
The Socialist 11 July 2018
Act now to get the Tories out

Tories in crisis - Act now to get them out!
600 more retail jobs on the line: workers must not pay for the bosses' high street crunch!
Britain bakes as water pipelines leak
Minister's benefits lie: sack the Tories - and scrap universal credit
Hit the streets against Trump and capitalism
US: "We've had to build a huge culture of resistance"
NSSN conference 2018: Mood for fighting action and coordination
Big victory for Wigan NHS strike against privatisation
Campaign in full flow to squeeze out every last Yes vote in pay ballot
Hackney traffic wardens strike for better pay and protection at work
Summer of discontent on the cards in Huddersfield bin workers' dispute
Tyneside shopfitting plant lays off 61 workers
Unite conference sees union go in a fighting, socialist direction
Pressure building on councillors to stop fire service cuts
Tram workers strike against 'derisory' pay offer
Women's Lives Matter launched in Leeds to fight domestic violence service cuts
Service users and families protest learning disability service cuts
NHS Leeds: Campaigners halt outsourcing... for now
Tories fractured... election possibility... give us the resources!
Issue 1000 drive shows sales potential
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Minister's benefits lie: sack the Tories - and scrap universal credit
We are the 99% - Take the wealth off the 1% Socialist Party placard, photo Paul Mattsson (Click to enlarge)
Karen Seymour, Mansfield Socialist Party
Work and Pensions Secretary Esther McVey arrogantly refuses to step down, after admitting to "inadvertently" misleading MPs about problems with the already unpopular 'universal credit' welfare restructure.
The head of the National Audit Office, Sir Amyas Morse, was forced to write an open letter outlining his concerns about universal credit, effectively accusing her of lying. Universal credit rolls six working-age benefits into one, supposedly to simplify the system - but in reality, it's about slashing the welfare bill.
Far from stating that the progress of the rollout should be accelerated, as McVey claimed, Morse actually said it should be paused until its many problems were addressed!
The Department for Work and Pensions' own survey shows 40% of universal credit claimants are experiencing financial difficulty because of it.
A significant number face eviction and homelessness. Food bank use has rocketed across the country. This policy is deliberately designed to wear working class people down, whether we are in work or not.
Labour's work and pensions spokesperson, Margaret Greenwood, has rightly called for McVey to be sacked. But Labour should also be calling for universal credit to be scrapped and replaced with a proper welfare safety net, living benefits without compulsion, and support to get people into work if that's what they want.
Super-rich
This could easily be paid for if the biggest companies, notorious for tax dodging, went into public ownership - and the super-rich faced proper, progressive taxes.
Esther McVey will not be pushed into poverty for the serious matter of misleading parliament, even if she does lose her ministerial job. But under the brutal sanctions regime, you can have your money reduced or stopped completely for such heinous offences as being three minutes late for a jobcentre interview!
As well as a mass programme of job creation and a humane benefits system, we need an immediate £10 an hour minimum wage without exemptions, and an end to zero-hours contracts and the gig economy which particularly exploit young people.
And as well as sacking McVey, we need this whole rotten government out!
In this issue
What we think
Tories in crisis - Act now to get them out!
News
600 more retail jobs on the line: workers must not pay for the bosses' high street crunch!
Britain bakes as water pipelines leak
Minister's benefits lie: sack the Tories - and scrap universal credit
Trump and the US
Hit the streets against Trump and capitalism
US: "We've had to build a huge culture of resistance"
NSSN conference
NSSN conference 2018: Mood for fighting action and coordination
Workplace
Big victory for Wigan NHS strike against privatisation
Campaign in full flow to squeeze out every last Yes vote in pay ballot
Hackney traffic wardens strike for better pay and protection at work
Summer of discontent on the cards in Huddersfield bin workers' dispute
Tyneside shopfitting plant lays off 61 workers
Unite conference sees union go in a fighting, socialist direction
Pressure building on councillors to stop fire service cuts
Tram workers strike against 'derisory' pay offer
Socialist Party reports and campaigns
Women's Lives Matter launched in Leeds to fight domestic violence service cuts
Service users and families protest learning disability service cuts
NHS Leeds: Campaigners halt outsourcing... for now
Tories fractured... election possibility... give us the resources!
Issue 1000 drive shows sales potential
Home | The Socialist 11 July 2018 | Join the Socialist Party
Related links:
Make the super-rich pay, not the poorest
No surprise, poverty is rising
What will the spending review mean for me?
Don't let Tories starve our kids
May elections: Tories and Labour's Khan both vying to slash public services
Covid: Bosses chase profit and put workers in danger
Bosses profit out of 'starvation' food parcels
National Shop Stewards Network: Fight together against the Tories' and bosses' Covid offensive
Books that inspired me: The Road to Wigan Pier
Life in lockdown - being home from school when you're poor is hard
PCS Broad Left Network conference
Film: 'Sick' - 'They've got people looking in the wrong direction'
Books that inspired me: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck