Thursday, December 30, 2021

Morocco: Casablanca - Hassan II University Holds Patent for Robotic System for Scorpion Venom Extraction


28 DECEMBER 2021
Maghreb Arabe Presse (Rabat)

Casablanca — The Hassan II University of Casablanca holds a patent for a revolutionary robotic system for scorpion venom extraction and will present a book on this topic next January, says the university in a statement.

Having received a positive notice of issuance from the Moroccan Office of Industrial and Commercial Property (OMPIC), after its publication last November 30, this invention was made by a research team composed of Mouad Mkamel, PhD student, Professor Anass Kettani, thesis director, Professor Omar Tanane, thesis co-director, and Professor Rachid Saile, Director of the laboratory of Biology and Health of the Faculty of Sciences in Ben M'Sik.

Thanks to this invention, the collection of venom is done via a network of automated conveyors and a central unit to extract the venom by providing electric discharges adapted to each species of scorpion in a faster and risk-free process.

In fact, it consists of a pneumatic and vibratory system that facilitates the recovery of the venom droplets that fall into a filling station. This robotic system ensures a fully automatic process without manual intervention of the operator.

It should be noted that the commercialization of this robot interests several actors at the national and international level, in particular venom farmers and industrial establishments thanks to its promising pharmacological properties.

Scorpion venom is among the world's most expensive as it is used as active principle in the manufacture of drugs and cosmetic products, as well as the production of the anti-venom serum.

The Hassan II University of Casablanca has an excellent project that can be included in the Center for Innovation and Technology Transfer, says the statement.

In the same context, the members of the research team have published a book entitled "Guide to scorpions in Morocco" with a first mapping according to the degree of venom, and they will present it on January 6 at the Mohamed Sekkat University Library.

Read the original article on MAP.


Moroccan University Pioneers Robot Extraction of Scorpion Venom

The Hassan II University of Casablanca holds a patent for a revolutionary robotic system for scorpion venom extraction and will present a book on this topic in January 2022, the university said in a statement.

Thanks to this invention, the collection of venom is done via a network of automated conveyors and a central unit to extract the venom by providing electric discharges adapted to each species of scorpion in a faster and risk-free process.

Scorpion venom is among the world's most expensive as it is used as active principle in the manufacture of drugs and cosmetic products, as well as the production of the anti-venom serum.


Scorpion tail (file photo).

AN ENTIRE CONTINENT!
Africa: Covid-19 Deaths Approach 230,000 Across Continent

Pixabay
(file photo).

29 DECEMBER 2021

As of December 29, 2021, confirmed cases of Covid-19 from 55 African countries reached 9,548,141 

While over 185,502,904 vaccinations have been administered across the continent.

Reported deaths in Africa reached 227,650 and 8,532,090 people have recovered. South Africa has the most reported cases 3,424,534 and 90,854 people died. Other most-affected countries are Morocco ( 957,594 ), Tunisia ( 724,092 ), Ethiopia ( 405,745 ), Libya ( 386,878 ) Egypt ( 383,003 ) and Kenya ( 285,654 ).

For the latest totals, see the AllAfrica interactive map with per-country numbers. The numbers are compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University (world map) using statistics from the World Health Organization and other international institutions as well as national and regional public health departments.

AllAfrica interactive map with per-country numbers.

 

Why isn’t Big Oil drilling more as gas prices surge? The answer is more Wall Street than White House

A popular trick at gas stations this fall is to slap a sticker featuring President Joe Biden pointing to the price per gallon and saying, “I did that.” But the real answer has more to with Wall Street than Pennsylvania Avenue.

The root cause of today’s high gas prices isn’t politics: It’s financial pressure on oil companies from a decade of cash-flow losses that have made them change financial tactics. Investment in new wells has dropped more than 60%, causing U.S. crude oil production to plummet by more than 3 million barrels a day, or nearly 25%, just as the Covid virus hit, and then fail to recover with the economy. For an oil-drilling sector that lost 90% of its stock value from 2012 through early last year, it hasn’t been the toughest call in the world.

Oil company chief executives and finance chiefs have faced years of rising demand from markets for more disciplined capital spending after a spree of development centered in West Texas and North Dakota produced an estimated $10.9 billion in negative free cash flow in 2014 alone — roughly speaking, operating profit minus capital spending. That persistent cash drain made blue-chip oil exploration stocks drop 90% from their peak and spurred demands that companies eschew fast growth in favor of steadier profits and stock-boosting finance moves like higher dividends, more share buybacks and reduced debt.

“For really the decade that ended in 2019 or 2020, there was an energy revolution and what did the energy sector get? They were the worst performers in the S&P 500,″ said Rob Thummel, portfolio manager at Tortoise Capital in Overland Park, Kansas.

A Dec. 6 report by progressive advocacy group Accountable.US says 16 of 24 large U.S. energy companies have raised their dividends this year (through third-quarter earnings reports), while 11 made special dividend payouts totaling more than $36.5 billion of what the group says were $174 billion in industrywide profits. Indeed, one new financial trick popular with energy companies is a “variable dividend” that allows high payments in good times and a small base payout when profits are lower, Third Bridge analyst Peter McNally said.

