& Workers’ Liberty

SolFor siociadl ownershaip of the branks aind intdustry y No 522 23 October 2019 50p/£1 ≫Second public vote ≫Remain & Transform Get the Tories out! ≫ A workers’ More: p. 3 answer to climate crises

Perspectives for the move - ment p.8-9; the XR action fort - night p.3; geothermal energy p.2 P. 2, 3, 8-9 A socialist against Trump?

Eric Lee reports on the Bernie Sanders cam - paign P. 2

Credit: Gemma Short The hijab in schools DEMOCRACY Continuing the debate P. 12-13 Renew Labour vs Labour Campaigns Together JOHNSON P. 7 2 NEWS More online at www.workersliberty.org Bernie Sanders: The road to Iowa

there is actually only one candidate won’t take corporate money either styles herself as a policy wonk with voters who like and trust Biden Sanders running on the issue of class, and – during the primary campaign. plans to solve each individual often see Sanders as a good second campaign that is Sanders. But once the Democrats have cho - problem. choice. Though Warren is a favourite of sen their candidate, she says that if Sanders says that as president The biggest test for Sanders and By Eric Lee many progressives, and would cer - she wins, she’ll consider accepting he’d be the “organiser in chief”, all the others comes on Super Tues - tainly be the second choice for corporate donations. with a strong focus on strengthen - day – 3 March 2020 – when 13 many Sanders supporters, both her Warren is a supporter of free uni - ing grassroots social movements states hold their primaries. In addi - Bernie Sanders has 100 days to record and her proposals fall far versity education to a point – but and the trade unions in particular. tion, on that day Democrats change American politics for - short of what socialists want. believes in means-testing. Sanders His campaign slogan reflects this: Abroad holds its Global Presiden - ever. Warren proudly proclaims her - considers education a human right, “Not me. Us.” tial Primary in which any Ameri - In a little more than 14 weeks, the self a supporter of capitalism – a like health care. For the next 14 weeks, Sanders can citizen can vote. Here in the voters of the small, largely rural, modified, more humane capitalism Sanders and Warren both sup - will continue criss-crossing the UK, there will be polling stations in state of Iowa will choose who they to be sure – and rejects the label of port a Green New Deal to battle cli - country, with a focus on the early London and several other cities, want to be the Democratic Party’s socialist, which Sanders embraces. mate change, but only Sanders says primary states – Iowa, New Hamp - and people will have the chance to candidate to run against Donald It’s not a question of semantics; that nationalising the fossil fuel in - shire, Nevada and South Carolina. vote remotely as well. Should Sanders win the nomi - Trump in November 2020. there are genuine differences be - dustry should be part of that. In all of them but the last, he’s nation – and then the presidency This is the first of a series of pri - tween the Sanders and Warren There are many other examples polling well. – it will mark a seismic shift in mary elections to choose delegates campaigns. of policy differences, on all of The leading candidate remains American politics towards one for the Democratic National Con - For example, Sanders rejects which Sanders is on Warren’s left. former Vice President Joe Biden, based on social class, ending up vention which will be held in Mil - large corporate donations, full stop. Their biographies too are radi - but he’s increasingly seen as out of with a pro-working class leader waukee in July. He has raised more money than cally different – Sanders having touch and not a viable alternative who grew up on the socialist left While the mainstream media has any other candidate, from more been a socialist since the late 1950s, to Trump. He has been steadily sitting in the White House. divided up the candidates into donors, without taking gifts from while Warren until 1996 was a Re - slipping in the polls. Those same “moderates” and “progressives,” the wealthy. Warren has said she publican. Like Obama, Warren polls indicate that working class Free Catalan political prisoners!

By Phil Grimm with the police is something new. Catalonia has a fiery history of A wave of unrest has swept working-class rebellion, but the na - through Catalonia following the tionalist movement, traditionally harsh sentencing of pro-inde - dominated by a Catalan bour - pendence leaders by the Span - geoisie which likes to project itself ish Supreme Court. as a modern, business-like alterna - 12 politicians and civil society tive to a dysfunctional Spanish leaders were found guilty of crime state, has until now prided itself on including sedition, misuse of public peaceful protest and decorum. The Groundbreaking ground-breaking funds and disobedience following new explosion of anger reflects the their involvement in the 2017 refer - way in which the Spanish state has frustrated what many Catalans Indeed, less-deep geothermal endum on and subsequent declara - view as a legitimate attempt to de - wells, and combined heat-and- tion of Catalan independence from Climate cide their own future. power from nuclear (or combus - Spain. CDC, the long-term governing tion power) would be a big step That referendum had been de - SUPPORT party that opportunistically swung By Misha Zubrowski, forward. clared illegal. The Spanish constitu - in favour of independence as a Anger at the conduct of the means of deflecting anger about That will require a higher level tion contains undemocratic vetoes Spanish government far exceeds of integration of heating systems, on any region declaring independ - austerity and capitalist crisis. In Cornwall, the deepest well support for separation. Solidarity does not think that sep - yet drilled in Britain now pene - with significant upfront invest - ence without the consent of Spain Despite there being no majority aratism is the answer for workers trates 5.1km into the earth’s ment – but is necessary, and as a whole. Defendants were sen - in Catalonia for independence, 60% in Catalonia or the rest of Spain. We crust, burrowing into fiery would reduce costs overall. tenced to hefty fines, bans from believe the nationalist leaders are against new borders except depths where the temperatures This geothermal well is impor - holding office and lengthy prison should have been pardoned. Com - where necessary to give an op - can reach 195C. tant as a test project. Drilling on sentences, including 13 years for the well was started in November the former Vice-President of Cat - parable majorities are angry with pressed nation space to breathe, This – literally – groundbreak - last year, and completed this Sep - alonia, Oriol Junqueras. the way in which the police shut and we believe that working-class ing well will soon be the UK’s first tember. This makes the timeframe The sentencing sparked new life down the referendum in 2017. unity across regional and national genuine functional geothermal for construction of the whole into an independence movement Rioting is new, but so too is the borders is the best way to force the power station. power station likely under a year that had begun to deflate in the last growing division between the pro- bosses into conceding to workers’ Water will be pumped down and a half – significantly shorter year. Shortly after the sentences independence demonstrators and interests. But in order to achieve into the Porthtowan fault, a geo - than many power stations. were announced, direct actions the leaders of the Catalan govern - that working-class unity, it is neces - logical formation through which it On Monday 14 October, it was took place to disrupt transport and ment. Demonstrations took place sary that national questions are can be circulated, flowing in a con - announced that a second geother - infrastructure in Barcelona and outside the regional government’s dealt with democratically and tinuous cycle. This water is heated mal power station will be joining other Catalan towns. Ministry of Home Affairs, protest - without coercion. up by the hot rocks, and pumped this first, also in Cornwall – built Thousands of protesters de - ing against the actions of Interior We are against Catalan separa - back to the surface where – as in the Eden project. The initial scended on Barcelona-El Prat air - Minister Miquel Bluch, who autho - tion (as are a majority of Catalans), steam – it powers turbines. £16.8 million funding for this was port, only being dispersed by rised aggressive action by the local but we condemn the Spanish state The final power station will be 60% from the EU, 40% from “insti - violent police intervention. Roads police force against demonstrators, for jailing people for organising a referendum. small, discreet, produce no green - tutional investors” and 10% from were blocked, railways sabotaged, even while officially encouraging We condemn, too, the actions house gases, and be very low-cost Cornwall council. workers went on strike and sub - the protests. of courts and police to squash to maintain. It will produce three Previous geothermal projects stantial fighting took place as Similar anger has been directed the nationalist movement by megawatts of electricity, continu - have been shelved when govern - demonstrators clashed with police, at Catalan president Quim Torra, force. ously, which is the average energy ment funding has been pulled. not just in Barcelona but in Girona who simultaneously seeks to use consumption of around 6,000 Privately owned projects, as many and Tarragona. street protests as a pawn to pres - homes; providing “baseload” en - of them are, siphon a lot of money An enormous demonstration sure the Spanish government, Corrections ergy to the national grid. away as direct profit, into the took place in Barcelona on Friday while also repressing them in the If the hot water condensed after pockets of the CEOs and share - 18 October, after pro-independence name of order. passing through the turbines is marchers from surrounding towns The hypocrisy and double-deal - holders. Somehow we missed the “let - well used, through a combined Billions of pounds should be filed into the capital on foot. ing of the regional government ters” logo which should have heat-and-power scheme, it can poured into construction of Although the constitutional crisis should come as no surprise. The flagged up Misha Zubrowski’s heat buildings, showers, and even publicly owned renewables, in - has been ticking along for years, the Catalan-nationalist coalition gov - and Ben Tausz’s letters (page 4, heated greenhouses. This could cluding geothermal. level of violence and confrontation ernment is led by the centre-right massively reduce fossil fuel usage. PdeCAT, the successor party to the last week). Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty NEWS 3 Climate rebellion: time to discuss next steps

road.” That said, he is attempting Climate to prove his climate credentials – undoubtedly partly in response – by chairing a new cabinet commit - By Misha Zubrowski tee on climate change. Positive measures are unlikely to come out Extinction Rebellion’s latest In - of that without further pressure. ternational Rebellion against cli - Responding to state repression mate inaction has drawn to a and to the UK’s aspirant autocrat, close after two intense weeks “XR Grandparents” gathered en starting 7 October. masse in front of Buckingham Palace, defying the ban, and chant - Protests and actions took place ing “I would rather be a crusty than across Europe, India and Sri Lanka, extinct”. New Zealand and Australia, Gam - Taking an opposite – but no less bia and South Africa, Hong Kong, valid – approach 2000 “profession - the West Bank in Palestine, and als in XR” descended on Trafalgar many more places. Square “to show that XR cannot be In the UK protests focussed on discredited as a movement of job - London, targetting government less ‘hippies’”. buildings and departments, and various sites around Westminster. JOB TITLE They faced increasing police re - Many turned up in their uniforms pression, with over 1640 arrests – — doctors, nurses, chefs, scien - likely over half the world-wide tists, or simply business suits — total — and an authoritarian at - and held signs with their job title. capitalist class.. In many ways this action seems which valid criticisms of the tube tempt to ban the protests. Perhaps because of trying to go A small number of Extinction Re - to be a logical progression of XR’s action, and XR in general, should Claimants including Caroline too far in debunking Johnson’s dis - bellion activists climbed onto the general approach. That is, heroic be made. Lucas MP, Clive Lewis MP, George missals, and because of a lack of a roof of a tube train, in the morning acts to cause general disruption It is not yet clear what the next Monbiot, Jenny Jones, and Ellie class analysis, in one of their “Hu - commuter rush-hour. They were and raise the urgency of action on steps for XR are to be. They seem to Chowns MP brought action on be - mans of XR” features of their gen - pulled off by angry passengers, and climate change. However, it was have gone quiet about their previ - half of XR, challenging this order eral briefing XR featured “Hamish, had to be defended by staff. clearly going to garner a more neg - ously announced ongoing actions, via judicial review in the High 33, Management Consultant”. These activists have faced much ative response from working-class across the country, every weekend. Court. XR’s bold climate action, how - In the class war – so intimately criticism for doing this action. XR people. Plus, it is even further from XR were attacked by Boris John - ever limited and flawed, are bet - tied up with climate change and centrally have been at pains to the necessary approaches which son. He has directly not engaged ter than none. They could and the fight against it – a management stress that this group was acting au - seek to build a mass environmental with their arguments or demands. must provide a step towards the consultant, whatever their private tonomously – as is the nature of movement. Instead he has dismissed them on mass, combative, class-struggle views, is inescapably an adviser or much of XR – and against the This inadequacy, rather than dis - more cultural grounds as “uncoop - climate activism we need. scribe in the camp of the enemy, the wishes of many other XR activists. ruption per se, is the angle upon erative crusties… littering the Home Office plans to trick the worst-off

