The Hardest Hit

Betrayed

Relax. Impossible to do with The Coalition attack on benefits

I took these photos of Brian in his pomp in November 2004 when Kate interviewed him

All I had with me at the time was a Canon G5 but it did the job

Stop!

Read the mirror in the reception to find out what makes life worth living…

• Being with other people
• Swimming
• Listening to songs
• Dancing to music
• Bingo
• Walking the dog

Simple really. Except the service users will certainly lose some of these things we take for granted. More from Kate soon.

Another faceless service user

Heartbreaking

In order to ‘save’ money Shropshire County Council has earmarked this unique centre for closure with no alternative for the users except, in their own words, to condemn us to staring at the four walls of our own room. Heartbreaking. But how unexpected is that?

Meanwhile, the tory council can find £80,000 for the refurbishment of the Shire Hall in Shrewsbury. WTF?

More details can be found at Hangbitching, including just how difficult the council made it for us to talk to the people in the centre. As if the heavy snowfall didn’t make access hard enough…

This is part of an ongoing project that is taking us round the country looking at the effects the tory/libdem coalition public sector cuts have on service users.

Hanging you out to dry
Tories. Huntin’, shootin’ -> YOU

Get angry

Fair trade starts at home

Today @hangbitch posted Fair trade starts at home:

Last week, 35 deluded business leaders wrote to the Telegraph to praise George Osborne’s cruel spending review.

I’m joining those who have decide to boycott every single company that those business leaders represent.

Rather than paraphrase, read the article & comments and return…

What has this got to do with photography?

For me, two of these companies are relevant to my work. Microsoft UK & Expansys.

Modern photography needs infrastructure, particularly computers and operating systems.

I’ve written before about Microsoft. Personally I’ve tried to be Microsoft free since the late 1980s. I used Linux from when it was only available of 17 floppy disks if you didn’t have a SCSI CDROM (Slackware anyone? Still around. SCSI less so thankfully). OS/2 too, even though at that time, IBM (or ‘Big Blue’) was the de jour personification of evil. Well, we all know what happened to OS/2, but Linux continues to grow. The installation of Ubuntu is arguably easier and quicker that Windows 7.

Currently I’m a bit lazy & use Photoshop & Lightroom inside a virtual machine running Windows 7. From now on I’ll try a little harder to use native Linux tools such as The Gimp and Raw Therapee and dump the vestiges of Microsoft. The (long) list of reasons not to use Microsoft just got a +1 (like it needed any more!)

But Expansys… They sell phones and computers and I have spent money with them in the past. As recently as last month. Most notably phones, but laptops too. Previously I’ve recommended them to clients. I will no longer be doing so. It will be a drop in the ocean, but if more people do so the same at least that droplet will get bigger. That is what this is all about. I will tell my clients why I won’t recommend them too.

I will also email Expansys to tell them that they would have had mine and my clients’ money but for the contempt their CEO is showing for their customer base (me).

On the one hand, publicly supporting the coalition’s CSR via the letter in the Telegraph, while behind the scenes, they are among those 35 companies laying thousands of people off and/or telling grim tales about the realities of lie of the fiscal land.

I’m guessing that Harvey Nichols may be safe from my boycott (I have been known to stroke the clothes), but Boots? Boots is a good target for me. ASDA & M&S I refuse to use anyway.

Vodafone

And let us not forget Vodafone, not on the list, but sliding out of paying £6bn (yes 6 billion) of unpaid taxes by doing a deal with HMRC. Likewise in India too, trying to wriggle out of a $2.5bn tax bill. One thing is for sure, I’ll never use Vodafone. What a bunch of fuckers. How far would that £6bn go? (Clue, the answer is that the CSR identifies ITRO of £7bn saving to be found from the public sector). How dare they?

Take direct action against Vodfone

Double Irish & Dutch Sandwich

While on the subject of tax ‘avoidance’, ok, let us not beat about the bush, tax evasion,  take a look at how Google & others (Microsoft, Facebook, Apple etc) wriggle out of it by moving profits through Ireland and the Netherlands (Bloomberg). $60 billion lost in the US. Eye-watering sums indeed. A simpler version is at The Register.

But lets us all remember: We. Are. In. This. Together. Repeat.

What utter bollocks

Do Your Bit

Join in the boycott. Visit http://boycott35.com. Re-tweet this article, re-tweet @hangbitch‘s article, follow @boycott35 on twitter, blog about it etc etc. Don’t buy from these companies. Get angry.

