Corporate Murder, Political Murder, What's The Differnce?

      Ian Duncan Smith, master of the grand plan, creator of the final solution, the culling of the sick, the vulnerable, those with disabilities, those deemed by the corporate world to be none productive units. We can't afford you if you don't sell yourself to the corporate greed machine, embrace the minimum wage, beg for zero hour contracts, profit is what it is all about.

      The recently released figures showing the number of people who have died after having their benefits cut, or been deemed fit for work, is nothing less than a crime, a crime against the most vulnerable in our society. Those who bring these pressures to bear on the sick and vulnerable are responsible for their deaths, and must be held to account. If it was a factory, there would be a charge of corporate murder, these deaths didn't happen in a factory, but the responsibility still lies with those pushing and enacting this legislation.

      However it is no more than we should expect from a system of exploitation based on profit for the few, at the expense of the many. We can protest, complain, demonstrate, all we want, but we can't turn capitalism into a caring compassionate system. It is not a system of social sharing, mutual aid, and caring for the needy in society, if you are unfortunate enough to be in need of any of these terms, you will be dumped by the wayside. Your only recourse to survival will be charity.

 Figures from Vox Political:

      A statistical release published today (August 27) in response to my Freedom of Information request dating back to May 28, 2014, states that the total number of deaths involving claimants of Incapacity Benefit, Employment and Support Allowance and Severe Disablement Allowance – between the start of December 2011 and the end of February 2014 is 81,140, including 50,580 (ESA claimants) and 30,560 (IB/SDA claimants). All figures are rounded up to the nearest 10.

      Add this to the 10,600 deaths that were already known between January and November 2011 and you have 91,740.

Information for ESA claimants shows:

• 7,540 deaths while claims were being assessed, bringing the known total to 9,740.
• 7,200 deaths in the work-related activity group, bringing the known total to 8,500.
• 32,530 deaths in the support group, bringing the known total to 39,630.
• And 3,320 deaths in which the claimant was not in receipt of any benefit payment and is therefore marked as “unknown”.
  

The total number of claimants who flowed off ESA, IB or SDA whose date of death was at the same time and of those the number with a WCA decision of “fit for work”, between December 2011 to February 2014 was 2,650 (2,380 ESA, 270 IB/SDA).

Read the full article HERE:

        The above figures show quite plainly the way this system treats its vulnerable and needy. This is not done with a heavy heart, it is worked out by expensive suits sitting round a table in the marble halls of power, in a cold and calculated way, checking balance sheets to see how much they can save by abandoning the weak, needy and vulnerable, based on their poisonous ideology of, if you can't provide for yourself, then you can be abandoned to the fate of poverty, deprivation and death.  

            Capitalism can't be reformed, it must be destroyed, or it will destroy any semblance of society that we might have at the moment.

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Important Diary Dates.

    A couple of dates for next week, the first is on Tuesday, April 22 and is hosted by Glasgow Games Monitor 2014. The subject matter, "housing", focusing on Glasgow's East End, though not exclusively. The East End of Glasgow has seen approximately 3,000 resident shunted out to make way for "The Games". A spectacle to feed the corporate greed machine with an estimated £524 million. Of course we all know what happens to the "estimates" in all these types of affairs, they are just the starting point of the rip-off. What would £524 million do if spent on simple improving the housing and social conditions of the East End?

From Glasgow Games Monitor:

Hi all,

     Two new posts online:

(1) 'THE MEETING THEY TRIED TO BAN! HOUSING IS IN CRISIS: WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT IT?'

     Public Meeting, Speakers and Discussion, 7-9pm, Tuesday 22nd April, St.Mungo's Academy, 235 Crownpoint Road, Bridgeton, Glasgow, G40 2RA. All Welcome!

http://gamesmonitor2014.org/2014/04/15/public-housing-meeting-tuesday-22nd-april/

    (2) 'Games Monitor on Newsnight

Scotland':http://gamesmonitor2014.org/2014/04/15/games-monitor-on-newsnight-scotland/

     Please circulate news of the housing meeting widely if possible. We want to engage with local people's experience in particular, but housing for the games and clyde gateway is a citywide issue and we welcome all those with an interest in housing issues.

Cheers,http://gamesmonitor2014.org/

       The other date is Friday, April 25, the monthly picket outside the ATOS offices in Cadogan street Glasgow. It is important that this picket continues and gains in strength. ATOS may have decided to withdraw early from its contract with the government, mainly due to the unpleasant publicity created by such pickets up and down the country. However, that doesn't mean that the government will abandon its attack on the sick and disabled. The millionaire cabal at the Westminster Houses of Hypocrisy and Corruption, have a bucketful of leeches ready and waiting to be unleashed on the vulnerable, when ATOS leaves by the back door, having made millions at the expense of the sick and disabled. 
This from Glasgow Against ATOS:

Friday April 25, 12:30 - 15:00

ATOS Assessment Centre

Carunna House

29 Cadogan Street

Glasgow.

