Phones for Iraq: follow-up

Inspired by this post on Harry's Place a couple of weeks ago, I wandered down to the TUC headquarters on Great Russell Street this lunchtime to hand in my old mobile phone. The TUC are scouting for old phones to send to Iraq - where as you can imagine, mobiles are very expensive and hard to come by at the moment - to be used by the leaders of local trade unions.

The TUC says:

Unions representing workers in Iraq and Iraqi Kurdistan face
incredible challenges in defending working people and rebuilding democracy. One of their requests for solidarity from British trade unionists is the provision of mobile phones - crucial for any union organiser these days, but especially in Iraq where travel can be dangerous and landlines aren't sufficiently reliable or widespread.

Read the full press release here.

People are being encouraged to send in their phones by post, but given that my office is only a short bus ride away, and well, I didn't want to splash out on postage, I decided to hand mine over in person. I have to say, I'm a bit worried that there may not be as many people sending in their mobiles as there could be, as no one at the front desk had any idea about the campaign. A few phone calls settled the isue, and my beloved blue Nokia was handed over to the appropriate person - but yes, all this to say that if any of you have any spare mobile handsets (and chargers) lying about, it only takes two minutes to hand them over to the TUC. It doesn't get much easier to make a direct contribution toward rebuilding some stability in Iraq and promoting solidarity among the country's different religious and ethnic groups.

And, for those of you of the female persuasion who live or work in central London, there's the added bonus of getting to deal with the rather cute floppy-haired guy manning the reception at Congress House. :)