The brands:

• Next
• ASDA
• Microsoft UK
• Mothercare
• Carphone Warehouse Group
• TalkTalk Telecom Group
• Alliance Boots
• Marks & Spencer
• Ocado
• Dunelm Group
• L.K. Bennett
• Kingfisher
• SSL International
• moneysupermarket.com
• Britvic
• Towergate
• Dhillon Group
• Arup
• ARM Holdings
• GlaxoSmithKline
• Reed Elsevier
• Tullow Oil
• UMECO
• Prestbury Group
• BT Group
• MITIE Group
• Lovefilms.com
• The Betting Group
• Hammerson
• AVEVA
• ASOS
• Inmarsat
• Fuller
• Smith and Turner
• Veetee
• Sage
• Diageo
• Robert Walters
• Harvey Nichols
• Expansys
• Stonehaven Associates
• Yell Group

The names:

• Will Adderley, CEO, Dunelm Group
• Robert Bensoussan, Chairman, L.K. Bennett
• Andy Bond, Chairman, ASDA
• Ian Cheshire, Chief Executive, Kingfisher
• Gerald Corbett, Chairman, SSL International, moneysupermarket.com, Britvic
• Peter Cullum, Executive Chairman, Towergate
• Tej Dhillon, Chairman and CEO, Dhillon Group
• Philip Dilley, Chairman, Arup
• Charles Dunstone, Chairman, Carphone Warehouse Group, Chairman, TalkTalk Telecom Group
• Warren East, CEO, ARM Holdings
• Gordon Frazer, Managing Director, Microsoft UK
• Sir Christopher Gent, Non-Executive Chairman, GlaxoSmithKline
• Ben Gordon, Chief Executive, Mothercare
• Anthony Habgood, Chairman, Whitbread, Chairman, Reed Elsevier
• Aidan Heavey, Chief Executive, Tullow Oil
• Neil Johnson, Chairman, UMECO
• Nick Leslau, Chairman, Prestbury Group
• Ian Livingston, CEO, BT Group
• Ruby McGregor-Smith, CEO, MITIE Group
• Rick Medlock, CFO, Inmarsat; Non-Executive Director lovefilms.com, The Betting Group
• John Nelson, Chairman, Hammerson
• Stefano Pessina, Executive Chairman, Alliance Boots
• Nick Prest, Chairman, AVEVA
• Nick Robertson, CEO, ASOS
• Sir Stuart Rose, Chairman, Marks & Spencer
• Tim Steiner, CEO, Ocado
• Andrew Sukawaty, Chairman and CEO, Inmarsat
• Michael Turner, Executive Chairman, Fuller, Smith and Turner
• Moni Varma, Chairman, Veetee
• Paul Walker, Chief Executive, Sage
• Paul Walsh, Chief Executive, Diageo
• Robert Walters, CEO, Robert Walters
• Joseph Wan, Chief Executive, Harvey Nichols
• Bob Wigley, Chairman, Expansys, Stonehaven Associates, Yell Group
• Simon Wolfson, Chief Executive, Next

Email addresses for the above welcomed

St Edmunds Catholic Church

A slightly dark vision, snapped from Nell Keenan’s “rose garden”. The rose garden is/was a squalid mess of empty cans, litter, shit, and the usual paraphernalia (I think the church may be demolished now). Poor Nell Keenan, she has a plaque but what a memorial.

Architecture… now where do we start?

What is it about modern eclesiastical architecture that is so shit? In the past, churches and cathedrals were built to shock and awe.

I love Coventry Cathedral and The Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption in San Fransisco, two modern examples that buck the trend. Sir Basil Spence commissioned artists such as Elizabeth Frink, John Piper and Graham Sutherland for Coventry Cathedral and it shows. In San Fransisco, from the right direction, on a good day, St Mary’s Cathedral looks like a giant breast. Which is no bad thing for a cathedral dedicated to The Blessed Virgin Mary. I’m sure there are others that I am not familiar with, but for me, the overall impression of recent church architecture (in the UK at least) is an homage to a cheap, tacky, soulless 1960s ‘dare to be different’ ethos.

Double murder scene

Nobody seemed to know very much about this. It had happened a few days earlier. There were some flowers by the door so somebody must have cared.

