Labour’s election pledges no answer to UK’s housing crisis

Paul Bond

Britain’s housing crisis is a social catastrophe for millions of people.

Research, published by Heriot-Watt University for the National Housing Federation (NHF) of social housing landlords, estimates that 8.4 million people in England live in unaffordable, insecure or unsuitable homes.

The housing crisis has a negative impact on one in eight people in England. Extrapolating from data in the University of Essex’s “Understanding Society” survey, the report estimates:

•  3.6 million live in overcrowded homes
•  2.5 million cannot afford their rent or mortgage
•  2.5 million are trapped in shared accommodation, including with relatives, that they cannot afford to move out of
•  1.7 million live in unsuitable accommodation but are unable to move
•  1.4 million live in poor or substandard conditions
•  400,000 people are homeless or at risk of homelessness, including those sleeping rough, living in homeless shelters, or in temporary accommodation

The total is almost double the number currently considered in need of housing on official waiting lists. The NHF concludes that England needs 340,000 new homes a year to tackle this problem. The last time that happened was in 1968.

The year to March 2019 saw 169,770 new homes built in England. The Conservatives have boasted of their “great track record” on house building, but the percentage of so-called “affordable” housing within this total continues to decline.

The Thatcherite boast of creating a “home-owning democracy” was aimed at undermining social housing and this continues apace. Since 2010 construction of homes for social rent has dropped by 80 percent.

The last two Labour and Conservative governments both looked to the private rented sector as the means of addressing the shortage of social housing, with disastrous results. Research by the Chartered Institute of Housing confirmed that the most vulnerable are routinely denied access to affordable housing by landlords.

Homeless applicants are regularly “screened out” and social landlords routinely reject vulnerable tenants on the expectation that they would accrue rent arrears when moved onto the punitive Universal Credit (UC) benefit system and forced to wait five weeks for their first payment.

Some housing associations have demanded that prospective tenants to be moved onto UC pay a month’s rent in advance—an impossible requirement for many. Housing charity Shelter reports that four in 10 private landlords surveyed operate an outright ban on renting to people receiving housing benefit.

In 2014, David Cameron’s Conservative government announced a plan to create 200,000 new homes for first-time buyers. This month National Audit Office reported that none of these houses had been built. Between 2015 and 2018, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) spent nearly £174 million on acquiring and preparing sites for these “starter homes,” but the housing that resulted was general, with only a part of it nominally “affordable.”

“Affordability” is the great deception in this destruction of social provision. A Shelter report found that “affordable rents” for typical two-bedroom properties are 30 percent more expensive than social rents and “completely out of reach for most people who are eligible for social housing.”

An Office for National Statistics report on housing affordability in England and Wales in 2018 noted that newly-built properties were “estimated to be significantly less affordable than existing dwellings,” and 77 local authorities—mostly in London and the South East of England—had become less affordable over the previous five years. No local authority in England had become more affordable.

Full-time workers could expect to pay on average 7.8 times their annual earnings on purchasing a home in England and Wales. The London borough of Kensington and Chelsea—where the June 2017 Grenfell Tower fire took place in one of its poorest areas—was the least affordable local authority in 2018. Average house prices stood at around 44.5 times average earnings.

Only 6,463 homes for social rent were built in England in 2017-18. Around 1.15 million families were on waiting lists for council houses, with only 290,000 homes available. Almost two-thirds of families had been on waiting lists for more than a year. Over a quarter had been waiting for more than five years. Labour said that at the current rate of construction it would take 170 years to house families on the waiting lists.

Shelter said the shortfall was caused by the lack of newbuild social housing, compounded by the Conservative “right-to-buy” policy. Under right to buy, two million council-owned houses were sold off since 1980 and not replaced. Councils were forbidden to build replacement homes. Today, over 30 percent of ex-council stock are private rentals.

Successive governments treated the poor as an eyesore to be hidden. Poorer housing estates were run down and closed. In 2003, Tony Blair’s Labour government launched the Housing Market Renewal Pathfinder programme. This aimed at tackling housing problems in northern England by bulldozing 250,000 homes and encouraging 1 million people to move south into new homes near airports to help secure London as a global financial hub.

Housing destruction took place in every major urban area in the north and midlands. Streets were forcibly emptied, with few homes built to replace them.

The ban on council house building exacerbated the problem. In London in 2010-16, available new homes were only 41.8 percent of the number of new households in the same period, according to the GMB union.

The result is exemplified by the London Borough of Newham, with 25,729 households on the waiting list but only 588 social homes available.

Due to the collapse in availability of social homes, there has been a vast rise in numbers of families with children renting privately—up from 566,000 in 2003 to 1.8 million in 2017.

The Conservative Party’s election manifesto promises a continuation of the socially destructive right to buy—committing to a private building programme that is accelerating the housing crisis for ever greater numbers of people.

What would a genuinely socialist housing policy consist of?

The Socialist Equality Party insists that quality public housing is a social right. All public buildings must be stripped of their dangerous cladding immediately and homes made safe. This requires a multi-billion pound programme of public repair works, which must be funded from the profits of cost-cutting property developers and the super-rich. The wealth of this parasitic layer must be expropriated to fund—as central to the programme of a workers’ government—the building of high-quality public housing, schools, hospitals and all the infrastructure required in the 21st century.

In contrast, Labour’s manifesto proposes annual construction of “at least” 150,000 council and social homes, but only by the end of the five-year parliamentary term. Even if this target were eventually reached, Labour’s commitment is only that two-thirds of these properties be built by councils for social rent. Construction of the remaining 50,000 is intended to be privately outsourced to housing associations.

Labour’s proposed construction programme is, moreover, based on the same capitalist market that makes the lives of millions impossible. Labour is committing half of its £150 billion “social transformation fund,” to be raised from borrowing on the international markets, for its housing pledges. Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell announced new fiscal rules which would see “borrowing for investment” not being included in borrowing targets. His borrowing plan—like the Tories’—is based on present low interest rates under conditions of escalated inter-imperialist tensions and trade war.

