Professional Documents
Culture Documents
ISSUE 81
SUMMER 2001
£1
PANTS TO COMIC
RELIEF
Thank you to the BBC and hundreds of much they care. Companies in the city
fading celebrities and entertainers for that spend 364 days a year pillaging the
inflicting yet another Comic Relief on us earth are suddenly devoting one day to
all in March. Has it never occurred to the saving it.
likes of Lenny Henry, Bob Geldof,
Vanessa Feltz etc that if charity could Anybody in the office who does not want
solve people’s problems it would have to wear a big red nose and a pair of silly
done so by now? Does anybody pants is instantly labelled as at best a
“Further to our meetings and discussions with them, we are seriously believe Africa (to take an misery guts, at worst as some sort of
offering the Bloomsbury Forum our full support of the Freedom Party. The example) is a healthier and more inadequate who cannot relate to his or her
leadership team consists of successful businessmen and top civil servants. prosperous continent now than it was colleagues. Even worse is the way the
The accounts will be run by a lecturer and audited by a certified accountant. before Live Aid? Of course it is not. |biggest wankers in senior
A board of trustees has been set up, headed by an esteemed barrister” People are poor, people are sick people management are portrayed as incredibly
Former British National Party high fliers Steve and Sharon Edwards encouraging are fucked over because of global zany generous guys because for one day
BNP members to jump ship to a new far-right party. They are very easily capitalism, not because Mrs Smith of a year they wear a silly shirt, donate £50
impressed by people with posh jobs aren’t they? Congleton has failed to send £10 to an and allow a few of the junior ranks to have
appeal fronted by Boyzone. a drink in the office.
What has become so offensive about Class War would like to work with others
SCARING THE HORSES? Comic Relief is the way so many big
employers, and their personnel
to organise a national phone in sick day
on the next Comic Relief is upon us. Join
The not guilty verdict for Vincent Bethell, the “right to be departments use it as a day to show how us.
naked” protestor, is probably more significant than it at first
appears. Whatever you think of Mr Bethell or his protests,
this was the first time he had appeared before a jury. On ADVERTISE IN CLASS WAR
every occasion he had appeared before a magistrate he
had been found guilty.
To advertise in britain's best selling class struggle Anarchist
The police, Crown Prosecution Service and Jack ‘Boots’ publication, please contact London Class War. Rates are:
Straw want to limit the number of jury trials precisely be-
cause jury’s are more likely to return verdicts like this than 1/16th page - £15
some reactionary old tosser of a magistrate.
1/8th page - £20
What’s the betting that the next time Mr Bethell is arrested
the charge is deliberately framed so as it can only be heard We reserve the right to refuse adverts from hippies, known rip off
at a magistrates court? merchants and people with their eyebrows too close together.
Class War Issue 79 3
JOURNO WATCH
offer. The Vote for Nobody Campaign is a
good way to deal with the forthcoming because they control the world
charade. Check www.geocities.com/ capitalist economy that oppresses us all,
votenobody/ the second because they are led by a
bunch of rich reactionaries who want Back in November 1999 a police trot out mug shots of alleged
One new development this time round are the the countryside for themselves when demonstration was organised at rioters. To do this they not only have to
various Socialist Alliance candidates. Last time really it belongs to us all. somewhat short notice at Euston get their own camera crews in place, but
these activists campaigned for people to vote Station to coincide with the huge N30 they rely on photographers and
for Tony Blair. They were wrong then – why There are a lot of local campaigns that event in Seattle. At the time Class War journalists from both the national media
should we believe them this time round? need to be done as well, maybe you will felt somewhat pessimistic about the and so-called “independent journalists”.
be fighting the bosses in your workplace, chances of taking on the huge police
On the legal front, Straw, Blair and co attacking penny pinching councils like operation on the day and decided to Class War believes that anyone taking
continue moving the country to the right. Blair Hackney, or helping other struggles stay at home and watch it on the telly. photographs without permission at a
has got away with far more in his first term as where ever they can be found - like that Given the events that evening we were demonstration is a threat to the security
Prime Minister than Thatcher did in hers. of prisoner Mark Barnsley. The only probably right, although it did not stop of that demonstration. We urge all
Ironically the Prevention of Terrorism Act came answer to ruling class attacks is to the “reporters” at ITN’s Tonight With activists to think very carefully about
into force alongside a media panic about encourage, and take part in fight back. Trevor MacDonald claiming we were people filming around them, and to be
animal rights terrorists whilst Farmers in Just do it! not only present but helped organise particularly cautious about the never
the event! ending stream of sympathetic
independent journalists doing the rounds.
