We are making available to our readers the editorial statement of the first printed issue of Fightback (Ireland), published just before Easter. As it states, “Neither social partnership in the south nor the TUV and ‘dissident’ republican terrorism in the north provides a way out. Connolly explained long ago that only the Irish working class stood alone as the incorruptible inheritor of the struggle for Irish freedom.”

This article which was written almost 70 years ago is interesting for a number of reasons, but we feel that it gives a clear exposition of the attitude that the Worker’s International League – to which the IMT trace our history, took towards the Republican movement.

We are delighted to announce the publication of Fightback: the magazine of the International Marxist Tendency in Ireland. The first edition of the magazine comes in two editions for the North and the South – they have different front and back pages and industrial material. This edition is full colour and has 20 pages.

We are proud to announce that the supporters of the International Marxist Tendency in the Netherlands have a new website: www.vonknl.org

Today civil servants in Britain staged another strike in protest at government measures that will affect pensions, redundancy pay and jobs. It is a sign of the growing militancy of the British workers, who are reaching the limit of what they can take. Socialist Appeal supporters in PCS prepared a leaflet which explains the union case and points the way forward for PCS activists. This can be downloaded here.

Last week, on March 11, Greece was shaken by an even bigger general strike than on February 24. As the government announced its third austerity package the mood of Greek workers has become one of growing anger and militancy. All the conditions are there for a massive escalation of the conflict.

Solidarity with the Antwerp Opel workers is growing as the solidarity committee links up with more and more groups of workers from many different workplaces.

This article was written just before the official announcement of the PCS strike ballot result on February 25, which confirmed massive support for action on 8-9th March. We are publishing it together with links to a series of short reports and interviews from the picket lines these past two days. Up to a quarter of a million jobs, possibly more, could be destroyed if government plans are allowed to go ahead. That explains the militant mood that has developed.

Right across the British Isles public services are under attack. The Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) have called two days of strikes against cuts in redundancy pay. The British Government has put a cap on redundancy and hope to save over £500 million. The union fears it is the beginning of both massive redundancies in the public service and also creeping privatisation of those same public services.

There is a lot of talk about normalising the statelet in the North of Ireland. But what has been “normal” here for the past century has been precisely civil unrest, sectarian violence and armed resistance to British rule. The way out of this impasse is to be found in directing discontent towards the road of class struggle.

The comrades of Socialist Appeal in Britain produced the following pamphlet. It is a compilation of different articles written by comrades on tuition fees, cuts in university funding and the students' union, and tries to elaborate some demands for the student movement. We encourage our readers to acquaint themselves with our basic positions on the state of the education system in order to intervene in the movements against cuts and fees which have already begun in a lot of colleges and universities in Britain, but also all around the world.

As the 2010 General Election looms ever closer, we have started to see the first round of political posters appearing on hoardings around the country. The Tories have kicked their campaign off with a poster of an airbrushed photo of David Cameron looking very serious next to the slogan: “We can’t go on like this. I’ll cut the deficit not the NHS.”

It is often said that nothing is certain in politics. However one thing is certain for 2010 – there will be a general election. Election results are difficult to predict but, based on the opinion polls and election results over the past year, all the indicators point to the return of a Conservative government by the summer.

New Year is meant to represent a new beginning, a clean slate. Old Father Time gives way to a new bouncing baby. But what can we expect in 2010? Will it be a new shiny outlook for world capitalism, or will 2009 just seem to be dragging on under a new name?

This year, Britain experienced its coldest winter in over 30 years, and as temperatures dropped below -20ºC in some parts of the UK, thousands of people suffered the effects of one of society’s gravest ills: fuel poverty.