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Demand the BBC reports on & analyses the growing Austerity Protest movement & actionsThe BBC is a public service with a remit to cover and analyse news, events signifying social & political shifts in the country, and not a spokesperson for power or corporate interests.10,980 of 15,000 SignaturesCreated by Emma Winfield
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The BBC Needs To Report News Not GossipOn Saturday 21 June 2014 50000 marched in one of our major cities London, but this was ignored by all the national newspapers bar one. There was also no coverage on any of the BBC News channels. I believe 50000 people marching in our capital city against the policy of austerity carried out by our elected government is news. Is this a further sign that the BBC is swinging to the right and therefore denying an alternative voice. I believe the BBC should, unlike our media Baron owned newspapers, remain unbiased but is this a sign that this is no longer the case.17,726 of 20,000 SignaturesCreated by Ken Long
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Let's tackle the youth democracy crisis, nowIn February 1974, 70% of 18- to 24-year-olds voted in the General Election. Fast forward to today, and our democracy is in crisis. Only half of the 5.6 million young people in the UK are registered to vote. Why? Because for millions of citizens, especially young people, ‘politics’ is seen as out of touch, complicated and unrepresentative. But it doesn’t have to be that way. The Voter Registration Bill will revolutionise our system of democratic engagement. 1. The Bill will empower Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) to take active steps to increase the shockingly low numbers of young, disabled or ethnic minority voters on the register. This includes organising at least one voter engagement session per year, per school or college. 2. The Bill will allow people to simply tick a box asking to be registered when filling in forms such as applying for a passport or driving licence - making registering to vote easy, simple and painless. The Voter Registration Bill is a golden opportunity to ensure that as many people as possible are registered to vote in advance of the 2015 General Election, and beyond.513 of 600 SignaturesCreated by Oliver Sidorczuk
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Order repairs to South Parade PierAfter years of neglect under private ownership, South Parade Pier is in danger of collapse. This iconic structure has dramatically decayed over the past six months and is now boarded up and derelict, creating an eyesore for both local people and tourists. Although a sale was widely publicised, the pier has not been transferred to new owners and no remedial repairs have been carried out since the winter storms. Without proper investment, it continues to decay before our eyes. By signing this petition, you are demanding that Portsmouth City Council take action to preserve this Grade Two listed building, treasured by both residents and visitors to Portsmouth. By ordering the owners and operators of South Parade Pier to carry out end-to-end repairs, the council could reverse the decline of this key seafront area, encouraging growth for both new and established businesses - as has happened in many other seaside resorts. South Parade Pier has important historical and cultural value. British and Canadian troops embarked from there on their journey to Normandy for the D-Day landings in 1944. Winston Churchill and Montgomery addressed huge audiences there. Rock legends Pink Floyd, Genesis and David Bowie all performed there - and filming of The Who's rock opera 'Tommy' led to the infamous fire in 1974. Generations of Portsmouth residents and tourists have walked, danced and gathered on the pier since 1879. By lending your support, the pier may once again become both a hub for the local community and an asset for the city of Portsmouth - but we must act swiftly.4,835 of 5,000 SignaturesCreated by Leon Reis
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STOP THE SALE OF SEKHEMKA BY NORTHAMPTON COUNCILThe proposed sale of the statue of Sekhemka matters to everyone because the issue stretches far beyond one of a single local council attempting to sell off the treasures it holds in trust for one local community and breaching the Museums code of ethics to do it. It is just the latest in a series of sales, or proposed sales of commercially valuable, nationally or internationally important items from local museum collections including those at Croydon and Southampton. The commercial sale of such material also impacts on people many thousands of miles away as it indirectly supports the illegal trade in looted antiquiteis and art. It is time a line was drawn and local authorities, like Northampton, are shown