They could soon be betting on water supplies

Financial markets on which speculators can bet on the cost of clean water supplies are getting closer, STEVE DRURY writes.

Food policy commentator Frederick Kaufman has called on financial market regulators to stop the betting on water supplies before it starts, in an article in the renowned scientific weekly Nature.

“Currently, no-one is trading water futures, but it won’t take much to spark the market into life”, Kaufman warned. After the recent drought in the USA,

London rail workers call for action on Kazakhstan oilfield repression

London underground rail workers have resolved to join the international campaign to support oil workers against state repression in Kazakhstan.

On Thursday 1 November, the Central Line West branch of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) decided to join the protest started by Russian and Kazakh trade unionists.

The campaign was launched after the massacre of workers by police on 16 December last year in Zhanaozen, which brought an end to a wave of strikes