The Socialist Issue 184

THE ROMAN emperor, Nero played his violin while the city of Rome burned. This example of political irresponsibility is nothing compared to the world's leaders last week at the failed conference on climate change in the Hague.
Bill Hopwood and Peter Glover
Yet again, the world’s ‘leaders’ showed they are unfit to ‘run the world’: blaming each other while the planet’s environment is destroyed.

Sea levels are rising. Islands, such as Takuu in the Pacific, are disappearing beneath the ocean. Extreme weather event such as floods and droughts caused by global warming are wreaking havoc globally.
Britain claims to lead the push for actual cuts in greenhouse gases because there has been a cut of 15% in the last ten years. But this is mainly due to the closure of industry and the switch from coal to gas to produce electricity.
Over the next decade releases will increase in Britain because of more road traffic, while Britain’s rail system descends further into chaos.
Global big business is more worried about short-term profit than protecting the environment. And New Labour protects the interests of these big businesses.
With a New Labour government, in the form of John Prescott, doing the dirty work of US government and big business, how can we stop the environmental destruction of our planet?
Socialist Party members in Bootle, Merseyside have been to the fore in a campaign to stop pollution in their area. Mobilising mass opposition they have stopped a landfill being sited just 15 yards from a primary school.
This campaign proved the green credentials of the Socialist Party while organisations such as Greenpeace refused to get involved.
This victory is especially important because Bootle docks is not only the main point of entry for genetically modified grain coming into Britain but is also a storage point for melted-down, slaughtered BSE-infected cattle carcasses.
This Labour government has done nothing to protect working-class families and has accelerated the contamination of our environment. Our party is determined to take a stand against Labour on these environmental issues and run candidates at the general election who will fight for a socialist programme to stop the destruction of our planet.

Political hot air at the Hague

THREE YEARS ago in Kyoto there was an agreement to reduce the release of greenhouse gases that effect the world's climates.
Bill Hopwood
These gases, the most important of which is carbon dioxide (CO2), hold in the earth's heat. Without these gases the world would be frozen, but even a small increase can change the weather and climate around the world.
Over the last few years the average world temperature has increased. The Arctic ice is shrinking as are glaciers worldwide.
As well as rising sea levels scientists expect the world to have more storms, like the recent ones in Britain and much of Asia.
Due to widespread burning of fossil fuels - oil, gas and coal - over the last 200 years the amount of carbon dioxide has increased by over 25%. The Kyoto agreement was to reduce these gases to 5% below the level of 1990 by 2010, but since then they have increased. Most scientists think that releases need to be cut by 60% not 5%.
The recent Hague conference was supposed to agree ways to reduce CO2 releases. However, most of the arguments were about ways to avoid reductions, by using various loopholes. Top of the list is counting trees, which when growing hold carbon. However wood only holds carbon if it never roots or is burnt - most unlikely.
Already companies are getting into the act, leasing land in East Africa to grow trees, planning to make millions. This latest form of colonialism will drive people off their land and the trees will use scarce water resources.
Another loophole is allowing the buying of permits to pollute from other countries that have cut the release of CO2, especially Russia.
The biggest supporter for the loopholes instead of actual cuts has been the USA.. The big oil-based companies - cars, airplanes and oil - have lobbied the government to resist any changes.
Some even argue that there is no evidence of climate change or that it doesn't matter. In recent years there has been no cut in CO2, instead it has increased 3% per person per year.
There are real alternatives which include public transport, renewable energy - using winds. waves and the sun, and energy efficiency. Britain currently only produces 3% of its electricity from renewables, although it’s well placed, especially for wind power.
The government wants to increase this to 10% by 2010, but is only investing a few million a year into research. Minuscule compared to the billions spent on nuclear power.
As well as reducing the releases of CO2, this policy would reduce air pollution which causes death and illness. It would also reduce the use of oil, a valuable raw material that will run out in the near future unless trends are changed.

