Innholdsfortegnelse for 2/8/2021 i The Big Issue

The vaccine roll-out continues at pace, as the UK flew past the 10 million barrier last week. While the achievement has been rightly heralded, The Big Issue has been calling for people experiencing homelessness to be included in the vaccination push. Currently, advice on who should get the Covid vaccine first is largely determined by age, beginning with over-80s, those in care homes and frontline workers before moving down the age groups. In recent weeks, The Big Issue has revealed how some local authorities have taken the initiative to vaccinate people experiencing homeless, recognising how the group is more likely to have underlying health conditions that can make the virus lethal. Oldham Council led the way on January 13, vaccinating 23 people, while Redbridge Council also vowed to offer vaccines…

A Big Issue vendor has criticised the strong-arm tactics of a central London council after his rough sleeping spot was ‘hosed down’ in a bid to move him on during lockdown. Martin Burns, 62, was among seven people sleeping rough on Southampton Street near Covent Garden when he claims he was woken up by Westminster City Council staff and told to move from the area early in the morning of January 28. The vendor then left to shop at the Marks and Spencer store in High Holborn where he has sold the magazine for six years. When he returned to the spot where he had bedded down for more than two years, he told The Big Issue he found bedding and tents belonging to the group removed and the pavement…

VENDORS Across the country vendors are prevented from working on their pitches by the national lockdown. Our staff is working closely with each vendor to make sure there is extra support to make up for lost earnings. We also understand that apart from reduced income, the lack of social interaction will cause a lot of distress. If you would like to pass a message on to your local vendor please email editorial@bigissue.com and we’ll do our best to make sure they know they still have your support. SUBSCRIPTIONS AND SHOPS Since the first national lockdown in March, we have supported our vendors with more than £700,000 of financial assistance to make up for lost sales. As the only certainty is more uncertainty, we urgently need your help to make sure…

David Lammy has joined The Big Issue as a Brand Ambassador. In his new role, the Shadow Justice Secretary and Labour MP for Tottenham has pledged to campaign against evictions and in favour of an ambitious reskilling programme to help us ride out the recession and avoid the Covid crisis being followed by a homelessness epidemic. Instead, he says, we need to be bold, build back better, and use the power of the state to put a net around people to stop them falling into poverty and homelessness. The Big Issue: Why do you want to be a Big Issue Ambassador? David Lammy: I have been the member of Parliament for Tottenham for 20 years. Sadly, in Tottenham and in Haringey we have among the highest homelessness levels in London…

Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg inspired millions of young people to swap their classrooms for the streets to fight for their futures – and the world stopped to listen. When the global pandemic made these protests impossible, they didn’t give up. They simply took their fight online, sharing ideas for limiting global warming and holding a ‘Mock COP26’ climate conference in place of the real, postponed, one. After all, it is the children and young people of today who will inherit the worsening effects of climate change, and bear the costs of it. But while protesting and the internet have enabled them to get their voices heard, there is now a way that young people – and anyone on their behalf – can take direct action to create positive change for…

Pink “I only started painting and drawing last year at Christmas,” writes Thomas. “I moved into the hostel I’m in now only a few months ago, after having battled with addiction and mental health problems for years. “I am six months clean, feeling and thinking positively, surrounded by amazing people that have helped me to get to where I am now. My artwork, I hope, will show you that it doesn’t matter how hard life gets, you will always make it through knowing that there is hope. I used darker colours for my first picture to show that I was going through a dark time, and lighter colours on the others to show that I had started my road to recovery and got help with my mental health, making life…

01 The Cazalet Chronicles by Elizabeth Jane Howard This seems the obvious first choice. Five novels, following the lives and loves of an upper middle-class English family, the Cazalets is both panoramic and exquisitely detailed. The books begin in 1937 and finish in 1956 and have countless devoted fans. 02 Our Little Cruelties by Liz Nugent Sibling rivalry? Dysfunctional relationships? A mysterious death? Step this way! This dark, grim, thrillingly honest book about three brothers and their manipulative mother is unputdownable. It might also make you feel that your own family isn’t that bad, actually. 03 Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons Such a funny book! Written in 1932, townie Flora Poste goes to live in Sussex with the Starkadders, her extensive family of country bumpkin cousins. A merciless and…

There’s no doubting music’s capacity to a›fect how we feel – so much so that Spotify is developing technology based on voice-recognition soǼtware designed to curate playlists to our emotions. But in the depths of a global health crisis, it seems suitable to wonder – can music and music making actually make us feel quantifiably, scientifically better? Can music literally heal? I don’t seek to platform quackery, nor am I about to suggest that music is a miraculous cure for Covid-19 or any other serious illness. But there are mainstream medical professionals who advocate for music in time becoming a tiny but established part of the healthcare system, potentially helping to ease pressure on certain areas of the NHS. In a less scientific but similarly well-intentioned spirit meanwhile, there exists…

A hand up... Our sellers BUY the magazine for £1.50 and sell it on for £3, keeping the difference. Not a handout… Vendors earn a legitimate income, and gain valuable social and employability skills. With your support now, we can continue to help them now and in the future. The right to citizenship… The Big Issue Foundation, our charitable arm, helps sellers to tackle social and financial exclusion. Prevention… Big Issue Invest offers backing and investments to social enterprises, charities and businesses which deliver social value to communities.…

More people than ever before are keeping up with the latest news at bigissue.com. Are you? Here are the latest highlights: • Facing redundancy? We have the advice you need • Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl: ‘For a while I wasn’t sure if I ever wanted to play music again’ • The forgotten generation – young people speak about the effects of Covid • ‘Left to sink’ – the scandal of disabled people going without food during the pandemic Learn more about our 100 Days Campaign and the impact of the pandemic on vendors…

