Innholdsfortegnelse for 9-5-2016 i The Big Issue

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Last week something remarkable happened in Scotland. It’s the sort of news story that spreads quickly, engages and demands comment. A house was put on sale for £1. Actually it’s a flat, in Airdrie, with a communal garden and on street parking. It’s not the first time that homes have gone on sale for less than the cost of a Mars bar and a can of Tizer. In Liverpool not so long ago there were a number of them. But the pound there had come with an undertaking to pay a considerable whack for renovation. Like buying a bust company for a pound and taking on the associated debt. It was a canny means of rejuvenating areas and preserving some handsome Victorian streets. This sort of thinking led to the…

Imagine waiting ages for a bus, only to be told by the driver there’s no space for you. Imagine having to give train companies 24 hours’ notice every time you wanted to travel. Or trying to hail a taxi in the street, only to watch them drive past you as if you were invisible. This is what public transport is like for many disabled people in 2016. Trailblazers, Muscular Dystrophy UK’s young disabled campaigners network, worked on a nine-month undercover investigation into the barriers we face today when trying to use public transport. Our report End of the Line found that, although progress is being made, the UK’s transport infrastructure still needs major improvement. We want to travel spontaneously without having to worry if the ramp will arrive at our…

The Big Issue is a partner with Project Literacy – a global movement to make significant and sustainable advances in the fight against illiteracy. We represent the letter ‘H’ for homelessness in their ‘Alphabet of Illiteracy’, which visually demonstrates how illiteracy underpins some of the greatest challenges facing humanity. For more info: projectliteracy.com/abc All proceeds from this T-shirt (right) go to the 22 partners of Project Literacy. One-in-two homeless people in the UK lack the basic English skills needed for everyday life. This figure compares with roughly one in six (15 per cent) of the general population who struggle to read. BUY HERE Every purchase through The Big Issue Shop directly supports the work that we do, offering a HAND UP and a chance to earn a legitimate income to…

CLOWN FISH BY DAWN TOMKINS Dawn worked as a carer for people with learning disabilities and mental health issues until a physical attack from a client put her in a wheelchair. “This caused me severe depression,” she says, “and in 2001 I was diagnosed with emotional borderline personality disorder. Through the charity Centrepieces, I have found the soothing therapy that art can bring, as well as a way to express feelings that I can sometimes find hard to express in other ways.” PARK SCENE BY DON GIBSON “I have lived in Brighton all my life,” says Don, 41, who submits artwork via Creative Future, a charity for people who lack opportunities due to mental health issues, disability or social circumstance. “I’ve had 13 solo and joint exhibitions. This work is…

Tickling audiences since 1954, Ken Dodd is a formidable force of nature. A man of infinite jest – Kenneth Branagh agreed and cast him as Yorick in his film version of Hamlet – Dodd remains an eccentric outsider, defying convention, living life on his own terms. A true trendsetter, he has influenced generations of comedians who followed in his wake (and, perhaps, tax-wary corporations and individuals; Dodd resolved some tax ‘issues’ in 1989). At the height of his fame Dodd enjoyed an unprecedented record-breaking 42-week sellout season at the London Palladium and knocked The Beatles off the top of the charts with Tears, the UK’s third best-selling record of the ’60s. The 88-year-old still lives in Liverpool’s Knotty Ash and regularly pounds across the country with his Happiness Show, exercising…

1. FATHERLAND Robert Harris I couldn’t put this one down. An alternative history thriller featuring a Kriminalpolizei detective, Harris’ mystery starts in a 1960s Berlin still controlled by the Nazis, with Hitler about to celebrate his 75th birthday. A stunning debut. 2. CHILD 44 Tom Rob Smith I’ve long had a fascination with the communist bloc. Child 44 is based on a true story of gruesome child murders in the Soviet Union, though Smith time-shifts back into the Stalin period. Frightening, grim, full of paranoia – a page-turner. 3. THE HOLY THIEF William Ryan One of my favourite detectives is Ryan’s Captain Korolev, who has to work with and against the system in Soviet Russia. A beautifully atmospheric mystery, played out against the terrifying backdrop of Stalin’s purges. 4. THE…

Seth Rogen has been casting an eye back on his 2014 comedy The Interview, which almost started World War Three when the North Korean authorities took exception. The obvious gag is that many who saw the film took exception for different reasons but it’s still a decent comedy. Not worth dying for, though. “It was a horrible experience,” Rogen told Graham Norton about living through the film’s release. “It’s bad to be blamed for almost starting a war. It’s not fun. It’s super weird.” Rogen is on safer ground with upcoming animation Sausage Party, due this summer. It’s a busy time for Star Trek fans. Star Trek Beyond is in cinemas in July, and a new Star Trek TV show heads into production later this year,…

Epic action adventure In the Heart of the Sea, directed by Ron Howard and starring Chris Hemsworth, Benjamin Walker, Cillian Murphy and Ben Whishaw, is out on Digital HD, 3D™, Blu-ray™ and DVD. To celebrate this exciting Home Entertainment release, we are giving away a fantastic Blu-ray™ bundle – which includes In the Heart of the Sea, Argo, Inception, Interstellar and American Sniper – to five lucky winners! In the Heart of the Sea stars Hemsworth as veteran first mate Owen Chase; Walker as inexperienced captain George Pollard; Murphy as second mate Matthew Joy; Whishaw as novelist Herman Melville, whose enquiries into the event 30 years later helped bring the story to light. In the winter of 1820, the New England whaling ship Essex was assaulted by a whale of…

