A turbulent 2008 beckons

The coming year is certain to be one of the most turbulent for a generation in terms of economic, social and political instability, particularly in Britain. While they undoubtedly present themselves as dangers and threats to people’s jobs and livelihoods, the new conditions also open up the possibility of shaping the future in a way that reflects the aspirations of the powerless majority.

At the heart of the matter is, of course, the crisis in the global capitalist financial system and its growing impact on the economy in general. We are witnessing the early moments of the unravelling of a period of economic growth constructed like a house of cards, with debt as its less-than-solid foundations.

The collapse of Northern Rock in Britain is only one example of what is to come in 2008. In the United States, several banks including Merrill Lynch, are in serious difficulties. Executives gave up their Christmas turkey to spend the holidays desperately trying to raise new capital for the ailing bank. John Thain, the new chief executive held talks with Chinese and Middle Eastern state-controlled sovereign wealth funds that could lead to the sale of another big stake in the bank.

Reports are mounting that Merrill Lynch will be forced to write down between $10bn and $15bn worth of assets related to CDOs - so called collateralised debt obligations - when it reports financial results next month. But the value of these assets is falling day by day – if buyers can be found at all – as the financial system remains log jammed by the so-called credit crunch. What Merrill Lynch is facing – just like banks around the world - therefore, is a solvency crisis. That’s why attempts by the world’s central banks to increase liquidity have had no real impact.

An economic system founded on credit and its twin brother debt, must plunge towards slump as lending is cut back and loans called in. No wonder then that New Labour prime minister Gordon Brown fears for the worst. Already wounded by his opponents, Brown insisted that "with unbending determination, in 2008, we will steer a course of stability through global financial turbulence" just as “we withstood the Asia crisis, the American recession, the end of the IT bubble and the trebling of oil prices”.

This is more of the same wishful thinking that led his government to ignore the warning signs at Northern Rock. It is also a distinctly rosy view of history. The trebling of oil prices in 1973 led to a period of social instability that lasted until the late 1980s. Two governments – Heath’s in 1974 and Callaghan’s in 1979 – were brought down by resistance to the impact of the economic slump and renegade MI5 and army officers seriously plotted a coup.

Furthermore, the British economy has lived beyond its means on a greater scale than anyone has previously understood. Figures released just before Christmas show that the gap between imports and exports is now a staggering 5.7% of gross domestic product – just as big as America’s and twice the level earlier estimates suggested. Stephen King, managing director of economics at HSBC, noted in The Independent (December 24): “And just like the US, the UK economy has motored along on a diet of debt and ever-rising house prices. To claim, then, that the sub-prime and credit crisis was born in the United States along is nonsense.”

Brown may want to portray himself as the politician who can guide the country through the crisis. But the truth is that events are largely out of his control. The same market forces that he encouraged as chancellor now dominate and will decide the fate of his government as well as the economy in general. The evolving crisis offers real opportunities to campaign for and create a new chapter in history, based on sustainable economic and political, democratic alternatives to the madness of the capitalist market economy and the corporate state. Building the membership and influence of A World to Win will be crucial in ensuring this project’s successful outcome.


Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

The other Bethlehem story

The Palestinians of Bethlehem, which according to the Gospels is the birthplace of Jesus of Nazareth, have waited and struggled a long time for their freedom. Rulers down the ages have included the Romans, Persians, Crusaders, Ottomans, Egyptians, British, Jordanians and, to date, the Israelis who captured the town in 1967.

The Israelis have built a wall which runs along on the northern side of the town’s built-up area and getting to nearby Jerusalem means obtaining a permit and passing through Israeli checkpoints. Not surprisingly, the numbers of Christians who are able to visit the Church of the Nativity at Christmas have plummeted.

How many more Christmases will the Palestinians of Bethlehem – who include one of the oldest Christian communities in the Middle East – have to endure occupation? The recent negotiations in the US between Israel and the Palestinian Authority ended without progress. That was inevitable. A large section of the Palestinians, the Gazans, were not even represented at the talks as their elected Hamas leadership is deemed unacceptable to Washington, which props up the Israeli regime with guns and funds.

The territories captured by Israel in 1967 are now so riddled with settlements, roads, checkpoints and the infamous wall, that drawing the boundaries of an integrated Palestinian state is simply an impossible task. In other words, a two-state “solution” is now history. Increasing numbers of Palestinians and Israelis now see that a single, secular state, that would embrace all the people in the area, is the only practical way forward. A One State Declaration was issued recently following conferences in Madrid and London. Endorsed by both Palestinians and Israelis, as well as by people from around the world, it says:

• The historic land of Palestine belongs to all who live in it and to those who were expelled or exiled from it since 1948, regardless of religion, ethnicity, national origin or current citizenship status;
• Any system of government must be founded on the principle of equality in civil, political, social and cultural rights for all citizens. Power must be exercised with rigorous impartiality on behalf of all people in the diversity of their identities;

• There must be just redress for the devastating effects of decades of Zionist colonization in the pre- and post-state period, including the abrogation of all laws, and ending all policies, practices and systems of military and civil control that oppress and discriminate on the basis of ethnicity, religion or national origin;

• The recognition of the diverse character of the society, encompassing distinct religious, linguistic and cultural traditions, and national experiences;

• The creation of a non-sectarian state that does not privilege the rights of one ethnic or religious group over another and that respects the separation of state from all organized religion;

• The implementation of the Right of Return for Palestinian refugees in accordance with UN Resolution 194 is a fundamental requirement for justice, and a benchmark of the respect for equality;

• The creation of a transparent and non-discriminatory immigration policy;

• The recognition of the historic connections between the diverse communities inside the new, democratic state and their respective fellow communities outside;

• In articulating the specific contours of such a solution, those who have been historically excluded from decision-making -- especially the Palestinian Diaspora and its refugees, and Palestinians inside Israel -- must play a central role;

• The establishment of legal and institutional frameworks for justice and reconciliation.

The more support this statement of principles gathers, the greater are the prospects that the Palestinians of Bethlehem and other towns and villages under occupation will win their freedom.

Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

Our next blog will be published on December 31. Seasonal greetings to all our readers.

Cultural apartheid

Disbelief all around has greeted the announcement that the Arts Council of England (ACE) is axing a fifth of the organisations it helps to fund. And it is not simply the loss of financial support that has angered arts practitioners, but the way in which the cuts have been made. The Arts Council only gave arts bodies 18 working days to lodge an appeal, after sending them a letter last week – what a nice Christmas present! Some are being forced to issue redundancy letters to staff because the cuts could mean they are trading while insolvent.

ACE chief executive, Peter Hewitt, who draws a salary of upwards of £152,000 per year, justified the withdrawal of arts funding from almost 200 organisations on grounds of “artistic concerns”. A spokeswoman for ACE claimed the distribution of funds was based on “the strength of the artistic output”. Hiding behind the spurious grounds of artistic quality, the cuts have a sinister logic. They damage areas of the country where arts provision is already spread thin.

The Northcott theatre in Exeter will lose the £547,000 ACE grant from April 2009, one third of its annual income – even though it has just undergone a £2.1m refurbishment! It is the only producing theatre between Plymouth and Bristol. In addition, the Bristol Old Vic, one of the oldest theatres in the UK, closed since July, may not be able to re-open. The smaller and the most vulnerable venues, whether in London or around the country, have been targeted in a sorry tale of bullying.

Two organisations promoting gay and lesbian events, Queer Up North and The Drill Hall in London, are being hit particularly hard. Funding for the Drill Hall is to be withdrawn within three months. Its chair Russell Gilderson has pointed out that the £250,000 cut will take place at a time when the Arts Council has the second highest number of staff in its history. “It calls itself the national arts development agency, but no one has ever seen a single national arts development strategy… And more to the point, exactly how does ACE see this as taking the arts forward into a climate of greater inclusion?” he said in a letter to The Guardian.

A small but extremely active and original company in London, the Bubble Theatre is appealing against a £420,000 cut in funding. Its chair, Sandy Craig, says: “We’ll have to close. I feel very angry. I feel there has been no process of consultation…” On a tiny budget, the Bubble runs four youth theatres, two adult theatre groups and one intergenerational band. It also works in 33 schools, attracting 43% of its participants from black, minority ethnic and refugee communities.

Director Jonathan Petherbridge said he was “gob smacked” by ACE’s claim that they had taken into account “the need to increase engagement and participation”. He told A World to Win: “If we want to build a broad theatre, we need to include a broad swathe of people. These decisions are being made by a narrow section of people for a narrow section of society. Instead of a diverse theatre, we will end up with boring theatre.”

In a fatuous speech at Tate Modern earlier this year, ex-PM Blair claimed that the arts would not suffer as a result of Olympics spending. Well, while it’s true that some major arts organisations will continue to benefit, New Labour is cutting off the oxygen to a host of truly creative organisations that have reached out to new audiences in culturally deprived areas. That is the real logic of the cultural apartheid underlying the Arts Council’s bureaucratic madness.

Corinna Lotz
AWTW secretary

Throwing good money after bad

The government certainly has got its priorities right at this time of giving. Forget those on disability benefits or older people struggling to pay for their care. Don’t bother about hard-pressed commuters facing sharp fare rises in January or people who can’t pay their mortgages. Don’t even worry about soldiers doing your dirty work in Afghanistan with second-rate equipment. But do show a great deal of concern, backed by large sums of money, about bankers.

