Hundreds of thousands of protestors are expected to descend on Edinburgh in early July to demonstrate against the annual summit of the bosses club, the G8.

Authorities and protest organisers in Scotland have been plunged into administrative chaos after Bob Geldof, out of the blue, called for a million people to march against poverty outside Gleneagles where the G8 are holding their summit.

20 years after the Live Aid gigs, free concerts are to be held in the eight countries of the G8 to "raise awareness" of global poverty. There is no doubt that the issues raised, by the great and good of the pop world, such as the AIDS pandemic, world poverty and environmental destruction, stir a powerful resentment from the mass of people towards the political elite of rich countries. Due to events such as the war on Iraq and the tsunami disaster, working class people have become more internationalist in outlook and more conscious of the horrors of global capitalism.

Since Live Aid 20 years ago, the gap between rich and poor on a global basis has widened to an unprecedented level. One billion people live on less than $1 a day. Over two billion survive on less than $2 a day. Yet, the richest 200 people in the world have more wealth than the poorest 2.4 billion. Every day 6,000 people die from HIV/Aids because they cannot afford the drugs that are now available which can reduce deaths. Yet the ten biggest pharmaceutical companies in the US made $35.9 billion profits in 2002 alone.

In 2002, the world's ten richest individuals had a personal fortune of $266 billion - five times more than the annual flow of aid from rich to poor countries. This amount of money would be enough to meet the United Nations' "millennium goals" such as the halting and reversing the spread of AIDS, malaria and other infectious diseases, reducing infant mortality by two-thirds and lowering the number of maternal deaths in childbirth by three quarters between now and 2050.

The G8 has been the target of mass demonstrations in recent years for its pro-big business policies that have resulted in mass poverty and exploitation. It has been responsible for promoting the "structural adjustment programmes" or SAP's which the World Trade Organisation (WTO), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have used to plunder poor countries of their resources and to exploit workers. These SAP's include granting loans to governments on the condition that they privatise public services, de-regulate industry and labour and open up their markets to multinational companies. These policies have resulted in a massive shift of wealth from the poor to the rich. As services have been privatised, multinationals have looted countries of their resources, impoverishing millions and enriching the world's wealthiest individuals. This neo-liberal agenda has destroyed the economies of many countries, in turn adding to the debt owed to these capitalist institutions.

While George Bush, Blair and the rest of the G8 rat-pack are put up in luxurious surroundings in Gleneagles, a different welcome is being planned for those protesting against the G8. A steel perimeter of "ripper mesh" fencing will stretch for several miles around the summit. Over 10,000 interlocking panels of the 8ft-high fencing have been erected around the hotel to provide an exclusion zone of almost a mile in diameter. While the G8 gets underway, police snipers will be on the roof of the hotel pointing guns at those protesting, backed up by an SAS team and military personnel armed with anti-aircraft weapons on standby. It will cost the taxpayer over £150 million to hold the G8. The British Treasury has provided £20 million alone for security.

'Make Poverty History'

Make Poverty History, an alliance of charities, religious leaders, NGO's, celebrities and many other organisations, has continued to call on the G8 and governments to tackle poverty through three demands: trade justice, drop the debt and more and better aid. Make Poverty History has correctly described the dire situation the majority of people on the planet face today. However, their demands on how to make poverty history and their reliance on lobbying world rulers are unfortunately deeply flawed.

The call for "fair trade not free trade" is based on the belief that a "fair" economy can be achieved on the basis of capitalism and that it is possible to improve everybody's living standards while still allowing for profits to be made. However, exploitation of workers and the environment is an inextricable and fundamental part of capitalism. Profits in reality are made from the exploitation of workers. If an employer can make a worker work longer hours or increase productivity while not increasing wages accordingly, the employer increases profits.

More profitable companies can also expand, taking more of the market from their competitors through the increased exploitation of their workforce. Profit, the exploitation of workers, is the driving force of capitalism. Any steps to tilt the balance in favour of poor farmers and workers in the neo-colonial world at the expense of major multi-nationals' profits, would be faced with resistance by big business. In order to improve the conditions of working class and poor people, a fight against big business is necessary.