that the way to solve budget cuts forced by Central Government, is not to impoverish their local culture and put at risk other people's culture, by engaging in speculation on the commercial art and antiquities market. The sale of Sekhemka is opposed as unethical and in breach of the Museums Association Code of Ethics by the Museums Association itself, the Arts Council, the Arts Fund, every major UK Museum with an Egyptology collection and a roll call of museum and heritage professionals. You claim the sale will help you build a £14 million extension to the museum, but the math's do not work. Even if Sekhmeka reaches its top estimate you will still only raise less than a quarter of the sum you claim to have budgeted for the proposed extension. Besides, even if you do build the new museum, you will have nothing to put in it. The sale of Sekhemka will result in Northampton Council losing its Museums Association Accreditation, cutting off Northampton's museums and gallery spaces from any public, charity or lottery funding. FOI material shows you have already spent over £40k, to facilitate the sale of Sekhemka. That is the equivilent of the salary of a teacher and a museum curator who could be telling the children of Northampton about the statue and all the other treasures you hold in trust in Northampton's museums. The proceeds of the sale will not all even go to the people of Northampton because you have agreed to hand over 45%, as much as £2.7 million, as a free gift to the Marquis of Northampton, one of the richest men in Britain. It is a free gift because you have announced that Northampton Council Tax payers will be picking up the legal and auction house costs, not the Marquis. ...and the sale may not even be lawful- you refuse to release the legal advice you and the Marquis have been given because the precise ownership of the statue is disputed and you may also be open to judicial review over the sale itself. Finally, the eyes of the World are on Northampton and this unnecessary, unethical sale and your actions have an impact far beyond Northampton. The sale of cultural objects like the statue of Sekhemka boosts the hammer price of antiquities and indirectly supports the criminals and even terrorists in places like Iraq and Syria, who traffick antiquities from all over the world for sale in the developed world.829 of 1,000 SignaturesCreated by Andy Brockman
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Reject Austerity: Campaign for the Progressive Funding of Local ServicesThis needs to happen now because: 1. Council tax is regressive. Band A takes about 1% of the property value but Band H takes about a tenth of that. So, the more the house is worth, the less you pay. 2. At least 2,500 homes are worth at least £1 million in Brighton and Hove but the vast majority are not even in the top Council Tax band. That’s £ billions worth of homes only contributing about £7.5 million a year to local services, a tiny fraction of their value. Meanwhile, Housing Benefit has been cut but rents in Brighton and Hove went up on average by 27% over the last year. 3. The government gave councils responsibility for Council Tax benefits but gave them the funding less 10%, adding to the burden of already over-stretched councils. This means the poorest in the City are now required by law to pay Council Tax out of meagre benefits, yet residents living in the highest value property have only seen minimal rises to their council tax bills despite seeing the value of property increase an average of 12% in the past year. 4. The top rate of tax on income was reduced by the Coalition government from 50% to 45%. This means the highest earners have received a tax cut while wages have stagnated for the majority, and benefits cut for the poorest. 5. The poor already pay more of their income in tax than the rich http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/jun/16/british-public-wrong-rich-poor-tax-research 6. Rising wealth inequality in Britain is one of the highest in the industrialised world and this has resulted in perverse situation where the top 1% own the same as the bottom 55% of the population http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/may/15/britains-richest-1-percent-own-same-as-bottom-55-population 7. The Spirit Level research shows that wider income inequality exacerbates and increases social problems, from health, to life expectancy, to education to others see http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/ 8. Thomas Piketty shows that the value of wealth has increased faster than the value of wages, effectively entrenching the circle of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/28/thomas-piketty-capital-surprise-bestseller. Progressive taxation should be used as a policy lever to address high levels of inequality. This is something the Coalition