Yesterday New Labour gave another hand-out to Northern Rock in a desperate move to keep the failed mortgage bank going so that it can be sold on. Brown’s business government announced that guarantees to the beleaguered bank could rise to £57 billion - almost as much as the annual Whitehall education budget and twice as much as originally laid out. That means that each taxpayer has loaned – without being asked and without any guarantees of repayment - the equivalent of £1,800. Were it so easy for ordinary people to get such easy money from the state just when they need it!

The government clearly fears that the collapse of Northern Rock would be a calamity so is prepared to risk all to take on the bank’s liabilities without gaining any legal control through nationalisation. In fact, the government has handed out more money, this time to Goldman Sachs for advice on how it can avoid state ownership of Northern Rock! The problem for the government and the financial industry as a whole is that the sale of Northern Rock is being held up by the so-called credit crunch. Banks who are interested in acquiring Northern Rock will have to borrow money to carry through the purchase. But the money markets are somewhat paralysed at the moment.

Enter the Bank of England and its equally hard-pressed governor, Mervyn King. He is also offering cheap loans to bankers to encourage them to return to the good old days of lending freely to each other as well as the public. King was up before a Commons select committee to explain why the Bank of England had apparently not seen the credit crunch coming or had spotted that Northern Rock was in trouble before it was too late. The governor warned that if the banks continued to rein in lending, an economic recession was pretty much inevitable.

King said: "There is not a shortage of cash. The large banks are now awash with cash. The issue is not whether they have enough cash, it is whether they are inclined to lend." He added: "A painful adjustment faces the global banking sector over the next few months as losses are revealed and new capital is raised to repair bank balance sheets." They are concerned at the capital position of other banks and where debts related to the US housing market collapse would appear next, he explained. King is right to be concerned. Figures released yesterday show that permits to build new homes in America have fallen by almost a quarter in 12 months.

King tried to blame the credit squeeze on sheer greed, with financiers buying and selling debt packages in a bid to make greater and greater returns. This is a partial, one-sided account of the process. Corporate-driven globalisation of the last 30 years was founded on debt in a bid to overcome some basic contradictions built into the capitalist system. The credit crunch is only the surface of the unravelling of this arrangement at state, financial and personal levels. Instead of trying to prop up the bankers, society needs to think seriously about creating alternatives to the failing market economy, as we suggest in our new book, A House of Cards.


Paul Feldman
Communications editor

The Afghan debacle

Gordon Brown claims that recent fighting at Musa Qala is a turning point in the six-year war against the Taleban in Afghanistan. The truth is that British and NATO operations in the country have been an unmitigated debacle and a suicide mission for many of the troops involved.

Even Brown’s allies in the “war against terror” - the justification for invading Afghanistan in the first place - don’t necessarily share the prime minister’s confidence. The Bush adminstration and NATO have just launched three major reviews of the entire Afghan mission, ranging from security and counter-terrorism to political and economic development. The New York Times says that the reviews are an admission that earlier successes in fighting the Taleban and Al Qaeda forces may have evaporated.

This has been the most violent year since the invasion of 2001. One senior NATO diplomat has admitted that “now we have significant issues with certain areas producing opium and the Taleban coming back in certain parts of the country, as well”. In addition, the allies are less than complimentary about each other: “The Germans, the Spanish, the Italians don’t send any troops to the south except for 250 troops by Germany,” said Representative Joe Sestak. A retired three-star admiral, Sestak complained that some allies “refuse to do combat ops at night and some don’t fly when the first snowflake falls”.

The balance sheet is as follows:
- a six year-occupation by NATO forces
- 40,000 troops, plus 12,000 other US troops conducting “counter- terrorism” operations
- illegal imprisonment of innocent people at Guantanamo
- billions spent on military operations
- £18 billions spent on NGOs
- high altitude bombing which has killed countless villagers
- a suicide mission in Helmand – dubbed “Hell-land” by British troops – with £1bn being spent on a new base there
- a resurgent Taleban roaming freely through most parts of the country outside Kabul.

And what has all this meant for the people of Afghanistan? Here is what Khaled Hosseini (author of The Kite Runner, which opens as a film next week) found when he returned to his hometown Kabul for the first time in 30 years. The capital, home to some three million people, is nothing less than a disaster area. The poverty and disarray in many areas was, in Hosseini’s words, “unspeakable”.

While visiting the grave of a popular Afghan singer, he was “mobbed again by burqa-clad women and barefoot children, their hair matted with dirt, faces oozing with sores, their teeth rotting already, begging for baksheesh [alms].” A Kabul policeman complained to him about the millions in aid given to the NGOs who spent it on fancy cards, offices and guesthouses.

Whilst the NATO occupation of Afghanistan cannot be blamed entirely for the destruction of what was once a beautiful country and capital city – the Soviet invasion and the Taleban are also responsible - it is certain that six years of occupation and war by mainly US and British forces have taken the country further down the road to hell.

So what exactly is the purpose of this mission, if it cannot succeed? As British forces withdraw from Basra, openly admitting to television cameras, that to remain in Iraq would only unite people against them, Brown badly needs to point to success in Afghanistan as his grip on the economy is seen to falter. It is a heavy price to pay for enhancing the tarnished image of a British Prime Minister.

Corinna Lotz
AWTW secretary

'Road map' with no destination

Environment secretary Hilary Benn and other ministers gathered at the Bali climate talks fell over themselves in the rush to declare the conference a resounding success. The reality is somewhat different. All that was agreed at Bali was to hold talks about more talks with the hope that one day there will be a firm agreement to cut carbon emissions. As one campaigner put it, the “road map” sketched out in Bali actually lacks a destination. And, as any walker knows, a map without a destination point is actually worse than useless.

A deal was struck in Bali on the basis that the agreement was left vague. There was an air of desperation of 11 days of fruitless talks. Plans to work towards binding cuts in carbon emissions were abandoned in favour of a statement which talked about the need to make “deep cuts” without saying how these might be achieved. Just in case anyone was under the illusion that the United States had shifted its ground, yesterday American officials were pouring cold water on Bali. Washington said that the US had "serious concerns" about future talks geared at setting emission targets.

Nelson Muffuh, a senior climate change policy analyst with Christian Aid, said: "The US delegation in particular proved a major obstacle to progress. They appeared to operate a wrecking policy, as though determined to derail the whole process. We were expecting a road map, and we've got one. But it lacks signposts and there is no agreed destination."
While Benn hailed the agreement as an "historic breakthrough", Andy Atkins, the advocacy director of Tearfund, the relief charity, said: "The fact that there is no agreement about how far to cut emissions means the Bali road map is missing a vital signpost. An ambitious, science-based target will have to be agreed by 2009 if the new agreement is not to be fatally flawed." Keith Allott, the head of climate change at WWF UK, said: "We are not at all pleased. We were looking for a road map with a destination."

The harsh reality is that climate change is advancing at a swift pace and the world’s major powers are incapable of doing anything about it. The political elites are beholden to corporate interests and the mantras of the market economy to such an extent that paralysis is the order of the day. Cutting carbon emissions at the rate required to halt global warming could only be achieved through a massive disruption to the status quo of production for profit. It would mean abandoning the drive to produce more and more commodities for the market and a total restructuring of economic activity. Whole new approaches to work and transport would be needed to minimise private car use. Local combined heat and power systems would replace centralised power plants. Can you see this happening under New Labour? Of course not! While global temperatures continue to rise, bringing sea level changes and extreme weather conditions, Benn and his fellow ministers will wasting more time on fruitless post-Bali meetings. The future of the planet cannot be left in their hands.

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

Time to cook Electrolux

The closure announced today of the Electrolux cooker factory in County Durham with the loss of 500 jobs is an opportunity for the trade unions to reject the profit and loss approach of the global corporations and mount a worldwide campaign against the decision. The early signs are not hopeful.

Electrolux’s decision is the worst kind of Christmas news for the workforce in an area of permanently high unemployment. Just as bad is the initial reaction of the workers’ union, Unite. Speaking after the announcement, Jeff Morland, North East divisional officer for the union, said: "I'm standing in the canteen with a lot of our members and obviously there is a lot of disappointment, fear and some anger. It could not have happened at a worse time and I think there will be the ghost of a few Christmases past rattling around here over the weekend. There is a lot to take in for families and this is the worst possible Christmas present."

These less-than-inspiring words were a reaction to the news that the plant in Spennymoor will close next year, with some production moving to Poland, where labour is cheaper. Morland’s pessimistic words are typical of a union leadership whose own jobs are safe following the merger of the engineers and transport workers to create Unite. The merger was driven by statements that it would create a stronger base to oppose closures like the one Electrolux has announced. Well, here’s their chance.

Electrolux had sales of almost £8 billion last year and a workforce of 57,000. The company has 22 factories in Europe and is the world's second largest appliance manufacturer. In other words, there is a powerful network of factories and workers that Unite could turn to. The union could mount a campaign against the closure throughout Europe to begin with.

