Workers' Liberty

During the first few days of last month, reports about the police raids of Birmingham massage parlour flooded newspapers all over the world.

There was nothing progressive about the riot that broke out in the Lozells area of Handsworth, Birmingham over the weekend of 21-23 October. The disturbances were fuelled by poverty, racism, mass hysteria, criminal drug gangs, religion and communalism.

Duncan Morrison reviews “Skint”, BBC1, Mondays, 10.35pm

The documentary series Skint has reminded me how valuable good documentaries can be. Using a not quite fly on the wall style, the makers ask questions to their subjects as they go through their lives. They follow a number of people and families in the Birmingham area as they struggle to make ends meet. These are Britain’s poor.

By Dave Jessop

Six Birmingham Labour councillors have been found guilty of corruption and a systematic attempt to rig the 2004 city council elections.

The Birmingham Repertory Theatre’s shameful decision to cancel the play, Behzti (Dishonour), was justified in the following way by Executive Director Stuart Rogers: “[Sikh] community leaders have been unable to guarantee to us that there will be no repeat of the illegal and violent activites we saw on Saturday… we cannot guarantee the safety of our audiences… [W]e have decided to end the current run of the play on security grounds.”

Privatised ex-NHS staff at Birmingham’s Heartlands hospital have accepted a deal which will see them reach parity with NHS pay and conditions by 2007. The deal was offered to them by Initial Hospital Services and Birmingham Heartlands management after the workers planned strikes in protest against the “two-tier workforce”.

Birmingham AWL meeting

Jim Denham recalls the strike support work done in Birmingham

Workers at Euro Packaging in Birmingham, which makes paper bags, have been on strike against redundancies and for a 37.5 hour week. The workers are members of the Graphical, Paper and Media Union. The employers are notorious for bad pay and conditions (some workers, say the union, work up to 80 hours a week and most are on minimum wage or just above). The GPMU was recently organised and won recognition. The employers have responded by "selecting" key organisers for redundancy.

Rally and March
11am Saturday 22nd May 2004
Broad Street, Birmingham
Speakers:
Tony Woodley, T&G General Secretary
Derek Simpson, Amicus General Secretary
Debbie Coulter, GMB Deputy General Secretary
Richard Burden MP

Rally to be Chaired by Gerard Coyne, Regional Secretary TGWU

Called By: The TGWU, Amicus and the GMB

By Joan Trevor

Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the French fascist party the Front National, is due to be guest of honour at a dinner hosted by Nick Griffin, leader of the fascist British National Party (BNP) in Birmingham on Sunday 25 April.

If the visit goes ahead, there will be a demonstration against the visit in Victoria Square at 3pm on Sunday afternoon.

Respect in Birmingham have called on the Chief Constable of the West Midlands to ban Le Pen's visit. Salma Yaqoob said:

West Midlands FBU will be protesting on 22 March to demand that the Fire Service reinstates Steve Godward.

Steve was sacked over allegations arising from the FBU strike a year ago. He has successfully pusued a campaign to clear his name. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has concluded that Steve should not have been sacked. And yet his employer has not given him his job back, and is instead trying to appeal.

Below is a letter from Steve's FBU branch giving details of the case, and inviting you to support the protest.

Trade union Amicus has written to Land Rover, asking them to resume talks to resolve the pay dispute at the Solihull and Gaydon plants in the West Midlands.

TGWU and Amicus members at Land Rover are due to hold another 24-hour stoppage on Monday 9 February after holding a successful strike on Monday 26 January.

By Martin Thomas

At a West Midlands Socialist Alliance meeting on Wednesday 14 January 2004, Stuart Richardson of Resistance accused Jim Denham of Solidarity and Workers' Liberty of supporting the US and UK troops in Iraq.

He repeated the accusation despite Denham immediately heckling him to say it was not true.

A. Resolution passed by South Birmingham Socialist Alliance on 15 October 2003

In June the Socialist Workers Party packed a meeting of Birmingham Socialist Alliance with newly signed-up SWP members to remove the entire executive of the local Alliance - including the chair, victimised FBU militant Steve Godward - and replace them with SWP members and fellow travellers. In Birmingham the SWP want to see a "Peace and Justice" candidate - mounted jointly with the leaders of local mosques - that is an alliance with a religious hierarchy. Comrades in Birmingham rightly fear that such an alliance would be a betrayal of independent working-class politics and full civil equality for lesbian and gay people and for women. Those comrades had to go.

By David Stamp, independent member of Birmingham Socialist Alliance

Whatever future the Socialist Alliance may have — and I’m no longer sure it even has one — it’s going to be an uphill struggle to recapture anything approaching a spirit of trust or unity within the Birmingham left following the antics on 1 July.

On Tuesday 1 July, the SWP organised a coup in Birmingham Socialist Alliance.
Mobilising dozens of people who have never before been involved in the Socialist Alliance - and very likely won't be again - they voted out all the officers of the Birmingham SA and replaced them by SWPers and their allies.