Wednesday of this week marked exactly a year since the glorious day in November 2010 when thousands of students charged into and smashed up the Conservative Party headquarters at Millbank. A year on -- and 11 months since Parliament voted through the £9k tuition fee rise -- the student movement was out to prove that it’s still a force to be reckoned with. Despite only token backing from the National Union of Students, upwards of 10,000 students came from across the country to march on London’s financial district in a demo organised by the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC).

A lot has changed since last November -- from the Arab revolutions to the huge anti-cuts demonstration on March 26th to the riots that hit English cities in August. And you could tell as much from the police presence: while the 50,000 strong ‘Millbank demo’ last year was initially policed by around 250 officers, this week’s demo had the much-vaunted figure of 4,000. Not to mention the horses, armoured vehicles, two helicopters, dogs, FIT teams, rubber bullets, intimidation letters sent the previous day and the thousands of twelve page glossy booklets that the police handed out at the starting point warning everyone not to fuck with them -- as if that much wasn’t obvious from the aforementioned 4000 cops, rubber bullets, cavalry… you get the picture. All justified by a bit of the usual pre-demo hysterics about anarcho-extremist infliltrators intent on causing a riot, nevermind that it was a totally legit demo organised in co-operation with the police, well stewarded and with a planned route ETC ETC.

Normally a demo of this size would barely get a mention from the media -- but Wednesday had it all: rolling news coverage, TV helicopters, hundreds of photographers -- all clamouring for things to kick off. And the police were trying their hardest to make sure things did as well: charging around in full Robocop get-up, shields out, and with plain-clothes occasionally jumping folk and dragging them off just cause they got a bit bored.

Elsewhere in London, thousands of electricians -- currently engaged in a huge struggle against the tearing up of their national pay and conditions agreement -- were at a Unite the Union organised demo, having blockaded building sites earlier in the day. While most then marched to Parliament to lobby MPs, a rank and file break-off of a couple of hundred sparks tried to march to join the student demo. Hundreds of militant private sector workers engaged in a frontline struggle uniting with the big student demo would’ve been a powerful image. With the media all over the student demo this would’ve then been hard to ignore, and something that wouldn’t have fit comfortably with the media narrative of middle class students just out to defend their own interests. And this is precisely why the state were determined to stop it from happening, with the sparks’ batoned and beaten up by the cops until being contained in a kettle away from the student demo. News quickly reached the student demo, and there was a bit of a stand-off  at one street when it was found out that the electricians were being blockaded in that direction. Such were the police numbers though that the demo was more akin to a walking kettle, and any attempt to break-off would’ve been verging towards kamikaze.

Electricians blockading sites before rallying later in the day and getting attacked by cops

The march picked up though, with a massive soundsystem emerging and some innovative chants, ‘You can shove your rubber bullets up your arse’ among them. It was a long route, and eventually wound its way to the end point sometime after 3pm, where the police decided to form an impromptu kettle before letting everyone go in a pretty chaotic fashion. A dispersal order was issued for 5.31pm, but most people were well away by that point.

Moving forward, NCAFC have -- much like last year -- called a follow-up day of action for Wednesday 23 November. While it’s unlikely to get as much momentum behind it as last year, given the totally different circumstances -- the HE White Paper is unlikely to garner as much opposition as the brazen, headline-grabbing £9k fees rise - it can be a way of buildng student and anti-austerity activity ahead of what is looking set to be a mass day of action on November 30, when three million public sector workers will be on strike. On that day, let’s meet “total policing” with total resistance.

The pavement outside the Radisson Hotel on Argyle Street, Glasgow was the setting of a showdown last night between electricians -- currently fighting the tearing up of a national pay agreement that will see wage cuts of up to 35 percent and the wholesale de-skilling of their trade -- and industry bosses, who were arriving for a glitzy awards bash.

Around one hundred electricians and supporters gathered outside the hotel from early evening in a protest organised by Unite, as tuxedo-attired construction chiefs, visibly shaken, sipped champagne within the glass confines of the hotel. Industry bosses were heckled and booed as they entered the hotel, with chants going up of “we’re going to ruin your party” and “we’re coming to get you!”.

This was the latest in an ongoing series of protests following the decision by eight major firms to pull out of the national JIB agreement, which offers protection on pay and conditions. Already one company has been forced to enter back into the agreement -- the other seven have yet to follow.

This is a vital struggle to protect workers’ rights in the private sector, with the economic crisis being used as a pretext to smash the joint-industry agreement. Further protests are set to be staged over the few next weeks across the country, including at Govan Shipyard this Wednesday 12 October. Unite have told their members to get organised and to get ready for a ballot, as the employers prepare to impose deadlines for signing onto the new terms and conditions.

Turning out to the annual STUC march – held yesterday in Glasgow – I witnessed thousands of people marching in the pouring rain (and it really was monsoon level) for over three hours, and rallying at the end of it. Watching everyone come into the park at the end, and then watching them keep coming and keep coming and keep coming, til even I got bored and went to find somewhere handy to stand, was immense. I got a bit sentimental.

