Book launch
Telling the Mayflower Story: Thanksgiving or Land Grabbing, Massacres & Slavery?
Friday 30th November at 5:30pm
Launch of a Socialist History Society Publication
UCL Institute of the Americas 51 Gordon Square, London, WC1H 0PN admission free, but registration is required…
Authors:
Danny Reilly & Steve Cushion
Chair:
Colin Prescod Chair of the Institute of Race Relations
In the autumn of 1620 the ship Mayflower, with 102 passengers, landed in North America and started the colonisation of the area that became known as New England. The Mayflower had landed in a region where the Sachem of the local Wampanoag Nation was Massasoit, who subsequently helped them survive. In the autumn of 1676, following the defeat of a war of rebellion led by Massasoit’s son Metacomet (King Philip), the ship Seaflower set sail from New England with a ‘cargo’ of Indigenous American slaves bound for the English Caribbean colonies.
The creation of the New England colonies by thousands of English colonists in the seventeenth century involved the rapid decline in the indigenous population, the violent seizure of territory and slavery. However, the 400-year anniversary commemorations in the UK seem to be overlooking this.
The Mayflower journey was part of Early English Colonialism:
• The invasions of Virginia, New England and the Caribbean were accompanied by land seizure wars against the Indigenous peoples of North America
• The economic success of New England depended on trade with the slave colonies of the Caribbean, and included the trafficking of slaves
• The colonists established a pattern of ‘extravagant’ violence in the wars they conducted against Indigenous Nations that was continued for 300 years
• The establishment of a tradition of sanitizing the story of English colonialism in the Americas that has lasted 400 years.
Why Universal Credit Should Become a Core Trade Union Issue
A briefing on Universal Credit, prepared by Waltham Forest Stand Up for your Rights, who have called for a protest against Universal Credit on December 1st, 11am at Chingford Mount [E4 9AA] in the constituency of Ian Duncan Smith, the author of the scheme.
Who in the Future will be Affected by Universal Credit (UC)? 1. To date, of the 1 million households now on UC, the vast majority (except in local pilot areas), have been the unemployed. However that is about to change. From now on across the country all new or updated benefit claims (with a few exceptions) including those in work who receive Tax Credits have to be made through UC.
2. DWP also plans to force everyone on benefits (including those on Working and Child Tax Credits) to claim UC even if there has been no change in their circumstances. DWP has refused to initiate transfers of Tax Credit claims on to a UC regime. Instead people have to initiate UC applications, a fraught and costly process. Testing forced transfers, called ‘managed migration’ by DWP, is due to start for some Tax Credit recipients in July 2019.
3. Nationally, DWP’s plans mean 3 in 4 of the planned total of 7 million families on UC, would be in work. So of the estimated 16 million people nationally in families receiving UC, around 12 million would be in working families.
Background 4. This note outlines the Department of Work and Pensions’ (DWP) plans on UC as at early November 2018. These plans have changed many times. DWP has said they may change again if more problems with UC come to light.
5. UC has been criticised by welfare and other advice agencies after cases of severe hardship came to light and a series of analyses on the impact of UC especially after funding was cut. Arguably UC has become so discredited that what its future should be and indeed whether it should have a future is a matter for serious political debate.
Why have People found the UC Application Process so Fraught? 6. Firstly the forms are very lengthy – running to tens of pages. Secondly DWP want people to fill them in online. Even experienced advisers find the process; setting up accounts, locating and scanning in all the documents which DWP require to ‘verify’ a UC claim, often takes many hours, not counting verification visits to DWP offices.
7. DWP’s own research found barely half could complete the process without help. One in 4 claimants were not able to claim at all without help. Many have found applying for UC more difficult than applying for Tax Credits. The UC application process is most intimidating and unsuitable for those with poor language, writing or IT skills. The process especially frightens those with mental health problems eg anxiety, as DWP’s own research shows.
8. Thirdly the risks, if things go wrong, have been largely put on to the applicant. Imposing on applicants financial penalties arising from the complex UC application process, is unreasonable given the widely known problems people have faced in completing UC applications to DWP’s satisfaction. Government November 2018 changes have reduced, but not removed, risks imposed on people when those on Tax Credits are forced to apply for UC.
