Matt
Wrack was elected general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) in
May 2005 as a left-wing challenger to the incumbent general secretary
Andy Gilchrist.That's the warning served on the government last week by the leaders of eleven public-sector unions representing over a million workers. They announced they are to begin a strike ballot on 20 February for a series of strikes, possibly starting on 28 March.
Glenn Kelly, a member of UNISON's national executive council said:
"Those of us in the local government pension scheme are already the Cinderellas of public-sector pensions and we have no intention of being turned into mice!
"The government is in league with the Tory employers. They are proposing to push ahead and attack our pensions, despite the fact that our union has shown that legislative change has already been made that allows employers to save enough to cover any shortfall, leave our scheme as it is and pay for improvements.
"At the UNISON local government national executive (representing 900,000 members) my proposal for a programme of escalating strike action and for the TUC to name the day for a national pension demo was won. This will help to cut across any attempts to divide workers in the public sector from those in the private-sector."
UNISON's ballot is part of a joint campaign by nine unions representing workers in the local government and firefighters' pension schemes. One of the key unions involved in this is the Fire Brigades Union (FBU).
Matt Wrack, FBU general secretary, told the socialist:
"Our conference policy is if there are any proposed detrimental changes to our pension scheme our conference will be recalled to discuss it. Our recall conference will meet in Southport on 16 February.
"A resolution is now being discussed by our members that would launch a ballot for strike action. It has given FBU members extra confidence that other workers in local government are also preparing to ballot for strike action."
What We Think
AFTER THE government's climbdown in signing the framework agreement on public-sector pensions, the socialist warned that this was just one battle in the pensions war but that the war itself was far from over.
The recent closure or threatened closure of final-salary schemes in the private sector has raised the temperature about possible strike action to protect these pension schemes. And, the temperature is rising in the public sector as well as over one and a half million workers in local government and the fire service have begun balloting to stop any detriment to their schemes.
After the government climbdown in October 2005, union leaders such as Dave Prentis of UNISON thought that the deal achieved which protected the rights of existing scheme members in health, education and the civil service would be automatically extended to local government and fire service workers.
Indeed, they thought that being affiliated to the Labour Party would bring them extra 'influence' in securing such a deal. However, the bosses and Gordon Brown have had other ideas.
Stung by the bosses' reaction to the framework agreement, the government appears to be pushing local government employers - led by the Tories - into taking a harder line. The government and local government employers are also mindful of the local government elections taking place in May and want to keep any increases in council tax to a minimum.
It seems that they are more determined to face down any threat of strike action by over a million workers. The unions conducting the struggle on their members' behalf have a responsibility to show equal determination.
It is positive that all the unions involved in this new round of pensions' action are looking to co-ordinate strike dates with a view to starting action at the end of March. It's also possible that other unions - such as the PCS - could also be taking action around the same time on other issues.
The government could be faced with a generalised strike wave in the public sector. At the same time private-sector workers could be taking action on pensions and other issues.
But, behind the scenes some local government union leaders believe they only have until the end of February to use their 'influence' to win a deal from the government or "the game's up". And they have raised the possibility of going for selective action, bringing out smaller groups of workers, to continue the strike action rather than calling further days of generalised strike action.
It is believed this is to avoid embarrassing New Labour in the run-up to the local elections. The idea of paying for small group guerrilla action as a way to win a dispute can possibly appear attractive. But as a tactic it has not been proven to be successful anywhere since 1989.
Instead of it being an auxiliary tactic to action by all members it soon becomes the only tactic, leaving the mass of the members passive in the dispute and relying on small groups on full take-home pay. This then runs the risk of money dictating the dispute not what is required.
The success in forcing government climbdowns in March and October 2005 was down to the threat of co-ordinated mass strike action. That is what is needed again.
And, with the prospect of other groups of workers taking action at the same time on other issues then it would be entirely possible for another pensions defeat to be inflicted on the government. However, union members in local government need to ensure that their leadership remain firm and do not dissipate any action.
Matt
Wrack was elected general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) in
May 2005 as a left-wing challenger to the incumbent general secretary
Andy Gilchrist.Matt Wrack speaks at the Socialist Party's Socialism 2005
"WE'VE BEEN discussing pensions for about a year with the government. They are proposing a new scheme for new entrants from April 2006 and changes to the existing scheme for new members. We also have 1,500 members in the local government scheme - emergency fire control centre workers - who face the same changes as other local government workers.
We have reached the stage where the negotiations haven't made any real progress and the FBU executive council therefore considered what action to take. Our conference policy is that if there are any proposed detrimental changes to our pension scheme our conference will be recalled to discuss it. Our recall conference meets in Southport on 16 February.
A resolution is now being discussed by FBU members that would launch a ballot for strike action. It has given FBU members extra confidence that other workers in local government are also preparing to ballot for strike action.
Undoubtedly, it's important that, if at all possible, we co-ordinate our campaign with other trade unions, that is clearly part of our policy and part of the resolution being put to our members. Just announcing a ballot has given a boost to our members at meetings I have attended recently.
Our other national priority is the threat of regional fire control centres. Each individual fire service now has its own control centre but now the government plans to regionalise them. This will mean a loss of jobs and for the public it will mean a poorer service. We are now involved in a national campaign to try and stop it (see article below).
We have put counter-proposals which are being discussed in the service at present.
Also, at a local level there is an ongoing threat to jobs and fire cover, which is tied up in all the jargon about 'modernisation' of the fire service. What this means is attempts to get rid of fire engines and close fire stations or a combination of the two.
For example, there are attempts being made to reduce cover at night-time. On the one hand this means the public get a worse service with less firefighters and engines available. For our members it means the employers come along and try to change or impose shifts - making for unworkable and unfriendly shifts.
Our union went through a big struggle a few years ago and clearly a number of employers and chief fire officers think the union is on the back foot and beaten. But, since 2003, we've already had two local brigades voting for strike action in Suffolk and the West Midlands, which in terms of following a national dispute is quite quick.
We've also had a number of other ballots for action short of a strike. So the FBU is still there; still representing its members.
We now have a number of priorities. We need to re-engage with the members and develop strategies to deal with the new environment. There has been a certain shift away from national bargaining to localised bargaining on certain issues, such as shifts for example. So we need to make sure we've got training in place for local officials to take these matters up.
We also need to pay attention to developing a new layer of activists within the FBU for the future. The FBU has always been at the heart of the fire service and we want to ensure it remains so.
I still see myself as an activist but one who happens to be in the general secretary's position. Obviously, it gives you a different outlook and you do see some things from a different perspective.
One thing I always make clear to people is that they need to make sure they have well-organised branches and committees to make sure whoever is in the leadership has the structures that can control that leadership - whether it's me or anyone else.
I don't take the full salary of the FBU general secretary; though I don't make a great deal of it. I've opened up a separate account and a portion of my wages goes into a campaign fund which gives donations to labour movement causes, campaigns and strikes.
