In this week's issue:

The Socialist 24 November 2009, issue "We wont pay for the crisis"

'We wont pay for the crisis'

Youth Fight For Jobs march 2 April 2009, photo Paul Mattsson

Young people fight for a future: All parents hope that their children will have better opportunities than were available to them. Today, for millions of working and middle class families, those hopes lie in ruins. The bleak and insecure...

How could full youth employment be achieved?

Editorial: Instead of throwing millions on the scrap heap, the available work should be shared out. In Britain the working week is one of the longest in Europe. The average working week for full-time workers is 41...

Bristol Youth Fight for Jobs challenges council leader

Lessons of struggle: If you fight, you can win!

Liverpool City Councillors hold press conference at House of Lords 26 Jan 1987, photo Dave Sinclair

Liverpool Council 1983 - 1987: Young people face enormous attacks on their right to a future - unemployment, low pay, ever-increasing university fees and slashed public services.
Here, Socialist Party activists provide a small taste of some of the past battles they have been involved in where victories were won by working and young people.

Flood chaos in Cumbria

ONLY FOUR years after devastating floods forced thousands from their homes across the county, the heaviest rainfall on record brought rivers crashing over their banks and through people's homes, writes A Cumbrian resident.

Afghanistan: Brown and Obama scrabbling for an exit strategy

Anti-war demo October 2009, photo Bob Severn

THE CORONATION of Afghanistan's president Hamid Karzai offers no solution to the long suffering workers and poor peasants of Afghanistan, writes Nick Chaffey.

Main parties plan cutbacks: It's time for a fightback!

THERE MUST be an election coming. All of a sudden, New Labour want us to believe that they're different to the Conservatives. After over 12 years of carrying out Tory policies, Gordon Brown and Co. used...

Mobilising to stop Griffin

Racists - stay out of Wrexham!

Successful Manchester Tamil Solidarity meeting

Fast news

People's Charter - a step towards workers' political representation?

The first convention of the People's Charter took place on Saturday 21 November. Speakers included Matt Wrack, general secretary of the FBU, Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT, and John McDonnell...

The battle for state education

Lewisham edutcation protest, photo Paul Mattsson

When Labour came to power with a mission to sort out education, they bulldozed ahead with the mantra of "whatever works", writes Linda Taaffe.

Socialist Party candidate increases vote in NUT election

Education: 'Try your best' is not enough

Schools paying for the crisis

Attacks begin at Bangor University

Fight cuts at Manchester Met

Leeds bins victory

Leeds bin workers received marvellous support, photo Leeds Socialist Party

As the bin strike in Leeds entered its twelfth week, an agreement was reached between refuse collectors and Streetscene workers, and the council, writes A Leeds Unison steward.

Superdrug workers show industrial action can win victories

Defend the four!

Postal dispute: Bosses still on the attack

London bus workers strike

Axiom railworkers' strike remains solid

Cuts crisis on the Isle of Man

Guadeloupe - End the profiteering and exploitation

THE SOCIAL situation in the "French West Indies", and particularly in Guadeloupe, is boiling over once again, writes Virginie Prégny, Gauche Révolutionnaire (CWI in France).

The 1970s, mainly viewed from the top

Review: DAVE GORTON reviews When The Lights Went Out; Britain in the Seventies by Andy Beckett...