The group only found $8 billion in share buybacks, but Exxon Mobil and Chevron alone pledged to buy back as much as $20 billion of stock in the next two years when they disclosed third-quarter earnings. Chevron’s annual dividend is now 4.7% of the company’s value, more than triple the average of 1.3% paid by members of the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index.

“Strong operating cash flow enabled us to deliver on our financial priorities, including the resumption of share repurchases,” Chevron CFO Pierre Breber said on the company’s earnings call. “Cost efficiency and capital efficiency are essential to navigate commodity price cycles.”

“The equity holders said, ‘you’ve got to give me cash,’” according to McNally. “Now the companies are being run to generate free cash more than growth.”

Much discussion, including on social media platforms like Twitter, as to why crude oil and gasoline prices have spiked has focused on politics, with followers of former President Donald Trump claiming he kept gas prices low before Biden made them climb. But if there are political leaders to take the credit, or the blame, according to Tom Kloza, president of Oil Price Information Service, the people most responsible are not Americans, but Russian President Vladimir Putin and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin-Salman.

After oil prices tanked in 2014 and 2015, with the U.S. national average price for gasoline reaching an early-2016 low of $1.72 a gallon, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries linked up with Russia to contain oil production, which had outstripped demand as U.S. production rose to 9 million barrels per day in 2016 from 5 million in 2008. Daily worldwide demand now is about 100 million barrels, according to a report last month by BP.

Production limits by the OPEC+ bloc let gas prices rise slightly during Trump’s pre-Covid presidency. Even as U.S. crude production kept rising, peaking at 13 million barrels in November 2019, gas prices, which averaged $2.37 a gallon at Trump’s inauguration, stayed between $2.24 and $2.92 until Covid sent them plunging to an April 2020 low of $1.77. That pushed U.S. oil drillers to finally cut production back to 9.8 million barrels per day by February 2021. Meanwhile, OPEC+ continued to hold its own production near-steady.

“You have a cartel that is traditionally as disciplined as Charlie Sheen’s drinking, and for the last year they’ve been as disciplined as Olympic gymnasts,” Kloza said.

Another reason is that investment in finding new wells peaked in 2014 and has dropped sharply since, making it hard for drillers to react quickly to an improving economy. According to S&P Capital IQ data, 27 major oil makers tripled capital spending between 2004 and 2014 to $294 billion, ad then cut it all the way back to $111 billion by last year. Once old wells were capped, new ones haven’t been available to fill the production gap quickly, explained CFRA Research analyst Stewart Glickman.

The pressure on oil companies to stop draining cash took many forms. The catastrophic drop in independent oil stocks forced a series of mergers of independent oil producers, and debt markets became more wary of oil companies, forcing producers to pay more attention to stockholders’ financial strategy demands.

“In effect, shareholders [had been] subsidizing the global price of oil,” says IHS Markit analyst Raoul LeBlanc.

The managements of bigger oil companies like Oxy, ConocoPhillips and others are more fiscally conservative than the independents they took over, LeBlanc said. Instead of maintaining debt loads of 2.5 times their annual earnings before deducting interest and non-cash depreciation and amortization charges, or EBITDA, some companies are targeting debt loads of 1 times EBITDA, he said.

Hanging over all of this is pressure from environmentally conscious investors to push carbon emissions lower, and the awareness that gasoline demand will likely erode as electric cars get more popular. “Companies don’t know where this is going and don’t trust the future too much,” LeBlanc added.

With crude still at $70 a barrel, even after a big dip caused by the emergence of the omicron variant of Covid-19, there would seem to be plenty of room to boost production with many areas of the U.S. flush with oil that would cost $50 or less to produce, according to IHS Markit data. And indeed, production has recovered to about 11.7 million barrels per day, helping to spur an 11-cent drop in gasoline prices in the last month.

But the most conspicuous part of the production jump has come from producers whose stock isn’t publicly traded, according to experts. Privately owned oil and gas exploration firms are moving faster because they don’t have the day-to-day shareholder pressure that has made CEOs and CFOs of bigger drilling companies change their tactics. One sign that the pressure is still working: The number of U.S. oil wells that have been drilled but are not completed, or ready to begin pumping, is still down more than 30% since 2018, according to government data.

The question is how long the restraint by publicly traded oil companies will last. Glickman is betting that it will be durable, with capital spending around $135 billion next year – less than half of 2014′s level. Kloza suspects the discipline will break down sooner, helping gas prices keep falling.

The worst combination for gas purchasers would be a quick recovery from omicron, followed by a surge in economic activity and continued low spending. That could pull gas prices toward $4 a gallon again if the economy is strong, according to Glickman, while McNally said consumers could benefit from a recent rise in gasoline inventories.

For shareholders, the outlook is for more dividend hikes to protect 2021 gains in energy stocks, followed by stock buybacks rather than plunging into new drilling — and, ultimately, a shift in investment toward the future that many companies have already telegraphed.

