It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, July 31, 2022
APTMA says Pakistan's textile exports to suffer decline in July
Trade organisation, which represents the country's largest industrial sector, says month-on-month fall to come on account of energy supply issues
Pakistan's textile exports in July are expected to suffer a major dent, and may drop to $1.5 billion, stated the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA), the trade organisation that represents the country's largest industrial sector.
Taking to social media, the association, while sharing tweets of Asad Naqvi, a senior research analyst at APTMA, said provisional data shows that textile exports stood at $1.16 billion for the first 25 days of July.
“Expected full-month textile exports approximately $1.5 billion,” said Naqvi. This amount would be 17% lower than $1.8 billion textile exports recorded in June.
Naqvi blamed the decline on the severe energy supply issues.
Pakistan’s textile sector accounts for a major share of country’s exports, which are vital for the cash-strapped economy. As per the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), the textile group exports registered an increase of 17.2% on a month-on-month basis as they reached $1.802 billion in June 2022 compared to $1.537 billion in May 2022. Textile exports witnessed 23.5% growth on a year-on-year basis as compared to $1.459 billion in June 2021.
Pakistan suffers from low foreign exchange with policymakers mostly scrambling to ensure dollar inflows. In such an environment, many experts have stressed on exports, especially in a rupee-depreciating environment.
“With depleting foreign currency reserves, rising inflation, the exchange rate in free-fall and irrationally high interest rates, the country is headed towards a path similar to the economic downfall of Sri Lanka,” APTMA said in a release.
The textile organisation called for political stability and consistent policy implementation, terming both crucial for economic growth and for the export sector to thrive and contribute dollar earnings to stabilise the balance of payments for a sustainable economic outlook.
APTMA also expressed concern over the exchange rate. “The exchange rate instability has significant negative relationship with sectoral exports of Pakistan such as textile. A negative indication indicates that a rise in relative price is to blame for the decline in export demand.
Shinzo Abe’s Assassin Succeeds in Twisted Plot to Expose Japan’s Deep Ties with ‘Cult’
MOONIE MADNESS
The shooting of ex-PM Shinzo Abe has blown open secret ties between Japan’s ruling party and the mass-marrying Moonies.
Jake Adelstein Updated Jul. 31, 2022 Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty LONG READ
NARA, Japan—The shooting of ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has had unexpected political blowback. The killer attacked Abe not for his political beliefs, but because he wanted to take revenge upon the South Korea-based Unification Church—sometimes labeled a ‘cult’—which he blamed for ruining his family and his life.
Instead of rallying behind Abe, the Japanese people have followed the killer’s wishes and turned their attention to long-standing but little discussed links between the ruling party and the Moonies.
Before shooting Abe, he wrote a letter to a freelance journalist—obtained by The Daily Beast—explaining that he murdered Abe in order to expose the deep links between Japan’s ruling party, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), and the Unification Church.
If that was his twisted aim, he has succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. The phrase, “After all, the Unification Church and the LDP are one and the same” is now trending in Japan. The Mainichi newspaper ran an editorial on July 27, “The LDP must clean up its ties to the Unification Church.”
The paper wrote, “Why did the Japanese government allow the Unification Church to change its name?… It is only natural that the Diet and the press should try to clarify the actual situation. Above all, the LDP should investigate its long history [with the group] explain it to the public, and liquidate the relationship.”
Not just in print and on the internet but in daily conversations, the Church and the LDP ties keep coming up.
Manabu Yanagi, a retired police detective in Nikko City in Tochigi Prefecture, told The Daily Beast, “The news is shocking. The ties between an anti-social group of fraudsters and the ruling party of Japan are disturbing. It needs to be made clear what exactly those ties were.” Shinzo Abe Was ‘Trump Before Trump’—Except He Pulled It Off ONE PARTY MAN
While the Japanese media at first refused to print the name of the cult, they are now going all out—detailing the links between the religious group, Abe, and his party in lurid detail.
The backlash is so strong that many are now openly calling for the cancellation of the State Funeral for Abe that is planned this Autumn. “I oppose the state funeral for Shinzo Abe” was trending on Twitter for a week. A petition opposing taxpayer money being spent on a lavish national funeral for Abe has already gained 67,000 signatures. It points out his connections to the cult as one reason disqualifying him for being honored. Meet the Unification Church
A Korean religious leader going under the name Reverend Sun Myung Moon founded the Unification Church in 1954. According to Moon, Jesus sent him to save families and achieve world peace and fight godless communism. His followers were commonly referred to as “Moonies.” They became known for massive group weddings and various schemes for extorting large financial donations from their members. They were also accused of using brainwashing techniques to recruit and keep adherents.
In Japan, they tapped into ancestor worship traditions and convinced adherents to spend large sums saving their loved ones from hell by buying expensive “spiritual” objects.
They strove to change their image in the late ’80s and ’90s, setting up front companies, think tanks, and related organizations. They have also been media-savvy. Moon founded the conservative Washington Times in May of 1982, and the newspaper is still allegedly tied to the organization, even though Moon died in 2012.
“The heinous act was committed in an attempt to take his revenge on the Church.” — Professor Koichi Nakano
The Unification Church under various names and guises has not only cultivated strong ties with Japanese politicians, especially the Liberal Democratic Party, but has also managed to forge tight connections to the Republican Party in the U.S., links intensified under President Donald Trump.
One of the sons of Reverend Moon, Hyung Jin “Sean” Moon, created a splinter group, Rod of Iron Ministries, that worships with AR-15s and virulently supports Trump. Sean Moon and congregation members were not only allegedly present at the Jan. 6 insurrection but are seemingly connected to some MAGA megastars. Steve Bannon called into the group’s Freedom Festival last October.
