Around 140,000 people joined trade union protests in Brussels, opposing austerity measures planned by Bart De Wever’s administration.
Approximately 140,000 people took to the streets of Brussels on October 14, 2025, answering the call of Belgium’s trade unions to oppose the austerity plans of Bart De Wever’s government. Demonstrators arrived from across the country, making this one of the largest labor mobilizations in years.
“People came from all over Belgium, from all walks of life: workers, employees from both the public and private sectors, from all the professions that keep society running,” said Peter Mertens, General Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Belgium (PTB-PVDA). “A total of 140,000 people who are fed up with this government’s social destruction.”
Prime Minister De Wever’s administration has pressed ahead with plans to cut workplace protections and freeze income while increasing military spending, including the purchase of new F-35 fighter jets. “With its summer agreement, the government is further reducing social security, social rights, and purchasing power, and therefore the future prospects of the population,” said the trade union FGTB-ABVV. “On the other hand, it has found money to buy more drones and warplanes.”
Trade unions and the PTB-PVDA have warned that certain groups of workers will be hit hardest by the reforms – particularly women, who risk being penalized for taking maternity leave if they cannot produce the required documentation. “The government intends to deliberately steal from thousands of women who took maternity leave before 2003,” FGTB-ABVV activists wrote in Syndicats Magazine. “These women will bear the ‘burden of proof’ for this leave. Otherwise, what? Their maternity leave will simply not be counted in their pension calculations. This is a discriminatory choice, and a deliberate one. It shows a total lack of respect.”
Feminists against Arizona coalition. Source: Workers’ Party of Belgium (PTB-PVDA)
But all workers are expected to suffer under the new wave of austerity: younger employees will face weaker protections on night work, while those retired or nearing retirement could see their pensions slashed. “Figures from the Federal Pension Service show that 30% of people – 70% of whom are women – will lose an average of 318 euros per month. That’s a third of their pension,” said Thierry Bodson, head of the FGTB-ABVV, in a recent interview. “For many, that automatically means falling below the poverty line.”
“Investing in weapons and cutting back on pensions is a political choice,” Mertens explained ahead of the protest. “By 2070, pension spending would rise by 2% of GDP, which the Reformist Movement (Mouvement réformateur) claims is impossible [to fund]. Yet increasing defense budgets by 2% over ten years is entirely possible for them.”
The government has attempted to dismiss the unions’ and the left’s analyses but largely failed to do so, only managing to offer vague assurances that pensions would not be cut and protections would be preserved. “All these distortions, half-truths, and blatant lies prove one thing: the government is under pressure,” Mertens said.
“What we feel today is incredible energy, collective pride, and great determination,” he added on the day of the demonstration. “More and more people are realizing: together, we can make the government back down. Together, we can win.”
Chancellor of Exchequer Rachel Reeves during a visit to the Sipsmith Distillery in Chiswick West London, October 9, 2025
BRITAIN must brace for a misery Budget of tax rises and spending cuts, beleaguered Chancellor Rachel Reeves confirmed today as experts also warned of rising unemployment.
Ms Reeves alleged that the economic problems she is struggling with could be attributed to Brexit, as the government increasingly protests about Britain’s exclusion from the European Union, a pose with potentially far-reaching political implications.
She brought an end to weeks of speculation by confirming that tax rises will feature in her Budget, scheduled for the end of November.
However, she did not indicate where the burden would fall. Labour committed at the general election to not raise income tax, VAT or employees’ National Insurance, pledges now regarded as a straitjacket.
While there are other measures the Chancellor could announce, they would not be likely to raise as much cash. She has firmly set her face against a wealth tax so far.
Ms Reeves also indicated that spending cuts will be on the Budget agenda. Her drive to cut the welfare Bill through reducing benefits for disabled people was thwarted in the summer by a backbench Labour rebellion.
Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa in January 2025. Photo: Presidencia Ecuador
Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa has not only deepened the crisis in the country, but is also attempting to change the country’s institutions and laws through loopholes and force.
Daniel Noboa’s government in Ecuador is characterized by the implementation of neoliberal austerity policies dictated by the IMF, the violent repression of social protests, and a series of legal reforms aimed at increasing state authoritarianism, and aligning the country with US foreign policy. All this is taking place amid an unprecedented security crisis.