“They’ll start spending capex on decarbonization,” Thummel said. “For these companies to get investors to return, you have to show a solid cash-flow-making business. It’s kind of a prove-it story for the industry.”
Source: CNBC

Natural gas use may affect climate as much as coal does if methane leaks persist

Flames from a flaring pit near a well in the Bakken oil field in North Dakota. Satellites are gathering methane release data from the oil and gas industry.

As satellites deliver more accurate data on methane emissions from oil and gas production, scientists are getting a clearer picture of how natural gas stacks up against coal and whether it is truly the cleaner fuel.

Researchers are refining their understanding of the point at which methane leaks along the gas chain offset the climate benefits of switching from burning coal to natural gas to generate electricity.

“I think the main breakthrough is that we’re starting to be able to put numbers to it,” Yasjka Meijer, a scientist with the European Space Agency’s Copernicus program, said. Meijer has looked at comparisons of carbon dioxide emissions from coal plants versus life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions from the production and burning of natural gas.

Methane, the main ingredient in natural gas, carries more than 80 times the warming punch of carbon dioxide for the first 20 years, an impact that matters in climate planning scenarios at all levels, from utilities to nations.

Scientists caution that research into ongoing methane emissions is in the early stages, noting that uncertainty remains around which sources are responsible for the rapid buildup of methane in the atmosphere. Accidental blowouts from oil and gas fields and releases from coal mines are likely major contributors, however.

But over the last several years, readings by a growing fleet of satellites circling the Earth have also revealed that some normally functioning facilities are releasing significantly more of the climate-warming gas than what official greenhouse gas inventories suggest.

“We’re able to pinpoint it down to specific sources, and in some cases, we’ve seen the quantification,” Meijer said.

Satellites gather data

Meijer estimated that if 3% to 4% of natural gas produced at oil and gas wells leaks into the atmosphere, power produced by natural gas plants is on par with coal plants in terms of the overall climate impact. If upstream emissions exceed that percentage, natural gas would be more harmful than coal in the short term.

Another study by German researchers published in the journal Nature in June 2021 concluded that methane leakage below 4.9% would still give natural gas a leading edge over coal. A research paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 2012 put the threshold at 3.2%.

One 2020 study modeling satellite observations of methane releases across North America found that operators in the prolific Permian Basin released 3.7% of the gas they extracted in 2018 and 2019. Based on Meijer’s calculations, the life cycle of that natural gas — from the well to the power plant stack — would have roughly the same climate impact as coal would from mine to plant.

Another six-year study found that older production wells in the Uintah Basin in northeastern Utah emitted 6% to 8% of the gas they extracted, twice the break-even threshold in Meijer’s estimate. Research from other areas has estimated a leak rate closer to 2.3%.

The persistent problem of methane plumes from oil and gas production fields in the Permian Basin has also been documented by the Environmental Defense Fund, a group advocating for stricter pollution controls. Its latest aerial survey released Dec. 13 showed that 40% of 900-some production sites are continuously leaking methane into the atmosphere.

‘Possible’ undercounting

The EPA calculates industry’s methane emissions by measuring leaks from a limited number of sites and by collecting data the industry self-reports. From there the agency extrapolates national data. The method has been challenged by researchers and environmental groups in recent years.

A 2021 Harvard University study looking at satellite data found methane emissions from oil production to be 90% higher and natural gas production 50% higher than the national data that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been reporting to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

The Harvard study was the first to confirm on a national level what regional studies had shown before: The government’s official inventory of methane emissions from oil and gas production sites underestimates how much they actually release. The EPA, in an email, acknowledged as much.

“Given the variability of practices and technologies across oil and gas systems and the occurrence of episodic events,” EPA Deputy Press Secretary Tim Carroll said, “it is possible that the EPA’s estimates do not include all methane emissions from abnormal events.”

The methane problem is an irritant for power companies that continue to shift to natural gas as a cleaner alternative to coal, and the power industry has applauded proposed regulations to rein in leaks from wells, pipelines and processing plants.

“We are working to get the energy we provide as clean as we can as fast as we can while maintaining the reliability and affordability that our customers value,” Tom Kuhn, president of the Edison Electric Institute, said in November when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed new and stringent methane curbs on the oil and natural gas industry. “Federal regulations on methane emissions across the value chain are essential.”

A number of electric utilities are also zeroing in on their own natural gas infrastructure and supply chains. Xcel Energy Inc. announced in November that it would cut emissions from its natural gas service by 25% by 2030 from 2020 levels and only source gas from certified low-emission suppliers.

Sempra is developing upstream “preferred source” programs to procure more cleanly produced natural gas as well. Dominion Energy Inc. sold most of its natural gas transmission and storage facilities in 2020 and plans to sell the Questar Pipeline Co., part of the utility’s plan to cut methane emissions 65% by 2030 below 2010 levels.

The demand for responsibly sourced natural gas is not lost on the industry: At least two dozen North American operators have thus far pledged to certify their products.

