Archive for June 2004

5 June 2004

Firefighters' Wary Of New Deal

FIREFIGHTERS ARE being consulted on a proposed 'deal' recommended by their national executive (NEC), which union leaders hope will end the dispute over last year's pay deal...

5 June 2004

Wanted - young union activists!

WITHIN THE last two years, there has been a big increase in new members of the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) under the age of 27. The union's Left Unity-led Executive has made improving the participation of young members a priority...

5 June 2004

Venezuela: A New Phase In The Revolution

The social and political turmoil that has rocked Venezuela since the election of the radical left-populist former army officer, Hugo Chávez, as President, in 1999, has now entered a new and critical phase...

5 June 2004

Bosses Want Deregulation - Workers Need Organisation

SINCE THE Thatcher era it has been common for Britain's trade union leaders to uphold the European "social market" economy against the American deregulated economy, (abandoning any concept of socialism, even as an ideal, at the same time)...

5 June 2004

Bush's Oil Gamble Slips Up

Iraq/Saudi Arabia: ONE REASON for the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq was to reduce the West's dependency on Saudi Arabian oil. With the world's second largest oil reserves on tap, imperialism viewed Iraq as a more secure fuel energy source then that provided...

5 June 2004

The Socialist - It Is, Are You?

If you are voting socialist on 10 June, if you are a trade unionist, community campaigner, anti-war activist or just incredibly angry at the injustices of this system - you need to read the socialist...

5 June 2004

BNP: a party with no solutions

THE BRITISH National Party (BNP) is out again campaigning for votes. But do they really offer an alternative to the main parties? NAOMI BYRON investigates...

5 June 2004

Education: Labour's failed all the tests

School students, parents and teachers are being failed by New Labour's education policies. ...

5 June 2004

Defend Young Workers' Rights

IN THE past 20 months, nine apprentices, all aged under 23, have died on vocational courses backed by the government...

5 June 2004

Save Our Services

THE CHAIRMAN of South West Oxfordshire NHS primary care trust (PCT), Martin Avis, has lost his job...

12 June 2004

Socialist Party Election Successes

STANDING 48 candidates in 34 council wards on 10 June, the Socialist Party (standing as ‘Socialist Alternative’) received 16,787 votes. In addition, 2,825 people voted for Socialist Party Councillor Ian Page in the London Assembly election...

12 June 2004

Ronald Reagan: A Rabid Cold War Warrior

IF YOU believe the eulogies from Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev, the Pope and Tony Blair, then Ronald Reagan, who died last week, was 'a man of peace, of vision, a freedom fighter who liberated the 'communist' world, and a friend of Britain'...

12 June 2004

Obituary - Rotimi Ewebiyi (1963-2004)

THE COMMITTEE for a Workers' International (CWI) deeply regrets to announce the death, at the age of 41, of Rotimi Ewebiyi, a leader of the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM) in Nigeria and a member of the CWI's International Executive Committee (IEC)...

12 June 2004

New Workers' Party Founded In Brazil

AMIDST ENTHUSIASTIC scenes, upwards of 1,000 workers, young people and representatives from the landless movement, formed a new party - "Party of Socialism and Liberty" (SOL) - in Brasília on 5-6 June...

12 June 2004

Chile's Workers Battle Against Neo-Liberalism

THE CHILEAN capitalists claim that unlike the other Latin American countries they have managed a successful economy...

12 June 2004

100,000 March Against Bush And Berlusconi

"NO BUSH - No war" was the main slogan of the 100,000 strong week-day protest in Rome on 4 June, when US President Bush was coming to visit his fellow warmonger Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi...

12 June 2004

Eyewitness In Iraq

Socialism 2004 will open with a rally on the theme of "The Price of Occupying Iraq: A World in Turmoil".
Amongst the speakers will be Haifa Zangana, an exiled Iraqi novelist and activist, who was jailed and tortured for her political opposition to Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath regime.
She spoke to The Socialist this week.

12 June 2004

Iraq's Sovereignty Sham

THE US presidential election campaign is governing US policy half a world away in Iraq...

12 June 2004

PCS Members Fight Low Pay

THE CONFERENCE of PCS members in the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has voted to strike again over pay in July...

12 June 2004

A Summer Of Discontent?

RAILWORKERS, CIVIL servants, airport workers, local government workers, and even racing stalls handlers are currently threatening action on pay and conditions...

12 June 2004

How We Won Our Tribunal Case

Whipps Cross Hospital: KOLA SHOKUNBI, UNISON shop steward at Whipps Cross hospital in east London and Socialist Party member, has won his appeal against unfair dismissal...

12 June 2004

Socialist Party Election Successes

STANDING 48 candidates in 34 council wards on 10 June, the Socialist Party (standing as ‘Socialist Alternative’) received 16,787 votes. In addition, 2,825 people voted for Socialist Party Councillor Ian Page in the London Assembly election...

12 June 2004

NUT general secretary election candidate says 'Stop The Pensions Robbery'

ON 7 June the ballot to elect the next general secretary of the National Union of Teachers (NUT) opened. Martin Powell-Davies, secretary of Lewisham NUT is challenging in the election from outside the union establishment...

12 June 2004

'Pay Us A Living Wage'

WAR IN Iraq, privatisation, cuts in public services - these are issues that ordinary people wanted to punish Blair for in the elections. But workers' anger in the workplace is also erupting over low pay, attacks on pensions and conditions, and...

