May Day is an important occasion in our calendar. On International Workers’ Day, the Workers Party celebrates the resilience, determination and strength of the working class - the true architects of progress and revolutionary change. Today, we honour the struggles of our comrades from previous generations and those who presently fight for the rights of the working class at home and abroad. We remember that change is not given, it has to be won through workers’ unity, class solidarity and collective action.

The capitalist system is facing another crisis. The gap between the rich and the poor continues to widen, with economic and social inequality, wage stagnation, job insecurity, and the lack of affordable housing. There is a lack of access to quality healthcare, social care and education. The escalating impacts of climate change, fuelled by capitalism, threaten the world. Systemic racism, sectarianism, xenophobia, sexism, homophobia and other forms of discrimination remain rampant.

The general election in the Republic of Ireland has provided no solutions to the critical problems facing workers and their families. There is rising poverty, a crisis in housing, healthcare, childcare and education. In Northern Ireland the working class also faces the reality of a cost of living and housing crisis, people working long hours at minimum or low wages with precarious job security. Workers often lack the right to strike or are unable to access the protection of a trade union and are vulnerable to poverty, mental health problems and homelessness. Inequality, poverty and destitution are the reality of many workers’ lives.

In Britain, the election of a Labour government immediately revealed the callous opportunism of social democracy and its ongoing betrayal of the working class. Labour’s time in government has been marked by a series of broken promises and an attack on the poor, social welfare, environmental sustainability and workers’ and migrant rights, together with a collapsing NHS, the bankruptcy of local authorities, stagnant wages and a massive housing shortage. At the same time, Britian, under a “Labour” administration, remains committed to NATO and is embarking on a massive increase in military spending.

World military expenditure reached $2718 billion in 2024, an increase of 9.4 per cent in real terms from 2023. Military spending increased in all world regions, with particularly rapid growth in Europe and the Middle East. Increased militarization is being built on the backs of workers and the most vulnerable in our society.

Today, the European Union and its bourgeois member states are ramping up preparations for war. While budgets for social, health and welfare spending are cut, war spending increases and an ever-larger part of state budgets is allocated to militarism and war. Increasingly, the imperialist alliances, the monopolies and the military-industrial complex assume a decisive influence in the policy of the bourgeois states. This is an issue of life and death for the people; a disaster with immense adverse consequences being actively promoted, planned and prepared, and accompanied by heightened tensions, the creation of a war psychosis and rising state authoritarianism.

Europe is arming at an unprecedented pace. In March 2025, the European Commission unveiled the ReArm EU program, aiming to mobilize €800 billion for the machinery of war.

At the same time, the violation of workers’ rights across Europe is increasing. There are severe restrictions on the right to organise in trade unions. Trade unionists are faced with obstruction, victimisation and discrimination in their struggle to organise workers.

The continued malign influence of the European Union, which has championed deregulation, privatisation and the constant and steady erosion of workers’ rights, exists to guarantee undistorted competition in the market and involves dismantling the state sector and promoting the privatisation of industries and services, including essential services such as health, education and water.

The type of change that workers need can only be achieved in a socialist society. A government which offers only the bourgeois management of the economy in the interests of a social system based on expropriation and profit cannot meet the needs of working people.

The world is in danger. The ever-growing imperialist threat, the rise of the far-right, increasing militarisation and warmongering and continuing and growing capitalist exploitation and oppression pose great dangers for the future of the planet.

The expansion of imperialist blocs, imperialist aggression and growing militarisation represent real threats to peace and the peoples of the world. The inter-imperialist confrontation between the Euro-Atlantic powers (USA, NATO, EU) and Russia in Ukraine (a result of the fierce competition of the capitalist powers for the control of the markets, raw materials, and transport networks of the country) continues with the working class of Ukraine and Russia paying the price for the competition between imperialist blocs.

The devastation of Ukraine is already exciting the appetites of the monopolies who plan to profit from the death and destruction of the war by suborning and exploiting Ukraine’s natural wealth and resources and reinforcing the ideological foundation of the reconstruction on the basis of the capitalist market. Enterprise Ireland has appointed a “Ukrainian market expert” to assess “potential future opportunities” for Irish companies in the rebuilding of Ukraine.

The Zionist state of Israel continues its genocidal assault across the Gaza Strip, slaughtering Palestinians, including women and children, medical personnel and journalists and once again displacing many thousands and imposing a complete blockade on the entry of all humanitarian aid, including food, water, fuel and medical supplies. The genocide in Gaza never ended.

At the same time, Israel has increased its attacks on occupied Palestinian territory in the West Bank, destroying infrastructure and laying siege to refugee camps. Israeli soldiers and settlers have attacked Palestinians in their homes and on the streets, killing Palestinian men, women and children and displacing more than 40,000 people.

The reaction of governments across the world to these events, particularly in the US and Europe, has been complicity as they continue to supply weapons and technology together with diplomatic and military support. State repression and co-ordinated attacks against the Palestine solidarity movement, including state violence against protesters in Ireland, has increased although the solidarity movement and the Palestinian people will not be broken.

The Workers Party celebrates the heroic victory over the imperialist forces by the Vietnamese people when 50 years ago, on April 30th, 1975, the National Liberation Front smashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace in Saigon bringing an end to the savage imperialist war on Vietnam and its people.

This month the Workers Party will also commemorate the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the Great Anti-Fascist Victory of the Peoples in Berlin. Eighty years ago today, on 1st May 1945, the red banner of victory was hoisted over the German Reichstag. Berlin surrendered the following day and on 8th May representatives of the Nazi High Command signed the instruments of surrender. 

At a time of the increased aggressiveness of imperialism and the conditions imposed by the monopolies the revolutionary parties of the working class require new and higher demands on our political and ideological work.

While Marx and Engels provided the working class with the ideological and theoretical framework for its emancipation, Lenin emphasised that without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement.

Capitalism cannot solve the problems facing humanity and the planet. Real change can only be delivered through a change in the social order. Peace and progress can only be guaranteed by the overthrow of the capitalist system. securing workers’ control over production, the establishment of workers’ power and the construction of a socialist-communist society. 

The Workers Party on International Workers’ Day of sends greetings and solidarity to our fellow workers in Ireland and across the world.

Long live socialist internationalism!

Long live proletarian solidarity!

For Workers’ Power and Socialism!

Workers of All Countries Unite!

Central Executive Committee

Workers Party of Ireland