Britain

It is rare, these days, to see the bloodhound like features of John Pilger on television - rare, but welcome. Occasionally ITV let him out of his kennel and nervously let him off the leash for a short run. For John Pilger made his name as a crusading, left journalist, exposing the truth from the perspective of the poor, the oppressed, and the exploited, especially focussing on the victims of American imperialism such as Vietnam and Cambodia.

The British TUC (Trades Union Congress) Congress opens up today. NUJ General Secretary and TUC  General Council member Jeremy Dear spoke to Socialist Appeal about the tasks and perspectives for the trade union movement

In the nine months since the publication of our perspectives' document, The New Situation in Britain, events internationally and here in Britain have continued to accelerate.  The consequences of the imperialist adventure in Iraq have had an even greater impact in Britain than in the US. Here the furore over the death of weapons inspector Dr. David Kelly and the Hutton inquiry represent the most important crisis faced by Blair to date. It is clear that the new situation in Britain is part and parcel of a new, profoundly unstable and tumultuous period in world history.

In Part one of his article Phil Mitchinson looked at the world situation and how this affects Britain. In this second part he looks at the devastation of British manufacturing over a period of decades as shown by the investment and output figures he provides. He goes on to chart the degeneration of the British ruling class, from its far-sighted predecessors to the current degenerates who can't see past their bank balances. This reflects itself in the present mess the Tory party finds itself in.

The forthcoming elections in AMICUS to elect the 48 lay member executive for the newly formed union of 730,000 members will be the beginning of a new era for workers in a whole range of industries. For many on the left over the years, the prospect of electing a leftwing executive committee to the former AEEU could only be a wild dream from which they would have expected to wake up at any minute. Yet the prospect is now very real.

A general perspectives document on the economic, social, political and trade union position in Britain, produced at the beginning of 2003 by the Socialist Appeal Editorial Board.

Each new piece of evidence presented to the Hutton inquiry raises the lid a little more on the real truth behind the government dossier on Iraq's weapons and the death of Dr. David Kelly. With each passing day the Blair clique is being increasingly exposed as nothing short of a nest of vipers.

Blair is having a lot of problems convincing us that he told the truth abouth the so-called Weapons of Mass destruction (WMDs). The majority of people in Britain no longer trust him. Mick Brooks unravels the contradictions in the various explanations givene by Bush and Blair to justify the war.

We live in an epoch of sudden and sharp turns. On Thursday night, as Tony Blair slept aboard a Boeing 777 bound from Washington to Tokyo, he was rocked by the news of the death of Dr David Kelly. In a single instant the whole situation was transformed. The magnitude of these events signifies the inevitability of resignations at the highest level, so the Prime Minister is frantically looking around for friends prepared to fall upon their swords in order to protect their Lord and Master.

The surprise defeat of Mick Rix by a right winger for the position of General Secretary of the rail union, ASLEF, will have come as a great shock to many in the union and in the wider Labour and trade union movement. Certainly it was not something that could have been easily predicted or even guessed at. The winner, Shaun Brady, is an old-style right-winger, relatively unknown in the union. He talks about taking the union back to the membership but in reality he means the membership of the Strategic rail Authority, CBI and the City of London! How did this happen? What does it mean? What lessons must be learnt from this?

As we were preparing for publication, the news came through of the sudden death of Dr David Kelly. Dr Kelly had been publicly named as the source of a report by BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan, that exposed the manoeuvres of the Blair government to justify the war against Iraq.

As the summer break draws near, the thoughts of politicians, as those of ordinary mortals, turn to sunny beaches where one can forget the travails of life and relax in pleasant company. For the British and American soldiers sweltering in temperatures of 50 degrees, dodging Iraqi bombs and bullets, this pleasant prospect is further away than for most of us. And for Tony Blair, besieged by an ever more hostile press and public, the holiday season cannot come quick enough.

This is the leaflet distributed by Socialist Appeal supporters at last Saturday's (July 5) Socialist Campaign Group Conference in London. A full report will follow in the next few days. You can also download this leaflet in PDF format.

We have reported in many articles the inexorable shift to the left that has been taking place in the British trade unions. Last year's move to the left in the AEEU (engineering workers) general secretary elections has probably been the most striking episode in this general process. Equally significant was the change in the TGWU (transport workers) where again the left took the position of general secretary. The latest development among the civil servants is another striking example of how deep the process is.

Why are pensions being cut or not paying out money that was promised? All over Europe pensions are under attack. Everywhere workers are being asked to retire later, to give up on the idea of a guaranteed state pension and to look to the private sector for a pension. British Socialist Appeal looks at the real reasons behind the pensions crisis.