A report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation on immigration and inclusion came to my attention as it offered some grounds for optimism. Inevitably, there was a down side with certain myths about immigrants stubbornly immutable.
There are more than 700,000 homes lying empty in England alone and the number of households living in temporary accommodation is about 83,000.
Labour's bold plan to force knife offenders meet victims was always a risky one to float.
After Wednesday's Outside Left bemoaned the treatment of asylum-seeking Darfuris and Zimbabweans, we have, at last, some positive news. It is reported that the threat of deportation facing 10,000 Zimbabweans has been lifted.
On holiday recently, the wife of my oldest friend presented us with a quartet of superb cigars from the Dominican Republic. The box assured us, in a typesize normally seen on the pages of red-top newspapers, that the contents would cause us a "slow and painful death".
Radio 4's Today programme has been examining care for the elderly and this week carried a worrying report about the lot of a care assistant.
On Friday a rally will be held in Westminster to urge the government to grant right-to-work status for Zimbabwean asylum seekers in the UK.
Has anyone outside the Metropolitan Police kept a tally of the number of stabbings in London in the past week or so? Sorry to sound glib, only I started to but I lost count.
A couple of months ago I wrote a partly tongue-in-cheek piece about nomophobia, the fear of losing one's mobile phone. But it also highlighted my concern that we were starting to invent mental health issues for the sake of it.
So, all you single social care workers earning more than £13,400 a year: stop complaining and get back to your caseloads.
With the Youth Justice Board's less-than-sparkling performance on reducing child custody numbers by 10% in recent years (they increased by 10%), it is justifiable to grumble that "something must be done".
I was out of London for only one week and naively expected even Team Boris to avoid doing something to annoy me. I was only partly disappointed.
| Outside Left questions the thinking behind today’s social policy, with a sometimes wry, occasionally cynical, always straight-talking look at the political elite that shapes it, written by sub editor, Mike McNabb. |
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