The security crisis
During the first half of 2025, Ecuador recorded 4,619 homicides, setting a new historical record and representing a 47% increase over the same period in 2024. This figure makes the country the most violent on the continent. No one knows what the Phoenix Plan, implemented by the Noboa government since 2024, consists of, and it has not produced positive results. On the contrary, citizen insecurity has worsened. The constant states of emergency that have militarized the country have also failed to reverse the situation.
Austerity policies
Re-elected in April 2025, Daniel Noboa has implemented a far-right program aligned with the demands of the IMF. In June, he dismissed 5,000 civil servants and merged four ministries. In the most serious case, environmental responsibilities were transferred to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Hydrocarbons, highlighting the government’s extractivist orientation. These measures represent the path toward the minimal state advocated by neoliberalism and respond to the conditions of the latest IMF loan.
On September 12, Noboa withdrew the subsidy on diesel, whose price rose from USD 1.80 to USD 2.80 per gallon until December. Subsequently, the price would depend on a band system tied to international market prices. This measure triggered a national transport strike on September 13, with transport workers quickly reaching an agreement with the government in exchange for subsidies, and subsequently the national strike called by the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) on September 18, demanding the repeal of the measure, a reduction in the VAT from 15% to 12%, no mining, respect for prior consultation, and more investment in education and health. It should be noted that public hospitals are in precarious conditions, without medicines or supplies. The media reports that patients who required dialysis treatment died because they did not receive it.
Submission to the United States and constitutional reforms
On June 3, the National Assembly, where the government has a majority, approved an amendment to Article 5 of the Constitution allowing foreign military bases. This amendment required the approval of the Constitutional Court and subsequently a referendum. On September 5, the Constitutional Court rejected four of the eight questions that Noboa had sent for popular consultation and referendum, including this issue.
Authoritarian laws and the Constitutional Court as the last bastion
In June 2025, the government managed to pass three new laws that were sent as economically urgent without actually being so: on Intelligence, National Solidarity, and Public Integrity. The progressive camp filed 23 constitutional challenges with the Constitutional Court because they violate rights related to children and adolescents, freedom of expression, intimacy, and privacy, among others. The Court provisionally suspended 16 articles of these laws, prompting a smear campaign organized by the government, which accused the Court of leaving the country defenseless against crime.
The National Solidarity Law sought to institutionalize the concept of “internal armed conflict” that Noboa used in a decree in January 2024. This implied: free use of the military in police operations; prior pardon for security personnel for potential crimes and human rights violations; criminalization of opposition organizations by classifying them as armed groups; and treatment of areas, movable and immovable property presumed to belong to criminal groups as military targets.
The Intelligence Law sought to intercept any communication without a court order, require information within two days without a court order, access personal data without a court order, reinstate confidential expenses (non-transparent discretionary funds), and incinerate documents rather than keep them on file.
On September 27, the Constitutional Court definitively rejected two of the laws, the National Security Law and the Public Integrity Law, as flagrantly unconstitutional.
The Constitutional Court is the only state body that the Noboa government does not control. The National Court of Justice and the Attorney General’s Office have supported the government by implementing lawfare against the opposition, especially Rafael Correa’s Citizen Revolution party, while failing to investigate any of the signs of corruption in the current government. These include million-dollar contracts with companies owned by Noboa’s relatives, new mining concessions that also lead to his relatives, 48 generators purchased to provide electricity, of which 30 are not compatible with the Ecuadorian system, and the scandal of the contract with Progen for the electrical system, for which USD 149 million was paid without results, leaving open the possibility that last year’s 14-hour daily blackouts will be repeated.
On September 16, in Cuenca, the country’s third largest city with 800,000 inhabitants, the largest environmental march in the country’s history took place: 100,000 people marched against the Loma Larga mining project in the Quimsacocha area, which would put water sources for agricultural and human use at risk. The project had been suspended by a local court for failing to comply with prior consultation and environmental requirements.
On September 19, Noboa ordered the National Electoral Council, by decree, to organize a National Constituent Assembly without seeking the opinion of the Constitutional Court, which constitutes a violation of the Constitution and was interpreted as an attempted coup d’état. The Court admitted five constitutional challenges and the execution of the decree was blocked, although the CNE quickly launched the call for elections for the Constituent Assembly.
At the time of publication of this article, the national strike called by CONAIE continued after 20 days, with support in several cities, especially from students. Roadblocks, protests, and shutdowns are spreading throughout the country, but are strongest in the Sierra, where the Indigenous movement is the main actor in the popular camp.
