Innholdsfortegnelse for 20-02-2017 i The Big Issue

WE BELIEVE in a hand up, not a handout... Which is why our sellers BUY every copy of the magazine for £1.25 and sell it for £2.50. WE BELIEVE in trade, not aid… Which is why we ask you to ALWAYS take your copy of the magazine. Our sellers are working and need your custom. WE BELIEVE poverty is indiscriminate… Which is why we provide ANYONE whose life is blighted by poverty with the opportunity to earn a LEGITIMATE income. WE BELIEVE in the right to citizenship… Which is why The Big Issue Foundation, our charitable arm, helps sellers tackle social and financial exclusion. WE BELIEVE in prevention… Which is why Big Issue Invest offers backing and investments to social enterprises, charities and businesses which deliver social value to communities.…

Maybe Churchill had itright. The old Bulldog liked to look to space. It emerged last week that amongst the things that kept him busy (cigars, whisky, winning the war) were thoughts of where we might find extraterrestrial life. He believed it was out there. His quote is worth repeating. “I, for one, am not so immensely impressed by the success we are making of our civilisation here that I am prepared to think we are the only spot in this immense universe,” he wrote in 1939, “which contains living,thinking creatures. Or that we are the highest type of mental and physical development which has ever appeared in the vast compass of space and time.” He shows a level of humanity, humility and intelligence that some of our leaders – who…

ATISHOO BY RENE ROBBINS Rene, who lives in London, is the daughter of an architect. Following the death of her husband and son she experienced a period of homelessness but doesn’t like to dwell on misfortune. At a low point, one of her friends invited her to go to an art project and she has been attending ever since. She works slowly and patiently due to a degenerative eye condition. Her work has been published and sold at exhibition. COSMOS BY MANGO Mango is a London-based graffiti artist who has been creating art for about 20 years. He describes his skills as including “crazy fades, wild styles and cool characters”. He is also known for his gothic art, and work as an MC and compère. BUY STREET ART! You can…

“I always felt like an imposter in the comedy world” I went through a metamorphosis when I was 16. I was terribly shy as a kid. Lacking in self-confidence. I never excelled at anything at school, sport or academic. Then one night I went along to the town hall to wait for my best friend while he was doing a rehearsal for this musical, Carousel. I stood at the back watching people with regular nine-to-five jobs throw themselves into this thing with great passion. Then someone asked if I was interested in joining and I heard myself saying yes. A few weeks later I was asked to stand up, hold hands with this very attractive girl and walk from up stage left to down stage right. Everyone else was…

Libraries have played a significant part at many points in my life but one of the most significant occurred when I was in sixth form. My family lived in a village eight miles from the nearest town with a school I could attend, and that meant commuting by bus. Taking the scheduled school run bus home was a stressful experience – the bus was almost invariably late, almost invariably overcrowded, and, worst of all, there were several bullies who took the bus and were determined to make everyone’s life unpleasant. But my school bus pass enabled me to take a different bus, two hours later. How did I spend those two hours? In the town library, doing my homework. The library, therefore, removed a significant source of stress from my…

Last week Peppa Pig became a symbol of all that is wrong with prisons in the UK. The custodial crisis has made for lurid headlines over the past 12 months, and the December rioting of hundreds of prisoners at HMP Birmingham was described as the worst British prison riot since Strangeways in 1986. Then, last week came the Panorama investigation into HMP Northumberland. What we saw on our screens looked like a complete breakdown of order – resulting in dangerously chaotic and even terrifying conditions for prisoners and staff alike. Panorama suggested that one reason for this apparent breakdown was privatisation. In HMP Northumberland the transfer of ownership to French company Sodexo has translated into staffing cuts of nearly 50 per cent, meaning lack of support for prison officers, seemingly…

Naomie Harris is used to being in big films. She plays Eve Moneypenny in Daniel Craig-era Bond, and sea goddess Calypso in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. But it is a role in writer-director Barry Jenkins’ independent film Moonlight, which she shot during a whistlestop, three-day trip to Miami squeezed between press junkets on a global promotion tour for Spectre, that is winning the 40-year-old north Londoner enormous critical acclaim. Nominated for both a Golden Globe and Bafta, the smart money suggests a two-way battle with Viola Davis for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar this weekend. “Hands down this was the best three days’ work I have ever done,” grins Harris. A combination of visa problems and the demands of global publicity for Spectre almost prevented her taking the…

