The Calton Martyrs of 1787

 Trades disputes had not been uncommon in the 18th century, but the Calton Weavers Strike of 1787 was remarkable for its duration, the violence with which it was met and in the reprisals which followed it. The strike was about the spread of new machinery and the increased importation of cheaper Indian cloth but most of all it was about people with families and a livelihood to protect.

Glasgow's possibly first strike lasted from June until October 1787 and it was to claim the lives of six men. In 1787, Calton was just a village on the boundaries of the city of Glasgow, home to mostly weavers who were well regarded for their high standard of education - many being self-taught - and their social awareness. They tended towards more radical politics, which made them unpopular with the authorities, the Glasgow Magistrates who were determined that they would control the weavers, the pioneers of the future trade unionists.  In June of that year, the weavers and their fellow brethren who were members of the Clyde Valley General Weavers Association learned the manufacturers planned to reduce payments for the weaving of muslin. The proposed cut came on the heels of an earlier one which had already reduced wages between six and seven shillings a week. A further cut, the weavers protested, would bring wages down by 25%, a remuneration they felt that they could not live on.  At a mass meeting held on Glasgow Green on 30th June 1787, the weavers resolved not to carry out any work at the proposed new rate.  At first, the striking weavers tried to act reasonably. As in previous disputes, they seized the materials which had been accepted by some workers at the reduced rates, but these were then returned to their owners. As time passed, the hardships experienced by the weavers increased and the measures adopted to attempt to overcome the stale-mate became more militant. Strikers went to premises where the work was being carried out at the new rate, cut the webs, and in some cases publicly burned them.

On September 3, protesting strikers were fired upon by troops of the 39th (Dorsetshire) Regiment of Foot at the order of the city's magistrates. Three weavers died instantly, while three others were to die from their wounds over the next few days. They paid the ultimate price for their principles and convictions. Scores of others were wounded. Many arrests were made and varying terms of imprisonment imposed. Some were forced to leave the country. One, James Granger, was flogged through the streets of Edinburgh then exiled from Scotland for 7 years. He later returned and took part in the 1811-1812 strike. The dead were regarded as martyrs.

The weavers' sabotage techniques anticipated the development of direct action associated with syndicalism over a hundred years later. Today, unions and workers are still fighting to keep jobs and maintain their incomes as technological advances and foreign competition gets introduced. Not much changes with capitalism, even over the centuries.  

A Free World

The free-access world awaits us. No longer a utopian dream, a money-free world of true abundance, peace and fulfillment is attainable today. Socialism will be a sustainable world beyond borders. All goods and services are available to all people without the need for means of exchange such as money, credits, barter or any other means. For this to be achieved all resources must be declared as the common heritage of all Earth’s inhabitants. Equipped with the latest scientific and technological marvels mankind can create an abundance of resources where scarcity is entirely eliminated. World socialism operates on the fundamentals of freedom, sharing, and respect. Such a society is enlightened to a point where traditional constraints such as law, money, trade and borders no longer apply.

 Rather than every individual seeking only to benefit themselves, a common understanding exists that enables everyone to benefit everyone, including themselves. Socialism is primarily concerned with the cooperation of people by creating a common understanding of the benefits to the individual in acting for the best interests of all. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that we’re doing a lot of things wrong in our society. Everywhere you look – greed, corruption, crime, poverty, financial stress, our health system, climate change – all of it links back to the way we do business on this planet. This simply must change. It only requires a shift in priorities to create the more compassionate and abundant planet where no-one gets left behind. There’s no new technology required. Technology can – and already does – most of the hard work for us now. Creating all the things we need has never been easier. It’s just a decision we all have to make.

The biggest obstacle facing advocates of socialism is how to convince people of the necessity of change.  We would all be in a better, moneyless society tomorrow if everyone understood how and why it works, but the truth is that it’s a very difficult idea to convince people of. Too often we’re faced with people giving reasons such as “it’s the best we have” or “your idea will never work”. Our case for socialism often seems to fall on deaf ears. Environmentalists have long suspected that doom and gloom have not worked very well, and we’re aware of how confronting depictions of extreme poverty is unpleasant and makes us want to turn away. Almost everyone senses that big changes are coming. The old ways like religion and racism are being abandoned as people are becoming more educated and connected. In a free society, people will still seek mentors and teachers to inspire and help them. However, this does not mean that we need rulers. Rulers do not necessarily help, they merely rule – and usually only when there is something to protect. Organisers and administrators are nominated and delegated for specific tasks based on their ability through the common wishes of the group. Selection can happen in many ways.

Because everyone has free access what they need we don’t need to compete or go to war for profit. Imagine no hunger, no stress, no debt, not forced to work long hours to pay for what you need? Who wouldn’t want that for themselves and others? Also, once we eliminate the need for profit, and ‘cost’ is no longer an issue, we can produce things much more sustainably and responsibly, thereby using fewer resources, no need to trash the planet. We are a social species that naturally prefer cooperation once our basic needs are met. We compete and hoard only because of scarcity. That’s just our survival instinct. But once our basic needs are met, we naturally gravitate into various communities who like work and socialise together for the same ends. This is the glue that keeps society together.

Most people who have given any consideration to a money-free world are already aware that we have the technology today to create a world of abundance without the constraints and inequality of the traditional market system, owing to how much human labour can now be efficiently automated. Without scarcity, and a massive reduction in the need for labour, money effectively becomes obsolete. A truly free society will be unlimiting, self-determining and self-organising for the optimum benefit of all. The best way to describe socialism is that we will happily co-exist with each other in a steady-state environment. History books are full of references to aggressive culture, heinous acts of violence and torture – man pitted against fellow man. This gives an abiding impression of a bloodthirsty homo sapiens, indiscriminately bludgeoning all in his path to get what he wants. But this is a false impression, and yet another dangerous misunderstanding of the world and of ourselves. For every lunatic who takes up a gun and starts killing people, there are millions and millions of other people who don’t, but we never hear about them. The reality is, our human experience, from a statistical point of view, is almost entirely peaceful. Non-conflict probably accounts for 99 % of all human behaviour. A self-determining society doesn’t use or require laws. Laws were invented primarily to protect private property interests. In a world of abundance, free access and greater understanding of ourselves, these laws would become redundant.

Adapted from freeworlder.com

Profit rules

It is profit which rules. Money is just the means of exchange which facilitates accumulation for the parasitic capitalists, rationing out for the wage slave wealth producer, of wealth. Food clothing and housing should be freely available, as all wealth comes from labour and should be produced for use and not for sale but owned in common by all. Time for a post-capitalist society of super-abundance of all the necessities of life rather than capitalist production for sale with access rationed via wages and prices with the profits going to the minority owning 1% capitalist class. Where there is a demand for houses they should be built for use and freely available. The working class built these homes. Why should they not be freely available?  In capitalism, food, clothing, and shelter are not produced for use, but for sale. What a daft use of resources. What an insane social system capitalism is? Much better to abolish capitalism and establish a commonly owned, free access, production for use, society, owned, controlled and democratically run by us all, without elites. As social equals, with equal access, we are all in charge.

