Wildcat strike action has spread across the UK in support of a strike by construction workers at the Lindsey oil refinery in Lincolnshire over an Italian firm getting a contract for part of the refitting work on the refinery. The Italian firm will use its permanent workforce of Italian workers.
Rapid, rank-and-file organised action is needed in the current economic crisis, where thousands of jobs are being lost every day. We need industrial and political action to oppose job cuts, stop casualisation and the driving down of wages and conditions and demand what the labour movement has called "work or full pay", i.e. the demand for the government to organise decent jobs for all or a living income for those not in jobs.
But Italian workers are not to blame for the capitalist crisis. Nor are any other workers! Keeping out foreign workers will not stop soaring unemployment. What it will do is boost racism and divide the working class, further strengthening the bosses' power over us.
The strikes echo Gordon Brown's reactionary and populist slogan "British jobs for British workers" - used previously and since by the far right. But working away from home is hardly something new to the construction industry. Thousands of British workers in the industry are working across the world today. Do we want them chased out of Italy and other countries? Worker fighting worker cannot be the way forward.
On the day the wildcat strikes spread, our sisters and brothers in France showed the real way forward, in a national general strike against the attacks on the whole working-class in this global economic crisis. It follows on from the general strikes in Greece and Italy late last year under the universal working-class slogan for these times: "We will not pay for your crisis".
"We" there means workers all over the world, including all over Europe.
We need action directed against Gordon Brown's government and the big employers, rather than echoing Gordon Brown's slogans. The demands should be:
* Work or full pay, that is decent jobs or decent benefits, for all workers! If the government can advance £1100 billion in cash and credit guarantees to save the banks, it can also take the energy industries into public ownership, under workers' control, and with working hours cut with no loss of pay to create new jobs. It can do the same in the car and car-components industries, hard-hit by job cuts. Militant action like these wildcats can force the government to budge - if it is directed against the government and the bosses, not against foreign workers.
* There should be an unemployed register for construction workers, with the Government enforcing a levy on the industry to pay them a living income when the industry does not find a job for them.
* All contracted labour should be under a single site agreement with union representation. The details of all contracts and sub-contracts should be open to union inspection. Where workers from other countries are employed on sites, the unions on the site should have access to them, and should work with the unions in those workers' home countries to ensure that the workers have representation, together with other workers on the site, via a union recognised on the site.
* Tax the rich and business to rebuild public services, creating millions of secure and socially useful jobs. Step up, not cut, investment in "green" energy alternatives, under direct public ownership! This is necessary to save the planet, and will create many thousands of jobs for construction workers.
* Workers' unity across the EU. British unions and shop stewards should be working with Italian unions and shop stewards to deal with the global corporations and the global capitalist markets, for example by "levelling up" workers' rights and protections across the EU.
One striker, on the strikers' website, writes:
"We want to be careful with the nationalism, lads, so that things don't turn nasty. I've got nothing against the Italian workers as such, they're just doing a job, putting food on the table for their families.
"They're not Without Papers, as they are EU citizens and are legally allowed to work here. Besides, this is racist. Many of us have worked abroad - Germany, Spain, Middle East - did we think or care about jobs in those countries? Getting at the workers is just going to give us a bad reputation, and turn the public against us.
"The problem is with the tenders, Total management and probably the Government for allowing foreign companies to undercut..."
Part of the background to the strike is increased use of sub-contracting on construction jobs, using EU rulings which allow contractors to undercut union-negotiated agreements by employing sub-contractors from other EU countries. The unions have been lobbying for changes in the law on this for some time.
The strikes could take a progressive turn if they shifted to making the sort of demands above: for all contracted labour should be under a single site agreement with union representation. For the details of all contracts and sub-contracts should be open to union inspection. Where workers from other countries are employed on sites, for the unions on the site to have access to them, and to work with the unions in those workers' home countries to ensure that the workers have representation, together with other workers on the site, via a union recognised on the site.
But under the slogans of "British workers first", or "British jobs for British workers" - which have dominated so far - the strikes cannot but turn worker against worker.
The far-right and Tory papers like the Express and the Sun and the Mail – which hate union power and urge on privatisation – are supporting the strike action rather than vilifying it. Why? Because they know that the strike's current slogans are a disastrous blind alley for the working class. Because they know that if anger is directed against Italian and other foreign workers, it will deflect that anger from the bosses who make the job cuts.