Amongst the many people injured on
the evening by the police was a Journo Watch 2 – News Of The
journalist, Danny Penman. Penman Screws
apparently attended that evening In the last Class War we carried a quote
because he had received an about Neville Thurlbeck, the News of the
anonymous tip-off that fascists from World crime correspondent who is a
C18 would be present (that he took registered police informer. We suspect
this seriously perhaps shows the level the same goes for many of his
of Penman’s intelligence) After colleagues. Thurlbeck, who uses the
having his arm broken by the cops he pseudonym Ray Levene amongst
circulated many activist groups others, specialises in the seedy tales that
appealing for witnesses. Sadly when have characterised the News of the World
Mr Penman was approached to help for a generation. Normally their reporter
defendants arrested that evening, he visits some respectable
refused point blank. Journalists are suburban house for the Women’s
often described as being parasitical Institute coffee morning, discovers it is
on the anti-capitalist movement but they in fact a knocking shop, and rushes back
are rarely as blatant as Danny to London to file his story usually ending
Penman. his report of suburban sex with the cliché
Foot In Mouth
There’s Now’t as Queer as Trots Disease -
“It is clear that socialist groups don’t have any influence on this Different Face, Same Shit!
In a recent article in the S.W.P.
The Politics Of The
protest but they falsely claim all gains for themselves.
Additionally they are worried about the continuous growth and
theoretical magazine (is that possible?) Countryside
entitled ‘Anarchy in the UK’ we are treated
popularity of Anarchism and its influence upon the to all the usual Trotskyist rejections of our Alliance
anti-globalisation movement” ideas of self determination in favour of
A Polish Anarchist in a letter to Class War following their line of the dictatorship of the The best news of 2001 so far has been the
last year’s S26 protest in Prague. proletariat. In plain language what the cancellation of the March 18th “Liberty and
S.W.P. mean by the dictatorship of the Livelihood” march planned through central
proletariat is the dictatorship by a few of London by the Countryside Alliance. Up to
The politics of the British left has seen widespread concern about the rape of their, unelected and unaccountable, 300,000 toffs and toadies, foxhunters and
some profound changes in the last two the planet and oppression of workers central committee members. Under this fawners, bumpkins and barristers, idiots and
decades. From the early 80’s when around the world by multi-nationalists, doctrine they will rule how we should all inbreeds were expected to congregate at
Militant were in control of Liverpool city these centralised parties have got live our lives which, if they are any Embankment. As their Land Rover
council, the Socialist Workers Party nowhere. The inevitable slide into oblivion example, will be drinking cappuccino in Discovery’s would have had difficulty
(S.W.P.) could mobilise thousands of of our once hated enemy, (the Trots not wine bars in Kensington. getting through the traffic, many were
students to rallies in London and there Capitalism that is), is in profound
expected to walk past Parliament,
were a multitude of other Trotskyist groups contrast to the successes that anarchist Whilst the S.W.P. treat us to a parody of Downing Street, Trafalgar Square and then
all claiming to be inheritors of Trotsky’s politics has had during this time. what anarchism stands for, which is to stop off at the Ritz for a quick sherry. Those
ideals. They have now reached the excellently rebutted in Freedom, they who could not get their servants to walk the
lowest point in their fortunes for a long From a few meusli crunching wierdo’s in don’t take a single step back from the rest of the way for them would then be left to
time. the 1960’s, anarchism can now mobilise idea of this dictatorship. According to the stagger into Hyde Park, where the march
enough forces world-wide to stop S.W.P, “Lenin’s development of a was due to finish.
Whereas the major Trot groups once meetings of the I.M.F., force governments Marxist theory of the party was so
hated each other more than they hated to change policies on road building , important... Such a party [the S.W.P. of A figure of 300,000 may well be an
the Tories, (Peoples Front of Judea, genetically modified crops and other course] will... be centralised, in the sense under estimate. Two special Eurostars were
fucking splitters!), they are now so weak environmental issues and generally be a that once it has voted on a course of booked to take exiled English nobs from Paris
that along with a rag bag of other lefties pain in the arse to police forces around action then all its members will [like a flock to London, 7 planes from Inverness to
(including the Communist Party of Great the world. As we all know the internet is a of obedient sheep] follow that course, or London Luton airport, and most of the top
Britain) they have to huddle together in wonderful thing and anyone who has once it has decided on a principle all its hotels in London were booked up for the
the newly formed ‘Socialist Alliance’. access can soon see that while the Trots members will adhere to that principle.” weekend. Add to that the “countrymen” who
Having failed to rouse the working class are ghettoised in a few, mostly western
would stay at their London address that
to join their ‘revolutionary’ organisations European countries anarchism has Do we get a hint of 1984 ‘doublespeak’ weekend, and the hundreds of coaches and
through Trotskyist dogma they will soon spread its wings and covers all four here? What they mean is that they trains booked, some estimates move up
be entering the electoral lottery and ask corners of the globe. decide what’s best for us and if we don’t towards 450,000.
them to vote for them in Parliamentary like it, tough! Indeed the article itself
elections. How the vanguard have fallen! Vampire Alert explains why we anarchists reject this Class War has covered the rise of the
The success of the anarchist movement parody of a revolutionary organisation, it Countryside Alliance ever since 1997, and
Principles of the Gutter in winning so many new converts to our is “undemocratic, sowing the seeds of we have been involved in opposing their
And what about the principles of these ideas and actions has now led to one of dictatorship and stifling the will of the activities around the country. That they
‘revolutionaries’? After the Scottish the more bizarre twists in the politics of individual.” Nuff said. attempt to disguise their demands to murder
section of Militant split off from the rest the S.W.P. Those of you with experience
animals for fun as some sorts of civil rights
of the British party, becoming the of Trot politics will be well used to these But according to them our rejection of issue is a sign of their weakness not their
‘Scottish Socialist Party’ their new führer middle class warriors doing everything their politics is because of “the failure of strength. Quite simply they have already lost
Tommy Sheridan, (the same Tommy possible to either distance themselves anarchism to understand the centrality of all the other arguments.
