The Socialist 27 January 2016

Housing: smash the Tory wrecking bill

Housing: smash the Tory wrecking bill

Davos summit: a broken capitalist system

Google pays pittance for avoiding £2bn tax

Red doors and wristbands scandal

Steelworkers may face benefit cut-off for not seeking bar jobs

Oscars snub black artists: fight racism and austerity in the arts

Labour councillor smears TUSC policy as 'BNP'

Them & Us

Top tweets: #TraditionallySubmissive

Teaching: a perfect storm is brewing

Teachers need national strategy for a national struggle

A day in the life of a teacher and mother

New wave of protests in Tunisia

India: student death exposes caste oppression

Tories 'Prevent' civil liberties

Labour councillor suspended for fighting cuts

Dave Nellist's byelection appeal to Jeremy Corbyn: 'let's discuss how to fight the cuts'

Labour election post-mortem: nothing to report!

The dark arts of Labour's right

Councillors must fight to defend our services

'People's budgets' and local democracy

Lewisham: no backsliding in council cuts fight!

"I have left work many times in tears" - a council worker

Trade union bill will stretch resources and limit action

Birmingham teachers strike to resist academy attack

24-hour tube strike suspended

Care services under threat in Haringey

Workplace news in brief

The end for deep coal mining jobs in Britain

Obituary: Dean Meehan 1962-2016

Letters

Protesting against closure of Huddersfield A&E

Coventry children's services closure protest

New Socialist Party branch fights against St Austell austerity

Socialist Party discusses the fight for socialism

Socialist Students bake-off

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'People's budgets' and local democracy

Women march against the cuts, photo Paul Mattsson (Click to enlarge)

Socialist Party reporters

Over 50 people gathered in Whitechapel, east London, for the founding meeting of the local Momentum group. Momentum was established to draw together supporters, both inside and outside the Labour Party, of Jeremy Corbyn's anti-austerity agenda.

The event brought together Momentum supporters from Tower Hamlets, Newham and Redbridge. People attending were a mixture of newly joined members of the Labour Party, a smaller group of longer-term members and a number of non-members.

Included in the latter were two councillors from the Tower Hamlets Independents Group who had spoken on the platform at last week's joint meeting with Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (in which the Socialist Party is involved) for a 'people's budget'.

The meeting divided into a number of 'break out' groups where topics like housing, democracy and austerity, among other issues, were discussed.

In the democracy commission the questions of cuts by the local council and defending the policies of Jeremy Corbyn against an entrenched right wing were raised.

Reselection

Socialist Party members argued for Momentum to support the no-cuts people's budget proposals, as well as establishing mechanisms for the democratic reselection of councillors and MPs. This latter point was taken up in the report back to the general meeting without disagreement.

In the austerity commission the ideas of a no-cuts budget was also put forward.

The meeting concluded with elections. A member of the Socialist Party was accepted onto the local Momentum committee.

There were also elections for delegates to a London regional meeting. Despite objections of Socialist Party members the organiser of the meeting unfortunately rejected Momentum's all-inclusive founding brief and instead made clear that no non-Labour Party members could be elected as delegates.

In this issue

Socialist Party news and analysis

Housing: smash the Tory wrecking bill