SSP Campsie

David Lammy - "smacking ban led to riots..."

2012-01-29T22:21:00.002Z

... what nonsense! The Scottish Socialist Party have already investigated the benefits of a smacking ban. This article, by Campsie member Neil Scott, was originally published in the Voice back in 2006.

Last week I was cooking a curry for tea. I’m quite good at curries; dopiaza, korma, thai - basically any curry you name I can do, and do well. I take pride in my curries. I had bought all of the spices, creamed coconut, yogurt and started to prepare them. I told my wife that the curry would be ready soon. After the meticulous preparation, the dish was to simmer for ten minutes.

I went into the living room where my wife was reading and, to my horror, stuffing herself with a box of chocolates. Now, I know my wife and I know that if she eats anything before her dinner it will put her off her food. My planning and preparation were all to be in vain.What should I do?Would anyone advocate I hit her? I know little children who are hit for the same reason.Society has moved on and we look back in horror at the days when people argued in Parliament against legislation that would outlaw men hitting their wives. Yet people actually argued that it was something we should not criminalise - what went on in their homes was their business, they said.

Today, would anyone say that the legislation introduced to protect women was wrong? Nowadays the same arguments are used against attempts to introduce legislation to protect children from physical punishment. The fact is that there are people in our society who think it is OK to hit children - and some say it is their religious and moral obligation. Quite a few of these people would not see the dichotomy of having laws to protect adults and advocating the protection of the ‘right’ to physically punish children.

British common law currently permits physical punishment of children, under the legal defence of ‘reasonable and moderate chastisement’.In 2004 this was reinforced by the Children’s Act which, whilst offering protection to children against ‘assault occasioning actual bodily harm’ at the same time implicitly reinforced a parent’s right to ‘reasonable punishment’.

The terms ‘physical abuse’ and ‘reasonable chastisement’ are imprecise and ultimately subjective. What constitutes physical abuse and what reasonable chastisement? Is a spank on the bottom with an open hand abuse? What about if it were across the face, or with a stick? Does abuse rather depend on how hard you hit and if so, how hard is too hard? Furthermore, is the nature of the misbehaviour important in determining whether the punishment is abusive or not?

In 2001 Elizabeth Gershoff undertook a study of the association between corporal punishment and certain behaviours and experiences.Gershoff found that children’s fear of physical punishment inhibited the development of internal motivation - problem solving skills. Corporal punishment, she concluded, may further decrease the learning of a moral code if its use results in little or no parental explanation of the problem the child is being punished for. Children live what they learn. In other words, behaviours that have been modelled for them by their parents are the behaviours they themselves imitate.

One of the main arguments therefore against the use of corporal punishment is that it models aggression for children and legitimises violence. In this way, children are more likely to show aggressive behaviour, violent criminal behaviour and aggression towards their own children.

Gershoff made the point that it is particularly poignant when children are physically punished for aggression, because corporal punishment models the very behaviour that parents are trying to discourage in their children. She goes on to say that, despite the risk of imitation, parents use corporal punishment more in response to children’s aggression than to any other child misbehaviour. Gershoff also concluded, in decreasing the moral internalisation (hitting rather than teaching) of society’s values, corporal punishment may predispose an individual to non-violent delinquency and adult crime. Their ability to internally judge what is morally right or wrong has been distorted by the unsparing use of the rod. The painful nature of corporal punishment may induce feelings of fear, anxiety and anger in the child or young person, which if associated with their parent may decrease the quality of the relationship between them. The child may become fearful of the parent who inflicts pain as a form of discipline, may withdraw from, or avoid them, resulting in an erosion of communication and trust between them.

Gershoff argued that children who experienced positive moods and emotions are more receptive to parents’ controls and that in contrast, feelings of pain or anger can motivate children towards resistance and retaliation. Gershoff cited evidence which indicated that coercive forms of discipline have a bad effect on the child’s confidence and assertiveness and increase feelings of helplessness and humiliation, and there is a significant association between harsh physical punishment and distress and depression in adolescence and low self-esteem, depression, alcoholism and suicidal tendency in adulthood.

Her suggestion that, when administered too frequently or too severely, corporal punishment becomes physical abuse is supported by statistics from an American study which showed that in 30 per cent of the families studied there was an escalation from the use of mild punishment to levels which could be considered abusive. Ultimately Gershoff presents a convincing argument indicating little evidence for benefits of corporal punishment but possible detrimental effects of physically punishing children.

In 2002 the Scottish Executive consulted on proposals to outlaw the physical punishment of children up to the age of three. Of the responses, 17 per cent were from people who were totally against a ban - people who were actually pro-smacking. The majority of these were individuals from the Christian right who believed that God, through the Bible, has instructed them that children MUST be physically chastised using an implement. So hitting their children brings the parents closer to their God. This response was typical: “I feel strongly that parents should be allowed to continue to use reasonable physical punishment for disciplining their children. This of course is useful only in a loving environment.“The only guideline that can be referred to is the Bible where it is very clear that corporal punishment has to be used and the short, temporary pain will save the child from a far worse consequence in life.”(From The Physical Punishment of Children in Scotland Analysis of Responses, page 9, seehttp://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Justice/Civil/17867/10386)

I am a Primary school teacher. Part of the curriculum I teach to P7’s is Democracy, part of which is learning how to have proper debates. A debate we have recently had in class is the issue of smacking. No child has said to me that they learn anything when they are hit.On the contrary, they say that anger comes in the way of their learning, even if an explanation for their punishment is offered. More than one child described the feeling that they could explode with rage and that they couldn’t hear or make sense of explanations after being hit.

As a teacher I have to ask, how do people think smacking benefits children? Is it not for the child’s benefit that people hit them? Under what circumstances does smacking improve the learning experience? The teaching profession, quite a few years ago, dropped this impediment to education - though not before a sadistic teacher beat a hatred of maths into me. I would argue that in our capitalist, elitist, violence-driven, patriarchal society, it teaches people that in violence lies an answer and that it is acceptable to be violated if you are weak or not part of the elite.

I wonder how many people who believe that the current situation in Iraq is acceptable were beaten as children? Or how many in Israel can look upon the violations they are inflicting upon the Palestinian people and say they themselves were not violated? Part of becoming politically aware is becoming politically aware of your oppression. Some children are aware of their oppression every day, through the imposition of capitalist poverty and through the imposition of adult chastisement. That the violation of children is socially acceptable tells us something very important about our society. We internalise our oppression and help to perpetuate it through the violent treatment of the impressionable young.

One way the class system is perpetuated is through the perpetuation of the violation of the weak and vulnerable. Back in 1979, Sweden became the first of 15 European countries to introduce legislation that protects their children. Three other countries have civil codes, constitutional rulings or supreme court rulings. The Swedish aims were to ensure that public attitudes were changed, to establish a clear framework of parental education and ensure earlier and less intrusive intervention when child protection was required. The ban was intended to be educational rather than punitive. Since 1979, the proportion of suspects prosecuted for child abuse who are in their 20s and therefore raised in a ‘no-smacking’ culture has decreased significantly. Violence against children has decreased since violence has been made unacceptable in law. The prosecution rate has shown a declining trend. There has been no increase of parents being drawn into the criminal justice system since the introduction of the protection and education legislation. There has been no increase of children being removed from parents through intervention. Quite the reverse. The number of children coming into care has decreased by 26 per cent since 1982 and increasingly these have been short-term placements. Youth crime has remained steady since the introduction of the no smack culture. Children involved in theft and narcotics crime has decreased. The proportion of youth who have experimented with drugs and consumed alcohol has decreased.The suicide rate amongst young people has declined. Assault against children by children has decreased. People who were brought up during the no-smacking culture have been less likely to commit child abuse than those brought up before the ban. I could go on. For more statistics go to endcorporalpunishment.org (pdf file)

In fact you can find reports from all of the other countries that have introduced the ban on the End Corporal Punishment site. Perhaps some will say that it is overly simplistic to say the ban has had a direct causal effect - but it certainly has not had a negative effect. Indeed, in modifying public attitudes it seems to have had an overwhelmingly positive effect.

Minutes of todays SSP Campsie meeting:

2012-01-28T15:39:00.000Z

May Council Election: We will have candidates across the three LOCAL NEWSPAPER areas in East Dunbartonshire. Further discussions required.

Morning Star advert: further discussions required.

Coalition of Resistance: We will affiliate to the Coalition of Resistance as a small organisation (£15 per year). It was also noted that Owen Jones is speaking on the coalition of Resistance in the STUC on 15 February (and also as part of the Aye Write! festival along with Paul Mason in the Mitchell Library - three events well worth going along to). there is also a meeting of the Coalition of Resistance on 7th February in the STUC.

CND: Re-affiliation to SCND. It was also suggested that we could run a joint public meeting with CND as part of our POSITIVE campaigning for an Independent Nuclear Free Scotland.

Independence campaigning: We will meet with local SNP to help with a positive non sectarian campaign and towards a positive outcome in the Scottish Independence referendum.

Well Red Book Club: meeting to be held on 18 February in Kirkintilloch Library. Posters to be printed this week and distributed to Campsie Branch members to have displayed across the East Dunbartonshire area. Graham Martin will also be contacted regarding an article in the Bearsden/Milngavie Herald about the launch of the Book Club.

Well Red

2012-01-18T20:24:00.000Z

"Well Red" book club - a book club for the Left starting in Kirkintilloch on 18th February, 2012 - watch this space for more information. Join virtually by clicking on the icon to the right of this post!

2012-01-11T19:56:00.000Z

Campsie Scottish Socialist Party Branch meeting this Saturday 14 January at 11am in Kirkie Puffer.Discussing issues such as this:

NO RETREAT ON CUTS FIGHT

By Richie Venton, SSP national workplace organiser

11 January 2012

The experiences of 2011 and prospects in 2012 for working class people can be captured in one phrase: grim - and grimmer!
Food bills, domestic fuel, transport costs and daily essentials rocket as wages are frozen.

The sick, disabled and unemployed are hounded and demonised by the Westminster millionaires' Cabinet, with threats of withdrawal of their measly benefits unless they find jobs that don't exist.

One in three Scottish children officially lives in poverty, with an appalling 52 per cent of kids in north Glasgow.

Meantime the richest 10 per cent of the population are on average £100,000 better off than they were in 2005.

Workers living in fear for their jobs are bullied by bosses into working massive amounts of unpaid overtime – the equivalent of working for absolutely nothing up until 24 February this year – and enough hours to create 2 million new jobs, whilst a million young people rot on the dole!

Workers whose faces don't fit are to be stripped of the paltry rights at work they currently 'enjoy', as the Twin Tories rail against health & safety 'red tape' and plan to charge workers £1,000 just to go through an Employment Tribunal against unfair dismissal.

Things can only get worse!

All this mayhem and exploitation even before the Coalition's fangs sink into jobs, incomes and services, as they have only just begun to do.

Last year 24,000 Scottish public sector jobs were lost; forecasts abound of up to 100,000 more to go in the next year or so. No wonder the SSP's warnings of 'another lost generation' - first coined three years ago - has now become the currency of many commentators and Labour politicians on the make, trying to appear anti-Tory after 13 years of acting as the New Tories in government.
But as the multiple assaults impact, workers and communities have increasingly joined the resistance, challenging the axe-wielders with quiet fury, protests, and strikes. The most spectacular display of working class resistance in several decades was the November 30 strike by over 2 million public sector workers.

At least 300,000 Scottish trade unionists came out in a fight to defend their pension rights. But that issue also acted as the vehicle for struggle against all other aspects of the unprecedented cuts to jobs, conditions and public services.

Crossroads

That battle is now at a critical crossroads, and the outcome will heavily influence workers' conditions for years to come.
As the SSP warned in advance, the Tory/LibDem razor gang have used every dirty trick to try and derail a movement that, behind the smug arrogance, terrifies them.

On the eve of the historic N30 strike, Cameron & Co offered fake concessions, and tried to isolate strikers from the rest of society by issuing blood-curdling exaggerations of the economic ruin it would cause. That, and their hard-faced announcement of even deeper cuts in Osborne's autumn statement in parliament literally the day before, only hardened the resolve of workers and strengthened the strike.

Cameron then tried to demoralise workers by dismissing it as "a damp squib", but in the face of the derision and anger this provoked, had to then admit it was "a big strike".
By taking united, militant action, the unions attracted 100,000 new members in the period of the St Andrews Day showdown; confirmation that decisive action is the way to build the unions as powerful weapons of resistance to the millionaires' butchery.
Having failed to cow public sector workers, the government resorted to an age-old strategy; they sought to use the most right-wing, spineless 'leaders' of the TUC and individual unions to undermine the momentum and unity of workers taking action.

Right-wing treachery

Ten days after the biggest show of workers' power in generations, the TUC's Brendan Barber, GMB leaders and fake-radical UNISON leader Dave Prentis argued for acceptance of the government's allegedly 'new and final offer'.

In fact, as PCS union general secretary Mark Serwotka rightly said in point blank refusing to accept this deal, there is nothing new about it. It is a minutely-adjusted version of what was on offer prior to N30.
Coalition Minister Danny Alexander subsequently boasted to the parliament on 20 December that their 'new' offer did not involve a single penny less in 'savings' than their pre-N30 proposals. It is merely a rearrangement of the misery, peppered with crude attempts to divide and conquer the millions of workers who had displayed such magnificent determination to fight the cuts.

Workers over 50 have been granted minor concessions, but will still lose 20 per cent of their pension through the switch from Retail Price Index (RPI) to Consumer Price Index (CPI) as a measure of inflation.

Retirement age is to be tied to the state pension age – 67 or 68.
NHS workers earning under £26,000 are to be granted a year's delay in the implementation of the misery, but that will be funded by deeper attacks on NHS staff earning more. Likewise with local government workers - but only so the assault commences in 2014. A year's respite for a lifetime of cuts to their deferred wages!

