Head of education, campaigns and organising for the General Federation of Trade Unions HENRY FOWLER explains why it is launching a fund to support trades councils and give them access to a new range of courses and resources

FRANCE’S ongoing electoral crisis has been directly and deliberately created by the head of state President Emmanuel Macron, in the name of “institutional stability” — playing into the hands of the fascist-led National Rally.
Macron says that the winners of the election, the New Popular Front (NPF) — the coalition of the Communist Party, France Unbowed, the Socialist Party and the Ecologists — cannot possibly be allowed to form a government as they would “immediately” be brought down, since they do not have an overall majority of seats in the National Assembly.
Of course Macron fails to remember that he happily appointed Gabriel Attal to head up a minority government of his own Ensemble party in 2022 — the second “Macronist” minority government during his presidency — and, with this memory lapse, feels able unilaterally to reject Lucie Castets, the prime ministerial candidate nominated by the winners of the most seats in the Assembly.

BILL GREENSHIELDS urges an intensification of the information offensive against the impact of the spurious discourse peddled by Reform UK



