| The Socialist 13 April 2001 |
Dinners For Them…Dole For The Workers |
| Dinners For Them…Dole For The Workers |
Dinners For Them…
THE BOSSES have cottoned on that an economic recession is threatening and they're telling us we all have to make sacrifices. But these sacrifices are not all equal. …Dole For The Workers AS THE fat cats gorge themselves, working-class people are suffering the bosses' slash and burn policies designed to maintain their profit margins. |
| Teachers: Reject The Deal - Step Up The Action | Teacher shortage: Labour offers nothing: DELEGATES WERE heading to this Easter's annual conference of the National Union of Teachers (NUT) looking to step up the campaign to expose teacher shortages. But the union leaders are set to do a pitiful deal to call off action before conference even has the chance to discuss it. Linda Taaffe, NUT national executive (personal capacity) |
| Football trial fiasco will stoke anger about racism |
What we think: THE HIGH-PROFILE collapse of the prosecution of Leeds
United footballers, combined with other developments, has the potential to
further inflame anger about racism in British society.
Regardless of the fiasco surrounding the Sunday Mirror's contempt of court, the lasting debate will now centre on the judge's criticism and rejection of parts of the Macpherson Report over the definition of what is a racially motivated crime. |
| Knowsley Unison - Council Concedes Historic 35-Hours For All Deal |
UNISON MEMBERS in Knowsley council on Merseyside have won a major victory in
defending their 35-hour working week and extending it within the council
workforce.
After a total of six days strike action between 1 February and 8 March by UNISON members, the council conceded the union demands. |
| Socialists Gear Up For Election Campaign |
THE DELAY in the general election campaign gives us longer to talk to
working - class people and convince them to vote socialist. Already our
election campaigns have got off to a good start. In Wakefield the campaign
started with a bang last week with seven activities over five days.
Hear The Socialist Party Candidates At General Election Public Meetings |
| Bush's China Syndrome |
AFTER A few months in power US President George W Bush, despite presenting
himself as a caring conservative during the presidential elections, is
pursuing a more hardline right-wing ideology both at home and abroad.
Within weeks of taking office the dysfunctional president was threatening to 'kick the butts' of anyone who didn't respect US power; bombing Iraq and threatening a more hawkish, isolationist foreign policy. |
| Construction: British Industry's Killing Fields |
IN THE year 1998-99 there were 66 workers' deaths in construction, 78 in
1999-2000 and this year there have been an average ten deaths per month. But
the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) only prosecute in a tiny number of
cases, with many of the fines imposed less than £1,000. Against this
terrible background, The Socialist looks at the killing fields of Britain's
construction industry.
Workers Protest As Safety Conference Is Downgraded |
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THE BOSSES have cottoned on that an economic recession is threatening and they're telling us we all have to make sacrifices. But these sacrifices are not all equal.
High fliers at Credit Suisse First Boston have been ordered to keep the cost of celebration dinners down to a mere £7,000 after clinching deals. That's their idea of a cut back. Other City fat cats have been told to fly economy class or stop using taxis.
All this is necessary, they say as 20,000-30,000 jobs are threatened in the City of London because of the US and Japanese economic troubles.
But it won't be the fat cats who lose their jobs, although they may whine as they reluctantly trim and tuck their extravagant expense accounts for a short while.
AS THE fat cats gorge themselves, working-class people are suffering the bosses' slash and burn policies designed to maintain their profit margins.
Multinational telecoms company Marconi made £1 billion profit last year and claims it has a £6 billion order book. But it's announced that 3,000 jobs will be cut from its worldwide workforce.
Over 1,200 are at Marconi's UK factories in Liverpool and Coventry - 1,000 jobs could go at Coventry.
Coventry Socialist Party councillors were angered at the news and are urging a fightback.
Councillor Rob Windsor said: "The whole of Coventry should give Marconi a clear message that we will not accept yet another blow to manufacturing."
Socialist group leader, Councillor Dave Nellist added: "Four months ago, Marconi boasted of plans to build a new headquarters in Coventry, which they said would create 2,000 jobs.
"Now they're stabbing Coventry in the back with mass redundancies. Just like Rolls Royce, also with a huge order book, which is threatening 1,300 job losses in Coventry.