And the One Future Coalition — a group of companies spanning the natural gas value chain and representing roughly 19% of the gas produced in the U.S. — set a 2020 methane intensity goal of 0.283%. The group said its methane intensity, or leak rate, for that year came in at 0.105%.

Scientists like Meijer say they hope the scrutiny of the natural gas supply chain will prompt policies that end methane leaks once and for all. Indeed, such efforts now have broad support from previously reluctant U.S. industry players.

The oil and gas industry’s main trade group is generally on board with methane reduction plans. In comments on the proposed methane emissions reduction policy, the American Petroleum Institute said methane reductions are a priority for the industry, albeit while urging the EPA to consider costs and implementation timelines.

Regulations could also help to tamp down criticism against the country’s booming production and exports of liquefied natural gas, the group suggested.

“We believe the direct regulation of methane can further bolster the environmental benefits of American natural gas,” Dustin Meyer, API’s vice president of natural gas markets, said in an emailed statement. “Exports of U.S. LNG could help drive down global emissions by replacing dirtier fuels and higher-emitting Russian natural gas to our allies abroad.”
Source: Platts

Labour demands stricter air pollution limits after child poverty link revealed

Research shows UK’s 50 most polluted areas also have highest rates of child poverty

Traffic on the A205 South Circular road in Lewisham, south London.
 Photograph: Dominic Lipinski/PA

Fiona Harvey
Environment correspondent
Tue 28 Dec 2021 

The Labour party has demanded stricter limits on air pollution after analysis showed the close correlation between children living in poverty and dirty air in the UK.

Five London boroughs rank worst for child poverty and worst for dirty air, according to government data collated by Labour, mapping areas of high poverty against statistics on air pollution. The analysis showed that the higher the rate of child poverty in a given area, the dirtier the air there was on average, with most of the 50 most polluted areas in the UK also showing the highest rates of child poverty.

Boroughs in Birmingham, Southampton, Portsmouth, Sandwell and Walsall also showed high correlations between child poverty and air pollution.

In the 11 local authorities that exceed the WHO’s recommended guideline limit of an annual mean concentration of 10 micrograms per cubic metre of air (µg/m3), an average of 39.5% of children are living in poverty – much higher than the national average of 31%.

Altogether, about 6.7 million children are living in areas of the UK where air pollution has breached legal limits, of whom about 2 million are also living in poverty, according to the research.

The announcement by the Labour party follows a meeting in December with Keir Starmer, Ed Miliband, and campaign group Choked Up, a group of young black and brown teenagers living in areas affected by air pollution, who are calling for a right to clean air.

Jim McMahon, the shadow secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs, said: “Everyone should have the right to breathe clean, safe air, no matter where you live. If the pandemic has shown us anything, it’s that public health has to be at the very top of the political agenda, and that has to start with the air we breathe.”

He pointed to Labour proposals for a Clean Air Act, which would establish a legal right to breathe clean air, and legal requirements for air quality based on the advice of the World Health Organization. The government rejected amendments to the environment bill that would have set pollution limits in line with WHO advice.

He added: “The Conservative government refused to protect the health of British children, voting against tougher limits on pollution. Our children should be able to take clean, safe air for granted. Only a Clean Air Act is going to guarantee that.”

Under the new environment legislation, the government will set new pollution targets from late next year. The government was repeatedly found to be in breach of EU air pollution rules, when they applied to the UK, before Brexit.

A government spokesperson said: “Air pollution has reduced significantly since 2010 – at a national level, emissions of fine particulate matter have fallen by 11%, while emissions of nitrogen oxides are at their lowest levels since records began. But we know there is still more to do. To continue to drive forward tangible and long-lasting improvements to air quality, we are committed to setting stretching and ambitious targets on air quality through our Environment Act.”

Some of the most polluted cities, including London, Birmingham and Portsmouth, have introduced clean air zones in an effort to reduce air pollution, which mainly comes from diesel and petrol vehicles, agriculture and wood-burning stoves.
ANTI-ZIONISM IS NOT ANTI-SEMITISM
Jewish woman accused of antisemitism by Labour threatens to sue

Exclusive: Diana Neslen, 82, claims party has discriminated against her based on her belief in anti-Zionism


Diana Neslen: ‘The Labour party has no idea in my opinion of what antisemitism is.’

Haroon Siddique Legal affairs correspondent
Mon 20 Dec 2021 

An 82-year-old Jewish woman, who is being investigated by Labour for alleged antisemitism for the third time in less than three years, is threatening legal action against the party, claiming it has unlawfully discriminated against her based on her belief in anti-Zionism.

Diana Neslen, who lives in east London, regularly attends her local synagogue and keeps a kosher home but has been accused of antisemitism for tweets she has posted about Israel and Zionism.

In a pre-action letter to Labour, her lawyers, Bindmans, say the party’s investigation is totally unjustified and disproportionate as it rests on a single tweet from 2017, which said “the existence of the state of Israel is a racist endeavour and I am an antiracist Jew”.

They claim anti-Zionism is a protected philosophical belief under the Equality Act and Neslen has been “subjected by the party to discrimination and harassment related to her protected philosophical belief”.

