BLINDED BY CAPITALISM

"Patients losing their eyesight are facing a postcode lottery over accessing groundbreaking treatment for their condition. While the drug Lucentis is already available in some of Scotland's board areas, it is yet to be introduced in key cities including Glasgow. In June, the Scottish Medicines Consortium, the body which advises NHS Scotland on new treatments, backed the therapy ahead of any moves by England and the decision was applauded. However, almost two months on, a number of health boards have still to make the injections available to patients. ...In Scotland, some 2300 people are diagnosed with wet AMD every year and experts emphasise the importance of delivering the injections as early as possible because sufferers' vision can deteriorate rapidly." (Herald, 8 August) So what is causing the delay? Is it mere bureaucratic ineptitude or could it be that the Scottish Medicines Consortium reckon it would cost £7.1 million in the first two years? RD

PROTECTION MONEY

"Sir Tom Cowie's decision to stop funding the Conservatives has been met with shrugs within the party presumably because, as revealed by publication of the party accounts, the party is very well off. So well off, in fact, that it could lose a couple of million pounds down the side of a sofa and still have the £20m traditionally thought needed to fight a general election. The Electoral Commission shows that in 2006 the Conservative party received nearly 50 individual donations each over £50,000 including 14 donors giving more than £250,000 each." (Guardian, 7 August) Anyone interested in a healthy democracy must ask themselves why these wealthy individuals are prepared to lavish such largess on a political party. Is it solely philanthropic and civil minded? We imagine the reason these millionaires are so apparently generous, is because of self interest. The reformist parties that they support are all in favour of capitalism and they look upon these donations as protection money. RD

A STRANGE DEMOCRACY

Politicians and political commentators laud British democracy to the skies and contrast how wonderful it is compared to some countries where the rich and powerful dictate events. This is of course a complete sham, as recently illustrated by events. "A major Conservative donor has accused David Cameron of an "arrogant, Old Etonian" style of leadership and said he would give the party no more money. Sir Tom Cowie, who has donated £630,000 to the Tories over the past six years, said he had become "disillusioned". ... The paper quotes Sir Tom as saying the Tory party seems to be run by "arrogant old Etonians who don't understand how other people live". ...Sir Tom, who founded the transport firm Arriva, gave £500,000 to the Conservatives ahead of the 2005 general election." (BBC News, 7 August) What a strange democracy it is that allows rich men to dictate political policy. RD

HOMELESS HEROES

We are all familiar with cheering crowds applauding soldiers as they march off to war and the unstinting praise of politicians as they fall over each other in heaping adulation on service veterans, but the reality is far different. "One in 10 homeless people in the UK are former members of the armed forces, a charity working with veterans says. A survey in 1997 by the Ex-Service Action Group on Homelessness suggested that 22% of people who were "street homeless" had a military background. Veterans’ charity, the Sir Oswald Stoll Foundation, said that efforts by the government and the voluntary sector had brought that down to about 10%. It fears the numbers may rise because of service in Iraq and Afghanistan." (BBC News, 7 August) RD

OVER THE TOP

"The green campaign against patio heaters is stepping up. Those devices like giant, fiery standard lamps that once you may have seen only outside the few British restaurants bold enough to put tables on the pavement, are spreading, into more and more catering outlets - and into the home. Yet they are anathema to environmentalists because of their profligate emissions of carbon dioxide, the principal greenhouse gas responsible for global warming. "It's difficult to conceive of an article that inflicts more gratuitous damage on the environment than a patio heater," says Tony Juniper, executive director of Friends of the Earth. "They just blaze energy out into the open air. Given what we know about climate change, they're just not justifiable." (Independent, 6 August) Mr Juniper's concern about global warming may well be justified, but we can think of a few articles that are more damaging to the environment. Has he heard of the A bomb or the H bomb? RD

MILITARY INTELLIGENCE?

There are many oxymorons, "Christian Science" is one of our favourites but the following news item would probably put "Military Intelligence" up there with the worst of them. "The US military cannot account for 190,000 AK-47 assault rifles and pistols given to the Iraqi security forces, an official US report says. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) says the Pentagon cannot track about 30% of the weapons distributed in Iraq over the past three years. The Pentagon did not dispute the figures, but said it was reviewing arms deliveries procedures. About $19.2bn has been spent by the US since 2003 on Iraqi security forces. GAO, the investigative arm of the US Congress, said at least $2.8bn of this money was used to buy and deliver weapons and other equipment. Correspondents say it is now feared many of the weapons are being used against US forces on the ground in Iraq." (BBC News, 6 August) RD

IT’S THE SAME THE WORLD OVER

"Mexican telecom tycoon Carlos Slim, who is estimated by some calculations to be wealthier than Microsoft founder Bill Gates, said Thursday he did not care if he was the world's richest person. ...In July, a journalist who tracks the fortunes of wealthy Mexicans said Slim was worth an estimated $67.8 billion and had overtaken Gates as the world's richest person. Slim hit the No. 1 spot after a recent surge in the share price of his America Movil, Latin America's largest cell phone company, according to Eduardo Garcia of the online financial publication Sentido Comun.Garcia said that made him close to $8.6 billion wealthier than Gates, whose estimated worth was $59.2 billion. ...In Mexico, a small elite holds most of the country's wealth and about half the population lives on less than $5 a day." (Yahoo News, 3 August) RD

BUSINESS IS BUSINESS

The gravestone in Springfield, Utah may have said "rest in peace", but it should have added "only if you keep up the payments. "The cemetery headstone for a teenager who died in a car wreck was repossessed after a $750 bill went unpaid. "That's just business," said Linda Anderson of Memorial Art Monument. "If we give every stone to everybody, we'd be out of business. They'd repossess your car if you didn't make payments." (Yahoo News, 31 July) RD

Victory for the Scottish Homeless

The number of people having their homes repossessed has surged, the Council of Mortgage Lenders has said. An estimated 14,000 properties were repossessed in the first six months of the year, a 30% increase on the same time last year.

Scotland have won the Homeless World Cup.

Every cloud has a silver lining , hasn't it ?

Personal debt increases

Over 8 million British adults are in serious debt and over 2 million are struggling with repayments. 18% of adults in Britain are in £10,000 or more of unsecured debt such as credit cards, overdrafts, loans and store cards .The number of bankruptcies rose by 10 per cent in the first quarter of 2007 compared with the same period in 2006. Around 420,000 people were prosecuted for defaulting on loan repayments in the first six months of this year - up eight per cent on 2006. Scotland was revealed as the area with the highest proportion of indebted residents .

The Bank of England has raised the cost of borrowing five times in the past year to 5.75 percent -- the highest level in six years. Analysts expect another rise to 6 percent by the year end . High levels of unsecured debt are clearly linked to the rise in interest rates over the last 12 months . The record rise in house prices -- especially in London and the south-east -- has led to a growing discrepancy between mortgage payments and salaries. The high pressure to maintain social and commercial status often goes hand in hand with high expenditure on the high street. Borrowers affected by the higher interest rates now are storing up debt problems for the future; instead of making cuts in their personal expenditure, they are taking on further unsecured loans and credit cards .

See here about the bubble bursting

Exploiting kids

Wal-Mart ( ASDA here in the UK ) prides itself on cutting costs at home and abroad, and its Mexican operations are no exception. Wal-Mart is taking advantage of local customs to pinch pennies at a time when its Mexican operations have never been more profitable. 19,000 youngsters between the ages of 14 and 16 work after school in hundreds of Wal-Mart stores, mostly as grocery baggers, throughout Mexico—and none of them receives a red cent in wages or fringe benefits.

