Declaration of the Tenth Congress of the League for the Fifth International Since 2008, global capitalism has entered a new period of historic crisis, characterised by weak recovery, stagnation and renewed recession. As well as economic, this has had political, environmental and ideological consequences, against which both the political and trade union organisations of the […]
The second instalment in our serialisation of a socialist history of the Labour Party. Read the first instalment: Labour’s early years: 1900-1914 By Dave Stockton The years of the First World War of 1914-18 were critical ones for the British labour movement. Its political party, its trade unions and the role they play in British life […]
By Jeremy Dewar Labour should demand the permanent nationalisation of Tata’s UK operation. Steelworkers have paid for these works many times over with their labour, so no compensation is necessary. John McDonnell is right: Labour’s previous nationalisation model is flawed. Instead of a capitalist management dictating to and exploiting the workforce, we propose workers’ control […]
By Jeremy Dewar At a board meeting in Mumbai, India, Tata executives voted through a plan to sell off all its UK plants or, failing that, to shut them down. Some 15,000 workers and their families face the prospect of devastating job losses, with another 25,000 workers in the supply chain at severe risk. The […]
By Dave Stockton Villains stashing their ill gotten gains on Caribbean treasure islands is not new “April is the cruellest month,” goes the poem. Well it certainly started cruelly for David Cameron. The publication of 11.5 million records (the “Panama Papers”) of Mossack Fonseca, an offshore law firm involved in arranging tax havens for wealthy […]
By Jeremy Dewar The biggest and most militant teachers’ union, NUT, has voted for a strike ballot against the threat to turn all 15,000 state-maintained schools into academies. The threat is lodged at the heart of the Tory government’s Educational Excellence Everywhere White Paper. Two other teaching unions, NASUWT and ATL, have also voted to […]
By Dara O Cogaidhin Junior doctors across England launched a fresh wave of strike action on 6-7 April in their long-running dispute with Tory Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt. This 48-hour strike was the fourth walkout since industrial action began. The first strike, called by the British Medical Association (BMA) in January, came as Hunt threatened […]
Instead of accommodating the right, we should organise the left It makes a change to have a Labour leadership that attacks the Tories rather than concedes to them. Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell have succeeded in knocking the Tories off their perch several times recently. Their counterattack against the Budget resulted in George Osborne’s humiliating […]
Take to the streets, Unite the strikes, Vote Labour David Cameron and George Osborne are facing a perfect storm. And much of it comes from their colleagues in the Tory Party and the right wing press. Firstly, the Britain Stronger in Europe campaign is in deep trouble, with the anti-European right, both Tory and UKIP, […]
The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) has announced the closure of 86 courts and tribunals across England and Wales. These closures threaten people’s access to justice in towns and rural areas, and the jobs of thousands of workers. The civil service trade union PCS is opposing the closures, alongside MPs, solicitors’ firms, magistrates and the Citizens […]
By Jeremy Dewar TORY CHANCELLOR George Osborne has told the BBC that, “storm clouds are clearly gathering in the world economy and that has a consequence for lots of countries including Britain”. At the same time, the Office of National Statistics revealed that the UK economy is 1 per cent smaller than previously calculated: a […]
The revolutionary legacy of Clara Zetkin By Joy Macready CAPITALISM from its earliest years gave birth to the modern women’s question. Women, particularly the women of the poorest classes, played a major role in its model revolution – in France in 1789. But the Rights of Man and Citizen it proclaimed turned out to be […]
The first installment in our serialisation of a socialist history of the Labour Party. Read the second instalment: Labour recruits for carnage in WW1 By Dave Stockton Keir Hardie speaking at a Women’s Suffrage demonstration in Trafalgar Square Foundation of the Labour Party, Memorial Hall, Farringdon Street, London, February 1906 IN FEBRUARY 1900, the Labour Representation […]
The Irish general election result has delivered a huge blow to the outgoing Fine Gael-Labour coalition government. Although Fine Gael will still be marginally the largest party, despite losing around a third of their seats, the plunge in the Labour vote from 19 to just below 7 per cent rules out a repeat coalition. […]