G8 = big business

The G8 and governments around the world however represent the interests of big business and protect the capitalist system. All the political leaders of the G8 are massively funded by multi-nationals, who obediently legislate in favour of big business. Lobbying of right-wing capitalist politicians is not only a fruitless exercise but can also sow illusions that workers have something in common with them. Unlike the strategy of Make Poverty History and NGO's however, the majority of people who will be on the streets of Edinburgh in July will be there to protest against the G8, not to lobby them.

Debt

One of the issues due to be discussed at the G8 summit is debt. Structural adjustment programmes have sunk poor countries deeper and deeper into debt. In sub-Saharan Africa, governments spend more on servicing debt to rich countries - $300 billion - than on the health and education of children. Blair has announced that debt is a priority for the G8 at Edinburgh.

However, the British government's rhetoric on debt stands in stark contrast to their actual record. Britain first promised to increase aid to just 0.7% of GDP back in 1970. Today it is still stuck at a miserly 0.35%. Gordon Brown and Blair have both proposed the establishment of an International Finance Facility which would grant aid funded by borrowing on the bond market. IFF represents a continuation of linking aid to the further liberalisation of poor countries economies which would result in higher debt. But even this initiative may not even be discussed at the G8.

G8 governments were recently shamed into increasing aid after the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster by the inspirational show of solidarity by working class people throughout the world in raising money. But without democratic control over aid by workers and the poor in these countries, most aid ends up being stolen by corrupt charities, aid agencies and government forces. In the countries affected by the tsunami, none of the 1 million people left homeless have been re-housed. Local charities are issuing fake receipts to con tens of thousands of pounds from central disaster funds.

One aid boss has been accused of using donations to build himself a £30,000 house - and then spending a further £1,500 on appliances and electric ceiling fans in every room. Warehouses are still full of clothes, food and medical supplies, while refugees are given rotten, out-of-date food that makes them sick.

Cancel the debt

Socialists support the cancellation of all debt. On it's own this would not stop the imperialist dominance of big business over the neo-colonial world. The problems facing the masses of these countries cannot be solved on the basis of capitalism. There are more than enough resources on the planet to provide a decent living standard for all, many times over. The technology and technique exists to plan for society's needs. As long as these resources are in the hands of a tiny rich minority, human suffering and environmental destruction will continue. Only by placing the world's resources in the hands of workers and poor people under democratic control, can humanity begin to plan for the needs of society. This requires a fundamental break with capitalism and the establishment of a socialist plan of production.

The only force that can bring about socialist change in the advanced capitalist and the neo-colonial countries is the working class, who through their collective cohesion and indispensable role in production can bring the capitalist system shuddering to a halt. Already we are beginning to see a re-awakening of the workers' movement across the world that has led to sharp conflicts with the capitalist class in many countries. The Socialist Party, together with our sister parties in the Committee for a Workers' International is intervening in these movements and building a socialist alternative which can once and for all truly make poverty history.

Gordon Brown and Tony Blair are trying to portray themselves as champions of debt relief for Africa. Brown and Blair used the recent Africa Commission report to support the "doubling of foreign aid to Africa and making fighting Aids a priority."

They even set a goal for "100% debt cancellation" and urged rich nations to drop trade barriers that hurt poorer countries. But even a doubling of aid to $50 billion would fall well short of what is required.

Gordon Brown admitted at the launch of the Africa Commission report that the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) drawn up in 2000, which aimed to halve African poverty by 2015, would not be met. Neither would targets to reduce infant and maternal mortality by 50% by 2015. In fact, it would take more than 150 years at current rates to achieve such goals. Against the background of the four million children in Africa who die before the age of five this literally means that hundreds of millions of lives would be lost.

