Labour’s Late Start
This year’s conference has shown Labour at last willing to intervene in a failing private energy system, but still not ready to do what the scale of this crisis really demands: getting rid of that system altogether.
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Ko Leik Pya
Ko Leik Pya works as a teacher and writer in the UK and Myanmar. He writes here under a pseudonym.
Giorgia Meloni’s Victory in the Vacuum of Italian Democracy
This weekend’s Italian election brought victory for Giorgia Meloni’s far-right Fratelli d’Italia, with record low turnout – the result of the decades-long collapse of Italy’s political horizons.
Building a People’s Economy in London
In the 1980s, a group of radical economists, planners, and activists in the GLC set out to transform London’s economy in the interest of its working class – with achievements and limitations we can learn from today.
Making Universal Credit Even Harsher Is Not the Answer
Universal Credit is already a disaster – and while millions worry about putting food on the table, the government has decided now’s the time to make the cruel system even crueller.
Here’s What That Budget Should Have Said
Yesterday was a chance for the government to take real action on the cost of living crisis: proper pay rises, a windfall tax on energy giants, a rent freeze. They chose not to take it – so on 1 October, we take to the streets.
University Workers Are Ready to Fight Like Never Before
University bosses have spent the last decade attacking pay and pensions and stripping bare the conditions that once formed the basis of a career in higher education. Now, members of UCU are rising to take back what is theirs.
The Great Tax Robbery
Tax is about political choices. At the worst possible time, our government just made all the wrong ones.
Handouts for the Rich, Hardship for the Rest
Today’s budget was an unashamed handout to the rich. Workers aren’t going to take it lying down, and everyone seems to know it – except the government.
Stop the Uberisation of Royal Mail
Today’s move by Royal Mail to rip up agreements with the CWU is the biggest attack on workers in a generation. If it isn’t fought, we could see the derecognition of a strong union and the fragmentation of our postal service.
The Treasury Needs a Reckoning
As a state bureaucracy, the Treasury is too controlling, conservative and elitist. Liz Truss’s attacks on it won’t make it work for ordinary people – but she’s right that change is needed, writes an anonymous civil servant.
How Labour Abandoned Apsana Begum
Apsana Begum returns to work today. Her treatment is a nauseating example of the Labour leadership’s willingness to abandon Muslim women and domestic abuse survivors if they don’t have the right political friends.
The Grenfell Tower Fire Was Part of Britain’s Colonial Legacy
Named for a colonial leader and built under the same deregulatory drive imposed on newly independent nations, the Grenfell Tower fire wasn’t solely a disaster of the present – it was proof of empire’s long and continuing shadow.
The Cost of Living Crisis Is Hammering the Global South
The Global South’s resilience against economic shock has been systematically stripped away – both by debt, and by the austerity countries had to accept to get loans in the first place. That debt must be forgiven.
Endless Summer
In her award-winning novel ‘Summer Fun’, Jeanne Thornton writes of pop, politics, and the pleasures and pressures of transgender life.
Multi-Level Marketing Companies Are Cashing In on the Crisis
Behind the rise of ‘cult-like’ multi-level marketing lies the fact that our economic system leaves growing numbers of people isolated, insecure – and keen to believe the promises of businesses that sell themselves as a way out.
The Tory Answer to Everything: Make the Rich Richer
While Kwasi Kwarteng weighs up ditching the bankers’ bonus cap, normal workers are told to show ‘restraint’ and quietly accept a decade of flatlining wages. It’s all designed to keep wealth moving in its current direction: upward.
There’s No Green Future Without Public Ownership
Ruling Labour for a Green New Deal’s conference motion ‘out of order’ stifles debate about public ownership just as public support for it reaches new heights. It needs to be put back on the agenda.
Rail Workers Are Fighting on Both Sides of the Atlantic
In the US, freight railroad workers have been pushed to breaking point while the rail carriers profit more than ever – and while a strike was averted in the early hours of Thursday morning, it isn’t off the table.
When Godard Came to England
Jean-Luc Godard’s shift from narrative cinema to the avant-garde was rooted in an ITV commission to make a film about Britain – beginning the director’s decades of experiments in integrating film and revolutionary politics.
The State Doesn’t Care About Protecting Free Speech
The ruling class loves to cry ‘free speech’ when it serves its culture war. The arrest of republican protestors this week has proved just how superficial that commitment really is.