Solidarity 058, 23 September 2004

TUC Congress: Big Four batten down hatches

By a delegate OVERALL this year’s TUC congress (13-16 September, in Brighton) was reasonably militant – Blair was not given a warm reception, delegates voted in favour of repealing all anti-union laws. But is there really a willingness to fight? The main debates were on employment rights, the situation in Iraq, public services, pensions, the economy and working time. On every issue there was near-unanimity. One possible area of disunity — over Europe – was avoided when the more “pro-Europe” amendments were withdrawn in favour of a bland General Council statement supported by everyone. The euro...

Putin uses Beslan to increase his power

By Dale Street The series of “reforms” announced by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in the aftermath of the Beslan school massacre have nothing to do with fighting terrorism. They are another stage in the evolution of Putin’s authoritarian and semi-dictatorial regime. The Washington Post summed up the ‘reforms’ as: “An unambiguous step towards tyranny in Russia. There is no complexity or fuzziness about the significance of Putin’s actions. Putin is imposing dictatorship the old-fashioned way. …Russia needs to fight terrorism. But eliminating elections and quashing Putin’s political opponents...

March for Zanon

On 14 September a delegation of Zanon workers and participants in the Unemployed Workers’ Movement (MTD) travelled to Buenos Aires in Argentina to organise a national campaign to defend the factory. Since March 2002 Zanon’s workers have run the factory under workers’ self-management without owners, bosses or foremen. A delegation of 170 activists — 100 workers from Zanon and 70 from social movements supporting the factory — arrived in the morning in Buenos Aires to march to a local court and national congress against a government eviction order on the factory. The march was part of a...

A necessary retreat on the Tube

The pamphlet Tunnel Vision is well produced and thought-out. It will be a useful tool in future actions. This said, there is one part that needs to be looked at again: pages 43 and 44. The pamphlet glosses over an issue central to why the improved offer was accepted. The main problem was that the track workers and maintenance workers were facing privatisation within weeks. There was nothing that could be done at that stage to stop this, except all-out revolution! We had to ensure that those workers received some protection. If the dispute had continued, those workers would have been...

Will the IRA dissolve?

By John O’Mahony Tony Blair’s high-powered negotiations at Leeds Castle, Kent, on the future of Northern Ireland, have broken up in failure. The Paisley Unionists and Sinn Fein (SF), the polar opposites in Northern Ireland politics, now have the support of most Protestants and most Catholics respectively, and agreement on a new Catholic-Protestant power-sharing Belfast government depends on them. Yet the failure to reach agreement on that should not be allowed to obscure the most important event in Irish politics since the IRA declared a ceasefire in August 1994. It appears that, speaking...

Against Bush, but US workers need their own party

The voice of the militant class struggle left in America may seem too quiet and abstract to bother with. But the future of American working-class politics, and of the world, lies with them. There is just over a month to go before the US Presidential election. As someone said recently: this is an election in which everyone in the world would like a vote, but only the American people actually have a vote. Many millions of people around the world would relish an opportunity to vote out George Bush and his cowboy foreign policy: invade now and think about the consequences later. Saddam’s fascistic...

Speak up for Iraqi workers

Seventy-one per cent of people in Britain now want the government to set a date to withdraw British troops from Iraq. Tony Blair replied on 19 September: “Whatever the disagreements about the first conflict in Iraq to remove Saddam… this conflict now taking place in Iraq… is the crucible in which the future of this global terrorism will be decided.” True, the Islamist militias in Iraq are terrorist, against civilian foreigners taken hostage and then ceremonially beheaded, and against the civilian population of Iraq too. True, the figure of 71% probably includes a large number who just think...

Cut the roots of fascism

Note: this article includes details of the forthcoming by-election in Dagenham where the BNP threaten to win another seat. Far right wins in E. London and soars in Germany. Cut the roots of fascism - fight for a workers' government! On 16 September, the fascist British National Party won a council by-election in Barking, East London, with over 50% of the vote. It was a ward which the BNP did not even bother to contest at the last full council elections, in 2002. Then, Labour won all the ward's three council seats easily, with between 847 and 778 votes to 520 and 509 for the Lib Dems, the only...

Left unity for general election?

The Socialist Party , which of all the socialist groupings in England has the largest electoral profile, has added its support to the call for an alliance of socialists at the next General Election. In a letter of 20 September it says: "an 'electoral alliance of autonomous socialist organisations and individuals' would be an important achievement and, we believe, one that is not necessarily easy to accomplish. We have clear political differences with the Alliance for Workers' Liberty (AWL) for example, such as that over our support for trade union disaffiliation from the Labour Party, which...

This website uses cookies, you can find out more and set your preferences here.
By continuing to use this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions.