Lead story

Benefit cuts will make patients homeless

by Daphne Liddle

THE CANCER charity Macmillan Support has warned that planned cuts to the benefits of the long-term sick could see cancer sufferers unable to keep up with their rent or mortgage and facing eviction from their homes while they are trying to fight the disease.

The House of Lords in January threw out the cuts that would affect people in the Work Related Activity Group (WRAG) — these are the people who are seriously ill but might at some time in the future be able to do some work.

But the Tory government put the cuts to Employment Support Allowance (ESA) back in the Bill last week.

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Benefit cuts will make patients homeless

LRC charts Labour transformation campaign

by New Worker correspondent

THE LABOUR Representation Committee (LRC) met last Saturday for a special general meeting to debate building the Labour movement after Jeremy Corbyn’s success in winning the Labour leadership.

In particular the meeting, which packed London’s Conway Hall, debated how to work with the new Momentum organisation to consolidate Corbyn’s victory and to carry forward the work of transforming the party into the voice of the working class — the purpose it was created for a century ago.

John McDonnell, now Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, was upbeat. He ran through a history of the events of last year, pointing out that at the beginning no one in the LRC would have thought it possible that Corbyn could win the leadership of the party.

And he thanked all those present for their role in that process.

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LRC charts Labour transformation campaign

Editorial

Vote NO to the EU!

ANY ILLUSIONS about the possibility of reforming the European Union (EU) must surely have been shattered by the outcome of the Prime Minister’s marathon talks in Brussels. David Cameron may claim that now “Britain will be permanently out of ever-closer union, never part of a European super-state, there will be tough new restriction for access to our welfare system for migrants, no more something for nothing.” But everyone else can see that his attempt to renegotiate the terms on which Britain will remain a member of the European Union has ended with a minor but vindictive attack on migrants’ benefits and a vacuous recognition of Britain’s “special status” within the Union.

The ruling class has long been divided over the European Union. Some want to align British imperialism with Franco— German imperialism within the European bloc. Others still hanker for the “special relationship” with the United States, and the supposed role that British imperialism can play as the “bridge” between the American and European imperialist blocs. These divisions have now split the Tories wide open.

Cameron’s words have been pounced on with glee by the Eurosceptics within and far beyond the Tory faithful. Six Cabinet ministers immediately joined the ranks of the “Brexit” campaign that until now had been dominated by Nigel Farage and the motley crew of racists, homophobes and chauvinists within his UKIP party. Boris Johnson has belatedly joined the Tory rebels in the mistaken belief that this will further his own dreams of leadership.

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Vote NO to the EU!