Monthly Archives: December 2011
The Tory ‘flagship’ council, Westminster, yesterday unveiled its blueprint for dumping the savage cuts in local government finances squarely on the backs of the unemployed and poor. In a move that lays open for all to see the future workers and their families face in the economic collapse of British...
severaL thousand people demonstrated on Sunday outside Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s office in Jerusalem, protesting over a plan they say will displace tens of thousands of people from their land. The demonstrators came from Bedouin communities across Israel, gathering outside Netanyahu’s office holding signs reading ‘We are staying here’...
THE split in the coalition government deepened yesterday, with Deputy Prime Minister Clegg absenting himself from the House of Commons as Prime Minister Cameron stood up to justify his veto of treaty change at the eurozone summit last Friday. Cameron’s statement began with Labour MPs shouting ‘where’s Clegg?’ Labour MP Kevin...
UP TO 1,000 workers, trade unionists, local residents and youth electrified Enfield on Saturday afternoon, after hundreds joined the march through the town with loud chants of ‘Defend Chase Farm – Occupy Now!’ ‘The NHS is not for Sale – Defend Chase Farm!’ ‘Defend the NHS – Kick this government...
WHILE the Prime Minister is being hailed by the anti-EU section of the Tory Party as standing up for the UK like a genuine ‘British Bulldog’ – albeit without any teeth – his deputy PM and coalition partner, Clegg, the Liberal Democratic leader, declared that Cameron’s veto at...
YESTERDAY the Tory prime minister, David Cameron, wielded the British veto over the Franco-German proposals to try and prop up the collapsing euro through the European Union taking complete dictatorial control over the finances of eurozone countries. What Cameron objected to was not the prospect of a EU diktat over...
UNILEVER workers are standing firm despite strong-arm tactics by the employer designed to destroy their resistance to plans to end their final salary pension scheme. The Unite union yesterday praised Unilever workers for their determination to defend their pensions. Unite members and shop stewards at Unilever have been coming under huge...
The South West TUC has today launched a campaign to stop the West Country being declared a low-pay zone. Chancellor Osborne’s plan to end national pay rates for public servants by levelling down public sector pay to that of the private sector would have a devastating impact on the South...
‘The new pensions proposals will hit the pockets of thousands of nurses, paramedics, occupational therapists and other key NHS staff hard’, Unison warned yesterday. The union criticised the timing of the government’s announcement as ‘unhelpful’ when pensions negotiations are still ongoing. Under the proposals, 530,000 staff earning between £15,000 and £26,557...
THE Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has accused the US Secretary of State, Clinton, of giving the Russian right wing – many of them part of the shock therapy brigade who pledged to restore capitalism in 100 days by looting the USSR in the 1990’s – the signal to...
THE BMA is now opposed to the whole of the Health and Social Care Bill and is due to launch a public campaign to demand its withdrawal. The BMA stated yesterday that ‘Doctors right across the medical workforce have been very concerned about major aspects of the Government’s reform...
ANGRY electricians fighting 35% pay cuts imposed by a ‘cartel’ of seven major building contractors led by Balfour Beatty, went on strike at construction sites in London, Cardiff, Manchester, Merseyside, Glasgow, Hull and North East Lincolnshire yesterday morning. Unite members at Balfour Beatty had voted 82% in favour of strike...
THE UK’s industrial output fell 0.7% in October, its fastest fall for six months. It is now 1.7% lower than the same month in 2010, according to the Office of National Statistics (ONS). Manufacturing output also fell 0.7% in October, the biggest monthly drop since April, while electricity and gas...
CIVIL cases against Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa and Shavendra Silva, an ex-army commander and currently Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations (UN) are waiting the next round of decisions from the District Court of District of Columbia and District Court of Southern District of New York respectively. The...
GERMAN Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble has said Standard & Poor’s (S&P) threat to downgrade all eurozone countries, and saddle them with ruinous interest charges for their multi-billion borrowings, is the ‘best possible incentive’ ahead of Friday’s summit, where German Chancellor Merkel with her French lieutenant Sarkozy in uneasy tow,...
head of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange avoided immediate extradition to Sweden on Monday after the High Court ruled that he has the right to appeal to the Supreme Court. Assange is threatened with extradition to Sweden where he has been accused of an alleged ‘rape’ although no charges have been brought...
THE Standard and Poor’s ratings agency has threatened to bankrupt the major eurozone states by shredding their triple A status. This would make it impossible for them to borrow the billions of currency that they require to function. ne region’s ratings before this Friday’s eurozone summit because the risks of a...
