Labour “lefts” capitulate as Starmer targets sick and disabled
McDonnell’s appeal for a “threshold of suffering” epitomises the collapse of any serious challenge by the Corbynite “left” to the Starmer government’s class war measures.
•Laura Tiernan
The British Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn
Corbyn calls for “Chilcot-style inquiry” into Britain’s role in Gaza genocide
Corbyn is acting, as he did in relation to the Iraq War, to conceal every fundamental lesson that must be drawn by the working class from the Labour Party’s naked support for genocide and crimes against humanity.
•Laura Tiernan
Corbyn offers verbal opposition, Labour’s “left” rump backs Starmer’s Ukraine war aims
Corbyn’s sermonising has one aim only: to allow him to pose as an advocate for peace while refusing to mobilise workers and young people against the Labour government.
•Chris Marsden
The political significance of Greece’s massive protests and general strike for Tempi rail crash justice
The mass movement over Tempi developed in direct opposition to all the major parties, with demonstrations featuring banners reading “Syriza, PASOK, ND [New Democracy]—Tempi has a history”, and largely outside of the structures of the trade unions.
•Robert Stevens
Grenfell Tower to be dismantled: Why is there still no justice?
The plan to deflect and contain workers’ demands for justice with a public inquiry could never have gotten off the ground had it not been for the Labour Party, particularly its then leader Jeremy Corbyn and prominent local MP Emma Dent Coad, who insisted there was no alternative.
•Robert Stevens
Labour in crisis and Reform UK gaining ground—build the Socialist Equality Party!
With the class struggle suppressed and Labour in power, opportunity has been given to the far-right to scapegoat migrants for the deep social grievances of the working class.
•Thomas Scripps
Petition calling for British general election: a right-wing political initiative
The most reactionary response to such right-wing populist initiatives is to obscure the class lines.
•Laura Tiernan
UK Labour’s support for genocide in Gaza: Build a mass party for socialism!
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn refuses to call for a new mass party for socialism—not because the time is not yet ripe, but because it would win huge popular support.
•Socialist Equality Party (UK)
Corbynites moot new party
The right-wing evolution of Labour into such a naked party of big business and imperialist war was not reversed by Corbyn’s leadership and cannot be answered by the formation of what would essentially be a Labour Party Mark II.
•Chris Marsden
After the Grenfell Fire inquiry: Where are the arrests?
People made decisions they knew risked working-class lives, and they were happy to do so because they considered those lives valueless next to the profits to be made.
•Thomas Scripps
UK Labour government cuts fuel allowance for 10 million pensioners unopposed by the “left”
Despite talk of a rebellion against Starmer's leadership, this time just one Labour MP, Jon Trickett, could bring himself to vote against a measure that will kill elderly people in their thousands. Only five of the seven suspended Labour MPs joined him.
•Robert Stevens
Labour government is “going to be painful” for workers, says Starmer
I stood as the Socialist Equality Party’s candidate for Holborn and St Pancras against Starmer to warn that Labour would be a government of war and social reaction, taking on the role forfeited in the ruling class’s eyes by a fractious, incompetent Tory government.
•Thomas Scripps
Mass protests erupt against UK’s far-right: The way forward
There can be no successful struggle against the far-right danger that does not base itself on the fight to mobilise the entire working class against the ruling capitalist class and the war and austerity agenda of its Labour government.
•Chris Marsden
Jeremy Corbyn comes out firmly against a break with Starmer’s Labour Party
Corbyn will not lead a movement against the Labour government. He will support it, while making the occasional criticism to supposedly pressure it to the left. But the Labour Party is impervious to such pressure, functioning as the unalloyed representative of the financial oligarchy and of British imperialism.
•Chris Marsden
Starmer routs UK Labour “left” over vote on two-child benefit cap
Tuesday’s vote has underscored not only the authoritarian character of the UK’s Labour government. It has confirmed the bankruptcy of all claims made by Jeremy Corbyn and his allies that the party can be pushed to the left.
•Laura Tiernan
Socialist Workers Party “Marxism 2024” festival promotes Jeremy Corbyn as leader of a “left” regroupment
Corbyn was featured speaker at the SWP’s festival on Saturday, with its members giving him a hero’s welcome.
•Laura Tiernan, Michael Barnes
SEP (UK) candidate Tom Scripps speaks at Palestine Solidarity Campaign hustings
Scripps explained that he would be presenting “my party’s programme, not simply for Holborn and St Pancras, not simply for the election, but for the international working class and oppressed peoples of the world in a period of history characterised by the descent into war, genocide, poverty and dictatorship.”
•Our reporters
The bogus African National Congress-derived political credentials of Andrew Feinstein—Part 1
Feinstein’s political credentials stand or fall firstly on his membership of the African National Congress during the struggle against apartheid, and secondly on his role as a crusader against corruption that began with him opposing an ANC arms deal involving high level government corruption, the political basis for which he offers no explanation.
•Jean Shaoul
Socialist Equality Party election campaign wins support in Holborn and St Pancras, London
Dozens of workers, youth and retirees stopped and spoke with SEP campaigners. The stall, with its large placards denouncing Labour’s support for the Gaza genocide and NATO’s proxy-war in Ukraine, attracted interest throughout the day.
•Our reporters
Starmer pledges to make UK military “fit to fight”
Starmer declared, “This Labour Party is totally committed to the security of our nation. To our armed forces. And, importantly, to our nuclear deterrent.”
•Robert Stevens