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Unions & politics

Trade Unions and politics


Trade union issues

Issues for workers and our trade unions - opposing victimisation, fighting for better pay and conditions, health & safety, rank-and-file organising, and more.


Trades Councils

Local TUCs, uniting workers from different trade unions across a city / town / borough


UK trade unions

Reports from UK trade unions, arranged in sections for each union.


TUC

Trades Union Congress


International unions

Trade union struggles outside the UK


Agitate, Educate, Organise!

Trade Unions

“Is it necessary to recall that Marxism not only interprets the world but also teaches how to change it? The will is the motor force in the domain of knowledge too. The moment Marxism loses its will to transform in a revolutionary way political reality, at that moment it loses the ability to correctly understand political reality. A Marxist who, for one secondary consideration or another, does not draw his conclusions to the end betrays Marxism.”


Blair’s children

Labour Party
Author: 
Martin Thomas

We are probably on the way to a Tory government. In the local elections on 1 May, not only did Labour do badly; the Tories did well. An opinion poll on the weekend of 7-8 May showed the Tories ahead of Labour by 49% to 23%.


France Education Strike

France
Author: 
Ed Maltby

In France, students and teachers are continuing a huge strike against the Sarkozy government’s planned attacks on education which threaten to demolish state education, and open the way for a Blair-style “choice agenda” and private-sector expansion into education.


Innuendo in the contract

Women
Author: 
Louise Gold

Sheffield was to be the second city in England to host a Hooters franchise — the American restaurant chain where young “cheer leader/surfer girl-next-door” waitresses, wearing a uniform of “wh


Rising from 40 years’ sleep

History

May Day, the International Workers’ Day, is known as a commemoration of the Haymarket riots in Chicago on 4 May 1886. But the reason why May Day was first celebrated internationally — the struggle for the eight-hour working day — is often forgotten.


AWL London Trade Unionists Meeting

Trade Unions
2 Jun 2008 - 6:00pm
2 Jun 2008 - 7:30pm

Location: 

Lucas Arms, Gray's Inn Road, near King's Cross


Description: 

Meeting for AWL trade unionists and contacts to coordinate our trade union work.


Workers' Liberty NUT bulletin for 24th April

Trade Unions
Author: 
AWL

Today we are witness to an example of what is possible. Over 200,000 teachers will take national action to defend our pay. We will be joined by around 100,000 civil servants and 25,000 FE lecturers.


South African dockers refuse to unload Chinese arms to Mugabe, interview with SA Dockworker

Trade Unions
Author: 
TomU

Two days after the polls closed in Zimbabwe's presidential election, 77 tonnes of mortars, rockets and ammunition were dispatched from China.


The Labour Party is a stinking corpse!

New Labour
Author: 
Editorial

It is time for the trade union movement to face facts with New Labour.


French teachers in dispute

Education

As British teachers are mobilising for a historic strike, their French counterparts are engaged in a bitter struggle of their own, in the face of a ferocious government attack and a scandalously timid


NUT Strike Rallies

Trade Unions
Author: 
AWL

NUT Strike Rallies

Central London: March from Lincoln’s Inn Fields 11am, rally at Central Hall 1pm
Newcastle: Grays Monument, Midday
Manchester: Friends’ Meeting House, 11am


NUT Strike Rallies

Public services
24 Apr 2008 - 9:00am
24 Apr 2008 - 10:30am

Location: 

Description: 

NUT Strike Rallies

Central London: March from Lincoln’s Inn Fields 11am, rally at Central Hall 1pm
Newcastle: Grays Monument, Midday
Manchester: Friends’ Meeting House, 11am
Liverpool: Liner Hotel, 11am
Preston: Preston North End Football Club, 2pm
Bolton: Friends’ Meeting House, 10am
Nottingham: Assemble 10am at the Forest, march to Congregation Hall, rally at 11.30am
Barnsley: March from Barnsley College, rally at Town Centre Cinema, 9.30am
Calderdale: The Traders Club, 10am
Derby: Market Place, 11am
Leeds: Victoria Gardens, 11am
Sheffield: City Centre, Midday
Bradford: Bradford City Football Club, 10.30am
Lincoln: Turks Head, 11am
Leicester: Athena Conference Centre, 10.30am
Birmingham: City Centre, 12.30pm
Northampton: Guildhall, 12.30pm
Cambridge: Guildhall, Midday
Oxford: Picket outside Oxpens FE College 7.30am, March to Town Midday, Rally 2pm
Windsor and Maidenhead: Thames Hotel, 9am
Medway: Command House, 12.30pm
Reading: International Solidarity Centre, 10.30am
Bristol: March from Castle Green 11.30am, rally at Marriott Royal Hotel 1pm
Exeter: Exeter City Football Club, 11.30am
Taunton: Rugby Club, 10.30am
Dorchester: Town Hall, 10.30am


AWL London Trade Unionists Meeting

AWL
21 Apr 2008 - 6:00pm
21 Apr 2008 - 8:00pm

Location: 

Lucas Arms, Grays Inn Road, Kings Cross, London


Description: 

London AWL meeting for trade unionists to help coordinate our trade union work better across London.