Something is happening in this country at the moment. Ever since the Sheridan debacle everyone who is casually in favour of the Scottish left has dissed us for not being united, and I think this is pish. I’d rather have honest difference than tactical, artificial unity. But at this point in time there is an honest unity, because people are uniting in the face of a common enemy. This enemy isn’t as simple as David Cameron, it’s the threat that he and his ilk represent – the immense threat to the welfare state and the end of a certain way of life, a certain kind of society: a kind of society which many had started to take for granted, and are now turning out to fight for its continued existence. People in Scotland are no longer deciding what kind of country they want to live in; now they know what kind of country they want to live in.

Independence is broadly being discussed as part of the process of achieving this country, but not the way the SNP talk about independence. For us independence is one possible means to a much more important end – not just the right to choose who runs the country without having to vote tactically against the Tories, but the right to choose what kind of a country we live in, what its priorities are, who it values.

The Scottish left have despaired of finding one party behind which to rally, and instead have banded together without one, building coalitions of resistance, new working groups, community groups, and policy-making units as they went. People have organised sporadically and multifariously, have started taking things into their own hands, have started taking responsibility for what is being imposed on their neighbourhoods (Save the Accord Centre campaign, the Save Otago Lane campaign, the Free Hetherington, earlier the Tripping Up Trump campaign). In the face of an overwhelming, despairing feeling that we cannot do anything in the face of the political power that rains down on us, we have decided we’re damn well going to do something anyway.

And I guess that this is the reason that for the first time in my life really I genuinely feel proud to be part of this entity we call Scotland. Here the nation’s history is being rewritten – people are invoking Red Clydeside, the poll tax riots, the shipbuilder work-in and are relating these things to the current uprising in Scotland, in order to construct an alternative historical narrative. This narrative which is the true story of a people who did not need a political party in order to do something. It is a minor narrative – none of these things changed the world, none of these things stopped the onset of neo-liberal capitalism, and we cannot expect the incredible efforts being expended at the moment to stop neo-liberal capitalism. But these efforts are aimed at slowing the imposition on a people of something it did not vote for, of a way of life to which it does not subscribe – a way of life where the only value is monetary, and where only those who have money are entitled to the support and protection of the state.

Something is happening in this country that hasn’t come from nowhere, and that – if this radical history is any indication – isn’t going away. Scotland, no longer proud of its part in the British Empire, of its stake in British wealth and oil, no longer necessarily proud of its industries (although still of its workers) is creating something else to be proud of: a refusal to sit back and watch while the subaltern suffer.

Introduction

On Sunday 22 May Spanish-language Windsor/Canada-based radio program Cayapa broadcast a program discussing the social and political changes underway in Venezuela, in the context of a recent solidarity brigade to the country by activists from the English-speaking world, and the country’s growing worker control movement. This article provides an overview of the program in English, followed by a translation of my report to the program about the worker control movement in Venezuela, particularly in the Guayana region in the east of the country. You can listen to the full program here.

Discussing the Revolution

The program, hosted by freelance journalist Alex Utrera, took interviews from several members of the recent Australia Venezuela Solidarity Network (AVSN) solidarity brigade to Venezuela, which ran between 25 April to 5 May last month. The brigade comprised activists, journalists, and students, which between them represented Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Scotland, and the United States. The brigade visited various examples of Venezuela’s growing infrastructure of social services as well as examples of popular participation and commmunity organisation which form part of Venezuela’s “Bolivarion Revolution”. The brigade also visited some of the country’s new institutions such as the headquarters of ALBA (Alliance for the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas), an international Latin America alliance founded by Cuba and Venezuela which seeks to promote regional integration and development based on alternative values to neoliberalism and ‘free trade’, and BanMujer, the government institution which provides credits and services to women in order to help them form cooperatives and achieve a greater level of independence and self-determination in Venezuelan society. Importantly, the brigade also visited the city of Puerto Ordaz in the east of Venezuela, to discover more about the worker control movement in that part of the country, both as part of “Plan Socialist Guyana” in the region’s nationalised industries, and other independent examples such as the Grafitos del Orinoco factory.

In amongst the interviews, the program also played a range of music from Venezuela and Latin America which reflect the “roch wind” of social change and revolution which have been blowing through the continent for the last decade, providing an appropriate context to the topics being discussed. The first interview was with Alejandro Rodriguez, who acted as one of the translators on the brigade, and gave an introduction to what the brigade was and what had been seen. It had been stressed during the brigade by participants that the aim was not only to see for ourselves the reality of Venezuelan society and report back our impressions as a counter to the distortions of the mass media (such as Fox news or the British BBC), but also to learn the lessons of the Venezuelan struggle for our own movements in our own countries.

