The Bulletin of Socialist Youth - Anti-Sectarian, Anti-Austerity, Anti-Capitalist Sept 2014

STORMONT OFFERS USNO FUTURE: FIGHT FOR A SOCIALIST ALTERNATIVE

BY COURTNEY ROBINSONBelfast Met StudentEast Belfast Socialist Youth40,000 on the housing waitinglist - resulting in racist andsectarian tension when itcomes to housing provisions.Closures to essential A&Eservices that have lead to anon going crisis in our hospi-tals. Politicians who placewomen into desperate situa-tions when it comes to abor-tion yet find it acceptable toobjectify women in a discrimi-natory beauty pageant in Stor-mont and auction them off ata DUP fundraiser. And let’s notforget the constant coinci-dence of a petty sectarianissue arising just as cuts are tobe implemented. The list goeson.

It is evident that Stormont isnot working for the majority.When it comes to equality forthe LGBT+ community, it wasrevealed that Health MinisterEdwin Poots, who also bannedgay people from donatingmuch needed blood, wastedover £100,000 of publicmoney in attempt to maintaindiscriminatory measuresagainst the LGBT+ communityin a pursuit of his own bigotry.This includes ensuring that

gay couples remain unable toadopt, meaning that manychildren in care are denied aloving home. This didn't go un-challenged as 7,500 peoplesigned a petition calling for hisresignation.

Almost 1 in 4 young people arenot in education, training oremployment. The main chan-nels used to become inte-grated into society andemployment are being contin-uously cut off to working classyouth. The assembly cut the£10 and £20 bands of Educa-tional Maintenance Al-lowance, which was pocketmoney in the hands of the As-sembly compared to the hugeamount they were willing tocut from corporation tax.There is undoubtedly studentswho rely on this as their onlysource of income for transportand supplies for studies andfor other students it was asource of financial independ-ence.

If you are considered 'luckyenough' to have a job, it islikely to be on a zero hour con-tract, allowing you to be superexploited by your employer. Itcomes with the stress of not

being able to budget and planyour finances but is very usefulfor the politicians as you cango for weeks without anyhours and not be included inunemployment figures. Again,young people have not beencomplicit in accepting such is-sues. We seen numerousprotests from students acrossthe divide demanding that thepoliticians did not cut EMAand Socialist Youth were ac-tive in organising pickets ofBusinesses that use Zero HourContracts, such as McDon-ald's.

Stormont has also made itclear that women's issues arefar from a priority on theiragenda. They are doing little tonothing in addressing themany women forced into des-perate situations in order toterminate unwanted pregnan-cies or for the women whohave to fund a £400-£2000trip to England to have anabortion. Basic reproductiverights for women are not beingdealt with, but a particularcouncillor in the DUP thinksthat it's okay to commodityand objectify women, sellingthem off in an auction at aDUP fundraiser. Members

from other parties such asSDLP found it fitting to holdthe Miss Ulster beauty pag-eant in Stormont. At a timewhen women are under a con-stant bombardment by bigbusiness and corporate mediatelling us what we should looklike, it is hardly appropriate tohold an event that rules con-testants must be a size 8-12 tobe considered beautiful.

There is a recurring pattern toall of these issues, and onethat should give hope to apa-thetic young people, com-pletely disillusioned with thesectarian status quo. Theyhave not gone unchallenged.Socialist Youth are a vibrantorganisation, active at theforefront of the struggle for aradical, socialist change of so-ciety. We have members fromacross the sectarian divide,campaigning against cuts andprivatisation, racist attacksand the underlying issues thebigots use to excuse their ac-tions, sectarian distractionpolitics, for abortion rights andorganising events andprotests in solidarity with in-spirational struggles acrossthe globe. If you agree with us,get involved today!

ALSO INSIDE: SOCIALIST VIEW ON WAR, FIGHTING FOR CHOICE, BANFRACKING, CUTS & MORE CUTS, WTF IS SOCIALISM? AND MUCH MORE...

