Every month, Workers' Liberty will be promoting a motion on a current issue for socialists to propose to their Labour Party branches and Constituency Parties.
January's Motion of the Month is taken from the Socialist Campaign for a Labour Victory:
This motion was passed at Forest Hill ward Labour Party to go forward to Lewisham West and Penge CLP in February. Please put a version of it in your ward / CLP.
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STAND UP FOR WORKERS’ RIGHTS
This branch notes
1. The vicious attack on workers’ rights and trade unions that the Tory government has unleashed with its Trade Union Bill.
2. That in addition to even more severely curtailing the right to strike, and criminalising many forms of trade union activity, the Bill also attacks unions’ ability to organise and fund a political voice, including the vital link between the unions and our party.
3. That party conference voted unanimously for strong opposition to the law, for the next Labour government to repeal it, and also for the repeal of earlier laws passed by the Thatcher government to limit workers’ rights – including the ban on solidarity action.
Believes
1. That workers’ rights, including an effective right to strike, are essential both to the labour movement’s ability to stand up for workers’ interests and to democracy.
2. That the Tories are blatant hypocrites, requiring 40 percent or more for a strike though their party took office with the support of less than 25 percent of the electorate.
Resolves
1. To campaign locally on this issue using the party’s petition against the Bill, which has already been signed by 340,000 people.
2. To strengthen our campaigning links with local trade unions and support their struggles.
3. To work with Unions Together, affiliated unions and other grass roots organisations in order to promote this campaign.
4. To call on the next Labour government to repeal the Trade Union Bill if it passes, repeal all the anti-trade union laws passed by the 1979-1997 Tory governments, and introduce a strong, positive charter of workers’ rights: to unionise, win union recognition and collective bargaining, strike, picket, take solidarity action and take political action.
5. To promote this position through the party.