International students face severe housing stress in Australia

Aditya Syed

Students at the University of Adelaide [Photo: University of Adelaide]

A recent academic survey has revealed that “hot-bedding”—the practice of tenants sharing a bed in shifts to reduce rental costs—is becoming more common in Australia. 

Immigrants and international students are the most likely to live in accommodation where multiple people share one bedroom or even one bed, due to unaffordable rents and the worsening cost of living. This often leads to a level of overcrowding that damages the physical and mental health of the students forced into these conditions. 

The survey was published last November by Dr. Zahra Nasreen, a researcher at the University of Sydney and Macquarie University, and included responses from 103 students. All the students surveyed shared their bedroom with strangers to ease rent costs.

The majority of respondents were international students with lower income. Of this sample, 17 percent shared their bedroom with three or more other people, while 18 percent reported that the living room in their accommodation was partitioned into one or more “bedrooms.” The most extreme case was a Nepalese international student who had been one of 20 people living in a single two-bedroom apartment. 

According to the survey, 46 percent of respondents were renting without a written lease, and 37 percent were paying rent in cash, a situation which would leave no record of their tenancy, giving them no legal options to counteract attempts by landlords to violate stated agreements, such as refusing to return deposits. 

Dr. Nasreen explained that these students understand their weak position in the rental market. They “lowered their housing expectations and settled for shared room situations that might not meet their everyday basic needs and can lead to health and safety risks,” she wrote.

Several surveyed students gave interviews that painted a vivid picture of the degrading conditions they face. Some reported not being allowed to cook, in order to prevent false fire-alarm penalties for the landlord or “head-tenant,” or being barred from using the heaters or air conditioners, for the landlord to save money on utility bills. One described the rules enforced in their accommodation, a two-bedroom apartment used by seven people: “[Y]ou’re not allowed to use the living room, you’re not allowed to talk loudly or laugh, even between phone calls or with the flatmates...” 

Tenants in these overcrowded conditions, the survey continued, reported sleepless nights, filth and social friction between themselves and fellow roommates, all strangers with their own schedules and needs. This increased the likelihood of physical disease and mental illness, negatively impacting the students’ employment and education.

Measures including hot-bedding, skipping meals and tolerating abusive landlords are all desperate responses to an increasingly unaffordable rental market.

In Sydney, the weekly rent of a one-bedroom apartment can range from $300 to $700, as of September 2024. The cost of living has increased staggeringly in the last five years: the Australian Bureau of Statistics shows the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a measure of household expenses, rose by 2.8 percent from September 2023 to September 2024, and has risen consistently since mid-2020, with a peak annual increase of around 7 percent in 2022. 

However, these CPI increases and the official inflation rate are an under-representation of the actual increases in costs of daily utilities, food items and rent. 

The Labor government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, since taking office in 2022, has backed multiple increases in mortgage interest rates, translating to higher rent prices for tenants. This is just one element of an historic assault on the social conditions of the working class and youth by Labor, including education and health, the steepest cuts since the 1930s.

Successive Australian federal governments, led by both Labor and the Liberal-National Coalition, have enacted pro-business policies that are accelerating the cost-of-living crisis. They have slashed social services as well as funding for universities, leaving universities to shift their financial losses onto international students and charge them exorbitant fees.

It was the Labor Party government in the 1980s, under Prime Minister Bob Hawke, that began the abolition of free higher education, beginning with fees for international students in 1989, as well as a broad pro-corporate assault on the social conditions of the working class.

Rental prices increased sharply across Australia between 2023 and 2024, including by 12 percent in Victoria and even 30 percent in parts of Brisbane. Over the last five years, rents have risen by over 50 percent, while wages are stagnant and declining in real terms.

An earlier survey, conducted in 2019 by researchers from the University of Technology Sydney, investigated housing stress among international students. It found that 3 percent of survey participants practiced hot-bedding. Extrapolated to the entire international student population in Australia, this amounts to over 20,000 students hot-bedding at that time. About a quarter of respondents lived in houses with at least two people per bedroom.

As the study stated, “hot-bedding is indicative of extreme financial stress.” About 22 percent of respondents deprived themselves of food and utilities to pay rent, while 57 percent had a total income of under $500 per week.

International students were among the most vulnerable layers affected by lockdowns during the initial outbreak of COVID-19. From the 2019 survey participants, 852 answered a follow-up survey in mid-2020. Of those who were employed, 61 percent lost their jobs. The proportion of those who skipped meals to afford rent ballooned from 22 to 33 percent. International students were also ineligible for any financial assistance from the government, leaving them to face this social crisis alone. 

Five years since the 2019 survey, the financial stress that underlies the resort to hot-bedding has significantly worsened. International students, who pay exorbitant fees and cannot access state financial aid, are viewed as cash-cows by the entire Australian political establishment and the universities, which are run as highly profitable businesses.

The Labor government is attacking public education and housing because it is a party of Australian capitalism, intimately connected to big business and property developers and advancing their profit interests. 

This has also been demonstrated in Labor’s drive to demolish public housing. The Victorian state Labor government is setting out to demolish 44 public housing towers across Melbourne, displacing up to 10,000 residents, and replacing them largely with private apartments. This is being done on the totally false pretext that the towers are unfit for habitation and there is no cost-effective way to refurbish them. 

