Tories Follow

THE BELL is tolling for Tony Blair. We are two weeks away from the 10 June elections, which should seal the fate of the liar who took us into this disastrous war and occupation. We have marched in our millions against this criminal attack on the Iraqi people. Now we have to vote in this referendum on Blair, his war and his Tory policies. Never before has the future of a British prime minister rested on an election which usually passes most people by.

THE LIBERAL Democrat MP and mayoral hopeful Simon Hughes never misses an opportunity to have a go at the Tory candidate Steve Norris's links with big companies. Hughes linked Norris to the Potters Bar train crash in a London mayoral election leaflet. Norris is chairman of Jarvis, the company that recently accepted joint legal responsibility.

Man y people in the anti-war and anti-capitalist movements agree with us on general principles. They agree that socialists must oppose all forms of oppression. They agree that any movement against capitalism must involve the initiative, energy and imagination of millions of organised workers. They agree we must unite the widest forces against the fascist BNP. They utterly oppose the Tory party and don't trust the Liberal Democrats. Mostly, they know the Labour Party offers no way forward.

A SCROUNGER and a criminal sneaks into another country to escape justice. Doesn't that sound like the sort of case the anti-refugee press love to splash on the front page? Except it is the Tory Dame Shirley Porter, heiress to the Tesco empire. Porter was the leader of the Tories' flagship Westminster council in the 1980s. Porter, along with nine other councillors, was found guilty of selling off council houses in marginal wards to potential Tory voters. The scheme cost £42 million. She was supposed to pay every penny of that back.

MY PARENTS worshipped the 1960s Labour leader Harold Wilson. He talked the language of the \"white-hot heat of the technological revolution\". He spoke of an end to deference and elitism. It was exciting to hear that as a youngster. Wilson unexpectedly lost in June 1970. I became a part of the great working class upsurge against Ted Heath's Tory government.

IMMIGRANTS ARE under fire again. No one should fall for the lies the mainstream parties and the press peddle about immigrants and asylum seekers flooding the country. Beverley Hughes had to resign as a minister because New Labour whipped up a climate of hostility to satisfy the Tory press.

NEW LABOUR ministers have poured fuel on the fire of racism with their lies about asylum seekers. They branded refugees and migrant workers a "problem" and a "drain on resources". It should come as no surprise to them when they get their fingers burnt. The Tories and right wing press have gleefully seized on the issue of asylum to attack New Labour, calling for immigration minister Beverley Hughes to resign.

POLLY TOYNBEE has produced a neat digest of Downing Street press releases over recent weeks. This is a service to the left, since it allows us to itemise New Labour's defence of government policy and reply point by point.

IN HER Guardian article Polly Toynbee suggested that Labour has reduced child poverty and substantially increased investment in public services, especially in health and education. The conclusion she reaches is that if we want to maintain this progress we should shut up, stop criticising the government and concentrate on fighting the Tories.

SPAIN'S ELECTORATE shocked the world by voting out its pro-war government on Sunday. There is no mainstream party you can vote for in Britain that has been unequivocally against the war. The Tories backed the war, the Lib Dems supported the war once it started.

'NO WAR! No war!" the crowd chanted as the Socialist Party leader, Zapatero, made his acceptance speech in Madrid on Sunday. They did so as a shock election result in Spain removed from office the Tory Popular Party of Aznar. Aznar was the one of the key European leaders who most backed the war against Iraq, and a year ago posed with Bush and Blair in the Azores as they launched that war.

SPAIN'S TORY government tried to blame ETA for the Madrid explosions as part of its attempt to hang on to power using Spanish nationalism in a completely reactionary manner. Under the Spanish republic established in 1931 Catalonia and the Basque country had their own governments. Franco's fascists destroyed this independence when they overthrew the republic in the civil war of 1936-9.