MENU

 

NEW BOOK

 

DVD

 

CD

UPCOMING GIGS (see all)

July 2009

August 2009

September 2009

Welcome

Welcome and thanks for visiting!

Here you can find out what Mark is up to, his current work and campaigns, tour dates and other appearances and we'll be sure to let you know what you can do to help in one man's attempt to subvert the system and investigate and expose the things that need exposing!

Elsewhere on the site you'll find a lot of related info, photo galleries, full details of all Mark's TV shows current and upcoming tour dates and details of how to buy Mark's books, CDs and DVDs. Just have a hunt around the menu on the left and you should find what you're looking for. If not drop us an email and we'll try our best to help.

PRESS RELEASE - Thursday 14th May, 2009

Today Mark Thomas, political activist, commentator, performer, writer and comedian has instructed his lawyers, Leigh Day & Co to write to the Speaker of the House of Commons threatening legal action unless a full transparent review is urgently ordered into the scandal of MPs expenses.

More on the Guardian website.

Mr Thomas has been advised that the approach peddled by MPs in the press that their unreasonable expenses are within the rules is not correct. In fact, the current scandal has been largely caused by attempts by many MPs to stretch the rules far beyond their ordinary meaning and an unwillingness by the House of Commons Department of Finance and Administration officials to rein them in.

The letter requires Speaker Martin, as Chair of the House of Commons Commission to take urgent steps to commence a review of the Department’s actions in dealing with MPs’ applications for expenses.  The following steps are set down as the bare minimum requirements:

• To obtain and publish independent authoritative legal advice & guidance on the meaning of the MPs’ expenses rules, to be consistent with other guidance applicable to the public where similar words are used
• To appoint independent accountants to audit all claims by MPs in the current parliament against the legal advice and guidance obtained
• To consider auditing all claims by MPs back to May 1997, applying consistent principles which would be applied in cases of false/excessive claims against other public authorities or the HMRC
• To explain publicly what sums have been wrongly paid out to members and to set out proposals for recoupment where overpayments have been made, such recoupment to be no more favourable to MPs than the system for recovery of benefits overpayments or income tax underpayments
• To report possibly fraudulent claims to the Metropolitan Police fraud squad for investigation.

The Speaker has been given 14 days to respond, failing which Judicial Review proceedings may follow.

Mark Thomas said:

“MPs are not above the law. If they have wrongly claimed expenses they should be made to repay. If they have acted fraudulently the police should be involved. This is what would happen to all of us as members of the public if we tried to fiddle public money.

Fraudulent benefit claimants are not allowed to form committees comprised of benefit claimants to investigate their misdemeanours. Nor can exposed tax cheats offer to pay back money because they are ‘concerned about how it looks to the outside world’ and then walk away with no repercussion.

If I need to go to court I will be making a public appeal to cover the legal costs of the case, which I’m sure will have overwhelming support!”

Richard Stein, partner at Leigh Day & Co said:

“The main problem here is not the rules governing payment of MPs’ expenses, but how they have been applied.  Many MPs have made claims which do not properly fall within the rules.  The rules say that MPs have a responsibility to satisfy themselves that expenditure claimed has been ‘wholly, exclusively and necessarily incurred’ for the purpose of performing their Parliamentary duties and that overspent or mischarged amounts may be recovered.  The House of Commons authorities must now take steps to make sure this happens”

A big thank you to all who have offered to make donations. Speaker Martin has 14 days to respond, if I have to take him to court I will set up a fund to collect donations for the legal action. I am setting up a not for profit company with the sole aim of raising monies for the legal action. It will be administered by a board and I will have nothing to do with the money. But for the time being I thought it was only right to pay for the legal costs myself, in all of this it seemed about time someone actually paid for something out of their own pocket.

NATIONWIDE TOUR NOW ON THE ROAD

The new tour is off and running around the country. Those of you that are coming along might like to download a form (see below) to fill in before you turn up for the show.

I am trying to create a People’s Manifesto and am looking for your help with this at the shows. It can not have escaped your notice that we are up a Creek called Shit, economically, politically, socially… er …totally.  So where are the great ideas, theories and visions to help us in our hour of need (Deep breath, lower voice, look sincere)? Within you my friends…

Each audience gets to come up with a policy, which I will include in the final manifesto and then campaign upon. So here is your chance to propose your policy or policies for the future. All I want is an idea that you think will improve our lives, it can be silly, serious, economic, plagiarised, original, bold, simple, complex, obvious or morbid. Click on the image below to get your copy of the form (pdf, 40 KB), fill it in, print it, bring it along to the show and hand it in.

