Awrite mah we muckers, It’s Wee Lydia Teapot here again mate.

Joost wahnteed tae droap in a wee message tae say that ahm fucken SHITTIN mahself aboot this Prime Minister buisness. Ah ken thit the Tories goat the maist seats but no a majority. Whit dis that mean? A hung Parliament? (Aye, ah’d like tae see thum aw hung tae be honest) ur an over rule by David “Thatcher” Cameron? Ah’d rather be kneecapped tae be honest.

Listen mah wee chumpos, A’ve goat a plan though. T’night wur gaunny rally against these wankers. Independence the fucken noo. You should dae it tae. Get yur clogs oan and dae whit ye need tae dae tae send oot the message thit you’re no an idiot ‘n’ thit ye wahnt yer fucken freedom fae the Tory mob.

Perty it George Sqr th’night anaw. See ye there mah wee muckers. (If ah’ve no shat mah brains oot in fear that is)

Over ‘n’ oot mah wee muckers.

Ahm hinkin' sumthin lit this...

Some Facebook groups regardin’ events thit ur gaun oan:

Peaceful Demo

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=105107362867240&index=1

Riot, mate

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=118461951509955

A wee Perty

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=117029908329208

Any you go tae, joost make the message clear, buds.

Fresh from the internets, news reaches Leftfield of the party of the year so far:

“Tomorrow we may be facing the first Conservative government in 13 years.
But Scotland didn’t vote Tory then. And Scotland doesn’t vote Tory now.On Friday evening, if the Tories get in, we’re going to party in George Square, Glasgow.

Party in defiance of tax cuts for the rich, tax hikes for the poor, VAT rises, racist immigration policies, massive cuts in public services, unemployment, job losses, bigger bonuses for the bankers, war-mongering… and the posh, Eton wankers we’ll have in government.

BRING: banners, flags, placards, soundsystems, food, music, noise, colour, ALL YER PALS, megaphones, sweeties and ANYTHING ELSE.

ALL WELCOME. except fascists and tories. They can fuck off.

Start time: Friday May 7th at 6pm.

End time: Saturday May 8th at 2am.

Location: George Square, Glasgow.

**this will only work if people invite folk and spread the word among their friends – dae it!**”

If tomorrow is day 1 of a new Tory occupation of Scotland, the resistance starts at 6pm. Be there!

Confirm yourself on the Facebook event.

Greek PM Papandreou: Quick to exploit deaths

During the massive protests against the IMF/EU assault on the Greek working class yesterday, a bank was burnt down, and three workers trapped inside were killed.

This event has been mercilessly exploited over the course of the day by the Greek government, and by the right wing media, who are preparing the way for possibly justifying a military crackdown against the people. George Papandreou, the Greek Prime Minister responsible for pushing through the surrender to the IMF and EU, said:

“We are all deeply shocked by the unjust death of three workers, three of our fellow citizens, who were victims of murderous attacks.”

His comments were quickly echoed in media outlets around the world keen to talk about “murderers” and “murderous hooded youths.”

Let’s be clear, no one participating in demonstrations today set out with the intention to murder other workers. The government is desperate to distract attention from their historic sellout of the Greek people. But the internet is proving a key weapon of those same people in getting the truth out to the world. That’s why we’re reproducing here a statement by one of the co-workers in the bank, who worked alongside those who died today. It’s vital reading, and please do copy it, show it to other people, put it on your own blog etc.

“I feel an obligation toward my co-workers who have so unjustly died today to speak out and to say some objective truths. I am sending this message to all media outlets. Anyone who still bares some consciousness should publish it. The rest can continue to play the government’s game.

The fire brigade had never issued an operating license to the building in question. The agreement for it to operate was under the table, as it practically happens with all businesses and companies in Greece.

The building in question has no fire safety mechanisms in place, neither planned nor installed ones – that is, it has no ceiling sprinklers, fire exits or fire hoses. There are only some portable fire extinguishers which, of course, cannot help in dealing with extensive fire in a building that is built with long-outdated security standards.

No branch of Marfin bank has had any member of staff trained in dealing with fire, not even in the use of the few fire extinguishers. The management also uses the high costs of such training as a pretext and will not take even the most basic measures to protect its staff.

