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48 hours in Liverpool: Go ‘ed, get down http://issuu.com/tntmagazinelondon/docs/1581/69?e=2929754/7607375   You won’t walk far (and never alone) in Liverpool without hearing the echoes of Beatlemania.   The story of the four likely lads who conquered the world will be told by locals for years to come. But these days, a new generation is looking forward, not back, and the buzzing artistic, creative scene and quirky nightspots that have sprung up with it are worth the trip alone. Day one:   Morning:   Between two imposing cathedrals on the side of a hill lies one of Liverpool’s classiest streets. Hope Street is a catwalk of Liverpool’sRead More →

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[Widget_Twitter id=”1″] This article was picked up by TNT Magazine in April 2014 One summer day two years ago I heaved a rucksack over my shoulder and set off on the trip of a lifetime. Over the next month I sat on train after train, either alone or thrown in with some truly colourful company, whizzing between some of the great European cities: Paris, Brussels, Berlin, Warsaw, on to Moscow, through the wilderness of Siberia, the plains of Outer Mongolia, the Gobi Desert, the lush greenery of China’s countryside and the madness of its colossal cities, until finally my last ride ground to a standstillRead More →

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Clause 118 would leave no hospital in England safe Rules are pesky things when you’re trying to get things done. Especially when it comes to health care and you’re making such big changes that they can be “seen from space”. But for Jeremy Hunt et al, they’re more of a bore, not real obstacles. If the rule book tells them they can’t do exactly what they like, it’s very simple: they just rewrite it. It’s a luxury of the rich and powerful when irritations like Lewisham happen. The public claimed a victory, Hunt feigned defeat. But it was only a simpering type of defeat; heRead More →

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In December I had my first article published in the New Statesman, on the EU’s role in NHS Privatisation. The article, which you can read here, has been tweeted over 600 times and received over 2,000 likes and shares on Facebook……… “No doubt the launch of Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) in June was cause for much celebration in Brussels. The European Parliament is in the process of enabling a historic shift in world economics with countless, far-reaching consequences.A key part of the TTIP is ‘harmonisation’ between EU and US regulation, especially for regulation in the process of being formulated. In Britain, the coalitionRead More →

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WHEN DANNY took out his first payday loan he had no idea what a terrible cycle he had just stepped into. A cycle that would see him make repeated suicide attempts as he got deeper and deeper into debt and found himself eventually struggling with a sickening 30 different loans at once. Danny is no stranger to suffering. Growing up family life was so dangerous that at the age of 12 he was taken into care, and placed in the tough new environment of a boy’s care home. “I had nobody there to support me,” he tells me. “I didn’t have much family support. ItRead More →

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Geographical snobbery is a two-way street, and for this nowhere man, whose life has meandered back and forth from London, it’s bullshit in both directions This piece appeared in Nottingham cultural magazine Left Lion in March 2014 It seems someone has to be the bad guy, so I guess I’ll be. I’m a bit of a nowhere man anyway, so I’ve not got that much to lose. I’m in a tumultuous three-way relationship, which got really complicated when I moved from Nottingham to London to follow my dream of being a journalist. No sooner had I exited the M1, than I found myself fielding someRead More →

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Update: this piece was featured on the Huffington Post UK, here. The police were on alert. Above hearts-and-minds grins, vigilant eyes followed a disparate procession as it streamed into the community hall on a still, pale evening in May. A week before, almost to the hour, a young soldier’s death had sickened a nation. But he had not bitten the dust of the Helmand desert. Lee Rigby fell on a far more ominous corner of the world, a hard grey London street, mowed down and hacked to death in broad daylight by two men wielding carving knives. Almost as soon as the news had hit,Read More →

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An article I wrote about Gordon Brown’s address to the MIPCOM conference in Cannes. Brown, who was speaking in his capacity as UN envoy for education, was joined on stage by the father of Malala Yousafzai, the girl shot in the head by the Taliban in Pakistan for refusing to stay away from school. He was there to launch the UN’s Global Education Initiative, a 1000-day drive to put every child in the world into school.      Read More →

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…in getting heavy with stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don’t bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I… And I have learned to live, as it were, with the idea that I will never find peace and happiness, either. But as long as I know there’s a pretty good chance I can get my hands on either one of themRead More →

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The tensions in the UK over the past two weeks, and the subsequent backlash against Muslims in Britain is distressing, but, as sobering reading of an article I wrote in 2006 shows, it’s hardly new….     A year on from 7/7 07/07/2006 Ben Cooper examines the effects of 7 July 2005 a year on…   Twelve months ago four young men plunged an entire faith into turmoil. Since the London bombings Islam has been thrust into centre stage to face scrutiny, persecution and rage. Fear, intolerance, extremism, and terrorism are the most lasting images of Islam reflected in the national media, which at timesRead More →