Nick Hallsworth – a Marxist student delegate from Leeds University – reports on NUS Conference 2017, where a well-prepared and organised right wing outmanoeuvred the Left. Nick draws out the lessons to be learnt and explains where the student Left needs to go from here.
Tory austerity and the seemingly endless crisis of capitalism have created the social conditions responsible for a rise in mental health problems, particularly amongst young people. Debt, unemployment, and exploitation have led to a feeling of hopelessness, anxiety, depression, and alienation. To save our mental health, we need to end capitalism.
The brutal lynching of 23-year-old student Mashal Khan by a fundamentalist mob is a new and shocking example of the reign of terror that is being waged against progressive forces in Pakistan. We are appealing to our readings for donations to the Pakistan Trade Union Solidarity campaign and the Progressive Youth Alliance to fight this menace.
British capitalism has been mired in industrial decline for decades, stuck in a low skill, low wage economy. To address this problem and grab the headlines, the Tories have announced plans to train three million new apprentices. But, as Ben Gliniecki discusses, the Tories’ token efforts are riddled with contradictions.
On Saturday 18th March, workers at the Duke of York Picturehouse cinema in Brighton held their first strike against unfair working conditions. Six Picturehouse sites are now part of a national campaign for decent pay and conditions. We publish here a report from a worker at the Brighton Picturehouse on their fightback.
The Glasgow University Rector elections attracted media attention this year, with the nomination of “alt-right” personality Milo Yiannopoulos. The reactionary provocateur, however, was firmly rejected by students. Shaun Morris of the Glasgow Marxists discusses the reality of the alt-right.
Comrades from the Leeds Marxists interview local delivery riders working for exploitative “gig-economy” firm Deliveroo, reporting on the precarious conditions faced by such “self-employed” workers. In response to these attacks by the bosses’, Deliveroo drivers – and others – are organising and fighting back.
A Marxist Student Federation member came a respectable second in the King’s College London student union elections, which concluded last week. Running on an openly socialist programme, Joe Attard of the KCL Marxist Society received 500 votes, demonstrating a real appetite for radical ideas at a traditionally conservative university.
We publish here three short letters in which young workers in different sectors explain the conditions they face in the workplace. It is clear that young people across the country are forced to endure enormous exploitation and insecurity. The leaders of the labour movement need to take bold steps to organise young workers and guarantee decent pay and conditions for all.
Campaigning has now begun for elections to the Kings College London Student Union (KCLSU) sabbatical positions. Joe Attard, President of the KCL Marxist Society, is standing for the position of vice president for postgraduate students on an explicitly political and socialist platform. We present here Joe’s manifesto. Postgrads and workers: unite and fight!
Sarah Taylor of the Newcastle Marxists looks at a little known strike that took place in Washington, near Sunderland, a centenary ago, when over 1,000 school children took part in a strike to ensure they were provided with free school lunches. Today, school students are again on the front line in the fight against austerity and the broken capitalist system.
Last Saturday, 11th February, around 100 students and young workers from at least 20 schools, colleges, and universities across the country gathered in London for the annual national conference of the Marxist Student Federation. The number of attendees was a fitting figure to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution.