Death Through Bottled Water.

     We all know that the corporate world is a destructive force that rides roughshod over the well being of the ordinary people, all in the name of profit and power. However like all bastards, some are worse than others and Nestles comes in among the bottom of the barrel. We can certainly target the worst offenders in this brutal war for profit, but until we rid the world of this system of capitalism, that breeds, feeds and proliferates, this festering cancer of corporatism, we, the ordinary people, will be on the receiving end of its greed driven destructive force.

This appeal from SumOfUs:

   Nestlé is draining developing countries’ groundwater to make its Pure Life bottled water, destroying countries’ natural resources before forcing its people to buy their own water back.

    Now Nestlé is moving into Pakistan and sucking up the local water supply, rendering entire areas uninhabitable in order to sell mineral-enriched water to the upper class as well as people in the US and EU. Meanwhile the poor watch their wells run dry and their children fall ill from dirty water.
Tell Nestlé to stop making Pakistan's villages uninhabitable by stealing their water.
   Nestlé’s aggressive water grab is already descending like a plague on parts of Pakistan. In the small village of Bhati Dilwan, villagers have watched their water table sink hundreds of feet since Nestlé moved in. Children are getting sick from the foul-smelling sludge they’re forced to choke down. Meanwhile, Nestlé spends millions marketing “Pure Life” to wealthy Americans, Europeans, and Pakistanis who can afford to watch their kids grow up healthy. This scenario is played out again and again in countries around the globe. But this is where we say: enough!

      Dirty water kills more children around the world than AIDS, malaria, war, and traffic accidents combined -- and Nestlé has a big hand in it.

     At the World Water Forum in 2000, Nestlé led the way in fighting against defining access to water a universal right. Nestlé and other big corporations won out, and government officials around the globe officially downgraded water’s classification to a “need” instead, meaning it could be captured, commoditized, and exploited by major corporations without regard for local populations.
Tell Nestlé: Water is a human right. Stop stealing it from communities around the world.

     When the company's Canadian subsidiary pushed to keep draining millions of liters of fresh water from the water table in a time of drought, we joined our friends at the Council of Canadians, Wellington Water Watchers, and Ecojustice challenging Nestlé in court -- and we won! Just this month, after additional pressure from thousands of SumOfUs members, Nestlé decided to drop its appeal -- a huge win for the public.

     If we expose Nestlé’s disgusting game plan for Pakistan, the company will scale back its water-draining facilities to avoid a damaging global backlash. But if we ignore what’s happening there, Nestlé and other major corporations will suck up more and more the world’s water -- and that’s not good news for anyone.

Join us in standing up to corporations like Nestlé that suck up essential natural resources.

Thanks for all that you do,
Claiborne and the rest of us

     P.S. Nestlé’s current chairman and former CEO was caught on tape arguing that water is "not a right”, and while the clip is shocking, the reality is even worse. Nestlé’s aggressive policies are depriving thousands of people around the planet of the basic water they need to survive, all to pump up the company’s bottom line. Please get word out about Nestlé's horrific practices by sharing this campaign on Facebook.

More Information:

The Global Search For Liquid Gold, Urban Times, 11 June 2013
Bottled Life: The Story, Bottled Life, 1 January 2012
Water Facts, Food and Water Watch

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

A Thought For Remembrance Day.

A thought for Remembrance Day:

Patriotism

No, I shall not die for the fluttering flag,

if truth be known, ’tis nothing but a multi-coloured rag

held aloft by some foolish hand

inciting worker and peasant to kill

on some green and wooded hill,

peasant and worker from some other land.

Nor shall I shed blood for the fluttering rag

that brings out fools to stand and brag

of brutal deeds painted grand,

deeds where rustic and craftsman lie so still

killed by my brothers' misguided hand.

No allegiance have I for the Nation

this man made autocratic creation

that divides my brothers in a world so small,

binds us to a country's cause, right or wrong,

bids us follow its drum, sing its song,

then sheds our blood in some border brawl.

No, I'll be no slave to flag or nation,

have no ear for power oration,

though its iron heel is on my breast,

my back feels its leather thong,

at patriotism's barracoon, I'll be no guest.

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Government Plunders Lottery Fund!!