1. RUBY RED Kerstin Gier Ruby Red and the two follow-up books, Sapphire Blue and Emerald Green, are fantastic YA novels! In fact, after finishing Ruby Red during a winter cold snap of -27˚C (not kidding), I cranked up my frozen car for a trip across town to get book two and three. 2. TIMEBOUND Rysa Walker This is the first book in her award-winning series of time-travel novels. A strange blue medallion bestowed by her eccentric grandmother sends our young heroine on a time-travel venture across time. 3. HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN JK Rowling My favourite of all the Potter books, especially because of the fact Hermione uses a time turner amulet to skip back in time to save a hippogriff, among other good deeds. 4.…

I don’t want to scandalise any divas out there but sometimes I just feel like there’s a bit too much singing in opera. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good aria as much as the next punter but all that vocal action can get a tad tiresome. A nice chunk of instrumental music can offset the warbling very nicely, thank you very much. Facetious assertions aside, some of the very best bits of opera come directly from the pit, when the orchestra is given a chance to shine in the metaphorical limelight. Composers have known this from the start, of course, which is why many operatic works are punctuated by instrumental interludes. A new CD on the Decca label from conductor Riccardo Chailly and the Filarmonica della Scala, the…

Drug awareness Colin McCubbin wrote a fantastic article in The Big Issue [January 23-29] called ‘The Greeting Veins’. It was graphic but described so well the awful effects that hard drugs have on the body and the life of the drug user. I think this article should be included in every drug awareness programme for senior school pupils. It would certainly make them stop and think about the consequences of ever starting to take drugs. Eileen M McLean, Perth Housing policy I have been supporting homeless charities for 30 years and read your article [Analysis, Jan 30–Feb 5] in The Big Issue with great interest. However, I would suggest the main reason for the lack of homes in London is due to the population increase of over 1,000,000 people in…

“Has there been a collective lifting of inhibitions from closet racists who might now feel emboldened?” “How did you get into first class? You don’t deserve to be in first class. You should be in common class. In fact, youshouldn’t be in this country at all. You don’t deserve to be here. Bloody foreigners. Where were you even born?” The words Alexander MacKinnon, a 47-year-old public school-educated solicitor, hurled at the Scottish lawyer Sanaa Shahid, who happens to be of Asian descent, and her four-year-old son, Zayn, on a train. Shahid calmly challenged his behaviour, called a member of train staff to witness what was going on and filmed the ongoing verbal abuse on her mobile phone. Thanks to her, MacKinnon was arrested and fined this month, after admitting racially…

“Libraries change lives and bring communities together. We’re delighted to be working with The Big Issue to showcase this” If you stop and think about it, libraries really are amazing. You can walk into any library across the country and read, learn and discover something new – for free. Everyone is welcome and friendly staff are there to help or leave you alone if you want to get stuck into a good book. Classes take place, friends talk and clubs meet. Every year they lend 220 million books and provide over 30 million hours of internet access. Libraries change lives and bring communities together. They introduce children to books and stories, they help people with their studies, they improve health and well-being and combat loneliness and isolation. We want more…

The drugs, violence and disorder recently revealed inside some of Britain’s jails raises some key questions about prison reform: how might inmates spend their time more productively? What are the best ways to begin inmates’ rehabilitation? Some of Britain’s social enterprises believe they have the answers, having developed innovative employment ideas to break the reoffending cycle. The Freedom Bakery was allowed to set up an artisan bakery inside HMP Low Moss near Glasgow, training prisoners to make bread and cake before assisting them in finding catering work upon their release. Similarly, the London-based Clink Charity runs a training programme inside several prison kitchens, then mentors people towards work across a range of roles in the hospitality industry after they get out. Big Issue Invest – the social investment arm of…

George Best was one of the first sportsmen to make as many headlines on the front pages as the back. His unmatched skill on the pitch and turbulent life off it have been much written about but never as well documented as in Daniel Gordon’s new film Best. Capturing the triumph and tragedy, more than a decade since his death, the lasting impression is of his incredible talent. As George Best himself reflected: “As long as they remember the football… because that’s what it was all about.” Best is in cinemas from February 24…

