Britain faces a stark choice, a competent, compassionate Labour government committed to an economy that works for all, or a bumbling, arrogant Conservative government that serves only the rich few. But we cannot achieve a Labour government unless we vote for a Labour government. Although Prime Minister, Theresa May continually harps on about Strength and […]
No, robots are not going to take all the jobs
Mar 8th, 2017 by Andy Newman.One of the underpinning arguments behind those arguing for a Basic Income Guarantee (BIG), alternatively known as the Universal Basic Income, is that automation is creating a new technological paradigm, where, as Paul Mason describes it: Information technology is preventing the normal adaptation process, whereby capitalism — as a complex system — reacts to crisis, to the exhaustion of […]
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The other trade union march
Mar 7th, 2017 by Andy Newman.Danny Glover, Bernie Sanders and NAACP president Cornell Brooks participated this weekend in a march with Nissan factory workers trying to unionize in Canton, Mississippi. It is worth watching the film below, and Brooks is particularly eloquent about why workplace rights are civil rights.
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Let’s Unite the left for Len
Feb 10th, 2017 by Andy Newman.Even taking account the advantages of incumbency, the momentum, dynamism and confidence of Len McCluskey’s campaign to be re-elected General Secretary of Unite stands in sharp contrast to the lacklustre efforts of the right wing challenger, Gerard Coyne, and the amateur hour theatrics of the “grassroots” candidate, Ian Allinson. What stands out is not only that Len can point […]
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Opposing Trump can unite the left after Brexit
Feb 9th, 2017 by Andy Newman.David Frum’s article in The Atlantic “How to Build an Autocracy” not surprisingly gained a great deal of attention because of the all too plausible way that it highlighted how the constitutional checks and balances of the US political system can fail, if those whose job is to exercise those checks and balances instead find […]
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Community need to face the consequences
Feb 1st, 2017 by Andy Newman.The criterion for success for any trade union campaign is whether or not it leaves organisation weaker or stronger. A hundred years ago, the German socialist, Rosa Luxemburg, observed that trade union organisation was a “labour of Sisyphus”, comparing it to the mythological figure who was doomed to an eternity of pushing a rock up […]
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How we adapt to the new Trade Union Act
Jan 30th, 2017 by Andy Newman.The Trade Union Act 2016 comes into effect for all industrial disputes where the ballot is to commence after 1st March 2017. Due to a well coordinated campaign by trade unions and the Labour Party, much of it lobbying behind the scenes, many of the more draconian aspects that had originally been proposed by the Conservative Government […]
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The left must encourage people into unions – not work against their leaderships
Oct 31st, 2016 by Andy Newman.There is an unfortunate tendency for articles nowadays to have sensationalist “click-bait” headlines, but by any standards the aggressive spin put on Michael Chessum’s latest piece in the New Statesman is highly unfortunate. The headline screams “It’s time for Jeremy Corbyn’s supporters to take on the trade union leadership”. Nothing could be more counterproductive than seeking […]
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Jackie Walker’s position is untenable, she should go.
Sep 30th, 2016 by Andy Newman.The fact that there has been a rise in anti-Semitic incidents across Europe and elsewhere is simply not a fact which can credibly be disputed. To take just two egregious examples. In January 2015, an Islamist terrorist, Amedy Coulibaly shot dead four Jewish men at a kosher supermarket in Paris before security forces stormed the […]
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How Corbyn has changed Labour
Sep 20th, 2016 by Andy Newman.It is surely a remarkable illustration of how political parties change over time that the current Presidential candidate for the political party of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant is Donald Trump. Whereas, during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War, white supremacist terrorists hunted down and killed members of the Republican Party across the Southern […]
