Dear Porsche (judicial.review@porsche.co.uk),

I’ve recently visited your website for the Judicial Review of the increased congestion charge for London. At a time when the world is becoming more environmentally conscious, Porsche is showing itself to be an utter relic, moving its business into heavier and more polluting vehicles like the Cayenne, and trying to buy its way out of environmental regulation through legal threats.
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(When not out voting that is…)

The Union Island project (to build a home for international unionists in Second Life - or Second LifeTM to its friends) launches formally on 1 May, with a big Virtual May Day shebang. Events on the day are going to range from plain-and-simple parties to focused help sessions for reps and organisers. Read the rest of this entry »

Fantastic demonstrations of solidarity with Zimbabwe from the Namibia Transport and Allied Workers’ Union, and the South African Transport and Allied Workers Union, where unions have stepped up when government failed to act. A great example.

Mad Bob’s guns are on their way back to China in an alternative international relay just in time for the Olympics, and Thabo Mbeki has seen what his people really think of his stance - from a long way behind them.

Mind you, dockers round the world have a habit of doing that.

And we can all do a little bit too.

UPDATE 7/5/8: Very bad news (if it’s true, and not the regime trying to save face) from Blogger News Network

Two months back now, I was lucky enough to get an invite to a big French conference on Web2.0, society and business, called Netxplorateur, and very slackly I’m only just getting round to blogging about it. –>

Great news that Mahmoud Salehi was freed on Sunday. He had already served his one year jail sentence, and it looked worryingly as though the authorities were planning to cook up fresh charges to keep him inside, prompting him to go on hunger strike and fellow unionists in Iran and around the world to join in protest until he was released. He joins Ebrahim Madadi of the Tehran bus workers’ union and, who were both also released from jail late last year, after arrests earlier in 2007 for union activity. Still behind bars though, with continuing fears for his health is Mansour Osanloo. Read the rest of this entry »

Well, ASLEF had me going there - I nearly spilled my coffee in surprise, before someone kindly pointed the joke out to dim-old-me (no, not the steam train bit…).