The Socialist 21 September 2011

We won't pay for the bankers' crisis!

We won't pay for the bankers' crisis!

30 November - the fight of all our lives

Gloucestershire: Rage ignites against NHS privatisation

12th hour reprieve for Dale Farm

Protest at Lib Dem conference

Wales mine deaths: Privatisation comes under the spotlight

Private rail companies - a licence to print money

Fast news

Poplar 1921: 'Better to break the law than break the poor'

2011 Labour Party conference - a debate: Can Labour be reclaimed?

Kazakhstan: Dictatorial regime threatens socialist activists

Floods devastate Sindh: Crisis worsens, hundreds killed

Don't let the Con-Dems steal our future!

Save Devon youth service: "time for young people to stand up"

Jobs, homes and services, not racism

University - pay more, receive less

Youth protest movement grows in Israel

Southampton council workers vote for more action

Remploy workers "will not go gently" - or at all!

Expelled from Unison for effective anti-cuts leadership

Bus workers force management climb-down

Protesting construction workers call for national strike ballot

Recognition won back - at a price

Workplace news In Brief

PDFs for this issue




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Don't let the Con-Dems steal our future!

Jethro Waldron, Warwick University Socialist Students

Not to Cuts: for a 24 hour general strike now! - Socilaist Party and Youth Fight for Jobs on demo, photo Paul Mattsson (Click to enlarge)

You're damned if you do and damned if you don't! Whether you go the long way round through university, piling up the debt, or are forced to take the fast track to the dole queue, a future of unemployment and lack of opportunity seems to await an entire generation.

According to figures released last week, there are now 972,000 people aged 16 to 24 looking for a job.

80,000 people were made unemployed in the three months leading up to July, the vast majority of whom (77,000) were under 25. It is clear that many of this year's school and college leavers have been thrown straight on the scrapheap.

The government's schemes have made no inroad into mass unemployment. There are now over 2.5 million people out of work. With cuts in the public sector beginning to hit and the economy beginning to take a nosedive, many more are set to join them soon.

The Tories and Liberals are the friends of nobody except the bankers and super-rich, but they have especially failed young people. Fearing years of poverty and joblessness, many college leavers, who would perhaps prefer to go into work, feel forced into higher education.

This has been especially apparent this year - the last year before tuition fees rise to a scandalous £9,000 a year. A record number applied to university, but a record 200,000 are set to miss out on a place.

But it doesn't have to be this way. Young people are beginning to fight back against the government. We say no to the slave-labour 'Work Programme' - you shouldn't have to work for your benefits.

Youth Fight for Jobs demands that the government reverses its attacks on education and launches a massive programme to create jobs and training opportunities.

The government bailed out the banks, so why can't they bail out our generation? If you agree with us, you should support and join our Jarrow March for Jobs in October.

Replicating an epic march of unemployed workers in 1936, Youth Fight for Jobs will be marching from Jarrow in the North East to London, taking our demands for jobs and free education into every town along the way.

It has never been more important to fight back - don't let the Con-Dems steal our future!

Jarrow March for Jobs

Support for Jarrow March at the Durham Miners' Gala , photo by Northern Region SP (Click to enlarge)

75 years ago 200 unemployed men from Jarrow marched from their home in the North East to London to demand jobs and an end to their poverty conditions.

This October Youth Fight for Jobs is marching their route again to demand:

A massive government scheme to create jobs which are socially useful and apprenticeships which offer guaranteed jobs at the end - both paying at least the minimum wage, with no youth exemptions.
The immediate reinstatement of EMA payments, expanding them to be available to all 16-19 year olds.
The immediate re-opening of all youth services that have been closed, including reinstating sacked staff.
The scrapping of 'workfare' schemes - benefits should be based on need not forced slave labour.
A massive building programme of environmentally sound, cheap social housing.