After scooping the Best British Film award at the Baftas for the remarkable I, Daniel Blake, director Ken Loach launched into a speech almost as powerful as the movie itself, taking the UK Government to task on poverty and hunger, and the “brutality” of its clampdown on child refugees. The speech earned Loach almost as many plaudits as the film itself. The story of Daniel Blake (played by Dave Johns), a 59-year-old joiner trying to navigate the nightmare twists of the British benefits system after his income is suddenly halted and he must repeatedly jump through hoops, has reaffirmed Loach as one of Britain’s most potent and listened-to film-makers. Available now on digital download and released on DVD and Blu-ray on February 27, we have three copies to be won…

Our council wants to close the city library to make offices for itself where, I suppose, they will employ people to close libraries. The new ‘library’ looks to be a titchy space with what looks like Mormons entering Heaven (you know those architects’ ‘artists’ impressions!’). They’ve already crowded a police desk in there and closed our ‘nick’ to make university offices. You can get your bus pass nearby. Or not, if the camera doesn’t work, like when yours truly called in there. Technology, don’t you love it? I find the best alternative is the Oxfam bookshop where you can get bookshelves of used, decent books for low prices but then, of course, libraries have already been paid for and the books are free; to borrow, not keep though. These ‘ghost…

An ex-homeless man, who lived in his car for a year, is launching a new jobs service to help others climb out of poverty like he did. Chris Adamson said he was inspired to start an “honest” recruitment business after struggling to prove his own talents while sleeping rough. For 12 months he slept in his car in a car park in Stroud, Gloucestershire, where he showered at the local swimming baths and lived on 19p loaves of bread. “I lived in a car because I could not afford to have a house,” he explained. “I went to many recruitment agencies to find work and again and again they promised to help but they never followed through. I never want to see someone have to go through that because they…

We’re off and running. The Big Issue campaign to keep libraries open and to work for better literacy levels in Britain has engaged and galvanized. We’re delighted and heartened by the messages of support – and intent – from readers. We will continue to lead the fight. We have also been joined by some well-known figures and key partners. Here are their messages. Next week, we’ll explain the next steps. “We need libraries and independent bookstores, these little bootcamps of interaction where people can go” What we need to invest in now is intelligence. If we’re going to get any sort of traction as individuals or as a society, we have to do that. That’s the great equaliser. People in poorer backgrounds should be investing in knowledge. Not in college…

Where I work in Gloucestershire my patients can go to their local library and borrow self-help books about anxiety, depression, agoraphobia, eating disorders and a host of other mental health issues. They even have a special range to cater for young people. This is a really good way of empowering people and preventing ill health. Losing libraries means people cannot access this so easily. In these times of poor provision for mental health, this is a disaster. Helen Bromwich (GP) My children love going to the library. I have two under 10. If we didn’t have the library, they probably wouldn’t be so keen to read. They both read really well, meeting and exceeding reading levels. And when literacy in boys is continuing to fall, closing libraries en masse makes…

The Crowdwish app recently celebrated its third birthday. You’ve probably never heard of it but that’s okay. It’s an anonymous network where people post the three things they most want in the world; whatever those things may be. If that was all Crowdwish offered it would be maybe kind of fine but a bit facile – kind of like an online ‘dreamcatcher’, and no one needs one of those. The point of difference is this – at 6pm every day, the most up-voted wish is chosen and an action is taken against it in the real world. These actions can be anything, depending on the nature of the wish made; they might involve the creation of a product, an experience, a public gesture or a simple act of kindness. One…

“Bits of Fanny Adams must have found their way into the Navy’s victualling yard” A few years ago it suddenly hit me that, as an historian of the 19th century, I hadn’t been doing a very good job. Or rather, I had done only half a job. Because while I had been diligent in finding out everything there was to know about the intellectual, professional and emotional lives of various eminent Victorians, I didn’t have a clue about what it felt like to live in their bodies. Was George Eliot secretly pleased that she managed to stay slender right through her 50s? What steps did Prime Minister William Gladstone take to disguise the fact that the forefinger of his left hand was missing? And how did the poet Elizabeth Barrett…