Triple whammy remains

The three-headed monster attack on pensions - payment of more in workers' contributions, for longer, for lesser pensions - remains at the heart of this latest offer. It still seeks to double-tax public sector workers - not to improve the state of pension schemes (many of which are in the black, all of which are set to cost less over the next decade), but to fill some of the hole in government funds caused by the bankers' bailout and the recession that has been exacerbated by the ConDem cuts.

To their eternal shame, some UNISON leaders, keen to get back to their quiet lives, undisturbed by outbursts of action by hard-pressed members, blurted out the cynical opinion "this was always going to be a damage limitation exercise"! Not exactly the views of the pickets on N30!
The spineless posture of more right-wing union leaders gave the government the opening to issue a monumental lie through the media at the height of the holiday period; that a deal had been reached. This, alongside repeated assertions that the pension plans were going ahead regardless from April 2012, was designed to browbeat workers into surrendering. And for good measure, the union that has spearheaded the battle in the wider movement - the PCS - was excluded from the so-called negotiations: an attempt to isolate and demonise them, and a back-handed compliment from the arch enemies of workers to this socialist-led union's success in inspiring others to join the fray.

Socialist alternative critical in unions

The obscene readiness of union leaders like UNISON's Prentis and GMB to cave in after the momentous scale of action by millions underlines the dangerous pitfalls of accepting the idea of ANY cuts.

Echoing Labour (and SNP!) talk of the cuts being "too deep and too soon", these union leaders lack a vision of measures that make ALL cuts entirely unnecessary, and so they are outrageously willing to capitulate in the face of a government that puts on a hard face. It is no accident that PCS especially have been firm in opposition to this deal; they have rejected the case for any cuts, calling for taxation measures and investment in jobs instead. The political viewpoint of unions becomes critical in determining what kind of fight they put up.

But when the Tory and LibDem boot boys looked to the TUC right wing for salvation, they reckoned without the furious resistance of union activists and members, who have lobbied their leaderships with demands to not sell out their pension rights even before the battle properly engages. A whole succession of union leaderships has since rejected the deal: PCS from day one; the teachers' unions NUT and NASUWT; POA: university and college lecturers' UCU; UNITE sectoral committees in both the NHS and local government.

But the united front against the cuts has been seriously breached by the decision of UNISON to accept the ‘Heads of Agreement’ – the framework for talks - thereby suspending further industrial action for at least the short-term. The national leadership’s surrender pre-Xmas did enough to confuse and undermine the confidence of branch delegates to their sectoral committees. But UNISON members should still bombard their leaderships with demands that unless the attacks on pensions are withdrawn during the negotiations, rather than delayed by a year, the fight is back on, alongside other unions who have rejected this shoddy package.

Now is the time to fight, not flee

In a remarkable confirmation that now is the time to escalate the fight against an enfeebled government, the doctors' BMA has announced plans to consult 130,000 members in what could be their first industrial action in 40 years.

As the Voice goes to press, the TUC Public Sector Liaison Group meets. Union members who have fought to save the deferred wages of millions from grand theft by the millionaires' government are demanding that they name the day without delay for further, united strike action.

Despite UNISON leadership’s weakening of the united front, the other public sector unions should forge ahead with further united strike action – as PCS, NUT, UCU and UNITE appear to be committed to.

Such a day of action could also involve sections of private sector workers, who a increasingly up in arms at cuts to their own pension schemes, wages and jobs. For instance, the UNITE members in the construction industry, battling and balloting for strike action against mind-boggling 35 per cent cuts in their wages; and Unilever workers taking their first ever national strike action against abolition of their final salary pension scheme by the giant multi-national with a previous reputation for paternalism, high quality tied houses for their workers, model villages, etc.

In rejecting the government's not-so-new deal, the UCU called for another one-day strike before university half term holidays in mid-February. Time is of the essence. Another mass strike could include lobbies of council buildings, as councillors throughout the land set budgets, with demands that instead of wielding the knife on behalf of their paymasters in Westminster and Holyrood, they should set 'No Cuts' Defiance budgets, and help build mass movements that demand back the stolen £millions from central government, to save every job, wage and service.

Councillors once again face the stark choice: defy or destroy! Faced with mass strikes, even a single council taking this principled route would add another layer of rebellion, another front facing the troubled Westminster cuts Coalition.

And closer to home, an immediate mass strike of all public sector (and sections of private sector) workers would pound the SNP government with the demand that they stand up for Scotland, for services, for social justice - instead of Swinney and Salmond aping the Tories with their pay cuts, service cuts and job losses. The SNP rightly tell Cameron and Osborne to stop interfering with Scottish democracy on the issue of an independence Referendum; they need to be hammered into something of the same resistance to Westminster 'interference' in Scottish jobs, public services and pay packets...or be exposed as the Tartan butchers that they are.

The unions, with their millions of members - workers who are indispensable in providing critical daily services - are pivotal to the battle against cuts. The union leaders have a duty to lead, not surrender at the first threat of retaliation by the Tory bullies. If they capitulate on pensions, that would be a serious blow to the wider anti-cuts struggle. A serious battle to save pensions will require further, united, national strikes and demonstrations, which would embolden workers, communities and students not even in a union to join the resistance to all aspects of cuts. And at the heart of all this lies the issue of boldly advocating an alternative that explodes the myths that cuts a necessary or unavoidable. The Scottish Socialist Party has consistently broadcast the CSS for taxation of the rich and big business, and democratic public ownership, as the core of a socialist alternative. At critical moments, like right now, the socialist case against all cuts is the difference between confusion, division, and acceptance of very slightly lesser cuts - or unity, confidence and a sustained struggle that can defeat the Eton boot boys and their spineless local servants.

Have a great Christmas!

2011-12-22T18:07:00.001Z

Letter to the Herald

2011-12-18T22:41:00.003Z

from SSP Campsie Branch member, Ron Mackay

Action not rhetoric required on jobs.

Very few would disagree with that, but what action? Harry Reid in his recent important article points out the need to rethink “our fundamental approach to eed the entire way we live”. Healso goes on to say “ Please give us a coherent political, economic and social prescription,something that reasonable people can take up and even vote for.

There is, indeed, such a policy but alas, the media dare not speak it's name.Socialists recognise employment as a basic human need. Whereare we to get jobs? That needs investment and where is that to come from? Socialistsbelieve it should come from the state, and where does the state get the cash? Why, by taxation.

Taxthe rich.

The Herald reported in June this year that there were 40,000 millionaires in Scotland. If half a million were taken from each of these millionaires by taxation, there would still be 40,000 millionaires but the government would have the resources to improve health, education,welfare and provide jobs not cuts.However,it's a rich man's world. The rich people who run our country won't readily face up to the needs of humanity and for greater equality.

The Heraldfrequently expresses concern about poverty and inequality. Harry Reid says “about inequality, the richwould have to get poorer much, much faster than the poor."

That has to be done by taxation.

Ron Mackay

Milton of Campsie.

Gypsy Travellers face racist collusion

2011-10-19T23:48:00.000+01:00

SSP statement on eviction of Dale Farm Travellers site (from the main SSP site)

The Scottish Socialist Party unconditionally condemns the eviction of the residents at Dale Farm Gypsy Travellers Site in Essex.We view this action as a consequence of collusion between the coalition government, courts, police and local authority, cheered on by racist elements in society.We do not accept that this was about 'planning' issues or the 'rule of law'.We stand four square in support of Gypsy Travellers in defence of their human right to pursue their culture and way of life.We note that many local authorities now take advantage of the removal of legal obligation to provide sites, by adopting a policy of making their localities no-go areas for Travellers who wish to pursue a traditional lifestyle.Despite gains in legal protection in Scotland and elsewhere in the UK in recent years, we note that racist attitudes prevail and are now proven to be institutional.We call upon progressive elements in Scottish society to join with us in condemnation of the Dale Farm eviction, and pledge to ensure that similar actions do not blight the creation of a tolerant society in Scotland.We especially condemn the violent reaction of the police against residents and their supporters, and their use of tazer weapons; these are said to have been designed for the protection of police officers facing individual aggression, and not to control crowds.We are concerned that this sets a dangerous and potentially lethal precedent for the control of future demonstrations of citizens rightly angry with a right wing government whose policies favour only the rich and privileged.19th October 2011

Upper Clyde Shipyard Hero passes away

2011-10-11T06:34:00.002+01:00

SSP Campsie would like to pass on condolences to the family and friends of Sammy Gilmore, a true hero of the Upper Clyde Shipyard work-in, 40 years ago, and a hero for working people defending their right to work across the world.

Herald Report - HERE

UCS Work-in Anniversary podcast!

2011-10-09T03:47:00.000+01:00

Featuring Pat Kane, Thee Faction, Primal Scream, Simone Welsh, The Mighty Wah!, Funboy Three and Michael Franti.
PART 1

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PART 2

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Tony Benn's speech at the UCS Work-in 40th Anniversary

2011-10-02T18:03:00.001+01:00

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Photo by Janine Kellett

Shop Stewards who were part of the UCS Work-In in the shipyards of Glasgow and Clydebank organised a concert to mark the 40th anniversary of the famous industrial dispute, in the Mitchell Theatre, Glasgow. The Gala Concert on Sat 1 October in the Mitchell Theatre featured Tony Benn as Guest of Honour.He was the Labour Minister who created the UCS consortium in 1968 and a prominent supporter of the Work-In when in opposition.This is the speech he delivered that night.

Elaine C Smith reads the famous "Rat Race" speech by Jimmy Reid

2011-10-02T15:54:00.000+01:00

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This is the famous "rat-race" speech that Jimmy Reid gave at his installation as Rector of Glasgow University. This recording was made on October 1st in the Mitchell Theatre in Glasgow, when people came together to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Upper Clyde Shipyard work-in, led by Reid and others. It was read by the wonderful Glasgow based actor, Elaine C Smith. The New York Times printed the speech in full and described it as "the greatest speech since President Lincoln's Gettysburg Address".A PDF of the speech can be found HERE

This is reproduced in good faith - if anyone featured within the audio would like it censored in some way, please contact plottracer@googlemail.com. By reproducing this audio, I have no rights to copyright and ownership. I have no intention of breaching copyright law by reproducing this audio file, which is purely for entertainment purposes only.

Thousands demonstrate against cuts in Glasgow despite the downpour!

2011-10-01T15:07:00.001+01:00

Thousands of anti-cuts and anti-ConDem Government protesters took to the streets of Glasgow today, despite the massive flooding that hit the city.

People First, not Profit!

2011-09-23T10:28:00.000+01:00

Build for a demo against cuts on October 1st!

Richie Venton explains, HERE

There is a better way...

How we treat our children...

2011-09-20T23:00:00.000+01:00

UNICEF report - An Overview of Child Well-being in Rich Countries -

UK children are WAY down the list in all of the indicators. full report HERE

Click on Table below for summary...

Attacking Teachers Professionalism...

2011-09-14T22:26:00.001+01:00

A teacher's response to McCormac's review of Scottish Education...

Prior to the findings of the McCormac review I feared the worst. The reality is somewhat different; the 35 hour week survives (in theory) and the need for preparation time is acknowledged. However, to accept McCormac on a superficial level, and regard it as an innocuous document, would be naïve. The cynic in me says that it is both a monstrous perversion of the English language and a pernicious attack upon our conditions.

My fears stem from the sheer number of contradictions contained in the report. The document claims to advance teacher professionalism. Introducing unqualified staff does not advance professionalism; it is the very opposite. Introducing a convoluted system of calculating class contact time will not be “flexible”- it will be exploitative. On the one hand it claims to want an end to hour counting; on the other, having to calculate their contact time on an annual basis will leave teachers with the choice of counting or being exploited. You can only fear the worse when they claim that they want teachers to be more “mobile”. What does that mean? Greater employment instability? More short-term contracts? In an attempt to simultaneously attack conditions yet be inoffensive to teachers, McCormac has ended up as a report that in many instances simply doesn’t make sense.

There is a saying that ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’. Industrial relations in teaching have enjoyed a harmonious period during the last ten years. The report even acknowledges this. It states that Scotland has “a well-qualified and committed teaching profession that provides a positive and stimulating environment for young people's learning”. Nonetheless, the authors have launched a sustained attack on teachers, their conditions and, the corollary of attacking either of these two, the welfare of young people.

The McCormac Review’s official title is Advancing Professionalism in Teaching. The irony is that by scrapping the Chartered Teacher Scheme, and introducing non-qualified staff, the report is in fact eroding professionalism in teaching. From the outset the report exudes an arrogant assumption that only management control – as opposed to teacher autonomy – can offer greater professionalism. The proposed end of the right for staff to work off-site is indicative of this; the implication being that we are not professional enough to work outwith the guise of management.

54% of responses to the McCormac review felt that Annex E should not be revised. By this, the report acknowledges that a majority of respondents do not feel that teachers should be carrying out any of the duties in Annex E. So, in what must considered a wholly disproportionate act, McCormac has recommended axing Annex E altogether.

There are a handful of positives that can be taken. The introduction of a national system for annual review will be a relief to those of us who have had to negotiate the dissimilar ways in which respective local authorities handle these matters. CPD requirements will be linked to this system. However, it is not clear what the report’s proposed changes to CPD will look like in practice.

Probationers will remain on the same contact time but it is calculated over a four week period. This potentially opens the way for probationers being taken for cover. This forces the probationer to hour count, keep a log of when they are taken for cover, so as to prevent management from exploiting them. Once again we face hour counting.