Labour proposals to borrow tens of billions is necessitated because Jeremy Corbyn and McDonnell cannot and will not countenance the expropriation of the super-rich. Rather than confront the parasitic layers that have enriched themselves at the expense of the working class, Labour’s manifesto reassures the billionaires that it will ask only for “a little more from those with the broadest shoulders.”

The super-rich will only be asked to pay an additional five pence on the pound. The manifesto promises to “reverse some of the Tories’ cuts to corporation tax,” while keeping the rate lower than in 2010. This is a pledge only to go back to the rates set by the pro-business Gordon Brown Labour government.

All of Labour’s proposals, from money for a Fire Safety Fund for provision of sprinklers and other safety measures in high-rise tower blocks and enforced replacement of dangerous cladding, to revisions of “affordability” in line with local income, must be measured against their overarching commitment to the capitalist market.

The manifesto’s pledge to “stop social cleansing by making sure regeneration only goes ahead when it has the consent of residents” has a hollow ring. Labour-run councils in every urban area in the UK have been at the forefront of enforcing destructive and despised regeneration programmes. In the London borough of Haringey this led to the removal of a Blairite council and its replacement by a group of Momentum councillors—the self-styled “Corbyn council”—which then carried on a programme of cuts and regeneration.

Over 2 million Americans don’t have access to indoor plumbing or water, report finds

Jacob Crosse

A new report titled “Closing the Water Access Gap in the United States: A National Action Plan,” published last month by two non-profit groups, DigDeep and U.S. Water Alliance, estimates that over 2 million Americans in 2019 do not have access to running water. The report drew its conclusions based on survey data from the American Community Survey and the US Census Bureau in addition to research conducted by Michigan State University.

Unlike other modern capitalist countries, the American federal government does not keep detailed records on lack of water access. The authors note that “datasets in the United States are incomplete, and official data collection efforts undercount vulnerable populations like communities of color and lower-income people.”

The authors also note that the available census data doesn’t provide a complete picture of the problem; while the survey asks if a household has running water or indoor plumbing, which includes a toilet, tap and shower, the survey doesn’t ask if the water service is affordable or safe to consume. As seen in cities throughout the United States, including Flint, Newark, Baltimore and Milwaukee, it is patently clear that the water flowing through corroding lead pipes and into the homes and schools of millions of Americans is not safe to drink.

(Credit: Flicker.com, Steve Johnson)

In order to compensate for the limitations provided by the survey data, researchers for the report gathered qualitative data including interviews with residents in six specific regions within the US that “face water and sanitation access challenge.” These regions include the Central Valley in California, the Navajo Nation which covers parts of northeastern Arizona, southeastern Utah, and northwestern New Mexico, Texas colonias near El Paso, rural southern communities in Mississippi and Alabama, McDowell County, West Virginia and finally, the US territory of Puerto Rico.

Residents in most rural communities are forced to build septic systems and dig wells in order to survive. The costs associated with the maintenance and repair of these private systems in order to ensure cleanliness and reliability are too high for many. Often wells have to be redug if they are contaminated with toxic runoff from nearby farms. Residents who have tried to speak out regarding water issues face reprisals from corporations, including service shutoffs, eviction, or immigrations raids.

In the Texas colonias residents are forced to make use of unmonitored private wells. Hector and Juana, who live in a colonia called Laura E. Mundy, told researchers that they drank their well water for 20 years before they were both diagnosed with H. pylori, a water-borne infection that can cause cancer. With no other choice they are forced to still use well water to shower and clean, but Hector is “very, very afraid” that the well may run dry as nearby farms compete for groundwater.

Several of the colonias are located less than a mile from working service lines, but residents are told by government officials that there is “no money” to extend the lines and provide service. Many moved to the area originally on the promise from developers that once the community grew, roads would be paved and the lines would be extended, but this never came to fruition.

In McDowell County, previously clear streams now run black with runoff from fracking and mining operations. In addition to dirty water contaminated from years of extraction companies violating what pitiful regulations were put in place, local municipalities are unable to afford the equipment needed to repair old run-down coal camp water systems. These private systems were constructed by the coal companies to serve their workers and were abandoned when the companies left.

While these areas are in acute crisis, the report notes that every state in the US has entire communities, not isolated individuals, without access to plumbing. Generally, those living in urban areas which invested in and built public sanitation projects in the early 20th century are still able to access running water. Over 5 percent of residents in Alaska are unable to access any public water works; in New Mexico it is 1.6 percent and just under 1 percent of the population in Arizona and Maine.

Given the survey results and their own research, the authors concluded that over 2 million Americans “live without basic access to safe drinking water and sanitation.” Within that group, 1.4 million people in the continental US and 250,000 Puerto Ricans “lack access to indoor plumbing.” The authors estimate an additional 553,000 homeless people within the US also do not have access to indoor plumbing.

As the authors note in the report, these numbers are vast under-representations of the true scale of the social crime perpetrated by the ruling class on the most exploited sections of the population.

“Water access issues disproportionately affect lower-income people, people of color, undocumented immigrants, and people who do not speak English, … all groups that are considered Hard to Count (HTC) populations and are underrepresented in the census,” the report notes.

In a shocking testament to capitalism's inability to guarantee the basic rights of the working class, six states, Delaware, Idaho, Kansas, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Dakota and the US territory of Puerto Rico saw increases in the number of people within them that lacked access to water between 2000 and 2014.

In addition to losing access the report estimates that over 44 million Americans, over an eighth of the population, are currently being served by water systems that had recorded Safe Drinking Water Act violations. Private wells, which many rural and underserved communities are forced to rely on for water, are extremely susceptible to contamination. The United States Geological Survey found contaminants, including arsenic, uranium, nitrates, and E. coli in 23 percent of the wells tested for the report.

