UK

Green gentrification and the coming storm

Harry Holmes

 

| 8th August 2022 | 

The Author

Insulate Britain

Green gentrification is a looming crisis - we must pay attention to who profits from, and who is exploited by, the built environment system.

A growing number of people are pointing out just how much of British housing and public space is not built for weather extremes in a warming world. 

At the same time, greater attention is being paid to the energy efficiency of homes and the built environment.

This is partly spurred by the activism of groups like Insulate Britain, whose road blockades caused major disruption in 2021, gaining press attention for their demand to retrofit homes with insulation.

Heatwave

But focus on energy is further spurred by the cost of living crisis, where bills are rising at an unprecedented rate, all whilst fossil fuel companies are boasting record profits.

This profiteering has led many to push for a mass retrofit campaign, with changes to reduce energy use and reliance on fossil fuel systems, as a method to deal with the violence of current bills. 

Two extreme weather events have hit Britain so far this year. Storms Dudley, Eunice, and Franklin together constitute the first, when in February red weather warnings urged everyone to stay at home and winds swept across the country.

During the three storms, over a million homes were left without power, some for several days, with others seeing their roofs ripped off and impacted by falling trees.

More recently, the July heatwave saw weather records broken across Britain, with temperatures going above 40°C recorded for the first time.

Sustainability

This saw a further red weather warning, with 999 calls spiking and a still to be calculated number of heat related deaths. Several fire services declared major incidents, with a substantive blaze in Wennington, East London, causing the destruction of a spate of homes. 

Train, road, and air travel were significantly disrupted during both these disasters. Critical infrastructure was unable to cope with the weather extremes.

The need to adapt and retrofit the built environment in Britain has never seemed more pressing and widespread. 

Despite the increased recognition of the need for built environment retrofitting and adaptation, a significant majority of the conversation remains focused on what may be termed the ‘technicalities’.

An ever widening pool of people are discussing and learning about built environment sustainability standards like Passivhaus, with a growing number of projects attempting to put its principles into practice.

Space

Similarly, there are a wide variety of measures around property level adaptation, with whole cottage industries selling technologies like flood doors emerging and being championed. 

British society is sleepwalking into a world of flooding, heatwaves, and cold snaps, wrapped in shoddy housing stock unable to provide basic levels of health and security.

This recognises that the built environment is a massive environmental issue, both as the area most in need of adaptation and of massive resource use - from the energy going into buildings to the materials needed to construct them. Despite this, action in Britain has been lacking.

As the most recent Committee on Climate Change Progress Report states: "Buildings are the UK’s second largest source of emissions (after surface transport).

"There has been no sustained reduction in emissions from buildings in the last decade reflecting low levels of annual home energy efficiency improvements." 

That the UK’s second largest emission source has received so little action is shocking. Buildings are not just an emissions problem, they are the fundamental space within which the vast majority of people maintain themselves.

Ownership

British society is sleepwalking into a world of flooding, heatwaves, and cold snaps, wrapped in shoddy housing stock unable to provide basic levels of health and security. This is a crisis of habitability wrapped up in, and central to worsening, the crisis of environmental breakdown. 

Therefore, the rising attention to the technicalities of building retrofit and adaptation should be welcomed. This technical know-how is empowering people to respond to the unfolding climate crisis. 

This includes calculating the amount of jobs which could be created locally from a mass retrofit campaign, to raising awareness about the exact flood risks a settlement faces.

However, if just left on the level of technical know-how, it becomes impossible to ask important questions about built environment sustainability: why have buildings been allowed to reach such a poor state? Who has profited from this process? How is further action on the built environment being prevented?

Any gains in technical know-how about built environment adaptation and retrofitting must be brought into alignment with an understanding of the economic forces that drive property development and ownership. 

Wealthy

Whilst this is a complicated picture, a short summary of British housing and the built environment can be provided.

After a period of significant social housing, the introduction of the ‘right to buy’, combined with reduced state investment in public housing, saw the promotion of mass homeownership from 1980.

This was further encouraged by government securing and liberalization of mortgage finance, leading to several decades of bubble-inducing property speculation, rising home-ownership, and the destruction of social housing provision. 

This speculative bubble led to continuous increases in land and house prices in most parts of Britain, particularly acutely in cities.

With reduced social housing and prices too high, new developments in housing were increasingly bought by the already wealthy as buy-to-let properties rather than those seeking their first home.

Coffers

Consequently, home ownership peaked in the UK around 2003, and the private rental market has grown in its place.

A significant number of people facing weather risks and needing retrofit are therefore living in long-term rented accommodation, particularly city-based working-class people. 

A further trend in government built environment intervention has been the drive for infrastructure mega-projects, done in conjunction with the private sector, as a way to develop public space.

This is often done as a way to supplement limited local government coffers with private sector money, often not considering the long-run impacts these projects have on council finances and local communities.

This is taking place within the context of the wide range of government backed financial mechanisms around the built environment, and the declining local government power to build social housing.

Influence

The most notable example of this is the Olympic Park in London, which saw the mass displacement of working class communities, bulldozed social housing, and the lining of property developer pockets. 

