The Socialist 9 February 2011

Big Society? Big Con!

Big society? ... big con!

Fight the cuts - whoever makes them

Ditch the library cuts

Hands off our forests!

Campaigners reject maternity unit cuts

Billy Bragg helps raise Exeter Anti-Cuts funds

Institute of Directors, bosses' organisation, bares its teeth at unions

Solidarity with the Egyptian masses

Uprising in Egypt - Socialist Party public meetings

EDL racists terrorise Luton

Fast news

National education shutdown needed

PCS young members' network conference

Yorkshire: organising the student movement

Demonstrating against cuts in Grimsby

Volunteering 'plaster' for unemployment

Egypt: Is revolution derailed?

Economic crisis in Greece: Immigrants made scapegoats

Solidarity messages needed for US prison reform activist

Southampton campaigners march in defence of jobs and services

Jobs massacre at Pfizer

Striking against health job cuts

Scottish Unison members oppose leadership's sell-out

Leicester Unison members rally against all cuts

March against the job losses in Greenwich

Unite anti-cuts conference

Woody Sez

Life on the autistic spectrum

PDFs for this issue




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Jobs massacre at Pfizer

On 1 February it was announced that 2,400 workers at Pfizer's research and development facility in Sandwich, Kent, will be made redundant after the company's decision to close the site completely.

The government claims that the private sector can provide enough employment to compensate for savage cuts in public sector spending. David Cameron commented only a month ago that companies like Pfizer will spearhead job creation.

The closure is being explained largely by Pfizer's decisions to cut costs due to the pressure of drugs coming 'off patent'. This will affect profits as Pfizer's monopoly on producing those drugs comes to an end and generic production can begin.

The patents system allows prices to be maintained at exorbitant levels. When the patents run out it becomes an excuse to reduce the workforce.

Pfizer is the main employer in the town and surrounding area. It is predicted the loss of Pfizer will result in an estimated total of 4,000 jobs lost from contractors and other employers.

This profit driven decision does not reflect a lack of demand for the development of new drugs or research. Generic production will reduce the cost of many drugs and make them more accessible to ordinary people, but that should not take place at the cost of workers' jobs.

The Socialist Party calls for nationalisation of the Sandwich facility. This call must be linked to the demand for the nationalisation of the pharmaceutical industry as a whole, to be run under democratic workers' and patients' representatives' control.