Radical Workers March as Firefighters Strike
Published:
October 23, 2010 13:58
by
circus
Neighbourhoods:
Almost 2000 marched in london against the government cuts and lobbied / criticised the TUC for not calling a national demonstration against the cuts for FIVE months. There were calls to more radical strike action, direct action, one day public sector strikes and a general strike.
With RMT Tube maintenance workers taking industrial action and firefighters on strike and resisting scab labour there were calls to emulate the industrial action seen in Greece, France and Spain, emphasising the need for mutual support in mass action and the necessity to involve more people than just those in trade unions, to defend each other. Read on ...
A 'Direct Action Militant Workers Bloc' joined the demonstration and handed out leaflets entitled "Strike, Occupy, Sabotage!" [text] which said that no march past parliament, no matter how big, would have any effect, and that only mass direct action, especially industrial action would be effective.
One speaker said we cannot rely on our MPs, councillors, the TUC, and often even shop stewards, we must agitate at the grassroots level ourselves.
See Videos: Steve Hedley, RMT regional organiser | Ian Lehair, London Fire Brigade Union | Bob Crow (RMT) + Matt Wrack (FBU) | Michael Bradley of Right To Work
Meanwhile protests were reported in many different towns and cities, including 25,000 marching in Edinburgh, Scotland. See also: Bristol | Cardiff | Sheffield [audio, 3] | | Cambridge [2] | Manchester [2] | Norwich | Belfast
Additions
firefighter background
Published: October 24, 2010 18:38
by
fyi
London firefighter strikes are on
Firefighters in London have overwhelmingly voted to take strike action in a dispute over new contracts.
The first strike is scheduled for the 23rd of October, with the second following on the 1st of November. The strike was backed by 79% of Fire Brigades Union members in a secret ballot, with the outcome announced earlier in the month. As part of a series of provocative measures in the run-up to the announcement of the result, management withdrew fire engines from stations around the capital and handed them over to the private contractors AssetCo.
The changes would equalise the length of day and night shifts. However, the real significance as far as firefighters are concerned is that the new shift pattern would make it much easier to close certain fire stations in the evening. With spending cuts on the way, the London Fire Authority has already been discussing making cuts of 20%-40%, with significant jobs losses. The contract dispute is widely seen as the first stage of the cuts.
Meanwhile, the union-busting chief of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority has threatened to “do a Ronald Reagan” and sack the firefighters who don't sign the new contracts – in his own estimation cutting London's 5,600 firefighters down to 2,000.
Source: Libcom UK Workplace News Roundup - October 2010
http://libcom.org/news/uk-workplace-news-roundup-october-2010-20102010
from solfed
Published: October 24, 2010 22:29
by
fyi
On Saturday (23rd October) members of the Solidarity Federation joined the Radical Workers Bloc on a march to demand an end to the cuts being imposed on the working class in the ‘austerity budget’ – the greatest attack on the working class in decades.
We join the fight against the cuts now because they will bring immediate and real hardship and suffering to working people. But the answer does not really lie in a readjustment of the government’s budget.
The real answer lies in a fundamental change in the way we organise our society and economy. The fight over cuts is symptomatic of the fight between the wealthy, the capitalists, and the workers. It concerns how the wealth generated in society is distributed: but a slight shift one way or the other is not enough.
No more do we want to see working people shoulder the burden for the rich: the burden of work which enriches them, or the burden of paying for a mess of their (the rich) own making. What we want is a fundamental shift so that all the wealth generated within society is shared equally by all.
No bank or capitalist controlling the means of making wealth and creaming off the profits. No false wealth being made by playing games on the money or commodity market. Just people in society working together to provide what is needed, for the benefit of all.
http://www.solidarityfederation.org.uk/radical-workers-bloc-joins-anti-cuts-march-in-london
from the cambridge march
Published: October 25, 2010 08:30
by
cp
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/10/466757.html
quote:
It's worth pointing out that Britain has had a national debt since Elizabethan times (peaking after World War Two), when Queen Elizabeth pushed the country into the red by building a fleet of battleships to fend off the Spanish Armada ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spanish_Armada). Since then, for the last five hundred years, there has never been a time when we have not had a national debt, so we are being presented a with a fundamentally flawed argument as to why the public sector requires such swingeing cuts.