The built environment is increasingly being commodified, rather than provided as a place for people to live in.

The consequences of this is the long-term decline of housing stock, as a result of the landlord incentive to only provide the bare minimum of renovations whilst extracting the maximum amount of rent.

Councils are, at the same time, incentivised to bulldoze these areas once the years of neglect accumulates, in favour of private finance megaprojects, merely displacing housing insecurity elsewhere. This displaces the development of plans for social housing which include retrofit and adaptation.

Combined with a collapsing high street and declining public budgets for critical infrastructure, much public space is being given to the private sector to control, influence, and gentrify. 

Landlord

Thus, if we consider a mass insulation campaign, it will be no good unless we recognise that a significant number of people live as renters, where they are forced to pay the energy bills without the power to actually commission structural work.

Consequently, the very buildings most in need of energy intervention will not see it if incentives continue to assume home ownership.

Worse, if landlords are sufficiently incorporated into any insulation scheme, they could see themselves profiting from or being subsidised by insulation grants, despite their profiteering from buildings being the very cause of energy inefficiency. 

There is a pressing need for environmentalists to seriously tackle the idea of adaptation justice - this is certainly the case around the built environment, as Chris Saltmarsh has argued in The Ecologist.

Take the case of ‘renovictions’, where a landlord renovates their property, and in some cases based on environmental concerns may use public money to install adaptation or retrofit measures.

Financialisation

This often requires the eviction of tenants, either before to complete the work, or afterwards when the landlord seeks to raise the rent. Here the cost of adapting and retrofitting is not borne by those who have profited from the built environment, but those most vulnerable to the housing system. 

Similarly, an increasing number of public bodies are building using Passivhaus principles or at least higher levels of energy efficiency when constructing projects.

However, if such buildings are built by bulldozing over existing working-class communities, it merely continues the vicious cycle of gentrification that is widespread in most British cities.

Without attention to who profits from and who is exploited by the built environment system, such green gentrification is a looming concern. 

To seriously tackle weather events like February’s storms or July’s heat wave, it’s necessary to also tackle the widespread growth of landlordism, the financialisation of buildings, and the ways in which the built environment is planned by market forces. 

This Author

Harry Holmes is a climate organiser and writer based in London. 

https://theecologist.org/

Mexico arrests former attorney general over student disappearances

Former Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam is the most senior official to be arrested so far in connection with what is viewed as one of the country’s gravest human rights tragedies.

In the eight years since 43 students vanished in Mexico, few answers have been on offer

Mexican federal prosecutors said they had arrested the country's former Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam amid charges he mishandled investigations into the disappearance of 43 students in 2014. 

On September 26, 2014, the young men studying at a rural teacher training college in Ayotzinapa went missing in the city of Iguala in Guerrero state.
No proof or suggestions have been made that the students remain alive.

Murillo Karam was attorney general between 2012 and 2015, serving under former President Enrique Pena Nieto. He is the most senior official to be arrested to date in the probe into one of the country's gravest human rights abuses.

What is Murillo Karam accused of?

The current attorney general, Alejandro Gertz Manero, had accused Murillo Karam in 2020 of "orchestrating a massive media trick" to oversee a "generalized cover-up" in the extraordinary high-profile case of the disappeared students.

Facing pressure to solve the case, Murillo Karam said in 2014 that members of a drug gang had killed the students and burned their bodies at a garbage dump. Murillo Karam labeled this assessment "historic truth."

Murillo Karam's speculative response was rejected by many, including the victims' families.

His arrest comes one day after a commission was set up to determine whether the army had any responsibility for the students' disappearances.

The commission said a soldier had infiltrated the student group and the army did not mobilize to block the kidnappings, despite being aware of what was transpiring.

What happened to the students?

It is believed that the students were abducted by corrupt local police, members of the security forces and a drug gang active in the city of Iguala, where the kidnappings took place.

The students disappeared near a military base where it is alleged soldiers were aware of what was going on. The victims' families have rallied for those soldiers to be brought to account.

The investigation included instances of torture, improper arrest and mishandling of evidence. The result is that some of the country's most hardened criminals within the underworld of narco-traffickers have been permitted to walk free.

Investigators believe the students were Initially detained by corrupt police who then handed them over to a drug gang who accused them of belonging to a rival gang, thereby placing their lives in extreme peril.

The final resting place of the students remains unknown though Murillo Karam had said that drug gangs incinerated the students' corpses and incinerated the remains at the Cocula dump and ditched what remained in a nearby river.

The head of Mexico's federal investigations, Tomas Zeron, fled to Israel after it became clear he was being sought on charges of torture and other grave rights abuses, including concealing the forced disappearances of the students. Mexico is seeking his extradition.

ar/sri (AFP, AP)

Putin to Allow Inspectors to Visit Russia-Occupied Nuclear Plant

August 19, 2022 
Agence France-Presse

A Russian serviceman patrols the territory of the Zaporizhzhia 

Nuclear Power Station in Ukraine, May 1, 2022.

ODESA, UKRAINE —

Russian President Vladimir Putin has agreed that independent inspectors can travel to the Moscow-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, the French presidency said Friday, as fears grow over fighting near the site.

