Solidarity 420, 19 October 2016

21 October 1966

A villanelle about the Aberfan coal mining disaster, in which 144 people, including 116 school children, died when a coal mining waste tip collapsed. There was a lot of anger at the National Coal Board for its neglect of safety, and at the inquest, one father insisted: "I want it recorded — ‘Buried alive by the National Coal Board’. That is what I want to see on the record. That is the feeling of those present. Those are the words we want to go on the certificate." The miner insisted the coroner record The Pantglas School building a homicide scene They were buried alive by the National Coal...

The pound and the Marmite crisis

It’s often thought bad in Marxist publications to write articles on the theme “we don’t know”, but that is what I have to do about the falling pound. The exchange rate of the pound against other major currencies has fallen 17% since the Brexit vote on 23 June, and has recently had a further sudden lurch downwards. The inflation rate is ticking up a bit. Marmite is disappearing from the shelves at Tesco because its producer demanded a price rise to compensate for the falling exchange rate. These trends could swell into dramas. The fall of the pound could spiral as speculators, seeing it sag...

No hard Brexit

Loud voices among the Tories are pushing for a “hard Brexit”. They want to slam the door on migrants from Europe and make things difficult for migrant workers already here. The Tories are divided. Most of big business want to stay in the EU’s “single market”, so that they do not face tariffs or complicated juggling with forms and regulation when trading with the EU. They want to keep “passporting” rights for UK-based banks to trade across the EU. They know they won’t get that without continuing freedom of movement for workers, but they don’t mind that, or they positively welcome a bigger pool...

Letters

I know Leo Panitch pretty well and I think Martin is misrepresenting him in his report of the “parliamentary socialism” workshop at the Momentum fringe event at Labour Party conference ( Solidarity 418). When Leo dismisses “insurrection”, he means that he doesn’t think that armed struggle with the bourgeois state — civil war, which Trotsky did say was the highest form of the class struggle — is feasible. The bourgeois state has tanks, fighter planes, nukes, etc. Unless revolutionary socialists win over the majority of the rank-and-file of the armed forces well in advance of taking power, we’ll...

Anti-semitism — a top-down perspective

On 16 October, a Home Affairs Select Committee on antisemitism criticised Jeremy Corbyn’s handling of recent controversies within Labour, but also found that “no reliable empirical evidence to suggest there is a higher prevalence of antisemitic attitudes within the Labour Party than in any other party”. The Committee report, which was dominated by Tory MPs, has been criticised for focusing too heavily on allegations of antisemitism within the Labour Party, and within that, on instances of online abuse, to the exclusion of analysing increases in antisemitic attacks elsewhere. Haredi (ultra...

Evans retrial show victims still blamed for rape

Last week, the footballer Ched Evans was cleared of rape after appealing against his 2012 conviction. This does not mean that he did not rape victim X, or has “proved his innocence”, but that the jury had “reasonable doubt” about whether he had raped X or if she had consented to sex. Reports of the trial’s proceedings suggest that the events were as such: X was engaged in sexual activity with Clayton McDonald, another professional footballer, who was acquitted of rape in the original trial. Evans then proceeded to have sex with X without having spoken to her, while Evans’s younger brother...

Conservatives derail Colombian peace process

In August, Colombian President Manuel Santos and Timochenko, leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), signed a peace accord. The agreement that had taken four years to negotiate would begin the voluntary disarmament of FARC guerillas by UN forces. On 2 October, voters in the referendum rejected the accord by a margin of 0.4% on a 30% turnout. The result was a shock to peace accord supporters. Santos and the FARC leaders have promised to honour the ceasefire to the end of the year, and to return to negotiations. The FARC twitter feed names companies who funded the “no”...

UK should stop supporting Saudi war on Yemen!

Following a Saudi attack on mourners attending a funeral in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, the US has reviewed its policy of support for the Saudi war. 140 died in the bombing raid on Saturday 8 October, with over 500 injured. The attack was a so-called “double tap”, with a second strike timed to kill rescuers moving to the scene to help the wounded. The “double tap” is the type of raid that the US and UK have called a “war crime” when carried out by Russia in Aleppo. The UN estimates that over 7,000 people have now been killed in the conflict — two thirds in Saudi airstrikes. Saudi airpower has also...

NUS boycott National Student Survey, but is it “risky”?

Earlier in October NUS announced long-awaited plans for a boycott of the National Student Survey, a government-sponsored questionnaire taken by final-year undergraduates where they are asked to rate their university on various criteria. The boycott is a tactic to fight the government’s current Higher Education reforms. These reforms have been criticised by groups such as the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts for not only proposing continually higher tuition fees, but also plans to relax rules on private providers, in an attempt to force competition in higher education. This will...

Defend Jackie Walker? Not like this! Antisemitism and the left

The most informative thing about the recent controversy in Momentum — around comments made by Vice-Chair Jackie Walker at an antisemitism training event — has been less the words Jackie Walker herself said, and more the comments made by some of those who have rallied to her defence. Walker claimed to have asked a neutral and innocent question about, and sought a clarification on, the issues of Holocaust Memorial Day and security for Jewish school students. It soon became abundantly clear that Walker's defenders recognised (or chose to recognise) a subtext behind the comments. Though Walker's...

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