     We are Glasgow Against Atos, a dynamic campaign group, defending the sick and disabled. We have been picketing the Atos, Glasgow assessment centre since early 2012.
     Please come and join us in fighting Atos, the DWP and the government cuts against disabled people, their families and carers.
        The weather is getting better – so no excuses, and we’ll see you all outside the assessment centre. All welcome!

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Glasgow Against ATOS Monthly Picket.

       Glasgow against ATOS is a Grassroots disabled activist campaign opposing Atos (Atos HealthCare) and supporting rights of disabled people in Glasgow and beyond. On the last Friday of each month the group picket outside the ATOS offices in Cadogan Street Glasgow. The next picket will be Friday January 31 at 12:30.

    Ian Duncan Smith's "reforms" of disability allowance, is administered by ATOS and since they started their brutal campaign against the most vulnerable in our society, we have seen more than 1,300 people died after being assessed and told to start work related activities. Whichever way you look at this, it is unacceptable, Ian Duncan Smith has blood on his hands. Some disabled people have committed suicide after being assessed as fit to start looking for work. People who force vulnerable people into this sort of situation have changed the category from suicide to murder, and should be held accountable.

Photo From Glasgow against ATOS

Visit ann arky's home at www,radicalglasgow.me.uk

Labour, Making The Cuts Nicer.

       We all know that the ConDems coalition of millionaires, is hell-bent on slashing benefits of the most vulnerable in society, social spending to them is an anathema, Sadly a high proportion of people see the next election as a possible end to this onslaught by voting Labour, (sorry "New Labour") They somehow have formed the mistaken opinion  that the Miliband gang will change this cruel market drive approach to health and welfare. Sadly they will be find that should the well-heeled Miliband mob get their grubby hands on the reins of power, nothing will change. This particular bunch of hypocrites are traveling around preaching how they will continue with all the trimmings of of Osborne's master plan, but make it fair!! How do you take away support from vulnerable people fairly? how do you cut the benefits of those living on or near the poverty line fairly? Thatcher, Cameron, Miliband, it doesn't make any difference, it is not the smile or the personality that matters, it is the system. Only when we start to dismantle, this greed driven system of capitalism, will we see the vulnerable being cared for as their needs dictate and the pain of poverty being removed.

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PIRATES OF THE PUBLIC PURSE.

       I have always said that the "austerity" (I love that word, it makes it sound so efficient and harmless), cuts to date are nothing, compared to what is still to come. 2013 will be crunch time, that's when the boot goes in with a vengeance. Homeless set to soar, workfare propping up the corporate profits as people are "obliged" to work for nothing more than their job seekers benefits, disability allowances disappearing, condemning thousand of vulnerable people to isolation and worse, and the only jobs on offer will be low paid part-time. Meanwhile the grand plan of transferring all the public purse to the millionaires' old boys club goes on unabated and all public assets become corporate assets. On top of all the already legislated cuts that have been in the pipeline, we are faced with massive increases in energy prices and increase rail fares. Plus Osborne has stated that all government departments will have to find extra efficiency savings, (cuts), on top of what has already been passed. However, we have to be careful when we talk about "austerity", it is not quite universal. While you and I struggle to pay our way, there are those in this twisted Alice-in-Wonderland system that are doing just fine, mostly, those who do nothing, Company directors, traders in the financial Mafia, and of course, those millionaires who pass all this "austerity" legislation. 

       An interesting article from A World to Win:

Unions should resist rail and fuel price rises with civil disobedience

      Millions of people who commute to work are a just a few weeks away from a massive cut in incomes that will intensify the dramatic fall in living standards that the recession and austerity measures have already created.
       As people struggle back to work after the Christmas holidays, they will be hit by a double whammy of steep rail fare increases and the bills for electricity and gas that in some cases will show rises of nearly 11%. his amounts to a huge transfer of wealth to the train operators and energy companies like E.On which yesterday announced increases averaging 8.7%. These will naturally impact harder on poorer households, adding to five million already in fuel poverty.
     So too will the rail fare rises. Passengers on many routes face fare increases of up to 10% next month. Season tickets and peak fares are regulated and will rise by an average 4.2%. Many commuters pay huge amounts already. For example, an annual season ticket from St Albans to London is around £3,000. That will go up by over £120 in January.
Off-peak and anytime tickets in England and Wales are set to soar, according to the watchdog Passenger Focus because they are not regulated. An anytime return from London to Norwich will now be 9.2% dearer at £107.70. A day return from Holyhead-Llandudno will be 6.5% more expensive.
      The ConDem coalition is pushing ahead with plans to reduce the £3 billion plus subsidy to the rail industry, a process that began under New Labour. That will result in ticket office closures and other “efficiency” savings.
      The rail unions have launched a campaign to bring the railways back into public ownership. Today they were holding protests in Swansea and Cardiff. More actions are planned before Christmas.
They handed out Christmas cards with a "seasonal message" from the train companies, which promised commuters will have a 2013 "packed full of cancelled trains, staff cuts and ticket office closures" while the train companies are "making huge profits".
Rob Jenks, of transport and travel union TSSA, said:

