National News
More job losses
by New Worker correspondent
NINETY-SIX JOBS will go when the closure of the Archant print operation at Thorpe St Andrew near Norwich takes place next month. Archant is the 165-year-old newspaper firm that produces over 50 regional newspapers, including the Eastern Daily Press. Whilst it will continue to publish the titles their printing will be outsourced to Newsprinters in Hertfordshire.
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On strike shh!
by New Worker correspondent
ON MONDAY and Tuesday, library and museum staff in Bradford took to the picket lines over ‘swingeing’ cuts. The 50 Unite members will hold a three-day strike early next month followed by a four-day strike between 18—21 November and a five-day stoppage at the beginning of December if the cuts are not reversed by the Labour-controlled metropolitan authority.
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Economic vandalism
by New Worker correspondent
THE TORY Government has been blamed for the collapse of the Thomas Cook group by the chartered accountancy company Syndex. Thomas Cook was founded in 1841 to charter trains to take people to Temperance rallies — but that side of the business has not been very important in recent years.
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Robbing Peter to pay Paul
by New Worker correspondent
HEALTH union Unison has said that more than £200m is lying unused by cash-strapped health trusts in England because of restrictions in the government’s apprenticeship levy scheme.
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How the spooks exploit the vulnerable
Sputnik
JEREMY FLEMING, director of Britain’s controversial Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), has revealed his organisation is targeting dyslexics for recruitment.
People with dyslexia struggle to varying degrees with reading, writing and spelling — but are often are equipped with precisely the skills and thought processes the Cheltenham-based spying agency looks for in staff, Fleming said.
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SNP’s Brexit Woes
by our Scottish political affairs correspondent
IT IS an article of faith for the Scottish National Party (SNP) that the European Union (EU) is a good thing, although it was different in 1975 when the SNP opposed staying in what was then the European Economic Community (EEC). On that occasion the only areas of Britain to vote to leave were the Western Isles (where they were especially hostile to the Treaty of Rome) and the Shetlands where fisheries were a major issue.
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Unenergetic Energy Policy
by our Scottish political affairs correspondent
At the last Holyrood election the SNP promised to set up a “publicly owned, not-for-profit energy company” to supply energy at “as near cost price as possible” according to its election manifesto. Three years on it might be worth enquiring what steps have been made to implement the scheme.
The short answer is not very much. Despite having spent £315,000 to formulate a business plan, nothing has actually been published.
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Bereaved parents reject Trump’s offer
by Oleg Burunov
THE BRITISH parents, who lost their teenage son in a road accident allegedly involving a US diplomat’s wife, Anne Sacoolas, have told reporters that during their visit to the White House last week they rejected President Donald Trump’s offer to meet Sacoolas who was waiting for them in “the room next door”.
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The Joke’s on us
fiLM REVIEW
by Ben Soton
Joker (2019). Director: Todd Phillips; Written By: Todd Phillips, Scott Silver; Staring: Joaquin Phoenix, Robert De Niro, Zazie Beetz. Warner Bros Pictures. 122 minutes. Age rating: 15.
ORIGINALLY a comic book character who first appeared in 1940, the Joker has been played by Cesar Romero in the original television series and Jack Nicholson in the 1989 film Batman. Whilst appearing in numerous computer games and comics, this demented clown faced villain maintains his place in film and other entertainment media.
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Palestinian cinema returns to London
by New Worker correspondent
THE Palestine film Festival returns to London next month, after a two year break, with a selection of feature films and shorts that reflects the culture and politics of a film industry that survives and even thrives under the oppression of Israeli occupation.
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International News
General strike called in Chile
by Ed Newman
MINERS and dockers unions in Chile have called for a general strike in support of the protests against the government of President Sebastián Piñera, who says he’s “at war against a powerful enemy”. But the head of the National Defence Javier Iturriaga said on Monday that he is not at war with anyone.
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Trump’s thousand days
by Lena Valverde Jordi
PRESIDENT Donald Trump recently celebrated his first 1000 days in office fully surrounded by scandals, suspicions and right in the middle of an examination by Congress to determine whether he should be prosecuted for serious offences during his tenure.
Trump is, by far, the most questioned Chief Executive in recent US history, and accusations and suspicions against him mount in number every day.
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Cuban leader in Dublin talks
by Jorge Ruiz Miyares
CUBAN President Miguel Díaz-Canel, left Dublin on Tuesday after a two-day official visit to Ireland. Meeting with its highest authorities, the Cuban leader agreed on the need to promote the bilateral relations established 20 years ago.
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Franco reburied this week
Radio Havana Cuba
THE exhumation of Spanish dictator Francisco Franco from the Valley of the Fallen and his later burial in the cemetery of El Pardo-Mingorrubio, scheduled for Thursday, will cost the public coffers a maximum of €63,061.
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Features
Remembering the Berlin Wall
by Victor Grossman
REMEMBRANCE DAYS are rewarding for journalists, especially since Google made research digging so easy. And how the German media love such days!
Their favourite dates recall four events: 17th June 1953; the “Uprising” (or whatever it’s labelled) by East German workers in the birthing period of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), the building of the Berlin Wall on 13th August 1961, its opening up on 9th November 1989 and “German unification” on 3rd October 1990.
[Read the complete story in the print edition]
The crime of poverty
by Rob Gowland
ONE OF MY ancestors was transported to Australia for the heinous crime of stealing a ham from the kitchen of the big house on the estate. He was apprehended crossing a field with the partially consumed ham still in his possession. Poverty and hunger was not an acceptable excuse at the time — for the ruling class it still isn’t — and he got seven years transportation to Botany Bay with hard labour.
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