I eventually chose to publicise this because the Sun were about to launch an attack on me concerning certain 'internal FBU battles' related to finance. Whilst some other members still don't quite understand why I do it a lot of members think it's a welcome change to see a general secretary not taking the full amount.
ONLY 3% of fire service personnel surveyed support government plans to shut emergency fire controls and move to a regional-only service according to a new poll.
Firefighters, officers, managers and control staff do not believe the new controls will improve either firefighter safety or the response to incidents.
The poll asked three key questions about the plans to close every fire brigade's emergency fire control and move to regional control rooms.
Asked if they thought regional control rooms would improve firefighters' safety, 95% said NO and only 2% said YES.
When further asked if they believed such a move will improve fire service response to incidents, 95% said NO and 3% said YES.
And finally, when asked if they thought the government should proceed with its plan to move to regional controls, 94% said NO.
Matt Wrack said:
"The poll findings are a body blow for these plans. In some regions you could not fill a phonebox with those who support them.
"Those who really know the fire service and what these proposals mean have given them a massive thumbs down. Those who will have to deal with the consequences of these proposals clearly have little confidence in them."
BOB CROW'S call for a national shop stewards' movement seemed to many at the conference to indicate this was his priority for the period ahead.
There is no doubt that there is a crying need for active trade unionists and shop stewards in every workplace. But to realise that goal we need to look back at how the shop stewards' organisations were built in the past, particularly the high point of the stewards' movement in the 1960s and 70s, rather than believe we can conjure up such a movement now.
Without a clear perspective about the need for shop stewards to have their own political voice is to condemn a new generation to fight with one hand tied behind their backs.
Every day, workers feel the brutal attacks on their conditions and standards of living and want to do something about it. In the average workplace, bosses brutally strive to get the most they can out of their workers whilst paying them the least possible. This is a major contributor to the huge rise in workplace stress today.
Millions of workers would, given the chance, join a trade union. No doubt the new layer of shop stewards that Bob Crow hopes for would come from their ranks. But this will not happen automatically. Indeed the fastest-growing unions, PCS and RMT, with the biggest increase in shop stewards have socialists playing the leading role. The role of workers' leaders at all levels but particularly at national level, is crucial.
If these leaders remain silent on how a new party could be built, or counter-pose the idea of the need for a new shop stewards' movement, as Bob Crow does, this could encourage the idea that militant trade unionism is enough.
THE SITUATION in the 1970s was very different. There were 13 million workers in unions, compared to 6.7 million today. And there were 29 million days lost in strikes in 1979, for example, compared to less than one million last year.
The reasons for falling union membership and the corresponding decline in mass collective strike action have been explained many times in Socialist Party publications. They are a combination of de-industrialisation of much of the British economy and the existence of draconian anti-union laws, which trade union leaders have refused to challenge.
Also, the collapse of the planned economies in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe ideologically demoralised or disoriented many trade union activists. Lastly, throughout the 1990s, right-wing trade union leaders clamped down on strikes and entered into partnership agreements and single-union, no-strike deals with the bosses.
Yet, even in the 1970s, the development of the shop stewards' movements and industrial struggle was not in a straight line. The slow building up of working-class confidence in the workplaces over a whole period led to these developments.
The growing confidence of workers to take strike action was a direct result of full employment and a gradual increase in living standards. This flowed from the massive development of the British economy in the post-war years, which healed the scars of the inter-war period, of mass unemployment and industrial defeats.
By the 1960s, the capitalist class had become increasingly alarmed by the growth of unofficial strikes and industrial action led by shop stewards in industries like docks, car manufacturing and engineering.
In the 1970s the Labour government commissioned an investigation into the power of the shop stewards' movement and the unions as a whole.
The Bullock Report revealed the widespread strength of trade union organisation on the shopfloor. Its leading layers were the shop stewards. Bullock revealed there were something like 350,000 shop stewards in the workplaces.
Then, workplaces mainly meant factories. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, service-sector and public-sector workers were only just beginning to get organised in trade unions.
NUPE for example (which later became part of UNISON) had about 60,000 members in 1970. By the end of the decade its membership had grown to 600,000.
IT WOULD be wrong to visualise the shop stewards' movement as a fully coherent national force. But in certain industries and companies the movement became better organised than others.
In the car industry, for example, because of the intense nature of production line assembly work, strikes against the bosses were frequent and in the words of one report: "99% of them were unofficial" - not sanctioned by the official unions but organised by the shop stewards from below.
And there wasn't one level of political understanding amongst the shop stewards. The very fact of becoming involved in union activity led to many stewards drawing political conclusions.
During the 1960s, for example, the Communist Party had a certain level of support amongst shop stewards and played a key role in mobilising the shop stewards' movement in the engineering industry, car industry, docks and certain areas of the mining industry.
In the mining industry, there had been 20 years or more of gradual decline. It was the reaction against Ted Heath's Tory government that propelled Left leaders like Arthur Scargill into prominence during the miners' strikes of 1972 and 1974.
The Communist Party mainly developed its influence through the Liaison Committee for the Defence of Trade Unions. (LCDTU).
In the late 1960s, the LCDTU organised action against the Wilson Labour government's attempts to introduce anti-trade union laws.
At that time, the Labour Party as a whole opposed Wilson's anti-union ideas. Eventually, the combined pressure of the unions and the Labour Party led to Wilson's own cabinet revolting against this first attempt to bind the unions with new laws.
The LCDTU continued to mobilise the shop stewards' movement against the Heath government when he came to power in 1970 and tried to introduce anti-union laws through the Industrial Relations Act.
And the LCDTU, through a network of CP shop stewards, organised an unofficial national one-day strike in October 1970 against the Industrial Relations Act. Over 250,000 workers downed tools.
THROUGH THE struggles of the 1960s and 1970s, the link between the political and the industrial struggle was clear. This reflected the material base of workers' struggles at that time and the existence of large well-organised factories.
Today, neither the large-scale factories or that level of trade union organisation exists to the same extent - though there is a relatively high level of trade union organisation in the public sector.
Workers can be propelled to become activists and shop stewards by a rapacious capitalist class driving workers into defensive struggles. But to continually motivate these same activists requires the need to change society along socialist lines to be raised.
To rebuild anything like a mass shop stewards' movement nowadays requires the best workers' leaders to argue and campaign for the building of a mass political alternative to New Labour. The big unions' links to the Labour Party today are an impediment to conducting an effective struggle for their members.
A new mass party of the working class would attract the best of the new generation of trade union activists and a new layer of workers. This would feed into the creation of a mass shop stewards' movement. In the current political situation one task has to go hand in hand with the other. To pretend otherwise is, unfortunately, to throw sand into the eyes of today's trade union activists.
Campaign for new workers' party
I am writing on behalf of UNISON Waltham Forest Health Branch based at Whipps Cross Hospital east London, to congratulate your union on the excellent discussion conference the RMT hosted on the question of the crisis of political representation facing working class people in England and Wales.
I attended this following a discussion at our last Branch Committee at which frustration was expressed at the continued support given to New Labour by UNISON, to the tune of £3 million annually, in the context of the ongoing assault on public services including the rapid privatisation/marketisation of our National Health Service.
You were absolutely correct when you commented that trade unions could only go so far in advancing the interests of ordinary people and that they cannot change society and that it was the rail unions a century ago that helped lead the campaign to set up the original Labour Party.
Once again, potentially, the conference you called may come to be seen as historically significant in the development of a new independent and inclusive formation based on the trade unions, that would and could at last give the confidence our class so desperately needs to change society and assist in the task of rebuilding union structures, bringing in the young to union activity and establishing the mass shop stewards movement you rightly said was needed.
In conclusion, thanks again for an excellent and overwhelmingly well supported initiative, I understand over a hundred had to be turned away due to lack of space and can I ask if the RMT will be taking any other initiatives? I understand there is a conference planned on 19th March.
Yours Fraternally
Len Hockey, Joint Branch Secretary
9 February 7:30pm
West London Trade Union Club, Acton High Street.
23 February 7.30pm
320 Brixton Road, Brixton, London SW9
Speakers include: Ian Page, Lewisham Socialist
Party councillor, Rob MacDonald, President
Lambeth College students' union.
23 February 7:30pm
William Morris Centre, Walthamstow.
25 February 2pm
Goldsmiths College, Room MB2106, Lewisham Way.
1 March 7.30pm
Charterhouse-in-Southwark, 40 Tabard Street (near Borough tube).
4 February 1pm
SADACCA Club, The Wicker, Sheffield.
16 February 7:30pm
Unitarian Church, High Street, Swansea.
Speakers include: Gloria Tanner (PCS), Rob Williams (TGWU convenor, Visteon), Sarah Mayo (PCS) - all speakers in personal capacity.
For more information on the Campaign for a New Workers' Party, go to www.cnwp.org.uk
email [email protected] or write to CNWP, PO Box 858, London E11 1YG.
Socialist
Party pamphlet now online: Join the campaign for a new workers' Party
£1 or £2.50 for 5. Cheques made payable to Socialist Publications at PO Box 24697, London, E11 1YD. Buy the pamphlet (no bulk discount online)
Welsh Blairite MP Alun Michael claimed in a recent newspaper article that "as the 21st century starts to mature, Wales faces a quite remarkable period of good fortune and opportunity".
Such an assessment beggars belief as the NHS in Wales enters "intensive care" according to the Welsh consultants committee and the last remaining manufacturing jobs come under threat in Wales. Even Michael was forced to concede in his article that Wales has the biggest coverage of population needing Objective One European funding (for the poorest areas) in Western Europe - 66%.
But the mood at the Socialist Party Wales annual conference was one of great confidence and opportunity that the forces of socialism are on the march after the difficult period of the 1990s.
Peter Taaffe, general secretary of the Socialist Party of England and Wales, opened the conference with a devastating criticism of the crisis facing British capitalism and society. Already there are signs of a slowdown in the British economy and crises in all three main capitalist parties. He pointed to the emerging movement of workers to defend their wages and conditions against further attacks and the huge potential support for a new mass workers' party.
Contributions from Socialist Party members on union national executives, Bernard Roome (CWU) and Andrew Price (NATFHE), demonstrated how the presence of just one or two socialist fighters on union leading bodies could take the struggle forward. Rob Williams, shop stewards convenor at the Visteon factory in Swansea explained how workers are fighting to defend jobs in the car industry.
Katrine Williams, PCS Wales secretary for the Department of Works and Pensions, reported that the civil servants' strike against government cutbacks in jobs and services had been hugely successful across Wales.
Mark Evans from Carmarthen UNISON showed how Labour supporters leading union branches now remain silent in supporting the Labour Party, such is the opposition from rank and file members. Geoff Jones, from Powys explained how the Blairite cuts in incapacity benefit were reminiscent of the attacks on the unemployed in South Wales in the 1930s with the hated means test and possibly could lead to similar mass protests.
And there were equally inspiring contributions from newer members of the party, young workers organising unions amongst low-paid retail workers. Lyndon Carroll explained how two Socialist Party members were trying to organise the shop workers' union, USDAW, in the Cardiff store of a leading retail chain. Already socialist ideas were gaining an echo amongst workers in what was a union bastion of pro-Blair right wingers.
A magnificent £560 was raised in the finance appeal. The conference ended with determination to turn the support for our ideas into a 40% growth in Socialist Party Wales membership this year.
ON 31 January, it was announced that the 100th British soldier had been killed in the war and occupation of Iraq. This government is risking the lives of young soldiers in order to help fight US imperialism's battles to control this vital oil-rich area of the world.
Blair and his government have persistently lied about this deadly war and occupation. The week before, New Labour Defence Secretary John Reid had sent 3,300 British troops to the Helmand province, a stronghold of drugs barons and Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan, Bush and Blair's other main theatre of war.
They are part of a new 9,000-strong Nato multinational brigade taking over from US forces in south-east Afghanistan. The deployment will last three years at a financial cost of £1 billion to Britain's Treasury. But it's the 100 dead British soldiers and the tens of thousands of Iraqi civilian dead who are paying the highest price for Blair's bowing and scraping to George Bush.
The Stop the War Coalition is organising protests at the occupation's deadly toll in all major towns and cities in Britain. The Socialist Party says:
IN RECENT years the Blair government has introduced more and more authoritarian laws that threaten civil liberties. In the year up to April 2005 nearly 36,000 people were stopped and searched under the 2001 anti-terror laws' emergency powers.
Every year since the Act came into force, the numbers have soared from 10,200 people being stopped in 2001 to 35,776 searches of vehicles and people recorded last year under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act. And these figures don't include people stopped and searched in the months following the July bombings in London.
The Terrorism Act, when sanctioned by a senior officer, allows police to stop and search people even without suspicion. This is seen as a throwback to the notorious "sus" laws of the 1970s.
The laws give police sweeping powers to stop people even if they have no grounds to suspect them of a crime. The powers are said to be essential to disrupt terrorist activity but they have already have been used against non-violent protesters, such as those arrested under the Terrorism Act for protesting at an international arms fair in London in 2003.
Now people are being stopped at the rate of nearly 100 a day, including 82-year-old Walter Wolfgang, stopped for barracking Jack Straw at last year's Labour Party conference. Despite the huge number of people stopped, only 455 were arrested.
They have also been used to whip up prejudice against minorities such as the Muslim community. In 2003-04, more than one in five of those stopped were black or Asian. Reports suggest a huge increase in the number of black and Asian people being stopped since the London bomb attacks.
Trade unionists, socialists, civil rights campaigners and all who need to protest at some stage against governments and big business need to keep fighting all these repressive laws.
YET ANOTHER political earthquake has struck the Middle East. Hamas, standing for the first time in national elections, achieved a massive landslide victory in Gaza and the West Bank with 76 seats out of 132 in Parliament.
Fatah which used to be the majority in the Palestinian Authority (PA) only won 43. Hamas won seats in all the major towns and cities even in places like Bethlehem where there is a large Christian population, and in Nablus which was historically a stronghold for Fatah.
