Archive for November 2014
3 November 2014
Representatives of South East Kent TUC stood on picket lines today alongside striking Unite range wardens, writes Seth Cruse, president South East Kent Trade Union Council.
3 November 2014
Defend firefighters' right to strike!
News from FBU pickets during the four-day strike; and a victimisation report from Bucks
3 November 2014
Sheffield Green workers start indefinite strike
Sheffield recycling workers, GMB members, have begun an indefinite strike
4 November 2014
Victory to St Mungo's strikers
Update 5.11.14: The 10-day strike has been called off following talks. Report to follow.
5 November 2014
Get even: The charity Oxfam reports that the number of billionaires doubled between 2009 and 2014 - the 'Great Recession' - a period characterised by savage capitalist austerity involving mass welfare cuts and falling real incomes
5 November 2014
Repel the Tories' attacks on our democratic rights
In early October the Tories set themselves against the Human Rights Act. Leading Tory ministers Cameron, May and Grayling all contributed speeches and newspaper interviews reheating Daily Mail headlines
5 November 2014
Pressure mounts on zero-hour contracts
Sports Direct, notorious for its widespread use of zero-hour employment contracts, has been forced to make clear in job adverts what its workers legal rights are
5 November 2014
Ebola virus crisis - no profit, no vaccine
In November 2010 the medical journal The Lancet ran a seminar on Ebola saying: "Previously, the usefulness of an Ebola virus vaccine was disputed, because of the disease's rarity, little interest by industry, and the potential cost"
5 November 2014
Burkina Faso: Mass uprising ousts dictator
After 27 years in power, Blaise Compaoré was planning to die in his presidential chair. But recent events have changed everything in Burkina Faso, one of the world's poorest countries
5 November 2014
Portsmouth jihadis: austerity and alienation to blame
Nineteen year old Mehdi Hassan has become the latest young Muslim from Portsmouth to be killed in Syria
5 November 2014
The article "Private companies hold NHS to ransom" (Socialist 830) showed how giant software companies can exploit their near monopoly position
5 November 2014
Library workers in Greenwich, south London, have scored a fantastic victory
5 November 2014
Police staff ballot for decent pay
Police staff in the Unison, Unite and GMB unions are being balloted for strike action to win a 3% pay increase
5 November 2014
London buses: London bus drivers in the Unite union have voted in a consultative ballot by 96% in favour of taking industrial action over sector-wide pay
5 November 2014
Every penny counts: donate to Socialism 2014
Placards, leaflets, book: Just some of the resources donations can help pay for
Please make a donation to the Socialism 2014 appeal to support the work of the Socialist Party and the Committee for a Workers' International
5 November 2014
Bitterne walk-in centre in Southampton faces closure. The health centre is the only facility in the east of the city for urgent care and minor injuries
5 November 2014
Socialist Students campaign reports
Socialist Students is a campaigning organisation on campuses across the country supported by the Socialist Party
5 November 2014
Agree with Russell Brand's call for revolution? Join the Socialist Party!
Russell Brand's mistrust of out-of-touch politicians is shared by millions
5 November 2014
All main parties in crisis: where will the opposition go?
It's not just Russell Brand attacking the political and economic elite this time, but also wealthy Hollywood actress and former Labour supporter, Emma Thompson. These celebrities have captured the mood of many who are disillusioned with the main parties
5 November 2014
Benny Adams (left)
Benny Adams died after a long illness on 6 October, aged 65. Benny was active in Militant, the Socialist Party's forerunner, in Northern Ireland from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s
5 November 2014
Carlisle: Stop the car parking tax
Carlisle's "Stop the Parking Tax" campaign, in which Socialist Party members play a leading role, recently held a public meeting of 150 residents
5 November 2014
The Con-Dems' Machiavellian cuts
Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), a replacement for Incapacity Benefit, was introduced in 2008 for paying benefits to those too ill to work or with a disability
5 November 2014
Ireland: We won't pay the water tax!