Whatever fraudulent claims Labor has made to be alleviating the housing crisis for ordinary people, their actions have been aimed at extracting more wealth from the population for the benefit of the ultra-wealthy, and expanding military spending as the Australian ruling elite prepares for a US-led conflict against China in the Indo-Pacific.

China announces retaliation against Trump’s “reciprocal tariffs”

Nick Beams

The Port of Shanghai, May 2013, [Photo by Bruno Corpet / CC BY-SA 3.0]

China has retaliated against the Trump administration’s imposition of a 34 percent “reciprocal tariff” by announcing a 34 percent tariff to be imposed on all American imports on April 10.

It has also taken other measures against the US, including an investigation into a Chinese subsidiary of the US chemical giant DuPont, further restrictions on the export of rare earths, and adding more US companies to its “entities list,” which prohibits Chinese companies from supplying them with components.

The blanket tariff on all US goods was previously considered a worst-case option, but the level of the attack was such that Beijing decided to go ahead with it.

A statement by the Chinese Commerce Ministry denounced the US action as a “typical unilateral bullying move.” It said that the US tariffs did “not comply with the rules of international trade” and seriously damaged “the legitimate rights and interests of China.”

Together with the 20 percent tariff hike announced before Trump’s so-called “liberation day” last Wednesday, the total increase in tariffs in the latest round comes to 54 percent.

But according to the Peterson Institute of International Economics, it is even higher than that. When combined with previous tariff measures, the rate comes to 76 percent—well above the 60 percent that Trump had previously threatened.

Trump responded to the Chinese action with a message on his social media that contained an implicit warning of further US action against it.

“China played it wrong,” he said. “They panicked—the one thing they cannot afford to do.”

This message needs to be read in the light of a statement in the fact sheet that accompanied the executive order announcing the tariff hikes.

It said the order, issued on the grounds of a “national security” threat, contained a “modification authority, allowing President Trump to increase the tariff if trading partners retaliate.”

The official “justification” for the “reciprocal tariffs” is that they are to compensate for non-tariff measures carried out by countries, such as taxes, regulations and biosecurity measures, deemed to be a non-market barrier to US goods.

The level of the tariff was determined in a back-of-the-envelope calculation. The trade deficit of the US with the given country was divided by the total of its exports in order to arrive at a percentage that was then halved to arrive at the “reciprocal tariff” number.

This has resulted in enormous tariff hikes for a number of Southeast Asian countries that have become significant manufacturing centers supplying the American market.

The hardest hit is Vietnam, for which the “reciprocal tariff” will be 46 percent. The tariff hit against Taiwan is 32 percent, with Thailand coming in at 37 percent.

These tariffs will have a major impact on the economies of the region, possibly pushing some of them into recession.

Whether by accident, the result of a cooked-up formula or design (the most likely explanation), they are indirectly aimed at China. Following the tariff measures directed at China in the first Trump administration, many companies, Chinese and American, among them, moved their operations to Southeast Asia to dodge the tariff hit. That road has now been closed.

There are now multiple warnings in the financial press and in business circles that the world is being plunged into an all-out trade war, akin to and possibly even more damaging than that of the 1930s, which played a crucial role in intensifying the Great Depression.

“This is increasingly looking like a full-blown trade war,” Guy Miller, chief market strategist at the major Swiss insurer, told the Financial Times, warning that Trump’s “misguided economic policy” had not previously been priced in by the market.

He was referring to the widely held belief that the measures would not be as severe as they were and that, in any case, they would be merely “transactional,” aimed at securing concessions within the existing regime rather than completely smashing it.

In an editorial yesterday, the FT said Trump’s decision in April would go down as “one of the greatest acts of self-harm in American history.” The “reciprocal tariffs,” it said, would “wreak untold damage on households, businesses, and financial markets across the world, upending a global economic order that America benefited from and helped to create.”

But such warnings about the effect of his measures will have no impact on Trump, for he has constructed an alternative narrative according to which the Great Depression would not have occurred had the tariffs of the era of President William McKinley been maintained and the post-war regime of liberal trade did not benefit the US but damaged it.

In another social media post directed to the “many investors” coming into the US with “massive amounts of money,” he said that “my policies will never change. This is a great time to get rich, richer than before.”

This sentiment does not seem to be shared in financial markets. Yesterday, Wall Street fell sharply again. In the two days since the tariff announcements, market capitalization has fallen by $6.6 trillion, with high-tech stocks entering bear market territory with falls greater than 20 percent.

The effects are already showing up in the real economy, with numbers of firms announcing layoffs because of the tariff hikes and the growing uncertainty.

Forecasts for US growth are being revised down. JP Morgan has slashed its forecast for growth in the US economy from a 1.3 percent year-on-year growth in the fourth quarter to a 0.3 percent contraction. It said the unemployment rate would rise to 5.3 percent.

Citigroup has cut its forecast for growth from 0.6 percent to 0.1 percent.

The massive hit on China will have ramifications around the world, not least of all in Europe, which is already under the hammer because of the 20 percent “reciprocal tariff” and the 25 percent levy on imported cars into the US.

In response, the European Union is preparing tariff measures against Chinese goods, which it considers will come into the market after being excluded from the US.

Deutsche Bank chief Germany economist Robin Winkler said the immediate trade shock to Asia would probably reverberate back to Europe, as Chinese manufacturers would try to sell more of their products as they face “a formidable tariff wall in the US.”

According to a senior US diplomat, cited by the FT:

We will have to take safeguard measures for more of our industries. We are very concerned this will be another point of tension with China.

