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Durham Miners Gala 2015

7/13/2015

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It was  a great honour to be again be a steward at the Durham Miners' Gala and still find time to march in with my union banner, in time to hear the speeches. 


The incredible turnout, estimated at 150 000 proved yet again just how important the heritage of solidarity and social justice is to the people of Northeast England.


Let's hope funding can continue to be found and the Friends of the Durham Miners Gala gain many more adherents.  Long may the Gala prosper! 
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Celebration of the Pitmen's Great Stand 1765

7/8/2015

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Last Friday, the Tyneside Irish Centre was packed out as about 120 people attended the celebration event commemorating the 250th anniversary of the Pitmen's Great Stand.   This pivotal moment in the development  of a Northeast English regional consciousness based on values of solidarity, fairness and social justice, was remembered through speeches and song.


Peter Sagar told the story of how the Northeast coalfield developed over the centuries and how the mine owners had developed into a cartel, who used the infamous bond system to tie miners down to one pit for a whole year as a way of ensuring that wages could be kept down. Peter then explained how it was this system that the miners were striking against and how, although they couldn't get rid of it in 1765, the strike did start the process whereby the bond system was removed in the 19th century. Peter also outlined the way that a radical identity developed in Northeast England over the 150 years after the Pitmen's Great Stand.      


Peter then performed the song We Are Strong, specially written for the occasion, which can be found at the page of music and writing on this website. 


David Hopper, secretary of the Durham Miners' Association then spoke forcefully of the challenges facing ordinary working people, especially young people today.  In a well-received speech David spoke of his fears and remembered miner's struggles of the last 35 years. 


The final speaker was Shane Enright, Trade Union Campaign Manager from Amnesty International UK. Shane skilfully linked the struggle of the miners in Northeast England 250 years ago with struggles of trade unionists across the world today, including a moving section about the teachers' union in Bahrain. 


The speeches were followed by food and a great performance by the Smokin' Spitfires, which got many people up and dancing. Their performance began with a short, poignant snatch of Gresford, the miners' hymn, written in the 1930's by Jarrow pitman Robert Saint.


Everybody seemed to have a great time and it was a great start to the weekend!
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3rd July 2015; Celebrating the Pitmen's Great Stand of 1765

6/6/2015

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On 3rd July 2015 A Living tradition are proud to be organising a special night at the Tyneside Irish Centre, to celebrate the Pitmen's Great Stand in 1765. This was a strike, which went a long way to establishing the principles of solidarity and social justice as major parts of the Northeast identity.

The night begins at 7.30 p.m.  


For more information about this great night, please click on the link below: 



3rd_july_new_poster.pdf
File Size: 391 kb
File Type: pdf
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Newcastle Human Rights Heritage Walk 

3/30/2015

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A Living Tradition is delighted to be leading a Human Rights Heritage Walk around Newcastle City Centre on Saturday 18th April, in conjunction with Journey to Justice, starting at Books for Amnesty on Westgate Road at 11 a.m. and lasting for approximately 2 hours.


Please click on link below for further details. 


heritage_walk_publicity.pdf
File Size: 228 kb
File Type: pdf
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Newcastle City Council Mandela Award

12/6/2014

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It was with great pleasure that on Friday 28th November 2014 I received an email from Newcastle City Council letting me know that I was invited to receive an award on Wednesday December 3rd to commemorate the first anniversary of the death of Nelson Mandela two days later on 5th December.

After a hearty Civic Centre tea, I attended the ceremony and was duly given the award, in recognition of work a Living Tradition has undertaken in contribution to the wellbeing of communities within the city.

I really appreciate the award. It is so good to feel valued and appreciated for the work I do.

Please go to More > Mandela Award on the bar at the top of this webpage for photos and more information.
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Working with the Roma

1/25/2014

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I was delighted that I was able to facilitate and contribute to a major feature in The Journal newspaper on Tuesday 21st January. As you can see on the dedicated Roma page (under the Community heading), A Living Tradition has been doing a lot of work with Roma in Newcastle and Gateshead.

It was great to see this work bear such positive fruit, last Tuesday, with a very fair article by Mike Kelly.  To see the full feature go to:  http://www.thejournal.co.uk/news/news-opinion/mike-kelly-pride-prejudice-were-6535063

We live in dangerous times, with economic hardship helping to increase prejudice fuelled by those seeking some advantage from putting one-sided stories across to the public about asulum and immigration. The article helps to put the record straight; Roma I have met and worked with have been very decent people, who have come to the Northeast to escape terrible discrimination in Eastern Europe and just want a chance to work for themselves and a chance of a decent education for their children.

Hopefully this positive start to 2014 can continue.