Unqualified staff are to be allowed to work with classes on their own given the assent of the Headteacher. The GTCS are to approve which unqualified individuals are allowed to do this, but by using the money that we pay them each year. In other words, we are paying for a move that could potentially lead to our own job losses. In another of the report’s wonderful contradictions, it is interesting to note that unqualified staff are to be allowed to look after children unsupervised, but experienced classroom teachers will not even be allowed off-site to complete their marking!

Advancing Professionalism in Teaching, is a misnamed, misguided and for the most part unnecessary document. It has been composed to ensure that Scotland’s local authorities fall into line with David Cameron’s sustained assault upon the public sector. The changes to working hours will allow authorities to hire fewer staff. As with all decisions in the public sector nowadays, its recommendations are driven by cost; the welfare of young people is afforded only lip service. However, in a rather perverse way, we are lucky. While London governs in a dictatorial fashion, in Scotland the authorities have to proceed with caution. McCormac is not as detrimental as it could have been, but it is far from an encouraging development for the teaching profession in Scotland.

Liberating the NHS: source and destination of the Lansley reform

2011-09-10T17:45:00.000+01:00

INTRO (the entire body of this document has been placed HERE)

This important document was written by
Dr Lucy Reynolds (a), Dr John Lister (b), Dr Alex Scott-Samuel (c) & Professor Martin
McKee (a)

a London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
b Coventry University
c University of Liverpool

A narrative for this reform, far more transparent than the double-speak of the White Paper, can indeed be located. It is described in the following pages. It maps a move away from the tax-funded NHS based on the principles of contribution according to ability to pay, and use according to medical need. It takes the NHS towards a US style arrangement of individual health insurance with access to care based on payment of health insurers at a level based on the insuree’s state of health. In other words it removes the pooling of risk which underlies the post-war social solidarity compact, involving subsidy of health care for poorer and less healthy citizens by richer and healthier compatriots. A plan for the end-state system to be jointly funded by the state and the individual solves the perplexing riddle of how the new systemcould generate £20 billion of savings, given that it involves more providers, fragmented procurement, more complex administration, the marketing costs involved in market competition, and multiple layers of profit extraction from the NHS budget,. Cost reductions will be achieved through de-skilling and poorer employment terms for medical professionals as the NHS hospitals which employ them are shifted into the private sector.

40 years ago...

2011-09-10T17:06:00.001+01:00

...Jimmy Reid led the Upper Clyde Shipyard Work-in.

Campsie Branch member, Bill Newman wrote an obituary of Reid HEREJimmy's famous speech to Glasgow University is reproduced HERE

SSP Campsie BBQ CANCELLED

2011-09-08T12:57:00.002+01:00

...due to forecasts of bad weather, this Saturday's BBQ WILL NOT GO AHEAD...

SSP Campsie BBQ in Mugdock this Saturday CANCELLED!

2011-09-06T15:54:00.001+01:00

CANCELLED!!

...Starting 2.30/3pm... coals will be lit - bring your own food and drink. Ring and Ride Bus will leave Milngavie Station at 3pm and then leave Mugdock again at 7.30pm.

Meet at the POND BBQ area (click on map below)

Red Pepper Review of "Downfall"

2011-08-28T21:01:00.001+01:00

Liz Davies, chair of the Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers and a barrister specialising in housing and homelessness law, has reviewed Alan McCombes book on the Sheridan affair for Red Pepper.

Review HERE

Former MSP Joins Scottish Socialist Party

2011-08-27T14:22:00.004+01:00

Article by Campbell on his reasons to join the SSP HERE
Colin Fox welcomes Campbell to the party HERE
Article by Campbell in which he writes about "The Economic Situation," on the Campsie Socialists website from July 2010 HERE

Owen Jones at The Free Hetherington

2011-08-22T07:59:00.003+01:00

On Sunday 22 August 2011, Owen Jones, the author of "Chavs; the demonization of the working class," visited the student occupied Hetherington Post Grad Club in Glasgow. This video is an hour of a much longer conversation that was led by Jones.

The SSP on the demonization of our youth (2003)

2011-08-12T23:51:00.002+01:00

I unashamedly reproduce this article from the Scottish Socialist Voice about Rosie's Scottish Parliamentary battle against the demonization of our youth:

No votes no rights

by Jo Harvie

After months of election propaganda, veiled threats and open slander, the Scottish Executive launched their crack down on "anti-social behaviour", predominantly aimed at young people labelled by the Executive as neds.Their bill could hand extensive new powers to police and the courts, including the use of electronic tags and fixed penalty fines for children.

Heavy emphasis was also placed on new police powers to "disperse" groups of three or more people gathered in the streets, touted as a way of dealing with young people in gangs.

But the Scottish Human Rights Centre have compared this to the stop-under-suspicion (sus) laws introduced in England and Wales in the 1980s, which caused a huge increase in tension between young people and the police.John Scott told press:

"It created a generation of people who were as suspicious of the police as the police were of them.

"As a matter of principle, I do not think that if there are three young people in the street doing nothing at all the police should have the power to interfere with them.

"This is a radical departure from current police powers. The European Convention on Human Rights guarantees the right of free association, the exception being if you are breaking another law.

"Giving the police such wide-ranging powers that could be easily abused is not the answer.

"We have gone too far on the intolerance current in society towards young people."

SSP MSP Rosie Kane agrees:"Young people are being demonised to promote a really oppressive piece of legislation.

"I don't think a few young people hanging about on the street is a problem - I'm all in favour of pedestrianising our communities.

"Obviously if any person is behaving in a way that is hurting or threatening other people, then we have to deal with that. But the Executive are saying that young people in general are a problem we need to deal with."They are refusing to say if they'll be tagging eight year olds or not.

"Imagine a wee eight year old child who can't go out in shorts in the summer because he's got the bad boy label on. What kind of message is that for young people?

"In the absence of any real, progressive legislation on poverty, they're using a few words that appeal to people's fears and I think will have a really negative effect, not just on young people but on all of our communities."

The Scottish Socialist Party was the only political party to speak out against the proposals, but anti-poverty groups were also critical.

As the Executive launched their crusade, the Scottish Human Services Trust released a report, Staying Human by Gerry Hassan and Sue Rawcliffe, saying that the Executive have failed to address real poverty and inequality.The report says Scotland has become more unequal since the founding of the Scottish Parliament.Hassan also criticised the Scottish Executive's increasing tendency to talk in "morally authoritarian" terms of blame and punishment, especially where young people are concerned:

"The Scottish debate never used to have that punitive language. These young people who are getting tagged better hurry and grow up and vote."

On Saturday, Rosie was in Edinburgh to unveil a mural painted by a group of young people under the guidance of a youth project called Citizen Y.

Angered by the way that young people have been scapegoated by the Scottish Executive, a couple of weeks ago they decided to rename their mural Who are you calling a ned?

Rosie told the Voice:

"The mural has been created by the young people who are viewed, labelled and dismissed by the politicians as 'neds'."The project has given them something to do, and they've made something beautiful out of it."Treating young people positively means you get positive attitudes back from them, just like anybody else."

Further article HERE from the magazine Frontline

Get some Socialist R&B...

2011-08-11T14:17:00.004+01:00

I reviewed Thee Factions previous album At Ebbw Vale, HERE and will review their new album Up the Workers OR: Capitalism is good for corporations; that's why you've been told socialism is bad all your life, in the coming days.

In the meantime, if you would like a free copy - I have one to give away! To claim it, send me one sentence on how you are fighting capitalism, to eastdunbartonshiressp@hotmail.co.uk. The winner will judged by me to be the person who has a suggestion that we can all take up and use. Ends 18 August.

Scottish Independence – it’s up to the Working Class.

2011-08-05T17:54:00.000+01:00

Huffington Post Blogpost by SSP Campsie member, Neil Scott HERE

Pamphlet's from the past...

2011-08-03T10:43:00.002+01:00

Our comrades from the down and dirty Socialist R&B group, Thee Faction, have drawn our attention to this Pamphlet from the Past. Definitely worth a read, comrades.

Read Thee Faction's introduction to the pamphlet and click on their link to read it here- GDH COLE ON GUILD SOCIALISM

...and buy their album...

Swinson- increasingly divorced from realities of living in East Dunbartonshire

2011-07-28T18:15:00.004+01:00

I have been finding our local LibDem/ConDem/Tory MP, Jo Swinson's "e-consultations" and online presence are becoming less and less about her constituency, and more and more about her want to make an impact with the "federal party" she is part of, and building a CV for the inevitable crash of the Lib Dems.

Lately, Swinson has replied to me via email to pronounce her support of Nuclear Weapons and "an alternative" to Trident being the imperative -

"A non-nuclear defence is not currently a viable option and the EDM does not recognise that we continue to live in an uncertain, unpredictable world where proliferation of nuclear weapons is still a priority for some countries. We also cannot assume that current nuclear states will remain stable and pose no threat to our country and its interests. The risk may be low, but so long as a risk exists, we cannot leave ourselves vulnerable and so some minimal deterrent is needed."

I would like to know what this threat she is hinting at is - and why reacting to this threat with a nuclear deterrent is a necessary and positive response. Would we really attack another country - killing many innocent families, children and workers - if some deranged terrorist or dictator launched an attack on us?

If you would like a copy of her response to my request for her to sign EDM 1924 regarding the Trident Review, please email me at eastdunbartonshiressp@hotmail.co.uk

Anyway, her latest e-consultation asks the question,

"Do you agree that the government should invest in high speed rail between London and the north of England?"

I felt this question was not only far removed from her "localism" campaign to be elected in the past two General Elections, but also shows her as a career politician, making sure of her place in the decimated LibDem Party after the next General Election (which, the way this coalition are going, could be sooner rather than later). Positioning herself as Vince Cables PPS will, perhaps after the election give her some sort of political position or at least a great entry in her CV.

Remember - between her and her MP husband, their family income is over £120,000 a year - not bad for two career politicians who have never had to struggle. The least she could do is fight for working families and poorly paid people in her own constituency. East Dunbartonshire is a place where we are reliant on public sector jobs - teachers, nurses, doctors and other "civil servants" commute daily to Glasgow and other cities and large towns for a diminishing return thanks to the VAT increases, increase in transport costs, increase in food prices and increases in fuel prices to name a few - alongside frozen wages. The median wage is £21,000 - far removed from her wage of over £64,700 plus allowances, including travel. How many East Dunbartonshire working people get transport allowances into Glasgow or Edinburgh or elsewhere? How many East Dunbartonshire people get their subscription the the Bearsden Milngavie Herald as a work expense? Or their mobile phone bill paid? As a teacher, I am in contact with my Head Teacher and other colleagues about work quite a lot - perhaps Jo should fight for ALL workers to have their mobile phone, travel to work and subscription to a local paper paid for through company expenses?

Swinson is increasingly being seen as the well off young person who has never had to work or struggle for her income she is. And increasingly as someone divorced from the present day hard realities of living in East Dunbartonshire.

This is my reply to her current anglo-centric consultation:

A fully integrated, updated public transport system is vital to our country - and indeed to East Dunbartonshire, which this question, and more and more of your "consultations" seem to forget about.

As the economy slumps and as more and more of your constituents have less and less money to help the economy grow due to the Lib Dem policy of support for the Tory plans to make the poor and working pay for the crisis of capital created by millionaires and billionaires, a free public transport system for the huge amount of commuters from East Dunbartonshire would be a policy that would not only help poor and working families financially; it would be a boost to the local economy as people would be left with more of a disposable income. It would also help clear our streets from the curse of the car (and ensure the predicted one hour travel time from Milngavie to Canniesburn DOES NOT happen post-Kilmardinny development).

Our policy of Free Public Transport - a policy that has been successful in other parts of the world in boosting economies and in creating a cleaner environment, can be found here along with links to articles in the Herald praising this "audacious" plan.

http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/transport/index.html

Neil Scott

Organiser, Campsie Socialists.

Open Letter to Swinson HERE
Criticism of her so called feminism HERE

To the Tory/Liberal Democrat coalition...

2011-07-25T11:35:00.000+01:00

...The Diary of a "Benefits Scrounger."

HERE

Doleman's Downfall

2011-07-05T13:13:00.001+01:00

Article by Campsie SSP member Neil Scott on James Doleman and Philip Stott's strange view on the events leading up to Tommy Sheridan's incarceration HERE

Update on threats to SSP Councillor Jim Bollan

2011-07-01T14:16:00.000+01:00

(see HERE for original post)
Jim has sent this statement to us -

"The death threats and vile hate messages from right wing Zionists will have no effect on the Council's boycott of Israeli goods. These threats expose the paucity of the arguments these Zionists try to put forward to justify the slaughter of innocent Palestinians by the IDF. The boycott was unanimously approved by WDC and remains in place. The Council Leader only last week confirmed and re-enforced our policy which was taken on humanitarian grounds after the IDF killed 1,300 innocent Palestinians in Gaza in 2008/2009. The Scottish Socialist Party stands 100% behind the Palestinians. Unless we speak out...nothing will change."

Remember - Swinson, the Tory collaborator, will get a bigger pension than you!

2011-07-01T03:15:00.000+01:00

...and after only being an MP for 9 years! Click on image below to see just HOW much bigger!

DVLA PCS Glasgow Branch Secretary Willie Telfer interview for Daily Record

2011-06-30T19:03:00.003+01:00

With thanks to http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/

Glasgow June 30th Public Sector Unions Strike!

2011-06-30T17:10:00.002+01:00

Thee Faction - 366

2011-06-17T01:21:00.000+01:00

Music to kick Condem ass to.

CiF Watch Threaten Scottish Councillor

2011-06-15T20:20:00.003+01:00

Threat to SSP Councillor from Pro-Zionist Website

Creepy pro-zionist web page, “CiF Watch” (Website HERE and twitter account @CiFWatch) has issued a threat to Councillor Jim Bollan after he endorsed West Dunbartonshire Council’s boycott of Israeli goods.