9. If people do not successfully apply within 1 month of a DWP deadline they risk losing ‘Transitional Protection’ which protects, for a while, their money if UC pays less than they get with Tax Credits. Further DWP only allow UC claims to be backdated by one month – less than the 3 months allowed for backdating of some benefit claims.
Do Tax Credit Recipients lose Money? 10. First of all, UC claimants face gaps in payment imposed by DWP in two stages. The UC system builds in a gap in payments, reduced in the 2018 Budget to a minimum of 3 weeks, after applying for UC. On top of that gap 1 in 5 claimants have faced on average a 4 week delay by DWP (ie on top of the 3 week gap) in receiving some or all of their money. DWP do not expect the % facing additional delays in some UC payment to be reduced during 2018.
11. Indeed there may well a big rise in the current UC claim processing delays by DWP under the strain of a six-fold increase in the rate of new UC claims planned by DWP for 2020 plus the more complicated circumstances of future UC claims with working income and child care costs, (unlike the mainly simpler unemployed cases so far).
12. Secondly amounts paid under UC differ from what working families get on Tax Credits. Some would get more money under UC. But overall working families face a net loss on average of about £250 a year on UC, after the 2018 Budget measures notably the higher work allowances. The Budget reduced, but did not end the losses.
13. UC losses are bigger for (mainly female) single parents, and disabled people loss of Severe Disability Premium. UC hits women more. The combined impact of tax and benefit changes hits women 7 times as severely as men.
14. UC’s Minimum Income Floor has adverse impacts for many self-employed people eg taxi drivers, often BME.
15. Tax and benefit measures in the 2018 Budget only partially offset the overall losses since Summer 2015 from for instance the benefit freeze. Overall tax and benefit changes reduce income just for the lower income groups.
Does UC Contribute to a More Hostile Environment for Workers? 16. As well as financial losses, UC can intrude into peoples’ lives. Under the UC regime, workers can be pressed by DWP to job search to increase hours or earnings. This is worse for some eg single parents with child care duties.
17. For the first time workers are now at risk of ‘sanctions’ – loss of benefit. UK has the 2nd most demanding set of ‘benefit conditionality’ terms out of 39 countries. Under UC sanctions are 4 times more frequent than pre-UC.
18. Insisting everyone has to apply for UC online is not user friendly, especially for those nervous of computers.
Is Universal Credit Actually Simpler? 19. One advantage claimed for UC is ‘simplification’ with 6 benefits rolled up into 1. The comparison is misleading: no one person ever receives all 6 benefits simultaneously. It is also partial: UC does not include some benefits. The difficulty of making UC claims shows that any ‘simplification’ is not usually to the advantage of applicants.
20. Other aspects of ‘simplification’ may not help people. Paying UC as one payment may be convenient for DWP, but it means women will lose out when all money goes to one person, the higher earner, usually male. At the moment Child Tax Credit and the childcare element of Working Tax Credit typically go to the woman in a family. Women with no direct access to money find it more difficult to leave when facing domestic abuse or violence.
Are there Other Benefits of UC? 21. DWP has claimed UC increases work incentives. That is so, but to a very limited extent. For the (1 in 3) people in work facing the highest effective tax rates they are cut from slightly over 90% to 85% with UC. The evidence is such incentives have little effect. Using sanctions implicitly admits that the work incentives are not effective.
22. DWP has argued that benefit take-up will rise under UC. But the user–unfriendly nature of UC, its toxic reputation and what an official report calls DWP’s ‘culture of indifference’, reduce the chances of higher take-up.
23. The DWP says that UC will reduce fraud and error. The NAO report refers to ‘a lack of evidence’ on this claim.
Conclusions 24. Government UC plans will increasingly affect people in work. Recent changes to UC have reduced the delays and the financial costs for workers, but not eliminated them. Reducing delays and more funding are not enough to make UC suitable. It is very user-unfriendly and intrudes oppressively into peoples’ lives. A harsh UC regime drives people into taking unsatisfactory work, putting downward pressure on work T&Cs – a core union concern.
25. There is a very strong case for Trade Unions to call on political parties to back ‘Stop and Scrap UC’ and, so long as UC continues, urging councils to minimise the impacts. Some Boroughs have set up information, advice and advocacy services eg Tower Hamlets, and others have committed to not evict tenants in arrears as a result of UC.
