Jenny (not her real name) describes herself as “a medicated production”. In preparation for our meeting, she had recourse to a morphine patch. She explained that she always tried to “dress nicely and take care with my hair and make up when I go out or meet people.”
The UK supreme court has confirmed that the government had broken the law through failing to supply adequate information about its work-or-starve schemes for jobless people. Yet, by and large, ministers are succeeding in inflicting terrible hardship on many unemployed and sick people, as Citizens Advice Bureau research reveals.
Do you go to church on Sundays? Do you have young children who need you to look after them on Saturdays, or adult caring responsibilities for even a few hours a week? If you lose your job in the UK, you might be punished with destitution.
Delegates from churches in Zimbabwe, South Africa and other countries in the Southern Africa Development Community have expressed clear support for targeted sanctions against Zimbabwe.
International solidarity and support for the Burmese democracy movement is growing, as evidenced in the imposition of new economic sanctions against the military regime. But what happens next?
American congress persons, including Joe Pitts of Pennsylvania, are urging European countries to keep up the political and economic pressure on the dictatorship in Burma, following the brutal suppression of pro-democracy protests originally led by Buddhist monks.
In a move that has been welcomed by campaigners, including many Christians, an influential group of British MPs has called on the British government to consider using economic pressure against Israel over its treatment of the Palestinian people.