Stop Trump’s Wars!

by New Worker correspondent

Protesters gathered  outside Downing Street in London, condemning the US strikes on Venezuela on Saturday. This marked the fourth such action in London after the American raid on Caracas on 3rd January. One of the supporters of the mass picket in Whitehall, the British Chapter of the Anti Fascist International, said it stands in firm solidarity with Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution and totally condemns “the complicity of imperialist Britain.The Labour government is an accomplice in this war. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has refused to condemn the US bombing and abduction, stating  he will ‘shed no tears’ and that ‘the UK has long supported a transition in Venezuela’.The former human rights lawyer was unable to answer whether or not Trump had broken international law. The Bank of England continues to hoard 31 tonnes of stolen Venezuelan gold in its coffers. The RAF, British bases and Ministry of Defence intelligence have aided in the seizure of Venezuelan linked oil tankers – this is imperialist piracy!
“This is not only a war on Venezuela, this is a war on Cuba, on Nicaragua, on Colombia, on Mexico on all progressive movements in Latin America and beyond. It is an attack on solidarity with Palestine, targeting the nations who have defied the Zionist genocide in Gaza. Labour’s refusal to condemn the US illegal action is not out of cowardice, but because they represent the interests of the British multinationals; Britain, like the USA, treats the whole of Latin America as a place to be robbed of its natural resources. This is also an attack on the ordinary people of the USA and Britain, who have far more in common with Venezuelan workers than they do with the ruling class of their nations. This is an attack on all who struggle to put people before profit, who fight for socialism, who fight to build a better world”.

Prisoners for Palestine!

by New Worker correspondent

Six of the 32 political prisoners for Palestine in the UK are on hunger strike - now in its fourth week. This is the largest hunger strike since 1981, yet the bourgeois media says nothing. 

As their health deteriorates, it is fundamental we escalate with our presence.  On Tuesday campaigners  mobilised outside BBC HQ in London to demand coverage of the hunger strike campaign. BBC content gives 33 times more coverage per Israeli fatality than Palestinian. While 85 per cenrt of Israeli weapons used for genocide comes from Elbit Systems. BBC, where is your so-called non-biased reporting?

We stand with the people of Palestine, the hunger strikers and their demands, including shutting Elbit, Israel’s largest arms manufacturer, down in the UK. Spread the word!

Justice for Gaza!

 

by New Worker correspondent

Protesters rallied outside the Egyptian embassy in London last weekend to call on the Sisi government to open up the Rafah crossing on the Egyptian border with the Gaza Strip to allow humanitarian aid into the beleaguered Palestinian enclave. Children attempted to post letters by hand, hoping that the Ambassador would read them, but they were stopped by the police guarding the embassy.  
The mass picket was part of an emergency protest in front of Egyptian embassies all around the world called by the Egyptian Revolutionary Council, a Turkish-based movement that supports the Muslim Brotherhood, which was outlawed in Egypt after its government was overthrown by General Sisi in 2013.
But back in Cairo the Egyptian Foreign Ministry condemned the demonstrations saying that they serve the Israeli occupation and divert public opinion from those truly responsible for the humanitarian crisis. They said the Rafah crossing is ultimately controlled by the Israelis who have closed it as part of their campaign to take over the Gaza Strip and denied allegations that held Egypt responsible for the worsening humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian enclave.

Boycott Barclays Now!

by New Worker correspondent

Palestinian solidarity campaigners were outside Barclays Bank’s Annual General Meeting in London this week to call out their complicity with Israel's genocide in Gaza while others, inside the hall, disrupted the meeting to protest against the bankrolling of Israeli terror in Palestine.   
Barclays holds over two billion pounds-worth of shares and provides £6.1 billion in loans and underwriting to nine companies whose weapons, components and military technology are being used by Israel in its attacks on Palestinians.
This week, Israel has committed to intensifying its genocide in Gaza by sending yet more troops into the Palestinian enclave. An Israeli government minister has said Gaza is "to be entirely destroyed". We must respond by escalating our campaigning against corporations that enable Israel's atrocities. 
Barclays has an agreement with Israel to act as a 'primary dealer' for its government bonds. This means it directly helps Israel sell bonds to raise money to fund its genocide against the Palestinians. Barclays has underwritten at least £500 million of Israel government bonds since October 2023. 
In addition, Barclays provides investment and loans worth billions to arms companies supplying Israel with the weapons and military technology it uses in its crimes against Palestinians. There must be no business-as-usual for companies like Barclays while they enable Israel's genocide.  

Stop arming Israel!