According to French President Emmanuel Macron's office, Putin had "reconsidered" his demand that the International Atomic Energy Agency travel through Russia to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear site.

The U.N. nuclear watchdog's chief, Rafael Grossi, "welcomed recent statements indicating that both Ukraine and Russia supported the IAEA's aim to send a mission" to the plant.

Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged Moscow's forces occupying Zaporizhzhia not to disconnect the facility from the grid and potentially cut supplies of electricity to millions of Ukrainians.

A flare-up in fighting around the Russian-controlled nuclear power station — with both sides blaming each other for attacks — has raised the specter of a disaster worse than in Chernobyl.

The Kremlin said that Putin and Macron agreed that the IAEA should carry out inspections "as soon as possible" to "assess the real situation on the ground."

Putin also "stressed that the systematic shelling by the Ukrainian military of the territory of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant creates the danger of a large-scale catastrophe," the Kremlin added.

'Most tragic' summer

The warning came a day after Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Guterres, meeting in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, sounded the alarm over the fighting, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged the United Nations to secure the site.

"This summer may go down in the history of various European countries as one of the most tragic of all time," Zelenskyy said in his Friday evening address.

"No instruction at any nuclear power plant in the world provides a procedure in case a terrorist state turns a nuclear power plant into a target."

During his visit to the southern port of Odesa on Friday, the U.N. secretary-general said that "obviously, the electricity from Zaporizhzhia is Ukrainian electricity. This principle must be fully respected."

"Naturally, its energy must be used by the Ukrainian people," he told AFP in separate comments.

On Thursday, Moscow said Kyiv was preparing a "provocation" at the site that would see Russia "accused of creating a man-made disaster at the plant."

Kyiv, however, insisted that Moscow was planning the provocation, and said Russia's occupying forces had ordered most staff to stay home Friday.

The United States on Friday announced a new $775 million arms package, including more precision-guided missiles for HIMARS systems that enable Ukraine to strike Russian targets far behind the front lines.

Scientists say they have found low-cost way to destroy cancer-causing 'forever chemicals'


PFAS are commonly found in various household items like non-stick frying pans because manufacturers like how well they hold up to oil, water and stains. 

File Photo by Joe Gough/Shutterstock

Aug. 19 (UPI) -- Scientists say they have found a way to eliminate, for the first time, cancer causing "forever chemicals" in everyday items like food packaging, non-stick frying pans, and women's makeup.

Researchers at Northwestern University reported the results of a study in the Journal Science, saying they used cheap household products to make the breakthrough, in which scientists eliminated the substances, known as PFAS, by using low heat in conjunction with sodium hydroxide found in soaps and painkillers.

Product manufacturers have used the chemicals for decades because of how well they hold up to oil, water and stains.

PFAS are also found in various products like adhesives, wet gear, pharmaceutical containers, papers, and paints. As consumers have become more aware, alternative products have cropped up in the marketplace with non-PFAS packaging and containers like those used for drinking water.

RELATED PFAS 'forever chemicals' linked to common liver cancer

Long-term exposure to PFAS have long been linked to a higher risk of developing cancer and birth defects, but research continues into how much exposure could actually lead to the most serious health concerns.

Through the years, various methods to destroy the substances, like high temperature incineration, have failed and allowed the problem to worsen globally. PFAs are so widespread that off-gassing has led to their presence in the atmosphere, as shown by rainwater that's tested positive for low-level amounts.

"There is an association between exposure and adverse outcomes in every major organ system in the human body," Harvard University chemistry professor Elsie Sunderland said according to BBC News.

RELATED 'Forever chemicals' could cost U.S. population billions in health care, study says

More than 4,500 fluourine compounds are found in poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances, which carry serious health risks as the human body cannot easily eliminate them due to their strong carbon bonds.

During their research, scientists at Northwestern identified a weak link -- a chain of oxygen atoms at the tail end of carbon-fluorine bonds, which was essentially an open gate for the new process that "decapitated the head group from the tail," said lead researcher Brittany Trang.

"This could be a breakthrough if it is low cost," Camilla Alexander-White, policy leader with the Royal Society of Chemistry, said according to BBC News.

Over half of people infected with the omicron variant didn't know it, a study finds

By Shauneen Miranda

NPR
Published August 19, 2022 

Al Bello/Getty Images

The majority of people likely infected with the omicron variant of COVID-19 were unaware, according to a study from a medical center in Los Angeles, Calif.

The majority of people likely infected with the omicron variant that causes COVID-19 were not aware they contracted the virus, which likely played a role in the rapid spread of omicron, according to a study published this week.

Researchers at Cedars-Sinai, a nonprofit health organization based in Los Angeles, examined the infectious status of individuals during the omicron surge in the U.S.

Omicron was first detected in November 2021 and has become the most dominant strain of COVID-19. Common symptoms are typically less severe than other variants and include cough, headache, fatigue, sore throat and a runny nose, according to the researchers.

What did researchers find?

The study analyzed 2,479 blood samples from adult employees and patients at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center around the time of the omicron variant surge.