By Misha Zubrowski Lies – as was revealed on Octo - Home Office’s “case-by-case” dis - the context, too, of policies which the vital policies in the conference ber 15 (bit.ly/ho-infiltrate). cretion. have fuelled skyrocketing home - motion passed on homelessness. The Home Office is holding “im - The surgeries are run by the The Salvation Army, Sikh gurd - lessness, increasingly criminalised Immediately: migration surgeries” at charities Home Office’s immigration en - waras and a Chinese community rough sleeping, and disgustingly “Call on all local authorities to and places of worship. forcement unit. Officials may de - support centre are some of the bod - disregarded the well-being or dig - cease the use of measures which They tell homeless migrants that cide that attendees have no right to ies working with the Home Office nity of people who find themselves could criminalise rough sleeping attending will help them get finan - be in the UK, asking these individ - in this way. St Mungo’s – another in these situations. and begging. cial support, and may help them uals — who came seeking and charity which purports to help Homeless people in a tube tunnel “Call on all local authorities to regularise their immigration status. promised support — to their agree homeless people – has worked near Westminster were recently cease the practice of embedding They are assured the sessions are to “voluntary removal”. alongside Home Office teams evicted following complaints from Home Office immigration officers not part of “an enforcement ap - Just how “voluntary” this is ex - searching for rough sleepers to ar - the Westminster chaplain. in their local services, as denying proach” to immigration status. posed by the fact that those who re - rest and deport. The answer, of course, to rough support to migrants is driving the fuse risk being deported, on the This practice is heartless and de - sleeping and whatever issues it crisis on our streets.” ceitful, and undermines claims of might cause to passers-by is pro - And to commit to: these places to provide “safe grammes to support rough sleepers “Repeal of the 1824 Vagrancy Workers’ Liberty spaces” or attempts to build trust to improve their situations. Not to Act, an end to all powers to regard week school with vulnerable people who are – try to sweep the people under the begging or rough sleeping as ‘Anti- for good reason – deeply suspi - carpet. social’ behaviour. cious. In another sense, this policy is the “[Invest] more than any previous By Gerry Bates The extent of the government’s cruel logical development of any government in social and afford - willingness or even desire to cause politics which aim to restrict free able homes and safe places to live. As in previous years, Workers’ further suffering to the worst-off in movement. “[Make] 8,000 more homes avail - Liberty will organise a week our society is harrowing. The com - Labour must commit to, and able for those with a history of school around the Christmas/ munity organisations and charities when in power implement, the rad - rough sleeping. New Year holiday time. working with the Home Office are ical policy on defending and ex - “Mak[e] £100m available to disgraceful. tending free movement and councils in year one to provide ad - The dates will be 2 to 5 January, It should go without saying that migrants’ rights passed at confer - ditional help for rough sleepers in and the place will be London. Ex - History of the Russian Revolution. sections of the state should never ence. It should – in line with confer - cold weathers” actly where in London is yet to be The two last week schools, in July The prevalence of homeless - lie and trick to ensnare individuals ence policy — commit to repeal, fixed. 2019 and January 2019, studied ness and rough sleeping, and the in this way, for whatever reason. and its local councils should work- Again as previously, we will use Pierre Broué’s The German Revolu - plight of rough sleepers, when This programme comes on the around or flout, the “No Recourse the time to study and discuss an tion and Marx’s Capital respec - the resources are easily available back of the Conservatives’ relent - to Public Funds” policy for mi - important book whose size and tively. to alleviate this situation, is an Put it in your diary now. For less anti-migrant policies and at - grants. NRPF is particularly harm - depth daunt many readers when abomination. details email tempts to create a “hostile ful for homeless migrants. they try to read it on their own. [email protected] environment” for migrants. It is in Labour should also implement This time, it will be Trotsky’s 4 COMMENT Email your letters to [email protected] Morning Star admits it backs Johnson’s deal

A poster by the youth section of the Johnson... This is crunch time. The British organisation which makes the Morning Star people — who have already spoken — are Antidoto not the protagonists in this particular episode. This government, which MPs have refused By Jim Denham to remove, has, against the expectations and manifest hopes of all those parliamentary As some of you may know, when I write renegades who have repeatedly found ways this column, covering the antics of the to subvert the popular will, reached agree - Morning Star and its political masters, the ment with the European Commission. Communist Party of Britain (CPB) I gener - This is the actually existing Brexit. There is ally try to maintain a jocular tone. But it no going back. The European Union insists can be difficult: sometimes I’m just too there will be no renegotiation. despairing and/or angry. It is important to keep a sense of perspec - tive here. This is a withdrawal agreement For some time I’ve been telling people that that offers an escape from the obligations that it’s obvious that the Morning Star and CPB the EU treaty regime imposes and a space for supported May’s deal and now support more considered negotiations about the form Johnson’s; if they had MPs that’s how they’d of Britain’s relationship with its continental be voting. neighbours — both those in the EU and those I have cited, for instance, the CPB’s general without. secretary Roger Griffiths, quoted in the Morn - It seems to satisfy the EU’s desire for a lim - ing Star of October 5-6, thus: “Pro-EU labour ited period of calm reflection and orderly MPs who claim to respect the referendum re - progress. sult can have no genuine reason not to sup - In reassembling this motley crew around a port a Theresa May-type deal which binds policy which commands a broad majority of Britain to EU single market rules for years party support, Johnson has begun to reassert into the foreseeable future, while also trans - the claim his party has to more fully repre - ferring all EU labour and environmental leg - sent ruling class interests. In doing so he has islation into British law.” dumped big tome on the DUP. But still, some people have said “no-o-o: In drawing the border down the middle of they’d never support a Johnson deal. After the Irish Sea the deal makes it clear that the all, their pal Jeremy Corbyn refuses to do so, Tories are no longer prepared to allow a party even though it’s obvious that he’s a Brexi - representing an anachronistic slither of opin - teer”. ion to veto government policy. For its part the Now it is plain fact that the Morning Star DUP seems an ever more out of touch force and the CPB now openly support Boris John - IT’S CRUNCH TIME FOR BREXIT — EU universe desire, a constitutional device in the northern part of what increasingly son’s withdrawal deal. This is treachery to peculiar to each of those states is mobilised THERE’S NO GOING BACK looks like a nation once again. socialism on a par with Ramsay McDonald: to compel a remain vote until the right an - Johnson is stronger than he was when it must never be forgotten — or forgiven. swer is delivered. Labour refused a general election last Well, all I can do now (beyond stating Morning Star Editorial Of course, when the millionaires funding month, but only because repeated delays that the labour movement should, forth - the slick Remain campaign conceived of this mean politics is dominated by Brexit. The with, withdraw all financial support from demonstration in support of the Commons sooner it is behind us the sharper can be this rag and that Jeremy Corbyn should Ranks of ardent Remainers are presently Remain majority, they thought they were to Labour’s focus on the pressing social and cease his embarrassing endorsement of arriving in London for what is now a be mobilised to prevent Britain exiting the environmental crises only a socialist gov - it), is reproduce, without further comment demonstration against the European Union leadership. EU without a withdrawal deal. ernment can begin to address. the Morning Star ’s editorial from this Sat - Jean-Claude Juncker and Michael Barnier urday, October 21: “ It’s crunch time for They have chosen a hard row to hoe. Every have shot their fox, torpedoed their leaky • The MS editorial is slightly cut here, for Brexit — there’s no going back ”. time the people of an EU state vote in ways vessel and instead done a deal with Boris which thwart the direction the masters of the space, but the whole text is at bit.ly/ms-eu Dempsey and the misogynistic warlord

Russian website Russian Insider . (I do mean far-right, as shown by its content on “The Letters Jewish Question”, “The Christian-Zionist Complex”, adverts for books doubting the Holocaust, and praise for American slavery.) There is more to add to the crucial points The piece was originally published in the Becky Crocker made about Eddie Morning Star but they have now taken it Dempsey in Solidarity 519. down from the website. The picture featured is Dempsey visiting The tenor of the article is summed up by Alexander Mozgovoy, an uber-nationalist, how Dempsey approvingly quotes one of uber-misogynistic paramilitary leader in the Mozgovoy’s “comrades”: “A man can be pro-Russian militias during the war in east - murdered, but not his ideas”. It concludes, in ern Ukraine. When Mozgovoy was killed a Dempsey’s own words: “Towards this pre - week after they met, Dempsey wrote a glow - Left, Dempsey; right, Mozgovoy cious goal his comrades will continue their ing obituary of his comrade, which I’ll quote late commander’s struggle.” below. male population, all night clubs. What kind Self-evidently, this is not a slip or small If you want to get a grip on Mozgovoy, this of female population do we have here? Are mistake, but a manifestation of a deeply-held is what he declared about women in the ter - they all prostitutes, or what?” political orientation. ritory he controlled as a warlord, and of “So, I repeat. A special order will be issued Am I saying Dempsey doesn’t think course by implication more generally: to patrols: to arrest all women who are found women in Britain should go to pubs? Of Anti-Brexit pamphlet “If I see even just one girl in a café or a pub in pubs. I said: all! And then let’s see whether course not. But he is a fairly extreme case of tomorrow, she will be arrested. A woman you drink. Stay at home... support for right-wing nationalist move - Remain and Rebel summarises our must be the guardian of the hearth, a mother. “You don’t like what I’ve said? It’s time ments as long as they are in conflict with arguments on Brexit, Europe, international But what kind of mothers are they after going that you remembered that you are Russians. Western imperialism, even when the people solidarity, free movement, immigration, and to pubs? How can they bring up their chil - It’s time to regain your spirituality.” they are as reactionary as Mozgovoy. And building socialist politics cross-borders. dren? What example are they giving? (For more on all this and on Mozgovoy and that is not unconnected to the political issues Becky raised in her article. “If you want to remain an honest person the forces he represented, see bit.ly/uk-moz). Will any of Dempsey’s apologists try to 40 pages A4. Cover price £4. and devoted to your husband, stay at home Dempsey’s obituary for Mozgovoy has find a way to explain this away? and do embroidery. All pubs are full of the fe - been approvingly reprinted on the far-right • Buy online at bit.ly/r-rebel Alexander Herman, London Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty WHAT WE SAY 5 Democracy vs Johnson

As we go to press on Tuesday 22 October, Labour for a Socialist Europe (L4SE) will the Tory government has been voted organising in the coming general election down, 308 to 322, on its plan to bounce its for a pro-Remain, pro-socialist-Europe, Withdrawal Agreement through Parlia - left-wing voice within the Labour cam - ment at panic speed. paign. MPs have insisted on the right to debate In London on 29 October (7:30pm at the amendments. These may include amend - Marchmont Centre, 62 Marchmont St, WC1N ments which will make the government drop 1AB) it is calling an open organising meeting its deal, or make the deal conditional on a to discuss that effort. new public vote. L4SE will organise leaflets and other mate - Boris Johnson responded by saying that he rials for Labour activists to use on street stalls would “pause” discussion on the With - and the doorstep. drawal Agreement he was so keen to rush L4SE was part of the push for a Remain through. In defiance of the “Benn Act”, he policy at Labour conference on 21-25 Septem - will seek to persuade the EU to deny a Brexit ber, and worked closely with the Labour extension to allow debate. Campaign for Free Movement there for the He apparently hopes he can get the EU to victory there for defending and extending deny the extension, and then panic MPs into free movement. voting his deal through, as he wishes, by say - L4SE produced independent pro-Labour, ing that the only alternative is a crash “no anti-Brexit publicity for the Euro-elections in deal” Brexit. May 2019. Tens of thousands of leaflets to - Johnson’s Brexit plans are worse than talling were taken by local Labour cam - Theresa May’s. The way he is seeking to push paigns and by individuals. them through without democratic scrutiny or L4SE has been fighting to stop Brexit and accountability is of a piece with his right- build a socialist resistance to the right- from-the-start drive to authoritarianism. wing forces and ideas driving it ever since A labour movement that had fought the it was launched from the Another Europe Brexit project wholeheartedly right from the is Possible conference in December 2018. start might well have defeated it. A labour • labourforasocialisteurope.org movement that fights Brexit wholeheartedly now may still defeat it. At the very least, a clearly anti-Brexit labour movement has the vote for Johnson’s Brexit plans and hand the implement conference’s near-unanimous best chance of mitigating Brexit’s impact on Tories victory. The revelation that leading vote to extend free movement and migrants’ Organising the left on migrants’ and workers’ rights. pro-Brexit Labour MPs Stephen Kinnock and rights teaches us the same lesson. Whatever twists and turns come now, the Caroline Flint sit on the board of right-wing, The questions of internationalism of which labour movement – and the Labour Party – hedge fund-financed “think tank” Prosperity Brexit and free movement is part go right to the 19 October march UK says it all. the heart of Labour’s direction. A Labour must put down a line and give battle. By Cathy Nugent Since 2016, despite the treacherous role of We endorse Jon Lansman’s call that any Party which stood firm on migrants’ rights the Milnes, Murphys and Murrays in MP who votes with the Tories on this should would surely not have wavered and retreated Labour’s “Leader’s Office”, we have had an have the whip removed and be barred from on Brexit. The “Let Us Be Heard” demonstration on anti-Brexit revolt by Labour members. We standing again at the coming general elec - That battle remains to be fought and won. Saturday 19 October felt bigger than the had a left-led upsurge on the streets after tion. In general we want a “broad church” Whatever happens in the next days, weeks previous march against Brexit in July. Johnson’s “coup” on 28 August to “pro - Labour regime, in which public dissent is ac - and months, we need a longer view. In face of Johnson’s shocking disregard for rogue” (suspend) Parliament. We have had cepted and dealt with by debate rather than If it triumphs, Brexit – a right-wing nation - democracy, Remainers felt obliged to turn many inspiring struggles by migrant work - administrative measures. alist drive to reverse the integration of Eu - out. Organisers claimed one million, and ers. Those movements show the spirit we This is different. This is an issue of whether rope at the expense of the working class – there were certainly many hundreds of thou - need. Labour MPs give a lifeline to a right-wing will not cease to be wrong. The labour move - sands on the streets. Whatever happens in Parliament, the left Tory government on the back foot; enable ment should not cease to oppose it. Given the We had an anxious wait for the vote from needs to organise to continue the fight Johnson to go to the polls as the triumphant chaos and regression Brexit will certainly en - Parliament’s Saturday sitting, followed by against Brexit, including in a possible election “Man Who Won Brexit”; and open the road gender, there will be no lack of opportunities cheers for the Letwin amendment. Socialists campaign. The more activists grouped to him to push through a Brexit formula to do so. don’t normally celebrate Tory-sponsored around organisations like Labour for a Social - modified from May’s so as to make it easier Labour should advocate that, as part of the amendments, but this one meant we were ist Europe, Another Europe is Possible and to trash workers’ rights and keep open the fight to transform Britain and Europe, the UK still “in the game”: Johnson had failed in his the Labour Campaign for Free Movement – option of a “no deal” tactic at the end of 2020. rejoin the EU. There is nothing impossible first attempt to bounce Parliament into a and Workers’ Liberty – the better we can do The evasion and demagogy used to block about that. Even if Johnson’s deal goes panic vote for his stitch-up. that. a clear anti-Brexit position at Labour confer - through, Britain will remain under EU rules We focused on helping with the Left Bloc. But to fight effectively we must transform ence shows how far there is to go in trans - until the end of the “transition period” in De - Such blocs have been a feature of all the re - our movement. The “Corbyn project” to forming and democratising the party. Labour cember 2020. Reversing and rejoining just cent anti-Brexit demonstrations, and have change the Labour Party seems to have needs structural reforms. Most of the recom - means stopping whatever talks Johnson may helped to mobilise leftists in Labour and the foundered on the issue of Brexit. The rank mendations of the 2017-8 Democracy Review have started about a trade deal and restoring Greens to join these protests. They have dif - were shelved. the British part in EU institutions. and file must push forward with transform - Labour should commit to reapplication ferentiated the “Remain and Transform” po - Labour also needs a new culture in which ing Labour and the whole labour movement. and a new referendum under the next sition from a bland cross-party consensus. collective and membership-led decision- In the first instance, we need to call to ac - Labour government. In turn the campaign for that position by count the right-wing (and some supposedly making ranks above loyalty to the leadership. Another Europe is Possible, Labour for a So - “left-wing”) Labour MPs who threaten to The leadership’s declaration that it will not cialist Europe and others has helped to push Labour towards a public Remain position. John McDonnell’s speech to the rally on Sat - Mobilise for Maisie’s efforts! urday was a welcome indication of that. As well as helping to steward the Left Bloc, A total of £279.33 in fund contributions Her running total, at £476, hasn’t increased several donors who wanted to be anony - leafletting, distributing stickers, and using this week took our total so far to over the last week, but we’re hoping for a mous. sign-up sheets, Workers’ Liberty activists £12,547.93, over halfway to our fund-ap - good run of new contributions over those Our baseline income from regular litera - sold over 300 papers and many pamphlets on peal target of £25,000 by 9 December. next two weeks: workersliberty.org/spon - ture sales and regular contributions covers the day. We argued hard for people to join Thanks to contributors to a collection at sor. only baseline operations: rent, utilities, and Labour and get involved in changing the London Workers’ Liberty forum on 17 Contributions to Martin Thomas’s spon - basic supplies for our office; printing and Labour’s stance, and for those already mem - bers to join Labour for a Socialist Europe. October (total £53.33), James Fallon (£1), and sored bike ride from London to Cambridge dispatch for Solidarity; stipends for some of On Twitter, we got a little bit of welcome closed on 21 October, the day after the actual our staff. contributions to our activists’ sponsored ef - We need a lot of extra money in the feedback: ″Got this newspaper yesterday ride on 20 October (six hours, two wrong forts (total £225). coming weeks to do the work we need to [Solidarity] at the #PeoplesVoteMarch for turnings, no rain). For the next two weeks our fund-raising do for the cause of Remain and Trans - 50p — it′s a fantastic read and shows The final total was £1227. Thanks this activity focuses on Maisie Sanders’s spon - form, and for a socialist voice in the exact reasons why lefties should support week to: Janet Burstall £10; Caroline Powls sored give-up-smoking (from 4 November). Labour election campaign. remaining in the EU.” £10; Laura Rogers £10; Jenny Bailey £50; and 6 FEATURE More online at www.workersliberty.org Haringey: losing momentum?