The second interview was with Mexican Lulu Garcia Larque, who reported on changes to the situation for women in Venezuela. She outlined how there had been many improvements for women in Venezuela, in line with the social gains made by the general population, however she reported that women continue being a more vulnerable group in Venezuelan society. In this context she mentioned the importance of the increase in access to services such as health, and the increase in centres dealing with information and services on reproductive rights and promoting the health of mothers and babies. She also opined on the difference between the social, political and economic situation of Venezuela with other countries such as her native Mexico, stating that: “access to health, education and the right to participate doesn’t exist for many other Latin Americans, for example in Mexico, where the economy is deteriorating, government decisions are not made in order to benefit the poor, and people don’t have the same rights of expression as in Venezuela”. Finally, commenting on the social progress in general and gains for women in particular in Venezuela, Lula concluded by stating her belief that ”the next generation are going to build another world”.

The final interview was with Alexis Ardarfio, who helps organise the social and political activities of the iron extraction company Ferrominero in Guayana and is also an activist of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). Alexis also played a key role in organising the Puerto Ordaz section of the brigade. Alexis mentioned the importance of having activists from other countries coming to see Venezuela for themselves, particularly the worker control movement in Guayana. He stated that in this movement “we are creating a new model of industrial organisation - a model of popular participation in industrial production, production of quality and effectiveness, in order to resolve societal and human problems, for example in producing resources for Gran Mision Vivienda (the Venezuelan government’s current effort to provide housing for everyone in the nation by building 2 million homes by 2017)…in this vein, the best manner of [solving humanity's problems] is with worker control.” Alexis also invited anyone interested in finding out more about Venezuela and the revolutionary process to contact him with questions. His email and articles on worker control can be found on the Aporrea website here.

Interview: Impressions of Worker Control in Venezuela

The final interview of the program was with myself, where Alex asked me to report on what the brigade had seen of the worker control movement in the Guayana region of Venezuela.

As I am in the process of preparing a fuller article on the topic, I felt it would be useful to include a translation here of my initial report and observations. For more information in english about the worker control movement in Venezuela, there are several articles available on Venezuelanalysis.com among other sources, including an article about the recent national conference of the worker control movement here.

Alex: Ewan, can you tell us what is worker control?

Ewan: Well, that is the great debate going on in Venezuela at the moment, on that question exactly. However generally, the idea is that workers should have control over the decisions in a company or workplace, and so the company, the production, and all of the decisions, are under the control of the workers…and this is a democratic idea, that all the workers have an equal role in the process of taking decisions about [the running of] a factory or workplace: that, basically, is worker control.

Alex: Ewan, you visited various factories [in the Guayana region of Venezuela], how was your experience of these factories?

Ewan: We [the brigade] had two distinct experiences. The first was of the nationalised basic insdustries that form part of the regional production plan called “Plan Socialist Guayana”, particularly SIDOR and Ferrominero, the steel production and iron ore extraction companies. In these companies, as part of Plan Socialist Guayana, they are developing a strategy to implement worker control…this process is at the stage called “sensibilizacion”, which is to say, a stage of debate and education with the participation of the workers on how to implement worker control. Thus, this is an important stage because it is with the participation of the workers, in a debate about what form worker control should take, however it is not at the stage of the actual implementation of worker control…so this experience was of a debate about how to implement worker control in factories with over 1,000 workers [SIDOR has over 10,000 workers for example].

The other example we experienced was a visit to a factory called “Grafitos del Orinico” [which produces products important for the production of steel in SIDOR, and was taken over by its workers  after an 8-month occupation and struggle against the former owners], which is a factory with 54 workers. The system in this factory is one is which every worker has a vote and an equal role, and [the decision making body] of the factory is the assembly of all the workers: all the decisions about the running of the factory, including finance (and what to pay themselves), are made in the assembly…thus this is a revolutionary and democratic idea, because it is a new model of organisation, of how to manage a factory…and so for us, this example was very, very interesting.

Alex: And can you tell us a little of what is the difference between a factory which has worker control and one that doesn’t?

Ewan: Basically, for me the difference is one between exploitation and oppression, and freedom and emancipation…in the factories with worker control, the workers have control over their lives, they can take decisions about their life in the workplace, decisions about their life, their work, and they can develop themselves as human beings…[this is because] the aim is worker control is not to make profits for the owner, but the human development of the workers and to help the community, thus the wealth created by the workers above what is needed for a dignified life goes to the community, for schools and childrens services in the area, and to help the community generally. Thus it is a different conception of how to imagine and organise production: is the aim of production to create profits for the boss, or for the wellbeing of the workers and the social development of the community and society? Therefore, this is the difference: one is a democratic model, opposed to a [heirarchical] capitalist model of oppression and exploitation, which aims not to make money for the boss but to the human and education development of the workers, and to help the community as well. Those are the most important differences in my opinion.

Thus, this is the most revolutionary idea, because it is the union of socialism and democracy…but to realise this in the entire Venezuela economy is, in my opinion, going to require a revolution within a revolution, because in order to conquer the spaces of popular power necessary for this process, you need to fight, or course, against the bosses and capitalism, but also against those sections of the revolution which are the most reformist, the bureaucracy…however there is a possibility, a possible future for humanity: worker control offers a future [path] for humanity: but it is an idea which must be struggled for, and is going to require a struggle to be realised. Thus it is possible, but it is a struggle, a struggle for humanity.