While overall the report’s authors found a slight decline in the population without complete plumbing access from 1.6 million in 2000 to a slightly lower 1.4 million in 2014, very nearly within the margin of error, even this “decline” is much less than in previous decades. Between 1950 and 1970 the percentage of the US population that didn’t have access to running water decreased from 27 percent to 5.9 percent.

The authors correctly point out that this decrease was due to robust public investment in public water systems. “In 1977, 63 percent of total capital spending for water and wastewater systems came from federal agencies; today that number is less than nine percent.” It is clear from the report that billions of dollars are needed to either rebuild or construct new pipes and sanitation systems to combat this growing health crisis.

In order to guarantee access to clean water and sanitation services for every human being on the planet, the immense resources monopolized by the top 1 percent—every race, ethnicity, gender and nationality—must be put under the democratic control of the international working class, the class that creates all of society’s wealth. This is not, however, the solution the authors of the report put forward.

Instead, drawing from the Democratic Party-aligned “Advisory Council” which had a hand in creating the report, including Derrick Johnson, President and Chief Executive Officer, NAACP and Pia Orrenius, vice president and senior economist of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, the report recommends further privatization of public services, promoting “collaborative collaboration” to “bring market expertise to the water access challenge.”

This also explains the report’s elevation of race as the primary factor in determining water access. In the “Five Major Findings from the National Analysis,” the authors determine that race is the strongest predictor of water and sanitation access. While it is true that there are racial disparities, the report notes that Native Americans, due to living on remote rural reservations, are “19 times more likely than white households to lack indoor plumbing,” these disparities are not rooted in skin pigmentation, but class.

Poverty and social inequality, which the report attempts to downplay, are the key obstacles to clean water. Despite the shortcomings of the authors’ conclusions, the report is valuable in highlighting the severity of the water crisis in America and the urgent necessity on the part of workers, students and youth to fight for a socialist solution that addresses the water access needs of the world’s population.

US prepares to deploy thousands more troops against Iran

Bill Van Auken

The Pentagon Thursday provided a series of conflicting responses to a Wall Street Journal report, citing unnamed US officials, that the Trump administration is considering the deployment of 14,000 more troops to the Persian Gulf along with dozens more warships. This would effectively double the number of additional personnel sent into the region since Washington launched a major military buildup against Iran in May.

Initially, a Pentagon spokeswoman sent out a tweet declaring that “the reporting is wrong. The US is not considering sending 14,000 additional troops to the Middle East.”

On Thursday, however, John Rood, the third-ranking civilian official in the Defense Department, told a Senate panel that the administration is indeed discussing a major new deployment of troops in the region, but declined to give any numbers.

US soldiers deployed in the Middle East (Credit: U.S. Army by 1st Lt. Jesse Glenn)

“We haven’t made a decision yet,” Rood told the Senate Armed Services Committee. “Based on what we are seeing ... it is possible we would need to adjust our force posture. I think that would be a prudent step, depending on what we observe, because our objective is to deter Iranian aggression.”

While saying that no decision has been made to deploy 14,000 more troops to the region, he acknowledged that an increase was under consideration that could include fewer than 14,000. “We are evaluating the threat situations,” he said. “We will need to make dynamic adjustments to our posture.”

The discussion of a major US military escalation in the Persian Gulf has been accompanied by a steady drumbeat of reports leaked by unnamed US military and intelligence officials to the major media alleging Iranian “threats” to the US and its allies in the region: the right-wing government of Israel, Saudi Arabia’s despotic monarchy and the other Gulf oil sheikdoms.

This includes claims that Iran has stockpiled an arsenal of hidden short-range ballistic missiles in Iraq, which, reports have stressed, could reach Jerusalem from the outskirts of Baghdad. The claim has also been made that these missiles could be targeted at US military bases in the region.

Underscoring the bipartisan character of the US war drive against Iran, one of the major sources for a New York Times article Wednesday promoting this unsubstantiated charge was first-term Democratic Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, who served three tours as a CIA operative in Baghdad, under both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations. “People are not paying enough attention to the fact that ballistic missiles in the last year have been placed in Iraq by Iran with the ability to project violence on the region,” she told the Times .

This followed a CNN story Tuesday citing unnamed Pentagon and Trump administration officials claiming that there existed “fresh intelligence of a potential Iranian threat against US forces and interests in the Middle East,” while failing to provide any details about this supposed intelligence.

“The officials would not say in what format the intelligence exists,” the television news network reported. “But in the last several weeks there has been movement of Iranian forces and weapons that the US worries could be put in place for a potential attack, if one is ordered by the Iranian regime.”

This has been combined with claims that the US Navy intercepted a ship carrying ballistic missile parts to the Houthi rebels fighting US-backed Saudi forces in Yemen, along with repeated statements by US Central Command (CENTCOM) chief Gen. Kenneth McKenzie that an Iranian attack is imminent and the US needs more forces in the region.

This concerted propaganda campaign, aided and abetted by the corporate media, points to a growing danger that Washington is preparing to launch a war of aggression against Iran under conditions in which it believes its government has been weakened by a series of violent protests triggered by a hike in gas prices that shook the country last month.

The conditions for this unrest have been created in the main by the unrelenting attempt of US imperialism to drive Iranian oil exports down to zero, depriving the country of the overwhelming source of its wealth. There is also no doubt that agents of US imperialism and its allies have been active in stoking up violence. These conditions have been exacerbated, however, by the policies of Iran’s capitalist government, which has sought to shift the burden of the crisis onto the backs of the working class, while seeking to maneuver for some kind of a deal with the major powers.

The US already has between 60,000 and 80,000 troops deployed in the region, ringing Iran with military bases. Just last month, the Pentagon sent the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group into the Persian Gulf from the Arabian Sea, docking the warships in Bahrain just opposite central Iran.

A month earlier, the Trump administration announced the deployment of an additional 3,000 US troops to Saudi Arabia—which the White House claimed were being paid for by the Saudi monarchy—along with two jet fighter squadrons and additional missile defense batteries. The pretext for the deployment was the destruction of Saudi oil infrastructure by missiles that Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed to have fired.