Electrolux says it is moving production to “improve competitiveness”. This is the heart of the matter and the union has to reject this profit-driven approach if it is serious about fighting the corporations. Instead of calling on the New Labour government “to do more to protect British manufacturing” – as Morland did today – Unite should make the case of running production on a not-for-profit, co-operative basis. Giving money to the corporations simply doesn’t work, in any case. In 2005, regional development agency One NorthEast agreed to plough £1.6m into the plant, in an effort to retain manufacturing jobs in County Durham.

In the coming months, corporations in every country will come under pressure to cut workforces as the economic recession bites. If Unite takes up the challenge to resist the Electrolux closure, it would inspire workers in every Electrolux plant whose owns are on the line. The first step would be to prevent the closure in Spennymoor with an occupation of the plant, supported by the local community, and to launch an appeal to Polish workers to reject the switch in production. That’s the kind of Christmas message the unions should be sending to Electrolux.

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

Central bankers go for broke

The unprecedented intervention in the financial markets by the world’s five largest central banks is the most dramatic illustration yet of the scale of the credit crisis. Already, doubts are surfacing about how effective the decision to pump billions into money markets will be because the underlying problems remain.

There is an air of desperation about the plan to make $100 billion (a comparative drop in the ocean) available to banks that are facing massive losses or that are unable to borrow on money markets and face collapse like Northern Rock. Earlier this week, both the Federal Reserve in the US and the Bank of England cut interest rates in a bid to restore confidence. They failed. Shares fell and mortgage companies were in no hurry to pass the cuts on to borrowers. So the central banks have gone for broke with their new plan.

The largely symbolic intervention by the banks drew a mixed response. Julian Jessop, the chief European economist at Capital Economics, said the move did “not address the underlying imbalances threatening the world economy - notably the impact the US housing slump will still have” while Julian Jessop, chief international economist at Capital Economics, concludes: “Risk premia are likely to remain permanently higher after the excesses of the last few years. The world economy is still facing a marked US-led slowdown in 2008.”

The pro-business Daily Telegraph for one is not sure whether the banks’ intervention will work because the problem is not one of liquidity – financial institutions are, according to the paper, “flush with assets”. The reason they won’t lend to each other is because no one really knows the extent of sub-prime losses competitors carry. For example, only this week, Swiss bank UBS took a $10 billion sub-prime hit and the Federal Home Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac), America's second biggest guarantor of mortgages, revealed $12 billion in losses. Some estimates suggest that a total $3,000 billion in sub-prime debts is lurking in the global financial system.

Says the Telegraph: “There is a nagging fear that we have seen only the tip of the sub-prime iceberg and until a clearer picture emerges of the scale of exposure, banks will continue to sit on their hands, and their assets. Given that capitalism is built on bank lending and lending has always involved an element of risk, how is that lost confidence to be restored?” That’s a good question.

Behind the intervention is the worry that the credit crunch is now affecting the economy in general. US investment bank Morgan Stanley this week forecast a deep recession in America. Consumer spending is falling everywhere as mortgage and credit conditions get tighter. And that is the real crisis for capitalism. If people won’t and can’t spend on credit, the products of the global corporations stay on the shelves and this will trigger a worldwide slump. This is the process we are bang in the middle of now.

In Britain, repossessions are forecast to soar in 2008 as millions on low, fixed-rate mortgages face steep rises in repayments. House prices are falling throughout the country in the absence of buyers. Profit warnings are coming thick and fast as retailers fear poor Christmas sales. What the Telegraph calls a “credit craze fuelled by cheap and plentiful money which underpinned the boom” is over. The wheels have come off the global capitalist, profit-driven economy, with threatening consequences for jobs, homes and international stability. There are, however, not-for-profit alternatives which we outline in our new book, A House of Cards. Make sure these receive the widest circulation and discussion.

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

Police anger mounts

Apart from Sir Ian Blair, the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, is there any other copper who likes this government? Not many, judging by the angry reaction from the men and women in blue to New Labour’s decision to reduce their pay award. An independent commission gave the police 2.5% but home secretary Jacqui Smith refused to backdate it to August, as recommended. Her decision effectively reduces the pay rise to just 1.9%, well below the rate of inflation.

So now the police are talking about forming a trade union and going on strike. You have to go back nearly 90 years for the last time that police truncheons were withdrawn. In August 1918, the National Union of Police and Prison Officers (NUPPO) launched a strike by London police, which was supported by 10,000 out of the 12,000 workforce. The executive of NUPPO demanded a pay increase, improved war bonuses, extension of pension rights to include policemen's widows, a shortening of the pension entitlement period, and an allowance for school-aged children.

The most significant issue was that NUPPO be officially recognised. They won their demands, but the issue of the union was left unresolved. In 1919, police in Liverpool began another series of strikes. This time the union was suppressed by force and every striker was dismissed. The Police Federation, which is no more than a glorified staff association, was imposed on officers and is currently in charge of negotiations with the government.

Anonymous police bloggers are lining up to condemn the government. One has even called for a march on London, while others favour action ranging from all-out strike to a work-to-rule. There is a general air of contempt for the Police Federation negotiators. The prospect of industrial action by police is apparently frightening some ministers and MPs, who fear for their seats as the opinion poll ratings continue to plummet. But it seems the Brown government doesn’t really have a handle on any major issue and dithering is the order of the day (as shown by Brown’s decision to sign the new Euro treaty by himself instead of jointly with other EU leaders!)

As far as the state goes, New Labour had the support of the police while the judiciary fought a rearguard action to defend inroads into their powers and a general onslaught by ministers on the rule of law. The intelligence agencies are still smarting at being politically manoeuvred into spinning the case for the invasion of Iraq while senior civil servants are said to be bemused by how the Brown clique runs (or doesn’t) the machinery of government. Add in the mounting impact of the global financial crisis and things are not looking good for New Labour. Who knows what the outcome of a strike by police might be.

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

March on Wall Street

The jailing of press baron Conrad Black for defrauding shareholders has captured the headlines this morning. Black’s $32 million theft is simply the tip of an iceberg of what may be viewed as an entirely criminal situation in the world of business and finance. Black’s six and a half years in jail will perhaps seem small to the millions of people around the world who are imprisoned by debt for their entire lives - while traders play the financial markets to notch up record profits.

The fact is that 2008 is set to be the year when debts come home to roost. And, as credit becomes harder to obtain, debt is changing from being a millstone around their necks, into a nightmare. Mortgages have helped people afford a roof over their heads, whilst at the same time locking them into repayments they can ill afford. But now comes the nightmare of repossession.

In the United States, things are now so bad that people have taken to the streets – Wall Street to be exact – to protest against the way in which black communities and ethnic minorities have been hit especially hard. Yesterday, demonstrators paraded through the centre of US big business to protest against the eviction of millions of homeowners, the first ever march to target the financial markets. US civil rights leader, Jesse Jackson, who has campaigned for economic empowerment since he joined Martin Luther King as far back as 1965, led the march. He has spoken on U-tube of a financial tsunami in the US and last Friday called for a Marshall Plan to provide relief to people who lost homes and savings in an editorial in the Wall Street Journal.

The National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People, which organised the New York rally and a second one in Chicago, said in a statement:

“As the mortgage market continues to decline, millions of home-owners could face foreclosure in the coming year. Unfortunately, a disproportionate number of those home-owners are minorities who were targeted for sub-prime, predatory loans”.

Like his mentor, Martin Luther King, Jackson sees the issue of debt as a class question as much as an ethnic issue. In Chicago, where Jackson’s Rainbow Push coalition is based in a former synagogue, 30% of homes are in foreclosure. In Detroit’s Wayne County, a quarter of homeowners are in default, as Danny Schechter reports.

Lest anyone thinks these problems are unique to America, just look at what is coming up here. The lead story in today’s Times notes that as shoppers are set to blow a record £11.7 billion on their credit cards this Christmas, the new year will bring nothing but pain. It concludes:

“There are fears that the credit crunch will have a devastating effect on some families which are already deep in debt. Nearly 5 million people have still not paid off their store and credit card bills from a year ago, according to moneyexpert.com.”

It is time to get real. We need to work out a bold programme for a not-for-profit economy, not rely on the same politicians who have worshipped at the shrine of capitalism for all their lives.

Corinna Lotz
AWTW secretary

Consumerism from cradle to grave

Not so long ago, I was amazed to find that my neighbour’s six-year-old boy knew more brand names than I did, as he swept around identifying every gadget in my flat, from Dell, HP, to Sony. I shouldn’t have been surprised at all. The average 10-year-old is now aware of between 300 and 400 different brands. Young people are exposed to about 10,000 TV adverts per year, as well as pop-ups on the Internet.

A number of new studies, including a report by the government’s own Department for Children, Schools and Families, point to the serious damage to children’s health and education resulting from over-exposure to marketing.

Britain’s biggest teaching union, the National Union of Teachers, accuses companies of using psychologists to target children in a way that seriously damages their health and well-being. The NUT’s study, the most comprehensive to date, has found that marketing strategies are highly damaging, leading to ill-health and unhappiness. Eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia result from unrealistic expectations about what they “should” look like. NUT general secretary, Steve Sinnot says that teachers are increasingly concerned by the “lifestyle pressures exerted on children by the advertising and marketing industries…. There are dangerous consequences for the physical and mental health of young people.”

According to the media watchdog, Ofcom, 92% of advertising before 9pm is for products high in sugar, sale and fat. Perhaps most shocking is the fact that nearly three-quarters of seven-year-old girls want to be slimmer. More than half of children know that someone has been bullied for not owning the latest gadgets or clothing, and nearly a third are dissatisfied with the way they look.