BY GARY LINDSAYSchool StudentNorth Belfast Socialist YouthFor those that don’t alreadyknow: Fracking is the processof extracting shale gas fromthe ground with the use ofdrilling and injecting chemi-cals at high pressure to extractshale gas. Fracking is highly environmen-tally damaging: near siteswhere fracking takes placethere can be 18 times moremethane in the water than nor-mal. Examples in Americahave shown us chemicals fromthe fracking process consis-tently leaked and polluted thewater supply to such an extentresidents in the local areawere able to ignite their tapwater!In order to maximise profitsthere are over 600 chemicalsused in fracking, among stthem known as lead, mercuryand radium. These are onlysome of the chemicals weknow about. The companiessuch as Tamboran and othershave not released the full listof chemicals that are used inthe hydraulic fracturingprocess. When the companieshave finished fracking an areathey are only able to removeabout 20-40% of the fluid usedmeaning that after they leavethere could be billions of gal-lons of chemicals still contam-inating the area!Despite the Environment Min-ister recently temporarily ‘halt-ing’ plans for Fracking inBelcoo, County Fermanaghthere are still plans for Frack-ing to go ahead in other areasof Northern Ireland. The politicians say that Frack-ing will bring thousands ofjobs when in reality over 750will be temporary contracts ofunder a year - hardly a solutionto the unemployment crisis.

The additional argument ofpro-- fracking politicians isthat our energy prices wouldbe significantly reduced.Tamboran - the company whichholds the licence for drilling inFermanagh admitted that allof the gas taken from Fer-managh would be sold on theinternational gas market mak-ing millions while local peoplehave been struggling with ris-ing prices during the winter de-spite SSE - one of the mainenergy providers here makingprofits of over 400%. So, what is the alternative tofracking? We have so many re-newable energy resourcessuch as experimental WavePower in Strangford Loughwhich has produced millions ofKWs of energy for next to noth-ing.A lot of people will say why hasrenewable energy - like windand wave power not becamethe norm? The simple reasonis because there is no profit init for large companies. The capitalist system is basedoff short-term profit. Capital-ism will happily destroy the en-vironment and working classcommunities (including ourwater supplies!) in order tomaximise their profits - worry-ing about the environmentalcatastrophe only when it af-fects their profit margins!

FRACK OFF!how profits are being put before the environment

cuts, cuts, cuts

&EVENMORECUTS!!!health cuts willcost lives!Currently the DUP Health MinisterEdwin Poots is opposing cuts to thehealth budget of £140 million. Pootsclaims that this will affect plans for thehealth service as well as waiting timesand elderly care being severly impactedas well.These cuts are coming when Poots aspart of the Executive has already imple-mented significant cuts to staffing lev-els at A&E's as well as staffs' pay andconditions. These cuts cause the Healthservice to reach crisis point regularlywith there only being half staffing inambulances in Belfast and waitingtimes of over 24 hours in A&E's.Opposition to the Stormont executivesagenda of cutting the Health servicemust be built or they pose a significantthreat to people all across the province.Workers in Public Sector trade unionsin the Health service will be taking partin a programme of action in the Autumnin opposition to all spending cuts butspecifically in Health.-save our studenthardship funds!!!Recently the BBC revealed that staff atNorth West Regional College are donat-ing money in order for their students tobe able to buy basic food items. This case is damning of cutbacks to stu-dent hardship funds cut, undoubtedlypart of the wider £4bn austerity pack-age which Stormont has begun to im-plement. The hardship funds have beencut by up to a third in some collegesover the past five years. Under the Hardship Scheme studentscan apply for a grant from in order tomeet basic costs such as transport,course fees, equipment, childcare andmeals. Those wanting to apply for up to£3,500 must prove that they have ex-hausted all other options for funding –and present all of their finances to thecollege which can decide whethersome expenditure constitutes ‘realneed’ – highly patronising and embar-rassing.By Robert Sharkey, UUJ Socialist Society

Socialist Youth fights for a dem-ocratically planned economy:the only way we can properlysafeguard the environment forus and future generations at thesame time as making sustain-able energy available for all.

We need to take the profit out ofenergy production and distribu-tion. We call for public owner-ship and democratic control ofthe big energy companies and asocialist plan for energy produc-tion, distribution and pricing.

BY AOBH SHARVINSchool StudentSouth Belfast Socialist YouthAbortion is a medical procedure, when permittedlegally. It allows a woman, who has for whatever rea-son become pregnant, to terminate the foetus fromthe womb before birth. In the United Kingdom, this ispermitted up to twenty four weeks after conception.Everywhere, except in Northern Ireland. Women’s rights, or lack of them in this area, are atro-cious. In one case in the South of Ireland, a rape vic-tim, eight weeks pregnant and suicidal, applied for anabortion, and no sooner than 12 weeks later, wasgiven a court order for a C-section, which she lateragreed to. Not before, however, she went on hungerand thirst strike in an attempt to be granted herchoice of whether or not she would have the child. No-one else was having this child. No-one. Not the judge,not the lawyers, not the jury. Why was this womanforced to have this child, even though the thoughtalone was making her want to kill herself?