This was a crushing defeat for Fatah and particularly for the weak PA President Mohammed Abbas. But it is also a severe blow and a huge surprise for both the Israeli ruling class and Western imperialist powers and their plans for an imposed 'peace settlement'.
The win is a major embarrassment for the Bush administration's campaign to 'democratise' the Middle East. Many of the corrupt Arab elite are also undoubtedly scurrying around their marble-lined, air-conditioned palaces wringing their hands at what this victory means for their already shaky grip on power.
The landslide has been accompanied by a torrent of propaganda in the Western press about "terrorists" winning at the ballot box. But the hypocrisy of the imperialist powers knows no limits. They have supported the Israeli capitalist state for decades. This regime has presided over one of the most brutal military occupations in the world using methods which can only be described as state terrorism.
HAMAS'S VICTORY was in the main a huge protest vote against the corrupt Fatah leadership at the head of the Palestinian Authority (PA) while the Palestinian majority slowly starved or were crushed under Israeli military occupation.
But the election's significance is not just confined to the Gaza and West Bank. It could have profound consequences for the region. Given the huge tensions in the Middle East and its vital geo-political importance to US and other imperialist powers, this election victory could contribute - along with other events - to abrupt changes in international relations.
The Middle East is characterised by various degrees of grinding poverty and social collapse, made worse by the implementation of at least 15 years of 'neo-liberal' policies. The collapse in living standards in the Middle East has in part exacerbated already burgeoning problems around the national question and the struggle of national minorities for their rights, particularly the Palestinians. The failure of imperialism's 'peace process' has actually complicated the situation further and led to more tension on this issue.
The huge pressure for change from the working class and the poor peasantry has been reflected, even if in a distorted way, in many of the political developments that have shaken the region over the last few months. The election of Hamas belongs to this category.
It is true that political support for Hamas' ideas has risen amongst some layers of the poorest and most downtrodden in the vacuum that exists in the West Bank and Gaza. However, rather than signifying overwhelming support for Hamas' Islamist policies, the extent of the election victory mainly reflects the anger against Fatah.
One Palestinian woman, summed up the mood of many Palestinians, saying "For 10 years Fatah haven't done anything for us. We have to try Hamas. We can't say if they will be better but we have to try." (The Guardian, London, 24 January 2006)
HAMAS ORIENTATED its entire campaign around this mood. Running under the name "Change and Reform", Hamas highlighted the rampant corruption of the PA and promised a clean-up.
Other organisations seen as being to the left of Fatah, such as the Peoples Party (Communist Party) the DFLP (Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine) and the PFLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine) stood candidates. However, historically the leadership of these organisations made serious mistakes by tail-ending the nationalist approach of Fatah which sought a solution within the confines of capitalism. Experience has shown this is impossible.
These organisations went into retreat in the 1990s because of the confusion and demoralisation caused by the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 and they never recovered. In these elections they never really distinguished themselves from other parties critical of Fatah and as a result they only won five seats.
When Hamas arose in early 1988 just after the beginning of the first Intifada, the Israeli state encouraged its development. These tactics were used by the Israelis to undermine Fatah, which then had majority support in the Occupied Territories, and prevent opposition to it taking a 'left' character.
Hamas' aims, expressed in its founding charter in 1988, are to create an Islamist state on the territory encompassed by Gaza, the West Bank and Israel. Such a state would be ruled under Shariah law. This would be an oppressive reactionary society which would be hostile to an independent movement of the working class in defence of its rights and socialist ideas. It would also mean the widespread oppression of women. It would represent a move backwards socially and politically.
The preamble to the Hamas Charter of 1988 states: "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it." This is taken to mean a call for the destruction of the state of Israel.
Hamas opposed the Oslo 'peace agreement' and also boycotted the first elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council (Parliament).
While Hamas has organised elements of mass protests during the second Intifada, these have always been strictly controlled from above and only used intermittently. One of its tactics has been suicide bombings.
The Committee for a Workers' International (CWI) opposes these tactics because it drives sections of Israeli Jewish workers into the arms of the government. This is because they feel they have no option but to support the government's oppressive measures as the only available measure to try to protect their security.
This does not mean the CWI has a pacifist approach. We believe in a mass, democratic struggle of the Palestinian working class and poor peasantry to end the occupation. Such a movement will have to be armed to defend itself against the attacks by the IDF and others but those bearing arms should be accountable to the working class as a whole.
Even before the death of Yasser Arafat in 2004, the PA leadership was in reality paralysed and unable to control events on the ground. Arafat was forced to announce the holding of local elections. They had long campaigned for this, eager to consolidate its growing base at local level. Hamas made sweeping gains in these elections last year which prepared the way for its election victory last week.
Whatever they said publicly, Hamas' military and political leaders knew that a campaign of suicide bombings on its own would not defeat the Israeli ruling class. There was also a certain war-weariness amongst the Palestinian masses. This forced Hamas to look at the possibility of entering the political process. Undoubtedly, the entrance of Hezbollah in Lebanon into Parliament had an effect. Abbas and the PA insisted on Hamas agreeing to a ceasefire in March 2005 as a precondition to standing in elections. Abbas took this gamble because he saw it as the only way in which Hamas might be forced to disarm its militias, something demanded by the imperialist powers and the Israeli state.
Hamas did not want to win an outright majority in these elections. They would rather not have taken the responsibility of ruling Gaza and the West Bank. This is why they spent the first day after the election appealing to Fatah to join them in government. They are also attempting to find a non-Hamas MP to be prime minister.
A new and very unstable situation has opened up in Gaza and the West Bank. The Israeli government has said that there will be no negotiations with the PA because Hamas will be part of the government.
Of course, the Israeli regime has not mentioned that it was prepared to have contacts with local councils run by Hamas and facilitate through prison officials, negotiations between Hamas prisoners with other Arab countries as well as their leadership. It has threatened not to pass over VAT receipts or customs duties to the PA as has been the case previously.
The Bush administration has said that it will review all aid to the Palestinian Authority since Hamas is on its list of banned terrorist organisations. At the moment it donates $234 million a year. But its first act was to plead with Abbas to stay on as President. Undoubtedly, one calculation behind this request was to have a non-Hamas member who could act as an intermediary without it appearing as if they are negotiating with 'terrorists'.
The EU (as opposed to its member states) also donates $280 million a year to the PA. It is less likely they will cut back or halt funding. But the imperialist powers face a very difficult decision.
On 31 January, the PA will need $100 million, at least, to pay the wages of its 135,000 employees. Without these wages an explosion of mass protest could occur. At the moment there is no money and the PA is bankrupt.
There will be huge pressure on imperialism to find some solution to this potential disaster - either through channelling the money via Abbas, the president, or perhaps with some of the Arab regimes stepping in with emergency funding.
In Nablus, demonstrations have taken place by Fatah members calling for the resignation of the entire leadership of the organisation. Members of Fatah militias have announced an "internal intifada" to drive out the old corrupt leadership.
