UK university campuses erupt in pro‑Palestine protests

10th May 2024Leave a Commenton UK university campuses erupt in pro‑Palestine protests

“Well done for taking a stand against your institution’s complicity in Israel’s war crimes against the Palestinian people.”

Jeremy Corbyn

In a wave of pro-Palestine activism, students at numerous UK universities have established encampments on their campuses since late April, demanding divestment from companies involved in human rights violations and sparking debates about free speech and the right to protest, reports the Anti-Capitalism Resistance

Starting in late April and continuing into early May, students at numerous universities across the United Kingdom have established encampments on their respective campuses as a show of solidarity with the people of Palestine. These peaceful demonstrations have been met with varying responses from university administrations and police, sparking discussions about free speech, the right to protest, and the proportionality of the state’s actions. The students involved are pushing for their universities to divest from companies involved in human rights violations and to address colonial legacies.

Warwick University students initiated an encampment on the Piazza located on campus grounds, commencing on April 26th.

University of Bristol students began occupying Royal Fort Gardens by setting up an encampment, which commenced on May 1st.

Beginning on the 1st of May, students from the University of Leeds set up camp on university grounds.

Newcastle University students initiated an encampment on campus, beginning on May 1st.

Beginning on the 1st of May, students from the University of Manchester set up camp at Brunswick Park.

Starting on the 1st of May, students from the University of Sheffield set up camp on university grounds.

On 8 May there was a solidarity rally at the student encampment at Sheffield University.

Starting on the 1st of May, students from Swansea University set up camp on university grounds as a show of solidarity with the people of Palestine.

Students at Goldsmiths occupied various university buildings, including the library, starting on May 1st and lasting until May 3rd. Their second occupation came to an end on the 3rd of May, after the students and university management reached an agreement addressing the students’ demands.

Students at UCL began occupying buildings and set up an encampment on the UCL campus on May 2nd, demonstrating their support for Gaza.

Several individuals participating in a protest camp at University College London (UCL) have been arrested under the Terrorism Act for displaying artwork that depicted a widely recognised symbol of peace. The arrests were carried out by law enforcement authorities.

The organization Camden Friends of Palestine, through their Twitter account @CamdenPalestine, has strongly condemned these arrests, characterising them as a politically motivated act of state repression targeting peace activists. They are demanding the immediate release of those who have been arrested.

The events have raised concerns about the nature and justification of the arrests, particularly given the use of terrorism-related legislation in response to the display of a peace symbol at a protest site on a university campus. The situation has the potential to raise questions about the boundaries of free speech, the right to peaceful protest, and the proportionality of the states’ response.

On May 5th, students at the University of Edinburgh began occupying Old College, demanding that the university divest from companies involved in human rights violations and address the colonial legacy of its former chancellor, Lord Arthur Balfour. The students have established an encampment at Old College and are inviting others to join them in solidarity as they continue to push for their demands to be met by the university administration.

At the University of Cambridge.

An encampment was started by University of Oxford students on the 6th of May, situated on the lawn of the Pitt Rivers Museum.

On May 6th, students in Aberdeen established an encampment on Elphinstone lawn.

Starting on the 6th of May, Liverpool students set up camp at Abercromby Square.

After a 200-strong demonstration on the 6th of May, SOAS students set up the “SOAS Liberated Zone” on the university’s green space.

Students at Queens University Belfast occupied the main Lanyon building on May 7th, presenting six demands to the university management.

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• This article was originally published by the Anti-Capitalist Resistance on May 9th, 2024.

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Featured image: University of Leeds’ Palestine Solidarity occupation. Photo credit: Palestine Solidarity Campaign

UK

SIR KEIR THE RED TORY

 

LABOUR HUB EDITORS

Starmer goes to Dover to ‘stop the boats’

“Keir Starmer is today unveiling Labour’s latest proposals to reduce small boat crossings, pledging to end the Tories’ ‘talk tough, do nothing culture’ on the issue with proposals including a new ‘Border Security Command’ – using cash currently allocated to the Rwanda scheme,” Labour List reports.

Rather than address the complete immorality of current Conservative migration policy, Starmer is focusing on the  “rank incompetence” of the government. He promises to make Britain’s shores “hostile territory for people-smuggling gangs” by introducing a new Border Security Command, which would bring together existing agencies.

