Build the socialist opposition
This Labour government knows it is hated. But signalling partial future U-turns on pensioners’ winter fuel allowance and the two-child benefit cap won’t help its popularity. The damage is done.
And yet more damage will be done by the further, grinding austerity planned. Health, education, social care, public transport… all ruined already by Tory cuts and privatisation, face more from Labour.
Trade unions taking action in the strike wave was part of what led to the Tories being smashed; now action needs to be taken against Keir Starmer’s Labour too.
The Tories initially refused to even talk to public sector trade unions about a pay rise, but just a few months later – after nationwide strikes, including several days where unions took action together – more money was on the table.
As modest as they are relative to the rest of Labour’s brutal austerity programme, the U-turns prove pressure works. They should give confidence to trade union members to demand decent fully funded pay rises, and for strike ballots to be organised now to fight for it (see page 5).
Elections on 1 May clearly added to the pressure on Starmer too; they were concrete evidence of just how unpopular his government is. For his next big electoral test due in the May 2026 elections, the trade union movement should make sure anti-Labour anger isn’t sucked up by Nigel Farage’s right-populist Reform, and instead stand its own candidates against Labour, fighting for a socialist opposition.
