Solidarity 361, 22 April 2015

Grow Heathrow is a community garden space and activist centre in Sipson, in the path of the proposed third runway at Heathrow Airport. Grow Heathrow activist Cameron Richards spoke to Solidarity about the project and its place in the wider movement against climate change. Grow Heathrow came out of Transition Heathrow, which came out of the 2007 Climate Camp. That Camp was sited outside the airport, protesting against the plans for a third runway. From that, a group of environmental activists decided to focus on the fight against expansion. A number of people moved into the local community, and...

The election of Dave Ward as General Secretary of the Communication Workers Union is a step backwards. Liberalisation of the postal sector and privatisation of Royal Mail should mean the priority for the CWU is building the union across the communication industry, but this has happened very slowly. In telecoms, where privatisation and competition arrived 30 years ago, workers with union recognition are a minority. More focus and resources need to be put into this work to take the Union into unrecognised areas. Though under Hayes the union could have done more, he at least recognised the need...

“Neither Nicola Sturgeon nor her deputy (Stewart Hosie) are saying austerity can be avoided. Instead, it’s being re-badged and re-profiled, or spread out for longer. …” “The defiant refusal to accept more austerity, which won power for Syriza in Greece last month, is not being offered here. Instead, a serious bid for a share of power in Britain requires a message that won’t spook the markets.” That was the verdict of BBC Scotland’s business and economy editor Douglas Fraser, and it is about right. The fact that the SNP are saying that more austerity is unavoidable is at odds with the SNP’s...

25 April 2015 will be the 100th anniversary of the landings by British, French, Australian, and New Zealand troops at Gallipoli, in Turkey, in an unsuccessful effort to seize Constantinople (now Istanbul) during World War One. More than any other imperialist sally, this one has become a nationalist legend. This article by Tom O’Lincoln, abridged with thanks from the Australian socialist newspaper Red Flag , recounts the history. From 1916, 25 April was officially named Anzac Day. Australian troops marched in London, and a sports day was held in the Australian camp in Egypt. In the Sydney march...

Campaigns to force institutions to move their money out of oil, gas and coal companies on grounds of pushing back against climate change is gaining momentum across the globe. The fossil fuel divestment campaign, started by the US-based 350.org associated with environmentalist Bill McKibben, has begun to gain support from universities, charities, religious groups, local councils and other bodies. Since 2010, around 200 institutions have withdrawn their investments from fossil fuel firms. These steps have been driven by “Fossil Free” student campaigns, urging universities to get their heads out...

It wasn’t the stars, or geology. It wasn’t ocean currents, or the weather. The world economy was brought crashing down in 2008 by the particular way we have allowed it to be organised. It was brought down by being organised around the priority of maximum competitive greed and gain of a small exploiting minority. From the early 1980s to 2008, world capitalism became more and more governed by the drive for quick, fluid gains, measured and coordinated through an increasingly complex and fast-flowing system of world financial markets. Ever more elaborate forms of credit were packaged and traded...

I’m under strict editorial instructions to leave the Daily Mail alone this week. Which is the first time anyone’s ever said that to me. So I lazily rolled across the barricades to the Mirror, a paper I’ve not had much connection with since they stopped running Garth the first time around. But their election coverage is quite interesting, for all sorts of reasons. It’s primarily geared around people not intending to vote; an admirable move, for sure. It would appear someone has done some research and created a profile of the sort of person they think doesn’t vote and then calculated the optimal...

In his article “Basic Income: Side –stepping struggle?” ( Solidarity 359) Kieran Miles gets a number of things wrong. I will attempt to pick up on some of these errors and then address his “questions for the UBI advocates”. Before proceeding, a point on terminology. Kieran uses the term universal basic income while I prefer citizen’s income. However, the most common term in use seems to be the shorter basic income and I would suggest using this in any future discussion. In a number of places Kieran is simply not comparing like with like. A “minimum income” is not a basic income and the...