Local councils are cowed by cuts and the opposition too cautious: only bold action can salvage investment for growth
Councils have been remarkably silent about the savagery of the cuts they have sustained. At last, the supine Sir Merrick Cockell, Conservative leader of the Local Government Association, is speaking out as a Guardian survey reveals the extent of the damage inflicted. Councils are losing one-third of their funding and, he says, so far this is only "the calm before the storm" – a storm sweeping away more Tory councils each May.
Visiting several Labour city council leaders, I found them politically conflicted: should they blast the government or boast of how well they are managing in hard times? This is odd, as the government rains down the heaviest cuts on the poorest (Labour) areas: Liverpool is the worst affected while Oliver Letwin's Dorset is the least. I was surprised by...
Councils have been remarkably silent about the savagery of the cuts they have sustained. At last, the supine Sir Merrick Cockell, Conservative leader of the Local Government Association, is speaking out as a Guardian survey reveals the extent of the damage inflicted. Councils are losing one-third of their funding and, he says, so far this is only "the calm before the storm" – a storm sweeping away more Tory councils each May.
Visiting several Labour city council leaders, I found them politically conflicted: should they blast the government or boast of how well they are managing in hard times? This is odd, as the government rains down the heaviest cuts on the poorest (Labour) areas: Liverpool is the worst affected while Oliver Letwin's Dorset is the least. I was surprised by...
- 3/26/2013
- by Polly Toynbee
- The Guardian - Film News
Following accusations that Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude sparked fuel shortages by urging motorists to keep "a bit of extra fuel in a jerry can", one pub saw the funny side of things and urged patrons to stockpile beer. The White Hart in Calne, Wiltshire probably took one look at the queues of car drivers at petrol stations around the country and thought "we'll have (more)...
- 4/2/2012
- by By Mayer Nissim
- Digital Spy
Drowning, rabies, electrocution: 70s public information films suggested you could die at any moment. And they were so frightening, they still haunt people today
• Peter Bradshaw on the horror of public information films
• Jude Rogers on how public information films haunt today's directors
In the mid 90s, a company secured the rights to release a selection of classic public information films on video, under the title Charley Says. I bought it not, as I suppose most people did, in a haze of nostalgia, but in the spirit of confronting a terrible fear, like those people who try to overcome their aerophobia by booking on to a course that involves a trip in a plane.
I can't remember the first time I saw The Spirit of Dark and Lonely Water, the 1973 public information film in which a Bergman-esque Death literally stalks children playing on riverbanks. That was part of the problem:...
• Peter Bradshaw on the horror of public information films
• Jude Rogers on how public information films haunt today's directors
In the mid 90s, a company secured the rights to release a selection of classic public information films on video, under the title Charley Says. I bought it not, as I suppose most people did, in a haze of nostalgia, but in the spirit of confronting a terrible fear, like those people who try to overcome their aerophobia by booking on to a course that involves a trip in a plane.
I can't remember the first time I saw The Spirit of Dark and Lonely Water, the 1973 public information film in which a Bergman-esque Death literally stalks children playing on riverbanks. That was part of the problem:...
- 4/2/2012
- by Alexis Petridis
- The Guardian - Film News
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