Tory versus Labour governments is silly and misses the point entirely, which is that all governments over you are to manage the affairs of the capitalist class to ensure the maximisation of the extraction of profit from the exploitation of the majority. Capitalism cannot be run in any other way. The route of trying to change capitalism or 'reform,' is the one that has been taken by most people who have wanted to improve society. There are examples of some 'success' in such fields as education, housing, child employment, work conditions and social security. However, in this regard we also recognise that such 'successes' have in reality done little more than to keep workers and their families in efficient working order and, while it has taken the edge off the problem, it has rarely managed to remove the problem completely. If you are convinced, however, that groups or parties promising reforms deserve your support, we would urge you to consider the following points. The campaign, whether directed at right-wing or left-wing governments, will often only succeed if it can be reconciled with the profit-making needs of the system. In other words, the reform will often be turned to the benefit of the capitalist class at the expense of any working class gain. Any reform can be reversed and eroded later if a government finds it necessary. Reforms rarely, if ever, actually solve the problem they were intended to solve. This was summed up by William Morris over a century ago:

 "The palliatives over which many worthy people are busying themselves now are useless because they are but unorganised partial revolts against a vast, wide-spreading, grasping organisation which will, with the unconscious instinct of a plant, meet every attempt at bettering the conditions of the people with an attack on a fresh side."

The profit motive of capitalism is a major cause of the problems we face in today's society: ever increasing inequality, poverty, alienation, crime, homelessness, environmental degradation—the list could go on and on. There are countless ways in which the working class (and indeed the capitalist class) suffer as a result of the profit system. Unless we organise for an alternative, the profit system will continue on its blind, unswerving path

Socialism has never existed anywhere in the world, as it is a post-capitalist society utilising the technology and productive apparatus of the modern age and transforming it into a commonly owned production for use society for all with free access, rather than a production for sale society for the enrichment of the few with rationed access via wages and prices. It is a world without a means or a need for an exchange economy.  All previous revolutions were minority led revolutions on behalf of new emerging ruling 5-10% classes. The post-capitalist society is the work of the immense majority 90-95% on behalf of themselves, with its aim the great emancipation of the wage slaves and true social equality arising from democratic control by us all over resources, the means of production and distribution being owned by us all in common and run by us all. A democratic, locally, regionally globally, administration of resources rather than governments over people as presently.

Profit can only come from exploitation of workers for their surplus value and even if this went back to workers, it would scarcely resolve the basic problem of capitalist production even of basic commodities requiring to be at a profit and not for the satisfaction of human needs. With intense competition from other capitalist enterprise chasing the same market production would cease, even as needs still remain unmet, on a 'can't pay can't have' principle and workers laid off. Capital has already plundered wealth from the exploitation of the working class. Welfare is a good deal for the capitalist parasite class. It provides the myth of 'homes built for heroes' after a war, staves off social discontent with promises of 'cradle to grave' provision, reduces the wage burden of the parasite class when boom times arrive they would have to make provision for insurance to workers organised in unions and in slumps maintains a reserve army of labour to be exploited as wage slaves when the good times roll and production picks up..

Capitalism cannot be reformed by Sanders or anyone else. Capitalism cannot be reformed to work in the interests of the wage worker. Capitalism will continue with its poverty, homelessness, and hunger for many Americans and Europeans. It’s not a different president, or government, that is needed but a new economic system.

Instead of blaming immigrants, get up off your knees and get rid of capitalism and its governments. The problem with pro-capitalist commentators is that, they believe their own bogeymen and misconceptions of what socialism is and continue to spread confusion in order to bolster an ideological narrative in which various manifestations of the capitalist systems of government, such as reformism, state capitalism, and regulation are equated with 'socialism' and not seen as failures of capitalism in that it is capitalism which is inimical to reform in any substantial way. Socialism is a world which does not need money, or any other means of exchange as it is, a commonly owned, production for use, free access, post-capitalist social system.

"Rise like Lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number,

Shake your chains to earth like dew

Which in sleep had fallen on you-

Ye are many - they are few."

Shelley.

Wee Matt

Expand your consciousness in Edinburgh

Lothian Socialist Discussion

Wednesday, November 23,

7:30 PM

ACE

17 West Montgomery Place,

Edinburgh, EH7 5HA

Many critics of socialism will defend themselves from accusations of strawman arguments by saying that there always will be those socialists who will defend socialist theory or practice, by declaring criticism of state-ownership or nationalisation that's not true socialism. We do indeed say that since, in our view, socialism does have a definite historical meaning. The word "socialism" rather becomes meaningless if everyone who calls themselves a socialist is accepted as being a socialist. Maybe the definition of socialism we adhere to is now a minority one, but up until the First World War it was probably the majority view that socialism is a system of society based on the common ownership and democratic control of the means of production, where the state and government over people will give way to democratic self-administration and where the money-market-profit economy, will give way to production solely and directly to satisfy human needs without buying and selling.

To build the foundations for hope in a future for humanity requires ending capitalism. The voice of socialist movement cannot be reduced to a whisper. It has to be clear and firm to be heard and to be echoed. Socialism’s rallying cry is the first sentence of the Rules of the First Workers’ International, drafted by Marx in 1864: ‘The emancipation of the working class must be conquered by the workers themselves.’ Socialism can only be achieved if working people themselves inspire it and create it. Socialism involves workers democratically taking over and running society in their own interests, under their own control. It is a sign of the times that more and more people are discussing the meaning of socialism.

Freaky Capitalism And Freak Shows

The city of North Bay may move the house where the Dionne quints were born as the land it's on may be used for other purposes. Since this puts the quints in the news again it's timely to look at their story, which is a depression era one. Born in 1934 to poor parents, they were soon taken away from them and made into a freak show. They were exposed to the public 3 times a day in an exhibit enclosed by one-way viewing mirrors as well as a playground that doubled as a public observation area. ''Quintland'' brought in $500 million during the next decade, precious little of which went to the girls. If anyone was intensely exploited during this time it was them.

 What a sad, sad reflection on a society that needs a freak show to help the economy. Perhaps one shouldn't be surprised - the very fundamentals of capitalism are pretty freaky.

 John Ayers.

Socialism is common sense

The Socialist Party considers that in our small way, we have made history. Yet we exist in the present as a political party is to make the future. The Socialist Party hopes to act as a catalyst ine the social transition towards a more egalitarian, participatory and environmentally sustainable world.

We are a sharing economy. We have always shared. Humanity would never have survived unless we practiced sharing at a personal and communal basis. We shared common lands with our neighbours and communities just as today share the roads. Mutual aid is an evolutionary trait that anthropologists have long recognised as intrinsic to our essential nature. It remains a fact that the sharing economy has always been with us in one form or another and sharing has forever played its part in our everyday lives. People are naturally social and creative and it drives us to innovate. And the flexibility of human behavior, such as our capacity for cooperation and adaptation, allows us to envisage and create a world beyond the current economic and political models many regard as unchangeable.

Capitalism is beginning to become a dirty word again. People have begun to protest against the profit system and the effect it is having on the environment and the quality of life generally. Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans want nothing to do with these protests. They are as committed to serving the interests of Wall Street. Jill Stein and the Green Party are not anti-capitalist either. Certainly, they criticise Big Corporations and are critical of some of the ways the market-driven system works. And Green Party Ministers in Germany, France Ireland and Italy haven't made any difference to the way capitalism works. It's the old illusion that you can use taxes and government intervention to make the capitalist system work for everybody's benefit. You can't, as has been proved time and again.

