London:
Socialist Party members visited HMP Holloway to offer their support to POA members who were meeting to discuss their response to yesterday’s announcement that HMP Birmingham would be privatised.
The POA is organising a strict work-to-rule across the country in response to this privatisation and although prison officers are legally denied the right to strike, POA members were not ruling out any options.
The idea of coordinating action with other unions was well supported.
Swansea:
There was an angry mood amongst prison officers and other staff this morning at Swansea prison after yesterday’s privatisation announcement by Ken Clarke and the realisation that the Con-Dems will be looking for other potential targets.
POA members said they are ‘ready for strike action – if they get away with this then we will be next’. The deputy prison governor told visiting Socialist Party members that it wasn’t ‘helpful’ for them to be distributing material outside the prison entrance, as privatisation is a ‘sensitive issue’.
You bet your life it is! That’s why POA members will be preparing action to stop the Con-Dem privatisation in its tracks.
