As one of the richest countries in the world, you would have thought that Norway could escape austerity. Not so! The bourgeoisie and its new right-wing government are preparing massive attacks against the working class.

Hundreds of thousands of students, teachers and parents marched yesterday, October 24, in over 70 cities and towns in Spain against cuts and counter-reforms and in defence of high quality and free state education as part of a one day strike of the whole education system.

Michael Noonan’s Budget 2014 will take a further €2.5bn out of the economy;  in other words a figure of around €600 for every man, woman and child in the state. It is evident also that as anticipated the losers are the old, the sick and the young unemployed.

Tens of thousands of people marched in Portugal on Saturday, October 19th, against the proposed 2014 budget which includes yet another set of severe measures to make workers, pensioners, civil servants and working people in general pay for the crisis of capitalism.

The Marxist Student Federation is a new organisation for revolutionary students. Supporters of Socialist Appeal have taken the decision to launch this national platform for Marxist ideas in the student movement because it is clear that there is both a need and a thirst for Marxist ideas in the movement. The response we have received at the freshers fairs with the numbers signing up and coming to our opening meetings has been phenomenal. We have never met so many young people wanting to learn about Marxism and fight to change society.

The verbal exchanges between Cameron and Ed Miliband over the last few weeks seem at long last to indicate that battle lines are being drawn. With 18 months until the General Election, the political ground has at last begun to shift. The Labour Party seems to be moving – in its rhetoric – slightly to the left, while the Tories are reverting back to their old image as the “nasty” party.

The strength of feeling among teachers can be seen in the magnificent turnout for the regional strikes that took place this month on October 1st and 17th. Teachers in the NUT and NAS/UWT, representing 90 per cent of teachers, have come out en masse, with the result that thousands of schools have been closed for the day.

This morning, a last minute decision by the European Court of Human Rights stopped, temporarily, the eviction of 43 people who have been occupying an empty block of flats in Salt, Girona, known as #BlocSalt. Over 700 people, organised by the anti-eviction movement PAH, had gathered overnight to resist the court order, including a large contingent of firefighters in uniform. This case highlights one of the most scandalous features of the housing crisis in Spain.

This article was written before the arrests of the leadership of Golden Dawn. However, the analysis it contains has been absolutely confirmed by the subsequent events. The Communist Tendency follows the developments and will publish further articles with our analysis and conclusions.

A recent article by Gary Mulcahy in the July/August edition of The Socialist dealt with the emergence of residents’ groups in North Belfast. The article was in line with the narrative that the Socialist Party espouses. Here Gerry Ruddy looks at where such a narrative leads in the context of the sectarian divided in the North of Ireland.

The leader of SYRIZA, Alexis Tsipras, visited Vienna recently where he spoke at the Bruno Kreisky Forum, drawing much attention. However, instead of appearing as the fiery left leader that some expected he posed as a reasonable social democrat.

The arrest of the Golden Dawn (GD) leadership as well as its MPs has naturally caused great satisfaction among labour movement and Left activists. But we must be careful not to allow this to foster illusions in the democratic nature of the bourgeois state.

Greek capitalism continues to be the weak link of the Eurozone as it is still under the “intensive care” of the EU support mechanisms for the fourth consecutive year and is in recession for the sixth consecutive year. Overall GDP decline since the crisis began will reach 25% by the end of 2013 and unemployment will reach 30%. According to the Institute of Labour (INE) of the Greek General Greek General Confederation of Labour (GSEE) it will take at least 20 years to return to the pre-crisis levels!

George Osborne announced that the British economy “has turned the corner”. Cameron has chimed in to hail the new “recovery”. But after years of stagnation and falling living standards, who are they trying to kid? The economy is crawling on its belly and we are still being hit with mass unemployment and wage cuts.

Last week, the new king of the Netherlands, Willem-Alexander, declared that the era of the welfare state was over and that the Netherlands are moving towards a ‘participation society’. This is a reflection of the crisis of capitalism, where all the gains of the past will be destroyed, unless the capitalist system is overthrown.