      You probably thought that when you bought your lottery ticket, if you bother, besides hoping to lift yourself out of the daily grind, you probably thought that you were also helping charities. As we are all told the lottery fund is there to help worthwhile charities and not to subsides government business. However, the sweaty hand of our millionaire Cameron/Osborne lead cabal, has had a dip into the lottery fund. They plundered the lottery fund of £425 million, just to help them out with the Olympics. Not only did we the public pour billions of pounds of our hard earned cash, by means of taxes, into this extravaganza, but we also got trick when we had that wee flutter. Of course we should have known, millionaires think that all money is theirs. You just can't trust millionaires.

More details HERE:

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Saturday 9 November, International Day Of Solidarity.

       The brutal and consistent crushing of what vestige of democracy there ever was in Greece continues unabated. The Greek government, having dismantled practically all social services, paid off thousands of public sector workers, pushing unemployment to approximately 29%, and increased taxes beyond breaking point for the ordinary people, the Troika, (E.C. European Commission, E.C.B. European Central bank, I.M.F. International Mankind Fuckers), after a visit to Greece, have come up with the idea that the Greek government hasn't carried out enough of its austerity plan. Along side this vicious attack on the living conditions of the people of Greece, the government increases its attack on any sign or symbol of people organising.

     When the Greek government closed down ERT, the Greek national radio, without discussion or legislation, the employees occupied the building and continued broadcasting, with massive support from the people. But once again the state resorts to its usual brute force, to silence the voice of the people and to break any solidarity among the people. In response the people of Greece are calling for an international day of solidarity on Saturday 9th. November.

This from The Greek Streets: 

“Police forces have just entered the studios of the Greek radio… It’s not for ERT alone. It’s not only for our jobs. But it is for Democracy itself… Don’t seek for legality… for the defence of Democracy, for holding each other’s hand, for our dignity and honour, for standing shoulder to shoulder to each other… because we met at the same street together, because we fought the same struggle… we ask you to come now at the headquarters’ of ERT… The voice of the Greek radio is silenced!”

“The prosecutor said that the person responsible for ERT’s inventory now is the ‘brigadier general’ of the police forces.”
Thursday, 7 November 2013

Read the full report HERE:

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

Circled A Radio.

     The latest from Circled "A" Radio, Mr G having a couple of his rants, laced with a little bit of music. Enjoy.

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

It Isn't Trickling Down!!!

       Things are tight under this financial Mafia's regime of austerity, at least for you and I, the ordinary Joes. How has your income been doing in the last year? What with wage cuts/freezes, and inflation, you are certainly poorer this year than you were last year. However, is that the picture across the world? Well no, according to a Credit Suisse Bank, report, global wealth rocketed last year to a staggering new record of $241 trillion, that's an increase of 4.9% on last year. Global wealth is projected to rise by approximately 40% to $334 trillion by 2018.   

     Does that mean that you and I will be 40% better off by 2018? Well again, no, we will probably experience the same in the next 5 years as we experienced in the last year, a fall in real income. Where does all that extra wealth go? You have probably heard of the trickle down theory, well the only thing that trickles down is piss. According to Professor Shorroks, there is virtually no social mobility, 87% of the world's population stay where they are, if you're rich the chances are you will stay rich, likewise, if you're in the gutter, then you'll probably stay in the gutter. It's the system, it's the system, matey. Here in the UK, the aggregate total wealth of all private households is £10.3 trillion, but the wealthiest 20% own 62% of that total, and the top 10% of households are 4.4 times richer than the bottom 50%. As the world gets richer, that is not likely to change to a more equal position.

      While all this wealth is slushing around in its very small circle, the truth is that two-thirds of all adults in the world have under $10,000 of net wealth each, and billions have nothing at all. World wide the figures for the distribution of that record $241 trillion pot of world wealth are, the top 1% own 41%; top 10% own 86%; bottom 50% own just 1%, and as we know in this system there is virtually no social mobility, so that is the way it will stay. But there is an alternative, scrap capitalism and start to build that better world based on the needs of all our people, built on the foundations of mutual aid, co-operation and sustainability, and free from the festering cancer of profit.
      You can get more details on the cruel and unjust, wealth inequalities in this world of capitalism from International Journal of Socialist Renewal.

Out Of The Mouths Of Babes.

Out of the mouths of babes!!

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Why Vote??

      I posted this some time ago, but saw it again on arrezafe, and decided it was worth another outing.

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

Burn Baby Burn.