A supposedly spontaneous, unorganised anti-capitalist revolution would only end in disaster out of which either the present rulers would succeed in reasserting their control or a new set of rulers would profit from the chaos to seize power. If we are going to get rid of capitalism the majority is going to have to organise itself to do so—in a permanent organisation with a democratic structure. We need to organise to create a state-free, money-free society where goods are produced not to make profits but simply because people needed them.

The election is carried out as if the two main protagonists are marketing agencies selling two superficially different (but nevertheless fundamentally identical) products. The tools of their trade are the typical marketing techniques employed by corporate business everywhere - "spin", "positioning" in relation to key target sectors, junk mail and cold calling of those in a targeted market niche.

So what can you do? Not voting is not as bad as voting for one or other of the parties that stand for keeping capitalism going. But it's a bit of a cop-out. Our ancestors were right to struggle for the vote. The fact that up to now it hasn't been used properly is no reason for rejecting it as useless. Because we think that, in future, the election system could be used in a constructive way we shall be exercising our right to vote. We suggest a write-in vote for socialism. Real socialism, that is. In real socialism, since profit making and money will be abolished, it is all the people and the environment which will come first. Capitalism, with its anti-environmental and anti-social policies, is what needs to be replaced. Socialism is a theory of society that pulls away the mystifying veil of capitalism to reveal the economic exploitation at its core. In light of all the suffering and misery that is erupting throughout the world, is it not time to share resources with one another. Capitalism really did create the capacity for comfortable living. Consider socialism as the common sense application of that potential for abundance. 

Sound theory must precede sound action

The purpose of the Socialist Party to hasten the introduction of socialism, which will abolish private and state property and secure common ownership of the means of production and distribution. Wage labour will be abolished, together with all the other harmful social relations of capitalism. This is a task which means that workers in the majority must be conscious in their revolutionary role, and fully aware of the implications of their actions. When they gain political power based on a socialist mandate they can establish Socialism.

Despite their many and often heroic struggles of defiance and resistance working class have yet to face up to the basic problems caused by capitalism. They suffer under its exploitation but still endure and accept the continuance of the system. Capitalism cannot continue without the overall compliance and complicity of the working class. They accept the idea of private property. The wages system is the natural way they can gain a livelihood. However, the problems and pressures of capitalism are making more workers anxious and apprehensive about the kind of existence they can expect under capitalism and what the foreboding future holds for their children. Social systems are changeable. The history of the ancient world and middle ages shows that past social systems, seemingly unassailable, were all subject to revolutionary change.  People know that in the past the world was very different from what it is now – different ideas and behaviour, different political systems, different production methods, different means of transport, and different social classes – slave owners and slaves, feudal lords, and serfs, and today employers and wage workers. In the past society has been made up of a number of conflicting classes - monarchs, landowners, traders, peasants, workers - but under capitalism these classes have been reduced to two, workers and capitalists. The modern struggle is between these two classes, and capitalism has now become a fetter on further social development. To free our society of war, crises, unemployment, poverty, the workers must capture control of the state and introduce a new system, one in which the means of production and distribution will be owned in common by the whole of society. Each new form of production has brought into being new social classes, a change in social relations, a change in political alignment, and a change in current ideas. The freeman and slave of antiquity looked upon the social world through different eyes from those of the feudal lord and bondsman of the middle ages, and likewise the capitalist and the worker of today have different ideas from those of their medieval counterparts. To understand the ideas of a period it is necessary to examine the economic framework of the period from which the ideas are derived because the economic framework is the dominating influence. Ideas carried over from old outworn systems are carried over into the new, but these traditions are forced into the mould of the new system, though they may have some influence on the shape of the mould. One has only to consider what Christianity looks like now and what it was like a thousand years ago to appreciate this.

Trying to make capitalism work is quite useless to the workers. Some may agree that capitalism has not in the past served the interest of the workers but still hope that perhaps it will in the future if some 'better' leaders are found. Leaders cannot provide socialism for those who do not understand or want it, and those who do understand it don't want leadership. The situation is not one for despair but for hope and action. Sound action must be preceded by sound theory. This requires thought and thought is not easy - most people are afraid of it. The Socialist Party has always held that socialism becomes possible only at a certain stage in the forward march of mankind. It depends firstly on the growth of the powers of production, transport and communication to the level at which the provision of the necessities and amenities of a full life could, with proper organisation and social planning, be assured for the whole population. Capitalism solved this technical problem long enough ago through the development of great industrial plants and machinery and the breaking down of the physical barriers which formerly kept people in different parts of the world isolated from each other. It depends secondly on the growth of working class organisation on a world-wide basis united by understanding of socialist ideas, and by agreement on the democratic political action necessary to replace capitalism by Socialism. The two conditions interact with each other. The second could not proceed the first and, as experience has shown, the growth of socialist understanding and organisation actually lags far behind the advance of productive capacity. Since one country can learn from another and the industrially more advanced could help the less advanced, it is not necessary for the latter to go through all the historical phases of capitalism. On the other hand, it is not possible for one country alone to leap forward into socialism in a predominantly capitalist and hostile world.

Continuous Poverty

A forum research poll conducted during the second week in October showed 63 per cent of responders were in favour of increasing the minimum wage in Ontario to $15 an hour. 31 per cent were not and 6 per cent didn't know. Those against it said such a large increase would reduce employment prospects for young people. Economics professor, Morley Gunderson said recent Canadian studies have shown a 10 per cent increase in minimum wage has resulted in a 3 to 6 per cent decrease in employment for young people. 

Some said it looked good for politicians to up the minimum wage, but the link between it and the reduction of poverty is unproven.

 If credence can be put on the above remarks, it shows no matter how great the effort, there will always be poverty under capitalism. 

John Ayers.

The battle for emancipation

It is part of the task of the Socialist Party to show that, with the exception of that single factor, working-class knowledge, the material conditions for the social revolution are ripe. It is now time for our fellow-workers step in and dethrone the capitalist class by gaining control of the State. They must capture the political machinery by the workers organising themselves into a political party, having for its object the overthrow of the present social system and the establishment of a system of society based upon common ownership of the means of living. Thus organised they must wrest control of the political machinery from the ruling class by means of the ballot, and having achieved this control, must use it to strip the capitalist class of their possessions, and consequently of their privileges. The vote is to be the weapon. A vote is something more than a cross on a scrap of paper. The value of the vote is measured by the man or woman behind the vote. It is not the elected representative who is the all-important factor, but the quality of the vote which puts him into place. Thus the votes cast for the revolutionary representative must be revolutionary votes. They must be the votes of those who understand the need for revolution, desire it, and are determined to achieve it. An MP elected by an informed constituency is its servant. Understanding the position, they are able to direct his course of action, hence they are his masters. If he plays them false, if he departs from the revolutionary path, they know it at once and seize the first opportunity of "dealing with him. On the other hand, such a representative knows that in all sound revolutionary action he has the full support of those whose delegate he is, and hence becomes the strong and efficient servant of a strong master. The representative of those who do not clearly understand what it is they want who gets his votes on all manner of vague pretexts and promises he dares not attempt to take a revolutionary course, whatever his views may be, for he has all sorts and conditions of persons in his following except revolutionaries and  the revolutionary does not follow. Such a representative is in a position to sell his electors. Depending upon confusion for his place, his best chance of maintaining it is to preserve that confusion. This suits the capitalists very well, for their chief concern is that the workers shall not know who their enemies are. Therefore, the political parties of the capitalist class welcome such representatives of labour—they know there is no revolutionary force behind them.