For all of Trump’s demagogy about ending Washington’s “endless wars,” there are now more troops deployed in the Middle East and Afghanistan than before he took office, and the threat of a far wider conflagration is steadily mounting.

US Defense Secretary Mark Esper clarified Wednesday that the permanent US presence in Syria has been set at 600—just 40 percent less than the 1,000 deployed there when Trump announced that he was pulling all US forces out of the country. Esper told the Reuters news agency that he had the authority to “dial up a little bit” in terms of troop numbers. While Trump has claimed that he has left the troops there to “take the oil,” their strategic purpose is to counter both Iranian and Russian influence in the country.

Meanwhile, the major European powers, which claimed to oppose the Trump administration’s unilateral abrogation of the 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and the major world powers, followed by the imposition of “maximum pressure” sanctions that are tantamount to a state of war, have also piled on.

The ambassadors of France, Germany and the UK to the United Nations submitted a joint letter to the UN Secretary-General Wednesday charging Iran with developing “nuclear-capable ballistic missiles” that were “inconsistent” with a UN resolution endorsing the 2015 nuclear accord, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

The 2015 nuclear agreement made no mention of Iran’s ballistic program, while the UN Security Council resolution endorsing the deal cautioned only against Iran developing missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons. Iran has always denied any intention of obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Since tearing up the agreement in May of last year, the Trump administration has demanded that Iran scrap its ballistic missile program along with all of its nuclear facilities as part of a general submission to US domination of the country and the entire energy-rich and strategically vital region.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif issued a sharp response to the three European powers, declaring that their focus on the country’s ballistic missile program represented a “desperate falsehood” designed to “cover up their miserable incompetence in fulfilling bare minimum of their own #JCPOA obligations.”

The European powers have failed to meet their obligations under the agreement to normalize economic and trade relations with Iran, the main incentive for Tehran to enter the agreement. Instead, they have bowed to the US sanctions regime that is strangling the country and driving ever larger sections of the population into desperate poverty. While setting up the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges (Instex), ostensibly to bypass US sanctions on Iran’s sale of oil and buying of products by avoiding exchange in dollars, the system has yet to facilitate any transactions.

No less predatory than Washington, the European powers also smell blood with the deepening economic crisis and social unrest confronting Iran’s bourgeois-clerical regime and are trying to position themselves to participate in any imperialist carve-up of Iran and the entire oil-producing region of the Middle East. Such a redivision of the spoils, however, poses the threat of a region-wide and even world war.

1.5 million march amid mass strike in France against austerity and inequality

Anthony Torres & Alex Lantier

In the largest such industrial action to hit France in decades, tens of thousands of rail, government and education workers walked out on strike, as 1.5 million people marched or struck yesterday against plans by French President Emanuel Macron to slash pensions.

The strike is part of a broad international resurgence of class struggle against social inequality and military-police repression.

Striking workers in France are joining mass protest movements in Iraq, Lebanon, Chile, Colombia, Hong Kong, Algeria, and strikes among US auto workers and teachers, as well as British rail workers. Yesterday in France, workers at the National Railways (SNCF), teachers, and workers in Paris mass transit, hospitals, airports, energy, ports, as well as students and lawyers marched together.

Manifestación en París

The strike demonstrated the enormous social power of the working class mobilized in struggle. Rail traffic was stopped across France, with just one in 10 high-speed trains (TGV) and 3 to 5 percent of Express Regional Trains running. According to SNCF management, 85.7 percent of train drivers and 73.3 percent of train controllers declared they were going on strike.

In Paris, mass transit also virtually stopped. The Independent Paris Transport Authority (RATP) announced 11 of 16 metro lines were shut, and only limited service available on the others.

Strikers blockaded fuel depots, and workers at 7 of France’s 8 oil refineries were on strike, threatening in the longer term to cause fuel shortages across the country.

According to statistics presented by the junior minister for the public service, Olivier Dussopt, 32.5 percent of government workers (including education, post office, and former France Telecom workers) joined the strike. Among schoolteachers, 51.15 percent of primary schoolteachers and 42.32 percent of secondary school teachers also went on strike. Many children stayed home, or had to be taken to emergency service centers run by city authorities.

Several major French airports were seriously impacted by the strike—including both major Paris airports, Nice, Marseille, Lyon, Toulouse and Bordeaux—due to strikes by multiple categories of workers, including air traffic controllers in the south.

The strike will continue in multiple industries during the coming days. Union sources said rail traffic would be badly affected until Monday, and airlines said they would cut 20 percent of their flights on Friday. Many teachers are expected to be on strike today. One truckers’ association, lOTRE, had announced last night that it would carry out 15 blockades today to protest against the Macron government’s tax hikes on fuel.

Strikers marched in the hundreds of thousands in gatherings organized across France. The unions announced 250,000 protesters in Paris, 150,000 in Marseille, 100,000 in Toulouse, 40,000 in Lille, and tens of thousands in Montpellier, Bordeaux, and Nantes, as well as 285,000 altogether in approximately 40 other cities. In several cities, authorities refused to provide to the press any figure whatsoever on the number of marchers.

Otra sección de la protesta

Without formally endorsing the union bureaucracies, well-known “yellow vest” protesters, including Éric Drouet, Priscilla Ludosky and Maxime Nicolle, had called on their supporters to join the protests.

Clashes broke out between security forces and protesters in several cities, including Lyon, Nantes, Rennes and Paris, where the security forces prevented large parts of the march from moving, then attacked them, first on Republic and then on Nation Square.

The Macron government had organized a massive police deployment—comparable to those for the largest “yellow vest” protests last December—but which was absolutely unprecedented for a social protest organized by the trade unions.