There has never been a single evacuation exercise in any building by staff members, nor have there been any training sessions by the fire-brigade, to give instructions for situations like this. The only training sessions that have taken place at Marfin Bank concern terrorist action scenarios and specifically planning the escape of the banks’ “big heads” from their offices in such a situation.

The building in question had no special accommodation for the case of fire, even though its construction is very sensitive under such circumstances and even though it was filled with materials from floor to ceiling. Materials which are very inflammable, such as paper, plastics, wires, furniture. The building is objectively unsuitable for use as a bank due to its construction.

No member of security has any knowledge of first aid or fire extinguishing, even though they are every time practically charged with securing the building. The bank employees have to turn into firemen or security staff according to the appetite of Mr Vgenopoulos [owner of Marfin Bank].

The management of the bank strictly barred the employees from leaving today, even though they had persistently asked so themselves from very early this morning – while they also forced the employees to lock up the doors and repeatedly confirmed that the building remained locked up throughout the day, over the phone. They even blocked off their internet access so as to prevent the employees from communicating with the outside world.

For many days now there has been some complete terrorisation of the bank’s employees in regard to the mobilisations of these days, with the verbal “offer”: you either work, or you get fired.

The two undercover police who are dispatched at the branch in question for robbery prevention did not show up today, even though the bank’s management had verbally promised to the employees that they would be there.

At last, gentlemen, make your self-criticism and stop wandering around pretending to be shocked. You are responsible for what happened today and in any rightful state (like the ones you like to use from time to time as leading examples on your TV shows) you would have already been arrested for the above actions. My co-workers lost their lives today by malice: the malice of Marfin Bank and Mr. Vgenopoulos personally who explicitly stated that whoever didin’t come to work today [May 5th, a day of a general strike!] should not bother showing up for work tomorrow [as they would get fired].” An employee of Marfin bank.

The bank worker’s union has also called a strike in protest at their deaths, however, they put the blame mainly on the shoulders of the government. “This tragic event that took the life of three of our colleagues, two women and a man, is the sad consequence of anti-popular measures that whipped up pop popular anger,” the OTOE bank employees’ federation said.

“The government has very serious responsibilities, as it seems it failed to take account the scale of the consequences which its decisions would have on Greek society.”

It’s of crucial importance that those of us standing in solidarity with Greece don’t allow the tragic deaths of Greek workers to be used as a propaganda tool that will help push through measures that will lead to (amongst many other terrible things) even more unsafe, deadly workplaces.

(Statement via Occupied London. Original in Greek here. Thanks for the heads up, Liam T!)

Update: In the video below, you can see the owner of the bank, a Mr. Vgenopoulos, arriving just moments after the deaths were confirmed. People repeatedly shout “murderer” at him. Around 43 seconds into the video one of the gathered people shouts: “how many yachts do you own?”, at which point Vgenopoulos signals with his fingers: “three”.

We’d like to ask George Papandreou, the Daily Mail and everyone else pushing the propaganda line on this: who is the real murderer?

Communist banner draped from the Acropolis

Today the Greek working class is on general strike against their government’s capitulation to the demands of the EU and IMF.

Ordinary people in Greece face massive unemployment, huge job losses, pension cuts, savage cuts in public spending, and rises in taxes on consumer spending. The Greek working class is fighting for survival in the face of the collapse of their income just as the cost of living rockets.

In the plans of the imperialist EU and the International Mugging Fund, Greek workers will bear the full cost of a crisis created by foreign and Greek banks. But those same workers have something to say about that, and are walking out of work across the country.

My intention today is to update the article throughout the day as more info comes in on the situation in Greece. In the meantime, here’s what we know since Leftfield last blogged about Greece.

On Monday, Greek teachers invaded the offices of the state TV channel, after they heard that they would be carrying an interview with the Education Minister after the news. They wanted to be part of the interview, and to put their own questions to the minister. During the news noise was heard in the background, and then programmes were disrupted for several hours. Riot cops were summoned to try and evict the teachers, who refused to leave. The cops beat them in the corridors, but they refused to budge. In the end, the channel was forced to allow the teachers a couple of minutes on air, which they used to make this statement:

“We are members of the Teachers’ with Limited Working Rights Coordination and the Pan-Hellenic Union of Unemployed Teachers. We decided to come hear today, in the studios of the government’s TV-station, for two reasons: The first one is that for six months now the Mass Media keep silent about the government’s economical measures. And the second one is that we want to break, in praxis the monologe of Education’s Ministry, the monologe of Mrs. Diamantopoulou who keeps silent about the multi-law agreement that wants to be voted and destroys the public and uncomercial education. We were “welcomed” inside and outside the studio by a team of MAT (Unions of Order Recovery) ready to beat us up. We condemn both the Education Ministry and the NET-channel Authorities for the certain event: You see that there is evidence of violence on us.

