THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO

Soapstar Danny Dyer’s on his soapbox again as he criticised Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage in an expletive-filled tirade over Brexit, as the EastEnders actor turned on the former foreign secretary for his “stupid haircut” and the ex-UKIP leader for being “another p**** in a suit”.

He further extended his sympathies to the Prime Minister saying that Theresa May, bless her, just got that job by default and that Boris Johnson’s running around with his crazy haircut spouting bollocks.

The 41-year-old, who plays Mick Carter, has previously called the ex-PM David Cameron a “t***” for calling the EU referendum.

Of course, Danny Dyer’s simply being himself, could this man talk without using foul swearing language, and even though Danny Dyer is loved by millions, just because he can’t string two words together without cursing shouldn’t make him any less a person.

The fact is a huge proportion of the constituency don’t even know what Brexit is, but then politicians aren’t explaining it in words we can understand on such a pressing matter.

Our government is struggling, and everyone is pulling in many directions, we must be the laughing stock of the world, and Theresa May must dread waking up in the morning to an attack of no faith comments.

So, what’s the news here, that Danny Dyer has an opinion or that he uses too many swear words to describe people?

Well, the news is that we’re letting people, (the government) run around the country stealing from the state’s coffers, left, right and centre of billions, taking it right from the support and social care system many of the poorest rely on, so why shouldn’t I grab myself a f**king TV?

Because then that makes us no different to them, the only thing is one is a couple of hundred, while the other is a couple of billion, and the state of life for our country is most vulnerable.

Theresa May talks about uniting a divided Britain by forcing through something that slightly over half the people voting wanted, but will have huge life-changing repercussions on the whole population for years.

I’m sure Danny Dyer wasn’t really implying that we should loot and riot, where would that really get us? Aside from some jail time, no, our outrage should be aimed at the government and the rich fools who got us into this mess, looting and rioting are never okay, but while there’s unrest in the United Kingdom, people like Danny Dyer will imply it’s okay to do just that.

In the meantime, there’s pandemonium on our high streets, and it’s just another day and another high street store at risk as stores on our high streets start to close down, and most of our shops have gone online.

But most people want to try their garments on before they purchase them, they want to look at the quality. People like to wander around the shops, and perhaps pick up something they didn’t expect to see but liked.

Online is the future, sadly, and if this is the case, then looting will be a thing of the past.

Of course, everyone out there has a view and that’s why it’s called free speech, although there doesn’t appear to be much of it these days, and if Danny Dyer wants to give his views on the matter of government, that’s fine, but perhaps he should consider how he puts his opinion across. Being a cockney is one thing but opening your mouth and every other word that comes out is a swear word doesn’t make him look particularly smart, and instead of getting recognition for his words, all he will get is a big thumbs down.

Lord Lester has trousered nearly £10,000 in expenses since he was indicted for being a sex pest but between the accusation being made in November 2017 and May this year he has received £9,485 and served only 32 out of the 102 sitting days.

Peers can claim £300 a day solely for clocking in at the Lords, and the sum could be higher as the last five months’ worth of expenses has yet to be announced.

Lord Lester, 82, has not submitted any written questions since December 2017 and has not voted since January 2018, and it’s a sad fact that lords can proceed to claim thousands of pounds while hardly contributing to the work of the Lords, including those under investigation.

Lord Lester, however, will not be able to claim allowances from the point where he’s suspended because the peer faces a House of Lord’s embargo after telling a woman that if she slept with him he would make her a baroness within the year.

Married Lord Lester could be barred for four years following an inquiry found he breached the code of conduct by touching and harassing the much younger woman for sex.

He stood down as a Lib Dem human rights spokesperson and retired from the party whip after it was revealed in February that he was under investigation. The woman told the Lords Commissioner for Standards, Lucy Scott-Moncrieff, that she met Lord Lester in the course of her work relating to parliamentary affairs.

The Lords Privileges and Conduct Committee supported the commissioners’ decision that Lord Lester had breached the code of conduct. It advised he be barred until June 2022, but Lord Lester, a leading QC, categorically denied the allegations and criticised the inquiry as flawed.

However, Blackstone Chambers has stood by Lord Lester, a member and Liberal Democrat Lord indicted of sexual harassment, while another of its barristers has intervened to save his skin in the House of Lords.

Lord Lester was set to be barred by the House of Lords until the arbitration of Lord Pannick, a fellow Blackstone barrister, who got a majority to refer the matter back to the Committee for Privileges and Conduct. He did so on the grounds that its commissioner, former Law Society President Lucy Scott-Montcrieff, neglected to act in accordance with the principles of natural justice and fairness when dispensing with Lord Lester’s case.

Lord Lester, a human rights lawyer who in recent years has acted for Scientology, was accused by Jasvinder Sanghera, a campaigner against forced marriage and the patron of the charity Karma Nirvana, of harassing her a decade ago.

Jasvinder Sanghera abandoned her right to anonymity to help, she said, any other victims of Lord Lester to come forth.

Jasvinder Sanghera made her accusation in November last year. She alleged that when she missed her train following a meeting with Lord Lester at the House of Lords, he insisted she stay the night at his London home, and on the drive there, he kept repeatedly missing the gearstick with his hand and instead quite firmly put his hand on her right thigh.

Jasvinder thought that the first time it happened she assumed it must have been an accident, but when it continued she realised it wasn’t an accident, and she removed his hand and asked him to stop, but he simply smiled.

She felt incredibly uncomfortable knowing that she was on the way to staying at his home as he continued to grope her thigh for the length of the journey, despite her objections.

After Jasvinda had a cup of tea with the barrister and his wife, he showed her to her bedroom where he informed her that her bedroom was not far from his bedroom, which he insisted pointing out to her, telling her that he would not be far from her, so Jasvinda phoned a friend to say she felt trapped, and on their recommendation she wedged a chair against the door and went to bed fully clothed.

