Trade deficit rising again
The trade deficit rose again to £4 billion in the final quarter of last year, reaching £34.7 billion for 2015.
News/Views
Syria siege broken
The Syrian army has broken the siege of the Nubl and al-Zahra towns in Aleppo after four years.
Unions mull local govt. offer
Unison, Unite and GMB are now consulting their members in local government over the Local Government Association’s two-year pay offer of 1 per cent a year, with higher rises at the bottom end to take account of the new National Living Wage.
No help for anti-EU ministers, says Cabinet Secretary
26 February 2016
Downing Street has imposed rules to prevent civil servants and special advisers from assisting ministers campaigning for Britain to leave the EU.
Government abandons steel
26 February 2016
Business Secretary Sajid Javid told a manufacturing conference this week that public funds wouldn't be used to rescue steel. He didn’t add that EU rules would prohibit it.
Are we witnessing the strange death of the European Union?
26 February 2016
Referendums all over the place, borders going up. Is the EU starting to collapse?
A strike worth remembering
26 February 2016
The historian and novelist John Tully tells the story of a forgotten strike of 1889. This book brings the struggle of those workers back to life and gives an insight into how our class developed into an organised labour movement.
Soviet planning versus capitalist chaos
They called it the ‘Great Breakthrough’ – the launch of the Soviet Union’s first five-year plan in 1928. While the Soviet Union grew, within a year the capitalism world was plunged into slump with the Wall Street crash…
1: The five-year plan
1928 saw the first Five Year Plan, crossing the frontier from the capitalist world into uncharted lands of building socialism. Its achievements were unprecedented.
2: The Stalin constitution
The citizens of the USSR have the right to work, that is, the right to be allotted assured employment, with remuneration therefore, in accordance with its quality and quantity…
1916: Out of empire and war [shorter version]
In World War One, groups of brave Irishmen struck to leave the British Empire and the war. It became known as the Easter Rising…
Inequality, social justice and surplus value
You can’t buck economic laws. It’s not an accident that capitalism doesn’t distribute the results of labour equally.