L’Express magazine reported that “overall, 108 security intervention units will be deployed across France: 60.5 mobile military police and 47.5 riot police. They will be overwhelmingly assigned, apart from the Paris area, to the south, southeast, and the north, leaving the north, the west and the southwest somewhat understaffed. 180 motorized teams of the BRAV (Brigades for the repression of Violent Action) will be deployed. In terms of technical means, six water cannon will be prepared for action, and three drones will overfly Paris.”

An anonymous high-ranking security official said he was “very worried” about the Paris protest and claimed that “we are in a pre-insurrectionary situation.”

In Paris, the security forces mobilized armored cars, water canon as well as soldiers and riot police armed with assault rifles to barricade the Elysée presidential palace and other state venues. Between 6,000 and 8,500 riot police were mobilized. At 8pm there had been 90 arrests, including 71 preventive detentions, in addition to 11,490 who had been preventively detained and searched.

The December 5 strike is the product of a new stage in the class struggle, with the radicalization of growing layers of the international working class. The call for the strike went from the SNCF, where the unions worried they would lose control, after two major wildcat strikes shook the railways in the autumn, against SNCF privatization as well as wage cuts and the introduction of two-tier work. Once the call was launched, however, ever broader sections of workers tried to take the opportunity to join in a legally-approved strike.

This mobilization reflects broad, growing opposition to European Union (EU) policies—the public-sector wage freeze and drastic attack on pensions and other social rights. Macron is eliminating multiple special pension funds and moving towards retirement based on “points,” with no pre-set monetary value. The state has rejected aspirations for more social equality and better living conditions for workers with contempt, instead planning deep cuts to pensions, health care and other key programs.

There is widespread opposition among workers to the capitalist social order, as well as legitimate mistrust of the unions, who are negotiating the cuts with Macron and had, until now, organized no significant strike action since his election in 2017.

More broadly, none of the problems driving yesterday’s strike had a national character; all of them—low wages and social austerity, the exploitation of workers in understaffed workplaces, social inequality, military-police repression of any opposition to the diktat of the banks—are international problems that have mobilized tens or even hundreds of millions of workers internationally this year. Resolving these problems requires the expropriation of the billionaire financial aristocracy that dominates economic life through the international financial markets.

This requires workers to make a break with the nationally-based union bureaucracies, and to build committees of action, independent of the trade unions, so they can take the struggle out of the hands of the union and link it to the struggles of their class brothers and sisters around the world.

For decades, “social dialogue” between unions, employers’ groups and the state in France has only served to impose a social regression on the working class. Indeed, top Macron government officials rushed to promote the trade unions during the strike, and made clear that they knew the union bureaucracies intended to accept the pension cuts and strangle any political struggle against Macron.

The head of Macron’s parliamentary group in the National Assembly, Gilles Legendre, said, “no trade union seriously thinks that (he) will give it up.” That is, the unions are, in fact, looking for a rotten compromise with the state and the employers’ groups to impose on the workers, which would include virtually all of the cuts laid out by Macron.

In the war room he set up at the Transport Ministry, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe declared, “Overall the strikes and protests have unfolded as planned. Many protests were organized today in France, most are going well. … I want to pay my respects to the trade unions for their organizational success.”

Such comments vindicate the warnings made by the Socialist Equality Party and its call for the building of committees of action, independent of the trade unions, to prosecute the struggle. Workers will gain nothing from a struggle within a purely national framework, controlled by union bureaucracies that are closely tied to the state. The way forward is to take the struggle out of the unions’ hands and turn towards a socialist, internationalist and revolutionary perspective to unite their struggles with those of their class brothers and sisters around the world.

Trump administration food stamp cuts spell hunger and destitution for millions

Kate Randall

The Trump Administration announced Wednesday a rule change that will deprive nearly 700,000 people of benefits from the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, increasing hunger for countless families.

SNAP, formerly known as the food stamp program, currently provides vital federal assistance to over 36 million people.

Beginning in April 2020, the rule will make it much harder for adults, aged 18 to 49, who are without dependents to obtain benefits. It will make it more difficult for states to waive a requirement that these individuals work at least 20 hours a week or lose their benefits by allowing only those states with an official unemployment rate of 6 percent or above to apply for waivers. Currently, some regions with jobless rates as low as 2.5 percent are included in the waived areas.

A supermarket displays stickers indicating they accept food stamps in West New York, N.J. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

The print and broadcast media have largely ignored the move, which will lead untold thousands of households to go hungry. Congressional Democrats have remained virtually silent, focused on their impeachment proceedings against Trump centering on claims that his policies are insufficiently aggressive against Russia.

That is because, in attacking the living conditions of masses of people, Trump is carrying out a bipartisan policy supported by both parties of big business. In 2014, President Obama signed legislation into law that cut $8.7 billion in food stamp benefits over the next decade, causing 850,000 households to lose an average of $90 a month.

According to a study from earlier this year when the change was first proposed, it will affect the poorest and most vulnerable: 97 percent of SNAP participants affected live in poverty; 88 percent have household incomes at or below 50 percent of the poverty level, or less than $600 a month.

The work rule change is tied to two other proposals—one capping deductions for utility allowances and another that would lead to nearly 1 million students losing access to reduced-cost or free lunches. Taken together, the Urban Institute estimates that these three proposals would cut 3.6 million people from SNAP benefits. In the words of Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, these measures—which will literally snatch food from the mouths of children, the destitute and the most vulnerable in society—will “restore the dignity of work to a sizable segment of our population, while also respecting the taxpayers who fund the program.”

In reality, Perdue’s dystopian vision has nothing to do with restoring the “dignity of work” and everything to do with plunging millions of Americans further into poverty while increasing the wealth of the already super-wealthy who have been the beneficiaries of Trump’s tax cuts and attacks on social programs. Forbes places Perdue’s current net worth at $5 million, a minor player compared to Education Secretary Betsy Devos, whose net worth is $2 billion, the highest in Trump’s cabinet.