The next morning after Lord Lester’s wife had left the house, the peer came up behind her and put his arms around her waist. She shoved him away, but again he put his arms around her, but this time further up her body and she pushed herself away from him once again.

Lord Lester then stalked her around the kitchen as she begged him to stop and that she wanted to leave. Before driving her to the station, he told her that he had strong feelings for her and insisted on showing her his shed, surely a suspending misdemeanour all by itself.

In a subsequent meeting at the House of Lords, Lord Lester told Jasvinda Sanghera he would make her a baroness if she had sex with him, and that he could destroy her if she refused.

Jasvinda Sanghera alleged that Lord Lester then started pointing out peers and commenting about the reasons they had reached the positions they were in, suggesting that this was the reason they were in such a position, either that, or they just had good relations and good connections and so on.

He further supposedly made reference to the colour of the carpet and stated that only members of the House of Lords were permitted to walk on the red carpet and that commoners were only allowed to walk on the blue carpet.

The impression that he conveyed was that he was a man of authority who could make things happen and that Jasvinda was feeble in comparison.

Lord Lester informed her that unless she was a good girl who agreed to sleep with him, he would see that she never had a chair in the House of Lords and that there would be other consequences for her before making a number of improper sexual remarks, such as that he could see her becoming a demanding concubine.

Jasvinda Sanghera promptly phoned friends including a district judge, a senior British embassy representative and a director of the CPS to tell them what had occurred, all of whom endorsed her account to the committee as witnesses.

She was subsequently frozen out of Lord Lester’s campaign but chose not to make a complaint until last year, when she learned of how an intern in the House of Lords had reported a similar encounter against another peer and became convinced that she had to act.

In his defence, Lord Lester presented the ten-year delay as proof of its misrepresentation, but Jasvinda Sanghera described the suggestion surprisingly self-serving, given his field of expertise because Lord Lester failed to appreciate the thought method of victims.

Lord Lester further contended that Jasvinda Sanghera’s absence of apparent distress at his home implied that he was innocent and that she did not demonstrate how her seemingly normal appearance and behaviour were compatible with her accusations of precariously distressing sexual misbehaviour the night before.

He portrayed himself as a blissfully espoused man and displayed his immaculate record with women as additional confirmation of his integrity, and he stated that had he been blameworthy of these things that Jasvinda had accused him of, then there would presumably be other women coming forward – Wait for it!

Lord Lester might have outlined his professional work advocating equality for women, but of course, that doesn’t demonstrate his innocence. On the other hand, we could be asking ourselves why Jasvinda Sanghera waited ten years to make such an accusation, I suppose the reasons why masses of other people waited years to come forth in the many celebrity scandals because they were too afraid of the machinations it would bring.

A basic platform of Lord Lester’s argument and his subsequent appeal was the House of Lord’s Cod of Conduct, which he claimed was not intended to investigate sexual harassment and therefore inapplicable, and Lord Lester seems to think that whether or not the accusations were true, he shouldn’t have been subjected to investigation.

And in 2009 Lord Lester made a speech in support of the suspension of other misbehaving peers, in which he actively defended the process which he now endeavours to undermine.

Lord Lester further harried Jasvinda’s own staff, where he besieged her office sometimes several times a day, with demands that she should conclude the investigation quickly and vindicate him, calling the Blackstone barrister’s conduct grossly inappropriate. He was further criticised for leaking Jasvinda Sanghera’s name to another Lord, and Lord Lester called the investigation a nightmare.

Council house tenants on Universal Credit owe an average of two-and-a-half times as much in outstanding rent as claimants still on old benefits, and Townhall bosses warn they’re grappling to cope with the welfare overhaul, which sees housing benefit paid to tenants rather than direct to landlords as under the old regime.

Council tenants on Universal Credit owe on average £663 in rent, around two and a half times the amount owed by those still on housing benefit, £262, according to BBC Panorama, and in Flintshire, North Wales, the amount of rent owed to the council by people on the Government’s flagship welfare shake-up owe an average £1,424, six times the amount owed by those on housing benefit.

Flintshire has been a pilot for Universal Credit, with their other local authority co-workers presently coming into the full roll out of Universal Credit, and it’s been a bit of a mess.

The Government was advised difficulties could be unleashed over the housing benefit shake-up, and in 2011, Professor Paul Hickman, of Sheffield Hallam University, was asked by the Department of Work and Pensions to examine impacts of paying the money to claimants to pass on to landlords.

Recognising a growth in rent arrears, his investigation determined only 8 percent of tenants managed to pay their rent in full.

Professor Hickman told Panorama: “Were we ignored?

Some of what they said was listened to by the government but they were so committed to the course of rolling out Universal Credit, and whatever was uncovered in the investigation, the government were going to proceed to plough ahead anyhow.

The Department of Work and Pensions said more than 80 per cent of claimants are paid on time, and maintains there should be no problem with landlords getting rent payments. Meanwhile, a Resolution Foundation report shows Universal Credit is estimated to be more costly than the policy it succeeds thanks to reforms revealed in last month’s Budget.

Proposals announced by the Chancellor mean 200,000 more families will be better off due to the welfare reform, the think tank believes, and the moves announced by Philip Hammond will cut the number of working families losing out because of the changes from 3.2 million to three million.

Philip Hammond acted amid rising tension from Labour, Tory rebels and the Mirror’s Stop the Universal Credit Cruelty campaign.

The petition, launched in the run-up to the Government’s financial showpiece, set out three possibilities: redesign Universal Credit to be fit for purpose, axe it in support of the old system if Universal Credit is unfixable, or introduce a brand new system.

Universal Credit rolls six welfare benefits, child tax credit, Working Tax Credit, Jobseeker’s Allowance, Income Support, Employment and Support Allowance and Housing Benefit, into one single payment. The roll-out is scheduled for completion in December 2023.

The difficulty is with these people getting into arrears because either Universal Credit are not paying them on time or they simply don’t pay it, then the Council’s and Housing Association will evict them, then we will find more families out on the streets with their children, I bet Social Services are rubbing their hands together.

