Cuts: Do we have no choice? Fighting the cuts in Britain and Greece

Join us at 7pm Friday 8 October

at the Phoenix Community Centre, Phoenix Place, Brighton

Massive cuts in public services loom over Britain. The government wants to make 25-40% cuts in public services. They are being told to do this by the very financial markets that caused this mess, and continue to enrich themselve...s at our expense. However not a whisper has been made in protest at this by any of the main parties! Labour councils in Britain are implementing Tory/Liberal cuts saying they have no choice.

If they were against the cuts they would refuse to make them, instead they just apologise for doing so, and promise they will be different in office if elected again. We, on the other hand, say that councillors must refuse to make these cuts. They must not pass any cuts budgets, and should campaign to plug the gap in public spending handed to them by the Government.

Across Europe governments are using the financial crisis caused by the banking sector as an excuse to slash public services and lower workers living standards. Greece has been at the forefront of those attacks and has seen the most active resistance amongst ordinary working people who refuse to pay the debts of capitalism. There is much anti-cuts campaigners can learn from the actions in Greece and unions joining up across Europe is going to vital in every country. Mitsos Helaris will be speaking on the Greek movement and the growing international resistance to the bankers crisis.

The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition stood in the General Election pledging to, if elected, refuse to make the cuts. Our candidate, Dave Hill, pledged to take only the average workers' wage, not the huge salaries other MPs take without flinching! The Socialist Party and Socialist Resistance, key supporters of TUSC, are hosting this meeting.

Do we have no choice but to make the cuts? Do councillors have the choice to resist them? If no party pledges to do so, can we build a party of the working-class that will?

PUBLIC MEETING - ALL WELCOME

Click here to join the Facebook event and to find out more...

Our fight against cuts begins

[From the Brighton Socialist - July/August edition]

Around 60-70 trade union members and campaigners, from Connexions workers to the Portslade anti-academy group, protested outside the Tory Cabinet meeting at Hove Town Hall today (Thursday 22 July) as our elected representatives rubberstamped cuts to children's services, youth and education budgets and welfare support, along with forcing through academy plans onto the next stage. Further meetings and protests are being planned so watch this space...

When low wage workers have their pay withheld and are kicked out of a job with no notice, at the same time four new council bosses are dished out salaries of £125,000 a year each, it must seem like the world is turned on its head.

But this is exactly the way capitalism puts greed and profits before the vast majority of people and society.

Our elected representatives are too busy handing over big money contracts, schools and hospitals to their big business friends, voting themselves more expense, cutting jobs, welfare, education, childcare and housing when they say they’ll defend the interests of ordinary people.

25 per cent cuts in government departments are being passed on to local council authorities right now and an initial £3.55 million is already being cut in Brighton and Hove this year.

Schools in Falmer and Portslade are being turned into academies, removing them from local democratic accountability with budgets and curriculums taken over by profiteers. An estimated 20,000 jobs are threatened as a result of closures, privatisations and “efficiency savings” across the city - £50 million cuts over four years.

Locally this will mean cuts of £1.5 million to education, youth and children's services, cuts to Aids/HIV support and stroke support. £120,000 will be cut from SureStart centres and the renovation of children's playgrounds. In addition to these measures, low paid local government workers are suffering a pay freeze, and the poorest will suffer the VAT rise to 20 per cent, cuts in housing benefit and tax credits from next year.

And this is just the start. This is an all-out war on the working class people of Brighton and Hove to make us pay for their capitalist crisis.

But why should we pay for mess caused by the rich? If we’ve bailed out the banks, then they owe us!

Our elected representatives are not on our side. They are attacking us and threatening to make our lives even more of a struggle letting the rich carry on as usual, raking in massive bonuses and tax breaks. But the Socialist Party and the trade union movement are organising support and unity with all workers, parents, unemployed, pensioners and youth who are fighting back.

Following the 600-strong March for Jobs demonstration earlier this year, Brighton, Hove and District Trades Union Council has also organised protests outside our two town halls. On 22 June, budget day, on 15 July, the day the council allowed the cuts through, and on 22 July when the Tories rumberstamped the first wave of cuts, 200 trade unionists, campaigners and socialists from different groups and workplaces across the city came together to demonstrate their anger.

These protests mark the shifting into gear of a potential mass community campaign to stop the cuts, and are aimed at our councillors as a wake up call to remind them that they are meant to be there to discuss with us and to represent the people of this city.