26. Pushing more people on to UC should be immediately halted, whilst a fundamental review considers the options.
Hugo Blanco video & Marcelo Ramos: Socialist Resistance meeting , London 6/11/2018
Socialist Resistance meeting , London 6/11/2018 to promote 'Hugo Blanco - A Revolutionary Life' by Derek Wall and 'We The Indians' by Hugo Blanco . Introduction by Dave Kellaway of SR.
url https://youtu.be/_2TnkBYSkJ8
'Hugo Blanco's video message is at https://we.tl/t-H1nVp0AW36
English translation of the Hugo Blanco video message to the SR meeting of Nov 6th 2018
I want to thank the British cdes for organising the presentation of the English version of my book.
I am sorry that there have been problems with obtaining a visa and even I manage to get one now I would arrive too late to take part in your meeting
That is why we decided to make this little video so that I can at least be present in this form at your meeting.
Question 1
Hugo, how did this book We the Indians come about?
Hugo:
It’s about various experiences I have gone through with the indigenous movements, including some writings from Fronton jail when I was a prisoner, and these have been gathered together in this book. There was a book I have written before, called Land or Death – which I mainly wrote when I was inside Fronton. Some parts of that book have been included in this one. They are experiences and reflections from various periods in the past and they have been brought together in this book, We the Indians. We are up to the third edition in Castillian and we are preparing a fourth. We now have the English translation and an Italian one. We are working on a Portuguese one and we know there is a comrade doing a French/swiss translation. Question 2
What does Indigenous mean to you Hugo?
Hugo:
Well, we call them primitive but they are right if we look at the type of organisation they had before and which prevailed everywhere, the collective will dominated with no chiefs or individuals and the indigenous communities had these features across the world, where horizontal relations dominated and not top down, vertical ones. Furthermore they were linked to the land and farmed but in ways that did not damage the environment unlike in today’s neo-liberal world. Neo-liberalism teaches that life is only how to buy and sell. But before it was not like that. So this is what an indigenous person, an Indian is for me, they are embedded in the sea or land, they co-habit with nature, other words, living well. In other words to live with mother nature, farming and rearing animals .
Question 3
Can you say something about your legacy?
Hugo
I am committed to social struggles. I had thought when I passed on that I would have my ashes spread in all those places of social struggles I had known but the Colombian comrade Ernesto Piez (Perez) said to me you got to be there when I am alive, and I am alive, so I wrote something to Maria Esquabe (???) about my experience as a peasant activist as an indigenous militant in the
Lares and Cusco communities. The other comrade told me about his experience of struggles with indigenous peoples and how it went but he said bloody hell I am getting old now, I cannot go and about like before, I cannot struggle like before, But I haven’t changed my ideas, I want to take my legs there, to take my voice there, to participate in the struggles. So this comrade reminded me of this and said my legacy wasn’t to have my ashes spread about but that the lessons I have learnt in my life had to be shared with others, obviously Not so that people should copy me but using my ideas to encourage the struggles. So we set up a group on the internet - We the Indians We thought of linking up with other places and seeing how different chapters would be relevant there . Not to give a line of course but so they could maybe use something from our experience. We also were able to read some chapters together and comment and link up the experience of the book with the present struggles in whatever part of the world. So we have this internet group. We were invited to Guadalajara, Jalisco, to a meeting of university researchers, professors, they had seen our book and the previous Land or death one ( about the struggle in Cusco and La Convencion). They set up meetings with other organisations. There was an interview with me which was important for spreading the message of the book. So it shows the importance of this group, to link up with younger generations and with currents like the Zapatistas. I want to learn from the experiences of the We the Indians group.
Question 4
What about the recent indigenous peoples congress in Ecuador
Hugo
Yes I could not attend this meeting but a comrade from our group was able to go and was able to distribute our materials there. We met up with Lorenzo Cammoro, a peasant leader who was there too. The materials and our work interested a lot of the people there. Another positive has been the setting up of a similar group to ours which is part of our network in Mexico city. Also we have links in Ecuador. so this network We the indians is making a contribution – not a model to be copied but to see where we can learn from each other and to discuss with each other and to understand our problems.
Question 5
What have you got to say to the English cdes
Hugo
I am very sorry that I cannot be present tonight. I want to thank you for the invitation I wanted to be at this presentation of my book but the visa problem has stopped me being there.