The growing movement against water tax and austerity: 11 October 2014 saw the opening of a whole new chapter in the struggle of the working class in Ireland, writes Kevin McLoughlin, Socialist Party (CWI Ireland)
5 November 2014
Cold, cruel cuts: Fight the Con-Dem attacks
Disabled people and their families protest in central London against government spending cuts, photo Paul Mattsson
The government onslaught of attacks on the sick, disabled and terminally ill looks set to increase rapidly. Tory Chancellor George Osborne wants to savagely cut Employment and Support Allowance. Some of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable people could see their income slashed by £30 a week
5 November 2014
Back fresh strikes to save the NHS
NHS pay dispute: Dedication doesn't pay the bills
None of the main parties will be satisfied until the NHS is a dried up, ruined husk
6 November 2014
7 November 2014
Crane drivers tell HTC: It's time to pay up!
Hundreds of crane drivers picketed building sites in London and around the country
10 November 2014
Strike achieved management climbdown
Unite convenor Adam Lambert speaks about a victory against draconian attacks
10 November 2014
How Unite beat the library employers
Strikers won a deal that vacant posts will be filled and casual contracts reduced
10 November 2014
Socialism '14: infused with contagious confidence
Over 1,000 workers, trade unionists, anti-cuts activists, young people and others from the 99% hit by austerity spent 48 hours being inspired and, in turn, inspiring others with their commitment and determination to fight back against the misery of capitalism
11 November 2014
Tenants serve 'eviction notice' on richest Tory MP
New Era estate tenants are fighting against plans to hike rents to 'market' levels
12 November 2014
Letter to Radio 4 re Militant and Liverpool
I listened very carefully to the Radio 4 programme on Militant and Liverpool. To a new listener it would appear to be fairly balanced. However, I must take you up on the time given to the Baron (Kinnock)
12 November 2014
What recovery? Thousands more jobs axed
Rolls Royce: The Con-Dems much vaunted economic recovery is a mirage judged by the recently announced large scale job cuts affecting manufacturing and the service sector
12 November 2014
Sheffield recycling: 'We're out until the boss is out'
Sheffield recycling workers went on indefinite strike on 1st November
12 November 2014
Theatre Review: United We Stand
It is the summer of 1972, two years into a Tory government, and building workers take strike action against the 'Lump' - the use of cash-in-hand non-union labour in the building industry, writes Reviewed by Kate Jones, Socialist Party Wales.
12 November 2014
Waltham Forest Labour council made a disgraceful decision yesterday in the face of angry tenants
12 November 2014
Socialist Party member John Reid is standing for the London Transport seat of the RMT union national executive after receiving eight nominations from RMT branches representing 70% of the region's members
12 November 2014
Construction machinery firm JCB is carrying out a consultation with office workers after announcing 150 job cuts through voluntary redundancy and early retirement
12 November 2014
Under capitalism, the only way is down: A study by Oxford University academics has shown that if you were born in the 1980s, you're far more likely to have worse living standards than your parents
12 November 2014
Flawed maths of the bedroom tax
I have been hit twice with the bedroom tax. The first time was last year when I was in a three bedroom place, as I was having my younger kids stay weekends, along with my older son living with me full
12 November 2014
Cuts without end: Millionaire Chancellor George Osborne boasted to a baying audience at Tory party conference in October that he was slashing an extra £25 billion from public spending and a further £12 billion from welfare payments
12 November 2014
Afghanistan war: A legacy of destruction
British combat troops were finally pulled out of Camp Bastion on 27 October
12 November 2014
The St Mungo's strike victory shows we can beat low pay, photo Paul Mattsson
Pay victories celebrated at Socialism 2014: Socialist Seattle city councillor Kshama Sawant brought the house down at Socialism 2014 in London on 8 November.She spoke about her election victory and the successful campaign she led to win a $15 an hour minimum wage in Seattle
12 November 2014
Little charity from high paid care bosses
Low wage Britain: Five million workers in Britain are on low pay. I'm one of them
12 November 2014
Heulwen Davies passed away suddenly on 30 October after suffering a stroke and then a heart attack while out walking, one of her favourite pastimes
12 November 2014
Labour - the singer or the song?