Tanks and military vehicles repressed the protests in the province of Imbabura, even firing on unarmed Indigenous communities. The Minister of Government, Zaida Rovira, said that it was a humanitarian convoy “ambushed by terrorist structures”. The convoy arrived without prior warning while all internet communication was interrupted, and there is no terrorist group linked to the incident. Efraín Fuérez was killed by the military in a nearby area. A Spanish journalist reporting from the area, Lautaro Bernat, was deported.
At least 100 people have been detained and 10 are missing. On September 26, twelve detainees were sent to one of the maximum security prisons where a prison massacre had taken place the day before, killing 17 people. These massacres have been repeated even with prisons under military control since 2024. These people were falsely accused of terrorism and of having criminal records. The government has frozen the bank accounts of popular leaders and organizations without a court order, claiming without evidence that the strike is being financed by the Venezuelan drug trafficking organization, “Tren de Aragua”.
The former president of CONAIE, Leonidas Iza, leader of the 2019 and 2022 uprisings, suffered an attempt on his life by agents of the National Intelligence Directorate on August 18, 2025. Four children from a suburb of Guayaquil were tortured and extrajudicially executed by the military in December 2024. The level of authoritarianism is such that the US State Department itself denounces it in a report that points to serious human rights violations in Ecuador between 2024 and 2025. International reports show that since 2024 there has been an increase in crimes of abuse of power in the execution of official duties, torture, forced disappearances, and extrajudicial executions.
Noboa’s response to the Constitutional Court’s rejection of the two laws was, on September 30, to send a new urgent economic law to facilitate donations to the National Police and the Armed Forces.
There are no negotiations with the actors on strike. Faced with demands for more democracy and state investment, the government responds with austerity, increased repression, and a communication strategy that seeks to establish the false narrative that all protesters are criminals and/or terrorists. In line with this, on October 8, the presidential guard, after attacking an Indigenous demonstration in the province of Cañar, broke the windows of the presidential motorcade’s vehicles and then claimed that it was an attempt to assassinate the president. This would be the first time that an attempt has been made to assassinate a president by throwing stones at the presidential motorcade, which is protected by the military, police, and private security, who had been warned about the protest by the mayor days earlier.
Pilar Troya Fernández is an Ecuadorian anthropologist with a master’s degree in gender studies and a researcher at the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research. She was an advisor to the National Secretariat of Planning, an advisor to the National Secretariat of Higher Education, Science, Technology, and Innovation, and Deputy Secretary General of Higher Education in Ecuador. She currently resides in Brazil.
I was lucky. Last week, I was cycling downhill when I hit a pothole. The front wheel folded into an infinity symbol. I went over the handlebars and, with no time to put my hands out, landed on my face. My helmet and glasses took most of the impact. I emerged, remarkably, with just a few cuts and bruises.
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Austerity – which leaves our potholes, alongside many other gaps in public provision, unfilled – does not save money. On the contrary, it costs us a fortune. What the rich might save in taxes, the rest must pay over and over again.
False economies abound. For example, the government may at last be persuaded to remove the Tories’ vicious, Malthusian two-child benefit cap. But what many people have failed to grasp is that behind it stands another brick wall: the household benefits cap. If families now receive money for a third child, it could push them past the household limit, and they’ll be scarcely better off than before. This household cap has extreme and perverse consequences. It ensures that rents, even in the social sector, are almost everywhere unaffordable to the families affected, most of which are headed by lone parents. The result is that they are thrown into temporary accommodation, which local authorities must provide at far greater expense: roughly £2.3bn a year. Being forced into temporary accommodation also curtails adults’ employment opportunities and children’s performance at school, and generates great suffering, which can translate into physical and mental health problems, which of course means further economic impacts.
In 2019, a parliamentary committee called on the government to “conduct a full cost benefit analysis of the benefit cap”. The government rejected the call, but said it would explore the possibility in future. I checked with the Department for Work and Pensions – it still hasn’t happened.
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Keir Starmer confirms that he’s proud to be a red Tory continuing austerity and targeting poor and disabled scum.Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership all feel a small part of Scunthorpe.
Chancellor of Exchequer Rachel Reeves during a visit to the Sipsmith Distillery in Chiswick West London, October 9, 2025
