Axe the Bedroom Tax!

The bedroom tax could affect Welsh households in many different ways. In a country that had nearly 25 000 empty homes in 2011, 4000 people could be made homeless by the bedroom tax according to the body representing tenants in Wales.

It's plain plain to see what's going on. The government is using economic pressure to force the conservative, old fashioned family structure on us. Something quite rightly outdated and irrelevant in today's Wales. The idea of conservatism is defined as; 'a political and social philosophy that promotes retaining traditional social institutions'.
How can the government through economic pressure use the bedroom tax to enforce these traditionalist ideals on us? One example is how the bedroom tax could make it economically impossible for parents to separate. I can not stress how dangerous this is. The sad truth is, domestic violence is common in our patriarchal society and making it even more difficult for parents to split up can result in psychological/physical injury and even death, 2 women every week are killed by an abusive partner in the UK. With this tax, people literally cannot afford to be single parents, even if its the best thing for their children and their own safety and well being. Separated parents who share the care of their children would not both be allowed a 'spare' room for their child/children in their separate homes. There must be a 'main carer' and only that household would count. What do they expect people to do? Expect children when visiting parents to sleep on the floor?

Food is a right not a privilege

You can go on a march, sign a petition or fight the police but my favorite form of protest against capitalism is to hand out hot homemade soup on the streets for free to anyone and everyone.

Food Not Bombs is an all-volunteer global movement that was born out of the anti war movement in the USA in the 1980s. By now it has groups all over the world and these loose-knit group of independent collectives serve free vegan and vegetarian food as a protest against war and poverty.

If governments and global corporations around the world spent as much time and energy feeding people as they do on wars, no one would be hungry. Food Not Bombs' ideology is that corporate and government priorities are biased towards allowing hunger to persist, even though there is more than plenty of food being produced. To demonstrate and highlight this issue, a large amount of the food served is surplus food from shops, bakeries and markets that would otherwise go to waste.

WISE Up for Bradley Manning - Three weeks in Wales

WISE Up for Bradley Manning is a loose network of groups and individuals in Wales, Ireland, Scotland and England (WISE) taking action for Bradley Manning, the young US military intel. analyst with Welsh roots who has been held for almost two years without trial accused of blowing the whistle on war crimes and revealing other truths the US would have preferred to keep buried. Bradley Manning has been tortured and denied his constitutional rights. President Obama, Commander-in-Chief of the military, has already said he broke the law and has therefore irrevocably prejudiced the upcoming court martial as well as breaking – not for the first time – his election promise to protect whistleblowers.

We call for all charges against Bradley Manning to be dropped and for his immediate release. Blowing the whistle on war crimes is not a crime!

Opposing anti-abortionists in Cardiff

The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) held UK wide kerbside vigils on Saturday 28th April to mark the 44th Anniversary of the Abortion Act - a law allowing women to opt for legal, safe terminations. In Cardiff, they chose an area by a junction on the busy A470 near Whitchurch High School.

As most people with an ounce of common sense don't think that sending human rights back to the dark ages is very progressive, it didn't take long to muster support for a counter demo. Nearly fifty of us turned up, despite SPUC's best efforts to keep the location secret. When we contacted them, we were told that it was a 'members only' vigil. It would appear, judging by Saturday's turnout, that they only have fifteen active members in the Cardiff area.

The demonstration started at 11am. The SPUCkers looked quite shocked to see us as they collected their boards which read 'Abortion - A baby can live without it' and 'Hurt by abortion? Call xxxx'. They spread themselves out thinly around all corners of the junction, and we thought it only right and good to keep them company. Some of us sang songs while others waved their placards strategically. Many of us attempted to engage in debate with them, and while a few were pleasant, their general response was aggressive. They made childish digs at our appearance, called us various names, including 'murderers', made homophobic comments, and one even threatened to push someone under a truck! I'm sure this isn't a fair representation of god-fearing, church-going Catholics as these all claimed to be.