The government brings the “Stability Program” in reality by packing more than 30 students in each classroom and keeping out of schools some thousands of unemployed educators. The “New School” like the government wants to name it, in reality it is not new at all. It is really old and brings us back in time. It will be against the needs and the rights of the society in Greece. Against the workers, the parents, the students, the teachers. The government calls us to pay for the cost of Education. Calls you the parents, your children who study, us who teach. After the multi-law of Mrs. Diamantopoulou we get dismissed; she fires around 17.000 teachers who are paid by hour or are temporary employed! We thought that we were the minority, but as it seems we become the majority after they brought the IMF to us, which will result in increase of poverty and unemployment of thousands of workers. Everybody on the streets to block the economical measures, kick out IMF and all those who brought it here. Tomorow we demonstrate to block the economical measures that destroy the Education System. On Wednesday 5th of May everybody is striking, nobody works. We gather infront of the Archeological Museum at 11:00 to block the economical measures.

We take out to the streets, we rise up!”

A Greek pensioner protests the cuts to his income

Yesterday, many workers decided to start today’s general strike early. Schools, hospitals and airports were shut down as public sector workers staged impromptu walkouts. Flights in and out of Greece were grounded from midnight as air traffic controllers joined the strike. Thousands of teachers and students marched on the parliament to protest the austerity package and its impact on education. They marched past parliament, shouting “Let the rich pay for the crisis” in the direction of the MPs who were at that point debating the austerity plans.

Public sector unions have occupied the town halls in the Athens suburbs of Agios Dimitrios, Nea Ionia and Vyrona.

This morning, Greek Communists staged a dawn raid on the Acropolis, symbol of Greece and its ancient glory, draping the massive banner you can see at the top. Its message couldn’t be clearer: the Greek people are crying out for our solidarity.

Keep checking back -- updates as we get them.

Update: Check out this statement signed by anti-capitalist parties all over Europe, including the Scottish Socialist Party.

Update: As Liam reports in a comment below, participants in a mass demonstration have attempted to storm the Greek parliament in Athens to prevent MPs from being able to discuss and vote through the IMF/EU package. There’s footage on the BBC site here, but it’s hard to embed BBC stuff. As soon as there’s footage on youtube I’ll stick it up on here as well.

The BBC reporter says that more were expected to join the demonstration as the day wore on, so they may manage to break police lines and get through. The police are using stun grenades against the marchers.

Elsewhere in Athens, a bank was set on fire, and apparently 3 people have been killed. There’s also been reports of mass action and violence in the northern city of Thessaloniki.

Looks like they’ve taken that off now, will keep an eye on it in case they go back to Greece though.

Update: As promised, embedded footage of the attempt to storm the parliament. The bangs you can hear are stun grenades.

Strikers on the streets of Kathmandu

After a huge May Day rally on Saturday, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) launched a massive general strike aimed at forcing the resignation of the government.

Although Maoist led, the strike is supported by the majority of workers, and so far has been really successful. Strikers have surrounded the Prime Minister’s residence. They have brought thousands of the country’s poorest people to protest in the capital Kathmandu, a move which has horrified the traditional elite, unused to seeing such ethnic diversity on the street.

Nepal was traditionally a monarchy, where the vast majority lived in stark poverty, and there were sharp divisions and discrimination between different ethnic groups and castes. In 1996, the Maoists launched an armed rebellion with the aim of bringing down the monarchy and establishing a new Nepal in which there would be more direct democracy, and the government brought an end to poverty and discrimination.

Following the success of the Maoist People’s Liberation Army in fighting the Royal Nepalese Army (which is armed and trained by both Britain and the US), a peace accord was negotiated, and in 2008 Nepal became a republic. In elections held that year, the Maoists came out on top, and headed a coalition government. The results showed how much support they had built in the areas of the country that were under their control. In these regions they had seized land from absentee landlords for the benefit of the people, as well as building roads, widening access to health and education, given people a direct say in their local government and started a campaign against ethnic and caste discrimination.

