Indispensable

Regular readers of this column will know that an increasing number of people prefer to read the paper in electronic form. Our website continues to be a great success (page views for this week are well over the 15,000 mark) in winning a new audience for our politics and informing the ongoing debates within the Socialist Alliance, Scottish Socialist Party, Welsh Socialist Alliance and the left in general.

Central to our success is the position of the Weekly Worker as the foremost partisan of the alliance project. It is the only paper where you can read detailed and regular reports on SA activity - last week’s paper devoted three pages to coverage of the SA independents and WSA conferences. By contrast last weeks Socialist Worker carried reports of neither. A sorry state of affairs. We desperately need a common organiser, educator and agitator and that is why the CPGB is at the forefront of the fight for an SA paper and is prepared to throw all its resources into making one a reality.

I am pleased to note that our high hopes of last week were realised. For that thanks must go to SS with £50, PC and LT with £20 apiece, FG and HJ (£15 each) and TP (£10). A weekly total of £130 means that we finish the month with £465 - £15 over our target of £450. Let’s not be complacent though: if we are to build on this success and take our struggle forward then we will continue to need your help, comrades.

Robbie Rix

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Weekly Worker 417 is available in pdf format as zipped (2.10MB) or unzipped (2.54MB) files

Number 417

Thursday January 31 2002

The Weekly Worker is available from bookshops across the United Kingdom or can be delivered direct to your door by completing our online subscription form.

Rail crisis: Socialist Alliance leadership needed
The media red scare over a revived left needs to be made real, writes Tine Becker

Letters
No ISO support; Broad campaign; SA indies; Print my name; Ethics; Workers' check; Greengrass; Brilliant

Solidarity call
International Socialist Organisation appeal for funds

Open the books
Jim Gilbert looks at the Enron corporate scandal in the USA

Tories regroup
A rebranded Conservative Party will cause problems for the left, writes James Mallory

NHS disarray: Racism smear -cover for failure
The NHS is not safe in Labour or Tory hands. Eddie Ford looks beyond the latest furore

‘Swampos’ derailed
Comrades from the Revolutionary Democratic Group give their view of events in Bedfordshire Socialist Alliance

Socialist Alliance reports

• Tyneside: Socialist Party quits
• Teesside: Campaign priorities
• Brent: Back in business

Solidarity with Labour Party Pakistan
Ian Donovan attended the January 25 public meeting addressed by Farooq Tariq of the Labour Party Pakistan.

Fight imperialism, fight fundamentalism
Mark Fischer spoke to comrade Tariq after his public meeting

Why not an SA event?
The Socialist Alliance should have been the organiser of comrade Taroq's tour, argues Marcus Larsen

Israeli embassy picket: No to reactionary terror
Several hundred people demonstrated against Israeli state terrorism. Danny Hammill was there

Conspiracy and dogma
Tina Becker reports on the recent 70-strong Media Workers Against the War meeting

Victim support
Derek Hunter reviews Jimmy McGovern's Sunday

Nothing to celebrate
Peter Manson calls on the left to organise against the jubilee