Of the 210 people who likely contracted the omicron variant — based on antibodies in their blood — 56% percent did not know they had the virus, the researchers found.

They also found that only 10% of those who were unaware reported having any symptoms relating to a common cold or other type of infection.

"We hope people will read these findings and think, 'I was just at a gathering where someone tested positive,' or, 'I just started to feel a little under the weather. Maybe I should get a quick test,'" said Dr. Susan Cheng, one of the authors of the study.

"The better we understand our own risks, the better we will be at protecting the health of the public as well as ourselves," said Cheng, who directs the Institute for Research on Healthy Aging in the Department of Cardiology at Cedars-Sinai's Smidt Heart Institute.

The findings help us understand how omicron spreads

A lack of awareness could be a major factor in the rapid transmission of the virus between individuals, according to the study.

"Our study findings add to evidence that undiagnosed infections can increase transmission of the virus," said Dr. Sandy Y. Joung, first author of the study who serves as an investigator at Cedars-Sinai.

"A low level of infection awareness has likely contributed to the fast spread of Omicron," Young said.

Although awareness among health care employees was slightly higher, the researchers said it remained low overall.

Researchers say further studies are needed, "involving larger numbers of people from diverse ethnicities and communities ... to learn what specific factors are associated with a lack of infection awareness," according to the news release.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org

Many Omicron Patients Unintentionally Spread This COVID-19 Variant: Study

Aug 17, 2022 

 By Luigi Caler

Many COVID-19 patients infected with the omicron variant could be spreading the virus unintentionally.

A small study published in JAMA Network Open Wednesday revealed that more than half or around 56% of omicron patients could be spreading the virus without knowing it because they are also oblivious to their condition.

“In this cohort study of 210 adults with evidence of seroconversion during a regional omicron variant surge, 56% reported being unaware of any recent omicron variant infection,” the researchers from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center wrote.

The team explained that some individuals infected with omicron could be completely unaware of their infectious status, so this could have led to more transmissions.

“Findings of this study suggest that low rates of omicron variant infection awareness may be a key contributor to [the] rapid transmission of the virus within communities,” the researchers noted.

For the study, the team analyzed data from adult employees and patients of the academic medical center, Cedars-Sinai, in Los Angeles County, California. The participants provided two blood samples for antibody testing — one before and another after the omicron surge.

It is worth noting that most of the participants were vaccinated. All 210 adults were asked to fill out health surveys describing their symptoms. They also had COVID-19 PCR testing to determine if they got infected during the study period.

Prior studies indicated that at least 25% and possibly as many as 80% of people with SARS-CoV-2 might not experience symptoms. Compared to other variants, omicron was found to cause less severe symptoms, especially in vaccinated individuals.

The most common symptoms of the omicron variant include fatigue, cough, runny nose, sore throat and headache. Because of this, some patients may brush their condition off as a simple cold or allergy.

“Our study findings add to evidence that undiagnosed infections can increase transmission of the virus. A low level of infection awareness has likely contributed to the fast spread of omicron,” the study’s first author and a researcher at Cedars-Sinai Sandy Y. Joung, MHDS, said in a media release.

“We hope people will read these findings and think, ‘I was just at a gathering where someone tested positive,’ or, ‘I just started to feel a little under the weather. Maybe I should get a quick test.’ The better we understand our own risks, the better we will be at protecting the health of the public as well as ourselves,” added corresponding author and director of the Institute for Research on Healthy Aging in the Department of Cardiology at the Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai Susan Cheng, MD, MPH.

UK
The Conservative Leadership Contest has Exposed the Big Lie About Brexit
Adam Bienkov
19 August 2022

Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss. Photo: Xinhua/Alamy

Voters were promised better-funded public services and stronger employment rights after Brexit – Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak are now offering us the opposite, reports Adam Bienkov

One of the many strange things about this summer’s Conservative party leadership contest has been quite how little Brexit has featured in it.

For decades, the UK’s relationship with Europe has dominated the debate within the party and, yet, neither of the candidates to succeed Boris Johnson have had anything of substance to say about it.

Liz Truss, who was a passionate Remain campaigner before switching to Leave once the result came in, has said that she wants to maximise “the opportunities of Brexit”. But, along with her rival Rishi Sunak, she hasn’t explained what that really involves.

The cause of their reluctance is obvious. By any reasonable standard, Brexit is not working. Since leaving the EU wages have slumped, prices have soared and even immigration has remained at historic highs.

Not all of this is due to Brexit. The pandemic and the war in Ukraine have both contributed significantly to the current crisis. But with every penny counting and the public sector under growing strain, the public has started to realised that cutting ourselves off from our closest neighbours has made a bad situation significantly worse.

Indeed, recent polling suggests that there has been a decisive shift in public opinion, with little more than a third of voters still believing that leaving the EU was the right decision.

Reversing that decision is not an option for either candidate – but neither is the status quo. If things remain as they are, the future of this Government, and even Brexit itself, will increasingly come into doubt.

So how do Truss and her colleagues plan to turn things around?

One clue came this week from Brexit Opportunities Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg, who suggested that the real opportunity from Brexit comes from slashing the public sector.

