From students to pensioners, private to
public sectors workers, unemployed and disabled, the march represented all of
Worcester residents threatened by the cuts. As one of the placards said,
“Cameron, Unions are the Original Big Society.”
With a samba band at the front of the march and the rhythmic
chanting of the labour movement activists you could have mistaken Worcester in the Midlands for
Caracas in Venezuela. Even the sun was shining on the 180 present as they marched
through the city centre to protest against the cuts in public sector services.
Banners and trade union flags made it a colourful procession but what was more
impressive was the large number of homemade placards with heartfelt slogans on
them such as “Don’t be young, old, sick, unemployed or disabled with Cameron in
power” or “Too Old To Work, Too
Young To Retire At 60,” “Bankers Rob From The Poor, Give To The Rich.” From students to pensioners, private to
public sectors workers, unemployed and disabled, the march represented all of
Worcester residents threatened by the cuts. As one of the placards said,
“Cameron, Unions are the Original Big Society.”
On the march,
Bryn Griffiths, secretary of Worcester Trades Unions Council, said:
“We have
organised this march with friends from Worcester Against the Cuts, various
local trades unions and political groups. It is a public demonstration of our
revulsion at the cuts being introduced by this Government, which have had an
effect on working people, on poor people and on society.
We have got people to come out and protest publicly and peacefully and are
following it up with a rally at Huntingdon Hall with various speakers to
discuss how we should take these protests forward. There is a national protest
in London on Saturday, March 26, and we are trying to get as many people as we
can to Hyde Park. We really want
people from Worcester to come out to that demonstration and say ‘No! – people
are being harmed.’ There is an alternative, it is not necessary.
We could do things with taxation, we could consider alternatives – and that
really is the reason for what we think is a very successful event today.”
We would say that the only effective option that will
resolve this crisis is to abandon the ideology of capitalism and fight for a
socialist alternative. Under the current system, public spending cuts will
still be forced onto us by capitalism, whatever we do with taxation etc., such
is the severity of their crisis. It is the whole system which is at fault and
it is the whole system which must go. Even if the government was to backtrack
in some way over the severity of the cuts – which, of course, would still be a
tremendous victory and an indication of what can be achieved if you fight back
– they would find some way of bringing the measures back at a later stage. That
is why we need socialism.
The march culminated with the rally. First to speak was
Tania Young, secretary of West Mercia NAPO, Justice & Probation union, who
explained the effects of the government’s attacks on jobs, pensions &
services locally. Tania outlined a range of jobs and services under threat from
the closure of two elderly care wards down to her own job. What will happen to
public safety when no probation officers are able to monitor serious offenders? Tania then went on to explain that
pensions in the public sector were not gold plated, at an average of £3,500 for
women they are not even tin-plated. By raising contributions this will force
low paid workers out of pension schemes altogether, which will actually cost
the country more in the long term with more pensioners relying on state pension
top-ups. The problem was not why are public sector pensions so high but why
were private workers’ pensions so low if private was so much better than
public?
Next to speak was Pete McNally, ASLEF and Worcester Against
The Cuts, who explained that we are now been told to stop bashing the bankers,
but Pete said that we have not yet started bashing them, after all it was their
crisis that got us into this mess. From Unison, Steve Akers Regional Organiser
NHS outlined the effects cuts are going to have in the local hospitals and
called on all to join the TUC March on 26th March.
The main speaker was Matt Wrack, FBU General Secretary, who
congratulated Worcester TUC for organising the March & Rally, stating that
he is spending most of his spare time travelling up & down the country
speaking at anti-cuts rallies from large cities to small rural market towns.
Everywhere in Britain the resistance to the cuts is being built. Matt then
spoke of events in Egypt and praised the bravery of workers and youth in
overthrowing a dictatorship, but he was critical of Cameron’s hollow praise for
the people in Tahrir Square, after all it is the system that Cameron supports
that kept Hosni Mubarak in power for thirty years. Matt wanted to know how many
people do we have on the streets on 26th March before Cameron will
flee into exile? Matt also wanted
to know how the public sector workers had caused a world financial crisis as
the government implied and told of the black humour of fire-fighters,
especially one who had sent out an email apologising for causing the banking
crisis – he doesn’t know how he did it but he is sure that it was his
fault. All the talk of redundancies
in “Back-office” jobs being somehow justified has to stop. These are still
redundancies and these jobs losses will have an effect on front line
services. Matt described the
effects centralised control centres in the fire service are having on response
times. That extra two minutes
could be the difference between life and death. Matt praised the excellent role
recently played by students in awakening the labour movement and called on all
activists to take heart from the recent student demonstrations.
The rally finished with the call on all present to go out
and recruit family, friends and neighbours to go to London to show that the
cuts are not going to happen in Worcester.
In passing, the local Tory MP, Robin Walker, told media that
the march & rally did not represent the people of Worcester. Well we may not represent his rich
friends but we do represent the majority of people in Worcester who either work
for the public sector or rely on its services. So here is a challenge to you
Robin Walker: how many people of Worcester can you get to march in support of
your cuts?