Because it chimes in with their more general racism and xenophobia, and in particular their noxious campaigns against asylum-seekers and poor, mainly illegal migrant workers from the developing world.
Because it chimes in with their longstanding campaigns against the European Union. Those campaigns are nourished in large part by the fear that the more extensive workers' rights and protections won by the labour movements in France or Italy, Germany or Sweden, but lost in Britain since the Tory onslaught of the 1980s, may spill over through the EU into Britain.
The Tories and New Labour has sought opt-outs for the UK from EU legislation, notably on the Working Time and Agency Workers Directives. British workers work the longest hours in Europe and have fewer individual and union rights at work.
To deal with the global crisis, workers need not a "British-first" mentality, but workers' unity and solidarity across Europe and the world.
Right-wing union officials who have waged no fight for jobs except to plead with employers to reduce their cutbacks have supported the strikers' demands. Unite, the union that organises the industry, has played a disgraceful role.
Where was the outcry from those same union leaders as the Welfare Reform Bill passed its main reading in Parliament - a wholesale attack on the rights of unemployed workers? As of November last year there were 1.92 million people out of work according to the official figures. Tens of thousands of jobs have been lost since then. In the energy industry, E-on this week announced 450 job losses in the UK and the Newcastle office of the National Grid is being shut, axing 182 jobs.
Yet in their talk with bosses, union leaders still plead, suggesting that workers will accept lower pay if the bosses reduce job cuts. No talk of direct action. Now they support the wildcat demands - while insisting that they can't support the strikes as such because they are unlawful.
Wrong way round! Against the jobs massacre, we need working-class action, including instant action in defiance of the law.
Strong, determined action can defy the law. The current action shows that: government and employers have made no move to use the law against it.
Unite's squirming justifications of xenophobia are linked to its leaders 'left-wing' economic nationalism. But they are also reflective of a wider problem with our union leaders. All this is highly reminiscent of what is happening at Heathrow, where Unite is quietly accepting an ongoing jobs cull, while at the same time pimping itself around on behalf of the British Airports Authority and the CBI with the claim that a carbon-spewing third runway is necessary to create jobs.
Workers at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago, USA, recently occupied their factory when the bosses shut it down. The occupation was completely illegal under US law. But the owner and the police did not dare use the law. The workers won what they demanded: back pay and pension money. Now it looks as if they may have won what at first they did not even dare to demand: the reopening of the plant.
The Republic Windows workers - many of them migrants or of recent Latin-American migrant origin - aimed their struggle against the bosses and the Bank of America (the bosses' financier), not against other workers.
Workers should not pay for the bosses' crisis! 'Work or full pay' for all! Workers' unity across Europe! Fight nationalism and racism in the British labour movement!
Comments
missed the pont
When a contract is re-awarded normal only the management change. British jobs for British workers in not really relevant here. If a company from Newcastle had done this the same situation would apply. It's wrong the call them shame fall, but instead should point out the deficiency in there slogans. By not supporting the strikes your lining up with Gordon Brown and the Tories.
The Worker are fighting defend there jobs being taken by others in interests of Capitalist profits, I support the workers in defending there jobs and support the sympathy strikes, so should you.
Fight For the Right to Work
Jerry Hicks a candidate in the coming election for General Secretary in the UK's biggest union Unite-Amicus is supporting the action. In a resent bulleting it reads:
STRIKE ACTION ESCALATES
AS WORKERS FIGHT FOR THE RIGHT TO WORK
But it should come as no surprise!
An emergency meeting of the national construction shop stewards forum took place in London as long ago as the 8th January. The meeting discussed the escalating crisis in construction following a series of protests in November and December of last year, over employment rights and also the proposed exclusion of UK workers by foreign companies on power stations and other major UK contracts.
The meeting was originally called for at Newark on the 3rd December following a series of protests at the gates of Staythope Power Station. At the meeting shop stewards voted overwhelmingly to organise a programme of demonstrations toward targeted construction projects within the UK power generation sector.
Shop stewards and trade union activists find it is hard enough as it is to get a job in the industry because of the black listing by the employers. It is a way of reducing their costs and attempting to break union organisation on the major projects.
