National News
Digesting Labour’s New Budget
by Svetlana Ekimenko, Sputnik
Britain’s new government is raising taxes by more than $50 billion amid a widening budget deficit. Meanwhile the Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, is allocating £120 million to Ukraine for military spending.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves has delivered the new Labour government’s first budget. So what’s in it?
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Down the Tube
by New Worker correspondent
Last minute talks on Tuesday have resulted in two planned 24-hour strikes on the London Underground by the drivers’ union, ASLEF, being cancelled. The decision by ASLEF came after RMT did the same last week. An overtime ban by managers which began at the start of the month has also been called off.
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Paying Peanuts
by New Worker correspondent
The festive season could see fights in supermarkets over the last packet of salted peanuts if workers at the KP Snacks plant at Ashby-de-la-Zouch in Leicestershire walk out over pay
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Unwise Cuts
by New Worker correspondent
Last week we reported on the strange combination of long waiting times and unemployment among medical graduates seeking to become General Practitioners.
At one of London’s busiest hospital trusts, Guys & St Thomas NHS Trust, management are planning to cut a massive 58 per cent of their facilities and capital development division.
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Hiking-up student fees
by New Worker correspondent
On Monday Bridget Phillipson, the Secretary of State for Education, announced that students in England will pay higher fees for university courses in the next academic year.
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Dodgy Figures?
by New Worker correspondent
The University College Union (UCU) recently announced that their members at five colleges in Cleveland, Redcar and Stockton-on-Tees had voted to accept a 16.5 per cent pay offer from their employer, the Education Training Collective (ETC). The agreement will also see car parking charges removed from all colleges and staff will get extra well-being days.
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Scottish Political News
by our Scottish political affairs correspondent
Alex Salmond’s funeral at Strichen Parish Church in Aberdeenshire was billed as a private affair but it was nothing of the sort. It was actually attended by numerous political figures, including former Commons Speaker John Bercow. Senior Alba figures were present, but the only present-day members of the SNP figures attending were those who spend their time decrying the recent leadership including the Ewing dynasty
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International News
Palestine will never surrender!
by New Worker correspondent
In a powerful display of solidarity, hundreds of thousands gathered in London on Saturday to demand justice for the Palestinians and an end to Zionist terror in the Middle East. Demonstrators also staged a “die-in” outside 10 Downing Street and left toys in memory of the Palestinian children butchered by the Israelis in the Gaza Strip
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Peace Call in Berlin!
by New Worker correspondent
Around 60 peace activists gathered at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin last Saturday, which happens to be exactly adjacent to the US embassy.
The rally called for solidarity with Venezuela and Cuba and the Global South, Peace with China and Russia, and Palestinian freedom, with speakers from the United Front for Latin America, Cuba Si, and the Communist Party of Chile
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Israelis beaten back in Lebanon
Radio Havana Cuba
The Israeli military has so far failed to “capture even a single village” in southern Lebanon despite deploying over 50,000 soldiers for the ground invasion, an Israeli paper has lamented.
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Malaysia working to expel Israel from United Nations
Radio Havana Cuba
Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Anwar says his country is part of a core group drafting a resolution, which, among others, proposes that Israel be expelled from the UN General Assembly following its human rights violations and genocidal crimes .
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Features
America’s occupation of south Korea: time to go home
by Ilya Tsukanov , Sputnik
How many troops do the Americans have in south Korea? Where are they? What are they doing there? Which US politicians have called for them to be pulled out and why?
The USA and south Korea are “deepening our nuclear and strategic planning efforts” and “increasing the regular deployment of US strategic assets on the Korean Peninsula”, DoD chief Lloyd Austin announced in a press conference with his South Korean counterpart in Washington last week.
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The contributions of Stalin and the struggle for socialism today
by Mick Kelly
This paper, by Political Secretary Mick Kelly of Freedom Road Socialist Organisation, was presented to the international conference entitled Stalin: The teachings for the fight of today’s communists. The October 15th conference took place in Milan and was organised by Partito dei CARC (Carc Party), Resistenza Popolare Milano (Popular Resistance Milan) and the Associazione Stalin (Stalin Association). The Communist Party of Cuba and the Communist Party of the Philippines also participated. The paper was delivered to the conference by FRSO National Organiser Andy Koch.
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Not just for the few
Book reviw by Jenny Farrell, People’s World (USA)
Poetry for the Many by Jeremy Corbyn and Len McCluskey. OR Books: New York & London; hardback 2023, softback 2024; 224 pp; RRP: hardback £17, softback £12, print+e-book £20. The book can be purchased direct from the publishers: https://www.orbooks.com/catalog/poetry-for-the-many/
This is a truly remarkable publication by two of Britain’s most outstanding socialists, whose public profile does not bring the publication of poetry books immediately to mind. Jeremy Corbyn and Len McCluskey, former leaders of the Labour Party and Unite the Union respectively, are prominent figures in British politics. They are highly respected not only by the political Left in Britain but also among working-class communities and all those who support their struggle for genuine democracy around the world
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