FRAN HEATHCOTE believes that while the the Chancellor outlined some positive steps, the government does not appreciate the scale of the cost-of-living crisis affecting working-class people, whose lives are blighted by endemic low pay
One of the key turning points in late 20th-century history
The UCS shop stewards paved the way for the creation of the Scottish Assembly, followed by the Scottish Parliament – but how does this legacy link in with the struggles of today? TOM MORRISON takes a look
James Reid (left foreground) chief spokesman for shop stewards, and James Airlie (right), co-ordinator, shop stewards’ committee, during a press conference, 1971
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is pouring €11.5bn into the Kiev swamp, blocking Trump’s peace plan, and pushing Nato right up to Russia’s borders – no matter if it costs hundreds of thousands of lives, warns SEVIM DAGDELEN
The 2025 Budget shores up the PM’s political position with headline-grabbing welfare U-turns, but with no improvements on offer to declining public services or living standards, writes MICHAEL BURKE
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A November 15 protest in Mexico – driven by a right-wing social-media operation – has been miscast as a mass uprising against President Sheinbaum. In reality, the march was small, elite-backed and part of a wider attempt to sow unrest, argues DAVID RABY
IN JULY 1971 8,500 shipyard workers took control of four shipyards on the Upper Clyde: Govan, Linthouse, Scotstoun and Clydebank to stop their closure.
The shop stewards remained in control of the yards for the following 15 months and only ended their “work-in” when the government had fully capitulated and financially guaranteed the survival of all four yards.
This action on the Clyde had a much wider national impact. The Tory government was alarmed at the growing shop stewards’ militancy with good cause, as the workers’ successful enforcement of their right to work gave encouragement to workers in hundreds of other workplaces facing closure during the recession years of 1971-73.
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