By Simon Nelson always going to be its relationship to the local party. The previous administration of Claire In 2017 a grassroots rebellion against a Kober had been stand-offish and abrupt. Lit - right-wing Labour Council led to the elec - tle information was shared between the tion of the first so-called “Momentum Council and the local parties. Distrust had Council”. come to a head by the time of the HDV. The new councillors were often supporters A movement in local government to op - of Jeremy Corbyn, but most of all opposed to pose the cuts (or even some cuts) and to build Haringey Council’s proposals for a public- a campaign against austerity is going to re - private partnership with Lendlease to deliver quire “left” councillors to work alongside ac - the Haringey Development Vehicle (HDV) — tivists and the local labour parties. a gentrification scheme that was set to so - Councillors have to be open about decisions cially cleanse large areas of working-class and involve the local parties in decision-mak - Haringey, hand in hand with a known black - ing. listing developer. We had hopes for openness in Haringey. A concerted campaign by the local Mo - Before the council election the two local par - mentum group, the wider local Labour left, ties, Hornsey and Wood Green and Totten - and the anti HDV campaign deselected key ham, held a conference where motions were put forward for discussion and voting on the High Court, allows Grainger, the developer, The unpublished draft of a report by a panel councillors. Others then resigned. The result - to buy up the remaining land. of back-bench councillors...urges the coun - ing selections put in place anti-HDV candi - basis they would be taken up in the mani - festo. Some councillors have been quite loud cil’s leadership to investigate ‘whether there dates, and shortly after their election in May with the view that, given the pay-off to was a breach of the section 106 agreement’.” 2018 the scheme was cancelled. Yet many of these motions were lost from the manifesto, even in spirit. Those lost in - Lendlease necessary to end the HDV, the However the publicly available version of It was a victory for local democracy. But Council is not in a position to fight another that report has expunged much of the now local activists face a “Corbyn Council” cluded a pledge to campaign for the restora - tion of all funding cut from local government developer. harsher criticism of the Grainger and the deal that has failed to learn the lessons from its Yet earlier in 2019 Ejiofor told the New itself, including the details of a “no-penalty predecessor’s debacle. Its culture of secrecy since 2010. Such a campaign could have been a driving force of the council, bringing the Statesman : “We’re treating this [the Ward’s termination”. maybe even surpasses the worst excesses of Corner development ] as a renewal. Nothing Accountability over this process is still the old Council. local parties, trade unions and community campaigns together. stays the same forever [but] nothing will woefully lacking. Local Labour members The first shot against local democracy was change” for the traders. know there have been a series of fallings-out, the election of the Council leader, Joe Ejiofor. LATIN VILLAGE There is mounting evidence of the traders changes of personnel in the cabinet, and re - As in all local Labour groups, the leader is Instead one of the first things that being intimidated and harassed about their allocations and deletions of jobs, but none of elected by the other councillors in the group. Haringey Council is now remembered for rent and about plans to move them. Trans - this is done in a way which allows for In Haringey, a positive was a local hustings is Ward’s Corner. port for London [TfL], which owns the land scrutiny and for political differences to be un - meeting organised with the four candidates the market is on, have been asked several derstood. all in attendance. Around 200 people came to After cancelling the HDV, the other major times to carry out investigations over the con - Resignations from the cabinet are not that meeting, and afterwards an indicative inheritance from the previous administration duct of the management company for the treated as political issues, and attempts to vote was taken. The overwhelming choice for was the proposed development of Ward’s market. discuss a different model of council, such as leader was Zena Brabazon. Corner in Seven Sisters, home of the Latin Proposed rent raises are due in November. the use of a committee system, have been re - Nonetheless the councillors put Joe Ejiofor Village, the largest indoor Latin American Many of the traders are worried this is a fur - buffed. in place. market in the UK, used by Latin American ther attempt to push them out. Even the Labour Group observers, mem - From the start Ejiofor insisted that the migrants and residents across London. The Council could get out of this situation bers of the local Constituency Labour Parties Council should not be viewed as the Momen - The proposals for the Market will see it de - by deciding that there have been breaches of elected to attend the meetings of the council tum Council: “We have people from all wings molished and replaced with flats. None of the “Section 106 agreement”, meant to lessen group, have found themselves unwelcome in of the party... It’s not a Momentum council. It these flats will be social housing or afford - the negative effects of planning and redevel - meetings and shrouded in darkness. Mem - might be on the left but it’s a Labour coun - able. The new retail space is designed only to opment. bers are still unaware why the portfolio for cil.” accommodate six units for shops other than The intimidation and harassment of Insourcing was abolished following the res - Ejiofor and one-time Deputy Leader Emine big-branded chains. traders, and a failure to adhere to standards ignation of the previous portfolio holder. The level of participation from local Ibrahim are both members of the National The traders are not happy with the propos - of equality and diversity, would be such a members is severely limited, at least for a Coordinating Group of Momentum. That als to move the market, and are at risk of ris - breach. The New Statesman reports that: left-led council. And Haringey’s defining Group itself reports only scantily on its meet - ing rents pricing them out of the area. There “Some Haringey councillors appear to sus - politics has yet to be markedly to the left ings. Its make-up includes four representa - has been a long running campaign “Save the pect the property developer has breached its of an average Labour Council. tives of “Labour Public Office Holders”. 50% Latin Village” to fight against the Council’s Section 106 agreements, which could hand of those four are Haringey Councillors. plans and against the Compulsory Purchase the council a painless route out of the deal.... One of the biggest tests for the Council was Order (CPO) which, now granted by the The Handke controversy

By Matt Kinsella Justice for Serbia , was widely excoriated for its Handke’s essay about Yugoslavia. have aesthetic value separated from its polit - sympathetic stance towards Serbia in the Yu - “He wrote of how he envied me: while ical content. But I tend to agree with Jennifer The Nobel Prize in Literature 2019 has goslav Wars, going as far as to describe Serbia those Austrians and Germans, those western - Egan, president of literature and human been awarded to Peter Handke “for an in - as a victim of the wars. ers, had fallen for consumerism, we, Yu - rights organisation Pen America. She stated: fluential work that with linguistic ingenuity In 1999, Salman Rushdie named him the goslavs, had to queue and fight for “We are dumbfounded by the selection of has explored the periphery and the speci - runner-up for “International Moron of the everything. Oh, how close to the nature we a writer who has used his public voice to un - ficity of human experience.” Year” in the Guardian , for his “series of im - were! How less materialistic and more spiri - dercut historical truth and offer public succor Born in 1942, Handke is an Austrian nov - passioned apologias for the genocidal regime tualised we were! Even at the time, I found to perpetrators of genocide, like former Ser - elist and playwright, best known for works of Slobodan Milošević”. Rushdie has stood him cruel and totally self-absorbed in his bian President Slobodan Milosevic and Bosn - including Offending the Audience and The by his comments, and other writers have con - naivety.” ian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic. We reject Goalie’s Anxiety at the Penalty Kick . He is also demned the award. Handke doubled down on his support for the decision that a writer who has persist - known for his film scripts, one of which, The Slovenian author Miha Mazzini said “I will Serbian nationalism. He publicly stood by ently called into question thoroughly docu - Left-Handed Woman , an adaptation of his own never forget the cold winter when Yugoslavia Milošević in the mid-2000s, despite his facing mented war crimes deserves to be celebrated novel, was nominated for a Golden Palm was falling apart and there was nothing on a war crimes tribunal, and even delivered a for his ‘linguistic ingenuity.’ At a moment of Award in 1978. the shelves of the stores. We were a young eulogy at Milošević’s funeral in 2006. He has rising nationalism, autocratic leadership, and The awarding of the Nobel Prize to family and my daughter was a toddler and it never distanced himself from his comments. widespread disinformation around the Handke has caused controversy, owing to his was bitterly cold. I’d spent the whole day in It is a question for the philosophers among world, the literary community deserves bet - the queue for the heating oil and in the us about the extent to which art can be sepa - ter than this. shameful political allegiances. In 1996, “We deeply regret the Nobel Committee evening, almost frozen, I started reading rated from its creator, and how far art can Handke’s travelogue, A Journey to the Rivers: on Literature’s choice.” Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty FEATURE 7 Johnson’s deal and Ireland

By Rhodri Evans engine of destruction of European democ - racy, peace, and rights, than Hitler was. But Sinn Féin has welcomed Boris Johnson’s engine of destruction it is. new Brexit formula as at least a “least Johnson’s deal, a version of an option of - worst” option. fered earlier by the EU but rejected by May, It expresses a “cautious welcome for the essentially keeps Northern Ireland economi - perceived maintenance of the all-Ireland cally within the EU, and draws the economic economy provided by the [new] Brexit deal”. border between a post-Brexit Britain and the At first sight that seems an odd about-turn. EU in the Irish Sea. Although in the 1970s Sinn Féin was vehe - The proviso that the “soft border” between mently against the EU, it long ago changed Northern Ireland and the 26 Counties will be that position, and in 2016 and since has been subject to cancellation by a majority of the strongly against Brexit. Northern Ireland Assembly does not seri - It still says “there is no such thing as a good ously complicate this picture. Short of great Brexit”. political upheavals in Northern Ireland And Sinn Féin has long had a leftish which would also change many other things, colouration on social issues. Johnson’s new no Northern Ireland Assembly will cancel the formula weakens Theresa May’s already- “soft border”. vague commitments to maintaining EU Already, within the EU, there is probably worker rights and social standards after more economic and social unification of Ire - Brexit, reducing them to a statement that the land than ever before in history. Even when British government will not dip below EU the whole of Ireland was part of the UK, the standards… unless the government wants to. respective economic connections of Belfast It opens a door to a “no deal” exit at the and of Dublin with different segments of the end of 2020. Even short of that, it seeks only English economy were closer than connec - for a “free trade” deal with the EU similar to tions within Ireland. Canada’s and not an alignment, even partial, Johnson’s deal promises to continue that unification within Ireland while at the same Algeria in 1961-2. De Gaulle had been Evian Accords, conceding Algerian inde - with Single Market regulations. brought to power in 1958 by a “soft” military pendence, in March 1962. Sinn Féin’s attitude makes no sense unless building a growing barrier between Northern Ireland and Britain. coup driven and backed by the European set - The militant minority of the settlers (the a narrow Irish nationalist point of view blurs tlers in Algeria, then a French colony. The set - OAS) launched a very bloody campaign of out the Europe-wide implications of Brexit. The Democratic Unionist Party was the en - gine driving the Tory revolt over Brexit terms tlers saw De Gaulle as a guarantee against the terrorist attacks on civilians to try to forestall It makes sense only in a Irish-nationalist risk that a compromising leftish government independence. At independence, almost all view as narrow as that of the 1940s IRA peo - which brought down Theresa May and ele - vated Boris Johnson to power. Now Johnson, in Paris would give Algeria independence the settlers fled Algeria, mostly to France. ple, who, though no fascists themselves, pre - under pressure from the militant war of lib - Loyalist activists have been remobilised by ferred a victory for Hitler in World War 2 ever the aspirant Bonaparte, has sold out the DUP. His deal indicates a greater barrier be - eration by Algeria’s Arab and Berber major - Johnson’s deal. We are as yet far off anything because they thought it would help Ireland. ity. Then De Gaulle, calculating realistically, like the OAS. tween Northern Ireland and Britain than any - Sinn Féin now talks confidently about The enslavement of many tens of millions of dumped the settlers. He steered towards in - thing May dared suggest. calling for a referendum within Northern other Europeans was a price worth paying if dependence and saw off a second attempted The operation is a lower-key re-run of what Ireland on Irish unity within five years. the Irish nationalist cause benefited. military coup in April 1961. He signed the Brexit is, of course, a much slower-burning French president Charles De Gaulle did with Ibrahim Dogus Labour Campaigns Together

