Robinson successfully defended his school from closure, fought for the unification of the teaching unions, mentored future trade union leaders and transformed teaching at the Marx Memorial Library, writes JOHN FOSTER
Defending the right to strike
Ahead of a TUC special Congress next weekend to fight Conservative anti-strike laws, JOHN FOSTER looks back to 1969 and 1972 when similar proposals were defeated through class solidarity and painstaking organising work
A judge in a German court ruled that the ban activity imposed on renowned Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah was unlawful, reports LEON WYSTRYCHOWSKI
At the very moment Britain faces poverty, housing and climate crises requiring radical solutions, the liberal press promotes ideologically narrow books while marginalising authors who offer the most accurate understanding of change, writes IAN SINCLAIR
From Gaza protest bans to proscribing Palestine Action, political elites are showing a crisis of confidence as they abandon Roy Jenkins’s apologetic approach for Suella Braverman’s aggressive ‘hate march’ rhetoric, writes PAUL DONOVAN
ANSELM ELDERGILL examines the legal case behind this weekend’s Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival and the lessons for today
Ben Chacko talks to RMT leader EDDIE DEMPSEY about how the key to fixing broken Britain lies in collective sectoral bargaining, restoring unions’ ability to take solidarity strike action and bringing about the much-vaunted ‘wave of insourcing’
The summer of 1950 saw Labour abandon further nationalisation while escalating Korean War spending from £2.3m to £4.7m, as the government meekly accepted capitalism’s licence and became Washington’s yes-man, writes JOHN ELLISON
BETWEEN 1969 and 1972 two successive attempts were made to limit the right to strike in Britain. Both were defeated.
The first was by a Labour government. In 1969 Harold Wilson produced his white paper, In Place of Strife, proposing to make unofficial strikes illegal and to punish unofficial strikers directly. Penalties were to include both fines and ultimately imprisonment.
The second was by Edward Heath’s Conservative government. Its 1971 Industrial Relations Act required the registration of all trade unions and laid down financial penalties for any union whose members were responsible for unofficial strikes deemed illegal under the Act. Strikers themselves were punishable at law for infringements of the Act.
More from this author
Robinson successfully defended his school from closure, fought for the unification of the teaching unions, mentored future trade union leaders and transformed teaching at the Marx Memorial Library, writes JOHN FOSTER
JOHN FOSTER examines how the late SNP leader shifted the party leftwards and upwards, bringing Scottish independence to the forefront while fundamentally failing to address deeper issues of class and corporate capture
JOHN FOSTER recommends the down-to-earth realism of a political memoir that navigates the surreality of Scottish politics
JOHN FOSTER discusses the role of communists in responding to the aggressive militarisation initiated by the US in a world that faces an unprecedented period of acute crisis, as he introduces the international resolution for this autumn's Communist Party Congress