government are ideologically opposed to but this leaves space for truly radical and progressive local politics to make bold an brave decisions. Brighton and Hove City Council has the power both to make reductions in household council tax bills due to Council Tax Reduction regulations, and it also has the power to establish free standing benefits, outside of Council Tax regulations, to make local funding more progressive. For more details and examples of what can be done, please go to our website www.newdeal4brightonhove.org This petition will be presented to Full Council in October 2014, but the campaign won’t end there. When the petition is presented, we are granted a 3 minute speaking slot. This will be available on the council’s online podcasts.711 of 800 SignaturesCreated by Carlie Goldsmith
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More Acute Psychiatric Inpatient BedsI have been a registered psychiatric nurse for more than twenty years. I am gravely concerned regarding the situation unfolding within our communities and mental health services as a whole. Times are difficult and I appreciate the need for financial constraint but fear we have gone too far down this road. Following the suspension of our local psychiatric inpatient unit in 2012 our area has been without sufficient inpatient beds to meet the needs of its community. Consequently people are being placed in intolerably difficult and potentially life threatening situations, as people are discharged prematurely to free up beds, increasing pressure on dwindling community resources. Similarly people are becoming unnecessarily acute symptomatically, prior to admission, necessitating Mental Health Act Assessment, where timely intervention would minimise the need for such measures. Services are at breaking point and I fear a significant rise in untoward and avoidable incidents were sufficient resources in place. The lack of adequate inpatient beds is resulting in many of our most vulnerable being hospitalised in an untimely manner, hundreds of miles away from family, friends and the familiarity of local support and services, exacerbating difficulties arising from already fragmented care and a lack of continuity and seamlessness within service provision. Waiting times for care co-ordination are in excess of 3 months. Something I have never before encountered, leaving people in the community unsupported and without service provision. Timely intervention at the point of referral is critical to recovery, promoting well-being and optimising the efficacy of community based solutions, as alternatives to hospital admission. My purpose in writing to you is as advocate to those I serve. They are amongst the most vulnerable and I fear, increasingly neglected members of society. I respectfully petition you to bring their plight to the attention of government and support my plea to you, to support the urgent need for adequate inpatient beds, per head of the population. Services are in collapse and otherwise avoidable tragedies are going to become common place. In the last two years 1291 acute inpatient beds have been c!osed. Below is a list of individuals within my local authority, who at the time of writing are being accommodated in inpatient wards a great distance away from local facilities. There are 60 such local authorities in England alone: 19 year old hospitalised 85.2 miles away from home. 20 year old hospitalised 83.1 miles away from home. 23 year old hospitalised 48.2 miles away from home. 27 year old hospitalised 75.6 miles away from home. 27 year old hospitalised 76.8 miles away from home. 30 year old hospitalised 105.5 miles away from home. 34 year old hospitalised 222.6miles away from home. 47 year old hospitalised 82.7 miles away from home. 54 year old hospitalised 316.3 miles away from home. 58 year old hospitalised 237.8 miles away from home. 68 year old hospitalised 81.5 miles away from home. 73 year old hospitalised 69 Miles away from home. 93 year old hospitalised 81.2 miles away from home. My greatest fear is these difficulties are not locally based but reflect a national crisis within the provision of services for those in need of acute psychiatric care.244 of 300 SignaturesCreated by Sean O'Donoghue
