An epic crime dressed up as choice

An epic crime dressed up as choice. A war is being waged on Britain’s most impoverished and vulnerable communities and its front line is the high street betting shop. Warfare is invariably the struggle for material resources when business negotiations break down and it is typically waged by the powerful against the weak; whilst it is normally carried out using conventional weaponry the economic war that is raging across the country at the moment uses a modern tool of mass destruction, the fixed odds betting terminal. A report to be published by Campaign for Fairer Gambling in parliament next week, but released to the national press today, has estimated that some £13 billion has been extracted by bookmakers from the most impoverished communities across England. So far there is no data for Wales and Scotland but it is unlikely to be any better given the explosion of high street book makers in all parts of the UK. The gambling industry likes to present gambling as a bit of harmless fun, a traditional pastime that dates back centuries, after all who hasn’t bet a pound on the Grand National, played a fruit machine in a pub or bought a lottery ticket? As with the drinks industry, pseudo-libertarian notions of resisting the nanny state and giving people the right to do what they want with their own money are trotted out whenever the possibility of legislation that might affect profits is mentioned; the punters are rational economic agents, making clear choices about what to spend, save and gamble, introducing the idea of compulsion and addiction ruins this rosy picture. This sanitised view of modern gambling is a fantasy for many, and the occasional punter that places a bet once or twice a year is of no interest at all to the gaming lobby, their favourite client is the vulnerable addict. The current explosion of betting shops on the high streets of Britain results from Labour’s Gambling Act in 2005, which relaxed the rules on how many gambling establishments there could be in any given area. The result, as with Labour’s introduction of 24 hour drinking, has been a catastrophe. In one instance the report showed that £118 million had been poured into just 570 machines in Liverpool, leading to a £23 million loss for the ‘customer’; little wonder that they are described as the crack cocaine of gambling. The current government’s mantra of solidarity, that we are ‘all in this together’ could not be further from the truth, the gaming lobby has as powerful hold over David Cameron as the alcohol lobby does. Far from being united by the adverse times in which we live and the struggles of the recession, the reality that has been exposed in this new report is that during this financial crisis there are winners and losers and the latter have become prey. The massive epidemic of gambling addiction in Britain, existing in symbiosis with crippling pay-day lending, has been deliberately ignored for years but the past decade of governmental irresponsibility has allowed the problem to grow until it is unavoidable. It is impossible for the government and the industry to argue convincingly that problem gambling is an issue for a tiny fraction of the betting community. Once that convenient narrative falls apart, the industry’s deliberate onslaught against the poorest in the country will no doubt continue, but without the veneer of legitimacy that all wars need.

Free from judgment: How the Living Room works

Free from judgment: How the Living Room works. The western world in the modern era has based itself on its ability to be critical, its societies have developed systems of mass education, health, welfare, science and economic might through critical thought. Applying a microscopic scrutiny over nature has yielded immense benefits to millions but also has pushed us to the brink of environmental and social catastrophe. This process of the Enlightenment has also been applied to examining the nature of the individual, when modern schooling, prisons, asylums and working life was created in the 19th Century, people were subjected to more examination and judgment than at any other time in human history. We still live with the values of the 19th Century, the ideas that shaped Victorian society were put in place because of the needs of the industrial revolution and an age of empire, and they were of course deeply toxic to the human condition. In the 21st Century the individual is criticised in the home, criticised at school, criticised at work, at the doctors and in the media. The logic that powers mass society is that this endless criticism and supervision of us as individuals makes us 'better people'; it may enable us to eventually achieve more in work, as economic agents in the economy but the damage that is done can often only be remedied by some form of self-medication. We live in an age of mass consumption, where we are criticised and judged for not being as beautiful and charismatic as the images we see on the television and so the values that mass culture hands down to us as a society encourage us to judge each other - inevitably we are all found wanting. How can a person live up to all of this? It is impossible to be the superman that the modern world requires us to be, but this salient truth is lost, or deliberately buried, keeping us all in a state of perpetual doubt and fear. Coming to a non-judgmental space like the Living Room, where one can be real and authentic and can stop trying to conform to the dysfunctional dictates of society is invaluable to the recovery of addicts. For many it is like the first gulp of air after decades of a strange type of asphyxia, and the discovery that not only is it OK to be imperfect, flawed and to make mistakes, but it's an aspect of all human beings. When criticisers criticise, it is rarely from a position of intended malice, invariably what they are trying to say is: "I know what is best, if you do what I say, you will improve as a person." What the individual, who often deep down knows what to do to be 'better', hears is: " You are no good, no one could love someone like you." At the Living Room criticism and judgment are lethal, we leave them at the door, few things are as dangerous to a recovery. Once we can see beyond the myths and fantasies that society presents us with and embrace our perfectly imperfect selves our recoveries and self-growth become energised and our own urge to self-judge and self criticise diminishes.

