Opinion

By Dr Roger Cottrell To listen to the selective media coverage and political sound bites regarding the poisoning, on March 4, in Salisbury, of Russian defector Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, you might for a moment start to believe that Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Amber Rudd planned to do something about it beyond throwing their toys out of the pram. After all, the implication of the Kremlin and of Vladimir Putin’s “murder incorporated” in this heinous and actually...

By Rupert Read and Bennet Francis It’s time we faced up to reality: humanity is almost certainly going to have to learn to live in a world that has been radically damaged and transformed by human-triggered climate change. We are – virtually all of us, either softly or (less often) explicitly – in climate denial. The greenhouse gases we have polluted the atmosphere with have already set us down a path of serious and possibly irreversible environmental disruption, and the...

 There’s an old adage that trust has to be earned. Ironically for the National Trust that’s something that seems to be in short supply among anti-hunt campaigners. After a highly controversial vote at last year’s AGM, which may face a legal challenge over what many regard as an inappropriate use of proxy votes, the Trust decided to continue to permit hunting on its land. This was in the face of highly vocal opposition from ordinary members, some of whom threatened...

Lynda Lang began her career in 1987 after a chance encounter with an old school friend who was training to be a sergeant.

Brexit poses wide-ranging risks to animal welfare, including a shortage of vets, costlier veterinary medicine, and an increase in the numbers of animals used in research, according to a new report by the Green Party's Animals Spokesperson. Keith Taylor MEP, who is also Vice Chair of the European Parliament's Animal Welfare Intergroup, launches his 'Animals and Brexit' report as the Green Party gathered for its Spring conference in Bournemouth. The release comes as the US dairy industry ramps up its...

  By Dr Roger Cottrell  “But make no mistake, the sky will fall in” -Harry Perkins in “A Very British Coup,” Channel 4, 1988. A week is reputedly a long time in politics. Looking at the seven-day time span that began, on February 16, 2018, it at times seemed (for those of us old enough to remember it) as if the cold war was back with a vengeance. First came the 37-page indictment by former FBI head of terrorism Robert...

By Sammy Russell The EU released its draft exit treaty earlier this week, which formally spelled out the terms of Brexit and what it may mean in practice. It shows just how tricky preserving peace in Northern Ireland will be if the UK wants to stick to the red lines it has given itself. Theresa May has been pushed into swearing by various ‘red lines’ by the pressures of internal Conservative party politics. These are things the UK will simply not...

We are almost at that time of year when the press office teams at the, increasingly corporate, food bank operators pump out the annual reports and latest figures for the millions who were helped by their food bank operation in 2017 .Their figure will give the main stream news the headline for the day. Film crews will be sent to the nation’s establishment food banks to report on the ever increasing numbers. Viewers and listeners will, as they do at...

This week marks six months since the Myanmar military resumed its ruthless crackdown against the country’s Rohingya people. Many women and girls fleeing brutal state sponsored persecution have reported horrific accounts of rape, sexual assault, torture and murder at the hands of government forces. When state institutions orchestrate such human rights violations and allow perpetrators to act with impunity, the international community must unite in taking a strong stand to hold those responsible to account. Violent oppression of Myanmar’s various...