SolFed members were among the thousands of people who gathered for this year's annual Pride event in Liverpool. Member's of the Liverpool local joined other anarchists and radical workers for the march through the city centre and, despite occasional downpours of heavy rain and a small group of miserable Christian counter-demonstrators, the atmosphere was upbeat and vibrant. We were also there to show solidarity with LGBT comrades facing state repression in Russia, particularly in Moscow where Pride has been banned for the next 100 years by the authorities.


View more of our photos from Pride here.

(Un)Qualified teachers wanted.
While the eyes of most people, both critical and uncritical, are drawn to the Olympics, secretary of state for Education, Michael Gove, has introduced possibly his most significant and destructive piece of reform.

Academies no longer need to employ qualified teachers to teach lessons. Gove heralds this as 'freedom' for academies to employ 'the best for the job'. So while trying to raise the profile of teaching, he's doing the exact opposite. But this is a smokescreen. This is nothing to do with profile, or improving education, or getting 'the best for the job'. It has everything to do with driving down pay and conditions.

I am Mazen ******, a Syrian anarchist . I want to inform you about the difficult humanitarian situation in my country, Syria ; due to the brutal oppression of the regime against the revolting masses. A group of young Syrian anarchists and anti – authoritarians from Aleppo – Syria, contacted me asking for urgent help. Their community is in urgent need for everything : medical drugs , tents , children milk , etc; almost everything. We hope that you can help them to alleviate the sufferings of Syrians in these difficult days.

During time spent in Berlin visiting friends and relatives, I decided to contact the Freie ArbeiterInnen Union (FAU) – the German section of the International Workers Association (IWA), of which I am a member of its British section; the Solidarity Federation.

Ruth, Jess and Charlotte recently took up a rented property in Bethnal Green through the Shoreditch branch of Victorstone Property Consultants, paying £3,451 as rent and deposit. After they had only just moved into the house, Victorstone fell out with the landlords over the fees they would take, the landlords decided they wanted to get out of the letting, and changed the locks.

Ruth, Jess and Charlotte managed to get some money back from the landlady, but the landlady had never been transferred the full amount, because Victorstone had subtracted their fee. Victorstone initially tried to mislead Ruth, Jess and Charlotte, implying that all the money had been transferred to the landlady. In fact they intended to keep c.£1200 of their money for a completely failed deal.

Liverpool SolFed held a social night to commemorate the anniversary of the Spanish revolution in 1936. Performers, including local musician Dominic Dunn, entertained those who were gathered, while films from the civil war and the current miners' struggle in the Asturias were shown on the projector.

Following enquiries from Solfed, Pizza Hut have confirmed they are no longer using workfare and do not intend to in the future. A spokeperson for Pizza Hut said “none of our restaurants currently take part in the workfare scheme, and haven't for the last six months, and we have no plans to change our hiring practices."
 

Five Pizza Hut restaurants had been using claimants from the work experience element of workfare but the company is keen to stress this was not national policy. In the middle of a pasta based makeover, Pizza Hut understandably wants to steer clear of association with the government scheme. With Holland & Barrett the latest in a growing number of companies to pull out, workfare is fast becoming toxic on the high street.
 

At 12pm on Sunday 15th July, SolFed members dragged themselves out of bed to join forces with local AFed and IWW activists to extend the anti-workfare campaign to the Costa coffee chain. A cup of coffee from the independent coffee shop next door helped us get ready for the picket. We managed to hand out around 150 leaflets, and, as before, we felt that people were generally very sympathetic to our action (apart perhaps a traditional Catholic, (French) National Front voter).