Existential Poverty

Existential Poverty In 1901 the Quaker Seebohm Rowntree, heir to the confectionary millions of his father Joseph, wrote a groundbreaking report into poverty, examining the condition of the working classes in York. He discovered that there were two main kinds of poor, those below the bread line who were locked in a daily battle for survival and those living just above it, struggling to keep their heads above water. The Rowntree Report shocked Britain, paved the way for Lloyd George's Liberal Reforms, old age pensions and unemployment relief; it was one of the most influential studies of the 20th Century. What would Seebohm Rowntree's report show today? The foundation established by his father still argues that there is immense material poverty in Britain and the existence of food banks and city centre begging would tend to support that view. There seems, however, to be a kind of poverty that is much more difficult to see until it manifests itself in tragic and sometimes violent ways; it is a poverty of meaning, an existential poverty that grips many lives, where the individual often has little sense of the purpose of living and is dominated by a sense of boredom. The medicine that is currently prescribed for this condition by our culture is alcohol, but increasingly other drugs and harmful behaviours are also used to medicate this spiritual malaise. Recently, feminist blogger and activist Caroline Criado-Perez's campaign to have a female face on at least one British bank note brought down upon her a storm of violent abuse from Twitter users. Much of this hateful misogynistic vitriol went unpunished, but the two individuals who were prosecuted, Isabella Sorley and John Nimmo, were given short custodial sentences for making threats to kill. For both offenders alcohol played a significant factor, with Sorley, by all accounts an educated and intelligent woman, having been arrested 25 times before for drunk and disorderly behaviour. The defence counsel for both individuals cited 'boredom' as an exacerbating factor in their lives, one that seems to have resulted in their mindlessly hateful behaviour. It might be tempting to dismiss this as a feeble excuse, but we must engage with the issue of boredom for a moment. We must ask ourselves why in a society that, even for some of the least well off among us is packed with more opportunities than Seebohm Rowntree could have dreampt of, do some people still feel disinterested in all but the most destructive pursuits? Why do we see internet 'crazes' like neknomination emerge, a phenomenon of such extraordinary stupidity - whereby a participant downs a large quantity of alcohol on video, posts it online and essentially dares the next viewer to consume alcohol in a potentially dangerous scenario, emerge? The internet troll, a lonely, marginalised figure and the neknominator who unwittingly causes the death of another (as has happened recently) are similar in that both are trying in misguided ways to matter. Both are medicating their boredom with alcohol and trying to have some kind of agency in the world, an agency that proves ultimately to be destructive. It might be that the kind of society that we currently have encourages a degree of consumption, in this case of state of the art computer technology and alcohol, and encourages a narcissistic individualism, but little else. These 'pleasures' fail to address the deeper human needs for involvement and connection with others, the nation's widespread existential poverty, boredom and disinterest in contribution is quite possibly linked to the roles that we have created for ourselves as citizens. The guiding logic of our society is that self-interest and self-indulgence eventually yields public benefits, and if this has ever been true, it's certainly not true now. The nation's bored and switched off subsist in an existential and spiritual wilderness with only alcohol, drugs and the internet to engage with and it is down to Britain as a wider society to rethink how we see ourselves as individuals and as a community, and to place deeper humanistic values at the forefront of our priorities.

Can we call it corruption?