The West Dunbartonshire boycott reads, This Council condemns the massacre of 9 peace activists by the Government of Israel, and the continuing blockade of Gaza. Council notes these brave people were trying to deliver 10,000 tons of humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza which has been blockaded since 2007 by the IDF. This Council therefore re-affirms its current boycott of all Israeli goods. Council also agrees to write to all Scottish Local Authorities, Westminster and Holyrood Governments calling on them to implement an immediate boycott of all Israeli goods.
Motion by Councillor Jim Bollan – Boycott of Israeli Goods

US based CiF Watch have posted an article by contributor, Aussie Dave, who has said “Jim Bollan: you are going down.” (see HERE )

The site, was purportedly set up to counter Guardian articles about Israeli Human Rights infringements in the occupied territories and Gaza (see Amnesty International concerns about Israel HERE and HERE ), but seems to have been set up to threaten anyone with a contrary view to Zionist propaganda.

CiF Watch have refused, contrary to their own site rules that state, “Comments which are ad hominem, racist, contain threats of violence or other inappropriate material will be deleted,” to withdraw the article. In a Twitter conversation with a SSP Campsie member, CiF first denied there was a threat and then said the threat came from Jim. The person behind the Twitter account does not seem to have control, or understanding, of the posts on the CiF site.

The Twitter conversation can be found on the @sspcampsie twitter feed.

(Screen grabs of original article below)

SSP statement after the Israeli storming of the Peace Flotilla HERE

Podcast and video of Jim Bollan HERE and HERE

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT TOMMY

2011-06-12T20:27:00.006+01:00

Thousands of words have been written about the fall from grace of the shamed MSP Tommy Sheridan but a new book, Downfall, claims to be the definitive account of the sex, lies and smears that dragged Sheridan through the courts and into jail.

Here, ALAN McCOMBES - the author and Sheridan's former comrade in the Scottish Socialist Party - explains why, as the jailed MSP continues to proclaim his innocence, the extent of Sheridan's lies had to be laid bare once and for all.

It is a book never wanted to write and one that I wish I never had to write.

The story of Downfall is just too raw, too sordid, too dispiriting.

Much of Scotland was fascinated by the dramatic twists and turns of the Tommy Sheridan saga, from its first stirrings in a small office in the back streets of Glasgow to its sensational finale six years later in the High Court of Judiciary.

But for those involved - personally and emotionally - it was a sickening and destructive spectacle. Lifelong friendships were torn asunder. Some people suffered emotional and psychological trauma. Good people were vilified and demonised.

They included the likes of former Sunday Mail columnist, Rosie Kane, one of the warmest and most compassionate people I've ever known.

For years on end, she and her female colleagues were portrayed in the media as a cruel gaggle of stony-hearted witches who had destroyed one of Scotland's favourite sons.

Or people like Keith Baldassara, denounced by Tommy "a scab and a rat" for refusing to lie in court.

Keith had spent years up to his neck in human misery dealing with the MSPs casework on the ground, from dampness and debt to crime and anti-social behaviour

When Tommy received the plaudits and the 'Thank You' cards when the problems were solved, Keith never complained.

His loyalty was as deep as the Clyde, but he was not prepared to stand by while Tommy leapt over the edge, with the rest of his party chained to him.

Worst of all, the most successful left wing socialist party in Europe was reduced almost to smoking ruins.

At its height 150,000 had voted for the SSP. Thousands had sacrificed their time, money and energy to build a movement that, for a time, gave a voice to the people that the mainstream parties had long abandoned – the poor, the sick, the elderly, lone parents, the low paid, unemployed, council tenants.

So Downfall was no pleasure to write but a story that had to be told as a warning and an explanation of that betrayal in all its gory and complex detail.

This book might not have been necessary if Tommy Sheridan had been brave enough, even at the eleventh hour, to put up his hands and take responsibility for his own actions.

Instead, aided and abetted by a noisy little band of supporters, he continues to claim he is the victim of a monstrous frame-up.

That does a grave disservice to those who have suffered from real miscarriages of justice.

And it leaves a chill cloud still lingering over those who have been falsely accused of perjury, forgery and perverting the course of justice as part of a fanatical anti-Tommy plot.

If this book can do anything, I hope it can deconstruct the Sheridan fantasy by offering a blow-by-blow, insider's account of exactly what happened behind the scenes over these sad, sorry years.

This is the truth.The rest is a lie.

Some people have accused me of cashing in. They are wrong. This book wasn't written for money - authors are paid just eight per cent of a book's cover price.

Even if Downfall were to be a best-seller in Scotland, I could have spent the last two years more lucratively pouring pints in a bar.

Nor was I motivated by revenge. If anything, Downfall challenges the idea that Tommy Sheridan alone can be held responsible for the pain and destruction of the past six years.

Many people in politics, the legal system and the celebrity showbiz circuit cheered him along every step on his road to destruction.

In many cases, their complicity was based on ignorance of the facts. But without encouragement Tommy would have been isolated and incapable of inflicting damage on such a scale.

I know many people will be uncomfortable with this book because it challenges their own role in these events but I make no apologies for
naming names.

I have always believed in redemption. But before there can be reconciliation, there must first come truth.

Downfall will, I hope, set the record staright once and forall.

Perhaps then, we can move on.

Sunday Mail 12 June 2011

Scottish Education- A Socialist Response to Curriculum for Excellence

2011-06-08T08:37:00.000+01:00

On the Eve of the EIS Conference, SFST member, Allan Armstrong analyses the CfE

The combination of the over 40% rejection of the latest EIS/COSLA/SEED pay and conditions deal, with the publication of the decisions of the the McCormac Review, means that socialist teachers are now presented with a real opportunity to advance a far-reaching alternative. Otherwise, if the SEED/COSLA and Moray Place get their way, teachers only face increased demoralisation and depression as greater and greater burdens are placed upon our shoulders, only to meet fewer and fewer of our students’ real educational needs.

Perhaps, the employers’ greatest victory, stemming from the 2001 McCrone Agreement, was the EIS giving up any critical assessment of ongoing governments’ educational counter-reforms. In the late 60’s and 70’s, many classroom teachers were avid participants in educational debate. Publishers, including Penguin, issued regular Education Specials. In these the latest ideas - some decidedly whacky, some divorced from any classroom experience, but many very stimulating - were read and debated by teachers, especially socialist teachers, many of whom entered education after ‘68’.

In secondary education, as recently as the 1990’s, there were vibrant subject organisations, such as the Association of Media Education (Scotland), in which classroom teachers eagerly participated, discussed and debated the latest developments and practice, without any thought of advancing their careers beyond the classroom. These organisations weren’t insular and also sought out the most stimulating external speakers.

However, the SED and SEED completely failed to build on all this classroom teachers’ knowledge and experience, whilst the EIS leadership never took radical educational reform seriously - it was too associated with precisely those who contested them on pay and conditions.
Reforming Scottish education took a different course. ‘Experts’ were drawn from the senior promoted staff in the universities and colleges of education, aided by selected promoted teachers. They were prepared to accept the latest top-down changes in return for their own rapid career enhancement. Initially, there were consultation exercises, like that conducted around Higher Still. However, when classroom teachers challenged these top-down initiatives, they were just ignored. Higher Still was launched to a great fanfare, and crashed spectacularly in the first year of the new examinations in 2000.

Primary teachers offered similar warnings over National Testing. This would result in young school students being trained to pass through the requisite hoops (the national tests), at the cost of gaining the more rounded knowledge that could advance their education. Eventually, even the HMI’s (now employed solely to promote the latest government initiatives, and to cow and police teachers into doing so) cottoned on to what classroom teachers had long being saying. They eventually realised that the National Testing they had been pushing down primary teachers’ throats would have to go.

Therefore. the SEED came up with a new catch-all educational counter-reform to cover schooling from 3-18 - the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE). A key feature of CfE has been the total non-involvement of class teachers in its formulation or development. The SEED decided to avoid the challenges from classroom practioners they had faced over their earlier reforms. Furthermore, another key aspect of CfE has been to make the actual nature of the changes as vague as possible. This means the SEED can continually change the goalposts, revealing new changes as they see fit, knowing that classroom teachers have been disarmed in advance, since they have never had any input into the process.

Following earlier precedents, CfE produced its own round of jargon (what was once essential knowledge for would-be careerists is now just as important for those trying to get a permanent contract). However, every classroom teacher realises that the four ‘capacities’ are a burdensome add-on extra, which do not help actual educational practice. Does anybody know one person in school, charged with promoting ‘responsible citiizens’ throughout the curriculum, who took the opportunity of all the brouhaha surrounding the recent royal wedding to promote discussion in school on what being a citizen actually means - as opposed to being a docile subject? For the authorities and school management ‘capacities’ are just another addition to their armoury of control - monitoring and measuring our compliance by ticking boxes and through regular teacher appraisal.

As local education offices and schools develop an ever-extended and privileged hierarchy of managerial posts, these people, far divorced from classroom realities, have to produce longer and longer paper trails to provide evidence to their immediate superiors, that they are in control of things. Since there is continuous downward managerial pressure, every effort is made to ensure, at each subordinate level, that the requirements demanded are met on paper. However, as the paperwork is passed up the managerial hierarchy, it reflects less and less of the reality in the classroom.

Our new managerial stalinists face similar problems to their now departed predecessors in the old USSR. At present, most teachers remain committed enough to the job that they try to deflect all the top-down imposed crap, the better to get on with the real job of teaching. However, if the McCormac Review were to be ‘successfully’ imposed, schools would likely become dysfunctional workplaces, where “they pretend to pay us, and we pretend to work”. And school students confronted with more and more meaningless school work, and fewer and fewer decent job prospects, would be even more disaffected - a recipe for failure.

Most teachers would recognise the need for some administrative jobs to enhance our work in the classroom (e.g. curriculum development, pastoral care, dealing with necessary agencies). However, the reality underlying many of the new promoted posts is that they create work that detracts from the job of teaching. The more elaborate and dictatorial the managerial hierarchies weighing down upon teachers, the less teachers have meaningful control, and the less effective is the education we provide.

So what can teachers do? Developing meaningful education for our students means asserting teacher control over classroom education. Nobody has more interests in providing effective learning than teachers, since we soon know to our cost whenever we are unable to do this. The massively increased managerial pressures resulting from the McCormac Review, coupled to the worsened conditions and the pay freeze, have educational failure and breakdown written all over them. Furthermore, Scottish Labour*, the SNP and the Tories all have plans to protect the more privileged, especially from the middle class, from the consequences of their planned educational, social and economic measures. They want to develop a hierarchy of state funded private schools (which can set their own curriculum, pay and conditions) leaving behind a growing number of sink schools.

And central of all their plans is CfE. Here is the Wikipedia assessment of how teachers currently view CfE:-

“Many within the Scottish teaching profession, including the teacher's union EIS and it's members, believe that the Curriculum for Excellence is too vague, in particular with regards to its 'outcomes and experiences'. There exists a fear that this vague factor will result in teachers not knowing what is expected of them in the classroom. This has been further exacerbated by the confusion over assessment. As the implementation of the CfE continues, then assessment guidelines will be published. This includes assessment on literacy and numeracy from all subjects within Secondary Schools. The time required to complete such expectations risk taking time away from teaching subject content.”

And here is the official EIS response:-

‘EIS general secretary Ronnie Smith said the union, together with most teachers, supported the aims of the Curriculum for Excellence.

But he added they had "a number of concerns about how the process of implementation is progressing"’.

(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/8039474.stm)

This reflects the fact that the EIS leadership, under McCrone, gave up the right to meaningfully criticise the nature of government educational policy. They can only confine themselves to negotiating the terms of its implementation (and thy have been lousy at doing that too!) This helps to explain why so much of the Scottish Educational Journal is indistinguishable from any SEED or Local Authority material promoting the latest government ‘education’ initiative. Moray Place has just become an additional personnel management service for our bosses.

On those occasions, Moray Place has been forced into taking action, it as been of a token nature, designed to let off steam. At the same time, as Moray Place was organising for teachers to attend the TUC’s display of trade union ‘unity’ against the cuts on March 26th, it was, at the same time, planning to be the first union to break that unity, with its latest sell-out. Putting demands on Moray Place is not sufficient. Socialists must argue the case now for independent action, which can not be recuperated and sold out by union officials. It may take a little time yet before we can make the sort of breakthrough achieved in 1975, with mass independent (unofficial) action, but the ground should be prepared. Scottish Rank & File Teachers were formed in1972, two years before this major breakthrough.

Therefore it is the gap between what teachers already clearly understand (see Wikipedia entry) and what Ronnie Smith and Moray Place oppose, that socialist teachers should address.

As a far from comprehensive starter, I suggest that the socialist teachers could initiate discussion around the following points:-

a) oppose the CfE on educational grounds
b) promote class teacher-controlled educational organisations (like the original AMES) to develop a meaningful curriculum and promote good educational material (pressing for resources and time from the SEED and Local Authorities - probably much cheaper than the current top- down, over-promoted and wasteful system, e.g. never ending costly glossy brochures, which just lie in cupboards, or are taken out before interviews, after their first in-service day airing!)
c) argue for democratising schools, with the scope and nature of necessary non-classroom work under class teacher control. Department (secondary) or Years Group (primary) organisers to be elected by the class teachers concerned (this would cut down unnecessary bureaucracy work to a mimimum) and to be subject to re- election.
d) reform the EIS, so all officials are directly elected, subject to regular re- election, recruited from amongst classroom teachers, and receive the average pay of classroom teachers (the impending replacement of the truly dire Ronnie Smith provides an opportunity to raise this issue).