The use of unsalaried youths is legal in Mexico because the kids are said to be “volunteering” their services to Wal-Mart and are therefore not subject to the requirements and regulations that would otherwise apply under the country’s labor laws. Although Wal-Mart’s worldwide code of ethics expressly forbids any “associate” from working without compensation, the company’s Mexican subsidiary asserts that the grocery baggers “cannot be considered workers.”

Wal-Mart is Mexico’s largest private-sector employer in the nation today, with nearly 150,000 local residents on its payroll. Wal-Mart de Mexico reported net earnings of $1.148 billion in 2006 and $280 million in profits in the second quarter of this year, a 7 percent increase in real terms over the same period last year and have announced plans in February to add 125 new stores and restaurants to its existing network of 893 retail establishments during the course of 2007. That expansion plan will represent new investment totaling nearly a billion dollars

In a country where nearly half of the population scrapes by on less than $4 a day, any income source is welcome in millions of households, even if it hinges on the goodwill of a tipping customer. But says Federal District Labor Secretary Benito Mirón Lince. “In economic terms, Wal-Mart does have the capability to pay the minimum wage [of less than $5 a day], and this represents an injustice.”

TOUR DE FARCE

The Tour de France has been a spectacular example of how capitalism ruins everything it touches but this is true of all sport not just cycling. The sports writer Simon Barnes summed it up well when he wrote: "The race lost the favourite, Alexander Vinokourov, to a positive drugs test; the leader, Michael Rasmussen, was kicked out because he lied to his team about his whereabouts during training and there are, inevitably, questions about the winner-by-default, Alberto Contador. ... Put on a good show, make the money, keep the wheels turning that's what really matters. ... Is that relevant to other sports? You bet it is. The Tour de France is in potential terminal decline because serious moral and sporting issues were ignored for the sake of financial expedient. There is not a sport in existence of which this is not true. Take football; awash with money, a substance that in sufficient quantities dehumanises people every bit as much as drugs does. The sport is at present dealing with an obscene affair in which a player is owned - as if he was a racehorse - by a private individual." (Times, 30 July) RD

CAN YOU HEAR ME, GRANDMA?

A worker who has worked all her life has found out what an uncaring, miserable society capitalism can be to the old and infirm."A woman of 108 has been told by health chiefs that she must wait 18 months to get a new hearing aid. Olive Beal, one of the oldest women in Britain, is confined to a wheelchair and losing her sight. Being able to communicate and listen to music is her only contact with the outside world, says her family. Mrs Beal, who has six grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren, has used an old-fashioned analogue hearing aid for the last five years. But she struggles to hear with it and needs a modern digital hearing aid which cuts out background noise. After being told of the wait, Mrs Beal, who lives in a care home in Deal, Kent, said "I could be dead by then." ... Donna Tipping, from the Royal National Institute for the Deaf, said "I am afraid this is a common problem. There are more than half a million people waiting for hearing aids in this country." (Daily Telegraph, 30 July) RD

VOTING WITH THEIR FEET

There never was a vote in parliament about British forces invading Iraq but it seems that some service personnel have let their views be known."Army chiefs have been hit by more than 9000 cases of soldiers going absent without leave since 2004 and 1100 are still on the run at a time when the military is being stretched by its involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Ministry of Defence denied yesterday that the incidents - the equivalent of almost 10% of the entire force - were connected to the current conflicts but admitted that there were almost 1300 cases of soldiers having gone missing in the first six months of this year alone....Figures seen by The Herald show that 3030 soldiers, 185 sailors and 55 RAF servicemen went absent in 2004, 2715, 195 and 35 respectively in 2005, 2330, 155 and 10 in 2006 and 1275, 55 and 15 to the end of June this year....Almost 7000 men and women are believed to have deserted from the US army since the invasion of Iraq." (Sunday Herald, 29 July) RD

