Ed Miliband accuses the Tories of playing politics with the tanker drivers’ strike. The Mail accuses Miliband of playing politics with the Olympics, because of the party’s funding by the unions (IIIE has already covered the ham-fisted idiocy that is the Tories’ attempts to paint the unions as undemocratic). Guardian commenters (again, let’s not go [...]
The European Union, in pursuit of an austerity agenda supported only by the elite, has now effectively suspended democracy in two European countries. We have now, within the space of a week, entered the age of the Technocrat government (described brilliantly by one writer in The Times as ‘a form of civilian junta’). It is [...]
Last week’s seminar at the Frontline Club asked a very pertinent question of the Occupy London movement pitched outside St. Paul’s. What do you want? I was surprised to see from the show of journalistic hands that the majority in the room did not know exactly what the protesters are camped out for, though, given [...]
I was in Paris last week, reporting on the Task Force for Financial Integrity and Economic Development’s annual conference. After a fascinating day hearing how illicit financial flows and tax avoidance are destroying the developing world, American economist Jeffrey Sachs gave an excellent keynote speech over the video link. Particularly interesting were his points on [...]
In recent weeks, as public sector strikes over pension reforms loom large, there’s been a growing call for tougher strike laws – specifically, for some kind of minimum threshold in strike ballots for them to be valid. The Telegraph were talking approvingly about it last week, but it’s been kicking around for some time – [...]
I received this through a friend; best report I have read. Ninth Week of the Syrian Spring This weekend, the Syrian Spring [entered] its ninth week, but still it remains too early to predict where it is going. The picture that is emerging for us here because of our work is very fuzzy, in spite [...]
I’m not going to take issue with the title of Jacob’s last post, partly because I’ve been guilty of the odd bit of abusive language myself at times, and partly because I’ve known Jacob long enough to realise that trying to stop him being gratuitously offensive is a bit of a fool’s errand. What I [...]
With recent news of the U.S. deploying predator drones in Libya to “degrade Gaddafi’s forces”, and Europe’s involvement teetering on the brink of all out invasion, we have to think carefully about what kind of message this sends out to the various protest movements which are on-going in the region. This is important not only [...]
On the same day that David Cameron and arch-Blairite former Home Secretary, John Reid, shared a platform to denounce AV, the Evening Standard came out against voting reform, patronising the electorate by basing its flimsy argument on the crazy notion that AV is so much harder to understand. I wonder what’s so hard to understand [...]
This is a guest post by Natalie. Over the past year I’ve observed “autonomism” being periodically evoked by members of Trotskyist/Leninist socialist parties as a dangerous force in the anti-cuts movement. The “autonomist” does not bode well for any activist group- they are opposed to all forms of structure and organisation, they refuse to vote [...]
