“I had a headache for five days in that week.” During the parliamentary recess in February this year, MP Helen Goodman set herself the challenge of spending just £18 a week on food. She had received lots of messages from constituents worried about the bedroom tax (which hadn’t yet come in) and decided to see for herself what it would be like to survive on the resulting lower income.
We’ve been hearing a lot about the Leveson inquiry. But another inquiry has been quietly rumbling on at the same time, and the findings should be very interesting to journalists.
TThe House of Lords has a select committee on communications, and it's conducting an inquiry called The future of investigative journalism. They're asking what its role is and how it will evolve in the future.They’re also looking at business models for the industry: in other words, how do we make serious reporting pay?
I recently wrote to my MP, who also happens to be the Prime Minister.
29th March 2011
Dear Mr Cameron,
I understand that you have recently sought the independent advice of the Committee on Climate Change and I congratulate you for doing so. I am now writing to urge you to accept the advice they give you and set serious targets for reducing the UK’s carbon emissions.
The spending cuts we’re facing today will not only be the largest since World War II, but perhaps also the most heavily spun. Finding out the real impact of the cuts means going beyond the press releases and searching for the small print in lengthy documents.
Health reporter John Lister has spent the past 26 years doing just that. He has become a familiar face on television as one of the few experts who can provide informed comment on NHS funding.
What’s causing the current unemployment problems? According to Iain Duncan Smith, it’s a failure to look beyond your home town for work. He gives the example of Merthyr Tydfil, whose inhabitants “didn’t know that if they got on a bus, an hour’s journey, they’d be in Cardiff and they could look for the job there”.