Educationalist Sue Palmer, says, “Marketers’ interest in the under-10s is at an all-time high… They’re grooming children to be consumers from an early age – and since consumption doesn’t buy happiness, it’s not surprising that one in 10 children is now diagnosed with a mental disorder.” The only reassuring aspect of the wanton destruction of childhood by commercialisation is that children themselves are keenly aware of the damaging side of the pressure to wear the “right” labels and to conform. Nearly 70 per cent of them say there is too much pressure to look perfect and wear the latest fashions.

But none of this will deter the government, nor Brown’s right-hand man, Schools Secretary Ed Balls from his crusade to replace existing schools with “academies”, sponsored by big businesses, often with their own ideological agendas. In this, they are seamlessly aligned with pro-business councils, whether New Labour or Tory.

In Tory-controlled Westminster, for example, the iconic comprehensive, Pimlico School, is about to be handed over to a Tory party donor and venture capitalist, John Nash. Nash is a former chairman of the British Venture Capital Association, and chairman of a leading private equity provider, Sovereign Capital. The council is riding roughshod over the results of its own consultation about the future of the school which showed that 92% wanted it to remain a community comprehensive school, with 4% for trust and 4% academy. Pimlico School Association has also voted that the school should keep its current status.

Corinna Lotz
AWTW secretary
10 December 2007

Basic rights reduced to a lottery

For this government, civil liberties are something to be subjected to a kind of lottery. You draw a number out of the hat and that becomes the number of days you can detain someone without charge on the suspicion of committing a terror offence. The rules are fixed, however, by comparison with the real game of chance. Under New Labour’s National Security Lottery Rules, the number chosen must always result in a longer period of detention than is already the case.

It began with the Terrorism Act 2000, which introduced the first breach in the ancient liberty of habeas corpus, which as far back as the 11th century stated that no person should be detained without charge. The 2000 Act introduced a seven day limit on pre-charge detention, which was lengthened to 14 days maximum under the Criminal Justice Act 2003. In 2005, Tony Blair went for the Big Lottery Detention Prize and tried for 90 days. He suffered his first Commons defeat but the government still managed to get the period extended to 28 days.

Not to be outdone, new prime minister Gordon Brown wanted that period doubled to 56 days. Why 56 and not 50 or 47? No one knows. Perhaps the cabinet drew numbers out of a hat to show how tough they are on terrorism. And the “justification” or evidence for abolishing basic rights? David Winnick, the Labour MP who led the revolt against Blair’s 90 days, says: “No evidence has been produced in my view – and in the view of a good number of other people who have taken a close interest in this matter - that any extension is necessary."

The only significant voice in support of the proposal to extend detention is that of Sir Ian Blair, the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, whose force got off scot free after executing the innocent Jean Charles de Menezes on a Tube train. Even New Labour’s former attorney general Lord Goldsmith is opposed to the plan, along with the director of public prosecution, Sir Ken Macdonald.

So now home secretary Jacqui Smith has come up with a new number – 42 days. In a pathetic bid to get this through parliament, she is proposing that the government should get the power to introduce 42 days detention with MPs being allowed to give retrospective approval on each case. Anyone can work out that by the time MPs get round to discussing the matter, the suspect would have been held for 42 days in any case! Tim Hancock, UK campaigns director of Amnesty International, said the plan would rob people of their basic rights, adding that "no amount of parliamentary window-dressing can disguise that fact”.

Britain already holds terror suspects far longer without charge than any other country in the world. If New Labour gets its way, the period will rise to the point where it amounts to internment or imprisonment without trial. And from holding terror suspects to detaining political activists and campaigners would be but a short leap.

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

Who killed Sajida Khan?

As the World Bank plans its launch of a new carbon fund at the United Nations climate conference in Bali, activists worldwide will pay tribute to the woman who spent her last breath resisting one of its most controversial projects. Sajida Khan won the struggle against the project when the Bank pulled out of the toxic South African landfill. But sadly, Khan passed away on 15 July 2007 in her Durban home.

Aged 55 her fragile but vibrant, uncompromising life endured several bouts of debilitating cancer. The dump that the government promised to close in 1987 is still open and thriving. Indeed, plans for new carbon financing were sealed by the South African government even before the Bali conference. The Bali conference is likely to generate a lot of hot air as it searches for climate solutions, but as government delegations debate yet more market-based policies for the post-Kyoto era we should pause and reflect upon who really killed Khan?

Meet the suspects and consider their motives:
1) Bisasar Road’s original design team of apartheid bureaucrats who in 1980 dumped what became Africa’s largest formal garbage heap in the middle of a nature reserve in the mixed-race residential neighbourhood of Clare Estate.

2) Operators of the illegal medical waste incinerator parked at Bisasar during the 1990s, sprinkling toxins onto Khan and her neighbours until its belated closure.

3) Durban Solid Waste for not terminating the dump as repeatedly promised. It runs a methane incineration system that spews yet more cancerous ingredients - dioxins, lead, cadmium — into the toxic soup around Bisasar.

4) The World Bank team who met Durban officials in 2002, persuading them that the dumpsite should remain open for seven to twenty more years. The reason? To capture carbon credits by selling investments in Bisasar methane-to-electricity operations to global polluters, who in turn will face less pressure to cut their own emissions.

5) The Kyoto Protocol – meant to turn the corner on climate change – is thus also a suspect. It established a ‘free market’ in carbon credits that would permit polluters in the North to purchase shares in ‘Clean Development Mechanism’ projects like Bisasar, instead of reducing their own greenhouse gases.

6) Major international polluters ranging from Big Oil to the Dutch government, who are the buyers of this “privatised air”.

7) Other landfill sites in Durban’s Marianhill and La Mercy suburbs, which are also supported by the World Bank’s Prototype Carbon Fund.

8) Who can forget the role of the [South Africa’s] national Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism? According to the National Climate Change Response Strategy, citizens must understand “up-front” how the “Clean Development Mechanism primarily presents a range of commercial opportunities, both big and small. This could be a very important source of foreign direct investment’. Khan and her Durban Group comrades considered this position a form of eco-prostitution equivalent to accepting toxic waste for a pittance.

9) Then there’s the South African economy itself, addicted to fossil fuels and the world’s cheapest energy. The US is the world’s largest CO2 emitter in absolute terms, but in relative terms SA emits 20 times more of that gas than the US, measured by each unit of output per person. That in turn has made Pretoria aware of the need for even rotten offset projects like Bisasar, so as to market SA’s feeble attempts to cut back on greenhouse emissions.

This blog is drawn from an article published in Alter-Eco, which is being produced by groups who have come together to make a unified call in support of real solutions to climate change and against the false market-based solutions that are being implemented under the Kyoto Protocol.

The emperor has no clothes

In the four months since the advent of the credit crunch in the global financial markets caught Northern Rock with its pants down, the chorus of ritual assurances about the soundness of the economic fundamentals has given way to doom-laden panic. A recent “emperor-has-no-clothes” statement from former US Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers opened the floodgates on admissions about the depth and breadth of the worsening crisis, together with dire predictions and warnings about its damaging effects.

Summers says that even if “necessary changes” in policy were implemented, the “odds now favour a US recession that slows growth significantly on a global basis”. He also believes that without stronger policy responses than have been observed to date, “there is the risk that the adverse impacts will be felt for the rest of this decade and beyond”. His assessment of the US housing market brings into the open predictions which had so far only been muted murmurs on the sidelines. Summers says that “indicators suggest that the housing sector may be in free-fall from what felt like the basement levels of a few months ago” and predicts prices could fall by as much as 25%.

In a shocking admission of the uselessness of the economic models used by forecasters, Summers is concerned that “we do not have comparable experiences on which to base predictions about what this will mean for the overall economy”. Put another way, the people who supposedly run the economy have no idea what the future holds.

Meanwhile, in Britain the Financial Services Authority (FSA) says there is "a very real prospect" that financial conditions will worsen next year because of the global credit crunch. The implication is that a number of smaller mortgage companies could go under because of difficulties in raising cash. An key indicator of the crisis is the soaring inter-bank lending rate, which is far higher than the official bank rate. .

As for debt-laden “home owners”, prospects are bleak indeed. Clive Briault, the FSA's retail managing director, says that more than 1.4 million borrowers on fixed-rate, short-term mortgages are due to come off their favourable terms next year. Many of them will have to pay higher interest rates as a result, which will contribute to the pressure on consumer spending. Other may not be so fortunate. Briault said that at the bottom end of market, the so-called sub-prime sector that focused on people with poor or non-existent credit histories, many borrowers "may not have access to the market at any price". Bluntly, they face losing their homes.

A House of Cards, our new publication, lays bare the intimate, mutually-dependent connection between the emergence of a web of transnational corporations during the uneven period of global growth, and the vast clouds of credit and debt needed to make it happen. There’s no pleasure in history proving us right, but it does mean that we’re able to see beyond the current crisis. A House of Cards offers the outlines of solutions based on collective ownership, self-management and replacing the profit motive with production for need. Get yourself a copy!

