Mihaela Ivanova, London Socialist Party youth organiser
We are the first generation to be worse off than the one before. 1 in 4 young people are unemployed in London, we are expected to live with our parents until we’re 30, we get saddled with massive student debts and our schools have been crippled by underfunding.
Meanwhile, capitalist politicians continue to defend a rotten capitalist system that prioritises profits for billionaires while fuelling wars, a climate crisis and poverty for the rest of us. While our planet burns, we can barely afford to make ends meet.
Young people are fed up of being treated like second-class citizens, getting paid less for our work just because of our age, while facing the same cost-of-living crisis as everyone else! Both the Tories and Labour are responsible, which is why they were absolutely smashed in the local May elections.
Nigel Farage might call himself and Reform UK ‘anti-establishment’ but he’s no different to the big business bosses he rubs shoulders with. We won’t let any parties of the rich divide us with their racist lies while they rob us blind! And the huge gains made by the Green Party shows that young people are looking for an alternative to the misery sowed by the establishment parties. That’s why members in the Socialist Party and Socialist Students are organising to fight for jobs, homes and services, to unite people of all backgrounds and win the services we need.
We live in a system – capitalism – that creates profits for a tiny handful at the top, hoarding wealth rather than improving the lives of ordinary people. But there is an alternative! The resources exist in society to provide a decent life for us all, not just a tiny minority. If we took the banks, public services and big businesses – like water, energy and transport – into democratic public ownership, we could provide a decent life for all of us. This would ensure that everyone has a decent, well-paid job, free public transport, education and an affordable home to go back to. Steps like this, towards a socialist society, would make it possible to end all war, oppression and division, where the needs of ordinary workers and young people come first.
Young and working-class people have the power to change society. It’s time to get organised and build a new political force that fights for us. We need a new mass workers’ party that fights for a future for young people – and that means fighting for the socialist transformation of society.
