Britain

The constant excuse of Cameron and the government for
attacking public sector pensions is that workers in the private sector do not
have access to final salary pensions but have to rely instead on the
fluctuations of the money markets to provide the pension funds with enough
income to give to its members a miserly pension. But it was not so long ago
that the majority of private sector workers had the opportunity to enrol in
final salary schemes. It was only after 1998 that schemes started to close to
new members so that today only 15% of private sector workers are covered by
final salary schemes.

A BBC poll has shown strong support for the Nov 30 day of action.

The 30th November day of action, for all intents and purposes a general
strike of the public sector, is a turning-point in Britain. It
represents a re-awakening of the working class after years of relative
dormancy. Now there is a catching up with the workers in the rest of
Europe, as the Coalition unleashes an austerity regime not seen for
generations. Sections are being drawn into struggle who have never been
involved in action before, such as head teachers – the first time they
have been on strike in their union’s 114-year history.

Trade
unionists in Cambridgeshire have taken the first steps in coordinating
the strike action taking place on November 30th by establishing a county
wide cross union strike committee. The strike committee involves local
activists from those trade unions taking action and both the Cambs and
District and Huntingdon Trades Councils.

The Tory-led government has come forward today with newly revised
proposals on public sector pensions in the wake of the build-up to the
mass strike on November 30th.

The protest camp outside St Paul’s Cathedral in the heart of
the City of London has had one unexpected side effect. It has revealed the
usually hidden fissures  inside the
Church of England.

Socialist Appeal member Adam Booth spoke against Vince
Cable, the Secretary of State for Business in the Coalition government, in the
Cambridge Union on Thursday 27^th October, in a debate that
highlighted the two starkly contrasting choices facing society as a result of
the crisis of capitalism: austerity or socialism.

As the Coalition intensifies its attacks on working people, it
clearly reveals itself as a government completely in the pockets of big
business. In fact it is a government of the stinking rich, for the
stinking rich, by the stinking rich.

The Tory Party conference is the place where leading Conservatives get
to "let their hair down" and head off into flights of fancy about giving
the working class/young people/foreigners (delete as applicable) a good
hammering. This is not just to cuddle up to the Torygraph and the Daily
Mail but to square things with the assembled Tory ranks in case they
are needed for election purposes.

It was billed as a "March and Rally for the Alternative: Jobs,
Growth and Justice". On Sunday, September 18th, over two thousand trade unionists and political activists descended on Birmingham
to march and rally with the aim of trying to bring pressure on the Lib
Dems at their conference in the city to break with the Tory policies of
the Condem government.