       I have no doubt that all us ordinary folks that are struggling to find the cash to heat our homes this winter, will shed a tear of sympathy for the owner of the £8 million+ 76ft. Yacht, Kahu, that went up in flames at Cowes Marina on the Isle of Wight, yesterday. This is the picture of the UK austerity, homeless children, elderly dying from avoidable cold related illnesses, food banks and kids going to school hungry, and parasites “messing around in boats” valued at more than you or I would ever earn in our lifetime. Capitalism, the system of contradictions, we who produce all the wealth in the world, struggle for a half decent life, while the parasitic wealth plunderers lavish themselves in unearned opulence.

    

       According to the organisation Shelter Scotland, this year 4,847 children in Scotland will spend Christmas homeless. While the pompous parasite class flick through the pages of the latest yacht catalogue, we in Scotland have more than 20% of all our kids living in poverty. In some areas it is 33% and more. This is amongst the highest child poverty rates in Europe, with Denmark and Norway having 10%, while in that so called, capitalist economic success story, Germany, it is still a shocking 15%.

      These figures are not just about hungry kids living in poverty, it is about blighted lives, destroyed potential, poor health and education, a future so much less that it could be. None of these problems are insoluble, the knowledge and resources are there to eliminate poverty. However because we tolerate a system of exploitation, called capitalism, children will go to bed hungry, elderly will die from hypothermia, while others will plan the next cruise in their £8 million yacht.

      I couldn't give a shit if every yacht went up in smoke tomorrow, the loss of these useless toys of the parasite class will be no loss to the ordinary people of this world. It's a pity that the marina staff managed to save the fire from spreading to the other symbols of inequality, as far as I'm concerned, burn baby burn.

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

Austerity, Poverty, 21st. Century Capitalism.

      Austerity continues unabated in Spain, with the usual wage cuts/freezes, massive layoffs and the resultant poverty that ensues with such policies. Monday 4 November, saw thousands of the refuse collectors demonstrate in Madrid, it was a noisy and colourful affair, they set off fire crackers, chanted and started bonfires in the Puerto del Sol plaza. This was to mark the start, at midnight, of an indefinite strike by the refuse workers in protest against the plans to lay-off more than 1,000 staff. The refuse workers started to converge on the Puerto del Sol plaza in the late evening. Another city, another angry population, another country facing deprivation, the face of 21 century capitalism.

 Photo courtesy of Demotix.com

      This picture is repeated across the world, how do you keep silent, how do you keep calm, when millions die in poverty, while the few lavish themselves in unimaginable wealth. A wealth created by us, the ordinary people. As children die of hunger, the parasites grow fat on their blood. This system has nothing to recommend it to the ordinary people, it is a system of abuse and exploitation that favours the greedy.

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

Canada, Land Of Immigrant Detention.

      Some countries manage to create the illusion of being a ”nice” country and keep the nasty side in low profile. Canada is one of those countries, the great outdoors and land of opportunity, but the same shit goes on there as else where in the capitalist world. Some months ago there was the student riots, which once again proved that under capitalism, anger and discontent are always simmering under the surface, ready to explode. More recently the way the Canadian government treats immigrants has been leaking out. In Canada the authorities can hold immigrants indefinitely in detention, and do. 

     According to figures released by the organisation No One is Illegal, between 2004 and 2011, the Canadian authorities locked up, 82,000 people in immigration detention, and since 2011, at least another 25,000 people have been detained. Of those detained in 2012, a staggering 289 were children, some under the age of ten. Approximately 33% of immigration detainees are held in maximum-security provincial prisons. Of course this is capitalism and immigration detention centres are big business, and in Canada that business is worth $50 million, and is run in partnership with private companies. Big international vultures like G4S and Corbel Management have their greedy hands in the pot. Recent figures show that in Toronto alone, these two companies, between 2004 and 2008, were paid $19 million of tax payers money to lock up immigrants.

      At present Canada accepts less than a quarter of all refugee claimants, and with recent legislation, immigrants are classed as “non-status people” a precarious position to be in as they are targeted in raids and detentions. To add to the difficulties of of those detained, approximately 200 immigration detainees have recently been moved from prisons in the Greater Toronto Area and sent to a maximum-security prison in Lindsay, Ontario. This has created greater difficulties for the detainees who have friends and families and adds to their desperation and isolation. Due to under staffing these immigrants now face lockdowns and in some cases are unable to leaver their cells for 18 hours a day.

    However, as always, people who are ill treated eventually try to hit back in self defence and since September 18, many detainees are on hunger strike. They are calling for better access to medical care, better food, adequate legal aid and services, cheaper phone calls, and an end to the persistent lockdowns.

