Working from home: who benefits?
“Working from home” has long been an option in many jobs. Now millions of workers have found they have to. For some the dream has turned out to be a nightmare…
Features
Features
Poverty and riches - the sad tale of Britain's food
How can an island with an ideal climate for growing food be so dependent on imports on the one hand, and have so many millions of its people living in food poverty on the other?
Time to end energy dependence
Dogged by EU rules on state support, bedevilled by government indifference over decades, Britain’s energy policy needs a radical overhaul…
A future for fashion?
Experiences during the Covid pandemic plus new technologies could help rebuild the clothing industry…
We need a discussion, not a postmortem
Covid-19 has revealed the evil effects of the criminal fragmentation of Britain’s health and social care. The so-called internal market has failed. Workers must ensure that we never again face such a calamity…
How about a real industrial strategy?
A union plan called Manufacturing Matters has been launched. With Covid-19 and Brexit, we not only desperately need a plan for a manufacturing-based recovery – we also have the opportunity to implement it…
Transport firms slash jobs under Covid-19 cover
The Covid-19 crisis has presented both opportunity and cover for the owners of transport operators to attack jobs, pay, and conditions of well organised British workers at a time when they are vulnerable…
A sustainable future for higher education
No wonder universities are in a financial mess. Wedded to a business model that relied on speculative investment to bring in increasing numbers of foreign students, they are going to have to re-focus on Britain to survive…
Separatists’ fear of the ballot box grows
Unable to achieve its aims through democratic means, the SNP is edging towards a set of manoeuvres that would see Scotland leaving Britain by stealth…
Time to clean up the monetary mess
The Covid-19 crisis has made it even more essential to get to grips with capitalism’s monetary mess. Quite simply, Britain’s whole business model is wrong.
Yes, it’s a crisis. And time to ask hard questions
Workers in the NHS, and all of us who use it should insist that never again can it be allowed to face such an epidemic with such limited resources…
Transport safety takes a back seat to profit
Keen to profit from the Covid-19 crisis, transport companies have been eagerly queuing up with their begging bowls, while ensuring that workers bear the brunt of the reductions in services…
Wales – more unity, not more devolution
Many are asking whether Wales needs any more devolution. The coronavirus crisis has made the question even more important…
EU vs the environment
The European Union poses as the protector of the environment – despite a disastrous record…
Wanted: vaccines
No one can say Britain wasn’t warned about its vaccine capacity, and yet very little was done…
Coronavirus: Cuba leads the way [print version]
During the global coronavirus pandemic Cuba is standing out as a shining example not just of international solidarity but also of the expertise and treatments possible when a country is run in the interests of its people…
The transition: stay alert, stay ready
We want to get Brexit done. But we’ve just had a 42-month tutorial in why we not to leave things to the establishment. What do we need to be vigilant about?
Agriculture: the great opportunity
While the EU is desperately trying to find the money to prop up its ailing and corrupt Common Agricultural Policy, Britain can plan for a productive future…
Unions call for ‘Jones Act’ to save jobs and industry
Britain is an island nation, but its shipping is open to any country in the EU. British ships sail under foreign flags, employing seafarers at below the UK minimum wage. Time to change all that…
The truth about quotas
British fishermen have reacted angrily to attempts to slur them by saying they sold off fishing rights…
Why Britain needs HS2 – and needs it urgently
HS2 or High Speed 2, a new railway from London to Birmingham and then on to the north, has finally got the green signal from the Johnson government…
The environment: what should workers do?
In fighting man-made climate change and defending the environment, the solution does not lie with global capitalism – which created the problems. Nor with the EU, which defends capital. Workers must do it themselves…
Break clean for fishing
With a clear majority, the government must retake full control of Britain’s coastal waters…
Destroyed: a travel company founded in 1841
The collapse of Thomas Cook left hundreds of thousands of travellers in the lurch, and put 9,000 staff out of work. Yet it should never have been allowed to happen…
Putting profit above staff and students
While university staff are forced to take industrial action to protect their wages and conditions, universities are piling up surpluses – and paying big salaries to their top administrators. What’s going on?
The toxic legacy of the Private Finance Initiative
Go to any website on personal debt and the advice is “It can be tough to face up to your financial situation, but it’s an important first step.” Not so with politicians and PFI debt…
The weakness at the heart of the EU
The referendum vote in 2016 continues to dominate politics not just in Britain but also in Brussels. The EU’s expansionist plans have been brought to a juddering halt. Time, then, to step up the pressure……
Blackouts ahead as energy policy fails
Yes, it’s possible to produce energy without using nuclear power or fossil fuels. But at the moment the price tag for that will be a reversion to pre-industrial levels of production and consumption. No central heating, anyone?
'Independence'-obsessed SNP fails in its day job
Beset by failure in running Scotland, at the SNP party conference in October leader Nicola Sturgeon was forced to bring forward her plan to hold a second referendum on Scottish independence in 2020…