Gerry Gold
Economics editor

Miners in challenge to ANC

Not a lot has changed for South Africa’s 500,000 miners since the end of apartheid. Most days, a miner is killed as he labours in unsafe conditions to extract precious metals for sale by the mining corporations. Today, members of the 270,000-strong Miners Union of South Africa stage a 24-hour strike against the rising death toll. Some 201 miners have been killed in accidents so far this year, compared with 199 for the whole of 2006.

The union expects some 40,000 members to march on the Chamber of Mines in Johannesburg, which includes famous names like AngloGold Ashanti, Gold Fields, Harmony Gold, Anglo Platinum, Impala Platinum and Lonmin. South African miners produce three-quarters of the world's platinum and more than a 10th of its gold in shafts that are up to 3.78 kilometres underground.

South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki ordered a safety audit of the country's mines after 3,200 workers were temporarily trapped at Harmony Gold Mining’s Elandsrand operation in October, but the death rate has continued to rise. Despite ever-rising prices for precious metals, especially gold and platinum, the owners have failed to invest in improved safety measures.

The owners know that there is a massive pool of unemployed workers ready to work in dangerous conditions, especially in mines where the union is not strong. Those who extract the fabulous wealth that lies underground, just like the poor workers in the townships, are treated with contempt, or are at best targets for token acts of charity while the mine owners and the country’s ruling political elite live off the fruits of their labour.

Miners are not the only South African workers battling for a decent standard of living 17 years after the ending of apartheid. In Cape Town, work is underway on a showpiece new stadium for the 2010 World Cup. It is a 68,000-seat arena within sight of the notorious Robben Island, where Nelson Mandel was imprisoned for years under the apartheid regime. The city’s newest icon has already been the subject of strikes and protests.

The government is spending R420bn [£30.1bn] on the 2010 World Cup and related infrastructure projects. Fifa is making a big show of providing affordable tickets for the poor. It has announced that the cheapest tickets for games will be sold only to South Africa residents for about $20, and a further 120,000 will be given away to the lowest paid. But even at $20, tickets are beyond the reach of ordinary workers who are building the stadium. So the World Cup is simply another profit-making bonanza for contractors and the media.

President Mbeki and his deputy Jacob Zuma are presently engaged in a struggle for the leadership of the ANC at its conference later this month. Zuma’s left demagogy has won him widespread backing, despite his pro-business policies and association with corruption. Today’s one-day strike is an indication that the working class needs to go beyond the ANC and its grip on power to carry through the social revolution against capitalist corporations.


Corinna Lotz
AWTW secretary

Stalemate in Venezuela

The narrow 51%-49% defeat for Hugo Chavez in a referendum on the constitution is a potentially dangerous moment for Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution. Emboldened by their victory, the anti-Chavez movement will undoubtedly look to the United States for support in yet another attempt to overthrow the president.

The vote represents the first major electoral defeat for Chavez after nine years in which he has won three general elections and two referendums. During this time, Chavez has tried to develop an accountable state that could facilitate a process of transition from reform to revolution. Sunday’s referendum was intended to approve Chavez’s plans to run for re-election indefinitely, give him increased powers and create the structure for what he called a socialist state in Venezuela. The reforms also included stronger powers for the president to seize private property and to censor the media during emergencies. There were also proposals to cut the working day from eight hours to six, extend social security benefits to informal workers, such as street vendors and lower the voting age to 16.

While the middle class in the shape of some students, business groups, opposition parties, the media and the Roman Catholic Church all lined up against Chavez ahead of the referendum vote, his support amongst the poor and the working class failed to be mobilised in sufficient numbers. There were reports that his own supporters were more concerned about soaring crime, inflation and food shortages. In the end, about 56% of voters turned out.

The political stalemate in Venezuela is connected to the unwillingness by Chavez to acknowledge the strategic necessity of a qualitative break with the capitalist state and its replacement with truly democratic alternative structures in the hands of the masses. Impressive reforms in education and health, and the curbing of big business, have led to the notion that the state can be transformed into an instrument of the revolution. But the basic objective fact is that the economy remains dominated by the role of the transnational corporations and global capital. At best, Chavez has been able to negotiate better terms with the TNCs, which have indeed brought benefits to the people, but the basic domination of capital over labour remains intact.

The ruling class of Venezuela is disgruntled because they perceive the state to be no longer acting in their overall social interests. They have been prepared to give support to various attempts to overthrow the Chavez regime in order to regain control of the state. So, what we have is an extremely complex and dialectical situation whereby the capitalist state is weakened, and yet in the last analysis it still remains a bourgeois state. For the revolution to consolidate its gains, this is what has to change. The democratic constitution has to be transformed from a formal document into a reality by the mass action of workers and peasants. People should not wait for a lead from Chavez. The same goes for the issue of challenging capital. If the state is unwilling to challenge the power of the TNCs, the working class should take a lead and develop real workers’ control, the revolutionary alternative to co-management.

The calling of a representative conference to develop a strategy for implementing the constitution in a complete way, could show that its aims can only be realised through the overthrow of the power of the TNCs. There is no doubt that Chavez’s reforms have increased workers’ confidence in their abilities, and sense of material well-being. But these advances can only develop further if the limitations of utilising the existing state are understood and a conscious struggle for revolutionary change is prepared.

Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

“Fire-storm” warning for global economy

A World to Win’s view of the capitalist economy is often pooh-poohed by those who tell us that the system is unchallengeable. We are told that we exaggerate the instability of the world economy. But over the last few days, one financial expert after another is outdoing us in predicting extreme crisis and break-down to come. Warnings are flying thick and fast as the credit crunch is conducted throughout the world economy via the global financial system.

From the high office of the Governor of the Bank of England down to broadsheet newspapers, commentators are united in saying that the damage from the financial storms to the real economy is as yet unknown and that the global economy is moving into recession. “This particular crisis is proving a more sustained fire-storm,” Jeremy Warner of The Independent said this week. “What in September was still looking as if it would be only a temporary financial storm with relatively limited consequences for the real economy has turned into something much more drawn out and potentially damaging.”

And in the run-up to what should be the annual Christmas spending spree, Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England, yesterday warned parliamentarians of “rather uncomfortable” times to come. King told MPs there were was a “big risk” that the credit crunch would intensify with consequent risks to growth and inflation. He spoke of "sheer uncertainty" and that fear of what lies ahead among US banks in particular was already pushing up interest rates.

And writer Sean O’Grady, asks: “Is the roof falling in on the housing market? . . . Has the bubble burst? The signs are ominous. For some months the property market has been cooling, the bubble showing distinct signs of strain . . . How bad can things get? The worst scenario is that the UK follows trends in the US. There the bubble burst last year, with the toughest market since the Great Depression.”

“The pain has just begun,” he concludes.

As municipal housing has declined and people buy instead of renting, so much money has been ploughed into bricks and mortar that British households have accumulated more debt than any other major advanced economy.The cruel reality of so-called “home ownership” (actually home indebtedness) is that of a dream turning into a nightmare – an unattainable fantasy. Those who have managed to scramble on to the first rung of the ladder pay an unprecedented one-fifth of their income on mortgage repayments. At about £200,000, average house prices are at nine times average earnings, the highest ever. The stark reality facing mortgage payers on both sides of the Atlantic adds substance to the analysis made in A World to Win’s new book, A House of Cards. What we are seeing is the crash of almost infinite amounts of debt, based on an unsustainable house price bubble. This is combined with the creation of countless and ever-more exotic financial products leveraged on debt, secured on ever-diminishing actual values.

Will the credit melt-down and economic down-turn automatically lead to the overthrow of the capitalist system and its replacement by a co-operative, not-for-profit economy? Of course not. But what it does mean is that for billions of people around the world, the conditions of their lives are changing dramatically. Confidence in the system at all levels is being shaken to the core. Until now, many people have been affected by a feeling of powerlessness that has made them reluctant to challenge the existing economic and political structures. But now the realities underneath the glossy images of homeownership and endless consumerism are breaking through. An understanding of how the system has reached this point is crucial. This is a good time to debate and develop the ideas for composting capitalism and building up a not-for-profit economy put forward in A House of Cards.

Corinna Lotz
AWTW Secretary

Planetary emergency appeal

In the run up to the December crisis meeting on global warming, a call has gone out to world governments meeting in Bali to make a global energy and economic transition without delay in order to save the planet and its inhabitants from disaster. Signatories to the call say a “systemic shift” is needed just to stabilise the planet’s climate.

Drawn up by leading development and climate organisations, include the International Forum on Globalisation, Focus on the Global South and the Polaris Institute, the appeal calls on governments to "begin a pathway toward new global agreements that recognise and operate within our planet’s limits and equitably share its ecological space". It rightly points out that the proposals governments are likely to discuss in Bali will "dangerously underestimate the challenges confronting us".

Instead, the signatories make the case for having "deeper binding targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at the very least 80% below 1990 levels by 2050... with solutions that place the greatest burden of adjustment on the richer nations, and the richer segments within all nations". The appeal demands that developed countries "drastically reduce consumption of energy and others resources, materials, and commodities" and proposes that "...conservation and re-localising cycles of ownership, production and consumption are the fastest, cheapest most efficient means toward powering down”.

Interestingly, the appeal recognises the need to "shift power away from global and national governance, and toward local economies, especially energy and food systems..". This appears to be the beginnings of a realisation that the structures of the existing society cannot deliver a sustainable future. There is a call for new development models that "satisfying basic human rights and basic human needs for all (such as survival, sufficiency, freedom, identity)", to replace existing measurements based on economic performance.