The first quality, then, of revolutionary vote is to have a working class that thoroughly understands its position in society, that thoroughly realises the hopelessness of any endeavour to improve materially that position under the present social scheme, and that therefore is thoroughly resolved to abolish the system and establish Socialism; the crying need, then, is knowledge. The first thing that the workers must learn is that there is only one working class and that their interests are one and the same the wide world over. Then they must learn that, just as the workers are made one by a common interest, so a common interest; binds the capitalists of the world into a solid class. The realisation of this teaches the lesson that the interests of the workers and the capitalists are diametrically opposed, for this follows from the fact that it is interests that divide the people into classes. The logical implication of this is that the workers must proceed to work out their emancipation as a class. This means organisation-—the closest, the highest, most perfect organisation possible—organisation on class lines.

The political organisation of the working class, having for its object the establishment of the socialist system by a politically educated working class, must first of all be an instrument capable of fulfilling its purpose. It must, then, be firmly anchored to its object so that it is impossible for it to drift. The first thing needed, therefore, is to be clear in what the object is because the party seeking working-class emancipation can only gain its object through men and women who thoroughly understand what that object is. Those who hold that it is the 'leader’ who is the source of power are, of course, quite logical in adopting an "object" that will appeal to the greatest numbers. In such a case all that is wanted is shoulders to climb upon. The ' leaders being the strength of the organisation, it is quite sufficient that they understand the object of the organisation—the others do not matter. The case is very different with a democratic organisation. The first principle of such is that it is the workers as a class who must fight the battle for emancipation; it is they who must be strong since their servants and delegates can be strong only with their strength. The logic of this is that the fitness of the organisation for its purpose depends upon the quality and strength, not of ' leaders’ but of the membership.

Those who want office, who are  determined to get our feet on the floor of the House of Commons and are not particular how we do it" (because that is all they want), claim that the emancipation of the working class does not need a revolution. The reason for this is easily seen. The only way in which they could get their feet on the floor of the House of Commons to-day is by denying the need for revolution. Revolution and the class struggle, of course, are necessarily connected. The "gradualist," therefore, in order that he may get his feet on the floor of the House of Commons with the help of non-socialist votes, is forced to deny the revolution because that implies recognising the existence of the class struggle. Those, however, who realise the facts of the political situation, know that the workers would not be driven to seek emancipation but for the class antagonism; hence they are driven to accept the class struggle as the very basis of their action. Members of the Socialist Party can never become the plaything of leaders and dictators. The first sign of compromise, the first indication of alliance with the enemy, the first particle of evidence that a member has become the tool of any section of the master class, and he is dealt with by a membership imbued with the principle of the class struggle.

Consider the following facts:

The first is that terrible poverty exists among the workers to-day.

The second is that the productivity of human labour, have increased enormously during the last 500 years, the bulk of the workers, in view of the vastly increased production of wealth, are poorer to-day than they were in the Middle Ages.

The third is that this poverty is worst when the warehouses are full to bursting.

The fourth is sufficient wealth is produced to-day to afford comparative comfort to every member of the community.

The fifth is that the work of producing and distributing that wealth is performed by the working class.

Are these statements true? If they are, then all that is required; is that working-class intelligence, courage, and determination shall rise to the height of seizing control of society and remoulding it to the end that the general happiness and well-being shall be the sole purpose of all productive effort. If they are true they impose upon every working man and woman the serious duty of giving thought to these matters; for it is from them alone that the remedy can come. The salvation of the working class involves the overthrow of the master class, therefore it is futile to look for help from the latter.

We need socialism

Industry cannot be wrested from capitalist ownership by degrees; this change must be fundamental, immediate and complete. Socialism means an immediate and fundamental revolution in the basis of society; the complete abolition of capitalist ownership of the means of production at one stroke, and its replacement by common ownership. Socialism cannot be achieved gradually. When the workers understand and want socialism the difficulties of organising production and distribution on the new basis will not present a great problem. Production and distribution of the world is almost wholly under the direct domination of the capitalist class of the world, and where this does not apply the domination is indirectly applied. This domination is based upon the subjection of the wage-labourer including those, who, consider themselves professionals and/or self-employed. The only way out of this subjugation and servitude is the unity of the working class for the conquest of political power with the sole object of dispossessing the capitalist class of its means of subjection and the transforming society from one based upon the private ownership of the means of production into one based upon the common ownership of the means of production. This new social organisation can only be achieved by the majority of the workers understanding its implications and relying upon themselves alone to accomplish the change. Not leadership but mass understanding is the condition of achieving socialism.

Socialism is an international question that concerns workers of all countries. One of the hindrances to its acceptance is race-prejudice which sets groups against each other on grounds of colour, religion, and so forth. Before the workers can really understand their fundamental unity they must get rid of this false and harmful race-prejudice. The Socialist Party understands only one fundamental social division in the modern world—the division that exists between the capitalist class on the one hand, and the working-class on the other. All other divisions, whether they are based on religion, nationality, language or “race”, are incidental to this main division. Regarding our attitude to the problem of race-prejudice, let us state categorically so that nobody will misunderstand:

“The interests of all members of the working-class, whatever the race to which they belong, are fundamentally opposed to the interests of the members of the capitalist class irrespective of the race to which the members of this latter class belong.”

The class division cuts directly across all others. Racism is but one of the many social problems that spring directly from the contradictions of capitalist society itself. As such, it must be kept in its proper perspective. To attempt to solve the problem of race prejudice in isolation will meet with the same abject failure that has resulted from the efforts to end, piecemeal, the various other evils of the capitalist system. Only as the workers of the world understand their position under capitalism; only to the extent that they absorb socialist knowledge, will they cease to be a prey to the hatreds and prejudices arising from fantastic notions of racial superiority and national chauvinism.

One of the most frequent criticisms of the Socialist Party is that while the policy of advocating socialism is useful and necessary for the ultimate solution of working-class problems, it is nevertheless a short-sighted and unrealistic policy to neglect to support measures of social reform designed to improve the conditions of the workers whilst capitalism is still in existence. It is urged that a socialist party should wage a guerrilla warfare with the capitalists in order to gain benefits, even if only temporary and minor, and that in doing so it would rally to the cause of socialism many workers who otherwise would not be prepared to support an organisation which appeared to have an excellent programme for the future but not for the present.

Our reply to that criticism has been that the task of a socialist party is to establish socialism and that as this can only be brought about by a working population possessing an understanding of the issues involved, our propaganda at all times must be directed at spreading the essential socialist knowledge. Further we have argued that a socialist party which advocated reforms would attract non-socialist support from those interested in all or some of the reform measures, and that the non-socialist support would sooner or later (and in all probability sooner) swamp the socialist elements and the party would become just another reformist organisation with no better claim to working class support than that of the Labour Party.

We have pointed to the records of many “socialist” organisations which have adopted the policy of “getting something now” to show the futility of attempting either to build up a socialist movement with a reformist programme, or even to reform out of existence some of the minor disabilities suffered by the workers under capitalism. In this latter connection it can be said that the reform measures that have been passed have generally been instituted by self-confessed capitalist organisations which have recognised the need to adjust capitalism in the light of changing conditions. The usual process has been for the so-called workers’ parties to agitate (often for a considerable period) for particular measures of social reform and then in the end, when the capitalists can no longer resist the agitation, for these (or watered-down versions of them) to be brought about by the governments which have thus been able to steal the limelight which the workers’ organisations have sought to obtain, and use it to their own advantage. This in its turn has increased the confusion in the minds of the workers, who feel that there can be very little wrong with capitalism when capitalist parties themselves are prepared to adopt what have been proclaimed to be “socialist” proposals. Socialism alone can end that poverty. We shall not be diverted from our task in order to chase the shadows, but we shall continue to strive for the substance, socialism, which will abolish forever the conditions which bring into being the evils of the modern world. Our aim has been to give our fellow-workers as clear and concise a picture of their present position in society as is possible. How far we have succeeded is for they to judge.

Sick Scotland

The average person from the most deprived tenth of Scots dies aged 73, after 23 years of living in "not good health".

The person from the least deprived tenth of Scots can expect to die, on average, aged 83, after 10 years of being in poor health.

Other gaps between least and most deprived:

1. Low birth weight was more than twice as high

2. Breastfeeding was almost three times lower

3. Signs of tooth decay in children ran 54% to 81%

4. Childhood obesity was less of a divider, at 18% to 25%

5. The teenage pregnancy rate was nearly five times higher in the most deprived areas.

Glasgow has the lowest life expectancy of anywhere in the UK. Even by comparison with similar cities.  Compared with Liverpool and Manchester, premature deaths in Glasgow are 30% higher.

How long can a child expect to live, born in 2014?

Men

Healthy life expectancy:

Most deprived 47.6

Least deprived 72.7

Life Expectancy:

Most deprived 70

Least deprived 82.5

Years spent in 'not good health':

Most deprived 22.6

Least deprived 9.8

Women

Healthy life expectancy:

Most deprived 51

Least deprived 73.2

Life expectancy:

Most deprived 76.7

Least deprived 84.5

Years spent in 'not good health':

Most deprived 25.7

Least deprived 11.3

Satisfying human needs

The basic and vital function of all societies is production. What distinguishes one form of society from another is the relationship between men and the means of production. In primitive communities, they belong, such as they are, to everyone; in more complex societies there is class ownership which directs the whole course of man's productive activities and the other activities resulting from them. In capitalism, the social form of the modern world, the means of production - the land, the factories and sources of energy, the machinery, and everything auxiliary to them - are owned by perhaps 10 per cent. of the population. The nine-tenths who remain without ownership live, therefore, by being wage-workers, all more or less poorly paid: they are the working class. There can be no identity of interest between the two groups; under this ownership system the one class is always exploited by the other. All production is carried on for, and all social activity is contributory to, the motive of sale for profit.

On this basis, modern civilisation has developed. With it have also developed the problems which are direct consequences of the universal production of goods for sale. The wars which result from the competition of capitalist nations in the world's markets, and the special problem which a particular weapon of war may impose; the economic crises which recur uncontrollably; the poverty and insecurity from which the wage-earning class is never free; the consequences of poverty in bad housing, ill-health, crime and many other evils. All social and economic problems must, therefore, be related to the organisation of society. Reformers in all fields, including education, fail to understand this and attempt to deal with the effects without touching the social causes. Often, too, the problems are dealt with from the point of view of what is good for “industry” or “the nation.” - that is, the owning class in the nation. What should really be judged is the capitalist system from the viewpoint of the great majority. Human society exists for the satisfaction of human needs, yet capitalism fails to provide a satisfactory life for most people living in it.

All people going to work for wages are selling their labour-power; the price of this depends, as does the price of every other commodity, on the labour that went into its making. Thus, a professional person or a skilled technician's labour-power (subject, of course, to market conditions) commands a relatively high price because it embodies other people's skilled labour in education and training; an unskilled workman's labour-power, on the other hand, has only a: low price because it is essentially a cheap product. From this economic point of view, the school under capitalism resembles a factory in which materials are tested, classified and put through processes which will mould them into finished products for the market ranging from the cheap, mass-produced to the costlier high-grade article. In practice, it cannot, fortunately, be as mechanistic as that because the material is human, but the view is not far removed from the capitalist one. The owning class at times is prepared to pay heavily and foster education to have its own requirements met; at other times and when there are other priorities, the education system may be subject to abridgements and economies. The granting of education and facilities for learning to the working class, even though it is for someone else's reasons, is of immense value. Within the framework of elementary education, there have been many improvements and additional benefits over the years. These, however, have resulted from the increased complexity of capitalism that has demanded more knowledge and more economic participation from even the least skilled worker, and so necessitated a widening of his or her education.

The aim of the Socialist Party is to bring into being a society in which not only will the problems and privations of the present-day world be absent, but every person will lead a free and satisfying life. What is wrong with our society is its basic condition of ownership by a class; the answer, therefore, is to establish a new social system based on the ownership by everybody of all the means of production. Such a society has not yet existed, though there has been much confusion about it because of the play with the word “socialism” made by reformers, the Labour Party and 'social-democratic' parties, and admirers of the former Soviet Union’s state capitalism. Socialism means that all people will have the same relationship to the means of production. Everyone will take part as he is able, in the necessary work of society; there will be no money, and everyone will have free access – will, in fact, own - all that is produced. Thus, there will be neither exploitation nor competition, and social activity will take new forms when no person is compelled to serve another's interests. The conditions needed for its establishment are with us now: the development of the means and methods of production that could create abundance if the profit motive did not stand in the way. All that is lacking is people to bring it to being. Thus, the concern of socialists under capitalism is education - showing the facts about capitalism, and the only answer to the problems which it causes.  Here, then, is the great need of today: people to make a different world. People, that is, who have looked at capitalism critically and seen that it has long ceased to be useful to mankind, and that socialism is wanted now

Capitalism - Insanity, Socialism Common-sense

“One man with an idea in his head is in danger of being considered a madman; two men with the same idea in common may be foolish, but can hardly be mad; ten men sharing an idea begin to act; a hundred draw attention as fanatics, a thousand and society begins to tremble, a hundred thousand and there is war abroad, and the cause has victories tangible and real—and why only a hundred thousand? Why not a hundred million and peace upon earth? You and me who agree together, it is we who have to answer that question.” – William Morris

People have endless problems to worry about - problems of wages and prices, rents and mortgages, and how to provide against sickness, unemployment and old age. The usual attitude is to regard these problems as ones that can be dealt with by the political parties who tell the voters about the new laws they will introduce if they become the government which will fix their problems so they have petitioned Parliament and supported candidates for office. Over the years working people throughout the world have employed a variety of other methods in the hope of improving their living conditions. They have marched and demonstrated in the streets, they have in their protests erected barricades and fought against police. But, more importantly, they have also organised in trade unions which have provided them with their most effective weapon, the strike. The unions exist to protect and improve wages and working conditions. The real worth of a trade union must not be overlooked. However, the Socialist Party say that the social system itself needs to be changed fundamentally, that is, the class relationships and the way production and distribution are carried on. This goes much deeper than a mere change of government but it can never be brought about unless there is widespread understanding of what needs to be done. The Socialist Party recognises that even at their best the unions cannot bring permanent security or end poverty.

