Kingfisher

Brazil is encouraging prisoners to read books, we are not. Who is right, who is wrong? I agree with the conclusions presented within the article, that we are wrong, and prisoners should be encouraged to read books. The article posses the question that even if Brazil, with its poor reputation can get this right, why can't we? What are your views on the banning of books in prison?

If they are lucky enough to be taken prisoner in Brazil, they get to read books. I really don't think that Brazil is a great example. Read the article? It says EVEN in Brazil they are encouraged to read books.

Chris Grayling has banned books in prison. http://www.leftfootforward.org/2014/03/the-prison-book-ban-is-not-just-nasty-but-bizarre/ In brazil they encourage prisoners to read books, that has to be a better way. As the article states, a bizarre and populist move.

Well, thats as may be, good for Aldi. But probably not that good, I bet most of the jobs are under the living wage. The real story however is that over 1000 people turned up for 25 jobs. That speaks volumes about the dire situation job seekers are in. Another angle... How many of those 1000 are officially not counted as unemployed I wonder?

£7.95 per hour rising to £9.50 per hour for store assistants according to Aldi's website.Thats a relatively good wage this day and age to be fair considering Tesco and Asda pay£6.50 - £6.70 for shop assistants. I think they need to update their website though, because a quick search on a job site shows them offering jobs at £7 an hour for stock assistants. None of these working poor will be effected by the October minimum wage rise. So, no zero hours contracts and a decent wage. Have you got anything left to moan about?What?? £7 an hour a decent wage? Only a guarantee of 20 hours, 25 applicants for every position. Sign of a healthy jobs market? I think not.

Isn't that on the VT blacklist? Reliable sources only please!

£7.95 per hour rising to £9.50 per hour for store assistants according to Aldi's website.Thats a relatively good wage this day and age to be fair considering Tesco and Asda pay£6.50 - £6.70 for shop assistants. I think they need to update their website though, because a quick search on a job site shows them offering jobs at £7 an hour for stock assistants. None of these working poor will be effected by the October minimum wage rise.

Aldi doesn't use zero hours contracts. Well, they say they will guarantee 20 hours in the article. If they don't offer zero hours then we can assume they will be offering at least 20 hour, near minimum wage (thus probably government subsidised) contracts to the 'lucky' applicants.

Over 1000 scroungers turn up for just 40 (possibly zero hour?) jobs at Aldi in Dudley. http://www.expressandstar.com/news/2014/03/22/aldi-jobs-1000-queue-for-40-posts-in-dudley/

He's learning. He got taught a lesson by Crouch.

One of the few to come out of today's game with any credit.

It was frustrating when he got his one shot off target today. Typical Gabby, doesn't test the goalie enough. Needs to up his game, looks like he's started his summer hols already.

Oh dear. After a week of gushing praise he plays like that. Embarrassing.

We were a football team for 5 mins. We were a pub team once they scored. Bunch of kids, no experience, no consistency.

Not really. They have no chance of power, so they say things which appeal, or might appeal to their target audience outside of those who'd vote for them for purely racist reasons. so they say things which might appeal to folk who are unaware of their extreme racist nature. Folk who might be alarmed by immigration or multi-cultural nature of our society, but aren't outright racist. They're basically scooping for support from as wide an audience as they can get, and they use seemingly "fair" stuff to try and pull in that audience. They're not for actual fairness, obviously, or for actually treating people equally. That much is self evident, I'd have thought. They're no more socialist or left wing than [insert name of right wing, but non-racist party of your choosing]. They're not about standing up for poor folk who are non-white, they cannot be socialist by definition, whatever they or others might say. Exactly, which is why they tap into the poorer, so called 'working class' areas, and which is why what 'success' they have enjoyed has been in such areas. Your typical BNP voter, and fortunately there are not too many of them, would otherwise vote Labour. Whether that is true or not, I have no idea. But BNP voters are not socialists either way.

Weimann off, I hadn't realised he was on tbh.

Got to get it on target Gabby!

Big business has more of a say on how the country is run than you or I. It seems Caroline Lucas yet again is the only one trying to hold the government to account. Labour have become so impotent (complicit) it's untrue. Here's an article on how 'close' the relationship between the government and Cuadrilla is. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/21/owen-paterson-urgent-meeting-fracking-cuadrilla-lord-browne?CMP=twt_gu

I recently purchased a Laney Klipp amp head. Built in Birmingham circa 1970, it's all original inside, with partridge transformers and original valves. It's the loudest amp I ever heard...from the days when amps needed to be loud! It's more or less the same amp Sabbath used on the first couple of albums.

True. But if a particular party has real alternative solutions, sensible things, (not just things people want to hear), that has to be a good thing. For me that's the Green Party, according to that survey I'm not alone. I haven't done the survey. Is it skewed to give a particular bias? Is it a website likely to be used by people of a particular political leaning? And yes we need proper PR, but the politicians made sure that was kicked into the very long grass, because they knew that was the best way to prevent real change - and that's disgusting, THAT is their mindset.

I haven't ignored him at all. The HS1 railway is there, it stops at stations in Kent. It's a premium service at a premium price, but back in 2011 it wasn't being used. According to the article people prefer the price and flexibility of the old network. The worrying part is that HS2 will be HS1 on steroids, less stops, more speed probably more expensive.

Hmm... I wonder why it hasn't attracted domestic passenger traffic to and from towns and cities in Kent? The article I linked to claims that it's about cost and practicality. The old network isn't as fast, but it carries more regular trains to more destinations for less. HS2 will be faster, but the same cost and practicality issues will surely arise. This project, to me, is pie in the sky transport planning.A vanity project that doesn't begin to address the population/ wealth/ jobs spread issues we face.

In order to draw any comparison along those lines, you'd need to make the case that HS1 was built for the same reasons that HS2 is being built. It isn't.I don't think it's comparing apples and pears. If its not relieving congestion on the old SE network, how will HS2?

Bloody hippy's... http://www.cnduk.org/component/k2/item/1855/people-not-trident-the-economic-case-against-trident-replacement These people who talk about love and peace just don't understand the realities of the world like we the grey, suit wearing, hand gesturing robots for the 'hard working people'.

'Have the Greens blown it in Brighton' is the title of the article from 2013. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/dec/15/greens-blown-it-in-brighton I'm not a Brighton citizen, so I wondered how they were getting on. I'm an admirer of Lucas and her vision of the future of politics. This article reads to me like, people who have my concerns at heart, having an argument about how best to address them. That has to be a progression from 'let's sell everything he has a stake in and has paid for to our mates as cheaply as possible, whilst diminishing his own personal control of his life'.