Alex: And finally Ewan, what is the impact of the implementation of this first phase of education and debate toward worker control in Venezuela: is it creating an impact on the average worker? What are the possibilities?

Ewan: In Plan Socialist Guayana in the “sensibilizacion” stage, the possibility [of full worker control] definitly exists, but something very important for this is the future of the proposition for a new Organic Law of Trabajo [an Organic Law is the highest form of law in Venezuela, and is rooted in and given the same weight as the constitution]. In this law, which is being debated and promoted by various sections of the labour movement, workers councils, the PCV (Communist Party of Venezuela) and sections of the PSUV, is a proposition for a new legal status for workers councils…another clause in the law is for paid time during the work day for the political and educational activities of workers: thus this law contains powerful proposals for workers struggling for worker’s control in all of the factories and workplaces of Venezuela, and so it is very important…and to be fair, Chavez stated during the giant May Day march in Caracas that he thought this law should be passed in the country’s National Assembly.

Aside from this, workers can still struggle to implement worker control and bring sovereignty to the workers, giving real democracy to the workplace…if workers have success with this, then yes, it is possible that there can be worker control in the factories [and workplaces] of Venezuela: thus it is important to investigate and understand the process of changes underway in Venezuela in this moment, particularly the movement toward worker control, because the examples of worker control, for example in Merida with the nationalised milk company Enlaces, with Grafitos del Orinoco, with Invepal [worker run paper factory in Maracay], and others, are important in my opinion because they offer another model to organis the workplace, along democratic lines, and thus understanding this process is important for all humans, all of humanity. Therefore in my opinion it is a good idea for all people to understand this process, what is happening at the moment, and learn the lessons the struggles in our countries as well.

Conclusion

Both the AVSN solidarity brigade, and the reportage of Cayapa radio show highlight the importance of investigating and understanding the changes underway in Venezuelan society and politics today. To date, the successes and possibilities of the country’s popular movements, and the social gains promoted by the current government, throw into sharp relief the poverty of the view that “there is no alternative” to the way humanity is organised and relates to itself, and is a counter to the demoralisation and apathy that this perspective encourges among those who would look to seek to build an alternative. Thus understanding, supporting, and learning from movements such as the worker control movement in Venezuela are important for showing us not just that “another world is possible”: but what that world could look like and how we can get there. To that end, in the coming weeks I will be publishing more of my (and other’s) investigations about the worker control movement in Venezuela, and indeed more about the social and political changes underway in Venezuelan society in general.

For any further questions or discussion about this topic, please leave a comment here or contact me on my blog.

Yesterday something unusual occured in the historic City of Stirling -- a large march and rally though its town centre. The purpose was to protest job cuts at the University -- specifically, 17 compulsory redundancies being made in the Institute of Aquaculture at the University of Stirling: Scotland’s only Instutute of Aquaculture, which enjoys an international reputation for world-reading research. The opportunity was also taken to celebrate free education in Scotland, and to continue the fight to protect our education system from cuts. On the same day staff across departments at the University were striking in protest at the redundancies.

Stirling Students Rally Against Job Cuts

The march was made up of 450 of Stirling’s staff and students, organised by UCU in collaboration with Stirling University’s Student Union. Starting at the university, the march wound it’s way through Causewayhead, over Stirling Bridge and through the historic town centre, ending with speeches at the public dais at the junction of King Street and Port Street -- bang in the city centre where the rally was supported and joined by locals, shoppers, and various other onlookers. Chants heard during the march included the classics ‘No Ifs! No Buts! No Education Cuts!’, and ‘When they say Cut Back we say Fight Back’. Some of these were chanted back at us enthusiastically by the school students we passed on the way (the march went past Wallace High School). The candidates for the Stirling constituency in the Scottish Election were present (except, obviously, for the Conservative), as well as local and national media.

Students and staff at the University of Stirling are -- like their counterparts across the country -- worried for the future of their jobs, their courses and their institutions. It is widely believed that these compulsory redundancies in the Instutite of Aquaculture will not be the last compulsory redundancies made at the University. The Institute of Aquaculture itself is well worth defending: as this article outlines, it does important humanitarian and conservation work in Bangladesh, teaching the local people how to conserve one of their most vital food sources, and running a night school for local children (which receives no funding and survives entirely on donations). Surely a department with such credentials deserves investment, rather than cuts? People in Bangladesh certainly think so, as can be seen both here and in the video below, where they stage their own protest against the redundancies at Stirling:

The Institute of Aquaculture have put people before profit, and in doing so have created jobs, run a school, and helped people in Bangladesh obtain the resources they need to preserve their environment and optimise a major food source. The institute literally educates the illiterate and feeds the hungry -- what further credentials can it possibly require in order to avoid attack by University management?

We must continue to fight for the future of education -- not only for our students and staff, but for the wider and international community, and all the people who benefit from what universities do. The Institute of Aquaculture at Stirling is a prime example of what education and research can achieve, and provides all the evidence needed in the case for the defense of our universities in the face of cuts.

The Herald’s coverage of the Stirling march and rally yesterday is available here.