Want to thank Derek wall, the English writer, who has written about our struggles, other interesting articles and has written a biography about me and my experiences. Obviously I wanted to thank him for that.
Hope the book can be useful to develop the ongoing stuggle not to be copied but as a additional tool for relating to those
struggles.,
Socialist Resistance meeting , London 6/11/2018 to promote 'Hugo Blanco - A Revolutionary Life' by Derek Wall and 'We The Indians' by Hugo Blanco . Remarks by Terry Conway of SR and RedGreen Labour, followed by Questions and discussion.
url: https://youtu.be/TlIUMHzOCLc
Socialist Resistance meeting , London 6/11/2018 : Marcelo Ramos (a member of PSOL Partido Socialismo e Liberdade ) on the situation in Brazil after the election of Jair Bolsonaro
url: https://youtu.be/tEh3IryqKTc
Report about Brazil situation
Today Brazil is living through one of the saddest moments of its history. The history of the Brazilian people is essentially a history of resistance, since the European colonial invasion it has been very difficult to survive in our land. But we fight and resist.
As you may know, the capitalist development in my country is permeated with blood throughout its history.
This includes the fact that there was a military dictatorship in Brazil between 1964 -1985. But democratic struggles of the working class in the 1980s succeeded in securing important social achievements that were brought together through the Federal Constitution of Brazil approved in 1988. We succeeded in approving the need for a social function of private property, education and free public health for all, democratic freedoms, labor rights and greater popular participation in decisions.
Although the current constitution is applied selectively, it still protects most of the rights historically conquered by the subaltern peoples in Brazil.
What is at stake today with the Bolsonaro election is exactly the end of the republican cycle that began with the 1988 constitution. 30 years later ,capitalism plunges Brazil again into a cycle of high repression.
Even with all their problems and contradictions we recognize that the Lula and PT class conciliation governments introduced some poverty reduction measures and invested more in social rights than all previous governments.
So how was it possible for Brazil to elect a fascist president who defends the military dictatorship and the persecution to the left even after 13 years of the government of a party that was born of the unions and the landless movement? Bolsonaro did not come out of nowhere!
We must remember two fundamental problems: the post-dictatorship democratic transition and the waning of PT's popularity from 2013 onwards.
First, Brazil, unlike Argentina, had a transition to democracy conducted by the military itself. They gave themselves an-amnesty for their crimes against humanity, they ensured that the first presidents continued their policy, and the majority of the population had negative memory of the military dictatorship. They promoted a conservative common sense which praised the dictatorship as a time of economic progress and social order, devaluing the persecution and violations of rights that occurred. Officials like Bolsonaro kept defending the policy of the dictatorship without suffering any retaliation.
Secondly from 2013, when the international economic crisis had serious effects on Brazil, the PT governments were widely challenged by popular mobilizations that brought millions of people to the streets. Intellectuals close to the PT claim that these protests were conservative and started the new fascist wave in Brazil. In my opinion this analysis is incorrect and dishonest. The so-called days of June 2013 were popular demonstrations unleashed in the context of the preparation for the World Cup and began with protests against the increase of the prices of public transport and the criticisms were extended to the withdrawal of investment in health and education for the World Cup of 2014.
The problem here is that if, on the one hand, there was a new generation of young social activists who formed in the leadership of those protests, and I am an example of this, a young university student from the periphery of one of the great cities of Brazil. On the other hand, the extreme right went to the streets and participated in those demonstrations – arguing that the fight against corruption as the main demand. The general response of the PT government was the widespread repression of demonstrations, the use of new coercive legislation and the new national force, a military force created by Lula for use in military occupation of favelas (poor neighbouhoods) and large demonstrations.
Initially the direction of these manifestations that questioned the government and the project of the PT to govern was from a left perspective, even though there was great questioning of the traditional organizations of the left the general tone was defense of improvement of the life of the poorest ones: more investment in health , education and leisure. However with the cooling of the large demonstrations there was little organizational balance left. Even with some growth of the PSOL and movements like the MTST (Moving Homeless Workers Movement) the following years were about growth and organization of the far right, while the idea of getting rid of the PT was growing.
