Workers Power

Disability cuts kill

Tim Nailsea

By Tim Nailsea In her Spring Statement on Wednesday 26 March, Chancellor Rachael Reeves announced a round of vicious cuts to disability benefits. The government is altering the points system for PIP to make it harder for people to claim the benefit. Claimants will have to display ‘greater difficulty’ in completing tasks, with a requirement…

Syria: Only workers and democratic forces can halt sectarian pogroms

Jeremy Dewar

By Jeremy Dewar Three months after the fall of Assad, the new Syrian regime, led by interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), is facing its stiffest test: a test that goes to the core of the HTS’ sectarian and anti-democratic politics. While part of the threat originates from former forces of the…
Free Mahmoud Khalil, defend free speech on Palestine!

Workers Power

A Columbia University SAW-UAW writes on the repression of the Palestine solidarity movement
London school strikes: All out from 27 February!

Jeremy Dewar

By Jeremy Dewar The National Education Union is coordinating strikes across 10 schools in four London boroughs. Teachers are on the picket lines on 27 February and 5, 11, 12 and 13 March, while some will take off days in between as well. Strikers from all the schools will rally together outside the Department for…

WORK & TRADE UNIONS

London school strikes: All out from 27 February!

Jeremy Dewar

By Jeremy Dewar The National Education Union is coordinating strikes across 10 schools in four London boroughs. Teachers are on the picket lines on 27 February and 5, 11, 12 and 13 March, while some will take off days in between as well. Strikers from all the schools will rally together outside the Department for…
Angela Rayner’s staff ballot for action

PCS Activists

By a PCS activist A ballot for industrial action has opened at the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Staff at Angela Rayner’s department are fighting closures, mandated attendance and restricted promotion opportunities. Birmingham, Newcastle, Truro, Exeter, Sheffield and Warrington offices will shut, with no guarantee that others are safe in the longer term. …
Trade Unions: Crisis of leadership in the rank and file

Tim Nailsea

By Tim Nailsea The trade union movement in Britain saw something of a strike wave in 2022-23, in response to the double-digit inflation and the cost-of-living crisis. Yet in the following years the tide has definitely ebbed. In December 2022, 830,000 working days were lost due to strike action; by December 2024, they had dropped…

LABOUR PARTY

Labour blames welfare claimants for unemployment

Rose Tedeschi

By Rose Tedeschi Liz Kendall says that young Universal Credit claimants are ‘taking the mickey’ by choosing not to work. Never mind that Universal Credit pays a standard rate of only £393.45 a month, less than a person could make in a week on a full-time minimum wage job. Never mind that millions of jobs…
When out of ideas, attack the disabled

KD Tait

The markets demand public spending cuts, and Rachel Reeves is happy to oblige.
Labour faces budget backlash as bosses plead poverty

George Banks

The bosses are threatening to pay for takes hikes by cutting jobs and hours.

REVOLUTIONARY STRATEGY

Review | SWP’s antifascism tails liberals and bureaucrats

Jeremy Dewar

The SWP’s idea of building a movement is to limit its demands to what is acceptable to the existing leadership
The ACR’s Ecosocialist Manifesto: a Trotskyist critique

Jeremy Dewar

A review of Ecosocialist Revolution: A Manifesto, Anti*Capitalist Resistance, July 2024.
Review | China: Rise, Repression, Resistance

Peter Main

A review of Adrian Budd’s new book on China

FIFTH INTERNATIONAL ISSUE 26

INTERNATIONAL

Free Mahmoud Khalil, defend free speech on Palestine!

Workers Power

A Columbia University SAW-UAW writes on the repression of the Palestine solidarity movement
No Zionist ‘peace’ in Gaza

Dave Stockton

By Dave Stockton As we go to press, stage one of the Gaza ceasefire is due to end on 1 March. However, Netanyahu’s war cabinet has been repeatedly delayed negotiations on stage two, which should have started on 4 February. The Israeli prime minister has also held back the release of Palestinian detainees, many held…
Congo bleeds in scramble for rare earths

Jeremy Dewar

By Jeremy Dewar In less than three weeks the Rwandan-backed M23 militia swept through the mineral-rich provinces of North and South Kivu, in eastern Congo, leaving a trail of destruction. Over half a million people have been forced to flee in terror, many not for the first time. In late January, the M23 ‘rebels’ surrounded…
German Elections: strong right turn but growth for Left Party

Martin Suchanek

By Martin Suchanek, ArbeiterInnenmacht, Berlin The Christian Democrat leader Friedrich Merz will almost certainly be the next Chancellor of Germany, probably in a ‘grand coalition’ with the Social Democrats (SPD). With a high turnout (83%), the CDU/CSU conservatives came top with 28.5% of the vote, up 4.2% since 2021. They will have 208 members in…
Sweden: Support the dockers’ arms blockade!