How to win Fees Battle

MANY COLLEGES are beginning to wind down for the Christmas break. But for many students the season will not bring glad tidings.
Kieran Roberts, Save Free Education campaign
Colleges are sending out the demands for the second instalment of tuition fees and the threats of exclusion for those who cannot afford to pay is looming large in the new year.
Recently updated figures show that tuition fees and the abolition of the grant are continuing to deter thousands of students from going to university.
Last year, for the second year running, universities fell short of filling their courses in England and Wales. About 7,000 places went unfilled in 1999-2000.
Of course, it is working-class students and those from the poorest sections of society who make up the majority of those deterred from going to university. National Union of Students (NUS) figures show that the number of male applicants from “skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled” backgrounds have dropped by 7% between 1997 and 1999. Applications from males of an African and Caribbean background fell by 11% and 9% respectively.
The figures from England and Wales are in sharp contrast to those from Scotland where universities reached their recruitment targets. This is because in Scotland up-front tuition fees have been abolished.
The Socialist Party and Save Free Education argue and work for a campaign to be built that will force the British government and Welsh Assembly to scrap not just up-front fees but all fees, and to reinstate the grant. Only when this happens will the thousands who have been prevented from going to university over the last three years get the chance they properly deserve.
In order to achieve the abolition of fees and the restoration of the grant a mass campaign of non-payment must be built. Thousands of students are unable to pay their fees.
If thousands of other students refuse to pay alongside them and organise together tuition fees can be made unworkable. For this reason mass non-payment provides students with the best means of forcing the government to back down.
With all three years in colleges now paying fees and many getting deeper into debt, the scene is set for an explosive next term where the battle against the fees will assume an even greater importance for all students.

What we Think

Socialist challenges break New Labour's grip

THE EXCELLENT victory for the Socialist Party in the Pepys ward by-election in Lewisham is another example of the potential support there could be amongst working people and their families for a credible and viable socialist alternative to the Labour and Tory parties.
This outstanding result, where Socialist Party candidate Sam Dias won 39% of the vote, was combined with good results for the Lancashire Socialist Alliance candidate Terry Cartwright in Preston (over 5%) and Scottish Socialist Party candidates in Glasgow Anniesland (over 7%).
The Socialist Party, a constituent part of the Socialist Alliance, now has five local councillors in Coventry and Lewisham and will work with other socialists to provide such a viable electoral socialist alternative.
The Socialist Party’s campaign in Lewisham saw a higher than average turnout for a local authority by-election. This was especially so in the Honor Oak part of the ward, where Sam Dias comes from and where sitting Socialist Party councillor Ian Page won £12 million of investment for the estate.
The extremely low turnouts in the parliamentary by-elections, where thousands of former Labour voters stayed away have caused panic among the establishment parties. Media pundits on election night programmes were also forced to comment on the sizeable votes achieved by socialist candidates on Thursday 23 November.
Even they had to recognise that anger with New Labour is causing huge swathes of former Labour voters to abstain, while a significant section of working-class people are looking for a credible alternative to the Left of Labour to vote for.
Incredibly, New Labour strategists tried to either blame the low turnout on the Tories - because they’re so ineffective as an opposition Labour voters couldn’t be bothered to turn out - or they tried to claim that voters stayed away because they were happy with New Labour.
The votes in last week’s by-elections make a May 2001 general election more probable. They also confirmed that New Labour is likely to retain power with a large but diminished majority on a much reduced turnout.
Though, as the events around the fuel crisis in September showed, nothing can be ruled out. Particularly if there is an economic downturn in the USA and other banana skins appear, Labour could still lose the election. It’s doubtful, however, that the Tories are capable of winning back enough votes to secure electoral victory.

THERE ARE significant lessons socialists can draw from last week’s parliamentary and local by-elections.
Firstly, that there is a constituency to the Left of Labour who will vote for a credible socialist alternative. Secondly, where that group has sunk roots in the local community it can not only prove a viable alternative but, as in Lewisham, can actually beat Labour.
In Preston and in Scotland the Lancashire Socialist Alliance and Scottish Socialist party were seen as providing a viable alternative and consequently gained a creditable result; as opposed to the increasingly marginalised vote for Arthur Scargill’s Socialist Labour Party.
Yet, it is Lewisham that gained the most success because of the years spent building up a solid base in a local area. As the Socialist Party has argued in the current debates in the Socialist Alliance, campaigning in a broad propaganda sense, while important, cannot be a substitute for building an electoral base from the bottom up and leading campaigns in the local community.
The Socialist party is confident that the Lewisham victory and the good votes in the other elections can see the beginnings of an electoral challenge to New Labour that provides a propaganda alternative to New Labour and can actually defeat them.
As has been seen in Coventry and Lewisham, where Socialist Party councillors have been elected they will be an extremely effective force for achieving change that improves working-class people’s lives.