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Eastbourne DGH: Local Services for Local PeopleWe need our hospital services back. Maternity and paediatric services at Eastbourne District General Hospital (DGH) were downgraded a year ago. The local NHS Trust said it was a temporary measure. Now we are facing a bleak future with these core services likely to be lost forever in Eastbourne. Why? In May 2013, the local NHS Trust centralised consultant-led maternity services for the area at the Conquest Hospital in Hastings leaving only a midwifery unit at the DGH. At the same time it stopped overnight care for children at the Eastbourne hospital. We were assured these changes were temporary for 18 months only. In the meantime, the East Sussex Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), the organisation which commissions NHS services, launched a review of permanent services for maternity, paediatrics and emergency gynaecology in East Sussex. It drew up six options, none of which include a two-site option for consultant- delivered services. Option 6 (selected by the CCGs) will keep consultant-led services for maternity and paediatrics at the Conquest Hospital. So people in Eastbourne will have to travel to Hastings for this care with an average total transfer time of 1 hour 34 minutes from the DGH to the Conquest. This far exceeds acceptable safety limits for many interventions such as emergency Caesarean sections. What is our alternative? Save the DGH launched an alternative proposal for the CCGs to consider alongside its six options. Option 7 keeps consultant-led maternity services, emergency gynaecology and in-patient paediatrics at both hospitals. Our proposal also maintains a level one special care baby unit and a short stay paediatric assessment unit at the DGH and the Conquest. It also goes further by stating that all core services, like emergency general surgery and emergency orthopaedics which have recently been removed, are needed and should be provided at the DGH. Option 7 maintains all of the services that the IRP stated must remain. Why do we need Jeremy Hunt's help? The CCGs made a ruling on permanent changes to services in June and selected Option 6. Then HOSC met on the 28th July and failed to refer the decision back to the Secretary of State. The IRP ruling states that these Consultant-led services must remain in Eastbourne and Hastings and therefore we ask Jeremy Hunt to intervene and enforce the IRP ruling. People living in Eastbourne deserve a hospital in the town that provides them with the care they need. If maternity and paediatrics are permanently downgraded at the DGH, we will have the most disadvantaged town in the UK for the population size. Please support us by signing. We need your help! For more information visit www.savethedgh.org.uk11,149 of 15,000 SignaturesCreated by Selene Edwards
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Hussein Must StayHussein was a member of a political group opposed to the dictatorship in Chad. His best friend, cousin and father were all arrested and disappeared in 2010 and the authorities were looking for him. He fled to Italy, but in his asylum interview they stopped him giving important information, then refused his case with no explanation and no chance of appeal. He then found that his life was also in danger in Italy, he was threatened by groups connected to the Chad dictatorship. He had to leave and came to the UK, which has no historical links to Chad. He thought it would be safe and to claim asylum, but the Home Office has refused to hear his case. Instead the UK wants to deport him on 20th June to Italy under the Dublin III regulation, where his life remains in danger. The Italian asylum system is under severe pressure, people wait for years in overcrowded immigration prisons and the chances of a fair hearing for Hussein's case in Italy are very low. If returned to Chad Hussein faces persecution. To be returned would be in contravention of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. He must be given the opportunity to apply for asylum and seek safety in the UK. We the undersigned people call on The Rt Hon Teresa May to stop the planned removal for 20th June to Italy and allow Hussein (H.O. No.A1802739) to claim asylum in the UK. Italy's asylum system is under severe pressure and his life would not be safe there. We want Hussein to stay because he won't be safe in Italy. We want Hussein to stay because in Italy the asylum system is collapsing. We want Hussein to stay because he is family to us. UPDATE 18 June: We have enough to pay for injunction! Unbelievable amount of money raised 12 hours! You are all amazing! Wow, thank you all so much for your help yesterday we now have over 1600 petition signatures for Hussein, including the paper petitions and have raised £1400 which is enough to pay for the solicitors to put in an injunction to aim to halt the deportation. So we don’t need further donations at this point. It's really amazing to feel the power of so many people working together to achieve this. We are hopeful that this will halt Hussein’s deportation. We are really grateful for all your support but since we won’t know until late on Thursday if the injunction has been successful, in the meantime we’re also taking other steps:1,247 of 2,000 SignaturesCreated by Bevan Richardson