Boycott Workfare at Tesco

Workfare is a government scheme that forces people on benefits to work long hours for big corporations in order to maintain the pittance they depend on so as not to starve or end up on the streets.

Its notoriety came to the fore when an advert appeared on the JobCentre Plus website offering a permanent night shift position for 'JSA+expenses'. Since then, there have been various campaigns and protests aimed at highlighting the scheme's exploitative nature.

On Friday, 24th February 2012 some of South Wales Anarchists headed to Tesco Extra on Western Avenue in Cardiff with placards, banners, guitars and bilingual flyers to protest against the company's involvement.

Earlier in the week, after an enormous amount of public pressure, Tesco made a watery compromise regarding their involvement with a scheme that can only be described as endorsing slave labour. Under 25s are working for as little as £1.78 per hour, while those over 25 receive £2.25 per hour. The Tesco Facebook page had been bombarded with complaints for days, so the company tweaked their involvement in what can only be deemed as a clever PR stunt.

No justice for the Cardiff 3

Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) incompetence or collusion allows corrupt cops to walk free.

After five months of a trial costing ‘tens of millions of pounds’, eight police officers accused of perverting the course of justice have been able to simply walk away from Swansea Crown Court. They walked free not because a jury acquitted them – the jury didn’t get a chance to pass any verdict at all. They walked free because the CPS and police investigators made such serious and repeated failings in presenting the evidence that it was impossible for the trial to proceed.

This was one of the biggest and most serious cases ever tried in Wales. These police officers had ‘allegedly’colluded to imprison three men for a murder they knew they did not commit,making little effort to find the real killer. They fabricated evidence, and bullied witnesses into committing perjury. One witness recounted that police officers had told her they would

"nail those men and, if I didn't do what they said, they would nail me as well". 

 A forensic witness told of how detectives had ‘strengthened’ a witness account in order to implicate Abdullahi and Actie, two of the three men, known as the Cardiff 3,who were later sentenced to life in prison.

Evade? Avoid? Invade!

Last week a group of like-minded anti-capitalists from the Occupy movement walked through an open window into a massive, neglected space on Westgate Street in Cardiff. Originally built as the High Court and Inland Revenue, the occupation aptly became known as The Great Tax Invasion. Despite displaying Section 6s, we managed to keep a low profile until banners were dropped from the balconies on Saturday.

Our intentions? To protest against tax evasion and avoidance, to highlight the fact that so many buildings are unused and neglected and to transform the space into a much needed community and art project.

Well, it's hardly a secret that the big boys are dodging their tax bills to the tune of £billions, or that more and more folks are losing their homes while the chosen few build luxury hotels and apartment blocks, or even that the government's austerity measures are screwing much needed community and support groups into the ground. The main focus of The Great Tax Invasion collective is on the latter.

New squatted social centre in Cardiff

The Tredegar Hotel on Clifton Street has been squatted for a month now, by the Red and Black Umbrella Collective. We've had the cops and landlord break in illegally, and visit from fire fighters, arson police and South Wales Echo journalists who we told to fuck off because they are a reactionary right wing paper, and part of the vile Trinity Mirror group. Despite all this, somehow we're still here.

Cardiff hasn't had a squatted social centre since the P.A.D. in the Canton Health Centre in 2005, and not one that  that actually lasted in years, often in Cardiff squats are evicted within a week, often brutally. I guess we've been lucky, but we also have a strong core collective. Those of us living here have gone from hardly knowing each other, to a group of really good friends in no time. Since we've started here Occupy Cardiff camp has sprouted, we've taken them hot meals, and now we're even seeing a second squat opening in Cardiff in the old inland revenue building in the centre of town.