And while we are on the subject, the estate on which this happened was designed/architected along the lines of a Cornish fishing village, Polperro or something similar. Huh? Don’t you want to just curl up and die? I’m sure Prince Charles would approve but is it really the way to create *instant* community for a Liverpool overspill new town? It has been done cheaply and it shows. Polperro it is not. Have the people that commission these things never heard of William Morris or Le Corbusier? Rhetorical question I know, it all comes down to how cheaply they can do it. The ribbon looks good when it is cut and the place is shiny new. Fuck the people who actually live there and have to endure its shoddy physical and social demise.

They get left with the ribbon in the picture above. Cut that Mr Mayor.

I was a one time inhabitant of a relatively successful new town:

“a town designed for healthy living and industry of a size that makes possible a full measure of social life but not larger, surrounded by a rural belt; the whole of the land being in public ownership, or held in trust for the community“

The italics are mine. Margaret Thatcher fucked up that particular vision with “Right to buy” turning the whole thing into very desirable real estate with typical nightmare Little England Tory values. I had no love for the place but had some pride in the principles on which it was built.

Somehow, I don’t think it will happen in Skelmersdale.

And here we go again with our current unelected ‘coalition’ government delivering a right-wing ideological onslaught that looks set to eclipse that of the Thatcher government of 1979, only this time with the complete destruction of public services. To pay back the banks? To save the economy? Fuck ‘em.

Thatcher was elected, a major difference from David Cameron and his lightweights. Weirdly though, Cameron, like Thatcher, is once again helped along by lap-dog Lib-Dems (then known as the SDP) when (back then in 1981) they split the Labour vote and thus helped the Tories keep power in the 1980s and 1990s in a strangely parallel universe.

Nick Clegg, St Vince Cable et al, may you rot in hell. Nothing personal, I felt the same about Roy Jenkins, David Owen, William Rodgers and Shirley Williams in 1981. At least most of those had some gravitas, even statespersonship. Unlike your craven, power-seeking, sell-out selves. Do I make myself clear?

I feel like I’m very much stuck in a loop at both ends of my life.

Unbelievable.

Cat

The moggie ignored everything… Well done moggie, you have the right idea

Some heavy post-processing for dramatic effect, aka laying it on with a trowel.

Greenwich buildings sink under scaffolding (multiple exposure)

A couple of years ago (or more) we were sitting on a bench in Cutty Sark Gardens looking at the broad sweep of the river. An Australian approached us and said “Where can I find the Cutty Sark mate?”

We pointed ironically to the scaffolding and the still smouldering ruins of the boat.

He’d come half way around the world from a remote station in the Australian outback to see the Cutty Sark. More fool him some might say, for not checking his itinerary first.

Two or more years later there is still a pile of scaffolding where the Cutty Sark should be and it is no longer possible to sit on a bench and view the broad sweep of the river. The former because the renovation seems to be taking for ever and rumours abound as to why. There are big sums of money and rapacious consultants involved. The latter because the entire river front is behind hoardings.

And looking round, much of Greenwich town centre is also covered up. It seems to have happened overnight or maybe I just blinked.

I decided to take a walk around town centre and photograph the damage.

St Alfege?

Looking for Hawksmoor? Forget it

Walking out of St Alfege Passage, the first thing you see is more scaffolding above the market

Even the heritage phone boxes are in a poor state, missing doors and glass.

Soooo, lets find the Tourist Office to ask what there is to actually see in Greenwich since we’ve come all this way. Errrr….

Discover Greenwich?

Doesn’t work for me either. Walking down a bit further, it is good to see what we are missing.  Tacky pictures beneath barbed wire and surveillance cameras.

Before, during or after?

Cutty Sark Gardens is full of signs helpfully pointing in all directions

Directions to nothing much

The ‘gardens’ themselves are bleak beyond belief and have been for a long long time. This is not a world-class attraction by any stretch of the imagination. It is also the first sight of Greenwich for anyone disembarking from the ferry.

The long march south

Looking in the opposite direction, this is the ‘view’ across the river. Some poor saps have had to carry their buggy up the steps from the foot tunnel. The lift isn’t working.

We mean foot tunnel

The Old Royal Naval College doesn’t get any better if you want to slip down past the pier

Not the entrance

The views of the river and Canary Wharf just get better…

Canary Wharf

Nice bollard, looks like a ….

