Archive for March 2003

7 March 2003

Mass Action needed to stop War

THE HUGE parliamentary revolt last week against Blair's war plans was all the more remarkable given that the Tory party officially lined up behind Blair and the payroll vote of Labour ministers and parliamentary secretaries - Blair's Human Shield - were obliged to vote for the government's motion

7 March 2003

School and College Student Action Friday 7th March

A number of successful student actions took place today, organised by ISR. News of walk-outs and protests are still being received, and will be covered more fully in the forthcoming The Socialist. They

7 March 2003

Bush's Bribes And Dirty Tricks

DESPITE SOME hefty arm twisting and dangling a $30 billion carrot in front of Turkey's political leaders, a US plan to use that country's military bases to launch a northern invasion of Iraq has come unstuck

7 March 2003

A New Alternative To New Labour?

ON 3 March a meeting entitled "Where is New Labour going?" took place in London. Around 500 attended, predominantly left activists. This meeting marked a significant development in the positions of all

7 March 2003

International Women's Day

TO CELEBRATE International Women's Day (8 March), the Committee for a Workers' International (CWI) - the socialist International which the Socialist Party in England and Wales is affiliated to - is organising a speaking tour by Titi Rasheed of the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM) in Nigeria.

7 March 2003

General Strike In Algeria

TUESDAY 25 February. Thousands of factories had to close down; the sky was without planes, the streets without public transport, banks and offices were closed, the printing presses of the daily papers

7 March 2003

SSP Conference: Scottish Socialists Debate The Way Forward

THE 2003 Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) conference met recently against the backdrop of a likely war in Iraq and two months before the Scottish parliament elections

7 March 2003

Anti-War Reports

IN LEICESTER, young people are ready to join the strike against the war at both Universities and several schools around the city, School Students And Students write.

7 March 2003

Action Now To Stop Bush & Blair's War

WHILE BUSH and Blair go through the charade of weapons inspections, the 'undeclared' war against Iraq has already begun

7 March 2003

Firefighters Demand A Living Wage

"MORE MONEY for the war machine! Gordon Brown has indicated that he will make more money available 'so that the Armed Forces are properly equipped for whatever lies ahead'. What about proper equipment

14 March 2003

Support the firefighters

Step Up The Fight For A Living Wage: THE LATEST offer has gone down a storm!! 15.2% over 18 months may look OK on the surface but the devil is in the detail.., writes Steve Brinkley, Suffolk FBU.

14 March 2003

PFI Doesn't Work

PRIVATISATION IS always a great thing - for the rich... But what about Public-private Finance Initiatives, which are supposed to provide private funding to expand and improve the education and health services,...

14 March 2003

Stop Work To Stop The War

What We Think: DESPITE THE biggest demonstration in the history of Britain and unprecedented anti-war protests, Blair is determined to go to war with Iraq over the next few days...

14 March 2003

Blair's war crisis

AS WE go to press, it's unclear whether or not Bush and Blair will have secured even the fall-back figleaf of a majority vote on the UN Security Council to 'justify' their imperialist war with Iraq...

14 March 2003

School And College Students Show The Way

Leicester: ON 5 March, tens of thousands of students internationally went on strike and took to the streets in protest against the war...

14 March 2003

10,000 rally in Stockholm

International Protests: AT LUNCHTIME on 5 March, Sergels square in Stockholm was filled by school students demanding an immediate stop to war preparations against Iraq...

14 March 2003

Asylum - What We Say

Decent services for all: TONY BLAIR is planning to introduce new harsh measures against asylum seekers while simultaneously embarking on a war against Iraq that will create hundreds of thousands more refugees...

14 March 2003

Organise To Walk Out Against War

BUSH AND BLAIR have issued an ultimatum to Saddam Hussein. The first bombs could be falling on Iraq within days, writes Sarah Sachs Eldridge, ISR - Youth Against the War.

14 March 2003

World economy: Is War Good For Business?

FINANCE MINISTERS from the seven largest economies in the world met recently to debate how to revive the sick world economy. However, there was little agreement on how to revive the patient, writes Kevin Parslow.