"Shareholders' interests are put well before those of the employees who actually make the company what it is."
Rob Windsor concluded: "If privately owned companies like Marconi and Rolls Royce can't guarantee jobs, particularly after the huge profits they've made, then their days of remaining in private ownership should be numbered.
"Just getting angry is not enough, we need to get organised."
Where workers have been organised and fought back, like in Knowsley (see The Socialist newspaper page 4), then they can win and turn back the bosses' offensive.
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DELEGATES WERE heading to this Easter's annual conference of the National Union of Teachers (NUT) looking to step up the campaign to expose teacher shortages. But the union leaders are set to do a pitiful deal to call off action before conference even has the chance to discuss it.
Once again, the leaders are letting down teachers and education. Teachers are getting out of the classroom because they have had enough of government policies, intolerable workload and divisive Performance-Related Pay. But the union leaders bear their responsibility for failing to defend classroom teachers.
In response to growing teacher shortages, the unions organised limited "cover-to-contract" action. Although this only sanctioned refusal to cover for long-term absences and vacant posts, ballots were won with overwhelming majorities. Action had spread to over 50 areas in the last few weeks.
Yet, instead of defending members, union leaders seem more interested in saving Labour's embarrassment by making sure classes aren't being sent home during a general election campaign.
First, they hoped the employers' offer of paying teachers £20 to cover for vacant posts could be presented as a victory. But this was angrily rejected. Now the flimsy offer of a government investigation into teacher workload is their excuse to suspend action.
Teachers don't need an inquiry to know what's wrong with our pay and conditions. Yet, in return, the union leaders intend to tell members to go back to covering for absences on top of their existing workload.
The McCrone inquiry in Scotland has resulted in the suggestion of a 35-hour working week for teachers including guaranteed marking and preparation time. Many Scottish trade unionists doubt these promises will be delivered. But, in England and Wales, the government has no intention of even making such an offer.
The supposedly "independent" School Teachers' Review Body (STRB) has already recommended a workload inquiry but has ruled out in advance any limit on overall working time or guarantees on non-contact time. The employers have rejected any prospect of a 35-hour week out of hand.
Far from calling it off, the unions should be escalating action so that the government is forced to meet our demands for a £2,000 pay rise and 20% non-contact time for every teacher.
We should extend our action on limiting workload, including boycotting the government's dangerous performance management scheme. Above all, we need a ballot for a one-day strike, co-ordinated across the country, so that teachers can take united action together. Such a day of action, asking parents to support our rallies and demonstrations, would make the government and employers think again.
The Socialist 13 April 2001 [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist] [Join] For all the news subscribe to The Socialist
THE HIGH-PROFILE collapse of the prosecution of Leeds United footballers, combined with other developments, has the potential to further inflame anger about racism in British society.
Regardless of the fiasco surrounding the Sunday Mirror's contempt of court, the lasting debate will now centre on the judge's criticism and rejection of parts of the Macpherson Report over the definition of what is a racially motivated crime.
It should be noted that there have been other high-profile cases, such as the Birmingham Six, Winston Silcott and suspected IRA members to name a few, where tabloid newspapers have shown blatant contempt of court proceedings and incurred only a nominal fine as the 'prejudiced' case continued.
The defendants denied any racial motive to the alleged attacks in the Leeds footballers' trial and the prosecution concurred. However, the father of the victim of the attacks disagreed. Not surprising given the other high-profile cases where the police initially denied race being an issue - the murder of Stephen Lawrence being the most notorious example.
But the way the trial collapsed, combined with the reactionary judge's remarks, now make it less likely that proper scrutiny of any alleged racial dimension will actually take place.
TWENTY YEARS on from the Brixton riots in 1981, which led to other inner-city riots and the Scarman Report and two years since the Macpherson Report, racism is still a massive and highly charged issue in British society.
Scarman's report 20 years ago expressed horror at the prejudice and deprivation experienced by ethnic communities in Britain's inner cities. It supposedly aimed to show how to overcome those problems.
But, today poverty and prejudice in many inner-city areas remains. Prejudice is perhaps not as open as it was 20 years ago but in many ways it has shown signs of increasing - especially with establishment politicians whipping up racism on asylum seekers.