Writing for The Daily Beast, cult expert and former unification church member Steve Hassan explained the religion as follows: “In the Moonies, we were told that we were heavenly soldiers engaged in a great struggle to take the world back from the forces of Satan, which included godless Communism and human-centered Western democracy. Our ultimate goal was to replace these godless human-centered forms of government with a god-centered theocracy, under Moon’s leadership.” Made In Korea, Sold In Japan
The Unification Church has been wildly successful in Japan and 70 percent or more of its revenue is said to have been derived from Japanese nationals. Billions of yen have been wired from Japan to the church over the last decade, according to an Upper House parliamentarian.
A watchdog group, the National Network of Lawyers Against Spiritual Sales, has been monitoring the Unification Church since the late 1980s. It supports victims of the church and cults. They claimed in a July 12 press conference that the confirmed financial suffering associated with the group up to 2021 exceeded 123.7 billion yen ($899 million). The number represents only a fraction of the whole, they say. The Network representatives also noted that between 2005 and 2010, the Japanese police handled 13 criminal cases of selling goods in connection with the solicitation of donations, involving the church, and that more than 30 Unification Church members were arrested and detained. Numerous lawsuits against the church resulted in damages being paid to victims of predatory practices. Couples from around the world participate in a mass wedding ceremony at the CheongShim Peace World Center in Gapyeong, South Korea. NurPhoto via Getty Images
The Unification Church of Japan has publicly stated that Yamagami’s mother was a member but insists the days of soliciting donations in problematic ways are over. The Unification Church has made a point of distancing itself from the various entities under its control in Japan by changing its name under the Abe administration and setting up a number of seemingly unrelated think-tanks and nonprofit organizations that critics call “dummy companies.”
As the Network points out, the Unification Church’s expansion has been driven in part by its ties to politicians.
The grandfather of Shinzo Abe, Nobusuke Kishi, forged sharp alliances with the group. Kishi was arrested as a war criminal in 1945, but later released and put on the CIA payroll. He and notorious political fixer and yakuza associate Yoshio Kodama created the Liberal Democratic Party which has ruled Japan almost uninterrupted since the 1950s. Kishi later became prime minister. He was instrumental in the formation of the church’s political arm, the International Federation for Victory Over Communism, in the 1960s. Kishi and Moon became so close that when Moon was jailed for tax evasion in the United States, Kishi wrote to President Ronald Reagan asking for him to be released early.
Japanese Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi,left, and Richard Nixon In Washington, Jan. 20, 1960. Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images
Kishi’s son and Abe’s father, Shintaro Abe, maintained ties to the organization, and Shinzo Abe continued the practice—ignoring warnings that the group was causing huge social problems in Japan.
The National Network said they had repeatedly warned Abe to break ties with the church, pointing out that he had given credence to their “predatory and fraudulent activities.”
The ties between Abe and the group were not superficial. In 2005 and 2006, while a lawmaker, Abe sent congratulatory messages to events co-hosted by the Universal Peace Federation which has strong ties to the Unification Church.
According to materials from the National Network and public documents, in 2010 and 2012, Abe attended meetings of the Institute for Global Strategy, another allegedly church-affiliated organization. In 2011, he and other conservatives put out a one page opinion ad in the Washington Times denying Japanese war crimes. In 2013, under Abe, despite opposition within the Ministry of Cultural Affairs, the organization was allowed to change its name—thus obscuring its problematic past. In 2016, Abe invited the chairman of the Japan branch of the Unification Church to the prime minister’s residence. In September of 2021, Abe sent a video message to an event organized by the Universal Peace Federation. He praised the church's leaders and its “family values.” But Abe wasn’t alone, Donald Trump, Abe’s golf buddy and ideological pal, also sent a video praising the church's leaders.
Reverend And Mrs. Sun Myung Moon Officiate The Family Federation For World Peace And Unification’s Blessing 98 Marriage Re-Dedication Ceremony And Wedding. Over 2,000 Couples Were Wedded At Madison Square Garden Jeff Christensen/Getty Images
After Abe’s video message last September, the National Network again sent him a letter asking him to cease and desist supporting the church and its affiliated organizations. It was apparently ignored just as the 2006 letter was ignored. The gunman, however, did see the video.
Abe is not the only LDP member with friendly relations with the Unification Church. According to the evening newspaper Nikkan Gendai, the church long provided free labor and secretaries to members of the LDP, handling office work, policy, and day-to-day duties while ingratiating themselves with the party. In its July 23 edition, Gendai published a list of 35 members of Abe’s political faction with connections to the church. Other political parties have also cultivated strong ties with the church.
At the press conference on July 12, Lawyer Hiroshi Watanabe said, “To the victims of the Unification Church, it seems that the police didn’t properly investigate the group (on criminal charges of fraud and extortion) because they were well-connected to politicians. We feel the same way.”
Yoshifu Arita, a journalist and Japanese parliamentarian, said on a television broadcast aired July 18 that he was told by a senior police official, “The reason we didn’t crack down on this group [when we should have a decade ago] was the intervention of politicians.” The Letter
In an interview published with Weekly Bunshun, the uncle of Yamagami describes in great detail how the involvement of the family with the church drove the family into poverty. Yamagami’s mother sold off the land and property her husband left her when he died, and donated a million dollars to the church. She was so involved in their activities, she was rarely home. Young Tetsuya would sometimes call, asking his uncle for food. The uncle would bring Tetsuya and his brother food and snacks, sometimes sushi. The mother donated all the money marked for his college education to the church. He joined the Self-Defense Forces to pay for school and became increasingly depressed. Yamagami took out a life insurance policy leaving his uncle and brother as the beneficiaries and tried to kill himself while still in the service.
I [once] wrote to you that I “want a gun so bad that a hand might as well come out of my throat to reach for one.” Since then and now, I have devoted myself to procuring a gun. My devotion resembled that of the Unification Church followers who discard all but their entire life in the name of a false God…
My fateful encounter with the Unification Church goes back about 30 years. My mother, since having entered the religion, wasted over a hundred million yen, our family’s collapse, bankruptcy... As such things went by, my teenage years were over. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that this experience continued to distort the rest of my entire life.
