A vicious anti-people budgetFTER much hype and kite-ying, and rumours of the Labour Party playing “hard ball”fl andAbeing the defenders of the interests of ordinary people, we see that it was all just hot air

and spin. They are as committed as Fine Gael are (and Fianna Fáil were) to making working people pay for their crisis. The budget is designed to take a further €3½ billion out of the economy through increased taxes and charges, and cuts in public spending. This will be the same for the next

two to three budgets—all to meet the targets in the “Programme for Ireland” agreed by the external Troika and the internal troika of Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, and the Labour Party.Under the guise of “austerity” there

has been a generalised attack on work-ing people, not just in Ireland but throughout the capitalist world. The establishment tell us austerity is neces-sary to bring government spending

back under control and to make “our” economy more competitive. By this they mean that they need to cut wages, cut pensions, cut social welfare, cut public services, to undermine and take away workers’ rights and conditions.In their terms, “austerity” is work-

ing very nicely. Wealth is being trans-ferred upwards and outwards, and being concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. The transnational corporations are making a killing with bigger prots,fi and their costs have been reduced. (Noonan tells us the transnational cor-porations opposed a 3 per cent increase in the universal social charge for those earning €100,000.)Those who argue that austerity is

not working and that there is some better, fairer austerity have fallen for the ruse. Austerity was never about the people; it was never for protect-ing jobs and conditions; it was not for protecting the unemployed or pen-sioners. It is doing exactly what it was planned to do.Talking of a “better, fairer way,” of a

fairer austerity, is like rearranging the deck-chairs on the Titanic. It’s only a dierff ent view of a sinking ship.The central question facing our

people is the massive debt, at present (depending on how you calculate it) between 180 and 220 per cent of GDP. It simply cannot be paid. The best the Irish state can get will be an extension of the repayment time. Already in 2012

No. 96 December 2012 €1.50

“There are no innocents in Gaza. Don’t let any diplomats who want to look good in the world endanger your lives; mow them down!”—Michael Ben-Ari (National Unity Party), speaking in the Israeli parliament.“We need to atten all of Gaza. The Americans didn’t stop with Hiroshima—thefl

Japanese weren’t surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki too. There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing. Then they’d really call for a ceasere.”—fi Editorial, Jerusalem Post, 18 November 2012.“Gaza should be bombed so hard that the population has to ee into Egypt.”—fl

Israel Katz, Israeli minister of transport.“The goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages.”—Eli

Yishai, Israeli minister of the interior.

In this issueA united union taking a stand p. 2

Austerity is both stupid andcruel p. 3

Understanding the crisis andputting the system on trial—Part 3 p. 4

Anglo: not our debt p. 5

Shocking revelations about blacklisting p. 5

Privatisation does not equal eciencyffi p. 6

An economic analysis of neo- liberalism p. 6

General strikes: An eectiveff

means to an end? p. 7

Spaniards spot EU-Germancon job p. 8

International Meeting ofCommunist Parties in Beirut p. 9

What if Cuba discovers oil? p. 10

Irish socialist republicanism, 1909–1936 p. 10

Letters p. 11

ISSN 0791-5217

j/7G@7I1\URQPPX/ Zazb“ ”

�

we paid about €7 billion in interest and €5 billion to bond-holders. Where do people think this money will come from? And who is to pay it?Every euro out of the pocket of a

worker, a pensioner or an unemployed person, every euro taken from the health and education budgets, is to go to the wealthy, to foreign bankers and nance houses in the European Union.fi

Both the establishment here and the European monopolies will continue to drive down workers, to extract as much as they are allowed to. They wish to force conditions down to what they believe will be sustainable, regardless of the fact that working people have nothing left to give. This and future budgets are part of that strategy.They will continue to push for more

and more unless we resist and begin to organise. The system is now entering a period of stagnation, which means they will try to bolster prots by constantlyfi demanding more from workers and the further privatisation of publicly owned companies and public services.Those elements within the trade

union movement who still believe that the Labour Party in government is the best option for the trade union movement need to seriously study this budget and its central thrust. There is no salvation coming from the Labour Party. Only a militant response from the trade union move-ment can stop the destruction of our people’s living standards.Up to now that leadership has been

lacking. The ultra-left have clearly little to oer and have no clear strategy.ff Their opportunism and their inghtingfi are doing themselves and the wider movement a lot of damage.

What is required is a fundamental rethinking of strategy. The success of the Dublin Trades Council’s pre-budget rally needs to be built on. People will resist if they are given leadership and have condence in those who claim tofi lead them.The debt, and our forced repayment

of it, are the strategic weakness of the Irish establishment. Repudiation is the only way forward. Breaking it down into “good” and “bad” debt will only confuse and divide people.We need to create jobs, we need to

control capital in order to give priority to investment, we need public owner-ship and control of our natural resources to develop them in a sustain-able way. Alternatives are possible. What is required to bring this about is the mobilisation of the people.

[EMC]

The budget in brief:

• Children’s allowance cut by €10 per month, from €140 to €130.• Property tax at 0.18 per cent up to a value of €1 million (the average Dublin home of €250,000 will pay about €450 per year), and rates (local property tax) at 0.25 per cent for houses valued at more than that.• Abolition of the weekly PRSI allow-ance for workers; the average worker will pay an estimated €264 more per year.• Higher weekly rents for people living in council houses.• “Administration” fees for third-level students, now €2,250, to rise by €250 per year for three years: September 2013 €2,500, September 2014 €2,750, September 2015 €3,000.

• Cuts to the electricity allowance for pensioners.• Telephone allowance for pensioners reduced by half, to €9.50 per month.• The back-to-school clothing and foot-wear allowance to be reduced by €50, from €150 to €100 for children aged up to eleven and from €250 to €200 for older children.• The prescription charge for holders of a medical card increased from €0.50 per item to €1.50.• The threshold for the drug payment scheme increased from €132 to €144 per month.• Cut of €325 to the grant for respite care, to €1,375 per year.• The number of public servants to be cut by 38,000, to approximately 287,000 in 2013 and 282,500 by 2014.• Maternity benet to be subject to taxfi from July next.• Eligibility for “jobseeker’s benet”fi (unemployment assistance) reduced by three months, from a year to nine months.• Motor tax to be increased on a slid-ing scale.• Excise duty on a pint of beer or cider and a standard measure of spirits increased by 10 cents, and on a 75 cl bottle of wine by €1.• The eligibility of pensioners for a medical card to be kept under review.• An increase in the amount that holders of a medical card will pay for medicines.• The allocation to VECs to be reduced by €13 million.• Any arrears in the household charge that have not been paid by July 2013 will be increased to €200 and will be collected through the local property tax system.