The secretary of agriculture and former Georgia governor built a fortune in agribusiness and real estate. Shortly after joining Trump’s cabinet, he transferred control of investments worth at least $8 million to his adult children. It is a cruel irony that the Trump official leading the assault on food stamps made his fortune profiting from agribusiness, while suicides among financially ruined Midwest family farmers are surging.

The three changes to SNAP rules would reduce the food stamp rolls by at least 15 percent in 13 states, according to an estimate by the Urban Institute. The third of these changes would hit the District of Columbia (24 percent) and Nevada (22 percent). Total benefits would fall by at least 15 percent in nine states.

In California alone, an estimated 200,000 people could lose benefits as a result of the restrictions on waivers to work requirements.

Americans living in cold-weather states like Vermont, New York and South Dakota will bear the biggest brunt from the rule reducing the amount people can deduct for utility costs. Mostly rural Vermont would lose almost 22 percent of its food stamp aid, while New York, South Dakota and Maine would lose about 11 percent each. The US Department of Agriculture estimates the utility cost overhaul will reduce food stamp spending by about $4.5 billion over five years.

Almost 7 in 10 Vermonters would see a cut in SNAP benefits, with the typical benefit reduced by almost 40 percent, dropping from an already paltry $215 a month to about $133, according to Hunger Free Vermont. Ellen Vollinger, legal director at the nonprofit Food Research & Action Center, said the utility cost proposal will force people to “choose whether to eat or heat.”

It is a myth that any of these measures will help people find jobs. Hunger advocates have emphasized that many of those who will be affected are impoverished, live in rural areas and often face mental health issues and disabilities. “The policy targets very poor people struggling to work—some of whom are homeless or living with health conditions,” Stacey Dean, food assistance policy vice president at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, told NBC News. “Taking away basic food assistance from these individuals will only increase hardship and hunger, while doing nothing to help them find steady full-time work.”

But as the Trump administration touts a rise in the GDP as an indicator of the country’s economic health, renewed signs of social crisis in America portend an increase—not a lessening—of suffering and despair, which will only be exacerbated by cuts to food assistance.

The US has experienced a decline in life expectancy for the third straight year. More disturbingly, growing numbers of people are dying relatively young, between the ages of 25 and 64, an age group that intersects with those targeted by the rule changes to SNAP.

These are people who in a healthy society would be in the prime of their working lives. Instead, rising numbers of people are dying from “diseases of despair:” suicide, alcohol and drug overdose. Midlife mortality rates have also increased as a result of at least 35 other causes, including diseases and conditions such as diabetes, autoimmune disorders, obesity and high blood pressure.

After a decline in the uninsured rate due to the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that those without health insurance obtain coverage from a private insurer, the uninsured rate is now rising again. The numbers of those who are underinsured and burdened by high out-of-pocket costs are growing, leading to increasing numbers of people filing for personal bankruptcy.

A new report by two non-profit groups reveals the staggering statistic that over 2 million Americans in 2019 do not have access to indoor plumbing or running water. New statistics also show that the Flint water crisis is not an isolated incident, and that the water supply in countless cities and towns across the country are contaminated with dangerous levels of lead.

The defense of the basic human right to adequate nutrition, water and health care cannot be entrusted to either big business party. The Trump administration’s assault on SNAP benefits poses the necessity of the working class adopting its own independent defense of these social rights through the organization of a revolutionary leadership that fights for the socialist organization of society on the basis of human need, not profit.

Wells Mountain Education Scholarship Program 2020 for Undergraduate Students in Developing Countries

Application Deadline: 1st March, 2020

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries; Developing Countries

Accepted Subject Areas? All fields are eligible although WMF intend to favor helping professions such as health care, social work, education, social justice, as well as, professions that help the economy and progress of the country such as computers, engineering, agriculture and business.

About the Award:
Wells Mountain Foundation offers undergraduate scholarship to students from developing countries to study in their home country or any other developing country. The foundation’s hope is that by providing the opportunity to further one’s education, the scholarship participants will not only be able to improve their own future, but also that of their own communities. The foundation believes in the power and importance of community service and, as a result, all scholarship participants are required to volunteer for a minimum of one month a year.
Applicants are only allowed to select a university in a developing country. Applications to study in UK, USA, Europe and Australia will not be accepted.

Offered Since: 2005

Type: undergraduate

Who is qualified to apply? To be eligible to apply for this scholarship, applicant must be a student, male or female, from a country in the developing world, who:

• successfully completed a secondary education, with good to excellent grades
• will be studying in their country or another country in the developing world
• plans to live and work in their own country after they graduate
• has volunteered prior to applying for this scholarship and/or is willing to volunteer while receiving the WMF scholarship
• may have some other funds available for their education, but will not be able to go to school without a scholarship

Number of Awards: 10 to 30 per year

What are the benefits? Maximum scholarship is $3,000 USD.

• tuition and fees
• books and materials
• room rent and meals

How to Apply: 

• Applicants are required to submit two letters of recommendation written by someone who knows you, but is not a family member, who can tell why you deserve to receive a WMF scholarship. What qualities do you possess that will make you an excellent student, a successful graduate and a responsible citizen who will give back to his or her country? These letters of recommendation may come from a teacher, a religious leader, volunteer supervisor, or an employer.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Israel – Dan David Prize Scholarships 2020 for International Doctoral Students

Application Deadline: 10th March, 2020

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: All

To be taken at (country): Tel Aviv University, Israel

Eligible Fields of Researchers: Advanced doctoral and postdoctoral students of excellent achievements and promise studying topics related to the fields chosen for this year, are invited to apply for the Dan David Prize Scholarships 2020.

About the Award: The Dan David Prize is a joint international corporation, endowed by the Dan David Foundation and headquartered at Tel Aviv University.
The Dan David Prize recognizes and encourages innovative and interdisciplinary research that cuts across traditional boundaries and paradigms. It aims to foster universal values of excellence, creativity, justice, democracy and progress and to promote the scientific, technological and humanistic achievements that advance and improve our world.
The Dan David Prize covers three time dimensions – Past, Present and Future – that represent realms of human achievement. Each year the International Board chooses one field within each time dimension. Following a review process by independent Review Commitees comprised of renowned scholars and professionals, the International Board then chooses the laureates for each field.

