Issues Follow Follow

More than 30 Respect supporters were out canvassing in Stonebridge ward in Brent, north west London last Sunday for the council by-election taking place on Thursday of this week. By the end of the day the entire ward had been canvassed.

The powerful strike by tube workers on London Underground has forced management to offer the guarantees that workers in the RMT union have been demanding over pensions and job cuts. The union suspended the action on Tuesday evening.

A classic of pre-war Hollywood – director Lewis Milestone’s 1939 film Of Mice And Men – is released on DVD this month. The film is based on John Steinbeck’s novella of the same name, and like the book it has suffered persecution by censors for most of its existence.

School students from across Scotland are stepping up their campaign to end army recruitment in schools.

There has been much talk recently about the need for black role models as the answer to the problem of gun and knife crime that has blighted so many lives this year.

My trip to Sainsbury’s this week reminded me of something. On the shelf where the supermarket used to offer families a good variety of children’s books, full of stories, poems and interesting artwork, all that was on sale was a set of booklets full of maths and language exercises.

It was the sudden eruption at the back of the room upstairs at Sandino’s bar which brought us eventually to the burial ground at Qana. At the edge of the Lebanese village, pictures of each of the 28 victims were displayed on a wall around the canopied space where the graves are laid out in a precise, neat pattern by the spot where the building they were crushed under once stood.

The US is planning a huge propaganda blitz to prepare the ground for a strike on Iran.

An aerial photo released by the Israeli army to justify their attack on Qana shows a rocket launch site in a field outside the village (bottom).

Hundreds of post workers at Stockport mail centre went on unofficial strike on Friday of last week to demand the reinstatement of a sacked colleague. They returned to work on Tuesday after agreeing to a ballot for an official strike.

Workers at a Coca-Cola factory in Milton Keynes struck over pay on Monday.

The past few weeks have seen a moral panic being stirred up in the press following a number of horrendous crimes involving knives and guns committed by children.