EcoRadio

Category: Freedom of speech, movement, rights

  • Finns trial Basic Income Scheme

    Finns trial Basic Income Scheme

    Finnish money
    Finns will get paid to live independently of whether they work

    The Finnish Government has moved ahead with plans to trial a Basic Income Scheme on 2,000 random citizens to study the impact on employment.

    Under the scheme, recipients receive a basic income of $US600 per month. Prime Minister Sipila wants to see if the measure can boost employment and simplify the welfare benefits system. “The primary goal of the basic income experiment is to promote employment,” he said.

    Canada is trialling a similar system. A Swiss referendum in June rejected a more generous scheme to pay adults $US2,500 per month and children $US600.

    http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Finland-to-Test-Out-Basic-Income-Scheme-20160826-0012.html

    http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Free-Money-Canadian-Province-Experiments-with-Basic-Income-20160307-0029.html

  • New Zealand grants personhood to a forest

    New Zealand grants personhood to a forest

    Te Urewera National Park
    Te Urewera is the first forest in the world with legal rights

    Global interest spiked this week in an Act of the New Zealand parliament granting personhood to the Te Urewera National Park.

    The actual wording of the act is that “Te Urewera is a legal entity and has the same legal rights, powers, duties and responsibilities as a person.” This means that legal action can be taken on its behalf.

    The Act was introduced two years ago and a similar one is now planned for the Whanganui River.

    The former Minister of Maori Affairs, Pita Sharples said, “This is a profound alternative to the presumption of human sovereignty over the natural world.”

    Ecuador, Bolivia and India are drafting similar legislation.

    http://www.outsideonline.com/2102536/parks-are-people-too-legally-speaking

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/14/world/what-in-the-world/in-new-zealand-lands-and-rivers-can-be-people-legally-speaking.html

  • War on cash picks up speed in Sweden

    War on cash picks up speed in Sweden

    War on Cash shredder
    Countercurrent graphic for the war on cash

    Many Swedish retailers stopped accepting cash this month as the next step in the nation’s move to become a cashless society.

    Writing in CounterCurrents this week, Brett Scott reports that European nations are backing the banks in a call to accelerate the elimination of cash. Scott quotes various politicians and bank executives as evidence that the move is designed to ensure that negative interest rates can be effectively implement to discourage people from saving.

    The global economy as we know it depends on constant economic growth to justify the debt that fuels the profits of the financial sector. As economic times become tough people tend to save rather than spend, thereby reducing financial profits and slowing the economy

    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/stores-to-customers-cash-not-welcome-here/

    http://www.countercurrents.org/2016/08/24/the-war-on-cash/

  • US Feds to phase out private gaols

    US Feds to phase out private gaols

    A private US prison
    Private prisons in the US are abusive, ineffective and more expensive than those run by the state

    The US Department of Justice has announced it will phase out corporate operation of federal prisons after A director General’s reports revealed ongoing abuse and failures of the system. This will not affect State penitentiaries or prisons run by other federal policies.

    Recent reports reveal that California has built one university and 22 prisons in the last thirty years. Independent reports of widespread institutional abuse and increasing rates of recidivism point to a widespread failure of outsourcing punishment.

    The Sentencing Project, an organization working for a fair prison system wrote that the decision, “signals a major milestone in the movement away from mass incarceration.”

    http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/US-Justice-Dept-to-End-Private-Prison-Use-After-Scathing-Report-20160818-0014.html

  • Hot Brown Honey takes Edinburgh by storm

    Hot Brown Honey takes Edinburgh by storm

    Hot Brown Honey
    Hot Brown Honey is on tour in the UK

    Australian cabaret troupe, Hot Brown Honey, has played to full houses and rave reviews at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this week.

    Mixing burlesque with comedy shot through with a powerful political message the show has been described as “gleefully challenging stereotypes of sex and race with a full grin, bared chest and raised middle finger.” Reviewers have noted that the artistic and technical mastery transcend both cabaret and satire. One reviewer described the performance at Edinburgh as “a show that never holds back, never apologises and never asks for permission to stand tall, proud and strong.”

    The show has played this year at the Adelaide Arts Festival, Melbourne Comedy Festival and the Sydney Opera House.

    http://www.thenewcurrent.co.uk/review–hot-brown-honey

    http://hotbrownhoney.com

     

  • Church closes ranks on rebel Pope

    Church closes ranks on rebel Pope

    Pope Francis
    Pope Francis is unpopular with the institutional hierarchy

    The Catholic Herald this week openly criticized Pope Francis’ statements that we must not equate Terrorism with Islam.

    It is the most recent in a series of high profile criticisms of the Pope by Catholic commentators. Pope Francis told reporters last week that we must not mention terrorism by Islamists without reference to Christian terrorism. He also said, “Terrorism is the work of fundamentalists. All religions have their fundamentalist sects.”

    He noted that Christianity and Islam share the same notion of conquest, and blamed imperial and colonial interference in the Middle East for the current unrest.