As it is, the G8 has only promised to write of $100 billion of the $375 billion debt of the world's 52 poorest countries. That was five years ago. To date less than half of that debt has been written off. In all, 88% of the 52 poorest countries' debt, most of them in Africa, is still being paid back. That's £30 million a day or £11 billion every year that flows into the coffers of capitalist governments and the world's financial institutions. For every $2 in aid Africa receives $1 is paid back in interest payments. Sub-saharan Africa pays back in debt repayments 100% of the aid it receives each year.

Malawi spends more on servicing its debt than it spends on health. This is at a time when 20% of Malawians are HIV positive. Capitalism thrives on the indebtedness of Africa and other poor nations. No wonder they are so reluctant to genuinely tackle the problem.

The aid rip-off

Thirty five years ago the United Nations set a target for all industrialised nations to pay 0.7% of their GDP in aid to the "developing" world. Only five countries have achieved that target. The USA pays only 0.15% of its GDP in aid. In total, high-income countries pay only 0.25% in aid. Almost all of that is in loans that poorer countries can barely afford to pay back the interest on. It means an ever-spiralling debt burden.

Scandalously, "high income" countries that agree to write-off debt to poorer countries can have that counted towards their 0.7% target.

This is supported by Brown and Blair as is "economic conditions" on imposing countries before they would qualify for debt write-off. This effectively means agreeing cuts in public spending and the opening up of their economies to foreign multinationals.

The UN estimates that £195 billion a year in aid is needed to halve world poverty within ten years, which would still leave more than 500 million people in extreme poverty. Only £20 billion a year is pledged at present. £40 billion would provide clean water, sanitation, adequate food and basic health care for those who require it. The richest 1,000 people in the world have a combined wealth of $2.2 trillion.

Africa in chains

Almost the entire African continent has been a colony of one or other of the imperialist powers at some time. They consciously prevented African countries from developing their own industries, making them totally reliant on imports from the West. To make matters worse, those products produced in African countries have their prices determined by the richer nations and multinationals who drive down prices in order to increase their own profits. At the same time, they force those same countries to buy imported goods from the West at a price determined by the West. This led to neo-colonial countries having to take out loans from the same capitalist powers that held a vice-like grip on their economies. Of course the West set the interest rates. The local African elites and corrupt governments have stolen much of the aid while unloading the burden of debt onto the backs of the poor masses. The IMF and other organisations demanded cuts in health, education and the privatisation of industries in order to qualify for loans in the first place.

Even debt relief and rescheduling has been dependent on countries agreeing to open up their economies to privatisation from multinationals in the West and agreeing to carry out neo-liberal policies. For example in Angola, water, which was free, now has to be paid for, which has led to disconnections and a subsequent increase in dysentery, cholera etc. While in Malawi the World Bank advised the government to sell off its surplus grain as part of a debt restructuring deal, despite widespread starvation in the country. Military spending however has increased in Africa with Western arms companies finding lucrative markets in both Africa and other neo-colonial countries.

Only by ending the domination of the African continent by multinational companies and the abolition of institutions like the IMF and the World Bank can Africa develop its real potential. That would require the nationalisation of the multinationals under democratic working class control and management to lay the basis for a socialist planned economy in the West. This is turn would be linked to a mass movement of the African working class and poor masses to overthrow the corrupt capitalist and feudal regimes throughout the continent. This would allow the 1 billion strong African people, one-half of whom exist on less than $1 a day, to be free from poverty, hunger and disease.

Bob Geldof has launched the call for a million people to protest in Scotland against world poverty during the G8 summit. Everyone opposed to world poverty, environmental destruction and war should join us in protesting against the G8. But no one should be under any illusion that a few big concerts and one big protest will solve the problem of world poverty.

Geldof announced that "eight world leaders in one room in Scotland on the 8th of July can save millions and millions of lives, but they'll only do it if enough people tell them to." He is correct in saying that these leaders have enormous power, but he's wrong to think that they will ever use that power to help ordinary people. Bush, Blair, Berlusconi and the rest are the highest representatives of the capitalist system, where profit always comes before people. 17,000 children die every day from malnutrition while food mountains are built up in the EU to maintain profits!