Is it Libya? Egypt? Tunisia? No, it’s the USA. It may have been overlooked amongst rioting and protests of a much bigger scale in the middle east, but there’s been a battle raging in Wisconsin between the State Government and its own people. Police were ordered to force demonstrators out of the State Capitol building yesterday, but instead of driving them out defected to the side of the protesters.

The occupied Wisconsin State Capitol

One of the police said “We have been ordered by the legislature to kick
you all out at 4:00 today. But we know what’s right from wrong. We will
not be kicking anyone out, in fact, we will be sleeping here with you!”. For a State to lose control of it’s police force is unprecedented in recent history, and a sign that the Wisconsin demonstrators are now winning groups to their struggle who, to put it mildy, are not generally associated with trade unions and radical struggle.

The origin of these protests lies in an attempt by the Tea Party supported right-wing Republican Governor Scott Walker to destroy the power of the unions in Wisconsin. Walker wants to remove the rights of unions to collectively bargain with the Government over all other issues apart from pay – ie, holidays. pensions, benefits etc.

Walker claims that this is necessary to deal with the state deficit, but the reality is that – just like the Tories in the UK – the Tea Party and it’s allies want to use the national debt as an excuse to do all the things they’ve wanted to do to Trade Unions but didn’t have an excuse to do. It’s the Shock Doctrine for Wisconsin – terrify people into accepting horrendous “reforms” whilst they’re scared of a financial crisis. Whilst attacking collective bargaining for Unions and attacking their members pensions and healthcare, Walker’s budget proposes tax cuts for the richest in the State.

Walker’s plan is summarised quite well here, as a three pronged attack on the unions.

“In part one, their ability to bargain benefits for their members is reduced. In part two, their ability to collect dues, and thus spend money organizing members or lobbying the legislature, is undercut. And in part three, workers have to vote the union back into existence every single year. Put it all together and it looks like this: Wisconsin’s unions can’t deliver value to their members, they’re deprived of the resources to change the rules so they can start delivering value to their members again, and because of that, their members eventually give in to employer pressure and shut the union down in one of the annual certification elections

And because the Unions provide large donations to the Democratic Party, as well as neutering class struggle in the State it also removes finances from a political opponent – OR it forces the Democrats to seek funding from non-union sources, like millionaire businessmen. This means either the Democratic Party loses funds, or has to shift more and more to the right to win the money of big business – shifting right on to a territory the Republican Party already hold. It’s a Machiavellian plan to fundamentally change the political terrain in Wisconsin in favour of the ideas of the Right and business.

The Unions in Wisconsin responded with a protest on February the 15th, as the joint finance committee in the State would hear ALL speakers who wanted to speak in favour or against the bill. Exploiting this loophole rather spectacularly, the Unions managed to rally thousands of people to come to the State Capitol building to testify against the bill.

Given the vast number of citizens who opposed the bill, unsurprisingly there wasn’t enough time to hear them all. Instead of leaving though, the protesters stayed overnight in the Capitol Building and have remained there for two weeks – with thousands more coming to join in their occupation and to protest outside the building.

This militant defiance of union busting by the Labour movement in the USA has even, dragged the Democratic Party in the State leftward. In both the Assembly and the Senate of Wisconsin the Democrats are a minority – having lost out to the Republican Party’s gains in the midterms. They cannot vote to defeat Walker’s proposals.

But instead the Democratic Party’s Senators have gone into a kind of political exile to Illinois. It sounds mad but is actually an inspired counter-move. The Republicans have 19 Senators in the state compared to the 14 Democratic Senators. But in order for any law to pass, there must be a quorate of at least 20 senators – so the Republicans have been unable to pass this law because the Democrats have fled the state! The Democratic Party are effectively acting in defiance of normal parliamentary practice to stop the Republican Party from crushing the Trade Union movement.

Walker has of course found allies from the Tea Party, who have organised counter-demonstrations against the Unions. But they have been massively outnumbered by the pro-Union rallies, which are the biggest demonstrations Wisconsin has seen since the Vietnam War. In a national poll over 60% of Americans opposed Walker’s plan being enacted in their own states, and even contributors from Fox News have realised that Walker’s argument is “malarkey” and that it’s all about union busting.

These protests show that while the USA isn’t normally seen as a hotbed of class struggle, when it happens they don’t mess about. The struggle in Wisconsin is reminiscent of other mass mobilisations of workers in US Labour Movement history – like the Bonus Army, who set up an illegal camp in Washington DC in protest at the President’s refusal to pay them their bonus after fighting in WW1. The US Army was eventually brought in to clear the camps, which it did at the point of bayonets and the use of chemical gas.

Of course this time round, if Walker wants to use the State’s security forces to clear the State Capitol he won’t have the support of the Police. What remains to be seen is if other parts of the State will obey his orders – he’s already declared his willingness to use the National Guard to bust Unions, a tactic that Mubarak would have been happy to use. State Troopers have even been dispatched to try and drag the Democratic Senators back to the occupied Capitol Building, to try and facilitate a “democratic” process through state sponsored kidnapping.