Youth Demand protesters laid “body bags” outside Foreign Secretary David Lammy’s door and blocked roads in central London on Tuesday to demand an end to British arms to Israel. Later they joined other Palestinian solidarity movements to picket the Ministry of Defence HQ in Whitehall.

BBC trashed!

photo: Martin Pope

by New Worker correspondent

Palestine Action activists smashed windows and splattered the BBC headquarters in Portland Place, London, with red paint last week in protest against the Beeb’s ongoing complicity in the genocide of Palestinians through its entrenched pro-Israel bias. The BBC was covered in blood-red paint to symbolise the Corporation’s responsibility for the blood spilled in Gaza and the state broadcaster’s role in whitewashing Israeli atrocities through its partial and biased coverage. For years, the BBC has consistently minimised Israel’s violence against Palestinians while amplifying the narratives of the Zionist oppressors.
“The BBC’s biased reporting isn’t a simple case of poor journalism – it’s a matter of life and death. By downplaying Israeli war crimes, the BBC is complicit in the genocide unfolding in Gaza,” said a spokesperson for Palestine Action. “This isn’t just about the news – it’s about the role of the media in shaping global complicity. The BBC has blood on its hands, and today’s action is part of a wider campaign to hold them accountable. We will not stand by as the BBC sanitises genocide“.

I.5 is Dead!

by New Worker correspondent

Two members of Just Stop Oil, the direct action climate campaign, were arrested last week after they spray-painted the words “1.5 is dead” on the grave of Charles Darwin in London’s Westminster Abbey. 
The protest followed the news that 2024 was the hottest year in human history, with the average global temperature rising by 1.6 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. 
One protest organiser, Alyson Lee, told reporters “2024 was the hottest year on record. We have already passed through the 1.5 degree that was supposed to keep us safe. Millions are being displaced. California is on fire.  And three-quarters of all wildlife has disappeared since the 1970s”.
 Alyson, a 66 year-old retired teaching assistant from Derby, said “ten years on from the Paris Agreement, we have already exceeded the so-called safe temperature rise of 1.5 degrees, and are heading for over 3 degrees of warming. This rapidly accelerating crisis means huge parts of the world will become unable to support life, resulting in millions of refugees, social collapse and extinction for countless species”.
She believes Charles Darwin would approve of their protest “because he would be following the science, and he would be as upset as us with the government for ignoring the science”.
The other protester, Di Bligh, a 77 year-old former CEO of Reading Council said “Darwin once said ‘it is not the strongest of the species, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change, that lives within the means available and works cooperatively against common threats’.
“Last year was the hottest since modern humans evolved. If we do not work together to rein in the corporations and billionaires driving us beyond our means, humanity will not be able to adapt to what is coming. We are on course to lose everything, and politicians are doing nowhere near enough to prevent it. How many will we have to bury as a result of climate breakdown and who will be left to mourn them?”

Gaza: Stop the slaughter

by New Worker correspondent

London comrades joined thousands of other Palestinian solidarity campaigners who rallied outside Downing Street in Whitehall on Monday to demand an end to Israeli aggression in Gaza. The emergency protest was called following reports that the Israelis had started to carpet bomb Rafah. Demonstrators called on the Sunak government to end arms sales to the Zionist state and as their numbers swelled the police were forced to close some of the roads near the Prime Minister’s residence.

Free the Elbit Six!

by New Worker correspondent

Palestinian solidarity activists gathered outside the High Court in London on Saturday to call for the freedom of Palestine Action prisoners, jailed for taking part in direct action protests against British-Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit Systems. People have taken action in the UK, Canada, and France over the jailings. It came after high-profile campaigners, including Roger Waters of Pink Floyd fame, issued a joint statement condemning the British state’s persecution of the six people over their activism against the state of Israel.
Since Palestine Action launched in July 2020, their actions have caused severe disruption to Elbit's business, causing the closure of a factory in Oldham, and the Central London HQ.
The state has increasingly become more heavy-handed, six Palestine Action activists are currently in prison, and over a hundred more may face it. The judiciary is also cracking down, refusing bail in some cases, or accepting long established legal precepts, such a defence of necessity, the argument that a small offence is justified to prevent a greater harm from happening. 

Protesters demand justice in Lewisham

by Daphne Liddle

Protesters took action outside Lewisham police station in south London on Saturday to express outrage at a police sergeant who brutally beat up a black youth who resisted when the officer tried to take his bike away. The police say the bike was stolen but no evidence has emerged on that. There was a large crowd at the protest which included two local neighbours who witnessed and filmed the incident and passers by on foot and in cars gave noisy support.
    Police inside the station came out to assure the protesters they would not interfere with the sit-down and to let them know if anyone needed anything. Since they are now under Sadiq Khan’s special measures they seem a bit sheepish when one of their own just does not get the message. The boy who was assaulted was injured and an ambulance was called but the wait for it was so long he gave up and went home when he started to feel a bit better.

