Europe is facing a humanitarian crisis, far too serious to be reduced to being the subject of petty political point-scoring

Despite David Cameron's flippant dismissal, something must be done to aid those suffering in Europe's humanitarian crisis. Photograph: Calais Jungle on 17 January 2016 by Malachy Browne (License) (Cropped)

In a week where Chancellor George Osborne had given the government one miniature PR crisis by claiming the retrieval of 3% Tax from Google as a victory (Churcher & Woodcock, 2016), it was almost inconceivable that a member of the government could make things worse. Almost.

During Wednesday's Prime Ministers Questions, Prime Minister David Cameron, as nothing more than a cheap shot at his opponent Jeremy Corbyn, dismissed the refugees in the 'Calais Jungle' camp as 'a bunch of migrants' (Dearden, 2016). The Prime Minister has been roundly criticised for his lack of tact or concern.

The particularly troubling thing is that this is neither Cameron's, nor his government's, first time treating the, largely Syrian, refugees that have fled to Europe with such disdain. A senior minister and Cameron himself have previously dehumanised refugees with words like 'swarm' and suggestions that towns were being 'swamped by migrants' (Elgot & Taylor, 2015; Syal, 2014).

This Conservative attitude does their position no favours and does them no credit. Having already resoundingly rejected UK involvement in taking a share in a proposed Europe-wide support network for those refugees who have fled into Europe (Parker & Robinson, 2016; BBC, 2016), such language doesn't paint their stance in a positive light.

As it happens, Cameron's stated priorities with regards to the refugee crisis are not tremendously far from the broad consensus: the people, made refugees by war, want to go home (Capaldi, 2016).

Cameron's plan is for the UK, firstly, to support the refugees who have stayed in North Africa and the Middle East (Watt, 2015). Then, secondly, to push for international resolution on a plan to create safe spaces in war-torn Syria, to allow those fleeing to return home.

Leading progressives like Guy Verhofstadt, former Prime Minister of Belgium and leader of the Liberals in the European Parliament, have stressed the need for similar priorities (Verhofstadt, 2016). Yet Verhofstadt also points out the big weakness undermining those in Cameron's position: being too tied up in managing and attempting to satisfy domestic nationalism to tackle the bigger picture.

However much of a priority it is, truly, to provide aid to those who have remained in Syria and Lebanon, the fact remains that turning a blind eye to those who have, and continue, to arrive in Europe will not solve anything. In Europe, conditions are worsening, restrictions are getting more severe, and there is a risk of hearts turning colder (BBC, 2015; Crouch & Kingsley, 2016).

What is especially unhelpful in that charged atmosphere are comments that belittle or dehumanise refugees, especially when those comments come from a Head of Government - and one who is, no less, part of the continental council whose job it is to come up with a solution to this major humanitarian crisis.

How can a political figure think anyone could take them seriously if they can be so flippant about people in distress? How can they be relied upon, trusted, to develop a respectful and humane response to a very human crisis?

This isn't a time for cheap, political point-scoring. Like it or not, refugees are here in Europe. Pettiness won't change that, only a concerted humanitarian effort in both Europe and the Middle East can alleviate their plight. Being prepared to stand together in support of vulnerable people is the only way out of this crisis.

Still opposition even as Italy on verge of completing historic year for LGBT rights, but progressives must maintain their optimism

The Catholic Church stands in the way of Italy extending legal recognition to same-sex couples. Photograph: St Peter's Basilica from Pixabay (License) (Cropped)

Later this week, the Senate in Italy will be deciding how to respond to condemnation for the lack of legal recognition of same-sex couples (BBC, 2016). The government of Matteo Renzi, Prime Minister and leader of the Partito Democratico, has put legislation on same-sex unions before the Senate to introduce civil partnerships after criticism from the European Court of Human Rights.

Italy was ruled by the ECHR in the summer as being in breach of human rights by not allowing same-sex unions (Kirchgaessner, 2015). That ruling seems to have inspired fresh hope of progress, with campaigners out in numbers over the weekend to call for a change in the law (Kirchgaessner, 2016).

The road to change in Italy, though, is still filled with obstacles. There are deeply ingrained attitudes to overcome (Scammell, 2016) and the power of the Catholic Church is behind the conservative opposition (The Guardian, 2016).

However, the public campaigns for same-sex unions show that there is a possibility of change. The successes of other civil rights campaigns around the world also highlight what can be accomplished. Big steps forward where made last year, on a number of fronts - even when just considering the fight for LGBT rights.

In the US there were reassuring steps, with a Supreme Court ruling establishing that equal marriage was a constitutional right (Roberts & Siddiqui, 2015). Barack Obama celebrated the decision as making the 'union a little more perfect', marking a rare win for the Democrat President in an extremely partisan time in the White House (Jacobs, 2015).

Meanwhile Ireland became the first country in the world to secure the passage of equal marriage by a popular referendum, with an emphatic 62% voting in favour (The Irish Times, 2015). That vote had the additional significance of leaving Italy as the last Western country to not have some form of civic union for same-sex couples (Duncan, 2016).

Later this week in the UK, the Commons will be considering an amendment to the Civil Partnerships Bill that aims to extend civil unions - originally intended as a same-sex alternative to marriage - to opposite-sex couples (Bowcott, 2016).

Though it may seem like a sideshow, at a time when these matters are being debated, it would be a positive and signal step to make all forms of civil union equal, whether marriage or partnership, regardless of gender pairing. For those who are socially excluded, the aim is to be treated as equals.