One of the measures being considered is to raise the tariff on Chinese electric vehicles, now at 35 percent, even higher.

Such a response—step up the tariff war—is highly politically significant. It demonstrates that the crisis into which the world economy is being plunged is not the outcome of Trump’s irrationality. Tariff wars arise out of the fundamental contradiction of the world economy, that between globalized production and the nation-state system for which the ruling classes of every country have no answer other than a deepening war of each against all.

Thailand’s prime minister survives no-confidence motion

Robert Campion

Thailand’s Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra survived a no-confidence vote last week after two days of a censure debate in the National Assembly. Called by the parliamentary opposition bloc, this was part of the ongoing infighting within the Thai ruling class, which is certain to continue and generate further political instability.

Thailand‘s Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, centre, arrives at Government House for cabinet meeting in Bangkok, February 4, 2025. [AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit]

The censure motion was led by the so-called “progressive” People’s Party (PP) in alliance with the military-backed Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP). The ruling bloc in parliament, which includes Paetongtarn’s Pheu Thai Party (PT) and its allies including the right-wing Bhumjaithai Party (BJT) and the United Thai Nation Party, which is also backed by military factions, defeated the motion 319 to 162.

Afterwards, Paetongtarn stated that the debate went “smoothly” and thanked all members of parliament for motivating her to “continue to work hard for our people.” Paetongtarn became prime minister last August after Srettha Thavisin, the first Pheu Thai prime minister, was removed from office by the Constitutional Court on trumped-up ethics charges.

Paetongtarn was probed on a number of issues including corruption over landholdings, tax evasion and even poor economic knowledge. She was also accused of taking political orders from her father, former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the founder of Pheu Thai who was removed from office in the 2006 military coup. He remains de facto party leader and a political target of the military and the royalist political establishment.

As has repeatedly been the case in Thai politics, the corruption charges are simply the means by which rival factions of the political establishment battle for power and influence. Tensions in ruling circles have markedly sharpened amid a worsening economic crisis and growing fears of an eruption of opposition by workers, peasants and youth.

According to the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Thailand’s GDP growth in 2024 was just 2.6 percent, with contractions in both manufacturing and agriculture. The growth rate was considerably lower than the region as a whole, which sees countries in the order of 5 to 6 percent.

In backing the no-confidence motion, the “progressive” People’s Party, as the lead opposition party in the National Assembly, has aligned itself more closely with the PPRP, which was the party of the military junta that seized power in the 2014 coup.

People’s Party MP Pakamon Noon-anan criticised remarks Paetongtarn made last September, in which the latter stated a strong baht was good for Thailand’s exporters. “People worldwide know that a strong baht benefits imports because they cost less to bring in. It harms exports because our products are more expensive… Lack of understanding of a simple issue affects people’s confidence in the nation’s leader,” Pakamon declared during the debate.

It is not the “people’s confidence” but the interests of big business that is the real concern. Thailand is in the firing line in the Trump administration’s trade war measures, having a trade surplus with the US of $35.42 billion in 2024. The US is Thailand’s top export market, supplying food stuffs, electrical appliances, automotive parts, industrial products and some minerals.

According to estimates from the Joint Standing Committee on Commerce, Industry and Banking, operating costs for Thai exporters could spike by 6 to 8 percent if US tariffs are directed against Thailand.

In the first part of this year, Thailand’s exports have actually grown, partly in anticipation of US tariffs. However, this growth is not sustainable. The Economic Intelligence Center (EIC) of Siam Commercial Bank this month lowered its export growth forecast from its November prediction of 2 percent to 1.6 percent, while the government is targeting 3 to 3.5 percent growth.

The EIC’s prediction is based in part on factors like US tariffs, which includes 25 percent tariffs on all vehicle and auto part imports into the US that came into force today. Thailand has the tenth largest auto industry in the world, and in 2024 exported approximately $US4 billion worth of auto parts to the US.

The Thai economy has taken another huge hit today after Trump announced his list of so-called reciprocal tariffs on countries worldwide—friend and foe alike. Now Thai exports to the US across the board will be subjected to a huge 36 percent tariff.

Sections of Thai big business are deeply concerned that Paetongtarn lacks the ability to deal with Trump’s trade war, protect corporate interests and deal with the inevitable social unrests as new burdens are imposed on working people. As a result, the future of the Paetongtarn government is still very much in doubt, despite its defeat of the no-confidence motion.

PPRP Secretary-General Paiboon Nititawan remarked prior to the parliamentary debate: “After the censure debate, many issues will follow and involve legal ones which can be expanded. They may turn out to be petitions to the National Anti-Corruption Commission and the Constitutional Court.”

He warned that a petition to the Constitutional Court on the prime minister “may lead to political change” and would be “fun.” Four prime ministers have been removed by the Constitutional Court in the last 16 years, including Pheu Thai’s Srettha Thavisin last year.

The National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) and other bodies like the Constitutional Court (CC) have been heavily influenced by the military since the 2014 coup. The coup leaders wrote and rammed through the 2017 constitution that paved the way for elections and included substantial powers for the military.

Significantly while the People’s Party criticised Thaksin’s “undue influence” on the Paetongtarn government during the censure debate, the influence of the military and the monarchy went unchallenged. Its past criticisms of the military and monarchy have now been shelved as it has aligned itself with the PPRP.

