From Committee for a Workers International
THE LOWEST paid staff in the Northern Ireland Civil Service (NICS) are angry and frustrated that more than a year after the Assembly First Minister Peter Robinson publicly admitted that they had been discriminated against for decades, they are still waiting for the money they are owed. Some continue to be underpaid by as much as £5,000 per year.
Their fury has led them to take matters into their own hands and a template letter to MLAs has spread like wildfire. They have organised meetings with political parties and one of those directly led to a debate in the Assembly and the passing of a motion which called on Nigel Dodds to ensure that staff receive the money they are owed within three months. The DUP amendment which sought to remove the three month deadline was withdrawn when it was clear there was no justification for the delay.
The Socialist Party (England & Wales) is saddened to learn of the death on 22 December of lifelong Militant/Socialist Party member, John Macreadie.
John died of a brain tumour which he had been fighting for two years. John will be remembered as a committed socialist and advocate of socialist ideas, a courageous class fighter and a militant leader in his work for the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) and the wider trade union and labour movement.
On 26 June, a gay couple were violently assaulted in Shipquay Street, Derry. Just a month previously, two men were found guilty of the homophobic murder of Shaun Fitzpatrick in Dungannon in 2008. These brutal attacks must be met with a firm response from the LGBT community and by workers and young people everywhere.
The News of the World’s illegal phone hacking scandal and the pernicious role of Rupert Murdoch’s News International has erupted into life again. A recent New York Times' investigation interviewed more than a dozen former NoW reporters and editors who "described a frantic, sometimes degrading atmosphere in which some reporters openly pursued hacking or other improper tactics to satisfy demanding editors".