The establishment of socialism will bring far-reaching changes in production and distribution, arising from the fact that ownership of the means of producing wealth is transferred to the whole of society. The products of labour will no longer be privately owned; incomes from property ownership and from employment will alike disappear, along with buying, selling, and profit-making. In distribution the principle will be “according to need”, and, of course, without the double standards that now exist throughout the capitalist world, of best quality for the rich, and varying degrees of shoddiness for the poor; which, in turn, presupposes that in production every person will give “according to his or her ability” and will see to it that there are no poor quality goods turned out. Unfettered access to educational and training facilities will enable all to acquire knowledge and skill and bring to an end the existing barriers between unskilled and skilled, manual and mental labour. Great demands will be made on the productive capacity of society but there will be ample means of satisfying them. With the ending of capitalism, enormous additional resources of men and materials will become available through stopping the waste of arms and armaments, and the innumerable activities that are necessary only to capitalism, including the governmental and private bureaucracies, banking and insurance, and the monetary operations that accompany every branch of production and distribution. This release of capacity will vastly increase the number of men and women available for the work of useful production and distribution. In addition, we may expect a continuing annual increase of productivity resulting from the accumulation of skill and knowledge and of productive equipment. With these large additional resources at its disposal society will easily be able—if need be with some loss of productivity in particular fields—to end excessive hours of work, harmful speed and intensity, and unnecessary night and shift work, and to use machinery to replace human labour for types of work that cannot be other than unpleasant. The aim of a society of free men and women should be that work is part of life, no more to be neglected than other intelligently conducted human activities. In a free society, functioning on voluntary co-operation, in which “the government of persons will have given way to the administration of things”, people will not wish to spend the working part of their lives as human automatons serving machines, performing monotonous manual operations. The principle must be that people in a socialist society shall be able to bring to all the various aspects of life, including work, all qualities of body and mind, skill, knowledge, thought and imagination. Our future technological developments will accelerate beyond all measure when mankind is freed from the constraints of capitalism. For the expansion of technology is forever intertwined with the expansion of human consciousness and neither can proceed in its correct path until the entrenched social, political, economic and psychological divisions and strive of capitalism is reversed. The more technology is shared, the more our understanding grows of what technology can achieve as a beneficial tool for humanity’s evolution.

The Socialist Party holds a shared vision of socialism as the lasting solution to much of the world’s problems that inflict misery and suffering upon billions of people. When we are genuinely sharing the planet's wealth and resources and when the people themselves are directing where it most belongs—then socialism will blossom beyond our wildest dreams. For then the whole world is involved, including the several billion people whose basic rights to life and liberty are presently unfulfilled and their talents untapped there will be an awakening, as imaginations are released and a metamorphosis takes place in ordinary global citizens, leading to results and transformations that we have never witnessed on this Earth with the disappearance of stress and tension worldwide and instead a newly-found sense of trust and hope. Yet, the socialist movement can go nowhere without the engagement of heart and mind to build it. Let not the aspiration for socialism remain an intellectual abstract ideal when the world needs socialism to be implemented if humanity is to survive. Capitalism contains within it the seeds of our environmental destruction. The longer we fail to pursue our socialist goal, the more likely we will have no future on this planet. 

Only One Loser.

Provincial Health Ministers are imploring Ottawa not to cut back anymore on health funding. When Medicare began, in 1967, Ottawa footed half of the bill, now it's paying 20 per cent and will decrease further if it cuts the yearly increase in health transfer from 6 per cent to 3. Ontario Health Minister Eric Hoskins said Ontario alone stands to lose $400 million and his Quebec counterpart Gaeten Barrette said Ottawas plans will amount to $60 billion less over the next decade for the provinces and territories. 

If Ottawa has its way there will only be one loser - the working class.

 John Ayers.

The alienation of workers

There exists an anti-working class prejudice peddled with no evidence other than anecdote and encouraged by the capitalist class since Victorian times that divides workers into 'deserving' and 'undeserving' categories. The real scroungers are the parasitic capitalist class.

The capitalist class does not produce any wealth, they steal it from the surplus value, created by wage-enslaved labour. Their capital when they invest is 'dead labour' already plundered. They are collectively economic parasites as a social class, in a system designed for their continued dominance. The working class is collectively the only useful class as they produce all wealth. Many of those workers presently unemployed or in poor health already worked and in many cases, their health is a consequence of their previous occupations. Things cannot be allowed to improve for the poor, how else will they submit into waged slavery and how else will profit be derived for the parasite capitalist class?

Those who are unemployed, they constitute a 'reserve' which will always exist, it keeps wages lower, also as the capitalist class may need them in any economic upturn, although they will not give the Right to Work'. It is a better deal for the capitalist class to pay unemployment benefit and welfare in general than to provide enough wages for the workers to afford insurance or to face a social revolution.

Of interest here is, the output per worker in the advanced economies rose more than three times as fast as the rise in real wages, which were close to stagnation. The workers in the advanced industrialised countries were not being undercut by workers in the 'Third World'. They were being robbed even more by their employers in the advanced countries.

Time for an end to wage slavery. The last great emancipation is that of the working class. Time for a societal upgrade to an elite free, democratic, post-capitalist, production for use, free access society, owned and run by us all as part of truly equal humans.

Government bail-outs are nothing to do with 'socialism'.  Government bail-outs are state-capitalist measures in the interests of the capitalist class as a whole, even especially when they are pitched as and seem to be, helping workers. For workers, there is always a sting, whether to dampen wage demands (family allowances) or fob off social discontent (welfare state). They are ultimately a good deal for the capitalist parasite class and can be clawed back if profit erosion occurs.

Socialism does not exist and has never existed. Any top-down direction in capitalism is state capitalism. Socialism is a post-capitalist society.

The alienation of workers is not caused by what form representative capitalist democracy takes, government over the peoples of the world is not done in the interests of the majority, they just have to agree to be governed over and elect Tweedle Dee or Dum, but in the interests of the capitalist class. In capitalism, political parties represent the sectional interests within the capitalist class with all of them competing for political control of the state and its machinery of government.

The contradictions of life under capitalism have engendered deep-rooted feelings of frustration. The wealth pouring from the factories and the farms has not assured many of prosperity nor offered security about the future prospects. Instead, of an expected welcome release from burdensome toil, the prospects of automation and robots have become a source of anxiety, producing the threat of chronic unemployment and the spectre of a new recession to follow, rather than the promise of peace and plenty. No wonder people feel alienated.

The most pressing need facing humanity is to progress from the anarchy of capitalism to a post-capitalist society. The price to pay for delaying this task will be more poverty, increasing hunger, mounting disease, and continuing wars. To these has now been added the climate change and global warming which could make all the higher forms of life extinct.