The new unit would be funded by diverting £75m from the Rwanda scheme, which Starmer believes is ineffective as a deterrent as it deports too few people. Instead  he is pledging to hire hundreds more specialist investigators and cross-border police and use counter-terror powers against organised immigration crime, including the power to search people suspected of being involved in people smuggling, close bank accounts, restrict their travel and trace their movements before any offence has taken place.

Insiders say the proposal echoes plans drawn up by Alexander Downer, a former Australian foreign minister, who was commissioned by Priti Patel in 2022 to devise plans for a rejigged Border Force.

Starmer’s speech says nothing about Labour’s earlier pledge to provide “safe and legal routes”. It is the absence of these that compels so many people seeking refuge to take to small boats in the first place.

Refugee Action responded, tweeting: “Here’s an idea for an ‘anti-terror’ measure. Prevent refugees going through the terror of crossing the Channel by offering safe alternative routes.”

Asylum Matters Director Lou Calvey said: “A proposed response to a safe routes crisis doesn’t include the introduction of safe routes. It’s sheer madness. And it means that the enforcement measures will escalate again when irregular migration continues as it will.”

Asylum and immigration lawyer Alasdair Mackenzie tweeted: “This rhetoric – associating refugees with terrorism and existential threat, and framing the answer as ever more coercive measures – feeds far-right narratives and opens the door to Tory calls to abandon international law and our moral duties to refugees. Myopic, dangerous and abject.”

As refugee and asylum expert Zoe Gardner pointed out: “We have to take away the market for the people smugglers… You take away the market by providing people with safe ways to travel… that would solve the problem much better than either the Rwanda plan or another elite police force.”

Insiders suggest that Starmer’s speech will have done its job if it outrages the charities and organisations working in the field, thus reassuring right wing voters that Labour is taking a ‘tougher’ stand on the immigration issue.

A progressive approach to migration would  expand safe routes for refugees, scrap the multitude of recent Tory legislation, establish a fair, effective and speedy asylum determination process and abolish the hostile environment.

These latest proposals reveal a very different Keir Starmer from the one who said in 2020: “If I’m honest, the Labour Party has been a bit scared of making the positive case for immigration for quite a number of years. And I think we need to turn that round.”  “Defend migrants’ rights” was one of Starmer’s ten pledges when running for the Labour leadership four years ago.

Mish Rahman, Labour NEC member and Momentum Vice-Chair, said: “Four years ago Keir Starmer promised to defend migrant rights and make a positive case for immigration. He has proceeded to dump this pledge, like so many others, engaging in a race to the bottom with the Tories on migrant rights and this week welcoming a hard-right, anti-refugee Tory MP into Labour. More than ever, we need a progressive Labour Party which stands up to Tory demonisation of migrants. That does mean ending dangerous boat crossings – but the way to do that is by expanding safe routes for refugees, not treating them as a threat to be neutralised.”

Members upset at Elphicke welcome

Tellingly, Starmer’s announcement on immigration was made in the Dover constituency of Natalie Elphicke. Two days ago, the Tory MP, who was a member of the Eurosceptic European Research Group, nominated Liz Truss for Tory leader and just last year described the Labour leader as “Sir Softie” on immigration, was welcomed by the latter with open arms into Labour’s ranks.

Momentum tweeted: “Starmer’s machine has blocked countless left-wingers from running for Parliament on the most spurious of charges. Meanwhile a hard-right Tory beset by scandal is welcomed with open arms. This isn’t due diligence. It’s a massive shift to the Right.”

NEC member Jess Barnard called the welcoming of Elphicke “a colossal error of judgement”. She pledged to raise the issue at the next Labour NEC meeting.

The Labour Leader of Dover Council expressed his “horror” at the decision and the Folkestone and Hythe CLP executive said it was “appalled” and described Elphicke as a “toxic and divisive figure”. Labour List reported that more than three-quarters of its readers thought Labour was wrong to accept Elphicke into the Party.

Many members are deeply disturbed by the welcome given to Elphicke by a Party leadership that cannot bring itself to restore the whip to veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott. On the same day, however, the whip was finally returned to Kate Osamor, who was suspended after reportedly calling Israel’s attacks on Gaza a “genocide”, a remark for which she later apologised.

Image: Demonstration in support of refugees, London, March 2924. c/o Labour Hub.