Type: Doctoral/Postdoctoral, Research

Eligibility: Registered doctoral and post-doctoral researchers who study at recognized universities throughout the world, and whose research has been approved, are eligible to apply.

Selection Criteria: The Dan David Prize scholarships are granted according to merit, without discrimination based on gender, race, religion, nationality, or political affiliation.

Number of Awardees: 20 (10 scholarships are awarded to students from universities all over the world and 10 scholarships to students from Tel Aviv University)

Value of Scholarship: US$15,000

How to Apply: 

• The application process, including the uploading of required documents, must be completed online only via the Dan David Prize website.
• The requested Application Form and all documentation must be completed in English only.
• It is important to go through the Application Guidelines before applying.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Government of Hungary Stipendium Hungaricum Scholarships 2020/2021 for International Students

Application Deadline: 15th January 2020

Eligible Countries: International. See list of countries below

To be taken at (country): Hungary

Field of Study: Applicants are encouraged to apply for study fields that are in the educational cooperation programmes between Hungary and the specific Sending Partner.

About the Award: Thousands of students from all around the world apply for higher educational studies in Hungary each year. The number of Stipendium Hungaricum applicants is continuously increasing as well as the number of available scholarship places.
The programme is based on bilateral educational cooperation agreements signed between the Ministries responsible for education in the sending countries/territories and Hungary or between institutions. Currently more than 50 Sending Partners are engaged in the programme throughout 4 different continents.

Offered Since: 2013

Type: Stipendium Hungaricum scholarships are available for bachelor, master, one-tier master, doctoral and non-degree programmes (preparatory and specialisation courses).
In the Hungarian education system, one-tier master programmes cover both the bachelor and the master level of studies; therefore it is an undivided master programme that results in a master degree. These one-tier programmes are offered in specific study fields such as general medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, architecture, law, veterinary surgery, forestry engineering, etc.

Eligibility: See full eligibility of all study types in Scholarship Webpage (Link below).

Applications will not be considered in the following cases:

• Hungarian citizens (including those with dual citizenships)
• former Stipendium Hungaricum Scholarship Holders, who are re-applying for studies in the same cycle of education (non-degree studies, bachelor, master, doctoral level) including both full time and partial study programmes

Number of Awardees: Numerous

Value of Scholarship: 

• Tuition-free education
  • exemption from the payment of tuition fee

• Monthly stipend
  • non-degree, bachelor, master and one-tier master level: monthly amount of HUF 40 460 (cca EUR 130) contribution to the living expenses in Hungary, for 12 months a year, until the completion of studies
  • doctoral level: according to the current Hungarian legislation, the monthly amount of scholarship is HUF 140 000 (cca EUR 450) for the first phase of education (4 semesters) and HUF 180 000 (cca EUR 580) for the second phase (4 semesters) – for 12 months a year, until completion of studies.

• Accommodation
  • dormitory place or a contribution of HUF 40 000 to accommodation costs for the whole duration of the scholarship period

• Medical insurance
  • health care services according to the relevant Hungarian legislation (Act No. 80 of 1997, national health insurance card) and supplementary medical insurance for up to HUF 65 000 (cca EUR 205) a year/person

Duration of Scholarship: Duration of candidate’s chosen program:

• Bachelor programmes: Fulltime: 2-4 years. Partial: 1 or 2 semesters
• Master programmes:  Fulltime: 1.5-2 years. Partial: 1 or 2 semesters
• One-tier master programmes: Fulltime: 5-6 years Partial: 1 or 2 semesters
• Doctoral programmes:  Fulltime: 2+2 years Partial: 1 or 2 semesters
• Non-degree programmes:
  • Preparatory course in Hungarian language: 1 year
  • Other preparatory and specialisation courses: up to 1 year

List of Eligible Countries: For full time programmes, students can apply from the following Sending Partners: Arab Republic of Egypt, Argentine Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, Federal Republic of Nigeria, Georgia, Islamic Republic of Iran, Islamic Republic of Pakistan, Japan, Kingdom of Cambodia, Kingdom of Morocco, Kurdistan Regional Government/Iraq, Kyrgyz Republic, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Lebanese Republic, Mongolia, Oriental Republic of Uruguay, Palestine, People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria, People’s Republic of China (including the Hudec scholarships), Republic of Albania, Republic of Angola, Republic of Azerbaijan, Republic of Belarus, Republic of Colombia, Republic of Ecuador, Republic of Ghana, Republic of India, Republic of Indonesia, Republic of Iraq, Republic of Kazakhstan, Republic of Kenya, Republic of Korea, Republic of Kosovo, Republic of Macedonia (FYROM is used at OSCE, UN, CoE, EU and NATO fora), Republic of Moldova, Republic of Namibia, Republic of Paraguay, Republic of Serbia, Republic of South Africa, Republic of the Philippines, Republic of the Union of Myanmar, Republic of Turkey, Republic of Yemen, Russian Federation, Socialist Republic of Vietnam, State of Israel, Syrian Arab Republic, The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, Tunisian Republic, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, United Mexican States.

For partial study programmes, students can apply from the following Sending Partners: Georgia, Islamic Republic of Iran, Japan, Kingdom of Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Lebanese Republic, Mongolia, People’s Republic of China (only Hudec applicants), Republic of Albania, Republic of Belarus, Republic of India, Republic of Korea, Republic of the Union of Myanmar, Republic of Turkey, Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Russian Federation, Syrian Arab Republic, United Mexican States.