“When I was appointed minister for Brexit opportunities and Government efficiency, I said that the two adjacent responsibilities were one and the same”, he wrote in the Telegraph. “Our departure from the European Union necessitates a re-thinking of the British state. This means going beyond ministers looking for fiscal trims and haircuts and considering whether the state should deliver certain functions at all.”

This is very much not what voters were promised.

Things Can Only Get Worse

The Dangers of a Truss Premiership

Jon Bloomfield

In both the 2016 EU Referendum and the 2019 General Election, Boris Johnson promised that Brexit would actually lead to an increase in funding for public services, with hundreds of millions of additional pounds poured into the NHS every week.

Johnson also denied all suggestions that Brexit would be used as an excuse to slash workers’ rights and food and environmental standards, suggesting that the UK government would instead strengthen these after leaving the EU.

The messaging during the Conservative leadership campaign has been quite different. Both of the candidates, as well as their supporters in the media, have signalled that the UK is instead heading for a new age of austerity, with both also competing to suggest that they will tear up UK regulations inherited from our time in the EU.

The candidates delivering these messages are not ideally-placed to do so. Sunak, who went to one of the most expensive public schools in the country before marrying into one of the wealthiest families in the world, has spent his campaign saying that no additional funding should now be put into the NHS.

Asked this week by a former nurse about what he planned to do to tackle the growing crisis in hospitals – where patients are now routinely left on trolleys, or mattresses on the floor – Sunak said that his priority was tax cuts and ensuring that the NHS stops “swallowing up every pound everyone has”. He then added that he would introduce charging for those who missed appointments.

Truss has been less open about her plans for the public sector, aside from her aborted plan to cut the wages of people working outside London and the south-east


However, we don’t need to look too far to see where her instincts lie. A report she co-wrote for the Reform think tank in 2009 called for big cuts to public services and welfare, with new charges also introduced for seeing your local GP. Her resistance to providing new help for families struggling with surging energy bills, in favour of implementing corporate tax cuts, also gives us a clear indication of the direction in which she is heading.

The belief among those on Truss’ wing of the party is that cutting the size of the public sector is a requirement for unleashing Britain’s supposed post-Brexit potential. Yet this is just one part of the puzzle. In order to fulfil their plans, they will also need to cut large swathes of European regulations and protections.

Both Truss and Sunak have signalled during this campaign that they plan to do this, but neither have been clear about which regulations they will cut or why.

However, Rees-Mogg provided another big clue earlier this year, when he told The Times that leaving the EU would allow the Government to slash workers’ rights and food standards in order to “see who needs protection and who doesn’t”.

By slashing standards and regulations, Rees-Mogg and his fellow travellers believe that Brexit is an opportunity to turn the UK into a sort of low-tax, low-regulation, Singapore-by-the-Atlantic.

While this has been a long-term aim of many on the right of the Conservative Party, it is not a vision that is particularly appealing to voters. When wages are slumping and the public sector is falling apart, nobody wants to hear that the Government plans to slash funding for hospitals or reduce workers’ rights.

Liz Truss’ ‘Lazy Brits’ Comments

Expose her Own ‘Plastic Patriotism’

Adam Bienkov

But this appears to be precisely where we are heading. Both candidates have vowed to bring in new legislation to make it harder for workers to strike, while Truss’ commitment to tax cuts means that further public sector funding cuts are inevitably on the cards too.

Some Conservative-supporting newspapers already appear to be priming the public for this eventuality, with former Conservative MP Matthew Parris writing in The Times this week that is is “time to decide which services are essential”.

“Local libraries? Leisure centres? Subsidised public swimming pools? Winter fuel payments for higher-rate taxpayers? Free school meals during holidays? Advice centres? Parenthood classes? Good things, some of them, but essential? We must be jolted into asking how citizens might band together to help voluntarily or even – good heavens! – actually pay for things,” he wrote.

Of course, none of this is what voters were promised when they backed Brexit. Nor will any of it make a meaningful, positive difference to people’s daily lives. And with public support for Brexit slipping away, neither candidate has a clear mandate for radically slashing the size of the state or for stripping people of their basic employment rights.

Yet, some six years after the public voted for Brexit, the harsh reality of life outside the EU is finally coming into focus – and it is a reality which the next prime minister looks set to enthusiastically embrace.

UK
Insolvency Service will not bring criminal proceedings over P&O Ferries sackings

by Adam McCulloch 20 Aug 2022

The government Insolvency Service has decided not to commence criminal proceedings over P&O Ferries’ decision to sack 800 crew and replace them with agency workers on below minimum wage rates.

The decision by P&O Ferries, owned by ports and shipping giant DP World, in March 2022 brought condemnation from all political parties and unions and was initially described by ministers as illegal.


Transport secretary Grant Shapps and Prime Minister Boris Johnson demanded the resignation of P&O Ferries’ boss Peter Hebblethwaite and announced proposals designed to ensure ferry companies had to pay minimum wage to crews. But these have not so far been enacted.

The TUC said in response to the Insolvency Service’s decision that it would be “shocking if there is no justice for P&O workers”.

