Solidarity 226, 23 November 2011

What's happening to the EDL?

At the start of 2010, the BNP looked poised to consolidate the greatest electoral achievements of any fascist organisation in this country by making party leader Nick Griffin a member of parliament as well as a MEP. The total quashing of these aspirations and the intensification of disputes within the BNP has significantly altered the far-right political landscape. The BNP is now at the point of almost total disintegration. The party is suffering not only from a series of personal and political splits, but is under investigation by the Electoral Commission (for late submission of accounts) and...

Newcastle College student union strike meeting banned by college management

By Ed Whitby, Newcastle Unison (pc) On 16 November, in the run up to the massive public sector strike, Newcastle college students mobilised to get their student union to vote to not only to support the strike, but to call a college student strike for the day. They also agreed to organise a public meeting with trade union speakers to call on students to strike alongside lecturers and support staff on the day. But the meeting, planned for 22 November, was then banned by college management. It has had to take place off college premises. Effectively the management at the college has banned trade...

What is CERN and what good is it?

By Les Hearn What do they do at CERN? It’s simple — they smash things, ions for example, together at high speed. Why do they do that? It’s even more simple — to see what happens! CERN is an example of “blue skies” research: particles are not smashed together to solve any practical problem but to test theories of matter and energy. We’re paying for it — and we should be! Physicists have been smashing particles for quite a long time, over 50 years at CERN and about 100 years altogether. It first revealed the structure of atoms. In 1911, Rutherford’s team bombarded gold atoms with fast-moving...

Strikes and shallow slogans

“Strikes can smash the Tories”. “November 30 [2011]: our day to smash the Tories”. “Mass strikes can kick out Con-Dems”. “Force Cameron out!” The text under such headlines in Socialist Worker and The Socialist varies, and sometimes does not really fit the headlines, but the headline message is common and frequent. You can see why SWP and SP think the message will be catchy. Strikes against cuts? Good. More of them? Better. Bring down the Tory/Lib-Dem government? Excellent. Combine the two ideas in a snappy phrase? Has to be even better. Increased mobilisation and agitation could destabilise...

Southampton workers vote to fight on

Southampton council workers have voted to reject the council’s latest offer in a long-running battle over attacks on pay and conditions. 53% of Unison members, 62.5% of construction union UCATT members and 83.4% of Unite members voted to reject the proposal. Unite regional organiser Ian Woodland spoke to Solidarity . The ballot results reflect the very deep anger that’s still felt about the council’s proposals. Our higher vote for rejection is probably a result of our stewards voting to recommend rejection of the deal [Unison did not put out a recommendation]. Unite stewards will meet on 23...

Busing the pensions jargon

Already the Government has changed inflation-uprating for pensions from one price index, RPI, to another, CPI, which on average is about 0.8% lower each year. That’s an accumulated cut of 15% in your pension after 20 years of retirement. Or if, say, you work as a teacher for 20 years, and do other work for a further 20 years, then the value of the pension you claim from your teaching work will have been cut by 15% even before you retire. The Government wants to increase workers’ contributions to public-sector pension schemes; to raise the age at which pensions can be claimed; and to change...

After N30: build rank-and-file power. Fight to win!

To orient the pensions battle after N30 around clear demands and to launch a programme of rolling, selective and escalating action that can win those demands, we have to create spaces where grassroots union members — the “rank-and-file” — can discuss, coordinate and organise together. Those spaces can be levers of resistance against any attempt by union bureaucracies to derail or sell out the dispute. At a workplace level that could be something as simple as having regular, cross-union workplace meetings. Without such forums, participation in a strike can become a passive experience. With...

Open debate at Irish “Marxism”

By Ed Maltby and Liam McNulty On the weekend of 19-20 November we attended the Irish Socialist Workers’ Party’s Marxism Festival. There were roughly 200 participants at the event, and the general culture was very open. This, in contrast to the atmosphere at the UK Marxism event, where SWP activists will often meet members of other groups with shrill denunciations and critical interventions are unwelcome. Activists at the Dublin festival were keen to discuss ideas with Workers’ Liberty. Sales of our pamphlet on the Ennis labourers’ strike were brisk. On Saturday afternoon, a debate took place...

Where next after N30?

On picket lines on N30 and in meetings on the day and after, strikers should be developing plans of action for extending and escalating the dispute, and deepening it beyond isolated single days of strike action. The pensions dispute will be won if, and only if, the government is convinced that the unions will escalate action and will hold out longer than the government will. Workers should not be left to wait until union leaders decide it’s time for another one-off “day of action”. As well as all-out days of action, we need rolling and selective action across different sectors — teachers...

Stalin's Russia: Continuity thesis not tenable

By Paul Hampton Sam Farber’s work is always worth reading, but I don’t think Martyn Hudson does anyone any favours by rehashing selected bits that coincide with his preconceptions ( Solidarity 224 , 9 November). Farber and Pirani deserve to be read seriously, but neither appears to subscribe to the view advanced repeatedly by Martyn: namely the “continuity thesis” that Leninism led to Stalinism. In the article Martyn quotes (from Against the Current 136), Farber states that there were major “qualitative differences” between Leninism in power and Stalinism. In my view, the continuity thesis is...

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