What was done through the impeachment process of Dilma Russef, led in the congress by a deputy who today is imprisoned for corruption, and through the imprisonment of Lula, orchestrated by a Judge (Sergio Moro) who made this a political trial, and fulfilled so well his mission that he prevented the election of Lula as president, that last week he became the new Minister of Justice of Bolsonaro.
What is happening today in Brazil is the conclusion of a process of capital recovering from its crisis in an extremely violent way. Today Brazil faces its biggest financial crisis in history. Starting in 2013, a dispute about the causes and solutions of this crisis began. The fragile bases of the recent democracy in Brazil, the inability of the radical left to create an alternative pole to the PT project, and the great capacity that the far right has had to organize (in Brazil and in the world) provide the basis for understanding why Bolsonaro was elected in Brazil.
My family is an example of poor workers who gave Bolsonaro his victory. For them Bolsonaro represents change. In a country where rates of violence have surpassed those of wars such as those in Iraq and in Afghanistan Bolsonaro, with his speech "good bandit is dead bandit", represents security. For my relatives, Bolsonaro represents the fight against corruption. In a country where all traditional parties are plunged in corruption, where even the PT has gained parliamentary support for its government through corrupt relations with traditional parties and has been placed by the media as the great example of a corrupt party, it matters little whether their is evidence that Bolsonaro and his party are also corrupt, what matters is to take the PT out of government.
Bolsonaro's surprising election is explained by the anti-petism, fomented by the large media but also by the leap of organization that the far right has been given worldwide.
The widespread use of fake news in social networks, often financed by entrepreneurs outside of regular campaign funding – a crime in Brazil – was Bolsonaro's main way of organizing a passionate army of militants who are today the basis of Brazilian fascism. There are many similarities to Trump in the way he use hate speech against LGBT groups, quilombolas, indigenous, landless and homeless, promising security and prosperity for conservative Christian families.
But there are also big differences with Trump, both in the neoliberal agenda that Bolsonaro and his new economy minister want to effect, ending social security and state-owned enterprises, but also in the greater aggressiveness of hatred toward the left. Bolsonaro, in addition to ending public universities and labor rights, also announced during the campaign, and reaffirmed one day after the election, that his government will pursue, to arrest the expulsion of all "reds" from the country, pointing mainly to the PT and PSOL.
He intends to resume the persecutions of the military dictatorship, he has already stated that he intends to kill 30,000 people and it is okay to die "innocent", everything to free Brazil from communism and the left. He also pledged to attack all popular governments in Latin America, such as Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia.
For this he will have a wide support network. Most of the bourgeoisie is with him. Most conservative evangelical leaders are with him, like Bishop Edir Macêdo, Owner of Universal Church of Kingdom of God (UCKG, who has 30 churches in the United Kingdom) and owns the second largest communication network in Brazil. The military leadership is with him. The Judiciary summits have already shown that they will not face it.
But do not doubt, we will resist! Today we in PSOL have no doubt that the alternative is popular mobilization and on the streets. We will not succumb to fear of what is to come. We are counting on the formation of a broad democratic and anti-fascist front that opposes parliament and the streets against Bolsonaros government measures, including counting on parties and sectors traditionally linked to the bourgeoisie, but that do not support the Bolsonaro project. We want all Democrats against Bolsonaro and Brazilian fascism! We understand that only a broad front in defense of democracy can oppose the force that fascism has won in Brazil.
PSOL, our party, has grown and demonstrated strength as a pole of organization of the popular movements that will resist in the next years. We grew up in these elections for the national congress and in the main states of the country. We have built an alliance with the indigenous movement and the homeless workers movement that is the best new factor on the Brazilian left. We believe it is possible to push the legitimacy of Fascist rule to the limit. 70% of Brazilians are against any pension reform and the Bolsonaro government will try to apply an ultraliberal reform that wants to end welfare and put a system of savings similar to Pinochet in Chile that filled the pockets of bankers and today starves the retirees.
The moment is terrible, 10 dead by the fascist paramilitary groups in 1 month. Our resistance must be intelligent, we do not want any more martyrs! For this your solidarity is fundamental! We need that our condemnations of Bolsonaro be spread as widely as possible, we need your shelter in the most difficult times. We need international networks of assistance to the movements in Brazil. Why we will not give up! Our hope is not over!
Against the shadow of fascism has the flame of millions of Brazilians who went to the streets on October 20 to show that in Brazil there is popular resistance. This is our strength!