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Covid-19 pandemic has hit apprenticeships much in the same fashion as it has hit the jobs market as a whole. The 91,000 apprenticeship starts made in England between August and October last year was 27 per cent down on the same period the previous year, according to o›ficial data. But not all ages and levels were a›fected equally. Despite the drop overall, higher apprenticeships – which can be equivalent to undergraduate or Master’s degrees – actually increased from 29,800 starts to 30,100. The highest level now accounts for a third of all apprenticeships. The biggest drop, however, was seen in intermediate levels (equivalent to GCSEs) and advanced (qualifications comparable to A-levels), accounting for 23,300 and 37,600 starts respectively. Even if the Covid-19 pandemic has brought you crashing…

The MACS Fund is available from the end of February. You can invest in it yourself at The Big Exchange, from just £25 a month, or through your independent financial advisor on Standard Life’s Wrap and Elevate platforms. You can invest only in the fund, or open (or transfer) an account to hold it in. Up to £9,000 a year can be paid tax-free into a Junior Individual Savings Account (JISA) on behalf of anyone aged under 18, or up to £20,000 into an Adult ISA. Nigel Kershaw says: “Young people can ask for their pocket money or allowance to be invested in the fund. It’s this ‘pester power’ that can bring about real change from the bottom up. But the fund is for anyone, whatever stage they are at,…

Novels thin on plot always rely on their language for survival; barely any writers can get away with staying still for a whole book. If it works, then any more development would feel overwhelming: think of Beckett’s world, where nothing seems to happen, but in its stillness rests the power, inviting us to hang on to every movement. Conor O’Callaghan’s new novel We Are Not in the World is not quite so static, yet carries the same effortlessness and trenchant depth of feeling, despite its seemingly unremarkable premise. Paddy, driving a lorry through Europe for a suspicious new employer, reminisces about his past love life and its consequences, while his daughter hides in the back of his truck. Their conversation, which is where the real action lies, flows seamlessly, mixing…

NEED HELP? Why not get together with other Big Issue readers on Twitter – @BigIssue Get the answers in next week's mag! Good luck 1. Which revered UK band take their name from a Talking Heads album track? 2. Blake Carrington, Dex Dexter and Alexis Colby were characters in which long-running US TV show? 3. What is the capital of Liechtenstein? 4. What is the name of Detroit’s American Football team? 5. Which famous Briton was born in Sandringham, Norfolk on July 1, 1961? 6. Who is the only female to win an Oscar for Best Director, and for which film? 7. Guppy, Blue Tang and Nile tilapia are types of what? 8. Who wrote the 1977 novel The Thorn Birds? 9. What was the name of Elvis Presley’s manager?…

23 people experiencing homelessness became the first to receive the jab in Oldham on January 13 That was 36 days after Margaret Keenan became the first person in the UK to receive a vaccine 477 people were vaccinated in Liverpool over one weekend in January, including 363 people experiencing homelessness, 84 hostel staff and a further 30 to avoid vaccine waste Despite local efforts to vaccinate, a rise in Covid-19 cases has been reported in London, with 127 in January alone across 18 outbreaks. Between April and December there were 85 cases.…

My most prescient year was 2018. I started it with my new year’s resolution that I o›fered to all. My local doctor had said if I wanted to help him, could I help him cut the amount of people in his waiting room in half. I said I would do my best. So I wrote in The Big Issue in the first edition of the year about a ‘self-health pledge’. A pledge to keep yourself as healthy as possible. So that the healthy should stay healthy and therefore give the NHS the well-deserved rest it needs. And allow my GP to see fewer people. I advocated exercise and cutting out excessive food and drink. I had seen too many people turn themselves unhealthy. That was at the beginning of this…

For years I have identified myself publicly and internally as someone who cares deeply and is immersed in the realities of class inequality. It’s been an area of study, an area of constant experience – any of my work that is publicly noted deals with these issues. But I’m at an interesting point in my life, where I’m still very in touch with my working-class roots but realise I’m on a journey to becoming ‘successful’, and feeling what it’s like to not have financial insecurity and to give my kids whatever they want, not just what they need. We hear about poverty and we hear about success, but we don't have a lot of stories from the perspective of someone going through the transition. You either have to contend with…

A conservative president hellbent on staying in power. A contested election result leading to a month-long stand-o›f. A violent protest in which several people died. No, not Washington DC in recent months – but Honduras in 2017. The president in question, Juan Orlando Hernández, succeeded where his ally to the North, Donald Trump, recently failed. He clung on to power in the face of overwhelming evidence he lost. The Trump Administration congratulated Mr Hernández even as his rival was asking where his lead vanished to when the count was inexplicably stopped for 36 hours. The entire sorry episode had huge consequences for Hondurans. President Hernández was later named by US prosecutors as the co-conspirator in his brother’s drug-trafficking trial in New York. He denies the charge – that he was…

WILL HERBERT, 61 USUAL PITCH: Outside Budgens, Upper Street, London Round the corner from where I usually work there’s a fruit and veg shop called Nourished Communities that does organic produce. I walked in and asked the owner Rollo if they needed anyone to hand out flyers. So for three hours a couple of times a week and I hand out leaflets for an online market stall they set up. It’s to help farmers and producers who aren’t able to trade in farmers’ markets. I’m not actually talking to anyone but I put on my PPE anyway and I get a few extra pennies in my pocket. My Big Issue regulars come by, say good morning and ask me how I’m doing through the pandemic. I just tell them the…