      Canada, just another capitalist country, knee deep in fire tinder, waiting for the spark.

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

Workers, Remember Your History,--Kurt Gustav Wilckens.

      An anniversary we should celebrate, November 3 1886, saw the birth of Kurt Gustav Wilckens, warrior of the working class who dedicated his life to the struggle for freedom and justice for all people. Our history is written in the blood of such people, ordinary people who become giants. Our's is not the history of kings and empires, of greed for power, but a struggle for justice for all.
This from FlagBlackened:

     KURT GUSTAV WILCKENS was born 3 November 1886 at Bad Bramstedt in Schleswig-Holstein, close to the Danish border in Germany, one of the five sons of August Wilckens and Johanna Harms. Of average height with red hair and light blue eyes, he loved nature and hated cities. Starting work as a miner in Silesia, he emigrated at the age of 24 to the United States where he got work in the Arizona mines.
     In Arizona he became involved in the agitation of the revolutionary workers’ organisation, the Industrial Workers of the World (popularly known as the Wobblies). Wilckens took part in strikes and became an orator in the miners’ mass meetings, The IWW organised successfully among Mexicans and South Europeans, the lowest paid of the miners. As a result of the growing might of the miners in the Bisbee area, the local businessmen and scab miners organised into Loyalty Leagues. Early on 12 July 1916, 2000 Loyalty Leaguers commenced a round-up of miners. One miner shot dead a Loyalty leaguer in self-defence and was gunned down. There were robberies, vandalism, and beatings and abuse of women carried out by the Leaguers during the round-up. 1,186 men, including 104 Wobblies, among them Wilckens, were herded into cattle trucks and dumped across the border in the New Mexico desert. Wilckens, by now an anarchist as well as an IWW member, was interned in a camp for German prisoners. He escaped from there, was recaptured and deported to Germany in 1920 from where he departed to Argentina, arriving there in late September.---

Read the full article HERE:

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

 

Faceless Corporations Have Us By The Balls.

      The final stages of corporatism, profit from your illness, profit from your incarceration, the end of public assets, the end of public spaces. You are either profitable to them or you are superfluous, a useless waste product. The faceless corporations have us by the balls, ----at the moment!!

via a comrade of Brighton ABC:

      Neo-liberalism, an ideology and concept usually associated with a particularly ruthless brand of free-market economics, has now reached into the very core services of the state and institutions that were once considered strictly off limits to financial speculators and entrepreneurs: the NHS, the prison system and the criminal justice system. Neo-liberalism doesn’t just involve a massive shift of economic power and wealth to an already extremely powerful and wealthy social group, but also a fundamental shift in the philosophy and policy of organisations like the welfare and criminal justice systems, both of whose ‘clients’ are now increasingly lumped together as an undifferentiated mass of the ‘undeserving poor’ or an always potentially criminal ‘underclass’ requiring an equal degree of punitive supervision, surveillance and ‘management’. For the poor the welfare state is becoming increasingly like a carceral state. 

Read the full article HERE:

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

Freedom Of Speech, If you Have The Money.

      Ian Bone, well known anarchist and class war activist, once again came face to face with the insidious ways of the establishment in silencing opposition. Having been invited to give a talk at Balliol, Oxford, the talk however, was cancelled as the Thames  Valley Police, hit the event with a possible security bill running into the tens of thousands of pounds, to police the event. Since Balliol were not prepared to stump up the money and the organisers of the event, Left Caucus, were unable, the event was prevented from happening. It's called democracy and freedom of speech.

This from Cherwell:

    Questions have subsequently been raised over the legitimacy of the police’s fears, and Ian Bone has been outspoken on the matter. He told Cherwell the tactics of Thames Valley Police were “fucking diabolical… cunning and underhanded.”

    Bone stressed the fact that he was willing to comply with all of the restrictions that Balliol had imposed upon the talk, and intimated that the police had acted in a coercive and persecutory manner. He has now resolved to deliver the same speech next on 1st May, outside Balliol, and protected by the right to protest.

    Bone said that he thought the police were exaggerating the potential danger. Whilst controversial movements on the far-right – such as EDL marches – often cause great public expense, Bone insisted that an hour-long indoor discussion wasn’t even remotely comparable.

Read the full article HERE:

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

Evictions To Help The Economy!!