An Insolvency Service spokesperson said: “After a full and robust criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the employees who were made redundant by P&O Ferries, we have concluded that we will not commence criminal proceedings.

P&O Ferries scandal

TUC: Redundancies by P&O Ferries ‘must be a turning point in workers’ rights’

P&O Ferries chief ‘should step down’ but redundancies expose legal anomalies

P&O Ferries, pressure on MPs to back ‘fire and rehire’ ban

“The Secretary of State for the Department of Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy asked the Insolvency Service to investigate whether any offences had been committed in relation to P&O Ferries’ dismissal of 786 employees on 17 March 2022.

“The offence alleged was failure to notify in accordance with section 193 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 contrary to section 194(1) of that Act.

“The Insolvency Service conducted a criminal investigation, which was reviewed by an independent senior prosecution lawyer in accordance with the Code for Crown Prosecutors, who concluded there was no realistic prospect of a conviction.”

However, added the spokesperson, the civil investigation by the Insolvency Service remains in progress.

TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said the sackings were “a shocking case of mistreatment of working people. And it will be shocking if there is no justice for P&O workers through serious consequences for the firm’s directors under current laws.

“Our laws should protect working people from companies that brazenly flout the rules and treat staff like disposable labour. The Insolvency Service must give a clear explanation for this decision. And government ministers must commit to strengthening the laws to better protect working people and to severely punish firms that behave like P&O.”


DP World on Wednesday reported a record profit of £603m for the first six months of this year, an increase of nearly 52% compared with the same period in 2021.

“We are delighted to report a record set of first-half results,” said DP World boss Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem.

U$A

Reproductive Healthcare Issues for Employers Series, Part 5: Collective Bargaining Implications of the U.S. Supreme Court Decision in Dobbs



On June 24, 2022, the United States Supreme Court released Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade. In our Reproductive Healthcare Issues for Employers series, we have discussed the impact of the Dobbs decision on abortion services as a non-taxable benefit under certain types of group health programs (Part 1), abortion-related travel benefits and the IRS employer payment plan rules (Part 2), HIPAA and privacy issues (Part 3), and Mental Health Parity considerations for abortion-related travel (Part 4). In this post, we consider some of the collective bargaining implications of Dobbs.

In the nearly 50 years since the Roe v. Wade decision, a meaningful percentage of U.S. employer group health plans have provided coverage for abortion-related medical services, with over 80% of employers responding to a recent survey on abortion services indicating that they provide coverage for at least some abortion-related medical services. While collective bargaining agreements (“CBAs”) typically do not include such a granular level of detail on health care to specifically provide for abortion-related coverage, there are still collective bargaining issues employers should consider.

CBA Language on Changes in Medical Coverage

It is not uncommon for a CBA to provide that during the term of the bargaining agreement, an employer must maintain the same medical plan provisions as in the previous agreement. Some CBAs only permit an employer to make changes in coverage as long as the changes do not result in a reduction or loss of benefits. Employers should review the specific language of their CBAs regarding what changes to medical coverages are permitted and/or prohibited during the term of the bargaining agreement. If there is language limiting an employer’s right to change the substantive medical coverages (e.g., no material or significant reductions), employers should consult with legal counsel on the impact that language has on changes to health plans that cover abortion-related services.

Illegality

Sometimes a provision of a CBA or a pattern or practice related to a CBA provision is no longer permitted due to a change in the law. When this happens due to an employee benefits related statute or regulation, it is common for the new law to provide some period following the expiration of an employer’s current bargaining agreement for the employer and its union to bargain before the new law takes effect. However, other times a change in law has a more immediate effect, such as is the case with abortion-related “trigger laws.”

Obviously, an employer cannot comply with a CBA term that requires it to violate the law but an employer may have an obligation to notify its union and bargain over a CBA provision that has become illegal and some CBAs are specific on this point. What may be more difficult for state law level abortion restrictions is that what is legal or illegal may not be clear and there may be risks to an employer and its employees (e.g., officers) from taking certain positions on abortion coverage.

Employers should consult with legal counsel on responding to actual or potential illegality, recognizing that what abortion-related medical services and support is or is not permitted may be a constantly moving target in many states. Depending on advice from legal counsel, an employer may need to provide its union notice of what is being changed, or notice and an opportunity to bargain.

Protected Activity

The Dobbs decision has triggered strong feelings across the political spectrum, including among employees. While not a new concept, it is important for employers to remember that the National Labor Relations Act prohibits retaliation against employees who discuss the terms and conditions of employment (protected concerted activity). Employers may become aware of an increase in employees discussing or demanding action on reproductive rights issues and/or how the employer should decide on coverage of abortion-related medical services. Employers should consult with legal counsel since these types of discussions may be protected activity under the NLRA.

Conclusion

The impact of the Dobbs decision on collective bargaining is just one of the many areas employers must address. The Dickinson Wright Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation Group has been and will continue to monitor the impact of these and other issues surrounding the Dobbs decision to advise clients on options for responding to this changing health care coverage landscape.

[View source.]

Abortion in Canada is legal for all, but inaccessible for too many

Abortions are a common medical procedure in Canada, yet those living outside of large urban areas have trouble receiving the care they need.


