Teachers, parents, and students in Sefton are currently engaged in a struggle to stop a number of schools in the area becoming academies. As part of that fight, they today held a "funeral for education" in Liverpool. Despite the wet weather, a number of people joined the mock funeral procession from St George's Hall to St Luke's Church and handed out leaflets to the public about the issue of academies and why they should be opposed.

Members of Liverpool Solidarity Federation were amongst those present on the march, as were those involved in a similar struggle over Shorefields College in the Dingle - whose picket lines we have previously supported.

A protest was held outside Liverpool John Lennon airport yesterday to highlight Ryanair's exploitation of employees and also remember Paul Ridgard, a Ryanair pilot who passed away in May of this year. More actions are planned for the future. SolFed are also making enquiries through the IWA/AIT about how we can help make the campaign against Ryanair go continental (our Spanish sister organisation, the CNT, has organised some workers at the airline, see here).

John Foley, founder of the Ryanair Don't Care campaign, speaks about yesterday's protest:

On Thursday 14 July, a meeting held in Unite's regional office saw the establishment of Liverpool Against The Cuts. 85 people, including members of Liverpool Solidarity Federation, were in attendance.

Residents of Cairns Street, in Toxteth, yesterday defied private contractors coming to demolish houses as part of a "regeneration" scheme by blockading the street. The demolishers Lovell and the police were both foiled by the peaceful action, which will be continuing every morning from 8am whilst the threat of demolition remains.

The demolition of the houses first came on the cards in June, when Lovell won planning permission to knock down six houses in order to build three. Residents objected from the point of the initial bid, but their protests have been studiously ignored by the Labour council. A site visit won no concessions, and when a planning meeting was split over the issue councillor John Macintosh used his casting vote to take the side of the developers.

As one local resident told Liverpool Confidential;

Liverpool Solidarity Federation recently agreed to fully support the Ryanair Don't Care campaign, which was formed to highlight and fight against Ryanair's exploitative employment practises. Campaign founder John Foley has been arrested six times for his direct action activism against the airline. Blogs exposing Ryanair's mistreatment of employees have been closed down by sevice providers. Numerous Ryanair employees and ex-workers have also been in touch to share their negative experiences of working for the airline.

Public Meeting: Saturday July 16th, 1:00pm at Friends Meeting House, Mount Street, Manchester

The aim of this meeting is bring together activists fighting the government’s cuts to discuss views of ‘direct action’ and how to apply it to the current struggle. There will be a number of speakers, including one from SF who will present an anarcho-syndicalist viewpoint:

There has been a lot of talk in the anti-cuts movement about the importance of ‘winning the argument’. This strategy holds that the best way to go about fighting attacks on wages, living conditions and services is to point out the flaws in the pro-cuts arguments and suggest alternative policies which would avoid the need for cuts.

Some even seem to think that if the argument is won, the government will see the error of its ways, stop the planned cuts and everyone can go home happy.

This is a letter written by Liverpool SolFed and printed in the Liverpool Echo newspaper yesterday (6th July 2011).

Three generic posters for supporting strike action, available as a pdf.