Last month 100,000 American private sector workers lost
their jobs. This is the third monthly rise in the unemployment figures in a
row. Capitalism is out of control. It’s
not delivering the goods. And it’s not just in the USA. Across the world alarm has greeted every bit of bad news from the States. Even if capitalism doesn’t fall
over and crush you this time, it will always be a threat to the welfare and
happiness of workers all over the world.
Now Gordon Brown has handed over the reins as Chancellor to
Alistair Darling it transpires that for the past ten years Gordon has been
displaying the fiscal prudence of a drunken sailor. The British government has
the biggest hole in their finances in Europe, a whopping £43bn – and it could
get up to £50bn. Where has it all gone?
It is a frightening possibility that, on May 2nd,
Londoners could wake up to find they have an extreme right-wing Tory as Mayor
of London. This is a truly scary scenario. Opinion polls show Boris the
Bumbling Buffoon – whom most regarded as a joke candidate when he threw his hat
into the ring – is creeping up on Ken.
School students, Ewan Gibbs and Nathan Morrison, give their views on the latest proposals on British citizenship. In this report issued by Lord
Goldsmith it states that school-leavers should take an oath of allegiance to ‘Queen
and Country’ and suggests that schools should hold citizenship ceremonies for
leavers. These proposals were made by a big business Labour government desperate to cover the glaring cracks in our public
services, below inflation pay rises, the imperialist military adventures in
Iraq and Afghanistan and the Northern Rock farce by resorting to flag
waving.
Marbles, the bank that lends to ‘sub-prime’ borrowers, has decided that if you can’t be good, then you’d better be careful. They’re walloping their customers with interest charges on their cards of up to 33.9%. So the financial crisis may be bad news for millions, but it’s all grist to the mill at Marbles.
Meet the Henwis. These are high-net-worth-individuals. You have to have $1 million to count, plus your home obviously. There were 11.4% more of them last year and they’re ‘worth’ $37 trillion all told. We now have 485,000 of these in the UK. Aren’t we lucky? They’ve raised the bar for our Rich List. You have to have at least £70m to get in. That should keep hoi polloi out!
According to the TUC, 5 million workers in this country are putting in £5,000 each in unpaid overtime. If they started working at the beginning of the year, they wouldn’t earn a penny till February 22nd. Nobody does this unless they’re under the cosh at work.
Also from the TUC (They’re a useful research body. Pity they don’t do something about all the facts they uncover) – we lose £13 billion through tax avoidance by the rich and another £12 billion through corporate tax dodging. As workers, can somebody tell us how to avoid PAYE?
Daily Mail gets it right! Tony Blair is on a part-time contract as ‘adviser’ with JP Morgan Chase, a bank that did very well out of the illegal invasion of Iraq. The Mail quotes Reg Keys, whose son died in Iraq as a British soldier, who said that the award was ‘almost akin to taking blood money.’
Scroungers? According to the Institute for Public Policy Research, 57% of households below the poverty line had someone in work. Half of the UK’s child poverty is in wage earning families. Capitalism causes poverty.
Haiti’s poor forced to eat mud. As food prices soar, the poor can’t afford a bowl of rice any more. So they make up biscuits from clay, mixed with water, salt and margarine. They bake them in the sun and eat them. At least you don’t feel as hungry.
Ama Sumani was deported to Ghana in a wheelchair by immigration authorities. Cancer sufferer Ama was shipped out of the University Hospital of Wales to what friends described as a death sentence. That’s what you get for overstaying your visa. Doesn’t it make you proud to be British!