Sheridan who once offered to ‘name from groups like Class War, or just the working class itself.” This comes from
name’s’ to the cops after the poll tax riot), ignore us, although many of their a party whose central committee is so We are not aware of ONE civil rights
became a member of the Scottish members often realised what a group of middle class they shit cucumber issue in the whole of the twentieth
Parliament. Not only has he joined the tossers they were and came over to our sandwiches and whose leading member, century that was supported by the groups
Scottish people’s elected oppressors he ideas anyway. In the last year, however, the journalist Paul Foot, had a father who that make up the Countryside Alliance. Not
also showed his true socialist principles the S.W.P. have been trying its hardest was the governor of Jamaica! And they one campaign for workers rights was
when he got married in a Catholic church. to appear to be us. have the cheek to say we don’t supported. One of their few campaign
Perhaps it was one of those paedophile understand the centrality of the working issues apart from promoting foxhunting is
priests who spliced the knot for him. At In Manchester, recently, a number of class! Finally the S.W.P. dismiss us about restricting not increasing
least he was happy to support a good posters were seen around the university. anarchists as a whole because freedom – they have lobbied hard against
Stalinist tradition of the Millies and took Whilst at first glance they looked like they “whatever ideals and gut instincts the right to roam.
his honeymoon in Cuba. were by the Manchester C.W. group, with individual anarchists may have,
the slogan of ‘Fuck’ something or other, anarchism, both in word and deed, fails That new Labour waver rather than stand up
As for the S.W.P it seems that getting and with the Nike flash ‘just do it’ in the to provide a roadworthy vehicle for to these characters proves everything we have
into bed with what is left of the English graphics, on closer inspection they were human liberation.” Yeah like Trotsky and said about the Labour Party over the years.
Trot movement has not increased their by the University S.W.P. This poster that Lenin who murdered thousands of Labour are open to pressure and will buckle
paper sales and they are now having sported classic C.W. imagery had the workers at Kronstadt have shown a – providing that pressure is applied from the
some seriously bad financial problems. slogan ‘Fuck tuition fees occupy the better example. right, not the left, from above not from below.
It has recently come to our attention that University’. Yet more dull S.W.P. go
one of their full time staff, the much loved nowhere student politics. The End is Nigh Class War members have been
Julie Waterson (who we all felt sorry for Although the Trots can still pull out a good instrumental in setting up a group that is the
when battered by a copper at the This comes on top the most recent major display of paper sellers on most demo’s exact opposite of the Countryside
Welling march, not!), has recently been parasitic political campaign of the S.W.P. the lengths they now go to recruit enough Alliance. Look out for the thousands of
made redundant with, apparently, much and their efforts to hijack the anarchist canon fodder to raise money for their Urban Alliance stickers going up and contact
falling out amongst the comrades. What’s led campaigns against the world bank. apparatchiks and their desperate attempts the Urban Alliance on 07946 687192 to
more their need of cash means they are Although the Trots were nowhere to be to mimic the rejuvenated anarchists oppose the Countryside March when it
now, indirectly, supporting the hunt scum. seen when any action took place at movement shows that as a political force happens. In the meantime get out there
In a recent copy of Private Eye the Seattle or Prague they are trying Trotskyism is on its way out. But we sabbing their hunts, slashing the tyres on
Countryside Alliance paid for a full page to get credit for the brave work of others. should be aware that before these their Range Rovers and encouraging your
advert, money that Eye used to pay their It is now obligatory for all of their parasites finally disappear we should friends to hit these bastards hard.
printers who are, yes you’ve guessed it, members to wear badges claiming be wary of the damage that they can,
the S.W.P! (East End offset who print themselves to be ‘anti-capitalists’. But their and often do, cause to the causes they
Private Eye and Searchlight amongst apparent new-found liking for dressing leech off.
others is owned by the S.W.P) up in anarchist clothing isn’t a
road to Damascus conversion after the When they do finally give out their last
The Failure of Trotskyism death of their, totally unlamented, dying gasp, however, no more will
The recent demise of groups like Militant leader Tony Cliff (boy did we laugh) that anyone be led into the blind alley of
and the S.W.P. can be put down to the we anarchists have been right all Marxist-Leninist politics and we
failure of Trotskyist politics. With the along. No when you scratch can get on with the fight against
massive discontent against Thatcher in the surface the same shitty oppressive the real enemy and not have to
the 80’s, Major in the 90’s and now Trotskyist dogma lies just below the watch out for them trying to stab us in
disillusion with Blairite politics as well as surface. the back.
