Solidarity 125, 24 January 2008

Around 600 postalworkers and other trade unionists took part in a national demonstration called by the Communication Workers’ Union in Stoke on 19 January. Over a hundred CWU members at the Burslem office have been on strike since 18 December in support of twelve victimised colleagues suspended by Royal Mail management last September. The background to this action is the CWU postal executive’s vote to call off national action over pay, pensions and jobs and leave discussions over new “flexible conditions” to local negotiations. This has left local managers attempting to push through new...

Canary Wharf: London Underground management have sacked two Canary Wharf Station Supervisors over some missing KitKats! Station staff often have to put up with commercial promotions on the stations, and it has become the norm for staff to get a few goodies in return for co-operation. Now this has become a sacking issue! Any Underground worker could be next in line in this discipline clampdown, so it is important that all rally round these sacked staff. Their union, RMT, is balloting for action in defence of one of the sacked workers who is a member. The other worker is in the clerical union...

London Underground has sacked a worker at London Bridge over an alleged incident with a customer. But the company’s only “evidence” against Gyles is the say-so of a different customer who admitted there was no violence involved, but speculated that there might have been! RMT is balloting members for industrial action. Vote Yes! More: www.workersliberty.org/tube.

In December last year, several dozen left-wing Iranian students were arrested for organising or taking part in action on 16 Azar (7 December), Iran’s traditional “Student Day” of protest. Since then, many more activists have been arrested in a continuing crackdown, and one of the detained has now been murdered by the police of the Islamist regime. On 6 January, 27 year old law student Ebrahim Lotfollahi was arrested in front of Payame Nur University in Sanandaj, the capital of Iranian Kurdistan, minutes after finishing an exam. Nine days later his family were informed that he committed suicide...

Having already announced his plans to build a new generation of nuclear power stations in November 2007, Gordon Brown has just completed a “consultation” on the issue and officially announced the “new” energy policy! A policy which, surprise, surprise, proposes up to twenty nuclear power stations, which will start coming on line around 2017. The government plan is for the power stations to be financed through private enterprise but there will be plenty of public money to bail out the companies if they get into difficulty. While New Labour tries to make a business case for nuclear, they are...

Students at Nottingham University are calling a demonstration for 21 February against attempts to quash their rights to protest and organise. One student has been arrested and others banned from the library for failing to ask permission to demonstrate and circulate petitions. Shortly before the Christmas holidays, administrators called in the police after students from the Palestinian Society refused to disband a small protest on campus. One student was arrested (see www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZLwtit8GXM for a video of events). But this is just the most extreme example of the bureaucratic...

More than 100 people attended the regional conference that took place in Nottingham on January 19th called by Nottinghamshire Stop the BNP and sponsored by a number of trade unions and campaigning organisations in the Notts area and other parts of the East Midlands. The conference was called to discuss a campaign to stop a repeat of the 2007 BNP “Red, White and Blue festival” in Codnor near both Derby and Nottingham. It attracted significant representations from a number of unions particularly the FBU from Lincoln, Loughborough, Derby and Leicester. FBU delegates came even from as far away as...

On January 16, a parliamentary rally organised by Abortion Rights packed out two committee rooms with over 300 people. Speakers included various MPs and Lords from all three parties, the TUC women’s officer, an adviser to Ken Livingstone and the Fawcett Society. In the usual mould of such meetings the platform was full and speeches took the majority of the time, leaving little for contributions from the floor. Activists were told of the parliamentary threat and the possibility of a victory in repealing the “two doctors” rule when the Human Fertilisation and Embryology act passes and assured...

The second Feminist Fightback open steering meeting saw women from across the trade union and student movements discuss direct action on abortion rights, a pro-choice teach-in and plans for international women’s day. It was decided that the picket of the Christian Medical Foundation should use the slogans “Don’t turn back the clock on reproductive freedoms” and “women deserve choice” (a spin on the CMF’s declaration that “women deserve better” than abortion). We’ll be picketing outside the CMF headquarters from 4pm, moving to Borough High Street at 5pm to leaflet the public. Other suggested...