The 157th annual TUC Congress is being held from September 7-10 in Brighton with the TUC theme of "changing the world of work for good". Once again, Congress comes at a time when workers in Britain and around the world are asserting that their voice must be heard, recognised and respected. As the Big Meeting at the Durham Miners Gala in July this year showed, the workers and trade union movement in their tens and hundreds of thousands are still here and not going anywhere [1]. This, and the ongoing strike struggles and other actions of workers, vividly demonstrates that the workers are continuing to fight for their rights and interests against the onslaught of the rich to destroy their living standards, their conditions at work, their conditions at home and their environment, their welfare and public services and the right to live in a world at peace with other nations and peoples. This is especially true when considered in the context of Britain's continued escalation of wars, particularly with its arming of Israeli genocide in Palestine and its continued escalation of NATO's proxy war in Ukraine.

This is why the time is now for the working people to renew and strengthen their organisations fit for the challenges of today, stand firm and speak out in their own name, with their own outlook and programme to build the opposition to the pay-the-rich system and the ruling elite's pro-war agenda which wants to consume our youth in imperialist war. This is such a moment in history when the working class and people must continue to develop and fight for their perspective and vantage point that they and the movements of the working class and people are the alternative that will give rise to the New in society.

One of the greatest challenges the workers face is to strengthen their organisations and establish mechanisms for discussion and deliberation amongst their peers so that they can share their experiences as they organise and take action. Today, the situation is such that the workers cannot afford to simply adopt pre-established positions fed to them by the cartel parties and their apologists which are outside of the workers' own actions and experience and are a block to their progress. They must continue to investigate with their peers and become informed, must work out their own positions based on their own struggle and speak in their own name individually and collectively.

Workers are increasingly aware that the cartel-party political system in Westminster provides no respite or prospect, or "plan for change" as the present Labour government claims. With this political crisis the ruling elite tries pit the "left" and "centre" and against the "far right" parties that are also promoted and backed by the oligarchs trying to weaken, divert and divide the people along with the other cartel party in power. Only the working class has the interest and outlook to unite the people around defending the rights of all in the course of their struggles to fight for what is the new and just alternative for society. The working class has the mission to bring about a situation where the interests and decision-making of working people will prevail, a situation which favours them and not the oligarchs who presently are restructuring the state in their favour.

Will these vital questions be reflected at the TUC Congress this year? This year the theme of the TUC is "changing the world of work for good". There are 76 motions with amendments [2] in the provisional agenda. Many debates are planned around motions and composite motions, not least from the TUC Disabled Workers Conference affirming the fight of disabled workers against the government's ongoing attack on Personal Independence Payments (PIP) and Universal Credit (UC). This is part of the many motions on the workers' fight against poverty pay and for pay restoration and investment in public services such as education and health, ranging from the fight to restore maternity services to the fight to save the steel and pottery industries. Thus running through the debates will be the focus on the fight to defend the rights of all workers regardless of race, religion, origin, status or gender.

Motions on AI will also be discussed. The theme here is to transform the situation and harness the technological advances to serve a human-centred society that looks after the interests of working people for their prosperity and for peace at home and abroad.

A motion from the University College Union entitled Wages Not War says; "reaffirm that our movement's priority is welfare and wages, not weapons and war" highlighting that "British participation in the F-35 programme implicates it in Israel's grave violations of international law in Gaza" and the ongoing genocide of the Palestinians. Another motion led by the National Education Union (NEU) stands against Israel's ongoing genocidal onslaught on Gaza which has killed over 55,000 Palestinians, including 18,000 children. "Key workers have been targeted by Israel, with 166 journalists and media workers, 120 academics, and over 224 humanitarian aid workers killed since 2023" and the motion calls for the ending of "this shameful complicity in Israel's illegal occupation, colonial apartheid and genocide". This debate will go along with a report from the General Council to Congress on their statements with TUC-supported workplace days of action for Palestine in November, February and May for the "suspension of the UK-Israel Trade and Partnership Agreement, and an end to all licences for arms traded with Israel, meeting international law a ban on UK trade in illegal settlement goods." These actions led to the TUC efforts "to secure a resolution on European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) trade policy regarding Israel". There will also be an important address to Congress on Wednesday morning by Shaheer Saed from the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions.

The oligarchs increasingly continue to wreck society and create wars and chaos in the world to service their super-wealth. Only the working class has the interest to transform the situation and is the only class that can save the day and lead the fight for the new society and an Anti-War Government in Britain. These and other vital questions must be discussed by the workers themselves everywhere and their voice needs to be heard. The necessity is to continue to act and work out their positions for their own interests and fight for the alternative and change the world of work and society for good! Workers' Weekly calls on the TUC delegates to rise to the occasion.

Notes
1. 139th Durham Miners Gala and Big Meeting "We Are Still in Palestine and You Are Still Here in Durham A Torch Lighting Our Path towards the Future", Workers' Weekly, August 2 2025
https://www.rcpbml.org.uk/wwie-25/ww25-17/ww25-17.htm
2. Provisional Agenda TUC Congress 2025
https://congress.tuc.org.uk/motion_type/all_motions/#sthash.RRkjFVlf.RGZU0EsD.dpbs

The Gaza Tribunal, an inquiry into Britain's role in Israeli war crimes in Gaza, took place in London on September 4-5. bringing legal experts, UN Special Rapporteurs, and witnesses together to examine Israel's war crimes in Gaza and Britain's role in the genocide. The event was convened by the Peace & Justice Project, and hosted and led by Jeremy Corbyn, who played a central role both as organiser and speaker.

