Oil spill shows hazards of the profit system

It is still difficult to assess the scale of the disaster that followed the explosion on the BP oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico on 22 April, which killed eleven workers. BP claims that ‘only’ 210,000 gallons a day of crude oil have been released so far, but others calculate the figure could be as high as 4.2 million gallons a day.

By Pete Dickenson

Gradploitation

IBEC and the government, as part of their ongoing campaign to undermine the wages and conditions of workers in Ireland, have teamed up to create the Gradlink scheme.

By Richard O’Hara

This scheme allows social welfare recipients, who have recently graduated from college, to work on placement schemes for private firms and multinational corporations, while maintaining their dole payments. Its apparent aim is to provide participants with work experience and to improve their employment potential. However, the real experience these highly skilled young workers will get, is that of capitalist exploitation as they work for sub-minimum wages and are used as part of the relentless attack to drive down wages in Ireland.

SY Kilkenny – Public Meeting

100th Anniversary of International Women’s Day

“A Women’s place is in the struggle!”

Low pay, cuts in services, sexism

7pm Tues 9 March,
Club House Hotel, Patrick St
Kilkenny

SY Dublin – Young Workers: Underpaid, Exploited & Fed Up

By Seamus O’Rourke

I was always told that if I got a degree, I’d have no trouble finding a well-paid full-time job. I finished college in May, and haven’t been able to find a job, though I have been working part-time in the same pub I’ve been working in since I was sixteen.

SY Waterford – Student Grants: Cut, Late and Inadequate

By Lucian Verkin

As a student who is reliant on the maintenance grant, I am at the mercy of an inefficient system and the Budget cuts that reduced an already inadequate grant. Each county and city council provides their grants at different times, sometimes weeks apart.

SY Lurgan – Stop sectarian attacks

By a Socialist Youth member

Sectarian attacks have once again hit the headlines in Lurgan after bloody clashes broke out in January between Catholic and Protestant young people aged between 14 and 18 years old.

NI Steps to Work Scheme: 21st century slave labour

Youth Fight for Jobs Belfast has uncovered a scandal involving the Department for Employment & Learning pushing unemployed young people to work for bosses for free in order to cut the dole figures.

Dublin SY PROTEST – Dole cut for under-23’s

1pmFriday 4th Dec

Outside the Dail

It has been mooted that the government plan to cut the dole for under 23 year olds to 160 euro per month.Young people under 23 are considered old enough to be put in jail or to join the army for example, and when working pay the same tax as other workers, yet when it comes to receiving basic social welfare they are being treated as some form of lesser being. It’s the government’s fault, not young peoples’ fault that there are no jobs or future in this country. Now they’re expecting young people to live on 160 euro a week!

Protests follow homophobic terror attack in Tel-Aviv

On 1 August, two gay and lesbian youth were murdered in Tel-Aviv, in the most severe homophobic terror attack in Israel’s history. The attack was followed immediately by an important wave of protest, in which the Socialist Struggle Movement (CWI in Israel) fully participated, against the Israeli establishment’s incitation to homophobia, and against oppression of LGBT people.

 Charlie James and Shahar Ben-Khorin, Socialist Struggle Movement (CWI in Israel)

CWI banner reads “The homophobes in power are responsible for the disaster”

Charlie James, a CWI member, used to volunteer in the “BarNo`ar” (“Youth Bar”) – where the attack occurred – and some of his friends were among the victims. He adds a personal note:

I had a personal connection to the “BarNo`ar”. When I relocated to Tel-Aviv a few years ago, the “BarNo`ar” was one of the first and most favorable places for me, a place where I could meet new friends, play billiards, chess, cards, and talk about everything. When I grew up, I became a guide over there, trying to give back what was given to me. We were there – me, Nir (his life now brutally taken), Nofar, and Khen. Every weekend we used to come, in rotation, to assist in operating the place, preparing food for the kids and the youth, calming their quarrels, organizing events, and most importantly – discussing with them, and let them realize that they’re not alone in this world, and there are people to support them. It was a sacred mission for us.

Kilkenny SY – Public Meeting

OPEN DISCUSSION FORUM :

Minimum wage under threat, unemployment and college fees…

What’s the socialist alternative?

7pm Wed 19th August

The Club House Hotel, Patrick St