The Scottish Socialist Party has confirmed it will stand in the 4 July General Election.
Scottish Socialist Party Election Campaign Organiser Richie Venton said:
“A bedraggled Rishi Sunak, leader of the Tory architects of chaos, crises, corruption, and cruel levels of poverty and inequality, has declared a general election on 4th July.
“This is an opportunity to boot out the hated Tories, dripping with contempt for the working class, riddled with racism, and complicit in the genocidal assault on the Palestinian people.
“But Sir Keir Starmer’s alternative means no change.
“He and his Continuity Conservatives have dumped promises of reform on a weekly if not daily basis.
“Labour is committed to keeping the Tories’ public spending limits, which means more years of cuts to jobs, benefits, and services.
“Labour wants to privatise even more of our NHS than New Labour’s Tony Blair did.
“They refuse to introduce a £15-an-hour national minimum wage, as demanded by the entire trade union movement, and the SSP; and will retain most of the vicious anti-union, anti-worker legislation designed to turn workers into slaves.
“Working class people need change – socialist change – to radically redistribute wealth from the rich to the rest of us.
“The Scottish Socialist Party cannot afford to contest every one of Scotland’s seats, as money buys votes in this rigged system. But we are determined to offer tens of thousands of voters a clean, principled, socialist alternative, with candidates in at least Rutherglen and Glasgow East, who will stand as socialist MPs who will live on the average worker’s wage.
“We will champion measures like:
“A £15 minimum wage, regardless of age;
“Equal pay for women;
“Abolition of all zero hours contracts, with a guaranteed minimum 16-hour contract for all workers who want one;
“Democratic public ownership instead of profiteering privatisation;
“Free public transport to combat poverty and pollution;
“Public ownership of energy to provide clean, green affordable energy instead of profiteering and pollution;
“Construction of 100,000 council houses for affordable rent, built to the highest environmental standards; and
“An immediate end to arms sales to Israel and war on the Palestinians.
“None of the mainstream political parties – Tories, Labour, or SNP – are prepared to advocate such radical change.
“The Scottish Socialist Party unashamedly stands up as the party of the working class and socialism, for the millions, not the millionaires.”