The struggle in Wisconsin shows that the Left in the USA are starting to fight back after being left in the shadow of the Tea Party and Obama’s failures and betrayals. Along the way, they are winning mass support and a few unusal (but not unwelcome) allies to their cause.

It has emerged that youth unemployment has risen to it’s highest levels since 1992. Officially 20.5% young people are unemployed in the UK as a whole. That’s just over 1 in 5 of us! Not only is this statistic worrying for young people it is the blunt, grotesque truth that young socialists have known for years; Capitalism is oppressing the youth. These statistics have been released as part of the

The full stats showing under-24s being the worst hit age group.

overall statistics on unemployment in the three months to December which shows a rise in the number of people unemployed  to 2.5 million (there was a minor decrease of people unemployed in Scotland). These stats do not paint a great picture for our future or the next generation’s future. The only way to change these stats is by changing the way in which we run our economy and it must start now!

For years we (the youth) have been told that we are a bunch of scroungers, we’re a spoilt generation and if we’re not in employment its all our own fault. That view is flawed and has been for years but now we have updated evidence to prove the knobheads who hold that view wrong. There is a reason why this current generation will be the first ever to become poorer than their parents’ generation. Unfortunately we are not going to have a public sector (becoming a bit of a luxury in the western world now!) by the time we become middle aged the way the current regime of cuts that are being forced upon us by the Tories and Lib Dems. These cuts are attacking those who are most vulnerable in society and the youth (in particular the working class youth) are being attacked by these cuts. The public sector cut-backs are being justified as being “necessary” as we are all in this together  the government believe that we shouldn’t punish the bankers who caused this crisis. As a result of these public sector cuts we have all been reassured by David Cameron and co. that the private sector will employ everyone! Well one look at these stats will show that the private sector ain’t doing what Cameron wants them to do. Cameron was so distraught about the announcement of youth employment he couldn’t hold back his tears when he said “(youth employment was) a matter of great regret”. Can you feel his genuine concern for the youth of this country? I fucking can’t!

The message from the government, even though there's no jobs!

In response to this report the government somehow claimed that it showed evidence of unemployment starting to “stabilise”. By stabilising they mean its going to get to a level so unbearably high it cannot go down or rise further thus “stabilising”, I guess. I cannot understand (well I can actually) how anyone in government are not in any sort of panic over the high youth unemployment rate. The simple fact of the matter is the government is run by middle aged millionaires who do not care about investing in the future, they only look at what money they can  make for themselves and people in a similar situation. That is why capitalism is exploiting the youth. Its not only this country that faces this problem. Its every capitalist country in the world. The people who are running the countries around the world are rather selfishly living for today. That’s not how govern. That’s a recipe for disaster, if you want to know how to sell out an entire generation look no further than the British governments from 1992 onwards. Although in that time we have had minimum wage act passed. This in principle is good for the youth of this country ending many years of relative slave labour for the youth but ironically the minimum wage is one of the most anti-youth acts right now (however its better than nothing.) . It is disgusting that the wage you receive is based on your age, that’s called discrimination but they get let off with it. If I was to get a job tomorrow which paid minimum wage I would receive £3.56 an hour (minimum wage for a 16-17 year old) but someone doing the same job as me but aged 21+ they would recieve £5.53 an hour (which is very poor anyway), an sad but true fact that shows how you are punished in employment if you are young, you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.

The campaign against youth discrimination must continue. That’s why come election we must put across our policies for a higher minimum wage (without age discrimination) for those young people lucky enough to have a job. The voting age should be lowered

Home from home for young people.

to 16 so those who are being screwed over by this government can at least vote against them (after all at 16 you are allowed to fight in illegal wars and deemed fit to be a parent). This article may be about youth unemployment but it is just one factor in this society that is run by people who are determined to increase their bank balance whilst  blaming the youth  for their own and society’s shortcomings and its time this attitude ends before its too late.

Tory Party conference kicks off

Now that the Tories have got past their honeymoon period in government – if they ever actually had it – they’ve decided to get down to the important work of being totally despicable, nakedly evil bastards. Last week they announced plans to replace trade union and labour holiday Mayday with “Trafalgar Day”. SSY has heard unconfirmed rumours that the Tories intend to mark the inauguration of this holiday by making a 50 foot statue of Thatcher out of gold in the middle of Liverpool.
On a more serious note, recent reports have shown what we have all known already – that the Tories are owned lock, stock and barrel by big business. This shouldn’t be controversial – but what is new, is which business sector contributed over 50% of Tory funds; bankers.

Yes the same industry which has bankrupted the UK is now providing funds to the party which says it’s going to fix everything they fucked up. Conflict of interest much? The Tories have always taken money from bankers, but this is a substantial increase in the influence The City has over the largest governing party in the UK – in 2005 bankers only provided 25% of Tory funds. The recent increase might account for George Osborne’s pathetic “raid” on the banks of £800million, less than the £1billion they make a week.