And more than half of homeless families across England are in work but rising rents and the shortage of social housing is forcing more families into makeshift accommodation, and more than 33,000 families in temporary accommodation are holding down a job despite having nowhere permanent to live, a figure that has risen by 73 per cent since 2013, when it was 19,000 families.

One single mother, Mary Smith, who works full-time in a shoe shop said she and her three sons had been stuck in a cruel succession of precarious makeshift accommodation for two years after being evicted from their private property, and they have been unable to afford to rent anywhere else.

She’s amongst thousands of working households in low-paid, part-time or contract employment that are no longer able to afford rents and are therefore being forced into squalid and overpopulated makeshift accommodation.

Losing a tenancy is now the single biggest reason for homelessness in the country, accounting for more than a quarter of all households accepted as homeless in the last year. It comes following an investigation exposed at least 310,500 households in England have been waiting to be moved into social homes for more than half a decade, with more than 100,000 stuck on waiting lists for more than 10 years and some waiting for as many as 18 years.

With the country having a backlog of 3.91 million homes, meaning 340,000 new homes need to be constructed each year until 2031, a figure significantly greater than the government’s current target of 300,000 homes yearly.

Ms Smith and her three sons, now aged 18, 19 and 21, had lived in a privately rented home in Watford for 13 years when the landlord evicted them two years ago, forcing them to move into a hostel.

They were stuck in an absolute hovel of a rat-infested hostel, where food would get robbed. Ms Smith almost lost her job when they first became homeless because of transport connections to work that were so bad, and the family spent three months in the hostel before being relocated into temporary accommodation, and they have since been relocated to two other temporary properties, which Ms Smith said was destabilising for both her and her sons.

Despite working full-time and recently getting a wage rise, her pay is not enough to rent a property, and it’s like a vicious cycle for the family, living in properties that are freezing and have mould creeping up the walls with the uncertainty of their future.

Ms Smith’s children have had to go through a lot, which means that they haven’t been able to attain their full potential because there’s simply no safety net for them.

Ms Smith loves her job that she’s worked in for four and a half years, and she’s just accepted a 40 hour a week temporary to cover the manager, which meant that she got a pay rise, but she can’t see any benefit from the salary if it’s still not enough to secure a tenancy anywhere.

Getting a pay rise doesn’t make her any better off because it simply means she gets less help, and she still struggles to put food on the table, and she’s a proud person and doesn’t like asking for help, but it’s from the help of friends that they got through.

And it shocking that even when families are working every hour they can, they’re still being made to live through the austere reality of homelessness, and in many instances, these parents who work all day or night, then have to return to a crowded hostel or B&B where their whole family are made to share a room, a room that has no space for ordinary family things like cooking, playing or doing homework.

This was once a country where the streets were covered in gold, well at least in London, the land of opportunity, which is now slightly ironic because now we see streets that are dirty and poverty-stricken, and it’s appalling how we’re sinking back into the eighteenth century of Dick Whittington.

And we can’t let struggling families slide through the cracks created by our housing crisis because this isn’t the eighteenth century, and our government need to urgently come up with a new plan so that social housing can genuinely deliver the affordable homes that we so urgently require.

Everyone deserves a safe and decent place to live, but Theresa May said that the best way out of poverty was to work, she further said that she was going to make this country work for everyone, so what happened Theresa May?

But our government believe that they can justify their mismanagement by proposing new laws, well, it doesn’t actually work like that, but then they knowingly created this situation, and then they use guerilla tactics, then hit, run, and hide because they’re plagued with their own greed, the most single destructive human activity because with obsession you keep coming back to the same problem and they never come up with a solution.

And isn’t it strange how there are constantly reports in the newspapers about homelessness, but despite the statistics, the government will still tell you it’s not a problem.

Figures revealed that 4,751 people slept rough across England on any given night in 2017, with a 15 per cent rise compared to the previous year and that more than doubled in 2010. Last year 57,890 households were accepted as homeless in England, and in Scotland, 34,100 applications were assessed as homeless and in Wales 9,210 households were threatened with homelessness.

Our government doesn’t believe in social housing and they want it exclusively in the private sector, but the way they’re going about it leaves a sour taste because it chokes new social builds, stirs up the market for private landlords who like mortgage pawnshops are saying no thank you very much not because of arrears but because fair rent figures rarely corresponds with rent required when you have a tiny stock.

If you take these arrears, waiting times for benefits, social loans, incorrectly determined work capability tests, tribunal costs for reversal of decisions, sanctions, money spent on donating to food banks, provider contractors, et cetera, but what the government say they have saved and what is reality, is two different things.

In the meantime, a Resolution Foundation report shows that Universal Credit is set to be more costly than the system it succeeded thanks to changes revealed in last months Budget. It was never about saving hardworking taxpayers money, instead, it was all about an ideological class war started by the Tories against the working poor and those who don’t and can’t work for whatever reason.

So, when you get these Tory supporters backing the Tories, insisting it’s for the good of the taxpayer, they’re either exaggerating or they’ve fallen for the propaganda.

When people were on the old system, rent was paid straight to the landlord, but now it’s paid straight to the claimant who then has the responsibility to pay it to the landlord. Now, not everyone’s the same, some of these people have some kind of disability, and when I say disability, there is a broad spectrum of disabilities, not all disabilities are the same.

Countless people in our society have an addiction of one sort or another. I’m not sugar coating it, it’s a huge problem in our society, however, addiction is frequently linked to mental health problems, probably started as a way to cope with feelings that person felt and was powerless to deal with in any other way, therefore it then becomes a disability.

But some people are too keen to judge, and we’re all sinful of this at one time or another in our lives, accusing alcoholics and addicts of wasting their money on a fix rather than paying their rent, but actually people are getting into arrears because once they go onto Universal Credit they have to wait 5-6 weeks for their first payment.

