• Equal Access to University
    Universities can use their discretion in setting fees and therefore have the power to decide to charge home fees or waive fees altogether. THE NEED FOR EQUAL ACCESS Asylum Seekers • Classified as overseas students and have to pay international student tuition fees. • Cannot access student finance (loans) to cover the cost of tuition fees or living costs. • Cannot work and if they have no money, must live on government support of just £36.95 per week. People granted ‘Discretionary Leave to Remain’ (DLR) • Classified as overseas students and have to pay international student tuition fees. • Cannot access student finance (loans) to cover the cost of tuition fees or living costs. • Allowed to work but cannot access student finance. In most cases this would mean a university education is out of reach. • As of June 2016, a small number of people with DLR are eligible for student finance, under a category called ‘long residence’ for those who have lived in the UK for half their life. People granted ‘Humanitarian Protection’ (including resettled Syrians) • Classified as home students and can pay home tuition fees. • Cannot access a student loan to cover the costs of their fees or living costs until they meet the 3 years ordinarily resident criteria. • Allowed to work but cannot access student finance. In most cases this would mean a university education is out of reach. Many refugees have been forced to abandon their education. They arrive in the UK ready to enter university, but without access to student finance they cannot do so, for example, Syrian refugees arriving in the UK under the government resettlement programme will be forced to wait three years until they can apply for a student loan to cover tuition fees and living costs. Young people who are in the UK seeking asylum are legally obliged to go to school like all British young people. Each year those who are academically able, pass their A levels only to find that they are suddenly separated from their British born class mates and barred from progressing to university. The system which classed them as “legally obliged to attend school” now re classes them as “international” and puts financial barriers in place to prevent further study. This situation is affecting the lives of people who are in the UK legally as a result of life threatening situations in their home countries. They cannot return home to study and cannot gain education to build a new life here. STAR receives calls every day in the run up to the new academic year from young asylum seekers and people with DLR and HP, desperate to take up a hard won place at university but unable to do so due to financial barriers. Instead huge potential is wasted as people are blocked from the education which would enable them to make a full contribution to our society and, when peace is restored, work to rebuild their own.
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    Created by Jemimah Beardwood
  • Stop PSPO's. Stop Persecuting Art & Exercise in Bournemouth town centre
    Bournemouth council is asking if we want a public space protection order (PSPO) for Bournemouth town centre. This will stop anyone over the age of 16 from skate boarding, Singing, Playing any music, expressing outdoor art including street artists, performers and statue work. The voice of the young and progressive individuals in Bournemouth is underrepresented because they often don't notice these types of policies until it's too late. The council have a moral responsibility to ask them directly what they want. We strongly feel that persecuting the arts and exercise will lead to less interesting town and a decrease in public health. As a community we enjoy watching them, they inspire us. Criminalising them is absurd, sports and arts should be held up as ways to maintain our mental a physical health. We would like to see more kids exercising more often in our public space they are the public too. We expect that busking only creates more tourism for Bournemouth at no cost to the council. We recommend that the council look at Winchesters busking policies and model yours on theirs which are very successful and well known. They should have free reign of where they can play within the town centre provided there is foot traffic and they are kept away from static pedestrians e.g. cafe patrons where business might be affected. The skateboarders should be provided with better faculties (skate parks) or a designated area with simple elegant obstacles like rails and modern concrete blocks, instead of spending money on making rails and benches skate proof (the steel bumps). Perhaps giving dedicated times and or spaces for buskers and skateboarders to enable them to express their art and improve the streets by accepting and supporting them and their skills. This is opposed to enforcing a PSPO which will persecute the arts, exercise and freedom of expression within Bournemouth town centre. This petition covers the area within the town of Bournemouth affected by the propose PSPO. We: Pearl Edwards and John McQuillan wish to present the petition at a meeting to the council. Please help us return the spaces to the people and enrich our town centre with art, individual expression and exercise. Thank you for your help
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    Created by John McQuillan
  • Emotional Assistance Pet Act
    The petition of residents of United Kingdom, Declares that there is compelling evidence from clinical and laboratory studies that interacting with pets can be beneficial to the physical, social, and emotional well-being of humans and that the human-animal emotional bond does not differ from the one that we sustain in relation to close family members; further that the twenty-first century is the beginning of the revolution in ethics related to scientific evidence regarding consciousness in animals – now confirmed that it is astonishingly close to humans; further that mental health services in the UK are overstretched, have long waiting times and a lack specialist services in some regions; further that the Mental Health Foundation also recognises the value of “pet therapy” in suicide prevention and treating depression leading to it; further that there is no scientific research to support the thesis that tenants who have pets are worse, more difficult or cause more damage to properties than those who do not; and further that almost all tenancy agreements, by default, contain a no pet clause, which is nothing more than a prejudiced practice, as a result, people who have pets are especially victimised in their attempt to simply put a roof over their heads in this difficult housing crisis context. Therefore, the petitioners request that the House of Commons urges the Government to introduce legislation that recognises the importance of the emotional relationship of man and their non-human family members; further to put the interest of the most vulnerable and the public interest above the right of the property owners if the property is a subject of commercial gain; and further that the legislation should allow the emotional support animal access in housing facilities, even when the complex has a no pet policy or breed/weight discriminatory policies.
