Washington and its Western allies decry human rights abuses while arming and shielding Israel, turning contradiction into policy, argues RAMZY BAROUD
Latest editorial
Behind the Budget smoke and mirrors, there is only more austerity
Comparing Budget measures to fictional Tory plans rather than actual spending levels conceals continued austerity, argues DIANE ABBOTT MP, as workers face stealth tax increases to bear the cost of economic stagnation
(L to R) Rachel Reeves with the ministerial red box; Songi cartoon after Edvard Munch's The Scream
Looking back to Engels’s reflections on the ILP’s emergence in the 1890s offers a revealing lens on the forces shaping a new working-class politics in 2025, says KEITH FLETT
Your Party can become an antidote to Reform UK – but only by rooting itself in communities up and down the country, says CLAUDIA WEBBE
Claiming to be under arrest, president Embalo has left the country while his opponents remain in custody after a military coup a day ahead of the announcement of the final results, argues PAVAN KULKARNI
A teaching delegation to Cuba offered IAN DUCKETT a powerful glimpse into a schooling system defined by care, creativity and the legacy of the island’s remarkable 1961 literacy campaign
The daughter of a legendary blacklisted Hollywood screenwriter has spoken out against the reactionary move, says MIKE SCHNEIDER
BUDGETS are accompanied by a blizzard of documentation designed to illuminate the detail of the big fiscal events. But the real effect can be to obscure what the real thrust of policy is and what its impact is.
The confusion surrounding the October 2024 Budget is even greater than usual. Essentially, what is being discussed as a huge tax-and-spend Budget is in reality, a Budget which not only extends austerity but actually deepens it.
First, let us highlight some of the things that have happened (or not) that give the lie to the idea that this is a big tax-and-spend Budget. One striking development is that the IMF has welcomed the Budget. The IMF has never supported what might be called “Keynesian” increases in taxes and public spending; it is an institution gripped by neoliberalism. But it specifically welcomes the central aim to “reduce the deficit by raising revenues.” As we shall see, the burden of that deficit reduction will be taxes on ordinary people.
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