United pressure from the city’s trade unions and communities can force back the ConDem council and government, and their cuts agenda. The Tories were defeated by Liverpool city council in the 1980s and by the 15 million-strong “can’t pay won’t pay” campaign that brought down the hated Poll Tax and former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher herself.

It will be actions that count when it comes to defending our communities, services and jobs. Public meetings, protests and petitions are needed to link up with local and national trade union demonstrations and strike action. As well as campaigning in communities and workplaces to help build for these events, we should make our voices heard in the council and stand our own working class, trade union-backed, community candidates in elections.

The Tories and LibDems are currently swinging the axe, Labour’s record in office is littered with betrayal after betrayal and the Green’s record, under pressure to resist cuts and privatisation, has been severely lacking.

The Socialist Party played a key role in the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition that put down a marker when it stood in Brighton Kemptown at the general election. TUSC fights against the cuts agenda supported by all the main parties and stands for making the rich pay for the crisis they caused.

The longer these currently elected councillors continue to attack us on behalf of capitalism, the louder calls will grow of the need for a working class political voice to fight back.

United action, fighting in our workplaces, communities and at the elections will be what is required to put a stop to every cut.

The Socialist Party is part of a growing coalition of trade unions, workers, campaigners, pensioners, parents, students and unemployed that is coming together and fighting back in Brighton and Hove. Get in touch with us to find out what we can do next.

Fight for jobs! Stop the cuts!

Time for the fight of our lives

[Hannah Sell, Socialist Party deputy general secretary]

BRITAIN HAS been 'Con Dem-ned' to a future of savage attacks on public services, pay, pensions and benefits combined with tax increases for working and middle-class people.

The Tory/Liberal coalition has been cobbled together in a desperate attempt to create a government strong enough to launch an all-out onslaught on the living standards of the working class.

Two thirds of the new cabinet went to public school. This is a government of the elite, for the elite, and it is going to set out to hammer the rest of us.

Mervyn King, unelected governor of the Bank of England, spoke on behalf of the majority of Britain's capitalist class when he welcomed the government's cuts plans and egged it on to go further in its emergency budget.

It should not be forgotten that it was Gordon Brown, in 1997, who first gave the Bank of England independence from the government, freeing it to campaign blatantly on behalf of the capitalist class.

However, Cameron and Clegg do not need egging on. The £6 billion worth of cuts that has been declared is the tip of an enormous iceberg. It is not certain how quickly the rest of the iceberg will be revealed but there is no doubt that it will be.

Click here to read on...

194 votes for TUSC in Kemptown!

Socialist Party members helped campaign for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition in Brighton Kemptown in the general election as a call to help create a new party for working class people. The whole farce of "coronating" a Con-Dem government, with threats of massive cuts to jobs and services becoming real and a Labour Party guilty as charged of abandoning working class people, means questions are asked about the absence of an alternative, working class voice in politics to fight to make the rich pay for this crisis.

Click here to find out more about the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition with election results and analysis. Watch this space for upcoming TUSC activities or get in touch.

Vote Dave Hill! Vote Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition!

Cuts? How do you like these cuts?

The main capitalist parties threaten working class people with cuts after the election to make us pay for their economic crisis, yet all three are keeping their vicious plans a secret because we wouldn't vote for them otherwise.

But working class people don't need to pay for this crisis at all. Instead, we offer a socialist budget that puts people before profits, that puts the millions before the millionaires. The main three capitalist parties would rather spend our money on the following items below but look at what we could cut instead of hospitals, schools, jobs and public services. Here's our simple economic alternative that shows there is another way...



Vote Dave Hill on May 6! Vote Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition!
Brighton TUSC Election Rally!
Wednesday 6pm at the Phoenix Community Centre,
Phoenix Place, Brighton
Visit brightontusc.blogspot.com

Brighton socialists backing the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition campaign

Click here for more on the campaign...

Trade unionist coalition launched for election

[by Peter Knight, Brighton Thursday branch]



Hundreds of trade unionists and socialist packed into a conference room at Friends Meeting house in central London on Thursday evening to mark the launch of a working class, anti-cuts coalition standing in the upcoming general election.

Workers and trade union representatives, who are involved in industrial struggles against big business and the government intent on making working people pay the price for the economic crisis, have united to form the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) to fight the election in 42 constituencies across the country.

TUSC is backed by the Socialist Party as well as a number of leading trade unionists including the RMT general secretary Bob Crow.