By Colin Foster movement rights; guarantee the right to fam - ily reunion; close all detention centres; end A coalition of grassroots Labour Party the Hostile Environment; and end ‘No Re - campaigns has launched a website, course to Public Funds’ and the discrimina - “Labour Campaigns Together”, tory denial of social security, healthcare and labourcampaignstogether.com. housing”. Its aim is to press the Labour leadership to The policy also says: “Labour will extend include left-wing policies voted through at the vote to everyone who lives here: every the 21-25 September Labour conference in member of our society deserves a say in how Brighton in its manifesto and in the actions we are governed”. Discontent grows over selections of a Labour government. Free Our Unions has got policy through The key policies are: Labour conference for “repealing all the anti- • A just transition to a decarbonised econ - union laws — not just the 2016 Trade Union Act, but also those introduced in the 1980s By Chris Reynolds winger, anti-Brexit, and active for some time omy by 2030 and 90s. They should be replaced with posi - in Vauxhall, enjoys wide support from • Build 100,000 social rented council homes tive legal rights, including strong rights to Discontent is growing in local Labour Labour activists there. a year strike and picket, such as in solidarity with Parties over “long lists” and shortlists of But, as The Clarion website reports, “Je - • Transition to a 32-hour working week other workers and over political issues (e.g. candidates imposed by the National Ex - remy Corbyn’s office has been rumoured by with no loss of pay the climate crisis)”. ecutive Committee for the selections of several publications to be supporting the • Protect and extend the rights of migrants We also support the other campaigns in - candidates to the general election al - businessman, landlord and Mayor of • End all forms of criminalisation of rough volved, and were active, for example, in most certain to come soon. Progress-dominated Lambeth council, sleeping • Free our unions: repeal all the anti-trade strengthening the “Green New Deal” policy The Campaign for Labour Party Democ - Ibrahim Dogus. union laws passed in Brighton. racy is circulating a model motion which “In addition, Dogus’s website says he has • Integrate private schools into a high-stan - So far the Labour leaders have been silent calls: “We call on the NEC to revise the long- received endorsements from major unions dard public education system on most of these policies. On free movement, listing process to ensure that all those with including Unite, the GMB, the Bakers’ • Implement a comprehensive coordinated they have said explicitly that still want a support in a CLP are included ahead of Union and... the CWU”. strategy for mental health. work visa system. On union rights, they have those totally unknown to that CLP”. Dogus also moved into the area only two Workers’ Liberty activists have been in - limited themselves to promising the repeal of A particular focus in Vauxhall, where the years ago. He talks of himself as pro-Corbyn volved in the underlying campaigns espe - the Trade Union Act 2016 (not of the Thatcher Labour MP Kate Hoey has consistently now, but his record and background are not cially through the Labour Campaign for Free laws). voted with the Tories on Brexit and anyway left-wing at all. As of yet, Labour Campaigns Together As The Clarion asks, “Does Vauxhall Movement (LCFM) and Free Our Unions has said she will not stand at the next elec - is only a website and an e-list which sup - Labour want a self-promoting millionaire (FOU). tion. porters can sign up to. We hope it can be as its MP?” LCFM got policy passed in Brighton which Katy Clark, a longstanding Labour left- developed into a more active on-the- bit.ly/cl-dogus commits Labour to “protect and extend free ground campaign. More online at www.workersliberty.org Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty A workers’ answer to clim

greater acceleration towards severe and harm. dards requires strong and developed produc - widely acknowledged climate catastrophe. It The IPPC warned, in 2018, that, aiming to tive forces, and advanced technology. Climate points the way out of this predicament: how limit warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial We demand an immediate ban on fracking, to organise to halt global warming. Workers’ levels, global net greenhouse emissions tar sands, other “extreme energy”, and any By Misha Zubrowski Liberty – the organisation behind Solidarity should be reduced to half by 2030 and zero new fossil power plants. We advocate the — has studied, developed, and will continue by 2050. We must respond with this urgency, fastest possible phasing out of all fossil-fu - to debate and refine our Marxist analyses of but 1.5°C is itself worse than 1°C, 2°C worse elled power stations, heating, and transport. The first research demonstrating that car - the forces driving climate crises. (This docu - still, and 2.5°, 3°, 3.5° each progressively more In general we oppose biomass-fired power bon dioxide released through burning fos - ment does not attempt to cover this further.) catastrophic. stations. Burning biomass produces more sil fuels would drive global warming was There is no cut-off point beyond which CO2 per unit energy than burning coal. Its published well over a century ago, the first HOW TO HALT CLIMATE CHANGE abandoning the fight to curb global warming profligate consumption of vegetation causes government warnings in the 1960s, and Capital’s exploitation and degradation of would be rational. deforestation and soil degradation, releasing the first IPCC report in 1990. nature goes hand-in-hand with its ex - Significant and powerful sections of and further CO2 and limiting the ability to grow Now, the scientific consensus about serious ploitation of labour. tendencies within the capitalist class will new forest. human-driven climatic heating — with far- The working class is the agent with the ca - fight every major change that is necessary to “Carbon Capture and Storage” is not a so - reaching effects — is over 99%. It is the great - pability and interest in transforming society: stop climate catastrophe. We recognise the lution, although we do not oppose its intro - est danger facing both humanity and the through immediate reforms as well as in the dangers of “greenwashing”. Even sincere lib - duction. At best, it provides a sticking plaster, success of the socialist project. battle for democratic, rational control of the eral and bourgeois attempts to limit climate mitigating the worst from power stations Beyond global warming, there are several economy and society as a whole. change are, as a rule, woefully insufficient. which we aim to shut down as soon as possi - major independent environmental threats. The gravity of current and imminent Ultimately, a fully and genuinely green ble. Biodiversity loss and species extinction un - change crises makes the necessity of inde - capitalist society is impossible, just as a fully Renewable energy production should be dermine many important ecosystems, leav - pendent working-class politics more urgent. democratic or equal capitalist society is. expanded. An integrated and coordinated ing plants we are reliant on more susceptible We argue for a socialist environmentalist Within the immediate fights to curb capi - electricity system using “smart grid” technol - to widespread disease. Water pollution has transitional programme to be fought for talism’s devastation of nature, we promote a ogy would maximise efficiency and reliabil - contributed to hundreds of marine “dead within workplaces, and more widely in the working-class programme and working-class ity. zones” to wildlife. Labour Party, environmental movement, and independence, insisting on measures that are We support nuclear power, which is much The WHO estimates that air pollution is at beyond, using a united front approach. adequate to meet the challenge of climate safer than fossil fuels. We fight for the scrap - dangerous levels for 90% of the world’s pop - This is most urgent in workplaces and in - change, in the knowledge that such measures ping of Trident and all nuclear weapons, in - ulation, killing seven million people every dustries with high emissions and key roles in lead to confrontations with the power of cap - ternationally. Without the siphoning-off of year. Depletion of natural resources, soil the fossil economy, such as transport and en - ital and its agents in the workers’ movement. by-products from power stations to make degradation, deforestation all bring further ergy. Beyond these sectors, widespread United front methods using transitional these abhorrent weapons, nuclear power dangers, notably to food production. workplace environmental action is important environmental demands are necessary both could be even more efficient. These environmental crises, and the social for a society-wide transition, for sparking to win immediate environmental reforms Our support for nuclear is not uncondi - crises which they fuel and will fuel, have in and spreading class struggle, and for stoking and overthrow capitalism to ultimately stop tional. Nuclear fuel is finite; nuclear power turn social roots. Fossil fuels are available to working-class environmentalism on the po - climate change. bears its own risks; and it would be possible use as a result of social relations and pass litical front of the class war. OUR PROGRAMME to construct a future power infrastructure through the “social metabolism” again as We are undertaking environmental agita - without nuclear energy. In many cases, inter - Humanity needs a major transition to they are combusted. tion in universities and colleges as a means nationally, other energy sources are more ap - achieve net zero greenhouse gas emis - A Marxist analysis can elucidate these of winning young people to socialism and propriate. We support it as a stopgap sions, internationally, as fast as possible: roots. It is necessary to explain the ever- creating a student movement which can act measure in the medium term. a 2030 target. as a political beacon to the workers’ move - Energy generation projects are not neces - ment. This includes making environmental We denounce bogus “offsetting” used as sarily better for being “local”. Large, inte - demands of universities and colleges. greenwashing by many capitalists and politi - grated electrical systems are generally more We want to work with the radical environ - cians, and aim for radical transitions across efficient. mental movement as a whole and win it to the board internationally. Zero CO2 emis - In the energy sector, as in others, we cham - our perspectives. But we want to move the sions is an impossibility as humans emit CO2 pion a transition organised on the basis of focus of that movement from direct action by by breathing out. That means that genuine worker planning, and in particular the re - small, self-sacrificing groups to mass action. offsetting is necessary, and for honesty and training of workers from polluting or obso - For that reason we regard the climate strikes precision we demand “net zero” — as a step lete roles into socially-useful jobs. as the most important opening in the new to net negative. We advocate public programmes of insula - round of climate struggles in the UK. We support the demands of a “socialist tion, electrification of cooking, and electrified We need urgently to build mass working- Green New Deal”, as advocated by the FBU large-scale heating systems. class participation in these strikes and raise and the Clarion, as one initial step. We support a moratorium on airport ex - their political level. We will use the climate All major industries should be socialised — pansion, advocating an expansion of high- strikes as means of cohering environmen - taken into public ownership, under demo - speed, affordable, electrified and efficient rail, tally-minded workers around our activists in cratic control of workers — to facilitate tran - and policies to radically reduce flights. We workplaces. sition. Expropriating the banks, and the support increased taxation on flights and “REFORM VS REVOLUTION”? wealth of the rich, would make available re - phasing-out of short-haul flights where there sources to fund rapid transition and adapta - are less-polluting alternatives, with flights ra - We have no confidence in the capitalist tion. tioned on the basis of need. Read our Climate class, or their states, to stop climate Our programme must and does aim to im - We seek an expansion of local free or low- change. Powerful sections of the capital - prove people’s lives, to a comfortable stan - cost good-quality electrical and efficient pub - Pamphlet! ist class will fight to stop a green transi - dard of living. lic transport, and policies to support cycling tion. This is necessary for a sustainably classless, and walking. Alongside this, we advocate a 40 pages A4. Cover price £3. But significant reforms, including environ - democratic society. Without it, the contest for public programme to – where workable – mental reforms, can be and have been won an adequate standard of living, for essentials, retrofit cars with electric or hydrogen en - With UK postage £4.20. Cheap under capitalism. These can limit the speed will rekindle: a basis of class society. Class so - gines, or to recycle them; and collectivise rates for bulk orders. of climate change, reducing harm and buying cieties have exposed themselves as no basis greener cars into car-rental schemes. us time. for environmental sustainability. People must Many changes to the food industry would •Buy from Confronting climate change is not simply be empowered to participate in consciously reduce its negative environmental impact, a win-or-lose fight: greater emissions mean and collectively running society. while enabling nutritionally good, diverse workersliberty.org/climate-pamphlet greater dangers, faster destruction, greater To maintain extensive high living stan - and enjoyable diets. Crucially, phasing out al - FEATURE 8-9 mate change

