Solidarity 180, 9 September 2010

Labour leadership election: let the cleaners decide?

Westminster University was the venue for the The Labour Finance and Industry Group (LFIG) Labour leadership hustings on 25 August. A full capacity of over 300 academic folk looked on as the Miliband brothers and Ed Balls regurgitated their finely orchestrated rhetoric. Before the speeches an introduction by LFIG was given which couldn’t have been less “socialist” in sentiment: “One of the failures of the left is the emphasis which should be put on the need to produce. We see production just as important as distribution,” said the LFIGer. This statement is so far off the mark that is just isn’t...

Gordon Brown: proletarian by New Labour standards

Gordon Brown responded to the launch of Tony Blair's autobiography by announcing that he will spend his time on unpaid work for good causes. As the press reported, this was “widely seen as a side-swipe at the millionaire lifestyle of Tony Blair”. Brown still gets £66,000 a year as an MP. He is touting for trade as a paid public speaker to rich audiences, and will put the revenues in the bank account of a specially set up company from which he can draw in later years. For “good causes” he will be working with people like the Queen of Jordan. By New Labour standards, all this seems proletarian...

David Miliband: "It wasn't my fault"

As the Labour leadership contest drew to an end David Miliband worked hard to distance himself from Tony Blair — Blair personally, more than the New Labour government. But it was all deeply unconvincing. In an interview with the Independent (29 August) Miliband accused David Cameron of thinking up policy by way of “positioning”, rather than by deciding what was good for the country. Ironically this is precisely what Miliband did in the rest of the interview. Miliband’s attempt to distance himself from Blair involved little more than a shameless rationalisation and vacuous rebranding of himself...

Trade union news in brief

Coca-Cola will face the second major industrial dispute with its UK workforce in less than six months as workers at its Edmonton bottling plant in north London prepare for strike action following an 81% yes vote in an industrial ballot. Union density at the plant is high, with 113 of 150 workers in the Unite union. The dispute follows a 2% pay offer from management, which union reps have described as “derisory”. Speaking in the Daily Telegraph, Unite’s Wayne King said “Coca-Cola is in no way suffering during the recession yet it wants to force its workers, in one of the world’s most expensive...

London Underground: solid strike against job cuts

London Underground workers brought the capital’s underground system to a near standstill (6-7 September) as they struck against job cuts that would radically alter the way public transport is delivered in London. Stations across the network were forced to close with all but one tube line either entirely suspended or running a greatly reduced services. Management were forced to staff stations themselves or train up emergency scabs picked from back-office employees. Ironically, the scab or boss-run stations provide a chilling vision of what the Underground would be like permanently if management...

National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts

The National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC) is a national network of student unions and grassroots campaigns fighting cuts in education. We also link student anti-cuts activity with trade union anti-cuts campaigns. The student movement faces job cuts and higher fees. More colleges and campuses will face outright closure; and it is clear that cuts are being used to re-shape education, and extend big business control over our courses. Last term, students staged large protests and occupations against cuts, and supported industrial action by staff. We need to do the same again this year...

Anti-cuts round-up

Cuts-happy bosses at Labour-controlled Kirklees council are fixing for a head-on confrontation with one of the best-organised union branches in the public sector as they attempt to cut up to £400 million from their budget, resulting in 2,000 job losses. It has already identified several places to swing the axe, including taking on vulnerable temporary and agency staff and introducing new formulae for calculating sickness absence, which will make it easier for bosses to dismiss absentees. The local Unison branch, led by left-winger Paul Holmes, has launched a ballot for industrial action and...

London firefighters gearing up to fight cuts

London firefighters will ballot for strike action unless their employer, the London fire authority, withdraws its threat to summarily dismiss the entire workforce and re-employ them on worsened terms and conditions. A ballot for action short of a strike is already underway and, following mass meetings involving over 1,500 workers, morale and confidence seem high. The fire authority's chairman is the Tory Brian Coleman who, according to FBU leader Matt Wrack, has been “itching for a scrap with London’s firefighters for a long time.” Coleman himself takes home nearly £120,000 a year and is well...

Ian Tomlinson must not be forgotten

There’s a “call to arms” coming from some of the more militant union leaders around the coalition government’s intention to reduce the public sector. Battle lines are being drawn in the run up to the upcoming TUC conference. There is a lot of talk about building a campaign as big as the one that eventually saw the downfall of Thatcher and her Tory government. Some of the calls from many on the left leave a lot to be desired. They are certainly vociferous, but who they are aimed at is questionable, and the language used is simply divisive. In an article in the Guardian on 4 August Tony Benn as...

Charities not safe from cuts

In a revelation that cuts starkly against the coalition government’s fetishisation of the voluntary and charitable sectors, the National Council of Voluntary Organisations has published a survey showing that third sector bodies face cuts of up to 99%. Countless organisations and services across the sector, as well as cultural bodies such as community theatres, are severely threatened by the ConDem axe. The cuts affect every area of the country; the Young Devon group, which provides support services to young people in the area, faces a 90% cut. The South Leeds Community Radio project will see...

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