Yes, this may seem like a ‘return to 1968’, however, I think it is such radical l thinking that is now required in the face of the ongoing economic, social and educational crisis we now face. Tahrir Square in Cairo may have seemed quite far away. However, when young students, workers and unemployed in Spain are joining daily protests in public squares, maybe ‘the spirit of 2011’ will once more take off across the world where ‘the spirit of 68’ left off. I still remember occupying Moray Place in 1974, as part of the movement which turned Scottish education upside down at the time. Bob Dylan may be 70, but perhaps ‘The Times They Are A’Changing’ again!

Allan Armstrong, 30.5.11

The Deepbone Roundabout- keep Swinson away.

2011-06-06T14:37:00.001+01:00

Letter to Bearsden Milngavie Herald

It is really good to see the construction of the new roundabout at the Duntocher Road / Baljaffray Road intersection. This will undoubtedly save lives and stop the risk taking of motorists pulling out on to the Duntocher Road.

When I saw this was given the go ahead I was reminded of the locally filmed “Burnistoun” comedy series and the single issue politician who was successfully elected to get rid of the traffic lights on the Deep bone Roundabout (see below for video ) and was also reminded of the single issue politician who represents our constituency in Westminster, and through a hung Parliament has become an apologist for the Tories, Jo Swinson.

Swinson was elected on the single issue that she was not the Labour Party, nor was she a member of the Tory party. How wrong we were.

I look around East Dunbartonshire and see the changes electing such a careerist politician to Westminster has imposed upon us. Her unfaltering support for the ConDem Tory led government and deep, rapid cuts aimed at working people have led to a huge proportion of our young people without hope of work after training as teaching assistants, teachers, nurses, doctors etc. Her proudest moment seems to have been the support for a policy that does not, thank goodness, even effect East Dunbartonshire and Scotland, ie. the imposition of huge fees to young people wanting to participate and add to our economy through educating themselves at Universities in England.

In her current position as Parliamentary Private Secretary to Vince Cable, she has now foisted the blame for the UK’s stagnant economy on to workers who are trying to defend their ever decreasing income and in fact their jobs, rather than on the banks and the billionaires who caused the economic crisis in the first place. Cable and Swinson and the rest of the ConDems have, regardless of their empty rhetoric , failed completely in taking on the banks and their bonus culture and the structural aspects of capitalism that will lead to further crisis, and further disaster for working people, in the future. Instead, the workers and their children growing up in East Dunbartonshire are bearing the brunt of the cuts – Swinson, Cable, Clegg and Cameron have turned socialism on its head and instead of the people they represent gaining through the profits of these institutions, the people of East Dunbartonshire, Scotland and the UK have had the DEPT shared out, whilst the bankers enjoy their bonuses and the oil and gas profiteers steal our resources (and charge us the highest prices in Europe for what is produced in our country).

Swinson, with her £60k+ salary and expenses is so far removed from the struggles of ordinary people in East Dunbartonshire, one can imagine her muttering under her breath the thatcherite nonsense, "There is no such thing as society," adding, "only workers who will pay for the neo-capitalist destruction of our economy."

Unfortunately, Swinson has another four years to be an apologist for a Tory led Government that is draining Scotland and East Dunbartonshire of its resources and young people (who undoubtedly will leave our shores to find work in countries that value the skills they have learned).

A single issue politician or a politician without a single issue?

I believe the time to start fighting for a local candidate who sees far beyond the £60k+ pay packet and huge expenses Swinson can claim, is now. I propose those of us in East Dunbartonshire who share a vision of a better world for our children and not more of the same, should come together and find a candidate we can support that will oust the Liberal Democrats from East Dunbartonshire AND ensure the Tories get the message that their extreme capitalism is not welcome here. A candidate who will fight for East Dunbartonshire and for an independent Scotland and a candidate who will not be seduced by the money and self aggrandizement the title of MP has brought to Jo. A candidate who will work for us on an average workers wage.

Oh, and I hope when this new Roundabout is opened, Swinson is not asked to cut the ribbon. The Burnistoun writers and performers have added much more to the Bearsden/ Milngavie/ East Dunbartonshire economy than Swinson has by far. Ask them.

Neil Scott
SSP Organiser, www.campsiesocialists.com

STAND UP FOR SCOTLAND AGAINST CUTS

2011-05-27T13:15:00.000+01:00

By Richie Venton, SSP national workplace organizer

25 May 2011

The annual conference of the UK’s fifth-biggest trade union, the Public & Commercial Services union (PCS), marked a decisive turning point in the resistance movement to public sector cuts.
The delegates there, representing 300,000 members, with branch mandates behind them, voted almost unanimously to ballot for strike action and action short of strikes, on the issues of jobs, pay and pensions.
They explicitly named 30th June for a one-day strike, and are seeking simultaneous strike action by other public sector trade unionists. Teaching unions – UCU, NUT and ATL – seem firmly committed to this day of united action. Other unions – UNITE and UNISON- have signed agreements with the PCS to combine and collaborate in anti-cuts action. Their leaderships should now move without delay to ballot members in affected areas for strike action to coincide with the plans for 30 June.

Build 30th June strike

And every other union in the public sector should be pressed from its branches, union reps and membership to follow suit. Even a partial general strike of public sector workers – numbering over 600,000 in Scotland alone – would be an industrial and political hurricane that could begin to blow the axe-wielding governments off course, at Westminster, Holyrood and local council levels.
There is no shortage of reasons for united action. Most people have yet to feel the full force of the storm of cuts descending on our workplaces and communities – apart from some of society’s most vulnerable, the sick and disabled, and big swathes of council workers.
Cameron and Clegg’s cuts orgy of £81billion includes £9bn being chopped off benefits for the sick and disabled. Over 5,000 of those hammered by these cruel cuts braved all obstacles to demonstrate in London last week. Protests in Scotland are being mounted against the vulture capitalists of Atos, the company hired to hand out callous, unprofessional, cost-cutting medical judgments that throw people off slightly higher rates of benefit.

Hurricane hits Scotland

But the looming assault on jobs – with economists predicting up to 100,000 job losses in Scotland – local services, pay and pensions are a cocktail about to explode and cause terrible social and human wreckage. The generalised nature of the attacks require a generalised response – a potent combination of direct action protests, united strike action, and hard-hitting arguments that explode the lie that cuts are either necessary or unavoidable.

Everyone would welcome the pre-election pledge of ‘no compulsory redundancies’ in the public sector from the Scottish government. But nobody should have to pay the price demanded for this promise – years of pay cuts and effectively a no-strike deal.

And one of the unions whose leadership was most craven in bowing down to a pay-cutting, conditions-hacking deal with COSLA – the EIS – has been given a rude lesson in the simple fact that weakness invites aggression. COSLA now wants to increase teaching hours; lengthen the working week; wipe out time protected for vital lesson preparation and marking; slash holidays and make them training days instead; and bring in fixed-term contracts for promoted teachers. All this on top of a two-year pay freeze 9at least a 10 per cent cut in reality).

Nobody is safe

Whether it is teachers facing this warfare from their employers, lecturers and students facing wholesale course closures and job losses, disabled people confronted by closure of their centres, or civil servants hit by closure of local offices in areas officially declared to be the unemployment blackspots of Scotland, nobody is safe. And that’s even before the £3.3bn cuts demanded of the Scottish government over the next two years.
The outcome of the Scottish elections was an attempt by besieged communities to find shelter from the storm of cuts issuing from Downing St. Mostly they entrusted the SNP to stand up for Scotland. The SNP made a good job of luring people into thinking they would do precisely that, and hid from view their spineless failure to stand up in defiance of the Westminster butchers’ £1.3bn cut to the Scottish budget last October.
And they cunningly disguised their plans to carry through cuts, not by defying and refusing to implement them, but by delaying them beyond the recent elections, stockpiling them, creating the conditions for a ‘double whammy’ of cuts over the next 2-3 years.

Demand SNP resist cuts

Now the SNP are in power, with hopes and expectations of protection raised. So anti-cuts campaigners – and in particular the STUC and various mass-membership trade unions – should demand the new government fulfils the hopes invested in them, use their popular mandate, declare unequivocally that they will refuse to pass on Westminster’s butchery, and mount a mass campaign of the Scottish people demanding the powers and the money to defend every single job, service, community facility, pay packet and pension.

Alex Salmond quite rightly immediately demanded of the London government an extension of powers for the Scottish government – including control over excise duties and Corporation Tax. But instead of demanding the latter to slash tax on big business to Southern Irish levels of 12 per cent – as Salmond clearly wishes to do – the unions should demand this extension of powers for Holyrood, not to reduce but to increase Corporation Tax to its pre-Thatcher level of 52 per cent – a policy that the PCS union shares with the Scottish Socialist Party.

Tax big business and the rich

That would enormously expand the funds available to the Scottish government, in order to build the best public services and welfare system in Europe, with a vast expansion of jobs, mopping up the criminal waste of a young generation left jobless, turning talent to the use of society as a whole.

One of the best possible ways of holding the newly elected Scottish government to account, of demanding they give material reasons for the “hope” and “vision” which they astutely preached to win the election, is to build a mass strike and rallies on 30 June. Public sector workers, students, communities, disabled people, pensioners … an army of resistance to the cuts on that day showing their angry determination, would not only rattle the severely weakened and divided ConDem Coalition, but also put the SNP government on the spot – not to mention an array of council leaderships who are busy slaughtering jobs, conditions and services.

Victories through action

In campaigning for 30 June to become a mass show of unity in action, we should be encouraged by several recent victories against cuts. Cameron, Osborne and others have been spewing out bellicose, bloodcurdling class warfare against workers and their unions, with for instance Osborne advising the Institute of Directors to “get stuck in” with even worse attacks on workplace health and safety regulations and more vicious anti-union laws than even Thatcher dared to wield. But alongside that, the ConDem government is executing more U-turns than the average professional ice-skater.

A mass petition frightened them into dropping plans to privatize the woodlands – but now they want to slash one in four Forestry Commission workers’ jobs.

As the interview with Willie Telfer of PCS [see below/box] reveals, their plans to crucify the coastguard service have been thrown into rapid meltdown by a powerful community and trade union campaign. And bosses in the Driving Services Agency have capitulated in the face of threatened strike action by PCS members against a brutal array of cuts they’d planned. Action works!

BA battles

Twin lessons on this theme arise from the 2-year-long battle conducted by BA cabin crews, members of the UNITE union.

These workers originally had no option but to strike against multiple attacks on their jobs, pay and conditions – including reduction of staffing levels for in-flight crews, and the introduction of new cabin crews on far worse wages and conditions, all imposed without even seeking talks with the union.

The UNITE members were driven to strike to defend union recognition, in order to defend their conditions against blatant attempts to wipe out both.

The tenacity of the cabin crew UNITE members has been remarkable, but a combination of anti-union laws and failure by the national union leadership to rapidly spread the action to the wider BA workforce left them in a dangerous stalemate, ruthlessly exploited by management, who launched a vicious press propaganda war, and meantime victimised strikers.

They disciplined and sacked UNITE union reps, ripped up union facilities previously agreed, and withdrew travel concessions from staff who had taken part in perfectly legal strikes. The battle went from defence of staffing levels and pay to one for the very survival of the union as a workers’ defence organization.

Now, faced with further strike ballots, BA bosses have conceded on most of their witch-hunt against the union, its reps and its members, restoring travel concessions to the strikers; restoring wages docked from crew off sick during the strikes; conceding union facilities again; and agreeing binding arbitration through ACAS on all the union reps who were victimized. A victory for the tenacious action of union members on those issues – but no concession whatsoever has been won on staffing levels and the galloping introduction of lower-paid new starts.

The twin lessons for other workers from this protracted struggle is that action forces concessions out of even the most hard-faced exploiters, but action in isolation from wider workforces severely weakens the chances of outright victory.

All out 30th June

Over 250,000 civil servants striking on 30 June, alongside tens of thousands of teachers and lecturers, would be a powerful body-blow to those in government hell-bent on making ordinary people pay for the bankers’ and billionaires’ wrecking ball to the economy.

But what an infinitely more potent weapon it would be if they were joined by EIS members facing the worst assault on their conditions in generations from COSLA; plus Scottish NHS staff who face 3.3 per cent cuts to health care this year and a future with redundancies, as Heath Boards seek to cut their deficits, according to new research by the British Medical Journal; and council workers who are already facing the brunt of pay cuts, work overloads and savage job losses?

Action and arguments

Every opponent of cuts, all who yearn a decent, civilized society that raises hopes fro the future and protects the most vulnerable, should work flat out to make 30 June the biggest and widest possible day of strikes and rallies.

Direct action protests against the perpetrators of cuts, combined with arguments for taxing the rich and taking wealth into public, democratic ownership, will help to raise the sights of people who otherwise despair at what the future holds.

The SSP will not flinch in helping build such actions and popularizing socialist alternatives to the cuts. We will stand up for Scotland – and demand the newly elected SNP government do the same, rather than asking for the power to cut taxes to the obscenely rich whilst sharpening the knives for the jobs, wages and public services that ordinary Scots depend upon.

Richie Venton spoke to Willie Telfer, PCS Dept for Transport Group Assistant Secretary

“There are 18 Coastguard stations in the UK. The government planned to centralize them into two super-stations.

There was huge uproar, for instance in Stornaway and Shetland, with mass community campaigns.

Coastguards tend to be ex-fishermen or seafarers, and live locally. There are also retained coastguards, with jobs ranging from the local church minister to civil servants. The service is a matter of life and death, and local communities know that. They know how absurd the government plan is, to leave only two stations, near Aberdeen and Southampton, over 600 miles apart!

So the fury was deep-rooted, with, for example, 250 at public meetings in Stornaway.

It was a mostly community-led campaign, with the scattered PCS membership (coastguards) joining in – with the open threat of strike ballots by PCS across the entire department for transport if there are any compulsory redundancies; driving examiners standing up for coastguards.

