By Christopher Winch Author’s Note. This article was first published in July 2003. It is a mark of the lack of progress that the left has made since then, that in preparing it for Labour Affairs in 2024 I have had to make minimal changes, like substituting ‘Starmer’ for ‘Blair’. It is often said by … Continue reading Equality and Socialism
The new party, Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance - Reason and Justice, is putting up candidates for the 9 June EU elections. Note that Wagenknecht puts the death of Navalny at the door of the Russian authorities, without proof, but she highlights the fate of the West’s prisoner of conscience, Julian Assange, at the same time. Preventing a … Continue reading Sahra Wagenknecht Newsletters February
The House of Lords has an Economic Affairs Committee (EAC) which has regular inquiries into economic matters that they think will be important for members of the House of Lords to understand. The structure of these inquiries is that the committee will hold a series of meetings to which it calls expert witnesses and asks them … Continue reading Sustainability of National Debt
In the February issue of Labour Affairs we outlined the Workers Party policy advocating that fans take control over their own local football clubs. It was noted that this is still to a large extent the case in countries such as Germany. There fan-controlled clubs are able successfully to fight off threats from powerful financial … Continue reading Fan-Controlled Football Clubs in Germany—a Success Story
Zyuganov: "Fulfilling the President's wishes and Nikolai Kharitonov's programme". Kharitonov is the Communist Party presidential candidate in the presidential election on the 17th March. Labour Affairs Commentary: In this speech Zyuganov (Secretary General, Communist Party of the Russian Federation) indicates his party’s broad support for the objectives of the government’s programme. In particular, he endorses the … Continue reading The Russian Presidential Election
February 2024 https://www.pnp.ru/politics/intervyu-prezidenta-rf-vladimira-putina-zhurnalistu-takeru-karlsonu-polnyy-tekst.html Т. CARLSON (as translated): Mr. President, thank you very much. On February 24, 2022, you addressed your country and your nation when the conflict in Ukraine began. You said that you had acted because you had come to the conclusion that, with NATO's help, the United States could launch a surprise attack, … Continue reading Tucker Carlson interview with Vladimir Putin—Part 1
This is the final part of the interview. Т. Carlson: So he traded more with Russia than with the European Union and Ukraine?V. Putin: Of course. It's not even about the volume of trade, even if it was higher. It's a question of cooperative ties, on which the entire Ukrainian economy was based. Cooperative ties … Continue reading Tucker Carlson interview with Vladimir Putin–Part 2
On the 11th November 2023 the largest of a series of ongoing popular demonstrations against Israel’s actions against the population of Gaza took place in London. By some estimates between 800,000 and a million people attended, certainly far more than the official estimates of 300,000. By any standards this was a significant expression of popular feeling, … Continue reading Authoritarian Liberal Democracy—Editorial
Martin Seale Jeremy Hunt’s November Autumn Statement was a clever piece of work. It had two objectives. Firstly, to win the next general election. Secondly, if the Tory Party did not win the next general election, to guarantee that any Labour administration would fail. Hunt’s trump card in achieving this dual objective is the fiscal rule book. Hunt, … Continue reading Taxing Issues
“Events, dear boy !” Mick Murray “A terrible beauty”? Harold Macmillan was the author of such enduring soundbites, as they would now be called, such as “the winds of change” a euphemistic term for the beginnings of the decolonialisation of Africa and“they’ve never had it so good” to describe the social change in Britain as it began to enjoy … Continue reading Gaza, Dawn of a New World
Israeli child “burned completely” by Israeli tank fire at kibbutz (Ali Abunimah & David Sheen, Electronic Intifada, 25 November 2023) The evidence Israel killed its own citizens on 7 October (Asa Winstanley, Electronic Intifada, 23 November 2023) Video: Gaza is ‘textbook genocide’: Holocaust Scholar Raz Segal (Owen Jones, 21 November 2019) Opinion: Here’s what the mass … Continue reading Palestine Links
The problem of housing the less-affluent working class. By Eamon Dyas We have now arrived at the point where the second Labour minority government took power in 1929. In terms of housing policy the most significant difference between this second Labour administration and its predecessor was the absence of John Wheatley, from Ramsay MacDonald’s 1929 … Continue reading LABOUR AND HOUSING – Part 14.
Letter to the Editor from a Labour Party member In September this year Labour Affairs published an articled entitled “Purges in the Labour Party” which began: “Starmer’s campaign of exclusion and harassment. This topic requires a report on the scale of the Forde report, which took two years to investigate complaints of all sorts regarding the behaviour … Continue reading Labour Party Harassment
Notes on the News By Gwydion M. Williams Democracy Only Real if Mediaeval? Democracy Frustrated Over Climate Change Class Politics in Climate Change Gaza: Ethnic Cleansing Snippets China Seeking Peace BBC Coopts a Dead Chinaman A New Hope for Germany? A Dope’s Guide to US Politics Gay Games in Hong Kong Wed Gayly, but no … Continue reading Notes on the News
Questions to the Ministry of Defence House of Commons 20 November 2023 These consecutive questions and answers to the Ministry of Defence cover a variety of topics, as per subheadings below. The questions and the answers show quasi unanimity among Labour and Tories regarding Defence and Foreign Affairs in general; they show also the British appetite … Continue reading The Ministry of Defence
Sahra Wagenknecht’s Newsletter December 2023 No to wars and armament madness Many people are worried about a policy that will soon be deciding on billions in arms deliveries every week, but at the same time is no longer in a position to provide adequate funding for our infrastructure, affordable housing and sufficient teaching and care … Continue reading Sahra Wagenknecht Newsletter
Workers Plan for Steel A union with a vision for the steel industry and the country. As part of Unite’s campaign to fight for the steel industry, open letters have been written by 130 businesses, associations and clubs in Port Talbot, 150 in Scunthorpe, 130 in Teesside, 150 in Sheffield. We reproduce the Teesside letter and comments, underneath … Continue reading Unite—The Union: A workers Plan for Steel
Below we reprint selections from a lively debate on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) that has been taking place under the auspices of the Workers’ Party of Britain. Those who are interested can access the full debate on the Workers Party website. MODERN MONETARY THEORY (MMT) FOR WPB Chris Williamson No political party in Britain has … Continue reading MMT Debate
