This could be the winter of Blackout Britain
[WORKERS, DEC 2005]
IF RECENT predictions of the Meteorological Office are correct, Britain could be experiencing unusually low temperatures and higher than average snowfall throughout the coming winter months. The Met Office is so concerned with their predictions that they have sent an official warning to the utility companies.
...[more]
'Free' trade – war against the workers
[WORKERS, DEC 2005]
The so-called Doha Development Agenda – the circulating international trade agreement talks – are due in Hong Kong before the end of the year. A lot of angst will come gushing forth as to whether poor countries will do as well as they should out of the negotiations; whether the terms of trade will be equitable and whether the new arrangements will be fairer than the old. Inevitably, the answer to all these questions will be a resounding no, for how could it be any other way?
...[more]
Performance Assessment – a stick to drive privatisation in local government
[WORKERS, DEC 2005]
A group of managers and their trainers look amazed and perplexed at the list of performance indicators local government have to comply with. The trainer, who has experience advising a wide variety of private and public organisations, agrees this list is nonsense, not the way to improve performance.
...[more]
Homes, not profits
[WORKERS, DEC 2005]
The government is proposing to change the way we plan for new housing, and in the summer published draft proposals in a consultation paper, Planning for Housing Provision. This sets out how it intends to take forward economist Kate Barker's recommendations to increase housing supply and affordability by making planning more responsive to the market and housing demand.
...[more]
The rising tide that threatens Britain's capital city
[WORKERS, DEC 2005]
London has always been at risk of flooding. In 1236 John Stow reported that "The Thames overflowed and in the great Palace of Westminster men did row with wherries in the midst of the hall." Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary on 7 December 1663, "There was last night the greatest tide that was ever was remembered in England to have been in this River all Whitehall having been drowned."
...[more]
Migration and class power
[WORKERS, NOV 2005]
As a class, we have got ourselves into an awful mess. Of course, it's not all of our own making. For over three decades, we have been subjected to an unrelenting, escalating ruling class assault: more than 30 years of reaction and counter-revolution from our ruling class, which has pressed down on our daily lives, shattered our trade union culture and traditions, circumscribed our hopes and strangled our aspirations.
...[more]
Education: Blair is taking us back to the Middle Ages – and beyond
[WORKERS, NOV 2005]
At a time when workers in Britain, a country with a highly sceptical and secular culture, are dismayed by the acts of religious psychopaths who want a fast-track entry to heaven by massacring infidels, the government's drive to push religion through schools continues apace. The promotion of religious thought has become a major plank of educational policy in Blair's third term.
...[more]
Wall Street ethics invade health care
[WORKERS, NOV 2005]
Choice and competition, market forces and the private sector, we are told, will improve patient care and make the NHS more efficient. We have been here before. The old discredited ideas of the internal market from the 1990s are being revived, only this time posing a greater threat to the NHS. Privatisation proceeds by stealth, without any public debate and with the rules rigged to give the private sector a greater foothold in public health care.
...[more]
Stop Blair destroying the NHS
[WORKERS, OCT 2005]
While the news headlines have been dominated by war in Iraq and hurricanes in the US, the Blair government has been wreaking havoc on the NHS, one of the world's great social achievements. As reported in the June edition of Workers, plans to hand over NHS facilities to the private sector, via the so-called "independent treatment centres" and other mechanisms, have shown a marked acceleration since Blair was re-elected in May.
...[more]
TUC Congress - signs of life
[WORKERS, OCT 2005]
What was this year's TUC about and what did it do? It received very little coverage in the media. Keen workers will only have found out from their own delegation reports and from late night TV which showed the live debates. The point is, the keenest will have been interested. Yes, the TUC comes and goes in a flash, but class conscious workers in their unions are not finished — far from it.
...[more]
The hurricane, the White House...and Cuba
[WORKERS, OCT 2005]
After the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, serious accusations have been made about the ability of the US to cope with major incidents of this nature. Then along came Hurricane Rita, with its spectacle of camper vans and 4X4 vehicles carrying one or two passengers each, running out of petrol in 100-mile traffic jams, providing a variant horror story, equally telling against the US way of coping with disaster.
...[more]
TUC Congress: back to the workplace
[WORKERS, SEPT 2005]
Should the TUC Congress meet annually, biennially, or every month, or not at all? Like all organisations in the fast emptying house of British trade unions, the TUC does have genuine financial and organisational issues to face. But as in all such debates, do you decide to prune back or regrow?