BUDDY, CAN YOU SPARE A DIME

Socialists are always saying that capitalism is a crazy society but the following news item suggests that it is stark raving bonkers! "SAN JOSE, Calif. - John Feigenbaum didn't sleep at all during his redeye flight across country. He's not a nervous flier — he had a dime worth $1.9 million in his jeans pocket. Feigenbaum, 38, of Virginia Beach, Va., is a rare coin dealer, and the dime he was carrying from San Jose to New York is a 1894-S dime, one of only nine known to exist. He picked up the dime, one of only 24 known to be coined in 1894 in San Francisco, on Monday from the seller's vault in Oakland. He delivered it to the buyer's vault the following day, in midtown Manhattan. Feigenbaum said he and the seller's agent will split a 6 percent commission on the deal. Feigenbaum said he put the dime, which is encased in a 3-inch-square block of plastic, in his pocket. Accompanied by a security guard, he drove to the airport." (Yahoo News, 28 July) RD

BUDDY, CAN YOU SPARE A BED

"Once in khaki dress, gee we looked swell. Full of Yankee doodle dum" goes the old song and it still applies today judging by the treatment handed out to veterans in New York. "The only homeless shelter in New York just for veterans will close in August for renovations, which city officials say will improve conditions there. But the plans are upsetting some of its residents. The shelter, the Borden Avenue Veterans’ Residence, in Long Island City, Queens, is to reopen in November with a little more than half its current number of beds, according to officials, who also say the refurbished facility may charge rent, which it does not do now." (New York Times, 26 July) It is all very well being cheered by the admiring public during a war but the realities of capitalism after it has used you are far from cheering. RD

Science for hire

Achieving headlines throughout the world , Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup improved men's fertility according to researchers after conducting tests involving six healthy male volunteers by the University of Portsmouth . The study found that a fortnight of tomato soup had some effect on semen.
Nigel Dickie, a spokesman for Heinz, said: "It's good to know that Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup could boost your mojo and give guys extra oomph. And for Heinz Ketchup lovers, the tomatoey goodness will put more ketchup in your bottle."

However , The Scotsman contacted fertility experts and the company admitted it had overstated the research, which it had partly funded. In fact, the Portsmouth study found that while lycopene levels rose in semen after a period of soup consumption, there was "no measurable increase" in the sperm's ability to combat damaging free radicals. The scientists said more research was needed to see if higher lycopene levels really would help boost fertility.
A University of Portsmouth spokesman said "But on the basis of this research alone, we cannot say that the lycopene levels in sperm boosted fertility."

Allan Pacey, secretary of the British Fertility Society, said although the study found higher lycopene levels in the sperm, it did not find any improvement in its quality to tackle infertility. Dr Pacey, a senior lecturer at the University of Sheffield, said sperm was produced by the body over three months, so long-term changes to diet would be most effective at improving its quality, rather than a two-week alteration.

So there we have it . Important science and research facilities at universities being hired to promote and market certain products . Commercial companies distorting scientific findings and then publicising inaccurate claims to increase its sales at the supermarket .

Capitalism , instead of using the field of medical research to advance and improve the quality of life simply employs the knowledge and brains of skilled and gifted people to make a fast buck and improve and advance advertising rather than health .

REFORM UNDER ATTACK

The governments are always out to erode any advantages workers may have won in the course of their struggles; however, they try to present their attacks on conditions as if they were really doing it for your benefit. An example is an attack on the 35 hour week of the French worker.
According to an article in Scotland on Sunday by Elaine Sciolino, French told: work more and think less
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1181162007
In proposing a tax-cut law earlier this month, finance minister Christine Lagarde bluntly advised the French people to abandon their "old national habit".