A climate has developed where Tory MPs make openly racist speeches, which go unchallenged by the party leadership, and where the fascists, who are still extremely small, feel confident to organise demonstrations in racially sensitive areas every week (see below and page 5).
The Metropolitan Police admits there are racists in their ranks and promises to tackle it, but new incidences of police racism occur with monotonous regularity. Football clubs regularly have anti-racist initiatives but racism still persists in the game.
Despite these 'official' anti-racist initiatives, the position experienced by the majority of Britain's ethnic minority communities has not improved significantly in 20 years.
The reason these initiatives have not succeeded is because they attempt to tackle racism as a moral issue. They don't tackle the fact that racism has always been used by the capitalist class to justify policies and maintain their power through divide-and-rule tactics.
Neither have these official reports tackled the racist suspicion and prejudice which stem from rising unemployment, cutbacks in public housing and services and a general deterioration in working-class living conditions.
Combined with the leaders of the labour movement doing little to effectively tackle racism, then a situation develops where a 'soft' racism can harden. Certainly, Socialist Party campaigners have encountered working-class people who agree with many of our ideas but then say what about asylum seekers etc?
It is not asylum seekers or Black and Asian people who are shutting down the factories or making cuts in public spending: it is big business and the Labour government and councils who are so keen to do the bidding of big business.
Labour representatives often speak at anti-fascist protests yet vote through measures such as the privatisation of council housing and cutbacks the next day.
It's Labour politicians' support for the capitalist 'market' and their failure to improve working-class people's conditions which enables the fascists to seek support in working-class areas.
There is enormous wealth and productive capacity in Britain that could be used to overcome the many problems working-class people face, which can foster racist prejudice. But to eliminate the scourge of racism, society has to be organised under working-class control and management in a democratic socialist economy.
The Socialist 13 April 2001 [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist] [Join] For all the news subscribe to The Socialist
UNISON MEMBERS in Knowsley council on Merseyside have won a major victory in defending their 35-hour working week and extending it within the council workforce.
After a total of six days strike action between 1 February and 8 March by UNISON members, the council conceded the union demands.
A special general meeting of Knowsley UNISON on 9 April voted unanimously to accept the agreement negotiated between UNISON and Knowsley council.
Branch Secretary Roger Bannister said: "We fought this campaign on two slogans, 'Defend the 35-hour week' and '35-hours for all', this agreement achieves both of these objectives!
"This agreement will undoubtedly set a target for other local government branches to aim for over the coming period, provided that members are well organised, and have a fighting leadership."
THE COUNCIL had served notice on the 35-hour week agreement from 1 February, using the Local Government Single Status agreement as the pretext.
They attempted to isolate 35-hour week members by denying them promotion and recruiting only to 37-hour contracts; so that in a relatively short period of time the 35-hour week would become a thing of the past in Knowsley.
But this strategy took no account of the anger of UNISON members at this attack, nor of their determination to fight back. A strike ballot of over 1,300 members voted by 78.6% to take action. By the time the first one-day strike took place union recruitment had swelled the ranks of strikers to over 1,400.
Throughout the dispute, management miscalculated. The Chief Executive wrote to all members over the Christmas holiday urging them to vote "NO" in the ballot, (the ballot result shows how few of them actually paid any attention to this advice!)
Then management appeared to assume that the strike would not happen. So, when UNISON offered to suspend the action for the 56 days allowed under law if they suspended their 37-hour proposals the council refused, only offering a partial concession.
The branch annual general meeting took place shortly after the first strike, and management circulated scurrilous literature urging members to attend and vote to end the strike.
In the event a massive turnout voted to endorse the actions of the strike committee and to escalate the dispute.
Salary advice notes then arrived three days early, in an attempt to create an anti-strike mood by showing how much pay had been deducted. Even this stunt backfired for two reasons.
Firstly, the deductions net of Income Tax and National Insurance were not as great as some members feared and, secondly, because it was such an obvious stunt. (Many members had never received their notes on time before and had been told that it was impossible for this to be done!)
THE STRIKES were held over one or two-day periods, determined by the strike committee, and they closed virtually the whole council.
Members of TGWU, GMB, UCATT, AEU and NUT unions refused to cross UNISON picket lines.