Hero to zero In Mark Hamill’s interview with The Kinks’ guitarist Dave Davies [April 18-24], I was disturbed by MH’s description of DD’s rebellious teenage intercourse with his then girlfriend as heroic. As DD points out, the ’60s were like Victorian times and consequently this single act confined his (unnamed) girlfriend, Sue Sheehan, to an unmarried mother’s home. All actions have their consequences and I just don’t see the heroism in this one. (PS: great mag, I’m a subscriber). Olivia McLeod, email Let me lay this bare The Rant by Katia Chornik [April 25–May 1] has me a bit puzzled. Is she just referring to junior schools for the very young girls? If so, then trousers are the most practical thing to wear, if that is what they prefer. But…

DAILY BREAD ‘NOT A CRIME’ A starving homeless man was cleared of stealing food after a court ruled he was in a “state of need”. In a landmark case that boomed across Europe, a judge in Italy’s highest court overturned Roman Ostriakov’s conviction for taking £3 of cheese and sausage from a supermarket in Genoa. On appeal the judge said it was not a crime as he took the food “in the face of the immediate and essential need for nourishment, acting in a state of need,” therefore the theft “does not constitute a crime”. Given Britain’s recent record on similar cases – a couple with just £8 a week to feed themselves and their infant were arrested for stealing food from a Tesco bin and three people were charged…

“The early days of The Big Issue were overrun with men who had been in the armed forces” I do not have a morbid interest in prison or prisoners, but I do find myself gravitating towards them. Prisons, with their troubled human content, are places where an emergency in society is sorted out, patched up or put on ice for a while. But mostly the problem remains. Hence the appalling reoffending rate among prisoners. Recidivism rates are up there in the 90 per cents with some prisons. And the recent stats on suicides and deaths within prison show us a state emergency response going off the rails. Last week I went to a prison that is probably the oldest in the British Isles, and certainly the most distinguished in terms…

“That gawky teenager still has an impact on me. We have regular conversations” I have a fairly acute memory of my childhood. And there was a big change around the age of 15. I had been learning the piano since I was eight. My mum was a single mum, a working mum, very resourceful, and she wanted my sister and I to learn the piano. But around age 15 I fell out with the piano teacher and around the same time I entered the school drama club. To me, it was an oasis of creativity and freedom. I wasn’t sporty, and I wasn’t keen on the very regimented approach of my teachers, mostly men from the World War Two period, with short-back-and-sides cuts. My hair was past my collar. When…

Ken Dodd is one of the few living Great Britons to have a statue erected in his honour, welcoming people to Liverpool’s Lime Street Station since 2009. But the UK is increasingly immortalising its comedy treasures in bronze. Each summer thousands of day-trippers play Wise to Eric Morecambe’s Give Me Sunshine skipping figure, unveiled by the Queen in 1999 on the Promenade in Morecambe Bay. Not to be outshone, Eric’s eternal sidekick Ernie was memorialised in Morley, West Yorkshire, in 2010. It was funded by his widow, Doreen, after a bid for a lottery grant failed. Another double act, Laurel and Hardy, greet tourists in Ulverston, their statue unveiled by none other than Ken Dodd in 2009. Stan Laurel was born in the Lake District but North Shields staked its…

Owing to a burgeoning trend in music that’s helping nobody conquer their social media addictions, take even just a little time offline these days and you might miss the snap digital release of a new album by your favourite artist. Radiohead, who in many ways started all this with 2007’s In Rainbows, have been teasing fans by mysteriously deleting all content from their website and social media channels then posting a series of cryptic stop-motion animations on Instagram as a primer for a scintillating new track called Burn the Witch and its accompanying trippy Trumpton-esque video (a full album will have dropped by the time you read this). Before all that, two of the biggest artists in the world, Beyoncé and Drake, surprise-released new albums via select streaming and download…

I started buying The Big Issue several months ago after reading the story about a Street Cat called Bob. I’m a real cat lover myself and I loved the way The Big Issue seller took the cat in and nursed him back to health. It was a very heart-warming story as they became inseparable. I decided to walk around my town of Truro and pick my vendor. I chose Nick who stands outside M&S. He’s there Monday to Saturday in all winds and weathers with his lovely dog Bryony. He never pesters anyone to buy but will have a chat with me when I stop to buy my Big Issue. I also wanted to say what a lovely read about Toni and Jack’s wedding. How refreshing it was to read…

JENNY ECLAIR COMEDIAN TAPESTRY I always thought hobbies were for when you haven’t got mates to play with in the park. But since turning 50, I derive huge pleasure from taking time out to paint, draw, and do iPad art. Tapestry is this year’s obsession. I have high blood pressure, so I’m trying to do something about it without too much medication or gym. Tapestry releases a serotonin that makes me feel quite content. One of the side effects is humming. I got a small tapestry kit of a squirrel eating a nut from my mother for Christmas. When I finished, I took it to a prison charity called Fine Cell Work, who rehabilitate people through needlecraft. They made it into a lovely cushion that I gave back to my…

“It’s straight-up elitism. And it makes ordinary people angry” Donald Trump, with his big hair, his billions and his badmouthing of Mexicans and Muslims, is undoubtedly a stain on American politics. But he has done one good thing. Seriously. Hear me out. His mad rise to become the Republicans’ presumptive presidential candidate has had the positive effect of exposing the gaping chasm that now exists between the political class and the people, between those who run society and those who work in it. Trump has shone a light on the crisis of politics in the West – accidentally, of course, since he’s only really interested in shining a light on himself. Yes, he has exploited ordinary people’s feeling of distance from, and disdain for, the political set; but he has…