Happy New Year to all our supporters! 
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Colin Veitch; A Great Geordie

7/31/2013

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With the new football season fast approaching, it is perhaps a good time to remember the great Northeast footballer and social activist Colin Veitch.  His is a story, not just of great sporting achievement, but also of someone with a real social conscience, who used his fame to do real good.

Colin was born in Heaton, Newcastle on 22nd May 1881.  At school he excelled both in the classroom and on the football pitch. Indeed Colin came to the attention of Newcastle United through appearing for the team of Rutherford College, which he enrolled at after leaving school. In the summer of 1899, Colin signed professional forms for Newcastle United at the age of 18.

Still the academic world attracted Colin and at one point he nearly gave up his football career to return to his studies, but fortunately for Newcastle United’s growing support he didn’t.  Instead Colin went on to captain Newcastle United to the League Championship on no fewer than three occasions; 1905, 1907 and 1909.  He also led Newcastle United to the first of their six F.A. Cup wins in 1910, also captaining them when they lost the finals in 1905, 1906, 1908 and 1911. Colin also won 6 England caps.

These were the times when Newcastle United’s defensive system was so successful that the football authorities had to change the offside rule. Indeed one away player alighting, with the rest of his team, from a train at Newcastle Central Station before making their way to St James’ Park, on hearing the train guard blow his whistle, was heard to moan that he had been found offside already!   In short, Newcastle United was THE side of the Edwardian Era and Colin was their star player.

However, his football was not the only reason why he is still looked back upon and deeply admired.  Colin Veitch was a real man of the people, a footballing superstar with a real social conscience.  In 1911 Colin was a co-founder of the People’s Theatre, which began life in the socialist rooms in Leazes Park, under the auspices of the socialist Clarion Movement.  The People’s Theatre recently celebrated its centenary in its present home just off the Coast Road appropriately in Colin Veitch’s birthplace of Heaton. Colin was a playwright aw wanted to enlighten people on the stage as well as entertain them on the pitch.

Colin was also a leading figure in the Players Union.  This was long before footballers received the huge salaries some of them get today.  Colin used his socialist principles to ensure that they were treated better than hitherto.

Colin also served as an officer in the First World War, reaching the rank of 2nd lieutenant. 

The official Newcastle United historian, Paul Joannou has summed up Colin Veitch, by saying that, “(Veitch) was an educated man of many talents: an articulate scholar, musician, actor, playwright and politician".

In 2012, he was voted 4th top in a poll of the 100 greatest ever Geordies, over 60 years after his death. On 25th September this year, a blue plaque in Colin’s honour will be unveiled by the Lord Mayor at Colin’s former home at Stratford Villas and on the same day at 7 p.m., Chris Goulding is giving a talk on Colin’s life to the Heaton History group in the Corner House pub.      

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Time Bandits

3/24/2013

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Further to my last post, more information about the work of the Time Bandits can also be found at  www.timebandits.org.uk .
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The Durham Light Infantry and the Relief of Belsen

3/23/2013

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On Thursday 21st March, I had the pleasure of attending a performance by the Time Bandits, at St James' Church in Benwell, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, where they re-enacted the role of the Durham Light Infantry in the Relief of Belsen in April 1945. It was a very moving performance, from which the audience were able to learn a lot about what happened and which they clearly enjoyed.

We should be very proud that it was a Northeast regiment that was at the forefront of the Liberation of Belsen and that they were at least able to save some of the inmates.  It was also a timely remindrer that sadly ant-Semitism is on the rise again and that the Roma are still being treated badly in many parts of Europe. It makes one wonder when people will ever learn....

At the end of the performance, the Time Bandits team ofJohn, Rosie, Sylvie and David very kindly allowed me to sing a song on the subject, which I have recently written. I am pleased to say that this was also well received by the audience. It is in the process of being recorded and should be up on this website in the Music/Writing section soon.

If you want to learn more about the work of the Time Bandits go to www.johnsadler.net.

Peter Sagar

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International Women's Day

3/9/2013

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Yesterday was International Women's Day and a couple of events I have been to in the last couple of days have reminded just why International Women's Day is celebrated and why the struggle for women's rights is at the heart of the struggle for all human rights across the world today.

The first of the two events was a moving performance of the the play The Space Between Us, performed by the Open Clasp Theatre Company at The Customs House, South Shields. Four women take refuge in a church as a biblical level rainstorm hits the Northeast of England.Eman is a Muslim originally from Syria, Cheyanne is Traveller from Northeast England, Eyshan a Roma from Eastern Euriope, whilst Zeyna is an asylum seeker from Nigeria.  While the storm continued outside, all four women have time to reflect on their lives and the myriad of ways many of their basic human rights have been denied to them.