‘WE urge all trade unions to follow Unite’s example and back our March to defend Chase Farm, Hospital’ states Bill Rogers, Secretary of NE London Council of Action. Unite wrote: Hi Bill You sent an invitation to our general secretary, Len McCluskey, for this demonstration. Len is unable to attend but I...
Julian Assange, head of Wikileaks, won a victory at the High Court yesterday with its ruling that he has the right to appeal to the Supreme Court, so avoiding immediate extradition to Sweden. Wikileaks internet site has exposed imperialist war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. At midday yesterday, Assange addressed the...
‘The plan to make patient data available to private companies is all about using the NHS as a treasure trove for profits for private business.’ BMA Council Member Anna Athow was responding to prime minister Cameron’s announcement yesterday that the NHS is to be ‘opened up’ to private healthcare firms. Cameron...
This week sees yet another desperate round of talks between the two leaders of the eurozone, German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Nicolas Sarkozy, to come up with an agreement on how to deal with the eurozone debt crisis. They are meeting in an attempt to come up with...
The sit-in at Cairo’s Tahrir Square was continuing on Sunday with hundreds of protesters still occupying tents in the square while others continued chants against military rule. The square’s central island and the sidewalks opposite to the Mugamma complex are still covered with tents. Most entrances leading to the square no...
Healthcare privateers and drug companies are to be given access to patients’ records and other NHS data under plans to be unveiled by prime minister Cameron today. The plans, which include letting health privateers run clinical trials inside NHS hospitals, were criticised by campaign group Patient Concern, which described the...
WE have already had the Hinchingbrooke NHS hospital scandal, where it was put under private management by Circle, with a brief to cut all losses, make a profit, and with Circle getting a £1bn ten-year contract. We have already seen the BMA leaders compelled to change their position on the...
Some 200 unemployed workers converged on Capitol Hill, Washington DC, on Thursday to demand that Congress act immediately to extend unemployment insurance to those whose benefits are due to expire, but who remain unemployed in what has been termed a ‘jobless recovery’. Unless Congress reauthorises the federal unemployment insurance programme...
The Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) is to review surgical services at Barts and Royal London hospitals, east London after five surgeons submitted their resignations over a ‘dangerous’ lack of supplies, staff and beds. A leaked resignation email from one of the five, orthopaedic surgeon David Goodier, showed the reality...
THE governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, made it clear this week that the banking system faces total collapse due to ‘systemic problems’ in capitalism. In other words King was admitting that, far from being caused by the greed of a few bankers, the international crisis of the...
HUNDREDS of thousands of workers and youth took part in mass rallies and marches in all Greek cities and towns on Thursday as part of the one-day general strike called by the GSEE (Greek TUC) and ADEDY (public sector trade unions) against the government’s Budget. The GSEE estimated that over...
Bank of England Governor Mervyn King yesterday urged banks to brace themselves for a eurozone collapse. Introducing the latest financial stability report, King said: ‘Faced with a crisis of the euro-area system, we are seeing at first hand the costs of financial instability.’ He added: ‘Many European governments are seeing the...
ADDRESSING a press conference yesterday afternoon, the governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, said that ‘Tackling the symptoms of the crisis without resolving the underlying causes, by measures such as providing liquidity to banks or sovereigns, offers only short-term relief. Ultimately, governments will have to confront the...
MORE than 4,000 striking council workers, NHS staff, teachers, lecturers, civil servants and students marched through Norwich on Wednesday, during the national strike in defence of pensions. The march set off from Norwich City College heading for a rally on the steps of the City Hall. The vast majority of schools...
huge marches and demonstrations were held in towns and cities all over the UK yesterday. More than two million nurses, other health workers, teachers, other education workers, council workers, civil servants and other public sector workers took strike action in defence of their pensions. More than 50,000 joined the march...
OVER two million public sector workers walked out yesterday. The message was that the coalition’s savage cuts programme, that was intensified in Osborne’s Autumn Statement, is completely unacceptable and will be fought tooth and nail. Thousands of schools were closed, and large numbers of hospital workers took strike...
LAST Tuesday a mass picket of Chase Farm hospital was organised by the North East London Council of Action. The pickets won support from doctors, nurses, patients and local residents who agreed with their policy of occupying the hospital to stop the closure. Pickets mass-leafleted the gates and also won big...