...[more]
Time for teachers to take responsibility for their pay
[WORKERS, SEPT 2005]
In April 2005 school teachers received a 2.5% pay increase on their basic pay — less than inflation. At the start of September the basic pay increased again by 0.7%. These small increases are part of a long-term pay agreement supported by some, but not all, teacher unions. Where does the suggestion of pay cuts come from?
...[more]
Stress and mental health in the workplace
[WORKERS, SEPT 2005]
Why does WORK, the source of all goods, often feel so bad? The Community Service Volunteers (CSV) conducted a survey which indicated that voluntary work helps people to overcome stress. So what is it that causes so many workers to feel stressed and become mentally unwell as a result of working for their employer?
...[more]
Cultural imperialism
[WORKERS, SEPT 2005]
In JANUARY WORKERS wrote: "The state machine developing under Tony Blair & Co. is broadening and deepening its campaign and powers to intervene into the lives of workers in Britain, telling us what is good for us..." Then we spoke of childcare, asking Do we really think the state knows best? Now our culture — in a sweeping definition, every aspect of living — is on their agenda for control and meddling.
...[more]
Why Britain must be able to reject the EU Constitution
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
The plans for creating a single EU state have met an immovable obstacle — the peoples of Europe's nations. The French working class decisively rejected the proposed Constitution by 55% to 45% on a 70% turnout. 80% of blue-collar workers and 60% of white-collar workers voted No. The Dutch voted against by 62% to 38% on a 63% turnout.
...[more]
And why Britain must leave
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
There is no such political entity as Europe and the sooner the right, left, ultra left and centre realise this the better. Workers have always known this which is why they liberated Europe from those seeking to impose their vision of it 60 years ago. Calls for a better Europe without the Constitution are chauvinist. There are only independent nations. The EU juggernaut has stalled, but not stopped; the enemy, in chaos, is regrouping. If sovereignty were truly respected, the process would have stopped by now. But the EU was established not to listen to the people but to dictate to them.
...[more]
You wouldn't have let Thatcher do this!
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
If Thatcher were trying to do what Blair is doing to the NHS working people would be up in arms. It has been said before, but it bears saying again: the working class allows a Labour government to get away with actions that it would not tolerate from a Conservative administration.
...[more]
Give us back our land
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
Who Owns Britain, by Kevin Cahill, paperback, 450 pages, ISBN 1-84195-310-5, Canongate, 2002, £16.99.
This is a survey of landownership across Britain and Ireland, detailed county by county. Cahill shows how a tiny minority exploits British society. 160,000 families, 0.3% of the population, own two thirds of Britain, 37 million acres, 230 acres per family. Just 1,252 of them own 57% of Scotland. They pay no land tax. Instead the government gives them £2.3 billion a year and the EU gives them a further £2 billion. Each family gets £26,875.
...[more]
What next for workers in the National Health Service?
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
The newly elected Labour government has its agenda for the health service, much of it unwelcome to health service workers. It has its origin in Tory policies — the Private Finance Initiative; Foundation Trusts; Value for Money; Independent Treatment Centres and finally, perhaps, abolition of Strategic Health Authorities. There is also a kind of unity amongst the political parties about some of the basic ideas on the health service. For example, that whilst it should be free at the point of need, the service requires for efficiency that the profit motive be introduced, extended and given a place of high standing within it.
...[more]
School meals under threat
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
Following Jamie Oliver's TV series on school meals, newspapers have carried a series of attacks on them which may endanger their already precarious existence. One pictured a single sausage and some jelly purporting to be an entire meal. School cooks and kitchen assistants are furious about the constant knocking of their service in the media. As mums of children in the schools they take great pride in their work and would never allow a meal like that to go out from their serving counter. But they are also well aware of a serious problem they see in schools — a large number of children are not getting the nutrition they need to grow into healthy adults.
...[more]
The man who wouldn't stay captured
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
If you are reading a book at present, then line up Under The Wire by Bill Ash as your next. And if you don't read books, then change the habit of a lifetime and purchase this marvellous tale. As the words of its blurb say, it is "the wartime memoir of a Spitfire pilot, legendary escape artist and 'cooler king'".
...[more]
No to state control — yes to a workers' Britain
[WORKERS, JUNE 2005]
The working class of which we are part has refused so far to face its historic task of replacing capitalism with socialism. It has chosen instead to chase the mirage of bourgeois parliamentary democracy (whether British or European) with its false promises of a better life. In clinging to illusions, the working class of the industrialised world is losing ground.