That first payment, four weeks worth would then be only for the upcoming month, so those first 5-6 weeks will still be outstanding, so nothing to do with poor budgeting or that the money is paid to people and not direct to the landlords.

Yes, people could be setting up direct debits as soon as their rent money gets into their account and several do, but they would still be in arrears because they don’t get any money on Universal Credit for 5-6 weeks and during that time Housing Benefit is not paid into the claimants account, which makes them in arrears.

Of course, most or all of it is backdated but by that time they have been evicted or a seeking of possession order served to them, that’s enough to make you either go insane or turn to addiction.

Things have shifted quite a bit in the last ten years, but there appears to be a deficit of understanding or just a deficiency of interest where people are concerned, and things are much different for people, now that the benefits system has changed.

Benefits aren’t quite as plentiful as they were on the old system, plus the cost of living keeps going up, however, benefits have been suspended at the same rate or cut, and judging people based on when things were much better is why maybe some people out there get confused.

And there’s going to be more chaos and mess through the government’s narcissistic clowns in office due to this Universal Credit, and people are going to be in such a dangerous place and before long we will start hearing of more deaths and mass homelessness.

Sadly, the government’s ego comes before the fall, the problem is, they won’t back down on this Universal Credit debacle and it’s Joe Public that will take the fall for it.

Conservatives win general elections but Labour never lifts its hands in submission by declaring the nation has expressed its policies it so bitterly opposed that must be embraced. Rather, Jeremy Corbyn promises to save the NHS, better salaries, unshackle trade unions and renationalise privatised industries such as the railways and the Royal Mail.

When Labour was triumphing at the polls, it was the same response from Theresa May, who challenged Tony Blair and Gordon Brown every inch of the way. The Conservative Prime Minister rejected article by article, bill by bill, Labour’s agenda.

Then, when the Tories fell back into power in 2010, they sauntered through Parliament’s lobbies to turn off health spending taps, scrap new schools and wield a cleaver at the welfare state. MPs standing up, win or lose, for what they believe, whether we agree with them or not, is how politics and government work.

The beaten party in a vote seeking to shift public opinion in future is perfectly legal. Jeremy Corbyn is entitled to demand an early general election to change last year’s decision, and Theresa May is within her rights to resist.

So the worst debate of them all against another Europe vote is that it wouldn’t be democratic. But it would be, the people are entitled to change their mind in a democracy, and Boris Johnson’s brother Jo, a Tory with sincerity unlike the dishonest ex-Foreign Secretary, revealed in his atomic leaving address how Theresa May’s in-out Brexit hokey cokey would be significantly damaging for Britain than remaining in Europe, while the hardline Leaver’s lies are fantasy.

The appearance of the harsh truth is why a Populus poll for pro-European group Best for Britain finds that 65 per cent of voters back the British public having the final say on the reality of going or staying, and our country’s best chance is in Europe yet campaigners will tell you that only 120 of 650 MPs would vote today for a saviour vote.

Everyone is allowed to change the minds of their own understanding, but it’s the consistent barraging and harassment by the moaners and segments of the media that gets on people’s nerves, and we should all have another election, but then we will vote to leave again, and then we’ll have another election and we will keep doing it until all the leavers are so fed up with voting that they won’t try anymore and we will stay in, thank god for democracy!

But isn’t that then like taking out a two year fixed agreement on something and then six months later you change your mind?

The current situation that we’re in is that Theresa May set out to subvert a genuine leave from the start, and EU leaders knew this, but they knew they had the upper hand against a weak leader, and the only reason David Cameron gave the people a referendum was to quell the EU critics so that they could move onto the next stage, consolidation of Europe, one flag one Parliament, one leader, a United States of Europe, should Brexit fail then that’s precisely what is going to happen and no-one in the United Kingdom will be able to stop it.

Greater Anglia has introduced ‘Offer Me A Seat’ badges after the concept got thousands of comments of support on social media, and Twitter and Facebook users gave their opinions and comments leading to the idea of three badges, now accessible to those who may require a seat, but may not feel confident enough to ask.

One of the badges says ‘Not all disabilities are visible. Please offer me a seat.’ Another option says ‘Please offer me a seat. My need may not be visible.’

A third badge is for railway personnel to wear, which says ‘Not all disabilities are visible. Can I help you?’

The badges are now available from customer information desks at Norwich, Ipswich, Colchester, Chelmsford, Shenfield, London Liverpool Street, Harlow Town and Cambridge stations and via Customer Relations, and if someone is in a wheelchair or has a white cane or guide dog, it’s evident to everyone they may require a little help when travelling on the railway.

But, not all disabilities or conditions are visible, such as MS, arthritis or early stages of pregnancy and not everyone feels comfortable or confident to request help if their condition is not visible, and the idea behind the badges is to make it easier for customers who need assistance to get help.

Staff do strive to do their best to give the customers the assistance they require but the badges will make it easier to distinguish people who want their help, and if passengers see someone wearing one of the new badges, it’s hoped they will offer to give up their seat if the train is busy.

Hopefully, this will be spread out over the entire network of travel, including buses and underground stations. Of course, pregnancy is not a disability, but its simply nice for someone to give up their seat for a pregnant lady, and in the initial stages of pregnancy, many women feel exhausted and really nauseous on their way to work.

Of course, pregnancy is a choice, not a disability, but as human beings, we should be generous enough to give up our seats, particularly those seats next to the toilets.

A disability may not be visible but that doesn’t mean that person is not disabled, not everything is visible in life, but as human beings, we should at least put ourselves forward to be sensitive to a person’s disability, and just because we can’t see COPD or Cancer does not mean they’re not disabled.

Sadly there will still be some people who will not give up their seats even if these people do have badges, but then this is an example of what’s wrong with our society.

If someone suffers from profound deafness, which is not visible, does that mean they’re not disabled? If a person suffers from Epilepsy, MS, ME or the early stages of Multiple Sclerosis, does this mean they’re not disabled?