Save our Ferries!

by New Worker correspondent

Several hundred P&O Ferries workers and supporters held a protest outside DP World’s London offices last week before marching to a rally outside Parliament. The rally was called by the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) following the mass sacking of ferry staff on 17th March by DP World, who are the owners of P&O Ferries.
    DP World, halted all crossing in the four routes it operates: Dover to Calais; Hull to Rotterdam; Liverpool to Dublin; and Cairnryan, Scotland, to Larne, Northern Ireland after some 800 crew members were sacked on the spot to make way for scab labour recruited in Britain, the Philippines and India to do their work on bread-line wages.
    The Rail, Maritime and Transport union, Nautilus International and the Labour Party called the protests held in London and other parts of the country following appeals to Prime Minister Boris Johnson to either force DP World to back off or nationalise the company— something the government, needless to say, has ruled out altogether.
    Now RMT has slammed what it described as a "disgusting statement" from P&O Ferries trying to justify one of the most shameful acts by any employer in recent history
    Sacked seafarers have been basically told that if they don’t sign up to be gagged by a non-disclosure agreement they will not only lose their jobs – they will lose money as well. This is from an organisation which has received millions from the taxpayer to support furlough payments and whose parent company DP World paid out vast sums in dividends last year
    General Secretary Mick Lynch said: "These are the actions of a bully trying to maximise profits by sacking workers and replacing them with agency staff below the minimum wage.
    "The detail of what the company are imposing is not new. The 2.5 weeks is what we have negotiated in the past with P&O.
    "The pay in lieu of notice is not compensation, it is just a payment staff are contractually entitled to as there was no notice given.
    "The way that the package has been structured is pure blackmail and threats– that if staff do not sign up and give away their jobs and their legal right to take the company to an employment tribunal they will receive a fraction of the amount put to them.
    "The actions of P&O demonstrate the weakness of employment law and protections in the UK. P&O have flagrantly breached the law and abandoned any standards of workplace decency. They have ripped away the jobs, careers and pensions of our members and thrown the on the dole with the threat that if they do not sign up and give away their rights they will lose many thousands of pounds in payments.
    "This is totally unacceptable and RMT will continue to campaign for our members to be reinstated at P&O and for better employment laws to protect all British workers.‎"

Support the Weetabix strikers!

by New Worker correspondent

London trade unionists were out leafleting and collecting for the Weetabix strikers outside Sainsbury’s on Kilburn High Road last week.
    Some 80 engineers at the Weetabix plants in Kettering and Corby are taking industrial action against new ‘fire-and-rehire’ contracts, which would leave them up to £5,000 per year worse off.
    It began with two-day mid-week walk-outs in September following the break-down of talks in the summer between their union, Unite, and management. Now the strikers have stepped up their campaign, moving to a four-day stoppage each week.
    Weetabix is the largest cereal manufacturer in the UK, exporting to over 80 countries, and has production facilities in Europe, North America, and East Africa with a combined global workforce of 1,800 employees. It was taken over by an American company, Post Holdings Inc, in 2017.
    Weetabix Management claim the dispute has nothing to do with fire-and-rehire – but this was dismissed by Unite leader Sharon Graham this week. “These attacks are totally unjustified,” she said. “They are a serving of corporate greed. And what’s more, although Weetabix deny it, we have irrefutable evidence that they are using ‘fire-and-rehire’ strategies.”
    Last year Weetabix turnover grew by five per cent to £325 million and profits leapt by almost 20 per cent to £82 million.

Fight for the NHS!

Corbyn says Centene out!