Faced with this uproar, the government has made it clear they are not going to stick to their original, crazy plan of only two stations, though it’s still unclear how many will be saved. This goes to show what pressure can achieve.

In another section of the Dept for Transport – the DSA – we have won an outright victory, this time led by trade union action.

The Cardiff DSA office does the admin for driving tests in England and Wales, and includes the Welsh language unit. DSA management wanted to close it down, to get their hands on the building, and made it plain there was no way they would back down.

PCS balloted and won a massive vote for strike action. The Cardiff PCS DSA branch led the big anti-cuts march to the Welsh Assembly; were prominent on the TUC’s 26 March demo, and won the backing of politicians from several parties.

This high profile campaign, and the mere threat of strike action, has forced the intransigent DSA management into a total capitulation, saving our DSA in Cardiff, but also winning five other union demands, including a moratorium on plans to shed 40 per cent of the Driving Test centres.

Fighting the cuts, you often run into those who say ‘it can’t be done’. These two examples prove the government and employers can be stopped – even before generalised, widespread action.

This government is a coalition, divided and weak. So June 30th is not just a show of strength, but another step on the road to halting the cuts. And within PCS, we are not just building for national action, but also encouraging action locally and within groups/departments. Whilst defending ourselves from the government sledgehammer we are not going to allow ourselves to be tickled to death!”

(Watch Willie Telfer speak at an anti-cuts rally in a personal capacity)

Unity Video from 5 years ago...

2011-05-19T12:33:00.002+01:00

...this video had been blocked by the Black Eyed Peas record company for quite a while... but they have seen sense and unblocked it. Check it out!

SSP Campsie Election Podcast!

2011-05-03T22:03:00.000+01:00

SSp Campsie Election Podcast, featuring tracks from Thee Faction, Tears of Sirion, MC5, The Exiles and Roy Moller - plus the voices of the Scottish public!

(Bonus Thee Faction track at the end - check out theefaction.wordpress.com for details on their new album, Up the Workers!

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"We aren't Taking this in Scotland - we didn't vote for this!"

2011-04-20T15:17:00.004+01:00

SSP Party Political Broadcast

2011-04-19T09:55:00.000+01:00

Thee Faction

2011-04-12T00:50:00.000+01:00

Thee Faction featured on a BBC Radio programme this week (Thee Faction are a raucous Socialist R&B band who have featured in our podcasts in the past) the Radio programme with the live performances is HERE

Hetherington Occupiers "Allowed" back in!

2011-03-23T11:34:00.002Z

The Occupation has resumed!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-12830785

Thugs and Police Smash Hetherington Post-Grad Club Occupation

2011-03-22T22:54:00.007Z

Police and security workers have used extremely heavy handed methods to break up the occupation of the Hetherington Club.

The occupation had been getting coverage from across the media, and indeed across the world's media, as a decent, worthwhile retaking of a building - and creating a space that was helping students and the people of Glasgow.

Frances Curran, Scottish Socialist Party Spokesperson condemned the heavy handed actions of the private security company and the Police, saying, “Students, university staff and the wider public need some hard answers about this totally over the top action by Strathclyde Police.

“All those involved in both the University hierarchy and the senior levels of Strathclyde Police must give a full account of their actions, how much they cost and how they justify what looks like a scandalous misuse of public funds to retake a closed building." (full statement HERE )

The thuggish and over the top action by the security forces come just as Parliament ends. Various political representatives had praised the occupation and the occupiers for bringing a much needed and loved building back into the use it was originally charged with - concentrating on the welfare of students.

Scots Makar Liz Lochhead, singer song-writer, Billy Bragg and Comedian Mark Steele had visited the building, praising the work of the occupiers.

At time of going to press, the occupiers have managed to take over the Glasgow Uni Senate, and have been joined by Lefty rocker, David Rovics

SSP member and former SSY Spokesperson, Jack Fergusson appeared on SSP NewsNight Scotland tonight. (our podcast featuring Jack talking about the occupation can be found HERE )

For a full account of the Police actions, please visit the Scottish Socialist Youth site
The Free Hetherington Blog
More in the Morning Star.
BBC Coverage

***STOP PRESS*** - Just after the Newsnight Scotland Programme, @glasgowoccupation tweeted:

glasgowoccupied glasgowoccupied

The Free Hetherington. Reopened by request of Senior Management!

14 minutes ago Favorite Undo Retweet Reply

glasgowoccupied glasgowoccupied

We have won the Free Hetherington back! This evening management offered us the Hetherington on condition that we...http://fb.me/HWY1spSi

16 minutes ago

The cuts - a local SSP response (podcasts)

2011-03-15T15:57:00.003Z

These three podcasts where the result of a public meeting in Kirkintilloch on March 12th 2011. They include the opinions of Left Banker, Raphie de Santos, SSP Councillor and West of Scotland top of Scottish Parliament Elections List candidate, Jim Bollan and local activist and Union representative, Willie Telfer (Click on their names to access the podcasts). Details of music and musicians on individual posts.

To download the MP3 of the podcasts to your ipod/mp3 player, go to the SSP Campsie podcasts archive HERE

The views expressed are the speaker’s own and not those of any other individual or organisation.

Willie Telfer talks about effect of Cuts on workers and local community

2011-03-15T15:48:00.002Z

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This is the third (and last) in the series of podcasts that were the result of a public meeting in Kirkintilloch organised by the Scottish socialist Party. Willie Telfer, local activist and PCS Representative, talks about his work in the union, how the cuts are effecting his members and workplace; the Hutton Report which has just been released today 15 March and local activism against the Tory/Labour administration in East Dunbartonshire He also highlights the demonstration against the cuts in London on 26th March.

The music in this podcast is from PP Arnold, Echo and the Bunnymen, Roy Moller and Socialist Activist Kevin Robin’s song Corporate Anorexia based on a poem by Kathy Tytler.

The views expressed are the speaker’s own and not those of any other individual or organisation.

To download on to your mp3/ipod and to access an archive of all SSP Campsie Podcasts, click HERE

Podcast- Jim Bollan on how the cuts are hitting locally

2011-03-14T13:46:00.002Z

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The views expressed are the speaker’s own and not those of any other individual or organisation.

Music included on this podcast: Roy Moller, "First you fall in Love" (Roy's site HERE ); Jaques Brel and "Amsterdam" (see HERE for film of this performance - ) and Steve Cooke with his song from the early nineties, "Alright for some" (More of Steve's music HERE ) .

The Left Banker in Kirkintilloch (Podcast)

2011-03-13T19:04:00.003Z

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The views expressed are the speaker’s own and not those of any other individual or organisation.

Left Banker, Raphie de Santos explains the economic crisis and gives his alternative. This is part one of three podcasts.

Music Featured (click the links to find out more about the acts): Captain Ska, "Liar Liar"; Ryan Harvey, "Economic Homicide" (details HERE);Thee Faction, "Social Inclusion Through Marxism" (Details HERE ); The Kara Sea, "Oh if Only". (details HERE )

NO TO CUTS Meeting in Kirkintilloch this Saturday

2011-03-09T17:53:00.002Z

Click on leaflets for closer look...

Lib Dems in this area - Endangered!

2011-03-06T12:29:00.000Z

In May - and in all future elections- Lib dems, you are the weakest link... goodbye!

Moral Sickness

2011-02-10T13:23:00.007Z

by Ron Mackay

87 year old retired teacher Ron Mackay has been a Socialist all of his adult life. He is a member of CND and the Scottish Socialist Party, Campsie Branch

"I want to say a bit about neo-liberalism, the creed that life is all about making money. They privatise water. They'd privatise the air we breathe if it were possible. It's a sickness and so many people have it, they're known as Tories. There's not so many in Scotland, but, alas, we are afflicted by carriers of this disease, they're called New Labour. In the vast majority of cases when you vote Labour you get New Labour. My own Labour M.P., Gregg McClymont, MP for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch is a typical example- all smiles and hand shakes- charming. I wrote to him about Trident and weapons of mass destruction and what did he reply? A full page of verbal diarrhoea quoting Brown and giving the excuse that others have it so we must have it. Now if ever there was a moral issue this is it. W M D s are for the mass slaughter of innocent men, women and children. Don't equivocate we're talking of mass murder. This is only one aspect of this malignant disease but New Labour is a carrier of this illness. Beware, for all their smiles, friendliness and concern, they are sick or at least carriers of the infection.

What about the Scottish Nationalists. The leaders of that party also carry the infection but they do oppose Trident and W.M.D.s and occasionally some of them sip the medicine – the only real cure for this disease. It's called Socialist policy."

Left Banker on BBC Radio 2

2011-02-09T20:51:00.000Z

THE LEFT BANKER was on the Jeremy Vine show on Radio 2 yesterday. He was up against ex-Apprentice loser and right wing self publicist, James Max, whose argument, "the bankers should no longer be blamed for the financial crisis" went no further than "because I say so."

Judge for yourself. The conversation begins at 7 minutes, 26 seconds into the programme.

Click HERE to listen

REGISTER YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE SSP!

2011-02-09T20:09:00.000Z

Register your hard won right to vote

You will be able to vote SSP in every region in Scotland

PLEASE READ!

Occupation and Revolutions!

2011-02-04T16:16:00.001Z

Solidarity with the Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions and an interview with SSP Hetherington Post Graduate Student Union Occupier, Jack Ferguson.

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SSP Campsie deliver supplies to the Hetherington Occupiers!

2011-02-02T20:00:00.000Z

Today, SSP Campsie branch delivered £70 worth of groceries to the occupying students in the Hetherington research Club at Glasgow University.

The students have done something absolutely fantastic with the space. The place was absolutely buzzing with people socialising, planning and interacting – as a student union should.

It would be an absolute scandal if this space were to be lost by Glasgow University. The students have ensured that those who are prepared to fight against the Cameron/Clegg Tory/Libdem cuts have a space outside the Labour run careerist NUS. Young politicised people are at the head of the fightback.

Why not go down to the Hetherington and offer solidarity?

More details on the SSY website HERE and on Facebook HERE

KIRKINTILLOCH RESIST THE CUTS PUBLIC MEETING

2011-01-31T11:28:00.002Z

Glasgow UKUNCUT demo

2011-01-30T11:54:00.003Z

Video of yesterdays UKUNCUT rally in Glasgow. Excellent views from SSP member, Jack Ferguson at around 11 minutes - plus arrest of young activist by police.

Guest blogger - Rioting, Sex, and Hypocrisy

2011-01-28T13:48:00.001Z

by Dave Coull

(Dave would like to make it clear he is not a member of the SSP, never has been, and has nothing personal against Tommy Sheridan)

Regarding the sentencing of Tommy Sheridan for perjury, somebody remarked that "18 months soft imprisonment seems lenient"

I’m not going to get into a Daily-Mail-style complaint about “lenient” sentencing, from my point of view prisons are the universities of crime and they do more harm than good. I think it’s an unhappy thing that Tommy Sheridan has been sent to prison. Yes, of course, Rupert Murdoch and his pals in the police and the establishment are enemies of the working class; that I would assume from the start. But the schemes of these enemies of the working class were made easier by the fact that Tommy Sheridan is a liar and a hypocrite. If he had just admitted from the start that he was a bit of a swinger, folk would have forgiven him. But it's much harder to forgive being told a pack of lies.

"X" wrote "Tommy Sheridan is someone who i have been familiar with since the anti-poll tax days. I was never a member of the anti-poll tax federation but i did actively protest against the tax from the very start. The reason i never became a member of the anti-poll tax federation was Tommy Sheridan."

From my point of view, although I was involved in the “federation” from the very start, nevertheless, the anti-poll-tax movement was more than just the “federation”. However, let’s be clear about this. First, there were local anti-poll tax GROUPS . I know, I was involved in starting one of the first, without any help at all from Tommy Sheridan. Later on , these anti-poll-tax GROUPS got together and formed anti-poll-tax federations. We got together with a couple of groups in Dundee and formed the Tayside Anti Poll Tax Federation. Then later still the Scottish Anti Poll Tax Federation was formed.

But let's be clear about this; the initiative for resisting the poll tax didn't come from the APT federations. Rather, the APT federations were formed because there was resistance. And I can remember the very first time I heard the name “Tommy Sheridan”. We had sent 3 delegates to some anti-poll-tax gathering in Edinburgh. They came back and told us about various things that had been agreed at that meeting. "Oh, and some young student called Sheridan is supposed to be acting as a kind of co-ordinator". But the appointment of this young student as a sort of co-ordinator wasn’t seen as being any big deal, and it certainly wasn’t seen as him being our “Leader”.

The myth that "Tommy Sheridan led the resistance" is one which has been spread by folk who were not involved in the campaign, and of course Sheridan himself and his pals have not been too particular about countering the myth. But it IS a myth.

Not only did we organise local demonstrations (with no assistance from Mr Sheridan), and take part in national ones, we organised people to turn out to physically stop sherriff's officers from carrying out poindings, organising phone-trees to contact people at very short notice for this purpose, and that sort of thing.

Also, as early as June 1988 I was writing to friends and contacts in England urging them to support our campaign, and to prepare for non-payment in England when the poll tax was introduced there. I presume folk like Tommy Sheridan and co were also contacting their Militant Tendency colleagues in England, saying "get on with organising against the poll tax down there, because if you don't, them bloody anarchists will be leading the movement". I even know a member of the SNP who spoke against the poll tax at a local public meeting in a small town in England months before the tax was introduced there.

It was because we were resisting so successfully in Scotland there was an anti-poll-tax movement in England. If we had failed to resist the poll tax in Scotland, that would have been it, Maggie would have won. Folk in England would have said "What's the point, the Scots have given up, we can't beat Maggie". But we didn't fail, and we didn't give up. We were able to show opponents of the poll tax in England and Wales a successful, organised, mass campaign of non-payment that they could join in with.

