The first Sunday ramble of September

I write about whatever is on my mind on a Sunday morning. In the news this week is the Paralympics, which according to David Cameron will change perceptions about disabled people and show what they can do. If that doesn’t get them back to work there is always the assessments by Atos Healthcare to give them a little incentive.

The contract that French company Atos Healthcare has is worth a billion pounds, well it’s better than wasting it on new cars for ‘disabled’ people to drive around in. Innit? I saw an outpouring of disgust at the department of works and pensions stopping benefits for a veteran of the Afghan conflict this morning, apparently after an assessment by Atos. Many of the people signing the petition seemed very concerned about ‘scroungers’ and ‘illegal immigrants’ getting benefits. Royalty has been getting massive State benefits for years and few people seem to mind. They also get grants to do up their many stately homes. We should keep public housing well maintained though.

GCSE’s have been in the news again. It seems the pass marks for many of them has been raised. Now there is a controversy about the English exam as many kids got grade D when they expected a grade C, which stuffs up agreements for apprenticeships and further education. It doesn’t surprise me, I’m surprise the education system works at all. Michael Gove the education secretary was cleared of blame of course. He wants to scrap the GCSE and bring back the old GCE or some such nonsense. I liked that tweet last week, that said he couldn’t pass a rectal examination! I doubt if he could pass a psychiatric assessment by Atos Healthcare…

There was something on TV about illegal immigrants living in ‘sheds with beds’ in London this week. Others were living under the motorway bridges. They are planning to knock the sheds down and prosecute landlords. They don’t seem to have any plans for the immigrants. The best course of action is to prevent them getting into the UK in the first place. International travel is seen as a right now and despite long queues at UK border control they still get in. This is bad for many people. I have been trying to help an International student to come to the UK to study and people are already saying ‘another immigrant’. These people don’t really matter of course, they’re Sun and Daily Mail readers. But it’s not good that people that are here legally are subjected to racism and abuse because of illegal immigration.

I was told, when investing, to invest in companies whose products you believe in and buy. So the middle classes should buy Tesco and Sainsbury’s shares. The upper classes should buy Rolls Royce and British Airways. Teenagers should buy shares in Apple and Samsung. Stupid people should buy shares in News Corp. Old people should invest in healthcare (not Atos). Poor people should invest in their future… That’s the only bloody thing they can afford to invest in. Wouldn’t it be great if all sections of society could have investments to provide for their future; we could call it capitalism. It would be so much better than Elitism.

I’m hoping Ivor Bollokkov will do well in the shot putting at the Paralympics. It’s bad enough when you’re only got one shot,  but he’s only got one ball.

I watched Mrs Brown’s Boys on TV on Friday night. I must be getting desperate. There was another bloody Die Hard film on and other crap. We really need to make some decent programmes for television. Programmes that people around the world will buy. Even Mrs Brown’s Boys is sought after in other countries. They can’t get it of course. We need to make less crap like Corrie and East Enders. Make television programmes that  the world will buy and maybe the UK will come of of recession and I’ll have something half bleeding decent to watch on a Friday night. They would rather build a new runway at Heathrow to handle more illegal immigrants.

Have a good week. There are more amazing blogs on a zillion ideas. Comments welcome!

Related articles

• Disabled storm DWP in daring anti-Atos raid (morningstaronline.co.uk)
• Big Society Vs Paralympic Games, Remploy workers (gordonlyew.wordpress.com)
• Disabled campaigners protest against ‘fit for work’ testing firm (mirror.co.uk)
• Campaigners target Games sponsor Atos (morningstaronline.co.uk)
• Hundreds protest against Paralympics sponsor Atos as anger about its role in slashing benefits bill intensifies (independent.co.uk)
• Rambling thoughts about well-being and gratitude (enablingoccupationaltherapy.wordpress.com)
• Anti-cuts demo targets Atos HQ (morningstaronline.co.uk)
• Disabled anti-cuts campaigners take the fight to the Paralympic Games (guardian.co.uk)
• ‘We’ll get justice for students’ pledge in GCSE row (yorkshirepost.co.uk)

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