David Cameron is taking two weeks' compassionate leave after the death of his six-year-old son, Ivan. It is the very least he will need.
Continue reading How much compassionate leave should we get?.
February 2009 Archives
The teenage pregnancy figures are out today and show a rise for the first time since 2002.
Continue reading The great teenage pregnancy mystery.
Education, education, education. But not of the religious kind, please. And especially not collective worship, also known as assembly.
Continue reading Religious worship in schools is so divisive.
Prejudice against disabled people is seldom "up there" with race and gender bias but the case of Cerrie Burnell shows that it should be.
Continue reading TV presenter victim of disability hate campaign.
Debbie Purdy is satisfied that the court system has done all it can to answer her call for clarification on the law regarding assisted suicide.
Continue reading A glimmer for Debbie Purdy but ruling falls short.
Barely a month goes by without yet another pessimistic statement on child poverty.
Continue reading Child poverty: have we gone as far as we can?.
The recent publicity given to the health-related battles being fought by Terry Pratchett, John Suchet and Jade Goody is forcing me to revise my generally negative stance on celebrity culture.
Continue reading Celebrities can challenge stigma on cancer and Alzheimer's.
The first few frames of the TV advert launched this week to warn about the dangers of cannabis use made me wonder whether it would be worth finding a dealer and having a few puffs myself.
Continue reading Is cannabis campaign money well spent?.
Which planet is Iain Duncan Smith on? Abregado-rae, apparently.
Continue reading Iain Duncan Smith's Gado-speak and Boris @!*@ing Johnson.
A series of UK Border Agency raids on restaurants run by people from ethnic minorities is bringing into sharp relief both the problems faced by many asylum seekers and the faults in the asylum system.
Continue reading Asylum seekers roughed up in Border Agency raids.
For those of us who are concerned about the destruction of the natural world, the plan to turn the Chagos Islands into a marine reserve on the scale of Australia's Great Barrier Reef is an exciting one.
Continue reading Indian Ocean special: Chagos hypocrisy and work in the Maldives.
If a social worker came out with the insults uttered by Jeremy Clarkson and Carol Thatcher last week or a remark similar to that allegedly made recently by a diplomat, they would be out of the door quicker than a Chelsea football manager.
Continue reading It's political incorrectness gone mad.
One subject that seems to stir more passion than most is the rights and wrongs of smoking. Separate debates on Community Care's CareSpace discussion forum and The Guardian's Joe Public website bear this out.
Continue reading No smoke without ire.
If the point of A Good Childhood was to maintain the profile of The Children's Society and provide the charity with some positive publicity, it worked.
Continue reading The Children's Society and the bleedin' obvious.
There was a certain paradox in David Cameron's choice of
word that sits at the heart of his poverty battleplan.
Continue reading Davos Cameron's policy poverty.
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| 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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