Economists estimate extreme poverty could be drastically reduced for a fraction of global defence spending, yet military budgets continue to expand year on year, says JON TRICKETT MP, ahead of the Stop the War International Conference on Saturday
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Grant Shapps, civil contingencies, and the right to strike
The latest plans to suppress industrial action are chilling. They are the hallmark of authoritarian government – and worse, argues Prof KEITH EWING
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps
As Unison launches its Year of Women Workers, ANNIE COGAN-THOMAS argues that stronger organisation and collective bargaining are essential to winning equality
Trade unions, trades councils and community organisations must work together to build lasting solidarity and resistance to the far right, argues DREW GILCHRIST
Recent violence in Belfast was not spontaneous — it was built on years of failure and political neglect, argues STIOFAN O NUALLAIN
As delegates meet in Brighton this week, Unison faces pressing questions about pay, organising, workers’ rights and political representation, explains ANDY CHAFFER
Andy Burnham’s growing stature has fuelled hopes of a Labour revival – but ALAN SIMPSON warns that Britain’s crisis runs far deeper than just its leadership and traces its roots to decades of financialised capitalism
GOVERNMENT powers to deal with peacetime emergencies are contained in the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, Part II.
The Act applies to war, terrorism, and environmental disasters, as well as to “events or situations” which threaten “serious damage to human welfare.”
Although a strike could in theory cause the Act to be invoked (though it has never happened), emergency regulations may not “prohibit or enable the prohibition of participation in, or any activity in connection with, a strike or other industrial action.”
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Labour movement history in Britain shows workers secured reforms through collective pressure and political representation, rather than being gifted from above, writes KEITH FLETT
The unions are unhappy with the Employment Rights Act 2025 and with good reason. KEITH EWING and Lord JOHN HENDY KC take a close look at why the Bill promised more than it delivered
The Bill addresses some exploitation but leaves trade unions heavily regulated, most workers without collective bargaining coverage, and fails to tackle the balance of power that enables constant mutation of bad practice, write KEITH EWING and LORD JOHN HENDY KC
It is only trade union power at work that will materially improve the lot of working people as a class but without sector-wide collective bargaining and a right to take sympathetic strike action, we are hamstrung in the fight to tilt back the balance of power, argues ADRIAN WEIR