6 Class War Issue 79
Beware of Byers
The Government has recently announced statement from Chancellor Schroder interests it was formed to and Byers have made references to business
plans to review how workforces are which said “Germany has no advance. Blair has courted big men as “wealth creators”. The fact is, any
consulted regarding redundancies. It difficulties with the consultation business since his election as wealth created in society is made by the
would be a mistake to imagine any directive”. leader in 1994. One of his first working class and the only role bosses play is
sudden conversion to compassionate actions was to drop employment mis-managing affairs to such an extent that
treatment of workers by the Blair It is thought the directive could rights for workers from day one there needs to be redundancies in the first
administration. The real reason is a come into force by 2004 unless of their employment, a measure place.
draft European directive establishing a the Labour government can come which was backed by his
“general framework” for informing and up with sufficient delaying tactics predecessor John Smith, hardly Instead of works councils, we really
consulting employees in the European to put the measure off. a revolutionary himself! Both Blair need Workers Councils and a system which
Union. gears manufacture to the
Works councils are no needs of society which is
Stephen Byers, the secretary of state more than a run by and on behalf
for trade and industry has reiterated concessionary piece of the working class. Need-
the government’s opposition to window dressing from less to say, Byers won’t
European legislation on this subject. the E.U. and anyone be calling for these, pre-
Byers has presided over the decimation who imagines real ferring ‘social partnership’
of the British motor industry in much gains could be made between bosses and T.U.C.
the same way as the Conservatives did from such bodies is unions. He is desperate
for the mining industry. surely naive. for this idea to work as
his career is on the
Businessmen fear the European The real issue is line and he needs the
legislation could lead to works councils. the way Labour T.U.C. to shore up his
Britain, Germany, Denmark and Ireland has flung aside tarnished image. Let’s hope
have formed a blocking minority even the remotest the whole thing falls flat
although the German government look pretence of looking and we can say bye bye
as though they may pull out after a after the class whose Byers.
Class War Issue 79 137
CW: What have your relations been like JFHS: Legally a Judicial Review of the
with the Metropolitan Police since the Crown Prosecution Service’s decision
shooting? Have they offered an apology not to prosecute the officers concerned.
and compensation? Harry’s family are going on a national
speaking tour with with other families
JFHS: Our relations have been hostile. campaigning for justice. This will lead up
No apology or compensation has been to a huge demonstration in
offered, whilst the officers concerned October/November time. We don’t want
remain unnamed and on the beat. to give too many details away right now
but it will be lively!
CW: At one stage letters strongly
criticising the campaign started Now is very much the time for
appearing in the local media. What was people to give this campaign the
all that about? support it deserves. Contact
JUSTICE FOR HARRY STANLEY
JFHS: A bloke called Yasmin Fyas had
PO BOX 29644, LONDON E2 8TS.
been slagging off the campaign in the
Hackney Gazette letters page. No one
TELEPHONE 0788 4096222.
3. Lord Melchett, no not of Blackadder 9. The Hon Sir Jonathon Porritt. Yet People in East Timor have a long record
fame - the Lord is one of the golden boys another old Etonian, Porritt has been of fighting against imperialist
of Greenpeace who do anything to get influential in the Green Party and Friends aggression having locked horns with the
on telly. of the Earth, and is now Director of the Portugese, Japanese and Indonesians
over the centuries. Let’s hope they turn
on the UN officers, supposedly there
In September 1998 a former resident of push ahead with plans to cut the salaries and as tellers assistants at schools and libraries
Hackney returned to the east London terms and conditions of its workers. A serving as polling stations. These premises FIRING FROM THE HIP
borough to talk about the perils of Social streamline, fitter Hackney is more need to be opened in the morning, and they
Exclusion. He should know. The former acceptable to big business. By putting up normally are by a union member. They have As a rule American politicians are even
resident was Prime Minister Tony Blair who rents and council tax, whilst reducing council to be staffed throughout the day. If workers worse set than British one’s, but then again
lived on Mapledene Road for 6 years in the services they intend to not only reduce their simply decline to volunteer on polling day most not many people have heard of Tom
1980s, and wisely turned down the debts (which, despite talk of bankruptcy are of the polling stations will be closed. Not their Alciere, the former Republican (!)
opportunity to become a Labour arguable no worse than some other inner – problem. No legal action can be taken against representative on the New Hampshire
Councillor in the borough. He has gone a city council’s) but to tighten the vice on the them, or their unions as they are simply legislature. In January Alciere resigned
long way in 20 years. poorest people in the borough. Council leader declining to volunteer. after a newspaper discovered he had
Max Caller and the Lab-Tory leadership of placed hundreds of anti-police statements
Blair’s visit was to praise the Jules Pipe and Eric Ollerenshaw appear It will however be the problem of council leader on Internet discussion sites.