Neslen, who said she was a “committed Zionist” before she visited Israel, told the Guardian: “I remember thinking at the end of the war, ‘Why didn’t the Germans do anything?’ When there’s injustice done in your name you cannot close your eyes to it.

 That’s why I feel very strongly.

“The Labour party has no idea in my opinion of what antisemitism is. My son was attacked by a luminary of the BNP [British National party] who was jailed for three years. I remember picking up the phone and being subjected to death threats from the BNP. People who have never experienced antisemitism have no idea what it means, what it means for a Jew to be found guilty of antisemitism.”

Neslen, who grew up in South Africa, said she had spent her life fighting apartheid and racism. In 2018, while mourning the death of her husband of 51 years and having recently been diagnosed with cancer, she was sent a “reminder of conduct” accusing her of antisemitic comments on social media.

In February this year, she was given a “formal NEC warning relating to your conduct”. Bindmans said all bar one of the tweets cited in the latest investigation, of which she was notified in August, were excluded under party rules either because they were before she rejoined the party in 2015 or were considered in the previous investigation.

In 2018, Labour, beset by antisemitism allegations, adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism, which includes as an example: “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, eg by claiming that the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour.”

Neslen is a member of Jewish Voice for Labour, which says it knows of 42 Jewish members of the Labour party, two of whom have since died, who have faced or are facing disciplinary charges relating to allegations of antisemitism. The group estimates that Jewish Labour party members are at least five times more likely to have faced actioned complaints of antisemitism than non-Jewish members.

The letter from Bindmans quotes the judge who, in the case of Maya Forstater earlier this year, determined that gender-critical views were a protected philosophical belief, saying “only if the belief involves a very grave violation of the rights of others, tantamount to the destruction of those rights, would it be one that was not worthy of respect in a democratic society”.

Neslen is threatening to sue Labour if it does not apologise and undertake not to pursue further investigations against her in respect of her beliefs.

Labour has not replied to letters from her lawyers and did not respond to a request for comment from the Guardian.

SEE 



UK
The new Tory right is fanatical and dangerous – and should be Labour’s prime target

They have Johnson’s ear on everything from face masks to net zero. But the public mood is against them, and Starmer needs to be too

Jacob Rees-Mogg and Steve Baker pictured at the Houses of Parliament in November 2018. Photograph: Peter Nicholls/Reuters


John Harris
Sun 5 Dec 2021

The House of Commons rarely hears speeches about what it is to be human, the elements of life that give it meaning, and the sanctity of free will. But last Tuesday, as MPs spent three hours considering what measures England should adopt in response to the arrival of the Omicron variant, the Conservative MP Steve Baker gave a brief oration that dealt with these things and more.

The debate, he said, was not really about modest proposals for mandatory face coverings in most public spaces, and 10 days of self-isolation for anyone deemed to have been a contact of someone infected with the new variant. Even if they didn’t know it, MPs were fundamentally considering “the kind of nation and civilisation that we are creating in the context of this new disease”.

He expressed concern about the effects of mask-wearing on children, and his worries about what a possible “pingdemic” might mean for the economy. But the nub of his argument was philosophical. “What is the relationship between the state and the individual?” he asked. “Are we to be empty vessels or mere automata – things to be managed, as if a problem? Or are we free spirits with, for want of a better term, a soul?”


Raab says ‘formal party’ in No 10 last Christmas would have broken rules

The latter was the truth, he said: all of us are “people who deserve the dignity of choice and the meaning in our lives that comes from taking responsibility. It is possible that meaning in our lives comes from little else”.

Having offered this somewhat dried-up vision of the human condition (what, you could only wonder, of the meaning given to existence by friendship, family or community?), he then told his colleagues that they were facing “a fundamental choice between heading towards heaven and heading towards hell”. Some of them seemed to agree: 32 Tories opposed the self-isolation rules, and 20 voted against the new mask mandate.

There it was again: that vocal element of the Conservative party that successfully pushed us into the hardest of Brexits, and these days spends a lot of its time railing against measures designed to control the worst effects of the virus.

In the wake of the 2016 referendum, MPs faithful to its view of things relaunched the European Research Group to push for the UK to leave the single market and customs union. Today, some of their most high-profile politicking is also done via the new(ish) Covid Recovery Group. You might call the people involved Groupies: many are also members of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group, reportedly overseen by Baker, who thinks that if the government achieves its carbon emissions target by 2050, people are “going to be poorer, they’re going to be colder … and they may be eating insects for protein”.

These Tories are often termed libertarians, but such beliefs seem to have their limits: notwithstanding one or two murmurings of concern, they have supported the new crime and policing bill, and its swingeing restrictions on the right to protest. They tend to insist that masks should be a matter of personal choice, but tell us what that choice should be by not wearing masks in the Commons chamber. Their politics is essentially emotional: hostile towards the state being used to shape society and the economy, more about the individual than any notion of the common good, and seemingly based on the insistence that people like them should be able to do as they please.

