Political & Civic Context Of City Of London Planning Decisions

Amidst a flood of criticisms of the City of London Corporation’s delivery of public services, support for the executive is ebbing away as rapidly as it is for the political leadership. The apparent impropriety in the management of the planning application for 81 Newgate Street has revealed a pattern of behaviour that seems to have become standard practice in the last couple of years.

Kawsar Zaman & Other City of London Councillors Including McGuinness, Hayward, Mainelli & Edhem, Lend Respectability To Repressive Regimes in Turkey, China & Elsewhere

The City of London council has for years given respectability to thuggish regimes in China, Turkey and other countries. Most of its members don’t have anything to do with this aspect of its activities. All 125 of them, however, share responsibility for what it does, and are tainted with the shame of appeasement unless they speak out. Very few do, not because they’re comfortable with what is being done in their name, but because those who step out of line with the leaders are politically undermined, socially ostracised and personally smeared. Members who aren’t indifferent to the suffering of others should find strength in numbers to stop the the leaders and some of their followers from appeasing thuggish regimes. But they probably won’t, which means that the abolition of this council which facilitates international evil is the only solution.

Sarah Jo Loveday Stands Against William Russell In Bread Street Aldermanic Election Farce

At Companies House we discovered a record that showed British citizen Sarah Jo Loveday was – until a year and a half ago – Romanian citizen Oana Elena Arama. We’re still looking for an explanation as to why Loveday underwent a radical identity makeover at the end of 2021. It isn’t much of a recommendation for Loveday as a candidate for political office that this unexplained transformation is the most interesting thing about her.

Chris Hayward, Keltbray & A £16M Bid Rigging Fine

The hospitality on council leader Chris Hayward’s new register of interests includes both Keltbray and those linked to the authoritarian regime ruling China – the latter despite the fact that the abysmal record of the Chinese government on human rights has been repeatedly drawn to Hayward’s attention. In fact, it was Hayward – when still deputy policy chair – who made the most aggressive speech heard at the Guildhall for some time defending the genocidal regime in China.

Leading Artists Oppose Barbican’s Partnership With Apartheid Israeli Embassy

More than fifty artists, including poet and writer Benjamin Zephaniah, actor Miriam Margolyes, DJ The Blessed Madonna and Turner Prize co-winning artist Tai Shani have called on London arts venue the Barbican Centre to end its partnership with the embassy of Israel. The Barbican is due to host the Jerusalem Orchestra East & West this Sunday 5th February, in an event organised “in collaboration with the Embassy of Israel in the UK”.

City Of London Lord Mayor Vincent Keaveny Welcomes The Repressive Kazakhstani Regime & Its Dirty Money To The Mansion House

There is a tradition stretching back decades of City of London lord mayor’s cozying up to the repressive Kazakhstani regime. This week current lord mayor Vincent Keaveny continued this sleazy affair by inviting ambassador Erlan Idrissov to his Mansion House residence for talks that both sides no doubt hoped would lead to more dirty money from this corrupt regime coursing through the square mile.

Ukraine, Tibet & The City Of London Council

I will vote for this Ukraine motion, unambiguously, as I am sure every other member will but it needs to be said, in the interest of democratic debate, that the motion rings hollow. It states that: “we totally condemn any engagement with money obtained from illegal sources anywhere in the world”. The financial City has for years been a magnet for dirty money including from Russia. This Corporation, as the financial City’s self-appointed promoter, has been frankly backward in coming forward to deal with that situation. So it ill becomes the Corporation now to be condemning what is has for years been condoning.

Edward Lord, The City Of London Council & How Their Neo-Liberal Lobbying Undermines Equality & Diversity

Given their ideological nature, neo-liberal projects are prone to unravelling – particularly when they are additionally hobbled by the lobbyist’s spin someone like Edward Lord brings to them. Lord’s is a neo-liberal ideology that doesn’t just tolerate certain manifestations of intersectionality, it celebrates intersectionality that has been economically disciplined and commodified to generate money at the expense of any real sense of community. Thus Lord is only a ‘champion’ of diversity and inclusion in as far as these things further neo-liberal ideology. Lord has demonstrated in practice they will lobby for and reputation wash oil rich authoritarian regimes – such as the government of Azerbaijan – in preference to standing up for human rights and LGBT+ communities.

Human Rights & The City’s New Lord Mayor Vincent Keaveny

The outgoing Lord Mayor, William Russell, is quoted in a recent article in China Daily (which is owned by the PR department of the Chinese Communist Party) as describing the Chinese government as “wonderful and brilliant” on its carbon emission commitments. Anyone who follows the news, even in a cursory manner, knows this description is false. Xi Jinping was conspicuous by his absence from COP 26. To use the words “wonderful and brilliant” in any connection with a regime that harvests the organs of internal opponents and threatens to “bash the heads bloody” of other countries is obscene. Will the new Lord Mayor, Vincent Keaveny, continue the sycophancy of his predecessors, or show moral courage by defying his string pullers?

Graeme Harrower On Nickie Aiken MP, the City of London & Human Rights In China

Nickie Aiken MP for the Cities of London & Westminster won’t put the life and liberty of fellow human beings ahead of supposed (and unexplained) national economic self-interest, believing “there is a balance to be struck” between genocide and the profits the square mile can make doing deals with China (and presumably other authoritarian regimes too). She enjoys a cosy relationship with the City Corporation and won’t oppose the extremists who lead it.

RECLAIM EC1

No To Business Votes, Yes To Democracy!

human rights