Rank and file members are preparing for mass disruption on projects throughout the country that refuse to recognise union national agreements. There will be organised demonstrations strikes and mass disruption. We are preparing for a battle to defend our jobs.
Jerry Hicks a candidate in the coming election for General Secretary in the UK's biggest union Unite-Amicus is supporting the action. He was present at a recent protest at Staythorpe power station where he sustained a fractured leg, having been assaulted by the police.
He said "This should come as no surprise to anyone. The employers have deliberately and actively been looking for ways to exploit cheap labour while covering their eyes and ears to the growing rage of discontent and ignoring all the warning signs, it's outrageous",
He went on to say, "To its shame the union leadership failed miserably to grasp the nettle months ago when the dispute was a crisis in the making. The union needs to confront the employers and organise a national campaign for industrial action."
The employers watch and listen to everything we say and do. If the union does little and says even less they drive the boot in harder and our situation gets worse.
This is not about race or prejudice it is about the exploitation of labour, playing one worker against another. It is about the employers trying to break nationally agreed arrangements and in doing so it is an attack on the union.
Gordon Brown, who at the last Labour party conference said 'British jobs for British workers', has created a huge problem all of his own making. He can no longer simply sit on his hands waiting on the sidelines.
Meanwhile, other energy companies are observing what happens next as they seek to further exploit the cheap foreign labour market.
This issue is as a result of the Employers deliberately exploiting a situation, the union leaderships woeful lack of response and Browns pronouncement, Now they act like the like the three monkeys. Hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil.
British jobs for British workers.
This is the first time in ages I looked on your website because I was hopeful I would find some insightful comment on what was happening at Immingham and suggestions as to how socialists should respond to the first spontaneous mass strike action in years. Your comment is interchangeable with the swp, are you sending people down to the picket lines to tell people to go back to work because they're racists? Or just not sending people and hoping it will go away. The article doesn't seem to have any purchase on reality.
Hi Paul. Good to hear from
Hi Paul.
Good to hear from you. Have a look here at Jim Denham's website:
http://shirazsocialist.wordpress.com/2009/01/31/distinguish-between-the-slogans-and-the-underlying-issues/
Jim Denham's website.
Hi Tom,
Jack Haslam's most recent comment is interesting and seems a more constructive response.
The demands are what they are
The demands of the strike are what they are, namely reactionary. I'm sure it is true that job insecurity and aggressive subcontracting in the industry has fuelled the feeling, but the strike cannot win progress on those issues unless it develops demands on those issues, aimed against the bosses and the government, rather than demands aimed against foreign workers.
Commentators from afar saying that they know what the strikers "really mean" won't change the demands on the strikers' placards and the strikers' website. Only convincing workers on the issues will do that.
Demands
In a sense, the demands are aimed are at the bosses. i.e. Employ locally where possible, or at least give British workers the chance to apply on equal terms with others
What about when AWL supported Burberry workers' campaign against offshoring of jobs? Obviously, you correctly said that several of the slogans raised by the campaign were incorrect, and openly stated your disagreement with the GMB union. Quite right. But you believed that it was basically a decent campaign.
The article above is more or less right, but some of the comments below go further. I think we've got to be careful not to assume that a few words on the placards are a comprehensive description of what the strikers are thinking. Things are more complicated than that.
EDIT: alot of strikers would say the strike is against the fact that local workers won't be given a chance to apply. So it's not saying Italian workers shouldn't be able to apply, it's saying at they should be allowed.
EDIT 2: do you really believe that the Italian workers are going to be employed on the same terms and conditions as local workers would be? Together with putting the workers up in floating hotels and transporting them here, how do you think the new company is making a profit out of this?
This is a real August 4
This is a real August 4 turning point for the British Labour movement. I am exceedingly pleased that the AWL, the SWP and Workers Power have taken such clear positions against this strike wave. Despite differences on other very serious matters we must noe unite to fight this reaction; it is led by Gordon Brown, it is developed by the Unite leadership - Woodley, Simpson, Hicks, etc., they are defended by the Morning Star and the Socialist Party and Respect - has the ISG mamaged to find its voice behind Galloway's arse yet? And shamefully your ex-comrades of the Commune can only front the reactionary Gregor Gall to speak for them on this matter.