21 March 2003

The Horror Begins

DESPITE MASS protests by tens of millions of people around the world, Bush and Blair's war machine has unleashed a horrific attack against Iraq...

21 March 2003

Fair Pay for Firefighters

FIREFIGHTERS AT their special union conference on 19 March have overwhelming rejected the employers 'revised offer', writes Bill Mullins.

21 March 2003

Where Next For The Anti-War Movement?

SO THE 'liberation' of the Iraqis is beginning - with massive carpet bombing...

21 March 2003

Worldwide Protests At Bush's War

60,000 march in Brussels: A MONTH after the huge 15 February demonstrations, there was another rapidly organised anti-war demo in Brussels attracting 60,000...

21 March 2003

School And College protest reports: School's Out!

I go to Haggerston Girls School and previously we were having problems with being able to exercise our right to strike, writes Suzanne Beishon.

21 March 2003

Fight Against War - Fight For Socialism

THE STRUGGLE for a planet without war goes beyond the struggle against Bush's 'war on terror'. Conflict and instability are all the norm in our capitalist profit system that is riven by crisis...

21 March 2003

Terrorism strengthens USA

IT IS possible that, angry and frustrated at the way Bush and Blair have ignored the anti-war movement, a minority may turn to the methods of terrorism...

21 March 2003

The alternative to war

"YOU'RE ANTI-war but what would you do about dictators like Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction?"...

21 March 2003

We Need A Political Voice

THE MOVEMENT against the war has revealed starkly the lack of a mainstream mass political party that represents the interests of the demonstrators...

28 March 2003

Step Up Action Against This Bloody War

AS WE go to press, the battle for Baghdad seems about to begin...

28 March 2003

Firefighters Reject 'New' Offer

THE 250-strong recall conference of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) met in Brighton last week and decisively rejected the latest "offer" from the employers, writes Bill Mullins and Matt Wrack.

28 March 2003

Defending the fire service

WE'VE HAD a 42-hour week since 1982. Now they want us to work 20 hours of overtime a month. That means 5,000 jobs going, writes Andy Brickles, East Midlands regional FBU chair.

28 March 2003

22 March, London: Biggest wartime demo ever

THE ANTI-war demonstration on 22 March attracted hundreds of thousands of protesters. It was the biggest wartime demonstration ever organised in Britain. The protest was dominated by the determination...

28 March 2003

Turkish state threatens Iraqi Kurds

BUSH AND Blair hope that the battle for Baghdad will not be too long and too bloody. They also have the problem of the Turkish troops mustering on the border of predominantly Kurdish northern Iraq...

28 March 2003

Hypocrisy on prisoners of war

IRAQI FORCES took five American GIs prisoner near Nassiriya on 23 March. The Arabic Al-Jazeera satellite (followed by most of the world's media) showed them being interviewed by Iraqi TV. Next day Iraq...

28 March 2003

Bush's billions for bombs

PRESIDENT BUSH is to ask the United States Congress for $74 billion (some £47 billion) to fund the war in Iraq...

28 March 2003

Youth Against The War

SCHOOL AND college students have been walking out in their tens of thousands against war with Iraq. Young people are angry at the death and destruction that war is causing; at the politicians and their...

28 March 2003

ISR / Youth Against the War: A guide to action:

Getting everyone together is the first and most important thing...

28 March 2003

The Rising Of The Youth

Waltham Forest: DAY X - the day war in Iraq began - was a day that youth walked out of schools, colleges and universities in their tens of thousands...

28 March 2003

Day X: Millions walkout against the war

WITHIN HOURS of cruise missiles exploding in Baghdad a wave of anti-war demos and protests, involving millions of people, has swept around the globe...

28 March 2003

War And The 'New World Disorder'

US IMPERIALISM'S war in Iraq threatens to create turmoil in the region and internationally. Socialist Party general secretary, Peter Taaffe, looks at the possible global consequences of this horrific...

28 March 2003

Quick Victory But Lasting Turmoil

THE LAST Gulf War in 1990-91 started after Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded and occupied Kuwait in August 1990, largely to divert angry protests at mass hunger and poverty after eight years of war with Iran, writes Roger Shrives.