Small birds spice up the already diverse diet of spotted hyenas in Namibia

LEIBNIZ INSTITUTE FOR ZOO AND WILDLIFE RESEARCH (IZW)

 

IMAGE: 

SPOTTED HYENA HUNTING BIRDS AT A WATERHOLE IN NAMIBIA

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CREDIT: PHOTO BY MIHA KROFEL

Hyenas are generalist predators (and scavengers) with a broad range of prey species. They are known for hunting (or scavenging) larger mammals such as antelopes and occasionally feed on smaller mammals and reptiles. Being flexible in the choice of prey is a strategy of generalists – and this even extends to small passerine birds, as scientists from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW) and the University of Ljubljana observed in Namibia: Spotted hyenas pursued red-billed queleas, picked them from the ground or the surface of a waterhole and swallowed them whole, at a success rate of approximately one bird every three minutes. These observations were described for the first time in word, photos and videos in the scientific journal “Food Webs”.

The diet breadth of hyenas is matched by few other carnivores. Spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta) are known to hunt a variety of larger mammals such as zebras and antelopes in southern and eastern Africa – but also ostriches, flamingos, reptiles, other carnivores. They also scavenge on carcasses from giraffes to elephants and cattle. Until now very few observations of hyenas feeding on small birds were reported. “In our paper we describe for the first time the hunting and feeding behaviour of spotted hyenas on red-billed queleas (Quelea quelea), a passerine bird known for its huge flocks, at a waterhole in the Etosha National Park in Namibia”, say Rubén Portas and Dr. Miha Krofel, scientists working for the Leibniz-IZW and the University of Ljubljana. On two different days they observed, filmed and photographed spotted hyenas chasing flying birds or picking them from the ground or the water surface, and devouring them whole at the waterhole. “We observed that a single hyena can catch on average one bird every three minutes”, the scientists conclude from their observations.

The scientists could draw some conclusions about the feeding behaviour of spotted hyenas from their observations. “It adds to the known variety of the spotted hyena diet and hunting tactics, since this behaviour has not been documented before”, says Portas. “It confirms their flexibility and ability to exploit foraging opportunities and obtaining food from unusual sources. We can also provide a first estimate on the capture rates and the food intake of hyenas hunting passerine birds.” As the observations were limited to a single waterhole, it is possible that the described foraging tactic was specific to the hyenas from the observed clan and occurred as an opportunistic response to an abundant food source, the authors say. Between May and August, thousands of wintering red-billed queleas gather at waterholes in Namibia.

Portas and Krofel regularly carry out field research on vultures, lions, leopards and hyenas and investigate carnivore-scavenger interactions and information transfer in the scavenger community for the GAIA Initiative and InterMuc projects in Etosha National Park. The GAIA Initiative is an alliance of research institutes, conservation organisations and companies with the aim of creating a high-tech early warning system for environmental changes. In several projects, the GAIA partners conduct wildlife research on selected species, their interaction and the functioning of ecosystems they inhabit. On this basis, the GAIA scientists and engineers build and utilize high-tech interfaces to the senses and intelligence of sentinel animals in order to detect critical changes or incidents in ecosystems fast and effectively. To this end, they develop a new generation of animal tags equipped with on-board artificial intelligence (AI), a camera, energy-efficient electronics and satellite-based communication technology.

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JOURNAL

Food Webs

DOI

10.1016/j.fooweb.2024.e00340 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta) predation on passerine birds in Namibia

When inequality is more than “skin-deep”: Social status leaves traces in the epigenome of spotted hyenas in Tanzania

LEIBNIZ INSTITUTE FOR ZOO AND WILDLIFE RESEARCH (IZW)

 

IMAGE: 

SPOTTED HYENAS RESTING AT THE COMMUNAL DEN IN THE SERENGETI NATIONAL PARK IN TANZANIA (PHOTO BY SARAH BENHAIEM/LEIBNIZ-IZW)

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CREDIT: PHOTO BY SARAH BENHAIEM/LEIBNIZ-IZW

A research consortium led by scientists from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW) provide evidence that social behaviour and social status are reflected at the molecular level of gene activation (epigenome) in juvenile and adult free-ranging spotted hyenas. They analysed non-invasively collected gut epithelium samples from both high-ranking and low-ranking female hyenas and showed that rank differences were associated with epigenetic signatures of social inequality, i.e., the pattern of activation or switching off of genes that regulate important physiological processes such as energy conversion and immune response in several genome regions. The results, published in the scientific journal Communications Biology, contribute to a better understanding of the role of epigenetic mechanisms in the interplay of social, environmental and physiological factors in the life of a highly social mammal.

In mammals, social behaviour and social status can substantially influence the survival, reproductive performance and health of individuals. However, it is not yet fully understood how the translation of social and environmental factors into the physiology of an organism is reflected in molecular processes. Now, scientists from the Leibniz-IZW Department of Evolutionary Genetics and the Serengeti Hyena Project at the Leibniz-IZW’s Department of Ecological Dynamics found that social status influenced epigenetic patterns, more specifically the methylation of DNA in both young and adult female spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta) which determines the activation of genes. They analysed DNA from gut epithelium cells from 18 adult female hyenas and 24 cubs with known social status from three clans in the Serengeti National Park, Tanzania. The scientists identified and validated 149 genome regions, where high-ranking and low-ranking individuals differed in the methylation of DNA (differentially methylated regions, DMRs). “We could, for the first time, provide evidence for epigenetic signatures of social inequalities in both young and adult spotted hyenas”, says Dr Alexandra Weyrich, head of the working group “Wildlife Epigenetics” in the Leibniz-IZW Department of Evolutionary Genetics and senior author of the paper.

The findings show that these epigenetic signatures are stable across life stages – and that they are linked to important physiological processes: Many of the identified DMRs were involved in the regulation of energy conversion, immune response, glutamate receptor signalling and ion transportation. “Especially the large number of DMRs in genes involved in energy conversion caught our eye”, says first author Colin Vullioud, data scientist in Weyrich’s working group. Co-author Dr Sarah Benhaiem, co-head of the Serengeti Hyena Project, explains: “We suspect that this may be driven by differences in behaviour and specifically the greater use of long-distance foraging trips by low-ranking than high-ranking females – the latter monopolising resources in their clan territory.” Interestingly, these genes were more methylated (or hypermethylated) in low-ranking adult females but not in cubs. This could indicate an adjustment of low-ranking adult females to higher energetic costs of frequent long-distance commuting, a behaviour not displayed by cubs. “Although the exact physiological consequences of the observed hypermethylation remain to be investigated, these findings are consistent with our observations and hint at the sought-after missing link between social and physiological factors”, Weyrich and Benhaiem conclude.

The analyses built on the expertise in epigenetics of the Leibniz-IZW as well as on the long-term research on spotted hyenas in the Serengeti, which started in 1987. The females in this investigation are individually known and their social status has been tracked for generations. This provided ideal conditions to study the links between behaviour, physiological factors, epigenetic modifications and fitness in terms of survival and reproduction in a wild population. “We collected our samples without invading the life of the hyenas”, say Dr Marion L. East and Professor Dr Heribert Hofer, founders of the Serengeti hyena project and co-authors of the paper. “We followed our study animals, collected super-fresh droppings immediately after they were produced and preserved gut epithelium samples from the surface of the faeces.” The use of samples collected in a non-invasive manner is one of the strengths of the investigation, the authors surmise. “The capture methylation method we used enriches methylated DNA as well as mammalian DNA, which improved the amount of hyena DNA over bacterial DNA and the quality of the sequencing data”, explains Weyrich.

DNA methylation is a chemical modification of the basic building blocks of a cell's genetic material. This modification is enabled by the transfer of methyl groups to nucleobases at certain positions in the DNA. As the basic structure of the respective nucleobase is unaltered, DNA methylation is not a genetic mutation, but a modification which determines whether this part of the DNA is ‘being used’ (activated) or switched off. DNA methylation is the most important epigenetic modification and thus a pivotal part of making genetic information available to the physiological processes within a cell.

Spotted hyenas are highly social and a model for social status-related differences in life history traits that are accompanied by differences in physiological processes and health. In hyena clans, females and their offspring socially dominate all immigrant males, and social status is behaviourally “inherited” by cubs from mothers who gain privileges associated with maternal social status. “As in some primate species, young hyenas receive social support from their mothers during interactions with group members. From these they learn that they can dominate all individuals which are submissive to their mother, but have to submit to those which their mother is submissive to”, explains East. Therefore, social status is stable and predictable because it is determined by family relationships and behavioural conventions.

“Additionally, the effects of social status on life history trajectories and health are typically passed across generations”, adds Hofer. For example, high-ranking females have priority access to resources in the clan territory and do not need to commute as much as low-ranking females to find food. They are therefore much more often present at the communal den and more frequently nurse their young. The milk-dependent cubs disproportionally benefit at this early stage in their life – by growing faster, having a higher chance of surviving to adulthood and starting reproduction at an earlier age than the offspring of low-ranking females.

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JOURNAL

Communications Biology

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Epigenetic signatures of social status in female free-ranging spotted hyenas (Crocuta Crocuta)

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

28-Mar-2024

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for HYENA 

An Eyewitness Account From the Streets of Haiti

BY ANONYMOUS

 MARCH 22, 2024
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If you had called me yesterday I couldn’t have answered. I was so traumatized. A young friend of my daughter’s called to tell me to pack a bag and he’d pick me up in half an hour and take me elsewhere because they were making their way to our neighborhood. As BBQ had announced last week they were coming to get the bourgeois living in the hills.

I’m at a friend’s now in another neighborhood, but I don t know for how long and don t know if my home will still be habitable after they go through it.

One of my neighbors was home with the kids and her husband had gone to work when they came. She hid with her children and locked the bathroom door, but the attackers fortunately did not get upstairs because the man next door whose yard they had entered shot 2 of them and the others ran. We worry that they’ll come back because along with the gangs come the hoodlums of the nearby slums, armed individuals who follow after the gangs and take advantage of their cracking the homes open to rush in for whatever is left over like vultures or jackals after the lions have fed.

My friend offered me a room in her home in a different neighborhood and I had to bring my maid since I couldn’t leave her alone at their mercy. She’s been living with me for more than two years now since the gang warfare got so bad in her area she had to leave her house.

A friend of mine who lives down the road in the neighborhood they attacked before mine was home with her husband and kids when the guys came to their gate. It was iron and heavy so they were not successful in their attempts to break it.

They called him to the gate and told him it would not be good for him if he didn’t open it cause they knew his wife and kids were in there. He refused and they told him they saw that there were two cars out front and he should put their keys in a bag with his wife’s jewelry and all the money in the house and throw that over the gate and they would leave it at that.  He did what they said and they left. They were some good bandits. That’s why we think the real paramilitary army might be behind in successive waves but we hope and pray.

I don’t really think the Americans told their gangs to go and massacre the bourgeois in the hills, I think the attacks have as a goal to force the Montana Accord alliance and the internationals to accept gang leaders sitting with them at the negotiation table. Give them amnesty and let them take part in the political process to determine the next president.

Since the gangs have been the ones who pay the crowd to take to the streets for the purpose of those who profit from the disorder and in turn pay their gang leader to foment it, they’ll be able to sway whatever elections we’ll have especially since guy Philippe is in alliance with them. That’s my opinion since the Americans have already said they want to see the gang leaders be part of the negotiations. Can you believe it?

In 1995 Aristide asked the US to put an arms embargo on Haiti that is still in place today and that is why the police cannot have new weapons, that is why ordinary people now can’t defend themselves.

Everybody is saying that the Presidential Council nominated by CARICOM, with the stipulation that Haiti accept a foreign intervention, will cause a massive bloodbath because the federated gangs will not accept CARICOM’s choice as they insist on being part of it. The US and its international and Haitian allies have created a monster and now they’re acting as if they didn’t want to meddle.

All Haitian billionaires with foreign passports have flown from the coup on Dominican helicopters to the tune of $10,000 USD a pop.  I’m an American citizen and targeted as the elite but I have nowhere to go in America, all I have is here. Do you think I could pay for such a trip? I have had my business burned down 3 times in the last 15 years during these political upheavals, It got to the point where I can no longer rebuild. I once was part of the upper middle class, now I’m just middle class and trying to hang on.

Those who can afford to pay,  who have friends in high places in the US, those families who have always made and broken presidents, who can bring in weapons to distribute to gangs, who have been doing so since 1995, those who own ports and never pay customs taxes are the impenetrable elite who have not had any of their properties looted or touched, none of their children kidnapped, who are not running for their lives but just leaving the killing field. It’s us who get our kids kidnapped and lose all our savings on the ransom, us who never meddled in politics, who pay our taxes, who pay customs we are the only elite in the world, it has been said, who take showers with one bottle of water.

My kids are gone after losing their retail business which could not function in this atmosphere. My family split apart. And yet I hope and pray.

The gangs who now say they are representing the people first destroyed the peoples’ neighborhoods, their small shops, their street booths. Then they destroyed the lower middle-class neighborhoods, the artists, artisans teachers, nurses and now it’s the bourgeois’ turn.

Look at that hypocrisy. They say they want a man of the people to rule but ever since Papa Doc men of the people have ruled as the puppets of the same international powers who want the minimum wage to remain below 4 dollars, the same families who are paying for their guns today who are giving them money for putting the people out in the streets to demonstrate and get shot by police. The poor are their first victims, they have suffered most at their hands.

Have you noticed in the foreign news recently when the announcer spoke of the US airlifting embassy personnel out of Haiti they slipped in that private planes were coming in to get some American citizens and some Haitian orphans?  Why does no one find this strange?  Every time there is a catastrophe natural or political the missionaries take orphans out of Haiti.

Their fate remains unknown. They haunt us. There is never a follow-up story to tell us what happened to these orphans five or ten years later. The news announcer did not say who those private individuals were but we know who the usual suspects are. It’s  always the same. And now the missionaries Haitian converts have a seat in the CARICOM’s presidential council. No separation of church and state here.

Why doesn’t the foreign press ever ask the right questions, ever?

To the gang leaders they never ask: where did you go to school, where did you learn urban warfare, what is the network through which you get weapons, or the information you use to kidnap people?

Yet foreign journalists are always giving the gangs airtime, always telling us of orphans carried off with no paperwork to better lives. Haitian journalists are starting to ask the right questions and the answers are out there.

Meanwhile, I’m at a friend’s house where no talk of politics is allowed, no news, no comments, no complaints. I’m outside now, under a beautiful sky and it’s quiet. We hope and pray.

The writer lives in the Laboule section of Port Au Prince.

PRO PALESTINE CAMPAIGN 
Left-wing firebrand George Galloway wins UK by-election

WORKERS PARTY OF GB WIN!

AFP Published March 2, 2024 

George Galloway celebrates after winning the by-election, at his campaign headquarters, in Rochdale, near Manchester.—Reuters

ROCHDALE: Left-wing firebrand George Gallo­way was elected to the UK parliament on Friday after tapping into anger over the Israel-Hamas war in a by-election.

Galloway, 69, first became an MP in 1987 and will return to the House of Commons for the first time since 2015 after winning the seat of Roc­hdale, in the north of England, by nearly 6,000 votes.

The vote saw the main opposition Labour party withdraw its candidate, Azhar Ali, after he touted a conspiracy theory that Israel had allowed Hamas to carry out its attack on October 7.

Galloway put the Gaza conflict front and centre of his campaign in Rochdale, which has a 30 per cent Muslim population.

Workers Party leader put Gaza conflict front and centre in his campaign

“Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza,” Galloway, leader of the Workers Party of Great Britain, said in his victory speech, referring to the Labour party’s leader.

“You have paid, and you will pay, a high price for the role that you have played in enabling, encouraging and covering for the catastrophe presently going on in occupied Palestine in the Gaza Strip,” he added.

The Scottish-born Gall­o­way, nicknamed “Gorge­ous George”, has had a long and chequered political career, in which he has represented several parties, including Labour.

He sparked controversy in the 1990s when he visited then-Iraq leader Saddam Hussein, telling him: “Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability”.

Galloway gained international attention in 2005 when he was called to testify over Iraq in the US Senate. He had earlier been expelled from Labour over his stance on the war.

His majority of 5,697 votes in Rochdale amou­nted to 18.3 per cent of the total, on a turnout of 39.7 per cent.

The surprise runner-up was David Tully, a local businessman and independent candidate.

It is very rare for none of the main parties to finish in first and second place.

Published in Dawn, March 2nd, 2024

How Labour has reacted to George Galloway’s by-election win in Rochdale

Galloway overturned Labour's 9,668 majority to win the by-election in the previously Labour safe seat with a majority of 5,697, securing 12,335 votes overall.

Basit Mahmood 

Yesterday
Left Foot Forward

The Labour Party has slammed George Galloway for only being interested in ‘stoking fear and division’, after his victory in the Rochdale by-election.

Galloway overturned Labour’s 9,668 majority to win the by-election in the previously Labour safe seat with a majority of 5,697, securing 12,335 votes overall.

The by-election was triggered when veteran Labour MP and former interim Manchester mayor, Tony Lloyd, died in-post at the age of 73 in January.

The Labour Party had withdrawn support for its own candidate, Azhar Ali, after he was found to have made anti-semitic comments. Despite Labour suspending its former candidate, he still appeared on voting papers in Rochdale under the party banner, because electoral law meant ballot papers could not be changed after publication.

Following Galloway’s victory, the Labour Party said it deeply regretted being unable to field a candidate in the by-election.

A spokesperson said: “We deeply regret that the Labour party was unable to field a candidate in this by-election and apologise to the people of Rochdale. George Galloway only won because Labour did not stand.

“Rochdale deserved the chance to vote for an MP that would bring communities together and deliver for working people. George Galloway is only interested in stoking fear and division. As an MP he will be a damaging force in our communities and public life.

“The Labour party will quickly begin the process to select a new Labour candidate for the general election, and will be campaigning hard to deliver the representation and fresh start that Rochdale deserves.”

Labour MP and deputy national campaign co-ordinator Ellie Reeves apologised on BBC Radio 4 on Friday morning for not having stood an endorsed candidate.

“If Labour had stood, I don’t believe George Galloway would have won. Our job now is to select a Labour candidate for the general election…someone that can work with all the communities in Rochdale to rebuild trust.”

“We ran no campaign there in support of Azhar Ali. We regret that we weren’t able to have a candidate…but it was the right decision.”

A full breakdown of the Rochdale 

by-election results

Galloway overturned Labour’s 9,668 majority to win the by-election

George Galloway has returned to Parliament after winning the Rochdale by election. The by election was triggered when veteran Labour MP Tony Lloyd died in-post at the age of 73 in January.

Galloway overturned Labour’s 9,668 majority to win the by-election in the previously Labour safe seat with a majority of 5,697, securing 12,335 votes overall.

The Labour Party has slammed Galloway for only being interested in ‘stoking fear and division’ after his victory saying that it deeply regretted being unable to field a candidate in the by-election.

An independent candidate, David Tully, finished second on 6,638 votes. The Conservative candidate Paul Ellison finished third on 3,731 votes.

Labour’s former candidate Azhar Ali, who the party withdrew backing for during the campaign because of anti-semitic statements he had made, but who it could not take off the ballot, finished fourth behind the Tories with 2,402 votes – just 7.7% of the vote.

For a full breakdown of the results, see below:

Workers Party: George Galloway – 12,335

Independent: David Tully – 6,638

Conservative: Paul Ellison – 3,731

Labour: Azhar Ali – 2,402

Liberal Democrats: Iain Donaldson – 2,164

Reform UK: Simon Danczuk – 1,968

Independent: William Howarth – 523

Independent: Mark Coleman – 455

Green: Guy Otten – 436

Independent: Michael Howarth – 246

Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward

1st March, 2024,

Rochdale by-election: Results breakdown and analysis as George Galloway says ‘this is for Gaza’

Tom Belger & Morgan Jones

LABOURLIST

John B Hewitt / Shutterstock

George Galloway has won a landslide victory in the Rochdale by-election, saying his victory showed Keir Starmer has paid a “high price” for his stance on the Israel-Palestine conflict as Labour’s suspended candidate slumped to fourth in its former seat.

The controversial politician, standing for the Workers’ Party, got 12,335 votes after a campaign dominated by Gaza, pulling off another insurgent campaign against his former party over its foreign policy by winning a majority of almost 6,000.

An independent candidate, David Tully, finished second on 6,638 votes. The Conservative candidate Paul Ellison finished third on 3,731 votes.

Labour’s former candidate Azhar Ali, who the party withdrew backing for during the campaign but too late to take him off the ballot, finished fourth behind the Tories with 2,402 votes – just 7.7% of the vote.

Former Labour Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk, standing for the Reform Party, got 1,968 votes. He represented the Rochdale constituency between 2010 and 2017.

‘Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza’

The constituency in north-west England was previously seen as a safe Labour seat. The by-election was triggered by the death of local MP Tony Lloyd.

Galloway said in his victory speech: “Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza. You have paid and you will pay for the role you have played in enabling, encouraging and covering for the catastrophe presently going on in occupied Palestine in the Gaza strip.

“The plates have shifted tonight…Keir Starmer’s problems just got 100 times more serious than they were before today.

“This is going to spark a movement, a landslide, a shifting of the tectonic plates in scores of parliamentary constituencies, beginning here in the North West, in the West Midlands, in London, from Ilford to Bethnal Green and Bow, labour is on notice that they have lost the confidence of millions of voters.”

He claimed Muslim voters were “bitterly angry” about Labour, but it would be “foolish” not to think “millions of other citizens” are too.

Ed Owen, a former adviser to New Labour minister Jack Straw, said Galloway’s speech was “full of self-serving arrogance and pomposity” and “overblown rhetoric”.

He said the “poor people of Rochdale” both “can and will get shot of him at general election.”

Galloway vowed to ‘make Rochdale great again’

Highlighting the upcoming local elections, he added: “Rochdale town councillors, I put you on notice that I plan to put together a grand alliance…the councillors have to go.”

Galloway put his victory down to both international and local issues, and called Starmer a “betrayer”.

He said the “heart has been piece by piece removed” from Rochdale, including the 2011 closure of its A&E and ongoing threat to its football club’s future.

One campaign letter to voters pledged to “make Rochdale great again” by bringing back “big names” to the high street and campaigning for health services and Rochdale AFC. It said he believed in “law and order”,  family and Brexit, had “no difficulty defining what a woman is” and would ensure there were “no grooming gangs on my watch”.

‘The lesson is about candidate selection’

Luke Tryl, UK director of More in Common, said it was a “terrible result for main parties”, but “the circumstances mean it is far more likely the lesson here is one about candidate selection and due diligence than about public opinion more broadly”.

Labour MP and deputy national campaign co-ordinator Ellie Reeves apologised on BBC Radio 4 on Friday morning for not having stood an endorsed candidate.

“If Labour had stood, I don’t believe George Galloway would have won. Our job now is to select a Labour candidate for the general election…someone that can work with all the communities in Rochdale to rebuild trust.”

“We ran no campaign there in support of Azhar Ali. We regret that we weren’t able to have a candidate…but it was the right decision.”

“It is impossible to know how Labour would have performed with another candidate that had the party’s backing (although one can reasonably assume a lot better than they did), whereas the Conservative candidate appears to have been the victim of the national swing.”

Pollster Joe Twyman of Deltapoll said the decline of the Labour, Tory and Lib Dem vote marked a “stunning change”, falling from 89.8% in 2019 to just 26.7%.

A contest between former Labour politicians

Galloway compared himself to former prime minister Winston Churchill in winning in multiple constituencies, saying he had “bettered” his record by being elected three times “outside the parameters of the great parties of state”.

Galloway, a prominent critic of former Labour prime minister Tony Blair over the Iraq war, served as a Labour MP between 1987 and 2003, representing Glasgow Kelvin. He was elected for the Respect Party in 2005, representing Bethnal Green and Bow until 2010, and was again elected to parliament at the 2012 Bradford West by-election, but lost the seat in 2015.

Azhar Ali’s suspension from Labour mid-campaign came after he apologised “unreservedly” when the Mail on Sunday alleged he told a meeting last year that Israel “allowed” Hamas’ attack on October 7th in order to get a “green light to do whatever they bloody want”.

The comments by the former Lancashire Labour group leader sparked heavy criticism, including from Labour itself. Shadow minister Nick Thomas-Symonds told broadcasters Ali’s words were “completely wrong”, and “in no way represent” Labour’s views. The Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester called the reported comments a “conspiratorial narrative”, “highly offensive” and “completely fictitious”.

The comments emerged on February 10th. On February 12th Labour announced that it would not support Ali at the by-election, leaving it without a candidate as it was too late for a new one to be added to ballot papers. A spokesman for the party said it followed “new information about further comments made by Azhar Ali coming to light”, but the decision not to act earlier sparked heavy media criticism.

Tom Belger is editor of LabourList.

Morgan Jones

Morgan Jones is a freelance journalist and former LabourList reporter. She also writes LabourList's book review column.@j0ne_s_View all articles by Morgan Jones

Rochdale by-election: George Galloway wins as voters punish Starmer

The Rochdale by-election was a referendum on Rishi Sunak’s and Keir Starmer’s support for Israel’s genocide

People voting in the Rochdale by-election were furious at Keir Starmer’s support for Israel (Picture: Guy Smallman)

By Charlie Kimber
SOCIALIST WORKER 
Friday 01 March 2024

George Galloway has stormed to victory in the Rochdale by-election, winning by almost 6,000 votes. He received 12,335 votes, while the candidate with Labour next to his name on the ballot paper took only 2,402 and came fourth with less than 8 percent of the vote.

Labour’s 9,668-vote majority melted away because of the rage over Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians and Labour’s support for it.

On Friday morning Galloway, the Workers Party of Britain candidate, said, “Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza. You have paid and you will pay a high price for the role you have played in enabling, encouraging and covering for the catastrophe in occupied Palestine in the Gaza Strip.”

It was a direct echo of 2005 when Galloway won the Bethnal Green constituency in east London for the anti-war Respect party against Tony Blair’s Labour. Then he exclaimed, “Mr Blair, this is for Iraq. All the people you killed, all the lies you told have come back to haunt you.”

In Rochdale, all the main parties saw a juddering fall in their vote. David Tully, a “local lad” and “community champion” standing as an independent, came second.

There will be much talk in the media and from politicians about Muslims flooding out for Galloway. But why shouldn’t Muslims vote for a pro-Palestine candidate and one who opposes Islamophobia? And it’s also not true that Muslims all think the same way. Many vote Labour and some vote Tory.

Galloway also gained votes from non-Muslims who support what he says about Gaza and other issues.

The election reflected the disarray in British politics. Azhar Ali appeared on the ballot paper as the Labour candidate. But on 12 February Labour said it had “withdrawn support” for him after comments he made regarding Israel and alleged antisemitism.

Labour will try to say it would have won with a proper candidate. But the anger of Gaza might well have swept away an officially-supported Labour one and triggered an even greater crisis for Starmer.

Simon Danczuk, the Reform UK racist party’s candidate, was elected as Rochdale’s Labour MP in 2010. He was suspended from the Labour Party in 2015 over allegations of what he called “inappropriate behaviour”. This followed reports he had exchanged explicit messages with a 17-year-old girl. It’s heartening that Danczuk did badly.

The Green candidate stepped down near the start of the campaign after he was discovered to have previously criticised Palestinians and Islam. Nobody, at any point, thought the Tory had a chance, despite coming second last time.

Galloway has ridden the Palestinian movement of the last five months and given it a focus. It is indeed a rejection of Starmer. But Galloway says it is not a one-off.

He said after his victory, “I want to tell Mr Starmer above all, that the plates have shifted tonight. This is going to spark a movement, a landslide, a shifting of the tectonic plates in scores of parliamentary constituencies.

“Beginning here in the north west, in the West Midlands, in London, from Ilford to Bethnal Green and Bow, Labour is on notice that they have lost the confidence of millions of their voters who loyally and traditionally voted for them, generation after generation.”

Galloway senses a mood in Britain and sees himself as central to creating a different kind of non-Labour left.

But the Palestinian movement deserves a far better expression than Galloway’s “for the workers, not the wokers” politics.

There was a revealing moment during the Rochdale count. Reform UK leader Richard Tice claimed abuse of postal voting and intimidation of Danczuk and his team.

Galloway replied, “I think Mr Tice has rather lost his balance, and Mr Farage too. And I remind Mr Tice that I have on my telephone a text from him inviting me to be the Reform UK candidate in a by-election not that long ago.”

This is most revealing about Galloway. It’s a condemnation that such a rotten racist party could have wooed him. Nick Griffin, former leader of the Nazi BNP, felt able to call for a Galloway vote in Rochdale as “the best way by far to stick two fingers up to the political elite.

Galloway is not a racist, but such support is telling. The problem with Galloway was summed-up by two letters he sent out to voters.

One said, “To the voters of the Muslim faith in Rochdale. The killing of thousands of our brothers and sisters in Gaza is a war crime, and Israel must be held to account.


Islamophobia, Palestine and a rotten system

“If Labour lose this by-election, Sir Keir Starmer could well be forced out as Labour leader. Sir Keir Starmer, a top supporter of Israel.”

But another letter, aimed at a different audience, said, “First and foremost, I believe in Britain. I believe in family. I am a father of six children. And I don’t like some of the things they are teaching our children.

“I believe in men and women. God created everything in pairs. Unlike the mainstream parties, I have no difficulty in defining what a woman is. A man cannot become a woman just by declaring as such.

“I believe in law and order. I will fight for more and smarter policing. There will be no grooming gangs on my watch. Even if I have to arrest them myself. MAKE ROCHDALE GREAT AGAIN.”

One is an anti-imperialist rallying cry. The other is a stark example of how he plays with a right wing agenda.

We need a left that fights for Palestine—and also combats all forms of oppression. And the most important direction for those who have marched over Gaza is in the streets, not the ballot box.

GEORGE GALLOWAY BANNED FROM CANADA 

BY TORY GOVERNMENT  

Theguardian.com

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2009/mar/20/george-galloway-banned-canada

George Galloway banned from Canada - The Guardian 

Mar 20, 2009 ... ... government, institution or process as they are understood in Canada;. (b) engaging in or instigating the subversion by force of any government ...

Cp24.com

https://www.cp24.com/mobile/canada-bans-outspoken-british-mp-1.381372?cache=yesclipId10406200text/html;charset=utf-80404/7.549035

Canada bans outspoken British MP | CP24.com 

Mar 20, 2009 ... ... George Galloway from Canada despite opposition claims of censorship. ... Harper's government has also waged a long-running battle with Arab ...

Theglobeandmail.com

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-mp-takes-canadian-ban-to-court/article20442095

British MP takes Canadian ban to court - The Globe and Mail 

Mar 25, 2009 ... Supporters of George Galloway say the ban has no legal justification ... Harper's government's direction on war," said Ms. Chow, an NDP MP ...

ON THE OTHER HAND

Opinion Byelections


After George Galloway’s triumph in Rochdale, urgent questions loom for Keir Starmer – and the left, too

Labour’s leader has left Muslim supporters disenchanted. And the left must think hard about what happens when his approach unravels

Owen Jones

THE GUARDIAN
Fri 1 Mar 2024 

When Keir Starmer’s political project comes crashing down, as one day it will, George Galloway’s Rochdale triumph should be remembered as a portent. For hardcore Starmerites, this assertion is easily dismissed. Courtesy of the Tories’ comprehensive self-immolation, Labour is heading for a crushing landslide victory. With an average 19-point lead – an undeniably stunning turnaround from the party’s 2019 rout – there is no sign of the usual polling swingback a government enjoys in election year. Rishi Sunak is an inept prime minister leading an intellectually exhausted government, devoid of any ideas except doubling down on the same policies that left Britain with an unprecedented squeeze in living standards, stagnant growth and a shrivelled public realm. When Starmer becomes prime minister in November, as he almost certainly will, he is unlikely to be worrying much about Rochdale, which may well return to the Labour fold in a general election anyway.

Well, such complacency may prove a mistake. The Labour candidate was, of course, belatedly disowned by the national leadership after claiming that Israel deliberately allowed the 7 October atrocities to happen, and deploying a crude antisemitic trope about the influence of “certain Jewish quarters” in the media. Labour – which has today apologised to the people of Rochdale for failing to offer a viable Labour candidate – will easily dismiss the candidate’s derisory vote, and yet overall turnout – nearly 40% – was actually higher for than the last three byelections. This means that, despite some demoralised voters staying at home in a farcical election, Galloway won far more votes than the Labour, Tory and Liberal Democrat candidates combined: that is, he clearly enjoyed an enthused turnout, many rallied by the message summed up at his victory speech: “Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza.” Labour says Galloway won because there was no Labour candidate. That is highly debatable.

This is all despite the fact that Galloway – despite being a compelling orator and a formidable campaigner – is, to say the least, a controversial figure, bitterly rejected by most of the left (myself included) on account of, say, voting Conservative in Scotland, appalling comments about rape, sidling up to Nigel Farage in the Brexit referendum campaign, and issuing statements such as: “As a father of six children, I’m socially conservative. I don’t want my children taught the kind of things Labour wants to teach them in schools.”

Undoubtedly, many who plumped for him are Muslim – understandably more aggrieved than the average Briton about Israel’s slaughter of mostly Muslim Palestinians. But Rochdale has a significantly smaller Muslim population than other seats Galloway has successfully contested, and he won wider support, too. That he specifically sought support from Muslim voters has been portrayed as somehow tawdry: this itself is testament to how mainstream Islamophobia is in Britain, as though seeking to address specific concerns of Muslim voters were not legitimate.

The truth is that Muslim voters are an important and growing plank of Labour’s electoral coalition, but the party treats them with contempt – as voting fodder who are otherwise an embarrassment to it. Consider the case of the former Labour minister Phil Woolas, who in 2010 had his victory in Oldham – 6 miles from Rochdale – overturned by a court when he was found to have stoked religious tensions to win by distributing a deeply Islamophobic leaflet. Some parliamentary colleagues leapt to his defence. In the brutal Batley and Spen byelection in 2021 – in which Labour defeated Galloway – party sources reportedly briefed that antisemitism among Muslim voters was losing Labour support, and boasted that they’d won Tory voters at the expense of the “conservative Muslim vote over gay rights and Palestine”. According to a survey of Muslim Labour members in 2022, 46% felt Starmer had handled Islamophobia “very badly”, with a further 18% opting for “quite badly”. When predominantly Muslim councillors resigned in disgust at Gaza, a party source reportedly bragged they were “shaking off the fleas”.


What are the main U-turns Labour has made under Keir Starmer


But it’s not just about Muslim voters, important though that is. It was Iraq that toxified Tony Blair among swathes of Labour’s natural electoral coalition. That was after he had been prime minister for many years. For Starmer, this has happened in opposition: 52% of voters think Starmer is doing badly as Labour leader, with just 33% saying he is doing well: remarkable for a man almost inevitably destined for No 10. Why? Because Starmer deceitfully abandoned his solemn promises – “pledges”, he called them – in his leadership campaign, such as taxing the rich, public ownership of utilities, scrapping tuition fees and much else. He failed to then develop an alternative vision, even going so far as to trash his more recent flagship £28bn green investment fund. He has promised to keep Tory policies that drive children into poverty, while refusing to reintroduce the bankers’ bonus cap, and has locked the party into keeping arbitrary fiscal rules that spell continuing austerity. In comments on Gaza, Starmer said that Israel had a right to cut off water and energy; he later said that he did not believe that. He has presided over mass resignations and sackings of opponents, and he sabotaged an SNP motion condemning Israel for collective punishment.

Labour’s support is soft and superficial, driven almost entirely by revulsion at the Tories’ calamitous spell in office. We can see in Germany and the US how similar political projects came to power with the promise of offering stability, but both countries face acute political crises. And so the left – hounded by the Labour leadership as it is – needs to make tough decisions. Does it wait for either the likes of Galloway or the far right to fill the vacuum when mass disillusionment with Starmer’s government inevitably kicks in? Better to start asking some tough questions about what to do next.

Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist

Opinion  George Galloway

George Galloway stands accused of profiting from the pain of Gaza – and rightly so. But he is not the only one

The new Rochdale MP is hardly unique. He is just highly adept at swimming in the toxic swamp that is so much of our politics

Jonathan Freedland
THE GUARDIAN 
Fri 1 Mar 202


You’re going to hear a lot of talk about George Galloway in the coming days, much of it negative and almost all of it true. But there will be one charge thrown at the new member for Rochdale – winner of a byelection victory yesterday as sweeping as the triumph he recorded in Bradford West more than a decade ago – that will be false and unfair.

Start with the accusations that stand up. Galloway poses as a man of the left – his latest vehicle is called the Workers party of Britain. But he backed Nigel Farage’s Brexit party (now Reform) in 2019 – the pair had appeared together, during the 2016 referendum campaign, laughing and smiling – and the Conservatives in Scotland in 2021. You did not misread that sentence: George Galloway voted Tory only three years ago.

The right are more comfortable with Galloway than you might expect. In Rochdale, he won the warm endorsement of Nick Griffin, the former leader of the British National party. “George Galloway isn’t just right on keeping us out of Zionist wars,” wrote Griffin. “He also understands the position of working class white Brits on immigration.” Offered the chance to reject that support on Radio 4’s Today programme yesterday, Galloway’s deputy – the former MP Chris Williamson, who was suspended from Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party over comments he made about antisemitism – pointedly refused. You may also have seen the photographs of Galloway apparently bonding with Steve Bannon, a one-time Trump lieutenant and current peddler of online conspiracy theories.

Others will remind you of Galloway’s employment history, and those facts will also be true. He did serve as a well-remunerated presenter for Press TV and Russia Today (RT), mouthpieces of Tehran and Vladimir Putin respectively – hardly a surprise given his admiration for a string of tyrannical regimes. In 1994, he stood before Saddam Hussein of Iraq, the man who had jailed, tortured and killed so many of his own people, and declared: “Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability.” In 2002, he told this newspaper that “the disappearance of the Soviet Union is the biggest catastrophe of my life.” When an estimated 1,300 Syrians were killed by chemical weapons in the Damascus suburb of Ghouta, Galloway did not, as most did, blame Bashar al-Assad – who he had long praised for his “dignity” – but rather pointed the finger at an imagined, if improbable, alliance of al-Qaida and … Israel. He offered no evidence, but that was his “theory”.

Indeed, given his determination to cast himself as a defender of Muslims – a pitch that paid great dividends in Rochdale – it’s striking how often he lines up behind those who kill, maim or oppress Muslims, even in their hundreds of thousands. In 2020, Galloway used his platform on RT to dismiss the copious evidence of China’s persecution of an estimated one million Uyghur Muslims: “There are no concentration camps in China,” he said, merely “re-education centres” for terrorists that humanely seek to draw them away from the path of extremism.

So he should not be confused for any kind of progressive. Doubt over that question was surely set aside in 2012 when he defended Julian Assange, then facing allegations of rape, by announcing that any accusation would be rendered absurd if there had first been an act of consensual sex. As he memorably put it, “I mean, not everybody needs to be asked prior to each insertion.” If campaigners against sexual violence disliked that, LGBTQ+ advocates might similarly recoil from some intriguing lines that appeared in Galloway’s election literature in Rochdale. “I believe in family … I believe in men and women. God created everything in pairs.”

He likes to boast that he is an implacable foe of racism. Yet he was fired by Talk Radio in 2019 over a tweet the station deemed antisemitic. After Tottenham, a north London club with a strong Jewish following, lost in the Champions League final, Galloway posted: “No #Israël flags on the Cup!” (Note the umlaut with its whispered hint of Germany, scarcely a shock from a man who’s long been fond of comparing Israel to the Nazis – a comparison that is specifically cited in the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism.)

In short, much of what you hear about Galloway from his detractors will be true. Where, then, is the falsehood? What is the unmerited charge laid against him?

It is the claim that he is somehow uniquely guilty of exploiting the pain of Gaza for political gain. Don’t get me wrong, he is certainly using that agony for his own advantage. He targeted the Muslim voters of Rochdale, sending them a flyer that did not mention re-opening the local maternity hospital, securing the future of the local football club or luring Primark to the town – all of which featured on the leaflet aimed at everyone else – but instead focused solely on Gaza. No, the flaw in the claim is the notion that Galloway is unique in what he’s doing.

He’s louder than others and his rhetoric is more florid – but the grim truth is that, when it comes to using the horror of the Israel-Hamas war, and all the fear and loathing that has stirred up in this country, Galloway is far from alone.

The former Conservative party deputy chair Lee Anderson was playing the same game when he baselessly accused Sadiq Khan of being so in thrall to his Islamist “mates” that he was failing to police pro-Palestinian demonstrations in London sufficiently harshly. Anderson was trying to whip up anti-Muslim sentiment, following a lead set by Suella Braverman when she spoke of “hate marches” and “mobs” – and followed again, if codedly, by Rishi Sunak in his address outside Downing Street late on Friday. He, too, attacked the marchers, warning against the threat extremism and bigotry pose to democracy – a bit rich given his indulgence of extremism and bigotry within his own party and his inability to call Anderson’s anti-Muslim prejudice by its name. Still, the prime minister can glimpse some favourable battlelines for the coming general election campaign and didn’t want to let the opportunity slip. Sunak, Braverman and Anderson all affect to have the purest motives – offering themselves as protectors of British Jews in particular, as that community faces a record surge of antisemitism – but, like Galloway, they’re in the exploitation business. Others’ pain is their gain.

They are the crudest practitioners, but they are not the only ones. The MPs of the Scottish National party are, of course, sincere in their outrage at the plight of Gaza. But few would argue that the ceasefire motion they tabled last week – which triggered such ructions in the Commons – was aimed solely at helping Palestinians in need. It was also designed to expose and widen the rift within the ranks of their electoral rivals, Labour. Meanwhile, Labour and the Conservatives plotted their own procedural moves thinking less of the Middle East than of the great Westminster game.

As it happens, this week a few members of the Commons foreign affairs committee sat in a modest room and took evidence from Israelis and Palestinians about how Britain might actually do something useful to end the bloodshed. The discussion was serious and practical – and delivered precisely zero attention or political benefit to those involved. If you want to profit from all this death and destruction, it seems the trick is not to try to solve the problem – it’s to capitalise on it, to take all that grief and heartache and trade on it.

So, yes, Galloway has a record that brims with poison. But he is not quite the outlier we might wish him to be. He was always a demagogue and a populist, and now our politics is crammed with such people: “Make Rochdale Great Again” was his slogan, a knowing, admiring nod to Donald Trump. As for what looks like a habit of swooping down to prey on those in pain, pitting community against community – well, maybe that once set him apart. But vultures are all around us now.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

Being anti-Labour doesn't put Galloway on the left
 28 February, 2024 - Author: Simon Nelson



The Trade Union and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) and the Socialist Party have endorsed George Galloway in the Rochdale by-election. Galloway’s former allies and bag-carriers in Respect, the SWP, have refused to do so.

Already, in 2022, the TUSC steering committee gave “observer status” to the Workers’ Party of Britain (WPB), formed as an alliance between Galloway and the Stalin-Society-supporting Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist). They have since fallen out.

Former MP Chris Williamson had already been wooed by the SP when he had his own vehicle, Resist. He is now in the WPB.

Clive Heemskerk of the SP and TUSC notes that “some on the left” criticised TUSC when the WPB gained observer status. Workers’ Liberty supporters in the RMT union, which was then affiliated to TUSC, had also criticised TUSC for taking in Williamson and Sian Bloor, a conspiracy theorist from Resist. RMT disaffiliated from TUSC in 2022 (and had been little involved for a while). SP and TUSC seem desperate to find others to link up, as bad as Galloway and Williamson, as long as they are anti-Labour.

Very little of what the WPB stands for is in tune with the SP’s proclaimed policies. The WPB is “for the workers not the wokers”, a tagline that can only put candidates on the wrong side of the “culture wars” on trans rights or the “Black Lives Matter” protests. It offers up “a migration policy that reflects the anxiety felt among the working class about an influx of migrants which appears to be out of control”. It warns against “apocalyptic Green hysteria that floods our media” and says there is “no need to be rushed” into a green economy.

The Socialist Party repeats the idea that Galloway is an “anti-war” candidate. What about Ukraine or Syria?

The SP claims a victory for Galloway would send an important message to the pro-capitalist parties in Westminster. Galloway himself confesses to a lavish lifestyle, pocketing hundreds of thousands when he was on an MP’s salary. He is far from the “workers’ MP on a worker’s wage” as which TUSC national chair Dave Nellist won respect.

The SP endorsement also comes dangerously close to backing the very same conspiracy theory as Azhar Ali used while still a Labour candidate, endorsing the idea that Israel deliberately had lax security at the Gaza border before 7 October in “the hope of a pretext to go to war”.

Charging Netanyahu with overconfidence and complacency before 7 October is one thing: this claim is quite another. It suggests that the SP is falling into the sphere of influence of Williamson and Galloway further than they realise.

Who is George Galloway?

20 February, 2024 -Author: Simon Nelson



As we go to press, George Galloway is the bookmakers’ favourite for the Rochdale by-election (29 February), and has been backed by the Socialist Party. But he is not fit to become an MP yet again.

He first became an MP for Labour in 1987. He was at best soft-left, by no means an outstanding rebel, with a strong Stalinist tinge such as had been relatively common among MPs for some time. As he has developed a distinctive individual profile as an “anti-imperialist”, he has become a bad smell the left seems unwilling to get rid of.

While on a delegation of European MPs to Iraq in 1994 he spoke the words that should follow him to his death, to Iraqi dictator and butcher Saddam Hussein. “Sir, we salute your courage, your strength and your indefatigability.” While presenting Hussein with a pennant from Palestinian youth in the West Bank he added “we are with you” and then in Arabic, “Until Victory! Until Jerusalem”.

We called for his local Labour Party to dump him. But he and others portrayed his pro-Saddam war-mongering rhetoric as a matter of being a great fighter for the Palestinians and a trenchant critic of Bush’s 2003 invasion of Iraq.

In reality Galloway has been a mercenary self-promoter, serving different imperialisms of his choice against others: Iraq and Iran against Israel and the US. Russia against Ukraine.

From 1996 he got money from two successive Pakistani governments to run a newspaper in London (East) aimed to back Pakistani policies in Kashmir. The paper folded after a Newsnight exposé.

He was kicked out of the Labour Party in 2003 for calling for troops to defy orders in Iraq. In 1998 he had launched the Mariam Appeal, notionally to pay for the cancer treatment of an Iraqi child and then provide other medications to Iraq. Galloway was able to spend much of the money raised on overseas trips by himself, which included Christmas lunch with Saddam Hussein’s foreign minister Tariq Aziz. When challenged about the funding, he said that most of it came from the United Arab Emirates or from a businessman trading with Iraq, and he didn’t know the businessman got money from the Iraqi regime.

Even before he became an MP, his time as general secretary of War on Want, 1983-7, ended with criticism of his spending. Later, when he became MP for Bradford West (2012-5) he pocketed another £265,000 from TV presenting. He earnt £150,000 from a previous appearance on Celebrity Big Brother.

His prominence in the Stop the War coalition was at its height in 2003, and then he helped to break up the Socialist Alliance, a short-lived coalition of almost the whole radical activist left. The SWP, which was the biggest component in the Alliance, wooed Galloway. Workers’ Liberty denounced that wooing. At the time, almost all other left groups denounced us as “sectarian” for doing so, but we believe we have been vindicated.

With a new electoral vehicle, Respect, or rather, “Respect (George Galloway)”, Galloway won Bethnal Green and Bow in the 2005 general election. He turned against the SWP, which had provided foot-soldiers for Respect, in 2007. The rump Respect which he ran after that wound up, after scandals, in 2016.

While a Bradford MP he also suggested that Julian Assange could not have been guilty of rape because these allegations were not rape, “as anyone with an sense can possibly recognise it”. He added: “I mean, not everybody needs to be asked priort to each insertion”. He has long been opposed to abortion rights and has proudly used his stance to show that he is “not as left wing as you think”.

He had paid little attention to Bradford or to parliament since being elected. Losing the seat to Labour in the 2015 general election. He has been active as a media figure on RT, the Russian state international broadcaster, and since 2019 as the head of the “anti-woke”, Stalinoid Workers Party of Great Britain.

We hope he will not be able to reactivate his parliamentary career from Rochdale. Whatever about that, he has no place in the left.

The Alliance for Workers’ Liberty: who we are, what we do

Contact us
Alliance for Workers' Liberty
20E Tower Workshops
Riley Road
London SE1 3DG
Phone: 020 7394 8923
Email: awl@workersliberty.org

What we stand for

Today one class, the working class, lives by selling its labour power to another, the capitalist class, which owns the means of production.

Capitalists’ control over the economy and their relentless drive to increase their wealth causes poverty, unemployment, blighting of lives by overwork; imperialism, environmental destruction and much else.

The working class must unite to struggle against the accumulated wealth and power of the capitalists, in the workplace and wider society.

The Alliance for Workers’ Liberty wants socialist revolution: collective ownership of industry and services, workers’ control, and a democracy much fuller than the present system, with elected representatives recallable at any time and an end to bureaucrats’ and managers’ privileges.

We fight for trade unions and the Labour Party to break with “social partnership” with the bosses, to militantly assert working-class interests.

In workplaces, trade unions, and Labour organisations; among students; in local campaigns; on the left and in wider political alliances we stand for:
• Independent working-class representation in politics
• A workers’ government, based on and accountable to the labour movement
• A workers’ charter of trade union rights — to organise, strike, picket effectively, and take solidarity action
• Taxing the rich to fund good public services, homes, education and jobs for all
• Workers’ control of major industries and finance for a rapid transition to a green society
• A workers’ movement that fights all forms of oppression
• Full equality for women, and social provision to free women from domestic labour. Reproductive freedoms and free abortion on demand.
• Full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people
• Black and white workers’ unity against racism
• Open borders
• Global solidarity against global capital — workers everywhere have more in common with each other than with their capitalist or Stalinist rulers
• Democracy at every level of society, from the smallest workplace or community to global social organisation
• Equal rights for all nations, against imperialists and predators big and small
• Maximum left unity in action, and full openness in debate