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Shut Dungeness B Nuclear Plant NowDungeness B has already had a life extension in 2005. The safety of Dungeness B and the safety of Europe is already on borrowed time with regard to potential nuclear catastophe. We understand that a transboundary Environmental Impact Assessment has not been carried out at Dungeness B. Steve Thomas, professor of energy policy at the University of Greenwich, said: "It doesn't feel good when we come up against limits and the first thing they [the ONR] do is to move the goalposts." Safety limits are being scrapped to allow Dungeness B to go on into dangerous old age. This would make Dungeness B the oldest operating nuclear plant in Europe at 45 years. Dungeness B is the son of Windscale, later renamed Sellafield after a fire broke out due to high temperature in the graphite bricks. Had the Windscale fire not been brought under control (by good luck and courage), and the radioactive fallout limited, then the writer of this petition may well have not have been born. The authorities deny that the Windscale fire increased the mortality rate amongst infants in Cumbria, preferring to blame "population mixing" for increased leukemias. But it is undeniable that radioactive fallout added to the routine emissions from the nuclear plant. People are realising that a large nuclear accident has transboundary impacts and that Environmental Impact Assessments (that the UK is signed up to - Espoo ) must include neighbouring and distant countries. A transboundary EIA has not been carried out at Dungeness. The leaders of Europe have a real opportunity right now to prevent catastrophe and contain nuclear pollution. Dungeness B http://www.engineering-timelines.com/scripts/engineeringItem.asp?id=1033 Previous Life Extension by British Energy http://www.modernpowersystems.com/news/news10-year-life-extension-at-dungeness-b Proposed New Life Extension by EDF http://www.nucpros.com/content/edf-extend-uk-dungeness-b-nuclear-plant-45-years Safety Scrapped to Accommodate Life Extension / Office for Nuclear Regulation Defends Dungeness Safety Decision http://www.imeche.org/news/engineering/nuclear-regulator-defends-dungeness-safety-decision-04061402 WHY IS A CUMBRIAN WRITING THIS PETITION? The threat from nuclear is not localised. Waste from Dungeness B travels up to Sellafield by train (through London) to be reprocessed i.e. separation of uranium and plutonium - this involves the waste being expanded x189 times with most of it spewed out into the Irish Sea. http://www.ucsusa.org/nuclear_weapons_and_global_security/solutions/nuclear-terrorism/reprocessing-and-nuclear.html Windscale Fallout http://nuclearhistory.wordpress.com/2012/07/21/windscale-fallout-path-scandinavia/ Still FIghting for Gemma http://www.truemovies.tv/tvguide/film.aspx?mID=472 http://www.robedwards.com/2007/03/still_fighting_.html 240 Greenpeace Activists take action across Europe to highlight the risk of ageing nuclear reactors http://ecowatch.com/2014/03/09/greenpeace-europes-aging-nuclear/ Windscale - Britain's Biggest Nuclear Disaster https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElotW9oKv1s A Gamble with Safety - No2Nuclear Power http://www.no2nuclearpower.org.uk/nuclearnews/NuClearNewsNo63.pdf Transboundary Environmental Impact Assessments http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2430353/europes_ageing_nuclear_reactors_will_have_to_undergo_environmental_assessments.html (this has not happened at Dungeness but is happening in the Ukraine!) Nuclear Waste Trains http://www.greenpeace.org/international/PageFiles/25532/7842.pdf Stop and Contain http://mariannewildart.wordpress.com/2013/10/03/stop-and-contain-reprocessing-at-sellafield-is-insane/ American Perspective on Reprocessing http://io9.com/failed-nuclear-weapons-recycling-program-could-put-us-a-1586851270898 of 1,000 SignaturesCreated by Marianne Birkby
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Save Stamford Close WildlifeThe desecration has already started, trimmers have been out, we have had a temporary reprieve after i had a go at the gardeners and they left. Then Plymouth police wildlife crime adviser got an undertaking from one of the committee to not do anything for two weeks! We have to stop it and stop it now!164 of 200 SignaturesCreated by Lynn Armstrong
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National 'Flash' Holiday in Memory of Rik MayallTo create a lasting memorial in the British collective memory to the genius of Rik Mayall, and recognise that he, and his characters, particularly Lord Flashheart, have become lodged in the national subconscious, but have also consciously shaped a generation. In return for the day off, the public will be expected to behave in an extremely silly way, with as many references to Lord Flash during the day as possible, Including repeated Woofs.356 of 400 SignaturesCreated by Nick Rosefield
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