When worlds collide: Occupy and the 99 percent

"Occupy a job"

was the terse direct tweet sent to me after I had blogged about my day at Occupy Cardiff. At first, I was furious as I have been in continuous employment since 1965, but once I calmed down I realised this just reflected the fact that the tweeter was making assumptions, but in reality knew nothing about me. And that summarises the problem with the Occupy movement, almost nobody knows much about it or really understands it.

The mantra 'we are the 99 percent' has resonated with ordinary people throughout the western world. People in western nations are confused and angry as they see their standards of living reduced because of the economic crisis of the last three years. Their anger is directed against a tiny number of people and organisations of wealth and power who continue to increase their prosperity and their influence, whilst ordinary people see the deep reduction in their living standards. However, ordinary people perceive no outlet to express that depth of feeling and so the emergence of the Occupy movement has at last provided them a vehicle to carry their anger and frustration with the 1 percent.

An open letter to Leanne Wood AM

Dear Leanne,

I'm writing because I know you'll listen. Thank you so much for your message of solidarity to Occupy Cardiff the morning of our attempt to set up camp.

Thank you for coming out to support us, as you have so many other demonstrations. You were stood in the cold and the rain next to the Plaid Cymru deputy leader of Cardiff Council, Neil McEvoy. This tableau raises the theme I wish to address: contradictions.

Cllr McEvoy offered us the choice of decamping to Callaghan Square, invisible to the working class of Cardiff. This surprised me: McEvoy lobbied extensively for £60 million of public money to be handed to Callaghan Square – to the very kinds of big business, banks, insurance companies, mega-law firms, which caused the banking crisis and contribute to many of society's biggest injustices; this money being extracted from the budget for Cardiff's public services.

Open letter to Rodney Berman, leader of Cardiff Council

Dear Rodney Berman,

It is not often that the tide of world history ebbs around the moat of Cardiff Castle, but on Friday of last week a group of protesters set up camp just there as part of the “Occupy” movement that has been sweeping the globe. I’m sure you’ll have noticed these protest camps, whether at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London, or on Wall Street in New York. Media reports currently suggest that there are 951 camps in 82 different countries. The protests are a demand for justice in the finance sector, a revolt against the avarice of a feral banking system that has brought economic misery into the lives of millions of poor people. This industry refuses to change its own behaviour or shoulder the burden of responsibility for its actions, yet is endlessly bailed out and molly-coddled by national governments who stand and stare in hypnotized awe at the cheap tricks of recalcitrant gamblers.

The protest in Cardiff began with a rally at the Aneurin Bevan statue on Queen Street, and then moved to the grass outside Cardiff Castle, where the demonstrators set up camp and proceeded to hold a meeting. This was widely covered in local media, and it was clear to anyone watching that the protest was good natured and entirely peaceful. Despite this, and despite the fact that the camp was not even blocking the pavement, much less disrupting the life of the city or posing a public order threat, South Wales Police took the decision to forcibly clear the camp at around 9pm in the middle of a heavy rain storm, arresting six people as they did so.

Aggressive policing breaks up peaceful protest

There has been a spontaneous outpouring of energy in Cardiff from activists both experienced and new, as we work together to build an occupation in the centre of the city. Along with Marxists, anarchists, representatives of Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg and Greenham Common campers, there are many students and out of work young people in the group, most of whom have never been involved in political protest before.

The start of the occupation was set for Friday 11th November, to tie in with the global day of action and show solidarity with our fellow protestors across the world. A rally was held at 2PM at Nye Bevan, attended by around 150 people. We then moved to the castle and set up camp. While the tents were being pegged, police threatened protestors with arrest under a 1981 byelaw from the Public Health Act 1875, and Section 61 of the Criminal Justice & Public Order Act 1994, but the situation remained calm as television cameras and a large number of spectators stood by.

