squid

Socialist Party members are standing in the general election as part of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, which is standing 40 candidates. Socialist Party members campaign for:

• Fully publicly fund the NHS and other public services. Stop and reverse privatisation

• Mass council house building. Rent control now. Don’t make workers pay for the housing crisis – reject rent and service charge increases.

• Stop the slaughter in Gaza. No to war! For mass trade union action to stop arming the Israeli state

• Renationalise rail, mail, energy, water and steel. And other privatised utilities, under democratic workers’ control

• For real workers’ rights. For inflation-proof pay rises. For a £15 an hour minimum wage. Repeal the anti-trade union laws. Ban zero-hour contracts and fire and rehire

• Free education and training. Scrap tuition fees. Grants not loans – for college and university. Votes at 16

• Combat climate change. For a free-to-use, expanded, renationalised public transport system. Don’t make workers pay for the bosses’ climate crisis

• Fight for socialist change. Take the wealth of the 1%. Run society in the interests of the many not the few

As we approach the general election it is crucial that we amplify our voices and champion our cause. We've successfully met our fighting fund goal, enabling us to field TUSC candidates across the board. This is our opportunity to bring about real change.

Solidarity comrades, Squid.

Plymouth’s LGBTQ+ Pride parade had been fractured in the lead-up to the event. Some people broke away from planning the march after hearing of the involvement of companies Babcock and BT.

Babcock, a UK-based multinational corporation, has made applications for export licences for military equipment to Israel, making them a questionable and inappropriate sponsor of Pride. Trans Pride and others stated: “No Pride in genocide”.

BT has announced that 55,000 of their 130,000 employees will be laid off over the next six years, as part of a move into ‘AI automation’. This will affect people in Plymouth.

Written by me edited by socialist parties in house editor's. I am also the one on the right in the picture looking uncomfortable as always.

It has been a busy two days! Being firstly tasked with writing a report for Plymouth's pride event has been challenging but a challenge that has been overcome and will be published online tomorrow and in print in the next issue of our physical paper. The article briefly goes over pinkwashing, the pride event and corporates unattractive affairs and how that juxtaposed grassroots workers movements even going as far as to undermine.

3 comrades and myself once again canvassed more of Plymouth, we are slowing making our way through the area rallying support for Alex Moore a TUSC candidate and dedicated socialist. Reception has been great, even reform voters are willing to talk and listen, some have realised that Nigel Farage is not the politician for the workers, many comrades have taken to dismantling Reforms 'social contract'/manifesto to help would-be reform voters vote within their interest.

Events ended today but not before visiting the RFA's picket line and showing our support for Plymouth government employees who have been hit with massive pay cuts over 15 years, but RFA strikers stood strong and seem very hopeful going into the next election.

Frank Hester, the Tories' largest donor, has given the Tories £15 million, despite his private company, TPP, profiting from £135 million contracts with the Department of Health and Social Care in under four years. Hester was paid £515,000 in 2021-22 and receives £10 million of dividends. The Tories received thousands more from him after his racist and sexist comments were exposed. The second-biggest donor, billionaire Mohamed Mansour, was a minister in Egypt between 2006 and 2009, giving the Tories £5 million and £600,000 from one of his companies. There are reports that Tory donations are drying up, and Labour is also receiving big donations from the ultra-rich.

Summarized

It won’t surprise anyone to hear that NHS waiting lists have gone up yet again – despite the Tories repeatedly claiming the opposite – to a staggering 7.57 million. That’s 40,000 more people living with the fear and pain these long waits impose.

The NHS has been at breaking point for so long now it’s become routine. The Tories have devastated services across the board, creating chaos and misery. People struggle to see their GP, wait for hours in overcrowded A&E departments, get stuck in hospital because there is no available care in the community, or wait months for operations they desperately need.

I am sure we've all heard the argument that "socialism is easily corruptible." This is a misconception. While there is and has been corruption in socialist structures, it would be of a lesser level to that in capitalist political and corporate society. The only difference is that capitalism calls the same corruption farcical names like "lobbying," "corporate influence," "campaign contributions," "regulatory capture," or "crony capitalism." institutionalized corruption.

The Tory Network of Climate Denial and Fossil Fuel Funding: Write up

Credit to @sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al for posting over on !climate@slrpnk.net

We think MPs are paid too much. If you’re elected as a trade union rep in an office or a factory, you don’t get three times the wages of your workmates or four times their holidays. You live on the same terms and conditions, face the same bills, and try and deal with the same financial pressures and problems as the people around you.

MPs should be the same. When I was an MP in the 1980s, my family and I took only the average wage of a skilled worker in a unionised factory in Coventry. We weren’t isolated or insulated from the problems of the people in our city. When I complained about the cost of living, it was because it hit my family exactly the same way it hit the people I represented. And every Socialist Party member standing as part of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition in this general election makes the same pledge. If elected, we would be socialist MPs living on a worker’s wage. I think that’s worth supporting. I hope you do too.

A politician should not be a professional career! Its telling when we hear Richie Sunak went without sky TV' as a misguided means to be relatable to the working class. MP's should struggle with us, in doing so they would know the meaningful changes we need. Soon we will see Labour take the wheel with more career politicians. We want better.

