Women in Scottish Policing: the first 100 years

from Women's History Scotland (blog) Women in Scottish Policing: the first 100 years

English Buildings: Somewhere in London

English Buildings: Somewhere in London: A question of viewpoint I’m don’t normally do new year’s resolutions, but if I did, they might be contrarian ones: get drunk more, read l...



Blog recommended by Caroline's Miscellany

Locking the Gate?

Dreadfully sad news in Australia's anti-fracking community this week - Queensland farmer George Bender, longterm frontline fighter against the CSG multinationals, has taken his life. Testimony to the terrible impact of the fight, against fracking, on people in the front line. This is a global front line of course and the story of government-sanctioned bullying by the miners takes one's breath away. In response people are now holding vigils in the cities and the towns, remembering George Bender and expressing their anger at the actions of big mining and the complicit state. Please, read Drew Hutton's words about his friend. http://www.lockthegate.org.au/never_again #fracking #csg #lockthegate #GeorgeBender

Australia and refugees: the cruel saga continues with the cancellation of planned visit to detention centres by the UNHCR: "It’s extraordinary that the Australian Government couldn’t assure the UN expert that people he spoke to wouldn’t be exposed to prosecution under the Border Force Act” http://hrlc.org.au/un-official-visit-to-australia-cancelled-due-to-risk-of-reprisals-on-asylum-seeker-issues/

The artist: paint, love, cat and justice.

 

And the soul of the artist, did he but know it. A man who should have lived somewhere on the Mediterranean, with his love and his watercolours. Maybe he'd have been quite at home on this Andalucian hill. This was my father: he painted.

 

Posted with Blogsy

Workshopping journalism - notes.

Link: http://ideas.ted.com/since-the-ted-talk-the-guardians-paul…/ Just for interest. I've followed Paul Lewis on Twitter for several years - It's how I first learned about the death of Jimmy Mubenga in October 2010 (see my earlier post). Lewis sought comment from followers, having heard that a person being deported had died. His investigation insisted that this death not be disappeared. He also first broke social media news on the 2011 London riots ('hearing that something was happening in Tottenham', heading up there). And then there's his award-winning work on the death of Paul Tomlinson at the 2009 G20 in London. If you care about journalism, and citizen journalism, he's one of many committed reporters whose work is worth following. A long list of course. Across cultures.

Dying for your Device

It must be said Apple has defended itself as a good global citizen and has disputed the allegations in this BBC Panorama program, aired on ABC 4 Corners tonight. But this program must be watched by anyone who owns an Apple (or other) device and/or is concerned about global worker safety and corporate ethics. And I out myself right now as a 25 year devotee of the Macintosh/ Apple brand. But face it: there is plenty of evidence that safety crimes and abuses have existed within the enterprises which have manufactured our phones and tablets. The question is raised here is whether Apple as a corporation has successfully addressed them in companies contracted to make Apple products. Evidently workers have died, including children, this seems to be continuing, and it looks like Apple's targeted safety regulations are being ignored. Add to this bundle of knowledge the findings of SACOM, the Hong Kong based Students and Scholars against Corporate Misbehaviour, who amongst other actions have publicised the notorious and heart-breaking suicides of FoxConn workers in the communications devices industry - workers producing devices for example for Apple and Hewlett Packard. So the plea is, don't only think before you knee-jerk upgrade; act to protect workers and their families: lobby your global corporate icons about their actions to protect the workers who labour for their profit, and for your technological indulgence. Who died so that you could tweet? [ cross-posted from rose webb at http://northcoastlabourhistory.typepad.com/north_coast_ohs_and_safety/]

North Coast - and the Rest - Labour History.

Relections: this is what this blog has become. It turns out that nothing constrains to one criterion in the writing and the research which had its genesis on the New South Wales North Coast. The intent - mirrored from my Typepad blog - was initially to locate that North Coast labour history which was diminishing as its institutions of labour - especially labour councils - closed down as public works privatised. Well well. Now it sprawls across Blogger (and Typepad) as a smorgasbord of labour history, social justice, safety crimes and workplace, words on traveling. After all, what's all this about if not chasing our commons?

New NCLH blog

Content from this blog has been copied to:

http://northcoastlabourhistory.typepad.com/north_coast_labour_histor/

Please visit that site for updates and new material - this site won't be updated from now.

thanks for stopping by. rw.

For info - Ottoman/Middle East labour history

[It's a long way from the north coast! but this post turned up recently on H-Labor. It's interesting - also a good model for the processes we're pursuing through this blog. rw]

From: "Jamie Bronstein, H-SHEAR"
Date: 24 May 2008 6:53:35 AM
To: H-LABOR@H-NET.MSU.EDU
Subject: Ottoman Labor History
Reply-To: H-Net Labor History Discussion List

There is a new website devoted to labor history during the late Ottoman and
modern Middle East era. It contains originals and translations of books,
articles and contemporary original documents. These materials connect to
many issues regarding social and economic and gender studies. These
materials may be used at will. The site managers-John Chalcraft of the LSE
and Don Quataert, SUNY Binghamton-ask only that you formally acknowledge
such use. Moreover, we welcome additions of any materials you may have.
Contact either of us at the addresses noted on the site.



The url : http://bingiwas.binghamton.edu/~ottmiddl/

Brunswick Heads History

http://www.brunswickheads.org.au/brunswick/history/9

This link briefly outlines early Brunswick Heads influences, and makes reference to some of the issues confronted in labour history. There's irony in that the coming of the railway to Mullumbimby meant decline in 'Bruns', with the demise of the railway in 2003 threatening links between all Northern Rivers towns.

Some other coverage on the 'old' Bruns Bridge' and its demoliton by the RTA, following the massive upgrade of the Pacific Highway through to Yelgun. :
> Govt press release 2006 at www.minister.infrastructure.gov.au/ jl/releases/2006/December/L161_2006.htm;
> local newspaper the Echo at www.minister.infrastructure.gov.au/ jl/releases/2006/December/L161_2006.htm) o

NCLH is interested in comment relating to work/ labour community on the North Coast that touches on these issues.

Rosemary

North Coast Labour History Collective

This is the new blogsite for the New South Wales North Coast Labour History Collective.

Labour history in this part of Australia is fast being run over by government, papered over by developers, and left behind when people move on, often when their jobs have been deleted by the actions of those governments and developers.

But since the early days of New South Wales this has been an important area for logging, rail, agriculture, fishing, industries that supported extended rural and town communities, including trade union community. Rail was wiped out in 2003 in a colluson between government and road transport interest that prioritised heavy vehicle transport, and road/air travel, over rail. Logging pretty much nearly destroyed swathes of this beautiful environment. Fishing continues. The newspapers that spoke to and for the region have been decimated though we still, proudly, retain vital independent press. Community? well, up here it just keeps on reforming, even generating new and smaller industries. But destruction of labour sites, dispersal of jobs and the 11 years of Howard politics has undercut both trade unions and the industrial networks already weakened by the disappearance of trades and labour councils as the region's profile changed.

In view of all of this the aims of the collective are a) to create links for recording the labour history of the north coast and b) given that distance makes it difficult to set up in face meetings and seminars, to provide a forum for history and labour communities to share debate, concerns, and knowledge, and to generate links between historians and unionists, including new unionists, that will feed into labour identity in the region.

Several founding members of North Coast LH are members of the ASSLH, the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History and many also are, or have been, union and political activists. We have informal connections with other East Coast LH Societies, including in Brisbane, and will establish on-line links with local unions through the recently re-generated Northern Rivers Union Network. This means that while our focus is on this area's labour history, our input will go wider.

Welcoming your comments. rw, for the collective.