The right for all women to be able to have an abortionis important in a modern, civilised world. The samepeople who campaign against this right are far toooften not in favour of free childcare, healthcare, hous-ing or adoption rights for gay couples. They show a bla-tant disregard for the life of the child once it’s born.This issue is not about one person's life; it covers thou-sands of lives, throughout the entire United Kingdom,Ireland, Europe, and the World. We all need to standtogether, to fight this issue which affects all of us. Weneed to campaign for free abortion on the NHS, secu-lar sex education, free contraception, free childcareand support.

not the church not the state...WOMEN MUST DECIDE THEIR FATE!Photo: Tyler McNally

Socialist Party

gaza - ukraine - iraq - mali - syriaCAPITALISM MEANS WAR!BY KEVIN HENRYYoung Call Centre WorkerEast Belfast Socialist Party

100 years ago young working classpeople across the world wheredragged into barbaric war thatserved only the interest of thesuper-rich. Over 10 million peopledied in what was meant to be a“war to end all wars.” When weturn on the news today the miseryin Palestine, in Syria, in Iraq, inUkraine illustrates what a cruel liethat was.

Indeed the next century has seenmore die in wars than in all of pre-vious human history. Yet, there aremany wars and slaughter thatbarely even makes the news- therecent brutal wars in Mali and theCentral African Republic. TheGlobal Peace index shows out of162 countries just 11 were not in-volved in conflict and that we live ina more volatile world than 5 yearsago.

In Iraq, the barbarism we see is aresult of the chaos caused by warand occupation waged by the USand Britain in pursuit of oil. IslamicState/ISIS is latest brutal Franken-stein monster that was armed aspart of the efforts to arm the rebelsby western governments and cor-rupt Arab regimes in the region par-ticular Saudi Arabia. Yet, the USand other western governmentshave no solution but further bomb-ings and killings. At the same time western backedgovernment are funding the racistIsraeli states slaughter of thePalestinian people. The UnitedStates alone gives $3.6billion ayear to Israel. Around three-quar-ters of that funding are used to buy

US military equipment. In the last 5years, 130 million was authorisedby the British government in armstrades with Israel. While workingclass people across the world aretold there is no money for ourschools or hospitals, $1.75 trillionhas been spent on buying arms.While politicians beat the drum ofwar and remain silent where warcrimes are being committed- ordi-nary people have been prepared toshow their hatred toward war, mili-tarism and occupation. This wasseen in the massive protestsacross the world against theslaughter in Gaza.

We need to rebuild a powerful anti-war movement that can organisepeople in there millions to opposethe warmongers. Part of this isbuilding an alternative to the chaosof the systems. Such an alternativewould mean democratically plan-ning of societies resources in theinterest in ordinary people ratherthan super-rich who back warmon-gering politicians. More on the international situationand more detailed articles on Iraq,ISIS, Palestine and Syria can befound on www.socialistworld.net

anti-sectarian, anti-austerity, anti-capitalist?JOIN US TODAY!

ft Find Us: SocYouthNIText: ‘JoinSY’& your name to 079 4184 1092Or On Our Website: www.socialistpartyni.net

Socialist Youth is an anti-capitalist or-ganisation run by and for young peoplesick of the fact that we are not repre-

sented anywhere. From fighting against sexism & for women’srights, organising against racist attacks,naming/shaming zero-hour contract employ-ers, opposing wars, resisting education cutsand showing solidarity to workers fightingback; Socialist Youth is active across theNorth. Socialist Youth does not have the backing ofbig business and rich donors (we campaignagainst them!). We rely on donations from ourmembers and supporters in order to cam-paign and print material.

How would a socialist economy work? How would a socialist democracy work? Wouldn’t a bureaucratic elitejust take over? Wouldn’t it be easier to reform capitalism? Socialism sounds great on paper, but is it realistic?

find answers to all these questions: www.socialistpartyni.net/FAQs

We have members from across thedivide and actively oppose sectar-ianism. In 2012 we organised the

March for a Future along the Shankhill andFalls uniting young people to fight againstboth austerity and sectarianism.We’ve also led protests in opposition to ed-ucation cuts, including an occupation of theDepartment for Employment and Learningas well as a protest inside Stormont - inter-rupting business.

We stand for real Socialism, whichmeans running society for all peo-ples’ needs and not for the profit of

the few. So much anger exists at the way theworld is run that the potential to build a social-ist movement for young people at the momentis massive. However, we cannot do this alone.If you are disgusted by the massive inequalityof capitalism, if you are against the rise inracism and sectarianism gripping our society,if you are for a world free from exploitation,then get active in Socialist Youth!