Workers' Liberty

THE Blair government’s obsession with “vocational education” — which is actually just training for the McJobs that the working-class kids who take it will have to get when they leave college — took an entertaining new turn recently when Britain was announced as the host of the 2011 ‘World Skills Games.’

ON a lighter note, we note with amusement erstwhile Lib Dem leadership candidate Mark Oaten’s explanation for his now well-known indiscretions: he was losing his hair.

SERCO is one of the government’s favourite PFI firms. Among its many public sector contracts is one for running the electronic tagging scheme for convicts on early release.

TONY Blair said something quite revealing to the “New Health Network” bosses’ forum at the end of April.

RUTH Kelly is to leave the Department of Education and take up responsibility for local government, which has provoked sighs of relief in some quarters, particularly teachers and parents not keen on religious schools. Surely her more off-the-wall, Catholic fundamentalist opinions will have no effect in her new job?

The most obvious and entrenched pay gap under capitalism is that between men and women. “Women’s work” is everywhere less well paid, for a variety of reasons.

On 1 May hundreds of thousands (and probably more) US immigrant workers will take to the streets to protest against the immigration reform. The US government was to crack down on migrant labour — despite the capitalist reliance on such labour.

>“McDonald’s is in some ways a toy company, not a food company,” says one retired fast food executive. In fact, in its desperation to sell its unhealthy products to small children, McDonald’s sells (or “gives away” with food) more than 1,500 million toys a year, worldwide.

Trust the BBC to come up with a particularly absurd example of the privatisation craze

>“The way things are happening in Respect is pure opportunism. Obviously I am in favour of working with Muslim groups, but for socialists the goal must be to win followers of religion to our own point of view, not to leave them in their entrenched positions.”

An AWL speaker? No,

The accession of Eastern European countries to the EU is supposed to have helped bring up respect for human rights there to “modern” standards. Maybe not.

Gareth Edwards, the man in charge of training staff for jobs in the Welsh tourism industry, has caused consternation by complaining about the number of Eastern European immigrants applying for jobs in the sector. The problem with Eastern Europeans, he says, is that they’re not “local people with local accents”.

You can tell that the anti-sweatshop movement is making an impact when the Liberal Democrats try to jump on the bandwagon.

The privatisation of the NHS Logistics Authority, the service that delivers food and medicines to hospitals, was announced on Monday despite one of the private companies involved being under investigation by the US Senate.

We’ve all heard that Tony Blair wants more “respect” in communities and is prepared to use ASBOs and so on to enforce it.

The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority was set up by Harold Wilson’s Labour government in 1964 on the classically Rousseauian bourgeois principle that the state is there to protect people from harm and if it fails to do so it should pay them money.

The Hazards Campaign, the trade union based health and safety watchdog, addressed a series of twenty freedom of information questions to the Health and Safety Executive at the beginning of this year. What they found is worrying.

Last month New Labour’s latest privatisation, Qinetiq, was floated on the Stock Exchange. Qinetiq consists of most of the Ministry of Defence’s Defence Research Agency, all except the most “sensitive” areas — these were split off in 2001 to prepare for privatisation.

ID-Biz

What’s behind the ID card proposal? A proto-totalitarian attempt to keep track of our every move? No. It’s just business, stoopid.

The wealthy’s way of giving birth —

courtesy of the NHS

Described by NHS bosses as, “an income generating” idea, the Jentle midwifery scheme — where women are guaranteed one-to-one regular care … for the price of £4,000 — is a step towards a two tier NHS pre-natal service.

RELIGIOUS HATRED...

It has been known for some time that Iqbal Sacranie, General Secretary of the Muslim Council of Britain, was right-wing. After all, he accepted a knighthood last year, and serves on government quangos including Blair's "task force" against terrorism.

Things can only get
wetter

Greenpeace protesters dumped sacks of coal outside Downing Street on Monday morning to protest against the British government’s lack of action against climate change.

back to back

“Full House?”, a report published this month by the housing charity Shelter has revealed that half a million British households are overcrowded, the same proportion as in 1997. The study, in which 550 families living in such conditions were surveyed, is the largest of its kind to date.

RECORD FINE FOR PFI FIRM

Earlier this month PFI engineering firm Balfour Beatty and Network Rail, the successor company to Railtrack, were fined £10 million and £3.5million, respectively, for their part in the Hatfield rail disaster. The judge described the crash as “one of the worst examples of sustained industial negligence”.

THEIR DISASTER RELIEF, AND OURS

The gross neglect and incompetence with which the US government responded to the New Orleans disaster is now well known.

Political-Christianists, against the teapot religion, Daily conspiracy, BBC bais, Transco in the dock

Stone the gays, says Ken’s friend

According to al-Jazeera, the Islamist cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi has called for Crown Prince Tameem of Qatar, who lives in Britain, to be stoned to death for being gay. [According to a statement from Ken Livingstone's office - see below - the report is untrue, and the call to kill Tameem came from another cleric].

Hatfield Killers Wriggle; Threats to gay rights group; Defend gay refusnik; The great liberal; Support fades for hate law

Go London!

As we go to press we find that London has won the bid to stage the 2012 Olympics.

African partnerships

Paul Wolfowitz, the new head of the World Bank and prominent neo-con has given support to Blair and Brown’s idea of massive and increased aid to Africa. He pledged to persuade Bush of the necessity and justice of this plan. He also said that “there were real partners [in Africa] with whom the west could work.”