Nice hat, shame about your government: Nepali Prime Minister MK Nepal

The elections were to a constituent assembly that was supposed to write a new constitution, transforming Nepal into a democratic, federal republic, in which the rights of minority peoples were recognised. However, when the Maoists tried to sack the head of the army, who is a western-educated General responsible for leading counter-insurgency operations during the war, they were overriden by the President. The Maoist led government resigned in protest.

The current government, which has not been elected, is an alliance of the centrist Congress party and other Communist parties, and is headed by Madhav Kumar Nepal. They pledged to write a new constitution for Nepal within two years, a deadline which will expire later this month.

In the meantime, Maoists supported minority ethnic groups in declaring autonomous states, and have also supported revolutionary students who have shut down 8000 private schools in protest at hikes in tuition fees. Now, with the deadline for a new constitution on May 28th fast approaching, they’ve launched a mass protest movement to demand the government resigns and the Maoists are returned to power, in order to remake the state on the lines demanded by the country’s poor majority.

The Maoists have said they do not intend to seize full power at this point, but are more interested in pushing forward the process of writing a new constitution. They have also pledged that the strike will not use violence, although strikers are prepared to defend themselves if attacked by the government. Nevertheless, if the situation continues on for several days, what happens next is uncertain. The government has already been consulting the army on the possibility of using force to crush the people, with the support of military “advisers” from India and the US. The PM declared the protests would be “suicide” for the Maoists, but his words look hollow compared to the mobilisation on the streets. One reason they haven’t been able to do this so far is that the loyalty of rank and file soldiers to their commanders is far from guaranteed if they were ordered to fire on ordinary Nepalis.

The government so far looks determined to cling to power, although how long they can do this in the face of a mass shutdown of the country by the people remains to be seen. The next few days look set to determine the future history of Nepal, and nobody is sure what will happen next.

Bonuses: A good source for keeping up to date on the situation in English is this blog, by an American Communist living in Kathmandu.

Here’s some footage of the massive May Day protest in Kathmandu:

German soldiers raise the Nazi flag over the Acropolis. Today, the Greek government has again surrendered.

The Greek government has agreed to a programme of loans of billions of Euros from the EU and IMF. This money comes with an incredible list of demands, that will plunge the standard of living for the Greek people. Many people are drawing direct comparisons between the Greek government of 1941, which surrendered to the Nazi invasion and became German puppets, and the current government, which has surrendered and become a puppet of the international financial institutions and the EU bureaucrats.

Already, ordinary Greeks can see that if the EU and the IMF get their way, then their country will be ruined. There is a mass exodus of Greeks fleeing abroad in an attempt to escape from the economic catastrophe; applications to migrate to the USA and Canada have jumped by 30% since the beginning of the year.

Check out this list of humiliating conditions imposed on the surrender of the Greek government:

-15% reduction in salaries for both private and public sector workers.

-At the same time increasing VAT, making food and basic goods far more expensive.

-Increase the retirement age to 67.

-Decrease pensions.

-Hundreds of thousands of job cuts in the public sector.

-Where workers have won a collective agreement between unions and their bosses, these will be abolished.

-Abolition of any restrictions on bosses ability to cut jobs in the private sector.

-Massive cuts in public spending. Already announced include the expansion of school class sizes from 25 to over 30.

This is shocking. It’s like a neoliberal shopping list, as if the most right wing economists are getting the right to write their dream programme for remaking Greece as a capitalist’s paradise. Make no mistake: these are ideas that big business has fought for in Europe for years. The fact that many European countries have a welfare state is a major block on the ability of capitalists to make as much money as they like. The crisis in Greece is a great opportunity for them to push through policies they’ve wanted for a long time. What we’re facing, firstly in Greece, but later in the rest of Europe as well, is the possibility of an economic dictatorship by the super rich financial elite. They are trying to use the force of the state, with its riot cops and soldiers, to force the people’s acceptance of a total surrender to their interests.

Naomi Klein has called this process the Shock Doctrine: when the global ruling class uses crisis as an opportunity to push through policies they would never normally be able to impose on people, while they are still in shock from the disaster. See the short film below for a more detailed explanation of how the shock doctrine works, and other times it’s been imposed on people.