As far as Hamas is concerned, it is very unlikely that it will renounce its call for the destruction of Israel or disarm immediately. This would cause huge divisions. Hamas leaders in the run-up to the elections did make the point that in return for a withdrawal by Israel to the 1967 borders, they would be prepared to announce a 10-15 year ceasefire.
What Hamas may do is formally set up a separate political party from its armed militias in an attempt to overcome this problem. Hamas may be looking at the example of Sinn Fein and the IRA as an example to emulate.
However, in Northern Ireland the 'peace process' has foundered. It is three years since the local power-sharing government collapsed. The level of violence which characterised the Troubles may have died down in terms of its intensity but the sectarian polarisation between Protestant and Catholic communities is as great if not greater, than before. None of the fundamental problems have been solved.
But in the Middle East the tension, huge social and economic problems, and the geo-strategic importance of the region mean that rather than a reduction in violence, a new period of instability and clashes could develop.
It still remains to be seen whether Hamas can successfully take control of the PA security forces. Many of them are Fatah members. Partly this depends on Hamas' ability to keep on paying their wages. But there is no doubt that the possibility of episodes of violence, verging on open civil war is more likely. There have already been armed clashes between Hamas and Fatah supporters.
The Hamas victory will destabilise the capitalist and feudal elite across the region. Egypt has already seen an increased vote for the Muslim Brotherhood in the most recent elections.
In Saudi Arabia, more hardline Islamist candidates won ground in the limited elections that took place last year. There is already a growth in support for reactionary Islamist organisations, including al-Qa'ida amongst the population.
Jordan already has a majority of Palestinians living there and the Muslim Brotherhood is active as an opposition group. In all of these countries, these forces will be strengthened and the ruling elite weakened by Hamas's victory.
The election results in Gaza and the West Bank will also increase fears that Iran, which has refused to bend to imperialism's pressure to close down its civilian nuclear programme, is strengthening its influence in the region, because of its historic links with Hamas.
The political situation in Israel will also become more complicated for a time. Fears amongst Israeli Jews have been whipped up as a result of the Hamas victory. Soon after the election of Hamas, Israel's Defence Minister, Mofaz, implied in a media interview, that Hamas leaders should not think they were exempt from assassination attempts by the IDF following their election victory.
Ahead of Israel's general election, and with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon incapacitated following a stroke, Likud's Benjamin Netanyahu is keen to attack Sharon's policy of unilaterally withdrawing Israeli settlers from Gaza as 'playing into the hands of terrorists'.
Hamas will now have to deliver the goods - and quickly - to the Palestinian people. While in power in local councils, although it cleaned up the worst examples of corruption, it also carried out cuts in spending and sold off local council land and property, ostensibly to clear debts which involved paying "non-Islamic" interest payments.
Experience will show the Palestinian masses that only a break with capitalism and feudalism can begin to offer a way out of the disaster they face. But disappointment with Hamas rule will not be, in and of itself, enough to ensure this conclusion is drawn. A clear socialist alternative as part of an independent working class movement will have to be constructed for that to happen. The CWI will, along with the most conscious activists, struggle to make that objective a reality.
This would require a struggle to end mass unemployment and poverty. But this would only be the beginning - a movement to end the political and economic oppression by Israeli, Palestinian and Arab capitalism needs to be built which can put in its place a democratically planned socialist economy to transform the living standards of the region.
Such a struggle would also include the right of Palestinians to self-determination, including an independent state with full rights for all minorities. This would mean the fight for a socialist Palestine and a socialist Israel, as part of a voluntary socialist confederation of the Middle East.
FILM DIRECTOR Steven Spielberg should get a gold medal for turning a pivotal event in world history into a tedious morality play.
Munich attempts to cover Mossad's (the Israeli intelligence agency) revenge of the killing of eleven Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games by the Palestinian terrorist group Black September.* They had taken them hostage to demand the release of Palestinian political prisoners in Israel.
Two athletes were killed in the Olympic village, the other nine were massacred in a botched rescue attempt by the West German police.
Following this outrage, Israeli 'Labour' prime Minister Golda Meir secretly set up 'Committee X' - whose Mossad agents went after Palestinian targets under the codename: 'Operation Wrath of God'.
After every 'hit' the widows of the murdered Israeli athletes were telephoned by the Committee. But many relatives wanted legal justice not extra-judicial executions.
But this action was more than revenge. After all, within days of the Munich atrocity Israeli jets blasted Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon and Syria killing over 200 people and injuring many.
Operation Wrath was in fact quickly expanded into a campaign to suppress exiled Palestinian nationalists and militants throughout Western Europe and the Middle East.
It was aimed at disrupting the various factions of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO); a 'war on terror' that persists to this day with the Israeli state's policy of targeted assassinations of Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The US and western European governments turned a blind eye to Mossad's activities but when it assassinated the wrong man in the Norwegian town of Lillehammer the game was up. The Norwegian police caught five members of the hit squad and the subsequent court case exposed Mossad's murderous campaign.
Committee X was officially wound up. However, Mossad continued its bloody campaign, finally killing Black September's main organiser, Ali Hassan Salameh, in 1979.
Although Operation Wrath was over it had singularly failed to end the armed struggle for Palestinian national and social liberation. And, notwithstanding the false methods of Black September and others, the ongoing Israeli state repression has fuelled a decade-long Palestinian Intifada. Indeed, the fundamental Palestinian national question underlying the bloody events of Munich and its aftermath remains unresolved.
Given the subject matter, Munich is a huge disappointment. Instead of producing a drama-documentary of events, Spielberg manages a limp morality play which becomes very tiresome.
In his account the Mossad agents are depicted as decent, home-loving guys, new to this deadly game. And who, after several 'hits', are wracked with moral doubts. However, there is little evidence for this version of events. In fact, the Mossad members interviewed in the recently shown Channel 4 TV documentary Munich: Mossad's Revenge expressed no qualms about their role.
On the contrary, Ehud Barak (later becoming Israel's Prime Minister and a Middle East 'peacemaker') - who was part of the commando team in the 1973 'Beirut bloodbath' - was positively gung-ho about his role.
Moreover, Spielberg plays fast and loose with the facts to contrive his view of Mossad agents being 'reluctant killers'.
For example, when the PLO representative in Italy, Wael 'Aadel Zwaiter, is assassinated (despite his reported opposition to terrorist methods) the Mossad agents in Munich are shown nervously hesitating before pulling their gun triggers. They then run from the victim's apartment block in a panic. In fact, the Mossad agents coolly followed the target, shooting him dead before the victim could react, and then they casually strolled out of the building.
Later, to try and explain the Palestinian national cause, Spielberg concocts a ludicrous scene where Mossad agents and Palestinian guerrillas end up sharing a 'safe house' in Athens but without incident!
If readers want an insightful account of Munich, see the excellent documentary One Day in September.
*The group Black September named itself after the civil war in September 1970 between the Palestinian Fedayeen and the Jordanian monarchy when, following a failed uprising, thousands of Palestinians were killed and driven out of Jordan.