The signatories urge the creation of global financial mechanisms to help poor nations keep their resources and see the need to "drive ecological solutions that transform today’s patterns of production and consumption, replacing long-distance trade and absentee-ownership with decentralised economic activity under community control".

There is nothing in the appeal you could disagree with, even if there is no reference to the economic system known as capitalism anywhere in the document. The real issue revolves around how these absolutely necessary changes are to be achieved. In this respect, the signatories mistakenly place their faith in existing governments and institutions to carry through the transition. For example, the appeal claims: “Just as one of the oldest global bodies, the International Labour Organisation, includes representatives from governments, labour, and business, these new negotiations must involve all of the sectors of society to be effective.”

Just how naïve this approach is was demonstrated by the New Labour government last week when it effectively gave the green light for a new runway at Heathrow Airport, despite massive opposition from local communities and environmental groups. Transport secretary Ruth Kelly said expansion was needed to keep the British economy “competitive”. Her “solution” for the extra CO2 emissions that would occur was to ensure “that every tonne of carbon that is emitted from a plane is matched by a reduction somewhere else in Europe” through carbon trading.

Kelly’s decision is just one of countless examples of how corporate power and compliant governments are locked into a mutual dance of death at the planet’s expense. They are deaf to appeals, whatever their merits and logic, and incapable of tackling the planetary emergency in the way outlined by the signatories above. Political and economic life will have to be restructured from top to bottom by the mass of the people themselves independently of their rulers’ wishes. If there was an easier option, it would have been discovered by now.

Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

Dangerous and unpredictable times

The crisis of the Brown government has a self-destructive logic, taking us into politically uncharted and dangerous waters. There is heady and unpredictable mix of a government in melt down, state administrative systems in turmoil, a deepening banking and financial crisis and senior figures in the armed services denouncing the prime minister for his indifference.

Over the last decade, the Blair/Brown project has attempted to bring the state, government and corporate power into a unified, seamless whole held together not by politics but by a managerial team, headed by a chief executive officer (formerly known as the prime minister).

Ancient processes like the rule of law have gone by the board because they get in the way of efficient government. New Labour has regarded itself if not above the law, then at least its equivalent. The acceptance of £630,000 from a property developer through third parties was clearly in breach of laws passed by the New Labour government itself. Yet no fewer than three party general secretaries stood by as the money flowed into the coffers.

New Labour’s outlook is that laws and the legal system should be subordinate to government policies. For example, the fact that the invasion of Iraq was illegal under international law is seen of no consequence (although it was of concern to army chiefs concerned about the implications for troops). Holding foreign nationals in prison without trial was considered so important that human rights were flouted until the judiciary stepped in. In terms of the donations, only after having been found out is New Labour to return the cash.

Other crises over Northern Rock and the loss of data discs with 25 million people’s identities and financial information indicate that the New Labour project is floundering. The credit crunch that has overwhelmed Northern Rock is the most graphic expression of the end of a consumer/housing boom based on fantasy finance, one that was encouraged by New Labour ministers. In a futile bid to stop the rot, the government has loaned the bank up to £25 billion – with absolutely no guarantees about getting the money back. The financial crisis is worsening by the day while millions of people are struggling to pay their mortgages and credit card debts.

In this context, the intervention last week of five former chiefs of the defence staff in a co-ordinated attack in the House of Lords is nothing if not sinister. Their warning that the Ministry of Defence was facing "blood on the floor" because of budget cuts was unprecedented. They demanded increased spending on the forces and criticised the government for breaking the “military covenant” between the country and its armed forces. Lord Boyce, attacked the government for using "smoke and mirrors" to cover cuts in defence spending. He told peers: "We are seriously endangering our people because of the lack of money being given to equip, train and properly support those in the second line preparing to rotate to the front line." Another accused Brown of indifference to the armed forces by being the only senior cabinet minister who had avoided coming to the Ministry of Defence when he was chancellor.

The next question is: what do these former service chiefs – who were undoubtedly speaking for the mass of serving officers – going to do about it all? If those in charge of the state are betraying the armed forces, as they allege, what do they propose? Do they want to become the government? It’s not such a daft question as you think. These are dangerous and unpredictable times.

Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

Two states no solution for Palestinians

Palestinian leaders meeting the Israelis in Annapolis, Maryland, today will be offered nothing. Instead, they will be asked to sacrifice the right of Palestinian refugees to return, to abandon Palestinians living inside Israel’s 1948 borders and to forget about the aspirations of the Palestinians living in Jerusalem and Gaza. Failed preliminary talks over many weeks mean that all those attending the US-sponsored conference know in advance that no genuine gains can be made.

What is not on offer is a Palestinian state. Where are its borders? Who will control its borders with other countries? Where is its capital? Who has the right to live in it? By consistently postponing the solution of these crucial questions, the Zionist state of Israel has been able to continue to create “realities on the ground” that make any viable Palestinian state impossible. The West Bank and Gaza are two separate prisons. Gaza is a hell on earth for those who live there. On the West Bank, Palestinians continue to be deprived of their land and their right to education and work.

West Bank-based Palestinian leaders have been drawn so deeply into the so-called two-state solution, that they are in danger of sacrificing their own legitimacy to try and achieve it. But 14 years on from the signing of the Oslo Accords, the peace process has become a trap from which the Palestinians must find an exit. Tony Blair’s announcement last week of a handful of meaningless economic initiatives underlined the fact that the only people to benefit from the two-state process so far are a handful of well-off Palestinian businessmen, and the group who are involved in administering and policing the enclave.

Jewish settlements continue to expand into substantial towns, sucking in resources of land and water. The borders between Gaza and the West Bank and neighbouring countries have been cleared of housing and the Israeli army has seized strips of land so that it can control access in perpetuity. The Israeli government has no intention of removing its illegal wall, and further plans include Israeli-only roads. The conditions of most Palestinians have worsened since 1993 and the conflict has claimed more than 4,000 Palestinian lives and more than 1,000 Israeli lives.

A far more significant conference than the one in Annapolis took place in London recently. Organised by the London One State Group - Palestinian and Jewish students who work together - it attracted more than 300 academics, activists and students from all over the world to discuss an alternative way forward that challenges the right of Zionism to rule over a state based on religious exclusivity.

The conference heard from many speakers that the Palestine national cause – made up of Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, those living as refugees in other countries and those living as second-class citizens within the borders established in 1948 – has become more and more divided as a result of the doomed two-state process.

At the same time Israeli Jews are more and more sceptical both about the possibility of a peaceful settlement of the conflict, and – after the defeat of the Israeli army in Lebanon – the chance of a military solution. The conference concluded that the time is absolutely right to revive and bring up to date the proposition that the only way forward for Palestinians and Jews is the establishment of a single, democratic, secular state from the Sea to the Jordan River, where all the people of the region can live together with equal rights.

Penny Cole

Writers' strike holds firm

Today is high-noon in the three-week long stand-off between screen writers belonging to the Writers Guild of America and the big studio conglomerates which dominate US cinema and television screens. Leaders of the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers are resuming negotiations after powerful strike action by WGA members.

Twelve thousand writers have been picketing in both Los Angeles and New York City for demands aimed at preventing loss of income as a result of Internet broadcasting and DVD sales. At present, writers receive 4 cents per DVD sale and no residuals (royalties) from iTunes sales or advertising-supported free rebroadcasts on web sites such as abc.com. Writers receive no payment from material aired for free on the Internet.

The strike has received tremendous support, not only from WGA members, but also from leading members of the acting profession who have spoken out and joined picket lines. Outside the film and television industry, recording artists like 13-year old singer-song-writer Shamim have also joined the picket lines. Shamim recently founded the Protection for Artistic Rights Coalition (PARC), an organisation whose ultimate goal is to spread youth awareness of the issues that artists face in an industry changed by the Internet and digital media. "I am affected by the same things that the writers are affected by with respect to digital media. I am a struggling recording artist who has music being downloaded freely through the Internet," She said. "At the end of the day we are all creative people who are watching profits and royalties stream in from advertisers to giant companies that haven't been paying artists their fair share."

US dockers have brought food hampers to picket lines, California Nurses Association members have joined the protests and Teamsters Union members parked trucks outside studio gates in demonstrations of solidarity. In the UK, the Writers Guild and International Art Critics Association have expressed support. The writers’ strike has also been strengthened by the support of show runners – the people who work as both writers and producers - such as Marc Cherry of “Desperate Housewives” fame.

Life-time WGA member Richard Walter noted that the present dispute was different from the last WGA strike in 1998: "Way back then there was more dissent within the guild, particularly involving the show runners. This year, very much to their credit, despite financial risk, show runners have been very pro-guild. Production has been affected much more directly and quickly than anticipated by management,” Walter said. “I’ve never seen anything like this in all my years – and I’ve been through seven or eight strikes.”