A chance to take some steps towards that parity approaches in Italy. Yet the outcome of the Senate vote is far from certain. Italy has had a difficult history with liberalising reforms. Campaigns have long been left to parties on the fringe, such as the Radicals, who have campaigned for everything from the separation of church and state to the rights to divorces and abortions (Moliterno, 2000).

And over everything, the Catholic Church casts a long shadow (The Guardian, 2016). The Pope, weighing in on the upcoming vote, declared that god wanted only one type of family union, procreative and insoluble, and no other.

It can be demotivating as a progressive to have a year filled with conservatism, populist nationalism and neoliberal austerity, with discrimination still protected by powerful institutions. To discover in the news that, in the middle of a humanitarian crisis, those most in need of help face segregation - in the most recent case, refugees being forced to wear red wristbands as distinctive markers used to distinguish them (Taylor & Johnston, 2016).

But 2015 also served as a reminder of how much that is positive might be achieved, even under a conservative stranglehold. Progressives must draw upon these accomplishments for strength as they move forward, in order to, as Yanis Varoufakis argues (Varoufakis & Pisarello, 2016), maintain the optimism needed in the continued struggle against discrimination and the hegemony that protects it.

Crisis in the neoliberal economic system may not be a guaranteed springboard for a radical new economy, but it does signal the need to prepare a coherent alternative

With the world economy in seemingly constant crisis, progressives need to have a credible alternative ready. Photograph: Euro Bank Notes from Pixabay (License) (Cropped)

Yesterday brought some gloomy economic news. The global economy is struggling, markets everywhere are slumping, and to all intents and purposes the great recession appears to be heading on into its eighth year (BBC, 2016). Not even a new low for unemployment in the UK could bring much cheer, as wages continue to stagnate (BBC, 2016{2}).

With 20% of Europe's young people unemployed (European Parliament, 2016) - as many as 50% in some cases and trapped by nearly a decade of slim to no opportunities - and with austerity cutting away at social security (Gaffney, 2013; Nielsen, 2014), it wouldn't be surprising for some on the Left to at least take in hope in the idea that the lack of return for all of the precariousness and the sacrifices might be a crisis in the making for the neoliberal order.

And yet, as Yanis Varoufakis has warned, a crisis is not so easily exploited by progressives (Varoufakis, 2015). In fact, they often play out at the expense of the Left. With the aims of the Left so often dependent upon the building of a social institutions - something taking time and public support - progressives can find themselves in the unenviable position of defending the establishment in the face more extreme populist positions.

So, building an alternative economy is not going to be accomplished overnight. Neoliberalism certainly wasn't (Ridley, 2016). It took decades, around a half century, of work and preparation for the neoliberal theorists to promote their cause to the mainstream.

That doesn't mean, however, that some of the work has not already been done. For the Left, the construction a new path has been bubbling away since at least the beginning of the great recession - almost a decade ago - and breakthroughs have been made.

In the past year, Syriza won two elections and a referendum as an opponent of the prevailing system (Mason & Skarlatos, 2015) - and even as they have been strangled and forced to concede endless ground their leader Alexis Tsipras continues to argue for the room to build something more inclusive and sustainable (Tsipras, 2016). Yanis Varoufakis, now the former Finance Minister of Greece, has become a figurehead for the European Left for the way in which he stood against the austerian establishment.

In Spain, the 15M Indignados movement has taken just two years to launch the Podemos party and become a real presence of the national scene (Jones, 2015). In the last year it has won control of some major cities with its municipalist ideas, becoming an inspiration for movements across Europe (Gutierrez Gonzalez, 2016).

Also of note is that in Utrecht (Perry, 2015), in the Netherlands, and in Finland (Unkuri, 2015), trials are being rolled out to test the merits of the Basic Income. An idea that could erase poverty and bring some salve to those suffering caused by the precariousness of the times, the Basic Income is an important idea whose time has come.

There has also, of course, been the rise of Jeremy Corbyn and Momentum within the Labour Party (Mason, 2015). Corbyn is faced with plenty of struggles with his own parliamentarians and with the mainstream media. Yet his ideas have led to a huge upsurge of engagement with the Labour Party that represents - regardless of whether it is enough to win a national majority - the emergence of a significant voter base for radical democrats in the UK.

As elsewhere in the world, much like how Spain's Podemos was born from the Indignados, this base of voters has been brewing and coalescing in the UK since the Occupy movement launched its protests around the world in 2011. Occupy saw individuals and groups coming together, organising themselves, in a massive show of civil disobedience.

All of these elements carry with them ideas and theories about how the world might alternatively be constructed. Yet so far they have been, not to sound disparaging, just protests or singular parties, isolated in the mainstream.

The next step is overdue. A part of it is coming from Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party, in a move that seems like something New Labour's masters of spin should have come up with a decade ago. Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell is taking his rockstar economists, assembled in October as an anti-austerity economics advisory body, on the road to debate and promote the building of a new economy.

Another part will come from in the not too far future with the launch of Varoufakis' movement for rebuilding democracy in Europe in February (Wingard, 2016). As he has been keen to stress, the next step has to include the building of a broad movement, bringing together many ideas, across the whole of Europe (Varoufakis, 2016; Varoufakis & Sakalis, 2015) - on the same scale as globalised neoliberalism also functions.

To topple a broken and unequal system in a time of crisis may not be more than a romantic Left-wing notion. But the stumbling of neoliberalism, from crisis to crisis, makes it essential to put together the various threads of thought into a coherent proposal that is ready to step up when neoliberal thinking finally runs of credibility.

From the basic income to the reduction of full time hours, a living wage to a living rent, municipalism to community energy, there are many elements that could fit together and complement each other. The job ahead is to construct that bigger picture and start showing it to the world.