re-development of the so confident of Max Caller, who is the returning officer for
Holly Street estate. He their positions the election, something that involves onerous We are happy to reproduce his views in
went on state “What that they have legal responsibilities. As it is the council and full:
an incredible simultaneously the councillors that are the problem, what
transformation. This taken on a large better response could there be than to “There is nothing wrong with
is the type of section of their ensure on council election day May 3rd, they slaughtering a cop. Just throw the
initiative we need to workforce, and a get a timely kick up the arse. To disrupt the carcass into the dumpster with the rest
see replicated across significant section parliamentary elections by this tactic would of the garbage. Cops are nothing but
the country” of the local be an act of national significance. vicious, brutal thugs anyway”
population. The last
As Hackney’s time they tried to do "Cor life is very busy for you “Nobody will ever be safe until the last
self-induced financial that was during the Urban Alliance people innit ay. cop is dead”
crisis has taken hold Poll Tax and we all Why don’t you get out there and
one of the council’s first know how that start killing some foxes I killed a “It’s unfortunate that cops do make it
suggested cutbacks ended up. few this morning and by the way necessary (to kill them) when they’re
was …. on the Holly stop putting stickers on my car." waging a war on drugs, and I view cops
Street Estate. One Two excellent Yet more rigorous intellectual debate as enemy officers”
block is reserved for methods of fighting from the world of killing animals for
pensioners only, and the council have fun. Mr Alciere, who inspects circuit boards
comes with a concierge. The Labour-Tory been proposed which we endorse at a factory for a living, denied he had
coalition’s suggestion was to cut the concierge totally. One is a sort of selective rent strike “Get out of bed you lazy fuckers. misled voters saying no one had asked
to reduce the council’s deficit. No mention of where residents simply pay their rent at the While you’re lying there wanking, him about his views on the police. His
course of cutting their own salaries or 2000-01 rate, rather than the increased rate. I’m out there killing foxes.” proposed bills, which are now unlikely
expenses, and certainly no suggestion that If tens of thousands of residents do this, the Telephone message left on the to go forward, included the legalisation
Tony Blair himself, so keen to promote the council’s already low expectations of rent Urban
th Alliance phone on the of drugs, reducing the minimum drink-
area 18 months earlier, should return for this collection will fall even further. 5th March 2001. Nice to see that ing age and the replacement of schools
part of the incredible transformation! at the time the ‘country sports’ with online learning. You are wasting
Like all workplaces Hackney Council relies fraternity were obeying the call to your time in the Republican Party Mr
Hackney council has a strategy. Despite 3 on the goodwill of its staff. Each general stay out of fields due to the foot and Alciere, from what we have heard you
brilliant strikes by its workforce, it wishes to election hundreds of staff volunteer to work mouth outbreak. should join Class War at once!
10 Class War Issue 79
COAL WAS OUR LIFE COAL IS OUR LIFE P.A.I.N “OUR UNIVERSE POLITICAL PRISONERS
by Royce Turner (£12.99, Sheffield University Press)
STOPS HERE” IN FRANCE
(CD, available from all good record
In the 1950s a book regarded as a culture, politics, vision that you choose shops) In February this year two anti-fascist
classic, Coal Is Our Life studied a pit town to lump together. Certainly grim toil, activists from the city of Marseille in the south
in West Yorkshire – the people, their death, injury, disease, conservatism are This is the long awaited second full-length of France, Yves Peirat and William Ferrari,
aspirations, their lives. Royce Turner has also words and concepts which battle with release from Propaganda and Information were convicted of a number of militant anti
returned to the same locations and found the former descriptions of pit life – no Network. Styling themselves as south fascist actions. Between 1991 and 1998 as
a devastating contrast. one here is looking for that. Instead we London’s finest exponents of nuclear dub, the Franc Tireur Partisans (FTP Partisan
have poverty strewn, heroin addicted, genetically modified ska and BSE laced Sharpshooters) Peirat and Ferrari were alleged
Turner is polemical, even confrontational. crime-ridden villages. punk rock, P.A.I.N should need no to have set fire to and bombed offices of the
The book erupts from the suffocating introduction to many Class War readers. French fascist party the Front National (FN)
swamp of PR sociology which has “The pop factory represented the only as well as buildings where they met.
buried the decimated pit villages since the foreign investment in Featherstone. Yet The album’s theme is the prison system
mass closures of 1992-3. The book foreign investment we were told and its use against the defenceless, and Although they did not injure anybody, on the
challenges the self-congratulatory throughout the 1980s – as laws that cannot be defended. In our sixth anniversary of the day that a group of FN
business schemes, job creation schemes, deindustrialisation savaged large parts universe they don’t exist ……. fly posters murdered a young north African,
retraining schemes, regeneration and of the economy - was going to be the Ibrahim Ali, the court of Marseille condemned
reinvestment schemes who constantly tell salvation of local economies. Looking For more information on P.A.I.N. Yves Peirat to a staggering 5 years in prison
us they are at work, which everywhere at a small town like this gets you away check the Iron Man website and William Ferrari to 18 months suspended
publish reports and surveys (they seem from the platitudes and generalizations http://www.music.mercia.org/ironman/pain/ sentence. The two were also condemned to
to be the biggest growth area themselves) of national politicians who would not .en pay the fascist councils they attacked 750,000
yet still poverty, deprivation and loss even know where Featherstone was francs (approx £75,000) in damages.