The PP’s predecessor, the Move Forward Party, rose to prominence following huge protests of mainly young people in 2020 against the 2014 coup leader, the 2017 constitution and the monarchy. After winning the 2023 election, the military blocked it from forming government and undoubtedly played a role in its dissolution last August.

That the People’s Party is working with the PPRP to target the Paetongtarn government, not only exposes the fraudulent character of its progressive posturing, but demonstrates the organic inability of any faction of the bourgeoisie to defend basic democratic rights.

US sends stealth bombers and aircraft carrier to the Middle East in threat against Iran

Andre Damon

A B-2 Spirit stealth bomber at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, June 29, 2024. [Photo: Air Force Senior Airman Jack Rodgers ]

Against the backdrop of Israel’s Gaza genocide and ongoing US attacks against Yemen, the Trump administration is rushing military hardware to the Middle East amid escalating threats to attack Iran.

While the Trump administration’s pretext for threatening Iran is the alleged development of its nuclear program, US war plans against Iran are part of a US-Israeli offensive, decades in the making, to reshape the Middle East under direct imperialist domination and launched using the October 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas as a pretext. As part of this plan, Israel is ethnically cleansing Gaza and seeking to annex the territory.

On Tuesday, the Pentagon announced that the USS Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group will be deployed to the Middle East, joining the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier strike group.

The Pentagon has sent six of its B-2 stealth bombers to Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean—within striking distance of Iran—or 30 percent of the entire US stealth bomber fleet. The B-2 bomber is capable of deploying both nuclear weapons and the largest US bunker-buster bombs, which are reportedly capable of reaching underground Iranian nuclear facilities.

Military aviation analyst Peter Layton told CNN that the deployment of six B-2 bombers would be far too many to be used against Yemen and could instead only be leveraged in an attack on Iran. “Six is a serious number. For Houthi deeply buried targets, two or maybe three, but six B-2s is a major effort,” he said.

Alongside the aircraft carriers and bombers, the US has sent additional destroyers capable of launching long-range cruise missiles and Patriot missile defense batteries to bases around the region.

Over the weekend, US President Donald Trump declared that unless Iran accepted the United States’ demands, “there will be bombing.”

Last month, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz told CBS’s “Face the Nation” that the United States is seeking the “full dismantlement of” Iran’s nuclear program. Waltz said:

This isn’t some kind of, you know, kind of tit-for-tat that we had under the Obama administration or Biden. ... This is the full program. Give it up or there will be consequences.

On Wednesday, French President Emmanuel Macron held a meeting to discuss the likelihood of a US attack on Iran, with a spokesman later declaring that a military escalation appeared “almost inevitable.”

On March 15, the Trump administration launched a series of bombing campaigns on Yemen, which have hit hundreds of targets in the most intense US bombardment of the country to date.

On Tuesday, Trump again threatened Yemen, saying:

we have only just begun, and the real pain is yet to come, for both the Houthis and their sponsors in Iran.

The same day, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the United States has carried out over 200 attacks on Yemen, declaring:

Iran is incredibly weakened as a result of these attacks, and we have seen they have taken out Houthi leaders.

In response to Trump’s threats against Iran, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that “if they commit any mischief they will surely receive a strong reciprocal blow.”

The Telegraph reported Sunday that an Iranian official said that British troops could also be targeted in response to a US attack, saying:

There will be no distinction in targeting British or American forces if Iran is attacked from any base in the region or within the range of Iranian missiles.

He added:

When the time comes, it won’t matter whether you’re an American, British, or Turkish soldier—you will be targeted if your base is used by Americans.

A US attack on Iran threatens to massively escalate the ongoing war throughout the Middle East, potentially drawing in China and Russia

Last week, Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Qalibaf said:

If the Americans attack the sanctity of Iran, the entire region will blow up like a spark in an ammunition dump.

During Trump’s first presidential term, the United States withdrew from the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), an agreement brokered under the Obama administration to reduce the scale of Iran’s nuclear program. In December, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that Iran has expanded its capacity to enrich uranium.

In a statement this week, Ali Larijani, Khamenei’s adviser, raised the prospect that Iran would build a nuclear weapon in response to the US threats. Ali Larijani said:

We are not moving towards (nuclear) weapons, but if you do something wrong in the Iranian nuclear issue, you will force Iran to move towards that because it has to defend itself.

He added:

Iran does not want to do this, but … (it) will have no choice. … If at some point you (the US) move towards bombing by yourself or through Israel, you will force Iran to make a different decision.

Meanwhile, the Gaza genocide continues to expand. Al Jazeera reported that at least 77 Palestinians had been killed in the blockaded territory Wednesday, amid nonstop ground and air attacks by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). In the IDF’s missile attack on a United Nations medical facility in the Jabalia refugee camp, at least 22 people, including women and children, were killed.

On Tuesday, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) announced that every one of the bakeries it operates in Gaza has been closed due to shortages of food and fuel caused by the ongoing Israeli blockade.

For nearly a month, Israel has prevented all food, fuel, water and electricity from entering the Gaza Strip as part of a deliberate policy of starvation and ethnic cleansing aimed at killing or displacing Palestinians in Gaza and annexing their land.

On Tuesday, Israel announced a major expansion of its ground offensive in Gaza, adding that large portions of the enclave would be seized and put under military control.

Meanwhile more details continue to come out about the 15 aid workers, including one UN employee, massacred by Israeli forces on March 23 and dumped into a mass grave. After The Guardian reported Tuesday that those who had been killed had been bound and executed, the New York Times reported that the rescue workers “were shot multiple times before being buried in a mass grave.”

French overseas minister returns for talks in New Caledonia amid ongoing crisis

John Braddock

France’s Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls in Paris January 7, 2025 [AP Photo/Ludovic Marin]

France’s Overseas Minister Manuel Valls returned to New Caledonia this week for four days of talks on the French Pacific territory’s future. Valls previously visited the capital Nouméa between February 22 and March 1 to convene multi-party discussions, ostensibly to initiate a new agreement on the colony’s political status, following months of widespread civil unrest by indigenous Kanak youth.

That meeting involved representatives of all the colony’s establishment parties, including pro-France “Loyalists” and factions of the pro-independence movement. That had not happened since 2021 following three referenda on self-determination, the last of which was boycotted by the Kanak community.

The participants insisted that the initial round of talks were only “discussions,” not formal negotiations. Valls published a “synthesis paper” summing up the pro-France and pro-independence camps’ opposed views, which was put forward as a working basis for the more advanced talks.

With the opposing camps holding, for now, entrenched positions, Valls, a former prime minister during the Hollande Socialist Party presidency, has adopted a superficially conciliatory approach. Interviewed by Le Monde ahead of his first visit, he spoke about the provisions of the 1988 “power sharing” Nouméa Accord, noting the Accord’s reference to eventual “full and complete sovereignty” and decolonisation. Valls’ statement provoked hostile protests from the Loyalist factions on his previous arrival.

In a statement before the latest meeting, Valls said the talks had “a clear objective: delineate the fresh horizons of New Caledonia and map out the contours of a shared future after clarifying everyone’s expectations, without any taboos or detours.”

The statement also affirmed President Emmanuel Macron’s priority for France’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, declaring: “Our exchanges concerning New Caledonia’s competencies in international relations were marked by a shared commitment: advancing New Caledonia’s interests while ensuring France’s strategic security.” Valls warned that “any actions or alliances that harm France’s strategic interests, particularly those that side with foreign powers seeking to weaken us, will not be tolerated.”

France, determined to ensure its position as an Indo-Pacific power amid escalating US-led preparations for war against China, will not relinquish its hold over the strategically vital territory. New Caledonia is home to a major French military base and holds nearly a quarter of the world’s reserves of nickel, essential in the manufacture of stainless steel and in the defence industry.

In an interview with French media outlets in March, Valls said the situation in New Caledonia was not yet “appeased” and that a comprehensive agreement on the territory’s future was still remote. “Even though we managed to get all political forces to speak to each other again, we are still far from an agreement. One has to understand the fear all of our compatriots over there, and especially those of European origin, have gone through. And to understand also the Kanaks’ aspiration to emancipation and decolonization,” he added.

The latest talks, held behind closed doors at the French High Commission, reportedly centred on the definition of New Caledonia’s future links with France, the possible transfer of powers from Paris, New Caledonian citizenship, and the related question of who is eligible to vote in local elections.

New Caledonia’s status remains to be determined. Options include “shared sovereignty,” “full independence” or a “free association,” similar to New Zealand’s neo-colonial arrangement with its so-called “Realm” countries, the Cook Islands and Niue.

New Caledonia’s main pro-independence organisation, the Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) issued a blunt statement condemning any move to open up the local electoral roll to recent arrivals from France. The issue triggered the uprising last May, which continued for months in the face of brutal police-military suppression by the French state.

Opposing the granting of votes to post-1998 immigrants, the FLNKS declared it “rejects the principle of mass naturalisation, which would weaken the emancipation project derived from the Nouméa Accord, by allowing recent residents to influence the political future of New Caledonia. In a process of decolonisation, citizenship is not built on residence or taxation alone. It is based on history, belonging, and mutual respect.”

Departing Nouméa on Tuesday, Valls told the media that “all parties of the political landscape, both pro-France and pro-independence, were once again part of the series of round tables.” An official document, which remains confidential, has been tabled for “a third sequence” of discussions beginning on 29 April.

What the talks will not address, let alone resolve, is the deep economic and social crisis hitting the colony, and in particular the impoverished working class and youth. The issues behind the unrest including poverty, social inequality, unemployment and social desperation remain. The rebellion brought a substantial section of Kanak youth into conflict, not only with French colonial oppression, but with the territory’s political establishment, including the local government and the FLNKS.

January saw a sharp shift to the right by the local ruling elite. Following the territorial government’s collapse on Christmas Eve, the new cabinet installed anti-independence loyalist Alcide Ponga, the first Kanak to lead the pro-France Le Rassemblement party, as its new president. Ponga replaced Louis Mapou of the pro-independence Parti de Libération Kanak (Palika), who bitterly declared; “It’s a dirty political blow to the country.”

Congress last month adopted an austerity budget. With businesses failing and thousands unemployed, the government is cutting public services. A spokesman for the pro-independence Union Calédonienne (UC), Pierre-Chanel Tutugoro, denounced the budget as an “anti-Kanak, anti-islander budget.”

In fact, the austerity measures are an attack against the entire working class, including workers in France and internationally, who are being made to pay for the worsening global economic crisis. The crisis in the colony has been exacerbated by the months of violence, including the brutal police-military crackdown, which resulted in 14 deaths and an estimated €2.2 billion in damages.