Continuing on the Tories being blatantly evil and not giving a fuck about it theme, internships with some of these bastard bankers have been auctioned of to rich Tory kids for up to £3k a pop – with the proceeds going to Tory party coffers. They were auctioned off at the interestingly named “Black and White party”. At SSY we don’t know why it’s called this, but are prepared to make an educated guess that it either involved minstrels or nostalgia for apartheid.

This guy is totally responsible and will solve all our problems

For a few thousand quid aspiring young bankers can learn all the tricks of fucking about the entire world’s economic system, making millions in the process and letting everyone else clean up whilst you snort coke and run over homeless people in a BMW laughing and tweeting about it on your Iphone.

Of course Tories don’t just have plans for their young folk – they’ve got one outlined for us as well. The Adam Smith institute, Maggie Thatcher’s favourite thinktank is floating an article calling for the minimum wage to be scrapped for young people. The minimum wage as it is is already a pittance, and for people under 18 it is even less – despite the fact that they usually do exactly the same work as over 18 year olds. The article regurgitates all the old Tory propaganda about how the minimum wage would put folk out of jobs, and how abolishing the wage would increase youth employment.

The reality is these are ideas the Tories have always believed in but they are now using the economic crisis to try and put them forward as a solution. We should remember these examples of Tory greed and class prejudice next time people in the Labour Party or anti cuts movement call on us to be moderate, or not alienate people – respect goes two ways, and right now the Tories have seen their honeymoon is over and got down to nakedly and blatantly fucking us over. Why should we be moderate or reasonable in how we treat these people when they never extend us the same courtesy?

Ye may have noticed over the New Year a prison riot in England, with prisoners staging an uprising over searches for contraband booze. What wasn’t reported as much was that in the USA a much bigger and more important protest by prisoners -- a one day strike, which crossed racial lines as Black and White prisoners refused to work for one day in protest at prison conditions in the USA, with demands for a living wage, decent healthcare, nutritional meals, access to rehabilitation, fair parole hearings and family visits.

The prison industry in the United States is big business as outlined here -- “prison workers provide ninety eight percent of the total market for equipment assembly services.  They produce ninety three percent of paints and paintbrushes, ninety two percent of stove assemblies, forty six percent of body armor, thirty six percent of all home appliances, thirty percent of all microphones, headphones, and speakers, and they even manufacture twenty one percent of all office furniture”.

Prisoners don’t only make commercial goods, they’re also an important part of the US Military Industrial Complex -- they produce “100% of all helmets ammunition belts, bullet proof vests, Identification tags, shirts, pants tents, bags and even canteens are produced by prison labour”. This means that by jailing a large whack of it’s own population the United States can afford to keep supplying it’s massively overstretched military maintain bases around the world and invade other countries.

This massive industry has been used by the largest corporations in the USA to undercut workers rights and make a killing -

* A Washington company “hired” prisoners to wrap software for Microsoft.
Golden arches, golden shackles? Oregon inmates produce electronic menu boards for McDonalds.
* In New Mexico, inmates take hotel reservations by telephone. California convicts took TWA airline reservations over the phone — during a flight attendants’ strike.
* Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the largest of the nation’s 88 private prison operators, teamed up with Company Apparel Safety Items in the first partnership between a private prison and a private manufacturer.
* Next time you’re turning the lights down and getting all comfy, consider this: Prisoners in South Carolina made lingerie for Victoria’s Secret.

Using prisoners as virtual slave labour has meant that for once, the practice of American jobs being outsourced to the Third World has reversed, for example an assembly factory in Mexico and sweatshop in Indonesia were closed down with their trade brought back to the USA -- because even prisoners can be paid less than workers in the developing world, as little as 25c an hour.

Not only can companies in the USA get prisoners to make all their crap on the cheap, they can actually run prisons themselves. Since the 1980’s the private prison industry in the USA has boomed (more on this later).

As the US prison population skyrocketed, the ruling class in the United States did what it always does, and pointed to the free market for a solution to it’s jailing of millions of it’s own citizens; It let private prisons ease the burden on the Federal Government. The problem is that even the US Bureau of Justice says the efficiency savings private prisons were meant to make ““have simply not materialized.” What happened was that a spate of violent prisoners escaped because privatised prisons cut corners for profit -- just like Railtrack in the UK, privatisation of what should be a not for profit social service resulted in a disastrous risk to people’s safety.

This graph makes sense when you realise the War on Drugs kicked off in 1980.

The reason the prison industrial complex has grown to become such a massive part of the US economy is simple -- the prison population in the United States has quadrupled in the past 20 years. The USA imprisons more people than any other country in the world at any time in human history. With only 5% of the world’s population, the USA has almost 25% of the world’s prison population. A whopping 2,500, 000 Americans are behind bars.

Despite this massive increase in prisoners, reports of crime have actually decreased in the same 20 years. The right-wing in the USA claims the two are related -- more people in jail, less violent offenders on the streets. But the overwhelming majority of prisoners in the USA are held for non-violent crimes.

The massive increase in jailed Americans is due to the beginning of the “War on Drugs” in the 1980’s. Just like the prohibition of alcohol in the 20’s, politicians in the US used the massive crack cocaine epidemic that hit the states as an excuse to jail hundreds of thousands of people, so they could pose as being tough and win votes for fighting a “war” (this was during the Cold War where fighting an actual war abroad to win elections was frowned upon by the Soviet Union).