How socialists saw off Labour

SAMANTHA DIAS is now the Socialist Party’s second councillor in Lewisham. This great achievement showed that where a serious socialist alternative is offered, voters will support it.
Martin Powell-Davies
Lewisham Socialist Party, particularly our councillor, Ian Page, has done years of consistent work in Pepys Ward.
Our canvassers put in weeks of hard work, distributing three different leaflets, knocking on hundreds of doors to convince voters that Sam could beat New Labour and their policies of cuts and privatisation.
We knew it would be close. When Ian was elected last year, Labour arrogantly assumed they could defeat us without campaigning in the ward. This time Lewisham councillors and local MP, Joan Ruddock, canvassed on streets that they couldn’t have visited in years.
We knew we’d win support from council tenants. Ian had led the successful campaign against the council’s attempt to transfer its housing to housing associations elsewhere in the borough. Sam is a well-known tenants’ rep on Honor Oak estate who helped pressurise the council into coughing up £12 million to refurbish properties.
But Honor Oak is only one part of quite a mixed ward. We also won support from middle-class voters disillusioned with Lewisham’s Blairite council leaders.
We launched a petition against Lewisham’s decision to close three elderly people’s homes. The private contractor the council wanted to sell the homes to had pulled out. Vulnerable residents would now be farmed out into the private sector.
On Telegraph Hill, where houses sell for over £250,000, many voters were angry at their local park’s deterioraton since the council privatised maintenance. A Parks User Group emergency meeting called on the council to keep their promise of match-funding the Lottery bid for park refurbishment.
Suddenly, gardeners were sent to Telegraph Hill Park to put things right, then councillors told park users that the funding was in the council’s budget after all! As Ian said, it was amazing what the council could do when a by-election defeat was looming!
Sam also made a good intervention, helping to counter Labour’s claims that she could only speak for council tenants.

Labour's Lies

LABOUR’S ELECTION leaflet incredibly claimed that Labour councillors “saved” the Honor Oak Neighbourhood Office. In fact the council had wanted to close it. Ian had to hand in the tenants’ petition after Labour councillors refused to do so!
Labour’s dirty tactics went further. They targeted Sam’s friends to try and persuade them to vote against her. Honor Oak tenants wrote an official complaint against one Labour councillor after he abused Sam at a meeting.
Socialist Party members were joined by local tenants and some members of the local Socialist Alliance.
We couldn’t always convince voters, sick of mainstream politicians’ lies, that we were a serious alternative. But we persuaded tenants who’d never voted before to vote for Sam. Several now want to join the Socialist Party.
On the final Saturday, Joan Ruddock and Labour councillors descended on Honor Oak estate. Quickly we set up a stall and our loudhailers warned tenants: “Don’t be taken in by Labour’s lies!”. Slowly Labour’s canvassers came back from the council blocks, dejected as tenants told them what they thought of New Labour!
That convinced people on the estate to get out and vote for Sam. On election day, I remember one young black man coming out of Honor Oak polling station, almost shaking with anger and shouting to the Labour teller: “I voted for Blair but you’re just like the Tories.” That anger with Labour helped us win.
On election day, voting was slow, but, against the usual pattern, heaviest on Honor Oak estate. But we kept knocking at the doors of our promised voters right to the end.
After a tense count, friends and Socialist Party members cheered Sam’s stunning victory. Sam, alongside Ian Page, will make sure Lewisham council hear the real anger of working-class people at their betrayal by New Labour.