All these things are hard to determine as disabilities, and just by looking at a person you would have no idea, that’s what the idea of these badges are for, although there are no checks done when a person requires one of these badges so there’s no guarantee of misapplication.

And studies have determined that those with hidden disabilities and infirmities, or those undergoing treatments, can frequently find it challenging to get a seat when they need one.

The new badges were tested by more than 1,200 people, with the preponderance reporting easier journeys and feeling more confident asking for a seat, and a badge and card will help make a substantial difference to the lives of people undergoing drug therapy or with longer-term conditions or disabilities.

When it is launched, the Transport for London (TfL) will become the leading European transport provider to officially identify invisible impairments and conditions in such a way, and thorough analysis of the findings of the trial is to be completed before the badge and card are implement in the United Kingdom in the spring.

It’s a little before 8 am at Kings Cross St. Pancras underground station, and rush hour is in full, turbulent flow. With over 90 million travellers joining or exiting the interchange each year, Kings Cross is second only to Waterloo as the Tube network’s busiest station.

As po-faced passengers flow through the barriers in their hundreds and thousands, towards carriages travelling all over the capital, and wherever they’re going, of course, most won’t get anywhere near to a seat. It’s a fate they’re begrudgingly resigned to, but James McNaught has a trick up his sleeve. Or rather, attached to his lapel.

James McNaught was one of 1,000 volunteers embarking on a six-week trial, which officially began on the Transport for London’s new ‘Please offer me a seat’ badges.

Bright blue and impossibly polite, the pins are meant to inform other travellers that the wearer has a hidden infirmity, illness or injury which makes it hard for them to stand for the duration of a Tube or bus journey.

James McNaught, who regularly travels from his home in Camden to Westminster, where he works as a white tie-wearing doorman at the House of Lords, was one of the first to sign up.

The 46-year-old made headlines for his homemade ‘cancer on board’ badges, created following treatment for throat cancer made it near-impossible for him to vocalise his need for a rest on the underground, especially since regular morphine doses gave him the impression of being drunk.

James McNaught’s personal campaign was a success, so he sees no reason TFL’s comprehensive, catch-all version shouldn’t be correspondingly effective.

Sometimes it actually isn’t visible to other patrons that you may have something wrong with you, and people could find it pretty awkward to have to disclose their medical problem to a stranger on a train.

His cancer badges worked almost every time, and the feedback was incredible, and these could help an awful lot of people get around without having to suffer, and despite improvement, the public transport in London and around the capital isn’t an easy thing to navigate for anyone in less than perfect health.

More and more stations have wheelchair access, and there are assigned priority seats on each tube carriage for the pregnant, elderly and infirm, but on a hot, packed rush hour journey, these stratagems are not enough.

Most disabled people with or without an invisible illness want access so that they can get about in London or to just be able to visit London for the day, but there are not enough lifts at the stations. London Transport has made stations a little more accessible in regards to lifts, but there are still not enough to get around London.

As a disabled user myself, if I want to travel to London I have to take somebody with me because I cannot access all the stations because there are not enough lifts on the underground, and frequently I have to use the bus which can take hours, and after my son walking me all the way around London we finished up in Tottenham Court Road for dinner, but even though there are lifts at Tottenham Court Road we would have had to change at Bank tube station where there is only a lift on the DLR which wasn’t the part that we needed, so we had to get a bus from there to Finsbury Park, and then from there another bus to Algate to get home, which ended up taking us two hours.

It’s a fabulous idea giving out badges to people with disabilities but if there are not enough lifts to accommodate then how are they suppose to access parts of the interface without lifts?

London’s Tube system is not currently anything like fully accessible to wheelchair users or people with mobility problems. Transport for London (TfL) offers various excuses for the lack of accessibility provision on the Tube.

 

But as the Crossrail project has shown, engineering solutions to a broad array of problems can be discovered and executed in the most challenging of situations.

TfL maintains that around a quarter of Tube stations have step-free access. That amounts to around 67 out of 270 stations (compare this with Berlin’s 100 out of 173 stations). But in Zone 1 there are just nine stations with step-free access from street to platform, and of these only four stations are step-free from the street to all trains running through those stations.

This means that a wheelchair user who wants to get around London is pretty unlikely to find the Tube at all useful, particularly if the journey involves Zone 1, or if lifts are out of order, which is often the case. Instead, wheelchair users rely massively on buses to get around.

There are several good points about accessibility on the Tube. Staff are well-trained and usually accommodating and helpful. There have been some developments in the last couple of years, including more lifts, more raised sections on platforms allowing step-free access from the platform onto the train, and the provision of manual boarding ramps at some stations. But these developments are proceeding at a snail’s pace and still leave three-quarters of the Tube interface totally inaccessible.

TfL maintains that each bus is accessible, and indeed all buses are furnished with wheelchair ramps. But there are still several problems for wheelchair users attempting to use buses, with unhelpful drivers, defective or unusable ramps, and baby-buggies obstructing the wheelchair space.

Even if the bus flotilla were as thoroughly accessible as TfL would like us to believe, it still typically takes about twice as long to get anywhere by bus (and often even longer) compared with the comparable tube journey, so why are wheelchair users excluded from the Tube system, and made to undertake lengthy, complex and usually stressed trips by bus?

TfL gives various explanations for this, citing geography, geology and architecture as the underlying causes for the lack of accessibility provision. Of course, there will always be a few small or restricted old stations where installation of lifts is going to be unfeasible.

But, as the Crossrail project has revealed, engineering miracles can be performed in the most unlikely, cramped and complex conditions. The recent boring of a Crossrail tunnel in the extremely narrow gap (nicknamed ‘the eye of the needle’) between a Northern Line tunnel and an escalator shaft at Tottenham Court Road Tube Station confirms that we have the skills, capital and technology to master difficulties of geography, geology and architecture.