It will obviously now have repercussions on the NSSN and everywhere else. If I have criticisms of the AWL and SWP's positions is that they are soft on the TU bureaucracy, who are funding Gordon Brown and whose capitulation to capitalism over the years has produced this situation. Now is the time to set ourselves the task of building a real principled internationalist rank-and-file movement in the TUs, independent of ALL TU bureaucracies. Let us now fight for that in the NSSN against all the British chauvinists and their apologists - and what really pathetic grovelling apologies we have heard! Poor old muddled Paul above thinks the article does not 'have any purchase on reality'. Hitler was a reality once. Perhaps it would have been a good idea to purchase him!
@Tom, re: Burberry
Tom -
Yes, the Burberry stuff had some seriously dodgy shit going on around the edges which, as you say, we criticised. The use of the slogan "keep Burberry British" was disgusting, but the core demands around which that campaign was organised were against the closure of particular workplaces.
I don't think the current wildcats are much of analogy. Surely the point about a strike conducted around the demand "British jobs for British workers" (rather than a dispute which has that kind of chauvinism as an element of it) is that it can't possibly win on that basis and that even if it did, the consequences of its victory would be far from straightforwardly progressive for the working class as a whole.
Do these workers have legitimate concerns? Yes, clearly. Do we support them taking action on them? Yes, clearly. But surely the point of a socialist engagement with a dispute like this is to make clear that the political basis on which they've chosen to take this action is a complete blind-alley. Don't you agree?
Playing games with analogies is dangerous, but indulge this one momentarily; what if, somehow, the plans for the new runway at Heathrow are scrapped and a group of construction workers whose company was promised contracts for it walk out, demanding that the building of the runway goes ahead. Do they have legitimate concerns? Yes, of course - jobs are short, wages are low and we're in favour of people's right to work. But would we just offer straightforward "support" for that strike? I don't think so.
Heathrow etc.
In the Heathrow case, I agree we would have to oppose that demand. Presumably we'd argue for spreading the strike in order to target the government, and demand that jobs be created building social housing or something. I see the key difference between the analogy and this case being the fact that the Third Runway is per se a reactionary demand, whereas the immediate demand here is for the original LOR workforce not to be made redundant and for British workers not to be excluded from applying for local jobs, which isn't reactionary. In the Heathrow case, it would be impossible to win without generalising, since obviously a construction company can't satisfy the deman for more construction jobs. There need to be bodies wanting the things - runways or houses - and prepared to spend the money to get them. That fact would raise the need to move beyond the reactionary slogan as not only a political but a strategic and organisational necessity, making the debate a lot clearer and less ambiguous than this one.
But as I think you imply, the issue is not whether it would be good for the strikers to win on the immediate demand as such - it would be - but what the reverberations will be in terms of the message percolating through the working class. I think that many workers have non-reactionary ideas, and are behind the slogan unreflectively or because they take to express opposition to the fact that local British workers weren't even allowed to apply for the jobs. But I don't know how far those ambiguities will come across to most people. There's a real danger that the slogan will gain strength and be raised again in a case where the immediate demands are straightforwardly reactionary.
I guess part of the problem is that we don't have political contact with anyone on the ground. Obviously the SP do, but it's hard for us to assess what the balance of opinion there really is, and what ideas people really hold. What they typically understand by the slogans, etc. When I first saw reports I was seriously worried. Now I'm still concerned, but less so.
Though the analogy raises another issue. What do we think about the expansion of oil refineries, and the intensified burning of fossil fuel? Aren't we against this, and for investment in ecological/sustainable alternatives? I haven't seen this raised anywhere in the left press, and I don't even know if it should be. Is there the political space for that conversation at the moment? I don't know.
but the core demands around which [the Burberry] campaign was organised were against the closure of particular workplaces
Is this really the point? Are we interested in workplaces, or workers? What if all the workers here were sacked, and replaced by workers from whatever country the work went to, but on the same rates they would have got there (due to some sort of EPZ type arrangement), and at the same site? Presumably we would still be against this: geography or particular buildings aren't important; it's the effect on people, and on organised workers in particular. So I think the Burberry analogy holds.
For me, the problem is some of the political language/ideas of the dispute less than its immediate object.