Assistant general secretary of the PSC Chris Baugh addressed the rally just a day after leading hundreds of thousands of civil servants out on strike on Budget day who had voted to take action to oppose a government attack on their redundancy rights. He said: “We welcome the opportunity to fill the void left by New Labour’s abandonment of working people.”

The union link with New Labour was highlighted as a central issue for workers in dispute against attacks on jobs, wages and conditions, with more and more union members supporting calls for dissaffiliation from the party that has now turned its back on them.

Baugh, talking to Radio 4’s Today programme which recorded the meeting, added: “I think the BA cabin crew is a classic example where Unite is a major contributor [to Labour], and yet the Prime Minister and other ministers have denounced what is and what we believe is a just cause.”

“We reject that fatalism and defeatism. We need to reinstate the idea of an independent workers’ party,” said Baugh.

Karen Reisman, a nurse and TUSC candidate standing in Manchester, emphasised that the coalition is gaining an echo across the country among many ordinary people in building that independent political voice.

“There are lots more people, who actually think that after 13 years of betrayal they cannot stomach putting their cross against Labour again. People want something different,” she said.

Socialist Party councillor Dave Nellist received only the average wage of his constituents during his nine year’s as a Labour MP between 1983 and 1992, in stark contrast to today’s ministers and their shocking expenses scandal. Quoting Scottish socialist John Maclean, he said: “Representatives should rise with their class, not out of it!”

Nellist is standing under the TUSC banner against New Labour MP Bob Ainsworth in Coventry North East.

Along with introducing Brighton Kemptown TUSC candidate Dave Hill to the audience, Nellist added: “TUSC is not just a case of a vote; it’s to get involved and to make sure the working class have the voice when the main parties attack working people.”

Prison Officers’ Association general secretary Brian Caton marked the significance of the launch. He said: “Tonight should be remembered for centuries to come, because it’s a time when we’ve decided we’re going to have a party for the people, by the people, that’s going to support working men and women, and not abandon them to the scrapheap in favour of bankers, bent businessmen and big business generally.”

Find out more about the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition at www.tusc.org.uk

If you would like to get involved and want some leaflets to give out to your workmates, friends, family and your local community, get in touch with us locally at brightontusc.blogspot.com or call 07894 716095. Thank you.

BRIGHTON WORKERS FIGHT BACK!

March for Jobs!
First up, Brighton Hove and District trades council involving Socialist Party members have organised a March for Jobs demonstration for this Saturday 6 March starting at 12 midday on The Level, Brighton.

With jobs losses and the threat of job cuts and public service cuts looming, as the private sector and the main political parties prepare to make working people pay for this crisis of capitalism, it is as important as ever that workers, pensioners, the unemployed, students and youth mobilise and unite to fight back against these unjustified attacks.

Visit brightontradescouncil.blogspot.com for more info.

Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition
The trade union movement is leading the way in many workplaces to defend their members and the working class. But none of the political parties standing in the coming general are going to stand and fight for working people. In fact, they all want to lay the burden of the recession onto the shoulders of working people while the fat cats are fed larger and larger bonuses paid for by us!

For years working people were told there was no money for decent pay, pensions, homes, health, jobs and education. But suddenly there is enough to bail out the capitalist gambling and speculation that has caused this mess! We say enough is enough.

The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition is a political alliance preparing to standing in constituencies right across the country consisting of leading trade union fighters and socialist campaigners striving to defend working class communities, jobs and services against the cuts on offer from the capitalist parties.

With RMT General Secretary Bob Crow and Socialist Party Deputy General Secretary Hannah Sell speaking at this Brighton launch to introduce your TUSC Brighton Kemptown candidate Dave Hill, this meeting offers workers the opportunity to get involved in the crucial political fight back that links together the industrial and electorial battles against the job losses and cuts that our not the fault of working people.

Visit www.tusc.org.uk, brightontusc.blogspot.com, Facebook: Brighton TUSC

Join us at the March for Jobs and the TUSC election launch.

Socialist Students in 100 strong occupation!

Occupying students negotiate with police and management just after the occupation began (left) before discussing their demands (right)

Over a hundred students have occupied a conference suite in Bramber House at Sussex University in anger at hundreds of job cuts and course closures. After a large campus demonstration students stormed the building. Campus security has blocked exits and the university management have called the police.

The demonstration was called by the Stop the Cuts campaign which has organised large protests since the cuts at the university were announced in October. Socialist Students and Youth Fight for Jobs activists are involved in the occupation and have been active in the campaign and the protests.