They clearly have a strong influence on the prime minister. When the leading lights of the ERG agreed to vote for his withdrawal agreement with the EU and opened the path to the 2019 general election, they ensured that he owed them a debt. The exit from Tory politics of remainers and Conservative centrists has been another boost, as has the presence in the cabinet of such ideological allies as Jacob Rees-Mogg, Priti Patel and Dominic Raab. Regular whispers about Nigel Farage returning to steal Tory votes maintain Baker and his comrades’ influence. And their laissez-faire outlook chimes with one of the few sets of coherent convictions that Boris Johnson seems to possess, evident in his habit of claiming that Covid measures are a matter of huge reluctance, and the fact that he has almost seemed to make a point of being photographed without a mask.

There are indications that this kind of Conservatism might not suit once-loyal Tory people and places quite as much as its adherents think: recent Tory losses in council elections clustered in the south of England, the summer’s Liberal Democrat win in the Chesham and Amersham byelection, even last week’s low turnout and 10% swing to Labour in true blue Old Bexley and Sidcup. Viewed from this perspective, the new Tory right perhaps has a flaw it shares with zealots on the left, claiming to speak for “the people”, but regularly falling out of step with large swathes of the public.

There are, of course, Brexity, me-first strands of public opinion that do seem to fit with its view of things. But climate scepticism and opposition to meaningful action now seems to be confined to an increasingly small share of the population, even at the upper end of the age range. Just before the latest Covid rules were introduced, YouGov found that 83% of us supported compulsory mask wearing in shops and on public transport. Were millions of people told that accepting such restrictions was tantamount to a descent into the moral underworld, they would surely conclude that they were listening to cranks and fanatics.

The Conservatives have a long history of focusing on the more eccentric, out-there elements of the Labour party and making hay, a habit that reached its peak in the Jeremy Corbyn years, and is these days reflected in all those caricatures of anything deemed “woke”. But even now, Keir Starmer’s Labour party seems surprisingly quiet about the Tory right and its ever-increasing influence – rarely pointing out how far its stances are from public opinion, nor highlighting the hold it seems to have on Johnson.

Boris Johnson’s rule is a throwback to the 18th-century golden age of sleaze
Andy Beckett


If this were to change, Starmer might finally master something that has eluded him since the start of the pandemic: the ability to cast the Tories’ failings in moral terms, and offer a contrasting alternative. Think about it this way: if the most influential wing of the Conservative party favours flimsy ideas of personal choice over our collective wellbeing, that surely shines on everything from the prevalence among Tory MPs of second jobs and their aversion to face coverings, to Johnson apparently allowing staff to hold parties in Downing Street in defiance of lockdown rules. Such things are not only about arrogance, sloppiness and ineptitude: they also demonstrate what reckless individualism looks like in practice.

If Starmer needs an example of the tone he might strike, he could read an old speech by one of his predecessors. Socialism, said this Labour politician, was about “a moral purpose to life, a set of values, a belief in society, in cooperation, in achieving together what we cannot achieve alone”. He wanted, he said, a country where “your child in distress is my child, your parent ill and in pain is my parent, your friend unemployed and helpless is my friend, your neighbour, my neighbour”.

“We are not simply people set in isolation from one another,” he insisted, “but members of the same family, same community, same human race.” These were values, moreover, “shared by the vast majority of the British people”. There should be no nervousness among the Labour frontbench about rhetoric like that: Tony Blair said those words, when he and his party were less than two years away from finally sending the Conservative party into the wilderness.


John Harris is a Guardian columnist
LIKE THE NDP IN CANADA 
Labour are much better at running the economy than voters think – new research
The two-horse race. Chris Dorney/Alamy
June 8, 2021 

Since the 1920s, the Conservative and Labour parties have dominated the political landscape in the United Kingdom. Their governments tend to be strong, since the country’s first-past-the-post electoral system helps to produce parliamentary majorities which enable the ruling party to implement its policies. Yet surprisingly, after a century of the two parties vying for power, there is a little academic research into which has been better for the UK economy.

This is even more perplexing given that the economic performance of each party is a key factor in UK voters’ political decision-making. Undeterred by the lack of research, however, they have long since reached a conclusion: the Conservatives enjoy a clear political advantage as the party expected to manage the economy better. Even a sizeable percentage of Labour voters have agreed at times.

This could possibly explain why the Conservatives have won the most general elections in the past century: 15 wins to Labour’s eight since 1922, plus four hung parliaments, with the Conservatives the largest party in three of them.

But are the voters right in thinking that the Conservatives are the most reliable party for economic performance? We have just published research into this that analyses the GDP growth achievements of the two parties. The results are not what you might expect.
The basic results

Over the past century of governments, the Conservatives achieved slightly higher mean growth per quarter (0.62% vs 0.56%), Labour achieved a slightly higher median (0.62% versus 0.58%). In other words, when you add together all the quarterly growth numbers of both parties and divide them by the number of quarters in question, the Conservatives come out on top. But when you take the middle number of each parties’ quarterly growth figures, Labour comes out on top. Incidentally, this analysis does not include the impact of COVID on the economy – including that makes Labour’s performance look better.