A united union taking a standHE Technical, Electrical and Engineering Union held its biennial delegate conference inTNovember under the slogan “Export goods—not workers.” The TEEU, which organises

workers in both the public and the private sector, is the largest craft union in the country.

The conference began with a number of workshops before the formal business got under way. These covered such areas of concern as changes in the industrial relations structures and job creation.The conference was opened by the

president of the union, Frank Keoghan, followed by the address of the general secretary, Éamon Devoy. “Ireland urgently needs to refocus on manufac-turing, in both new and established industries,” Éamon Devoy said. “It has been estimated that up to 80,000 jobs

could be created from retrottingfi government buildings, local authority housing, schools, and other premises in public ownership. Ultimately this would be self-nancing in terms offi energy bills saved.”During the conference the delegates

supported the demand for a 5 per cent pay increase, to be lodged with protfi-able enterprises in the private sector.The delegates also endorsed the

demand for repudiation of the odious debt, beginning with the Anglo-Irish bank debt socialised by the previous Government.They also decided to contact other

unions to see if a united union cam-paign could be built for opposing the handing over of the $3.1 billion to

bond-holders on 31 March next.A number of other progressive reso-

lutions were adopted, including resolutions relating to pensions, the development of sustainable energy, apprentices and apprenticeships, and opposition to privatisation.This is a united union, with a solid

reputation for defending its members and taking a stand in defence of their interests as well as on issues that have an eect on the wider workers’ moveff -ment.The CPI was an invited guest at the

conference and was warmly received both by ocials and by delegates. Theffi Labour Party and Sinn Féin were also invited to send representatives, but neither turned up.

2

Austerity is both stupid and cruelT is obviously stupid to pursue a policy of austerity in the midst of a recession—and not justIstupid but cruel, as it prolongs the pain of unemployment and emigration. Recession is caused by a deciency of aggregate demand. To overcome it, it is necessary to increasefi demand, and this requires larger expenditure.Private expenditure

on consumption is restrained in a recession by the fact of unemploy-ment and low income. Private expenditure on investment is restrained by the fact that when markets are not expand-ing, capitalists have little desire to increase their productive cap-acity.The sole feasible way

that the recession can be overcome is through an increase in govern-ment expenditure, that is, through a scalfi stimulus. Austerity, being the very opposite of this, will clearly worsen rather than improve things.But then why is there a push for

austerity even in the midst of a reces-sion? Part of the explanation is that nance capital does not want a statefi actively engaged in demand manage-ment.If the state intervenes to x thefi

level of activity in a capitalist economy, the “state of condence” of the capifi tal-ists ceases to matter as the determin-ing factor in the economy. This removes any need to appease capital-ists, to bolster their “state of confi-dence” through all kinds of induce-ments, in the “interests of society.”State intervention in demand

management through scal means isfi anathema for nance capital, whichfi therefore uses all the resources at its command for preaching the virtues of “sound nance” through balancingfi budgets.The demand for austerity in the

midst of a recession, for cutting down government expenditure in tandem with the reduction in tax revenue that occurs in such a period, is thus in keep-ing with the predilections of nancefi capital. To eect this self-servingff policy, nance capital and its spokesfi -persons advance the argument that such austerity will actually overcome the recession, which is stupid.That is why the so-called “Fiscal

Stability Treaty” that was foisted on us in May is such a pernicious legal- political instrument. It requires a maximum public decit in any year offi 0.5 per cent of GDP, with automatic penalties for breaches. The eect is toff clamp permanent austerity on the euro-zone countries and make it im-possible for governments to run a defi-cit to counter slumps in private

domestic and foreign demand for their countries’ products.Measures such as these for enfor-

cing balanced budgets and draconian scal rules on the seventeen eurofi countries do nothing to address the sovereign debt and bank solvency prob-lems that are at the very root of the present crisis. Between now and 2031 the Government has agreed to pay debts of €31 billion, plus interest of €17 billion, for Anglo-Irish and Irish Nationwide alone, at the insistence of the European Central Bank.Irish government debt is 117 per

cent of GDP. According to the Bank for International Settlements, the Repub-lic’s total debt in 2010, combining government debt, household debt, and private business debt, was the highest in the world, at nearly ve times GNP.fi This was 50 per cent higher than Greece’s.All this debt must be met by Irish

people in the form of taxes, mortgage debt, and payments to private lenders.To suggest, as many progressive

economists seem to do, that the crisis is simply the result of Government “policy failure,” and that once the Troika-imposed curtailment of “econ-omic sovereignty” is lifted it becomes possible to argue credibly for stimulus

policies, is to ignore very real systemic obstacles to such a course of action. The Irish state cannot serve its own people while it is con-strained by the austerity regime that member-ship of the euro zone imposes. And it gets worse. The only way in which the euro zone can be given a temporary lease of life is for euro- zone states to give up all or most of their control over their national budgets, and for the

euro zone to push towards a scalfi union in which scal defi ficit rules are rigidly enforced.An Irish Government that put the

Irish people’s interests rst would seekfi to build alliances with the other per-ipheral countries in seeking ways to rid both itself and them of the burden of private bank debt, which the euro-zone authorities have insisted should be imposed on the people. It would also seek the early dissolution of the euro zone and a reversion to national currencies in as organised a manner as possible.It follows that state intervention

through a scal stimulus to overcomefi the recession must reckon with the need to confront nance capital. Thefi state must be willing to run scal defi fi-cits not just as a temporary phenom-enon but even persistently (since the “state of condence” of the capitalistsfi may be undermined by the very fact of scal decits to a point where privatefi fi investment does not easily revive). And it must also be willing to exert adequate control over the nancialfi system to ensure that public borrowing is always nanced, so that the statefi does not become a prisoner to the whims of nanciers.fi

[COM]

3

PROPOSED DAY OF ACTION IN FEBRUARY

The General Purposes Committee of the ICTU has called on the Execu-tive Committee to organise a number of demonstrations on 9 February against austerity and the handing over of €3.1 billion to bond-holders at the end of March.This move is to be welcomed, and everyone should push hard to make

this the biggest demonstration possible.Although the proposed day of action is a Saturday, this is nevertheless

a welcome start and can provide a platform for further mobilisations of workers, their families, and their communities.