Can we call it corruption? When Russell Brand recently said on Newsnight to interviewer Jeremy Paxman that he didn't vote and he encouraged others not to either, his sentiments were taken to be an endorsement for the widespread political apathy that seems to exist in Britain today. Far from Brand being apathetic however, he is one of our more engaged political citizens. Often he articulates himself through humour and irreverence, but his key point, that politics has been hijacked by corporate power, is becoming more and more evident. Last year some 40,000 people died of alcoholism, this figure is a conservative estimate and does not include the suicides, accidents, murders, manslaughters and deaths through neglect that alcoholism causes. A million people were assaulted by those who were intoxicated with alcohol and the taxpayer forked out £12 billion to pay for the policemen, social workers, paramedics, street cleaners and doctors that treat the nationwide alcoholism epidemic that we are currently enduring. Overall the cost to our society is devastating, not simply in terms of lives lost and resources sacrificed, but in the damaging, alienating and estranging quality of mass public addiction. The sense that high streets and city centres are shared space that everyone can use has sadly diminished, and with it, many of the intangible bonds that draw us together. The government's response to this crisis revealed this week a great deal about the state of government in Britain. The British Medical Journal is the latest body to blow the whistle on this national scandal. Continuing moral cowardice on the subject of alcohol pricing has allowed ministers and top civil servants to be directly lobbied by spokesmen for the alcohol business no fewer than 130 times during deliberations on minimum alcohol pricing. Proposed legislation, backed by every major charity dealing with alcohol addiction, homelessness and mental health and professional health care body in the country, was inexplicably torpedoed by this government at the last minute. Why? Everyone knew at the time exactly why, it was not what Conan Doyle would have described in the Casebook of Sherlock Holmes as being 'a three pipe problem.' The reason why is that the interests of corporate power hold more sway in the corridors of power than evidence, logic and philanthropy. 40,000 deaths and £12 billion of waste every year cannot compete for a minister’s attention in the same way that 130 hours of professional lobbying can. Lest you think this is just a party political issue, consider where the last administration chose to hold the 2005 G8 summit in the UK. In this context it makes perfect sense for Brand and countless others not to vote, his argument that he is legitimating a system based on pure greed that supports alien and inhuman ways of thinking and being against the interests of the multitude seems entirely valid. Can we call it corruption? If not, then only because the unfettered access of divisive business interests to the highest levels of decision making has been legitimated long ago. The fact that no law has been broken here is in fact somehow worse, however; it means that our system of government and it's obeisance to corporate power is corrupted and morally bankrupt.

