The 4G rip-off
Last month I switched from the 3G SIM-only deal I’d been on with T-Mobile since 2012 to a new 4G deal with EE, which is part of the same company (I’m not sure who...
Author: Matthew Smith
A rail geography lesson for jihadis and journos
Over the years I've noticed that a standard tactic of the dishonest journalist or columnist in the age of the Internet is to rely on the geographical ignorance of your overseas audience, most of...
Lipman, the socialist, deserts the poor for Israel
Last week Maureen Lipman, the British comic actress best known for roles in advertisements in the 1980s (as in “if you’ve got an ‘ology, you’re a scientist”), announced in an article for Standpoint magazine...
Bedroom Tax gag on Lamont typical of Labour’s cowardice
Miliband barred Lamont from attacking bedroom tax for 12 months | Politics | theguardian.com Yesterday, in the fallout from Johann Lamont‘s resignation as leader of the Scottish Labour party (a nominally independent Scottish version...
Julie Bindel does not deserve a “no-platform” policy
This week Julie Bindel (right) is due to speak in a debate at Essex University about pornography. Bindel is a radical feminist best known for her work with Justice for Women, a group that...
From Clegg to Clacton
The other night I was driving home (I had a long drive from Diss, Norfolk to west London, which takes three hours by any reasonable route in an 18-tonne lorry) and listening to reports...
Would Braille have thrived in inclusive education?
The other day I had a brief tweet discussion with Liz Ball, campaigns involvement officer with Sense, the British deafblind charity, about whether Braille would have become established as the major means of written...
Niqab in Camden: where are the Muslim voices?
The niqab is not just a fashion statement | @guardianletters | World news | The Guardian These two letters appeared in today's Guardian in response to an article in yesterday's edition by Gaby Hinsliff,...
ITV’s soft focus on learning disability crisis
Last Thursday ITV broadcast a 24-minute programme titled Against the Odds, which supposedly revealed "the reality of life for people with learning disabilities in the UK, with many experiencing harassment and violence and just...
The UK is not the USSR, nor an abusive relationship
Recently I've seen some quite preposterous commentary on the Scottish independence referendum, which is taking place as I type this. I have heard that the turnout for this has been higher than at any...
There will be FUD
In under a week as of this writing, the Scottish independence referendum will have been held and the votes will either have been counted, or will be in the process. Last Sunday in the...
Ice buckets and cruelty
I'm sure everyone has heard of the "ice-bucket challenge", in which someone is filmed having a bucket of freezing water poured over their head in response to donations to a charity, usually one dedicated...
Claire Dyer and the LB Bill
On Friday 1st August, Claire Dyer's family lost their legal bid to stop her being transferred from an assessment and treatment unit in Swansea, where her family live, to a medium-secure unit near Brighton,...
Claire Dyer: Transfer postponed!
Update 30th July, 14:13: See this BBC news report – this may be on TV later, especially in Wales. Update 14:55: There is to be a court hearing this Friday; Claire will not be...
'Retirement flats' to free up family homes
Demos: build retirement properties to free up 3 million family homes I was going to be writing a piece this morning about how unworkable it would be to ‘encourage’ the over-55s to move out...
Online friends, suicide and threats thereof
Recently, two people I know (or knew) on Twitter posted threats to kill themselves. One of them is a woman who has bipolar disorder and has been in hospital on several occasions recently; the...
Claire threatened with secure unit transfer again
Last January I wrote about Claire Dyer, a young autistic woman in Swansea who was at the time being threatened with transfer to a secure hospital in Northampton. Then as now, she was living...
Work
The past month or so, I’ve been working full-time, and most of that has been in one job that requires quite long hours — it usually starts at 9am (which is late for a...
McDougalls' children removed yet again
Mark and Kerry McDougall, the Scottish couple who fled to Ireland in 2009 to avoid the social services in Fife, Scotland, taking her then unborn son into care at birth (on the grounds that...
So, what are these 'British values', then?
I’m a bit late in writing about this, as I’ve been working long hours the past two weeks during which the Ofsted report into a number of Birmingham schools supposedly targeted by a conspiracy...