most all animal products (with the added Climate Change (CCC) in May 2019 argued wards the labour movement bureaucracy. benefit of reducing the needless extreme suf - for a target of net zero emissions by 2050, not - The fight to get conference policy into the fering of billions of sentient beings). We ad - ing that the government was already failing Manifesto marks a first step here. vocate seriously funded research and on existing targets. The UK government leg - Momentum’s own “Bankrupt Climate development into substitute foods. Genetic islated for a 2050 net zero target, but without Change” campaign was very politically lim - engineering is in itself not problematic, and concrete policies that would make it possible ited, and seems to have been retired. SERA, genetic engineering of low-emissions substi - to meet this target. Labour’s oldest environmental campaign, is tute foods is positive. Labour movement bodies and trade unions run like an NGO or think-tank and is politi - “Geoengineering” is advocated as a future have, for the most part, advocated compara - cally very conservative, siding with the GMB technical fix to problems which are better tively bold programmes to tackle climate against LGND at Labour conference. solved politically. Most proposals have hor - change, with more of a class dimension. But Red Green Labour is a small initiative, as - rendous side effects, typically for areas in the this has only translated into very limited real- sociated with Socialist Resistance and estab - global south. Global weather patterns and world action, and reactionary sectional atti - lished in early 2018. It is a loose organisation ecosystems are so complex that it would tudes are alive and well. See, for example, the or network, generally to the left of the previ - cause unintended consequences. stances of Unite and GMB on airport expan - ously mentioned campaigns. It has an insuf - We demand huge public investment in an sion and fracking, their successful pushes to ficiently combative attitude towards the ambitious programme of ecological restora - enshrine energy union sectionalism in policy, leadership of Labour and the trade unions. It tion to increase biodiversity and natural car - and GMB’s opposition to a 2030 or even 2050 aims to intervene within SERA. We will work bon sequestration. net zero target. with it where appropriate. However, due to The fight against climate change can only LABOUR its small size, putting lots of effort into it is be won internationally. not a priority. The left-wing surge within Labour over We stand in solidarity with workers and NEXT STEPS IN LABOUR movements fighting their hard-right govern - since the election of Corbyn as leader has ments in Brazil, China, India, the USA, and created openings for socialist environ - We seek to win a broad section of our Workers’ Liberty’s conference this year will be elsewhere. This solidarity is crucial in the mentalism. class to a radical environmental pro - discussing and debating maybe amending a gramme. We will continue and increase fight against climate change, given the alarm - Labour’s 2017 manifesto, and 2018 Green document, “Fighting Climate Crises”. This our agitation and organisation around en - ing policies pursued by these governments transformation documents were steps for - article is a section from it. A future issue of vironmental transitional demands. for the environment. ward from previous policy. To render Solidarity soon will carry the second and final Climate crises will create hundreds of mil - Labour’s policy adequate, the membership instalment of the climate document going to We will use the sections of the policy lions more climate refugees. Anti-migrant will have to assert itself against the leader - conference this year. It discusses: the trade passed at Labour conference as a springboard politics will be stoked by climate-driven ship and break with Blair-style office-led pol - union movement; the new climate movement for promoting a radical, socialist Green New movements of people. We advocate freedom icy development. from the Youth Strikes to Extinction Rebellion, Deal. In particular, the sections that were in - of movement and equal rights for migrants The policy itself was seriously insufficient, and beyond; the broader revolutionary left, serted by the SGND motion, the lines on in - and; Workers’ Liberty’s traditions in climate as the only alternative to a hell of borders. even by the standards of the broader labour ternationalism and refugees from LGND, and activism, and our next steps. This programme entails class struggle. An movement: quantitatively, in money commit - the additional policy passed on fracking, car adequate programme to curb climate change ted, qualitatively, in challenging rule of capi - scrapping, and ecological restoration. and preserve civilised conditions contains tal in key industries. cipline their supporters and liquidate their Additionally, we continue to argue for the many elements that are not acceptable to the For example, while it called for nationalis - programme. necessity of, expropriating finance, and end - bourgeoisie. The “labour lieutenants of capi - ing energy transmission and distribution, the The “Socialist Green New Deal” motion, ing airport expansion, and fleshing out a so - tal” in the union and Labour bureaucracies market dominating energy generation was to promoted through the Clarion and passed by cialist, working-class internationalist are already fighting to keep such an adequate be left intact, but with state-supported alter - the FBU, marked a start in bringing concrete environmentalism. These will be a core part programme from their masters’ doors. natives competing within it. It had no serious class politics into the Green New Deal. of the programme of environmental transi - THE LANDSCAPE TODAY working-class orientation, other than vague Our activists and other left-wingers got a tional demands that we agitate for immedi - token commitments to work with unions. workers-led “just transition”, repeal of anti- ately. Climate change has already caused or ex - “Labour for a Green New Deal” (LGND) is union laws, a fracking ban, socialisation of We have a particular history and tradition acerbated droughts and heatwaves, currently the most prominent environmental and investment in energy production and of international solidarity, which we should storms and hurricanes, sea level rise and tendency within Labour. Its existence raises transport, and more, into the patchy policy bring into environmental activism, standing displacement, crop failure and spread of the profile of the idea of a progressive envi - passed by Labour Conference 2019. How - in solidarity with workers and activists fight - diseases, all around the world. ronmental programme. Where Labour had ever, socialisation of finance and a ban on air - ing environmentally destructive regimes Tens of thousands of people are already implicitly committed to net zero by 2050, port expansion were buried by Conference elsewhere. We will also draw links, in both killed by the effects of climate change every with only 60% low carbon or renewable en - Arrangements Committee. We should re- directions, between environmental crises and year, if not more. Environmental threats are ergy within 12 years, LGND pushed for “zero raise all of these key issues. migrants’ rights. already fuelling and heightening conflicts. carbon emissions by 2030 and a rapid phas - The 2030 target, which LGND regarded as We continue to argue for a rational non- Every year, of the last few, tens of millions of ing out of fossil fuels”. LGND also advocate the main prize at conference, suffered from conspiratorial approach to nuclear energy people have been displaced by weather-re - “[s]upporting developing countries’ climate compromise. It survived compositing in a and a proportionate assessment of its pros lated “natural” disasters, which have tripled transitions by increasing transfers of finance, tentative, watered-down form. and cons. We call for it to be part of, or a po - – in reported statistics at least – since the 196 technology and capacity;” and “[w]elcoming LABOUR-ORIENTED tential part of a low-GHG emissions energy Most of these are “internally displaced” climate refugees”. mix. However, immediately, we do not treat within the same state, but many become (in - LGND is a Momentum-supported initia - ENVIRONMENTAL CAMPAIGNS it as a necessary and central part of a socialist ternational) refugees. tive, and has the character of a “loyal oppo - Whatever its political weaknesses, Labour environmentalist programme. To fight for this minimum SGND pro - Global and local inequalities, underdevel - sition”. Its policies are a more ambitious for a Green New Deal marks the best at - gramme and beyond, we will seek, with opment, and competing capitalist states are version of Labour’s: a “state-led” (not tempt at injecting discussions around a others, to develop a campaign with inde - the backdrop to climatic disasters and re - worker-led) transition, again lacking concrete specific political programme into the pendent life and democratic structures, sponsible for the severity of their effects. policies. It has no democratic structures and broader radical environmental milieu, with one foot in the Labour party and one Awareness and concern are increasing is run by a small and opaque group of self- from XR to the Climate Strikes. foot in the unions — including non-affili - across the global north, and beyond, and we appointed “directors”, nationally. (After Its programmatic approach marks a step ated unions. We’ll pursue such a cam - are witnessing a renewed “wave” of climate Labour conference, there have been moves to forward for the movement. We will work paign with assertive united front tactics. activism. Strong words around anthro - set up local LGND groups, or at least What - with LGND wherever possible and assist in pogenic climate change have become wide - sApp groups.) These directors’ strategy re - the development of local LGND groups, spread amongst politicians. volves around diplomacy with a while trying to push for a better programme, The official advice on the UK’s emissions fundamentally hostile bureaucracy – diplo - a better and less sectarian democratic culture, reductions, published by the Committee on macy which will tend to require them to dis - and a more uncompromising attitude to - 10 FEATURE More online at www.workersliberty.org Why we don’t look to “the international community” to defend the Kurds Debate

By Duncan Morrison

“The policy that attempts to place upon the prole - tariat the insoluble task of warding off all dangers engendered by the bourgeoisie and its policy of war is vain, false, mortally dangerous. “’But fascism might be victorious!’ ‘But the USSR is menaced!’ ‘But Hitler’s invasion would signify the slaughter of workers!’ And so on, with - out end. “Of course, the dangers are many, very many. It is impossible not only to ward them all off, but even to foresee all of them. Should the proletariat attempt at the expense of the clarity and irrecon - cilability of its fundamental policy to chase after each episodic danger separately, it will unfailingly prove itself bankrupt. “In time of war, the frontiers will be altered, military victories and defeats will alternate with each other, political regimes will shift. The workers will be able to profit to the full from this mon - strous chaos only if they occupy themselves not Kurdish areas. the Kosovars... We could not, did not, and do the British and Americans to stay. by acting as supervisors of the historical process Most commonly, the call was for “the inter - not positively support NATO” (quotes from “What we refuse to do, and it is the crux of but by engaging in the class struggle. national community” and NATO to inter - Workers’ Liberty 55, 56, 57). our dispute with [some others on the left], is “Only the growth of their international offen - vene, ignoring that the US is central to both NATO intervened in Kosova at America’s raise a ‘demand’, Troops Out Now, whose sive will put an end not alone to episodic ‘dangers’ NATO and “the international community”. behest because of the huge disruptive effect likely, calculable, practical consequences we but also to their main source: class society.” Regardless of the variations between the dif - Serbia’s attempt genocide could have had on do not want. Which may well bring on a ca - (Trotsky, A Step Towards Social Patriotism, 7 ferent forces in NATO, all of them are repre - that whole corner of Europe. It carried out es - tastrophe that will abort all the possibilities March 1939) sentatives of big-power military forces and sentially a “global policing” operation to en - that the rising labour movement is opening they act for their own interests. They are not sure that capitalism could continue freely for the working class of Iraq” (Sean Following a phone call between Turkey’s swayed by the calls of socialists or labour functioning in as wide an area as possible. It Matgamna, Solidarity 3-81). President Erdoğan and President Trump movements. It is delusory for us to believe was not concerned with Kosova self-determi - on 6 October the White House issued a otherwise. nation: Britain, in particular, had long urged DISTRUST statement saying that Turkey would soon Even were we to organise demonstrations the Kosovars to submit to Serbian rule and Again the precedent is clear. We did not carry out a military offensive into Kurdish- as large as the recent anti-Brexit ones or those hope for mild improvements to come with call on the bourgeois forces to intervene, administered northern Syria. US troops against the 2003 invasion of Iraq, we would time. we were clear in our hostility and distrust began to withdraw from the area. not shift the tactics of the commanders and We refused to echo slogans such as “Stop in them. Turkey invaded the border areas, threaten - generals. Were we strong enough to force any the bombing!” or “Down with NATO!” when We simply would not demand actions from ing to suppress the Kurds there and resettle of those big powers to intervene against their the only possible meaning of these slogans them which, if they carried them out, would those areas with a pro-Turkish population. will, then we would be strong enough to con - was that we wanted to let the Serbs carry out run counter to the interests of our people and Socialists were rightly revolted by this, and test power with them. their genocide unfettered. We refuse to raise our programme. protested on the streets around the world In that circumstance our duty would be to slogans whose effects if carried out were Transferred to the current situation in about the plight of the Kurds. do everything we could to take power. It cer - counterposed to our programme. northern Syria, these politics translate as fol - Some chose to call on the British state, or tainly would not be to sow illusions in the But that did not mean that we positively lows. We did not call in advance for the US Britain “with the international community”, imperialists as benign defenders of the Kurds supported NATO. to get out. As we have seen, Trump’s move to send in troops or enforce a “no-fly zone”. or self-determination. Beyond Kosova, comrades might look for has had bad consequences for the Kurdish To criticise the US withdrawal as a betrayal KOSOVA further historical precedent in our position people. of the Kurds, rather than hail it as an “anti- on the Iraq war of 2003. We opposed the in - Yet we cannot and will not mis-educate During the Kosova war in 1999, Workers’ imperialist” victory, is one thing. For social - vasion under the slogan “No to war! No to ourselves, and those around us, by preaching Liberty refused to join the cry by support - ists positively to recommend the British Saddam!”. When the Sunni-supremacist and faith in the US, NATO or any other force ca - ers or semi-supporters of Serbia to “stop military as the force we should look to for de - ultra-Islamist “resistance” emerged, we op - pable of intervening. the [NATO] bombing”. It is a misunder - fending the Kurds was another. posed both that resistance and the US occupa - We remain on the lines indicated by Trot - standing to think that we positively sup - As revolutionary socialists our goal is to tion, and refused to raise the slogan “Troops sky in 1939: ported NATO or its campaign of bombing, create a militant, fighting “Third Camp” of Out”. As we explained at the time: “We are not a government party; we are the or that we called in advance for NATO to the organised working class, against all the “AWL was against the war. We preach ‘no party of irreconcilable opposition... Our bomb or invade. established powers. To call on Britain to send political trust or confidence’ in the American, tasks… we realise not through the medium troops or enforce a “no fly-zone” was not “Workers’ Liberty described what NATO British, or any ruling class, in their states, of bourgeois governments… , but exclusively only fantasy — there was no chance that was doing: ‘They throw bombs at the Serbs, their politicians, or their armies. We analyse through the education of the masses through Britain was going to take the risk of war most of whom don’t know the scale of Ser - the motives of the American, British and agitation, through explaining to the workers against some or all of Turkey, Assad, and bia’s slaughter and ethnic cleansing in other ruling classes in their dealings with what they should defend and what they Russia — but radically militated against that Kosova. They do not... ally or seek to ally Iraq; solidarise with the new Iraqi labour should overthrow. basic goal. with either the Serbs or the Kosovar people… movement wherever it clashes with the occu - “Such a ‘defence’ cannot give immediate It would educate ourselves, and those who “They deploy a crude and savage weapon, piers; indict US/UK misdeeds unsparingly; miraculous results. But we do not even pre - listen to us, to put faith in bourgeois military bombing, for the wrong political goals, at say to those Iraqi socialists whom we can tend to be miracle workers. As things stand, machines. Those bourgeois military ma - best the Balkan status quo... NATO went to reach and to people in Britain that they can - we are a revolutionary minority. “Our work must be directed so that the chines do not and will not listen to us. war to force the Rambouillet ‘agreement’ on not rely on the US and UK to bring democ - workers on whom we have influence To make it more concrete, who would we the Serbian regime… racy. should correctly appraise events, not per - be calling on to implement the “no-fly zone”? “Rambouillet was not primarily pro-Al - “We long ago, before the war, pointed out mit themselves to be caught unawares, The more “realistic” variants would be to call banian. Rambouillet aimed to curb, stifle and that the occupation of Iraq would not curb Is - and prepare the general sentiment of their on Trump and the US generals to reverse frustrate Albanian nationalism... NATO re - lamist terrorism. own class for the revolutionary solution of their withdrawal. Or on Putin and Assad and mained fundamentally concerned with se - “That is enough for now. the tasks confronting us.” (Leon Trotsky, their generals, who in fact did move against curing stable conditions in the Balkans for the “We say that the peoples of Iraq must have The USSR in War , 1939). the Turkish invasion, to limit it and at the ‘imperialism of free trade’ and with asserting self-determination. We maintain a stance of same time regain some control in majority- US power, not with the rights and interests of hostility to the troops and we do not call on Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty FEATURE 11 Becoming wiser and stronger

