Solidarity 092, 27 April 2006

“Local people” demagogy is no answer

In the last council by-election in my ward, in Islington, north London, I voted for the Independent Working-Class Association. I had my doubts, but the IWCA seemed to be making some effort to offer a working-class political perspective to the voters here — a corner of Islington which until recently was almost all big blocks of council and housing-association flats, and is still very heavily working-class, yet belongs electorally to the Liberal Democrats. The IWCA did well, coming third only 14 votes behind a competent New Labour candidate. That was in January 2003. The IWCA’s literature for...

Dehumanising?

In Solidarity 3/89 David Broder started a discussion on animal testing and the broader issue of “animal rights”. Here Clive Bradley and Janine Booth take issue with David. His reply and other debate can be found at: www.workersliberty.org/node/5802 I am not going to argue that medical testing on animals should be halted. I am an insulin-dependent diabetic, and — actually I’m hazy on the precise history of what's called “human insulin”, but it's likely it involved animal testing, without which I would be dead. But there are aspects to the argument David puts — which is pretty typical of a...

First victory in London

Sweat-free campus campaigners at Queen Mary College in east London have won a great victory. The college council has committed itself to making Queen Mary the first “living wage campus” in the UK. This means no one will be paid less than a living wage (currently set at £6.70 an hour), or receive fewer than 28 days’ holiday and 10 days’ sick pay.

US Living Wage activists visit UK

Brie and Diane from the Living Wage Action Coalition are visiting the UK at the end of May and start of June. They will be speaking at various events including the student activist school at Sussex University on Saturday 27 May. Diane was a student activist at Georgetown University, and was an organiser and hunger-striker during the Georgetown Living Wage campaign. Brie was active in organising around farmworker rights with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and the Student/Farmworker Alliance through the victorious Taco Bell Boycott. She was the US national co-ordinator for the Student/...

USAS in conference

By Laura Schwartz Recently I attended the United Students Against Sweatshops conference in San Francisco. It lived up to everything I had heard about the energy and increasing power of the US anti-sweatshop student movement. 450 delegates were united in their commitment to 'solidarity not charity'. Support for the international workers' movement was firmly at the centre of all USAS discussions; they understood that workers and students would both benefit from united action.

A new generation

A series of US student initiatives that link worker struggles to student solidarity now form the biggest protest coalition on US campuses since the Vietnam war. As Dan Katz argues, this practical, effective movement should inspire UK students and show a way forward to home-grown initiatives like Students Against Sweatshops and People and Planet. Beginning with the anti-sweatshop struggles of the 1990s which were focussed on the garment-making transnationals, the activists of the US student movement have extended their campaigning. Activists have worked with the unions during “Union Summer”...

Mexico: strikers shot and killed during steel mill occupation

Police shot and killed two workers, another was crushed to death in a melee, and over 40 others were wounded, most by gunshots, when authorities launched an assault to expel striking workers occupying the SICARTSA steel mill in Lazaro Cardenas, Michoacan, Mexico on 20 April. Reports from the scene suggest that others may also have been killed or may die from their wounds. Workers and townspeople retook the plant, but were then besieged by the police. Parts of the plant have been taken over by the Mexican Army and the Mexican Navy. Mexican unions have demanded the resignation of the country's...

May Day action against new US immigration “reform”

A number of actions (marches, rallies, student walkouts and strikes) are planned on 1 May. Huge protests, demonstrations and rallies in many cities across America in the last two months have given birth to a national immigrants’ rights movement. Workers, mainly Hispanic workers, have been fighting legislation which will make being an undocumented immigrant a felon and criminalise anyone who offers non-emergency assistance to undocumented workers and their families. • From www.nohr4437.org: On May 1, we are calling for “No Work, No School, No Sales, and No Buying”, and also to have rallies...

The campaign won’t be over when it’s over!

The Socialist Unity campaign in Hackney Central — where AWL members Janine Booth and Charlie MacDonald are standing — isn’t just about winning votes. We want to help working-class people in Hackney organise to fight back against attacks from their employers, their landlords and the government. And there are certainly plenty of attacks to fight. Just before the election, on 2 and 3 May, Hackney benefit workers including Charlie McDonald will take action against their managers’ attempts to force through job losses without even a compulsory redundancy agreement. This is part of a national...

Action against deportations and detention

On 8 April, as part of a worldwide day of action against the detention and deportation of asylum-seekers and immigrants, 250 people converged on the Harmondsworth and Colnbrook "removal centres" near Heathrow Airport. Organised by the London No Borders network among others, the demonstration had a clear message of solidarity with the incarcerated asylum-seekers: no immigration controls! The following week also saw demonstrations in towns across the UK including London, Glasgow and Manchester. After the 8 April demonstration, 150 detainees at Colnbrook began a hunger strike in protest at their...

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