Directing the Irish economy and the Irish state

Understanding the crisis,and putting the system on trial

Part 3■ The rst two parts of this article were published in the October and November issues. This isfi the concluding part.BOUT the same time that the theory of the general crisis of capitalism was being developedAby the communist movement, and monopoly contradictions after the First World War

were developing towards the great depression and fascism, a Soviet economist, Nikolai Kondratyev, researched and put forward an analysis of the cycles of capitalism that saw new contradictions emerge following the “resolution” of the preceding crisis and that developed the next one.

Every new phase of the cycle is pre-determined with the accumulation of factors of the preceding phase, and every new cycle is following the preceding one as naturally as one phase of each cycle after another. However, it has to be understood that every new cycle emerges in new particular historical conditions, on a new level of development of produc-tive forces, and therefore is not a simple reiteration of the preceding cycle.

Kondratyev saw the capitalist econ-omic cycle as containing a period of expansion culminating in a peak, followed by a recession, a stagnant plateau, and then a secondary recession or depression. These cycles would last fty or sixty years, and he idenfi tiedfi three such cycles, importantly iden-tifying the Great Depression in a report he wrote in 1926, only three years before the crash.

Expansion Recession Plateau Depression

1784–1800 1800–1816 1816–1835 1835–1844

1845–1858 1859–1864 1864–1874 1875–1896

1896–1907 1907–1920 1920–1929 1929–1949

For Marxist economists in the vein of Kondratyev, a fourth cycle began with a period of expansion after the Second World War, lasting until the early 1970s, when a recession period kicked in, until the early 80s, when stagnation and a plateau took over.

In some ways the depression period was articially kept from view orfi delayed by what is commonly called neo-liberalism but essentially by state interference in the economy to prop up prot-creation. But despite this, thefi rate of return on capital has declined signicantly over the last few decades,fi prompting a drastic drop in interest rates to try to stimulate investment, resulting in a ood of capital intofl speculative bubbles and nancialfi -isation.This state interference, and the high

degree of monopolisation of power, has prevented the naturally occurring des-truction of capital that came towards the end of previous cycles and that pro-vided the opportunity for the rate of prot to recover.fi

As the article by NC in Socialist Voice points out, Andrew Kliman has produced extensive quality research on this prevention of the destruction of capital and how this has played a sig-nificant role in creating the crisis and deepening it.Both the general crisis of capitalism

and Kondratyev cycles as explanatory theories are extremely powerful, and the latest research and analysis must be used to build on these. Economic crisis, political crisis, democratic defi-cit, crisis of education and culture, identity crisis, social problems—all

form part of what is the general crisis of capitalism and are evidently part of the system today.

Improving our understanding of the crisisWe must continue striving to achieve a better understanding of how the system operates today and how in essence we cannot deal with individual aspects of the crisis without challen-ging the system in its entirety.The democratic decit cannot befi

seriously overcome without democra-tising the economy. The environmental destruction of the planet cannot be reversed without a planned and con-trolled economy. Social problems, drugs and alcohol abuse won’t be eradi-cated without full employment and community control over people’s future. They are all interrelated and interlinked, and so is the struggle to understand and to overcome the system that creates and sustains them.In trying to achieve this under-

standing, a number of things are becoming clear:

• Crises are a cyclical part of the sys-tem that occur periodically.• The tendency is for the rate of protfi to decline, but the state acts to counter this tendency.

4

�

• Capital ew to areas such as nfl fiance, where a better return could be made.• Capital oods areas of return, resultfl -ing in bubbles.• Debt—personal, company, and state—is used to mask fundamental weak-nesses and to absorb excess capital.• A number of factors—including mili-tary contracts, privatisation, and nanfi -cial innovation—deferred the crisis.• Monopolisation and the concentra-tion of economic and political power in the hands of fewer people and entities has prevented the “normal” destruction of capital that facilitates a return to growth.• Through the internationalisation of production and technological improve-

ments, excess capacity exists in the production of goods, meaning that the system operates on the verge of over-production.• Alongside the continual concentra-tion of wealth in fewer and fewer hands, economic growth has been vir-tually stagnant in the system’s mature economies.• Fictitious capital—a paper claim to prot yet to be produced—has grownfi far out of step with real capital but has become increasingly entangled with the real economy through debt and nancial innovations.fi

The reality of the system today is of one in deep crisis, a system that relies

on the state to transfer the crisis to working people while it tries to work out a new set of solutions—or contradictions—to temporarily return the system to growth.Over the years Socialist Voice has

been to the fore in exposing this pro-cess. In essence it has put the system on trial and month by month has explained economic, political and social problems as stemming from the capi-talist system that determines human relations.This must be the basis on which an

economy for the common good is fought for and an alternative presented to workers.

[NL]

Anglo: not our debtHE initial reaction I had towards the title of this con-Tference was almost enough to put me o going in theff

rst place. It was clear that only a cancellation of thefi debt was going to be discussed, rather than an actual repudiation of the debt, that is to say, a refusal to accept the debt as being ours.Choice of language is crucial on this issue, and mincing

around with words like “cancellation” and “default” reveals an all too conventional position. Nevertheless, the Repudiate the Debt Campaign went along with an open mind to gain an understanding of a wide range of views on the issue.My reaction at rst was positive, and I noticed that afi

majority of the people at this political meeting were women. There was much talk about global debt and the collaboration of ordinary people with the trade unions in calling a general strike on 1 March 2013, to coincide with the next illegal payment of €3,600 million to be paid to the bond-holders.

We had the usual anti-union rant from one partici-pant, but no contribution from the religious orders; it would have been interesting to hear their views on the issue. It was obvious that some do not keep up with politi-cal times, as they constantly knocked all the trade unions.Yet in the last few weeks the TEEU has come out in

support of repudiating the debt (and I was surprised that its representative at the meeting did not stand up and say so).A very interesting talk was given by Dot Keet of the

Africa Trade Network and Transnational Institute, who clearly articulated the politics of debt and outlined some historical narrative.All in all it was a frustrating day, but lessons were

learnt, and hopefully we will be able to work on raising the debt question for a larger audience in the future. This issue would become more relevant to people’s lives as Budget Day approached.

