Against victimisation

Picturehouse workers will be on strike again for the Sundance film festival happening at Picturehouse Central from 31 May to 3 June.

They will be striking during the opening night on Thursday 31 May, and again on Saturday 2 May. The strikes will hit several premières taking place at the festival. 

Lecturers strike over pensions

Staff at 61 universities have voted to strike in a dispute over pensions, beginning on 22 February.

University bosses want to remove guaranteed pension provision, in favour of a “defined contribution” scheme where the eventual pay-out is dependent on performance of investments. Staff face losing up to £200,000 over the course of retirement.

Electricians working on the Crossrail development in London struck on Wednesday 10 January after contractor Balfour Beatty refused to pay industry standard project completion payments.

Workers at Fujitsu in Manchester will strike for 11 days over victimisation of union reps, breaches of the company′s redundancy agreement, and compulsory redundancies.

On Saturday 30 September, workers and supporters protested outside the HR Owen car showrooms in London.

HR Owen sells a number of luxury sports cars, including Maserati and Ferrari, some of which sell for over £250,000 each. Last year it made a profit of £400m. Yet it only pays the minimum wage (through an outsourcing company) to its cleaners for the last five years. The inequality between rich and poor could not be clearer.

July has seen a number of interesting and potentially important developments in the ongoing dispute between rail unions and the Train Operating Companies (TOCs) and the government over Driver Only Operation (DOO).

Bob wrote about the dispute at the Queensland Children’s Hospital construction site in 2012. The hospital is now named the Lady Cilento Hospital.

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A primary school in Sheffield is to become the first to get rid of all its teaching assistants. As part of a cost-cutting restructure, unions claim the school is planning on sacking its nine teaching assistants.

As Solidarity goes to press, the annual general meeting of the National Union of Rail, Maritime, and Transport workers (RMT) is debating a series of motions at its annual general meeting on its relationship with the Labour Party. The RMT, whose predecessor union helped found Labour, effectively had its affiliation cancelled by the New Labour leadership in 2004, after the RMT leadership refused to censure Scottish branches which wanted to back candidates of the Scottish Socialist Party, then an active and growing force.

Joe Booth, a young socialist, writes his thoughts about the importance of linking the Picturehouse workers’ struggle to the struggle in the Labour Party.

Since October 2016 Workers′ Liberty has been helping the dispute of Picturehouse workers for the Living Wage, sick pay, and maternity/paternity pay. People should support the Picturehouse workers in their fight for a Living Wage and use the momentum of the Labour election gains to build solidarity.