New Organiser for Campsie Branch SSP

Photo: Some of the branch on the way to see Rob Roy FC  after today's meeting at which we elected Willie Telfer (back row, left) as Campsie Branch Strathkelvin Organiser. Willie is a founding member of the SSP and an organiser in the PCS union.

Members also expressed solidarity with the Yes campaign and we will be producing local SSP material giving our view on what an independent Scotland can achieve in the coming weeks.

We will be having our annual branch Christmas Curry on 21st December and SSP members old and new are welcome- please contact Organiser Neil Scott or our email address at eastdunbartonshiressp@hotmail.co.uk.

Next meeting Jan 11th, Kirkie Puffer at 11am.

Photo: back row l-r Willie Telfer, Pamela Page, Angus Clark.
Front row l-r Mark Callaghan, Ron Mackay, Sonya Scott.

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Scottish Socialist Party initiate Peaceful Protest at Labour Deputy Leader's Shameful Failure to vote for Bedroom Tax Abolition

PRESS RELEASE - for IMMEDIATE use

Scottish Socialist Party initiate Peaceful Protest at Labour Deputy Leader's Shameful Failure to vote for Bedroom Tax Abolition

Friday 15th November 3pm onwards At Anas Sarwar's Office, 9 Scotland St, Glasgow

The Scottish Socialist Party is appealing to all those who detest the Bedroom Tax to join a peaceful protest outside Scottish Labour Deputy Leader Anas Sarwar's office, to express their disgust at his failure to attend the debate in Westminster on Tuesday and vote for the abolition of the tax.

The protest has been initiated by SSP candidate in the Glasgow Shettleston Council by-election, TOMMY BALL - a constituent of Mr Sarwar's.

Tommy said:" Anas Sarwar recently made great play of how Labour would abolish the Bedroom Tax if they were elected in two year's time.

But he couldn't even bother to turn up at his extremely well-paid work on Tuesday to vote for the Motion to abolish this vicious attack on the poorest - even though the Motion was proposed by his own Labour party! Since then he has blocked all attempts by constituents - including myself - to contact him for an explanation of why he and 46 other Labour MPs boycotted such a critical vote, whether by phone calls, Twitter or Facebook. So we feel we have no other choice but to demand a face-to-face explanation at his office. And that is even more important after a woman was evicted today in Glasgow - where the Labour council has refused to declare a ban on evictions in the city they rule."

SSP regional organiser, and prominent anti-bedroom tax campaigner RICHIE VENTON added:

"For a year Labour has done absolutely nothing to resist and defeat this obnoxious theft of incomes from the poorest, and in fact said they would retain it under a Labour government. Belatedly, in mid-September, Ed Miliband declared they would scrap it if elected in 2015. I immediately initiated an ePetition demanding Miliband act now, not some time after 2015, and the SSP warmly welcomed the subsequent Motion put by Labour on Tuesday. That makes it all the more shameful that 47 Labour MPs didn't think it important enough to attend and vote for their own Motion - including 10 out of 40 Scottish Labour MPs. We expect spineless treachery and obedience to their Tory masters from the LibDem MPs, who ignored their own party conference wishes and voted to keep the Bedroom Tax. But if anything, the absence of the Treacherous Ten from Scottish Labour was even more reprehensible, since they 'represent' the very people hammered by this vicious measure - as today's Citizens Advice Scotland Report confirms, the poorest, chronically sick, disabled, low-paid workers, single parents. Their treachery cannot pass in silence."

END

For more info Tweet Tommy Ball on @tommy_ball or @the_ssp_

More hypocrisy from @joswinson

Wages For Interns, Workfare For The Poor Says Jo Swinson MP

Little sums up the vile double standards at the heart of Britain’s class ridden society than acampaign against unpaid internships for graduates which ignores the massive expansion of unpaid work for everyone else.

More absolutely appalling hypocrisy by local MP @joswinson READ ON HERE  via @johnnyvoid

@joswinson part of ANOTHER expenses scandal...

As East Dunbartonshire working people, pensioners, job seekers and families struggle to heat their homes and pay for food, local Tory/Liberal Democrat Westminster coalition Minister MP Jo Swinson has been claiming from the taxpayer to pay her and her husband, MP Duncan Hames, electricity bill.
The SSP have published a pamphlet HERE exposing the extent of fuel poverty in Scotland.

Swinson  and her husband who have, at the lowest estimation, not including the fact they have expenses incuding food paid and subsidised, a joint income of £150,000 a year - claimed £569.72.  This in the face of the calls from coalition members to end the £300 winter fuel allowance pensioners receive.
Politicians and their banker pals gamble and play with our money and caused the financial crisis, but seem to be the only ones not ‘in this together’, with the rest of us suffering wage cuts and hugely increased food and energy bills.
There is a more detailed expose in this weeks Bearsden/Milngavie Herald - "Anger as YOU pay Jo Swinson MP’s electricity bill"

The Scottish Socialist Party have published an 8 point progamme to solve the problem of fuel bills:
-Cap gas and electricity bills immediately with no further rises permitted until fuel poverty is eliminated
-Investigate the big 6 energy companies on charges of profiteering and acting as an industrial cartel
-Double the Winter Fuel Allowance paid to the elderly and extend it to all other vulnerable groups
-Introduce a windfall tax on the big 6 energy companies profits to ensure all their existing 'powercard' customers are moved on to the cheapest tariffs instead of the dearest
-Diversify away from expensive and dirty fossil fuels used in the generation of electricity towards renewables
-Treble the sums spent on Government domestic energy saving schemes such as insulation, double glazing and efficient water boilers
-Build 100,000 new energy efficient new homes for the socially rented sector in Scotland annually to replace the worst of our current 'drafty, leaky and inefficient' stock, and
-Return the energy industry to public ownership to ensure every home has the heating they need and any profits go to the public purse.
Our pamphlet will be available for £3.99 from the Scottish Socialist Party website www.scottishsocialistparty.org