HOW CAN the NHS generate more patient treatments and income when it has to close beds and lay off staff to pay the PFI charge, or face closure?
Well, according to Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt it can become part of the vision of future foundation hospitals and become "like Debenhams", where one shop is home to a range of branded boutiques, or where you can visit your doctor at the local supermarket. This week, to deflect from a growing crisis in hospital funding, Patricia Hewitt announced several new NHS initiatives in a Government White Paper including:
- Commercial operators setting up surgeries.
- Doctors to open surgeries within supermarkets.
- Voluntary groups to run surgeries.
- Longer GP opening hours.
Blair has admitted that where you live largely affects your well-being, but claims that if commercial operators set up surgeries it will mean "greater fairness and social justice". Yet, rises in NHS spending are to stop in 2008, less than two years away. Patricia Hewitt does not believe the government will "need to put money in... but we need new providers.".
With these new White Paper initiatives, NHS resources are to go from hospitals to fund GP Health Centres over the next ten years, many likely to be run by private firms, despite the continued closure of smaller 'unproductive' hospitals and community hospitals. 45 million outpatient appointments are to be farmed out to local health centres, comparable to German 'polyclinics'.
However, expensive additional administration will then be switched to GPs who are unwilling, or unable, to manage their own budgets now.
A District Nurse working in Yorkshire told the socialist that these changes will be implemented by top management and no decisions will be taken on the ground by her colleagues, both doctors and nurses.
If Patricia Hewitt's aim behind her current proposed reforms is to clear hospitals of minor and unnecessary admissions, it is not a new vision, rather one that has been repeated many times over the past 30 years. Whilst people may welcome more access to local clinics, the difference now is the involvement of the private sector. Wherever the private sector has become involved in running public services it has been a disaster, from health to education to railways.
Now we are expected to believe that surgeries in shops run by the private sector, combined with cutbacks and closures in hospitals is going to lead to better healthcare.
This year 31 of the 46 NHS trusts in three counties in South East England are in deficit, including Sussex and Surrey (£41m), Royal West Sussex (£17m) and Swale Primary Care Trust (£7.8m). The BBC has said the response to problems in the region's NHS will be to sack 300 staff.
Perhaps these people will be re-employed in their local supermarkets where they can stack the shelves of the increased amounts of products from the pharmaceutical companies whose presence is also to be encouraged to expand by these initiatives.
ON 21 January, over 2,000 people marched in Kendal against any attempt to reduce NHS services at Westmorland General Hospital.
As NHS worker, and organiser of the march and the local NHS SOS campaign, Socialist Party member ANDREW BILLSON-PAGE, wrote in a letter to the local Westmorland Gazette, it showed "how important our hospital is to its community and in particular, the esteem in which local mental health services are held."
In the week when health secretary Patricia Hewitt said that NHS Trusts were expected to make a profit, Andrew Billson-Page attacked the way these 'free market' ideas were ruining the health service.
"From the outset we determined our priorities would be to engage with the public, to inform the public and to empower the public to reclaim their NHS. The NHS is, after all, the property of the people - not of the government, managers or accountants.
"The Hospital Trust I previously worked for in Greenock is facing possible deficits of £100 million, while hospitals in other urban areas are also in heavy deficit. This is a problem on a national scale.
"The root causes of the problem are: the market economy within the NHS, increasing fragmentation, the financially absurd idea that public services can be run as private enterprises, the power of the pharmaceutical industry (which takes 47% of the national NHS budget) and steady privatisation combined with the target-driven culture of New Labour.
"They have undermined both the long-term future and the ethos of the NHS. At the heart of the matter is an issue of public funding not operating in the public interest. This is too important an issue to be left to politicians.
"The solutions lie in channelling community opposition constructively and challenging the economic philosophy that puts finances before patients. Unlike New Labour, the NHS SOS campaign will always put people first and over the next few months will be putting together a new, radical and viable alternative to the cuts threatened by our health bosses."
The Socialist Party has been calling for all the anti-health service cuts campaigns like NHS-SOS to be linked together to fight to defend the NHS.
Hackney Socialist Party (SP) and International Socialist Resistance (ISR) are campaigning against the threat to turn local secondary schools into city academies.
Hackney's education has been run by a private body, the Learning Trust since 2002. The trust has overseen a dramatic reduction in resources and facilities for schools in Hackney, with the latest attack being the planned closure of Homerton boys' school. It has already set up one city academy in the borough and plans to have four more, as part of the government target of 60 across London.
From the SP and ISR working with local parents, students and teachers, there are action groups in both schools, backed up by the NUT branches. These groups regularly meet together as a Hands off Hackney Schools group.
We have had two big and very lively demonstrations marching from both schools to the Learning Trust to protest outside board meetings. We have had three deputations to the council, spoken in the public sections of trust board meetings (at one the pupils refused to leave so the trust board left instead) and organised public meetings.
The campaign quickly forced the trust to back off on its academy plans for Haggerston girls' school, although they are now trying to turn it into a mixed-sex school, possibly as a stage towards establishing it as an academy. In the build-up to the demonstrations ISR leafleted schools, everyday at some points, and made banners, placards, leaflets. We were outside the schools on the mornings of the protest days to remind pupils to take part later in the day.
On 24 January, 200 angry parents, pupils, teachers, councillors and governors argued that Homerton School should remain open, at a public meeting called by the government's Schools Adjudicator.
One teacher spoke of how some boys were stopped from coming into the meeting despite it being a public meeting. The highlight of the meeting was the five Homerton pupils who did get to speak about their opposition to the proposals.
The next steps in the campaign are sending written objections to the Haggerston proposals and a Hands off Hackney Schools education rally on 8 February, funded by the local NUT branch, where the new attacks being made in the government's education White Paper will be discussed and where we will be planning what to do next.
As an ISR and Socialist Party member I know that these attacks on education will not disappear. They may be postponed but the council and the government will try again in the future. That is why I will be encouraging as many pupils at Haggerston and Homerton schools to come to ISR/Socialist Students conference on 4 March where they can discuss the socialist alternative - a society where education isn't run for a profit.
HUNDREDS OF students and staff joined Lambeth College Student Union's boycott of canteens on 26 January. In all four canteens only a handful of meals were bought. We believe that 95% of students and staff who normally use the canteen didn't do so on boycott day.
Management in both the college and canteen owners Scolarest now know how serious the students are and the power we can have when organised. After the boycott a student union delegation handed in a 1,400 strong petition calling for food at prices students can afford - a common comment from students was: "I boycott the canteen every day because I can't afford it."
Canteen issues affect most students. We complained to Scolarest and the college, then launched our petition, wrote articles in our magazine and researched Scolarest's record.
We then set the date for the boycott, held site rep meetings - involving up to 100 students in decision-making and planning - to recommend the boycott and prepare for the day.
Then we saturated the college sites with leaflets with facts and figures arguing the case for action. We contacted lecturers' union NATFHE, who gave us 100% solidarity then contacted the canteen staff and stressed the action was not against them but their national bosses. They fully understood; they are low-paid and poorly treated.