The entrance

Once we get to The ORNC things start to get slightly surreal

Uber scaffolding

There are some guys blocking access even as I took photographs

Then came the Pièce de résistance…

I went into the courtyard of Trinity College of Music to take some photos of the scaffolding hidden away even in there. I sat on the bench and loaded a film and a security guy came out but just to play with The Dog rather than order us off the premises. I started taking photos while Kate chatted about dogs with him and then another security guy came out and told me that I couldn’t take photos… He ignored the dog. And his colleague.

“Its the rules” he said, “I don’t make them, its the college’s rules”.

“Security” he replied when asked. I forewent the “I’m a photographer, not a terrorist” meme.

Could I see the rules? “No”.

I’d have to go to the East Gate or the West Gate to get permission to photograph and it was, in his view, doubtful that I would get it.

Naturally, I chose the wrong gate but we got a little closer to the truth. The supervisor at the East Gate reckoned I’d have to go to the West gate for permission. He didn’t have a clue why I shouldn’t be allowed to photograph in the courtyard, but another guy at the gate thought it had “something to do with copyright, innit”. This is far more likely since the place makes loads of money from the film industry using the location for historical shoots. I’m not quite sure how yours truly impacts on Hollywood, but rules are rules.

I couldn’t be arsed to schlep all the way back to the West Gate. I have a sneaking suspicion I would have been referred back to the East gate anyways.

Trinity College of Music – a small suggestion. Brief your security staff properly so they are confident about what they are enforcing. They will be less defensive and less shit scared of ending up on a YouTube video looking and sounding like total dickheads given the current paranoia about filming in public places. At the very least, place a sign somewhere visible saying ‘No Photography’.

What was the big secret? just shitloads of scaffolding.

Rules are rules

So, shoot me…

I’ve had to make this post part 1 of a series. In just two and a half hours I have enough photos to fill several posts. Particularly when you walk down the Thames path a little way. I don’t suppose the average tourist would get that far:

Thames path hi-jacked by developers

Literally, up the garden path. How have they got away with this? The Thames path is now so convoluted with ‘short-term’ closures for ‘improvements’ that you might get more enjoyment walking down the main road approach to the Blackwall Tunnel.

So… for three times the price of a coffee in Deptford, where I can overlook an insanely interesting and vibrant High Street and market, I could do the same in a World Heritage site just down the road. I could take in that olde-worlde town centre full of scaffolding, cladding, tat-shops, fast-food tex-mex outlets, more scaffolding and even more wardens than The Dog could shake a stick at. If only I could see it.

Under wraps

Now why do I think of Christo and Jeanne-Claude…?

Think I’ll stick to Deptford till 2012 has gone. As somebody who lives nearby I can see a dark humour in all of this. As a visitor attraction, Greenwich is currently a massive fail. I hope nobody from UNESCO drops by for vacation. I also hope local people are being employed for all this new work.

Back in the day (early 1980′s) I spent (quite a lot of) time protesting outside Lambeth Town Hall supporting a Labour council who fought Thatcher’s cuts tooth and nail.

Here we are, nearly thirty years later, outside another Town Hall, outraged that a Labour council is rolling over on its back to implement the Tory cuts as painlessly as possible for the coalition government. Fuckers. This isn’t why Lewisham council got the Labour vote in the recent elections.

Megaphone photos are obligatory…

I turned up with the vintage Nikon F4, which seemed appropriate somehow for such a back-to-the-future protest. And it wasn’t working as it should. The winding mechanism in the old warhorse is obviously feeling its age and slipping. Like me really.

Bemused of Lewisham

Not happy people

For such short notice there was a decent turnout with several unions represented. The NUT organised the rally, and I saw GMB, Unison, Unite, PCS and others represented (and NUJ if I include myself as a [non-]partial observer), plus the Green Party, SWP (quelle surprise) and Labour Party. Goldmiths too.

I knew the winder on the F4 was fucked when I looked at the counter and somehow had only shot 15 frames. I knew I had pressed the shutter release more times than that! However, the results could have been worse. Sometimes double/triple/quadruple/quintuple exposures are lucky accidents:

This my personal take on the protest. It is hard to be objective in your own back yard.

More coverage of the protest, interviews with local people affected by the cuts and videos by Hangbitch

(Usual disclaimer not applicable)

Cutting edge CCTV in Deptford hehe