Buried away on page 36 of the Daily Mirror on Friday Oct 31st 2003, was an article which was headed "Outrage as 21,800 OAP's Killed by Cold" The article stated that ' Campaigners reacted with anger' but this anger was not an anger which was noticeable anywhere apart from the odd comment in the media. The Daily Mirror reporter who penned the fairly throwaway article was Lydsay Moss. The Daily Mirror, by putting this article on page 36, was showing contempt to the Elderly. This news should have been on Page One yet it was somehow resigned to obscurity and the front page instead broke the 'news' about Paul Mc Cartneys baby, plus a story about an 'heroic' soldier and a mention that Liverpool FC may 'ground share' with Everton FC - if the Council taxpayers foot the bill. But we'll come back to that last important point, Bear it in mind.

Excess winter mortality

The figures for deaths from the cold for pensioners are given out by the National Office for Statistics (website here http://www.statistics.gov.uk/default.asp ) and the figure of some 21,800 old folk dying through the cold is not determined by examining the causes of death. The figures are called 'Excess winter mortality'

Killed by the vicious culture of profit before people

Many pensioners have worked all their lives only to find themselves fall victim to a generation of vicious thugs in suits who talk a lot about 'regeneration' and 'moving forward' whilst conveniently milking pension funds and stealing the nations wealth. Look how Care homes in Liverpool have been purchased and sold off by mostly out of town property speculators to be turned into luxury apartments for the invading middle classes.


In 1999, a year after New Labour rose to power, the signs were ominous for our old folk as around 800 care homes closed in the UK with the loss of 15,000 beds - and since then the closures have continued. A generation of pensioners threw on the scrapheap and killed by the vicious culture of profit before people. Our MP's ought to ashamed - but they're too busy voting themselves pay-rises and finding other part time jobs like our MP here, George Howarth, who will never freeze in any of his homes unlike his constituents. These MP's ought to be ashamed but ther e will be no great inquiries, and more concern will be expressed over the latest racist cop incident than the blatant neglect and subsequent deaths. We'll have inquiries over gatecrashers at Royal parties for the scrounging Royals - but will we have any inquiry to help stop the deaths of the elderly? - will we hell. 21,800 dead and we'll be lucky to get more than a few local websites kicking up a fuss.

Help the Aged and the British Gas Charity Trick.

British Gas, not content with making massive profits, want to make a further killing (apart from killing OAP's) and have put massive rises on gas prices over the past few years. Surprisingly, to me at least, not many would point this out to perhaps be a major contributory factor towards OAP's dying of cold. Rising Gas bills would surely lead to more deaths from cold. The Daily Mirror recently ran a series of articles backing a charity campaign by, amongst others, British Gas! - The very organisation whose greed has surely been responsible for killing pensioners with extortionate charges! Amazingly, Help the Aged are actually partners with British Gas and advertise this partnership on their website, Help the Aged make no mention of Gas prices when they inform us that 21,800 OAP's have died from the cold.

Pay Students to collect money in Liverpool!

The very same organisation pays students commission to drum up financial support in the streets of Liverpool and other major towns and cities. Help the Aged has the audacity to pay management and all sorts of important sounding ranks of paid workers a very nice pay packet. They even pay the students commission now - so if you see them collecting in Bold Street etc in Liverpool City Centre, you'll know they are paid to do so - that's less money for the working class OAP's and more beer for a few more students. I don't begrudge students a few pints but can anyone see the actual stupidity of all this?

£67,536,000 income in 2001

Mathematics is not my strong point - but you work it out. 21,800 OAP's sharing 67 million odd pounds seems to indicate that Help the Aged could have easily paid the bills,draftproofed the houses, saved the pensioners and been acclaimed as hero's or heroines.

Charity donation - start off with £1 and we get 10p, 5p, or 1p?

