THE ATTACKS on pensions are part of the neo-liberal assault.
Myth One Pensions are a huge burden on taxation. At present 5 percent of Britain’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) goes on pensions. The government’s official statistics say that even in 2050 this will only be 5.7 percent. This is not a crisis.
RECENT VICTORIES in private sector pension battles show that our side can win. Private sector workers have suffered attacks on their pensions for years. In the last ten years, almost 50 percent of final salary schemes have been closed to new entrants.
TALK OF a future pensions crisis makes me angry. The crisis is now and it’s pensioners who are getting a very bad deal. My long time friend Terry is one of those suffering because pensions have been sold off, robbed and devalued. He’s having to try to live on just over £100 a week.
FRANCE WITNESSED two of the most extraordinary mass strikes since May 1968 in the fight against pension reform. At the heart of the battles in the winter of 1995 and the spring of 2003 was the fight against increasing the retirement age—just as in Britain today.
The TUC Day of Action on 18 February must be the start of a sustained campaign. Some unions are already balloting for strike action. Others were set to follow as this factsheet was produced.
GEORGE BUSH and Tony Blair say the elections scheduled for the end of this month will bring democracy to Iraq. But the democracy they are talking about is the rule of the occupiers under the cover of an elected Iraqi assembly.
It might seem strange that, in 1922 and 1923, when the Russian Revolution was still fighting for its life, Leon Trotsky, having refused to accept the office of vice-premier in the new government, devoted an entire book, Literature and Revolution, to artistic questions.