Sbwnjwyr

Yr wythnos hon, gwnaeth Cymdeithas Feddygol Prydain ei datganiad cliriaf a’r un fwyaf amserol hyd yn hyn ar fater argyfwng alcoholiaeth ym Mhrydain: "Yn yr hinsawdd economaidd bresennol, ni allwn fforddio parhau i wario miloedd ar filoedd o bunnau ar glirio ôl-effeithiau problem alcohol y dylai’r llywodraeth ddelio â hi gyda mwy o bwyslais ar fesurau ataliol." Mewn ffaith, mae’r pwysau y mae alcoholiaeth mas yn ei roi ar y GIG yn anghynaladwy ac mae’n gwthio ein hysbytai i dorbwynt ac mae’r sefydliad meddygol yn gwybod hyn yn dda. Mae’r llywodraeth yn gwybod hynny hefyd, fel y diwydiant alcohol - y mwyaf pwerus o’r ddwy lobi a’r un yr oedd y llywodraeth yn dewis ei gefnogi. Yr wythnos hon, roedd y BMA yn galw unwaith eto am leiafswm pris ar alcohol, strategaeth a brofwyd fel un i ostwng y nifer o gleifion cysylltiedig ag alcohol sy’n cael eu derbyn i ysbytai yn yr Alban ac ‘yn ymosod ar arferion marchnata anghyfrifol’. (Pan ystyrir bod alcohol, fel arfer, ar frig y mynegai sy’n achosi fwyaf o niwed, yn achosi miliwn o ymosodiadau bob blwyddyn, yn gysylltiedig â’r mwyafrif o achosion o gam-drin ac esgeuluso plant ac sy’n gweld pumed ran o bedwar deg rywbeth yn cael eu derbyn i wardiau argyfwng bob blwyddyn, nid yw’n rhy ddadleuol i awgrymu bod yr holl arferion marchnata’n anghyfrifol). Y rheswm dros bryder y BMA oedd yr ystadegau brawychus a ryddhawyd ac a oedd yn dangos epidemig o ddibyniaeth mewn pobl rhwng 40-50 oed; mae yfwyr pyliau’n rhoi baich o ryw £22 miliwn y flwyddyn ar y GIG ond mae yfwyr cartref yn eu 40au yn mynychu ysbytai mor aml fel eu bod yn draenio £670 miliwn o’r coffrau cyhoeddus. Mae meddwl am bethau yn nhermau ariannol, wrth gwrs, yn ddadlennol ac mae’n ddefnyddiol wrth roi awgrym i ni o raddfa’r broblem (un sy’n 30 gwaith y maint) ond ni ddylem adael i’r gost hon ein pellhau oddi wrth y bobl hynny ynghanol y drasiedi hon. Mae canran fwyaf dioddefwyr y diwydiant alcohol yn dlawd, bron i 40 y cant o deuluoedd incwm isel ac mae’r mwyafrif yn ymddangos fel yfwyr cartref, sy’n gallu mwynhau eu dibyniaeth i ffwrdd oddi wrth heriau sefyllfaoedd cymdeithasol. Yn y cyfnod hwn o lymder, pan mae nawdd i lyfrgelloedd, canolfannau chwaraeon a bysiau’n cael eu torri, yn rhyfedd iawn, mae’r diwydiant alcohol fel petai’n cael ei eithrio o fesurau tynhau o’r fath ac mae ganddo un system ariannu anferth gan y trethdalwyr i gynorthwyo ei waith; y GIG. Mae’r mwyafrif o fusnesau sy’n creu cynnyrch gwastraff niweidiol er mwyn elw neu sy’n llygru, yn gorfod glanhau’r llanastr neu’n gorfod talu’r trethi gwyrdd i dalu am eu heffaith ar yr amgylchedd, ond nid y diwydiant alcohol. Cost y gollyngiad olew Deepwater Horizon oedd 11 bywyd a thua $50bn i BP. Pa bris y miloedd o fywydau sy’n cael eu colli bob blwyddyn ym Mhrydain oherwydd cam-drin alcohol? Mae’r diwydiant alcohol yn preifateiddio’r elw o’u gweithgareddau ac yn cymdeithasu’r gost i’r gweddill ohonom ei thalu, yn ariannol ac yn ysbrydol. Petai’r diwydiant alcohol yn gorfod talu ei ffordd am unwaith a chyfrannu at y niwed mae’n ei achosi, byddai’n methu - mae hyn yn arwydd bod costau alcohol yn llawer mwy na’r budd a geir i fusnesau preifat neu i gymdeithas.