In fact, most economists would argue that it is necessary for the Capitalist system to operate within a certain margin of indebtedness for it to actually function. Whether we like it or not, this is the way it works, and if any politician tells you otherwise, they are lying.
No, what we are witnessing is a concerted attempt by right wing governments across Europe to gut our public services, possibly in a pre-emptive attempt to privatise them, devolving responsibility (and liability) away from the state, in favour of something more "competitive" - that is, driven by the requirements of a small number of private shareholders, rather than by the needs of the majority of Human Beings.
However, we the ordinary people have different ideas to the Bankers, Market Analysts and Politicians, because we all acknowledge - and are willing to fight for - a fair and decent level of employment and living standards for all.
This is why there will be more demonstrations, more pickets, more walk outs, until the Neo Cons in government (masquerading as something new) get the message that they can't have things their way.
Re AssetCo - Video of confronting scabs
Published: October 27, 2010 15:25
by
vids
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7HRjHgZdZs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgohJcdNMws&sns=fb
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DXAc_Fh6_E
Fight for a Workers-led ‘Just Transition’
Published: November 03, 2010 11:51
by
workers unite!
Resist the Cuts..
..Fight for a Workers-led ‘Just Transition’
Shocks to re-shape the Economy
· We are seeing the most savage spending cuts since the 1930’s. The cuts of 25% to most Whitehall departments will smash our social welfare system- violently pulling the rug from underneath individuals and families, who have been supported by public goods such as housing, education, and transport.
· Two years ago the banks were bailed out with £850bn of taxpayers money
· The Bank Levy of £2.5bn is pale in comparison to the last round of city bonuses of £7bn, and will take 0.04% of the banks’ profits in the first year. Some of the major banks will actually make an overall gain from government intervention due to the reduction of the corporate tax from 28% to 24% in June.
· Public bodies which exist to promote corporate profit remain untouched and uncut. E.g. the Commonwealth Development Corporation, Export Credit Guarantee Department, Sea Fish Industry Authority.
· As the Con-Dem coalition shrinks state provision the private sector will move swiftly in to capitalize on new markets attacking working conditions and reducing service quality to bolster the bottom line.
The government is using the financial crisis caused by capitalist economics to re-shape the economy for the ends of profit and corporate gain
Fuel Poverty
· In March 2009 over 5 million households across the UK were living in fuel poverty
· Lowered incomes and higher fuel prices will increase fuel poverty again this winter, and the governments lack of action will leave the most vulnerable to suffer the consequences. Ordinary workers didn’t refuse to have a national program of free home insulation, not to invest in sustainable energy rather than having coal and oil burning power stations, so why are people being forced to choose between financial poverty or fuel poverty?
A fight for stable jobs and a just economy is a fight for the environment
· The environmental crisis and the coming cuts onslaught have their roots in the fundamentals of the way our society is organized; capitalism.
· The organisation of society under the interests of profit can only allow for the pursuit of more profit – consideration of the interests of the planet or of human need comes second, if at all.
· The owners, bosses and shareholders are a minority of people wielding enormous power over the rest of our lives. Not only do their colossal battles at the top of the economy cause frequent crisis and devastation for the rest of us, but they also wreak havoc with the natural world.
· Capitalist control over the world's land, resources and factories is causing untold devastation to the ecology of the planet, and the affects will hit the workers hardest
Resistance to the Cuts starts in the Workplace
· As workers we have the power to change the economy; to take control of our workplaces and secure our livelihoods, to re-organize society not for profit but for social need and a healthy environment
· Let’s take back our workplaces
- Occupy for democratic workers control of our livelihoods
- Operate them for social need not profit
- Organize them to meet the threats of climate change and peak oil
- Create a solidarity economy supporting each other’s workplaces as was done with the occupied Argentinean co-operatives in the 1990’s
lets look to tactics of the French strikers now who have shut down the oil depots and refineries..
..to the Lucas Aerospace workers who produced a plan for turning their arms factory to the production of socially useful goods..
.. and the 1970’s The New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation who refused to allow the building of socially and environmentally destructive projects
..we can do this too
lets build a unified movement to..
Occupy, Create and Resist for a Workers-led ‘Just Transition’
For more information see http://workersclimateaction.wordpress.com
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confronting the assetco scabs
Later that day around 200 firefighters confronted the scabs who were returning 27 engines to the fire training station at Southwark whilst police tried to push them back and threatened them with arrest.