Last week, 35 deluded business leaders wrote to the Telegraph to praise George Osborne’s cruel spending review.
I’m joining those who have decide to boycott every single company that those business leaders represent.
There are two reasons for this:
1) The first is that leaders on the list take us for suckers – a trait I rarely care for in people I spend my money with.
They wrote:
“There is no reason to think that the pace of consolidation envisaged in the Budget will undermine the recovery. The private sector should be more than capable of generating additional jobs to replace those lost in the public sector, and the redeployment of people to more productive activities will improve economic performance, so generating more employment opportunities.”
The letter authors decided the advantages of signing the letter meant more than being straight with their customer base.
And they weren’t straight with their customers at all. Liberal Conspiracy was leaked a private email that clearly demonstrated that people on the list had no confidence whatsoever in the nation’s ‘improved economic performance’ or the ‘generation of more employment opportunities’ of which their Telegraph letter spoke. Osama Saeed had the names of those who, when not flying pro-cuts and pro-government flags, were laying thousands of people off and/or telling grim tales about the realities of lie of the fiscal land.
It also seemed that many of the 35 had reasons for cheerleading Osborne’s mad plans – reasons that spoke of vested, rather than national, interests. Arup has just been awarded a major rail contract by the government. Another outstanding piece of Liberal Conspiracy work told us that BT’s government contracts had just been renewed and deals done on government contracts with Microsoft and AVEVA.
2) I do my best to spend my money with ethical businesses.
Companies that support the CSR are failed corporate citizens. They back an ideological programme of cuts that will throw thousands out of work and onto the mercy of a welfare system that itself will barely exist. In private, they have no suggestions for growth. In public, they’re collaborators who run a strong second line in denial. I would no more spend my money with them than I would with companies that beat t-shirts out of child workers in Bangladesh.
I am a consumer. I have money to spend. I will no longer do business with the retailers who appeared on that list. Fair trade begins at home.
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Lets not forget uncle rupert,scrapped sky and went to freeview
Oh yes. We gave Uncle Rupe the big finger years ago. Sky’s definitely the limit in our household. We only have the free stuff here.
Maybe someone with more computer skills and I could lay this out into a handy, print-and-put-in-your wallet chart for point-of-purchase boycotting? With a list of the brands associated with these groups? That would be really handy. Or maybe the alternative – a list of competing brands who DIDN’T sign up to the Festival of Greed, so we can switch to the alternative immediately.
That’s an excellent idea – do you mind if I add you to our email list?
Please do add me to your email list – that would be great. My idea is a little chart that reads “Where do I go instead?”. Free publicity and organised marketing for brands that *don’t* treat their customers like cash-bearing peasant scum is a good carrot.
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I’m on a Vodafone contract for the next 2 years, but was considering getting a number of accessories for my phone including a 32Gb memory card, which is quite expensive. I won’t be getting it through Vodafone, Carphone Warehouse or BT now, and when my contract is up I want to find a provider who pays their tax bill. Do we know of such a company?
Good question. I’ll put it out on twitter and through the rest of my forums, and come back.
Matt – people are saying the Phone Coop – http://www.thephone.coop/residential/mobile. I’m going to come back with more lists.
If you’re going to boycott Vodafone then you should be boycotting Google too!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/apr/20/google-uk-tax-avoidance
Don’t use their search, e-mail or phones!
I really do support the principle, but feel as I did when I first decided I’d wish to boycott this lot that it’s near impossible. It’s not just the companies listed there, it’s all the ones run by these groups like B&Q and Screwfix beneath them. The list gets very long. Then of course, I quite like owning a mobile phone of which almost every handset on the planet runs off an ARM based chipset. Unless I want to live my life with no mobile or some obscure Chinese model that I’d have to iport myself then I’m screwed. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll be avoiding as much trade as possible with these companies but there again I already did in most of their cases for past support of the Tories or just being crap from experience.
That is a good point and has got a few of us thinking generally. I think that as we refine this idea, we should target a specific number of companies for boycott. I can – and indeed have started to – avoid Boots, Mothercare, ASD and M&S, because those are retailers I often use.
Given the enthusiasm that people have shown for this and the number of people who’ve said they want to be involved, there’s room for something more focused and refined, so that’s what we’re going to work on. I’ll put up another post soon, with more specifics about the campaign.