[PD]

Shocking revelations about blacklistingEMBERS of the British Parliament have heard shocking revelations and received anMinsight into how the bosses organise their blacklisting, and how undemocratic modern

capitalist society is.In an investigation by the Scottish

Aairs Select Committee, a convictedff blacklister, Ian Kerr, broke his silence and gave nearly four hours’ worth of evidence. Among the revelations:• Ian Kerr has been a full-time black-lister since 1969. He was previously employed by the “Economic League” before he became chief executive of the “Consulting Association.”• Other blacklisting operations were in existence, including Caprim Ltd, which was set up by the former managing director of the Economic League.• Kerr was paid £50,000 per year plus car, bonus, health insurance, and life insurance.• Kerr and other blacklist spies were sent undercover into union meetings.• Using illegally obtained information—some of which could only have come from the police—hundreds of workers were condemned to unemployment on such grounds as “union activity,” “involved in dispute,” “brought in H&S

[health and safety] issues,” “politically motivated,” “recently seen at a left- wing meeting,” and “keeps extremely interesting company.”• The police held regular meetings with senior members of the blacklist-ing operation, with information owingfl both ways.• Some union ocials provided inforffi -mation about their own members that ended up on the blacklist les.fi

• Two hundred environmental activ-ists were also blacklisted.Meetings of the Consulting Associ-

ation took place in the head oce offfi the McAlpine Group in London. Callum McAlpine, a director of several companies within the group, was the rst chairman of the Consulting Assofi -ciation, after providing a start-up loan of £10,000 following the demise of the Economic League. The McAlpine Group paid Kerr’s £5,000 ne and hisfi solicitors’ fees and the costs associated with closing the organisation.

And a footnote: All the organisa-tion’s documents and computer records have been burnt or destroyed.

5

Privatisation does not equal efficiencyNorthern Ireland’s small electricity sector was privatised in 1992–93. To date it has not brought many of the benets itfi promised. Electricity prices are now rising in real terms while elsewhere in the UK they are falling. ESB taris are now 30 perff cent lower than those of NIE. This paper examines the priva-tisation model adopted in Northern Ireland and highlights the anomaly that while the distributor, NIE, is heavily regulated, the Generators are not. To a large extent eciency savings by theffi privatised generators have not been passed on to consumers . . . The Government’s rationale for privatising the electricity industry was ostensibly to introduce eciency through comffi pe-tition and to give consumers more choice and hence lower elec-tricity prices.

—Michael Smyth (University of Ulster), “Electricity after privatisation in Northern Ireland,” Irish Banking Review, summer 1996.This is the rationale of neo-liberals and the IMF. The

lower prices do not necessarily follow.“The remainder of the business—transmission, distri-

bution, supply and systems—was vested in Northern Ireland Electricity PLC which was oated in June 1993.” Thefl measure of eciency was the price compared with the pricesffi of other companies in Britain and Ireland.

Table 2: Irish and British domestic taris, 1995–96ff

Cost per unit QuarterlyTotal chargestanding per unit1charge

Easter Electricity 7.42p £7.02 8.27p

East Midlands Electricity 7.25p £8.91 6.33p

London Electricity 7p £11.31 8.38p

Manweb 7.63p £11.55 9.03p

MEB 7.18p £8.79 8.25p

Northern 7.21p £11.04 8.55p

Norweb 6.6p £9.34 7.73p

Seeboard 7.04p £8.34 7.92p

SWEB 7.73p £9.9 8.93p

Southern Electric 7.1p £10.33 8.35p

Swalec 8.08p £11.25 9.44p

Yorkshire Electricity 6.95p £10 8.16p

Average, England and Wales 7.27p £9.82 8.45p

Scottish Power 7.13p £10.11 8.36p

Scottish, hydro-electric 6.78p £11.03 8.12p

Average, Scotland 6.96p £10.57 8.24p

Average, Britain 7.22p £9.92 8.42p

NIE 8.25p £14.84 10.05p

Average, Britain + NI 7.29p £10.25 8.52p

ESB3 6.58p £7.45 7.49p

Method of calculation1. The prices have been calculated from published tariff

leaets, assuming an average consumption of 3,300 units perfl year for consumers at the standard domestic rate.2. The British gures exclude VAT at 8 per cent.fi

3. The gures exclude VAT at 12½ per cent. Prices havefi not been changed since March 1991. The gures have beenfi adjusted for the exchange rate prevailing at the end of November 1995. The ESB price was approximately 30 per cent lower than the Northern price; so the ESB was most ecient then, even compared with all the privatisedffi companies in Britain and the North; and the privatisation of generation will probably lead to higher prices, as was the case in the North.The savings from privatisation in generation are mainly

in labour, by reducing the number of employees and reducing wages. But if prices are not reduced, these savings are not passed on to the consumer. The generators increase their prots, and the confi sumer does not benet.fiThe role of the regulator is fundamental in the outcome

of the privatisation process. They are not a dispassionate referee: they are a member of the elite and are appointed because they are reliable. They are more likely to take the side of the generators. The regulator for gas recently gave An Bord Gáis an 8½ per cent increase when the board had sought only 7.54 per cent.What about consumers? There are tax implications. If

wages fall, then PAYE, PRSI etc. fall. If the generators’ prots go up as a consequence, their tax will go up; but taxesfi on wages are higher than taxes on prots, so there is a netfi loss in revenue to the state. Also, if the generator is a foreign company, which is most likely, there will be no tax on all prots.fiThe sale at the moment is likely to be a “re sale.” Thefi

value of a generating station is based on estimated future prots. If expected future prots are low, as is the situationfi fi at the moment, when there is a recession, then the value will be low. This means that we have to privatise even more assets to satisfy the neo-liberal Troika.

[KC]

An economic analysis of neo-liberalismNeo-liberals argue that the role of the state should be reduced and the role of the market should be increased.They argue that taxes should be cut. This reduces the

�role of the state and increases prots and the incomefi of shareholders. Tax cuts reduce services to the rest of the population. Irish trade unions fell into the trap of forgoing services (taking tax cuts) for pay increases in the national wage agreements. In the United States the Republican Party argues that there should be tax cuts for the rich.Neo-liberals argue that government expenditure

�should be cut. This includes cuts in welfare so as to provide “incentives to work” when there are no jobs.

In addition, they argue that the budget should be balanced if there is a decit. To get to this requires cuts infi expenditure and increases in taxation and “austerity,” as we know it in Ireland.They argue that businesses should be deregulated.

�The argument goes that government regulation increases costs and makes them less ecient. The bankffi -ing debacle of 2007 shows how wrong this argument is. Deregulation increases prots for businesses in the shortfi term.They argue that ination should be kept low (2 perfl

�cent is the European Central Bank rate). Lenders

6

Table 1: Concentration in the Northernelectricity-generating industry

Power stationOwner Capacity Market share

Ballylumford British Gas 1,067 MW 48%

Kilroot Nigen 578 MW 26%

Belfast West Nigen 240 MW 11%

Castlereagh Management buy-out358 MW 16%

Total 2,243 MW

�

tend to be rich, borrowers tend to be poor. If the interest charged to a borrower is 3 per cent and ination is 2 perfl cent, the borrower is paying 1 per cent in real terms (1 per cent above inafltion). This makes the rich richer and the poor poorer. This applies to creditor (rich) countries and debtor (poor) countries. So Germany is getting real interest transfers from Spain, Ireland, Portugal, and Greece. Neo-liberals argue that low ination leads to highfl growth and low unemployment. There is no economic evi-dence for this assertion.They believe in low wages. Thus they advocate

�undermining the role of trade unions by changing the laws on picketing. They call for an end to the minimum wage, or a reduction in it. They want a high level of un-employment to keep downward pressure on wages.The IMF and the OECD called recently for the reduc-

tion of the Irish minimum wage, which stands at more than half the median wage, to between 30 and 40 per cent. They are in the forefront of the austerity measures that are damaging the peripheral countries of the euro area. Falling wages should cause prots to rise, but they havefi the opposite eect, cutting consumer spendff ing and prots.fiThey believe in privatisation. They argue that

�private rms are more ecient than state-sponsoredfi ffi

companies, because they operate in competitive markets. But in reality they become monopolies when they are sold to private monopolies.

[KC]

General strikes:An effective means to an end?

HE recent protest rally led by Dublin Council of Trades Union saw the question of aTgeneral strike in opposition to austerity being raised by participants in the march and by the president of the ICTU, Eugene McGlone. Subsequently an industrial o cer ffi with the ICTU, Fergus Whelan, told RTE radio that such a strike on a “general matter” would be illegal.“Unions are democratic bodies,”

Whelan pointed out. “We can only do what our members want us to do, on the basis of a secret ballot.” The last thing private-sector members wanted was a strike, he added. Similarly, the general president of SIPTU, Jack O’Connor, distanced himself from any move to call a general strike. He said the matter had not been discussed by Congress, and he was not sure they would win support for one if they sought it.While it is unlikely that a call for a

general strike will be issued, it is worth considering its likely eect as aff strategy in opposing austerity, particu-

larly so given that some sections of the left favour it. (See, for example, Social-ist Worker, 24 November.)While political strikes are formally

illegal under industrial relations law, a de facto general strike could be organ-ised through the co-ordination of thousands of lawful strikes on the same day, after a course of balloting and notication, so that all actions hadfi legal immunity.An unlawful general strike, on the

other hand, would probably depend on neither the Government nor the aected employers responding withff injunctions and damages for loss of business, for fear of intensifying the

political situation.In practice, a general strike of this

unlawful type would be principally a public-sector strike with, given low density gures, a rather small presencefi in the private sector. This is because there are large swathes of the private sector that are non-union: total union density in that sector is less than 20 per cent.Furthermore, it is dicult to specuffi -

late on the degree to which non-union workers in both organised and un-organised sectors would participate in such action.In any event, what would a general

strike secure for workers? Whether in the public or the private sector, the principal aim would simply be to put political pressure on the Government in order to prevent or reverse austerity.A one-day strike, therefore, would

do little else than oer a cautionaryff reminder to the Government of popu-lar anti-austerity discontent. It would neither prevent Government strategy nor run the Government out of oce,ffi nor result in a general election.A good conrmation of this isfi

Greece. With a much more militant and well-organised working class, Greece has witnessed twenty general strikes since 2010. Although the crisis is much more profound there, the frequency of general strikes in that country has been no panacea for the woes of the Greek working class.

7

Get the latest news and information . . .

• Connolly Youth Movement: www.cym.ie• Cuba Support Group: www.cubasupport.com• International Brigades Commemoration Committee: homepage.ntlworld.com/e-mckinley/ibcc.html• Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign: www.ipsc.ie• James Connolly Education Trust: www.iol.ie/~sob/jcet• Latin America Solidarity Centre: www.lasc.ie• Peace and Neutrality Alliance: www.pana.ie• People’s Movement: www.people.ie• Political Economy: politicaleconomy.ie• Progressive Film Club: www.progressivefilmclub.ie• Repudiate the Debt Campaign: www.nodebt.ie• Trade Union Left Forum: www.tuleftforum.com

�

A consideration, therefore, of the general-strike strategy in Ireland must answer such questions as the probable duration of such a strike, and indeed

how many times it would need to be called to have any distinct impact. The risk in holding a general strike of a 24-hour type, for instance, is the pros-pect of making no obvious impact on the intended targets. It might simply be a damp squib.What would make a general strike

more feasible and more forceful would be if the wider level of strike activity in the economy was much higher. If that was so there would be a more tangible sense that a general strike emerged from, and fed back into, a mounting level of more condent struggle and anfi increasing degree of class- consciousnesses among Irish workers. Calling for a general strike at present, however, while sounding good in the abstract, is a rather vacuous statement.At the present time the general-

strike strategy is unlikely to be adopted, for a variety of reasons. One pertinent reason is that a majority in Congress do not want Ireland “to be like Greece,” as it is frequently, and ideologically, put. Most senior union

leaders—though not all—hold the view that even regular street protests will not advance the interests of members, or of “the country.” Congress would prefer to pursue its policies through contacts with the Government and, perhaps, indirectly through the Nevin Economic Institute.In any case, the public-sector unions

have accepted an invitation from the Government to begin talks on a review of the Croke Park Agreement, and are mindful of the partial backing of several Fine Gael backbenchers for any sort of pact. These union members value guarantees on pay and no com-pulsory redundancies under the Croke Park Agreement and don’t want to play into the hands of the deal’s political opponents.This is the defeatist mentality that

exists at present in the Irish labour movement. It will take a much more sustained approach to overturning this mentality than simply shouting for a general strike.

[NC]

Spaniards spot EU-German con jobHE Spaniards went mad,” Enda Kenny, Germany’s new Irish Viceroy, might have said recently“Tto the rogues’ gallery of delighted white-collar criminals had he been asked to explain Spain’s

enormous debt crisis. To their applause, he had just been made a Teutonic knight and given a bit of metal in recognition of his services to German capital in Ireland.And they laughed and

applauded when he suggested that Ireland’s debt crisis was caused by the Irish “losing the run of themselves.”Current wisdom holds that

the bursting of the housing bubble in Ireland and Spain initi-ated the present crisis in the two countries. Two Spanish legal experts, Manuel Balbé and Yaiza Cabedo, disagree. In an article in Spain’s largest-circulation daily, El País, on 28 November they blame the quasi-criminal collu-sion of the German government, Deutsche Bank and their accom-plices in a plan to suck the EU periphery dry in order to alleviate Germany’s whopping—and seldom talked about—€800 billion debt.The rot began in 2000 when,

prodded by the German government and Europe’s nancial elite, nancialfi fi transactions were deregulated. Thence Germany’s capitalism joined the “casino capitalism” club, which lacks administrative supervision, where the transmission of privileged information is decriminalised and players need no longer identify themselves.This private, opaque stock

exchange, based in New York and London, consists in eect of six Ameriff -can and six European mega-banks. All of these have been bankrupted and

bailed out by their governments—i.e. taxpayers.The true basis of the crisis was the

securitisation and resale in the casino of mortgage bonds—guaranteed cash cows for the buyer, according to the seller, who doesn’t inform them that they are certain to default. As an inves-tigation by the US Senate revealed, Deutsche Bank was a major seller of such junk around the world. It knew full well that its clients were going to lose money when the original seller of it to the bank (with which it was in cahoots) went, inevitably, belly up.Deutsche Bank was condemned last

year by Germany’s Supreme Court for such malpractice. The president of the bank, Josef Ackermann—Merkel’s close

pal—resigned, and proposed compensation of €1 billion to buy his silence. A condential report by thefi German nancial regulator (confi -rmed by Merrill Lynch) valuedfi Germany’s “hoard” of toxic shares at €800 billion in 2009. However, instead of being arraigned, the vampire class and their political collaborators closed ranks and deected attenfl -tion to the alleged mismanage-ment of nancial aairs in thefi ff EU periphery, especially in the South. Many “Anglo-Irish Banks” in

Germany were suckered by Deutsche Bank into buying their junk. Hypo Real Estate was “rescued” by more than €100 billion of German taxpayers’ money, and six other big banks fol-lowed suit.Germany’s second-largest bank, the

bankrupt Dresdener Bank, was absorbed by Commerzbank, which received a bail-out of €100 billion, Merkel’s government grabbing 25 per cent of its shares. Commerzbank returned €14 billion of its rescue money last year.Such mega-prots can only comefi

from betting in the casino using privi-leged information supplied by the German government. This is the key to the current crisis of casino capitalism:

8

Madge Davison: A Revolutionary Firebrand

Lynda Walker (editor), Madge Davison: A Revolutionary Firebrand: Recollections (Belfast: Shanway Press, 2011).

£6 (including postage) from Unity Press, PO Box 85, Belfast BT1 1SR. Cheques payable to Northern Area Trading.

Women in Spain searching through refuse for food

�

such rescues and nationalisations have converted the German, British, Swiss and North American governments into bankers, who need their banks to make rapid prots to recover the moneyfi injected into them.So where do they get the money?

From the periphery, aided by Euro-pean and international agencies under their control. How? Putting ourselves in their shoes, how do we bleed, for example, Spain?Firstly, ruin Spanish banks by

inveigling them into buying our junk. Then, spread rumours to force increases in Spain’s interest payments. Then again, force the privatisation of protfiable enterprises (airports, trans-port, state lottery, etc.) so that our gang can grab them for a song. Induce

a credit squeeze, so that the shares of Spanish transnationals are devalued, so that once again our lads can grab them.And the best of all, provoke nanfi -

cial panic—actually a criminal activity; but so what? The law turns a blind eye, so that capital ees abroad.fl

In eight months of this year €330 billion ed Spain alone (not to mentionfl Greece, Italy, Portugal and Ireland), winding up in German, Swiss, Dutch and Luxembourg banks—an “unprece-dented” windfall according to Bloom-berg, the American investment analysts. “Austericide” generates mega- prots for vampires. Sounds familiar?fi

The unelected European Commis-sion turns a blind eye to all this infringement of free competition and

to the crooked manoeuvres of the gang who control London’s market casino. Likewise to the identities of the vampires.EU law is an ass. The EU Court

ruled in 2009 that the free circulation of capital could be restricted if it “undermined economic stability of social policy” and the sovereignty of a member-state.The economic Germanication offi

Europe proceeds apace as attention is deected to nancial mismanagementfl fi in the periphery. Socialists must be aware, at least, of this massive scam—and that the key to ending it is re- imposition of the regulation of nanfi -cial dealings, binding on all national governments.

[TMS]

International Meeting of Communist Parties in BeirutThe 14th International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties took place in Beirut over the weekend of 22–24 November. It was hosted by the Lebanese Communist Party and was attended by sixty parties from forty-eight countries.The international meeting has grown with

each passing year, reecting the re-emergence offl a communist movement battered but not broken by the storms following the counter-revolutions in the Soviet Union and eastern European socialist countries.It has been slow and dicult terrain that many partiesffi

have travelled, but most have now re-established a clear presence within their labour and national movements. In Latin America communists play an important role in the changes now under way in much of the continent, as for example in Venezuela, where in the recent elections they secured a big increase in their vote.Every continent was represented at the meeting, with

a very good turn-out from parties of the Middle East.The conference took place at a time when the Israeli

government was bombing Gaza and the western-backed rebellion in Syria was attempting to overthrow the government. The conference expressed its solidarity with both the Palestinian and the Syrian people. On Syria it called for an end to the violence and an end to the externally organised aggression and declared that the Syrian people can and must solve their dierences in aff peaceful way and that the sovereignty of Syria should be respected.There was full support for the Palestinian people in

their struggle to establish a state of the their own. The presence of so much media attention created an oppor-tunity to show solidarity with progressive and communist forces, which face the twin enemies of democracy in the region: imperialism and political Islam.The Communist Party of Egypt give a good account of

the momentous changes there and also of the dangers now facing the Egyptian working class and the rise of political Islam, an anti-people and pro-imperialist move-ment that has no social agenda other than maintaining the status quo. The Muslim Brotherhood is a creature born out of the bowels of British imperialism and its con-trol of Egypt in the 1920s. Throughout the Arab world the role of this organisation has been one of securing the interests of the ruling elite as well as western interests while presenting itself as the champion of the Arab masses. Representatives of the international movement of communists debated the world situation, bringing to bear their own immediate experiences and that of the working class to give a greater understanding of the present stage

of the crisis of monopoly capitalism and to see what areas of co-operation can be built and strengthened. They rea rmed the nature of theffi crisis as a crisis of over-production and over- accumulation of capital. Delegates also expressed grave concern at the deepening environmental crisis created by monopoly capitalism and the dangers now posed

to life on our planet.While in Europe resistance appears to be weak and

slow to emerge, this does not give the full picture of the extent and scale of resistance around the globe.What was clear from experiencing the work of the host

organisation is that the Lebanese Communist Party is well organised, drawing to its ranks people from across the sectarian divide and across the deep religious and ethnic divisions that western interests—British, French, and American—have carefully constructed over centuries of domination and exploitation. The Lebanese party does not pander to any one side but takes a stand that is in the interests of working people and against external interfer-ence, both by western interests and by the reactionary Arab states, such as Saudi Arabia.The fourteenth international conference was another

important step in re-establishing the communist move-ment as the central and most principled voice of workers and exploited masses around the globe.

