MBDA’s Alabama factory makes components for Boeing’s GBU-39 bombs used to kill civilians in Gaza. Its profits flow through Stevenage to Paris — and it is one of the British government’s favourite firms, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES
How the European Union captured the labour movement
In 1988, the late Jack Delors ‘sold’ the EU as the future of industrial and economic harmony to a much-diminished TUC — instead of more protection for workers’ rights, what came next was a neoliberal coup, writes NICK WRIGHT
President Maduro mobilises the 4.5 million-strong Bolivarian National Militia in response to US ‘threats’, vowing to defend the country’s sovereignty and independence, DEVIN B MARTINEZ reports
Washington plays innocent bystander while pouring weapons and intelligence into Ukraine, just as it enables the Gaza genocide — but every US escalation leaves Ukraine weaker than the neutrality deal rejected in 2022, argue MEDEA BENJAMIN and NICOLAS JS DAVIES
For those in the West, hunger is often just the familiar feeling of a growling stomach between meals — in Gaza, it has become a strategic weapon of slow, systematic and deadly destruction, writes MARC VANDEPITTE
After almost two decades of rule by the Movement Toward Socialism, once led by Evo Morales, right-wing parties have emerged in the lead after the first round of elections on August 17 and are now in control of the legislature, reports PABLO MERIGUET
DAVID MATTHEWS looks at what a collective future for welfare might have in store for us
THE YEAR was 1987. Thatcher had signed the Single European Act. This signalled Britain’s fuller integration into what became the European Union.
With sovereignty surrendered, the pressure for a reversal of the labour movement’s long-standing opposition to European capitalist integration intensified.
In the late 1980s, the labour movement was in bad shape. A slump conjoined with a Thatcherite destruction of manufacturing capacity and Thatcher’s deregulation of the financial markets — combined with the unashamed “monetarist” fiscal policies she and her chancellor pursued — drove unemployment over three million.
More from this author
Starmer sabotaged Labour with his second referendum campaign, mobilising a liberal backlash that sincerely felt progressive ideals were at stake — but the EU was then and is now an entity Britain should have nothing to do with, explains NICK WRIGHT
Deep disillusionment with the Westminster cross-party consensus means rupture with the status quo is on the cards – bringing not only opportunities but also dangers, says NICK WRIGHT
Holding office in local government is a poisoned chalice for a party that bases its electoral appeal around issues where it has no power whatsoever, argues NICK WRIGHT
From Gaza complicity to welfare cuts chaos, Starmer’s baggage accumulates, and voters will indeed find ‘somewhere else’ to go — to the Greens, nationalists, Lib Dems, Reform UK or a new, working-class left party, writes NICK WRIGHT