the dogmatic thinking of religious authority. Lyra becomes infatuated with two seemingly Book review contradictory books: a philosophical novel that promotes selfishness and egoism over kindness of spirit, a nod to Nietzsche’s Thus By Kieran Miles Spoke Zarathustra , and another which denies the existence of objective reality. Note: this review discusses themes from the lat - The common theme of both books, how - est Philip Pullman book but avoids major plot ever, is the idea that beneath the clever word - spoilers; it does discuss previous books in depth, play and seemingly subversive and daring however. aphorisms lies little more than sophistry and justification for small-mindedness and self - 24 years have passed since Philip Pullman ishness. first published Northern Lights , the first The long quest Lyra undertakes in the book volume of the groundbreaking His Dark reflects her personal journey to reconnect Materials trilogy. with her more humane, generous, forgiving In the world of Northern Lights , people’s younger self — a self which embraced the consciousness exists both inside their heads, “secret commonwealth” of magical creatures and in the form of a daemon, an animal that and other worlds, rather than just the cold reflects aspects of their personality/con - formality of reason, logic, and inward-look - sciousness/soul, which is both part of and in - ing Objectivist-type thinking. dependent from their human counterpart. CRITICISM The book follows the adventures of Lyra There have been some criticisms raised of Belacqua and her daemon Pantalaimon, as the book: that it is too didactic, too long, she discovers her true parentage, learns how too shocking. to use the truth-telling device known as the alethiometer, travels to the Arctic to rescue a It seems out of character that Lyra would group of kidnapped children, and learns “Every little increase in human freedom distance herself from her childhood travels, more about the mysterious Dust that the has been fought over ferociously between and the kindly and patient outlook gained Magisterium (roughly the Catholic Church) those who want us to know more and be from those experiences. Some scenes of vio - so desperately seeks to destroy. wiser and stronger, and those who want us lence, or even just swearing, seem deliber - Where Lyra is fearless in using her imagi - to obey and be humble and submit.” ately written just to remind the reader how nation to blag and lie and talk her way out of Pullman stated in an interview after the “adult” this series has become. And must any situation, she finds herself learning from completion of the trilogy, that he had aimed every character, whether romantically or Will, whose contrasting skill is to make him - “to undermine the basis of Christian belief... parentally, unconditionally love Lyra? self so unobtrusive and dull as to almost dis - I find the books upholding certain values that There is additionally, perhaps a tension be - appear. He finds himself the possessor of the I think are important, such as ‘life is im - tween Pullman’s rationalism and his fantasy Subtle Knife, a powerful object that can cut mensely valuable’ and ‘this world is an ex - universe. This is highlighted in the latest doorways between the different worlds. traordinarily beautiful place’. We should do book’s fight against dogmatic rationality – On their travels, they encounter all kinds what we can to increase the amount of wis - the solution to which is apparently belief in of creatures: angels, harpies, talking bears, dom in the world.” the intangible and otherworldly, things the wheeled mulefa, and the horrifying Spec - The final book in the volume ends with a which are arguably the kinds of superstition tres that feed on people’s imaginations; and visit to the land of the dead, and the death of that Pullman argued against in the first tril - find themselves embroiled in a battle be - God. Not bad for a supposedly “young” ogy. This is a departure from the consistency tween free-thinkers and the Magisterium. adult trilogy. Reading the books as a young of the worldview and framework of previous Pullman makes explicit his atheistic and teenager felt thrilling, daring, subversive. books. humanist worldview in the books. Will’s fa - And it is for this audience, of young read - If the ideological contrasts seem one-sided ther, summarising Pullman’s thesis, states ers now grown-up, that Pullman has created or in places contradictory, the underlying “There are two great powers and they’ve his follow-up trilogy, The Book of Dust . thread of Pullman’s oeuvre does shine been fighting since time began. Every ad - The first volume, La Belle Sauvage , pub - through, however: a belief in the necessity of vance in human life, every scrap of knowl - lished in 2017, is set ten years before the human-centred politics, a philosophy con - edge and wisdom and decency we have has events of the His Dark Materials trilogy. Fea - cerned with the fates of individual human been torn by one side from the teeth of the turing a baby Lyra, and new characters Mal - beings as much as society, an affirmation of other. colm and Alice, the book was much darker the necessity of both art and science, in a hu - and more violent than previous ones. manist embrace of the labours of mind and hand. THRILLER Despite unsolved questions and flaws, this Audio of Solidarity Though set in the same fantasy universe, theme is what keeps the series fascinating La Belle feels more like a spy thriller than and worth engaging with. Many thanks to the volunteers YA fiction. Proof of Pullman’s consistency I’ve read numerous terribly-written sci-fi in the rules of his universe, or “story novels just because they have an interesting who have enabled us to pro - bible”, came in a particularly shocking idea, and Pullman’s novel is far, far better duce an audio version of the scene which sees villain Bonneville beat than those. A step down from iconic is excel - his own hyena-daemon in a brutal act of lent, or at least very good, after all. And no- paper. self-hatred. one can deny this is a page-turner. A sub-plot involves a refugee crisis caused by people The struggle against the Church authorities fleeing from war and religious fundamental - was made even more prominent in the book. Links to the audio version are ists — not a particularly subtle modern refer - Pullman’s obsessive love for his home town at workersliberty.org/audio, and ence, but still incredibly moving. also continues (sometimes referred to deri - Pullman skilfully weaves the different nar - can be found through many sively as “Oxford porn” by his readers), but ratives together, interlacing stories, leaving which I find idiosyncratic and charming podcast providers: search one character in a cliff-hanger situation be - above all else. fore switching to another, with the rigour and “Workers’ Liberty” or “Solidarity The second volume, The Secret Common - plotting of a crime thriller. Yes, I probably wealth , set ten years after the events of the & More”. would have read this latest addition to Pull - previous trilogy, has been released this au - man’s series anyway, regardless of its ten - tumn. It sees Lyra as a university student on sions and flaws. Email [email protected] the trail of an unsolved murder, which leads But the masterful author has once again to more revelations about Dust, conscious - created an engrossing, thoughtful, hu - for e-reader versions of Soli - ness, and daemons, and continues the ever- manist novel. darity . dangerous battle against the Magisterium. www.workersliberty.org/books Pullman does not just aim his fire against 12 DEBATE More online at www.workersliberty.org School ban would mis-focus

Debate

By Katy Dollar

We are right to oppose the hijab as a so - cial mechanism of female subordination, and we oppose pressure on girls to wear the hijab. Our priority is to help and support secular - ists and leftists in the mainly-Muslim com - munities and who fight that pressure. It is true that the concept of female modesty, whether motivated by women as tempters, or as requiring protection, embodies women’s oppression and is inseparable from the seg - regation and subordination of women. The debate about children rather than teenagers and young people must be had on very different terms than the previous discus - is increasingly racist is not helpful. girls, or minimally social services interven - without that being reported to parents. sions which focused on teenagers due to the The argument that it is a “safeguarding tion. That is not a useful way to relate to such Schools should provide forums, collective French context. issue” seems to me stretching safeguarding ideas within the family structure. and one-to-one, where children can explore Here the broader context is “parents’ to a point that is no longer a workable frame - If not a state ban, what instead? Clearly ideas about their own identities, rights and rights”, the extent to which people have a work. The issue is not the piece of material, part of the answer is support for secularists, lives, confident that what is discussed will be right to make decisions over their children’s or the fact that a child’s hair is covered, but leftists, and feminists within Muslim commu - reported back only in very particular circum - the fact they are being raised in a framework nities. Within schools, specifically, we should stances (safeguarding, etc.). lives, and where the limits fall. This is a very We should begin a much more wide- of reactionary ideas. In that case the removal argue that in matters relating to gender or important discussion, one which brings in reaching discussion about parents’ rights of head covering whilst at school does very LGBT oppression within the family a degree home-schooling, religious schools, with - over their children’s lives, while under - little to positively improve their lives. of confidentiality should be established be - drawing from various aspects of the curricu - standing that many families have under - If it was a safeguarding issue like others for tween children and the school. lum, healthcare and much more. standable concerns about the state and children, the logic would not be schools ban - It should be made clear that all children To start this discussion by focusing on an wider society in relation to the rights and ning the hijab but the removal of children and young people should be able to remove oppressed minority community at the time safety of themselves and their children. the far right is growing and the centre right from families who prescribe “modesty” for any religious clothing they wish in school How could it be enforced?

ness at an early age in a similar way to the rary comfort zones. Schools, however, should clearly and precisely what our opposition is Catholic/Aristotelian notion of “Give me a be a place of free enquiry, with the expecta - all about, and not be intimidated by the Left. Debate child until he is seven, and I will show you tion that students are encouraged to develop But I am not sure how a ban on hijabs will the man”. their abilities in the widest and deepest pos - be enforced. In other words it is an attempt to “hard- sible way to become fully rounded human I am also not convinced that parents By Ian Townson wire” religious values and practices perma - beings. should have the right to choose which parts nently and irrevocably into the minds of Religious schools can never achieve that. of the curriculum their children should be al - The hijab isn’t just about “modesty” which girls. The hijab plays a part in this form of in - There is no reason why that cannot be put to lowed to take part in or how they should be blames girls or women for being doctrination and is reflected throughout life teachers and parents though in a less strident established. Christians have objected to Dar - temptresses or “asking for it”, and ab - in other forms of female subordination. and more friendly way than I have put it. winism in schools without comparable les - solves men from responsibility for their That is why it is vital that we show solidar - It’s been pointed out that no-one objected sons in creationism! The recent controversy own actions — though it would be outra - ity with secularists and leftists in the Muslim to banning Christian “purity rings’ from in Birmingham over LGBT rights education geous to expect men to wear chastity community. Ultimately we are opposed to schools. If we’re more hesitant about the encourages queer-bashing — subtle or other - belts! the non-materialist mystifications of religion, hijab, is it that we are afraid of being accused wise. All of these issues should be open to but in the meantime we do not try to stop of racism and of giving succour to far-right It strips girls of their autonomy as human public debate with teachers and parents people using their mosques, synagogues, crap? beings by making them male property. It is present. also partly about capturing their conscious - Christian churches, temples etc. for tempo - The way we counter that is to explain Graham Hellawell 1964-2019

By Dan Katz in his home town of Huddersfield. place Grantite socialism with anything stable, I first met Graham in 1982 when he was a coherent and better. That made him difficult Graham Hellawell has died, aged 55. hack in the Militant Tendency. He had the to deal with because although he knew he Supporters and members of Workers’ Lib - standard Militant hand actions and intona - was – generically – on the left, he was adrift erty may well remember Graham from when tion. He had completely accepted the on big political questions, often agreeing with he took an active and leading part in the Grantite political framework. the last person who forcefully put their case. Campaign for Free Education in the mid-90s. But Graham was gay, and that was a prob - In the CfE it was hard to come to an agree - As President of Huddersfield University lem in the Militant in 1982. Every year at the ment with him that we knew would stick. Students’ Union, Graham helped to set up Militant-run Labour Party Young Socialists And over the 1980s and 90s he was a mem - CfE. For a while the Campaign was a very conference motions were submitted to sup - ber, at one time or another, of most of the left large force inside the National Union of Stu - port lesbian and gay rights, and every year groups. He never joined the AWL, although dents battling against the Blairites’ attempts the Militant refused to allow them to be dis - he worked with us closely in the 90s, pre - to ditch free education policy. cussed. They had a position then that homo - cisely because he was not politically stable on sexuality was a “bourgeois deviation” and the big issues of politics. Graham was also active in Unison, in I put this to him once: he smiled and would disappear under socialism. health campaigns and in the fight against agreed. racism and fascism. In the 2001 General Elec - Graham’s Militant framework was shat - tion he stood as a Socialist Alliance candidate tered. His problem was that he failed to re - Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty DEBATE 13 We have to start from here