The show of unity amongst everyone from writers, actors, musicians , show runners and even producers in the American entertainment industry is awesome. WGA members are showing a side of the US that is too often submerged by right-wing governments like the Bush regime. The immense strength of the strike, together with a number of anti-government films coming out of Hollywood like Rendition, indicates that a big change is taking place across the Atlantic, coinciding with an historic crisis for the American economy


Corinna Lotz
Secretary
A World to Win

Crying for Argentina

In the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires, the poor – many of them street children - scurry ahead of municipal lorries collecting in well-off areas. They are searching for glass, paper, cardboard, scraps of food - anything that can be reused. They also pick through rubbish dumps in search of food. But as political tensions rise throughout the country, the city’s right-wing mayor, businessman Mauricio Macri, has decided to curb their activities.

Last May, 30,000 people marched hundreds of kilometres to the capital under the banner “Hunger is a crime” demanding an end to poverty and a better life for the country’s children. Protests held around the country revealed seething discontent with poverty, low wages and state-sponsored repression. Over the last five years, shanty towns have been growing even though the economy has expanded by more than 8%, revealing continuing deep inequalities in Argentina.

Now the ruling elites are hitting back. Buenos Aires mayor Macri, has declared: “It is as much a crime to steal garbage as it is to rob a person round the corner.” The city government has set punitive rules for those try to survive off refuse.
Alberto Morlachetti, a campaigner for Pelota de Trapo foundation, that champions the rights of street children, says angrily: “Garbage has become a sacred value. It must not be tossed away, it cannot be mixed as if it lacked categories…. It cannot be left lying around because it has proprietors. The duty not to waste our rubbish has become a civil mandate. Mayor Macri was one of the precursors of this passion for garbage and the importance of urban detritus and their transformation into merchandise. Rubbish-tip pickers are now required to wear a vest, gloves, reflective tape and have official permits in order to be able to work and feed themselves. The governor’s whip must bear down hard enough so that the crime - of those who want to eat – does not start again.”

Macri’s election as mayor last June was seen as a tough challenge to the government of Nestor Kirchner, who is being succeeded by his wife, president-elect Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. Yesterday it emerged that Argentina’s defence minister Nilda Garré sacked Brigadier General Osvaldo Montero, head of military intelligence, after discovering that he had plotted against her appointment. Defence minister Garré is part of the government being formed by Cristina Kirchner, due to take over as president on December 10. Taped conversations revealed that the Brigadier General had told interior ministry officials that Garré, who is well-known as a former Peronist left-winger and the first woman to hold office as defence minister, had to go. The plotting by the military intelligence chief incident speaks of uneasy relations between Kirchner’s civilian government and the military, whose brutal dictatorship during the 1970s led to the “disappearance” of 30,000 people.

Kirchner’s husband-to-wife handover cannot mask deep-seated problems economic as well as political problems. Tensions are mounting between the big power suppliers and Kirchner, who plans to continue her husband’s policy of keeping prices largely frozen for residential users since the country's economic collapse in 2001-2002 which hit middle-class voters particularly hard. During that crisis, millions became involved in a variety of actions, including takeovers of factories by workers whose bosses had gone bankrupt. The downturn in the global economy driven by the credit crisis will hit Argentina hard. Cristina Kirchner’s government is in for a rough ride.

Cornna Lotz
AWTW secretary

Put New Labour in the post

The government’s refusal to accept responsibility for the loss of personal and financial records of 25 million people is absolutely typical. Blaming some “junior official” acting alone is simply an excuse to avoid the fact that ten years of New Labour have created the conditions for what happened at Revenue and Customs (HMRC).

Infatuated by managerialism, New Labour has tried to turn the state into a mirror image of the way big business functions. Like most of its other policies, this has proved an abject failure. Endless mergers and acquisitions of government departments, stuffing ministries out with consultants and corporate advisors, on top of ruthless “efficiency savings”, have created not only widespread chaos and confusion but major policy failures in every department.

The story of Revenue & Customs is typical. In 2005, when Brown was Chancellor, he merged what had been historically two separate departments into one. The price was paid by staff after Brown demanded that the merged department shed 25,000 jobs out of 94,000 – more than a quarter. Morale inevitably plummeted and management systems floundered. The disappearance of the child benefit data discs was only one in a string of breaches of security. Yet the government has until now refused appeals by the Information Commissioner Richard Thomas to do spot checks on government departments to see whether data protection is being observed. The Institute of Chartered Accountants has been warning of a catastrophe waiting to happen at HMRC. Chief executive Michael Izza said: “We have been flagging for most of 2007 that there has been a deterioration at HMRC. It manifests itself in things like postbags being unopened for weeks. It now takes 13 weeks to register a new company for a VAT number.”

The mantra of “efficiency savings” has contributed in other ways to the data loss disaster. Apparently, officials at HMRC told the National Audit Office (NAO) that it was too expensive to select the data the NAO wanted and that it was cheaper to download the entire database onto a disc. Then there is the way the discs were transported. Not for New Labour the use of expensive, in-house services. No, TNT Logistics, a major global corporation, has the contract for HMRC. As to the idea that one, young civil servant is totally responsible for the breach of security, this is simply laughable. New evidence suggests senior officials were aware that data including addresses and bank account details of 7.5 million families, was to be provided to the NAO. Sir John Bourn, the outgoing comptroller and auditor general, told a secret session of MPs on public accounts committee that a senior business manager at Revenue & Customs had authorised the information to be released in its full form. His email approving the sharing of the data was copied to an assistant director.

So now the government is involved in a cover-up of what really happened. While it builds an oppressive, authoritarian, surveillance state, New Labour can’t even provide basic protection of the data it holds on citizens. It’s time Brown and company were packaged up and sent unregistered (preferably by TNT) to some faraway destination.

Climate report passes the buck

Even vetting by the US government could not prevent the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) from opening its synthesis report with the stark statement that "warming of the climate system is unequivocal". The United Nations agency has, however, once again passed on identifying the main cause and fails to come up with any solutions to climate change that might challenge the status quo.

A jump in GHG emissions has not only resulted in rising temperatures but also been responsible for the increasing number of heat waves (such as the one that caused the deaths of thousands in France in 2003) and droughts (currently causing major problems even in developed countries like Australia and in Tennessee in the United States). Rising emissions are also behind rising sea levels and has affected tropical storm systems (the cyclone which hit Bangladesh last week claimed over 10,000 lives).

IPCC scientists also warn that the consequences of allowing temperatures to rise un-checked could expose up to 250 million people to increased water stress in Africa alone, where rain-fed agriculture yields could be halved. The synthesis report admits that GHG emissions will continue to rise even with current "climate change mitigation policies" and "sustainable practices". These could result in changes to climate systems even greater than already experienced and could lead to abrupt or irreversible impacts (such as oceans rising several metres if polar ice sheets are lost). Up to a third of all the planet's animals and plants face extinction as temperatures rise.

While the IPCC report admits that adaptive capacity is unevenly distributed both "across and within societies", a recent Christian Aid report, Truly Inconvenient: Tackling poverty & climate change at once shows that for millions of the world's poor “safe” levels of climate change have already been exceeded. Christian Aid rightly points out that "industrialised nations" (aka global capitalism) have been responsible for causing the climate crisis and it is they who should start to put it right. It even recognises the need for a debate about the "very nature of development".

The IPCC report does confirm that global warming is due to the increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions arising from the activities of the society we live in and that these have increased by 70% since 1970. As this is the period that has seen the rapid growth of global capitalism, it appears to leave little room for argument as to the real culprit for the climate crisis we are facing.


Yet the solutions proposed by the synthesis report, however, are firmly wedded to the status quo. The only “solutions” are market-led, with the IPCC seeing "substantial economic potential for the mitigation of global GHG emissions". It still supports the use of nuclear power for generating energy and biofuels for transport despite the dangers of radioactive pollution and increasing food prices for the world’s poor from farmers diverting to more profitable biofuel crops. The IPCC still sees industries trading in carbon as "an effective carbon-price signal” which could “realise significant mitigation potential”.

What the report fails to recognise that to truly tackle this crisis, a fundamental change in how society is organised will be needed. This is the very question that Running a Temperature addresses published by AWTW addresses, providing a clear and alternative framework for dealing with the climate crisis beyond capitalism.

Stuart Barlow

Sarkozy’s ‘Thatcher moment’

The outcome of the strike movement sweeping France is being monitored closely by The Economist and other voices of the market economy. “Let battle commence”, urged The Economist (15 November). “Can Nicolas Sarkozy be a French Margaret Thatcher?” asked Les Echos, a business newspaper. “Is Sarkozy ready for a long trial of strength with the unions à la Thatcher?” mused Le Parisien, in a reference to the class conflict that shook Britain between 1982 and 1986.

Previous French governments have lost their nerve in the face of strikes and demonstrations against plans to impose what is referred to as the Anglo-Saxon globalisation model by the country’s trade unions. This is viewed, correctly, as an economy based on flexible, low-cost labour, the unfettered movement of capital and a continuing reduction in social benefits and rights.

Will Nicholas Sarkozy stand firm, The Economist asks? It recalls with alarm the attempt in 1995 by the Chirac government to break up the country’s excellent public-sector pension schemes. Sarcastically, the magazine notes: “In the end, Jacques Chirac's government did what French governments do best: it backed down and dropped the whole plan.” It sees more hopeful signs this time, as Sarkozy confronts strikes by transport workers, civil servants, teachers and protests by students against plans to open universities to corporate investment.

