The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) is arguing for a leave vote in Thursday's referendum. We stand in the tradition of the late Bob Crow, the RMT transport workers' union leader and one of the co-founders of TUSC, who was well known for his support for international workers' solidarity while opposing the EU as a body that was pushing anti-worker and pro-austerity policies.

TUSC's core policies include the renationalisation of the railways, Royal Mail and other privatised public services, industries and utilities; defending the right to asylum and opposing racist immigration controls; and democratic public ownership of the banks and major companies.

None of these policies are compatible with the EU treaties. So why should we give a vote of confidence to EU institutions and laws which, as Greece shows, would be used to try and block socialist policies?

Monday's Sky TV Q&A with Jeremy Corbyn shows that there is a desire for a serious discussion on the EU referendum that has been generally unmet in the establishment media coverage.

Here was the Labour leader being asked questions by an audience of under-35s which took the debate to a far higher level than the normal 'Boris and Dave' show. 'How would you fulfil your pledge to renationalise the railways if EU competition laws prohibit it?' 'What is the case to remain in an organisation which promotes policies like TTIP which will sustain inequalities?' 'Wouldn't voting to Remain lead to the privatisation of the NHS?' were just some of the issues he had to address.

These are exactly the issues that the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) has been raising in making the socialist case for exit - not, unfortunately, in a 40-minute show on a major broadcast channel, but in the snatched opportunities that have come our way.

With EU referendum campaigning resumed, the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) issued a press statement today asking media organisations to reflect on their role in creating the climate of hate that formed the backdrop to the shocking and horrific murder of Labour MP Jo Cox last Thursday.

The Electoral Commission was also criticised by TUSC, which supports an exit vote, for its decision early in the EU campaign to give political authority to the reactionary Vote Leave organisation, led by Tory Brexiters Boris Johnson, Michael Gove et al, when it was under no legal obligation to grant 'official designation' status - and millions of pounds of public funds - to any campaign group at all.

Dave Nellist, the former Labour MP who is now the chair of TUSC, said: "People are still in shock at the brutal murder of Jo Cox and, with campaigning now resuming for Thursday's ballot, must be hoping for a different kind of debate.

The three constituent organisations of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, and other members and supporters of TUSC, have expressed their shock and horror at the brutal murder of Labour MP Jo Cox.

The Socialist Party released a statement on Thursday evening pointing to the "big-business politicians on both sides of the EU referendum debate [who] have dangerously whipped up racism and anti-migrant feelings", while re-affirming its support, as a component part of TUSC, for an EU exit vote on "a pro-working class, internationalist standpoint" (see http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/23031/16-06-2016/shocking-killing-of-jo-cox).

The Socialist Workers Party posted an article on Friday, saying that it was now clear that Jo Cox's suspected attacker Thomas Mair "had connections with Nazi organisations" and calling for a redoubling of "our campaigning against fascism and racism" (see https://socialistworker.co.uk/art/42926/Racist+hatred+behind+murder+of+Jo+Cox).

The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) today appealed to shadow chancellor John McDonnell to explicitly repudiate Alistair Darling's support for George Osborne's threat of an emergency austerity budget in the event of a vote to leave the EU.

This followed the appearance by the former Labour chancellor, Lord Darling, in support of George Osborne's scare threat that tax increases and spending cuts of £30bn would have to be rapidly agreed by parliament if an EU exit vote won on June 23rd. Together they produced an 'illustrative' list of new cuts including £2.5bn to the NHS, £1.15bn in education, and cuts of more than 5% from transport and local government.

The TUSC national chair, the former Labour MP Dave Nellist - once a backbench colleague of Jeremy Corbyn - said: "Jeremy Corbyn, backed by John McDonnell, won the Labour Party leadership election last summer with a clear message that austerity is not necessary but is a political choice. That is true whether Britain remains in the EU or votes to leave and it is welcome that Jeremy said Labour 'would oppose any post-Brexit austerity budget' in today's Prime Minister's Questions.

