Mike Vickers' Blog

April 16, 2016

Lesbos and the Refugees

Filed under: Europe, History in the making, Politics, Yeats — derryvickers @ 8:57 am

The Pope visits Lesbos today, The Archbishop of Athens attends, Tsipras has little choice, Bernie Saunders crosses the Atlantic

Lesbos was quoted to have a population in 2011 of 86,436

Since the Refugee crisis started:

Lesbos has borne the brunt of the refugee influx with over 850,000 of the 1.1 million Syrians, Afghans and Iraqis who streamed into Europe last year, coming through the island

How does it manage it

Well here is quote from a resident

“Outside my door the media has turned my home into a reality show while I struggle to make a living and face huge difficulties in supporting my family. People here are slowly falling apart attempting to survive. I don’t know if I can stay here.”

Things fall apart; Lesbos  cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Yeats 1920

From the Telegraph (of all papers)

David Cameron has rejected calls for Britain to take 3,000 orphaned child refugees who have made their way to Europe amid concerns that it could encourage more of them to make the dangerous journey

At the Conservative Party conference

Britain “would be overwhelmed” if it opened its door to every refugee, Prime Minister David Cameron has said as he defended his position on how he plans to deal with the growing crisis….Mr Cameron told …in his keynote speech that he found it “impossible to get the image of that poor Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi out of my mind”. 

And yet Greece is broke

While Cameron / Osborne continue to claim the UK is booming in Europe

Even if the UK took all the refugees its population would only increase by 2%

At least one bright light – Merkel puts HER own job on the line

Germany To Strip Job Protection From Citizens To Make Room For Refugees

April 10, 2016

DHI Seminar ‘Providing Independent Advice to Government: difficult choices and managing tensions’

Filed under: DHI SPIF, Education, Politics, Scotland — derryvickers @ 10:04 pm

The David Hume Institute seminar was given by Naomi Eisenstadt in the Standard Life Building in Edinburgh

A few comments on the seminar.

  1. Despite her name Naomi is American rather than a German
  2. Appointed as independent adviser on Child Poverty to Scottish Government
  3. Scotland is different from California
    1. White bread  > brown bread > with jam then milk
  4. Poverty is not the same as inequality
  5. How poor is poor – numbers resonate
  6. More than ½ the adults in poverty have a job
  7. That a child is physically healthy doesn’t mean that the child is not in poverty
  8. A child of wealthy parents is not in poverty, but it does not mean that the child will grow up to be a productive and healthy adult.  Some kids from wealthier families go off the rails.
  9. 90% of the children with multiple problems, not just poverty (unemployment, poor maternal mental health, poor housing,  etc,) do not wind up in the criminal justice system.  But this is 10 times the rate for the wider population,
  10. Making sure My child is OK  – All parents
  11. Expose children to ‘the world of work’ at an early age
  12. High priority on early education is a proven fact
  13. Better joining up: parents > schools > teachers
  14. Poverty will never be eradicated but can be reduced
    1. The Nordics do better – the gradient between the poor and the wealthy is less
    2. High taxes mean better social care
  15. Lower paid are less likely to go to University (not unfortunately new)
  16. Quick Wins do well but often go unnoticed
  17. Caring is very very expensive – carers need to be well paid
  18. Naomi stressed that the ‘The problem is Me’ by which she meant that much of current policy protects pensioners from the impact of austerity, but is particularly harsh on young families.  She noted that she had worked very hard, but still felt the state protects older people like her, at the cost of younger people
    1. Which I expect applied to the majority of the evenings audience
  19. Theory is fine but practice better
  20. Scotland does better than England

Eisenstadt came over as a great practitioner rather than a theorist.

For more on Naomi Eisenstadt’s recommendations to the Scottish Government see https://www.holyrood.com/articles/inside-politics/naomi-eisenstadt-scotlands-independent-adviser-poverty-and-inequality.

Interestingly no one asked about the Scottish Government’s policy for Universal Child Guardianship.

Codicil – Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold

Filed under: Ireland, Personal, Poetry — derryvickers @ 9:13 pm

Bob Geldof has presented WB Yeats – A Fanatic Heart on BBC 4. It is too late now to watch on the IPlayer but it will be back.
To anyone who cares about Ireland, to anyone who cares about poetry this is compulsory watching.

A classic line by Geldof

‘Die for a Cause but live for a Reason.’

And then there is Yeats own epitaph

‘Cast a cold eye
On life, on death
Horseman, pass by!’

April 4, 2016

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold

Filed under: Europe, History in the making, Ireland, Poetry, Politics, USA, War — derryvickers @ 9:45 pm

With all the comment on the Easter Rising of 1916 in Dublin I felt a need to listen to a CD I have of WB Yeats’ poems including Easter 1916. Three of the four verses finish with the line ‘A terrible beauty is born’. I then listened to next poem ‘The Second Coming’ and came across that well know stanza

‘Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;     Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,     The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere,     The ceremony of innocence is drowned;     The best lack all conviction, while the worst     Are full of passionate intensity.’

Well the poem’s well known to me since a guy I worked with in my first job harangued me that Yeats was the best of poets.

Interestingly I understand that Yeats ordered his published poems very carefully and he juxtaposed these two poems.

And when I look 100 years on from the Easter Rising I see that the Second Coming may be here and now. Whether we think of the Middle East, the US with the Donald, or here in the UK with Jeremy Corbyn at one extreme and the Right Ring Tories at the other with their passion to leave the EU. I am old enough to remember WWII and the thought of the EU breaking up appals me.

I am horrified that the young don’t vote; they see their vote as making no difference to what goes on in their name.

 

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