19 June 2004

Venezuela: A Decisive Turn In The Crisis

IN A surprise announcement, the radical left-populist Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, has accepted the decision of the National Electoral Commission (CNE) and will face a recall referendum...

19 June 2004

General Strike Stops Nigeria But Union Leaders Have No Answers

FOR THREE days, 9-11 June, Nigeria came to an almost complete halt in the fourth general strike in four years as workers and poor once again moved into action...

19 June 2004

Kurdish people's struggle: No Trust In Imperialist Powers

SINCE THE war on Iraq, the Kurds have stood out in stark contrast to the rest of the Middle East. They welcomed the war, fought for the US, and celebrated the occupation as liberation. Their leaders even offered Kurdish fighters to help put...

19 June 2004

Iraq: A Transition To Discontent?

ONE REASON for Labour getting 'a good kicking' in the 10 June elections was opposition to Blair's war and occupation of Iraq...

19 June 2004

Political Fund Up For Debate at UNISON conference

The big debates this year will be at the local government conference which meets before the main conference of the union...

19 June 2004

PCS Executive Passes First-Year Test

THE 2004 conference of the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) was a test of the first year of the Left Unity-led national executive (NEC) by delegates and union activists from across the country...

19 June 2004

Hands Off Our Pensions!

THIS SATURDAY, 19 June, thousands of workers and pensioners will join a TUC-sponsored demonstration in protest at the great pensions robbery being carried out by money-grubbing private companies and their accomplices in government...

19 June 2004

How to Combat the Threat of the Far Right

Stoke-on-Trent election report: Stoke-on-Trent contradicted the national picture of major losses suffered by New Labour in the local elections...

19 June 2004

Ireland: Victory For Socialist Party In Local Elections

THE SOCIALIST Party in Ireland, a leading force in the anti-Bin Tax campaign last year, has made excellent gains in the local elections in Ireland and won four councillors, doubling its representation...

19 June 2004

European elections: 'Kicked In The Ballot Box'

WHEN TONY Blair arrives at yet another European summit this week he'll be able to share the burden of electoral defeat with the other heads of state around the table...

19 June 2004

A Shadow Over Blair

Elections 2004: : A "GOOD kicking", a "bloody nose", a "slap in the face" - all the media descriptions of New Labour's disastrous election results had some reference to being beaten up. ...

19 June 2004

European and local elections 2004: Blair Takes A Battering

MOST PEOPLE who went out to vote last week, mainly to punish Blair and New Labour, had no illusions that the outcome of the elections would improve their lives...

26 June 2004

Unite Campaign In Australia Wins Major Victory Against Low Pay

THE SOCIALIST Party-initiated Unite campaign and workers at the massive US multi-billion dollar Borders Books company have won a massive victory!...

26 June 2004

Iraq: Imperialism's Plans Going Up In Smoke

THIS WEEK will see a fresh propaganda deluge from Bush and Blair (and probably more guerrilla attacks), as, on paper, the US-dominated occupying powers hand "sovereignty" back to the Iraqi "people" on 30 June...

26 June 2004

Blair's War on Workers' Rights

WHY ARE so many angry workers telling their trade unions to cut their links with New Labour? Well, look no further than Tony Blair's comments on workers' rights and the proposed European Union (EU) constitution...

26 June 2004

European Union: Bosses' Club Agrees A Constitution

"LIKE BARGAINING in a bazaar" was how the new Spanish prime minister, Zapatero, referred to the recent European Union (EU) summit to agree a new EU constitution...

26 June 2004

Firefighters' Bitter Pay Battle

FIREFIGHTER'S PATIENCE with their employers and the government they represent finally ran out last week. The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) reconvened conference was dominated by their increasingly bitter dispute over pay with their employers...

26 June 2004

UNISON local government conference: From Drama To Farce

AT THE end of a day of high drama on 21 June, UNISON's Local Government conference descended into farce when the president refused to take a vote on two emergency motions rejecting the pay offer and simply closed conference!...

26 June 2004

Respect And The June Elections

RESPECT - THE Unity Coalition was formed by George Galloway MP and the Socialist Workers' Party (SWP) at the beginning of the year. It stood in elections for the first time on 10 June...

26 June 2004

Kilroy Was Here, Then There. Where Next?

ROBERT KILROY Silk, former tribune of the Kirkby working class, and the octogenarian soap star Joan Collins, now threaten to deliver a hammer blow to Britain's membership of the European Union...

26 June 2004

Encouraging Result for Martin Powell-Davies

NUT Elections: SOCIALIST PARTY member Martin Powell-Davies received 6,482 first-preference votes in the National Union of Teachers’ general secretary election...

26 June 2004

Socialist Councillors Fight Housing Crisis

LEWISHAM'S SOCIALIST Party councillors Chris Flood and Ian Page have opposed all attempts to sell off their council's housing stock. You cannot rely on the 'market' to meet ordinary people's housing needs...

26 June 2004

Socialist Students Fight NUS Cuts

National Union of Students (NUS) held a one-day extraordinary conference on 17 June to discuss finance and reform, which never got debated at the last annual conference...

26 June 2004

Stop Cuts In Jobs And Services

NEW LABOUR took a hammering in the 10 June elections. But Blair wasn't listening. "Now is not the time for a change of direction, but it is the time for a change of gear," he said the week after the election...

26 June 2004

Time For A New Workers' Party

Firefighters break with Labour: "OUR CHOICE is whether to stay in the Labour Party, docile and tame, or leave and fight like tigers for what these class traitors have denied us... ...