Nearly a year since the unrest started, unemployment remains high. One in five workers has lost all or part of their income and more than half of the 11,000 people who lost their jobs after last May were still unemployed at the start of this year.

University of New Caledonia economist Séverine Blaise told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation the economic situation was “catastrophic.” She said the local government should focus on strengthening social security for people struggling to make a living, and invest in sectors that might promote economic development, such as agriculture. This is a forlorn hope.

Migration figures earlier this year showed a net 10,700 people, mainly French nationals, departed the territory in 2024, a dramatic population decline for the territory of just 270,000. A shortage of doctors and nurses has left health services on the verge of collapse. About 20 percent of the 1,000 locally registered doctors have left, according to the French Medical Association of New Caledonia. A similar shortage of surgical nurses has forced Nouméa’s hospital to close departments and stop some surgeries.

The nickel industry, which in the past accounted for about 20 percent of GDP and 90 percent of exports, is in crisis. It was already in decline before the uprising due to global competition from suppliers in China and Indonesia. Since then, exports have dropped and two of the main smelters have been idled.

One of these is Koniambo Nickel SAS (KNS) owned by Swiss mining giant Glencore in a joint venture with Kanak-owned Société Minière du Sud Pacifique SA (SMSP). Last year Glencore announced it would suspend production and sell its stake, leaving 1,000 workers jobless.

Koniambo was a product of the “economic rebalancing” agenda of the Nouméa Accord, established to provide business opportunities for a privileged Kanak layer. Its unviability is testament to the fraudulent promise of Kanak “independence.”

Simmering tensions could erupt again at any time. Last month, in an incident outside a Nouméa nightclub, up to 400 youths were involved in a public brawl. Law enforcement units were called and declared they found themselves in “a dangerous situation” confronted with “hostile” individuals and used teargas and stun-balls.

The French High Commissioner’s chief of staff Anaïs Aït Mansour told reporters the reintroduction of restrictive measures used under last year’s “insurrectional situation” would again be “under consideration.”

Education Dept. abruptly ends COVID relief extensions, revoking $3 billion nationwide

Jane Wise

University of Michigan academic workers struck in September 2020 to prevent their exposure to COVID-19

In the latest series of actions by the Trump administration to decimate public education, the Department of Education has abruptly ended billions in pandemic relief funding to districts across the country.

Last Friday, the Department of Education (DE) revoked funding extensions—previously granted under the Biden administration—for states to use remaining Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds. This will retroactively nullify spending plans already approved for schools across the country such as tutoring, mental health services, and infrastructure upgrades. 

The Trump administration’s revocation of ESSER extensions affects 41 states, with $2.5 billion stripped from K-12 schools and $433 million from private school grants.

In a blatant disregard for the well-being of students, Education Secretary Linda McMahon issued a letter on Friday, March 28, informing state education officials that the deadline to spend remaining COVID relief funds had passed that very day at 5 p.m. EST. 

McMahon’s letter, issued sweeping dismissals of schools’ ongoing need for pandemic aid, framing further support as unnecessary and misaligned with the department’s priorities. She stated that “extending deadlines for COVID-related grants, which are in fact taxpayer funds, years after the COVID pandemic ended is not consistent with the Department’s priorities and thus not a worthwhile exercise of its discretion.” 

Furthermore, she asserted that states and school districts “have had ample time to liquidate obligations” and that they “could not rely on the Department adhering to its original decision” to grant extensions. This declaration effectively pulled the rug out from under school districts that had already budgeted and committed these funds for crucial projects, anticipating federal reimbursement.

Districts had requested extensions for a variety of reasons. Many had already signed contracts for services, like tutoring, HVAC and window upgrades, and mental health programs, that extended past the original deadline. Supply chain issues delayed deliveries, and labor shortages made it hard to schedule contractors, especially since many districts were competing for the same workers. Major renovations also had to be done during summer breaks to avoid disrupting classes, further limiting timelines. 

Some districts needed extra time to launch tutoring, literacy, or after school programs, and the complex process of managing and reimbursing funds also caused delays. These extensions were essential to help schools use the funds to improve air quality, boost health and safety, and support student recovery. 

These cuts are only the latest in the Trump administration’s efforts to do away with the right to a public education and critical thought. Since January 2025, the Trump administration has slashed billions in education funding while halving the Department of Education’s workforce. These cuts have disrupted Title I support for 26 million low-income students, gutted civil rights enforcement, and jeopardized 420,000 education jobs.

Programs serving 7.5 million students under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) are being transferred to the Department of Health and Human Services, under the control of the anti-science quack Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The $1.6 trillion federal student loan portfolio was handed to the Small Business Administration amid its own staffing crisis. This restructuring deliberately destabilizes public education to pave the way for the Trump administrations privatization schemes like vouchers.

School officials across the country, already facing major budget crises are now scrambling to figure out how they will deal with the abrupt loss of billions of dollars already approved for their schools. Details from just a few states indicate the massive impact on schools across the country: 

Maryland faces over $350 million in lost funding, placing immediate halt to HVAC upgrades, tutoring, mental health services, and school construction in Baltimore City, Prince George’s, and Montgomery counties. $305 million was already spent but not reimbursed, including literacy programs and room health upgrades in schools across the state. Some districts may be unable to pay vendors for new instructional materials and tuition costs for educator preparation programs.

