January 2010 Newsletter
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Happy New Year! Here at IPN we are already working hard to help make 2010 a good year for freedom… and a bad year for organisations that receive taxpayers’ money to promote increased spending by government.
A Closer Union: The Political Abuse of Foreign Aid
Following on from our previous investigation of how "foreign aid" is being used for advocacy work by NGOs inside the UK, IPN has discovered that trades unions are benefiting from millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money aimed at "international development".
Our new report, A Closer Union, was covered by the Times, and shows how since 2003, the Trades Union Congress has received £3.6 million from the UK Department for International Development (DfID). But much of this money has been spent on projects benefiting the domestic UK labour movement. We're just not sure how this benefits the poorest people around the world.
Clearly, this is one cosy little union that has got to stop. Read our full report.
Commenting on Copenhagen
The world was watching as the cold wind of failure blew through the Copenhagen climate conference in December. Our Executive Director Julian Morris offered daily comment at the FT’s Climate Experts' Forum. Meanwhile our Environment Programme Director Caroline Boin and other associates published articles worldwide offering real solutions and unconventional wisdom.
Health as Human Right?
Can there be a right to healthcare? In recent decades it has been written into national constitutions and international treaties. Even America has been warming to the idea. But international human rights academic Jacob Mchangama took issue with this trend in a paper for IPN. Health as a Human Right: The wrong prescription explains both the questionable legality and practical dangers of the principle, as well as the insidious political agenda behind the wrong kind of human right. Read the report.
IPN in the News
Caroline Boin: The poor need modern agriculture. Daily Telegraph
Julian Harris; Caroline Boin: The TUC can’t hide behind George Bush. The Times
Philip Stevens: UNICEF fails in West Africa. Associated Press
Alec van Gelder; Philip Stevens: Benefits of EU-Indian free trade. LiveMint, India
