AWL

Today one class, the working class, lives by selling its labour power to another, the capitalist class which owns the means of production. Society is shaped by the capitalists' relentless drive to increase their wealth. Capitalism causes poverty, unemployment, the blighting of lives by overwork, imperialism, the destruction of the environment and much else.

Against the accumulated wealth and power of the capitalists, the working class has one weapon: solidarity.

The Alliance for Workers' Liberty aims to build solidarity through struggle so that the working class can overthrow capitalism. We want socialist revolution: collective ownership of industry and services, workers' control and a democracy much fuller than the present, with elected representatives recallable at any time and an end to bureaucrats' and managers' privileges.

We fight for the labour movement to break with "social partnership" and assert working-class interests militantly against the bosses.

Our priority is to work in the workplaces and trade unions, supporting workers' struggles, producing workplace bulletins, helping organise rank-and-file groups.

We stand for:

• Independent working-class representation in politics.
• A workers' government, based on and accountable to the labour movement.
• A workers' charter of trade union rights - to organise, to strike, to picket effectively, and to take solidarity action.
• Taxation of the rich to fund decent public services, homes, education and jobs for all.
• A workers' movement that fights all forms of oppression. Full equality for women and social provision to free women from the burden of housework. Free abortion on request. Full equality for lesbian, gay and bisexual people. Black and white workers' unity against racism.
• Open borders.
• Global solidarity against global capital - workers everywhere have more in common with each other than with their capitalist or Stalinist rulers.
• Democracy at every level of society from the smallest workplace or community to global social organisation.
• Working-class solidarity in international politics: equal rights for all nations, against imperialists and predators big and small.
• Maximum left unity in action, and openness in debate!

If you agree with us, please take some copies of Solidarity to sell - and join us!

Mike Perkins, 1932-2020

Mike Perkins, a long standing supporter of Solidarity and Workers’ Liberty, died on 9 November aged 88. Mike joined shortly after his retirement from work, some 20 years ago. Through his union, Unison, he was on the trade union education course at Southampton College. Run by a socialist tutor, the course was lively, relevant and political, rooted in the class struggle and related political issues. It was 1997. The Labour Party had won the election, but were led by pink-Tory Blairites who had captured control. These issues were discussed on the course, with a number of members continuing that...

24 October 2020 debate on the US presidential election

• See here for other articles debating the US election, Trump, etc . The motions below were debated at a Workers' Liberty committee meeting (by Zoom) on 24 October. Motion 1 was defeated. An amendment to motion 2 to delete the first sentence,"Trump is not likely..." (in square brackets below), was carried, and then Motion 2 as amended was carried. Motion 1 This US presidential election has narrowed down into a contest between a fascistic demagogue with a militant and part-militarised mass base, and a standard-issue neoliberal. Voting Biden to stop Trump requires saying no more "for" him than...

Agenda for activists

As the virus spreads, Safe and Equal is stepping up efforts to get its model motion on isolation pay passed through Labour Parties and union branches. It also asks activists to seek invitations for S&E to speak at meetings. S&E has recently been approached with an invitation by a local Labour Party with which it had previously had no contact, and has had ongoing links with Redbridge Trades Council's drive to get Redbridge council to ensure full isolation pay in its care homes since an S&E speaker went to the Trades Council in April. The Uyghur Solidarity Campaign UK and Labour Movement...

Tabloid 9 September

From the next-but-one issue, no.562, 9 September, we will return to our usual tabloid format from this reduced format which we've had to use in lockdown because lack of street activity and meetings made it difficult to circulate the paper. We will use the return to run an experiment of producing a couple of regular issues in the "endorse-folded" format (which we've previously used for "specials" on fighting fascism and on automation) and seeing whether that format sells better than the plain-vanilla version of tabloid. Because of the probability of a second virus surge, we won't run our...

Cooperate where we agree, debate where we disagree

Neil Faulkner of the Mutiny group has published a series of articles about the ideas of Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky on revolutionary parties, prompted, he says, by "an online meeting on the future of the British Left in which I participated on 12 July". That meeting brought together us, Workers' Liberty, with Mutiny and another group, Red Flag. We found it useful and hope for more similar. Faulkner's series takes off from a polemic against the emphasis of the Red Flag speaker, K D Tait, on "different programme and strategy". He makes no comment on what the Workers' Liberty speaker, Ruth Cashman...

Remobilising the left

At the end of July, local AWL organisers met to discuss remobilising members to respond to the economic and political upheavals that face labour movement activists as the lockdown eases. Our window for that remobilisation may be short if lockdowns are partially or fully reintroduced. As socialist activists whose political bread-and-butter is face-to-face communication and outward-facing activity such as meetings, street protests, and picket lines, we need to learn the lessons of lockdown. Some trade union activity has been possible in some unions, at the local level and among leftists, but...

Answering "Momentum against the AWL"

A “Momentum Against the AWL” twitter campaign have said the Working Group looking into a report of sexual assault taking place in 2005, made public in 2018, was a “whitewash”. This assertion is variously linked to other points including not involving the survivor in their work, and that nobody in the AWL has resigned as a result of its findings . Our response, written in consultation with members of that Working Group, and to correct some of these misrepresentations, is as follows: • The remit of the Working Group, published on our site on 30.1.18 was: to “further investigate individual and...

£3,412 towards £10,000

A donation of £155 from Zack and £50 from Lucy takes us to £3,412, towards our £10,000 target by 22 November. We have seen an increase in sales of our paper and some of our pamphlets at the recent Black Lives Matter demos. All our branches are now thinking of ways to adapt to sales with less cash-handling. You can continue to support us by making donations by bank transfer, by PayPal, or by cheque to our office. (The industrial estate in which our office is sited will soon, we’re told, be open longer hours). We are continuing our programme of online meetings even while the lockdown eases. Zoom...

£3,207 towards £10,000

This week has been a slow one, taking us only from £3,125 to £3,207 towards our target of £10,000 by 22 November. Only a few small donations this week, but several more promised for the next week! As more and more places now become card-only, why not get your change jars paid in and send the money to us? We’ve been selling literature at the Black Lives Matter protests while trying to maintain covid- distancing, collecting cash payments in collection boxes rather than by hand, and using portable contactless card payment machines (until demos get so big they overwhelm the mobile phone networks...

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