While I did loathe Abe, he is not the primary enemy. He is no more than one sympathizer of the Unification Church, one who has great influence in the real world.
Yamagami told the Nara police that he was ready to die in his assassination attempt and that the entire purpose of the attack was to bring attention to the misdeeds of the church.
Unholy Alliances
That has certainly happened. The Japanese public and the media are taking a hard look at the relationships between the Liberal Democratic Party and fringe religions. Already bookstores are packed with books about the Unification Church and magazines are running cover stories. On television news programs, the links to Abe, the LDP, and the church are being examined.
Professor Koichi Nakano at Sophia University, an authority on Japanese politics, notes that the LDP has gotten into bed with many other extremist religious groups since the 1990s.
He notes: “About the Yamagami letter, I also think that it shows that he fully knows what he is doing. He did not kill Abe for his politics, but because he identified Abe as one of [the Unification Church’s] most powerful patrons. So the heinous act was committed in an attempt to take his revenge on the church. He targeted Abe, if anything, in spite of his politics.”
For some, the unholy alliance between the LDP and a ‘cult’ that sucks its members dry doesn’t make sense. But there are historical and practical reasons for the marriage.
Nakano explains,”In the early postwar era, it was anti-communism that brought together such religions as the Unification Church with the Japanese right-wing politicians. On the side of the new religions, the appearance of powerful conservative politicians in their events and publications provided a source of authority and credibility, and with deeper ties, even access to favorable government dispensations. The LDP politicians, in turn, gained not only organized votes but also campaign staff and secretaries, which were particularly appreciated by faction bosses who were looking to increase their inexperienced and under-resourced underlings fast.” Abe’s regime was very close to the religious cult Nippon Kaigi. It has a long history. In 1995 a variety of ultraconservative religions, including the Association of Shinto Shrines, which has always longed to reclaim its special status in prewar State Shintoism, formed the notorious Nippon Kaigi together with right-wing business and media leaders. It promoted reactionary nationalism that espoused reverence for the emperor, changing the constitution, remilitarization, historical revisionism, and traditional gender roles and family values. The world view of the Christianity-based Unification Church and Nippon Kaigi are not far apart.
For many years, the increasingly well-known alliance between the LDP and Nippon Kaigi, as well as its hidden alliance with the Unification Church, have served it well, but the assassination of Abe has had unexpected blowback. The echoes of those two gunshots will be heard in Japan for many years to come. For current Prime Minister Fumio Kishida (LDP) the growing voices of dissent and calls for an investigation into ties between his party and the Unification Church—as well as other extremist religious groups—are a present-day headache.
Last week, the journalist and television announcer Masaki Kusakabe delivered a harsh message for Japan’s politicians toward the end of a special feature examining the history of the Unification Church.
Speaking with a video image of Abe addressing a Unification Church-related gathering behind him, he said: “The Unification Church is a money-sucking group that can’t stand without donations from Japan. It is ill-advised for a politician to consort with them. Even more, they should bear in mind that sending messages and greetings may endorse the ideals and activities of the organization.”
Much of Japan heard that sermon and said, “Amen.”
Lufthansa pilots vote for industrial action over pay The Lufthansa logo is pictured at Frankfurt Airport in Frankfurt,
Germany, September 21, 2020. REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski Strikes and staff shortages have already hit sector
BERLIN, July 31 (Reuters) - Pilots at German flagship carrier Lufthansa (LHAG.DE) voted on Sunday by a margin of 97.6% in favour of industrial action, threatening further disruption during the busy summer travel season.
Strikes and staff shortages have already forced airlines including Lufthansa to cancel thousands of flights and caused hours-long queues at major airports, frustrating holidaymakers keen to travel after COVID-19 lockdowns. read more
The vote does not necessarily mean a strike will be held, but it was a signal to the employer that constructive steps needed to be taken, pilot's union Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) board member Marcel Groels said.
"We are showing we are ready to talk," he added.
A spokesperson for Lufthansa said they respected the results of the vote and hoped for a constructive solution at the negotiating table.
Pilots' union VC is demanding a 5.5% pay rise this year for its pilots and automatic inflation compensation thereafter.
It also wants a uniform pay structure for all staff at the Lufthansa group's airlines, which include flagship carrier Lufthansa as well as budget unit Eurowings.
Lufthansa has already been rocked by strike action by its ground staff on Wednesday, which forced the carrier to cancel more than 1,000 flights. read more
Separately, pilots at Lufthansa's Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) unit rejected by an 80% margin a contract proposal, their Aeropers labour union said on Sunday, adding that it aimed to resume negotiations with SWISS management as soon as possible.
"If management continues not to recognise the signs of the times and does not immediately offer adequate solutions, then the pilots must show the management even more clearly how dissatisfied they are," it said without elaborating.
The current contract expired in April after management rejected a tentative deal from initial talks, Aeropers said.
UK Empty Words Are not Enough – It’s Time Nurses Got a Pay Rise
Nurses were clapped and called 'heroes' during Covid, only to be slapped with a real-terms pay cut by the government. Now they are fighting back – and many are prepared to take to the picket lines. In the context of inflation, a decade of austerity-inflicted pay stagnation, and a nursing sector on the brink, the NHS pay offer is seen by many as a bad joke. (StÃgur Már Karlsson / Heimsmyndir / Getty Images)
Last Tuesday the government ended its consultation with independent review bodies over NHS staff pay, accepting in full its range of recommendations for workers across the sector. The increases were meagre, representing a real terms pay cut for workers, with the highest of 9.4 percent for the lowest paid porters and healthcare assistants still below a runaway inflationary spiral that could reach twelve percent by the autumn.