Audience suggestion form

When you get to the show please hand your form at the box office, to one of the front of house staff at the theatre, my merchandise stall or one of the policy officials that will be at the shows. The earlier I get the policy ideas on the night the better as I'll have more time to review them and you are more likely to have your policy idea put forward as a contender! There will be forms at the theatre on the night so don't worry if you forget to do it beforehand.

I'll also get the manifesto ideas put up here on the site as the shows progress so you can read them and hopefully come up with something that hasn't already been selected for the campaigns.

Thatcher Post Card

To launch the Huddersfield Policy campaign," that Margaret Thatcher should pay for her own funeral", I have designed a postcard to protest the prospect of a state funeral for Margaret Thatcher. The person with most say on a state funeral is Elizabeth Windsor (sometimes known as the Queen), thus the cards should be sent to her, seeking to influence her decision making in advance of Margaret Thatcher's demise. You can download the card here, simply print, sign and post. There are two versions of the card, a one sided version and the postcard photo version.

If you decide to send a more personal letter to the Palace please let me know if you get a reply. Mark

Here is the "Thatcher post card" which you can print out, fill in and post off to help Mark make the policy decided by the Huddersfield audience become a reality. For full details please see here.

Thatcher Post Card

IT'S THE STUPID ECONOMY - THE MANIFESTO - LATEST

See all policies

Mark's message to Innocent

Mark's response to Innocent who are apparently an ethical company but have now received a £30 Million investment from Coca Cola who are probably not an ethical company:

Hi Richard,

I just wanted to drop you a note regarding your new found partnership with Coca Cola. An acquaintance mailed you earlier today and passed your response on to me. There are some fundamental factual inaccuracies and ignorance in your reply. You wrote:

"As a business, Coke are definitely not perfect (although it is worth saying that independent judicial enquiries at the time found that the Columbia (sic) allegations to be unfounded, the same with India water
although I am nervous about saying these things as it makes it sound like I am here to represent Coke, which I am not). But they do show a relatively good track record in learning and making good on the things
they get things wrong. And the people we've met have been decent, ordinary folk."

 

The allegations against Coca Cola in Colombia are simple: trade unionists working for the company have been intimidated and murdered, in one case Isidro Segundo Gil was killed inside the plant, virtually under the Coca Cola logo, to this day Coca Cola have not had any independent investigation into the allegation that managers of the bottling plants in Colombia colluded with or directed the para military death squads. The murders happened over 12 years ago.

Your response states that "independent judicial enquiries at the time found that the Colombia allegations to be unfounded," What independent judicial enquiries are you referring to? The Colombian judicial system has managed to investigate, prosecute and convict about 1% of the trade unionist murders, out of thousands. So any investigations conducted in Columbia are hardly independent and barely qualify as enquiries.

Or do you refer to the USA court case? Here the Alien Tort Claims Act is being used to try and get the Colombian bottlers and the parent company in the dock. But it can't be that one as initially the case was found to be inadmissible (though it is being appealed), so this is obviously not the 'independent judicial enquiries' that you refer to, is it?

So what 'independent judicial enquiries" are you referring to?

You do not mention the fact that the Coca Cola Company tried to silence the Colombian trade unionists who brought the case against them in the USA. Coke offered to settle out of court to the tune of about $13 million on condition that they give up their jobs working in the Coke bottling plants and that the trade unionists never ever criticise Coke nor any other company that work with Coke in the future. Had the trade unionists signed and taken the $13 million they would break the terms of the settlement and be liable to court action if they criticised you Richard.

Neither do you mention the trade union busting of the company bottlers. The cases of Coke plant managers falsifying evidence against trade unionists, accusing them of terrorism. resulting in innocent men wrongly imprisoned for 6 months before the charges against them being dismissed.

You do not mention the fact that over some 15 years the company bottlers have gone from about 80% of the work force being in permanent employment with 20% casual labour to the situation we now find, where 20% of the work force is permanent and 80% casualised with no rights to even join a trade union.

