Unions & politics

Trade Unions and politics

Scotland: class or nation?

This year is the centenary of the Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC). This august event in the calendar of the labour movement is being celebrated with millennium-style revelries, ranging from face-painting to street-busking. Unfortunately the festivities have diverted attention away from one fundamental fact: during the hundred years of its existence the STUC has turned away from working-class politics, in favour of Scottish-consensus politics of the lowest common denominator. The founding of the STUC in 1897 was a by-product of a conflict in the late nineteenth century British labour...

Mexican Electrical Workers Union Fights For Its Life

Dan La Botz has warned that the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME), one of the most important in Latin America, is fighting for its life.

On the night of October 10, the Mexican President ordered federal police to seize the power plants, while he simultaneously liquidated the state-owned Light...

No public service cuts Tax the rich!

The competition between the Tories and New Labour over who will be the most “responsible” at making cuts in public services and public pay if elected at the next general election has become an unedifying and foul spectacle. Here we have politicians trying to “prove” themselves on who will be the most adept at cutting the wages of low-paid workers, slashing benefits and further privatising vital services. The Tories promise big cuts. Labour says it will save money by “improving efficiency” (cuts and privatisation), but will protect vital frontline services. David Cameron says he will not return...

Dockers’ struggles and oral history

PDF below I enjoyed Sean Matgamna’s review of Bill Hunter’s They knew why they fought: unofficial struggles and leadership on the docks 1945-1989 (Workers’ Liberty 21). One small disappointment I experienced reading Bill Hunter’s stimulating book was the lack of any comment on the role of the militants of the Revolutionary Communist Party in the struggles in the docks during the 1940s. The breakthrough which secured the Trotskyists an influence in the struggles of the 1950s came in 1951 when, as Bill Hunter notes, Gerry Healy’s ‘club’ was able to bring the dockers leaders, Harry Constable and...

Tyneside debates: “Can the left unite?”

About 60 socialists, activists and trade unionists attended a Tyneside Socialist Forum open meeting about left unity on 15 July. The timing of the meeting wasn't ideal, as most students had left for the summer, but still the organised left turned out (Socialist Workers Party, Revolutionary Communist Group, Alliance for Workers’ Liberty, Labour Representation Committee, as well as Green Party). Trade unions were also represented including PCS, Unison, and Unite. Although the Socialist Party could not attend No2EU was represented by the RMT Regional Organiser. The lead off by two older comrades...

Who are Workers’ Climate Action?

Workers Climate Action is a network of socialists, anarchists, environmentalists and trade unionists seeking to build a mass working-class response to climate change. We don’t believe that climate change can be averted by a bit of green consumerism, whether that is individuals buying organic veg or multinationals buying “carbon credits”. We respect, but see the inadequacy, of the direct action environmentalists, like Greenpeace — elitist bands of brave individuals pulling off media stunts. Climate change requires an urgent and appropriate response — we believe the working-class needs to stand...

Democracy is power

Martin Donohue recommends Democracy is Power, from the Labor Notes rank-and-file organising project in the US. In the last issue of Solidarity I recommended the Trouble Maker’s Handbook (also produced by Labor Notes) as an invaluable resource for rank and file union activists. This companion volume addresses the key question in any serious attempt at union renewal, democracy. The central message of this book is that only consistent democracy offers hope for union revival. And it is the struggle for that democracy and accountability that can itself transform the existing movement. Why should...

letter: Making trouble in the UK?

Sometimes great minds think alike — or at least minds focussed on spreading the word about working-class struggle. The timing of Martin Donohue’s tribute (Solidarity 3/154) to the US Labor Notes publication A Troublemaker’s Handbook (TMH) coincides almost exactly with the National Shop Stewards’ Network’s latest conference in London on 27 June, where as NSSN Education and Publications officer I issued an appeal for a British “Troublemaker’s Handbook” — with the rather less snazzy (provisional) title Tips and Victories. At the NSSN conference, as at all gatherings of trade union activists, from...

Union leaders say they will restore life to Labour conference

At the recent Unison Labour Link conference, UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis said that the union would push for the restoration of unions and local Labour Parties' right to put motions to Labour Party conference. According to an insider from the Executive of the Unite union, all the big Labour-affiliated unions - Unison, Unite, GMB, and CWU - are agreed on this push, and expect Labour's National Executive to respond to their pressure by proposing restoration to the Labour Party conference this September. Whether it all goes through like that remains to be seen, of course. Union activists...

AWL debate 2009-10: the unions and the Labour Party

Workers' Liberty 3/23 1. How the new facts change the prospects 2. What the dispute is not about, and what it is about 3. Why argue now for a union fight in the Labour structures? 4. Instead, build an alternative "pole" by disaffiliations? 5. Does disgust with New Labour rule out revival? 6. The lessons of history 7. AWL and the imaginary "pole" 8. Trotsky: "It is impossible to leap over the problem. It must be solved" Earlier contributions Debate: Labour and the unions. Why we should not back CWU disaffiliation , by Sean Matgamna; AWL National Committee text on the subject (and online...

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