MAY 10, 2024

Natalie Elphicke: One CLP passes motion urging Labour to kick out ex-Tory MP

Daniel Green  

 \14th May, 2024

Photo: @Keir_Starmer

At least one Constituency Labour Party has now passed a motion condemning the decision to welcome Natalie Elphicke into the party, calling it “galling” when some left-wing MPs are suspended.

Controversy has continued to swirl after the former Conservative MP for Dover and Deal, seen as one of the most right-wing parliamentarians, crossed the floor last week.

The motion, said to have been passed almost unanimously by members of the City of Durham CLP, expressed “strong protest and dismay” at the acceptance of Elphicke into Labour.

The motion read: “Accepting someone into our ranks who clearly does not share the values of the Labour movement is a retrograde step and even more galling when we see long-standing socialists excluded from the parliamentary party at the present time.

“This grubby move by our party’s leadership debases our values and what we stand for. The Labour Party should be in the business of changing the country, not saving the careers of Tory politicians who the British public are rejecting because of the damage they’ve done to communities across our country.”

The CLP called on the party leadership and the party’s national executive Committee to reverse its “misguided” decision to welcome Natalie Elphicke into Labour.

After the CLP posted the motion on social media, a number of individuals claimed they would be leaving the party over the decision to allow Elphicke into the party.

One wrote: “I cannot remain a member of the party under its current direction and accepting a Tory MP who is so opposed to Labour values was the last straw for me.”

It comes as the Folkestone and Hythe CLP, which neighbours Elphicke’s constituency of Dover, posted on social media that it was “shocked and appalled” by the decision, describing the MP as a “toxic and divisive figure who has no place in the Labour Party”.

“While it might have been temporarily headline grabbing to accept her, tremendous damage has been done to the party’s reputation in doing so,” the CLP said.

Elphicke has faced claims from former justice secretary Robert Buckland that she tried to lobby him while her ex-husband Charlie Elphicke faced trial for sexual assault. Charlie Elphicke was jailed in 2020 for two years for sexually assaulting two women.

A spokesman for Natalie Elphicke has described Buckland’s claims as “nonsense”.

However, Labour MP for Canterbury Rosie Duffield is among those to have called for the party to suspend the Dover MP while investigating the allegation, only a few days after she welcomed the fact she was no longer the only Labour MP in Kent on social media.

Speaking to the BBC, Duffield said: “I think that if the shoe was on the other foot, if she was still officially a Conservative MP, we would rightly be calling for this to be thoroughly investigated and that’s what should happen in this case.”

The Labour Party was approached for comment.

SEE

Defected ex-Tory MP Natalie Elphicke’s worrying voting record

Adam Boulton: No one likes a turncoat, but Labour is gambling Tory MP's defection shows which way political wind is blowing

UK

“Bakers’ Dozen” General Election manifesto launched today in Parliament

The Bakers Food and Allied Workers Union (BFAWU) are set to launch their Bakers’ Dozen Manifesto that they and their members want to see introduced by the next UK Government.

Aimed especially at the Labour Party, the Bakers’ Dozen report and manifesto lays out 13 policy demands that would transform the lives of their members and working class people across the country.

Based on union policy and a survey of their members, the Bakers’ Dozen Manifesto sets out a visionary range of policies including full employment rights from day one, a £15 an hour living wage, the creation of a national care service, renationalisation of utilities and the abolition of university tuition fees.

The survey also demonstrated that support for Labour amongst BFAWU members has fallen and that the Party in Government must deliver for working class people and not take their support for granted. 

Sarah Woolley General Secretary of the Union said: “The results show how politically engaged our members are. The issues impacting BFAWU members reflect the concerns of the wider population. The cost of living crisis that is affecting people’s ability to pay for basic needs such as food, energy and housing is the single biggest concern facing members. Access to NHS services, the lack of affordable housing and low pay are also big issues.

“Critically, our members have set out what they believe is necessary to help address the issues that are confronting them in their communities and workplaces. We have offered in our Bakers’ Dozen Manifesto, good, common sense, fair and constructive hopeful suggestions, which if implemented, would benefit our members and every other worker across the UK. We urge the Labour Party in particular to pay attention and take on board our manifesto.”

The full list of demands is:

1. Introduce a £15 an hour national minimum wage for all workers regardless of age to end the unfair youth limit on the national minimum wage.
2. Abolish zero-hour contracts.
3. Full employment rights from day one.
4. Ensure all employers are legally required to provide six weeks of contractual sick pay at 100% of normal pay to all workers.
5. Repeal all anti-trade union legislation.
6. Legislate for a maximum temperature in the workplace.
7. End the practice of companies going into administration to avoid their financial responsibilities and obligations to their workforce and fine directors who leave workers high and dry.
8. Take water, energy and Royal Mail back into public ownership, curb excessive pricing and remove the profit motive from our essential services.
9. Introduce a statutory Right to Food, free school meals and place a cap on Supermarket profits.
10.  Re-nationalise our train companies, cap bus fares at £2 max for a single journey and introduce free public transport for all 16–25 year olds.
11.  End arm sales to Israel.
12.  Abolish Tuition Fees, re-introduce the Union Learning Fund in England, whilst protecting the funds in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
13.  Create a national care service that provides dignity for the elderly and vulnerable no matter their income and wealth.

Ian Hodson President of the Bakers Food and Allied Workers Union said:

“Our Bakers’ Dozen manifesto represents a set of policies that our members are demanding and need in order to help them live and work with dignity and in a way that provides them with the means to lead a good and fulfilling life. Working class people need policies that will ensure they are paid well, treated fairly in the workplace and are given the public services that they need and deserve.

“After years of decline they are a million miles from having these. If an incoming Labour Government does not address that decline, then this will lead to bitter disappointment and fuel the seeds of their future decline. They should pay attention to these demands and the needs of working class people.” 

MAY 14, 2024LABOUR HUB EDITORS

UK

Pensioner poverty in the world’s sixth largest economy is a political choice

To avert a major humanitarian and economic crisis, governments need to be bold and commit to aligning the state pension with the living wage

Prem Sikka 

10 May, 2024 
 Columnists
Left Foot Forward Opinion

Prem Sikka is an Emeritus Professor of Accounting at the University of Essex and the University of Sheffield, a Labour member of the House of Lords, and Contributing Editor at Left Foot Forward.

Death and taxes may be the only certainties in life, but poverty in retirement is increasingly a harsh reality for UK retirees. It will be even more so for future retirees as low wages and unchecked corporate profiteering has reduced chances of adequate savings for old-age, and people will be forced to survive on the inadequate state pension.

The UK has over 12.7m retirees. For the pre-April 2016 retirees, the state pension is £169.50 per week or around £9,000 a year conditional upon National Insurance contributions. Only 75% of the pre-2016 retirees receive the full amount i.e. nearly 2.4m people, mostly women miss out.

For post-2016 retirees, the state pension is £221.20 a week or £11,500 a year, all conditional upon National Insurance contributions for qualifying years. Only 51% of the post-2016 retirees receive the full state pension, i.e. nearly 1.7m, and once again women lose out as they are penalised for being child bearers and carers.

A minister informed parliament that the “lowest State Pension amounts in payments are less than £1 per week”. When asked to publish the median state pension, the Minister replied: “There are no plans to publish the median weekly amount”. Despite hikes in the state pension age and the Equality Act 2010, women continue to receive lower state pension than men’s. Those not receiving the full state pension may be entitled to mean-tested benefits such as Pension Credit and housing benefit, if they can negotiate the bureaucratic maze. Nearly 1.4m pensioners receive pension credit, worth £3,900 a year, and last year £2.2bn went unclaimed.

Based upon the past data, the average state pension may be around £9,000-£9,500 a year and is the main or the only source of income for majority of retirees, especially women. This compares with median wage of £28,104 a year and average wage of around £35,200 a year. The headline minimum wage for 37.5 hours a week is around £22,300. Pensioners are expected to survive on the state pension which is less than 50% of the minimum wage and barely 26% of the average wage. It is even worse for pensioners who choose to live abroad with their loved ones. Their state pension is frozen and not increased each year. Some pensioners may receive work pension, but the future is bleak as DB schemes have vanished and low wages prevent people from saving for retirement. Some 28% of over-55s have no other pension saved apart from the state pension. Nearly 32% of Britons are unable to save for pension due to low incomes. Due to gender pay gap women are more likely to heavily rely on the state pension.

Our political establishment is all too willing to condemn current and future pensioners to poverty. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt complained that annual salary of £100,000 is not enough. Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson complained that the then PM salary of £141,000 is not enough to live on and described income of £250,000 as chicken-feed. Former Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and former health secretary Matt Hancock demand £10,000 for a day’s work. Tory MP Peter Bottomley says he can’t live on an MP’s salary, currently £91,346, but they all expect pensioners to live on £9,000-£9,500 a year.

The UK state pension, as a percentage of average earnings, is one of the lowest in the developed economies. Pensioner benefit spending for 2023-24 is estimated to be £138bn, of which £125bn is spent on state pensions. According to the OECD, the UK was spending around 5.7% of its GDP on state pensions and related benefits, compared to 16% for Italy, 13.9% for France, 13.5% for Finland and 10.4% for Germany. More recent estimates for the UK suggest that it may now be 5.9% of national income, still well below the spending by major European countries.

Despite a variety of benefits and the triple-lock, some 2.2m UK retirees, including 1.25m women, live in poverty. Some 2.5 million retirees skip meals and 1.3 million are at risk of undernourishment. Around 68,000 retirees die in poverty each year. Despite winter fuel payments, last year there were nearly 5,000 excess pensioner deaths from cold as retirees have to make tough choices between eating and heating. A study covering the period 2012-2019 noted 335,000 excess deaths (48,000 a year) in England, Scotland and Wales due to poverty and austerity. Over one-third of the deaths were under the age of 65 years i.e. majority were senior citizens. Mortality rates increased, especially for women.

The plan of the political establishment is to make older people work longer, effectively prevent people from claiming the state pension after lifelong payment of taxes and national insurance. The state pension age is currently set at 66 years and is due to increase to 67 in 2026-2028 and to 68 from 2044. Some want to pile on the agony by hiking the state pension age to 71. Tory MP Ian Duncan Smith wants to make people work until they drop by hiking the state pension age to 75 years of age. UK life expectancy is stagnant or shrinking. Due to poverty, low wages and lack of access to good food, housing, hospitals, family doctors and dentists healthy life expectancy in England is 62.4 years for males and 62.7 years for females; 61.1 years for males and 60.3 years for females in Wales.

In sharp contrast, France is to increase the state pension age from 62 to 64 by 2030. Poland reduced retirement age to 65 years of age for men and to 60 years of age for women.

Each hike in the state pension age results in wealth transfer from the poor to the rich. On average the rich tend to live 10 years longer than the poor. Life expectancy in Blackpool is around 73.4 years, compared to 86.3 years in affluent Kensington and Chelsea. So the rich will receive the state pension for a longer period than the poor.

Too many spin pensioner poverty as an old versus young issue, forgetting that today’s young people are tomorrow’s retirees. In time, today’s low pensions will haunt them too. The real issue is nothing to do with age. It is a class issue, connected with low wages and inequitable distribution of income and wealth. The UK is increasingly a place where a small minority of people have excessive wealth and the rest struggle to make ends meet. The top 1% has more wealth than 70% of the population combined. Just 50 families have more wealth than 50% of the population. It needs to be redistributed to enable people to live a dignified life.

To avert a major humanitarian and economic crisis, governments need to be bold and commit to aligning the state pension with the living wage, within the lifetime of a single parliament and enable senior citizens to live with dignity. Contrary to the right-wing commentators, the state pension is not a burden. It keeps retirees nourished, heated and active. It improves physical and mental health, reduces pressure on the NHS, GPs, care services and reduces demand for social security benefits and related administration. It also stimulates the local economies as pensioners tend to spend locally. Pensioners pay income tax if their total income exceeds tax-free personal allowance. They also pay council tax, VAT and other indirect taxes.

A country that can bailout banks and energy companies; fund wars in Ukraine, Afghanistan and Iraq, and hand out billion is subsidies to rail, steel, oil, gas, auto and internet companies can also fund the state pension to enable people to live with dignity. For example, by taxing capital gains at the same marginal rates as wages, around £12bn a year in additional revenues can be raised. The same remedy for dividends can raise another £4bn-£5bn. Levying national insurance on recipients of capital gains and dividends, currently exempt, can raise another £8bn-£10bn. Restricting tax relief on pension contribution to 20% for all will generate £14.5bn a year. Since 2010, HMRC has failed to collect over £500bn in taxes due to evasion and abuse. Some £570bn of UK citizens’ assets are held in offshore tax havens and HMRC has no idea of the level of tax evasion. So, investment in HMRC can generate billions of pounds. Additional revenues can be raised by wealth taxes and a financial transactions tax.