The last day strike was as solid and effective as the first. Eventually, management agreed to UNISON's proposal to attend talks with a "third party" facilitator.
These talks lasted four and a half days, and the agreement which was hammered out has to be seen as a major victory to UNISON.
This is because whilst it allows the council to recruit to 37-hour contracts, it protects the current 35-hour week and commits the council to putting the entire Single Status workforce onto a 35-hour week in two stages over the next seven years.
The Socialist 13 April 2001 [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist] [Join] For all the news subscribe to The Socialist
THE DELAY in the general election campaign gives us longer to talk to working - class people and convince them to vote socialist. Already our election campaigns have got off to a good start. In Wakefield the campaign started with a bang last week with seven activities over five days.
We held a train station stall, four town centre stalls and two canvasses, and raised a grand total of £149.35 fighting fund, and 173 copies of The Socialist were sold. We got three new subscriptions for The Socialist, and met four people who are considering joining the Socialist Party.
In Deptford our rally to launch the election was attended by over 50 people, including 20 new people, £220 was raised for the fighting fund.
In Walthamstow more than 60 copies of The Socialist have been sold on election activities each weekend since the campaign began. Our candidate, Simon Donovan, is very well known as a local activist.
"Is that Simon Donovan's party, then of course I'm voting for you" has been the immediate response of around 10% of the people that we talk to.
As well as winning votes, the election also represents an opportunity to increase Socialist Party membership. The lack of difference between all the major national parties means that it's likely this general election will not grip people's imagination. Nonetheless, more people will be thinking about politics than usual.
There will be thousands of people who start to think about socialist ideas for the first time in the course of this election. We have to try and reach them and convince them to join our party.
One sixth-form college student in Southampton joined the party on Thursday evening and on Friday morning signed up three other students to the party.
All Socialist Party members should take the same approach, and ask everyone they know if they want to join the party.
If you need campaigning material or want to help with our election campaign contact Hannah on 020 8988 8767 or go to Contact or Join.
The following material is being made available:
Posters on NHS, education cuts, transport, and sleaze.
Vote Socialist poster blanks
Socialist Party Election manifestos. (see right)
Join the Socialist Party leaflet.
Environment leaflet.
Leaflet on why black and Asian people should vote Socialist.
Vote Socialist stickers.
Young Socialist Action leaflet and poster.
Weds 2 May 7.30 pm, Lightwaves Leisure Centre, Wakefield.
Hear: Mick Griffiths.
Details Tel: 01924 365795.
Bootle
Thur 26 April 7.30 pm, Netherton Park Community Association Centre, Chester Avenue, Bootle.
Hear: Pete Glover.
Details Tel: 0151 922 6077.
Birmingham Northfield
Thur 26 April 7.30 pm, Frankley Community High School (buses 61 and 49).
Hear: Clive Walder.
Details Tel: 07771 931185.
Coventry South and Coventry North East
Tues 1 May 7.30 pm, Coventry Working Men's Club (old Builder's Club), Whitefriars Coventry.
Hear: Rob Windsor, Dave Nellist and guest speaker.
Details Tel: 024 76 525 394
or 024 7655 5620.
Leicester
Mon 30 April 7.30 pm, Leicester Adult Education College, Wellington Street.
Hear: Steve Score
Stevenage
Tues 1 May 7.30 pm, Bedwell Community Centre, Bedwell Crescent, Stevenage.
Hear: Steve Glennon.
Details Tel: 020 8988 8777.
Walthamstow
Tues 1 May 7.30 pm, William Morris Centre, Greenleaf Rd, Walthamstow.
Hear: Simon Donovan.
Details Tel: 020 8988 8777.
Lewisham Deptford
Wed 25 April 7.30 pm, Deptford Albany, Douglas Way SE8.
Hear: Sam Dias, Ian Page.
Details Tel: 020 8988 8777.
Southampton Itchen
Tues 24 April 7.30 pm, St Mark's Institute, Victoria Rd, Woolston, Southampton, Full Access.
Hear: Dave Nellist, Gavin Marsh Details Tel: 023 8049 5266.
Bristol East
Thur 26 April 7.30 pm, St George's Secondary School, Russell Town Avenue, St. George.
Hear: Andy Pryor
Details Tel: 0117 965 6591.