"Just like Iraq, [Britain] will not succeed in its attempts to suffocate the truth. We will uncover the full scale of British complicity in genocide - and we will bring about justice for the people of Palestine," Jeremy Corbyn said ahead of the launch.

Jeremy Corbyn opened the proceedings by framing the tribunal as a moral and legal reckoning. He condemned the British government's military and political support for Israel, arguing that it amounted to complicity in genocide. He called for accountability, urging civil society to hold the British government responsible for its role in enabling the destruction in Gaza. Jeremy Corbyn highlighted the failure of Parliament to investigate UK arms exports and intelligence-sharing with Israel, referencing his own Gaza Inquiry Bill that was rejected by Parliament earlier in the summer.

Speaking at the opening of the event, Shahd Hammouri, lecturer in international law and legal theory at the University of Kent, said that bringing witnesses to the event was a moral duty for them. "Today we pay tribute to democracy, we pay tribute to justice, we pay tribute to common humanity, and historically decisive moment," she said.

Dr Nick Maynard, who works as a consultant gastrointestinal surgeon at Oxford University Hospital and who has recently returned from his third trip to Gaza, gave evidence of how Israel is deliberately targeting hospitals and healthcare workers. "Hospitals are being targeted deliberately, I have seen that daily," he said. He added that more than 450 of them have been abducted, along with many others who were killed or injured in the ongoing Israeli attacks.

Dr Maynard described operating on dozens of teenagers shot by Israeli forces while waiting in line for aid during his latest mission at Nasser Hospital. The injuries, he explained, showed clear patterns: one day victims arrived with wounds to the head and neck, another day with chest injuries, and then with abdominal trauma. His and other testimonies emphasised the calculated nature of the attacks, pointing to a clear intent to exterminate and ethnically cleanse Gaza. Meanwhile, Britain and other European governments have continued to turn a blind eye, focusing instead on criminalising Palestine solidarity movements.

For her part, Hala Sabbah, a Palestinian and the co-founder of Sameer Project, a donations-based aid initiative for Gaza led by Palestinians, said that during the siege, many children have died due to lack of medicine. "Aid is controlled by the military occupation deliberately," she said, adding that the famine has not stopped and children still starve to death. She also condemned Britain for the very low number of Gazan children who were treated here, while, for example, Italy and Spain host hundreds of children in their hospitals. "The UK is not only actively killing us, they refuse us," she said, accusing Britain of being complicit in the genocide, which she emphasised had started long before October 7, 2023.

Another witness, Palestinian journalist Abubaker Abed, shared his account of malnutrition during the time he was still in Gaza before being evacuated to Ireland in February 2025. "What you see in Gaza is an extension of what Israel has been doing in Gaza in past 20 years since the blockade," he said, mentioning that the situation was already bad for Palestinians in Gaza before the beginning of the Israeli attacks in 2023. He also talked about how Israel targeted journalists in the strip, and said that over 250 journalists have been killed deliberately by Israel.

On the second day of the tribunal, more space was given to exposing the depth of British involvement, despite Labour's attempts to avoid the issue. The proceedings aimed to establish a factual and legal basis for holding the British government accountable under international law. It was especially searing, with nearly thirty witnesses delivering testimony that painted a devastating portrait of life in Gaza and Britain's role in enabling it. It focused on testimonies from aid workers and survivors, including accounts of systematic targeting and deprivation; legal analysis of Britain's obligations under international humanitarian law, and a political critique of the current government's complicity, particularly under Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Since October 2023, numerous reports have documented British complicity in the genocide in Gaza. They range from warnings over ongoing exports of F-35 jet parts used to bomb schools and hospitals, to accounts of intelligence shared with the Israeli occupation that facilitated attacks on civilian infrastructure. These revelations have sparked regular mobilisations, with many hundreds of thousands demanding accountability from the government and an end to the genocide.

The Gaza Tribunal heard evidence from lawyers that Israel's murder last year - in three co-ordinated airstrikes - of British World Central Kitchen (WCK) aid workers in Gaza was almost certainly guided by data from an RAF spy plane flying overhead at the time. And lawyer Forz Khan, who acts as lawyer for one of the bereaved families, told the tribunal how the Starmer government blocked the family's request for the plane's footage and data in a cover-up of Israel's crime and Britain's involvement in it. Israel initially tried to claim the murders were an accident, but the attacks - on three WCK vehicles - were proven to have taken place in three separate locations spread across 1.5 miles. The Foreign Office did not even summon Israel's ambassador to answer for the murders. Khan also recounted how families of Israelis held captive in Gaza were invited to bring legal counsel to their meeting with government ministers - but the bereaved WCK families asked to bring their lawyers were refused permission by the Starmer regime.

The same concerns of the British government's assistance in Israel's murders were raised only last month, when a UK spy plane was proven to have been operating over Gaza during occupation airstrikes that murdered six journalists.

Jeremy Corbyn made a striking reference during the Tribunal to the use of rubble in Gaza, reportedly stating that Israel was repurposing the debris from bombed buildings "regardless of whether bodies were still buried beneath it". This remark was part of his broader condemnation of what he described as a systematic erasure of Palestinian life and dignity.

The Tribunal intends to publish a formal report with findings and recommendations, encouraging civil society groups to launch a public pressure campaign for parliamentary debate. Legal teams are exploring avenues for international accountability and sanctions.

Note
The Gaza Tribunal website can be found at: https://thegazatribunal.uk/
(MEMO, The Corbyn Project, Popular Resistance, Skwawkbox, other news sources)