      According to Sweet & Maxwell,(legal information providers), tenant evictions by landlords have risen to 36,177 for the year June 2012 to June 2013. This is the highest in 5 years, an increase of 9% on the previous year. We all accept that the governments “bedroom tax” has pushed already struggling tenants over the edge and must be blamed for most of this increase. Of course we should not forget the last few years of enforced austerity measures had already taken thousands to the brink of financial collapse and ever closer to that eviction. As Daniel Dover, co-author of Residential Possession Proceedings, has been quoted as saying, “Rising rents on residential property and falling real wages are trends that have been in place for a number of years, and have stretched the finances of an increasing number of tenants to breaking point.”

      Campaign group False Economy, through a Freedom of Information request, received figures from 114 local authorities, indicating that because of the “bedroom tax”, a minimum of 50,000 are adversely affect and facing rent arrears problems. You can add to that number by approximately 30,000 tenants in housing association property.

      Recently a much smaller survey, found that one household in four, 25%, affected by the “bedroom tax” have found themselves facing rent arrears for the first time. According to the National Housing Federation, just over 50% of 63,578 tenants from 51 housing associations were unable to meet their rent payments in the first few months of the introduction of this tax. The worst affected area being Barrow in Cumbria, where more that 75% of all council tenants have fallen into rent arrears since the introduction of this brutal tax. Other areas are showing figures of around 50%. That is a lot of anxiety, stress and misery.

     We are not alone in seeing this tax on the poor as unfair, brutal and unacceptable, the United Nations’ special rapporteur on housing Raquel Rolnik has called for a rethink on the policy after finding the reform was causing “great stress and anxiety” to “very vulnerable” people.

      Will rent arrears, the ensuing poverty, and the actual and threatening evictions, be the spark that will light the fire? The fire is inevitable, as sparks are flying everywhere, ATOS, workfare, zero hours contracts, decimated social services, continuing austerity in the midst of arrogant wealth, and a government that is no more than a thin mask for blatant corporate greed.

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

You Reap What You Sow.

      For a couple of years now Golden Dawn, the Greek fascist party, has been beating up anybody who didn't look "Greek". Immigrants came in for some of the most brutal treatment, it was a very dangerous thing to walk the streets in the cities of Greece if you were an immigrant, you could be taking your life in your hands. The tide seems to have turned against the fascists after the murder in the street of singer, Pavlos Fyssas, by members of their Golden Dawn Group. The state, having talked of a possible coalition with the fascist party, has now turned against them. It is not only the state that wants to hit out at the Golden Dawn thugs, it seems that there are people who will not forget or forgive.

This today from the Greek Streets:

Two Golden Dawn members shot dead, one injured outside GD office in Neo Iraklio, Athens

      According to mainstream media reports, two Golden Dawn members have been shot outside GD’s local office in the neighbourhood of Neo Iraklio, a northern suburb of Athens. Another one member is injured and hospitalised. The three were shot by two men on a motorbike that drove past the building. GD members are gathering at the spot.

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

The State And Fascism!!

       What is happening in Greece? The state taking on the fascist Golden Dawn? As somebody once said, “Representative democracy is capitalisms best weapon.” it is the most efficient way of keeping the masses consuming and for the survival of the state. The jackboot builds resentment, throw sweeties around and as longs as most people think they can get one, then there is a manageable society.

This report from Cognord:

    Golden Dawn (GD), as we knew it, is over. Their leader N. Michaloliakos is behind bars, along with other prominent members, while those who survived the first purge are facing added charges that emerged a few days after the first arrests. While this was happening, a number of their offices around Greece have closed down, the state funding they received has been stopped, and reports indicate that many of their members (ex or current) are forming lines outside the High Court to testify against the organization. These testimonies are used as key evidence in the legal proceedings, leading among other things to the finding of hidden weapons[1]. Even if the legal case does not bring most of GD’s members to prison, the inside fighting is bound to create enough damage to forbid the Nazi party from continuing as it has. 

      This approach of the collapse of GD is not only based on an analysis of recent events. It is also based on a specific understanding of the nature of the State in the modern capitalist world, and its essentially democratic ideology. Democracy is a system of decision-making and of social relations ideal for the capitalist economy. It creates a subject stripped of any control over the means of production, but abstractly equal to the rule of law, bound by existing class, property and exploitation relations,  a subject which exchanges its need to consume the means of survival with the ability to participate in deciding who will manage these relations. This is the form that capitalism finds more suitable for the continuation of accumulation and the creation of value, and democracy has proven that it has far more tools and elasticity, as part of its social structure, to recuperate struggles and threats to the capitalist order, than the brute force of fascist/totalitarian regimes who require no consensus for their rule. The power of capital does not depend on the brute force of Nazi thugs, nor does it require coercion to further the devaluation of proletarians -in Greece or elsewhere.

