30k website and the FBU rank and file

Submitted by martin on 16 May, 2003 - 10:11

By Vicki Morris
What has 4,600 members and puts the wind up FBU General Secretary Andy Gilchrist?
Not the scab outfit the Retained Firefighters Union, that's for sure - contrary to its claims, it probably only has a thousand members. The answer is... a website.
www.30kfirepay.co.uk was set up at the beginning of the firefighters' pay dispute, first, to inform the public about the dispute. But its forum section, where FBU members share views and experiences, quickly came to be its main raison d'etre.
And it has played a vital role! The website has become a major organiser of the dispute, and now a thorn in the side of the majority on the FBU National Executive.
To read the posts on 30k is to follow the raised and repeatedly dashed hopes of rank and file FBUers, as the executive has moved from 30k - "Y... because we're worth it" - to an ever more desperate-looking attempt to settle... at almost any price.
It is to watch as the government turned the dispute on its head, from a fight by the firefighters for better pay, to a defensive battle against job losses and attacks on conditions, and against cuts in the service to the public.
A crucial turning point came around 19 March, when the executive called off a strike to recommend the employers'11th hour "offer" to the union's recall conference. (The conference rejected the offer.)
At the start of March, newspapers had been full of stories of Andy Gilchrist spending £800 on a curry, but the mood on 30k then was to give him the benefit of the doubt. Not so after the 19th! Gilchrist became "the one with the napkin and popadum", at the very kindest.
He hit back. At the second recall conference on 15 April, 30k came in for attack from those on the side of the executive.
Small wonder. 30k had become a vital tool in the hands of those who aim to keep the pay dispute alive. Correspondence, press reports, motions, parliamentary speeches were shared in the run-up to the second recall conference. After it, 30k was the means of distributing a "branch pack" to inform branches about the executive's recommended Burchill proposals, and dispelling the idea that the proposals - already rejected by the employers! - offer a way forward.
From the early days of the dispute it was clear that FBU members were not getting enough information. When no news came out of FBU HQ over Christmas, when Gilchrist cancelled strikes, when no news went up on the FBU's official website, 30kers hoped it was because their leaders had a cunning plan. Over the months, they have come instead to think of the union's HQ treating them like mushrooms: keeping them in the dark and feeding them shit. Now 30k is probably FBU members' best source of information. In a union that, like most - all? - does not have a permanent organisation of the rank and file, 30k is fast becoming one.
Life on 30k is not always comfortable - perhaps this helps to explain the large number of members who don't post, and the many guests who never join. (But out of a union of 55,000, one tenth signed up and many more visiting is good going!) The style is trenchant. A "real" 30ker has a set of views on the dispute: woe betide any poster who shows themself fainthearted.
There are unpleasant skirmishes on issues like asylum. There was reluctant censorship around the Iraq war. Threads on it were pulled to stop people going at each other hammer and tongs.
But if you have not found your way to 30k yet, go there today. Even John "Imposition" Prescott has been: "Hon Members will know that I have become familiar with the chat lines - perhaps I should be more discreet about that - of the firefighters, who say what they think about the dispute. I have certainly picked up the signals as to what they think about me."

Funds for 30k: Y... because they're worth it
Help the firefighters win their dispute. Help build the FBU rank and file. Support democracy in the trade union movement. Get up John Prescott's nose. Send a cheque - payable to "Simon Hickman" - to 12 Thornfield Drive, Swinton, Manchester, M27 5SX.

Comments

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 18/05/2005 - 23:12

let us work as much as we can get and want,regardless of whether it is to cover staffing shortfalls.

Submitted by Janine on Thu, 19/05/2005 - 21:41

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

1. Vacancies left unfilled.
2. Duties left uncovered, because vacancies are left unfilled and no-one is willing/able to do overtime. So other workers over-worked and possibly in danger.
3. Workers scrapping and bitching with each other about who is doing more overtime, whose turn it is to do the overtime available on Friday etc.
4. Everyone taking home a different amount of money at the end of the month.
5. Women earning less than men. And men with family responsibilities earning less than men without.
6. Basic pay slipping back, because the employers say you can always top it up with overtime.
7. People too knackered to do their job properly.

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