Massachusetts lost $106 million for pandemic recovery initiatives. The New Bedford Public School District in Massachusetts, where approximately 80 percent of students come from low-income families, had $12 million in ESSER funds approved for extension to support five critical infrastructure projects. Three of these projects—a central kitchen, modular classrooms, and accessibility upgrades—are nearing completion. The district is now relying on emergency reserves to honor existing contracts.

The sudden ending of federal funds has halted and jeopardized the remaining two projects in the district: the installation of an HVAC system in a 1970s-era building that currently lacks proper ventilation and the construction of a school-based health center to provide medical services for students. 

Michigan stands to lose as much as $42 million, impacting at least 27 school districts. State Superintendent Michael Rice rightly decried the action as “unacceptable,” telling the Detroit Free Press that the state had already approved projects, including HVAC improvements and window upgrades, with the expectation of federal reimbursement. Now, to honor these contracts, districts may be forced to reduce classroom spending or dip into savings. Flint Community Schools faces the largest potential loss in Michigan, at $15.6 million.

Efforts to improve student health in communities heavily impacted by the pandemic, such as Flint and Pontiac, Michigan, are also likely to be undermined. Programs supporting homeless students, including transportation, after school tutoring, mental health services, and navigators who assist families with basic needs, are now at risk.

Initially, states had to justify each expense as pandemic-related but were not required to submit contracts, only to keep them on file. Then in February, the department quietly changed course, demanding itemized receipts for every purchase, adding a new layer of red tape.

On March 11, just weeks before the cutoff, Secretary McMahon fired all 16 staffers in the office responsible for processing those payments, effectively shutting down the mechanism for distributing the remaining funds. 

By mid-March, state officials were scrambling. “I’m reaching out again to find out the status of these approvals,” a Pennsylvania official pleaded in a March 15 email to the department, according to The 74.

“It makes me incredibly angry,” said Laura Jimenez, who led the relief office until January. “We very carefully administered $200 billion, and they’re completely destroying that with the last couple of billion.”

The ED, meanwhile, offered no real justification. Spokeswoman Madi Biedermann claimed it was “past time for the money to be returned to the people’s bank account” and vaguely referenced “numerous documented examples of misuse” without naming one.

While GOP lawmakers have long railed against schools spending on gyms and athletic fields, there’s little evidence of actual fraud. In contrast to the Paycheck Protection Program, which saw over $60 billion lost to theft largely from businesses, school relief funds were tightly monitored. A 2023 Inspector General report confirmed the department had taken “significant actions” to oversee spending.

The Trump administration’s ending of ESSER funds extensions comes after the Biden administration had allowed ESSER funding to expire, sending many districts across the country over a “fiscal cliff” because of their dependence on the funding. Even before the abrupt cutoff last Friday, school districts have been carrying out steep budget reductions by closing schools, shuttering vital programs, and triggering layoffs of thousands of teachers, counselors, social workers, and support staff, stripping schools of vital personnel and pushing class sizes higher. 

Furthermore, the Trump administration, through its Education Department spokesperson Madi Biedermann, shamelessly declared, “COVID is over” as a justification for halting the payouts. This statement flies in the face of the pandemic’s continued global impact.

As the World Socialist Web Site (WSWS) has documented, five years after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, the disease continues to spread, having claimed roughly 30 million lives globally, with hundreds of millions more suffering from Long COVID. 

The current administration’s denial of the pandemic’s ongoing effects is a continuation of the deliberate bipartisan policy of deception to justify the austerity measures imposed on the working class to fund war and enrich the world’s oligarchs.

The assault on public education must be understood within the broader context of the Trump administration’s agenda to dismantle essential public services. Just days before McMahon’s announcement, the Department of Health and Human Services abruptly canceled more than $12 billion in federal grants to states used for tracking infectious diseases, mental health services, addiction treatment, and other urgent health issues. 

This move, like the defunding of schools, will further cripple already underfunded public programs, leading to the layoffs of thousands of workers and jeopardizing programs vital to the working class. The halting of COVID relief funds is another step in this destructive process, aligning with the administration’s broader attack on science and social programs and its “let it rip” pandemic policy.

The capitalist system is incapable of addressing the fundamental needs of the population, as evidenced by the disastrous response to the pandemic and now the gutting of public health and education. 

The fight to save public education cannot be left to the Democrats or union bureaucracies who, in their refusal to act in the interests of the working class, are open collaborators with the fascist Trump administration. 

The Democratic National Committee issued a statement denouncing the cuts to education as part of Trump’s broader agenda to dismantle public education, calling it a betrayal of 50 million students. Yet, despite their rhetoric, Democrats voted for the 2025 federal budget that included over $200 million in cuts to education, exposing their complicity in the bipartisan assault on public education. 

Meanwhile, the national teachers unions the American Federation of Teachers and National Education Association—led by Randi Weingarten and Becky Pringle respectively—have sought to suppress the growing opposition of their four million members, including blocking strike action by 26,000 Chicago teachers. Instead, the union bureaucracies are trying to smother opposition by telling educators to appeal to Democratic Party legislators as well as Trump himself.