Higher paid staff such as dentists and doctors will receive 4.5 percent, while nurses’ average basic pay is set to go up by £1,400, equal to an uplift of four percent, or 5.5 for the newly qualified. In a context not only of inflation, but of more than a decade of austerity-inflicted pay stagnation and a nursing sector in which labour shortages and burnout are leaving services on the brink, this offer is being seen by many as a bad joke.
As in other sectors, trade unions are taking the fight to the government. Back in March, as inflation started to bite, the RCN, Unison, and eleven other unions representing healthcare workers co-ordinated a response to stagnating pay to formulate a collective demand: a joint statement to the NHS Pay Review Body (PRB) called for an ‘inflation-busting’ pay rise that absorbs the effects of higher pension contributions, and a comprehensive retention package to ‘help tackle the workforce crises blazing across the service’.
The RCN then called for a pay rise of five percent above inflation specifically, with Chief Executive and General Secretary Pat Cullen stating that summer must bring ‘a pay award that turns the tide on the years of unfilled nursing jobs and experienced professionals struggling to make ends meet.’ The RCN held an emergency meeting of its council in July and voted to ballot members in England on industrial action. Unison is also moving toward consulting NHS members, recommending they ‘oppose this NHS pay award with industrial action’.
Emily*, a staff nurse, told Tribune that levels of pay have been unacceptable across the sector for years, and that ward-specific contexts often cause underpayment. ‘If you take into account the fact that I leave most shifts late, and I often don’t get a full hour’s break, then my hourly rate will actually be a lot worse than it already is,’ she said. Another staff nurse, Violet*, also argued that pay fails to reflect the stress and pressure nurses feel. ‘The government don’t understand what we do on a daily basis; if one of them were to come and see what a nurse does in a day, I think they’d be shocked. We’re the first on the scene in an emergency, and we have huge responsibility on us from a very early point in our career—in our early twenties we’re asked to take charge of a ward of ten or twenty sick children.’
The government has justified the pay cuts with economic logic designed to legitimise lumping the blame for inflation onto workers. New Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay argued that ‘Very high inflation-driven settlements would have a worse impact on pay packets in the long run,’ in a statement that also said that the government was taking care ‘not to drive even higher prices in the future’ through pay rises. Notwithstanding the moral case for higher pay in a depleted sector whose wages are growing at a fraction of that of its private counterpart, the metrics by which decisions are being justified simply don’t hold up to economic scrutiny.
RMT General Secretary Mick Lynch made the alternative socioeconomic case in a recent interview with LBC, arguing against the idea that higher wage rises would cause a ‘wage-price spiral’ and instead pointing out that low wages are chasing spiralling profits, rents, and costs. When disparities in wealth and capital ownership are accelerating, when we have more billionaires than the country’s ever had, and when big gas and oil companies are raking in record profits, workers and their unions simply aren’t buying government lines.
Unlike the unions, however, the Labour Party finds itself tied in political knots over industrial action in the NHS and elsewhere, with Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting repeatedly cowing to right-wing arguments on staffing, pay, and waiting lists. Speaking to the Institute of Government think tank back in June, Streeting backed sending NHS patients to private health providers as a short-term measure to ease the six-million person long waiting list for treatment. Despite the spiralling crises in the NHS caused by persistent underfunding and a government desperate to force the population into private alternatives, Streeting has doubled down on his position, arguing in an LBC phone-in more recently that he ‘stands for’ a publicly funded NHS, but that as health secretary he would use NHS budgets to pay for patients to have private care. In discussions on pay, Streeting has been conspicuous in his absence.
Streeting’s position is naïve in its assumption that private provision can ever be used as a short-term stopgap to stave off waiting lists. A report by the IPPR think tank earlier this year showed that the expansion of private interests in the NHS is creating a ‘two-tier’ health system divided between those who can afford to pay and those who can’t, with expenditure on private healthcare quadrupling since 1980. In such a system, entrenched market players become difficult to push out, unwilling as they are to give up their market share. Recent history tells us that Labour can and should tell a different story about the NHS and its future—specifically the commitment in the 2019 manifesto to year-on-year above-inflation pay rises for NHS workers.
Today, both parties fail to challenge the contempt with which nurses have been treated. As a result, the workers I spoke to will be voting for a full strike in the upcoming ballot. ‘We deserve to be listened to and paid properly for our work,’ says Emily. ‘Everyone claims to love nurses, but nobody seems to care about our working conditions or staffing levels. The better staffed a ward is, the better outcomes for all our patients, and better pay will keep nurses in the profession.’
However, turnout needs to increase dramatically from the twenty-three percent who voted in last November’s indicative RCN ballot on industrial action up to at least the fifty percent threshold for the ballot to succeed. Violet, for one, says that since last year’s result her feelings about action have shifted. ‘At the last ballot, I voted for action short of a strike,’ she explains. ‘However, I’ve realised that we are not being taken seriously and we need to make more of a stand if we want to see results and be respected as skilled professionals, and in the next ballot I will be voting for a full strike. Saying that we will just take our full breaks or not do overtime isn’t enough.’
These changes represent the beginning of a process that will inevitably see hardworking nurses pitted against antagonistic elements in the government, the opposition, and the billionaire press. Monday’s depressing debate between prospective prime ministers Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss exemplified the hostility key workers face, with both unhesitatingly committed to an outright ‘ban’ on strikes in essential public services if elected.
But hope is a powerful and resonant thing, and the changing atmosphere around the cost of living crisis more broadly makes this feel like the first time in an age of Conservative hegemony in which nurses in a deliberately crippled NHS are having their interests properly championed, alongside those of other workers. The pandemic and its aftermath has proved how far the government assumes it can take key workers—both their labour and their lives—for granted. Now, those workers seem increasingly ready to fight for something better.
*Names have been changed to protect interviewees.
About the Author George Walker is a freelance journalist who writes on politics, culture, and philosophy.
