Solidarity 186, 2 December 2010

Sacha is one of nine members, supporters and friends of the AWL are in Israel/Palestine on a solidarity delegation attending demonstrations, meeting Palestinian and Israeli trade unionists and activists. Adam Keller an Israeli socialist, and spokesperson for the left-wing peace group Gush Shalom, spoke to Sacha Ismail. I have been involved in the Israeli left, in all kinds of campaigns and action committees and political parties, since I was at school. I have the same position as your group: a two state settlement, on the 1967 borders, Jerusalem as the capital of both. I’ve had a lot of...

“If we want things to stay as they are things will have to change,” says one of the protagonists in Giuseppe Lampedusa’s novel about resistance to the Sicilian aristocracy against the forces of the bourgeois Risorgimento. It is a cynical remark highly appropriate to events in Italy right now where with the defection of around 40 of his ruling party has left Silvio Berlusconi technically bereft of a majority and facing a vote of no-confidence on 14 December. Unfortunately Berlusconi can take considerable reassurance from the fact that his government has so far gladdened the hearts of both his...

In many areas Labour councillors say they will “fight the cuts” — but also implement them! They say they have no choice. In fact they can and should use their council positions as platforms to mobilise to defy the cuts. The alternative is not a little harmless trimming. Central government is set to cut councils’ funding by 25% over the next four and a half years. Since much that councils do is “statutory” — background stuff that they must do, by law — a 25% cut is huge social destruction. Poplar’s Labour council, in 1921, and the Labour council of the town of Clay Cross, in 1972-4, upheld the...

The SNP minority government in Holyrood has announced its proposed budget for 2011-12 (although current opinion polls suggest that the SNP will be voted out of office only four weeks into that financial year). The Westminster grant to the Scottish government for 2011-12 will be cut by £1.2 billions. Over the next three years the Westminster grant is to be reduced by a total of £3.3 billions — an overall cut of 11% in real terms. In the 1980s and early 1990s the SNP used to mock the Labour Party for failing to stand up to the then Tory government despite having control of most Scottish councils...

Ask most parents, children or teachers to identify the main problems and in all likelihood a core of issues will be held in common by all three groups. Classes are too large, there is too little money for resources, too many classes are taught by unqualified teachers or teachers not qualified in the subject they are expected to teach. The government does not agree. In last week’s government education White Paper Professor Alan Smithers of Buckingham University set out the problems as he saw it — left-wing councils, university training departments and the teaching unions. The Sunday Times...

On 29 November Lewisham Anti Cuts Alliance organised a peaceful protest outside the Town Hall against a first wave of cuts (around £20 million, with a possible £78 million coming over the next three years). The protest involved local unions and users of public services. Students from Goldsmiths College marched through Lewisham to the protest. Already the council has announced the closure of five libraries, the Amersham Children’s Centre and the Opening Doors employment centres. It has made 466 council workers redundant. Around 150-200 people gathered from 5.30pm onwards in the freezing cold...

In a bitter dispute which has lasted months, seen several rounds of strike action, court injunctions and victimisations, British Airways bosses remain intransigent and committed to breaking the back of the cabin crew workers’ union. Unite decided not to recommend acceptance of BA’s latest offer, which failed to make any significant concessions on the docking of pay and travel allowances (which have become central issues in the dispute) and eventually the offer was not even put to ballot. Solidarity spoke to an activist from BASSA, the section of Unite which organises cabin crew, about the...

On 27 November over a thousand people attended the Coalition of Resistance conference in London, and responded enthusiastically to speeches calling for militancy against the cuts. The platform called for support for the TUC anti-cuts march on 26 March 2011, and for a week of action from 14 February (around the “Housing Emergency” lobby of Parliament on 16 February). AWL members attended the conference, calling for anti-cuts unity and for a political orientation to making the labour movement fight against the cuts and for a workers’ government. We advocated that COR (run by the SWP splinter...

Tube workers braved wintry conditions to turn out on picket lines across the combine for a fourth time on 28/29 November. The strike remained solid and affected services on every line, forcing some to close entirely at various points throughout the day. One picket at Mile End station said: “It’s another successful day. We’re fighting for jobs and safety. “I’ve been working nights this week and I’ve seen six trains taken out of service due to safety problems. That’s the sort of thing that will only get worse if these cuts are allowed to go through. “This station has been opened up by two...

London firefighters will vote in December on whether to accept new shift patterns as recommended by a dispute arbitration panel. London firefighters were facing mass sackings after Section 188 notices were imposed in August. The sackings were due to begin from 18 November, but after two successful strikes and the threat of bonfire night action, London fire brigade management agreed to put back the deadline to January, improve their offer on shifts and go to arbitration. The arbitration panel, known as RAP, produced its recommendations on 22 November. Unusually, it made two alternative...