On 20th October 2012 the Northern Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions organised thousands of trade union and community demonstrators in a march in Belfast for an alternative to the Westminster government's austerity policies. Speaker after speaker lambasted the policies of austerity.

The European Trade Union Confederation has called a European Day of Action and Solidarity against austerity on November 14. The initiative was taken by the Portuguese CGTP-IN trade union confederation which decided to call a 24h general strike against the latest package of austerity measures proposed by the right wing government of Passos de Coelho in the 2013 budgets. It was the enormous explosion of anger on September 15, when the largest demonstrations since the Portuguese revolution of 1974 took place, which pushed the union to take this action.

'A company that only makes money is not good business'.pThis phrase from Henry Ford does not appear to be an inspiration for Stephen Odell, the current CEO of Ford Europe. Money seems to be the only reason for its industrial policy, as shownby the announced plant closures in Genk and Southampton (UK).The announcement on October 24 of the plant closures and the layoffs of 4500 workers in Belgium and 500 in the UK are another nail in the coffin of the European automotive sector.

It’s finally been confirmed. After months of dithering and posturing from David Cameron last month saw the British and Scottish governments agree that there would be a referendum on Scottish independence in 2014.

Splits and divisions are haunting the Coalition. Such a situation could not have come at a worse time for Cameron and Osborne, as they sharpen their knives for further cuts.

The following article was originally written by the Greek Marxist paper Marxistiki Foni, on Thursday 18 October, as yet another general strike had taken place in Greece.

The Ukrainian Parliamentary Elections were recently held, and with the almost complete results showing the ruling “Party of Regions” in first place at around 31% of the votes. They are followed by a bloc of opposition parties known as the “Fatherland”, formed around the jailed former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, taking 25% of the vote.

News that Enda Kenny has been chosen as “European of the year” by a group of German Magazine Publishers makes sense only in the context that recently the European Union itself recently won the Nobel peace prize. We would have to ask the question “European what of the year?”

On Saturday, October 20^th, the streets of London were once again filled with red flags and colourful trade union banners as 130,000 workers from all over the country marched against the austerity policies of the LibDem-Tory coalition government.

We have received the following report from a Spanish comrade living in Edinburgh, Julia S. Vidania, on her recent visit to her home city of Madrid. She gives a vivid account of the almost revolutionary tension in the city as the European austerity programme and the crisis of capitalism erodes the veneer of stability in society, exposing the deep fault-lines of the class struggle. We strongly recommend this well written account which is full of detail and insights.

The decision of the Workers and Unemployed Action Group to withdraw from the United Left Alliance is an unwelcome symptom of the growing impasse within the ULA, previously reflected in the controversy over Mick Wallace and the departure of Clare Daly from the Socialist Party. The WUAG has a long standing base in South Tipperary and its departure will have an influence on the development of the ULA at a national level.

In the darkest days of the Italian labour movement in the early 1930s, shortly after Mussolini had consolidated his grip on power, and as many Italian Communists and Socialists languished in fascist prisons or were forced to live in exile, a small group of Communist Party members, including three Central Committee members, turned to Trotsky as they attempted to build an opposition to the Stalinist leadership of Togliatti. Here we publish five letters of Trotsky to the newly formed group.

On October 20th  we will witness another massive display of opposition to the Coalition government. Hundreds of thousands of angry workers will take to the streets in an attempt to push back the Tory austerity programme.

We are publishing this letter from Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, as it gives an interesting insight into how degenerate the bourgeois parties that dominate the political scene there have become, with rabid racist propaganda accepted as a legitimate way of winning votes.

The three-party coalition government of Greece – New Democracy, Pasok, Democratic Left - has reached an agreement on the next round of spending cuts of €11.5billion that is to be presented to parliament. But the Greek workers are not prepared to accept this without a fight. On Wednesday between 150,000 and 200,000 marched through Athens, 30,000 in Salonika and many more in other parts of Greece, with big rallies in many cities.