The Con-Dems are the most unpopular government in living memory. Yet Labour's lead limps between 1% and 4%
12 November 2014
'A magical fairyland' of corporate tax avoiders
More shocking revelations about tax avoidance by giant corporations have just been revealed
12 November 2014
Care UK workers to ballot on 2% pay deal
Doncaster Care UK workers are to ballot on an offer after 90 strike days over 10 months
12 November 2014
Exhibition review: Disobedient Objects
Disobedient Objects, photo V&A
This exhibition takes people on a journey through protests around the world and across time through objects, protest art and design
12 November 2014
Leading Scottish trade unionists back TUSC
Speakers at the Scottish TUSC conference, November 2014, photo SPS
Some of the leaders of Scotland's most combative unions were gathered at a significant Scottish Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) conference on 1 November
12 November 2014
Leicester party building school
Our party is not funded in the same way as the mainstream parties - we don't get corporate handouts. We rely on the money we raise through campaigning
12 November 2014
Mid-term elections do not mean shift to right in US
The significant gains made by Republicans in the mid-term elections, in particular taking control of the US Senate, have caused alarm for working class and progressive people across the country
12 November 2014
25 years after the Berlin Wall fell
After the fall of the wall, Berlin 1989
Was capitalist restoration inevitable?: While, for millions, the 1989 opening of the Berlin Wall is celebrated as a great victory for democratic rights, the official celebrations to mark its 25th anniversary have been dominated by anti-socialist propaganda
12 November 2014
Students marching on 19 November 2014 will rightly be asking what the next steps are for our movement today. How can we rebuild an effective movement to challenge the government and end austerity in education?
12 November 2014
Scottish TUSC conference votes to stand candidates in 2015
The Scottish Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) conference has voted unanimously to stand candidates in the 2015 Westminster elections on an uncompromising anti-cuts platform
13 November 2014
14 November 2014
Socialist Party attacked in attempt to undermine student fightback
14 November 2014
Local government unions accept shabby pay deal
Local government unions have accepted the employers' pay proposal
14 November 2014
Campaigning against rail cuts and profiteering
The RMT is fighting to stop massive cuts
17 November 2014
Lincoln protest against Sports Direct's 0-hour contracts
Trade unionists and campaigners marked the opening of a new Sports Direct store in Lincoln on Saturday morning with a protest against zero-hours contracts and low pay
19 November 2014
Poorest robbed: A new report on the effects on households of Con-Dem austerity cuts and income tax reductions found, unsurprisingly, that wealth has shifted further from the poorest to the richest
19 November 2014
Leaked document reveals union busting plan
PCS vice-president John McInally spoke to the Socialist about the government's attacks on the civil servants' union
19 November 2014
Toxic mix in Rochester and Strood byelection
As we go to press, Ukip is widely expected to win the Rochester and Strood parliamentary byelection, overturning a Tory majority of nearly 10,000 polled by Tory MP defector Mark Reckless
19 November 2014
Pay workers a living wage! That is the urgent demand in the fight against the relentless driving down of living standards in Britain's low-wage economy
19 November 2014
Labour councils attack organised workers
Hull rally, public sector strike 10.7.14, photo Hull SP
Hull: A year after determined Hull council trade unions stopped the worst attacks of a Labour-led council on it workforce, the council leadership is now preparing the way for a fresh onslaught
19 November 2014
Fighting for decent working conditions
Zero-hour, minimum wage, and no chairs: The Conservative Party boasts it has 'created new opportunities for youth' and 'got Britain working again'
19 November 2014
Unison members in Welsh FE colleges have delivered a mandate to our union to ballot for strike action over pay
19 November 2014
Raging tenants evict rich landlord
New Era estate campaign
When a 200 strong march of London's New Era estate and their supporters posted a massive eviction notice on management's door, no one believed it would happen five days later
19 November 2014
When the Con-Dems brought in the Bedroom Tax, they told us it was to get rid of 'surplus rooms' in social housing
19 November 2014
Southampton TUSC supporters have been campaigning against the closure of a vital walk-in centre in Bitterne
19 November 2014