People in Montreal take part in a protest on June 26, 2022, to denounce the United States Supreme Court's decision to overturn the law that provided the constitutional right to abortion for almost 50 years. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes

by Kyra Keer, Kayla Benjamin, Roma Dhamanaskar

POLICY OPTIONS

August 18, 2022

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade – an attack on the rights of women and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people who can get pregnant in America – has sent shockwaves of fear and grief across the globe. Nearly half of all states have laws that can restrict access to legal abortions with 13 having pre-existing “trigger laws” to outlaw abortion, which kicked in when Roe v. Wade was overturned. Now women and the 2SLGBTQQIA+ community in Canada are left wondering whether we are vulnerable to the same regressive, anti-choice influences.

We can be comforted by the fact that abortion is decriminalized in Canada, with no legal requirements such as parental consent or waiting periods that can prevent access. Karina Gould, minister of families, children and social development, has said Americans could travel to Canada to receive an abortion, which may lead to an influx of U.S. patients to Canada.

However, Canada is not the safe haven for abortion it may seem. The organization of Canada’s health-care system, the dearth of abortion providers across the country and the prevalence of anti-choice organizations combine to make access difficult if not impossible in some cases. The onus is on patients to find the care they need. With abortion being one of the most common medical procedures in Canada, this is entirely unacceptable.

Put abortion pills into people’s hands

Decades later, abortions in Canada are still hard to get

Those who live in rural areas, especially those living on reserves, have almost no access. Abortion clinics in Canada are concentrated along the U.S. border and only one-in-six hospitals provides abortion care.

As a result, people in rural communities do not have access to nearby care and are forced to travel to receive what they need. This is especially true for provinces such as Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Ontario, where 35 to 40 per cent of individuals live in remote communities or in rural areas.

A Canadian study from 2013 found that 18.1 per cent of women travelled more than 100 kilometres to access abortion, with Indigenous women being three times more likely than white women to have travelled this distance. This puts those without the financial and logistical means to travel at a disadvantage and further exacerbates issues of inequitable access.

Provincial guidelines also contribute to this inequity. Nearly 90 per cent of all abortions in Canada occur before 12 weeks. Yet some individuals may require abortion care beyond this gestational period and whether they can access it depends on their home province. P.E.I., for example, is the most restrictive, with abortion becoming inaccessible after 12 weeks.

Even though abortion rates decline after this period, it is still critical that the option is accessible. A decision to terminate later may be made for personal reasons, medical concerns, or factors outside of the person’s control – including transportation difficulties, limited access to accurate pregnancy tests, or desperate domestic circumstances. Currently, abortion care at 20 weeks is available only in B.C., Alberta, Ontario and Quebec. After 24 weeks, individuals are forced to leave the country to seek safe care – a luxury reserved for a privileged few.

Insurance coverage, or the lack thereof, also affects access. Nunavut, for example, does not offer coverage for medical abortions except for select cases, such as those prescribed in hospitals. Similarly, in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, those accessing surgical services through freestanding abortion clinics must pay out-of-pocket. Abortion is one of only 16 medical procedures exempt from “portability” under the Canada Health Act (CHA).

Portability allows services under provincial health plans to be covered even outside the individual’s home province. With abortion, however, those forced to travel outside their home province to access care are stuck with a bill for a service that should be covered under medicare.

Compounding the issue of inequitable abortion access are unregulated crisis pregnancy centres (CPCs). CPCs are anti-choice wolves in sheep’s clothing. They are advertised as a resource for individuals with unplanned pregnancies to receive support and counselling. However, they deceive clients with misinformation about abortion or other options that may delay or interfere with their ability to access the care they need.

CPCs far outnumber abortion care providers in Canada. In Ontario alone, there are 77 active CPCs but only 38 abortion providers. Overall, in Canada, there are 165 CPCs compared to 147 abortion providers. This means an unwitting pregnant person seeking an abortion is more likely to come across a CPC than an abortion provider for information. Considering geographical and gestational barriers to care, time is of the essence for any pregnant person to exercise the right to choose.

It is disturbing that in a country with legal and (mostly) publicly funded abortion, we still face massive hurdles to obtaining care. So how do we move forward to improve access in Canada? Let’s start with funding. Why are we, members of a pro-choice non-profit focused on evidence-based education, competing for funding with anti-choice groups such as the CPCs? We heard promises that were included in the Liberal platform in 2021 to prevent anti-choice groups and CPCs from being assigned charitable status, but we have yet to see these promises kept.

One recommendation is not to limit who can obtain “charitable” status, but instead restrict what types of charities can receive donations and tax exemptions from a values-based perspective. Religious groups focused on charitable issues could still receive funding, but those imposing religious beliefs on others would not.

We commend the federal government for announcing $3.5 million in funding for Action Canada and the National Abortion Federation Canada since Roe v. Wade was overturned. Let’s continue to build on these progressive steps. Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos must consider funding smaller, community-led organizations to help improve regional abortion access and education.