I was one of a number of Scottish anti-poll-tax protesters who went down to London for the big protest there on the 31st of March 1990. At the demonstration, folk were congratulating anybody with a Scottish accent on our fight. I made a point of singing, loudly, to that well-known samba tune, "We're STILL no payin the poll tax". The mood of the demo was optimistic BECAUSE we in Scotland had been running a campaign of non-payment for a year.

And yes, that demonstration did turn into a riot. And Tommy and the other Militant leaders completely misjudged the mood of the public over that. I remember getting into a taxi in London, the London taxi-driver told me there were certain parts he couldn’t take me to because of the rioting, but then he added “Mind you, I think it’s great that they are giving Maggie a bloody nose”. And that reaction was typical. The wider public LIKED the rioting.

And Tommy Sheridan was asked about it on the television news and said that “The Federation” would be taking action against these rioters who had “disrupted” a peaceful demonstration. Within a few hours, he had realised his blunder, and he never repeated that remark, or did anything about it. In fact, he and his pals deny he ever said anything like that. But I saw that TV news broadcast, I didn’t imagine it, Tommy Sheridan condemned people who were actively fighting against the poll tax.

"X" wrote "Tommy Sheridan's crimes go much further than perjury."

Indeed they do. I think he should acknowledge this, and stop lying to himself, to his wife and family, to his colleagues, and to everybody else. The first step in redemption is to acknowledge the sin..........

Oh, and the lesson for today's working class rebels? Putting your faith in "Leaders" turns YOU into followers, and that's a very bad way to do things. It makes them big-headed and it makes you too easily mainipulated and it practically ensures that they will let you down. Free men and women don't need Leaders. In fact, there's a far better chance of revolt succeeding without them.

Dave Coull was born in 1941, and left school to start full time work at the age of 15. He has worked at many different jobs, always for a weekly wage rather than a salary, mostly in the building industry. Dave has been active in various campaigns but has always avoided joining any political party (unless you count anarchists as a party). While acting as a site steward for building workers in London, Dave was sacked, which led to a (successful) unofficial strike by his fellow workers for his reinstatement. Nowadays Dave has slowed down a bit and tends to feel it’s mostly up to younger folk to carry on the fight.

Superb piece of film from the democracy protests in the Middle East

2011-01-28T10:25:00.002Z

New Labour - "A Wolf in Sheeps clothing."

2011-01-27T13:48:00.000Z

Comment by Ron Mackay

Your taxes - useless missiles or useful hospitals?

“We have an extremist Government at Westminster which is hell bent on using the current economic situation to achieve a neo-liberal society and dismantle the welfare state despite the fact that it was just these market structures and competitive individualism that resulted in the banking fiasco”. With the Scottish elections, in spite of it's limited powers we may get some limited protection. The media forecasts Labour as the largest party with the Scottish Nationalists second. When you vote Labour in most cases you get New Labour which is totally different from the party for which our parents and grandparents voted. New Labour, with it's neo-liberal policies, is just a variant of the Conservatives and should be opposed by the Scottish people as the Conservatives are. New Labour is “a wolf in sheep's clothing”.

Iain Gray, along with his Labour colleagues voted in support of the war in Iraq in the Scottish Parliament debate on March 13, 2003 which will long shame the Labour in Scotland. As recently as last September an opportunity arose for Labour to oppose the war in Afghanistan. Only 310 M.P.'s (less than half) turned up to vote and only 16 voted against, two of them being Katy Clark and Mark Lazarowitz the only two Scottish Labour M.P.s to vote against. These wars are not just a mistake they're criminal. Millions of innocent men,women and children have been killed and further millions made homeless. Labour bears a heavy responsibility.

Labour during 13 years in power made no effort to get rid of Trident and in the midst of the present crisis continues to support the huge expenditure on Trident and warfare in general. As Socialists have long proclaimed YOU CAN'T HAVE WARFARE AND WELFARE. Labour has chosen warfare.

Labour is not a Socialist party nor is the Scottish National party but ,at least the Scottish Nationalists do oppose Trident. The Scottish people will have the opportunity to vote for a Socialist .In all 8 regions of Scotland there will be a S.S.P. Candidate who, if elected, will be able to raise vital issues which would otherwise be neglected and introduce policies to promote health, welfare and education as they were able to do in the past.

SSP Statement on Sheridan sentencing

2011-01-26T13:00:00.001Z

TODAY'S STATEMENT HERE

A Very Public Sociologist blog post on the outcome HERE

The Eskimo Republic

2011-01-24T01:20:00.001Z

Podcast featuring Andy McPake, Roy Moller, The Girobabies and Morris Blythman

Podcast Powered By Podbean

Finally Getting Hip to the Capitalist Ruse! - SSP Campsie Podcast

2011-01-14T19:32:00.001Z

Podcast Powered By Podbean

RESIST THE CUTS! Meeting in Kirkintilloch...

2011-01-09T18:55:00.000Z

Jo Swinson - Dick of the Year?

2011-01-02T12:38:00.005Z

Although the contenders are all likely candidates, East Dunbartonshire constituents should consider Jo Swinson as Dick of the Year on brightgreenscotland.org

Lisa Ansell, the Yorkshire single parent who nominated her wrote a piece for the Campsie blog a few weeks ago (an open letter to Jo Swinson)...

Swinson claims to be a feminist... but has been defending Lib Dem policy which financially discriminates against single mothers by saying, "The father should be made to pay..."

Lisa's letter is HERE

on the basis of this, her blog and also her tweets, Lisa was asked to speak at the Oxford Union; her speech is HERE

Definitive Sheridan Timeline

2010-12-26T13:17:00.002Z

By Scottish Socialist Youth HERE

Elvin Revolution!

2010-12-25T10:21:00.005Z

Received from newswires:

Rumblings of revolution in Lapland. --STOP--

Santa issues a statement, "all is well. Totalitarian capitalism prevails. Any elf caught plotting will be deported to Antarctica." --STOP--

Deported elf, Leanon Jetski, has declared commune in workshop 1. --STOP--

Elves make statement,"Santas egotistical reign of terror over impoverished exploited elves is over. Boys and girls around the world will learn that their toys are from the Lapland Collective and also hear of Santas role as an installed dictator by the Coca Cola company. Henceforth Lapland is free of Capitalist marketeers..." --STOP--

Claus is secreted out of Christmas land... --STOP--

America launches attack on new socialist elvin regime. Intense fighting around the 'Bay of Reindeer' --STOP--

Elvin socialist leader Sleigh Guitara takes on US military might. US Coca Cola ousted entirely from Christmas land and reforms initialised --STOP--

Elves declare a socialist state and set about sharing the wealth 365 days a year and no longer differentiating between naughty and nice. --STOP--

Elves say ALL to benefit from Christmas land's wealth and hard work. Christmas declared all year round. --STOP--

-Disgraced Christmas land exleader Santa reportedly living in Saudi Arabia. US announce a blockade saying their children can do without socialist toys. Children of the USA rise up! –MESSAGE ENDS--

Christmas is a Christian festival and most religions have some festival at the end of the old year and the beginning of the new year.

The Scottish Socialist Party has believers and non-believers, we're a broad church and we send seasonal greetings to all.

Our wishes are for peace and an end to war-- all war, Afghanistan and where-ever.

We salute those who struggle against Trident and the even more fiendish weapons being developed at Aldermaston and Porton Down.

In the testing times ahead the S.S.P. will be there to help maintain and develop the health and well-being of the Scottish people and ensure a happy new year!

SSP Campsie Christmas Podcast:

SSP Statement on Sheridan Conviction

2010-12-23T20:41:00.000Z

The Scottish Socialist Party have released a statement on today's news. Read it HERE

Donation

2010-12-16T21:22:00.003Z

Text SSP to 85199 make a £5

donation to the Scottish

Socialist

Party!

Text cost £5 plus network charge. Obtain bill payers permission. Customer care 08448479800 to opt out reply Stop SSP.

Just what ARE Labour's opinions?

2010-12-16T21:16:00.001Z

LETTER TO THE HERALD:

Ron Mackay,

Milton of Campsie

While I agree with David Whitton's criticism of Jo Swinson's ConDem policies, I wonder what his policies are. Iain McWhirter in the Glasgow Herald says “The S.N.P. Is to be congratulated for sticking to it's guns and reaffirming the Scottish tradition of open access to higher education”. I'm a Socialist, not a member of the S.N.P. But I fully support that position. What are David Whitton's views on this matter? Again will Labour continue to call for the reintroduction of fees, or will it do a hasty U-turn of it's own and back the S.N.P.'s policy? To use David Whitton's phrase “I won't hold my breath."

David Whitton,a typical career politician, rarely misses a photo opportunity, and there he was posing with the post office manager. What are his views on the privatisation of the profitable parts of the post office? And where was he when the local posties went on strike last year?

What are his views on the cuts and the attack on the welfare state ?

Bio-metric Fingerprinting - redux

2010-12-16T21:13:00.000Z

Back in 2008 SSP Campsie raised concerns about biometric fingerprinting children in our schools. It aseems the EU agree with us. It turns out this is most probably an illegal practise.

Click HERE for report

Sunny Hundal - 'Trots out to wreck'

2010-12-15T23:01:00.007Z

A Campsie view

As the campaign gathers speed to oust the existing leadership of the NUS, Sunny Hundal, editor of liberalconspiracy.org is in fear that these calls are an SWP take over of the movement.

Trots under the bed.

He has also insinuated that left unity is the unity of the left and right within the Labour party - a kind of sectarian monopoly of left unity that must incorporate those who believe illegal war was and is justified, through to those cowed by the fear that the press will find out they are lefties so hide behind the latest New Labour/Nouveaux/Newest Labour title.

I'm not entirely sure of Hundal's left claims - he describes himself as "firmly on the left," a rather vague description - I AM sure he is as sectarian as those he has went out to criticise in his newly found hat as a member of the Labour Party.

He has in the past urged non-white voters to back the Tories and at the last election called on people to vote for Nick Clegg's Liberal Democrats.

I am no fan of the SWP - but to label all who are criticising Aaron Porter and the NUS leadership as "Trots" (as he has on his twitter stream) in the way the right wing of the Labour Party bandy the term - and in the way Tories do without a definition of what he is talking about, is misleading - and jumping on a bandwagon that tries to discredit a movement. It seems that any organisation with a left anti-capitalist view outside the Labour Party fits this description (he is also critical of the WRP).

I do agree that the SWP will do their usual silly heavy handed "we are the leaders of this movement" rubbish and get on peoples nerves - and may well be part of the large body of students calling for Porters removal - but the SWP are not respected on the left as perhaps they once were (to say the least) - and are certainly not as strong as they have been in the past due to internecine fighting and resultant splits and bad feeling.

My take? I feel that criticising all who are outside the parenthesis of the Labour Party NUS leadership is not understanding the current student movement - the NUS were irrelevant in the organisation and execution of any of the demos and occupations.

I suggest Hundal reads this superb analysis of where the REAL organisation of student resistance against the cuts is taking place (not in the student union NUS office)

Hundal's article is here

...and this is my comment on his blog.

Sunny – are you not also sick of the tendency for people to brand others they disagree with as ‘Trots’ if they raise their head above the parapet of a party selling itself as a movement (the Labour Party)? I know I am. In fact most of those I know who are outside the Labour Party and are part of the labour movement are NOT trots – either affiliated to other groupings or none. I would also say that is the case of the students who went beyond the SWP etc and used the technology and tactics they have learned over the past few years to organise (flashmobbing/ using twitter/ texting/ blogs etc etc)- and from school occupations across the country last year.

the current youth movement do not trust the mainstream media nor the ready made SWP type fronts to “guide them.” We would be wise to remember that.

That is not to say that the SWP will not try to highjack parts of this movement – but recent splits / walk outs/ wrecking tactics by the SWP in England and Scotland have weakened them beyond all recognition from even during the G8 demos in 2005.

Porter and the NUS are not representative of students- nor have had much bearing on what the movement has achieved. The NUS is really as this blog says, just a coming together of student Unions – and those who involve themselves in those (http://www.betternation.org/2010/12/perhaps-its-time-for-an-actual-national-union-of-those-studying/ ) – and they are usually young people already involved in either mainstream parties or, and not to put to fine a point on it – those interested in DJing in the union etc.

This movement needs spokespeople – not Aaron Porter pretending to lead from his candle lit front. Young people are wise enough -perhaps beyond the wisdom of their parents etc – NOT to want leaders – just spokespeople.

I vote for Jody McIntyre as a spokesperson – neither a Trot nor a slave to the party as far as I am aware…http://twitter.com/jodymcintyre

Music for the Student Resistance!

2010-12-12T22:45:00.001Z

Remember folks - MP Jo Swinson let us down. She let our young people down. She let the families of young people who want to go to University down. She let young people who want to go to college down. She let our Universities down.

Liberal Democrats and Jo Swinson - you are the weakest link... Goodbye (at the next elections...)

Public Meeting in Kirkie on 11th POSTPONED

2010-12-05T13:28:00.000Z

due to the weather conditions and the fact we have not been able to do much leafletting for this meeting, we are postponing until the new year. A new date will be arranged and posted here ASAP!

#Solidarity with the Students Podcast!

2010-12-01T00:59:00.000Z

Podcast supporting the students in occupation and against the cuts...

Mentioned in this podcast:

www.ssy.org.uk

@TheeFaction www.theefaction.org

@edinunianticuts edinunianticuts.wordpress.com

@radicalginger @Northernechoes @Labourcat

@efink (free downloads!) HERE and HERE

www.drivebytruckers.com/

Great ideas for advancing the BIG society

2010-11-25T20:25:00.000Z

Bill Newman

I see that the noble traders of Milngavie are doing shift work to operate the town's public toilets themselves in order to save the Council money and to promote, presumably, the "big society". But why stop there? Residents could be volunteered to organise their own refuse collection, unpaid of course, and hard-working voters could be encouraged to maintain the roads in their spare time. No-one could then complain to the Council about the pot holes endangering motorists and discouraging cyclists from venturing out. Perhaps graves could also be dug by grieving mourners.