The NHS is facing the biggest crisis in its history. GP surgeries are breaking under pressure, waiting lists could top nine million by March 2024, and there’s a huge shortfall of staff. Many medics are opting to simply throw in the towel. Having recently qualified as a doctor, I can't say I'm surprised.
For junior doctors, stress, burnout and bullying are quick to take a toll: seven per cent of medics leave within the first three years. This bucks the expected trend: that people are at their most vitalised nearer the start of their careers. For medicine, the evidence suggests otherwise.
Clinical placements reveal harsh realities early on, acclimatising trainees to the most appalling parts of the job, even before they have the chance to fully understand what it's like to be a doctor. This week, the health service committee cited bullying, sexism and harassment as reasons for doctors leaving medicine early. It drudged up a multitude of memories from my own experience training to be a doctor, so I can’t say the findings are especially shocking.
On my first day of hospital placement, fresh-faced and bright-eyed, I received a jarring introductory talk as my foundation year doctor told me matter-of-factly about how she already knew of three suicides attempts by colleagues across the UK. ‘That’s awful,’ I agreed. ‘Why? What causes it…?’ ‘The job,’ she said.
I’ve seen senior registrars bully their juniors, exercising the power they feel they ought to have over those who cannot risk complaining
I’ve seen medics humiliated in front of their colleagues by senior consultants, as we desperately averted our eyes in embarrassment while anxious to avoid becoming the next prey. I’ve seen nurses scream at doctors in front of patients, after they have received a snide verbal pummelling. Once, a shouting match disrupted a ward round for so long one elderly patient shuffled off to get a shower. He returned, freshly dried, before the argument had subsided.
I’ve seen senior registrars bully their juniors, exercising the power they feel they ought to have over those who cannot risk complaining. On one ward round, I witnessed a surgeon repeatedly verbally abuse a junior doctor; the insults became progressively more personal the further round the ward we walked. His junior was getting more embarrassed, and quite clearly more upset. At one point, he mumbled his excuses (something about leaving his notebook in the previous six-bed bay) and left quickly, covering his face as he went. He was my boss, but within the space of 40 minutes, he had been completely torn to shreds in front of me.
Everyone’s been humiliated at work, but I saw it happen continuously, day in, day out. Sometimes I was on the receiving end, but as students we changed wards so frequently that it rarely cut too deep. I came to better understand that junior doctor’s earlier cantankerousness, his pale face pulled taught, stressfully multitasking, flicking his head dismissively when us students offered our help. ‘See one, do one, teach one,’ is the educational mantra of medicine. No wonder the bullying becomes endemic.
I spent years seeing either myself or my peers being berated at patient bedsides, often by registrars pushed to breaking point, or consultants simply enjoying having finally reached the top of the food chain. Sexism has not been eradicated, no matter how many more female doctors there are now. My experience of it was often at the hands of women, whether doctors or nurses; again, perhaps another trickle-down effect of a culture that was even worse years before these staff rose the ranks. Colleagues of mine have complained of racism and the poor handling of related complaints by hospitals and universities, both unwilling to dive too deep into the murkiness.
A junior doctor once whispered to me and a group of my fellow medics as we walked along: ‘What do you think of the consultants here?’ I shrugged, not wanting to give anything away. ‘They’re too intense,’ I remember another doctor, still whispering, telling me. ‘They’re always on our backs. They’re always watching.’ There was a Big Brother joke in there somewhere, but she wasn’t laughing.
In medicine, as with other careers, of course you get the odd bad apple. But most doctors and nurses are good people who go into the profession to care for others, to make their patients better. So why is the bullying culture endemic? The answer lies in the pressures of the job. The emotional toll of having another’s life in your hands requires an incredible level of mental resilience in itself. People can only take so much.
Medical staff work in an environment that consistently demands more and more of you for less and less. Staff are increasingly stretched: one of my friends is due to start work in a hospital that has nine fewer first year junior doctors than the year before; another has been the sole doctor, in her first year, responsible for three entire wards when on night shift. It’s terrifying – and dangerous.
Perhaps if there were more doctors, or if there were better hours, or if the pay wasn’t so relatively decimated by years of caps and inflation, or if an improved work-life balance was achievable, the NHS wouldn’t be seeing this unprecedented resignation crisis. Many GPs have cut back to work only three days a week. Is it any wonder? They’re the lucky ones: they’ve escaped from what can often feel like the barren, unfriendly landscape of hospital life, where workers don’t experience the same work-life balance, particularly if you’re a junior.
The NHS is a victim of its own success: it has provided vital healthcare, free at the point of use, to those who need it most. But after the creation of a system that sounded too good to be true, it was inevitable that demand would very quickly outweigh resources. The NHS needed to reorganise well before Covid, but the pandemic has simply amplified any pre-existing issues tenfold.
The health service has been unable to slow down and revamp itself at the points it has most needed to because it’s never had a chance to stop. Old traditions and cultures have been stamped out; new changes jar with a way of working that refuses to fully modernise.
New jobs are being created without the problems of those pre-existing ones being solved. Different trusts operate in entirely different ways. Some hospitals are still paper-based; those that don't have tech teams that aren’t always available around the clock, when they are needed. Rotas are pre-arranged, annual leave is not always, if at all, easy to book, though nepotism may get you somewhere. Waiting lists are rising exponentially, emergency departments are routinely overwhelmed and Covid still causes staffing issues.
So when, given all this, the medical hierarchy punches down, it’s no wonder that the NHS is facing a record staff exodus. The NHS is breaking – and patients and doctors are paying the price. WRITTEN BY Lucy Dunn is The Spectator's social media editor. She studied medicine at Glasgow University
Mohammad Yasin attends Bedford RMT picket lines same day as Sam Tarry sacked by SIR Keir Starmer
Mohammad Yasin visited striking RMT worker picket lines in Bedford yesterday, the same day that Labour front bencher Sam Tarry was sacked by Keir Starmer for attending a London protest.
