar Sq. If you can get there early and help us steward, please email the office today: office@thepeoplesassembly.org.uk See you on the Streets! The People's Assembly Against Austerity http://www.thepeoplesassembly.org.uk/

The People's Assembly Against Austerity · United Kingdom This email was sent to northernvoices@hotmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here. You can also keep up with The People's Assembly Against Austerity on Twitter or Facebook.

Bedroom Tax campaigner goes to Supreme Court!

Manchester tenant Meryvn Drage  (57) of Bradford Court in Moston, has appealed against the Bedroom Tax.

His case has been taken all the way to the highest court in Britain, the supreme Court (House of Lords). A date for this hearing has yet to be set.

 

Meryvn is being represented by the Public Law Defenders. His is a test case. The outcome will have an effect all the other appeals against the Bedroom Tax. That is the reason so many other appeals have been held up. 

Solicitor Ann McMurdie, from Public Law Defenders will give an update on the challenges to the Bedroom Tax in the Courts.

Like many who have been hit by the Bedroom Tax, Mervyn has a number of mental health conditions. To be forced to move away from his home would have a detrimental effect on his life and his health.

Mervyn has joined marches and protest against the Bedroom Tax since its introduction in April 2013.

The legal speak for his appeal is:

'The Claimant is a 56 year old sole tenant of a three bedroom flat initially allocated to him in 1994 when it was hard to let. He has a number of physical and mental health problems including depression, anxiety and OCD together with persecutory delusions from time to time. His condition is aggravated by stress and changes of routine and his disability means that it would be unreasonable to move or share occupation of his flat.'

Councils reclassifying homes to avoid 'bedroom tax'!

When it introduced the 'bedroom tax', the government claimed that it would result in £490m savings for the taxpayer in 2013-14. Under the regulations that were brought in, tenants who were deemed to have one spare bedroom, lost 14% of their housing benefit while those deemed to have two or more spare rooms, had 25% deducted from their housing benefit.

As we reported recently, thousands of tenants across the country are facing eviction and legal action because they cannot afford to pay the bedroom tax. In Solihull, one person has already committed suicide claiming she could not afford to live.

But councils in Leeds, Nottingham, Knowsley and North Lanarkshire in Scotland, believe they have found a way of circumventing the law by reclassifying thousands of bedrooms as box rooms, studies or non-specific rooms, so that tenants can avoid the 'bedroom tax'.

Knowsley Housing Trust in Merseyside, has reclassified more than 500 bedrooms, while Edinburgh, Birmingham and York councils are looking into it. The city council in Leeds has reclassified 837 bedrooms which will now be exempt from the 'bedroom tax'. In the case of Leeds, "reclassification was based on specifc criteria: where bedrooms were used as box rooms, where they were entered through another room, or where they were on the ground floor and not near a bathroom." In Nottingham, the city council has reclassified 1,000 two-bedroom flats in high-rise tower blocks as one-bedroom, while bedrooms less than 50 square feet could be reassessed.

The deputy leader of Leeds City Council, Peter Gruen, told the 'Independent' newspaper that the reclassification had been 'prompted by welfare changes' and added, "This is a totally perverse tax. Fair-minded councils cannot simply stand by and see such havoc."

Jim McCabe, leader of North Lanarkshire Council, said authorities "have been left to pick up the pieces of this horrendous reform."

A government spokesman told the 'Independent' that £150m had been provided to councils for support for vunerable people struggling to pay the 'bedroom tax', and added: "Councils may choose to redefine some properties, but we don't expect this to become widespread."

The Bedroom Tax & 'Austerity Kills'

SINCE the suicide of the English lady in Solihull concerned about her 'bedroom tax', reported by Blanco on this Blog last Sunday, David Stucker and Sanjay Basu have written an article in the Global Edition of the New York Times (yesterday) entitled 'How austerity kills'.  It seems that early last month a triple suicide was reported in the seaside town of Civitanova Marche in Italy, where a married couple, Anna Sopranzi aged 68, and Romero Dionisi aged 62, had been struggling to live of her monthly pension of 500 euros (£590), and had fallen behind with their rent.  Their problem was that the Italian government had suddenly raised the retirement age and MR. Dionisi, a former building workers had become one of Italy's esodati (exiled ones) - older workers plunged into poverty without a safety net.  On the 5th, April, he and his wife left a note on a neighbour's car asking for forgiveness, then hanged themselves in a storage closet at home.  Then when Ms. Sopranzi's brother, Giuseppe Sopranzi, aged 73, heard the news, he drowned himself in the Adriatic.

 Mr Stuckler and Mr. Basu claim:
'The correlation between unemployment and suicide has been observed since the 19th century.  People looking for work are about twice as likely to end their lives as those who have jobs.'

They maintain that this is not just a story of suicides being an 'unavoidable consequence of economic downturns', but that in 'countries that slashed health and social protection budgets, like Greece, Italy and Spain, have seen starkly worse health outcomes than nations like Germany, Iceland and Sweden, which maintained their social safety nets and opted for stimulus over austerity.  Mr Stucker and Basu note:  'Germany preaches the virtues of austerity - for others'.

Stucker and Basu argue:
'What we have found is that austerity - severe, immediate, indiscriminate cuts to social and health spending - is not only self-defeating, but fatal.'

If Stucker (senior researcher in sociology at Oxford) and Basu (an assistant professor of medicine at Stanford) are right, then this may raise problems for anarchists, like Chris Draper, who insist that to be consistent the anarchist movement must detach itself from the andencies of the state through a program of cuts in state spending.  Chris Draper opened up a valueable debate for anarchists which must be confronted if an alternative vision for society is to be presented.