Richard, I have spent some time in Colombia interviewing and taking testimony from people who witnessed Isidro Segundo Gil's murder to the delivery men who are not allowed to join a union. I am happy for you to have all of these interviews and for you to review them and see for yourself. I can even put you in touch with the people themselves , so if you wish you can visit Colombia and talk to them face to face, I think you would find them decent ordinary folk.

And so onto India, there are many stories here but let us stay with the stories about the Company opening plants (in a water intensive industry) in water sensitive areas with with little or no regard for the communities who find their water compromised and depleted. Once again you say independent judicial enquiries have found claims unfounded. Once again I ask what independent judicial enquiries?

Firstly there are four plants where Cokes operations have put the local community water in danger, in Kerala, near Jaipur and two in Uttra Pradesh. Two of these four plants have been shut down after protests and legal challenges. Coke were forced to close these plants.

The two remaining plants are near Jaipur and near Varanasi, neither plants have had judicial enquiries that found any claims of water depletion unfounded. So I am at a loss as to what judicial enquiries you refer to.

Happily for you Richard I have spent time in India too, and am happy for you to have access to all the interviews I have conducted with local people from all four of the plants, so you can hear for yourself what the allegations are.

Richard, you fail to mention the allegations that are raised against the company in Turkey regarding union busting or in El Salvador regarding Coke's sugar being produced with the help of child labour. Neither do you refer to the allegations of union busting in Ireland or the court findings against the company in Mexico, where they were found to be in breech of anti-monopoly law and intimidated some of the poorest shop owners.

So I am happy to send you a copy of my book which details some of these things BUT more importantly I offer to make my research and interviews on all of these issues available for you to come and peruse , so you might be able to make a more balanced comment on your partnership with the company. I do not understand how you can make comments that Coke have a "relatively good track record in learning and making good on the things they get things wrong" without considering these points.

Yours, Mark Thomas

Additional response:

Dear Richard, just seen another reply you have made to an enquiry about Smoothie and Coke, you quote the ILO report made in 2008 - referring to 'direct' employees. You say "everything suggests that conditions of work and rights applicable to direct employees [in Columbia (sic)] are duly respected." The key here is that over 15 years the ratio of direct employment to casual labour has been reversed, from 80% of the workforce that was 'direct' labour and 20% that was casualised, to the present day where 20% of the work force is direct labour and 80% is casualised. Casual labour have no rights to join a trade union. None whatsoever, I met and talked to plenty of people who testified that this is the case.

So your quote is selective and deceptive that is being used to promote a vision of the company that is simply not true. once again I am happy for you to come and see the interviews and bring your own translator if you wish to go through what these men and women say about working for the company.

Looking forward to hearing from you. Mark Thomas

Mark on tour - It's the stupid economy tour 2009 - THE MANIFESTO!

Fifty-four shows, fourteen weeks, one comic and a government to influence!

Comedian and activist Mark Thomas creates a manifesto - a policy paddle to help steer our way out of Shit Creek. It's a roving comedy think tank of a show where every audience gets to nominate and vote for their favourite policies.

Mark road tests them and then sets off to make them happen. It is somewhere between Jim'll Fix It for anarchists and White Collar Crimewatch, with a passing nod at Bill Drummond, the Fluxus art movement and Anneka Rice.

The list of winning policies from the shows will be put up on the site and we'll keep updating them so you can see what not to suggest at the show you're going to!

We'll be putting the chosen policies on the site as they come in and keeping you updated on Mark's efforts to get them implemented.

Also don't forget that you can pledge money to get our own peer in the house of lords here, the best suggestions for policies that our own lord of the realm could implement will be put up there soon.

 

Stop and search? Carry the card.

Download this handy card, warning police officers that if a stop and search is intrusive, unlawful or malicious, you will take action. As featured in the Guardian on 10th February 2009 here.

The debate about the use of stop and search – be it protesters or young black and Asian men, be it in the case of stopping knife crime or deterring terrorism – is one that has (understandably, perhaps) been fixed on the police results rather than the times they get it wrong.

But it is in the cases where they get it wrong that attitudes towards police are sharpened and the rights we feel we have as citizens practically defined. So I offer this card for readers to download, print and carry. It warns police officers that if a stop and search is intrusive, unlawful or malicious, you will pursue the issue through the Independent Police Complaints Commission and, if necessary, to civil proceedings. You might want to offer this card to an officer before a search takes place. Enjoy.

Click here to download a pdf of the card. Then print, cut it out, fold it in half and carry it around with you.