Solidarity 203, 11 May 2011

Direct action and class struggle

Much of Bobi Pasquale’s response to our “Open letter to a direct action activist” ( Solidarity 3/202) was made up of statements no leftist could object to (workers and students in struggle good; the cuts, coppers and Labour careerists bad). And while the Socialist Party, for instance, believes the police are “workers in uniform”, and has as its “priority” in the labour movement “moving through elected positions” — these are certainly not accusations you can make at the AWL. They are not relevant to this debate. I’d urge everyone interested in this debate to read “Can we build a revolutionary...

Don't follow leaders: Bob Dylan in China and Vietnam

Bob Dylan recently performed in China and Vietnam for the very first time, prompting critics to denounce him for “selling out” — and not for the first time. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd led the charge. In a recent column she denounced the singer, ending with these powerful lines: Maybe the songwriter should reread some of his own lyrics: “I think you will find/When your death takes its toll/All the money you made/Will never buy back your soul.” Strong stuff indeed. But of course Bob Dylan wasn’t writing those lines about “protest singers” who had betrayed their values. He wrote them...

TUSC shrivels

The three left-of-Labour sitting councillors up for election on 5 May all lost. The SWP’s Michael Lavalette was defeated in Preston after eight years on the council; and Ray Holmes, also an SWP member, in Bolsover after four years. In Walsall Pete Smith of the Democratic Labour Party (a local group which was part of the Socialist Alliance) lost the seat he had held since 2007. The Socialist Party’s Rob Windsor, in Coventry, failed to win back the place on the council which he held in 2000-4 and 2006-10. Jackie Grunsell, a Socialist Party member elected to Kirklees council as “Save Huddersfield...

SNP out-labours Labour

On 5 May the Scottish National Party increased its share of the popular vote by 13%, increased the number of constituency seats it held by 32, and won an absolute majority of 69 seats in the 129-seat Holyrood Parliament. Labour’s share of the constituency vote (31.7%) was the lowest since 1923. Its share of the list vote (26.3%) was its lowest since 1918. It lost 20 constituency seats, leaving it with MSPs in just 15 out of 73 constituencies. In Scotland, Labour could not coast to gains on a vague political platform about deploring Tory cuts (as too harsh and too fast) and promising to...

Sacked for eating

At our staff meeting last month, our ward manager warned us that Trust management are taking a zero tolerance approach to the heinous crime of... eating leftover patient food. We were informed that two members of nursing staff have already been sacked and we could expect management spies to jump out from the shadows at any moment. No-one in the NHS is particularly proud of eating leftover patient food. However, on some shifts it is the only way to grab a quick bite to eat. As a recent survey in the Nursing Times shows, 95% of nurses regularly work in excess of their contracted hours with 22%...

Midnight raid on university protest

On 9 May university management at London Metropolitan used police and private security to evict a peaceful occupation of the Holloway Road Graduate centre. Students at London Met’s North Campus staged the occupation in protest against planned cuts of 400 courses and several student support schemes. London Met provides courses and support to working-class students who otherwise would find it difficult to access higher education. These cuts will transform the college into, in VC Malcolm Gillies’s words, a “lean”, “tightly-organised”, “competitive” institution. Gillies plans to outsource services...

Organise for 30 June!

On Tuesday 17 May members of the National Union of Teachers will begin balloting on strikes against the government's plans to increase their pension contributions, raise their pension age, and cut their pensions. The government plans affect all public service workers - in similar, though slightly varying ways. They go together with the government's plans to increase the age for the state pension, and are setting the frame for further trashing of what pension provision remains in the private sector. Another teachers' union, ATL, will start balloting on 20 May. On 18-20 May the civil service...

Unions must fight for the right to strike

Tory mayor of London Boris Johnson is campaigning for new laws to make it even more difficult for workers to defend our interests by striking. Prime minister David Cameron has said that he is "open to the idea". Tory transport minister Philip Hammond responded to the Tube drivers' recent vote to strike against victimisation of union reps by saying (5 May) that "this is only strengthening the hand of those including the Mayor who are calling for tougher industrial relations laws". Not in the rail union RMT, but elsewhere in the union movement, the word is increasingly heard from officials that...

All feathered up: a new defence of anarchism

Review of "Black Flame: The Revolutionary Class Politics of Anarchism and Syndicalism", by Michael Schmidt and Lucien van der Walt (AK Press). Click here to download all three parts as pdf . Part 1: All feathered up: a new defence of anarchism Part 2: How anarchism parted ways with Marxism Part 3: Anarchism and the Commune Variants of revolutionary syndicalism were major influences in the labour movements of several countries between the 1890s and World War One. Their activists reckoned the work of the "political" socialists who spent much time on parliamentary electioneering to be deficient...

Tories backtrack on extra university places for rich

Having floated the idea of universities creating a separate admissions system for those who pay above the £9,000 cap on tuition fees, the government has quickly backtracked. Universities minister David Willetts had suggested that institutions could recruit more British students by offering extra places to those who pay full-cost fees of up to £28,000. He claimed that the extra income would free up more places for students for poor backgrounds. In Australia, those who pay their tuition fees upfront are offered a lower grade for entrance to university than those who have to take a loan to pay...

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