Solidarity 124, 10 January 2008

A public meeting on 10 December 2007 was part of the build-up to the No One is Illegal Trade Union conference against immigration controls. Javez Lam from the GMB, who has supported Chinese families following the Morcambe Bay cockle pickers disaster, spoke about organising the Chinese workers in Soho. He said that many migrants come to this country focused on finding a wage and a place to live. He noted with regret that immigration is often not the first thing on their minds, and that this pragmatic approach has left the political debate about immigration in the hands of the racists and the...

Following the upsurge of action by French railworkers, students and others in October and November last year, a group of young AWL members and contacts visited the city for thee days in December. We joined up with two Workers’ Liberty members who are currently teaching in Paris as part of their university course. As well as learning about the ongoing struggle, we revived our ties with sections of the French revolutionary left. In the process we gained valuable ideas about the way forward for socialist activists in Britain. By the standards of Britain, at least, the class struggle in France is...

On December 22 2007, Andrew Glyn, left wing economist and prolific author of books and articles about capitalism, died of a brain tumour. When Andrew began teaching economics at Oxford University in 1969, the capitalist world was experiencing major political turmoil. Memories of the US civil rights movement were fresh, France’s political explosion of the previous May still echoed around Europe and workers in many countries were engaged in the most active struggles for decades. In this atmosphere large numbers of workers, students and teachers were radicalised and Andrew, already something of a...

A smug doctor, played by Emma Thompson, gives a TV interview about how she has adapted viral bacteria to, in effect, cure cancer. Then, behind the words “Three years later”, we see the sunlit cityscape of New York — but a New York totally abandoned, no people, no traffic, its buildings falling into disrepair and vegetation sprouting up from the concrete. This is the incredibly effective opening of I Am Legend, the new sci fi/horror film starring Will Smith which is the third adaptation of the 1954 novel of the same name, the other two being The Last Man on Earth (1964) and The Omega Man (1971)...

Last week my seventy year old mother, who walks with the aid of a stick, was deemed a security threat by a bus driver. The driver had already failed to stop for her once, yet was very quick to call the police when she tried to board the bus on her second attempt, using her stick to keep the back door open. Yes, it was naughty, and she shouldn’t have done it, but waiting for half an hour for a bus when you’ve recovering from a knee replacement operation is not exactly a pleasurable experience. Watching it drive past you twice is painful. This isn’t just an everyday sorry tale of an...

In mid-December of last year Tommy Sheridan, former Scottish Parliament member and leader of the Scottish Socialist Party was arrested and charged with perjury. In 2006, after the News of the World had carried articles alleging that he had engaged in extra-marital affairs and visited a swingers’ club in Manchester, Sheridan took the newspaper to court and was awarded £200,000 in damages after the jury found in his favour. In the aftermath of the trial — which had seen leading figures in the SSP give evidence, under protest and unwillingly, against Sheridan — the SSP split. Backed by the...

The first state-funded Hindu faith school in the UK — the “Krishna-Avanti primary school” — is set to open this September in Edgware, north-west London. The sponsor is none other than the International Society for Krishna Consciousness — aka the Hare Krishna movement. In 2000 the organisation was forced to pay out £5 million to more than 400 people who claimed to have been abused at 12 Hare Krishna schools in the US during the 70s and 80s. While they seem to have cleared up their act since, the Hare Krishna is still widely considered to be a cult. A spokesperson for ISKON disagrees, describing...

It’s time to challenge Labour Students for control of the NUS women's campaign. For Sofie's manifesto, supporters' list and more on the campaign, see the ENS Women website . Since the takeover of the NUS Women’s Campaign by Labour Students four years ago, the potential for student women’s organising to lead an active, political regeneration of the women’s movement has been squandered. The campaign has the potential to reach out to thousands of women, as well as having relatively plentiful resources (staff support, a budget and a fully-paid officer) with which to build actions. However, the...

At the start of December, the Iranian government arrested over 40 left-wing Iranian student activists. Some have been released but many are still in prison. (A full update will appear in the next issue of Solidarity.) Meanwhile, there have been a number of protests held in London, and British students and education workers have launched this statement of solidarity. As education workers and student activists, we condemn the detention of over forty student activists by the Iranian regime since 7 December (16 Azar in the Iranian calendar). This date has been a day of student protest in Iran for...

A report on discussions between Education Not for Sale and Student Respect (published in a spirit of openness and accountability) Representatives of the SWP/Student Respect met members of Education Not for Sale on Sunday 9 December to discuss the idea, proposed by ENS and others, of a united left slate for the six full-time officer elections at NUS conference 2008. I wholeheartedly welcome the decision of the SWP/Respect to participate in discussions. However, the meeting highlighted a number of barriers to progress. Among these are the SWP’s insistence that Respect must have at least half the...