The occupation of Cardiff begins

Friday 11th November was the beginning of Occupy Cardiff. Taking its inspiration from the worldwide movement with numerous recent occupations, including one outside Saint Paul’s cathedral in London and Wall Street in New York based on the revolutionary Arab Spring. New York has had eyes on it the world over and the London occupation has been a subject of public scrutiny owing to disputes over land that the church originally gave and a resignation from a cantor over concerns of violence over the eviction. The movement claims to be occupations "of the 99%", a term used by demonstrators to signify the disparities within income and power; the working class being the 99% and the rulers the 1%. Occupy actions have sprung up here in the UK outside of London, in Bristol, Glasgow, Nottingham and elsewhere. So it was only a matter of time before the movement came to Cardiff.

After meeting at 2pm in the centre, the occupation started setting up tents just outside of the castle on Kingsway. There were signs from Cymedeithas yr Iaith (Welsh language society), and a broad spectrum of men and women of all ethnicities, religion and political beliefs were there. As were the local chapter of ‘Food Not Bombs’, a counter-culture movement that highlights food wastage by collecting unused and unwanted food from markets and such, and then cooking and serving it to people. Police presence was well felt at this point.

Occupy movement is coming to Cardiff

Protest camps are an old tradition on this island. The summer of 1549 and ‘Kett’s Rebellion’ was once known as ‘the camping time’ as rebels set up 18 campsites across England. Under the ‘Oak of Reformation’ commoners met to debate and demand an alternative government and condemned the first privatisation – the enclosure of the common land. Closer to our own time we recently marked the thirtieth anniversary of the famous 1981 Greenham Common Peace Camp when women marched from Wales to RAF Greenham Common to call upon the nation to choose the human race over the nuclear race.

On Friday 11th November activists in Cardiff will participate in a global day of action called by the Occupy Movement, gathering at 2 pm on Queen Street under the shadow of the statue of Aneurin Bevan, the founder of the National Health Service. The aim is to set up a city centre camp against the cuts, austerity and the lack of economic and political democracy in our society. The camp will be a space to meet new people, swap ideas and information, share survival tips, raise awareness of issues of poverty and deprivation; a visible symbol of resistance in the heart of the city.

“Tent City” may well prove an appropriate form of protest for this generation, the precariousness of life on a campsite mirroring the precariousness of our generation. Whether the ‘graduate with no future’, or the NEETs (Not in education, employment or training), or the thousands unemployed or trapped in part time or agency work, or the low waged and unwaged: A spectre is haunting the youth, the spectre of no future.

UK Uncut take action in Cardiff

In what was called the ‘emergency operation’, actions took place across the UK on Saturday 28th May, in protest at government cuts to the National Health Service. UK Uncut carried out 41 actions against banks and tax avoiders, some of which took the form of occupations.

In Cardiff the target was Topshop, the clothing store owned by retail giant the Arcadia Group, headed by Sir Philip Green, who has avoided the payment of millions of pounds of taxes. Following an anti-austerity rally dubbed "Busk against the Cuts" around 50 people simply walked down the main shopping street and straight past the shop's security guards, who were clearly overwhelmed by the number of protesters walking through the door. They then occupied the store for an hour, forcing it to close for at least half of that time.

It seemed to be the chants of the protesters that bothered Topshop the most. One of the more amusing aspects of the occupation was the rather pathetic attempt to drown out the chants by cranking up their own, awful ‘background’ music to ear splitting levels. In the end even the cops were begging them to turn it down. .

ConDem circus coming to town

Will conman Cameron face cheering or jeering crowds at the Tory party conference in Cardiff this March?

On the weekend of the 4th - 6th March 2011 Cardiff will be the venue for not one but two government party conferences. The Conservative Party will be hosting their Spring Forum at the Swelec Stadium, whilst the Welsh Lib Dems will be having their party conference just down the road at the Angel Hotel.

The Prime Minister himself, David Cameron will be be coming to make a keynote speech to the party faithful on the Saturday afternoon. We should give him the welcome he deserves to ensure he knows that his cost-cutting policies are not popular with the poorest in society. 