Then today I attended an Amnesty International conference put on by the Scarborough Amnesty International group to celebrate International Women's Day.  Along with music, poetry, fascinating testimony from a human rights defender from Sri Lanka and some excellent North African-style food, there was a fine presentation from Hugh Sandeman, AIUK Country Coordinator for Algeria and Libya, about the progress of women's rights in those countries where change had taken place since the Arab Spring two years ago and the neighbouring North African states such as algeria and Morocco.

Hugh highlighted three major tensions. Firstly, there is the tension between jobs and education for women. There are now many more women in higher education, but the skills and education of women is still not reflected in the jobs market of countries in North Africa. The second tension was between laws and family codes and traditions.  New laws are seemingly protecting women's rights, yet the suffocating blanket of family codes and traditions means that women are still not getting the legal protection they deserve. Lastly, there is the tension between women's aspirations and women hav ing a real political voice. The role of women was crucial in the downfall of a number of the dictators in the region in 2011, yet they have been largely sidelined since and in the case of Egypt there was not one woman on the committee to draw up the new constitution after the fall of Mubarak.

Social change IS taking place, but clearly there is still a long way before women in North Africa can really say that they have claimed the full rights they deserve.

Hugh also talked about the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (UNCEDAW). It calls on all countries to not just bring in laws but ensure that they really have eliminated discrimination against women in the social practices of their countries.   All five countries in North Africa had reservations with regards to this, due to specific interpretations of Islam. However, there was progressin 2011, when Tunisia said that they would accept everything in the UNCEDAW.

Amnesty International has initiated a flood of reports and missions since the uprisings began in early 2011. All of them are directed at or relevant to the rights of women.

Amnesty has also highlighted some cases of individual women who have been notable human rights defenders in the region. One of these is Anna Suleiman. In December 2011, she and a friend were protesting in the middle of Cairo, against attempts by the interim government to limit the rights of women, when she was assaulted by a policeman. As a consequence of this she had to go to hospital, yeyt today she is uncowed and campaigns, not just for herself, but others who have been similarly injured. There has been a systematic attempt by security forces in Egypt to terrorise and humiliate women who dare to operate in the public realm. There have been many very deliberate mysogynistic attacks be men on women.

Other testimony was of women in Egypt in March 2011, barely 2 months after the fall of Mubarak who was detained after a peaceful protest and not only beaten, but forced to undertake the horrendous humiliation of virginity tests. At the other end of North Africa,Hugh told us about  a young woman, who was raped and then forced to marry the rapist, to keep him out of trouble as the law allowed him to escape prosecution if he married the woman he raped.  He continued to abuse her once they were married, leading to her suicide.

We were also told of Nassera Dutour, from Algeria, which did not experience the Arab Spring who is a spokesperson for an NGO which campaigns on behalf of families of those who 'disappeared' during the civil strife of the 1990's. It is nearly always women who are left behind to keep campaigning for those who disappeared.  Nassera has done great work, despite the fact that in Algeria there has been a deliberate attempt to prevent the empowerment of women through civil society.

The issue of human rights in North Africa is one where the women who are bravely campaigning deserve our support. The issue is very complex. Women face a tremendous struggle to get theright laws to protect and empower them onto the statute book and even then there are many obstacles to them claimimng the full rights they should have.

Women's Rights are the rights of all women, regardless of local values. Many women campaigners face hard choices about which fight to take on and when. They want us to keep listening to them and to support them in their struggles.

2013 also sees the centenary of the death of Emily Daavison the Suffragette martyr, buried in the churchyard of St Mary the Virgin in Morpeth, Northumberland.  She was knovked over by the king's horse Amner at the Derby on 4th Juine 1913 and died four days later, without reciovering consciousness. Surely one of the best ways to mark the centenary of Emily's death is to continue to support those women across the world who are striving for their rights.

Tomorrow is Mother's Day and on the day after 11th March it will be 30 years since my mother passed away.  It was my mother who first introduced me to ideas around human rights when I was a boy.. Here's to her memory and to that of Emily Davison and to all women past, present and future, who have played and continue to play such a crucial role in the struggle for universal human rights.     

Peter Sagar
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    Peter Sagar

    Peter is a teacher and human rights activist. He is also an historian, specialising in the history of North-east England over the last 250 years.

    Peter has been a teacher of young people and adults in North-east England since 1987.

    Peter has been the Regional Rep for Amnesty International in the North-east and Yorkshire Region since 2000 and has also served as Trade Union Co-ordinator for Burma Campaign UK and in various other positions in human rights related organisations.

    Peter holds an M.Phil in the regional identity of North-east England, from the University of Northumbria in 2005.  His subsequent writing on human rights and about North-east England has been published in numerous publications.

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