The Socialist 13 April 2001 [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist] [Join] For all the news subscribe to The Socialist
AFTER A few months in power US President George W Bush, despite presenting himself as a caring conservative during the presidential elections, is pursuing a more hardline right-wing ideology both at home and abroad.
Within weeks of taking office the dysfunctional president was threatening to 'kick the butts' of anyone who didn't respect US power; bombing Iraq and threatening a more hawkish, isolationist foreign policy.
However, during the recent stand-off over the US spy plane, cooler heads are now prevailing over Bush's hawkish behaviour. They realise an escalation of the dispute would have far more serious consequences than Bush's previous 'playground spats'.
The spy plane incident occurs at a particularly delicate time in US-Sino relations. Tensions are rising over a proposed new missile defence system which the US is considering providing to Taiwan. This followed Bill Clinton's administration accusing China of stealing sensitive US nuclear missile plans.
Also, China's leaders attacked the US's decision to proceed with the National Missile Defence system ('son of Star Wars') - effectively a new offensive nuclear weapon.
And there are rifts emerging inside the Chinese leadership about how to currently respond to the US.
This tense climate has left US secretary of state Colin Powell and other US officials trying strenuously and so far unsuccessfully to smooth things over with incensed Chinese authorities.
IN THE last decade, while political tensions between China and the US have continued, trade and commercial restrictions have thawed as the US has tried to rapidly bring China into the capitalist fold.
The US ruling class wasn't bothered by the crushing of the 'democracy movement' in the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
And US capitalism isn't going to allow new human rights abuses to interfere with exploiting labour and markets in China as capitalist relations re-emerge in that country. (Nor will British capitalism, as witnessed by Tony Blair's use of heavy handed police tactics to silence protests by Chinese dissidents during President Jiang Zemin's visit to Britain in 1999.)
The US capitalist class want to tie China into the legal and political framework of the World Trade Organisation. This will allow greater market penetration by US capitalism and protection of its property rights.
The Chinese leadership want to grab a bigger slice of world markets, by exploiting its huge reserves of cheap labour as it abandons its bureaucratically planned heavy industries and collectivised agriculture.
While it's likely the current diplomatic spat between the two nuclear powers won't have any lasting effect on trade, the tensions created by the current stand-off could lead to future exchanges, not just of words, but fire power.
The Socialist 13 April 2001 [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist] [Join] For all the news subscribe to The Socialist
IN THE year 1998-99 there were 66 workers' deaths in construction, 78 in 1999-2000 and this year there have been an average ten deaths per month. But the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) only prosecute in a tiny number of cases, with many of the fines imposed less than £1,000. Against this terrible background, The Socialist looks at the killing fields of Britain's construction industry.
FOUR PEOPLE died in the Hatfield train crash, paying the price for deregulation and privatisation. Building workers are dying through a similar hodge-podge of contractors and subcontractors. Big business sacrifices everything, including workers' lives, for profit.
Over the last 20 years the construction industry has changed. Large contractors now employ very few workers directly, they rely on a vast network of small sub-contractors.
In 1997, just over 136,000 building workers were employed by firms with less than 13 workers, whilst the largest firms only employed 44,500. Yet the big firms dominate the trade.
As well as a massive rise in sub-contracting, 'self-employed' workers account for about half the building workforce. Yet while the vast majority of these workers may be 'self-employed' under the tax system they are really part of the workforce without employment rights.
By this method, the contractors are able to avoid responsibility for national insurance, sick and holiday pay, redundancy pay etc.
This, in turn has had a big effect on training within the industry. Apprenticeships, for example, fell from nearly 9,000 in 1985 to 2,500 in 1994. This means there is a chronic shortage of skills, as well as direct safety training.
The confusion and communication breakdowns between the many different sub-contractors working together can mean unsafe working practices, exacerbated if incentive payments are used.
All these factors, combined with a low level of trade union organisation on many sites provide a lethal cocktail of risks for workers in the industry.
THE GOVERNMENT is the biggest client in the construction industry, responsible for 40% of all work. They could play a vital role in setting and insisting on safety standards, yet there are only 128 safety inspectors to cover over half a million sites in England, Scotland and Wales.
Regulations introduced by New Labour in 1999 have actually encouraged the use of 'self-employment' in the building industry.