How to Apply: Apply for a Stipendium Hungaricum Scholarship Here
Separate: Call for Applications for doctoral programmes 2020/2021

• Applications shall be submitted to the responsible authority of the Sending Partner
• It is important to go through all application requirements in the Award Webpage (see Link below) before applying.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Chinese Government Scholarship—Chinese University Program 2020/2021 for International Students

Application Deadline: 29th February 2020

Eligible Countries: International

To Be Taken At (Country): China

About the Award: Chinese Government Scholarship—Chinese University Program is a scholarship established by Ministry of Education (MOE) to support Chinese universities in specific provinces or autonomous regions to recruit outstanding international students for graduate studies in China. MOE authorized USTC to recruit full-time master and doctoral students under the Chinese Government Scholarship since 2008.

Type: Masters, PhD

Eligibility: 

1. Applicants must be non-Chinese citizens and mentally and physically healthy.
2. Applicants must not be a registered student in Chinese universities at the time of application; or be a graduate from Chinese universities for more than one year.
3. Education background and age limit:

• Applicants for master’s degree studies must have bachelor’s degree (equivalent to bachelor’s degree in China) and be under the age of 35 (by September, 1st, 2020).
• Applicants for doctoral studies must have master’s degree (equivalent to master’s degree in China) and be under the age of 40 (by September, 1st, 2020).

※ For the graduates to obtain their degrees in 2020, they should submit a Pre-graduation Certificate to ensure that they will complete their study and obtain the degree by July of 2020.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The Chinese University Program provides a full scholarship which covers tuition waiver, accommodation, stipend, and comprehensive medical insurance.

• Tuition waiver.
• Accommodation: free university dormitory or accommodation subsidy.
• Stipend:

• master’s students: CNY 3,000 per month;
• doctoral students: CNY 3,500 per month.

Duration of Program: The duration of scholarship is decided in accordance with the duration of each specific program:

• Master’s Degree Programs: 2-3 academic years
• Doctoral Degree Programs: 3-4 academic years

How to Apply: To complete the application for USTC “Chinese Government Scholarship – University Postgraduate Program”, please make sure you finish each of the following steps as required and before the specific time.

Visit the Program Webpage for Details

Award Providers: Chinese Government

Women in News (WIN) Accelerator Programme for African Women Journalists 2020

Application Deadline: 15th December 2019

Eligible Countries: sub-Saharan African countries

About the Award: WIN works with media companies and their high potential female employees to overcome the gender gap in management and senior management positions. The programme seeks to equip women media professionals in middle and senior management positions with the right skills, knowledge and attitudes to help advance their careers. WIN provides them the support networks they need to take on a greater leadership role within their organizations and works with their organizations to create environments for high potential women to succeed.

Type: Training

Eligibility: 

• Applicants must have 2-3 years management experience and be working in the media sector (This includes print or digital newspapers, radio and, in some cases, broadcast).
• Journalists from Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe may apply for the 2020 programme.

While in previous years WIN has been accepting media women mostly from the print media, this year the call is being extended to even those in digital and electronic media.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award:

• The WIN Accelerator is an intensive, 9-month long career and leadership programme for journalists and editors. The programme accepts 100-150 applicants, annually.
• We offer four things to ensure the women who take part in the programme acquire new skill sets and build their capacity: Coaching, Training, Mentoring and Networking.

Duration of Programme: 9 Months

How to Apply: There are two steps to complete your application:

1. Complete the following application form here, or download the Word version here.
2. Have your direct manager complete the nomination form here, or download the Word version here.

Please note: both forms must be completed in order for your application to be considered complete.

If you are using the Word version of the application and nomination forms, please send the completed forms to info@womeninnews.org.
Please write the country which you are applying from in the subject line of the email.

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

One Africa Award 2019 – A Chance for Individuals and Organizations to Win $100,000

Application Deadline: 31st January 2020 23:59 SAST / 21:59 GMT/UTC

About the Award: The 2019 ONE Africa Award will recognise Africa-driven and Africa-led advocacy efforts that have demonstrated success at the community, national or regional level. The award recognises, rewards and advances the exceptional work of organisations founded by Africans and based in Africa, dedicated to advancing development goals in Africa. The US$100,000 award will recognise innovative African initiatives to fight extreme poverty and incentivise more of such efforts.
The $100,000 award will bring recognition to innovative African efforts to fight poverty and will incentivize more of such efforts. The award may be split into two prizes in order to award two smaller organizations better able to absorb a smaller monetary award.

Who is eligible to Apply?

• Civil society organisations, non-governmental organisations and other groups based in Africa that have demonstrated commitment and success in advocacy to promote the attainment of one or more of the SDGs are invited to apply.
• Qualified recipients may be engaged in direct services to achieve any of the SDGs, but must demonstrate a strong advocacy component integral to the delivery and success of their programs. Qualified recipients may be advocacy/pressure groups and think tanks engaged in governance activities, such as the monitoring of flows of resources and/or holding governments accountable to commitments to SDG attainment.
• Qualified recipients may be advocacy/pressure groups and think tanks engaged in governance activities such as the monitoring of flows of resources and/or holding governments accountable to commitments to MDG attainment.

Award Criteria: Organisations will be graded in five categories and will be awarded between 1-10 points in each of these categories:

1. Extent to which the organisation has designed and implemented an innovative advocacy program that employs entrepreneurial and sustainable approaches to impact in a given sector(s).
2. Ability to demonstrate and communicate specific indicators of progress and impact linking work to a given sector(s) in a clear results-oriented framework.
3. Demonstration of the ability to replicate efforts of the organisation to scale interventions.
4. Demonstration of strong internal and constituency accountability mechanisms (for example, community leadership consultations and involvement in programs to demonstrate that interventions are relevant to the majority of the poor in the target community and empowers them in a sustainable way) along with transparency of operations.
5. Extent to which the organisation has employed creative partnerships to achieve its goal(s) and ensure coordination with other development actors. These partnerships may include public and/or private sector players.

Shortlisted applications will undergo a due diligence process.

Selection Process: ONE will informally review the award winner’s project activities and progress a year following the receipt of the award.

Value of Award:  $100,000

How to Apply: Apply Now

Visit Programme Webpage for Details