■ The paper presented by the CPI can be read on its web site (www.communistpartyofireland.ie/c-beirut.html). The agreed statement adopted by the international conference can be viewed at Solidnet, the international solidarity net-work (www.solidnet.org/14-international-meeting/3158-14- imcwp-final-statement-en), which also carries many of the papers presented to the conference.

9

What if Cuba discovers oil?N July 2009 the Venezuelan ambassador to Britain and Ireland, Samuel Moncada, spoke inIDublin. He addressed the role of oil in Venezuela’s economy and particularly noted the

downside of such natural wealth. Among the issues mentioned was security and also the development of one industry at the expense of all others.For the last few years there has

been speculation in the oil industry that Cuba may have a vast oil and gas eld oshore. However, a well sunk byfi ff the Spanish company Repsol and a second deep-water exploratory well in the Gulf of Mexico by PC Gulf, a sub-sidiary of Petronas of Malaysia, with Gazpromneft of Russia, did not pro-duce signicant nds.fi fi

There is hope that Venezuela’s state oil company, PDVSA, may be willing to take up the baton from Petronas and Gazpromneft. After all, what might not be a commercially viable nd for thefi transnationals might still be su cientffi to meet all of Cuba’s needs.One of the interesting aspects of the

oil exploration in Cuba has been the pressure being put by the United States on oil companies involved in the work. The rst line of attack was tofi question the safety aspect of the work. While all oil wells come with such con-cerns, the exploration has been carried out by some of the world’s leading companies. One wonders whether such concerns were voiced before the nearby BP Deepwater Horizon accident in 2010.A bizarre moment came early in

2011 when a rumour that a very large oil nd was imminent, and Americanfi businesses, together with politicians, considered asking their government to lift the illegal trade embargo on Cuba—nothing like the possibility of making a fast buck to change a businessman’s “deeply held” political beliefs.Soon afterwards the American oil

lobby found itself in a confrontation with the right-wing anti-Cuba lobby, and things reverted to what passes for “normal” in US dealings with Cuba. A bipartisan letter signed by thirty-four members of Congress threatened the Spanish oil company with prosecution under US law for daring to work with the Cuban government.There seems to have been very little

discussion on the left about the conse-quences for Cuba of a major oil nd.fi With a neighbour like the United States, and its unquenchable thirst for oil, surely the threat of invasion and

the installation of a regime sympa-thetic to US interests is greatly increased, especially considering the recent histories of Iraq and Libya and the continuing attempts by Western powers to grab the rich oil elds offi Iran.The best result for Cuba would

seem to be to discover enough oil and gas for its own domestic fuel security. Whether the cost of extraction, both economically and environmentally, of such a nd would make it viable isfi another question.

[RN]

Irish socialist republicanism, 1909–1936Adrian Grant, Irish Socialist Republicanism, 1909–36 (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2012; ISBN 978-1-84682-361-9; €50).This book is based on a PhD thesis

for the University of Ulster supervised by the eminent Labour historian Emmet O’Connor. It is scholarly and well researched. It is only in this generation that the history of the labour and left movements has received the attention it deserves, and now an additional resource is available for further study.

Desmond Greaves’s Life and Times of James Connolly (strangely missing from this book’s bibliography) and Emmet Larkin’s James Larkin opened the way not only to reclaiming our heroes but to placing them within the context that shaped their times. Further recent work, with the contri-bution of the Irish Labour History Society, continues in this vein.

The book’s title dates socialist republicanism to the foundation of the ITGWU by Jim Larkin in 1909. “The formation was a separatist act in itself and was the basis for the socialist republicanism that emerged in the fol-lowing decades.” It fully documents the dual aim of Larkin in not alone carving out a role for independent Irish trade unions relevant to Irish conditions but

10

A bitter-sweet successIn Chile, Maya Fernández Allende gained a bitter-sweet success when she defeated Pedro Sabat of the centre- right National Renovation party in Chilean municipal elections on 29 October. Allende is a granddaughter of the democratically elected Marxist president Salvador Allende. Along with this success, Carolina Tohá defeated the ultra-right candidate Pablo Zalaquett. It is worth remem-bering that Tohá’s father was Allende’s vice-president when he was tortured and murdered by the CIA-backed coup that overthrew Allende. In the Provi-dencia district a local community leader, José Fina Errázuiz, defeated one of Pinochet’s henchmen, Cristián Labbé, who was chief of the domestic intelligence agency under the brutal regime. [PD]

�

in planning the strategy they should use in achieving the Republic. Here we see the political Larkin as distinct from the reductionist portrait of him as just a Labour leader and even more so the caricature of him as a “rabble-rouser.”Larkin’s career was of course dierff -

ent when he came back from imprison-ment in the United States, and he lacked the theoretical ability to sustain a unifying role, either on the left or in trade union aairs. As expected fromff the man, however, a fascinating career.Until this resurgence of labour

history the poplar discourse was that it was the nationalist movement and the separatist revival that were the main elements that shaped Ireland in the revolutionary period. But the rst confi -cepts of organised socialist republican-ism lay in the formation of the Irish Socialist Republican Party, founded in 1895 and moulded intellectually by Connolly.From the defeat of the bitter class-

against-class lock-out of 1913, socialist republicanism after 1916 ensured that a crucial role was played by labour in the War of Independence. This book is invaluable in tracing this narrative from the general strike against con-scription in 1918, the strikes against carrying British munitions and for the release of prisoners, the organising of farm labourers, and the creation of the soviets. The Red Flag ew bravely onfl these occasion, and the ITGWU grew to 120,000. With history repeating itself as farce, the labour leadership and trade union careerists tried to dampen the revolutionary fervour and depoliticise these struggles.The role of the rst Communistfi