His speech is already pretty much written: “Thank you for your wonderful Welsh welcome… blah blah… the cuts are necessary and tough decisions have to be made by everyone… a reference to recent Ashes victory… If we all work as team we can get through this together… ". Toad-like Welsh conservative leader Nick Bourne will lead the standing ovation, before staking a subtle claim for his surely inevitable seat in the House of Lords.

Noam Chomsky to speak in Cardiff

On Saturday 12th March, Professor Noam Chomsky, the world-renowned linguist, scholar and political analyst, will deliver a talk on 'The current crisis in the Middle East' at St David's Hall, Cardiff.

Widely regarded as one of the most influential intellectuals of our age, deemed one of the fathers of modern linguistics, it was his opposition to the Vietnam War that really brought him to public attention. As an outspoken critic of the global hegemony of the United States and neo-liberal capitalism, he has become hugely well known despite little mainstream media coverage.

I emailed Noam Chomsky on 27th April 2010 inviting him to speak at Cardiff University. I didn't in my wildest dreams expect that he would get back to me, but he did. It wasn't a response from his secretary or assistant, but from the Professor himself, only a few hours after I emailed him. I knew he was the most cited living author, but now I realised he's probably the most modest living author too.

Towards a radical future

Radicals have being saying for years that the electoral system is a fake, and that real change cannot come through parliament. In the recent elections millions of people did not vote, and millions more voted reluctantly and without enthusiasm; most of these will not vote in the next election. They can see that, at bottom, there is little difference between Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives. Millions of people, perhaps the majority, can see this.

From the beginning, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have been condemned by radicals as wrong morally, militarily and politically. The West has lost in Afghanistan and is losing in Iraq. People are sick of these wars and do not believe in the politicians, politics and parties who sold them the war. Millions of people can see this.

Practically since its inception, Left politics has said that capitalism cannot create a better society, that it is based on exploitation and subject to crisis. The current economic crisis and the cuts that are hitting society have shown the brutal reality of capitalism. Millions of people can see this.

The radical analysis has been proved right. Yet, these millions are not drawn into the orbit of the radical politics. Why? Why are radicals isolated from the masses of people in society, with so little influence?

Cause a revolution: get on your bike

“Critical Mass is an organised coincidence. It happens when a lot of cyclists happen to be in the same place at the same time and decide to cycle the same way together for a while” - Cardiff Critical Mass

This Saturday 4th December is the anniversary of the revival of Cardiff Critical Mass. Critical Mass events have been happening in the city for many years but the regular meetings were restarted by a tireless group of activists in December 2009. It now meets by the Museum steps at 11am on the first Saturday of every month.

The first Critical Mass happened in San Francisco in 1992 and was originally known as 'Commute Clot'. A group of cyclists came together at a set time and cycled together as a block taking over the road and for a brief moment replacing the sounds and smells of combustion engines with music, the ringing of bells and the honking of bike horns. It has since spread to over 300 cities across the world. Although some individuals get more involved with printing and distributing flyers or discussing possible routes, Critical Mass is 'horizontal' and so has no leaders or 'organisers'.

Michael Albert to speak in Cardiff

Was Margaret Thatcher right when she said that there is no alternative to neo-liberal capitalism? Increasing numbers of people across the world are exploring more democratic and participatory ways of managing human affairs; economically, politically, culturally and personally.

This month the prominent radical thinker Michael Albert is coming over from the USA for a speaking tour of Britain, hosted by Project for a Participatory Society UK (PPS-UK). He will be speaking at Cardiff University on Monday 25th October at 12noon in the council chamber of the Glamorgan building (there's also a talk in Birmingham).

The talk is entitled "Participatory Economics: Imagining a Humane, Efficient, and Sustainable Economy". The author of several books on political economy, strategy for social change and societal vision, Participatory Economics (Parecon) is the economic vision that he and Robin Hahnel collaborated in putting together.