Mr Yasin, Labour MP for Bedford and Kempston, visited the picket lines outside Bedford Train Station with members of Bedford & District Trade Union Council (BDTUC) on Wednesday 27 July. He went to show his, “support for the rail workers who have a very strong democratic mandate to strike over pay, safety and working conditions.”
This came on the same day as Labour party leader, Keir Starmer, sacked Shadow Transport Minister, Sam Tarry, for attending the RMT protest at Euston station.
In a statement yesterday, about the Tarry sacking, Labour said: “This isn’t about appearing on a picket line. Members of the front bench sign up to collective responsibility. That includes media appearances being approved and speaking to agreed front bench positions.
“As a government in waiting, any breach of collective responsibility is taken extremely seriously and for these reasons Sam Tarry has been removed from the front bench.”
Frontbencher Tarry had been told by Starmer to stay away whereas Mr Yasin said he was not told he could not attend a picket line.
Mr Yasin said he supported, “Keir Starmer’s actions to ensure collective responsibility.” He said: “Labour needs to be a credible Government in waiting and it’s always been the case, if you’re a front bench minister on either side of the House that you don’t make up policy on the hoof without consulting colleagues.”
He added: “Labour is a party of the working people” who would, “always stand up for workers and businesses”.
The National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) called for strike action on 27 July to “secure a decent pay rise, job security and decent working conditions”.
According to a statement on the RMT website, “over 40,000 workers across Network Rail and 14 train operating companies” were expected to “walk out” yesterday.
In the statement, RMT General Secretary, Mick Lynch, said: “Network Rail have not made any improvement on their previous pay offer and the Train Companies have not offered us anything new.
“In fact, Network Rail have upped the ante, threatening to impose compulsory redundancies and unsafe 50% cuts to maintenance work, if we did not withdraw our planned strike action.
“The train operating companies have put driver only operations on the table along with ransacking our members terms and conditions.”
President of the Bedford and District Trade Union Council (BDTUC), Graham Tranquada, said of the strikes: “We fully support RMT members in their dispute to resist a pay offer which amounts to a pay cut and demands from the employers for job losses, worsening of working terms and conditions, including un-social hours and safety practises.
“It cannot be right that following years of austerity and pay freezes that RMT members are expected to pay for a crisis not of their making.”
Mr Yasin pointed to the disparity between the huge pay-outs made to rail company shareholders last year while employees took pay cuts.
He said: “Train companies paid out nearly £800m to shareholders last year before telling rail unions that employees must take a real-terms pay cut for them to stay afloat, whilst threatening passenger safety through merging specialising roles.”
He criticised Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps, saying he was, “directly responsible for industrial relations” and was “tying himself in knots trying to blame Labour for the rail strikes instead of his own failures to prevent strike action.”
Mr Yasin further criticised the government saying, instead of, “listening to the genuine grievances of workers who feel very vulnerable and are struggling,” their response was to “reduce the right to withdraw labour to another divisive culture war.”
His message for the Conservative Government was simple: “get around the table and lead the negotiations with rail companies and Unions in good faith.”
He called the cost-of-living crisis, “a wages crisis”, saying, “too many workers can no longer make ends meet while working conditions are under threat and pensions are being eroded.”
Mr Yasin pointed out that workers strike as a last resort and said a Labour Prime Minister would have resolved the issues before leaving workers feeling like they had no choice.
UK
Train drivers’ strike ‘solidly supported’ as bitter dispute continues
ALAN JONES, PA INDUSTRIAL CORRESPONDENT
A strike by train drivers was “solidly supported” on Saturday amid a fresh clash between unions and the Government over the bitter pay, jobs and conditions dispute.
Passengers suffered another day of travel misery as thousands of members of Aslef at seven train companies staged a 24 hour walkout.
The union said it has received an offer from Transport for Wales for a 6.6% pay rise which it will put to its members.
Picket lines were mounted outside train stations and Aslef said strikers were receiving support from the public.
Protesters on the picket line outside Leeds train station (Danny Lawson/PA)
General secretary Mick Whelan clashed with Transport Secretary Grant Shapps, accusing him of lying.
He told the PA news agency: “The strike today was solid. That shows the solidarity of our members and their determination not to be pushed around by Grant Shapps, the Department for Transport, and the train companies.
“After keeping Britain moving during the pandemic, they expect our members, who have not had an increase in pay since 2019, to keep working, effectively for a pay cut.
“All we are asking for is an increase in line with the increase in the cost of living – soaring inflation is not the fault of working people in this country, it’s the fault of this government and its inept handling of the UK economy.
“Shapps holds the key to this but, true to form, he is blustering and ducking and diving, and looking to blame everyone else, indeed, anyone else, for the problems he has created.
Mick Whelan (centre in suit), general secretary of Aslef, joins the picket line outside Paddington train station in London (Maighna Nanu/PA)
“He could solve this in an instant by allowing the train companies to come to the table with a sensible offer and negotiate with us.”
Former Labour shadow minister Sam Tarry, who was sacked after giving broadcast interviews from a picket line last week, said he “absolutely” still thinks Sir Keir Starmer is the best person to become prime minister.
Joining another picket line at Paddington station in London on Saturday, the former shadow transport minister said it was “really important” for Labour MPs to show their solidarity with striking workers.
He said: “We should never have been in a situation where we had an edict that you can’t join a picket line. This is the Labour Party, the clue is in the name. We are the party founded by the trade unions.”
He added that the link between the union movement and the Labour Party is “indivisible” and “part of the same fabric”.
Sam Tarry, the former shadow transport minister, joins the picket line outside Paddington train station (Maighna Nanu/PA)
Grant Shapps told The Times: “The ‘Two Micks’, Lynch of the RMT and Whelan of Aslef, are taking the taxpayer for a ride, but not in the way they are meant to.