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Our Bodies - their profits

MISS WORLD will be held in the millenium dome and hosted by Jerry Springer. Ticket prices start from no less than £100 going up to £400 for the night.
Clare James
In 1988 the contest was taken off terrestrial TV as it was ‘an embarrassing relic of a bygone era.’
Two years ago channel 5 attempted to resuscitate it.
The contest now has UK audiences of around two million (compared to 27.8 million in 1968) two billion people across 130 different countries, including 96% of India’s population watch contenders from around the world, battling it out to be voted as the world’s most beautiful woman.
Organisers of the contest are desperately trying to make the contest appear as modern and not sexist by stating that some of the contestants are studying for degrees, some have professional jobs etc. This may be worthy but it is a token gesture to try and claim that it is not just looks that determine the winner. But then why are all of the contestants a certain height no more than a size 10 and generally look the same?
Miss World is an outdated contest, as it objectifies women. Reflecting that even in the year 2000 women are still judged on what their looks rather than what they do. In the workplace women still on average earn only 70% of men’s wages.
Miss World and magazines such as Cosmopolitan, Marie Claire etc along with the fashion industry and cosmetic industry promote a certain ‘acceptable’ image of women.
Models and TV personalities are getting thinner as the pressure is on from these industries to look a certain way.
There is a huge profit to be made from this, in 1990 the diet industry worldwide was worth $33billion, cosmetics $20billion, cosmetic surgery $300million and the porn industry $7billion.
All making money from women’s bodies and low self-esteem, which they help to reinforce. 85% of women worry about their bodies every day and 1 in 25 women aged 35 or under suffer from an eating disorder.
Also the recent spate of men’s magazines which are no less than soft porn, such as Loaded, FHM, Maxim etc prove the slogan ‘sex sells’. These magazines reinforce the ‘ideal’ body image of women and how they should behave, and give particularly young men a completely false idea and distort how women should look.
But in the age of girl power, and the growth of the ‘Laddette’, some say that this industry is not sexist, that we’re all having a laugh as we know its not really sexist. If you complain you haven’t got a sense of humour as we are living in the age of irony.
The fact is sexism is rife, in the workplace, at home, in schools, colleges, clubs and pubs from the day you are born, it is society that continues to divide women and men down lines of sex.
Capitalism is a system based on power, wealth, hierarchies and competition, this is reflected in personal relationships and in culture generally. It’s in capitalism’s interests to exploit women’s inequalities in order to make huge profits, women are seen as commodities. The sex industry and the media, and Miss World play a big part in this process. They also help to undermine any organised, collective movement of men and women to fight exploitation and oppression.
This is why it is vital all socialisits oppose Miss World, to highlight the continuing divisions and inequality that exist under capitalism. But while we live under capitalism those divisions will still exist in one form or another.
So it is essential that to end oppression of women and also other layers of oppressed across the world this system based on greed, profit and private property is replaced by a system that is based on meeting the needs of everyone. This would economically ensure the needs of women for decent childcare; housing; health and education etc would be met. Based on equality and cooperation, socialism would lay the basis for these values to be reflected in people’s personal relationships and in the culture of society generally.

The Difference between Life and Death

THE THEME of World Aids Day on 1 December is ‘Men Make A Difference’, which focuses on one aspect of the pandemic.
For a person anywhere in the world - male or female - what will make the difference to their prospects, not just of avoiding infection with the virus in the first place, but also maintaining health and life if they do?
There are many answers, including a person’s level of awareness about the HIV virus or the set of illnesses known as AIDS, their sexual identity and general health and the facilities in their local community. But social class is the one factor which towers above the rest.
In July, Edwin Cameron, a HIV-positive judge and white South African, addressed the 13th International AIDS Conference gathered in his country: “On a continent in which 290 million survive on less than $1 a day, I can afford medication costs of $400 a month. I stand before you as a living embodiment of the iniquity of drug access in Africa. I can afford to buy life itself...”.
Cameron attacked the “shadow boxing” of drug companies on price negotiations, and condemned “the international patent and trade regime that seeks to choke off any large-scale attempt to produce and market the drugs at affordable levels.” (Positive Nation, September 2000).
A Nairobi doctor told the same journal how Médecins Sans Frontières arranges for a drug to be smuggled into Kenya from Thailand, where a 'reputable' company produced fluconazole for 60 cents for a day’s dosage, compared to $15 for the same drug bought in the USA.
He criticised drug donations, pointing out that one company had promised free nevirapine to tackle mother-to-child transmission in southern Africa, yet a country like Kenya, which is one of the poorest, doesn’t get any.
Médecins Sans Frontières criticised another drug giant for offering free fluconazole to southern Africa, and then adding conditions to the offer afterwards.
Socialists would support any step which takes humankind forward in the battle against HIV and AIDS. Steps like slashing the price of drugs, and the widest possible cheap access to all urgently needed safe medication under generic licences.
But the biggest advance of all would be bringing to an end the rule of big business and private profit across the world. That would make the difference between life and death for millions of people.