What is lacking it appears is the inclination to create and implement solutions to make all of London’s Tube stations accessible. This will is lacking because an accessible Tube system is not regarded as a sufficiently important precedence for the investment of the needed resources, resources which would cost a small portion of the funds needed for Crossrail.

It is a principle enshrined in the Equality Act of 2010 that it is unlawful when rendering goods or services to treat anyone less favourably for a reason related to their disability. We must have an accessible Tube system. Disabled and older people should have the same priority to travel by Tube as everyone else in society, and it is not right that we should be so excluded from the largest and quickest means of getting around London.

For wheelchair users, travelling on the tube can take a lot longer, and if you can’t use the stairs your journey will take four times as long.

The lack of step-free access to the underground means a journey on the Jubilee line from Baker Street to Bond Street takes 33 minutes for people with disabilities, just two minutes for able-bodied passengers.

If a disabled person was to travel from Bond Street towards Westminster you’ll discover that what is a 5-minute journey for most, is another story for those in a wheelchair. The nearest tube station from Bond Street is Green Park, so they would have to get there in order to travel to Westminster.

It’s actually easier to take the pavement, than the bus, buses aren’t as reliable. Frequently the ramps don’t work, or there’s a buggy in the wheelchair area, or the driver is not being helpful. So what should have taken ten minutes, took twenty, and in London there’s a lack of dropped curbs, and it’s part of a disabled person’s everyday life.

But when they’re confronted with a time deadline, and they’ve got to get somewhere fast, and they’re challenged with a shortage of lowered curbs, that’s the reason it takes so long, then it gets very frustrating for them.

Yet, TfL has promised to have more than half of the rail and underground stations accessible by 2018, saying that London has one of the most accessible transport systems in the world, and supposedly they’re spending hundreds of millions of pounds in making stations and trains more accessible.

But for some that’s simply not enough, and even though it’s a move in the right direction, it’s not significant enough to open up the rest of London because at the moment only one in ten stations in zone 1 are accessible, so the West End is a no-go zone for most wheelchair users, so they can’t socialise with friends or family.

But squeezing onto a Northern line carriage, travelling south through the City of London, passengers appear sceptical of this new badge assistant because most people have their eyes elsewhere, reading books, looking blankly at their phones or catching up on a moment’s extra sleep.

Those that are alert will size this disabled person up dubiously as a woman shifts in her seat, seemingly weighing up whether to give up her seat because of the badge but in the end, settles on a firm NO! Which is amusing, they were considering it, but then they wouldn’t move…

The badge is a great idea because I’m guessing a bunch more people will now offer a disabled person a seat, if not for anything else but out of guilt, although they’re a lot of people out there that will gladly give up their seats simply because they have an ounce of humanity!

Part of the appeal of the new badge, which will also come with a TFL card displaying the same slogan, should users prefer to only attract attention to themselves at specific times, will be its non-specific wording, allowing patrons with any condition, from chronic fatigue to sports injuries, to apply for one without having to disclose the nature of their condition.

Its ambiguity could further, of course, be a disadvantage. As with TFL’s triumphant ‘baby on board’ badges, which began in 2005 to allow pregnant women a greater opportunity at getting seats, and are now given out more than 300,000 times a year, the new badges will be accessible through a simple online application process, or in person at stations.

Unlike applying for a Blue Badge disability parking permit, which may involve a face-to-face assessment, there’s nothing to prevent scammers taking advantage, but TFL are confident they’ll be few and far between, and a tiny price to pay for supporting those in actual need.

People can be narrow-minded on the Tube, they’ll see someone in need and perhaps pose to be sleeping or avoid their gaze, but the official badges eliminate any of that awkwardness, and it might seem like such a small thing to some but to a disabled person it gives them freedom which feels amazing and stops someone from having anxiety attacks, and most disabled people won’t even travel in the rush hour as it’s such an ordeal, but these badges could actually change that.

More money for schools, the NHS and Universal Credit were among the eye-catching announcements in Philip Hammond’s budget speech, but as always, the devil’s in the detail.

Once you get past the poor jokes, the glistening knickknacks and the claims that austerity is over, all that’s left is the small print, and guess what? Some of it will leave you and your family worse off, and if you were able to trawl through all 106 pages of the Budget Red Book, plus the independent Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR)’s assessment of the measures of it, here are some things you would spot.

Britain’s poorest people won’t be any better off because buried in a chart of small print notes that the Budget won’t really make the poorest 20 per cent any better off, and this chart explains the total impact of all tax, welfare and public service reforms since 2015.

Look at it and you’ll notice the poorest people are on the left, and they utterly flatline in the analysis. While the wealthiest 10 per cent is taking a hit, it’s the middle-class people, those in the top 30 per cent or 40 per cent who will benefit the most, getting up to £750 a year.

The welfare, housing and justice departments are all being slashed and Philip Hammond made a big play of pumping more money into defence and the NHS, but he was a little reticent about yet more swingeing cuts being imposed on some of the biggest frontline Whitehall departments.

The Department for Work and Pensions is being expected to cut its budget from £6 billion to £5.4 billion in 2019/20 (not including benefit payments), and the Ministry of Justice is being cut from £6.3 billion to £6 billion, and the housing and communities section of Whitehall is being cut from £2.6 billion to £2.3 billion.

That’s despite a welfare crisis, a prison crisis and a housing crisis. Why are they doing this?

That plastic tax will take four years to come in, and Chancellor Philip Hammond insisted he will become a world leader in tackling the scourge of plastic littering on our planet.

Not only did he resist any proposal to tax plastic cups. His big signature move, a tax on packaging that doesn’t have at least 30 per cent recycled plastic will only come in April 2022.

He made no mention of the date in his address, but it’s all in the small print, and this speaks volumes about the Treasury’s priorities, as China, Vietnam and Thailand shut their doors on Britain’s plastic waste, the Chancellors reply is to keep calm and carry on.

