Initiatives that are in progress, right now.
It's time to put the secateurs, herbicide and peat compost away and let the over-manicured English village return to nature. Thirty years ago we bought a rather rat infested - alright, very rat infested – cottage, and have enjoyed it ever since. It’s where we’ve spent...
The Chancellor’s recent ‘New Towns’ deal - £1bn for 45 towns (of which 40 just happen to be in Tory constituencies) is welcome. So is the £150m to help communities take over pubs, theatres and other local institutions in their areas which have a unifying social effect...
On the morning of Sunday 24 January, 97,329 lives had been taken by the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK, according to Government statistics. By some estimates, the country had already passed 100,000 deaths 11 days earlier. Marking this milestone is in some sense...
Each year the Financial Times newspaper investigates the UK’s upcoming economic prospects with a survey of economic analysts. New Weather’s Andrew Simms took part. The survey’s predictions often prove highly accurate but after such an extraordinary year, and with...
By David Boyle, Lindsay Mackie and Andrew Simms “We created 400 clone towns nobody loves. We shouldn’t get upset - job losses aside - about changing them.” So said Mark Robinson, co-founder of landlords Ellandi and chair of the government’s High Streets Task Force, on...
Andrew Simms and Sarah Woods reflect on the accidental relevance of their performance-lecture Neoliberalism: The Break-Up Tour for the launch of Digital Theatre+'s new filmed discussion. “A pandemic spreads'' are the first three words of our participatory show...
Lindsay Mackie, Andrew Simms and David Boyle argue that the UK test and trace debacle shows why capitalism - critics of which are now banned from school educational materials - isn't working The testing crisis in which we are now engulfed could easily - like the...
In my just published eco-thriller, Skyseed, the untimely eruption of an obscure volcano in Bolivia dooms an illicit programme to engineer the climate to failure – and worse. The events that follow are pure fiction and hopefully will stay that way. Nonetheless,...
POWER OUT is a new BBC thriller about power and protest on a dying planet, starring Vinnie Heaven and written by New Weather's Sarah Woods. It asks what happens when the power system we’re hooked up to fails? If this is power, then POWER OUT: POWER OUT on the BBC...
The world of staycation is bound to lead to those sad scenes by motorways and country roads of the broken down, burst tire, overheating vehicle. Time to call the AA (Automobile Association) or the RAC - splendid British institutions, supposed to be there to assist. A...