But the thing is, the people who are forcing through the destruction of Greece are the same ones who were responsible for creating the crisis in the first place. The huge debt of the Greek government comes from loans from French, German, British, Dutch and Swiss banks. The Greek people are being punished by the European ruling class . . . for the mistakes of the European ruling class.

In the face of this economic warfare, the Greeks only have one choice: to fight back.

Yesterday May Day rallies were attacked by riot cops as tens of thousands came on to the streets to demonstrate their resistance. As one shipyard worker put it:

“These latest measures have been cooked up by outsiders and are totally outrageous. They are aimed not at the rich but at the poor. What we are saying here today is that they will pass only over our dead bodies.”

Showing their rage at the capitulation of their government, protesters at one point spotted Apostolos Kaklamanis, an MP and member of the government, and jumped him. He had to be whisked away from the fury of ordinary Greeks by riot police.

The next big day in the streets is set to be Wednesday, when there will be the next Greek general strike.

Greeks vs Riot Cops

Many establishment political commentators recognise that the people are too angry, and too organised, for the government to be able to carry out this programme of attacks. They think it is possible that Greece will be unable to pay its debts to the bankers and capitalists, who will then bankrupt the country and force it to withdraw from the Euro, something that would be a crisis for the entire future of the single currency.

In the face of this, the ruling class are already talking about an “emergency government of national unity” or appointing an unelected administration of “experts”. In a country that suffered under a fascist military dictatorship from 1967-74, this kind of chat is obviously very scary.

But the other possibility that may seriously be on the cards is the overthrow of the government by the people. A revolution in Greece is far from a sure thing, but the scale of fury on the streets mean that this is an important point in Greek history. But to truly solve this crisis, and face down the massive attack of the ruling class and on the people in Greece, and across Europe and the world, we need to get in touch with our allies in other countries and prepare for an international fightback.

If they win their war with Greece, Spain, Portugal, and ultimately we, will be next. A crisis can also be an opportunity, for us as well as the capitalists. It’s time to join the fightback.

(Please take this as an open invitation to use the comments thread as a way of sharing ideas about how we can build solidarity with Greece, and more generally prepare for a continent wide fightback.)

Thailand's right wing Yellow Shirts are calling for martial law

As Leftfield has already reported, the centre of the Thai capital Bangkok has been locked down for weeks now, as hundreds of thousands of Thais, mostly from the rural and urban poor, have camped out in mass protests. The Red Shirts, as they are known, demand the immediate dissolution of parliament, and fresh elections. The current government of Thailand has never been elected, and the last elected government was deposed in a military coup.

The current government of Abhisit Vajjajjiva last weekend rejected a peace offer from the protesters that would have given him 30 days to dissolve parliament and 60 days after that to hold new elections. Protest leaders emphasised that they wanted to try and save lives and prevent violence with the compromise. The PM’s reaction was to begin preparations for a military crackdown to try and resolve the crisis, which has seen clashes throughout the capital over the course of this week.

Now, the right wing, pro-monarchy and pro-military movement, the yellow shirts, have re-emerged calling for the Red Shirts to be crushed. Yellow Shirt leaders called for martial law, and the military to take action on its own if the government does not, clearly paving the way for another military intervention in politics. The Yellow Shirts’ own violent protests in 2006 helped pave the way for the military coup that installed the present government. They represent the business and bureaucratic elite, and fundamentally oppose new elections because they know the majority of Thais, who live in poverty, would not choose a government to their liking.

Red Shirt protests have been much bigger than the Yellow Shirts'

And Thailand’s ailing King Bhumibol Adulyade (the world’s longest reining monarch) has also spoken to the nation for the first time, calling on all Thais to “perform their duties strictly and honestly.” When you take this alongside the fact that the government has tried to justify its violence against unarmed protesters on the basis that they are “republicans” (which is not even true in many cases), the stage seems set for a final confrontation between the mass of the people and traditional elite, centred on urban businesses, the nobility and the monarchy.

A key argument deployed by the government as to why they won’t dissolve parliament is that they need time to deal with the economy, and pass a new budget to support the economy. In other words, the government is determined to make ordinary people pay for the crisis caused globally by financial capitalists, just like here and across Europe. The difference in Thailand is that the poor are organised and in the streets. Although their demand is simple, a return to democracy, the stage is set for a much bigger class confrontation which will shape the whole future of the country. The whole world could learn a lesson from the way ordinary Thais have got into the streets to stand up for their rights, and we’ll watch with interest to see if the Red Shirts can maintain their fortified position, and hold off the coming military crackdown.

