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Darwin’s challenge

February 12th
2009 saw the 200th  anniversary Charles Darwin’s birth.. The
beautifully simple idea embodied in his most famous book, Origin of the Species – evolution
by natural selection – was a revolutionary departure with profound scientific
and philosophical implications. Following the
footsteps of Copernicus and Galileo three hundred years earlier, Darwin battered an
enormous, irreparable breech in the walls of Fortress Theology and for that
reason the book has been the source of intense debate right up to the present
day. Darwin
sought and found an explanation – a mechanism – for the evolutionary changes in
species, which other scientists were beginning to suspect, using a purely materialist method, without any recourse
to God or metaphysics.

 

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Build on the success of Lindsey… All-out National Strike Action Needed!



With workers everywhere being
forced onto the defensive through employers’ attacks on jobs, pay and
conditions the victory at Lindsey of the protests and strike action will be
seen as a marvellous example to others of what can be achieved in the face of
attack. The background to this latest dispute has been a deliberate employers’
offensive over a number of years to undermine the National Agreement for the
Engineering Construction Industry (NAECI). The slump in the construction
industry since last summer and the onset of the recession only intensified
these attacks.

 

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Short… and sweet? The 2009 Local Government Pay Claim

“To improve real
pay levels, the Trade Union Side of the NJC seeks a one-year, across-the-board
pay increase of at least the level of retail price inflation, with additional
increases for the lower paid. The Trade Union Side’s
2009 -10 pay claim is for one year only and distinct from any other
negotiations over the Green Book.  We would like negotiations to take
place in an expedient manner and for settlement to be reached by 1 April 2009." Short and sweet and
utterly reasonable, at least that’s how many UNISON members will see this
year’s pay claim. In reality however, this year’s claim is likely to be a great
source of contention between the employers and UNISON, Unite and the GMB.

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Fight compulsory redundancies at Transport for London and London Underground Limited



Rail unions held a protest on Wednesday
February 11th outside London Underground head offices against the
first wave of threatened cuts of 1,000 jobs. Workers turned out to demand that
those responsible for running up the massive TfL/LUL deficit of over £2.5
billion be sacked, and not the workers who are being threatened with the sack because
of senior management incompetence.

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Ireland: ICTU leaders to call for a 24 hour national day of demonstration

It’s
increasingly clear that the political and economic situation in Ireland is
heating up – what with the banking crisis and the bail-out of the banks, then
the nationalisation of Anglo Irish. Thousands of jobs have disappeared, Dell
and the threat to Waterford
being two of the most important. Unemployment has risen by over 120,000 in a
year and the government is looking for cuts in the private sector.

 

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A scandal a day keeps the voters away



Yesterday it was David Blunkett and his
privately funded trip to South Africa, which he forgot to own up to. Today it
is Home Secretary Jacqui Smith and her £116,000 expenses claim. According to
the BBC: ‘Ms Smith reportedly claimed £116,000 in expenses for her home in
Redditch, Worcestershire, after telling the Commons that her sister’s home –
where she stays while in London – was her main residence.’ The tax-free
Additional Cost Allowance is worth up to £24,006 a year at present.

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Boris beats up workers



Boris Johnson,
Mayor of London, was the man who didn’t let the buses go out during the snow in
London on Monday 2nd February because he thought it was dangerous.

So how did he
expect people to get in to work? Now he’s docking transport staff a day’s pay for
not making it in. The managers who are making the threat are claiming that they
were ‘working from home.’ So they get their money.

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Blunkett – another one on the take



David
Blunkett has been rapped over the knuckles by the Parliamentary Commissioner
for Standards. Apparently the former Minister ‘forgot’ to register a trip to
South Africa paid for by a private training company.

Blunkett,
as a former Minister in charge of the Department for Work and pensions, was a
big fan of opening up the administration of the welfare service to the private
sector. No wonder. Sheffield-based firm A4e is bidding for a whole raft of
multi-million pound contracts under New Labour’s misnamed welfare reform
programme. And they find Blunkett’s services well worth purchasing.

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Lindsey Total oil refinery – Militancy pays

Socialist Appeal interviewed Keith Gibson, spokesperson for the Lindsey
strike committee:



“I believe the result in Lindsey was an
excellent victory for the workers. It truly inspired me. The solidarity of the
lads around the country in particular was tremendous. It was spontaneous. The
lads were looking for a lead, especially as they were fed up at seeing
employers with their own workforce for years coming in and under-cutting the
national agreements."

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Lindsey Total oil refinery – Employers’ lies exposed

Socialist Appeal interviews John
McKewan, victimised worker from Lindsey Total Oil Refinery:

"The workers
were prepared to break the law. The national trade union bureaucracy don’t want
a fight on their hands. They are more afraid of losing their salaries and cars.
They do not understand the anger of workers fearful for their jobs and
livelihoods. I asked the coppers what they were doing here. “Shouldn’t you be
in London
arresting bankers and city speculators?” They seemed to agree. We told them to
move the BNP. If not, then we would move them ourselves, so they obliged."

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French students in militant protest



French students are out of the classroom and back on
the street. On Thursday, 29th January, students and teaching staff
joined in the national strike that had an estimated 2.5 million French workers
marching in the major cities to prove to President Sarkozy that his provocative
remark in the summer of 2007- ‘These days, when there’s a strike in France,
nobody notices,’ was as wrong as it was rash.

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