Sarkozy wants to end what are known as “special regimes”. These allow railway, electricity and gas workers to retire on full pension after 37½ years of pension contributions, rather than 40 years in the rest of the public sector. Some 500,000 workers, and 1.1m pensioners, benefit from these regimes. Over the next four years, Sarkozy wants to lengthen the required contribution period to 40 years. The government also wants to extend to 41 years the required pension-contribution period for all workers, as well as introduce changes to the labour market and the benefit system.

The Economist is keeping its fingers crossed. By comparison with his predecessors, the magazine notes, Sarkozy has done exactly what he said he would do. And he has calculated that the leaders of the strike movement are looking for a compromise rather than building a momentum to bring down his government. The government has said it is prepared to talk about details in an effort to woo union leaders. The Economist is not completely convinced that France will enter the world of Anglo-Saxon globalisation, however, warning: “The deal he [Sarkozy] does on special regimes needs to be scrutinised to see how far he keeps his word.”

Nevertheless, the strike movement in France, along with industrial action by railway workers in Germany and nurses in Finland, indicate a rising tide of militancy just as the wheels come off the global economy. With the euro rising to new heights against the declining dollar, exports from the European Union become more expensive. This is what is driving the state and employers to reduce workers’ conditions. The events in France could presage a European-wide period more like the revolutionary year of 1968. Now that would really get The Economist worried!

Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

Bankers the priority for New Labour

When it comes to bailing out bankers, the New Labour government’s coffers are deep, as shown by the vast amounts of taxpayers’ money used in the futile bid to save Northern Rock. Contrast this with the treatment meted out to people claiming disability benefits and spending cuts imposed on climate change agencies as well as the body that reviews miscarriages of justice, and you get the picture about where priorities lie.

The government has loaned the failed Northern Rock anywhere between £22 and £40 billion and is not quite sure when - or even if - the state will gets its money back. There’s billions in interest due on top of the capital sum and city commentators are agreed that that this is unlikely ever to be repaid by whoever ends up buying the first British victim of the global financial crisis. Today it is revealed that potential buyers have valued the stricken mortgage bank at well below the closing price of its shares on Friday. They were selling at 132.6p each, giving the bank a valuation of £560 million. So much for the government’s soothing words about Northern Rock’s assets totalling over £100 billion.

Meanwhile, spending cuts are coming in thick and fast as the government slashes vital services in a bid to balance its books. According to leaked reports, there are plans to cut £300 million off the budgets of agencies funded through the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). Nature England is being asked to cut 30% from its budget for new conservation work. In addition, it is being asked to repay the £12 million spent on setting it up! Another agency facing cuts is the Waste and Resources Action Programme, along with other organisations dealing with canals, national parks, forestry, fisheries, sustainable development and environmental protection. These cuts expose the sham nature of the government’s claim to be tackling climate change just as leading scientists warn of an impending catastrophe as a result of global warming.

Also facing swingeing cuts is the Criminal Case Review Commission (CCRC). Staff are not being replaced and chairman Professor Graham Zellick said that the CCRC had made “great strides” in dealing with a backlog of cases. “Now that’s all going to be reversed, I suspect.” Solicitor Campbell Malone, who helped clear the name of a man wrongly jailed for murder, was more blunt. “The philosophy of this government seems to be that miscarriages of justice don’t matter any more. The climate is changing and the thinking seems to be that, if you go on interviewing people long enough, they will eventually confess.”

Soon to join the wrongly convicted as victims are the disabled. Work and pensions secretary Peter Hain has announced that fewer sick and disabled people will qualify for disability benefits for being unable to work, after a new test is introduced from next year. Hain says the changes will end what he calls "sick-note Britain", which is fine coming from someone who is paid £136,677 a year and who is entitled to endless holidays and various allowances. At the moment more than 60% of the people who apply for incapacity benefits are successful, but only 50% of people who take the new test are likely to pass it. The moral of the story is that if you’re a banker, New Labour will see you alright. But if you doing vital public service work or have a disability, forget it.

Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor

Co-Op FC a winner

At first sight, it might seem like an idea for a new comedy. A football website buys a controlling interest in a serious football club, promising the 20,000 fans who have each put up £35, not only joint ownership, but an equal say in team selection, player transfers and the running of the club. “Own the club and pick the team”, says the website.

A closer examination of the project reveals a wonderful experiment in democracy and co-operative decision-making, made possible by the internet. Football at the top end, of course, like everything else, has been sucked into the orbit of big business and the exceedingly rich dilettantes, oligarchs and billionaires who control it. It has been turned into a capitalist industry with the primary purpose of making money and satisfying the egos of the owners. Many fans have been excluded by soaring ticket prices from even watching their teams.

It couldn’t be more different at Ebbsfleet United (formerly Gravesend and Northfleet FC), in North Kent. Proposals from the new owners are not only designed to give the fans a voice and a share of the club, both on and off the pitch, but also to stop any possible takeover or abuse by one or more individual interests. It is open to all to pay the £35 (less than the cost of a ticket to watch many premiership matches) and become a voting member, including those living overseas (which will help the club’s scouting network, says the site), but nobody is allowed to buy more than a single share. “All profits generated by the club will be re-invested in the club, meaning members will not be paid a dividend or share of these profits… There will be no shareholders who take money out of the club.”

How will the team be picked? “The head coach will brief members online. This will include a review of the previous match, reports from the training ground and views on the forthcoming opposition. He will also give his thoughts on players, their form and fitness, as well as possible selections and tactics. Members will then submit their preferred 11, formation and tactics. A database will calculate the most popular choice. This will be handed to the Head Coach to instigate.” The manager (to be re-named head coach), the players, the full-time employees and everyone involved are all supporting the takeover of Ebbsfleet United, currently 9th in the Blue Square Premier League and only one promotion away from getting into the Football League proper.

The plan is unheard of in football; in fact it is rare outside the game. Several clubs have been formed by supporters trusts, but none of them have this level of input and control by members. Wimbledon AFC in 2002 and FC United of Manchester in 2005 were both set up as not-for-profit trusts by fans infuriated at decisions taken, with money and profit in mind, by the directors of Wimbledon and Manchester United.

Both these new teams are doing well and regularly get gates of between 2,000-3,000 at home matches, far larger than any of the other teams in their league. Soon after the takeover of Manchester United by the Glazers, one of the fans of the new club, FC United, Martin Howe, said: “The excitement is back in my football life. The banter with the fans, the quality of the football, the pricing and , best of all, the feeling of being part of something that is not funding unscrupulous men in suits, but is ours, it belongs to all of us”.

Developments like these at Wimbledon and Manchester, and now at Ebbsfleet arise from a powerful hostility to the commercialism rampant not just in football , but in all sport. And they point the way to new forms of ownership and co-operative working in the wider world beyond sport.

Peter Arkell

Just not cricket

There’s a striking simultaneity about events in Britain and Pakistan in the last 24 hours. Yesterday in Pakistan, Imran Khan, current Chancellor of the University of Bradford, former captain of the Pakistan cricket team - one of the finest all-rounders the game has ever produced - and a graduate of Oxford University, attended a protest rally against the imposition of emergency rule by US-supported authoritarian military dictator President Musharraf. Within minutes of appearing Khan was seized by religious students and handed over to the police who charged him under anti-terrorism legislation. Penalties under the act include life imprisonment and death.

Yesterday in New Labour’s Britain, as the Governor of the Bank of England warned of increasing threats to the economyfrom the global financial crisis, Gordon Brown introduced new measures to counter the perceived threat of terrorism. These include hardening the physical protection for public buildings, offering guidance to those operating public buildings, strengthening regional counter terrorism units, and “training neighbourhood police teams to deal with radicalisation in their local communities”. In addition, a single senior judge has been nominated to manage all terrorism cases, whilst a single senior lead prosecutor will be responsible for cases relating to “inciting violent extremism”. Musharraf has cited “judicial activism” – opposition from the judiciary - amongst his reasons for locking up all political opponents. It certainly looks as through Brown is side-stepping any future judicial opposition in the UK by selecting those who can be trusted to toe the line.

A major, nationwide “hearts and minds” campaign of propaganda emphasising “our shared values” will be launched in every community through schools, colleges, mosques and sports facilities, amongst faith groups and criminalised youth, in fact anywhere where people might be influenced by “ideologues” proposing radical change. After ten years with personal responsibility for the British economy, it is clear that Brown shares his values with his financial friends in the City of London, so “updated advice for universities on how to deal with extremism on the campus” is highly likely to include the identification of students seeking changes to the status quo, and guidance on neutralising them and rooting them out.

Also yesterday contracts were issued for the intelligence infrastructure involving biometric technology and shared databases, to support the UK Border Agency which will have 25,000 staff, uniting passport control, and customs with new powers of arrest and detention. Together with a new legislative assault on the rights to privacy and confidentiality, these measures will enable a huge range of police and other agencies to share up to 90 separate pieces of information on all cross-border travellers. “Airline liaison officers” based abroad will have new powers to cancel visas.

As the global recession begins to hit hard, millions will be radicalised as they lose their jobs and homes. New Labour is in the forefront of governments preparing and implementing a wide range of authoritarian measures to deal not just with suspected terrorists, but all those opposed to the capitalist corporations and the consequences of globalisation. No wonder the government’s response to Musharraf’s suspension of the constitution and the removal of Pakistan’s top judges has been muted.

Gerry Gold