...[more]
Rover: a tale of home-grown vandalism and asset-stripping
[WORKERS, MAY 2005]
MG Rover has collapsed with the attendant misery for the Longbridge workers and the thousands employed in the various supply components industries. Despite possible Chinese orders to Rover's suppliers, redundancy announcements are starting, with Corus announcing 50 in Wolverhampton. Current overall estimates stand at 30,000 job losses. Network Rail hopes to benefit, declaring that there will be vacancies for skilled engineers (but not at the wages paid by Rover).
...[more]
Take a short reality break: time for a few facts about the real economy
[WORKERS, MAY 2005]
We are hearing a lot of self-praise from Labour about its stewardship of the economy. We should remind ourselves of a few facts.
...[more]
The British textile industry — after decades of decline, down but not out
[WORKERS, MAY 2005]
The textiles and clothing industry is Britain's 9th largest manufacturing sector, with an annual turnover of around £17 billion. At the end of the 20th century, the industry exported £5 billion worth of goods.
...[more]
Democracy and colonialism, Iraqi-style
[WORKERS, MAY 2005]
The final outcome of the much-heralded Iraqi elections bears some resemblance to Michael Howard's election statement — "vote Blair, get Brown". But in the case of Iraq, it was "vote for an end to the foreign occupation of your nation and get a President who does not even believe in the existence of Iraq".
...[more]
Capital casts its shadow over British football
[WORKERS, MAY 2005]
Turn on the television and, if you have satellite or cable access, you can guarantee that football will be available somewhere. Pick up any daily paper in Britain and four or five pages of print will be devoted to the professional game here or abroad.
...[more]
How healthy is class organisation within the NHS?
[WORKERS, APR 2005]
April looks as though it will be the month before the general election. It is definitely the month of the UNISON Health Conference. Hopefully, not too much time will be spent by the latter on the former.
...[more]
The coming campaign on the European Constitution
[WORKERS, APR 2005]
In a special focus on the European Constitution, we expose the European Union's plans for propaganda to influence referendums across Europe, detail the effects on public services and outline the Constitution's main points
...[more]
The language of division in the schools
[WORKERS, APR 2005]
THE GOVERNMENT is to put £190 million into schools in England to finance the achievement of minority ethnic children, a massive increase on last year's funding of £150 million. As these funds are "ring-fenced" — in other words may only be expended for specific purposes — we have the potential for divisiveness between schools and between provision for pupils in those schools.
...[more]
Oil, imperialism, environmentalism — and the new politics of energy
[WORKERS, APR 2005]
Resources, not differences in civilisations or identities, are behind most conflicts. Most important is oil, which drives economies, international politics and the deployment of armed forces.
...[more]
Singing the changes
[WORKERS, APR 2005]
For the Birmingham Banner Theatre's 30th Anniversary celebrations, a book of songs by Dave Rogers, a leading member of the group, has been published. They are presented as 85 songs of resistance and celebration, spanning over three decades of events. Interspersed between the songs are concise, informative historical accounts of the events recalled in song, together with interviews with workers and photographs
...[more]
Don't vote for Blair's bourgeois democracy [WORKERS, MAR 2005]
The past few months have seen British political leaders trying to outdo one another over who will rid our hospitals of the killer disease MRSA quickest. Who can axe the most civil service jobs? Whose figures add up? Who will introduce the most ruthless model of the free market into our health services? Who will save Africa, a continent plundered by British colonialism? And who will implement the Australian model immigration policy best?
...[more]
The lowering of higher education - and how to fight it [WORKERS, MAR 2005]
The number of students in higher education is a measure of the success of the working class. A better educated and more highly skilled population strengthens the entire class. For a hundred years the number of students in higher education has risen. But for the past 20 years these rises have been at the expense of university and college workers, with students getting an increasingly raw deal from the experience.
...[more]
EU bids to grab research [WORKERS, MAR 2005]
IF THERE'S ONE thing that the European Commission and its backers hate more than anything, it's seeing cooperation across Europe when it has nothing to do with it. It wants to control everything, be seen as the source of funding. Nowhere is this envy of others stronger than in the field of scientific research.