Socialist Student member Claire Laker Mansfield, fighting to be elected as Education Officer for the student union this week, gave her solidarity to the occupying students and urged everyone in the student community to get involved with the Stop the Cuts campaign.

Claire said: "A demonstration has been called in solidarity with this action, assembling tomorrow (Tuesday) at 12.30 in library Square. Its essential that this protest is well attended, to show management that the student community supports the occupation and calls on them to meet the demands of the occupiers and the Stop the Cuts campaign."

Socialist Students and Youth Fight for Jobs have called for one day walkout strikes of all education workers and students locally and nationally against cuts and fees co-ordinated by trade unions, student unions and anti-cuts campaigns.

Please send messages of solidarity to Socialist Student member Sarah, who is in the occupation, on 07956 132470.

Click here to find out more about the Stop the Cuts and here for more on Claire's election campaign...

"Fight the cuts!" Vote Claire for Education!

VOTE CLAIRE LAKER MANSFIELD NO.1 FOR EDUCATION OFFICER

With the recent announcement of another £2.5 billion to be cut from the education budget nationally, the student union leadership next year will need to be able to fight cuts both at Sussex and nationally. Not only do I have a clear strategy for this but I am also committed to representing students, individually or collectively, on education issues.

FIGHTING THE CUTS
I’m a member of Socialist Students and believe that a decent education should be a right for everyone. I have been involved in several campaigns at Sussex, for example I am a leading activist in the Stop the Cuts campaign and am currently organising Save Life Sciences. If elected I would:
• Organise mass opposition to cuts, job losses and fees.
• Fight for decent grants, bursaries and hardship funds.
• Use the national campaigns I’m involved in to link up Sussex’s struggle with others fighting attacks on education across the country.


REPRESENTING YOU
I believe that a Student Union is all about representing the interests of students. For the last two years I’ve been elected to represent Life Sciences students on Union council. If elected I would:
• Demand the university open its finances to scrutiny of staff and students.
• Hold regular report backs from university meetings and a weekly surgery to hear your concerns regarding education and campaigns.
• Work closely with student reps and try to increase communication between course reps and union representatives.

LISTENING TO YOUR CONCERNS
Essentially the role of education officer is to not only defend decent education in general but to deal with any problems students may have such as disciplinary action or complaints. I am approachable, non judgemental and keen to help in whatever way possible using the full resources available to me in the position.

Click here to join the Facebook group and get in touch to help get Claire elected!

No2EU-Yes to democracy campaign gallery

(Socialist Party members with fellow comrades out and about in Brighton, London, Crawley and Hastings for the No2EU-Yes to democracy European Election campaign.)

No2EU-Yes to democracy election results: prepare now for next election challenge

Bob Crow, RMT general secretary, speaking at the London No2EU election rally. Photo by Paul Mattsson

Over 153,000 votes have been cast for the RMT -led No2EU-Yes to democracy coalition across the country. This represents 1% of the overall vote for a campaign that has only been active for less than eight weeks. Right from the start No2EU-Yes to democracy was up against a complete blackout by the mainstream media in fear of what the coalition of the RMT, trade unionists and left parties could achieve in the face of a collapse in support for the three main capitalist parties and endless coverage for far right groups.

In Brighton 601 votes were achieved and in the South East constituency No2EU-Yes to democracy gained an impressive 21,455 with Socialist Party members right across the region out campaigning for this working class electoral alternative. With a significant vote to build on, and support from trade union members from all over the country, the foundations are now being laid to organise a united left working class challenge at the next general election.

The follow is a press release from the No2EU-Yes to democracy campaign

EURO ELECTIONS SPARK CALL FOR LEFT AND TRADE UNION UNITY TO DEFEAT BNP AS POLITICAL ELITE COLLAPSE

With all the Euro election results confirmed, Bob Crow, convenor of the No2EU coalition and general secretary of the RMT, has called for urgent discussions involving socialist organisations, campaigns and trade unions to build a concerted political and industrial response to the volatile situation which has contributed to the election of two fascists from the BNP to the European Parliament.

The combined vote in Thursdays poll for No2EU, the Socialist Labour Party and some of the smaller left parties stacks up to nearly a third of a million votes – just over 2% of the total. In Scotland, the combined left vote was close to 4%.

