Socialist Appeal

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Britain

By Darrall and Andy
Monday, 19 September 2011
It was billed as a "March and Rally for the Alternative: Jobs, Growth and Justice". On Sunday, September 18th, over two thousand trade unionists and political activists descended on Birmingham to march and rally with the aim of trying to bring pressure on the Lib Dems at their conference in the city to break with the Tory policies of the Condem government.

All out November 30th!

By Socialist Appeal
Thursday, 15 September 2011
It’s official. November 30^th is the agreed date for a national “day of strike action” by public sector unions and others against the government’s plans over pensions. It is expected that three million workers could strike in what has been called the “biggest mobilisation in a generation.” Unison, Unite and the GMB have given notice that they will ballot their members, joining other public sector unions in what is intended to be the start of a rolling campaign of action, which will go through the winter and into 2012.

Barnet council attacks workforce

By Socialist Appeal
Monday, 12 September 2011
Barnet Council workers are taking action on Tuesday - however the bosses are attempting to impose a 'lock out' to pressurize Unison members into backing out. This is just the latest in a series of attacks initiated by Tory-led councils against workers resisting the cuts. Plymouth has 'derecognised' Unison and Soujthampton workers have been taking action for some weeks now.

Official report attacks PFI schemes

By Socialist Appeal
Monday, 05 September 2011
Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee have issued a report which comes as close as they dare to damning the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) approach used over the last decade or so to fund public projects.

London Met: A laboratory for conservative education policies?

By Interview by Niklas Albin Svensson
Thursday, 25 August 2011
Socialist Appeal recently met up with Claire Locke, president of London Met SU, to discuss the cuts taking place at London Metropolitan University and the fightback against them Claire described how the Tories are conducting a class war at the University. They are cutting humanities, arts and student support at the same time as strengthening the business ties of the university.

Editorial: Tory Britain in crisis

By Socialist Appeal
Wednesday, 24 August 2011
The Tories are on the rampage. Their response to the worst riots in living memory is more state repression. The blame for the riots, according to David Cameron, lies with the “criminal disease” sweeping our neighbourhoods.Cameron also attacked the “moral collapse,” the breakdown of “family values,” poor standards in schools, and a welfare system that rewards the idle.The Tories’ answer, as always, is tougher rules on benefits claims, the introduction of National Service, more discipline in schools, ending the human rights culture, and the introduction of “family tests.”

UK riots: Bosses' justice?

By Steve Jones
Friday, 12 August 2011
As Britain prepares for the possibility of new outbreaks of rioting this weekend, the courts have been hard at work dispensing bosses' justice to those unfortunates picked up by the police in the wake of the disturbances over the last few days.

UK Riots: Crackdown will solve nothing

By Steve Jones

Wednesday, 10 August 2011

As expected the state is warming to the task of cracking down hard, as they like to put it, on looters/rioters past, present and future. Cameron and May have been strutting around talking tough about what they are going to do.

UK Riots: Strange mood hits the streets

By Steve Jones
Tuesday, 09 August 2011
As the day moves on a strange mood has hit the streets and estates of London. Traffic has started to die down and shops are being boarded up. Yet families are walking around as if nothing is happening. Stories of likely flash points are being banded around. Indeed police have just advised people in the building where our print offices are based to lock up and stay indoors as a riot is "expected shortly" in the street outside.

The riots in Britain: a warning to the bourgeoisie

By Alan Woods
Tuesday, 09 August 2011
The riots in Britain are only a symptom of a general crisis of capitalism. The Marxists will not join with the bourgeoisie and its agents in their hypocritical chorus of denunciation. Our duty is to find a road to the youth, to help them to find the right road – the revolutionary road, the road to the socialist reconstruction of society.

Tottenham Riots: A community on the edge

By Sam Ashton
Monday, 08 August 2011
Burning cars, broken glass, looting and an entire community enraged at the violent actions of those who are supposed to protect them. This describes the situation not in Greece or 80s Liverpool, but Tottenham, London on 6th August 2011. In this article we look at the background to these events demonstrate the underlying cause lies in the crisis of capitalism.

London riots reveals society's decay

By Steve Jones
Monday, 08 August 2011
The riots which started in the Tottenham area of North London on Saturday night and which have since spread to many others parts of the capital have exposed the social decay within the city as we enter the final year before the start of the prestige Olympics.

EDL march in Cambridge – the Labour movement responds in numbers!

By Dan Cooper
Wednesday, 13 July 2011
Saturday the 9th of July saw the arrival of the EDL (English Defence League) to the centre of Cambridge to protest against the proposal to build a new mosque on Mill Road, a vibrant and multi-cultural part of the city. The events in Cambridge were part of a national day of action by the EDL that saw around 150 members of the EDL march through Plymouth only to find them met by around 300 anti-fascist demonstrators, alongside a demonstration in Middlesbrough that saw around 200 EDL protestors met by 400 anti-fascists and a demonstration in Halifax that numbered around 450 EDL demonstrators and 200 anti-fascists. Various other EDL divisions were also planning on marching through Liverpool, Dagenham and Derby however these marches were cancelled due to the high level of opposition by the local community.

NoW Scandals: the ugly face of capitalism

By Fred Weston
Tuesday, 12 July 2011
The phone-hacking scandal that has led to the closure of the News of the World newspaper has brought to the surface the real state of things within the British establishment. The rottenness of a regime, that prides itself at being a model of “democracy,” is now out in the open for all to see. What has now been revealed is that a powerful media empire that for years has played a key role in British politics, making and unmaking political leaders, has been buying police officers, using influence with politicians, and all this peppered with out and out criminal activity.

Lloyds bank slashes jobs - action needed

By A bank worker
Monday, 11 July 2011
For all of us working at Lloyds, the announcement that the bosses would be throwing 15,000 (or 14% of the 104,000 strong work force) people onto the street came not from our employer but from the press release that was made to appease the stock markets – they were only too happy to hear we’d be bearing the brunt of the effort, as ever, to drag Lloyds out of the mess the bosses got it into in the first place.