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    Created by Sophia Davenport
  • Discriminating landlords
    For some years now social housing has been in decline & those people on housing benefit are in dire need of housing many of them single parent family’s. Who are unable to work due to there individual circumstances. Such as a wife beaten up by her husband having to seek temporary shelter & unable to return to the family home now having to live in a one room B&B with her three children. Unable to rent a private flat or house as the private landlord is discriminating against her due to her being on Housing benefit!! She is now forced to live in a one room B&B with other families in the same situation. This law must change today for these People need our help! In particular they need your help & those of your friends & family who are lucky to live in there own home. What is the point of housing benefit if No landlord in the private sector will accept it? This must change & they must be forced to accept them on short term let’s & long term let’s there must be no difference between the two. So private land lords are switching to holiday let’s rather than normal letting this is because they can offer short term let’s which makes it easier to remove bad tenants which is understandable & B&B is where perhaps they should be but why should the vast majority be penalised due to the small minority? Please support these people many of them very vulnerable young women with children who have hurt no one!!
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    Created by graham nicholson
  • Allow wheelchair accessible vehicles into rubbish and recycling centres
    I am a wheelchair user myself and my vehicle is 3.5 ton and lately I have had a lot of rubbish and I have needed to go to the recycling centre but as the rules are in Shropshire, I cannot because my vehicle is over the weight limit. I have recently had a phone call with Telford and Wrekin Council and I was trying to prove the point that it is discriminating against disabled people to not allow them into the recycling centres when most disabled people’s vehicles are over 3.5ton. There is such thing as an equality act, and so I believe, that means everything is meant to be equal, clearly in this case it is not equal and it is not fair that disabled people are not allowed to go to the recycling centres due to the weight of their vehicles. The weight of the vehicles is also heavily added to due to adaptations for most people due to lifts or ramps and other equipment. As we all know disabled people such as myself would not choose to have the conditions we have, and live our lives this way. The government and local councils do not understand how hard it is for disabled people to be as independent as possible and by taking our rubbish to a recycling centre we are able to support ourselves. So please, please may you all support this campaign and sign this petition because like most disabled people, I need to get to the recycling plants to get rid of my rubbish.
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    Created by Corey Haseley Picture
  • Metropolitan Pubs: Pay your staff the real Living Wage
    Metropolitan Pubs own 71 pubs up and down the country. They employ hundreds of bar staff, waiting staff and kitchen staff.... People deserve a proper wage... as an employee myself...
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    Created by Ruby Earle
  • GWR should provide Welsh on their signage and in their announcements
    Under the terms of the Welsh Language Measure 2011, Welsh people understood that train companies were going to provide Welsh language services. This was a clear message during the campaigning and information disseminated to help Welsh people understand their linguistic rights. Whether Welsh-speaking or not, the majority of Welsh people welcomed and celebrated the extension of the legal status of Welsh into the private sector. Over recent years, Welsh people have received news on several occasions of the increased efforts to promote and protect the Welsh language, such as the 1 million speakers by 2050. As a result, the news that GWR will not be providing a Welsh language service is disappointing. It sends a statement that they do not understand or care about their customer service provision in Wales. The Welsh Government's inability to enforce the status of Welsh in the private sector also sends a message of no confidence in the Welsh Language Measure 2011, and other legal frameworks to ensure the linguistic rights of Welsh-speakers. Where train companies operate through two or more areas where different languages are spoken, there is an expected provision of services in those languages, e.g. Eurostar, VIA Rail Canada, SNCF TGV Paris-Milan (France/Italy). In light of bilingual services provided elsewhere in the world on board train services, any official statements that 'operating in England invalidates the provision of a Welsh language service' should be considered ignorant of both cultural and business practices. Wales is a bilingual country. GWR must respect that.
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    Created by Charles Wilson
  • MRI screening
    People are having to fly hundreds of miles for an mri scan. Many people have suffered injuries and should not have to travel so far, especially as there are 2 mri machines in Raigmore hospital. Some people are not allowed to fly because of insurance purposes and a 9 hour journey by ferry then car/public transport is long. From my own experience I was told I wouldn’t be allowed on the plane as I could not bend my knee so my only other option was the ferry. I was really struggling with pain and there was no way I could spend that amount of time in a car, especially as I was struggling with really bad pain after being in the car for 20 minutes. It is unfair to ask patients to travel so far for a diagnosis. Some of the poorest countries in the world have far more advanced technology than the uk which doesn’t seem right. The cost of nhswi paying for flights for patients is ridiculous too, I know people go away for other things but surely having their own mri scanner would save them money in the long term.
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    Created by Ann Marie Macleod
  • William Wilberforce statue
    Because there has been a lot in the media about modern day slavery & racism it is essential that what Wilberforce and his set achieved is remembered publicly & in the modern curriculum for school children to know as part of the fabric of their education.
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    Created by Claudia Miller
  • Decent Internet for Cheshire's Rural Areas.
    At the moment on a really good day we get 5.00 Mbps, at the moment i get 1.00 Mbps. By 2013 they said they said they would upgrade our WiFi to fibre broadband (about 30.00 Mbps)(which is about 5X better than it is now) which they never did.
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    Created by James Nelson
  • Save Heysham Swimming Pool.
    Cllr Margaret Pattison, Cllr Janice Hanson, Cllr Darren Clifford and Cllr David Whittaker are very concerned with living in a seaside area such as Morecambe and Heysham that children should have a local pool to learn to swim. The pool has 54.000 visitors a year with 16 schools using the pool for swimming lessons and groups helping people to keep fit and healthy, if closed this would effect the health and safety of the people in Morecambe.
    1,066 of 2,000 Signatures
    Created by Cllr Margaret Pattison.
  • Referendum on the final terms on which the UK will leave the European Union
    The EU referendum represented a low point in post war UK democratic politics. Only now are problems coming to the fore that were not considered in the referendum and not debated at the time. Oeople did not know the consequences of them and Brexit impact reports are being unacceptably hidden from the people. This is unacceptable and we need a final decision when we know exactly what Brexit means and that means the full terms of an any deal.
    79 of 100 Signatures
    Created by Roman Haluszczak