remain. How can so many organizations, except when it was needed to provide a
awash with European and lottery money rock solid Labour seat for some anointed NOTES FROM THE These actions were carried out to combat the
be running so fast and yet standing still? rising star …… BORDERLAND rise of the extreme right in the south of France
Magazine, Issue 3, £3 from Class War represented not only by the murder of Ibrahim
On housing in Featherstone in 1996: “The Yet these were the two themes of the Ali, but by oppressive racist regimes taking
or from Larry O’Hara, BM Box 4769
families that lived in them were beset by 1980s and much of the 1990s. A newly control in a number of southern French towns
London WC1N 3XX
social and economic problems. On top rejuvenated small business sector, and and cities: these included Orange, Toulon and
of that the residents were struggling to inward investment by multi-nationals Vitrolles which is like the British National Party
Notes from the Borderland goes from
survive in the face of a poor local were going to transform the economy. holding a majority of council seats in
strength to strength. This issue contains
reputation. It is almost as if the houses Neither has happened in Featherstone, Liverpool, Blackpool and Chester.
the first detailed, serious analysis of the
are a physical representation of hopes and neither will”
1999 nailbomb campaign in London, as
dashed of a vision for the future turned The radicalisation of the methods used by the
opposed to the police/Searchlight
sour. People had secure employment, The author gets sucked down too FTP was a way to show the fash that their
sponsored analysis provided elsewhere.
brand new modern houses, what were deep by the depression and despair opposition would not give in to their
Given one of the survivors of the Soho bomb
seen as good prospects for their kids. he sees all around him. Yet class anger intimidation and also that alternatives to state
is taking legal action over the police’s
Now forty odd years later, the houses remains 13 years after the defeat led opposition to fascism exists. The actions
failure to prevent the bomb, this promises
are crumbling, and the lives have of the miners strike, when Ian MacGregor of the FTP gained a large degree of popular
to be the first chapter in a story of national
crumbled too. Old battered cars sit on died, someone felt enough to support.
significance.
oil-soaked drives. If it is sunny people go onto the site of a former Barnsley
sit on the door step for half a day. There’s colliery and paint a tribute Class War fully supports the action and
Londoners will find the analysis of the
nothing much else to do.” on the walls! principles that these two anti fascist
Lawrence enquiry by Russell Miller equally
activists showed. The punitive sentence that
ground breaking. An enquiry seized upon
The book points to areas none of the Attend the annual Durham Miners Gala Peirat received from the French state is clearly
by the liberal left as earth-shattering and
incoming social missionaries can seven years after the last Durham meant to be a lesson to other anti-fascist
some sort of defining moment in history,
comprehend – as they never understood Colliery closed and see the pride activists. To help fight for the freedom of Peirat
looks very different under a critical light.
what we had in pit communities in the first and class anger as the banners and removal of the fines support groups have
The liberal MacPherson basically delivered
place, how the hell can they understand retake the streets carrying their old been started up by French anti-fascist groups.
us no justice for the Lawrence family, no
what we have lost? message of class struggle and socialism.
police officers prosecuted or sacked,
50,000 turned out in July 2000. If you want to help Yves and William, a benefit
publication both on the Internet and in the
It is more than the sum of many parts – At the time of writing the NUM is balloting t-shirt is available for 65 French francs (about
initial report of witnesses home addresses
roots, pride, class identity, community, again for strike action. Class politics £6.50 but if you send them a tenner it would
and ultimately the likely removal of the law
still strike a chord in cover postage and give a donation) from:
of double jeopardy.
pit communities, but Solidarite Resistance Anti-Fasciste,
it would be a 21 ter Rue Voltaire, 75011, Paris, France.
The constant themes of O’Hara’s work are
downright lie to
the use of the media by the police and
suggest most eyes Information is also available from the
security services for their own propaganda
had their vision committee for the liberation of Yves Peirat and
purposes, and analysis of the breakdown
fixed in that direction. William Ferrari at:
in relationships between different sections
Comité, Theatre Toursky, Passage Leo
of the state. Given the lazy way some
The antisocial FERRE, 13003, Marseille.
Anarchists tend to view the state as a
spread of emptiness
monolithic block, rather than as a vehicle
consumes everything
around it and one
for overlapping and sometimes competing
sections of the ruling class, we hope Notes SOLIDARITY NEEDED IN
needs real
determination not to
from the Borderland goes from strength to
strength. POLAND
succumb to it. We
need a national fight No we don’t mean Lech Welesa and his
back linking these i Simon Jones Campaign Roman Catholic Church front group!
solated pit villages to Solidarity is needed in Poland and throughout
struggles and issues On 6th March Richard Martell Europe with Tomasz Wilkoszewski who is
nationwide, we need of Chichester appeared in court serving 15 years for the murder of a Polish
a return of vision charged with the manslaughter nazi. Tomasz was jailed for 15 years after Polish
and hope. of Simon Jones at Shoreham Docks. activists fought back against the rising tide of
Simon was killed on his first nazism, particularly in youth culture in Poland.
