The capitalist system that flourished in the time of Dickens is still upon us, as are all of its ills and evils. Reminiscent of the popular festive tale A Christmas Carol, in 2006, over 150 years after Charles Dickens wrote the story reflecting the callousness of a society divided by class, we still find that ordinary working peoples everyday lives are subject to the whims of a minority of parasitic individuals. This has found expression most recently in the Farepak fiasco.

The minimum wage went up by 30p an hour on the 1st October. It now stands at £5.35 for anyone 22 and over. But it's as little as £3.30 if you are 16 or 17 and only rises to £4.45 when you hit 18, unless you are an apprentice of course (which means you can paid as little as £80 per week!). The TUC was holding out for £6 an hour. £6 is a bit better, but it goes nowhere near far enough to solve the problems of low paid workers. 

The International Conference in Solidarity with the Lebanese Resistance against Imperialist aggression was held at the UNESCO Building in Beirut on November 16-19.

Comrade Lal Khan, who is the International Secretary of the Pakistan Trade Union Defence Campaign (PTUDC) and Editor of the Asian Marxist Review, had been officially invited to address the conference. Here we provide a summary of his speech, which, we hope, will be of great interest to our readers.

"Trabajadores arrechos, exigen sus derechos!" (Angry workers demand their rights!). "We cannot choose between winning or dying, we must win!" and "Sanitarios Maracay under workers' control and cogestión NOW!" These were some of the slogans written on the banners of the workers of Sanitarios Maracay who took to the streets of Maracay, the capital of the industrial region Aragua.