UK Young and unemployed people in Trade Union Backed demo

Young people from across the UK are to join a demonstration in London, highlighting growing concerns over youth unemployment and lack of opportunities for jobs.The campaign group Youth Fight for Jobs are the central organisers for the demo.

Trade union leaders support this demonstration and will play a part in the protest in central London to press for more action to tackle youth unemployment. Youth unemployment in the UK is nearing a million.

Students, union activists and other campaigners will travel to the capital from areas which have been badly hit by the rise in youth unemployment, including Hull and Birmingham.

Political support
Labour MP John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) said: "This march highlights the plight of the million young people who are now unemployed and the many more who are facing joblessness as a result of this recession."

Young Pay the Price
"Young people are being forced to pay for the economic crisis whilst bankers award themselves another £5 billion in bonuses this month. I support the march and urge people to join this campaign to demand action against youth unemployment."

Union Leaders
Bob Crow, general secretary of the Rail Maritime and Transport union said: "Unemployment is a massive human cost to accept. It's even more damaging with one in five young people being unemployed. It's important that we place young people at the core of our aims and objectives, to achieve developing policies for them."

National Organiser
Sean Figg, national organiser for the campaign, added: "This demonstration is going to make it clear that young people are not prepared to face a future of unemployment, job cuts and attacks on our public services.

"Youth unemployment stands at around one million, and disgracefully the Government is cutting vocational education, and is thinking about raising university fees, whilst increasing the level of qualifications needed to find employment."


Summary
All this leads to further cutting out and increased exclusion of the working class youth from further education. When a degree qualification has become the minimum qualification to apply for well paid jobs and this right has been taken away from the poorer classes, you cynically and aggresively remove any chance of the poor from improving their standard of living and their lifestyle.


Excluding and condemning the UK youth to unemployment induced poverty is a recipe for civil unrest and another step towards the breakdown of democracy and a liberal society.

Monster Employment Index UK - Oct Report optimistic increase or leveling off?

Click on the chart for a key to the chart and the full report ........

Free Speech under attack in the UK - Guardian gagged over Trafigura oil dumping scandal

The Guardian has been prevented from reporting parliamentary proceedings on legal grounds which appear to call into question privileges guaranteeing free speech established under the 1688 Bill of Rights.

Today's published Commons order papers contain a question to be answered by a minister later this week. The Guardian is prevented from identifying the MP who has asked the question, what the question is, which minister might answer it, or where the question is to be found.

The Guardian is also forbidden from telling its readers why the paper is prevented – for the first time in memory – from reporting parliament. Legal obstacles, which cannot be identified, involve proceedings, which cannot be mentioned, on behalf of a client who must remain secret.

The only fact the Guardian can report is that the case involves the London solicitors Carter-Ruck, who specialise in suing the media for clients, who include individuals or global corporations.

Remarkable, even by the appalling standards of our libel laws and addled judiciary. This appears to be the question in, er, question:

From Parliament.uk, “Questions for Oral or Written Answer beginning on Tuesday 13 October 2009″

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N Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme): To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of legislation to protect (a) whistleblowers and (b) press freedom following the injunctions obtained in the High Court by (i) Barclays and Freshfields solicitors on 19 March 2009 on the publication of internal Barclays reports documenting alleged tax avoidance schemes and (ii) Trafigura and Carter-Ruck solicitors on 11 September 2009 on the publication of the Minton report on the alleged dumping of toxic waste in the Ivory Coast, commissioned by Trafigura.

And this is a report on how the oil company Trafigura tried to cover up pollution in Africa.

This country's libel laws have been a disgrace for years and one can only hope that egregious abuses of an already abusive system persuades folk that, dash it, something must be done.

UPDATE: The Twitterverse is going mental for #trafigura and I suspect that by the time all this is over far more people will be aware of the controversy swirling around Trafigura's African adventures than would have been the case had they kept quiet and not attempted to silence the press. Combatting this sort of bullying, however, is one thing the blogosphere is good at.

UPDATE 2: There is, at the time of writing, no mention of this story on the BBC's website. Why on earth not?

Foreign Banks mopping up business in the UK

Despite lowering house prices and apparent rock bottom interest rates, it's not getting any easier to borrow money or find a mortgage in the UK. Certainly not with the local banks.

This is leaving the door open for foreign banks to muscle in and capture a share of the UK housing market.

Rates are continuing to climb and research found that the number of mortgage deals available to buyers has slumped 60% over the past 12 months.

Some simplification of offerings has taken place as part of cost cutting exercises and because it is a less competitive market place now, with fewer lenders dominating the scene.

The Bank of China has announced it will start lending to British borrowers and it isn't the only overseas bank to have entered the lucrative UK mortgage market. This, like the Curate's egg, is partly good and partly bad.

The big question; Is the Bank of China a knight on a White Charger, riding in to save the UK home owners from the fiery dragon of the UK banks, that has held such a strangehold over them for so long.