Workers who become safety reps are routinely sacked for carrying out their duties. For example, building union UCATT is currently dealing with a case in west London where a worker was sacked for calling an ambulance after a fellow worker fell 12 feet.
One of UCATT's main demands is for roving safety reps, which the HSE is piloting at the moment. The pilot scheme in agriculture however ran into problems when the National Farmers Union adopted what amounted to a "get off my land" approach. Similarly, the Construction Confederation - representing 5,000 contractors, recently voted against the idea.
As Sean Prophet argues, at the very least any effective scheme must be backed up by laws which allow safety reps access to the sites in the first place and give them powers to stop dangerous jobs.
Similarly, charges of corporate manslaughter will only be really effective if the directors face prison for a workers' death, rather than just the site foreman.
Deputy prime minister John Prescott called a safety conference in February this year. It was originally to be a full day event with the major players in the industry; contractors, clients, trade unions and families of victims. But it was down-graded to a three-hour session, closed to ordinary building workers and bereaved relatives.
The trade unions and other safety campaigners lobbied the event. Sean Prophet explains what happened:
"On the day of the summit, round the corner in a church which was being renovated, a wall had collapsed on a bloke and killed him. So whilst the summit was on, he was still under the ground.
"The union had a mountain of hardhats outside the summit showing how many building workers had died that year. So blokes came round from the church job and laid another hard hat on the mound.
"Also at the safety summit most of the bereaved relatives weren't allowed in. 600 people were there, mostly employers' representatives. So we got a big group of builders around the relatives because they said they wanted to go in.
"Two loads of old Bill were called - yet some of the people there were 80 years old.
"Eventually the police had to go inside and tell the Health and Safety Executive to let the relatives in. Which was about the only useful thing which came out of the day."
"I THINK what we have to get across is the carnage there is on sites. We have to get it across to the government and the health and safety executive...
"I think the only time that real action will come out of this is when building workers themselves decide they have had enough.
"One of the things we have been calling for is roving safety reps and greater protection for safety reps on site. I know from bitter experience that when you get safety reps on site you are usually counting in days the time they are left on site before they're dismissed, moved or harassed or whatever.
"I haven't really noticed this Labour government has been any better than the previous Tory government on health and safety.
"The Health and Safety Executive still appear to be underfunded, they don't appear to be on sites, they don't appear to be taking proactive measures on sites.
"The only way you will get across to construction companies that they have to improve health and safety is you when start to hit the people who have overall responsibility through corporate manslaughter."
Ron McKay, UCATT official for Essex and London South East Region
"IT'S GOING to build up where we have hundreds and thousands of workers saying: 'No more, we're not standing for any more deaths on sites.' That's the main thing that will change things.
"The government see that there has been a change in attitude and people expect more regarding safety. People do not expect a 60% increase in deaths and serious injuries on sites.
"So publicising deaths and injuries on sites puts the politicians on the spot and they don't like that.
"We've had to struggle with this Labour government all the way to get a ban on asbestos for example. Blair was going to do a deal with the Canadian prime minister, which is the biggest exporter of asbestos. It was a right fight. We had many demonstrations, including national demonstrations and yet we had all these promises which they haven't carried out.
"Also, they should have implemented corporate manslaughter laws by now. There's a pilot study going on about roving safety reps, which is very important. But building employers are resisting it like mad. But we have got to make a breakthrough.
"If I had two minutes with Tony Blair the most important things I would tell him to address are: make changes to say that killing people at work is a criminal offence; and I'd ask him why aren't you working as fast in stopping workers being killed at work as you are about petty thefts and other crime."
Tony O' Brien, Construction Safety Campaign.
"MY WORST experience in the construction industry was when a friend of mine was killed. The company didn't even supply a pair of steps for him. One day he stepped on a transformer and fell down a hole.
"He was in hospital and his mother had to come over from Ireland to turn his life-support machine off.
"Workers are getting more organised and groups like the Joint Sites Committee (JSC) have been absolutely brilliant, there's no doubt about that. They've brought things to a head in many areas on this issue.
"Unions in the construction industry survive with the management's say-so. I think sometimes the unions rattle the sabre but I'm afraid that's all it is.