A student nurse approached Harrogate Socialist Party's NHS campaign stall on 15 November
19 November 2014
Around 1,200 people attended the Socialist Party's recent discussion and debate event, Socialism 2014
19 November 2014
Owen Jones, photo Senan
Owen Jones, the celebrity, journalist and Labour member, spoke to a packed lecture theatre on 15 November
19 November 2014
Fraudster bankers couldn't give a Forex
Just two years after the exposure of a series of fraudulent actions in the banking sector connected to the fixing of the London Interbank Offered Rate (Libor), five banks have been collectively fined £2 billion by UK and US regulators for rogue traders' successful manipulation of the foreign exchange market
19 November 2014
The beautiful game looking ugly
Yet again the world of football finds itself mired in a corruption scandal. This time it is over the Fifa (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) decision to allow Qatar to host the 2022 World Cup
19 November 2014
Israel/Palestine: Wave of rage answers new repression
The July-August brutal war on Gaza resulted in the slaughter of 2,200 residents. Since then the Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank and annexed East Jerusalem have refused to return to 'normal' life under the occupation
19 November 2014
Unreported Nigeria: Class struggle and inequality
A general strike against fuel price hikes in Nigeria
When Nigeria is mentioned in the British press it is usually to report the horrors of Boko Haram’s latest terrorist attack or the - at least for now - successful battle against Ebola. However, there is another side to Nigeria - the magnificent history of struggle by the working class
19 November 2014
Teacher and health worker take fight to Oxford council
Women hit by Oxfordshire's housing support cuts lobby the Tory council, January 2014
Teacher Stella Collier and health worker James Morbin are standing for TUSC on the Blackbird Leys estate in city and county council by-elections on 27 November
19 November 2014
Workers unite to defend the NHS
NHS workers in England will once again be striking for four hours on Monday 24 November from 7am. This time the action has been stepped up as more health unions - eleven in total - will be taking part
19 November 2014
Solidarity vital to defend trade union rights
Thirty years after the Miners' Strike, the Con-Dems have launched the biggest attack on a trade union since Thatcher set her sights on the NUM
19 November 2014
We can defeat low pay and zero-hours!
Protest 21 November: Fast Food Rights has been causing a stir with country-wide protests
19 November 2014
Building an anti-academies campaign
Lewisham TUSC is supporting the newly established Stop Academies in Lewisham campaign
24 November 2014
24 November 2014
Nurses, cleaners, porters, midwives, therapists, paramedics, scientists, radiographers and other NHS staff have again taken strike action
26 November 2014
Firefighters block fire minister's path
Over 200 firefighters and supporters blockaded the entrance to West Norwood fire-station to prevent the entry of fire service minister Penny Mordaunt
26 November 2014
Anger erupts in Ferguson over acquittal of killer cop
Protests have erupted in many cities in the USA following the Grand Jury decision not to charge white policeman Darren Wilson who shot dead unarmed black youth Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, on 9 August
26 November 2014
Rochester: 'Business as usual' politics falling apart
The Rochester and Strood byelection was an expression of one of the major developments of the post-economic crisis world. The growing anger of the 99% is starting to find expression
26 November 2014
College UCU strikes against imposed new contracts
UCU members at Barnsley College began a two-day strike on 26 November
26 November 2014
photo Paul Mattsson
Scandal of unequal Britain: Many MPs will be looking forward to 2015 - perhaps not to the general election but to the 11% pay rise they'll get if they survive it
26 November 2014
World economy - heading for the junkyard
David Cameron seems to have woken up to the problems facing the world economy when he said "red warning lights are once again flashing on the dashboard"
26 November 2014
Food banks: The Con-Dems austerity cuts have pushed hundreds of thousands into poverty
26 November 2014
The deepening staffing and funding crisis in the National Health Service (NHS) is causing hospital Accident and Emergency departments (A&Es) to be stretched to breaking point
26 November 2014
Council beaten on austerity tax
Cumbria's Labour-Lib Dem council has been forced into a humiliating defeat over part of its austerity budget
26 November 2014
Not everyone is happy about the Netherfield by-election on 4 December...