All the major Charities have massive bills for offices and expenses and wages which reach ridiculous amounts when you consider they are working for charities. Help the aged even run newspaper ads - very expensive. Only after taking a FAT slice of donated money do they look to donate the money we donate to the pensioners. How much of your quid actually ends up in directly benefiting OAP's? 10p?, 5p, or 1p? Too many Charities like Help the Aged are run by the Middle Class who simply 'tut tut' when figures are released telling us that we are letting 21,800 pensioners freeze to death. Help the Aged should be calling for the heads of the government and organising a massive march to save our elderly. We should be fighting outside Parliament if need be to prevent the deaths of these Great People. They fought for us - we owe them a lot. British Gas should be nationalised and pensioners told not to worry about bills. But Help The Aged are getting their wages paid in part by British Gas - he who pays the piper calls the tune! British Gas not only buy off the potential embarrassment of having a National Charity target them, they come out looking like the innocent bystanders trying help OAP's.

British Gas are happy to pay Help the Aged and the Charity is happy in turn to take the money off British Gas. As Help the Aged inform us on their website…..

"The Help the Aged Corporate Relationships Department advances the Charity's vision by securing corporate partnerships to help fund the Charity's work."

In Liverpool, money is being wasted left right and centre. Euro Money has been seized upon by a variety of Middle Class and corporate regeneration vampires - groupies who follow the grants round from town to town and disappear conveniently as things inevitably go wrong. We even have Everton FC now trying to ask Liverpool City Council for a big hand out so that they may 'ground share' with Liverpool FC - if the Council taxpayers foot the bill that is. In July 2002, the vicious Liberal Democrats in Liverpool were reported to have cut the social services budget by £16m. In this so called Capital of Culture - care homes are closed and luxury flats resurrected in their place - the Middle Classes snap up bargain properties and our OAP's freeze to death The middle classes count the share profits in British Gas and start more charity campaigns.

Deaths could easily be stopped.

British Gas could END the majority of these deaths this Winter. They could still make a profit if they were to cut the bills by 2 thirds or offer free gas to the neediest OAP's. One of the things the National Office of Statistics will never do is to apportion blame. Kirkby Times is luckily not held back from blaming or accusing organisations with due cause and evidence. The English Government could easily push British gas with legislation to cut bills. Help the Aged could push the Government to make sure heating was affordable - THEN we would not have the situation where 21,800 OAP's are found dead due to the callous greedy money grabbing lowlifes who bleed them dry.

A Generation of Scouser's dancing on Thatcher's Grave

Ricky Tomlinson, in his autobiography, stated that "A generation of Scousers will dance on Maggie Thatcher's grave" As a Scouser myself I can only applaud that statement. I hope the next generation of scouser's actually dig the graves of any politicians or councillors or the Middle Classes who suggest cutting funds for our elderly. Why is it that we have millions upon millions of pounds of grants floating around Liverpool and the Merseyside area - money meant to tackle poverty, yet our pensioners are going to be dying of cold this Winter?

These pensioners are not just victims of some unfortunate accident - they have been systematically robbed by the Government, Big Business, and the Banks and Financial institutions. British Gas, Powergen and every other privatised Utility Company are bleeding the pensioners dry and then donate to charities who in turn keep quiet and pretend that the OAP's are dying because of some undeterminable problem unrelated to large heating bills for instance. Charities can often make matters worse by the dominance of the Middle Classes who actually know that big business is bleeding the OAP's dry but don't want the working class to particularly dwell on it or to ask too many awkward questions.

Worse of all, the so called 'Great' British Public sits back and takes this. It's gotten to the situation where the cold blooded systematic culling of our elderly has reached the stage where the papers see fit to throw the news on page 36. It's about time the Working Class woke up to what's going on. To sit back and allow 21,800 OAP's to die this way is a reflection on the sickness of our Government and the utter apathy of those of us who could act yet have chosen not to so far.

Paul Mc Cartney becomes a father = Page 1

21,800 OAP's are practically killed = page 36.

Can you see how the media is trying to dumb us down?

Do you think our OAP's deserve to be treated this way?