Workers Power

ArbetarmaktSwedish section of the League for the Fifth International The following statement was published by our comrades and sent to the union. On Tuesday 4 February, the dockers’ union launched a six-day blockade of all types of weaponry for Israel. This is really exemplary – exactly the kind of action that the workers’ movement needs!…

REVIEWS & CULTURE

Review | SWP’s antifascism tails liberals and bureaucrats

Jeremy Dewar

The SWP’s idea of building a movement is to limit its demands to what is acceptable to the existing leadership
The ACR’s Ecosocialist Manifesto: a Trotskyist critique

Jeremy Dewar

A review of Ecosocialist Revolution: A Manifesto, Anti*Capitalist Resistance, July 2024.
Review | Hard Graft

Agnes Finnie

An exhibition exploring the impact of work on the human body, particularly women and the marginalised.

BOOKS & PAMPHLETS

Palestine: A Marxist Introduction charts the struggles of the Palestinians against colonial oppression, invasive settlement, mass expulsion and war.

Find out more about Palestine: A Marxist Introduction

The 1984–5 miners’ strike was the decisive class battle of postwar Britain. This pamphlet analyses the origins of the dispute, Thatcher’s strategy, and why the miners lost.

Find out more about the 1984 Great Miners’ Strike

The need to chart a way out of capitalist climate breakdown and war has never been more urgent. Our international programme is a contribution to this strategic debate.

Find out more about A Manifesto for Socialist Revolution

FREE PALESTINE

No Zionist ‘peace’ in Gaza

Dave Stockton

By Dave Stockton As we go to press, stage one of the Gaza ceasefire is due to end on 1 March. However, Netanyahu’s war cabinet has been repeatedly delayed negotiations on stage two, which should have started on 4 February. The Israeli prime minister has also held back the release of Palestinian detainees, many held…
Sweden: Support the dockers’ arms blockade!

Workers Power

ArbetarmaktSwedish section of the League for the Fifth International The following statement was published by our comrades and sent to the union. On Tuesday 4 February, the dockers’ union launched a six-day blockade of all types of weaponry for Israel. This is really exemplary – exactly the kind of action that the workers’ movement needs!…
Anti-Zionist Jews get organised

Alex Rutherford

Israel’s genocidal assault is prompting a generation of young Jewish people to play a leading role in Palestine solidarity campaigning.

CLIMATE & ENVIRONMENT

COP29: World leaders abandon efforts to address climate change

Rebecca Anderson

The COP29 conference demonstrated the total inability of capitalism to solve the climate crisis.
Spain: floods unleash storm of protest

Frieda Koppler

Catastrophic flooding in southern Spain has provoked anger among residents who say the government’s inaction made the crisis worse.
Review | We Only Want the Earth

Geilis Duncan

A review of the rs21 pamphlet on climate change

WOMEN & LGBT+

The femicide pandemic

Millie Collins

By Millie Collins In 2023, every 10 minutes, a woman or girl was intentionally killed by a partner or family member. A report recently released from the UN showed that gender-related killings, or femicide as it is now commonly known, is on the rise around the world. While there has been some public outcry, this…
Women face a rising tide of reaction

Rebecca Anderson

By Rebecca Anderson Trump’s second term has brought into sharp focus the fact that progressive changes that seemed irreversible can be reversed, sometimes with the stroke of a Sharpie marker pen. The accumulation of rights for women and other oppressed groups is always presented as a slow but steady march from the vote to equal…
Child sexual exploitation scandal

Millie Collins

Racist myth-making obscures real causes of violence against women and girls.

RACE & MIGRATION

Labour’s attacks on migrants won’t stop Reform

George Banks

By George Banks Fearing the electoral threat posed by Reform, Labour has launched a fresh assault on migrants. Part of this campaign is a disturbing ad blitz, boasting of the highest deportation levels seen in five years. These advertisements are styled in Reform UK’s distinctive turquoise, with Labour’s branding conspicuously absent. They have also launched…
Child sexual exploitation scandal

Millie Collins

Racist myth-making obscures real causes of violence against women and girls.
Chris Kaba’s killer walks free

Jeremy Dewar

The acquittal of Martyn Blake has been seized on by police chiefs to demand immunity for killings

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