But funding is only half the battle. We also urge federal and provincial governments to treat abortion like the medically necessary procedure it is by firmly situating abortion within the CHA. All provinces and territories have deemed abortion a medically necessary procedure – meaning it currently falls under the CHAs broad definition of “insured health services.”

For provinces and territories to receive full funding through the Canada Health Transfer, they must meet CHA criteria and conditions for all insured health services, such as full funding and accessibility. However, as we and countless others have pointed out, abortion is not accessible. Our governments are failing us.

Some provinces do not fund abortions provided outside of hospitals, and others force patients to pay for services at private clinics or incur other costs to obtain an abortion. These are violations of the CHA, under which the federal government has an obligation to intervene.

We must call on provincial and federal representatives to ensure compliance with the CHA and to address significant barriers to receiving an abortion in Canada. Funding must improve to cover all of the costs associated with accessing abortion services. As well, the scope of practice for health-care professionals such as nurses and midwives could be potentially expanded to provide abortions.

To hold provinces accountable, the federal government must impose more severe funding restrictions on those who do not take actionable steps to improve access. The decision to penalize New Brunswick by withholding slightly more than $140,000 in health-care transfers is not enough.

Canada likes to think of itself as a beacon for those escaping the implications of Roe v. Wade in the United States. But there are still concerns that all women and members of the 2SLGBTQQIA+ community are not being provided equal access, particularly if they live in rural or remote areas of Canada. It’s time our governments acknowledge that without equitable access, abortion is a right reserved only for the privileged few.

The authors would like to also acknowledge the contributions of missINFORMED’s advisory chair, Nipa Chauhan, who supported this piece as an editor. Chauhan holds a master of health sciences in bioethics from the University of Toronto and works at Mount Sinai Hospital as a bioethics associate.

Amazonia ablaze

Brendan Montague | 19th August 2022 |
Creative Commons 4.0

Image: Eduardo Fonseca Arraes, via Flickr. "People from the Desana ethnic group at Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil. They call themselves Umukomasã."

Eduardo Fonseca Arraes / Creative Commons 2.0
Professor Herbert Girardet today launches a major new series of essays - Megamorphosis - exclusively with The Ecologist.

Unprecedented change on a global and historical scale is now required if we are going to avoid catastrophic climate breakdown. The combination of extreme weather - heatwaves and flooding - and agonising increases in energy bills across Europe demonstrates that our fossil fuel based economies are in, and are creating, profound crises.

Download Amazonia Ablaze as a PDF.

The scale of the challenge is so immense. The very way human societies connect with and exchange energy with the natural environment - its metabolism - needs to be fundamentally transformed. In this moment we need Megamorphosis.

Professor Herbert Girardet, an environment researcher, author, filmmaker, consultant and academic, has been warning about the threats posed by our extraction from and exhaustion of natural resources for five decades - and has been leading the way in coming up with systems based, planetary scale solutions for just as long.

Ecosystems

Today, The Ecologist is launching his most recent work - a major series titled Megamorphosis. The series of essays opens with a heart-rending and fact-filled examination of the destruction of the Amazonian rainforests and the high risk this now poses to our climate: Amazonia Ablaze. You can download this article for free right now. You can also donate to support this work.

Professor Girardet told The Ecologist: "Our house is on fire - but is there still time to put out the blaze? Can the technosphere we have built become compatible with the complexities of the biosphere?

"Against all the odds, can the planet’s recent urban-industrial transformation yet be superseded by a global ecological megamorphosis – mainstreaming the green energy transition, the circular economy, regenerative farming and cities, and restoration of soils and ecosystems?

"Megamorphosis argues that only big, system level changes will suffice in dealing with the planetary crisis we are facing.”

Future

He added: "So what can readers of The Ecologist do to make a difference, what can they help initiate? We need to work together globally to make a future worth living, thinking beyond the tired notion of sustainable development towards life-restoring regenerative development."

This major series benefits from Professor Girardet's work with the Club of Rome, the World Future Council, the Schumacher Society, and as a long-standing contributor to the Resurgence & Ecologist magazine.

The first essay - Amazonia Ablaze - draws on Professor Girardet's experience visiting the region shortly after Brazil won its independence in the 1960s - ushering in a new era of deforestation and devastation in the name of economic growth and neoliberal ideology.

Professor Girardet discusses the global connectedness of modern humanity, while challenging the assumption that we can ever assume a wilful dominance over life on earth.

The Megamorphosis series is the first in a trilogy of investigative projects that will be published by The Ecologist in the coming months and years. This work is part of a new plan - Strategy 2022/5 - for the online environmental news and analysis website, focussing our attention on the global fossil fuel economy and its impacts on our planet.

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist, including the Megamorphosis series. Professor Girardet is a trustee of the Resurgence Trust, the publisher of The Ecologist online and the Resurgence & Ecologist magazine. The Resurgence Trust and The Tedworth Trust (see below) have a trustee in common.

Funding

The Megamorphosis series is part funded by The Tedworth Charitable Trust. Fundraising is ongoing for this and future work. You can make a donation restricted to supporting the publication of the Megamorphosis series online now. All contributions, from £1 to £100, are very gratefully received. We use the Enthuse.com platform for our donations.