More likely and more cynically, they are in reality an economic Trojan Horse, willing to buy into the UK market and infiltrate deeper over the coming years, to the point where they can change and influence Treasury decisions.

What is the Bank of China offering?
The Bank of China has announced it will start offering mortgages in the UK to both residential and buy-to-let borrowers. It's a well defined market and the risks are known and clearly visible, if you follow the standard format.

It's residential deal is available for loans up the 75% of the property's value. It has a lifetime tracker at 2.5% above the Bank of England base rate, giving a current pay rate of 3% with a £995 arrangement fee. While not quite market-leading this is highly competitive.

Bank of China is also launching a buy-to-let loan at 3.5% above base rate, so it is currently 4%.

HSBC (Hong Kong & Shanghi Banking Corporation!)

Perhaps the Chinese are not such strangers to the UK banking system after all. Consequently the HSBC are offerinf better deals. Those deals are the HSBC lifetime tracker at 2.74% with a £999 fee which is available for loans up to 60%of the property's value. Alternatively, HSBC has a version available up to 75% which has a rate of 2.95% and a £799 fee.

First Direct (CitiBank in USA)

First Direct also has a competitive lifetime tracker at 2.98%. This is an offset so you can reduce the amount of interest you pay by setting your savings against your borrowings. The fee on this deal is £999 and it is available on loans up to 75%.

UK Lenders

This is likely to prove quite attractive because unlike most UK lenders which require the monthly rental income to be 125% of the mortgage payments (meaning you'd need to be getting at least £625 a month in rent if your mortgage payments were £500), the Bank of China only requires the rent to equal the mortgage payments.

Many say that the entry of Bank of China into the UK market, however tentative, has got to be positive news for a market that has been starved of choice and where lenders are increasingly able to call the shots as competition diminishes.

A Matter of Conscience

So, if you can conveniently forget their history of brutality and oppression, the invasion and cultural destruction of Tibet and their continuing breaches of human rights at home, you may be seduced by their offerings.

Is it simply a matter of conscience, or should you not be naturaly cautious. Have we learned nothing from the recent crisis or are we willing to close our minds and simply jump headlong into another fire. Be very wary of Chinese bearing gifts, loans and bonds. Look behind the bamboo curtain for stability and sustainable growth, in the long term.

Which other overseas banks are now operating in the UK?
As we mentioned earlier, the Bank of China isn't the only foreign institution to spot the shortage of mortgage supply in the British market.

Leumi

The Isreali bank, Leumi is offering a competitive five-year tracker. Most trackers from UK lenders are linked to the Bank of England base rate, but Leumi's deal tracks the three-month Libor rate (this is the funding rate banks and building societies borrow from the wholesale markets at). The rate is 1.625% above Libor, giving a current rate of 2.56%.

Of course, this is great while the Libor rate is low but this rate tends to be more volatile than the base rate, meaning monthly payments could fluctuate.

Handelsbanken

Handelsbanken, a Swedish bank, is also offering deals to UK mortgage borrowers, although it is operating at the top end of the market so its loans won't be available to the majority of borrowers.

Nonetheless, for those needing a large mortgage having another player in this market is welcome news. Handlesbanken is willing to consider loans up to £2.7 million which is much more than most UK lenders will advance.

In summary

With such a shortage of mortgage deals available the arrival of new lenders is good news. This doesn't mean the problems affecting the market will disappear overnight: if you don't have a sizeable deposit and a good credit history you will still struggle to get a UK mortgage.

BT relocates call-centre jobs to the UK. Bringing Further Gloom for India

In a complete reversal of the normal outsourcing policy for some years now, BT has decided to relocate 2,000 call centre jobs, currently held in India to the UK.

This is seen as a wholly predictable cost cutting measure that will slash half of BT's India-based customer service operations.

Backlash hits India
India is facing further decline in its business of providing customer support and response centres as an outsourced operation, over the coming months. BT insisted that the move is entirely cost-based and is “not about customer service”.

Shareholder Questions
The decision was revealed during a shareholder question session at BT’s annual meeting. When one BT shareholder asked when the company would close its Indian call centres. Her question was met with an enthusiastic round of applause by other investors. Demonstrating a substantial rise in support for in-country and UK national providers.

Chief Executive Statement
Chief executive Ian Livingston then disclosed the decision. After the meeting a BT spokesperson said: “This is not about customer service, as the service in our operations around the globe is of very similar standards. One shareholder commented that they would have preferred that he had used the term 'a very similar high standard of service'.

Mr Livingston went on to say; “It is about the effective deployment of our resources.” BT currently has 11,000 customer-facing call centre staff in the UK.

What Colour is the Future?
Last year the telecoms giant, BT axed 15,000 jobs across the company, and plans to cut a further 15,000 posts this year, to meet shareholders expectations, after reporting a net loss of £83 million in the year to March 2009.