For the memory of Marielle, Moa do Catendê and dozens of social fighters who were murdered for defending our people in recent months, we have no right to retreat! By the blood of our indigenous ancestors, negroes, caboclos, we will not retreat!
Comrades, more than ever, internationalism is a necessity. We need your solidarity!
Socialist Resistance meeting , London 6/11/2018 :Marcelo Ramos (a member of PSOL Partido Socialismo e Liberdade ) on the situation in Brazil after the election of Jair Bolsonaro: Questions and discussion.
url:https://youtu.be/qZhfbwKb5f0
On yer way, Pinochet! The factory workers who
fought fascism from Glasgow
When Scots refused to service Chile’s
jet fighters after the 1973 military coup, their protest all but grounded the
air force – and may have saved prisoners’ lives. Nae Pasaran, a powerful
documentary, tells their story
We are experiencing the biggest rise in support for fascism, the far right, racism, Islamophobia and Antisemitism since the 1930s. In Britain fascists and racists are mobilising on a scale not seen for decades. We must unite against this threat. A range of national figures are supporting this national demonstration. We will shortly update with more details.
The demonstration is initiated by Stand Up To Racism, co-sponsored by Unite Against Fascism and LoveMusic HateRacism, and supported by Diane Abbott MP and John McDonnell MP amongst others. More details will follow.
Heatwaves and hurricanes make it clear: it's time to act on climate change. The recent IPCC report is a landmark for our planet, setting out just what is at stake if we breach 1.5C warming. The Paris agreement was a starting point but we have a long way to go, and it's not just Trump who won't quit fossil fuels. From fracking to a Heathrow third runway, the UK is stalling on climate action.
This December in Poland, countries will negotiate the crucial next steps to keep the Paris climate deal on the rails. It's urgent. But we know we can't depend on governments to represent us at UN talks infiltrated by fossil fuel interests. We need to hear the voices of those in the front line of climate change, those whose land and water is threatened by fossil fuel industry pollution, and those fighting for climate jobs. We need solidarity from all parts of society, as we saw in the unprecedented mobilisation against Trump's UK visit this summer. The government of Poland wants to suppress the voice of civil society, but we will speak out. And send a clear message to our own government to act on climate now. Join us 1st December in London.
[Assembly point by the Polish Embassy in Portland Place, tbc]
This branch/region/trades council notes the current impacts of climate change, including hurricanes, floods, crop failure and heatwaves.
It notes the findings of the recent IPCC report, both the importance of keeping warming below 1.5C because of the huge ecological and human cost of failure, and the scale of the challenge that this presents: "remaking the world in a generation,"
It notes the importance of the UN climate talks in Poland this December at which the Paris 'rule book' will be finalised, and condemns the Polish government's restrictions on protest and civil society, banning spontaneous protest.
It believes that trade unions have a vital role to play in bringing about urgent climate action which is rooted in workers' rights and social justice, and notes that with the talks held in the heart of the Polish coal country, just transition issues will be a key issue in the talks.
It notes that the current targets under the UK Climate Change Act are inadequate, and that the UK is off track to meet even current targets. Most worryingly, some government policies actively increase emissions. These include expanding aviation, promoting fracking, funding fossil fuel projects overseas, reducing fuel duty in real terms, blocking new onshore wind energy in England and introducing financial disincentives to rooftop solar.
The branch/region/trades council therefore resolves:
To publicise and encourage participation in the demonstration in London on 1st December, at the beginning of the UN climate talks, including bringing our union banner.
To hold a branch or public meeting to highlight climate change, invite a speaker to present from the Campaign against Climate Change trade union group;
To ensure all members are aware of national union policy promoting climate action, to ensure that this is implemented locally and to actively engage in further policy development;
To work with other unions, campaign organisations and community groups in the campaigning for action to tackle climate change;
To affiliate to the Campaign against Climate Change and to send a representative to meetings of its Trade Union Group.
[Affiliation fees: branches and trades councils £25, regions and County Associations £50, national unions from £150, depending on size]
Hugo Blanco talks about fighting for indigenous and land rights in Peru Public · Hosted by Socialist Resistance London Going Share Tuesday, November 6, 2018 at 7 PM – 9 PM Community Centre 62 Marchmont Street, WC1N 1AB London, United Kingdom
