Monthly Archives: April 2014

Speaking in Nottingham, the historical city associated with Robin Hood, the three lead Green Party candidates for the European elections call for a Robin Hood Tax, a small levy on financial transactions which will provide a much-needed injection of funds for our public services.

Kat Boettge, lead MEP candidate

In launching its European Manifesto, the Green Party called for Real Change in the European Union to make it responsive to the needs of people and less controlled by the lobbying of powerful multinational business.

Speaking in Nottingham, Kat Boettge, the Greens lead candidate in the East Midlands said that the EU does have a direct impact on people’s lives.

‘EU laws protect worker’s rights, health and safety both at work and in the home. They lay down common standards for animal welfare, they are a powerful influence in protecting wildlife as in the Birds Directive. They are driving the deployment of renewable energy systems and the minimisation of waste.’

The Greens are critical of the EU’s acceptance of Austerity and argue that the economic crisis was caused by the financial sector taking high risks with investors money. Green MEP’s are calling for the…

Kat Boettge, lead MEP candidate

Remember also, those who gave their lives at work . . .

I am writing this on the first anniversary (24th April) of the fire in the Bangladesh garment factory that killed over 1100 workers. One year on their families still wait for adequate compensation and large retailers still “bring to the market” clothing made in unsafe conditions by over exploited workers in Bangladesh and elsewhere.

Monday April 28th is Workers’ Memorial Day, when trade unions across the world remember fellow workers who have lost their lives due to accidents at work, which have often been caused by a lack of health and safety measures by employers, and reaffirm their commitment to creating and maintaining safe working environments. As the TUC says on its website The purpose behind Workers Memorial Day has always been to “remember the dead; fight for the living” … the latter…

Kat Boettge, lead MEP candidate

Amidst all the froth that is 24 hour news, and away from the unhealthy warmongering on both sides that is happening in Ukraine, two recent publications have received some warranted attention in the last couple of weeks.

Firstly, the recent report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a call for action by governments to address potentially calamitous global warming. The third in a series (the first report focussed on emphasising the scientific consensus that global warming is happening and has been caused primarily by human activity and the second outlined the catastrophic consequences of failing to take action) the report concentrates on the actions that can and must be taken to address global warming, and stresses that is entirely possible to take these necessary actions providing there is the political will to do so.

The authoritative report, the cumulative work of over…

Kat Boettge, lead MEP candidate

Supporters of Margaret Thatcher and her legacy often point to her housing policies as her greatest achievement. By creating a “freedom of the market” and a “property owning democracy” through the sale of council housing and the removal of ” unnecessary red tape” in the private rented sector, she is claimed to have increased prosperity for all (except perhaps the “feckless”) and to have increased the number of “stakeholders” in a society which at other times she claimed did not exist!

As with the rest of the Thatcherite legacy the success of her housing policies is myth rather than reality. Indeed the consequences have been disastrous, particularly for most of those not even born when she began her destructive and disastrous rule.

The sale of council housing to sitting tenants was certainly an electorally popular policy. In truth it had very little to do with…

Kat Boettge talks to protesters in Retford.

Kat Boettge, lead MEP candidate

This government would have us believe that we are better off managing on our own.

Get the state “off our backs”, allow us to “keep more of our own money” and we will “manage just fine”. So it commits itself to continuing to reduce taxes, Corporation Tax on companies (reduced from 28% to 21% since 2010) and Inheritance Tax (already only paid on 5% of estates and set to be far fewer if Cameron and co are re-elected) in particular.

Meanwhile public services, particularly those provided by local authorities, are slashed to the bone, and spending on “welfare” is squeezed and scorned, with the reasonable desire to have a “spare bedroom” denied to those too poor to ” pay their own way” , and with high quality Surestart child care provision, and Day Centres for the elderly and disabled, all but wiped off the map.

According to Medline Plus, ‘Complementary and Alternative Medicine’ (CAM) is the term for medical products and practices that are not part of standard care. ‘Standard Care’ is what medical doctors, doctors of osteopathy, and allied health professionals, such as nurses and physical therapists, practice.
Complementary medicine is used together with standard medical care. An example is using acupuncture to help with side effects of cancer treatment.
Alternative medicine is used in place of standard medical care. An example is treating heart disease with chelation therapy (which seeks to remove excess metals from the blood) instead of using a standard approach.
So before I discuss further my views on complementary and alternative medicine, let’s look first at the framework and some relevant points including Green Party policies on improving health, treatment and a patient-centered care approach.
What is health? When I used to deliver training about mental health, I always stressed…

Kat Boettge, lead MEP candidate

Science was once sceptical about climate change. Nearly 200 years ago, a few scientists, including John Tyndall, demonstrated that some gases in the air could absorb heat. This they realised was why the Earth was warmer than it should be considering its distance from the sun. So the inevitable question arose: what would happen if those gases changed in concentration? It was known that carbon dioxide was one of these warming gases and it was known that burning coal gave off the same gas. But the conventional view was that the Earth system was so big and complex that nothing we humans could do could have much effect. We surely couldn’t change the climate.

But the question remained, ‘what if?’ By 1938 it was possible to measure that the level of CO2 in the air was rising, so, it was reasoned, the temperature must rise…