We are proud of the students' union we have built, but we have no sabbatical positions and many students had lessons during boycott times. We gave out thousands of leaflets and had a successful protest.
Already prices have started to fall. Next day Ribena was 5p cheaper and water 10p. We won't be bought off with just a few reductions. We want a not-for-profit canteen we can afford to eat in. We are meeting with other colleges and await a response from Scolarest after half term. We look forward to other FE student Unions building similar action.
As PCS general secretary MARK SERWOTKA told the London rally on 26 January:
"The strike has been the best-supported so far, and it's the third national strike in the DWP since 2001 - over a million days of strike action."
The two-day stoppage followed cuts of around 15,000 jobs in the DWP. As our reports show, these cuts not only threaten workers' jobs but are bringing services to the verge of collapse in many areas.
Mark Serwotka commented:
"Management and the government could have met our demands but they have a wider agenda for cuts and job losses. They want to make £1 billion of annual savings regardless. At present 67 DWP staff are forced to leave work each month because of sickness.
"We must put maximum pressure on the government. There should be meetings with members in every area and there will be a national meeting of reps on 11 February to discuss how to take the struggle forward.
"1.5 million workers in the local government pension scheme are being balloted for a strike on 28 March. We must link our dispute with this. But we aren't waiting for 28 March for the next DWP strike.
"If NIPSA (Northern Ireland public-sector union) votes for an all-out indefinite strike they may try to transfer DWP work from Belfast. We must be clear we haven't the staff to do our normal work anyway, let alone any transferred work."
SUPPORT FOR strike action was even higher than for the national strike against the cuts in November 2004. In Wrexham pickets nearly outnumbered the 38 staff who went into work in the benefit-processing centre of 400 staff.
Half of the 39 staff who went into work on the strike days in Pembroke Dock contact centre were brand new staff who had just started training last week. The JobCentre in the small coastal town of Cardigan had its first DWP picket line ever.
The issues of privatisation of support services, the threat of handing over the advisors and other frontline staff to the private 'new deal' provider in Bridgend RCT district and the latest threat of 'offshoring' has concentrated members' minds on the real battle we face.
Services to the public have already been badly hit in Wales with the loss of over 700 experienced staff but management's vision of the future is even worse. Strike action has increased members' confidence and determination to fight to maintain services and vital jobs in our communities.
AT THE huge Swansea Pension Centre, Roger Langley, PCS branch Secretary and Gloria Tanner, PCS branch organiser told Alec Thraves:
"Workers are angry at the job cuts and fear for the future. There is a lot of stress on our members.
"Management's attendance policy is used to disguise job cuts by dismissing people rather than give them redundancy packages and our members are left with more and more work with less staff.
"The last straw was the news that contact centres are going to be centralised with jobs going offshore to countries such as India. Claimants are the poorest section of society and most cannot even afford a phone to make their claims. Our members are determined to keep our jobs, conditions and a service that genuinely helps the most needy".
Gloria Tanner will be a platform speaker at the Swansea launch of the Campaign for a New Workers' Party on 16 February.
IN LEICESTER Paul Vizard, PCS Branch Chair of Yeoman Street pensions centre, and Regional PCS Chair of Leicester DWP said: "We have had brilliant support, about 90% on strike, despite the fact that this office is one they have said they are keeping.
"Even though a lot of people's jobs aren't at risk for the time being, members have supported the union. They know that no-one's job is safe in the long run and also that this is about defending the welfare state."
STRIKERS AT Totton DWP office in Southampton told Nick Chaffey and Will Schafer-Peek: "Not that long ago there were 1,000 staff in Hampshire processing claims, that's down to about 200 now with a computer system that doesn't work.
"We know what this is about, they're cramming people into our office with plans to close us down in a year or two and move everything out of the South-East.
"The service is horrendous for vulnerable people. We can't contact the call centres, let alone the public. We have staff here with 30 years experience being replaced by staff given four weeks' training."
Activists in the PCS met with UNISON members in Southampton recently to discuss developing links between public-sector workers to fight this government. Plans are underway to build a Public Sector Alliance in the area. Trade unionists from CWU also supported the picket line, annoying management.
AT WESTMINSTER JobCentre, Christine and Mark, PCS reps spoke to Mick Philipsz, (PCS assistant branch secretary, Department for Education and Skills):
Staff are being threatened with dismissal just for being sick. After only eight days off sick, they face a formal warning. It is a charter for management victimisation and bullying. This is exacerbated by the 'Red, Green, Amber' appraisal system that also threatens staff with disciplinary action.
Westminster's workforce has already been cut from 76 staff to around 50 with no recognition of the extra workload. JobCentre clients who apply for emergency loans now have to apply months in advance, defeating the whole idea of 'emergency'. Staff see the attack on employment as part of a much wider agenda.
The petition for a new mass workers' party received a favourable response.
PCS PICKETS told Sheffield Socialist Party members that privatisation and off-shoring were raising fears for the service. A claimant whose benefit had not arrived was advised to try the Salvation Army to get a food parcel. "Little did we know that the Sally Army could end up administering the entire Social Fund in a few years time!"
At the local rally there was support for mass picketing to enforce the overtime ban at week-ends. "The contact centre has been on emergency operations for months. Overtime is the only thing that keeps Sheffield district going." Others called for targeted action at contact and processing centres to supplement further national strikes, and for the jobs and services dispute to be extended throughout the civil service.
IN LINCOLN PCS pickets told us how government cuts meant that people in need were waiting up to six weeks for benefit payments to be processed, Mark Glasscoe reports. So the number of 'interim payments' - to people in need whose claims have yet to be approved - had increased massively.
Workers now deal with more interim payments in a month than they were previously getting in a year. If the claim is then not approved, for whatever reason, they have to pay the money back.
This particularly hit migrant and seasonal workers, a major part of Lincolnshire's local economy. Meanwhile management freeze recruitment whilst trying to implement the government's cuts programme and while Lincolnshire's unemployment figures were increasing!
ON THE picket line at Alfreton DWP office in Derbyshire, the steward Gary said that a regional manager from Nottingham was sent to keep the office open but all she could do was cancel appointments. When Gary asked if she'd be turning up next week to actually deal with claimants, there was a stony silence!
AT READING'S JobCentrePlus, PCS member Shaun McFadden confirmed that a dozen workers there had joined the union in the previous week. Senior managers seemed to think everything can be done using computers but people using the service expect to speak to qualified staff. This strike is primarily about saving a public service and is in everyone's interest.
Neil Adams
R0YAL MAIL claim to have gone from a crisis with record losses to a miracle turnaround almost overnight. The opening up of the markets, along with 'downstream access' (where other postal operators can put mail in the postal system for it to be delivered by Royal Mail for a fraction of the cost), has seen Royal Mail go on the offensive against postal workers. And from 1 January other postal operators can collect, sort and deliver any mail.