26 November 2014
Victories against sexism in Leeds
Misogynist comedian Dapper Laughs was recently set to tour the whole UK, performing in Glasgow, London, and among other places, Leeds
26 November 2014
50 supporters of the Fast Food Rights campaign lobbied outside Parliament as those inside were discussing a private members bill to limit the use of zero-hour contracts
26 November 2014
Anger grows over missing Mexican students
Led by the families of the 43 students who disappeared two months ago, thousands of protesters marched through Mexico City on 20 November to demand answers and action from the government
26 November 2014
NHS campaigners must fight all cuts
On the NHS Jarrow March, I spoke to one of the organisers. The march was creating incredible awareness about selling off the NHS. I said we must oppose all cuts...
26 November 2014
This year is the 225th anniversary of the beginning of the French Revolution. It forms the backdrop to one of this year's popular Assassin's Creed series of games
26 November 2014
The People Speak: Democracy is not a spectator sport
Google up The People Speak: Democracy is Not a Spectator Sport and you find a BBC news video...
26 November 2014
Health workers walkout in second NHS pay strike
Midwives in Gateshead, photo E Brunskill
Nurses, cleaners, porters, midwives, occupational therapists, paramedics, scientists, radiographers, admin, catering, security staff and other NHS staff in England took part in a second four-hour strike on Monday 24 November
26 November 2014
UCU pensions: reinstate the action!
On 20 November the UCU lecturers' union suspended the marking boycott started two weeks earlier
26 November 2014
Crane drivers' wage lift: Crane drivers at HTC Plant have won a 14% pay increase following strike action on 7 November
26 November 2014
North-west TUSC conference: "People are looking for an alternative"
Crammed conference maps out plans for next year
26 November 2014
Education: "a hurricane of ill thought initiatives"
In a 2010 election manifesto, the Tories said they'd give many more children the kind of education that was only available to the well off. A more honest manifesto would have said they'd give many more children the kind of education that is best for the market
26 November 2014
Housing crisis! What do socialists say?
The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition stands for rent control and building council housing, photo Waltham Forest TUSC
The housing crisis is hitting everyone in the face. The mainstream press, politicians and economists all feign concern. Not to mention the real concern of those of us actually affected by it!
26 November 2014
Watford and Hatfield Socialist Party members have collected around 900 signatures and £200 of fighting fund. In the last four months we have led campaigns on issues including bus service cuts and Israel's blockade
26 November 2014
Ireland: establishment attacks water tax protests
But movement stronger than ever: On 14 November, an anti-water charges protest took place in Jobstown, Tallaght against Labour Tánaiste (Irish deputy prime minister) Joan Burton. Following this the entire media, government and establishment went into overdrive.
27 November 2014
Care UK: Inspirational struggle for all trade unionists
Protesting outside the London offices of Care UK owners Bridgepoint, photo by Paul Mattsson
After 90 days of strike action since February, Doncaster Care UK Unison members voted to accept the company's pay offer
28 November 2014
Solidarity with US Wal-Mart workers
Today, Friday 28 November, there are 'Black Friday' protests around the United States in support of the $15Now campaign and particularly workers in Wal-Mart who have been staging sit-down strikes
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