I don't know from the above whether AWL is making like Workers Power and opposing the strike. I guess from the above, like the SWP, you're limiting your critique to the slogan...
these are the strike demands
these are the strike demands - the ones 'martin' apparently believes are reactionary:
No victimisation of workers taking solidarity action.
All workers in UK to be covered by NAECI Agreement.
Union controlled registering of unemployed and locally skilled union members, with nominating rights as work becomes available.
Government and employer investment in proper training/apprenticeships for new generation of construction workers - fight for a future for young people.
All Immigrant labour to be unionised.
Trade Union assistance for immigrant workers - including interpreters - and access to Trade Union advice - to promote active integrated Trade Union Members.
Build links with construction trade unions on the continent.
Re-instatement of [victimised worker] John McKewan
The AWL will apparently support nobody and nothing unless it comes along with perfectly formed politics. Which is why you will remain a tiny sect on the edges of the workers movement.
Nice try, belboid
If honest analysis rather than point scoring sectarianism was your objective, belboid, you'd explain that the 'demands' listed above were agreed by the mass meeting at Lindsey today, after the AWL statement was written yesterday in response to the initial wave of strikes having little besides "British jobs for British workers" and "Put British workers first" on their placards.
The reports of that mass meeting today are certainly positive.
AWL counter-protests?
I understand that the AWL members have been calling for and attending pickets of UNITE headquarters as counter-protests against the strikes. This is, to be blunt, a completely insane way of going about influencing the strikers. I have difficulty thinking of a less appropriate thing to be doing at the moment, even if you agree with the (deeply flawed) AWL position outlined in this article.
In fact, it fits extremely well with the method behind your interventions into the Gaza marches - provoking and antagonising the people you are allegedly trying to influence, rather than starting the dialogue where people actually are and pointing the discussion in a socialist direction.
Sectarian lies?
As Nick points out, the demands that Belboid cites are a new, and positive, development. As I understand it, the events outside Unite's offices were not "counter-protests against the strikes" and were called by the Campaign Against Immigration Controls (which the AWL participates in), not by random "AWL members". There have been none of what Mark P refers to as "AWL counter-protests".
Mark P's and Belboid's sectarian bullishness is disgraceful; at least Tom's trying to work through the issues. If I was a migrant worker, I think I'd be feeling incredibly threatened and got at by the strikewave. We have as much of a responsibility to have a "dialogue" with them as we do with the strikers.
Effects of ''British jobs...''
On local radio (BBC Radio Northampton) this morning, unemployed workers from Corby were asked 'who is to blame for the economic crisis?'. Without exception the answer given was 'foreign workers'. Just a couple of weeks ago, surely that response would have been unthinkable, and the response would have included 'fat cats', 'bank bosses' and such like.
Now, the 'fat cats' must be laughing all the way to the bank, so to speak. The BNP, UKIP, and other racists will have been given a big boost.
Of course, we should engage with the dispute, making arguments against the blind alley of reactionary slogans and nationalist sentiments, and for international working class unity.
As the comments above point out, today's mass meeting at Lindsay offers more hope.
Dan: The following email
Dan:
The following email from a prominent AWL member was posted to some left wing mailing lists, before the Campaign Against Immigration Controls called it's protests against the strikers. It clearly describes the strikes as "bigotry" not "solidarity". It also suggests that people who are opposed to the strikes should protest so that a "a serious alternative anti-capitalist voice" can be expressed "in opposition to these protests".
The CAIC is listed as one of the groups this AWL members intends to contact with his suggestions. The CAIC, a group the AWL is involved in, subsequently announced that it was calling pickets on the UNITE headquarters.
Do you still think that I'm displaying "sectarian bullishness", Dan? Did AWL members in fact attend these pickets or not?
Hi comrades,
You will have all seen this wave of nationalism spread round the country
with our union banners flying high. Working-class people are reeling from this
economic crisis. Migrant workers and those in the colonies have been suffering
the sharp end of this system for centuries . We need action. We do not need
nationalistic and racist outpourings. What we're seeing is not solidarity, it
is bigotry.
Tomorrow morning workers around the UK will be meeting to decide whether to
escalate action. 900 Sellafield may join the action.
I really think it is important that tomorrow does not pass without a serious
alternative anti-capitalist voice being expressed, in opposition to these
protests, in sympathy with job insecurity and in solidarity against the bosses
version of internationalism- exploit freely across borders, divide and rule.