If only he had a taser I'm sure this incident would have been better handled

SSY today condemned the growing burden that interfering in politics is having on police officers.

This follows the latest attempt of a top cop to influence government policy. Les Gray is the Chairman of the Scottish Police Federation, and used the organisation’s annual conference as an opportunity to call for a crackdown on the right to protest, “officer discretion” in cases of domestic abuse, and for cops to be issued with tasers.

SSY think it’s ridiculous Les was stuck behind a podium trying to influence government policy, when crimes are being committed on the streets. If elected, an SSY Prime Minister would pledge to put bobbies on the beat, and leave defending democracy to those who know what they’re doing.

The most ill judged of Les’ comments were on the right to march and protest. As Leftfield has reported before, the right to protest is under severe attack throughout the UK. For several years now governments have used the fear of terrorism as a cover to bring in laws that restrict the right of people to express dissent. It’s now harder than ever to get official permission to protest. On a local level, this has been played out by the pledge of Glasgow City Council to cut the number of marches in the city centre by 90%, meaning groups like teachers and other public sector workers have been unable to take to their own streets to protest cuts.

Les called for this undemocratic situation to get WORSE. Speaking to the Herald he exposed the real agenda of cops working with anti-democratic governments in both London and Edinburgh:

“We need to drastically reduce the number. There is no point in doing half a job. It needs to be reduced to single figures so the bigger organisations would have fewer than 10 a year and others would have even less.”

Referring to the cost of policing protests and marches, he invoked the mythical “hard working tax paying law abiding majority who don’t want to see their hard earned tax money being spent in this way” of the Daily Mail. He left out the bit he was thinking about how anyone that wants to oppose government policy are workshy, dolescum hippie bastards.

He did at least crack one joke though, claiming “marchers only have three months on their calendars, namely, January, February, March, March, March, March and March” [dadum tish, thankyou, thankyou. But seriously folks. . .]

Of course many of the marches that take place in Glasgow and across Scotland are not political protests that SSY would support, but Orange Marches. Many who are genuinely offended by the politics of Orange Marches and some of the behaviour that goes on when their taking place might think restricting their number wouldn’t be that much of a shame. But in his actual speech Les had an interesting proposal to make on how to make sure marchers are still able to take to the street:

“We need to see a significant reduction in such events and if the marchers are so hell bent on marching, let them pay for it in the same way as football clubs and others do.”

If this plan was implemented there’s little doubt who would be hit hardest. As permanent organisations dedicated to marching, Orange Lodges almost certainly would be able to raise enough money to be able to keep a fair few marches on the streets. However, groups of ordinary people trying to protest cuts, or those who have little experience running political organisations, or indeed campaigning groups operating on a shoestring budget, would be the ones hit hardest. It’s a measure that would be blatant class discrimination, preventing people on lower incomes from having the right to protest on their own streets.

One of the ways that Les would like to see the money saved from less policing of protests is on high tech weapons. In one of the most clearly political of his interventions, he directly attacked those who have raised concerns about police using the “less lethal” electroshock weapons, Tasers.

“I take great exception to some of the ill-informed comments made by Amnesty International and others.  I invite them to join us on the streets of Scotland and see for themselves what it’s like to deal with drug and or drink fuelled violent individuals armed with firearms, swords, axes, baseball bats, knives or other deadly weapons. Perhaps they could show us how to disarm such individuals without the necessary equipment.  Minister, I don’t think Amnesty International will be reporting for duty anytime soon.  We need to have the right equipment to do the job and we are convinced that includes Taser.”

Again, there’s clearly a hidden subtext here: Amnesty and people who don’t want tasers are all bleeding hearts who have no idea what it’s really like on the streets. His comments of course ignore the fact that many of those of us who are extremely worried about cops being issued with potentially deadly electroshock weapons do themselves live in these same communities, and are well aware of the dangers of violence that are out there. However, living in a poorer urban area also gives you a big insight into what the causes of the violence are (alienation caused by poverty, people who don’t receive proper support for drugs, alcohol and mental health problems, lack of community facilities, hopelessness to name but a few), and how little is done by the state to tackle these problems. Getting to the root of why people end up in situations where they behave violently would be a better use of public money than equipping cops with a nasty new weapon.

