UK Workers struggle

5,000 protest in Sheffield as Lib Dems cower behind fence

Lib Dem leader and deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, protected by 1,000 police and a huge metal fence, was the focus of many people's anger.
5,000 people marched on the Lib Dem conference in Shelfield on Saturday to ‘Rage against the Lib Dems’.
Rage at the Liberal liars sparked what was the biggest demonstration in the city for many years, organised by the Right to Work campaign and Sheffield Against the Cuts.
Trade unionists joined the protest in groups, including blocs of council workers, teachers, nurses and railway workers. Students and pensioners came out in force too.
The march was organised by Right to Work and Sheffield Against the Cuts. The CWU mobilised. Friends of the Earth and the local Save Our Sure Start campaign were there. There were lots of families and lots of home made placards. The banging of drums filled the air.

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Angry march through east London for NHS Day X

Angry health workers and students took to the streets of the City of
London yesterday last Wednesday in a protest against cuts and Tory threats to privatise the NHS.
Student nurses and medics, many dressed in blue or white scrubs, joined the 1000-strong march outside the Royal London hospital in Whitechapel, east London.
Together with doctors, nurses, and an array of therapists, they took to the streets chanting, “public health, not private wealth”, and, in a reference to Tory plans going through parliament, “kill, kill, kill the bill, it will make you very ill.”
The protest was organised by a recently-formed network of health workers and students, in all unions and none. Many had spent the week leafleting their lecturers, putting posters in surgeries and putting up stalls outside hospitals.
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London marks women's day
Sunday 13 March 2011
by Louise Nousratpour

Leading communist women gathered in London this weekend to celebrate International Women's Day as an important day for the working class to assess the achievents of the past year and prepare for challenges ahead.
An international panel of women representing several countries' Communist Parties brought greetings to a packed meeting at Marx Memorial Library.
Their tales of struggle against gender-specific discrimination and violence were remarkable similar and their enemies the same - imperialism and neoliberal policies.
But a positive tone was struck by new Cuban ambassador Esther Armenteros, who told the audience that she was proof that gender and race equality could be achieved in a socialist system.
"I was born into a very poor black family living in a society where discrimination was rife and opportunities scarce," she explained.
"I was 12 when the revolution swept Cuba and it changed everything. Suddenly all possibilities were open to people like me. Today, there is equal pay and equal rights in our country. In some areas we have excelled compared to men to a point that the government has had to put quotas in in favour of men."
Ms Armenteros condemned the decades-long US economic blockade on Cuba, adding: "Can you imagine how much better women's situations could have been?"
Chairing the event Communist Party of Britain women's organiser Liz Payne highlighted the significant achievements women have made in capitalist countries.
But she dismissed claims by sections of the bourgeoisie that women should now hang up their marching boots.
"Recent reports from the UN and Unicef show that women's lives everywhere are still alarmingly bleak - they suffer violence and face economic and social discrimination," Ms Payne said.
Representatives from Sudan, Iraq and Iran all condemned their country's Islamic laws restricting women's rights.
Azar Sepehr of the Democratic Organisation of Iranian Women said: "Discrimination against women is enshrined in law in Iran."
Iraqi Women's League speaker Nora Mohammed Ali warned that the puppet regime in her country had pushed women's rights back decades by introducing regressive marriage and other anti-women laws.
"Girls as young as seven are forced to wear the hijab, though the government denies this is happening," Ms Mohammed Ali said.
Amal Gabrala of Communist Party of Sudan called for the women's struggle to be linked to the wider working class struggle: "Let us remember Rosa Luxemburg and the likes of her, whose memory and work continue to inspire us."
Representatives from the Bangladeshi and Indian communist parties also took part.