“RMT is stalling on reform and Aslef is dragging its feet in negotiations while both call more strikes. Enough.”
In response, Mr Whelan told Times Radio: “I say Mr Shapps is lying, quite simply, quite clearly.
“We’re not dragging our feet in negotiations, we negotiate with 14 private companies, we do not work for the Government or the DfT (Department for Transport).
“I would like Mr Shapps to get us out of this catch-22 situation that he misrepresents at every opportunity.
The strike hit Arriva Rail London, Greater Anglia, Great Western, Hull Trains, LNER, Southeastern and West Midlands Trains.
A DfT spokesman said: “It’s extremely misleading to suggest the Transport Secretary should get involved in these negotiations.
“His role is to protect the public purse, ensuring value for money for the hardworking people of this country. As such, he’s required to set the limits of taxpayer support and ultimately sign off on any deal – not to be involved in negotiating one – and his contracts with operators allow him to do precisely that.
“The union knows full well that negotiations over pay and working practices don’t happen with the Government – they happen with the employers of the people they represent. We once again urge union representatives to get back round the negotiating table.”
Football fans travelling to the opening Saturday of English leagues, and people going to the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham were among those affected by the disruption.
Strike action will be stepped up next month with a series of stoppages by Aslef, the RMT and the Transport Salaried Staffs Association.
Meanwhile, Hitachi rail workers are to strike for three days from Sunday in a row over pay and conditions.
Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) whose jobs include maintenance, are in dispute over pay and issues including breaks, leave entitlement and shift length.
ANOTHER rail strike! Train repair workers will walk out for three days from tomorrow while millions are hit by network shutdown today as football season and Commonwealth Games begin
Rail services across the UK will be severely disrupted today and into Sunday morning due to Aslef strike
Seven rail operators are affected with no services on London Northwestern and West Midlands Railways
The AA has warned that road traffic will increase as a result, with delays set to peak between 11am and 3pm
Now the RMT has announced a three day strike from tomorrow as railway repair workers walk out too
The latest strikes take place before further industrial action throughout August by various train unions
Rail services will be severely disrupted this weekend as a train strike by train drivers times to coincide with the Commonwealth Games and the kick off of the new football season brings trains to a halt across the country, and repair workers set to walk out for three days from tomorrow.
In the latest outbreak of industrial unrest in the industry, members of the drivers union Aslef at seven train operators have walked out for 24 hours over pay today.
General secretary Mick Whelan said the strike action today was 'solid': 'The strike today was solid. That shows the solidarity of our members and their determination not to be pushed around by Grant Shapps, the Department for Transport, and the train companies.
'After keeping Britain moving during the pandemic, they expect our members, who have not had an increase in pay since 2019, to keep working, effectively for a pay cut.
'All we are asking for is an increase in line with the increase in the cost of living - soaring inflation is not the fault of working people in this country, it's the fault of this government and its inept handling of the UK economy.
'Shapps holds the key to this but, true to form, he is blustering and ducking and diving, and looking to blame everyone else, indeed, anyone else, for the problems he has created.
'He could solve this in an instant by allowing the train companies to come to the table with a sensible offer and negotiate with us."
But the UK government says the average Aslef member earns almost £60,000 - double that of many NHS nurses and care workers.
Hitachi rail workers responsible for maintenance and repair for train companies and the railway network also announced today they will strike for three days from Sunday in a row over pay and conditions.
Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) whose jobs include maintenance, are in dispute over pay and issues including breaks, leave entitlement and shift length.
RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said: 'Our members know the value of their work and will not be short changed by Hitachi Rail.
'I congratulate our members on this strong industrial response and RMT will support further stoppages until they receive a just settlement.'
ASLEF Union: 'Members fed up after three years with no pay rise' Watch video
Across the concourse from King's Cross (pictured), Eurostar queues are said to stretch all the way from St Pancras to its sister station this morning (July 30) Aslef union members are already joining picket lines this morning, such as this one outside Paddington station in London. Pictured in blue is former Labour MP Sam Tarry, who was recently sacked for joining picket lines while a shadow minister The picket line at Euston station as ASLEF train drivers go on strike over pay on July 30, 2022 in London, England
Platforms and tracks are completely empty at Kings Cross this morning as the majority of services are simply not running at all Picket lines are going strong across England this morning as the union demands a real terms pay rise in line with inflation
As the second weekend of the summer holidays enters full swing, traffic is building up on motorways around Britain, including on the M25 (pictured)
Empty rail stations and dozens of stationary trains have been pictured across the UK on Saturday, with travellers taking to the roads instead to get to summer sports events.
The Rail Delivery Group, set up in 2011 to bring together the leadership of passenger, freight and high speed rail operators, said the industrial action has been specifically timed to coincide with the Games in Birmingham and the start of the new season for most English football league clubs.
With delays expected into tomorrow morning, the strike could also impact passengers heading to the women's Euros final.
There will be disruption to parts of the rail network on Saturday and into the morning of Sunday.
The strike is mainly affecting English routes and impacts trains run by Arriva Rail London, Greater Anglia, Great Western, Hull Trains, LNER, Southeastern and West Midlands Trains.
Picket lines were mounted outside railway stations on Saturday, with Aslef saying they were receiving strong public support despite the disruption the strike was causing.
There are no services on the London Overground network because of the strike on Arriva Rail London, and no Night Overground services on Saturday evening and the early hours on Sunday.
Mick Whelan, general secretary of train drivers' union Aslef, has accused the Transport Secretary of 'lying' about negotiations over strikes.
Grant Shapps had written in The Times: 'The Two Micks, Lynch of the RMT and Whelan of Aslef, are taking the taxpayer for a ride, but not in the way they are meant to.
'RMT is stalling on reform and Aslef is dragging its feet in negotiations while both call more strikes. Enough.'