Life threatening dangers: big business, cuts and privatisation

BRITAIN HAS one of the lowest rates of HIV infection in Western Europe. The expectations of the estimated 30,000 people living with HIV and AIDS in this country are markedly different to those facing the average worker or farmer in Africa or Asia.
But the same factor which bars treatment to the majority of HIV-positive people in the Third World - private ownership of the pharmaceutical industry - is now beginning to put a question-mark over the future of people living with the virus in Britain.
During the 1990s, new treatments including combination therapy, resulted in lower death rates in the advanced industrialised countries. In 1999, 419 people died from AIDS in Britain, a quarter of the 1994 figure.
Provisional figures for 1999 indicate a record 3,300 people were diagnosed HIV-positive. Around 1,400 are thought to have become infected through male-to-male sexual contacts, the first increase among gay and bisexual men for several years. The biggest group of new infections came from heterosexual contacts. Whatever one’s sexuality, the risks of infection are increasing.
In 1998-99, the United Kingdom’s AIDS treatment budget was £226 million. Pharmaceutical drugs accounted for almost three-quarters of the total. The cost of HIV treatment is placing particular pressure on health services in London.
London has a disproportionately large HIV-positive community, around 85% of whom receive combination therapy. NHS chiefs have responded by cutting the share of spending going to other services, through the use of competitive tendering for voluntary-sector services.
As a consequence, many HIV/AIDS projects have merged or closed. Closures include Body Positive, the AIDS Treatment Project, Camden Link, Centrepeace women’s centre and the FACTS centre in Crouch End, which was recently occupied by users in protest at the threatened closure.
FACTS campaigner Kevin Greenan told The Socialist: “The health authority managers think if you give someone combination therapy, that’s the cure. But one-quarter of the people who are prescribed the pills can’t take them because their body rejects them.
“No one asked anyone living with HIV what the closure of FACTS would mean. They thought because HIV has a stigma, we wouldn’t raise our heads above the parapet. Well we did, and we haven’t finished yet”.
Kevin and other FACTS users have now set up a campaign called coNsuLt, to put pressure on health authorities in north London.
THE LAMBETH, Southwark and Lewisham Health Authority Area (LSL) has the greatest concentration of people living with HIV and AIDS in Britain.
Last year the number of HIV-positive people in LSL rose by 20%, the highest rate of increase in Europe. Yet, south London HIV services such as Positive Place in Deptford are among those facing closure.
The centre’s deputy chairman Joseph Healey told a local newspaper: “What we really fear is that they’re going to reduce the HIV service to a skeleton service relying on telephone helplines and IT technology.
"Personal contact is very important for people who are in such a vulnerable situation. A lot of people, in this area particularly, don’t have the skills or facilities to access these sort of services on the Internet.”
People living with or affected by HIV and AIDS who are looking to defend and expand the range of services, need to link up with trade unionists and community groups, and make common cause against cuts and privatisation in the health service.
We need to campaign for a socialist health programme, involving public ownership of the pharmaceutical companies, under democratic control by workers, consumers and the community generally. The health service must also be under democratic workers' control, providing free treatment at the point of need.

There are other important issues in the various fronts of the global war against AIDS which socialists need to address:

“The world spends $150 million a year on Aids in Africa. It spent $2 billion on one month’s bombing of Kosova/o... Some 200,000 die in conflicts around the world every year while 2 million die of Aids.” Guardian September 1999.