However, not all forms of violence are of the same concern to Les. In his speech, he also spoke about the “bureaucratic nightmare around domestic abuse.” He said:

“There is no such thing as a standard case of domestic abuse. Each case will have its unique features and deserves to be dealt with uniquely. We need to simplify how we deal with domestic abuse. We need to reintroduce officer discretion and do away with the pointless bureaucratic quagmire that has developed recently. Let us deal with each case in its own right and take the appropriate course of action if and when required.”

Officer Discretion

Nobody is claiming the way the police deal with domestic abuse is perfect, but there is a reason that their procedures have been forced to change in recent years. That reason is that campaign groups and women’s support organisations have worked for years to expose the abysmal record of the criminal justice system in protecting people abused in their relationships and holding abusers to account for their behaviour. What Les is saying is that he wants cops to have the right to ignore complaints if they think that’s appropriate.

Now you might think that cops are the best placed to decide if someone is really being abused or not. But the fact is cops are just as much a product of our sexist, patriarchal society as anybody else. Do we really want to go back to the days when a police officer has the right to decide whether an abuse allegation should just be swept under the carpet?

Domestic abuse is a problem that is at virtually epidemic levels; in his speech Les said that police in Scotland investigated 55, 000 incidents last year. In the face of this, the solution is not to look away and pretend that some of it isn’t happening. Les described policing domestic abuse as “an absolute nightmare”. Perhaps he ought to think about what a nightmare it would be to have your abuse not dealt with properly at an officer’s “discretion.”

The big theme running throughout Les’ speech was that the police are, like all other areas of the state, having to face up to the massive cuts the next government is going to impose on public services to pay for the bail out of banks. While the police, as the frontline forces of the state, are likely to be slightly more protected than other public services, they’re going to be under pressure to cut costs.

Les’ solution? Get the savings from restricting people’s democratic rights and reducing protection for the vulnerable. In the conclusion he said that police forces are “in relatively good shape and are up for the fight.” If that fight is about our right to take to our own streets, or to be free from fear of having an electroshock weapon used on us, then SSY are well up for the political fight as well.

Real ants, real placards and no post-production or visual effects -- these ants are protesting against Baygon, who produce a shitload of products deadly to ants and their beastie brethren.

The Thai capital is filled with protesters

As Leftfield has already reported, Thailand is currently in the grip of a political crisis as hundreds of thousands of some of the nation’s poorest are on the streets demanding democracy.

The Red Shirt movement demands the immediate dissolution of parliament and the calling of new elections. The current government was installed in a military coup in 2006. The coup overthrew Thailand’s first government to install a national health system for all, and was constantly attacked by the elite for using state funds to help the poor.

For weeks now the Thai rural and urban poor have been engaged in a rolling campaign of non-violent campaign of protest demanding a return to democracy. The response of government has been to crack down, with a massive wave of censorship taking TV stations off the air and websites off the internet. This weekend at least 21 people were killed by government forces, including a Japanese cameraman.

This morning Red Shirts carried coffins through the streets of Bangkok, at least some of which contained the bodies of killed protesters. They have declared they will “not negotiate with the murderers in government.” They control key streets in the city, and have let it be known they will stand firm against attempts to move them by the police or military. They are braced for state violence after the government branded them “terrorists.”

Carrying coffins of killed protesters through the streets

The current Thai government is backed by the Royal elite in Thailand, the military, and a minority of the population, mainly the small middle class and wealthy. The Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva was educated at Eton and Oxford.

Unlike the Red Shirts, who have protested peacefully, the government’s supporters, who wear Yellow Shirts, have previously used violence and weapons. Despite this, they have received support from the Liberal International, the global grouping of liberal parties of which the Lib Dems are a member.

The ironically named Democrat Party which holds power in Thailand is afraid of holding new elections because they know their anti-poor policies would almost certainly lose. The poor people of Thailand are on the streets demanding democracy and an end to dictatorial rule by the country’s aristocratic/military elite, proudly calling themselves “serfs.”

For updates on the situation in Thailand, check out the blog of Thai socialist Giles Ji Ungpakorn, who’s currently living in exile in the UK. There’s also a free download available there of his book ‘A Coup for the Rich.’ He’s got some useful links as well, although some are currently down, possibly due to Thai government censorship. This just makes it all the more important that people around the world spread the word about what’s happening.