Party of Ireland from 1921 in analysing the Treaty from a class viewpoint, pre-paring a social programme on which to galvanise popular support for the anti- treaty forces, and joining in the armed defence of the Republic, is recorded here. All this complements Charlie McGuire’s research in his biographies of Roddy Connolly and Seán McLaughlin as well as his published lecture on the ninetieth anniversary of the CPI.Of prime interest will be the

account of the attempt to revive social-ist republicanism in the 1930s, culmin-ating in the Republican Congress of

1934. The tragic split at its rst confi -vention is often attributed to disagree-ment over one word—whether to aim for a “republic” or a “workers’ republic” —but in fact it was over theoretical assessments. It still has a resonance today, despite the fact that all the left seemingly stands for a socialist Ireland. However, the central dispute was in fact whether to have the Republican Congress organised as a united-front alliance or as a new political party.The role of the CPI and how it

vetoed this decision at the convention in Rathmines was crucial and contro-versial. It was so because, apart from the young CPI trying to grapple with the complicated and uid changes infl the 1930s—a rst Fianna Fáil governfi -ment, a wavering IRA, the rise of fascism in the form of the Blueshirts, etc.—the inuence of the Cominternfl and the Communist Party of Great Britain had a hand in their decision.Grant does justice to the facts, but a

retrospective Marxist assessment by the CPI is long overdue. Both Peadar O’Donnell and George Gilmore justied their historic stand, even infi written works up to the 1970s, so per-haps a future issue of Socialist Voice will return to the subject.In closing his book at 1936, after

the best remnants of the Republican Congress, the left republicans and the

communists went to ght in Spain,fi Grant writes that socialist republican-ism “nally breathed its last breath infi the late 1930s.” But did it? The late 60s saw a republican moment add a social and cultural agenda to its separatist aims and seeking allies in the left and working-class movement.It is the role of historians to record

facts, and it is the role of social and political activists to make history. Today again many people from a physical-force tradition are examining the changing role of imperialism and its relationship with Ireland, north and south. Again, as in the past, they will nd common cause with the Marxistfi left. This book will help that process by recording the past, warts and all.While there were mistakes, people

like Peadar O’Donnell, Frank Ryan and Seán Murray acted as they did in con-ditions not chosen by themselves but always with the interests of the Irish working class dictating their life’s work.The book is expensive at €50; but

suggest it as a Christmas present, or failing that get it from your local library. On sale in Connolly Books.

[TR]

Stalin’s purgesDear editor,Yuri Emelianov’s series on “Stalin’s

purges” (Communist Review, nos. 63 and 64) was a welcome read. His attempt to bring to a non-Russian readership the results of new research is to be commended.The facts and gures given in thefi

articles provide communists with the necessary material to substantiate an

argument when confronted either by clear enemies of socialism or by ignor-ant fools parroting the Cold War narra-tive about the arrests and executions of the late 1930s. The reprisals of 1937 and 38 have for too long been used as a stick to metaphorically beat commun-ists with by opponents of the progress made in Russia under the government of the USSR.

At present, with capitalism in the biggest crisis since the Great Depres-sion, there is naturally growth in interest among working people in alternative economic systems. People will turn inevitably to assess argu-ments for economic planning and democratic control of the means of pro-duction. There is an onus on socialists to arm themselves with articulate,

11

�

SOCIALIST VOICE

assertive responses about any negative aspects of the greatest example of socialism that actually existed.One of the simplistic tirades levelled

at socialists is about the “cult of personality.” Critics of Stalin fail—either deliberately or not—to take into account the sheer level of popularity the man had. In the Russian language the term for what is called negatively in English the “cult of personality” is “kul’t lichnosti.” This is more accurately translated as “cult of the great man.”In response to Khrushchev’s criti-

cisms, a saying started in the USSR: “Byl kul’t, no byl i lichnost,” translating as “Yes, there was a cult—but there was also a great man.” Stalin was a great man; his eorts contributed to theff great achievements made by the USSR.An attempt to reassert the demo-

cratic essence of the USSR was seen in the 1936 constitution, which provided economic rights not included in consti-tutions in the US or Britain. One of the characteristics of the “free world” was the (hard fought for) extension of the right to vote to all adult citizens. At

this time no other state enshrined in its constitution the right to work. The 1936 constitution recognised collective social and economic rights, including the rights to rest and leisure, health protection, care in old age and sickness, housing, education, and cultural benets. This constitution also profi -vided for the direct election of all government bodies.Contrary to the Cold War version of

Soviet history that portrayed the USSR as forcing people to abandon their religious beliefs, Article 124 of the 1936 constitution guaranteed freedom of religion. The inclusion of this right was opposed by large segments of the Communist Party. One result of this article was clergy in the Russian Orthodox Church petitioning to reopen closed churches, gain access to jobs that had been closed to them as religious gures, and even to runfi religious candidates in the 1937 elec-tions to the Supreme Soviet.There was also an insistence by

Stalin that many Soviet citizens who had been hitherto deprived of the fran-

chise have it restored. These included class enemies like former landlords and kulaks, as well as belligerents from the Civil War.Gary Boyne

12

43 East Essex Street · Dublin 2(01) 6708707

www.communistpartyofireland.ie

For the latest newsand information about events

www.communistpartyofireland.ie

Please send me information about membership ofthe Communist Party of Ireland.

Name: ............................................................................................................................Name: ............................................................................................................................

Address: ........................................................................................................................

..............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

.......................................................................................................................................

Phone: ................................................ E-mail: ............................................................

õ CPI, 43 East Essex Street, Dublin 2 õ CPI, PO Box 85, Belfast BT1 1SR

CPI'

Join the struggle for socialism ! Join the CPI.

NOTICE BOARD

Sunday 9 December

4:30 p.m.

Candlelight vigil

to protest against the awarding of

the Nobel Prize for Peace to the

European Union

� European Parliament offices

(Dawson Street)

People�s Movement

Sunday 16 December

1 p.m.

Frank Conroy Commemoration

� Kildare Republican Memorial

(Market Square)

Frank Conroy Commemoration

Committee

Not exactly your local bobbyThe face of police forces and policing has changed beyond recognition in recent years. This is how today’s armour-plated Robocops—indistinguishable from combat troops—treat Greek workers and Chilean students when they demonstrate against the effects of neo-liberalism.

Meanwhile in the Philippines the police courteously clear a shanty town of its “un-authorised residents” before it is demolished.