Pensioner poverty in the world’s sixth largest economy is a political choice, and needs to be challenged in the next general election.

UK

How many social homes have been sold off in the last 10 years

The number of social homes being lost continues to outnumber those being built, and in large numbers 

  

Hannah Davenport 

10 May, 2024

Left Foot Forward

England has a chronic shortage of social homes, with housing groups saying that around 90,000 social rent homes are needed every year to address the huge deficit.

The lack of good quality social housing has been attributed as a major factor in fueling the UK’s housing crisis, with Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham recently calling to suspend the Right to Buy scheme, which allows council tenants to buy their council home at a discounted price.

Recent research by the New Economics Foundation found that more than one in ten council homes sold under Margaret Thatcher’s Right to Buy scheme are now owned by private landlords. The figure varied in different authorities, finding in Brighton 86% of homes sold under the scheme are now being privately rented.

More than a million households are currently waiting for social homes which has pushed many into temporary accommodation or into the private rented sector where there is an affordability crisis.

But the number of social homes being lost continues to outnumber those being built. Last year, government figures revealed there was a net loss of 12,000 social homes in England, with sales and demolitions surpassing the number of homes built. The stats showed that 22,023 social homes were either sold or demolished in 2023.

Over a 10 year period, a whopping total of 212,590 social homes were sold off, analysis by homelessness charity Crisis found. While a further 58,772 were demolished. This compares to the 93,875 that were delivered between 2012/13 and 2022/23, marking a net loss of 177,487 social homes.

Crisis Chief Executive Matt Downie said it was “disgraceful” seeing the number of social homes “continue to be decimated” and added that the “system is at breaking point”.

Housing charity Shelter has launched a new campaign called ‘Made in Social Housing’, celebrating the positive impact social homes have had on people and wider society. It is calling on the government to pledge to build at least 90,000 social homes a year for 10 years.

Hannah Davenport is news reporter at Left Foot Forward

UK

Why I’ve quit Labour to campaign for Greens and Independents

Hilary Schan

Yesterday
Left Foot Forward 

'I’m now sitting as an independent councillor, but I don’t feel politically homeless or hopeless.'

Hilary Schan is a councillor in Worthing and former Co-Chair of the Labour campaign group Momentum. (MOMENTUM WAS LABOUR LEFT MOBILIZED BEHIND CORBYN)

I’ve quit the Party I’ve given eight years of my life to. When Peter Mandelson was asked about my resignation this week, he described it as “a very important development”. At least we agree that defections from Labour are significant, but he thinks that me and other “disgruntled hard leftists” leaving the Party is a good thing.

While it’s no surprise that the ‘prince of darkness’, who is reportedly advising Starmer and his team and seemingly has the Shadow Cabinet on speed dial, would welcome our departure, stating this publicly just after Labour has suffered widespread losses to left-wing candidates, while the leadership embraces a hard Tory MP, right shows how complacent the Party has become.

In the last eight years, I’ve knocked on countless doors, helped to elect the first Labour council in my hometown of Worthing’s history, and become a Labour councillor here myself. For the last two years, I’ve been proud to serve as the Co-Chair of Momentum. I’ve resigned from that role and I’m now sitting as an independent councillor, but I don’t feel politically homeless or hopeless.

I’ve joined We Deserve Better – the new initiative building the alternative to the race to the bottom between the Tories and their Tory-lite opponents in Keir Starmer’s Labour Party. While Labour benefited from Tory collapse in last week’s elections, and many other places besides, we also saw voters roundly reject Starmerism in favour of socialist, pro-Gaza independents and Green candidates in Labour heartlands from Norwich to Newcastle, Oldham to Bristol. Our campaign is mobilising support for these candidates in key Parliamentary constituencies including: British Palestinian Leanne Mohamad’s grassroots campaign to unseat Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting in Ilford North; and Green Co-Leader Carla Denyer’s campaign in Bristol Central, where Shadow Culture Secretary Thangam Debbonaire is at real risk.

Last week’s election results show the Tories’ vote has collapsed and there is no coming back from their spectacular self-implosion but Labour is still facing a backlash in its urban heartlands. Over the weekend, one Labour figure after another was wheeled out to promise that the Party is listening and that they will work to win back the support they’ve lost, particularly within the Muslim community. But these seem only warm words. Instead, Starmer seems to be actively trolling them.