"I've never heard of any union in this industry say they are going to close a site down because of safety. All they do is talk about so-called partnerships. You need people like the JSC and the Construction Safety Campaign to really hammer the point home.
"I would like to see company bosses jailed if they neglect safety. Also I would like to see unions get off their backsides and stand up for their members and not for the bosses. I was on a job at the Royal Opera House and they sacked 30 people to get rid of me as a safety rep off the job.
"Safety reps should have the law on their side and they should be guaranteed that they can have the right to stop a job without being victimised."
Jim, an electrician and AEEU member.
All construction workers to be employed directly by the main contractors, with proper employment and trade union rights.
Legal protection and full training for safety reps, giving them the power to shut unsafe jobs down.
For company directors to face imprisonment if a worker is killed on one of their sites.
Nationalisation of the building and construction industry under democratic workers' control and management.
Nationalisation of the land. Democratically agreed plans should be drawn up to provide good quality housing and other facilities for all, without ruining the environment.
ROVING SAFETY reps are a great idea. The HSE is running a pilot scheme but they've had to go to the construction employers and ask them to help them run it. The employers have said: 'We're not interested'.
They've already changed the name to 'workers' safety advisers'. And to get the pilot scheme running they're going to have to find employers who are already 'union-friendly'.
So sites which are already organised will have people coming in probably forewarned, to do a quick inspection on the basis of: 'Don't upset them too much so everyone will say what a great idea it was'.
In the building game at the moment everyone has to have a safety inspection periodically anyway. Small ten-bob subbies obviously haven't got their own safety officers. So what they do is employ freelance ones to come in and have a look.
Of course there's an inevitable financial conflict of interest. If you're being paid to visit the site and you give them a really bad report, they won't employ you any more. They'll go and find someone who will tell them there's nothing wrong.
The only thing they'll ever pull anyone on is not wearing their hard hat or not having their boots on. Something which isn't going to cost them any money. As soon as there's any money implications, they won't book it.
So when the roving safety reps come in are we going to be the same as them? Go and see the employer and be polite?
There's no point inspecting a 'union-friendly' employers' site. The places where you really want to go are the rotten horrible places where they won't let the union in.
In places like Sweden and Australia they have roving safety reps who can issue notices themselves to stop the job and fix the dangerous parts of the site. The problem we have is the level of union organisation on many sites.
Fifteen years ago, people in the trade union movement calling for corporate manslaughter to be used against employers were considered to be 'mad'. The Construction Safety Campaign, Hazards and the JSC have campaigned on this and it became national union policy. Last year the TUC adopted it as policy.
In 1999, 80 people were given prison sentences for cruelty to animals but no-one was sent to prison for murdering a worker. But if anyone does get sent down, it will be someone like site foremen who are only allowed to get away with disregarding the rules because the company employs them to do that.
We want one of the managing directors in prison. But of course what Labour are introducing isn't going to be that at all. There's talk about banning them from being a director - what a big deal.
The deputy prime minister turns up at the construction safety summit with all the employers there and you expect him to lay down the law about all these deaths. But all we got was: "We need a bit more training and then we can improve".
The main demand should be for everyone to be taken on the cards. You can have as much education as you want, roving safety reps and corporate manslaughter but it's no good as long as the entire industry is so deregulated.
20 years ago if you walked past a Balfour Beatty building site, the vast majority of people there would be working on the cards for Balfour Beatty. Nowadays a big building site might have 600-700 people working on it with Balfour Beatty on the hoarding but they will only be employing 10-15 people. They will all be the managers. Everything else will be sub-contracted out.
As soon as work is subcontracted, people work for a price, rather than being paid the daily rate. So the way work is organised is asking for people to cut corners.
The quest for profit by the speculators, major contractors and cowboy subbies has meant health and safety has gone out the window.
The Socialist 13 April 2001 [Top] [Home] [News] [The Socialist] [Join] For all the news subscribe to The SocialistWorkers Memorial Day 28 April.
March and rally organised by the rail union RMT,
supported by the Construction Safety Campaign.
Assemble 10.30am Grant Road, Clapham Junction, London SW11.
March to rally at Clapham rail crash memorial site, Spencer Park.
Further information from the London Hazards Centre: www.lhc.org.uk