alarm if they see signs of any one of these. siblings or contemporaries in the school. home or isolated, but on the contrary that I maintain that the enforcement of the hijab “Schools should provide forums, collective they are educated within the school and a let - Debate in primary schools is certainly emotional and one-to-one, where children can explore ter explaining the policy is sent to the par - abuse. If making children wear an embodi - ideas about their own identities, rights and ents. ment of their oppression, segregating them lives, confident that what is discussed will be Possibly we should consider provision that By David Pendletone and subordinating them, isn’t emotional reported back only in very particular circum - the children should then have additional age- abuse, someone needs to make the case. stances (safeguarding, etc.)”. Yes, but how far appropriate lesson(s) about feminism and Katy Dollar writes: “To start this discus - I also believe that the hijab may also exhibit can that exploration go when the pupils are gender, I would propose getting feminists sion by focusing on an oppressed minor - characteristics of physical, sexual and neglect wearing an embodiment of women’s oppres - and secularist from Muslim backgrounds to ity community at the time the far right is abuse. It is abuse in plain sight. sion, segregation and subordination? work on creating a programme which appro - growing and the centre right is increas - That we cannot stop or control all abuse “We should begin a much more wide- priately addresses the issues of segregation, ingly racist is not helpful”. that occurs outside of school does not mean reaching discussion about parents’ rights oppression, modesty and the hijab. This is the “I wouldn’t start from here” ap - we should allow to occur in school. Children over their children’s lives, while understand - Finally, an anecdote, recently, I went for a proach to politics. It is clearly not where we get hit when they are at home. That doesn’t ing that many families have understandable drink with some comrades we work closely would choose to have this battle, all things mean we should allow it to happen in school concerns about the state and wider society in with in the Labour Party. One of them had being equal, but we haven’t chosen the ter - premises. relation to the rights and safety of themselves obviously heard about this debate, and asked Katy writes: “We should argue that in mat - and their children”. me about it. rain. The religious reactionaries have. Both initially disagreed with me, but ters relating to gender or LGBT oppression Who isn’t in favour of more discussion? To respond to “[embodiment of] women’s after 10 minutes discussion, both said within the family a degree of confidentiality But it can always be used to avoid calling for oppression [which] is inseparable from the they strongly agreed. We can win this ar - should be established between children and a definite action. segregation and subordination of women” gument. being enforced on more and younger girls by the school”. Taken as a whole these proposals once saying we can’t start the discussion here be - I agree with this. But the demonstrations again strike me as a scrabbling round to find cause it focuses on an oppressed minority is around Birmingham schools concerning the a way to address the problem whilst trying to lose our moral and political compass as new RSE curriculum, was largely perceived to avoid the most obvious answer: banning revolutionaries. to have all the drawbacks of “focusing on an the hijab in primary schools. What about the recent case of a private Is - oppressed minority community at the time I think I agree with Ian’s points. lamic school shut down because it “wilfully the far right is growing and the centre right He asks: how would a ban be enforced? I neglected” safeguarding? Should we oppose is increasingly racist” which Ruth describes think that the Department for Education Ofsted’s concerns because focusing on an op - as “not helpful”. would ban it in primary schools, and issue pressed minority community… is not help - guidance that children attending school with PARENTS the hijab should be asked to remove it in a ful? “It should be made clear that all children Katy further questions whether the hijab is non-confrontational and sensitive way by and young people should be able to re - people working at the school. Given these are AWL conference a safeguarding issue. move any religious clothing they wish in In safeguarding training in schools you are primary school children, the vast majority school without this being reported to par - will comply unless they have been drilled by debate moves on trained to recognise emotional, physical, sex - ents”. ual and neglect as forms of abuse that are their parents or religious bigots in their com - The next regional pre-conference meet - often overlaid and interconnected but can I agree with that too, but it fails to deal with munity to not comply. ings for the Alliance for Workers’ Lib - stand alone. the fact that reporting is less likely to be done In the instances where there is refusal, we erty’s [AWL’s] conference are 16 and 17 Workers in schools are told to raise the by the school, and more likely to be done by should insist that the children are not sent November, in Sheffield and London re - spectively. The first and second printed discussion bulletins have gone out, a third one is due soon, and much debate is being circulated electronically. Foisted, not a choice In this issue of Solidarity we print part of the conference document on climate ac - tivism, and debate on the hijab in schools. We’ll carry as much as workable of the foisted on them by their families and commu - LGBT identity? Genital mutilation? All of debate on other questions in future issues. nities. these things are harmful to the development For a Marxist group it is necessary that Debate A letter, protesting this increase in hijab- of young minds (and bodies). Should it be re - members both study all the submissions wearing, was sent to Justine Greening, then ally be down to individual choice? (Or, as in and arguments in writing — in a form Education Secretary, in 2017. Its signatories the case of primary school children, really, which can be annotated, re-read, analysed By Matt Kinsella included: Stephen Evans, Campaigns Direc - their parents?) and compared — and follow the “live” de - tor of the National Secular Society; Sara I am perfectly happy for the state to inter - bates about them, in meetings with a Daniel Randall in Solidarity 518 states that Khan, Director of Inspire; and Pragna Patel, vene in schools in a number of areas: to en - broader range of opinion and experience David Pendletone’s argument for banning director of Southall Black Sisters. I think it is sure that RSE lessons include discussions on than regular meetings of our local groups. the hijab in schools is based on “an un - worth quoting at length. safe sex, consent, LGBT rights etc. I think The conference is on 7-8 December. If substantiated assertion that the wearing “Given the ‘justifications’ that lie behind so doctors should have the right to overrule par - you want to know more about it, email of hijab amongst primary-school-aged called ‘modesty’ codes, and its implicit sexu - ents when it comes to decisions impacted by [email protected]. girls is increasing”. alisation of children, we regard it as a matter religious belief e.g. refusal of blood. I would dispute that there is no evidence. of deep regret that so many schools are facil - Why is the hijab (and any item for religious The National Secular Society in 2017 found itating young girls being dressed in the hijab. clothing for that matter), that different? Arabs Jews, and Socialism that the incidence of hijab-wearing is grow - “Whilst policies permitted the wearing of The hijab is straightforwardly reactionary The socialist ing in schools, and particularly that younger the hijab are so often framed in terms of and misogynistic. Why else do women have debate in the and younger children are wearing it. In 2017, choice and freedom, we urge you to recog - to wear it and men not? The onus is on 1980s and 90s out of 142 Islamic schools that accept girls, 59 nise that this ‘freedom’ is often dictated by women to cover up, as only their fathers and on Israel and have uniform policies on their website that social pressure. brothers, and later, their husbands, have the Palestine, and suggest a headscarf or another form of hijab “Education policy should empower girls “right” to see them unveiled. It is a convic - development is compulsory. and help them to make their own decisions tion born from the time when women were of Workers’ This includes eight state-funded schools once they are ready to do so. We therefore call chattel-property. Liberty’s and 27 primary schools, three of which are on you to work alongside Ofsted to ensure As well as that, the logic behind the mod - ideas. state-funded. That means girls as young as that girls from Muslim backgrounds are sup - esty aspects of the hijab is that men should Third four years old. The same survey found that ported to have free choices, rather than hav - not bear the responsibility to not assault reprint, with girls as young as five are wearing the hijab in ing so called ‘modesty’ codes imposed on women; the onus is again on women to cover an additional thousands of non-Islamic schools, which them. No child should be obliged to wear the up, lest they “provoke” men into assaulting intro by Sean have incorporated it into their uniform codes. hijab, or any other article of religious cloth - them. That is a straightforwardly victim- Matgamna. Four and five year olds cannot make judg - ing, whilst at school.” blaming idea, which I find repellent. Are you really going to give a single inch £5 cover ments about the existence of God or accept - I would ask any comrade against a ban: to people who think that if an unveiled price, £6.20 ance of religion, or be said to “choose” to what other right-wing religious concessions four-year old is raped, they had it coming? inc. postage. wear religious garments . Those garments are are you willing to make? Segregated school - ing? Exclusion from school, for expression of More online at www.workersliberty.org Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty Where we stand

Today one class, the working Winter Wonderland class, lives by selling its labour power to another, the capitalist class, which owns the means of dustrial cleaners, who had burning production. Diary pains in his stomach. Today we’re The capitalists’ control over the informed that this was caused by economy and their relentless drive chemical poisoning. to increase their wealth causes By Emma Rickman ‘K & G’ the two workers prima - poverty, unemployment, the rily responsible for clearing up the blighting of lives by overwork, Last week there were two lime lime, are notorious for refusing to imperialism, the destruction of the leaks at our Combined Heat and wear face-masks, gloves or eye- environment and much else. Power plant. A problem – yet to protection, and now the lime is re - Against the accumulated wealth be identified – caused the Ven - acting with K’s digestive system. and power of the capitalists, the tura to blow instead of suck, and According to rumours in the mess working class must unite to the harsh white powder covered room, he has ulcers from throat to struggle against capitalist power the plant. stomach. in the workplace and in wider This news starts up another con - Operators needed full face- society. versation which joins the dots of and secure contracts, who do simi - There are currently two OMA va - masks and huge torches to get The Alliance for Workers’ some plant politics I’ve only par - lar work, but leave all the cleaning cancies that K & G will very likely through the thick grey clouds on Liberty wants socialist revolution: tially understood. to K & G. When OMA vacancies apply for. Now K has been poi - every level, and we lost half of the collective ownership of industry K & G are not directly employed have come up, K & G have applied soned at work, the debate in the lime supply. and services, workers’ control, by the ERF, but are paid hourly by several times, but are always mess room is whether the Ops Lime is highly alkaline, ab - and a democracy much fuller than Veolia Industrial Services (VIS). turned down for less competent manager will cave in, and give the sorbent, and turns hard as rock the present system, with elected Though their work is difficult and outsiders. jobs to those that – we all agree – when mixed with water (like con - representatives recallable at any dangerous, they’re paid minimum This is because the OMA salaries should have had them years ago. crete). On the plant lime is used to time and an end to bureaucrats’ wage and work 10-hour days to come out of the Operations budget, Or whether, of course, K will ever absorb the pollutants in the gases and managers’ privileges. break even. K will receive £50 a and K & G’s wages come out of the come back to work. emitted by the furnace, so it’s criti - His colleague, G, still refuses We fight for trade unions and week sick leave from VIS for his in - Maintenance budget, run by differ - cal for preventing toxic waste. Its to wear a mask; “Well, it’s got me the Labour Party to break with juries, as his refusal to wear PPE ent managers. The Ops manager also eats through pumps, pipes, already hasn’t it?” “social partnership” with the will absolve Veolia of any responsi - benefits from K & G’s cheap labour, ducting, clothes, machines and bosses and to militantly assert bility. while not having to pay them out steel walkways. working-class interests. The ERF does directly employ of his budget. He won’t hire them • Emma Rickman is an engineering Two days ago an ambulance was Operational Maintenance Assis - directly, because he would then apprentice at a Combined Heat and called to site for ‘K’, one of the in - In workplaces, trade unions, tants (OMAs) on higher salaries have to pay for them. Power (CHP) plant in Sheffield. and Labour organisations; among students; in local campaigns; on the left and in wider political alliances we stand for: GMB rules hamper democracy • Independent working-class representation in politics. • A workers’ government, By Dale Street cumbent General Secretary! – with sion was overturned on appeal. • Candidates are not allowed to based on and accountable to the their own network of contacts to The embarrassment caused by address “any meeting of any labour movement. Ballot papers have been sent out obtain branch nominations. media coverage of the attempt to branch (including their own) or Re - • A workers’ charter of trade to GMB members in the union’s Three GMB members “expressed exclude Walker-Shaw may have gion or Section of the union or any union rights — to organise, to General Secretary election, a an interest” in standing for election weighed more heavily on the meeting of any kind whether in a strike, to picket effectively, and to choice between the incumbent and sought to achieve the 50 minds of the appeal committee workplace or elsewhere on the sub - take solidarity action. Tim Roache and the union’s Eu - branch nominations. than the actual merits of the appel - ject of the election.” • Taxation of the rich to fund ropean Officer, Kathleen Walker- Jack Yates – a kind of “rank-and- lant’s arguments. • The only meetings at which a decent public services, homes, Shaw. file” candidate, but one who lacked Going on past elections, turnout candidate may speak are hustings education and jobs for all. That an election is taking place at a “rank-and-file” programme – se - is likely to be low. meeting organised by the GMB, up • A workers’ movement that all is an achievement. cured two nominations, Walker- In the 2015 General Secretary to a maximum of three such meet - fights all forms of oppression. Full In previous elections only 30 Shaw picked up 57, and Roache (two candidates, both white male) ings in any region, although it equality for women, and social nominations were needed to get over 300. turnout was 4.2% of the member - seems some regions will have just provision to free women from onto the ballot paper. But last But then a meeting of the GMB ship. Roache was elected with a one hustings. domestic labour. For reproductive year’s GMB conference agreed to Finance and General Purposes “mandate” from 2.2% of the These rules also give an inbuilt justice: free abortion on demand; increase the number of nomina - Committee decided that Walker- union’s membership. advantage to an incumbent Gen - the right to choose when and tions by two thirds, raising the Shaw was not competent to fill the In the 2010 General Secretary eral Secretary, given that he will al - whether to have children. Full number to 50. post of General Secretary and election, turnout was zero. There ready be a “known name”. equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual The GMB’s rules also make it no - should not be allowed onto the bal - was no election because there was Only a week after the day on and transgender people. Black toriously difficult, and deliberately lot paper – leaving Roache as the only one candidate (Paul Kenny – which Walker-Shaw’s appeal was and white workers’ unity against so, for anyone who is not already a only candidate. white male). Ditto the 2006 General upheld, for example, all GMB racism. union full-timer – such as an in - Fortunately, this disgraceful deci - Secretary election: one candidate members received an e-mail signed • Open borders. (Paul Kenny), so no election. off by Roache, in his capacity as • Global solidarity against In 2003 there had been an elec - General Secretary, boasting of the global capital — workers Union to double dues for many? tion (two candidates, both white union’s proud record (and dis - everywhere have more in male). But the winner (Kevin Cur - counted offers for its members). common with each other than ran) stood down after only two On paper there is little to choose By Charlie George is instead considering getting rid with their capitalist or Stalinist years following allegations of bal - between the two candidates, al - of the part-time rate for new mem - rulers. lot-rigging in the 2003 contest, in - though Walker-Shaw’s election USDAW, the shopworkers bers, at its next annual conference, • Democracy at every level of volving votes being “cast” by dead statement does include unspecified union, is facing a financial presumably a prelude to getting society, from the smallest and lapsed GMB members. commitments to “protecting the in - shortfall due to large numbers rid of it all together. workplace or community to global But at least that helped to in - dependence and democracy of of its members being made re - This would double the cost of social organisation. crease the turnout. GMB branches” and “strengthen - dundant. union membership for many shop • Equal rights for all nations, A low turnout is virtually hard - ing lay membership democracy workers on low-hours contracts, wired into General Secretary elec - and governance.” against imperialists and predators This is particularly felt at Tesco, But a victory for Walker-Shaw, and place union membership out tions by the GMB’s rules: big and small. which is the largest employer for apart from meaning the first ever of their budget. Many only work 6 • The only election material • Maximum left unity in action, the union’s members, but also female GMB General Secretary, hours a week. which a candidate may produce and openness in debate. where the union has refused to To cover this shortfall, paid would be a spanner in the works and circulate is their election state - put up any resistance to the loss of union organisers should take a of the bureaucratic apparatus ment, no more than 1,000 words in If you agree with us, please around 9,000 jobs this last year. pay cut to be on a worker’s built up by Roache and his pred - length, to be circulated by the GMB take some copies of Solidarity Instead of launching a massive wage, and USDAW should be ecessors over the years and cre - with the ballot paper. This also cov - to sell — and join us! recruitment campaign or fighting recruiting new members on a ate the space for potential ers electronic communications, i.e. back against the bosses, the union militant, socialist platform. further advances. they are not allowed. REPORTS 14-15 Second victory at BEIS John Moloney

