Benjamin is a 37-year old Iranian human rights campaigner who lives in Glasgow. Detained by the UK Border Agency and facing imminent deportation, he urgently needs help and solidarity.

Please take the time to fax British Airways and the Home Office to protest his deportation, scheduled for 10 March. Model letters and more info are online at

http://www.noborderscotland.org.uk/

Degrowth Conference Barcelona 2010
Conference dates: Friday 26 - Monday 29 March 2010

An open letter sent to UAF on the anti-SDL protests of Saturday 20th February.

 I have been contacted by Alex Adamson Sherrif officers about Council tax that i owe between 1993 and 2000. I now live in England and this is the first contact that has been made to me by them. A normal debt would be treated as Staute Barred as over 6 years(5 in Scotland) but i have been told as it is council Tax and issued in scotland with Summary warrant i can be pursued for 20 years. I am totally confused about this as most articles relate to unlimited time where others treat Council tax as any other debt. Can anyone clarify the legal position for me please.

Summary warrants were isued but I have never heard any communication in over 10 years. I have lived in England for 8 years. At this point i have not communicated with Adamson until clear my legal position.

Hot off the press and packed with Direct Action - the new Earth First! Action Update is out! Get your quarterly round-up of ecological direct action from the UK and beyond To download for printing, http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/efau/actionupdate_feb10print.pdf To download for on-screen reading, http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/efau/actionupdate_feb10.pdf

What's in this issue? A feature about Mainshill looking at their strategy of continuous action and tactics, info on nuclear new build, UK direct action news plus an exclusive interview with "D Lock,our mystery digger diving activist" about the ins and outs of this form of action. And from across the seas, read about our brothers and sisters struggling against high-speed train destruction in Italy, high-voltage power lines in Catalonia, and whale hunting on the High Seas. "We are going to inherit the earth.

There is not the slightest doubt about that. We Are not afraid of ruins. We carry a new world, here in our hearts. That world is growing this minute." - Durruti

Love and Rage - Your Action Update collective

The campaign against the tender process for care and support services has achieved a huge success as the tender will now be scrapped.

However, we stand to lose much of these gains if the Council's plans to set rates for Direct Payments and Service Level Agreements at £15.04 per hour are agreed at Thursday's Full Council meeting.

We need everyone to act now - if we lose the vote on Thursday it will mean a 17.5% cut for the services that were put out to tender. Once approved by full council there will be nowhere left to go (except costly legal challenges).
Please take some time this week to take action - we have won a vote at the full council meeting before - we can do it again but it needs pressure from all of us.
Please read on for what you can do;

 Independant candidate in Aberdeen South fights for justice in sexual abuzse case

 West Lothian SSP confirm election '10 candidate
West Lothian Scottish Socialist Party

Ally Hendry Selected To Contest The Livingston Constituency At The 2010 Westminster Election

Following a branch selection meeting held in Whitburn Community Centre on Monday 25-1-2010 Ally was selected as the West Lothian Scottish Socialist Party candidate. Having previously stood in the 2005 Westminster election Ally said he felt proud and honoured that the branch nominated him.

Ally is a local lad from a socialist background who has lived in West Lothian all his life and has campaigned in the constituency on many issues since joining the party in 2003. He looks forward to raising pertinent issues in the forthcoming election campaign with members of the public who are being ignored and betrayed by the incumbent New Labour government.

Our country has been led into immoral wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and like everybody else “I listen to daily reports of our troops being killed in a war opposed by 70% of the British population”.

Domestically the banking crisis has brought about the near collapse of the capitalist system and it has only survived due to the government pumping in billion of pounds of tax payer’s money. This at a time when hundred of thousands of people are losing their jobs, homes, savings and pensions and yet the banks still see fit to payout unwarranted and obscene bonuses. Ally says the task of the Scottish Socialist Party is to bring these bankers to account and to reverse the damaging effects their actions have had on the British working people.

He would also remind people that the scandal of the MP’s expenses is still ongoing despite the politician’s efforts to play the matter down and have it removed from the front page of the daily press.

Over the past few years we have witnessed the services at Saint Johns hospital being cut and slashed to the point where lives are being put at risk. Ally was personally involved in the campaign to save S.t Johns at all levels from street demonstrations public meetings, letters to the local press, raising petitions and was a member of the initial steering group. He says “I was totally disgusted at the way the whole issue was handled because the consultation process was a sham and the Labour government via the mouthpiece of the Lothian health board had already taken the irreversible decision to downgrade the hospital and were only paying lip service to public opinion”.

The above issues are only a sample of the problems facing the ordinary British man and women. The Scottish Socialist Party along with Ally Hendry will be on the streets of West Lothian from now until the general election putting forward the Socialist alternative to the capitalist policies of the current government. As part of the campaign a public meeting will be held on the 23rd of February in the St James Young high school at 7pm with Ally Hendry and Colin Fox speaking on a wide range of issues