Royal Mail aim to cut £370 million by this April, with no regard to quality of service or postal workers' workloads. This can only be achieved by job losses, reducing full-time jobs to part-time hours, closing mail and distribution centres and attacking delivery workers.
Recently they have spent a huge amount of time studying the postal service in Holland, where there is a low-paid, part-time casual workforce.
Their longer-term view is even more frightening, with the aim of 40,000 job losses. And they are increasing our pension contributions to fund the pension deficit caused by the Royal Mail pension holiday, with the possibility of raising the retirement age from 60 to 65.
Their idea of 'total flexibility through self-motivated teams' seems to be only the start. They have other plans, such as moving from weekly to monthly pay and restructuring the pay package with 'winners' and 'losers'. There will be more automation, which will mean more job losses.
Scottish management have started the offensive by attempting to remove all nightshift workers from Dundee and Edinburgh and not filling vacant full-time duties but recruiting them at part-time hours. This has resulted in a ballot result of 5:1 in favour of industrial action in Dundee.
In Edinburgh we have seen management attempt to enforce changes in the Dell Delivery Office. This was first met with a ballot for industrial action in the Dell office, soon followed with the announcement that the Scotland No 2 branch were going to ballot the whole area for industrial action. They were not prepared to allow Royal Mail pick off their members one by one.
This forced management back round the table and a partial climbdown. It's clear this was only achieved through the threat of industrial action in the office concerned and the fact the whole branch was prepared to take strike action in defence of our terms and conditions. It's clear this is only an uneasy truce. Royal Mail will attack again. The likely industrial unrest that lies ahead will decide what type of industry we work in.
PUBLIC MEETINGS are becoming a regular event across Devon. Cuts to services and privatisations are being railroaded through at district and county level.
Here in Mid-Devon, a campaign is being waged against the transfer of housing stock from the council to a Housing Association. The campaign has the support of local Liberal Democrats. Several lively public meetings have seen significant opposition to the proposals, and the Socialist Party has been active in the Campaign for a 'No' vote, which looks like it could be won.
Another lively public meeting took place, 'consulting' on the county council's proposal to get rid of two residential care homes for the elderly in Mid-Devon. The decision has been made to get rid of the homes, along with two others in the county.
This is the latest phase in their programme of cuts and privatisation that has already seen several other care homes close. The only 'consultation' will be whether to sell the homes to the private sector or a charity to run, or sell them to developers.
Everyone at the meeting wanted the homes kept open. The county council here is run by the Liberal Democrats, who say that lack of government funding leaves them having to make 'tough choices' - choices such as leaving elderly, vulnerable people to die a lingering lonely death isolated in their own homes, or if they are 'lucky', to get a scarce place in a poorly run private residential care home, looked after by staff on poverty wages.
The Lib Dems' latest 'tough choice' in Devon is their proposal to close 12 libraries across the county. Of course they're being forced to make these cuts by that nasty Mr Blair, as one councillor told me.
When I suggested he could stand up to the government, pass a deficit budget and demand the extra money from Blair's government, he said: "We couldn't do that, that would be illegal."
The Socialist Party in Devon will stand shoulder to shoulder with everyone willing to fight these cuts, and we will seek to build a political alternative to the spineless stooges who pass for political representatives by standing Socialist candidates against them.
OVER 50 UNISON pickets were outside the Stroud District Council in Gloucestershire, taking part in the first day of strike action against the imposition of new contracts.
All 450 contracted staff, out of a workforce of 600, have been threatened with dismissal if they don't sign within ten days. National agreements and any consultation process are being ignored. These new contracts state that further changes to terms and conditions can be made with only four weeks' notice (in other councils this is three months) and without union consultation. It's in effect union derecognition.
Management are refusing any meaningful talks with UNISON, as Christine Cook, the Regional Officer, said: "They don't want to talk, they want to dictate. There will be continuing strike action until we get this resolved."
SDC worker Ian Soule said: "I'll lose £3,000 a year for doing the same job." Management are attempting to impose a reduced 12-point salary scale. The top three are for management who recently gave themselves a pay increase. The other nine points jump £4,000-£5,000 per point.
The outcome will be experienced staff working alongside inexperienced staff on the same pay and it will be harder to go up the pay scale. Redundancy pay will be slashed to the legal statutory minimum, making it much cheaper to make experienced staff redundant. And a three-year pay protection for anyone who accepted a pay cut is now only 12 months. Sickness pay is also under attack.
Jerry Whitney, a council worker for 37 years said: "We've never had this hassle over reorganisation before." Stroud council is Tory controlled but these changes are in line with Labour's generalised attack on public services. If they get away with this it will open the way for other councils to follow suit. The outcome of this dispute will be felt far beyond the five valleys of Stroud.
A THOUSAND-strong rally of Ministry of Defence (MOD) workers from across Britain on 25 January heard trade union leaders like Mark Serwotka and Janice Godrich promise to back their fight against job losses and privatisation.
PCS, supported by all unions in the MOD, organised the day of action as part of their fighting campaign against New Labour's plans to slash 104,000 jobs from the civil service. The government say they plan to cut 20,000 of these jobs from MOD.
Although not, in the past, noted for their militancy MOD workers are being driven to industrial action by the government. PCS plan to ballot its MOD members in April in preparation for industrial action against the government's plans.
The MOD and other parts of the civil service look like being involved this year in the biggest battle against privatisation and job cuts yet seen if there is no response form New Labour.
CHRIS MORRISON, a member of PCS's NEC and a Socialist Party member who works for a privatised part of the MOD in Telford explained what has been happening.
"I work for Cap Gemini in Telford and as part of the PCS campaign against privatisation and job cuts, we got together with other unions across the town in a committee against cuts.
"Telford and the surrounding area faces the loss of 3,000 jobs alone from the MOD work. According to the council the knock-on effect would take £64 million out of the local economy. 1,800 jobs are definitely going and perhaps another 1,200 if RAF Cosford closes down.
"The MOD workers have not previously been known to join up with others in militant action but now under the leadership of the PCS they are becoming more like other parts of the union.
"The lesson of the fightback in the Department for Work and Pensions is not lost on the MOD workforce and I expect industrial action will be our next step."
Bill, an AMICUS electrician from Fleetlands in Gosport, said: "We repair helicopters and other aircraft but they want to privatise us. There will be nothing left at this rate - many workers are already leaving to work overseas, in Germany for example on the new Airbus project.
"All these skills are being lost because the government are trying to cut costs. It's nothing to do with efficiency, more to do with the profits of the private contractors."
To hear an audio version of this document click here.
What the Socialist Party stands for
The Socialist Party fights for socialism – a democratic society run for the needs of all and not the profits of a few. We also oppose every cut, fighting in our day-to-day campaigning for every possible improvement for working class people.
The organised working class has the potential power to stop the cuts and transform society.
As capitalism dominates the globe, the struggle for genuine socialism must be international.
The Socialist Party is part of the Committee for a Workers' International (CWI), a socialist international that organises in many countries.
To hear an audio version of this document click here.
http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/4988
