November is a crucial month in the fightback against the cuts. Demonstrations and protests by students and electricians will hit the headlines; there will be a large conference, Unite the Resistance, with hundreds of rank and file trade unionists; and everything will be building up for mass strikes on 30 November. And let’s not forget […]

DIRECTORS OF the FTSE 100 – the top 100 British companies – saw their incomes rise by an average of 49 per cent last year, while for the rest of us the average pay rise was less than 2 per cent. Someone’s doing well out of the recession – but it’s not you! The directors have […]

CHANCELLOR GEORGE Osborne famously claimed that, “We’re all in this together.” But when it comes to wealth and living standards, this simply is not true. Price rises are outstripping wages and benefits week by week, month by month. The official index for inflation (CPI) rose to 5.2 per cent a year last month. But even […]

THE UN’S INTERNATIONAL Labour Organisation has produced a report stating that “social upheavals” are on the cards due to growing cuts, unemployment and inequality. Meanwhile Andreas Whittam Smith, writing in The Independent, has declared that countries like Britain are now “ripe for revolution”. The ILO cited a study showing that in 45 out of 119 countries […]

The government, backed up by howls of anger by those on the right, are threatening to strengthen the anti union laws, warns Jeremy Dewar TORY GRANDEE Francis Maude claims Unison’s 78% YES vote “shows there is extremely limited support for the kind of strike action their union leaders want,” basing his argument on the 29% […]

Is the struggle over pensions limited to an economic issue, or is it a political fight, asks Jeremy Dewar

No matter what they try, nothing seems to work… The world leaders have gathered at the G20, and European leaders are having regular summits, but the economy is just getting worse. Peter Main explains why

Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou gives way to a coalition government as the EU leaders attempt to force through more cuts and austerity. But the Greek people are fighting back, writes Martin Suchanek

Since the fall of Mubarak, workers have taken their chance to launch strikes and protests over both political issues and working conditions. There have been strikes of telecoms workers against the management board and demanding the releaase of fellow co-workers, a strike at Egypt’s Misr Cement over wages as well as lawyers locked in a […]

The Egyptian army’s attack on unarmed Coptic demonstrators has not occurred in a vacuum. It takes place in the run-up to parliamentary elections, due to begin on 28 November and end on 10 January; following large protests against the trial of civilians by military courts; and in the midst of controversy around a new “constitutional […]

Violence against Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority, about one-twentieth of its population, is not a new phenomenon. Hosni Mubarak’s regime, and Anwar Sadat’s before it, frequently allowed or enabled “popular” expressions of hostility towards the Copts as a safety-valve for social discontent.

The electricians have a only weeks left until their industry agreement is ripped up, how can the campaign escalate to beat the bosses back? The electricians’ dispute has shown what a well organised rank and file movement can pull off today. From an initial conference in August to weekly protests and now a ballot of […]

Joy Macready, an NUJ member, reports on the continuing struggle at the BBC

MICK DOOLEY, a bricklayer who has been blacklisted and imprisoned for his militant trade union activities on construction sites in the 1990s, has been banned from standing in the building union UCATT’s election for the top post of General Secretary. This outrageous, bureaucratic diktat is an affront to every worker on the sites and every […]

Fifty rank and file union activists, mainly but not exclusively from Unite, gathered in Birmingham on 5 November for the Grass Roots Left’s (GRL) second conference. Held six months after the GRL’s launch in May, it was a much more productive meeting, reaching agreement on a platform and a constitution.

A new anti cuts coalition is being set up in November, it offers a real opportunity for the left, but only if it breaks out of the style of campaigns we have seen before, writes Luke Cooper

The shocking police violence around the eviction of travellers at Dale Farm exposed the racism at the heart of British society, write Natalie Silverstein and Luke Cooper

Despite president Bashar al-Assad’s promises not to shoot protesters, his regime has continued to kill civilians, most recently in Damascus and Homs. The Arab League’s week-long talks to produce a peace plan made his regime hypocritically issue an amnesty for those carrying arms. But the uprising itself remains largely unarmed, while most armed civilians belong […]

The Occupy Lahore Camp started on 22 October at noon in Nasir Bagh park, a regular site for political rallies. More than 500 participated, largely peasant women, factory workers, students and left activists. The camp began with speeches from various participants to show solidarity with international “Occupy” movement, and also bring to the fore the […]

Electricity supply workers took to the streets in Lahore on 1 November to protest at government plans to dissolve the Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO), the privatisation of power distribution companies and the appointment of a private sector Chief Executive in the Islamabad Electric Supply Company (IESCO). Mass demonstrations, marches and rallies organised by the […]

With the publication of the International Atomic Energy Agency report on the Iranian nuclear programme this week, it is no surprise we are seeing images of Israeli soldiers preparing for nuclear attacks. Warfare rhetoric is already in place, political commentators are prepared for their interviews and the question that will be replayed across the media […]