Solidarity 592, 12 May 2021

The night shift operators seem to have smashed the crane and grab into a wall. No one will admit fault, but it’s a mess. The grabs are connected to the crane with heavy shackles and thick steel cables. When we first inspect the ropes one of the guides has splayed open, which must have taken incredible force. The crane engineer replaces it immediately. I assist the hydraulics contractors on the grab while the electricians work on the crane controls. The contractors — A and S — gather spanners, rags, paper overalls and work permit, then head into the pit where the grab is parked on a concrete...

Scottish NHS workers in the GMB union have rejected the 4% Scottish government pay offer. The RCN, who also recommended rejection, are expected to announce their result as Solidarity goes to press on 11 May. Unison recommended acceptance of the offer, and Unite did not make a recommendation, so it seems likely their members will vote to accept. The issue in Scotland will now be whether GMB and possibly the RCN will ballot for action, or simply use the recommendation to reject as a crude recruitment ploy, as happened in the last pay round. Members should push for a ballot for strike action...

Pete Boggs’ articles on the Kurds ( Solidarity 591 and 589 ) suggest it is time for a Kurdish film. Although director Samira Makhmalbaf is not Kurdish, her film Blackboards (Takhté siah) was shot in the Kurdish-populated mountainous border region of northern Iran and Iraq. Released in 2000, the film features a group of itinerant teachers who, carrying their cumbersome blackboards on their backs, hope to find some village children to teach. It is hard, dangerous work and many villages are deserted as the inhabitants have taken flight due to the Iran-Iraq war. One of the teachers, Said...

After a 20 month delay, due to Covid and a change of franchisee, guards on East Midlands Railway will resume their fight against unfair starter contracts and rostering which busts terms and conditions with three strikes on consecutive Sundays starting on 16 May, the first day of the new timetable. Reps have paid close attention to the strike days that members wanted, with the majority being in favour of consecutive Sunday strikes rather than Saturdays, weekdays, or more than single days of action per week. Planning has also been done to further pressurise management if they don’t see sense...

Workers at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) complex in Swansea struck again from 4-8 May. The strike was very successful, and built on the previous strike. Our picture is that more workers participated this time, so it’s good to see the strike is growing. The call centre, which is a key part of the complex, had more people striking than last time. The workers want to strike again, so the union will announce further dates soon. After that we are looking at ongoing selective action, with rolling strikes across different parts of the complex, aimed at maximising impact. The dispute...

The Uyghur Solidarity Campaign and the Hong Kong campaign LMSHKUK will protest on 4 June from 7 pm outside the Chinese Embassy in London: “Remember Tiananmen 1989 -Democracy, freedom, workers’ rights for China, Hong Kong, Tibet, and Uyghurs”. The Safe and Equal campaign is putting together a model Covid safety survey. It wants health and safety reps to use this period where there is a lull in the pandemic to conduct workplace inspections and a survey of the workforce. Health and safety reps have a legal right to paid time off for these duties. We don’t know if there will be future waves coming...

With further lockdown-easing announced from 17 May, many people are coming to think that the Covid pandemic is “almost over”. It’s not. The battle for social measures to underpin pandemic control remains urgent. • Requisition the assets of Big Pharma, especially the vaccine patents and the know-how to expand new vaccine-production facilities. The US administration’s move to support a patent waiver is a victory for campaigning here, and Labour should demand that the UK government does similar. • Full isolation pay for every worker self-isolating because of Covid symptoms, testing, contact, or...

The world’s richest man, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, has increased his wealth from $130 billion to $186 billion during the pandemic. US billionaires in general have gained by about the same. Meanwhile poverty in the US has exploded. Thirty years ago US billionaires owned less wealth than the poorest half of US society. Today they own four times as much. It’s the same basic picture in the UK, and worldwide. The number of billionaires in the world has increased by a third in the last year. Those 2,700-odd people now control combined wealth of almost £10 trillion, up from £6 trillion a year ago. This...