Dockers from Italy, Greece and beyond will stage co-ordinated port blockades on February 6, declaring ‘we don’t work for war’ – in a call in solidarity with Palestine. ALFIO BERNABEI reports

The selection, analysis and interpretation of historical ‘facts’ always takes place within a paradigm, a model of how the world works. That’s why history is always a battleground, declares the Marx Memorial Library

Megapicket to shut down Birmingham’s refuse sites

The newly catalogued News International Dispute Archive ensures the history of the Wapping dispute – and the solidarity it inspired – is preserved, accessible and alive for future generations, says MATT DUNNE

Forty years on, TONY DUBBINS revisits the Wapping dispute to argue that Murdoch’s real aim was union-busting – enabled by Thatcherite laws, police violence, compliant unions and a complicit media

The once beating heart of British journalism was undone by technological change, union battles and Murdoch’s 1986 Wapping coup – leaving London the only major capital without a press club, says TIM GOPSILL

LAURA DAVISON traces how Murdoch’s mass sackings, political deals and legal loopholes shattered collective bargaining 40 years ago – and how persistent NUJ organising, landmark court victories and new employment rights legislation are finally challenging that legacy

As advertising drains away, newsrooms shrink and local papers disappear, MIKE WAYNE argues that the market model for news is broken – and that public-interest alternatives, rooted in democratic accountability, are more necessary than ever

LOUISA BULL traces how derecognition, outsourcing and digitalisation reshaped the industry, weakened collective bargaining and created today’s precarious media workforce

Unison Scotland’s BRENDA AITCHISON says her union won’t tolerate further cuts to public services 

A handful of journalists at The Times faced a stark personal and political choice in 1986 – cross the picket lines for cash and career, or stand with organised labour at great personal risk. BARRIE CLEMENT recalls why refusing to scab at Wapping was not just an act of union loyalty, but a stand for the future of journalism

Four decades on, the Wapping dispute stands as both a heroic act of resistance and a decisive moment in the long campaign to break trade union power. Lord JOHN HENDY KC looks back on the events of 1986

Enduring myths blame print unions for their own destruction – but TONY BURKE argues that the Wapping dispute was a calculated assault by Murdoch on organised labour, which reshaped Britain’s media landscape and casts a long shadow over trade union rights today

On the 40th anniversary of the Wapping dispute, this Morning Star special supplement traces the long-planned conspiracy that led to the mass sackings of printworkers in 1986 – a struggle whose unresolved injustices still demand redress today, writes ANN FIELD

NEU members at Woodfield School in north London are taking sustained industrial action against enforced cuts to learning support assistants’ hours and pay. MARY ADOSSIDES reports

From childhood summers in a post-industrial village to midnight picket lines in Glasgow, the promise of ‘social mobility’ rings hollow for MATT KERR

Take a read of the latest Unite Hospitality Glasgow Strike Bulletin and hear from workers fighting for better pay and dignity at work

Ten days after right-wing destabilisation attempts, Mexico’s leadership has emerged strengthened, securing historic labour and wage agreements, while opposition-backed protests have crumbled under scrutiny, says DAVID RABY

Amid the festive lights, Scotland faces a stark holiday truth: only real investment in public services and the workers who sustain them can lift communities out of poverty, argues LILIAN MACER

Labour, like the Tories, sees rising mental ill health simply as a spending problem — but it reflects a diseased society, argues DR DAVID MATTHEWS

Unions and left MPs slam government for cutting day one protections from unfair dismissal into the Employment Rights Bill

In part V of a serialisation of his new book, JOHN McINALLY argues that to confront capitalism’s escalating crises, unions must reorient toward class politics and help build a united, explicitly socialist alternative capable of representing the working class and its material needs

As President Javier Milei is set to unveil a radical rollback of Argentina’s labour laws, unions warn of an unprecedented assault on workers’ rights, says BERT SCHOUWENBURG

As unions sound the alarm on kafala-like dependence, FC Barcelona must decide whether their values extend beyond the pitch, writes KIVANC ELIACIK

Roger McKenzie talks to general secretary of Unison CHRISTINA McANEA about the impact of the cost-of-living crisis on members, the local government funding emergency and the threat of Reform UK

Solidarity is needed for the longest strike in NHS history, argues HENRY FOWLER of Strike Map

Ex-John Lewis boss calls for action against Britain’s ‘sick note culture’ as unions fear proposals target disabled

Real action is needed to make sure tragedies like that at Huntingdon never happen again. TSSA leader MARYAM ESLAMDOUST suggests some practical, achievable steps to be taken

Unions say government and train operators must act quickly to review security, support affected workers and ‘ensure nothing like this happens again’

The visa system traps workers with abusive employers, creating a vulnerable workforce scared to complain for fear of deportation — that is why we’re campaigning for a ‘common sponsorship’ model instead, writes FAVOUR DAVIDKING

ANN HENDERSON looks at the trailblazers of the Women’s Trade Union League and their successful fight for female factory inspectors — a battle that echoes in today’s workplace campaigns

HENRY FOWLER puts the strike of public-sector workers in New Zealand in the wider context of deteriorating employment conditions throughout the world’s major economies

Labour could break pledge to equalise minium wage, warn campaigners 

Witnessing a war of words at a meeting on tackling militarism at The World Transformed, BEN COWLES spoke to a union rep who is organising against war from inside the arms industry itself, to hear about worker-led solutions to ending weapons production

Call comes as unemployment rate hits highest level since early 2021, the height of the pandemic

MAT COWARD looks back to a 1931 protest against mass unemployment featuring a young Ewan MacColl