Freeloaders

This week the British Medical Association made its clearest and most timely statement to date on the issue of Britain's alcoholism crisis: "We cannot afford to keep spending millions of pounds in today's economic climate on mopping up the after-effects of an alcohol problem that the government should tackle with a greater emphasis on preventive measures." In essence, the burden that mass alcoholism is placing on the NHS is unsustainable and is pushing our hospitals to breaking point and the medical establishment knows this full well. The government knows it too, as does the alcohol industry - the more powerful of the two lobbies and the one the government chose to back. This week the BMA called once again for minimum pricing on alcohol, a strategy proven to reduce alcohol related hospital admissions in Scotland and a 'crackdown on irresponsible marketing practices' (when one considers that alcohol is normally at the top of most harm indices, causes a million assaults per year, is connected to most cases of child abuse and neglect and sees a fifth of forty somethings admitted to the emergency wards annually, it's not too controversial to suggest that all marketing practices are irresponsible). The reason for the BMA's concern were the shocking statistics released that show an addiction epidemic amongst 40-50 year olds; town centre binge drinkers place a burden of some £22 million a year on the NHS, but home drinkers in their 40's attend hospital so frequently that they drain £670 million from the public coffers. Thinking about things in financial terms is of course revealing and it is useful in giving us a clue to the scale of the problem (one that is 30 times the size), but we should not let these costings distance us from the human beings at the centre of this tragedy. The largest percentile of victims of the alcohol industry are poor, nearly 40 percent come from low income brackets and most appear to be home drinkers, able to engage in their addiction away from the challenges of social situations. In this time of austerity, when public subsidies for libraries, sports centres and buses are being cut, the alcohol industry curiously seems to be exempt from such belt tightening measures and still has one enormous tax-payer funded system to assist its operations; the NHS. Most businesses that generate harmful waste products in the pursuit of profit or who pollute are legally obliged to clean up their messes or are levied green taxes to pay for their impact on the environment, not the drinks industry though. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill cost 11 lives and about $50bn for BP. What price the thousands of lives lost each year in Britain to alcohol abuse? The alcohol industry privatises the profits from their activities and socialises the costs for the rest of us to pay, financially and spiritually. If the alcohol industry were ever forced to pay its way and to contribute to paying for the damage it caused it would collapse, an indication that the costs of alcohol far outweigh the benefits accrued to private business or society. Wynford Ellis Owen CEO Living Room Cardiff

We're all perfectly imperfect

Last week the global news media was fixated with the story of Brian Jones, a bus driver from Solihull who was dismissed from his job after it was revealed he had taken crack cocaine, was drunk at the wheel and clearly had sex addiction issues due to his frequent use of prostitutes. At the same time an obscure bank clerk from Reading, Mrs Andrea Smith, revealed that she had bought cocaine and enjoyed a weekend bender in Manchester. Except it wasn’t. These two fictional stories are composites of real ones, stories of ordinary men and women whose lives are wrecked by addiction, day in day out. The narrative of fall from grace, disgrace and public shaming is too commonplace, too mundane, too familiar and everyday for the newspapers, TV and internet to bother publicising, except when a high profile politician or public figure is involved. The Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, has given the media some wonderful material to work with, appearing at once to be both a buffoon and psychopath and even worse, publicly funded but, in many ways, the story of his British counterpart Paul Flowers is even more perfect for the tabloid press. Mr. Flowers, former Chairman of the Cooperative Bank, has had to resign and face police investigation after it was revealed that during his tenure at the loss making bank he was purchasing cocaine and other substances. He was not only a Methodist Minister, but the trustee of a drugs charity, and in the eyes of our ever judgmental media (who are, as a profession beyond reproach in matters of substance abuse of course), a cardinal sin has been committed. Mr. Flowers was no doubt meant to occupy some saintly position, untainted by addiction, the title of minister conferred unto him seems also to have come with the presumption by everyone else of infallibility. The suggestion is also implicit from news reports that have circulated about his fall from grace that the Cooperative Bank would be operating at a profit were it not for his nefarious vices. Maybe it would, it’s almost impossible to say for sure, but the reason for this letter is not so much about either Ford or Flowers, but our collective response of surprise and shock when we learn that the rich and powerful are out of control. When we see other lives out of control such as city centre street drinkers, most of us barely register their presence, but they are every bit as human and in distress as the damaged people who all too often have access to the levers of power. It is understandably difficult to extend our human compassion and understanding to the most vulnerable and damaged victims of addiction who we encounter on a day to day basis, but equally it becomes increasingly challenging to show compassion to high profile victims too. Despite their disagreeable antics in high office, both men Ford and Flowers are as human, as flawed, as likely to feel sorrow and loneliness as the rest of us; both men are very ill with addiction and completely lost, having to make sense of a whirlwind of chaos in the full glare of the media spotlight. We have come to assume that our leaders are less human than us, that these wizards of public affairs, finance and administration can work some special kind of magic that we mortals are not privy to, and our societies will continue to function in a generally normal and secure way. What these two examples suggest is that within the corridors of political, financial and bureaucratic power, there are probably as many damaged, addicted, frightened and lonely people as there are within the population at large. We therefore need more than ever to have a frank and honest open discussion about addiction in our society, one that transcends our tabloids, taboos, secrets and shame.