The planned national industrial action by the firefighters is the first for
25 years. It coincides with an increasing radicalisation in the union movement,
which is a culmination of years of bitterness and resentment built up by the
attacks on the wages and conditions of workers in general, and in the public
sector in particular. The FBU is playing a leading role in the struggle for
better wages in the public sector.
Strikes in Britain are at their highest level for thirteen years and the
trend is upwards. The recent council workers’ strike involving over one
million people was the largest strike by women workers ever seen in this
country. Fire fighters have voted unanimously at their recall conference to
ballot for strike action over a 40% rise in pay! If this takes place, it
will be the first national strike in 25 years. Rail and tube workers, who
have their own disputes, have threatened to refuse to work on grounds of
safety if there is no fire cover. The general public, according to a recent
Guardian/ICM poll, appear to sympathise with them. The days of workplace
"servitude" seem finally to be coming to an end.
Today marks the end of the Trade Union Congress in Blackpool. It was a Congress that reflected the mood not
seen since the hey-days of the miners’ strike of 1984-85. Since that time, we have had a decade and a half of
"new realism" and policies of (class) "collaboration" or "partnership", epitomised by the likes of Sir Ken Jackson,
ex-general secretary of the AEEU. Now a wind of change has hit the trade union movement.
We have covered the dramatic changes taking place in the British trade unions in
previous articles. Here we examine these developments in the context of the 2002 TUC Congress which
takes place this week.
This article is a follow-up to Britain's Summer of Discontent – An Earthquake in the British Labour Movement.
The magnificent one million-strong strike of local authority workers on
July 17 has forced important concessions out of the government. Anyone
who still doubted the power of militant industrial action has been
answered.
This article deals with the scandalous so-called "Private Finance Initiative" in Britain. This process allows private companies to be involved in the building and running of what were formerly public services, such as hospitals, railways, and even schools. Mick Brooks shows quite clearly that the only people to benefit from PFI have been the fat cat capitalists who run the private firms.
What a decisive answer to all the cynics who had written off the labour
movement in Britain. In scenes reminiscent of the late 1970s, scenes we
were told would never be repeated in Blair's New Britain, more than a
million local authority workers took strike action yesterday, the first
national public sector stoppage in 20 years. The action by members of
UNISON, the T&GWU and the GMB was described in the London Evening
Standard as "the biggest strike in Britain since the 1926 General
Strike".
We are appealing for messages of support and financial backing for 24 airport security staff in Belfast who have been sacked for striking against low pay and poor conditions. The sacked workers were prominent union activists, including two key shop stewards. The response of some of the higher-up officials in the T&GWU union has been woefully inadequate. Gordon McNeil, one of the sacked shop stewards, spoke to Socialist Appeal.
Steve Jones from the British Marxist magazine Socialist Appeal looks at the World Cup and also the game closer to home, with the ITV Digital catastrophe.
The Jubilee has come and gone. India and Pakistan stood on the brink of nuclear war. Suicide bombers were striking in Israel and Belfast was aflame with sectarian conflict. But on the streets of London and other British cities, millions of people cheerfully participated in street parties in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Yet this year’s festivities totally lacked the grassroots "spontaneity" of the Silver Jubilee, 25 years ago. The enthusiasm for the monarchy that has been whipped up by the media in recent weeks is at best superficial. The mood is quite different to 1977 and even more distant from that of 1952.
This is a shorter report of the same event.
This is a report of the successful meeting in London organised both to launch Ted Grant’s book History of British Trotskyism and to celebrate 10 years of .