Corbyn stands up to Zionism

 JEREMY Corbyn has, at last, responded to the intervention of the Israeli leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, in the internal politics of the Labour Party. Netanyahu poses as defending Jewish communities around the world. But the Zionist leader remained silent when his friend, Donald Trump, endorsed neo-Nazis and racists last year. And the reactionary Israeli leader had no qualms in cosying up to the Hungarian premier who whitewashes Hungary’s fascist role during the Second World War and has launched an anti-Semitic campaign against George Soros, the Hungarian-American financier accused of funding opposition to the Budapest government.

The anti-Corbyn hate campaign has gone unchallenged for far too long. Rank and file opposition to the Blairites and Zionists inside the labour movement is the only way we can combat the lies and filth of the bourgeois media. 

False promises for rough sleepers

THIS WEEK the May government unveiled what they claimed was a £100 million plan to help people living on the street. The Tory minister for housing claimed that this would end rough sleeping by 2027. But Labour soon exposed it as a hollow sham when it transpired that it would be paid for out of existing funds. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn blasted the plans for containing “no new money” and homelessness organisations have urged that the strategy should go further.

The sight of people sleeping in shop doorways in major towns and cities across Britain was once commonplace during the Thatcher era. The numbers went down during Blair and Brown’s Labour governments — but it has once again become a familiar sight under the Tories’ austerity regime.

The homelessness charity Crisis says more than 9,000 people would have spent last Christmas in tents or cars, or on trains or buses, on top of the thousands who sleep rough every night. Tent ‘cities’, so commonplace in the USA, are now becoming a feature of British life as well. Rough sleeping has more than doubled since 2010 thanks to decisions made by Tory ministers. But the next Labour government would end rough sleeping within its first term by making 8,000 homes available to those with a history of sleeping on the streets. 

The shambles of the railways

TRANSPORT unions and passenger groups are launching protests at fare rises announced this week. The TUC says fares have risen 42 per cent in 10 years, whilst nominal weekly earnings are only up 18 per cent. Many long-distance commuters will see their annual costs increase by more than £150 next year. RMT General Secretary Mick Cash says: “If it wasn’t for the profiteering and exploitation that is endemic after more than two decades of rail privatisation we would have enough cash in the pot to invest in staffing and infrastructure and hold down fares at the same time…today’s fare rise is just another nail in the coffin of Britain’s rip-off privatised railways. It’s no longer a question of if our rail services are renationalised, it’s a question of when.” That will only come if and when Labour wins the next general election. Another good reason to back Jeremy Corbyn!