The current incumbents, Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer. PA Images/Alamy

These differences are not statistically significant, but the discrepancy between mean and median hints at the presence of outliers of particularly strong or weak quarters in the data that are skewing the mean averages. In fact, Labour have achieved a higher concentration of quarters of positive growth than the Conservatives. Indeed, despite the 2008-09 recession taking place on Labour’s watch, the party has only overseen seven quarters of recession in the past 100 years compared to 17 under the Conservatives.

If we disregard the global financial crisis as an external shock, Labour has presided over just two recession quarters since 1955, and has produced average annualised growth of 2.66%. If we similarly disregard the three quarters following the 1973 oil shock that took place under the Conservative administration of Ted Heath, his party has presided over 14 recession quarters and 2.65% of average annualised growth. You can also see the performance of specific governments since 1955, as shown by the average annualised growth numbers, in the graph below.

Growth by administration since 1955
Algarhi/Tziamalis

Improving the analysis


So far, our findings have shown that there is no statistically significant difference in the GDP achievements of the two main parties (COVID aside), and that Labour is the more consistent performer. But those who follow politics will be well used to politicians saying, “We inherited a bad situation from the previous government”. What if the performance of a newly elected government is affected by the ongoing policies of the previous administration?

To assess whether the economic performance of either party improves as a newly elected government is given time to implement its policies, we incorporated time-lags into our analysis. The graph below shows the difference in growth rates between the parties when you apply a time lag to their performance – for example, the bars under lag 1 show average growth across a party’s period in office if you reallocate its first quarter to the previous party in office.

Average GDP growth over lagged quarters
Partisan gap = the gap between the Conservative and Labour growth figures. Algarhi/Tziamalis

What this shows is that the already statistically insignificant gap in real GDP growth between the Conservatives and Labour tends to close even further if you reallocate up to six quarters of growth figures. If you allow seven or eight quarters, however, the gap seems to widen in favour of the Conservatives. But when we ran some econometric modelling to see whether this was statistically significant, we concluded that it was not: there was no clear winner between the two parties.

To add an additional layer of sophistication, we then resorted to a technique that implicitly acknowledges that new government’s affect on the economy from their first day in office, often through sentiment rather than new legislation. For example, if people think a new government will do a better job with the economy, they might save less and spend more.

But since new policies may well take months or years to yield results, there is a limit to how much sentiment can affect economic performance. To simulate this gradual shift, we used an “annual thirds method”, where the new government is economically responsible for just one-third of growth in year 1, two-thirds in year 2 and then assumes full responsibility only from year 3. Using this analysis, the annualised growth rates for the two parties stayed almost the same as before, and was still statistically insignificant.

In short, the economy grows at a very similar pace under Labour and the Conservatives, but Labour governments seem to do better at tackling recessions and achieve a more consistent performance. And if we discount the global financial crisis of 2007-09, Labour’s (slight) superiority becomes more pronounced. It should be food for thought for UK voters next time they are trying to decide where to put their cross.
Labour reshuffle: Keir Starmer’s shadow cabinet exudes confidence – but the party’s left has been shut out
Keir Starmer with members of his new shadow cabinet: David Lammy, Yvette Cooper and Rachel Reeves.

December 1, 2021 


Labour leader Keir Starmer’s reshuffle of his shadow cabinet has ended up proving far-reaching in scope. This changing of the guard is clearly the sequel to a piecemeal reshuffle in May that was botched because of a struggle between Starmer and his deputy Angela Rayner.

We are about halfway through the life of this parliament so it’s likely that this is the team Labour will deploy to fight the next election (due in 2024). Starmer may also be gambling that Boris Johnson plans to go to the polls even earlier and so wants a strong team in place.

What Labour now has is emphatically a post-Jeremy Corbyn cabinet. There seems to be little prospect of bold experiments (which some will find a problem). Whereas the 2019 manifesto promised a national investment bank and free broadband to promote modernisation, Starmer’s leadership so far has been characterised by caution.

The new line up also represents a bid for the political centre. Although Starmer was elected as leader in 2020 as a figure acceptable to the left (having served in Corbyn’s shadow cabinet), he clearly sees the party’s identification with the far left as a turn off for voters, especially those in the so-called red wall constituencies (which swapped life-long allegiances to Labour in favour of voting Tory in 2019).

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The mood music is instead all about experience and reassurance. It tells the electorate that the grown-ups are back in charge. We have the return of Yvette Cooper to the shadow cabinet, facing off against Priti Patel at the Home Office, and the promotion of David Lammy to become shadow foreign secretary. Both have served in government and carry authority.

Yet the key appointment is the shift of Lisa Nandy from shadow foreign secretary to taking on Michael Gove in his levelling up brief. This is the demotion that is not a demotion. The next election will partly be fought over Johnson’s promises to invest in the red wall. Nandy’s work with the Centre for Towns thinktank and her experience as MP for Wigan place her in an excellent position to contest government claims about delivering for the north of England.