     We want to point out the dramatic rise in rail fares, a 30% increase in rail fares, compared to the average increase in people's wages of 11.9%.  So you can see there's a huge gap between what people can afford to pay and what people are having to pay.
      It's about fares, it's also about all the cuts the industry is facing as the government tries to allegedly balance the books but without taking the opportunity to actually look at what public ownership would bring and all the savings that would make by cutting out profit and various other things.

     The Action for Rail campaign says that since privatisation, more than £11 billion of public funds has been “misspent” on debt write-offs, dividend payments to private investors,  and higher interest payments in order to keep Network Rail’s debts off the government balance sheet.

     At the same time, privatisation has failed to deliver on its promises. Genuine private investment makes an insignificant contribution to the railways, representing about one per cent of the total money that goes into the railway each year.  Our fares are among the highest in Europe, many of our services are overcrowded and rely on obsolete rolling stock.

       Obviously, there is no way the Coalition is going to contemplate public ownership as an option. And nor is Labour. Shadow transport secretary Maria Eagle has only pledged to make sure that the limit on fare rises is applied more strictly. That’s really worth waiting for!
       The savage reduction in living standards that will greet millions on January 1 is unprecedented. Rail unions ought to step up their action. RMT general secretary Bob Crow has in the past talked of a campaign of civil disobedience to fight the government. There couldn’t be a better time to put his words into action than right now.
Paul Feldman
Communications editor
11 December 2012

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ATOS KILLS.

       Is it a civilised country when disabled people have to take to the streets  and demonstrate in an attempt to hold on to what meagre assistance they get to help make their lives liveable? To see an army of disabled people being manhandled by the police for simply objecting to having their lives made intolerable, shames any society. This is 21 century Britain, one of the wealthiest countries in the world, and the powers that be are stripping away the quality of live from the most vulnerable. What is more, it is for no other reason than to follow the dictate of the financial Mafia's enforced ideology department.

      Scenes like this video tell you that this present economic system is not fit for purpose.

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THE BRUTALITY OF ATOS.

          The brutal stories still come out from the ATOS experience, each story is a case of human suffering. This from ATOS Victims Group News.

Hello

         About two years ago I started suffering from extreme anxiety due to the pressure of my work as a college tutor combined with my caring duties for my mum. This triggered a severe panic attack and also severe alopoecia. My doctor of 20 years and my counsellor both said I was unfit for work. My medication also means that I feel very tired and have poor concentration for large parts of the day. I was placed on ESA and had to attend an ATOS ‘assessment’. I wasn’t able to travel in on my own, on the bus or by foot, due to my fear of having another panic attack; my mum, who I was meant to be caring for, cared for me and brought me in by car, despite being in pain with her own condition and needing to rest several times on the short walk from the car to the assessment centre.

        The first impression I had of an ATOS centre was seeing the TV tuned to ‘The Jeremy Kyle‘ show at full volume in reception, watched by a bored security guard. This increased my levels of anxiety even further as I waited and my mum had to ask for it to be switched off. When I entered the interview room I answered all the questions as truthfully as possible whilst the ‘assessor’ ticked his little boxes on a PC.

My report said that I was able to work and that ‘I underestimated my ability to concentrate on work tasks’. This was despite the report saying that I was very subdued in the assessment and looked extremely anxious, despite me telling the ‘assessor’ that the very reason I was suffering from severe anxiety was because I was trying to combine a job with caring for my mum.

        After some excellent advice from my local CAB, I found I was able to claim Carer‘s Allowance and Income Support to help me look after my mum full-time. Obviously, at no time was I ever told this by anybody at ATOS or at Jobcentreplus; I was just another statistic, boosting ATOS’s performance profits and meeting government targets. I know this; I worked for Jobcentreplus Head Office as an Executive Officer for eight years.

        This experience is one of the many reasons I am now fighting the government’s cuts; their desire to move genuinely disabled and incapacitated people into a workfare style scheme that takes no account of their condition is merely a way for the government to make an easy target, people who did not cause our social and economic crisis, pay for it.

         Don’t let them make the people of this country an easy target. Don’t let them forget the effects of their atrocious policies on real flesh, blood and minds. On real people who refuse to be treated like crap.

Show them that we have the guts to fight back.
Read the story:

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