Solidarity 092, 27 April 2006

The Ballad of James Larkin

By Donagh MacDonagh In Dublin City in 1913 the boss was rich and the poor were slaves The women working, the children starving, then on came Larkin like a mighty wave The workmen cringed when the boss man thundered, seventy hours was his weekly chore He asked for little and less was granted, lest gettin' little, then he'd ask for more But on came Larkin in 1913, a mighty man with a mighty tongue The voice of labor, the voice of justice, and he was gifted and he was young God sent Larkin in 1913, a labor man with a union tongue He raised the workers and gave them courage; he was their hero, the...

Ninety years since the Easter Rising

April 23 marks the 90th anniversary of the Easter Rising, in many ways the defining event in modern Irish history. The Rising, its consequences and aftermath shaped the situation Ireland faces today. It offers important lessons for the Irish workers today against both imperialism and indigenous exploitation and reaction. Mike Rowley tells the story. Despite its importance, the events of Easter 1916 have been downplayed in much recent historiography and in Irish politics. To the song’s defiant question: “Who fears to speak of Easter Week? Who flinches at the name?” The answer seems to be, a...

Fight for comprehensive education!

by Patrick Murphy, newly elected NUT executive member The National Union of Teachers (NUT) conference, meeting in Torquay over the Easter bank holiday weekend, confirmed what serious left activists in the union have been saying for some time. The potential for a fight back against the government’s agenda for education exists, but we will not clear the roadblock of our right-wing leadership unless we rebuild and politically renew the left. On pensions, on the Education Bill, on religious schools, large sections of the left at the conference repeatedly failed to stand up for basic socialist...

UNISON healthworkers agree action - Strike to stop NHS crisis!

By a health worker Delegates at the public sector union UNISON’s conference for health workers at the end of April gave Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt the silent treatment when she spoke to them. They then voted for the union to “find ways to take national industrial action against the cuts”. Activists must now campaign to ensure this action includes strike action. At the very least action could include an overtime ban, a refusal to do bank work and the withdrawal of good will, i.e. a refusal to do the unpaid overtime on which the NHS relies. The union leadership will now take legal advice...

Fighting for all of us

On the day before the 28 March pensions strike for local government I was working in a Geography class. It was the last period of the day. Year 9 i.e. 14 year olds. They had taken little notice of the supply teacher during the lesson on the grounds that “supply” translates as “won’t be back tomorrow, therefore no comeback if we misbehave”. As the students filed out when the bell went, I wished them all a pleasant day off for the next day. A group of students stayed behind to ask me what it was all about. “Can we come on your picket line tomorrow?” “Will we get into trouble if we do?” “Any...

Decent jobs for all!

The TGWU and Amicus have responded to Peugeot’s announcement of the closure of its Ryton factory in Coventry by demanding “stronger” laws making it difficult to cut jobs, laws like those that exist in France. There was no talk of direct workers’ action — action like the French workers’ strike which have put limits to the destruction of job security in France. But, so far as can be seen, this wasn’t just a matter of union leaders being feeble: there was no confidence for a fight among Ryton workers, either. For the last twenty years at least, the union leaders have had nothing much to say about...

Pension scheme gutted

Now that the main public sector unions have capitulated on pensions — for the time being, anyway — the capitalist bosses are picking off smaller, weaker groups of workers at their leisure. The BBC has announced that its current final salary pension scheme will be replaced by a worse scheme for new entrants from September. The changes will mean: • The introduction of a "career average" scheme which will leave new workers an average of 30% worse off than their colleagues. • An increase in the normal retirement age to 65 in 2016. • An increase in contributions for existing staff from 5.5% to 7.5%...

Defend pensions!

Four rail unions will begin balloting tens of thousands of their members for strike action if the bosses of the various infrastructure and operating companies fail to agree with proposals for saving pensions by 28 April. RMT, ASLEF, TSSA and the engineering confederation CSEU are demanding that the Railway Pensions Scheme remain open to all workers, that employee contributions are capped, that at least the current level of benefits is maintained, and that the ridiculous proliferation of subschemes created by privatisation and fragmentation on the railway be streamlined into three basic...

How to fight the BNP

In the council elections on 4 May the fascist British National Party (BNP) is standing 350 candidates, hoping to make a small breakthrough. They appeal to those who feel themselves “despondent, depressed, angry, ignored, abandoned, forgotten, ripped off, exploited, overtaxed, unrepresented”. They say that the crisis in the Health Service shows “the profit motive outweighing patient care”, and denounce “private gain for public service”. In other words, they appeal to many of the same working-class people as socialists appeal to. But the BNP identifies the enemy, the people who are doing the...

Needed: a workers’ party

David Broder went to Bolivia during April as part of the Bolivia Solidarity Campaign delegation of British trade unionists. In Solidarity 3/90 I argued that while Evo Morales has failed to deliver what the masses demanded during the gas nationalisation protests of last summer, the trade unions and social movements have failed to come out strongly enough in criticism of the new Bolivian president. Having seen more of the objective situation on the ground, I realise that such an analysis is only partly correct. While many trade union leaders are keen for revolution, they remain generals without...

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