...[more]
First Iraq, then Iran? The propaganda machine warms up again [WORKERS, MAR 2005]
Not content with the continuing death toll on its soldiers in Iraq, the US is rattling its sabres in the direction of Iran. The US government alleges that Iran is not offering full access and cooperation to nuclear inspectors. Bush says that Iran is stonewalling. Yet the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly said that Iran is giving its inspectors full access. For example, it reported in September 2004 that Iran has let inspectors into every site to which they have sought access.
...[more]
Cassini-Huygens: a Titanic achievement [WORKERS, MAR 2005]
The successful landing on 14 January of the Cassini-Huygens probe on Saturn's moon Titan marks the climax of an epic journey begun long ago and is a fine example of how productive international cooperation, driven by science rather than politics, can be.
...[more]
Who says disaster aid is not a political issue? [WORKERS, FEB 2005]
Working-class generosity and solidarity look very different from aid by capitalist governments. Workers regularly give up their time and money to assist victims of a natural disaster or for other workers in struggle -�as in the solidarity with the Soviet people in the Second World War and with the Vietnamese people in the 1960s. Remember the generosity shown to Africa both during the famine and the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. Remember the support for the miners in 1984/5.
...[more]
Yasser Arafat, 1929-2004: "Mr Palestine" [WORKERS, FEB 2005]
Yasser Arafat, who died in November 2004, personified the Palestinians' fight for freedom: he kept alive their hopes and defied their enemies, often in the most difficult of circumstances. Throughout a life of struggle, he remained true to his objective: a free independent Palestine.
...[more]
Class conscious social work?
[WORKERS, FEB 2005]
Social workers have not always been regarded as a section of the working class, and have been treated with a degree of disdain by other sections of the class. For instance, in the Reg Birch biography (see menu to the left) Dorothy Birch notes how within the community of Byker, Newcastle, where she grew up in the 1920s-30s, "...everyone hated the welfare workers who gave good advice like why don't you sell your tea set?". Such sentiments would have carried considerable weight both at the time and more recently.
...[more]
Local government workers face up to their pay problems [WORKERS, FEB 2005]
All around the country local government workers are aggrieved and in revolt against a new pay system, which is part of a single status agreement dating back to 1997.Protests vary, with groups coming out for periods of strike action like the bin workers in Coventry, widespread ballot rejections of the new pay system, lobbies, mass meetings in work time, non-cooperation and widespread protest in the local press.
...[more]
childcare - do we really think the state knows best? [WORKERS, JAN 2005]
Are you unemployed? No decent jobs where you live? Rents too high? Can't afford the basics for your children? Don't worry — the government will send you on a free parenting skills course to find out how to bring up your children. If it doesn't work too well, and your kids end up hanging around on street corners in the evening — all the local caf�s and youth clubs have closed down and they can't afford the fare or entry money to go to the cinema — the police now have powers to send them away.
...[more]
Euro-fraud flourishes [WORKERS, JAN 2005]
Marta Andreasen, the sacked European Commission Chief Accountant, who was voted Accountant of the Year in 2003 after refusing to sign off the Commission's accounts, addressed a large gathering of VOTE NO (to the Constitution) supporters in Westminster in December. The meeting was entitled "Europe needs real reform, not the EU Constitution".
...[more]
No nation - the poetry of the future [WORKERS, JAN 2005]
SO MUCH of our culture is linked to the stability and peace of being a nation without outside military incursion, let alone massacre and theft of land, that we find genuine nationalism hard to understand. We hate the American sort and we know little of the genuine attempts from Ireland to South Africa to Palestine to Cuba to create it. So British people will struggle badly as they are being deprived of their nation. They may turn in civil war upon themselves before this matter is resolved. The existing political order will be immeasurably damaged.
...[more]
On the wrong lines: the government's opposition to public control of public railways [WORKERS, JAN 2005]
THIS YEAR'S Labour Party Conference voted overwhelmingly in favour of returning the railways to public ownership. This decision has predictably been ignored by the government, who have instead published yet another Railways Bill which industry observers, even those opposed to renationalisation, consider completely inadequate to address the problems. Transport 2000 commented, "The bill lacks any vision for growing the railway."
...[more]
The capitalist takeover of Russia [WORKERS, JAN 2005]
IN THE 1990s, Russia's new capitalist class seized, through privatisation, the enormous wealth that the country's workers had produced during the Soviet era. By 1996, 80% of Russia's 22,500 industrial enterprises, employing 80% of Russia's industrial workers and producing 90% of Russia's industrial output, had been privatised.
...[more]