There have been penalties for those who looked the other way when Epstein was convicted of child sex offences and decided to maintain relationships with the financier — but not for the British ambassador to Washington, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES
Striking to win the dispute or defeat the government?
KEITH FLETT looks at the long-running quandary faced by strike movements like the one gripping Britain today: do we aim for influence over the ruling party — to drive it from power — or both?
Students shout slogans during a protest in Lyon, central France, March 9 2023, during massive nationwide protests against the government's push to raise the retirement age.
Labour’s new Treasury unit will ‘challenge unnecessary regulation’ by forcing nominally independent bodies like Ofwat to bend to business demands — exactly what Iain Anderson’s corporate clients wanted, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
DR DYLAN MURPHY looks at a Big Brother Watch report which exposes the government as an enabler of DWP secret spying on benefit claimants
The EU faces a critical choice: will it remain in the shadow of an increasingly unreliable US ally, or will it forge its own path in a multilateral world where co-operation with China is essential, asks MARC VANDEPITTE as leaders meet for the EU-China Summit
A lot of discussion about how the left should currently organise – including debate on whether the Green Party is a useful vehicle for advance – runs the risk of refusing to engage with or learn from the reasons the left was defeated previously, argues KEVIN OVENDEN
For Egypt trade trumps the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians, but how long can the country’s ‘misleaders’ – and others in the region – continue their indifference against the popular will of their own people, asks ROGER McKENZIE
WHEN the Radio 4 news at 7pm on March 15 could report first on Jeremy Hunt’s Spring Statement, and then secondly note that it had almost been overshadowed by strikes on the day, it’s clear something significant is moving — at least potentially.
The strikes involved a range of unions — Prospect and PCS in government employers across Britain, NEU teachers in England, Aslef and RMT on London Underground, BMA junior doctors in England, and UCU university workers across the UK.
There was an impressive central London march and rally. I attended one called by the Wales TUC in central Cardiff. At the Cardiff rally, there were of course veterans of many previous fights, but there were also numbers of younger trade unionists. Indeed, such was the scale of the action that many on strike would have been doing so for the first time.
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KEITH FLETT looks at the long history of coercion in British employment laws
The government cracking down on something it can’t comprehend and doesn’t want to engage with is a repeating pattern of history, says KEITH FLETT
While Hardie, MacDonald and Wilson faced down war pressure from their own Establishment, today’s leadership appears to have forgotten that opposing imperial adventures has historically defined Labour’s moral authority, writes KEITH FLETT
10 years ago this month, Corbyn saved Labour from its right-wing problem, and then the party machine turned on him. But all is not lost yet for the left, says KEITH FLETT
