Tax the rich... say German millionaires...!

You couldn't make it up!

Reports of a demonstration of millionaires in Germany throwing fake banknotes in the air and demanding higher taxes - for themselves! Perhaps they've read the SSP Euro election manifesto where we called for a 10% tax for the super rich in Europe? Sounds like it because they are calling for 5% a year for two years!

Now with George Osborne calling for a limit on bankers bonuses perhaps socialism as an idea whose time is coming may just be the case!

Truth is it just shows how blatant the inequality and injustice is that even the some the rich are starting to get embarrassed!

A tale of two stalls... the SSP stalls in Springburn are always mobbed, while the mainstream parties who have let the people of Glasgow North East down continually, are ignored.

The battle-bus!

The campaign is launched!

Launch of party campaign today. Really proud to share it with two outstanding socialists like John McAllion and Frances Curran.

Key point we wanted to get across was the need to tax the rich to make them pay for the economic crisis they have created.

Our 10% tax on every millionaire would raise £70 billion - imagine the difference that kind of cash could make if used to create of jobs and improve our public services. That vision, in contrast to the dismal alternative of cuts and unemployment on offer form the other parties should be the faultline in this election.

Just as we fought to move free school meals, the scrapping of prescription charges and ditching the Council Tax into the centre stage of Scottish politics so the fight starts here to put the taxing of the rich to redistribute wealth as a defining issue for 2009 and beyond.

The alternative is left...

Infuriated by last weeks fascism on the licence fee courtesy of the BBC. In what appeared to be a quite cynical attempt to boost ratings and create controversy the BBC used our licence fee to give a platform to a group of fascists who preach the politics of hate and division.

Infuriated because we fight for a space in the mass media for our socialist alternative and are denied space for our views. Infuriated because a party that can only a muster nothing on the ground in Glasgow East have been giving a week of free publicity during this election - and then hot on the heels of the BBC - after they have opened the fascist flood-gates, a local Glasgow radio station allows the same evil, nasty bigotry on our airwaves. And what a waste of good eggs. I hope they were out of date.

Makes it even more important that the SSP's alternative from the left is built to answer the failure of the mainstream parties to properly represent working class communities. Fascism has no place on our screen and on our streets and we'll continue to offer an alternative to capitalism and will resist the scapegoating of our fellow citizens of whatever creed or colour.

"Make sacrifices!" is the advice from the rich to the rest of us...

Talks are continuing on the postal dispute and now BA cabin crew re considering a ballot on strike action. No one in this day and age takes strike action lightly but at least both of these events highlight that people are responding to the onslaught from bosses determined to use the economic crisis to further drive down wages and conditions.

At the same time heard today that Chief Executive pay is staying steady. So while the rest of us are meant to accept pay cuts and freezes the Adam Crosier's and Willie Walsh's of this world continue to pocket salaries that run into millions.

On the CWU picket line what struck me as well as the determination to defend our postal services was the outrage that long serving workers felt about a management culture that was about bullying and contempt. This comes from the top, from the same greedy bosses who are demanding sacrifices from us whilst their wealth goes untouched.

Postal Pickets

Some photos of the pickets today. We went along to show our support for these brave workers defending our postal service and fighting for their jobs.

Why I support the Posties...

Click HERE for my reasons
Click HERE for more coverage from the SSP

Me with Willie Marshal CWU Scotland No2 branch

Me outside a Royal Mail Depot - where I will be on Thursday and Friday this week - showing my support on the picket lines.

Defend our door to door posties!

If ever evidence was needed of Labour's capitulation to Thatcherism look no further than their disgraceful complicity with Royal Mail management in their provocative attempts to break this week's national postal strike.

After a ballot that overwhelmingly supported strike action to stop managements attempt to bully the workforce into accepting the imposition of changes to their terms and conditions it is outrageous that the response of management to this is to consider bringing in an army of scab labour in an attempt to break the strike.

It is difficult to believe that this threat has not been tacitly supported by the labour heirarchy as part of their determination to break the CWU to smooth the way for their declared goal of handing over our postal service to their big business friends.

Everyone should get behind the postal workers this week and beyond as they are fighting to defend a national door to door service. Labour's talk of standing up for people in Glasgow North East is again shown to be hypocrisy. When push comes to shove profit will always come before people for them.

Colin Fox Speaks on the Jeremy vine Show, 19.10.09 (the discussion begins at 7 minutes 50 seconds)

The fight for women's rights is still raging...

Attended the 'Gude Cause' march In Edinburgh yesterday to celebrate 100 years of women's suffrage. Delighted to be part of such a big and positive demonstration.


Went along for two main reasons. the first was simply to celebrate and honour those that fought for the right to vote for women. They didn't wait to seek approval from anybody but instead realised that they would have to organise themselves to fight for what they believed was right. In the face of whatever obstacles where thrown in their way they kept going and changed the course of history. Power lies in people once they are organised and determined and those that seem powerful can do little to stop them. Its a simple but crucial lesson. Things can and will change if we want them to - we just have to stick together and fight in the way that the suffragettes did.

The second reason is that the fight for equality and rights for women is far from over. I have two daughters and they are growing up in a world where they are still likely to receive less pay for work of equal value, face the threat of domestic or sexual violence or be bombarded with images that objectify and demean women. Tackling these issues will take more than just the vote to change. For me they are part and parcel of the struggle for a society that is based on co-operation and respect, not exploitation and inequality. Celebrate our past but build for the future that's why I was on the Gude Cause march.

Get Scotland Working! (...and the Tories won't do it)

It seems like the eighties are back. If it's not Crockett and Tubbs in the remake of Miami Vice or bands ditching their guitars for synths the eighties revival is in full swing. As a child of the eighties, if nothing else, it may allow me to look at my old photos without being completely embarrassed.


Another more depressing side of the eighties is reappearing however, with growing levels of unemployment, particularly amongst the young. When I left school in 1982 I remember feeling lucky that I was doing so to start a job as amongst my school pals not too many of them were as fortunate. This was the time when the question you asked people was not so much,'what do you do?', but 'do you have a job?'. Too many lives were blighted by unemployment as the Tories, followed by New Labour, re-shaped the economy to one based on low pay and job insecurity.

Not another wasted generation will be the slogan of the March for Jobs that is being organised in the Glasgow North East constituency later this month. We can't sit back and allow the future of thousands to be crushed under the juggernaut of corporate profit and capitalism as the price once again to be paid for the failure of the system. Resistance has to start now and our march for jobs can be part of the process of rejecting a future of unemployment and low pay for our young.