Nandy has an ability to identify the issues that voters actually care about (not always a characteristic of the post-2010 Labour party). She has long publicised issues such as the lack of effective bus networks that blight the lives of many voters, for example. Few would deny this is a smart appointment.

Lisa Nandy is shadowing Michael Gove on levelling up. Allstar Picture Library/Alamy

Ready for battle

The elevation of Wes Streeting to shadow health secretary is significant for another reason. For an opposition to be effective it needs its warriors. These are not just good communicators or people who can be guaranteed to turn in a good performance on television.

It needs figures who will quite simply take the battle to the enemy and make life difficult for the government. Streeting has a fearless and sometimes aggressive quality (so does Lammy), which a good opposition needs to have. Another person to watch is Bridget Phillipson, who will now shadow education, and could well prove to be the first female leader of the Labour Party some time in the future.

Ed Miliband has been sidelined. His business brief has been taken over by Jonathan Reynolds, leaving the former Labour leader to concentrate on climate change. While there is a case for a shadow minister focusing on the most important issue of our times, Miliband has no equivalent cabinet minister to shadow, which may limit his ability to make an impact (though Alok Sharma, the minister who served as president of COP26, retains cabinet status).

Miliband and Starmer seem to have disagreed on nationalising the top energy companies. The appointment of Reynolds instead reflects Starmer’s determination to be pro-business at a time when businesses seem disenchanted with the government. He told the CBI business association in November that Labour would embrace fiscal discipline and that he does not think “the solution to every problem is to throw cash at it”.

The broad church narrows


What is missing is any significant figure on the left of the party. Cat Smith (previously a supporter of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership) opted to give up her role as shadow minister for young people and democracy. This is a problem for the new line up as it does not feel like a broad church. Even Tony Blair (both in opposition and in government) found room for left-wing figures such as Robin Cook and Clare Short. Where is their equivalent here? This matters because Starmer could find he has huge problems taking the party with him.

There is also no figure who has a history of supporting Brexit, even if Lisa Nandy is associated with the view that the only way that red wall voters could have been brought on board in the 2019 election was through Labour embracing a soft Brexit position. This matters if a political conversation is to start with voters in constituencies like North-East Derbyshire (now represented by a Conservative MP). They may want someone who shares their world view if they are to return to Labour.

Corbyn’s shadow cabinet was big on vision but never could persuade large parts of the electorate that it would be good at running things. This shadow cabinet feels the opposite. It exudes competence and capability. However, it has yet to answer the big question: what is Labour for in the 2020s?

Author
Rohan McWilliam
Professor of Modern British History, Anglia Ruskin University
Disclosure statement
Rohan McWilliam is a member of the Labour Party.

Campaign launched against child labour in the Kurdistan Region and Iraq

“Children need to go to school and their rights must be protected.”
 
 Wladimir van Wilgenburg 2021/12/22 


ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Young children at a school in Sulaimani took part in awareness raising activities promoting education and highlighting the dangers of child labour in the Kurdistan Region, the International Labour Organization (ILO) said in a press release on Tuesday.

T-shirts, hats, balloons and leaflets were distributed among the young school children with the slogan “No to Child Labour” to encourage them to better understand the dangers of child labour and the importance of staying in school.

According to ILO, child labour has been on the rise in Iraq in recent years due to a combination of factors including armed conflict, displacement and economic challenges.

“The risk of children entering the workforce has been further compounded by COVID-19, which has forced a growing number of children to drop out of school,” the organization said.

The school, includes pupils who were pulled out of child labor and brought back to school.

Najat, the school’s principle, told the ILO that the main reason for child labor is financial difficulties that force some poor children to drop out of school to make a living for their families.

“But in order for these children not to miss out on their rights to an education, we, along with social workers and teachers, go to their homes and try to bring them back to the classroom, because children need to go to school and their rights must be protected,” Najat said.

The event at these schools is part of a campaign to raise awareness about the dangers of child labor led by the ILO in cooperation with the Kurdistan Region’s ministries of Labour and Social Affairs, as well as other national and social partners in Iraq.

The plan is to hold the campaign in major cities across Iraq, including Baghdad, Basra, Diyala, Dohuk, Kirkuk, al Najaf and Ninewa.

The campaign is targeting more than 10,000 children, their families and guardians, teachers, employers, and the media through a series of activities, ILO said.

The campaign also include sessions for local journalists on labor standards related to child labor and the role the media can play in shedding light on the plight of working children.

“Child labour is a longstanding issue in Iraq, with poverty as the main reason but also security and displacement,” Dr. Maha Kattaa, ILO Country Coordinator in Iraq, told Kurdistan 24. “The COVID-19 pandemic and consequent school closures have added yet more pressure on children and their families, increasing the risks of more children being forced into child labour, including its worst forms. “

“At the ILO, we are working closely with all our partners, namely the government and social partners to address these issues through various efforts,” she said.

“This campaign aims to raise awareness on the increasing dangers of child labour, and mobilize efforts to reach communities most impacted by the rise of child labour in the country.”