The majority of people arrested were not drug dealers though -- they were actually drug users. The penalty for drug use in the USA makes the UK look like Bob Ainsworth’s psychedelic drug paradise -- you can get 5 years without any chance of parole for possessing 3.5 ounces of smack/5 grams of crack.

This means those jailed for drug offences are predominantly poor and Black. As well as looking back to the war on alcohol, the “War on Drugs” helped reintroduce another American tradition; making lots of Black men slaves -- almost 40% of the US prison population is made up of Black males, despite them only making up 12% of the population.

While black males were jailed en masse, many of the people who were actually responsible for letting crack into the United States were protected because crack cocaine helped to fund anti-communist rebels in Nicaragua. The CIA actively assisted the distribution of crack cocaine in the USA so they could illegally arm these rebels, and unlike their victims, none of them have ever done any jail time for it.

At least one polis gets it.

The war on drugs itself was biased against Black males, with people who smoked crack (the cheap form of cocaine taken by poor folk, a lot of whom were also Black) being treated much more harshly by the Justice system than cocaine in it’s pure form (the kind of cocaine taken by people in the Justice system). For example you’d need to get found wi 500 grams of pure cocaine to get the same punishment (5 years) as someone wi 5 grams of crack. Cocaine is a hell of a drug (for jailing lots of folk).

The War on Drugs, and the massive increase in prison population and jailing of Black males means there are more Black men in jail than in college than the USA. SSY is still waiting for Mr-Change-You-Can-Believe-In to rectify this situation but we won’t hold our breath. As Stephen Fry outlines below, keeping lots of young black guys in jail makes a few white guys in Washington a lot of money.

Well done American ruling class, I see what you’ve done there.

There are some cases where encouraging folk to work in prison is something Socialists should support -- it keeps them active, it can help rehabilitate them, teach them new skills and prepare them for life outside. But the fact is right now, rehabilitation in the United States isn’t just frowned upon as being too liberal, it’d be a hammer blow to large parts of the economy. Societies are ordered by what makes money for the people in charge of it, and there’s no motivation to stopping the Justice system from jailing millions of folk in the USA -- the opposite in fact.

People on the conservative right in the USA often attack Socialists for all the dodgy stuff that happened in the Soviet Union -- one of which was the Gulag, a massive Prison Industrial Complex which used to exist in Russia. Aside from the fact we don’t actually support that, the Gulag system in the Soviet Union was a massive white elephant which lost the Soviets millions of roubles as prisoners dug meaningless canals to nowhere. These projects were quickly scrapped by the Soviet leadership after Stalin kicked the bucket.

In contrast, the US Prison Industrial Complex is very, very profitable for the people who can get a cut out of it. The War on Drugs may have failed to stop drug use in the USA but it has been a roaring success for the shareholders of hundreds of companies, private prisons and military suppliers who have jailed drug addicts to use as slaves.

People who commit the worst, most violent crimes of murder, assault, rape etc shouldn’t be anywhere else but behind bars but those Americans who get addicted to drugs should get help from their Government to go clean, instead of working for years in the 21st century equivalent of cotton picking.

While most folk manage to spend the festive season off work, spending times wi our friends and family playing monotonous games with our “loved ones” spare a thought for the unlucky ones – the folk who have to work on Christmas day, serving those people who still think Christmas day involves something else than getting pissed and falling asleep on a couch.

As appalling as a lot of workers rights are in the UK, most folk still at least get Christmas off or get paid an improved rate for working over the holidays. But some supermarkets have tried to pull a fast one by only offering staff a Sunday rate for working boxing day this year. Some supermarkets are also bullying their staff into ‘volunteering’ to work over Christmas. In England tube workers are going on strike to secure triple pay and a day off in lieu for working on Boxing Day.

It’s ironic because the origins of Boxing Day come from Victorian Britain’s class divided society. The rich folk would have a great Christmas Day, wi presents, food made by their servants, entertainment provided etc but obviously for this to happen they’d need lots of folk to work for them. So the servants worked on Christmas Day, but got the day off on Boxing Day – as a kind of cheaper, low budget holiday for the plebs, but where they would get boxes of gifts from their masters – hence Boxing Day.

With massive unemployment in the UK just now refusing a request/order to ‘volunteer’ working on public holidays is a lot harder to do – your manager will be happy to point out all the other folk who will be more flexible than you in your job if it’s time for redundancies. USDAW has produced a set o guide to your rights in work over Christmas, when you can refuse to work, how long and how much pay you can expect.

There  are certain industries and services that do have to work over Christmas – and folk should be paid extra from working away from their families, and it shouldn’t always be the same folk – but low paid workers shouldn’t be intimidated or forced to work over the holiday period because they’re scared for their jobs. If that happens we go back to the Victorian celebrations of Christmas where loads of the servants couldn’t enjoy Christmas Day because they were working  - except this time, workers might not even get Boxing Day.