Government only exists to run the affairs of the capitalist parasite class, however, they are organised, in state capitalist dictatorships in the absence of a domestic capitalist class, or otherwise. No government can do any more than govern over us in the interest of extracting profit from the exploitation of waged workers, for the benefit of a minority capitalist class.

The working class always vote against their class interest when they support any of the political parties of capitalism, whether allegedly Labour, or unashamedly Tory and misguided Leftist Leninism/ -state Trotskyism. (nationalisation = capitalism). Capitalism cannot be reformed in the interests of the working class. There is no benefit in the working class changing their support from one set of politicians to another. Capitalism is not like some benign country estate and it cannot be organised as if it were. It cannot put human welfare in the forefront of its concerns. It cannot be controlled by any leader or expert. It must produce problems like poverty, sickness, and war. Workers who are seduced into thinking that things would be different under a government of less abrasive personalities are deluding themselves. Western democracy is a choice between the same outcomes, government over you and social control of you for the benefit of the rich.

If you have to work for a wage or a salary in order to live, then you are a member of the working class.

1. The capitalist class owns and controls the means of production and distribution.

2. The working class neither owns nor controls the means of production and distribution.

3. As a result, the working class lives by producing wealth for the capitalist class.

The working class currently and slavishly, accepts the necessity of its dependence upon the capitalist class for permission to work for it, to get wages from it, and to buy means of consumption from it in order to live. The working class rationally resigns itself to continuous exploitation under capitalism as a tamed dog rationally continues serving its master to survive off its master’s scraps.

Tax is a burden upon the capitalist class. Your wage is the bottom line. If the nominal tax figure in your salary or wage check was abolished, your wage would be reduced by the same amount.

Taxation is a way of adjusting the bottom line so workers without dependents do not get the same wage (ration) as those with dependents. The other way is in work so called benefits wage subsidies for employers.

Incoming fellow workers are not stealing jobs. The enemy is the employer class.

“The comfort of the rich depends upon an abundant supply of the poor.” ― Voltaire

Wee Matt

Capitalism is a mockery of human values

Socialism can be defined simply to mean that the factories, mines, transport and so on will belong to all the people of the world, who will partake freely of the things and services which they produce. This will bring fundamental changes to many aspects of human life. It will alter our social relationships because it will be a new social system with a basis which is different from that of present-day society. We define society as people who are bound together by certain relationships. Today, for example, people are bound by the relationship of employer and employee, landlord, and tenant, buyer and seller, debtor and creditor, etc. A casual inspection of society reveals millions of people all over the earth constantly entering into such relationships, and into others, in an apparently haphazard manner. A man may work one week for this employer, the next week for another. But, in fact, these relations conform to a definite social pattern or system which, in turn, stems from what we call the basis of society. One man may employ another because he owns the place of employment, a factory, mine, ship, and so forth. Buying and selling involve a change of ownership; lending is a temporary surrender of the use which comes with ownership. In other words, these social, relationships have something in common. None of them can operate unless the social condition of property ownership is in existence. What seemed a confused and formless mass of social, relationships, in fact, falls into a pattern; what it is that forms the basis from which our social relation­ships are born, and the institutions through which they operate. Every social system has its basis through which almost every feature of it can be traced and explained. Today, for example, the basis of the social system is the private/government ownership of the means of producing and distributing the world's wealth. A section of the population, as direct proprietors or company shareholders, own the land, factories, ships, banks, trading concerns, etc., or invest their money in government or municipal securities, this being the method by which capital is provided by the central and local authorities for industries and undertakings in their control. This is the basic social condition which forms social relationships like buying and selling, employing and being employed. It is also responsible for the social institutions, like shops and markets, which are needed for the relationships to operate. This social system is called capitalism.

Because many of the features of capitalism are an accepted part of modern life, many workers think that they have always existed. But capitalism is a comparatively young social system but even so, socialists say that capitalism has outlived its usefulness and that it is destructive and wasteful, and now is the time to abolish it. The capitalist system denies the vast majority of people full access to the wealth which could be produced in abundance. It hedges round its productive efforts with a mass of restrictions — considerations of cost and profit and of military strategy, for example. In other words, capitalism has fulfilled its historic function, has outlived its social usefulness. Now it is a hindrance to mankind's advance and it is to mankind's benefit to abolish it. Capitalism inevitably produces a mass of people who are forced to suffer poverty and to live insecure lives. It means that for the great majority of humanity capitalism is a restrictive and harmful social system. Capitalism must produce profits. When the profit is not available capitalism stops producing. The market has no relation to human needs. Capitalism makes a mockery of human priorities. Capitalism dooms the majority of people to poverty. Its economy is anarchic. It is a destructive system; it produces continual wars. It is an insecure system. That is a massive indictment.

No matter how it may be superficially altered, capitalism cannot operate in the interests of the majority of people and it is in the interests of those people to abolish it. This is the social revolution by abolishing the class ownership of the means of producing and distributing wealth. This means the abolition of private property. It means that society would be based upon the opposite of class ownership - that the land, the factories, mills, mines, transportation and so on, would become the property of the whole of mankind. It would also mean that, because the basis of society had changed, the social superstructure would also be transformed. People's relationships would be different. The cultural and social features of living would be completely different from those of capitalism. This, in brief, is the meaning of the revolution to end capitalism and establish socialism. And in changing the basis of capitalism and its other features the revolution will abolish the problems which are an essential part of private property society.

If we are to abolish capitalism we must aim at political power to neutralise the legal source of the coercion which holds capitalism together. To get this power we must dissuade the popular support upon which the coercion ultimately depend upon. A socialist party must convince the working class of the need for socialism. It must spread knowledge of society widely and deeply so that the workers become knowledgeable socialists. Unless people understand socialism and want it, they will never establish it. History teaches us the validity of this argument. At the beginning of the century, many political parties thought that a small elite of wise intellectuals could on their own set-up socialism and impose it upon an ignorant and indifferent working class who, ran the argument, would like the new system so much that they would soon come to support it. The aspirant leaders were tied down by the ignorant desires of their supporters. By the time they came to power they had forgotten all about socialism and could only administer capitalism. Such was the sorry tale of the Labour Party in this country and of many similar organisations in other parts of the world. The prospect for Socialist knowledge is by no means dark. Ideas change; even ideas which seem stubbornly popular. When they have reached that condition the workers will require general strikes or barricades to establish socialism. Nor will they need leaders. They will know where capitalism's power is controlled. Instead of electing pro-capitalist members to the seats of government they will elect socialist delegates who will be mandated to take the formal, legal steps to abolish private property in the means of wealth production and distribution and to make these things the property of the whole of mankind. When that happens socialism will have been established. The task of the world-wide socialist parties will be finished. It may seem an enormous task but there is no choice in the matter.