European Union threatens retaliation against Trump tariffs

Alex Lantier

Ursula von der Leyen presents the new Commission and its program ahead of the vote in the European Parliament [Photo by Europäische Union, 2024 - EP]

European Union (EU) officials responded to global tariffs imposed by the Trump administration yesterday by moving to impose tens of billions of euros in tariffs on US products. With Washington now imposing a 20 percent tariff on all EU goods and a 25 percent tariff on European auto exports, US-EU ties are suffering a historic breakdown, and a trade war is being set into motion, threatening unprecedented attacks on workers in America, Europe and internationally.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spoke this morning from Uzbekistan, where she is attending a Central Asia-EU summit, appealing to Washington for talks while threatening a first raft of €26 billion in EU tariffs. Asking Trump to “move from confrontation to negotiation,” she said, “We are already finalizing a first package of countermeasures in response to tariffs on steel. And we are now preparing for further countermeasures to protect our interests and our businesses if negotiations fail.”

Vast numbers of goods and jobs are at stake. US-EU trade reached €1.6 trillion in 2023, including €851 billion in goods and €746 billion in services. While Europe ran a €153 billion trade surplus in goods, mainly in cars, machinery, aerospace and pharmaceuticals, it ran a €109 billion deficit in services, driven mainly by purchases of services by US banks and tech firms. The United States and the EU have invested over €5 trillion in each other’s financial markets.

The EU’s first wave of tariffs target US goods, including jeans, Harley-Davidson motorcycles, steel, aluminum and agricultural goods. The EU may also invoke its so-called Anti-Coercion Instrument (ACI), a 2023 law to coordinate trade war measures against countries the EU considers are seeking to economically coerce it. This would let EU countries cut payments to US banks and tech firms for financial services or intellectual property rights.

For now, uncertainty prevails in European ruling circles as to what sort of deal they can negotiate with Trump and how quickly and deeply trade war measures will undermine Europe’s economy.

Dutch bank ING estimated that a 25 percent US tariff would cut 19 percent of EU goods exports to the United States. The value of these lost sales, at around €100 billion, is 0.87 percent of EU Gross Domestic Product (GDP). However, there would be far broader economic knock-on effects as workers in affected industries are fired, their income and purchasing power collapse, and the US and EU potentially impose further rounds of tariffs on each other. ING said it is “impossible” for now to quantify the economic collapse the “tariff tsunami” will cause.

Financial analysts are raising concerns over German car exports, with tariffs expected to largely price them out of US markets. “Tariffs on automotive exports present a major challenge for Germany’s economy,” said Daniel Parker of Capital Economics. “Stuttgart, Upper Bavaria, and the Braunschweig region—which includes Wolfsburg—are likely to suffer the most pronounced impacts.” Auto plants and parts suppliers in Germany and across Europe, notably in Slovakia, Hungary and Austria, would also be badly hit.

EU officials, together with broad sections of the European corporate and political establishment, are calling on Trump to come to reason and grant a deal reconciling US and European interests.

EU Council President and former Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa told Euronews:

[US-EU] trade relations represent 30 percent of global trade [and] 40 percent of global GDP, so it won’t just affect Europe and the United States, it will affect everyone. So it’s a big mistake. ... We must respond in a firm but also smart manner. That means we must reach a negotiated solution … in the common and mutual interest of the United States and Europe.

Whatever deals the EU may make with Trump, however, they will not restore the US-European alliance and economic equilibrium as it existed in the decades after World War II. Not only do US and European imperialist interests clash, but trade war measures will vastly intensify economic hardships facing workers on both sides of the Atlantic.

The Trump administration’s foreign policy is indubitably hostile to Europe. Beyond its tariffs, it is threatening to take Greenland from Denmark and aims to plunder hundreds of billions of dollars of Ukrainian mineral resources that the EU hoped to also seize in the Ukraine-Russia war. However, the US-EU conflict does not flow simply from the mindset of America’s far-right president but from objectively rooted inter-imperialist contradictions between America and Europe.

Trump’s trade war marks an eruption of US-European tensions that twice in the 20th century exploded into world wars. His trade war aims to address America’s relative economic decline, reducing its deepening budget and trade deficits, while defending US military dominance by consolidating US military supply chains. The EU powers, on the other hand, have been discussing for nearly a decade how to consolidate their industry and build European military forces ultimately to rival America’s.

While governments on both sides of the Atlantic are formally preparing for negotiations, hostile statements are mounting on both sides. Yesterday, acting German Economy Minister Robert Habeck denounced Trump’s tariffs, comparing them to the Russian invasion of Ukraine that the EU opposed militarily. He said the tariffs recall “the beginning of our time in office, especially with the war of aggression against Ukraine and the threatening situation with natural gas.”

Yesterday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with NATO foreign ministers in Brussels, who agreed on a target of spending 5 percent of GDP on the military—which would require savage social attacks on workers in Europe. However, US officials reportedly objected to EU plans to build up its defense industry with a €800 billion rearmament package, by blocking EU purchases of US weapons systems. European diplomats demanded to be consulted on US plans to move weapons systems out of Europe to the Pacific to target China.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot had, however, traveled to China last week, seeking closer ties with Beijing on trade policy. He asked his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, to help end the tariffs China imposed on French alcoholic beverages after France voted for EU tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles and to pressure Moscow to include EU powers in the Ukraine negotiations. Wang called for “multilateralism over unilateralism” in world affairs, while Barrot said that “a number of major principles, particularly those of multilateralism, are being shaken.”

While conflicts are mounting between the imperialist powers, workers on both sides of the Atlantic face similar prospects of mounting attacks on their basic social and democratic rights. The first stage of the trade war threatens US workers with devastating price increases and layoffs, while European workers face vast job losses. The EU estimates that 5 million jobs in Europe depend on exports to the United States, while 2.4 million US jobs depend on exports to Europe.