Our members in Cork and Dublin have been active in the Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes, at local, regional and national levels, helping with stalls, leafletting and demos, and arguing for greater grassroots democracy within the campaign.

On the weekend of 5th-7th October, Anti-Fascist Action Ireland held a series of events to celebrate their twenty one years in existence. The organisation was founded in 1991 with the aim of fighting fascism both physically and ideologically as and where the need arises.

This college year has seen a large increase in the number of students taking out loans in order to go to college. As part of an aggressive advance into the student debt market, Bank of Ireland has already agreed schemes to provide “discounted loans” to students in DCU and Trinity, and to postgraduate students across the country (in this case the scheme was negotiated directly with theState) .BofI is also said to be in “advanced discussions” with over 10 other 3rd-level institutions.

Despite increasingly desperate attempts by the government to extract their pound of flesh from householders,the Campaign against Household and Water Taxes (CAHWT) continues to rack up victories.

In August 400 people marched through Dublin to protest the internment without trial of a 58 year old woman in ill health for over a year. In May her husband told the Belfast Telegraph she “is so ill that she had to be taken to a recent visit in a wheelchair. Her hair is falling out, she has lost a lot of weight, and her arthritis has got worse. She is suffering from severe depression after a year in solitary.”

Issue 127 of Ireland's anarchist paper Workers Solidarity  May / June 2012.

An accusing finger is pointed at anarchists any time the word organisation is mentioned. Many people believe that anarchism is against organisation and just another word for chaos, but is it? The simple answer, of course, is no, but that does not explain the confusion surrounding the question, nor the accusations thrown at anarchists.

Mother Jones was “the most dangerous woman in America” according to Reese Blizzard, a West Virginia District Attorney. Born around 1837, Mary Harris Jones was an Irish woman who became one of the most important revolutionary trade union organisers in the history of the USA. Her courage in standing up to mine owners, politicians and their armed thugs (who often killed striking workers) is legendary.

This May sees the return of the annual Anarchist Bookfair to Dublin, the seventh to be held to date. Since the first, back in 2006, the event has grown hugely in scale, against the background of the bursting of the Celtic Tiger bubble, the IMF/EU bailout and the catastrophic effect of austerity on Irish society. The Bookfair consists of a day of meetings, debates and discussions and will also host bookstalls and information stands from a large number of political organisations and campaigning groups.

The decision to approve the new Welfare Reform Bill earlier last month signals yet another devastating blow to those living on or below the British government’s very own recommended guidelines on poverty. Prior to the initial bill being passed, attempts were made to water it down in the House of Lords but that too fell on deaf ears, despite the fact that it may violate international conventions on human rights.  However in welcoming the move, one Tory politician jokingly remarked: “desperate times, calls for desperate measures”, but desperate for who? Certainly not those on a politicians salary in Westminster or up in Stormont.