Third Camp Marxism

The fiasco of A Level results on 13 August was followed by a week of government crisis leading up to 20 August when GCSE grades were announced. BTEC results, due to be released at the same time as GCSEs, were delayed at the last minute.

Following a series of protests and government stumbles A Level grades were eventually, overall, boosted by allowing “teacher assessed grades” to count (in fact Centre Assessed Grades, CAGs, which are signed off by Head Teachers and are far from being simple teacher assessments).

GCSE results (in England) were notable by a sharp increase in the pass rate (Level 4 and above), by 9%, to 76%. Awards of top grades (Level 7 and above) went up by 5% from last year to 25.9%.

BTEC results are now due on 28 August.

The A-levels fiasco will have perverse effects on universities.

High-tariff universities have had their limits on student numbers lifted, and been pushed to accept more students than they've planned for. Some are offering money to students who will defer their places for a year.

They will probably try to shift more of their increased teaching load onto casualised, insecure, low-paid staff.

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.

The Labour Campaign for Free Movement is seeking signatures for a statement against the Tory government's moves to clamp down on asylum-seeker boats crossing the Channel. Sign here

We increasingly live in a "Border Force State". Over the last 25 years the powers, jurisdiction, importance and prestige of what's now called the UK Border Force has grown massively. It has also become much more militarised.

Beyond that, the policing of migrants is becoming an increasing part of the roles of the police, schools, universities, NHS and armed forces. 

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".

This is part one of a series. For the other articles, see here.
Buy our pamphlet on Saklatvala here.

In 1922, sixty-five years before before Diane Abbott and three other Labour MPs of colour entered Parliament, Indian-born Shapurji Saklatvala was elected MP for Battersea North in South West London.

“Conditionality” for benefit claimants has been restored, which means claimants can be “sanctioned” — i.e., have their benefits revoked — for things like being late for appointments. This is a spectacularly cruel decision on the government’s part, which PCS completely opposes.

After nine strike days since the start of July, and a lot of vibrant campaigning, Tower Hamlets council workers are regrouping in their fight to stop the “Tower Rewards” attack on their terms and conditions.

Under the anti-union laws, they need to reballot to strike again. There are rumours that the national Unison leadership, despite its public support for the dispute, is dragging its feet and insisting on drawn-out procedures that will make further action impossible for a while yet.

Howard Beckett (pictured, right), head of Unite the Union’s Legal Department, announced on 20 August that he will stand for election as the union’s General Secretary.

In online hustings held in mid-July the millionaire solicitor had sought to win the backing of the United Left, the “Broad Left” in Unite. He lost to Assistant General Secretary Steve Turner (pictured, left).