In response, Mr Whelan told Times Radio on Saturday morning: 'I say Mr Shapps is lying, quite simply, quite clearly.
'We're not dragging our feet in negotiations, we negotiate with 14 private companies, we do not work for the Government or the DfT (Department for Transport).'
He added: 'I would like Mr Shapps to get us out of this catch-22 situation that he misrepresents at every opportunity.'
MailOnline understands that the train operators in question have told Aslef previously agreed deals with government means they do not have the money to offer workers a pay rise.
The Department of Transport said: 'It's extremely misleading to suggest the Transport Secretary should get involved in these negotiations. His role is to protect the public purse, ensuring value for money for the hard-working people of this country.
'As such, he's required to set the limits of taxpayer support and ultimately sign off on any deal, not to be involved in negotiating one, and his contracts with operators allow him to do precisely that.
'The union knows full well that negotiations over pay and working practices don't happen with the Government, they happen with the employers of the people they represent.
'We once again urge union representatives to get back round the negotiating table.'
Members are demanding a pay rise in line with inflation, which is currently around 10 percent, and according to the union the striking members have not had a pay rise at all since April 2019.
MailOnline understands Aslef is willing to sit down with the seven train companies to negotiate a pay rise - but the train operators have not offered any rise at all to initiate negotiations since inflation began spiraling up toward 10 percent.
RDG chairman Steve Montgomery said: 'We're really disappointed that the Aslef leadership has decided to impose yet more uncertainty and disruption for passengers and businesses in a week which has already seen a strike by the RMT.
'Millions of passengers will have their weekend plans disrupted, particularly those who are working, or going to the Commonwealth Games or the first football match of the season.
'While we will do all that we can to minimise disruption, if you are going to travel on the routes affected, please plan ahead and check the latest travel advice.
'If you're not able to travel, you can use your ticket either the day before or up to and including August 2, otherwise you will be able to change your ticket or claim a refund.
'Like any service or business, we must move with the times and cannot continue to ask taxpayers or passengers for more money when we should instead respond to the huge changes in travel behaviour post Covid.
IRELAND
Farming climate plan imposes ‘impossible’ burden on other sectors, say scientists
‘Special dispensation’ for agriculture leaves State exposed to legal action for failing to hit 2030 climate target Minister of State for Farm Safety Martin Heydon with Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue, Minister for Climate Eamon Ryan and Minister of State for Land Use Pippa Hackett at the announcement of sectoral emissions ceilings.
The emissions reduction set by Government for farming places an impossible burden on other sectors to reach the overall climate change target by 2030 and exposes the State to legal action, scientists have warned.
Climate scientists have said the Government decision’s this week to demand a 25 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from the agriculture sector will result in the State falling short of the Government’s commitment, set in law, to cut emissions by 51 per cent by 2030.
The Climate Change Advisory Council, the independent body set up to advise Government, has said the sector-by-sector emission targets announced by the Government on Thursday would lead to an overall cut of just 43 per cent over the next eight years.
Advisory council chairwoman Marie Donnelly said in the long term the ceiling for one sector will have to be substantially increased “or all sectors will ultimately have to be revised upwards. At this point, it’s no longer about talking; it is now about … implementing actions and implementing them at speed,” she said.
Dr Cara Augustenborg, an environmental policy professor at UCD and a member of the council, said the shortfall left by the sector-by-sector ceilings should create a “big concern” for the Government.
“It means at some stage the targets will have to be increased to meet that 51 per cent and it puts the Government at risk because it has been set forth in legislation, so it is obviously justiciable, meaning that any group can take the Government to court,” she said.
Peter Thorne, a climate science professor at Maynooth University, said the 25 per cent target for the farming sector was responsible for a large proportion of the shortfall between what the sector-by-sector ceilings will actually achieve and the overall target of 51 per cent.
‘Cold hard maths’
“Agriculture is responsible for about 37 per cent of emissions, so if we give only a 25 per cent reduction, the ask on all other sectors becomes impossible. The cold hard maths is going to have to come into this,” he said.
“Physics doesn’t care for a special pleading or special dispensation; physics fundamentally cares about emissions and it is the emissions that matter.” Climate politics is here to stay
Technological University Dublin professor Pat Goodman, who researches air pollution and human health, said the plan was “very much a political document trying to keep all sides happy. The reality is you can set all the targets you like but how are we going to achieve them? We need to see a bit more detail about how we get there.”
Dr Patrick Bresnihan, a geography lecturer at Maynooth University, said the Government’s admission that the changes demanded from farmers would be voluntary showed that it was “not grasping the contradictions” between the State’s agricultural models and its climate ambitions.
This was also the case for the Government’s policy on foreign direct investment into data centres and the approach taken to encourage people to buy electric vehicles.
“I am really not convinced that any of the political parties, including the Greens, are willing to tackle those contradictions,” he said. Data centres
The academic, a researcher on the environmental cost of energy-intensive data centres, said the emissions-cutting plan also depended on unproven advances in wind and solar technology.
“This is being kicked further down the line and it is very much reliant on technologies that haven’t been proven at scale,” he said.
Green Party politicians have argued that the agriculture sector’s contribution to carbon emissions cuts will be greater than the 25 per cent agreed by Government due to plans for more energy generation on farms.
However, there is a push from some rural Fianna Fáil TDs that farmers’ efforts on renewable energy should be included as part of their cuts rather than those allotted to the energy sector.
The issue has the potential to cause continued internal tension within the Coalition over carbon emissions targets for agriculture. Documents obtained by The Irish Times reveal the difficult nature of the Coalition talks, with the prospect of “herd retirement schemes” raised at one stage between Ministers.
Simon Carswell Simon Carswell is The Irish Times’s Public Affairs Editor and former Washington correspondent
Cormac McQuinn Cormac McQuinn is a Political Correspondent at The Irish Times
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