This is a book that day at work. Martell’s company, His appeal was recently refused so this
needs to be read – Euromin, face a separate charge of campaign needs to be kick started to shame
lying down and dying corporate manslaughter. the authorities. He has already served 4 years.
has never been our
way of dealing with That this case has reached the courts Donations and mesasages of support should
hardship. is a testimony to got to:
the superb work
“The Manufacturing, Science and Finance Union calculates that done by Simon’s Warhead, PO Box 129, 15-662, Bialystok
friends and 26, Poland.
Vauxhall has made about £100,000 profit per employee over the family over the ABC Poland, PO Box 5, 60-966 Poznan 31
past decade” past three years. Poland.
The Guardian 20th January 2001 discussing the proposed closure of the Vauxhall Well done!
plant in Luton. How much has your boss made out of you in the past decade? Also e-mail rozbrat@friko2.onet.pl
Class War Issue 79 11
BILLY ELLIOTT daughters of miners were taught free of HACKNEY HECKLER WORKING CLASS FIRST!
(PG, all main cinemas) charge during the strike. (Issue 3, local newssheet, SAE from PO THE WORKING CLASS AND
Box 38, 136 Kingsland High Street, ANTI-CAPITALISM
Lets face it the character of Billy was Having said all that I got a sick feeling as London E8 2NS)
the film opens portraying Billy’s dad as a by Jacob Pugh (£2 from AK Press, PO
always going to have a hard time, Box 12766, Edinburgh EH8 9YE plus 60p
regardless of the interest in ballet. He violent brooding man, and feared this As Hackney Council and its crises
would be the caricature of the miners as postage)
seems to have been a pretty weird kid unfold, local opposition takes on new
before he got interested in that or a whole. Thankfully it was not. Instead it forms and formats. The Hackney
was his dad’s way of coping with the loss This timely pamphlet contains much that
discovered his best mate liked dressing Heckler takes on a newssheet role is up Class War’s street containing
up in his sisters dresses and wearing his of his wife, left with two lads to look after promoting local events and
in the middle of a long strike and no money strong criticism of middle class
mam’s make-up. With those qualities in demonstrations (congratulations to the environmentalists and reaching a
a Sunderland pit village perhaps boxing he had more than most on his plate be- workers who burnt their new terms and
fore the youngest lad starts conclusion that will have many so-called
was not a bad choice in the first place! conditions outside Hackney Town Hall) revolutionaries biting their pillows in
skipping the light fandango. He comes an expose role - look out for Council
through it all and thankfully without horror “the struggle for working class
Billy’s gravitation toward dance and leader Jules Pipe riding round in a taxi affluence should be at the centre of left
ballet in particular is essentially a story becoming a scab. at council expense - and an ability to grasp wing struggle”.
of an individual swimming against the tide nettles.
of expected and required behaviour. Given that location was obviously
important to the film, the makers could Such clear, non-moralistic language is a
Earlier explorations of this theme have Hackney’s latest scandal, involving the breath of fresh air, although other
found some hapless lad expected to join have worked harder on getting actors rigging of council elections by certain
from the region. With a couple of sections of the pamphlet fail to pack a
his brothers and dad down the mine, Jewish politicians in Stamford Hill, has punch. Mr Pugh seems a bit to taken with
when he aspires to stay on at school/go exceptions dialect was purged from the gone largely unreported in the national
film, as it always is in films focused on sociological studies, and talk of “the left”
to university/be a writer etc media and entirely unreported in the may look very redundant indeed in a
Tyne or Wear. You only have to look at revolutionary media. They fear of the
the verbally filleted accents of Byker decade’s time. The publishers,
In Billy Elliot this story is updated using conservative left is that to comment on Anti-Capitalist Debate Press, may be
not the hard labour of pit work but the Grove to see what I mean. We are these issues in detail plays into the hands
eventually left with that ‘north of ones to watch if these themes are further
struggle on the picket line during the of the extreme right. The Hackney developed.
84-5 strike. It remains a story of somewhere’ voice that does not come Heckler rightly points out that to sweep
working class hard rootin tootin fighting from anywhere but is meant to convey these issues under the carpet plays into
manhood set against the more genteel the impression it is not from down south. the hands of the extreme right. ORGANISE... TO RESIST
intellectualism of the arty and creative This is a good film, worth seeing more Dec. 2000. No. 3. Magazine of the
world of the would be escapee. than once. I have reservations about the Since the rise of the anti-capitalist Anarcho-Syndicalist Federation
extent of the reaction to the ballet classes. movement the most significant omission (Australia). $1
Some on the left (most notably the Weekly The strike had opened up closed pit has been the failure to translate into P.O. Box 231, Westgate, NSW 2048,
Worker and Freedom) have seriously communities to new tolerances and other reality the slogan “Think global, Act Australia.