Read the full report HERE:

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

 

I Know People, But Only a Few---

From 325.nostate.net :
      ‘I want Comrades, not the mob…’ by the imprisoned members of CCF, plus Andreas Tsavdaridis and Spyros Mandylas (Greece)


I know people… people silent and chatty,
coward and audacious, humble and arrogant…
People, who live obediently, like sheep and others,
who lurk treacherously, like hyenas.
I know people who dream without fantasy
and others, who live without dreaming… people, whose eyes
are used to staring low and whose ears
are used to taking orders “wake up”, “work”,
“pay”, “buy”, “believe”, “comply”…
People from the lonely crowd, who patiently wait
in the line of life… for the eternal tomorrow,
for the better days, the optimistic future, the answers to their prayers…
They are waiting to believe in every prospective savior
and in any conman of thought, who will promise them a better life.
But those, who wait to live a better tomorrow,
are today, already dead.
I know people, but only a few of them are my comrades.
Slow Death or Insurrection here and Now…
These are the two paths, that unravel before us.
We choose to be there, where the strong ones dare.
The air is cleaner and the crowd, which bows before its false idols,
doesn’t ugly our aesthetics.
It is nice to look down from the mountain Peak of the Unique
even if the crowd secretly wishes for you to fall into the abyss
in order for it, not to be ashamed of its short stature.
Our words, carve today like a blade
and our actions burn the bridges with yesterday…
With tenacity and will, until we murder authority.
For Nicola and Alfredo.
For the Anarchists of Praxis.

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

Masters In The Art Of Deception.

     You can always rely on that babbling brook of bullshit, the media, to sow confusion, distort the truth, quote details out of context, excel in double-speak and continually attempt to create divisions among the ordinary people. The last thing they want is an informed public, that would sound their death knell.

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

Dignity And Respect Are Universal Rights.

       Grabbed in a dawn raid, sent to a detention centre to be returned to a land where your life might be in danger, and before you are dispatched, you are raped. Not in some far-away dictatorship, but here in the so called civilised UK.

This appeal from The SumOfUs:

       Serco, one of the largest and most powerful companies in the UK, privately runs Yarl’s Wood in Bedfordshire -- an immigration removal centre where vulnerable women are detained and in some cases, raped and sexually abused by the staff who are there to protect them.

        The Chief Inspector of Prisons released a report this week on Yarl’s Wood, urgently calling for a ban on male staff entering the rooms of female detainees uninvited and for the urgent recruitment of female staff. We want more than that. We want Serco to get out of the detention business altogether.

Tell Serco the sexual abuse of women by guards proves it has no business being in the detention business.

      “They choose younger girls, the most vulnerable. They do whatever they want." That’s what “Tanja”, one brave witness and detainee at Yarl’s Wood said. The staff have worked out a convenient way to abuse the women in their care - in the upstairs room set aside for asylum-seekers to take family photos. There's a nice sofa, curtains, and no CCTV up there.

      We have to act quickly. The alleged victims and witnesses who are coming forward and testifying are being deported by the Home Office. Several of them were put on a flight to Pakistan on 1 October. We can’t let this go on another minute.

      Serco will hear us. Their reputation is already in tatters. They’re hoping that if they make a few concessions, and sack a few staff, the controversy will die down. We won’t let it. We won’t accept the sexual abuse and rape of vulnerable women by Serco staff.

       This is part of a pattern of abuse. In 2010 a 30-year-old woman became pregnant by an officer in Yarl's Wood. And many other women may be too fearful to testify or are deported before their case is sufficiently examined. These women are not criminals - many have been victimised by traffickers or were in abusive relationships before they were detained.

Corporations have been left unaccountable for too long. Help hold Serco to account for their behaviour.

Thanks for all that you do,

Hanna, Kaytee, and the rest of us at SumOfUs.org

      p.s. To make things worse, Serco also services our schools. They manage the Local Education Authorities in Bradford, Walsall, and Stoke-on-Trent... that’s right.

 

**********
More information:

The truth about sexual abuse at Yarl's Wood detention centre, 29 October, Open Democracy
Yarl's Wood immigration detention centre 'needs more female staff' after detainee abused by officers, 29 October, Independent
Yarl's Wood abuse allegations: Tanja's story, 14 September, Guardian

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