Spokesman Books

Spokesman Books and Russell Press will be at the Lowdham Book Festival on Saturday. Details of the final day can be found below. All Day Book Fair and Café Saturday 29th June, 10am–5pm Village Hall, Main Street, Lowdham Throughout the day the Village Hall hosts a café run by mmm…deli ,serving hot and cold drinks, salads and panini, cakes and ice-cream. The book fair is spread over the Village Hall, a marquee behind the hall and assorted gazebos. It features publishers, charities, book trade organisations,booksellers with new and second-hand books and cards. There are displays of old-fashioned letterpress printing equipment and bookbinding. Free author talks and talks about books will go on throughout the day. There will be books for children and adults, bargain books and books signed by all the authors appearing during the festival. Entry is free to the book fair and all events on Saturday 29th June. No tickets required. Join us for an hour or the wholeday! For...

We have received this urgent appeal from the President of the Union of Journalists in Turkey. Dear colleagues, Everything is getting worse. In Istanbul, on Saturday evening, police entered Gezi Park using tear gas and water cannon against civilian people including women and children. Police also used tear gas in hotels around the area, where injured people had gone for treatment. Police do not allow the press to work freely in Taksim or other places where they attack to people. Pictures of a photo-journalist (Cem Türkel from Akşam daily) were deleted by using force in Harbiye near Taksim on Saturday night. On Sunday, police began to arrest the doctors from the hotels who treated the people there. Police also made operation in some houses to arrest the leaders of Çarşı group (fans of Beşiktaş football team who were very active at the protesting demonstrations). In Ankara, there was a funeral ceremony for Ethem Sarısülük, who was killed by a plastic bullet fired by police. Polic...

The WEA in partnership with the London Hazards Centre invites all Trade Union H&S Reps and trade unionists who want to get up-to-date with Government proposals for H&S to Health and Safety and the Cuts & Book Launch for Safe at Work? WHEN? Monday 24 June 2013 6.30pm - 8.00pm WHERE? WEA London Region 96 – 100 Clifton Street London EC2A 4TP SPEAKERS include Tony O’Brien – Construction Safety Campaign Dave Putson – Author, PCS H&S rep Tony Simpson – Publisher, UNITE The evening will be a combination of speakers on fighting the current attacks to H&S, an opportunity for H&S reps to network, and the launch of Dave Putson’s book, Safe at Work ? Ramazzini versus the attack on health and safety . Dave is an active PCS TU H&S rep in the Courts Service Please let Monica know if you will be attending on mgort@wea.org.uk or 0207 426 1976 ALL WELCOME !! WEA Registered Charity number - 1112775

In April 1963, Grigoris Lambrakis laid a wreath at the feet of Lord Byron, whose statue is to be found near Hyde Park Corner in London. He had walked about 80 kilometres, all the way from the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston, carrying his banner marked “ELLAS” (Greece), as part of CND’s annual Easter March. A few weeks later, on 27 May, Lambrakis was murdered in public, in Thessaloniki, in the north of Greece. These dramatic events were captured in Costa-Gavras’s acclaimed film “Z”, which takes its title from the first letter of the Greek word Zi , meaning “he lives”. “Z” appeared in graffiti all over Athens. Dr Lambrakis’s public stand for peace and against oppression continues to resonate in Greece and beyond. He inaugurated the first Marathon March for Peace, carrying the same ELLAS banner he had raised in England. In Greece, he marched alone initially, it seems, defying an official ban on the event. Later, thousands joined him, defying the ban. Bertrand...

This extract is from the forthcoming publication by Prof Allyson M Pollock and David Price on the future of the national health service for the Centre for Labour and Social Studies ( Class ). This blog first appeared on Left Foot Forward on 25 March 2013. At 2.36 on the afternoon of Tuesday 27 March, 2012 the Health and Social Care Bill 2011 , repealing the legal foundations of the NHS in England, was given royal assent and became law. Campaigning groups, NHS staff and professional organisations had fought for nearly 2 years against what must count as one of the most regressive pieces of UK legislation of the last 60 years. That the bill became law in the end is testimony not to our robust democratic processes but to the autocratic power of government. The coalition came to office in May 2010 on a manifesto promising no further top-down reform of the NHS, and then promptly did the opposite. The bill passed into law without an electoral mandate because no major political p...

Ayse Berktay, friend of the Russell Foundation for many years, has now been acknowledged by PEN America and awarded the 2013 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write prize. Here is here acceptance speech, written in prison in Turkey, where she has been held without bail since October 2011 (see Spokesman issues 115, 119, 120) Ayşe Berktay in Bakırköy Women’s Prison. Photo courtesy Ali Berktay STATUS: On Trial Ayşe Berktay is a translator, scholar, author, and cultural and women’s rights activist. Her publications include History and Society: New Perspectives, 2008, and The Ottoman Empire and the World Around with Suraiya Faroqhi; and she is the editor of Women and Men in the 75th Year of the Turkish Republic. Her translations include The Imperial Harm: Gender and Power in the Ottoman Empire, 1520-1656 by Leslie Penn Pierce; and The Ottoman Empire, 1700-1922 (New Approaches to European History) by Donald Quataert. Over the past decade, Ayşe conducted work at the History Trust, ...

Taking the message to Parliament On 15th April, the Global Day of Action Against Military Spending (GDAMS), CAAT, Pax Christi, War on Want, CND and others joined together to take our message to Parliament, with a protest against prioritising military spending over public services and welfare. We came together to ask for investment in improving people’s quality of life, not destroying it through war and suffering. Improvements could be made by scrapping the £3bn annual cost of nuclear weapons in favour of quadrupling investment in renewable energy. On the day campaigners took the message to parliament. For more details visit the GDAMS website .