NSSN lobby of the TUC 2019, photo Mary Finch, photo Mary Finch

NSSN lobby of the TUC 2019, photo Mary Finch, photo Mary Finch   (Click to enlarge: opens in new window)

This year the Trades Union Congress (TUC) conference meets at a crucial time. Millions of workers face further attacks looming in the autumn – the end of furlough, a £20 per week cut in Universal Credit, and now an energy price hike. The bosses are unleashing an offensive to make us pay for the crisis. Already workers at British Gas, Go North West buses, Goodlord, and many others have taken strike action against the bosses’ ‘fire-and-rehire’, with many winning important victories.

Health workers have spearheaded a grassroots campaign to reject the insulting NHS pay offer, and other public sector workers face a pay freeze.

There is no organisation better placed than the TUC to coordinate the struggles of these workers. That’s why Socialist Party and National Shop Stewards Network (NSSN) activists are campaigning for the TUC, and its Public Services Liaison Group to convene a meeting of the public sector unions and to name a date for a national demonstration to fight for pay justice and help to prepare for coordinated public sector strike action.

The NSSN meets for a virtual rally on the eve of the online TUC conference on Sunday 12 September. The rally will bring together union reps from these ongoing disputes, fighting trade union leaders, workers, young people, and other trade union activists to discuss a strategy to take on the Tories and the bosses. But also to put pressure on, or give confidence to, TUC delegates to take the steps needed to coordinate workers’ action.