Irish Teachers strike over pay

SIXTEEN THOUSAND secondary school teachers in Ireland took strike action on 14 November as part of their continuing campaign for a 30% pay rise.
Stephen Boyd, Dublin
The Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland (ASTI) has been pursuing its pay claim outside of the terms of the Programme for Prosperity and Fairness (PPF, national social partnership agreement) since March. Talks with the minister for education, Michael Woods, failed to deliver any progress.
ASTI vice-president Catherine Fitzpatrick said that teachers must be compensated for their significant and continuing contribution to the modernisation of the education system.
There has been a drop in applications for H.Dip courses and many qualified teachers are opting for more financially rewarding careers.
On 14 November all secondary schools in the country were closed except those with less than ten ASTI members. Demonstrations were held on that day outside the Department of Education offices in Dublin, Tullamore and Athlone.
The union have also banned school yard and break supervision on six days in November. This has meant that pupils, on instruction from the authorities, have not attended school on these days, although the teachers have turned up for work normally.
The government has further inflamed the situation by refusing to pay teachers for these days despite the fact that supervision is done on a voluntary basis and not a contractual obligation. A court action by ASTI is impending.
Another strike day is planned for 5 December, the day before the budget. The leaderships of the other two teachers unions TUI (secondary schools) and the INTO (primary schools) are pursuing their members' claims for higher wages through the benchmarking (linking public sector workers pay to the private sector) aspect of the PPF. However this process is not due for completion until 2003.
The TUI have announced it is to ballot its members for industrial action for a 40% pay claim to force the government to bring forward benchmarking, and that this claim should be met through the benchmarking process. However, many teachers view benchmarking as the precursor to performance-related pay.
The lead given by ASTI should be followed by the other teachers' unions. A united campaign of industrial action by all three teaching unions would bring the government to its knees.
Blame for disruption to students' education should be laid firmly at the feet of the government who are stubbornly refusing to recognise the legitimacy of the teachers' pay claim. The government is terrified that if they concede to ASTI that it will undermine the already discredited PPF and lead to further outbreaks of industrial action by other public-sector workers.

The Socialist 1 December 2000	Stop the Corporate Polluters
Stop the Corporate Polluters	THE ROMAN emperor, Nero played his violin while the city of Rome burned. This example of political irresponsibility is nothing compared to the world's leaders last week at the failed conference on climate change in the Hague. Political hot air at the Hague
How to win Fees Battle	MANY COLLEGES are beginning to wind down for the Christmas break. But for many students the season will not bring glad tidings. By Kieran Roberts, Save Free Education campaign. Colleges are sending out the demands for the second instalment of tuition fees and the threats of exclusion for those who cannot afford to pay is looming large in the new year.
Socialist challenges break New Labour's grip	How socialists saw off Labour SAMANTHA DIAS is now the Socialist Party’s second councillor in Lewisham. This great achievement showed that where a serious socialist alternative is offered, voters will support it. What we Think: THE EXCELLENT victory for the Socialist Party in the Pepys ward by-election in Lewisham is another example of the potential support there could be amongst working people and their families for a credible and viable socialist alternative to the Labour and Tory parties.
Our Bodies - their profits	MISS WORLD will be held in the millenium dome and hosted by Jerry Springer. Ticket prices start from no less than £100 going up to £400 for the night. By Clare James. In 1988 the contest was taken off terrestrial TV as it was ‘an embarrassing relic of a bygone era.’ Two years ago channel 5 attempted to resuscitate it.
World Aids Day	The Difference between Life and Death: THE THEME of World Aids Day on 1 December is ‘Men Make A Difference’, which focuses on one aspect of the pandemic. For a person anywhere in the world - male or female - what will make the difference to their prospects, not just of avoiding infection with the virus in the first place, but also maintaining health and life if they do? Life threatening dangers: big business, cuts and privatisation
Irish Teachers strike over pay	SIXTEEN THOUSAND secondary school teachers in Ireland took strike action on 14 November as part of their continuing campaign for a 30% pay rise. Stephen Boyd, Dublin

Stop the Corporate Polluters