With Israel now bombarding Rafah, Labour’s refusal to condemn Israeli war crimes and listen to 56% of the public, and 71% of Labour voters, who back a ban on arms sales is more egregious by the day. Meanwhile, a refugee bashing, union trashing, anti-abortion, hard right Tory MP who has undermined the fight against sexual harassment being welcomed by Starmer with – literally – wide open arms, while he still refuses to restore the whip to Jeremy Corbyn or Diane Abbott, despite one hundred years of party service between them. This will only drive away even more young, ethnic minority and progressive voters.

It’s not like there’s much else for them to be excited about. Labour won’t: nationalise our public services, implement rent controls, scrap the two-child benefit cap, abolish tuition fees, tax the rich, repeal authoritarian laws, implement a Green New Deal or give the NHS the money it needs.

So while there’s no prospect of the Tories getting back into power after the next election it’s no surprise there’s no real enthusiasm for Starmer’s Labour either. He’s 60% less popular than Blair was in 1997 and recent polling shows 61% of people think they will be the same, or worse off under a Labour government. On the domestic front, Labour’s “unrecognisably” watered down ‘New Deal for Workers’ is just the latest example of a decent policy they announce and then swiftly consign to the dustbin of history, along with Starmer’s leadership pledges, showing yet again that Starmer can’t be trusted and alienating even more of Labour’s core voter base in the process.

Naturally, you may ask, why not stay and fight from within Labour? This had been my mission as Momentum Co-Chair but, from stitching up parliamentary selections by blocking left candidates and even allegedly rigging votes, to the hounding of left-wing MPs and the empowerment of corporate lobbyists over party members, the reality is that the game is rigged.

And as the Gaza kickback shows, the Labour Leadership only responds to pressure from outside. It’s time for the Left to be that force again. We need to free ourselves of our collective Stockholm Syndrome, and rediscover the mass energy and excitement which powered Corbynism, above all in 2017.

We Deserve Better is working to revive that spirit . We want to mobilise the tens of thousands of Labour members who campaigned for Labour in the last two elections – who knocked on doors, delivered leaflets, phonebanked and organised in their communities – to help us elect socialist independents and Greens in key seats where we know they can win, or if they can’t join the campaign on the ground, then donate to our campaign war-chest.

Although electing any candidate not from a main party is a tall order in our First Past the Post system, much of the country is crying out for an alternative. There is a massive constituency for hope. Until now, though, opposition to Labour has been fragmented. We’re coming together to mount a serious challenge, electing progressive candidates is vital to pressure Starmer to finally listen to the voters he has taken for granted, mirroring Reform UK’s pressure on the Conservatives but from the left.

While projections and polls using different methodologies are producing wildly different results about the number of seats, it’s clearer than ever that the Tories are toast. Those feeling politically abandoned by Labour can support the alternative and send Labour a message on Gaza, climate change and austerity, safe in the knowledge that there is no possibility of the Tories returning to power. Mandelson once infamously said Labour needn’t worry about its base as “they’ve got nowhere else to go”. Now, we do. Join the alternative.

UK
Tougher post-Brexit immigration rules worsening Britain’s vets shortage, MPs and immigration law experts warn

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead 

Today
Left Foot Forward 

A less well-documented casualty of Britain’s departure from the EU is the veterinary sector

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A less well-documented casualty of Britain’s departure from the EU is the veterinary sector. Britain has historically been reliant on EU-trained vets. Post-Brexit regulations have had a negative impact on the nation’s veterinary workforce, with the number of EU vets having more than halved since Brexit. This is on top of pay freezes for public sector vets, and stricter animal controls, including visa and food security requirements, which are also having a detrimental impact on Britain’s veterinary industry.

A letter to the environment, food and rural affairs secretary Steve Barclay, calls for a number of changes to help attract interest in the sector. This includes greater funding for veterinary degrees, higher salaries for public health vet roles, and a reduction in the minimum salary required to obtain a skilled visa for overseas vets.

The letter was penned by Conservative MP Robert Goodwill, chair of the environment, food and rural affairs committee. It cited a shortage of vets as a major concern, noting how many vets are leaving the profession because of high levels of stress, feeling undervalued and a poor work/life balance.