The cause of continuing world poverty is not a few bad eggs at the head of governments - it's the profit system itself. As long as profit dominates the world, wars for resources and power will be waged, world trade will benefit the rich and debt, which makes Western banks millions in interest, will never be scrapped. Instead, we need to build a socialist society based on people not profit. This can be achieved by taking the sources of the world's wealth into public ownership and democratically planning the world's economy to meet people's needs.

The massive demonstrations in Scotland against the G8 will be a real indication of the anger of millions of people at the horrors this system creates. It will also show the potential that does exist to build a very powerful movement against capitalism and for a socialist future. We don't want this anger to turn into frustration when the G8 fails to make poverty history. That's why we're very clear in stating that capitalism will never eradicate world poverty. This can only be achieved by a socialist society based on working class people.

We urge all working class and young people to join in the protests against the G8 in July, not to plead with the leaders for change, but to show your opposition to the capitalist system of war, exploitation and poverty! Don't stop there - join the fight for socialism now!

Socialist Youth have been holding a series of meetings across the North on the upcoming G8 Summit on 6 July.

Meetings have been held in Strabane, Omagh and Enniskillen and more are planned in Portadown, Newry and Belfast. So far the local Scottish Authorities have been trying to oppose most attempts of young and working class people to voice their disgust at the fat cats' club that is the G8 Summit.

The aim of Socialist Youth's public meetings is to raise awareness among young and working class people in Northern Ireland of the truly insane nature of the G8's policies and the capitalist system they represent.

We will only see token measures from the G8 to deal with poverty in Africa. Socialist Youth are also trying to counter misconceptions among young people that celebrities like Bob Geldof can be relied upon to bring about a solution. Instead, young people should join the demonstrations against the G8 in Edinburgh and Gleneagles and register their opposition to Bush, Blair, Berlusconi and the rest of the right-wing leaders in the G8.

Join the fight for a socialist future!

Gordon Brown has tried to portray himself as the champion of debt relief in Africa in the run-up to the G8. Blair has commented that he cannot understand why people would want to protest against the summit of the world's most powerful leaders in July when he wants to focus on dealing with the problems faced by the people of Africa and climate change.

However, many people can see through the "caring" face of New Labour and their attempt to publicise the summit as an attempt to seriously deal with issues facing our planet and its poor. This is nothing but Tony Blair and his cohorts trying to do something to reverse the huge damage that the Iraq war and the ongoing occupation have done to his reputation. It must be remembered that Blair's government is responsible for the war for oil which has so far killed over 100,000 Iraqis and thousands of soldiers.

Brown has said he will be pushing for the cancellation of all African countries' public debt at the G8 summit. However, this debt was never going to be repaid anyway. African nations struggle to pay the interest on their debt alone, which amounts to $15 billion per year. Cancelling the debt owed to governments gives African countries more space to pay off the debt they owe to the private banks and companies which fund and back the New Labour government and other governments around the world. The last thing Western capitalist governments want is a third world government defaulting on its private debt under pressure from their people.

Brown has also said that any debt cancellation must be connected to "economic conditions", which means third world countries further opening their economies to privatisation and the domination of Western multinationals. These companies steal huge amounts of wealth from the continent of Africa by exploiting cheap labour and valuable resources. It is the capitalist "free market" which has caused many of the huge problems facing the people of Africa.

The only way to seriously deal with poverty, famine, HIV/AIDS and climate change is to build a socialist alternative to the system of capitalism which can fight for a world where society's wealth is used democratically to provide a decent standard of living for all. Then the amazing technological and medical developments that we have today could be used to effectively deal with the problems capitalism has created. Only a socialist alternative can deliver a world run for the benefit of humanity as a whole, not the profit margins of the bosses.

Socialist Youth are organising a contingent to travel to Scotland for the G8 protest. Our bus leaves on Friday morning (1 July) and there is the option of returning on the Monday morning (4 July) or of staying until the Thursday (7 July). The cost for the weekend is £25 and £32 for the week. This includes travel and campsite accommodation. To book your place phone: 07821058319