savaged the film as being anti-working ways of living, at least for a time. When Local” Perhaps the Hackney Heckler is
class. Violent miners are contrasted to the Hatfield main branch of the NUM was a first step down that road. This little number is typical of
the nice middle class world of ballet and adopted by the LSE Gay and Lesbian fundamentalist conservative anarchist
the arts. I did not get this at all. This is Society and their collections helped keep thought and obsessions. On page 3
not a film about the miners strike, the miners kids fed it made some people think. MINUS TIDES VOL 12 NO.1 downtrodden workers are encouraged
strike provides the backdrop, but it is just Within a year the Hatfield Main NUM (3$ from Box 47, Denman Island, BC, to think about an obscure “Anarcho
a backdrop after all. branch banner was on a gay rights march Canada, VOR 1TO) Quiz” - we kid you not. This Australian
in London. The proposal to do this brought mag - presumably for the working class in
The police rampaging through the villages laughter and a few raucous wise cracks This magazine is produced from a small Australia - doesn’t deal with any
and occupying pit communities is well but was passed unanimously, something community (pop 1100) in rural Canada. So Australian issues until the bottom
presented, as is the solidarity and inconceivable a few years before. small they have no police in their own half of p.5. We would like to see more
strength of the miners collective community! emphasis on class struggle participation
resistance. I watched this film in In times of collective struggle new found and action locally rather than a tour de force
Sheffield and there is no doubt which awareness and wider consciousness, as Other problems emerge though – loneliness, of worldwide anarchist titbits -
side the audience identified with. well as individual and family relationships boredom etc the things that have historically however useful. We’ve read about
expand. Sadly many of these attitudes persuaded people to drift to the big towns the Makhno book before so we didn’t
Reviews such as the above pose the have retreated with that defeat of social and cities. need a two page review [even though
question to what extent anyway is ballet and class solidarity, and more atomised we love this history]. Overall this
an entirely middle class passion. The and jaundiced views have crept back. Minus Tides takes an eclectic approach is characteristic of the anarchist
girls in the film were obviously not meant covering anarchism, literature, poetry and ‘life’ illusion that we can turn the anarchist
to be middle class, their ballet school was Given this, its obvious that social, but, as so often with this style of production, ideal into a strategy, when the
situated in the heart of the community, political and sexual values ebb and flow it ends up pleasing some but failing to satisfy real world needs a more considered
the Miners Wefare, with the strike with the currents of class relationships. I everyone. approach.
raging all around them. would like to think that a lad during the
strike aspiring to a career in ballet
And I Know Why I stand Here 21st Century Class War - Introduction to the Fed
Excellent video about the fans of the staunchly Manifesto into the new millenium. £1.00.
anti-fascist club St. Pauli. £5.00
Up Against the Odds
Get Rid of the Royals by John McArthur. This pamphlet gives an account of the JJ Fast Food Workers Strike in Tottenham from
M'AM's hard-hitting royal expose. £7.00 1995-6. £1.50.
Sew on patch
Various designs. £0.30
T-Shirts
Justice for Mark Barnsley
£5.00
Class War Biffa Bacon Design
Light Grey - to clear for new stock £3.00
Records
NEW - Days Of Coma -
7 inch 4 track EP by Swedish metal band Mindblaster.
£2.
Xmas!
NEW - Class War Xmas Cards
£1.50 for 10 Class War designs. Envelopes provided -
ideal for your boss this Xmas.
Stickers - 50 for £1 We are also looking into the possibility of making Class
War available on cassette tape from next year.
Class War Issue 79 15
English-
Bhoy
At one ground now probably a the wages of already overpaid
supermarket (Hello Reading FC) the primadonnas.
‘toilet’ amenities for the away fans
man! were in fact a brick wall ..... with a trough
at the bottom. Could you imagine
Our solution? A maximum wage. Leyton
Orient Chairman Barry Hearn recently
Bizarre rumours have been buying a ticket for a West End show stated that Roy Keane’s wages at It will be interesting to see how the
circulating in the football world and being treated in the same manner? Manchester United for one week Northern Ireland football authorities
that Arsenal manager Arsene Don’t think so! were the same as the cost of running handle the campaign of sectarian
Wenger has signed an Leyton Orient for the year. If each club is abuse directed at Northern Ireland
Englishman. We at Class War Let’s face it standards have improved budgeted to X amount per week, they could midfielder Neil Lennon. Lennon was
are happy to reproduce 200%. But at what cost? Thanks to afford to lower ticket prices, enticing the booed and abused throughout
photographic evidence that the various satellite and cable masses back to their local football ground Northern Ireland’s friendly defeat by
the Gunners have signed companies we now have the glorious - the hub of the community. Norway in March, despite being one
somebody famous for their game six or seven days a week. of the best midfielders ever to play
excellent shooting! The increased ticket prices and the Let’s reclaim the game. Some clubs are for the country. Loyalists make up
difficulty in obtaining already making inroads by electing virtually the entire Northern Ireland
tickets for some games supporters on to the board to liase support and Loyalist bigots for the
mean the only way to be with directors. We want a fuck of heinous crime of being a Celtic
guaranteed to see your team a lot more than that, but as a player targeted Lennon.
is to subscribe to one of first step it will do!
The previous Celtic player to be
capped for Northern Ireland, Anton
Subcribe to Class