I'm going to suggest that people who want to discuss this, draft a leaflet,
make slogans, meet at the Lucas Arms, off the Grays Inn Road, Kings X tonight
at 7pm.
I'm putting this call out to the Campaign Against Immigration Controls, No
Borders, the London Coalition Against Poverty, Feminist Fightback and Climate
Camp, Liberty and Solidarity and Workers' Liberty whose activists have been
at the forefront of championing migrant workers' rights, inter/trans- national
class struggle. I will also urge comrades in the different anarchist,
socialist, migrant, trade union groups to attend.
I'll be out and about today. But if I set up a facebok group, then people on
different lists and networks can join and communicate.
for working-class solidarity against borders
An extra detail
I forgot to mention in my last post, that the CAIC announcement of its pickets carried the following, pretty straightforward headline: "Two pickets against the strike for 'British Jobs for British Workers'". I think it's fair to say that call out is unambiguous in the position it takes on the strike.
I had a question mark in the title of my earlier post for a reason, the same reason I prefaced the post with "I understand that...". It seems that AWL members were involved in organising these pickets and that they participated in them, but I don't know that for sure. If they did not support these pickets or attend them, then fair enough. So, Dan, did they take part or not?
Pickets of UNITE
To clarify, the AWL did / does not support the proposed pickets of UNITE head office by CAIC - proposed pickets because we're not sure they took place. So that answers your question, Mark.
Incidentally, CAIC's statement on the strike, 'We want a fight that can unite all workers', does not demand the strikes be called off.
accusations of sectarianism
accusations of sectarianism from Daniel Randall are always amusing, but it is a simple truth that your sectarian and nonsensical attitude towards the strike would have been disastrous if it had been taken up by the wider left.
Had your young comrades marched in telling the strikers that they were taking part in a reactionary strike, which could not be supported, then they would undoubtedly have got short shrift. And then the reactionary slogan of British Jobs for British Workers would have gone unchallenged, and, who knows, maybe the BNP wouldn't have been chased off as they were today. It was only because sane socialists could actually see what the strike was ACTUALLY about that they could intervene, be listened to and propose a set of excellent demands that the strikers have now taken up.
You rushed into comment without actually bothering to find what the real issues were, taking your views simply from the headlines on the news, and now look a bit stupid. The demands formally adopted by the strike committee today WERE always the actual demands - so when martin writes 'The demands of the strike are what they are, namely reactionary.' his view is based on simple ignorance, presumption, and falsehood.
Here's the actual text of the CAIC leaflet
Here's the actual text of the CAIC leaflet - it is, to repeat, not an AWL leaflet.
* Foreign workers are not to blame for the capitalists' crisis
* Action against the bosses and their government, not foreign workers
* No to nationalism and racism in the labour movement
* Don't echo Brown's reactionary slogans
* Jobs or full pay for all: cut work hours, expand public services. Tax the rich!
* French, Italian and Greek workers show the way - for workers' unity across Europe! Workers of the world, unite!
Today at 7am and at 5pm the Campaign against Immigration Controls is picketing the Unite offices in Holborn, London, to protest against nationalism in our movement and to argue for working-class internationalism, freedom of movement and equal rights and jobs - for all. The Italian workers should be welcomed here.
We want strikers to adopt a programme to fight the job losses, the union breaking and the benefit cutting - the general strategy of the bosses and New Labour during their economic recession of their making.
But we want a fight that can unite all workers and win. In Italy and France and Greece the unions have held local and general strikes against the economic crises. Look at what’s happened in Iceland. In England and Scotland, the first big display of resistance has ended up targeting foreign workers. We oppose this direction. We need a different politics and a united class struggle.
Strikers have our full support and solidarity for a struggle along the lines of the workers and students in Italy who have organized national general strikes promising “We will not pay for their crisis”. At the same time, the Italian working-class needs to combat anti-migrant and anti-minority bigotry in its ranks. Ironically, news of the UK strikes have caused pause for thought for many Italian workers who had taken racist and xenophobic positions.
We support the strikers’ resolve to self-organise and fight unemployment militantly, with or without the trade union leaders who should have begun a proper fight, years back - who in other places are putting down workers' action.