Meanwhile, the Labour share of the vote has dropped by a massive 31%, the Lib Dems by over 7% and the Tories, despite all the hype, have only managed a tiny increase in share with turnout collapsing to just over 30%.

Bob Crow said today: “There is no question that the BNP have benefitted from the collapse of the establishment political parties and from media coverage that has pumped them up like celebrities on “I’m a Nazi – Get Me Out of Here.” Sections of the press, which have deliberately ignored anti-establishment parties from the left, need to take a long, hard look at the way the blanket coverage they have given to the fascists from the BNP has contributed to their success.

“But it’s the collapse of public support for the three main parties – each of which is pro-business, pro-EU and supportive of the anti-union laws – which has created the conditions for the scapegoat-politics of the BNP to thrive. The fascists support in former mining communities like Barnsley is shocking and throws down a massive challenge to the Labour and Trade Union movement.

“We now need to take stock. Along with our colleagues from the SLP and other left groups we won nearly a third of a million votes. From No2EU we won over 150,000 supporters from a standing start in the teeth of a media blackout. That gives us a solid platform to build from. We now need urgent discussions with political parties, campaigns and our colleagues in other unions like the CWU to develop a political and industrial response to this crisis.”

More election analysis can be found at www.socialistparty.org.uk

Socialist victory in European Elections!

Joe Higgins, the Socialist Party candidate in Ireland, was elected to the Dublin Constituency for the European Parliament on Sunday 7 June 2009.

Joe, who is a member of the sister party of the Socialist Party in England and Wales, got 82,366 votes, with 50,510 first preference votes. Over the last few days, Joe Higgins was widely predicted in the Irish press to be best placed to take the third of three European Parliament seats in Dublin. Click here to read the full story...

No2EU-Yes to democracy television broadcast

Meet your No2EU-Yes to democracy election candidates!

Come along to our local No2EU-Yes to democracy public meetings where you can ask your questions and meet your workers' candidates for this years' European election taking place on Thursday 4 June.

Thursday 28 May, 7pm, The Brighthelm Centre, North Road, Brighton
Monday 1 June, 7.30pm, St John's Church Hall, Cross Keys, Crawley Town Centre

Find out more about at no2eusoutheast.blogspot.com and www.no2eu.com

Your South East candidates for No2EU-Yes to democracy

In the South East, as the biggest constituency in the UK, there are 10 candidates on the list. The No2EU-Yes to democracy slate is one that has trade union and socialist campaigners from across the region. They are:

Professor Dave Hill – Former East Sussex Labour Group leader, long standing socialist and trade union activist.

Garry Hassell – RMT Executive Committee

Kevin Hayes – Ford worker and Unite campaigner

Owen Morris –Construction worker and supporter of Lindsey and Olympic site protests

Gawain Little – Teacher and CND National Council member

Robert Wilkinson – NUT Wokingham and District Secretary

Jacqui Berry – President of Medway Trades Union Council

Nick Wright – Graphic designer and teacher

Nick Chaffey – Youth worker and Unison activist

Sarah Wrack – University of Sussex student campaigner and Youth Fight For Jobs steering committee

For more information on the campaign in the South East visit no2eusoutheast.blogspot.com

Historic electoral alternative to big business and racism

 

(RMT's Bob Crow and the No2EU-Yes to democracy banner on the TUC's G2O Demo

Photographs by Paul Mattsson)

For a workers' alternative to the bosses' parties
Vote No2EU-Yes to democracy on 4 June

The national union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) has initiated an electoral alliance for the European elections that will be contesting all of the seats in England, Wales and Scotland in the elections on 4 June. This is a temporary platform for the European elections, entitled No2EU-Yes to Democracy, with initial support from the RMT, Socialist Party, Solidarity–Scotland’s Socialist Movement, the Indian Workers’ Association, the Communist Party of Britain (CPB), the Morning Star newspaper, the Socialist Alliance, the Campaign for a New Workers’ Party (CNWP) and others.

Historically, this is the first time since the formation of the Labour Party that a trade union has taken an electoral initiative on an all-Britain scale. The transformation of the Labour Party from a workers’ party at base – albeit with a capitalist leadership – into an unalloyed party of big business has left the working class without a mass party for well over a decade. The absence of such a party has been a central factor in holding back the confidence of workers to struggle in defence of their pay and conditions. The fact that the RMT has taken this step, however tentative, is therefore enormously positive.