On 21 October our members working for the contractor ISS at BEIS (the Department of Busi - ness, Energy, and Industrial Strategy) won a complete victory in their dispute. This follows a victory for catering staff at BEIS, employed by another HMRC in Liverpool. We’re looking strike, we’ve been told by the stu - contractor, Aramark, on 4 October. at extending that dispute to other dents that they will welcome work - Now porters, security, post room, sections in similar conditions, and ers taking action that day, but cleaners and receptionist staff have maybe to more extended action. they’re not making the same call to also won the London Living Wage, Almost all the contracts in “facil - workers that day as on 20 Septem - improved sick pay, and a number ities management” these days are ber. I believe there may be a fresh Post workers target of other conditions. held by five or six big companies. call for more general action in the The victories can be put down to The pay and conditions for workers New Year. one factor: all-out indefinite strike vary from contract to contract. The PCS general secretary ballot late November action, which isn’t that common Usually bids for the contracts are opens on 7 November and closes these days. submitted on the basis either of on 12 December. Unlike some At FCO (the Foreign and Com - minimum wage, or of Living Wage. unions, PCS puts no restrictions on By Gerry Bates section out one day, another the monwealth Office) we’ve been in a Then most departments pick a min - what the candidates can put out in next, yet another the third, and so dispute with another contractor, In - imum-wage bid. the way of leaflets, social media Postal workers are talking on. terserve, for over six months. Be - At BEIS the staff were on the posts, and so on. The only restric - about strikes around the big on - In results announced on 15 Oc - cause of the Trade Union Act 2016, minimum wage, but now they’ve tion is that they can’t use the mem - line-shopping days of “Black tober, Royal Mail workers voted we have had to re-ballot to con - won the Living Wage. bership database to circulate Friday” (29 November), “Cyber 97% for industrial action, on a tinue the dispute. We have written to the Govern - material. Monday” (2 December), and in 75.9% turnout. There were also big There are no compulsory, cen - The result of that re-ballot came ment saying that we want all those the run-up to Christmas. majorities for industrial action in trally-organised hustings, but in on 21 October: an overwhelming outsourced workers on the Living Parcelforce. PCS branches and other bodies The aim is to time the action for vote to continue action, with a good Wage and with sick pay from day The union is demanding imple - of the union are free to organise maximum impact. A strike which turnout, well above the threshold. one and other conditions, and that mentation of a deal reached in as many hustings with the three included 29 November would also I think we’ll now be discussing we want the PCS to be recognised 2017, for a shorter working week candidates as they wish. have the boost of coinciding with escalation. There is the possibility, for all those contracts. the next big student climate strike, among other things, and resisting if the members want it, to go to all- Our true aim is to bring all that when a number of workplaces a planned restructure of out strike there too. work back inside the civil service, • John Moloney is Assistant Gen - will take action too. Parcelforce which threatens jobs. Cleaners represented by PCS are and onto civil service pay and con - eral Secretary of PCS, writing here The talk is not of one-day The CWU and Royal Mail have currently in dispute with ISS where ditions. in a personal capacity. strikes. A Doncaster postal worker discussed with a mediator since 15 they hold a contract with the On the 29 November climate told Solidarity : “The general feel - October, and are due to consider ing in my office is we can handle the mediator’s report this week. a week or so of lost wages. We’ve According to the Financial Times, had ample notice, and I know a two weeks are then set aside for Merseyrail: two-tier danger few posties who have been put - attempts to restart talks, and ac - ting a little aside each week to cre - tion will be set after that. ate a small strike fund for Under the Trade Union Act By Off The Rails guards’ jobs by cutting cleaners’ themselves. 2016, the union has to make its call jobs. “Lots in the office such as my - 14 days before the action, to give the bosses notice. RMT is announcing a “major These offers should never have self have the belief that a one week That takes the start of strikes breakthrough” on Merseyrail, made it out of the talks; the fact that strike and the loss of pay that goes up to late November, but postal after negotiations produced a the RMT Executive spent any time with it is better than the long term workers report “quite a lot of new offer including a method of considering offers that were an af - ramifications of not striking or not regular updates regarding the train dispatch which retains con - front to the basic principles of in - making an impact”. mediation and next steps”, and trol of the doors for the guard, in dustrial unionism was frankly a In other offices, there has been the late-November schedule is line with RMT policy. waste of time that slowed momen - talk of more complicated options widely accepted. The union says the “fine detail” tum. such as rolling action, with one still needs working out, but the fact Those proposals are now gone, If a two-tier deal is accepted, you that it has suspended the strikes it but more recent proposed settle - can guarantee that mischief-mak - planned for every Saturday ments, including the most recent, ing managers will be pouring poi - through November and December included a plan to put new starters son in the ear of new guards from Tube cleaners prepare ballot is a pretty conclusive signal that the on worse terms and conditions — day one: “Thinking of joining the RMT Executive believes the dis - longer hours for less pay — than RMT? You know they accepted a By Tom Saff pute is now reaching its endgame. existing guards. With negotiations deal that means you’re working on the “fine detail” of the offer on - Make no mistake: defeating the longer hours and earning less RMT cleaners on London Under - company’s attempts to impose going, RMT reps will have to push money?” to get those strings removed. But ground are balloting for strike DOO will be a huge achievement Ultimately the decision on where action from Monday 28 October. on its own terms, and is something without the additional pressure to go next has to be led from the that would not have been achieved and leverage of looming strikes, shopfloor, on the basis of whether RMT members across the Lon - without the solid industrial action they only have persuasive words to workers feel confident to fight on. don Transport Region will be mo - workers have taken, backed up by rely on. It will now be extremely But if the bosses do insist on bilising to get the highest possible solidarity from Aslef drivers. hard to reinstate action, having strings, then a discussion must be turnout and a yes vote for strike ac - Merseyrail workers should be called, and then suspended, strikes had about extending the excep - tion. congratulated for this exceptional twice in the last month alone. tional resolve workers have shown The cleaners have waged a long It’s a difficult argument to ask ex - resolve, and other workers can take so far to fight for those strings to be campaign to get the same travel the same conditions as London Un - isting workers to make sacrifices, inspiration from yet another re - cut. pass benefits as directly employed derground workers. Despite sug - by losing pay on strike days, for minder that direct action really Oh, and one more thing. We workers, company sick pay, im - gesting in various speeches that he workers who aren’t even on the job does get the goods. couldn’t help but notice that in the proved holiday and pension enti - will consider some of these issues, yet, but the alternative — accepting But before we pop the cham - RMT press release, the General Sec - tlement and a reversal of the job he has failed to do anything about a deal that screws over future staff pagne, we need to examine any retary thanks the regional organiser cuts that have left some stations it. strings that might be attached. Pre - to protect the conditions of current by name. with just one cleaner per shift. RMT plan to continue the pres - vious deals have included com - ones — risks undermining union Very unusual. You’d think there London Mayor Sadiq Khan, of sure on the Mayor right thought pletely unacceptable strings, such organisation on the job going for - was an election on. course, has the power to bring the this period and into his upcom - as offsetting the cost of retaining ward. cleaners in house, putting them on ing election campaign. SolidaFor a workers’ giovertnment y No 522 23 October 2019 50p/£1

Self-determination for the Kurds! By Pete Boggs The remaining American troops the last few weeks the US has mayor of İstanbul, Ekrem party. It has unambiguously con - in the area are being sent to Iraq in swung between making wholly İmamoğlu, tweeted his support for demned the invasion, despite the A temporary ceasefire for five order to combat the resurgence of unconvincing defences of Turkey’s the invasion, and the CHP leader pressure on it of state repression. days in Turkey’s invasion of ma - Daesh in the west of the country. claims that it will defend ethnic mi - Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu also made sup - The Turkish government has for - jority-Kurdish areas of Syria was As they left their military bases in norities during its invasion, to portive comments. bidden people from even referring negotiated by the USA on 17 Oc - northern Syria, they were bom - making outright threats of war Kılıçdaroğlu has since become to its invasion as an invasion, de - tober. barded with potatoes and rocks by against Turkey. more critical, but not about the claring such description as tanta - The American delegation to betrayed locals. There have been Russian and Syrian forces have bloodshed or treatment of the mount to supporting terrorism. Ankara, headed by Vice President mixed signals regarding what the entered the Kurdish-controlled Kurds. He has attacked Erdoğan According to the HDP, hundreds of Mike Pence, agreed a 120-hour pe - US will do next. areas. Turkey has opened up com - for failing to respect the territorial people have been detained for riod for the Syrian Democratic There have been debates within munications with them, and seems integrity of Assad’s Syria and for posts on social media, and at least Forces (the Kurdish-led forces in Trump’s Cabinet about leaving a to have no interest in clashes. failing to stand up to Trump. 24 arrests have been made. the Autonomous Administration 200-strong force in northern Syria VISIT PUTIN The CHP has made it perfectly One CHP deputy, Sezgin Tan - of North and East Syria) to with - to continue the fight against Daesh clear elsewhere where it stands on rıkulu, a former defence lawyer Erdoğan is visiting Russian pres - draw from a 20-mile deep area and make sure that the Kurds re - the Kurds: right behind the Turkish who was famous for defending which Turkish president Erdoğan tain control of the oil fields as op - ident Putin in Sochi on Tuesday army as it butchers them. At a Kurdish politicians, has called Op - has decreed as a “safe zone”. In re - posed to Syrian or Russian forces 22nd, the same day that the US- press conference, CHP deputy eration Peace Spring “unjust”, and ality, this is a zone which has been coming into control of them. negotiated ceasefire will expire. chairman Faik Öztrak called the is being investigated for “treason”. This is a naked admission of YPG terrorists, and attacked Er - This repression follows years of designated for occupation and eth - Turkey has also been in covert nic cleansing. America’s chief priorities in the re - doğan from the right for being in - attacks on the most basic demo - gion: not avoiding mass slaughter communication with the Syrian sufficiently tough on them, cratic rights of the HDP in Turkey. Even the temporary halt to the government, both directly and violence is good. According to the and displacement, but making sure seeming to condemn the ceasefire. Where the HDP have won local that the Kurds are able to carry on through Russian arbiters. The CHP has now found itself in elections they have usually been Syrian Observatory for Human All the forces involved assume Rights, there have been at least 592 fulfilling what America wants de - a lash-up with far-right Islamists barred from serving due to “links spite their betrayal. that Syria’s bloodstained dictator (Felicity Party) and the conserva - with terrorists”, parliamentary deaths (120 of them civilians), and Assad will win his country’s civil over three hundred thousand civil - Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tive İyi Party, a split from the semi- deputies have been arrested, and has made comments which com - war and retain power. fascist Nationalist Movement Party offices have been raided. ians displaced. Since the invasion more local plicate matters even further, saying Inside Turkey the main opposi - (MHP). However, the ceasefire also im - HDP mayors have been ar - that whilst the US prefers to use tion are the Republican People’s The opposition to the invasion plied a demand from Erdoğan for rested, had their offices raided, economic and diplomatic powers Party (CHP), a Turkish nationalist domestically has come from the a clear path to carry out his de - and been replaced by state-ap - to pressure Turkey, they will resort party twinged with vague social- People’s Democracy Party (HDP), struction. pointed trustees. to military action “if necessary”. In democratic aspirations. The CHP a leftwing and Kurdish-linked Write to us: 20E Tower Subscribe to Solidarity Contact us Workshops, Riley Road, Trial sub (6 issues) £7; Six months (22 issues) £22 waged, £11 unwaged; European rate: 6 months €30, One year €55 London, SE1 3DG Solidarity production team: Simon Subscribe online at www.workersliberty.org/sub 020 7394 8923 Nelson, Cathy Nugent, Martin Thomas Or send your name, address and postcode with payment to 20E Tower Workshops, London SE1 3DG solidarity@ (editor), and Misha Zubrowski To subscribe with a standing order: £5 a month, or pay us more to support our work. Forms online, as above workersliberty.org Printed by Reach Plc