THE NEW WORKER

The Weekly paper of the New Communist Party of Britain
Week commencing 25th January 2019

Lead story

Stop The Israeli Strikes On Syria!

by our Arab Affairs correspondent

ISRAELI warplanes have again rocketed Damascus airport in a series of attacks that began with air-raids against alleged Iranian military camps and intelligence centres in the Damascus countryside, and intensified after the Israelis downed a missile over the occupied Golan Heights that they claim was fired by Iranian Revolutionary Guards volunteers operating in Syria.

Four Syrian soldiers were killed and six others wounded during a barrage of cruise missiles and guided bombs, which did hit some buildings in the international airport complex. Over 30 Israeli missiles were brought down by Syrian air-defences before they reached their targets.

Some believe that Zionist premier Benjamin Netanyahu has stepped up the air war over Syria to impress his American masters and to use the ‘Iranian threat’ to boost his chances in the Israeli elections in April. But Iranian air force chief Brigadier General Aziz Nasirzadeh said that the Islamic Republic was ready “to confront the Zionist regime and eliminate it from the Earth” if it is needed

Read the full story here >> Stop The Israeli Strikes On Syria!

No Justice! No Peace!

by New Worker correspondent

THERE WAS joyful militancy, solidarity and rage during the Ministry of Justice strike in London this week. Management called in scabs and the police, but United Voices of the World (UVW) strikers shut down one side of the building and raised hundreds of pounds from supporters. Support staff represented by the mainstream PCS civil service union, and making similar demands, joined the action at the nearby Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) HQ. This was the first co-ordinated strike in Britain between a TUC and a non-TUC union, and the first co-ordinated strike between outsourced workers in government departments..

Read the full story here >> No Justice! No Peace!

Balloting at Gatwick

by New Worker correspondent

GUARDS at London’s Gatwick Airport are balloting for strike action over their demand for a £1 per hour pay increase to bring their pay up to a magnificent £9 per hour. Employed by OCS Manned Guarding they are paid £8 per hour, which is all they got in 2007. OCS is only offering a 4.5 per cent pay increase.

Read the full story here >> Balloting at Gatwick

Editorial

Ending BBC bias

LABOUR HAS quite rightly lodged a formal complaint with the BBC about the treatment of Diane Abbott on last week’s Question Time. The Shadow Home Secretary says that the show’s presenter, fiona Bruce, “was clearly repeating Tory propaganda that Labour were behind in the polls”; that she was interrupted more than double the number of times Tory MP Rory Stewart was; and that she was not allowed to respond to a “blatantly abusive remark” from the audience.

Labour has told the BBC: “The way she was treated on Question Time was unacceptable and fed the hostility towards her. We expect the programme to correct inaccuracies, provide a full explanation of what happened during the show’s production and to apologise to Diane.” In its heyday Question Time attracted huge audiences. Although viewers have now crashed down to an average of 2.7 million, the bourgeois media still regards the show as one the jewels in the BBC’s crown. But the programme’s only real merit in the eyes of the ruling class is it attempt to pass off bourgeois propaganda as informed debate.

None of us should be surprised at this. The British Broadcasting Corporation is one of our supposed “national treasures” whose aims are to educate, inform and entertain the public that funds it through the licence fee. Under the motto “Nation shall speak peace unto Nation” the Corporation claims to be a pillar of impartiality and a reliable source of independent news at home and abroad. That was never the case back in the 1920s when the BBC was founded and it is certainly not the case now.

Read the full story here >> Ending BBC bias