The candidates for No2EU-Yes to Democracy include leaders of the Lindsey oil refinery construction workers who went on strike in January and of the Visteon car components workers currently blockading their factories. Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT, will be heading the list in London, and a number of RMT regional officers will be standing around the country. Coventry Socialist Party councillor and CNWP chair Dave Nellist heads the list in the West Midlands. In the North West, the regional UNISON NEC representative and CNWP secretary, Roger Bannister, is heading the list. In Scotland, Tommy Sheridan is second on the list. Other candidates include car workers fighting job losses, postal workers resisting privatisation, health workers, teachers, fire-fighters and other public-sector workers. This list offers an alternative to the pro-capitalist parties, and its candidate lists are dominated by some of the most combative sections of the working class in Britain today.

No to the BNP

The campaign is partially motivated by an understanding of the urgent need to provide an alternative to the far-right racist British National Party (BNP). There is a real danger that the BNP could capitalise on the anger with New Labour and succeed in winning one or more MEPs in this election. The BNP will never be cut across by bland campaigns pleading with people not to vote for racists. The implication of such campaigns is that workers should vote for the pro-capitalist parties in order to stop the BNP. Only the development of a genuine working-class alternative, combined with a serious campaign against the BNP, will be able to effectively undermine them. This electoral initiative is taking an important step in that direction by offering a left, anti-EU alternative.

Keep Britain out of the eurozone

The programme of No2EU-Yes to Democracy is limited. Nevertheless, it seeks to oppose the European Union (EU) from a working-class, non-nationalist standpoint. The EU has not been central in most workers’ minds up to the present time. However, recent developments have made it more of an issue, at least amongst those workers who have been directly affected, and perhaps increasingly amongst a wider layer. It was central to the Lindsey construction workers’ strike. It was under the EU Posted Workers Directive and subsequent European Court of Justice (ECJ) rulings that the Italian-registered company, IREM, was able to employ workers not covered by the union-enforced national construction industry agreements.

No2EU’s programme takes up the different aspects of the EU’s neo-liberal laws. These laws arise from the support of this government, and all European governments, for neo-liberal anti-working class policies. EU laws provide them with an additional lever with which to drive through their pro-big business programmes. For example, the EU's public spending criteria gave New Labour an excuse to privatise capital projects like new schools and hospitals, by means of private finance initiatives and the disastrous public-private partnership on London Underground, which increase the costs of public services and subsidise corporate profits. The government’s plan for the part-privatisation of Royal Mail, the first step to its complete sell-off, is linked to the EU’s 2007 Postal Services Directive to introduce a deregulated postal services market.

Steps forward

In Britain we do not yet have a new mass left party – or a significant step towards one such as exists in Germany, France and Greece. However, we are faced with an important beginning. We have the leadership of a militant trade union that is prepared to take the responsibility for initiating the development of a political voice for working people – at least in the European elections – that will oppose all the capitalist parties and provide an alternative to the far-right, racist BNP. They will undoubtedly face attack from the capitalist media for daring to stand up. All those who are serious about building a new mass workers’ party should offer every assistance in ensuring the campaign is a success. Vote No2EU-Yes to democracy on 4 June and get involved in the campaign.

For more information on the electoral coalition visit www.no2eu.com or read about developments of the coalition here.

Fundraisers!

This upcoming Sunday 26 April features two fundraising events for two important working class campaigns.

Brighton's local Keep Our NHS Public campaign group are holding a vegan Sunday roast during Sunday lunchtime between 1pm and 4pm to raise funds for the fight to prevent the privatisation of our publicaly-owned National Health Service. The campaign has been a primary frontline in Brighton for the last five years against the New Labour, Tory and Lib Dem neo-liberial attacks on health services. For more information visit brightonkeepournhspublic.blogspot.com. The event takes place at The Cowley Club, 12 London Road, Brighton (opposite Somerfield) and costs just £5 for a vegan roast and dessert! Bargain. Arrive early to avoid dissapointment!

Then on Sunday evening join socialists, trade unionists and campaigners for a fundraiser night with drink, music and information on the campaign to build for an historic electorial alternative to capitalism and fascism in this year's European elections. The No2EU Yes to democracy coalition plans to stand in all 11 regions including the Southeast. This could well be the opportunity for the formation of a new workers' party that will stand up and fight for all working people, not just in Britain, but internationally.

For more information come along to the gig. Meet 8pm at the Horse and Groom public house on Islingword Road. £5 entry. Visit no2eusoutheast.blogspot.com and www.no2eu.com