Years of austerity and political failure have left classrooms overcrowded and staff overstretched – now educators are organising across roles to demand change, says ED HARLOW
Labour denies it, but Reeves has brought back austerity
While slashing welfare and public services, Labour’s spring statement delivers a bonanza for death-dealing bomb merchants. We now see the true and terrible face of austerity 2.0, writes MICHAEL BURKE
Protesters show placards as Chancellor Rachel Reeves is about to leave 11 Downing Street to deliver the spring statement in London, March 26, 2025
While US restrictions tighten economic and social pressures on Cuba, international allies and grassroots campaigns are stepping in to support the island’s resilience, writes BERNARD REGAN, secretary of Cuba Solidarity Campaign
Labour’s approach to Scotland reveals a long-running tension between rhetoric and reality, warns PAULINE BRYAN
We can't move forward as a progressive society, until we break away from our neoliberal past, says CHRIS WILLIAMSON
Austerity is breaking the education system. We must unite to save our schools and pay our teachers properly, says NEU national president ED HARLOW
Marx’s early lectures on economics, together with Engels’s additions, provide a valuable introduction to Marxist political economy today, writes the MARX MEMORIAL LIBRARY
WELFARE CUTS. Reductions in departmental spending. Job cuts in the public sector. But a boost to spending on the military.
These were the main elements of the Spring Statement delivered by the Chancellor.
Yet government ministers seem dismayed that they are accused of implementing austerity, pointing to rising spending in real terms. In reality, as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation shows, the average family will be £750 a year worse off by 2029, and 400,000 households will be pushed into poverty.
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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
Exempting military expenditure from austerity while slashing welfare represents a fundamental misallocation of resources that guarantees continued decline, argues MICHAEL BURKE
RMT’s former president ALEX GORDON explains why his union supports defence diversification and a just transition for workers in regions dependent on military contracts, and calls on readers to join CND’s demo against nuclear-armed submarines on June 7
DIANE ABBOTT MP points out the false premises used by Rachel Reeves in the Spring Statement