The main drain on the Council's coffers is our schools, however. There is a simple answer to this problem. Scotland has a huge pool of unemployed teachers and these could be used without pay to gain valuable experience in educating our youth. Should this prove insufficient, then surely there are many retired teachers who would relish the opportunity to renew their joy in front of the eager faces of school students; naturally, there would be no need for monetary compensation. Nor need the size of classes be limited. Academic studies on the merits of small class sizes are ambiguous at best.

Should all this sound too idealistic, readers should bear in mind the great new scheme from Strathclyde Passenger Transport that residents in remoter areas should organise their own bus transport needs.

You may think that the implementation of these imaginative advances towards the "big society" would save the Council sufficient money to reduce Council tax, but it must be remembered that the future cost of the private funding of school construction and refurbishment has to be paid for at great expense into the remote future and we have to continue paying the wages and expenses of our senior executives and our governing Labour-Conservative councillors.

If none of this appeals, then it is surely time that we return to the concept that our Council gives priority to the real needs of our community and endeavours to meet these needs. But this, of course, suggests a socialist alternative where needs take priority over greed and opportunism. This may be unfashionable to our current breed of politicians, but it is a realistic alternative whose time will come again.

animation - The Crisis of Capitalism

2010-11-25T20:19:00.002Z

This is an animation of a lecture given by David Harvey on the Crisis of Capitalism. Well worth the watch...

thanks to Thee Faction for pointing this out on their site!

Podcast - The Thatcher Rant!

2010-11-24T00:54:00.003Z

Podcast featuring anti-Thatcher, pro-revolution music!

Twitterers mentioned:
@efink http://www.scottishsocialistvoice.net/pages/centrepages.html
@peoplenotprofit www.scottishsocialistparty.org
@bellacaledonia http://bellacaledonia.org.uk
@TheeFaction www.theefaction.org
@RedRector
@thebillyreeves http://nostalgiaofthefuture.podbean.com

Thee Faction "At Ebbw Vale" Review

2010-11-22T22:11:00.001Z

A nod to the eighties - a review of the Thee Faction album, "At Ebbw Vale"

Click on the Zine cover...

Scottish Socialist Party NO TO CUTS! PUBLIC MEETING

2010-11-18T22:22:00.001Z

CLICK ON LEAFLET PAGE TO ENLARGE.

POSTPONED! NEW DATE TBA

SSP Campsie Remembrance Podcast

2010-11-14T21:12:00.000Z

For next year, order a White Poppy

Check out Drive-by Truckers up coming gig dates - HERE

(this podcast is by a member of the Campsie branch)

The Students in London started the fightback for our democracy...

2010-11-11T22:26:00.002Z

this is a transcript of a piece made for this TORY podcast - the piece in isolation can be heard here:

Personally speaking, I am a believer of non-violent confrontation. Having said that, I am no pacifist nor am I Gandhi. Even he understood when under great duress, peoples frustration boiled over into violence. And I totally understand the frustrations vented by young people on the streets of London yesterday. In fact, what I would say is that what happened yesterday was about frustrations over the recent tory coup and undemocratic take over of this country and their insistence on foisting an ideology onto us - one that the majority of voters did not vote for.

This tory minority Government, without the help of the liberal democrats , could not enact this anti-poor, anti-woman, anti young people and anti working people cuts agenda.

People voted for the Lib dems as a vote against the tories - to stop them from carrying out their butchery of our social system and now, in order for the likes of Danny Alexander and Nick clegg to have a bigger salary – and – lets be honest – in order to pay off and protect their parties rich backers, they have done a back flip and are helping the Tories push through their un-necessary cuts.

The students, in my opinion, have actually began the fight back to retake our democracy from this unwanted minority and their failed ideology that saw the original big society quite rightly dismantled after the depression and after the second world war. People are seeing rights and needs their grand parents and parents fight for disappear. People in the past lost weeks and months of pay – and in many cases – their lives, in order to secure for future generations rights such as pension provision, child provision,homes and free education.

To vote for a party who said they stood in the way of the education cuts the Tories proposed, and then to have the same party open the flood gates of tory ideology must be gut wrenching for many voters.

I was glad to see that there were Scottish young people in that crowd. If anything, the Scottish people should be more angry than the rest as 85% of the electorate here voted against the tories. Scottish society is far to the left of the rest of the UK, yet because of the union, our government have no power to raise their own taxes or indeed save our services. The call is going out up here for the Scottish Government to refuse to pass on Westminster’s cuts. Rather, community organisations and activists are calling on the Scottiush Government to set No-Cuts Budgets, Defiance Budgets, and rally masses of workers and communities round a fight for the funds to retain every job, every penny in pay, and every single local service. There are other ways to raise the funds to pay off the richmans debts. The Scottish socialist Party have costed a Scottish service tax which not only would ensure no cuts in services or jobs, but would also raise extra money to invest in these.

Remember the lessons of the past. Remember the un democratic “saviour of Romania” ceaucescu or the people rising up against the right wing cuop in Venezuela. This undemocratically installed Government will have its ceaucescu moment. No-one voted for their ideology and no one voted for their cuts.

It was precisely mass civil disobedience, a refusal to obey Thatcher’s laws and the collection of her government’s hated poll tax, which tossed it (and her) in the dustbin of history.
I say well done to the students who have led the way in retaking our democracy.

SSP Campsie Podcast - featuring Thee Faction!

2010-11-09T01:40:00.006Z

Show featuring Thee Faction - website HERE (@theefaction on Twitter) - May 1985 interview with the group HERE

Also mentions - @ocicat_bengals, @lisaansell and @joswinson

superb music in this episode from Thee Faction, Manu Chao, the Manics, Paolo Nutini and Gil Scott Heron.

Listen if you dare...

The Sheridan Trial

2010-10-27T17:39:00.003+01:00

Some people have requested updates on the trial against a former convenor of the SSP, Tommy Sheridan.

The Latest on the trial can be found on the BBC website HERE

or on a blog written by a member of the SWP (a left wing micro group who helped Tommy set up "Solidarity" after it became apparent he would not win back the leadership of the SSP) HERE

Paul O'Grady calls for an uprising against the Tory/Libdem cuts

2010-10-24T19:57:00.000+01:00

From Counterfire

What next for those on the STUC march?

2010-10-22T20:57:00.000+01:00

by Richie Venton, SSP national workplace organiser

The Demolition Coalition launched the social and economic equivalent of a nuclear attack on workers and communities on Axe Wednesday.

The thousands marching on the STUC demo have a critical part to play in building mass resistance to the slaughter of jobs, services, pay, benefits and pensions. Every marcher can help build united action through their trade union, community, pensioners’ or students’ organizations – and by building local anti-cuts alliances.

 Demand No Cuts budgets in Holyrood and local Councils – Defiance budgets that refuse to pass on Westminster’s butchery.
In the wake of Osborne’s declaration of war, the hour has struck for SNP, Labour and other politicians who claim to oppose the Twin Tories’ cuts to take action louder than words.
When Swinney, Salmond et al set Scotland’s budget in a few weeks, they face a stark choice: put up genuine resistance by defying Westminster’s £1.3bn slashing of the block grant to Scotland, or shut up their talk of being ‘Scotland’s champions’, of being anti-cuts. If they are serious about defending Scotland, instead of talking about a 3-year pay freeze for all public sector workers and cuts to so-called ‘back-office’ jobs, the SNP government should set a budget with not a penny cut in pay or services, not a single job loss, and demand the missing £1.3bn back off the Westminster thieves who have stolen it to bail out the bankers and billionaires.

That would act as a clarion call to action by workers and communities in support of their defiance, with rallies, demonstrations, peaceful civil disobedience and industrial action. A nation in rebellion on the scale of the anti-poll tax struggle could be built, to win back the £1.3bn for next year’s Scottish spending plans.

 Build a mass lobby of Scottish parliament
Given the record of the SNP so far, they are unlikely to show the spine to do this unless they face a rebellion from below. The STUC should use the Edinburgh demo to call a mass lobby of the Scottish parliament before tartan butchery is carried out next month. If they fail to do so, the public sector unions should take the lead and call it.

 Make councillors fight
Councils face the same stark choice: defy or destroy. Union members and community groups should bombard councillors with demands for No Cuts budgets; not as a folded-arms gesture, but as a lever to building massive local resistance, combining councillors, council workers and service users in united action. It’s been done before – successfully – in Poplar and Vale of Leven in the 1920s, Clay Cross in the 1970s, Liverpool in 1984. They should mount a mass campaign to demand the stolen millions back off Holyrood to balance the books, with no cuts.

This stance has already been pushed within West Dunbartonshire council by SSP councilor Jim Bollan. It has been backed by at least two UNISON branches already: North Ayrshire and Glasgow city. More unions should follow suit.

 Tax the rich – axe the Council Tax
Alongside such demands, marchers should take up the call for the Scottish parliament to introduce an emergency Bill to scrap the hated, regressive Council Tax, and replace it with an income-based, progressive Scottish Service Tax, which could virtually double the funds currently raised through Council Tax, by making the rich pay. £1.6bn extra raised through this measure alone would negate the savage impact of the £1.3bn cut to Scotland’s budget.

 One-day public sector strike
No form of cuts is acceptable – or necessary; neither Coalition cuts, nor lesser, slower cuts by Labour or SNP. To force back the Scottish butchers, united strike action before the council budgets are set in stone could rock and rattle them into retreat. The STUC march is a golden moment for the STUC to call for a united one-day strike of the entire public sector (over 600,000 workers) in early 2011. Failing that, the more left-leaning public sector unions should make the call, name the day, and build the rebellion in the workplaces that would embolden communities too.

 Socialism, the ultimate answer
Marchers need to express their political voice too; for taxation of the rich and big business; full and democratic public ownership of the banks’ £850bn assets; an end to Trident, war and other capitalist waste; for an independent socialist Scotland, free of the Westminster butchers. Join like-minded socialists – join the SSP.

SSP Campsie

David Lammy - "smacking ban led to riots..."

Minutes of todays SSP Campsie meeting:

Well Red

Have a great Christmas!

Letter to the Herald

Gypsy Travellers face racist collusion

Upper Clyde Shipyard Hero passes away

UCS Work-in Anniversary podcast!

Tony Benn's speech at the UCS Work-in 40th Anniversary

Elaine C Smith reads the famous "Rat Race" speech by Jimmy Reid

Thousands demonstrate against cuts in Glasgow despite the downpour!

People First, not Profit!

How we treat our children...

Attacking Teachers Professionalism...

Liberating the NHS: source and destination of the Lansley reform

40 years ago...

SSP Campsie BBQ CANCELLED

SSP Campsie BBQ in Mugdock this Saturday CANCELLED!

Red Pepper Review of "Downfall"

Former MSP Joins Scottish Socialist Party

Owen Jones at The Free Hetherington

The SSP on the demonization of our youth (2003)

Get some Socialist R&B...

Scottish Independence – it’s up to the Working Class.

Pamphlet's from the past...

Swinson- increasingly divorced from realities of living in East Dunbartonshire

To the Tory/Liberal Democrat coalition...

Doleman's Downfall

Update on threats to SSP Councillor Jim Bollan

Remember - Swinson, the Tory collaborator, will get a bigger pension than you!

DVLA PCS Glasgow Branch Secretary Willie Telfer interview for Daily Record

Glasgow June 30th Public Sector Unions Strike!

Thee Faction - 366

CiF Watch Threaten Scottish Councillor

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT TOMMY

Scottish Education- A Socialist Response to Curriculum for Excellence

The Deepbone Roundabout- keep Swinson away.

STAND UP FOR SCOTLAND AGAINST CUTS

Unity Video from 5 years ago...

SSP Campsie Election Podcast!

"We aren't Taking this in Scotland - we didn't vote for this!"

SSP Party Political Broadcast

Thee Faction

Hetherington Occupiers "Allowed" back in!

Thugs and Police Smash Hetherington Post-Grad Club Occupation

The cuts - a local SSP response (podcasts)

Willie Telfer talks about effect of Cuts on workers and local community

Podcast- Jim Bollan on how the cuts are hitting locally

The Left Banker in Kirkintilloch (Podcast)

NO TO CUTS Meeting in Kirkintilloch this Saturday

Lib Dems in this area - Endangered!

Moral Sickness

Left Banker on BBC Radio 2

REGISTER YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE SSP!

Occupation and Revolutions!

SSP Campsie deliver supplies to the Hetherington Occupiers!

KIRKINTILLOCH RESIST THE CUTS PUBLIC MEETING

Glasgow UKUNCUT demo

Recent Posts Menu

Guest blogger - Rioting, Sex, and Hypocrisy

Superb piece of film from the democracy protests in the Middle East

New Labour - "A Wolf in Sheeps clothing."

SSP Statement on Sheridan sentencing

The Eskimo Republic

Finally Getting Hip to the Capitalist Ruse! - SSP Campsie Podcast

Recent posts menu

RESIST THE CUTS! Meeting in Kirkintilloch...

Jo Swinson - Dick of the Year?

Definitive Sheridan Timeline

Elvin Revolution!

SSP Statement on Sheridan Conviction

Donation

Just what ARE Labour's opinions?

Bio-metric Fingerprinting - redux

Sunny Hundal - 'Trots out to wreck'

Music for the Student Resistance!

Public Meeting in Kirkie on 11th POSTPONED

#Solidarity with the Students Podcast!

RECENT POSTS MENU