The other point to make PP – we have to start somewhere. We might not get far, but we could, on the other hand, get quite far. We could make a bit of a mess on the corporate reputation front with some of this and as a regular shopper and consumer, I feel that the people I shop with need to pay attention to customer concerns. I don’t work for M&S shareholders – they work for me. I’m a customer in their stores. That being the case, they need to take my concerns about ethical conduct seriously.
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http://boycottbigbusinesssociety.blogspot.com/
Unite the campaign
We could do with a page like this http://littlesis.org/
It operates like a wiki and maintains a high journalistic standard. Rumour and say-so is not acceptable input. If enough of us contribute, guided by journalists and researchers, we can build a picture of who owns what (and who!), in the UK. I have time to sit in a library, but I need guidance. Many students need to learn how to research as part of their course-work.
A reliable insight into UK power networks will allow us to tactically choose our targets for action. They’ll care about us when we effectively target their profits.
Had an after thought…. A UK or European version of http://littlesis.org/ could help identify the rich individuals who have got richer since the bail-out. I am certain some are doing very well out of this recession.
I like the look of that a lot. This guy has done some v good work backgrounding UK companies and their relationships, so will mention it to him:
http://boycottbigbusinesssociety.blogspot.com/
I have (like many others,) spare time to spend in Birmingham Central Library. Its only a bus ride away. If George wants access to any data at BCL, I can volunteer my time. I can probably twist the arm of a friend who has more experience of thorough research to help too.
If we can build enough support for the Wiki idea over here, the people at littlesis might be enthusiastic about helping set littlesis.uk up. ( Mr Blairs connection to JP Morgan springs to mind). You can pass my e-mail address to George, just to test the idea of a total novice helping with research.
I contacted littlesis about supporting a UK version. Here is the reply;
Alec-
Thanks for getting in touch! We have been excited to hear of the activity over there — in fact I met someone the other night who took part in recent demonstrations. It’s very inspiring.
You should check out uk.littlesis.org, which some British folks set up earlier this year but didn’t end up officially launching. There is some limited data in there. Would that work, instead of setting up a whole new site?
Kevin
Hi Alec – sent you an email about this. It would be good for a few of us to get some work done together on it. Cheers, Kate.
I like the idea of the wallet card as these companies control so many brands and it is difficult to identfy them. It is time we put a stop to being milked by the cynical corporations. We are controlled by computers, the human element has gone from life, for politicians and corporations, we are just fodder to pay the bills whilst they have lovely tax avoidance schemes and crucify the poor.
Could we, collectively, target one retailer on a specific day and picket outside each store nationwide. Just one day should make the individual retailers sit up and take notice, if not, we extend the no-shop policies to longer periods until it does hurt them.
I feared that the UK was either too apathetic, too selfish or we had the last bit of fight kicked out of us by Thatcher. We have many more reasons to revolt than Italy or France. Let’s change our society for the better and that must begin with telling our politicians and corporations that we will stand up for positive change and not just roll over and allow our tummies to be tickled any longer.
I want to help put the Great back into Great Britain, let’s do it, let’s make this a place we are proud to live in!
Let’s help our poor, our disadvantaged, let’s find a way to ensure those less fortunate have a chance, let’s find a way to preserve and grow our potentially fine welfare system, let’s go back to manufacturing and inventing quality products, let’s buy British, from British companies paying British taxes and employing British staff.
Let’s start building our communities again, start by saying hello to your neighbours! Let’s fight the media induced fear of each other! Divided they win, united, we can win.
There has to be a better way forward. Let’s find it!
Thanks for the comments all. Am @ work atm, so will be back later in the day to respond to your comments and suggestions. Cheers, Kate.
You need a simple A5 leaflet on the topic, to hand out in the high street. And drop off with the businesses in question.
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Thanks for all the feedback and suggestions. Will set up a facebook page tomorrow. Will also put up another post in the next day or two – I want to discuss the role boycotts have played over the years and the idea of narrowing the list of targets down, which is a suggestion a lot of people have made.
A number of people have made suggestions for alternate suppliers for phones and accessories, so I think it would be a good idea to start listing them. There must be a lot of local retailers whose names should be mentioned.
Onwards.
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I’ve also added my 10p worth – this is a groundswell movement, I’m amazed at how people are horrified and getting on board. I’m a stylist and fashion blogger – don’t worry I won’t be taking any jobs from or clients to M&S, Next, LK Bennett or ASOS recommendations. I can be directive and hurt them by quite a bit.
http://makedostyle.blogspot.com/2010/10/style-budget-special-week-day-5-winners.html
Cheers for that – have tweeted and added to the blogroll. That’s a really good action.
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Mothercare – wow