The tax on Amazon, Google and Facebook will cost tech monsters a pittance, and according to the OBT forecast, Google and other online colossi could pay an insignificant £30 million each under Philip Hammond’s new tax, and the figure is a mere pittance for these large international assemblies, and the percentage of tax paid by the big five tech giants has halved since 2013, but the new tax won’t come into force until 2020 at which time the tech monsters will start to enjoy a 2 per cent cut in their corporation tax rate.

And it raises even less than we imagined. If you thought the £400 million raised from the Digital Services Tax didn’t look like much, then don’t look at the back of the Budget book. It reveals £400 million a year is only what it’ll raise in 2022. Next year it raises to £5 million, and in 2020/21 it only raises £275 million.

Crack cocaine of gambling stakes will stay above £2 for another year and campaigners blasted a six-month delay to cutting stakes on fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) to £2.

The move to cut maximum stakes on the crack cocaine of gambling from £100 had been expected to come into force next April, but the Budget small print reveals the move will not take place until October.

The Campaign for Fairer Gambling announced it was “unacceptable”, and Labour’s Carolyn Harris, who chairs Parliament’s cross-party group on FOBTs, was “appalled” at the “wholly unjustifiable” delay.

But a Treasury source stated: “It’s clearly a judgement call. This we think strikes the right balance.”

The extra money for schools can’t be used on pens, books and toilet paper, as Philip Hammond announced an additional £400 million for struggling schools to pay for the little extras they can’t afford.

Countless parents will have sighed relief at the announcement, after getting begging letters from their kids’ teachers, begging for money to pay for such extravagances as pens, books and toilet paper. But they’ll be disappointed. The money is capital spending, ring-fenced for building maintenance and buying equipment. That means schools will be permitted to purchase iPads with the additional money, but not pens and paper.

The Queen is getting a pay increase. The Sovereign Grant, the money given by the government to assist the Queen in her royal duties is going up. Last year the figure was 76.1 million, this year it’ll go up to an eye-watering £82.4 million.

The size of the grant is normally 15 per cent of the government’s revenue from Crown Estates, but last year she got a 10-year increase to 25 per cent to pay for essential refurbishment of Buckingham Palace.

There’s going to be a tax on liquefied tobacco for the first time because the government is set to propose a particular tax on heated tobacco, and the products will be taxed at the same rate as hand-rolling tobacco from April 2019.

The article basically said the tax would also apply to vape fluid, this is not the case and duty on rolling tobacco amounts to about £13.40/unit £0.45/g, all depending on where you purchase it from.

The Tories have finally confirmed they’re delaying Universal Credit, and the rollout of the despised six-in-one benefit will officially close in December 2023, the ninth delay following its last end date of March 2023, and it may only end in June 2024, because the Office for Budget Responsibility assumes it will take six months longer than the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) states.

Delaying the rollout will actually save the DWP £1 billion because thanks to a £1.7 billion-a-year package of help, it’s now more costly than the legacy system would have been. There’s also a suggestion that the funds will be saved because, by delaying Universal Credit, less will be given over to claimants in transition payments.

No Deal Brexit will have a severe blow on the economy and The Office For Budget Responsibility admits No Deal Brexit will have a severe impact, and if an agreement is not reached in time, it could have a drastic short-term impact on demand and supply in the economy.

It is next to impossible to calibrate this kind of situation because of the lack of exemplar as Philip Hammond announced another £500 million in the no-deal Brexit preparations, taking the sum to £4.2 billion.

The Chancellor boasted of “firepower to intervene” if the economy requires more assistance in the coming months with £15 billion of “headroom” to deploy, there’s no Brexit dividend, only years of widespread torture.

 

And the Brexit divorce bill will be even higher than thought. Again, this is one from the independent OBR, not the Budget report itself, and the experts have revised their estimate up from £37.1 billion to £38.7 billion.

It’s been revised up because of a weaker pound-euro exchange flow, and changes to contribution methods and timetables, and it should be noted that an earlier account of the article stated the divorce bill would be £47 billion, it is understood that this is the sum paid to the EU institutions over the following five years.

A questionable Tory home buying scheme is being reestablished, and it’s costing £9 billion. So, you’d imagine a package of help for first-time buyers costing nearly £9 billion might have been mentioned in the Budget address, but, no, you have to delve into the documents to discover the Help to Buy equity loan scheme is being re-established for two years from April 2021.

The scheme was previously slammed for supporting buyers who were already well-off and allowing a five-year “time bomb” of fees to build up. This time it will be accessible only to first-time buyers correcting an important defect in the old system, but there are still some components of unfairness.

Londoners will be able to use it to get a home worth £600,000, while in the North East it’s only accessible on homes worth £186,100, and the scheme’s huge cost on its own will draw awareness.

And lastly, one cut that isn’t even in the small print, this one’s not in the Budget itself, but the release from the Office of Budget Responsibility. It states capital spending, long-term one-off hits on building plans and the like has been cut, and the Treasury hasn’t spelt it out. Departmental capital spending has further been cut from 2019-20 onwards, a decision that does not appear on the Treasury’s scorecard of policy measures.

It’s rather disturbing that we’re leaving the EU and while there are a number of people out there voted out, in Liverpool they have a work scheme for the young that pays a living wage financed by the EU, the docks and the city revitalisation is financed by the EU, in fact, most things now are financed by the EU.

When we finally do come out of the EU who will finance those things that the EU fund? Will our Tory government fund it, of course, they won’t, and we will end up in an enormous economic depression, and we should be concerned for our children and grandchildren who will inherit this mayhem.

It was a genuinely bad idea to enter the EU, but it will be an even worse idea to leave, better the devil you do know, than the devil you don’t!

Does everyone think that the EU countries will roll out the red carpet and want to trade with us after we leave? Of course, they won’t, they will make it as challenging as they can and Great Britain will end up in an enormous economic depression, and France has already stated they would roll out the red carpet for businessmen retreating from the United Kingdom.