The real reasons to criticise Ken Livingstone

City Hall
Author: 
Mike Rowley

The mayor of London receives the salary of a Cabinet Minister - that is, £137,579 per annum plus expenses. The latter are bound to be high.


Shelter Staff Await Strike Ballot Result

Housing
Author: 
A TGWU Member

On Thursday the 21st of February, we will find out if some 450 members of the TGWU/Unite have voted in favour of national strike action, an event which would be a first in Shelter's 41-year history.


Public sector unions: strike together!

Trade Unions

Will other public sector unions pull forward their disputes over Gordon Brown’s two per cent pay limit so that they hit the Government together with the postal workers?


The Tolpuddle Festival

Trade Unions

By Mark Osborn

The TUC-organised festival which celebrates a key struggle in the fight for trade union rights in Britain took place over the weekend of 14-15 July in the Dorset village of Tolpuddle.


Industrial reports: London Undgertound, Schools, Crown Post Office

Trade Unions

Bakerloo strike over lone working

Following a 94.5% yes vote to take strike action, drivers and detrainment workers on the Bakerloo line will be out this Friday to force management to withdraw their plans for ‘lone-working’.


Haiti: Pain at the Pump Spurs Strike Actions

Globalisation

By: Jeb Sprague and Wadner Pierre

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jun 19 (IPS) - A two-day transport strike last week gripped Haiti's major cities and underscored a mounting crisis over fuel prices, which rose nearly 20 percent in just two weeks.


Le transport en commun paralysé en Haïti par une grève pour protester contre la hausse des prix du carburant

Globalisation

Port-au-Prince, le 12 juin 2007 &endash; (AHP)- La grève de 48 heures lancée par des syndicats de chauffeurs a paralysé ce mardi le transport en commun à Port-au-Prince et dans la plupart des villes de province.


Iranian bus workers’ leader sentenced to five years in prison

Iran

Mansour Osanloo, president of the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company in Iran was last week sentenced to five years in prison, according to the International Alliance in Support of Workers in Iran (IASWI), based in Canada.


"Ramparts of Resistance" author, Sheila Cohen, replies to Tom Unterrainer and Martin Thomas

Books

Sheila Cohen responds to two reviews, by Tom Unterrainer and Martin Thomas, of her book on trade unionism, Ramparts of Resistance: Why Workers Lost Their Power, and How to Get It Back (Pluto Press, 2006)

For Tom Unterrainer, click here
For Martin Thomas, click here


Interview with Iranian workers leader

Iran

The new Iranian Workers Bulletin has an interview with bus workers' union leader Mansour Ossanlou, as well as updates on other workers' struggles in Iran.


Chavez vs trade unions in Venezuela

Trade Unions

After the attack on Sanitarios Maracay workers recently in Aragua state in Venezuela, more evidence of anti-union activity by the Chavistas.

According to Greg Wilpert on the Venezuelanalysis website:


NUT - No Deals with Brown! For a fighting union, not a bosses union

Education

From Workers' Liberty Teachers NUT conference bulletin 2007
Those of you who have not been to NUT Annual Conference for a few years may find the experience a very odd one.


Victory at Central Foundation Girls’ School

Education

From Workers' Liberty Teachers NUT conference bulletin 2007
Support Staff at Central Foundation Girls’ School in East London won a dispute over redundancies just before the Easter holidays began.


Iran: More Arrests of Teachers

Iran

Teachers’ vow more protests to come over the next few weeks!

April 8, 2007- According to the Teachers’ Trade Association of Iran’s website and other reliable sources about 45 teachers of the province of Hamadan were arrested on Sunday, April 8, 2007 and then transferred to an unknown location. About 30 of the arrested teachers were arrested in the office the teachers’ Trade Association of Hamadan and a number of other educators were arrested in their homes and other places; this included all members of the board of directors of the association in Hamadan.


Another view on "Ramparts of Resistance"

Trade Unions

Tom Unterrainer's review (Solidarity 3/108) of Sheila Cohen's book "Ramparts of Resistance" sees the main reason for the British labour movement's defeats since the 1970s in "bureaucratisation" at workplace rep level.


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