But we believe the slogans of the strikers as they stand are an offense to migrants, to all those who welcome and solidarise with migrant workers around the world (including British migrants), and to fellow trade unionists and activists who stand against bigotry and borders in our movement. The current slogans are divisive and feed the poisonous nationalism that Gordon Brown's budget speech gave legitimacy to and fostered. It is no surprise that the BNP see this dispute as a rallying point. But neither is it a surprise to see Gordon Brown squirming.
Workers are referring to the solutions he offered. His solutions were wrong; we opposed his rhetoric then, as we oppose it being adopted by workers now.
We see the problems with tendering, self-employment, agency work, the eroding of individual and collective rights, union breaking, under-cutting of wages; these are general attacks, facing most workers in the world today, but get associated and blamed on migration. Migrant workers are often the most precarious and exploited. We need solidarity.
Bosses exploit divisions. Why are the right-wing media so behind these strikes? Why, in contrast, did they denounce the postal-workers’ wild cat action? It is the same media that has been whipping up support for workplace immigration checks and raids, forced deportations and detentions, and a general climate in which the BNP have grown significantly.
We do not put it past corporations to deploy even whole battalions of foreign labour to break up union strength in a locality. Or even to whip up race riots and anti-migrant actions which happens frequently in Italy.
There is also a parallel in what the strikers say is happening now, in off-shoring. It simultaneously undermines organized work-places and sometimes the workforce of whole countries, exploits generally cheaper and less organized labour, and creates a sense of resentment in the way it is done.
Workers in the UK are paying again for the breaking up of the manufacturing unions and industries - and the reshaping of the UK economy around the rule of the banks and the arms, security and energy multi-nationals.
Is it new for the bosses and governments to divide and rule? What is the real strategy to fight this?
We campaign for working-class unity across borders, and against immigration controls and nationalism, because we believe that we need a united struggle across the world against a capitalist system that is global in its reach. We have no desire to turn the clock back, and retreat to imagined nations and races. Or even to press pause. Neither is wanted or possible.
We support both the right to work locally and the right to migrate within existing national boundaries and across them.
Bosses want non-unionised, dispensable workers. New Labour wants this too. Bosses want profits and New Labour makes sure they get it.
People are fearful and anxious of what is to come. The idea of further job losses, which in this case the workers are arguing are a calculated attack on the British workforce and unions, demands a response and a solution. The Viking and Laval test cases which ruled against the unions need to be fought. It is the kind of action that is being taken now that can secure workers’ demands, but for now the demands are at best unclear, and seem to suggest that British workers must first in the queue. This may seem reasonable to some in this warped world of ours, but it a logic that leads to division and defeat.
The tactics for fighting will be decided by the workers themselves. There are significant voices within the union who are rejecting the nationalism and trying to put this dispute on better footing.
There are positive alternative demands that can be made. Many of the activists and organizations that have participated in the activity of the Campaign against Immigration Controls have put forward broad alternative programmes and slogans, many of which seem viable and necessary. It should also be said that there have been long discussions and arguments among trade unionists and activists across the country about this strike wave.
There is widespread dissatisfaction with the slogans. There is total support for militant action to fight for jobs. There is starkly differing reading about what this strike represents. We say it hangs in the balance. Everyone would surely agree that the fight for our times is, and must be, the fight for jobs for all.
The year began with the flaring up of historic struggles where working-classes and born again nations have been turned against each other. In Palestine, Sri Lanka, the Congo, Kashmir. These struggles need to transform in to reconciliation among workers, on the basis of mutual respect and equal rights for all – and united class war against the people who profit from human misery.
This dispute, coming in the wake of these existing tragedies, is another (for now smaller) blow to class unity.
With all these situations reality can change, and change they must urgently. Peace is needed across the world between workers. Struggle is needed against this system of global exploitation, of plunder and war, of displacement, forced migration, unemployment, poverty, ecological crisis, starvation: the whole catalogue of crimes of capitalism.
We want to be supporting, taking parting in, spreading strike action and protests that secure jobs for all, not fearing the nationalist, racist and fascist turn that is evident throughout Europe. The bosses’ European Union – of coordinated attack upon attack against workers - is coming apart at the seams, and so it must. A workers’ Europe, based on coordinated and unified grass-roots struggle is the only way to fight this recession. Workers’ of the world unite.