How can we be sure that the socialist delegates will take the legal steps to abolish capitalism? How do we know that they will not simply ignore the mandate, keep capitalism going, and decline into the hard-bitten cynicism which is so typical of the politicians we know today? We do not claim that socialist delegates will be more honest, more knowledgeable, or more skillful than capitalist politicians. We make no claims whatsoever for socialists as individuals. We merely state socialists are not, and do not want to be leaders of the working class. Political leaders exist because of the political ignorance of their followers. Within the limits of that ignorance, the leaders can do almost anything. But because they must always act within the limits of ignorance they can do nothing to set up socialism, which depends entirely upon knowledge. Socialist delegates would - indeed they must - be backed by the knowledge of the working class, consciously opting for socialism, knowing what that society will be and how it must be established. Under these conditions, the Socialist delegates would be powerless to stray outside their mandate. That is the guarantee of socialism; the guarantee of knowledge, as gilt-edged as any can be.

Common ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution means that the things which are needed to make and distribute wealth will be owned by the whole human race. At present these things are the land, factories, mines, railways, steamships, etc. But common ownership does not mean that everybody in the world will own an equal share of every factory, mine, railway train and the rest. This sort of ownership might just be possible if the means of production were primitive; if cloth was produced on a hand-loom and goods carried on the backs of pack horses. It is quite out of the question if the means of production are developed enough to give an abundant life to every human being as they will he under socialism. Common ownership does not mean a grand free-for-all in which everybody grabs everything they can. We shall still have some things under our individual control - such as clothes and other articles of personal use and consumption. Socialism does not mean that everybody will be allocated exactly equal amounts of wealth. Human beings are obviously unequal in their capacities and abilities. There is no sensible reason for two such men being forced to consume exactly the same amounts and kinds of food, clothing, etc. What common ownership does mean, is that there is one way in which all human beings will be equal. Everybody will have an equal right to take however much wealth they need and to consume it as they require. Because the means of production will be commonly owned the things which are produced will go into a common pool from which all human beings will be able to satisfy their needs.

Now if there is unrestricted access to wealth for everybody it must follow that nobody, in the sense of an individual or a class, owns wealth. This means that wealth will not be exchanged under socialism; it will not be bartered nor will it be bought and sold. As a rough parallel, we can consider the air we breathe. Everybody has free access to the air and we can all take in as much of it as we need to live. In other words, nobody owns the air; nobody tries to exchange air for anything else, nobody tries to sell or buy it. Similarly, there will be no buying and selling under socialism; no need for money, therefore, nor for the complicated and widespread organisations which deal in commerce and banking in a capitalist society. Socialism will have no merchant houses, no banks, no stock exchanges, no tax inspectors, or any of the paraphernalia of capitalism.

Nobody will be employed by another person - nobody will sell his labour-power or work for wages. Everybody, in fact, will work for themselves, which means for the whole of society. Work will be a co-operative effort, freely given because men will realise that wealth can only be produced by working - unless wealth is produced society will die. Yet it will not only be a reluctance to commit social suicide that will keep us working under Socialism. Men will be free - free from the fetters of wage slavery, free from the fears of unemployment, free from economic servitude and insecurity. Nobody will be found doing a job which he hates but tolerates because its pays him well. Healthy young men will not grow pigeon-chested over fusty bank ledgers. Nobody will waste his time learning how to kill scientifically. We shall be set free to do useful work, making things which will add to society's welfare, things which will make human life a little better, a little happier. This is an enormous incentive to work. It is the greatest incentive to intense, co-operative effort and that is how it will operate.

Nobody will starve in one part of the world whilst food is being stockpiled or destroyed in another. Nobody will go cold whilst coal is being held at the pit heads. These anomalies arise because capitalism produces wealth to sell. Socialism will produce for people's satisfaction - the only barriers to that satisfaction will be physical. Bad weather, a ruined harvest or some other natural calamity may cause a breakdown in supplies. If this happens society will take steps to deal with the situation, unhampered by the commercial and monetary considerations of capitalism. Human interests will be the only consideration. Because we shall be free of the commercial necessities which hamper production under capitalism, we shall be able to turn our whole attention to satisfying human needs, to making our lives happier, fuller, easier. When that happens society will be able to support itself for the first time in the style to which it is entitled.

Pauper Funerals

"Paupers' funerals" or national assistance funerals, as they are known have risen by 24% in the last four years in Scotland.

Across the UK the cost of a basic burial has risen for 12 years in a row and now stands at an average of £3,693 - a 90% increase since 2004.

Report author David Robertson said, “Most families will struggle to meet that kind of cost, particularly if the bereavement is sudden and they have not been planning for it. Low-income families in particular, who are finding it hard just to pay their food and fuel bills, can suddenly face a bill for several thousands of pounds which they simply can't pay."

Researchers found that in the 2004-2006 period the funerals were split 49% to 51% between people with no traceable next of kin and those whose relatives could not afford or were unwilling to pay for a funeral, for the 12 local authorities that provided data. Between 2013-2015 this had increased to 73% where relatives were unable or unwilling to pay and 27% whose next of kin could not be found.

Fact of the Day

Nearly a quarter of children in Dumfries and Galloway are growing up in deprivation, a new report has found.

The UK-wide survey for the End Child Poverty coalition said the region had one of the highest percentages of child poverty at 24.3 per cent, including nearly one in three in North West Dumfries.

John Dickie, director of the Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland, said: “Whether it’s the nearly one in three children in North West Dumfries, one in five in Annandale or the one in six in Lochar, too many children are growing up in families that just don’t have the incomes they need to give children a decent start in life.”

Class in the class

The life chances of Scots are set early. By the time a pupil starts school, those in the most deprived fifth of communities are well behind those from the 10% of areas with the highest income.

On average, the more deprived pupils are 13 months behind in their vocabulary. They are 10 months behind in problem-solving.

On numeracy in 2013, the proportion of pupils from the least deprived areas who were performing well or very well was at 84%, but for the most deprived, 72%. At second year of secondary, that gap had opened to 90% and 68%.

On reading in 2014, the primary four gap on "performing well or very well" was at 75% in the least deprived areas, and 61% in the most deprived. Five years up the school, and the gap was a wider 52% to only 25% of pupils from deprived areas performing well or very well.

In 2012-13, less than 30% of fourth year students in Clackmannanshire, Dundee and Glasgow achieved five or more awards at the Level 5 national qualification, while more than 60% did so in East Dunbartonshire and East Renfrewshire, both containing Glasgow's more prosperous suburbs.

Sue Ellis, professor of education at Strathclyde University, says: "Some of those who are the most gifted are children in poverty, who are gifted but not getting support. We're not identifying the children who are most gifted. What we may be doing is giving a lot of advantage to quite mediocre children who have the most pushy parents." She continued, "Middle class kids spend a lot of time whingeing and whining about stuff they don't like and don't want to do. What they're learning is that they can ask for help, that parents are there to help them, and that they can organise their world according to their wishes. Kids in poverty don't whinge and whine. They don't ask for stuff. And they don't have that sense of entitlement that adults are there to help them.

Pupils who do well despite a disadvantaged background are described as "resilient". In 2012, a third of Scots children from deprived backgrounds (one in 12 of all pupils) were classified as resilient. Schools with similar catchment areas, in terms of deprivation, can produce widely varying outcomes for their pupils. The same can be said of entire council areas.

Scotland is one of only five countries where immigrant pupils out-performed the national average. Audit Scotland noted that those from the Indian sub-continent out-perform 'white-Scottish' pupils in fourth year of secondary, while Chinese-Scots are clearly tops for attainment.