THE nationalist left outside the SNP are campaigning for another independence referendum as soon as possible, but the SNP has said it will not call another one unless it is 100 per cent sure of winning. However, Nicola Sturgeon has indicated that if Britain votes to leave the European Union in the June referendum and […]
By Sandy McBurney ALL commentators are agreed that the governing party, the Scottish National Party (SNP), is going to win the 2016 Scottish parliamentary elections. They are on 50 per cent plus in the opinion polls. Their membership stands at 115,000, which is the equivalent of over a million members on a British scale. This […]
DAVID CAMERON returned from the European Summit in Brussels in February with a deal he claimed would ensure Britain’s continued membership of the European Union. He speedily announced a date for the referendum on 23 June. The wording of the referendum is: “Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?” It contains […]
It’s time Labour showed leadership and solidarity We have the chance to save our NHS and inflict a serious defeat on the Tories THE NHS is in crisis. Everyone knows that. The Coalition and Tory claims to have ring-fenced health spending was and is a cruel deception. In fact funding has been frozen in real […]
No to racism & xenophobia Defend workers’ rights Vote to ‘Remain in the EU’ ‘National independence’ is a retreat from class unity and internationalism THEY’RE OFF. The EU referendum and May elections have triggered a storm of propaganda that will fill the tabloids and news bulletins with an unparalleled torrent of racist lies and distortions, as the […]
The concept of cooperatives as an alternative to both private and state ownership has resurfaced courtesy of a recent speech by Labour’s shadow chancellor John McDonnell. This article sets out the Marxist critique of the prospects of cooperatives to exist within and act as a focus to overcome a capitalist market economy. In the 19th […]
By Dave Stockton John McDonnell’s speech at the Cooperative Ways Forward Conference in Manchester on 21 January opened his campaign for what he calls “the new economics” – involving a clear break from the austerity-lite policies pursued by Labour under Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband. This was John’s opening gambit in a welcome – and […]
By KD Tait SINCE Jeremy Corbyn’s landslide election as leader of the Labour Party, the grassroots network Momentum has formed 90 local groups to coordinate the activities of Labour Party members and supporters who want to champion the policies Jeremy was elected on and spearhead resistance to the Tories. Local groups have rallied a cross-section […]
Saturday saw more than one thousand council tenants and activists march against the Housing Bill and the demolition of the Aylesbury estate in Southwark. We took our protest to Downing Street, as the Bill is debated in the House of Lords. Gathering outside the Imperial War Museum in Kennington, the rally heard speeches from local […]
THE referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union, EU, is now likely to take place no later than the Autumn. David Cameron was forced to promise a referendum in his election manifesto under pressure from UKIP. Now he wants to get it out of the way as quickly as possible because he knows a […]
By KD Tait Labour MP Sadiq Khan has secured a six point lead over Tory rival Zac Goldsmith in the battle to seize control of City Hall after eight years of Tory misrule. The campaign is a chance to build on the 2015 General Election gains and mobilise the enthusiasm generated by Jeremy Corbyn’s new […]
By Joy Macready Labour Right’s “misogyny” accusations against Corbyn are a study in hypocrisy THE Labour party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) took the correct action in suspending Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk’s party membership after revelations he sent lewd text messages to a 17-year old woman. He used his position of power to make sexual advances […]
A motion committing Labour branches to opposing local government budget cuts
£11.3 billion will be cut from total central government grants to councils by 2016 From 2010-2015 council budgets were cut by 40 per cent. In 2015 George Osborne announced a further 30 per cent cut 75 per cent of local government workers are women, meaning cuts will affect those already discriminated against in the job […]
Key extracts from the 17 December letter from Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnell and Jon Trickett to Labour council leaders To the Leaders of Labour Councils Dear Colleague, We are writing to you as Leader of the Party, Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and Shadow Chancellor. Today the government has announced the […]
A local government worker responds to Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell’s recent letter setting out their policy in relation to Labour councils implementing Tory austerity OVER the coming month, councils across the UK will be setting budgets for the coming year. They will include savage cuts, with the most vulnerable (women, children, the elderly and […]