The negotiations of a new agreement will clearly unfold a Pandora’s box of demands, and this is going to be a tremendous test for British politicians, diplomats and officials, and they will need to build up various alliances, offensive and defensive.

And then there’s Theresa May and her loony tunes party telling everybody that they’re ending austerity and that they’ve slashed expenditure right across the board, and of course, it’s worked so well – we’ve seen the National debt sore, and they’re spending more to implement their strategies than they raise, and then you end up with nothing but homelessness and child poverty to show for it.

Philip Hammond announced that the age of austerity was finally coming to an end and that they’ve reached a defining moment on a long hard journey after repairing the damage to the public finances, right now Pinocchio has a smaller nose than Hammond has…

…And he’s promising them a glowing future after years of constraint.

Yet, Philip Hammond warned that an emergency Budget would be required if Britain leaves the EU without a settlement, but Downing Street announced all spending plans in the Budget will go forward irrespective of Brexit.

Arguably he’s just about got to the absolute minimal definition of ending austerity but it’s certainly nothing like a bonanza for the rest of the public services because most of the proposed welfare cuts are still in the works, and with growth remaining persistently low and Brexit pulling down our economy, it’s obvious there are significant problems that still have to be tackled.

There’s a plaster on the Budget that needs to be taken off so that major surgery can begin because this is a fantasy pre-Brexit Budget based on theoretical numbers.

 

Philip Hammond’s at it again with his derogatory remarks as he declared that there was going to be a £400 million gift to schools as if schools weren’t insulted enough by the Tories cuts, but now the Chancellor is telling schools they can buy a little extra with the Budget cash, while still starving them of necessary long-term funds.

Our education system has been brought to its knees by Tory cuts and now this £400 million one-off payment for education has rebounded spectacularly as teachers and parents laid into the Chancellor over his condescending remarks.

The Chancellor is completely out of touch with the mayhem his party has caused, as they plunge schools into chaos where teachers and parents have had to beg for necessary supplies such as pens and books, and his paltry payment was faced with a series of harsh tweets under the mocking hashtag #littleextras.

Teachers and pupils are being condescended and devalued by Philip Hammond because he thinks that a few little extras will make up for years of underfunding, this government simply doesn’t have a clue, especially when Philip Hammond maintained that he had to give a little gratuity to every school which he hoped would be welcomed.

He must have a huge grin on his face because he truly believes in his own little fantasy world that this will be welcomed, and his remarks were in the style of a 1950’s husband who has given his wifey some pin money, but this money wouldn’t be able to fund the things that schools are absolutely desperate for, including better provisions for children with special needs or teacher’s wages.

A pack of dry wipe pens or glue sticks are essentials that a lot of schools are finding harder to afford, and photocopying costs a fortune, and because schools don’t have enough textbooks they have to do a lot more photocopying.

Most of the school’s computers are on their last legs, and they’re short of chairs, so they have to take them from other rooms if they can, and half the gas taps in labs haven’t worked in a while, and it’s utterly disrespectful to parents and teachers that the Chancellor speaks about little extras when school funds have been cut by billions and head teachers are begging parents for money for essential supplies like books and stationery.

Full-time education is compulsory for all children aged 5 to 18, either at school or otherwise, with a child entering primary education during the school year they turn 5. Children between the ages of 3 and 5 are entitled to 600 hours per year of optional, state-funded, pre-school education. This can be provided in “playgroups”, nurseries, community childcare centres or nursery classes in schools.

What happens if a child does not attend school education?

As a parent raising a child, that parent is liable for ensuring that the child is being educated, whether or not you have parental responsibility for the child, that person or parent can be prosecuted and fined if the child is on a school register but does not attend or does not attend regularly.

If it’s compulsory for a child to attend school, and this is a government policy, the government should pay for that said child to attend school, this should include school uniform, pens, books and anything associated inside school because this is a government policy to systematise our children, not a life choice by the parent.

If the government are not able to fully fund schools that they instigated in the first place, then it should not be mandatory for our children to attend school. It’s not rocket science if the government wish to institutionalise our children, then they should pay for it.

The amount Philip Hammond has offered is barely a 10th of the £3.5 billion the Tories have cut from capital funding year on year, leaving thousands of children in leaking and decaying classrooms, and this proves how hopelessly out of touch the Tories actually are.

And the Chancellor has shown in this budget the extent of his stupidity on school funding, and when millionaire Philip Hammond was questioned about what exactly his little extras were, he stated that if schools needed to buy a couple of whiteboards or some laptop computers or something like that, having a cheque for £50,000 would be very useful for most schools.

The Tories have pounded our schools with harsh cuts since coming to power in 2010, including one in Theresa May’s own constituency, and Philip Hammond is not deserving of academic analysis. Margaret Thatcher operated a sweetie-shop economic policy, and this shower followed on and he doesn’t care because he’s not in this realm of reality.

This government has made the most brutal cuts right across the board, and no matter what they say, people simply don’t trust them with the never-ending crap that spews from their mouths.

What is it that this government simply don’t understand?

They have destroyed this country along with the many people in it, and they’ve made no attempt to put things right, and people will continue to suffer while they oversee this country, and we shouldn’t let the Tories ruin our children’s futures, or their children’s futures.

The Tories are running our schools into the ground by their underfunding so that they can privatise everything else, like the police, fire and ambulance services, and if the Tories are given absolute control these things will happen because we don’t have much more to sell off, the Tories have sold most of it already, and they will destroy our country.

Three hundred and seventy-five million pounds for Buckingham Palace. £3.5 million for Parliament, millions for 2 Royal weddings, our country has a wealth of money but not for us common folk, and since coming to power under David Cameron and now Theresa May, the Tories have more than doubled the National Debt.

They’ve borrowed more money than any single Labour government combined, missed every single financial target set, and lost our AAA credit rating and had it decreased further.

Our government has failed to pay down the debt, has narrowed the economy and imposed austerity for nothing more than political dogma, and then they gave us Philip Hammond!