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Letters

Bob Geldof is 100 percent wrong on Bush and Africa BOB GELDOF is right to attack the European Union's "pathetic and appalling" response to Africa's human crisis. But he is totally wrong to praise George Bush's policies towards the continent. Bush's administration is the central actor in making sure that debt payments are pumped out of Africa.

Letters

Casablanca's two cities THE RECENT suicide bombings in Casablanca in Morocco were horrific and wrong. Attacks like this kill innocent people and do nothing at all to change the things those carrying them out are angry about. But we have to understand that people are right to be angry at the poverty and injustice in the world and offer an alternative which offers a real way to change things.

Letters

More and more people standing up to Nazi BNP Many people in the local community here were shocked when the British National Party (BNP) got someone elected to Broxbourne council on 1 May. On Tuesday 13 May we had a local protest against the BNP councillor taking up his position.

New forces join the fight to challenge the Nazi BNP

IT'S NOW time to build a mass campaign, uniting all those who want to stop the Nazis. The BNP stood 54 candidates in the north east of England and poured in massive resources. They failed to win a seat but the Nazis still managed to get over 13,000 votes in Sunderland and 3,000 in Gateshead.

Truth, lies, propaganda over war and occupation

WATCHING NEWS at Ten (29 April) revealed blatant distortion by the BBC over the killing of Iraqi civilians in Fallujah by American troops. The BBC suggested US troops fired upon an aggressive protest and that protesters headed for a US "base" or "compound".

Full marks for standing up to Blair over education

WHAT SORT of school curriculum do our children deserve? New Labour plans to label 14 year olds as sheep who will follow an "academic pathway" - based on exams - or goats forced into second class "vocational" education.

How we made gains in our battles for justice

ACTIVISTS IN Burnley were celebrating last week after the court of appeal halved the sentences of five Asian men jailed after the Burnley "riots". The defendants had taken to the streets to defend their areas from Nazi attack 18 months ago.

Blair should be worried

EAST OXFORD's Labour MP, Andrew Smith, is a senior foreign office minister who sits in the cabinet. There have been angry anti-war demonstrations each time Smith has held his constituency surgery in Oxford. Many people in the Labour Party are angry with Smith because of his support for the war.

The real benefits rip-off

LAST WEEK it was revealed that nearly £5 billion in means tested benefits are not claimed every year. As a benefits worker, I see it first hand. People who desperately need extra cash don't claim the benefits they are entitled to because the system is so complicated and the rules are constantly changed.

Why don't our trade union leaders catch this mood?

OPPOSITION TO this US war and an increasing fury at our own government's complicity have been growing in our PCS union branch. Our motion was carried at the 2002 PCS conference. It committed the union to a strong anti-war stance.

Short has abandoned every shred of decent principle

I AM a Labour Party member in the West Midlands who on several occasions met local MP Clare Short. I feel ashamed to have shaken her hand after last week. Within the party we were circulated her disgusting note trying to justify her betrayal-although from the language employed I very much doubt that she wrote it.

The Daouds are the human cost of attacks on refugees

THE FINANCIAL Times carried a report on Wednesday of last week that David Blunkett is trying to reduce the number of people from Iraq who are granted asylum in Britain. Apparently Iraqis make up the largest group requesting asylum. This is hardly surprising given the present situation.

Race, class and education

IF YOU believed the Daily Mail you would think there is a witch-hunt against middle class students being rejected by top universities simply because they are middle class. "Felicity had ten A grade GCSEs and three A grade A-levels. So why was she rejected by Bristol University?" screamed the front page of one edition.

Iraqis are not cheering Bush and Blair's war

I have listened with intrigue to Mr Blair saying, "It is the moral case for removing Saddam." I was one of the many people of Iraqi descent who campaigned against Saddam in the 1980s up to the present day. I don't believe that Mr Blair's morality lies in what is right or wrong for the Iraqi people.

From the front line

"THE GREATER Manchester Coalition to Stop the War is coordinating an antiwar demonstration on 8 March. This will involve three separate marches converging on the city centre. On the city centre stall on Saturday 5,000 leaflets and hundreds of posters were distributed.

This time Tony Blair has gone too far for us to stay

I HAVE just written to Tony Blair with the following message: "Dear prime minister, My family has Labour roots going back to the beginning of the Labour Party. To witness the disintegration of a once proud party into the spineless shadow of its former self fills me with horror.

Don't fall for the right wing lies about asylum seekers

BLAIR'S PLAN to cut the number of asylum seekers is shocking. One way the government justifies its plans is to say children's education suffers if they are taught with children who don't speak English. I am a parent governor at my daughter Sorcha's school, in a very deprived area of central London.

Victims of the cruellest cuts

FIVE ELDERLY people have died within eight weeks of their residential home in Liverpool being closed. This appalling treatment caused blazing anger at our weekly Merseyside Pensioners' Association meeting on Wednesday of last week. One man who is in his nineties said it was a disgrace that the government could spend millions on war but abandon pensioners.

Learning to toe the class line?

LABOUR'S CHANGES in education will mean many students are expected to choose their future jobs aged just 13. They won't have to learn foreign languages, history or technology. Instead they will be taught a narrower work-based curriculum tailored to meet the demands of employers.

Starvation is Labour policy

AS A result of recent changes in government policy, asylum seekers are being evicted from their homes, having all benefits removed and being denied the right to work. Most are Iraqi Kurds. We challenged my local MP and immigration minister Beverley Hughes to say what the government expects Kurdish refugees to do in such circumstances.