The capitalist establishment in Britain and internationally are starting to panic about the result of the EU referendum.

They are especially concerned at polling evidence that working class Labour voters, in particular, are reluctant to come out and save the Tory government from what will be a shattering defeat. Now the media focus will be on Labour voters, starting with Gordon Brown's 'relaunch' of the Remain campaign, to try and intimidate them by any means possible from voting Leave.

That's why it is important, in the days that are left before June 23rd, to get the widest hearing possible for the socialist arguments against the 'Employers' Union' that is the EU, with its austerity agenda.

The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC), which is supporting an exit vote in the EU referendum, today added its voice to the protest over the voting pack issued by Bristol city council for postal voters in June's ballot.

The council has been distributing a how-to-vote guide to postal voters with pictorial instructions that show a pencil hovering over the Remain box on the ballot paper (see below). At the very least the graphic is not a neutral depiction of the mechanics of voting.

Bristol council's voters guide

A council spokesperson has dismissed the complaints, stating that "the placement of the pen graphic was entirely incidental". But this is not the first instance of political bias by Bristol's election officials, argued TUSC's National Election Agent, Clive Heemskerk. "Bristol council, unfortunately, has form in making political interventions into the democratic process", he said, "which TUSC had first-hand experience of in the city's mayoral election this May".

The Wales TUC has become the latest trade union organisation to come out in support of a fighting strategy that could roll back the attack on local public services.

At the Wales TUC conference last week (24-26 May) a composited motion was unanimously passed calling on Welsh councils - mainly Labour or Plaid Cymru-led - to set no-cuts budgets, using legal measures such as prudential borrowing, use of reserves, and capitalisation.

Taking such a step, the motion went on, "buys time for councils to build a campaign of mass resistance with other councils, the Wales TUC, anti-cuts campaigners and local communities" to force proper government funding of council services. The full text of the composite motion passed is printed below.

The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition national chair, Dave Nellist, was a panellist on BBC Radio's Any Questions programme last week (20 May), appearing alongside the Tory minister Andrea Leadsom, Blairite Labour MP Emma Reynolds, and the former Tory Party chairman, Chris Patten.

Questions included whether the NHS was sustainable after the news about the deficits incurred by Trusts last year; the Dave v Boris pantomime character of the EU referendum debate; and the vote to retain a men only policy at Muirfield Golf Club. The full 50 minute programme can be heard on BBC iplayer at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07bfzjf But if Chris Patten's golf anecdotes etc don't appeal, you can hear Dave's contributions by clicking below.

Last week three trade unions representing over 120,000 workers - the RMT, ASLEF and the BFAWU Bakers Union - issued a joint statement setting out their case for trade unionists to vote for Leave in the EU referendum. The statement reads:

"Many great figures of the labour moment such as Tony Benn, Michael Foot and Bob Crow were firmly against the EU. Millions of Labour voters oppose the EU and we believe a similar number of trade unionists support withdrawal.

"Whatever the result of the EU referendum the labour and trade union movement will continue to fight against injustice and austerity.

The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition's national chair, the former Labour MP Dave Nellist, appeared on the BBC's Daily Politics programme (19 May) debating with Frances O'Grady, the general secretary of the Trades Union Congress (TUC), on why workers should vote for EU exit on June 23rd.

The left-wing commentator Paul Mason had a very disappointing article in Tuesday's edition of The Guardian (There is a left-wing case for Brexit - but we can't let Boris Johnson turn Britain into a neo-liberal fantasy island, G2, 17 May).

It started so well. The EU, wrote Paul, "provides the most hospitable ecosystem in the developed world for rentier monopoly corporations, tax-dodging elites and organised crime.

"It has an executive so powerful it could crush the left-wing government of Greece; a legislature so weak that it cannot effectively determine laws or control its own civil service. A judiciary that, in the Laval and Viking judgments, subordinated workers' right to strike to an employer's right to do business freely". What trade unionist or socialist could disagree with that?