Campaign Against Immigration Controls 07974 331 053 contact@caic.org.uk.
picket of UNITE office
The comments above are not an honest portrayal of the events surrounding the picket - it was the personal initiative of an AWL member, the CAIC number above belongs to an AWL member, and at it he most certainly did call on the strikes to stop. Whether or not the snow stopped it going ahead was surely not your reason for not supporting it.
Why don't you explain the POLITICAL reason for this, which surely has to be that it is impossible to relate to the strikers, and the left of the strike movement opposing nationalist slogans, at the same time as demanding that the strikes stop (and indeed displaying indifference to who stops the strike and why).
The tone (and listed authors) of the above article have also been changed a couple of times without explanation.
Questions and answers
Actually, whoever is posting as "AWL" it doesn't answer my question because, having seen the report on DB's website, I don't believe you.
I know that AWL members were suggesting such a counter-protest before the pickets were called, including saying that they would contact CAIC about them. I know that they were then called by CAIC. And I know that they were called specifically to oppose the strikes, as it said in no uncertain times on the CAIC website.
According to the detailed report on DB's website, at least one AWL member attended and participated despite the bad weather.
IMHO, I don't think AWL
IMHO, I don't think AWL should have to take responsibilty for the actions of every member, unless actions put the member outside the organisational basis of unity. That's not my vision of a political group, even though it might be the offical vision of the AWL. I think the comrades involved with the picket have made a mistake. The appropriate steps are to discuss this issue with them, and try to clarify.
If the AWL collective view has evolved, and lessons have been learned, this is a good thing. What does criticism based on the charge of inconsistency aim at? That AWL should have been better in keeping the comrades concerned 'in line' or something? I am opposed to this model; this way lies the SWP approach; it would not have been 'better' if this had happened.
This approach, where groups or individuals are supposed to be avatars of the historic leadership of the class is ridiculous, and will be shown to be ridiculous at regular intervals when they inevitably fail to reach the standards they set for themselves, and that others implicitly accept. It only bolsters the impression such groups/indviduals have of themselves that they are such a leadership, as opposed to a bunch of people doing their imperfect best to articulate and evolve their political ideas and activity. Which is what they are, and we all are, and the sooner people stop pretending that any of us can be anything more than that, the better. And the sooner that happens, the sooner - hopefully - there will be more circumspection and less bluster in the way people go about politics.
Support The Strikes / Criticise The Slogans .
Obviously - the responsibility of Socialists is to support the Strikes while at the same time criticising the nationalist slogans .
unless We provide leadership the far-right will try to fill the vaccumn ( although We shouldn't over-estimate the influence the BNP can muster , They are desperately trying to make it look on Their website that They are a major factor in leading/supporting the Strikes ) it's a shame that The BNP have acted much faster than the Left in producing stickers/posters/leaflets - a fighting Left must stop being so lethargic & start reacting speedily to working class struggle .
These Strikes show that the Tory Anti-Trade Union laws are not invincible - We should encourage the working class to undertake rank & file Strike Action to defeat the laws .
AWL: all over the place
Duckman congratulates the AWL (along with SWP and WP) on taking a "clear position".
Strange it has taken completely contradictory positions. This article, by Martin and Sacha, says the strikes are reactionary. An article underneath it by "AWL editorial" takes the opposite position, saying the workers on strike are "our people" and congratulating its militancy. One leading member of the AWL organises a picket of UNITE denouncing the "reactionary strike", while the AWL website dissociates itself from it.
Meanwhile over at stroppy blog, Janine Booth manages a serious analysis of the strikes weaknesses and strengths, actually looking at the issues at stake ( a similar argument can be found on our permanentrevolution.net site).
It was quite possible to both argue against nationalistic slogans while supporting the strike. Indeed in the course of the strike the demands changed as socialists (from the SP) and experienced militants intervened. Which goes to show that the Martin/Sacha position of denouncing the strike as reactionary was ill considered and had little knowledge of the issues at stake. It would have cut socialists off from intervening in such a strike by denouncing the workers as reactionary - classic sectarianism.
The result of the strike, not throwing out of Italian workers but winning over a 100 new jobs - rarely can a political position have been proved so wrong so quickly.