The Greenhouse
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The soap box and the soap opera
Max Wind-Cowie criticises the melodrama surrounding Chris Huhne's charges.
This morning Chris Huhne made me late for work. The irony of that, considering the charges he now faces, is far from lost on me. Like so many political nerds I was sat, enthralled, as Keir Starmer swaggered out to face the Westminster pack and deliver Huhne’s fate, like so many I was live-tweeting along with the action as though this was merely an extension of last night’s Question Time and, I hope, like so many I now feel thoroughly dirty about the whole thing. A declaration o...
A curriculum for life
Matt Grist reacts to today's decision to remove the GCSE equivalence of vocational qualifications.
Today’s announcement that over three thousand vocational qualifications are to be stripped of their ‘equivalence’ to GCSEs is to be applauded. This is a long overdue culling of useless qualifications that possess neither labour market value nor allow for progress in further and higher education. Today’s announcement is also a welcome rejection of the English tendency to over-specialise educational options too early – young people should be training for careers an...
Populism in Europe: the Jobbik movement
Jonathan Birdwell introduces the first in a series of case studies examining the rise of populism in Europe - this time looking at Jobbik in Hungary.
Today we are releasing our report into the Hungarian far-right movement, the Jobbik Party. This report is the first in a series of country reports into far-right populist parties in Europe. The research is based on a research sample of over 13,000 Facebook supporters of far-right populist groups. This research was published in November 2011 in the Demos report, The New Face of Digital Populism. The country reports will present more detail for each country party or street movement,...
Extreme frustration
Jamie Bartlett on the difficulties defining an 'extremist'.
If you have ever attended an event about counter-terrorism, you will have experienced the inevitable, interminable and insoluble debate about what the word ‘extremist’ means. It is usually accompanied by some guff historical commentary: that the Suffragettes were once considered extreme, and so were the Abolitionists et cetera. Even though I’ve never been to a terrorism event where it hasn’t been raised, for some reason the instigator of this lurch usually believe...
Labour: the new Lib Dems?
Max Wind-Cowie reacts to Ed Miliband's performance in today's PMQs.
Martin Bright wrote an excellent blog for the Spectator last week in which he claimed that, to all intents and purposes, Labour is now Britain’s ‘third party’. His case, damningly put, was that ‘Labour just does not matter all that much. Having its ideas filched is the best it can hope for, at least for the time being.’ I think he’s more right than he knows, Labour aren’t simply becoming the third party they’re directly morp...
Needing more than criminalisation
Phillida Cheetham outlines Demos' forthcoming report on forced marriage.
The Government’s public consultation on whether forced marriage should be made a criminal offence in the UK will close in March 2012. The results of the consultation will be published shortly after the publication of a new Demos report on the topic: Ending Forced Marriage. Criminalisation of forced marriage is a contentious issue, with successive governments failing to develop a coherent programme to tackle the problem. During our research, Demos spoke to people who worked both w...
The ECHR must be saved from itself
Max Wind-Cowie warns that public commitment to human rights risks being eroded by the ECHR.
Just before Christmas Demos launched Open Dialogue – a collection of essays looking at counter-intuitive threats to our open society. My contribution, discussing human rights, made the claim that the ‘European Court of Human Rights [is] the single biggest threat to human rights’ here in the UK. Yesterday the ECHR was kind enough to reinforce the point. The British Government is hoping to deport radical Islamist cleric Abu Qatada an...
Message on care stays loud and clear
Louise Bazalgette welcomes a new report on youth offending amongst children in care.
A new report exploring risk factors for offending among children in care, which is launched this week by TACT and the University of East Anglia, concludes that “the care system has proved to be effective in providing good care to children from background and abuse and neglect, promoting security, resilience and pro-social values”. The most prominent risk factors they identify for crime and anti-social behaviour are children’s pre-care experiences of abuse and neglect and the...
Social Housing: Not a cure-all
Phillida Cheetham argues that government expects too much of the social housing sector.
On Monday morning Demos held a seminar with experts from the social housing sector, where we discussed the findings of our ongoing research into early intervention and preventative support in social housing. At the same time, the Guardian’s housing network was hosting a live discussion where they asked: ‘Is the government asking too much of the housing sector?’ Housing has spent years struggling to be seen as an equal partner in the holy trinity of support - health, care an...
Byrne, Beveridge and welfare myths
Claudia Wood is disappointed at Liam Byrne's recent attack on welfare claimants.
Just a week into the New Year and a depressing case of rhetorical brinkmanship is unfolding over welfare reform. The coalition has, for several months, been pushing the controversial Welfare Reform Bill through on a wave of ‘scrounger’ phraseology, often backed by cynically spun DWP statistics. These have been eagerly seized upon by the tabloids. Despite widespread criticism of this approach, it has proved successful in the sense that is has captured the public imagination and pl...
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- Max Wind-Cowie on The soap box and the soap opera
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- ChristianCarter18 on City Salon - 17th February
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