"France is a country that thinks," she told the National Assembly. "There is hardly an ideology that we haven't turned into a theory. This is why I would like to tell you: Enough thinking, already. Roll up your sleeves."
Citing Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America, she said the French should work harder, earn more and be rewarded with lower taxes if they get rich.
The government's call to work is key to its ambitious campaign to revitalise the French economy, abandoning what some commentators call a nationwide "laziness". France's legally mandated 35-hour week gives workers a lot of leisure time but not necessarily the means to enjoy it.
I don’t think working a 70 hour week gives you much time to enjoy your life either.
Reminds me of Matt McGinn’s wee classic ’Three Nights and a Sunday’
Chorus
Three nights and a Sunday double time.
Three nights and a Sunday double time.
I work a’ day and I work all night.
Tae hell wi’ you Jack, I’m all right.
Three nights and a Sunday double time.
We in the Socialist Party are depending on workers thinking for themselves and not relying on leaders to think for them.

...Names will never hurt me

Two of Socialist Courier contributers felt the need to comment on recent health and safety statistics and the rise in deaths at work .

Why increase the expenditure on safety? It cuts profits and capitalism hates that! said RD

The Sunday Herald carries a story with much the same conclusion concerning the weakness of the recently passed legislation governing "corporate killing", which has just received Royal Assent and is expected to become law within months.

In the UK, between 1966 and 2006, more than 40,000 people have been killed in work-related circumstances, according to Gary Slapper, professor of Law at the Open University. 40,000 deaths .

But under the common law of culpable homicide (or manslaughter in England), only 34 companies were prosecuted and only seven convictions were secured. In Scotland, only one company has ever been prosecuted for corporate homicide - utility firm Transco for the Larkhall gas explosion, caused by a leaking main, which killed Andrew and Janette Findlay and their two children in their house in December 1999. Although the company was eventually fined £15 million in 2005 for breaching health and safety laws, the homicide charge failed because, given the disperse communication channels of large companies, the court could not find a "controlling mind" or pin the blame on one senior figure who knew enough to be liable.

The new legislation removes the requirement to find a "controlling mind." Now, it must only be shown that someone in senior management was guilty of "gross negligence". YET , under the new legislation, there are no extra duties that directors must adhere to. The maximum penalties are the same as under existing health and safety laws.

Courts will now also be able to order the company to publicise any conviction. The reputational damage and stigma is thought most likely to act as a deterrent and encourage directors to take health and safety concerns more seriously.

Patrick Maguire, legal adviser to the Scottish TUC who was also a member of the Scottish Executive's expert panel , however interprets the new law as one that simply finds new scapegoats .
"...the need to identify the "controlling mind" has simply been replaced by the need to find a senior management who committed "gross negligence"...It is not the board of directors that makes these decisions on health and safety. They delegate the task to middle and lower management. They are going to say the guy who got it wrong was not a senior manager "

A Labour regime that purports to be "tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime", exempts business from this treatment.

Voicing what the capitalist class thinks - and echoing the words of RD that the a central concern with any proposal which could mean stricter laws coming into force in Scotland, would scare businesses away , David Watt, director of the Institute of Directors in Scotland, said: "We don't have different company law across the UK. We don't want bits and pieces of company law pulled out and made more punitive in Scotland. We need all the incentives we can for people to do business here."

Private schools - only for the richer of us

Marx talks of how capitalism drives those professionals often vaguely called the middle class into the ranks of the proletariat so i note this story in the Herald .

Teachers, engineers, and police officers have been priced out of private education by a 40% rise in fees in just five years, according to the Bank of Scotland.
It now costs an average of £8247 every year to educate a child privately in Scotland compared with £6039 in 2002, and fees are now rising at twice the rate of inflation. Only prices for houses are growing faster. The average earner in a number of occupations, including engineers, journalists and teachers, can no longer afford private education for their offspring. average school fees were now only in the reach of 13 occupations, down from 23 in 2002.

Affordability was measured at a quarter of average earnings for the profession. So a scientist, earning an average of £37,290 a year, would have to give up an unaffordable 26% of his or her income to put one child through school for a year. But an architect, with an average income £42,224, would only be parting with a bearable 23% of their earnings.The professions that could afford fees were company directors, bank managers, accountants, production managers, IT professionals, doctors, pilots, senior police officers, lawyers, architects and customer care managers.