Keep out of the water
Keep out of the water
July 30, 2026
You might expect that a walking trail called the Severn Way would largely be alongside the river from which it takes its name. But in fact most of the section between Shrewsbury and Telford is not along the river at all.
This is just one illustration of the extent to which there is a lack of public access to river banks in England. In almost three quarters of cases, there is no right of way within a hundred metres of the river, with most reservoirs and lakes also being off-limits.
Private ownership of land drastically restricts people’s ability to enjoy the countryside (not just rivers) and seek some relief from the recent heatwaves.
SPGB Meeting on ZOOM
Friday 31 July 7.30pm
HAVE YOU HEARD THE NEWS? (Zoom)
Discussion of recent happenings.
Host: Paddy Shannon
To join the meeting click https://zoom.us/j/7421974305
Rough reality
Andy Burnham pledged ‘to finally end long-term rough sleeping across the UK’. He previously aimed to prevent rough sleeping in Manchester by 2020, and in 2019 the Conservative Party manifesto committed to ending ‘the blight of rough sleeping’. Instead, in 2025 the number of people estimated to sleep rough on a single night in England was the highest recorded, at nearly 4,800.
Rough sleeping is not just about housing. Rough sleepers are among the most marginalised and victimised in capitalist society. Support services, however ‘well-funded’, can only ever offer limited palliatives as they are working within a system that pushes people into homelessness – why previous attempts to end rough sleeping have failed, despite Burnham’s ambition.
worldsocialism.org/spgb/
SPGB Meeting on ZOOM
RACISTS CAN’T DEFINE RACE (Zoom)
Speaker: Paul Bennett
To connect to a Zoom meeting, click https://zoom.us/j/7421974305
Football: beautiful or ugly?
Can we separate the skills of the beautiful game from the ugliness of the money machine that drives it and the rivalries and nationalism it thrives on? Should we regard the emotional investment of fans as people being brought together or a reminder of how alienated they are from their own lives and capabilities. Is it, as one commentator stated, people being sold ‘meaningless thrills to patch over the pain’?
Whatever the case, in the society of voluntary cooperative work and free access to goods and services that socialists look forward to, appreciation of the talents of others – including footballers – will still exist, but side by side with each person having the time and space to cultivate their own talents and capabilities.
Who wants to be a Billionaire?
“The collective wealth of US billionaires reached a record $9.24 trillion this month [June]—an increase of around $2.2 trillion compared to the same time last year—while millions of Americans struggled to afford groceries, healthcare, and other basic necessities as inflation driven by President Donald Trump’s illegal Iran war eroded their wages.
“America’s 15 centi-billionaires and now one trillionaire alone make up 43% of all billionaire wealth—an astounding $4 trillion—and their wealth is growing over twice as fast as fellow billionaires in the past year,” the group noted. “Just these top 16 billionaires hold more wealth today than every US billionaire combined in September of 2020, less than six years ago.””
From Common Dreams: Full report at:
https://www.commondreams.org/news/billionaire-wealth-new-high
Something for the weekend:inequality
From the World Inequality Report 2026:
“The first and most striking fact emerging from the data is that inequality remains at very high levels… today, the top 10% of the global population’s income-earners earn more than the remaining 90%, while the poorest half of the global population captures less than 10% of the total global income. Wealth is even more concentrated: the top 10% own three-quarters of global wealth, while the bottom half holds only 2%.
The picture becomes even more extreme when we move beyond the top 10%… the wealthiest 0.001% alone, fewer than 60,000 multi-millionaires, control today three times more wealth than half of humanity combined. Their share has grown steadily from almost 4% in 1995 to over 6% today, which underscores the persistence of inequality.”
Full report here:
SPGB Meeting On ZOOM
Friday 17 July 7.30pm
SOCIALISM AND FOOTBALL (Zoom)
Speaker: Bill Martin
To join the meeting click https://zoom.us/j/7421974305
Ann Widdecombe
Red faces in the Socialist Workers Party after their tweet on X in response to the death of Widdecombe was ‘Hooray, she’s dead’, followed by immediate deletion as furore swept the media. Some even confused the SWP with us.
So we should point out that, while we oppose capitalism and all its works, and urge the world’s people to establish a post-capitalist society of democratic common ownership, we have no truck with the SWP’s infantile reaction to the death (probably murder) of a pro-capitalist politician, however detestable that person’s opinions.
Capitalism is a worldwide system of private property and market trading, which can only be replaced at a worldwide scale by a conscious and informed majority, not by targeting individuals.