In December, the Home Office announced a package of measures designed to cut migration and put British workers first in line for jobs. The changes, which came into effect on April 4, included increasing the salary threshold for those arriving in Britain on a Skilled Worker Visa by 48 percent from £26,000 to £38,000.

Immigration law experts have warned that the UK veterinary sector will ‘inevitably’ miss out on recruiting overseas vets because of the tougher immigration rules.

“The five-point immigration plan has been introduced to reduce net migration figures, but could potentially add pressure to vet practices already struggling to fill vacancies – after all, sick animals can’t wait for care. The 48% salary rise from £26,200 to £38,700 comes into force on 4 April and will inevitably rule out some overseas vets from being recruited on a Skilled Worker Visa,” Julie Moktadir, a partner with the law firm Stone King and head of its immigration department, told Vet Times.

The letter sent to Steve Barclay cited the new minimum salary threshold as the “most immediate concern,” warning that it will “preclude all but highly experienced professionals from coming to work in the UK.”

The MPs are also urging for more funding for veterinary degrees, which are the most expensive degrees to deliver, costing between £27,000 and £32,000 per student per year. Additionally, the MPs have suggested a student debt forgiveness scheme is introduced, to attract graduates to work in “particularly hard-hit specialisms and regions of the UK,” such as public health roles and in rural areas.

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Beasts of burden - Antagonism and Practical History | libcom.org

Beasts of burden - Antagonism and Practical History. An attempt to rethink the separation between animal liberationist and communist politics. (Published ...

UK

Jacob Rees-Mogg gets schooled by green energy boss after fossil fuel subsidies clash

'Have you not done your homework?'

Hannah Davenport 

10 May, 2024 
Green Politics
Left Foot Forward 

Jacob Rees-Mogg was schooled over fossil fuel subsidies by green energy boss Dale Vince after the pair clashed on net zero during an episode of the Tory MP’s GB News show.

The Tory MP for North East Somerset is out-spoken on being anti-net zero, recently calling the policy a “fantasy” during his GB News programme which he has been hosting on the right-wing news channel for over a year now.

Last week Dale Vince, the founder of Ecotricity, one the UK’s leading suppliers of green energy, was invited onto an episode of Rees-Mogg’s Moggologue to discuss the topic.

The pair clashed as Rees-Mogg argued net zero could crush British business and that the technology was not ready for it, which Vince disputed.

Debating the cost of using renewable energy Dale Vince claimed over £16bn a year was spent on subsidising the fossil fuel industry, according to a report by the International Monetary Fund.

Rees-Mogg claimed this was “nonsense” and that no fossil fuel subsidies were handed out. He argued that they were tax breaks not subsidies and that the two were “completely different”, before cutting off the interview telling Vince to “do your homework”.

The energy boss did, and hit back with a video in which he explains how tax breaks are subsidies, as laid out in a piece of Brexit legislation passed when Rees-Mogg himself was Brexit Minister.

Vince refers to a piece of Brexit legislation, the Subsidy Control Act 2022, which replaced EU laws with new British legislation which he said lays out that tax breaks are in fact counted as subsidies.

In the video Vince said: “It begs the question, Mr Mogg, were you not paying attention when you were Brexit Minister passing pieces of legislation, did you not know that it was EU rules that say that tax breaks are subsidies and UK rules as well, both inside and outside the EU? Have you not done your homework?”

The New Economics Foundation has estimated that oil and gas extractors could receive up to £18.5bn in tax relief between 2023 and 2026, while the UK government gave fossil fuel companies £20bn more in support than renewables from 2015 to 2023, research found.

Campaigners have said that owners of the Rosebank development, a massive new, controversial oilfield in the North Sea, are set to receive around £3bn in tax breaks from the UK government.

The british green energy industrialist was praised online for his comeback.

A professor of law wrote on X: “Indeed, and a tax break can also be a subsidy (provided that it is specific) under the rules of the blessed WTO, which Rees-Mogg used to praise so highly. It’s Rees-Mogg who did not do his homework here.”

The Labour Business group: “Another piece of reality confronting @Jacob_Rees_Mogg on his TV show. Nice work @DaleVince. Think JRM must need another lie down.”

Another X user wrote: “Rees-Mogg is one of those people (much like Johnson) who, because he is posh and speaks in a posh accent, makes others believe he is clever and well-informed. It’s a form of intimidation imo. In reality it’s all a facade.”

Hannah Davenport is news reporter at Left Foot Forward