Solidarity 274, 13 February 2013

On 20 February the Greek trade union federations GSEE and ADEDY have called for a 24-hour general strike. The strike is against the government’s move to abolish general coverage of industrial collective bargaining agreements. The unions call for a new national general collective bargaining agreement after the current one expires on 30 March. The decision to strike was taken on 31 January. January was dominated by the nine-day strike of the subway workers over wages, and the government’s use of “civil mobilisation orders” to order the strikers back to work. Other transportation workers struck...

Mobilisation since the murder on 6 February of a left-wing politician, Chokri Belaïd, has shaken the Islamist government in Tunisia. Prime minister Hamadi Jebali has called on all ministers to resign so that he can replace the current administration — a coalition of his Islamist party, Ennahda, with two smaller secular parties — by a “government of technocrats” to run until parliamentary elections in mid-July. This is his fallback gambit after his initial call for the dissolution of the government was rejected both by Tunisia’s president, a secular politician, and by Jebali’s own party. The...

The explosion of political discussion in IS, ignited by the sudden change of line by Cliff in favour of building the embryo of a "revolutionary party" seemed six months ago to be the most hopeful thing on the British left. Many, seeing also the new-type IS positions on Vietnam and the Middle East — a radical break with the abstentionist attitude of the group to this kind of struggle in the first 15 years of its existence — wondered whether the leadership might not even disavow other aspects of its past. But actually the leadership disavowed none of its past. Cliff said he had always advocated...

Construction workers downed tools and walked off sites in Australia on 11-13 February to support victimised trade unionist Bob Carnegie, as his trial began in Brisbane. Striking construction workers demonstrate at Lend Lease's Brisbane offices Demonstration at Lend Lease HQ in Sydney Workers mount a union guard of honour as Bob Carnegie enters court Activists from the Brisbane Aboriginal Sovereign Embassy join the march in solidarity with Bob Bob is being pursued by Abigroup (a subsidiary of multinational construction/property giant Lend Lease) for contempt of court charges and damages because...

The campaign against fire station closures in London took a further step forward this week after the fire authority again voted against proposed cuts, in defiance of Mayor Boris Johnson’s plans. The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) welcomed the decision by the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority (LFEPA) to ignore an order by Johnson to begin making savage cuts to the brigade. The mayor wants to close 12 fire stations, remove 18 fire engines and slash 520 frontline firefighter posts in an attempt to save £45 million. On 21 January the LFEPA board, made up of elected councillors as well as...