by New Worker correspondent

Jeremy Corbyn joined a protest against GP practices being taken over by a US health insurance company last week. The former Labour leader, along with East London MP Apsana Begum, joined demonstrators outside the London headquarters in Westminster of Operose Health – a subsidiary of the giant Centene corporation –to protest against NHS privatisation.
    Corbyn told the crowd to “fight for the NHS until hell freezes over” at the protest called by Doctors in Unite (DiU), a campaign led by the biggest union in the country.
    Unite, with 100,000 members in the health service, has hit out at “a culture of Tory cronyism that is rapidly enveloping the NHS”, and called for an urgent independent inquiry into the ever-expanding lobbying scandal engulfing the NHS and its impact on the accelerating pace of health service privatisation.
    The call for an inquiry – with its recommendations cemented into law – follows on from the revelation that Tory health secretary Matt Hancock met former prime minister David Cameron and financier Lex Greensill for a private drink in 2019 to discuss a new payment scheme for the NHS.
    Doctors in Unite chair Jackie Applebee said: “Ministers and senior NHS executives have repeatedly mouthed the mantra that the NHS is not being privatised.
    “But now we have the case of a huge swathe of English general practice, including the data of nearly half a million patients, being handed over to US health insurance giant Centene – with a breath-taking lack of transparency and openness.
    “Tory politicians and their outriders in the media roll out the tired old trope that all general practices are private, but this is disingenuous and they know it.
    “There is a world of difference between a multinational corporation that operates to make a profit, often by cutting staff and services, so that it can pay dividends to shareholders, and local GPs who are very much part of the NHS ‘family’ and provide services from a budget fixed by the Treasury.
    “The public needs to wake-up to the fact the NHS that they so value and which has been the lynchpin of the successful vaccination programme is being steadily sold off to profit-hungry healthcare companies – in this case one whose headquarters is in America.
    “This is another prime example of the accelerating privatisation of the NHS by stealth and Unite is spot-on to call for an independent inquiry into the wider lobbying scandal engulfing the NHS which emanates from a desire by profiteers to get their hands on lucrative health service contracts.
    “Now is a time to draw a line in the sand to preserve and cherish the NHS as an organisation free at the point of delivery to all those in need. If we are not vigilant, these founding principles of the NHS in 1948 will become pale shadows of themselves.”

Corbyn joins housing protest

 by New Worker correspondent

Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was one of 30 campaigners who took part in a protest outside Pentonville Prison last week. The protest targeted a Ministry of Justice (MoJ) decision to sell off two blocks of 28 flats formerly used to house prison staff.
    In his capacity as the local MP, he said: “The Ministry of Justice is selling off a group of properties at the back of Pentonville Prison. The council, quite correctly, tried to buy them in order to house local people in housing need.”
    Their particular objection is that the developer, LGP Wellington Mews Ltd, has submitted several applications for a Certificates of Lawfulness for Existing Use or Development (CLEUD), which would excuse it meeting a target of 50 per cent of the homes on the site being rented at so-called affordable rates.
    Islington Council was close to a deal with the MoJ in 2019 to acquire the flats, used as temporary accommodation for those in desperate need of homes, but this fell through. Now Corbyn says: “The Ministry of Justice upped the price and prevented Islington from doing that. So what are we doing? We’re demonstrating outside those places to say to the MoJ and everybody else: let us solve the housing crisis by filling the empty homes with people that need them.”
    Unsurprisingly this claim was rejected by the MoJ, who insisted they were put out on the open market and that they were not trying to blackmail the council.
    Private ‘affordable housing’ is of course nothing of the sort. On Monday, a search of local estate agents for one-bedroom flats had nothing under £500,000.

Black lives matter in London

By New Worker correspondent

Londoners gathered in Trafalgar Square on Sunday to protest the death of George Floyd, the Black man whose murder in Minneapolis by police officers has triggered off a week of protests and rioting across the USA. Following clashes with the police after they tried to clear a junction in Parliament Square blocked by protesters, 23 people were arrested.

One protester, who chose to remain nameless, said the demonstrators had been protesting peacefully: “We came out here peacefully to protest the injustice in the UK, it's now a global issue with the murder of George Floyd, everything that's going on in the world," the protester said. “The police came and they made it violent. They came and antagonised us; we were protesting peacefully.”

Boycott Puma!

By New Worker correspondent

Members and supporters of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) were out in force last Saturday, protesting outside sportswear company Puma’s flagship store in London’s West End. The demonstration in Carnaby Street, near Oxford Circus, greatly slashed the numbers entering the store. A much smaller but extremely rowdy pro-Israeli counter-protest certainly also helped to deter shoppers with its loud music, endless slogans, fanatical dancing and waving of flags in the faces of passers-by.

The PSC is targeting Puma as the main corporate backer of Israel’s football association, which includes teams from illegal Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land. More than 200 Palestinian sports clubs have called on Puma to end the sponsorship deal and stop supporting Israel’s illegal land grabs.

This is part of an ongoing response to the call from the Palestinian civil society in 2005 for a campaign of Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) against Israel until it respects human rights and international law.

Puma is the main sponsor of the Israel Football Association (IFA), which includes football clubs based in illegal Israeli settlements on stolen Palestinian land. All Israeli settlements are considered war crimes under international law.

As one of the world’s top sports-kit makers, Puma’s sponsorship brings international legitimacy to the IFA and helps maintain its direct involvement with violations of human rights and international law off the field.

Take action and support the call from more than 200 Palestinian teams for Puma to end its support for Israel’s military occupation by terminating its sponsorship deal with the IFA.