The Socialist Party Formally Militant pays all party staff a skilled workers wage, our news papers to be competitive and without predatory advertisements are sold at a loss whilst also printed weekly in house and articles are often submitted in by members, all propped up by memberships and donations.

I don't ask that you join my party but I do ask that if you are a socialist you seek to join one of the many leftist parties here in the UK, I ask that you mobilise. The working class are crying out for an alternative, we want change.

The Labour Party today unveiled its manifesto for the 4 July General Election, with wealth creation and economic growth at the heart of the party’s plans.

Unveiling the party’s manifesto at the Co-op headquarters in Manchester, Starmer told the audience: “The way we create wealth is broken. It leaves far too many people feeling insecure. Wealth creation is our number one priority. If you take nothing else away from this today, let it be this. We are pro-business and pro-worker. A plan for wealth creation.”

He went on to add: “It is too hard for working people to get on, opportunity is not spread evenly enough and too many communities are not just locked out of the wealth we create, they’re disregarded as sources of dynamism in the first place.”

The Labour Party leader pledged to ‘turn the page forever’. So, what are the key themes and takeaways from the manifesto. We’ve got a breakdown of some of the key pledges:

Economy

• The Labour Party made clear its commitment to its fiscal rules, that the current budget moves into balance, so that day-to-day costs are met by revenues and that debt must be falling as a share of the economy by the fifth year of the forecast
• Planning reform in order to build 1.5 million new homes
• Set up the publicly owned GB Energy in order to cut bills for good
• £1.5bn to new gigafactories “so our automotive industry leads the world”

NHS

• Alongside pledging to reduce NHS waiting lists, the Labour Party will deliver 40,000 more NHS appointments each week, during evenings and weekends too
• New dentistry rescue plan, including 700,000 more urgent appointments
• Recruit 8,500 additional mental health staff
• Double the number of cancer scanners
• Bring back the “family doctor”

Immigration

• Create a “Border Security Command” -with hundreds of new investigators, intelligence officers, and cross-border police officers, funded by ending Rwanda scheme
• Hire additional caseworkers to tackle the asylum backlog
• Reform the points-based immigration system

Education

• Recruit 6,500 new expert teachers in key subjects
• 3,000 new primary school-based nurseries
• Free breakfast clubs in every primary school
• High-quality apprenticeships and specialist technical colleges

Constitutional reform

• Votes for 16 and 17 year olds
• Immediate reform of the House of Lords
• A new Ethics and Integrity Commission
• Enforced House of Lords retirement age of 80
• Establish “modernisation committee” for House of Commons

Law and order

• Crack down on antisocial behaviour with more neighbourhood police
• Recruit “thousands” of new police officers
• Introduce new offences for spiking and for the criminal exploitation of children
• Refer every young person caught in possession of a knife to a Youth Offending Team to receive a mandatory plan to prevent reoffending, with penalties including curfews, tagging, and custody for the most serious cases.
• A ban ninja swords, lethal zombie-style blades and machetes, and strengthen rules to prevent online sales

OP: any thoughts from my fellow comrades? personally i find it revealing that wages and rent are missing. he also speaks of building new houses but we aren't struggling with a lack of houses, more-so ownership of those house, i am sure Labor's MP's will have 1.5 million houses to sit on though, but i do like that they're lowering the voting age.

Hello comrades,

I had the pleasure of spending two days with the Plymouth branch of The Socialist Party formerly Militant. It was notably hectic with enthusiasm, which is a given with the general election around the corner. We started with laptops out, a large board for scribbling an action plan, and a table covered with maps showing districts around Plymouth, highlighted to mark areas that have been visited. We spoke about the campaign at length. I spent time with TUSC candidate Alix Moore, an ex-Militant member, now Socialist Party member. Alix and I went door to door speaking with locals—all very lovely and fed-up people due to the current political climate. Concerns around the NHS, schooling, stagnating wages, and sky-high rent were prevalent, and these are all issues TUSC aims to address with rent caps, a £15 minimum wage, and restructuring and funding of public services, to mention a few.

Alix and I busily made our way to a union conference where we listened intently to the issues of our rail workers. Alix then gave a great speech and gained the support of the union. We had a cheeky beer before heading off to the Plymouth branch members' meeting held at a lovely live music bar in an industrial corner of Plymouth. The branch Secretary gave a heartfelt speech about UK housing and how it's failing us—which it is.

The next day, I woke up at the home of a very kind-hearted comrade who had given me his sofa for the night, where I slept off the bustling of the previous day. But that wasn't the end. We set off to Exeter at 11 to set up a stand to sell our papers and speak with shoppers and workers alike. Though there for only an hour, we had very insightful chats with Exeter's residents and received kind-hearted donations.

The working class of the South West is crying out for an alternative to the current situation and what lies ahead after the election. I sincerely ask that my comrades stand up, join the fight, and be active members of your branch and the wider party. This is what mobilization is about and this is our fight!

In solidarity,

Squid.

With the general election less than a month away Starmer remains on course for Downing Street. “Things can maybe get a bit better”, was how the Economist magazine summed up its very faint hopes in the incoming Labour government. Millions of people who, on 4 July, will grit their teeth and vote Labour feel the same, but for very different reasons to the pro-capitalist, neoliberal Economist.

Polluting for profit

But why should anyone expect anything different? After all, these privatised companies are simply doing what they are in business to do – reward their shareholders.