Solidarity 295, 11 September 2013

Unions must fight for the worst off

Real wages in Britain have dropped further, and for a longer time, than since records began. The wage share of total income has dwindled since the mid 70s. It has dropped even further since 2010, although usually in economic slumps the wage-share recovers a bit (because profits rise faster in booms, fall faster in slumps). The overall wage figures tell only part of the story. Both higher “wages” (the pay-outs which bosses award themselves) and higher wages proper (for the best-off workers, managers, etc.) have held up well. At the top end, they have soared. The lower-paid have suffered worst...

Bosses won't release their grip without violence

Nick Wrack, a member of the Socialist Platform in Left Unity, spoke to Solidarity about the lessons of the Chilean coup for socialists today. Solidarity : On the left in Britain now a lot of people are looking to the Syriza majority as their political model. In the majority of Syriza, not in the left-wing minority, the Popular Unity government in Chile in the early 1970s is held up as a model. What light is shed on these models by looking back at what happened in Chile 40 years ago? Nick Wrack: I can’t comment directly on the situation in Syriza, but the lessons of Chile are of enormous...

Chile: how the army killed reform

On 11 September 1973, a bloody military coup in Chile ousted the Popular Unity government of President Salvador Allende. Allende was killed defending the Presidential Palace during the coup. Workers in the factories attempted to defend themselves against the military attacks — but they were not sufficiently organised or sufficiently armed, to stop the onslaught. The military regime of General Pinochet which followed tortured and killed hundreds of thousands of working-class militants and political activists. Allende’s Popular Unity (UP) coalition government was elected in 1970. The two main...

Against Assad, against sectarian militias, against US bombs; for democracy in Syria!

Obstacles to the planned US bombing of the military bases of the Assad regime are multiplying. Socialist agitation should be one of those obstacles. We are against Assad; but the opposition in Syria, which started off secular and democratic, and probably is still that way in the wishes of many people in Syria, is now dominated militarily by reactionary and sectarian groups. On the evidence, the opposition military forces currently able to make the biggest gains from setbacks for the Assad regime have nothing to offer the Syrian people beyond further repression and religious fundamentalism. And...

Crossrail bosses beaten on blacklist

Frank Morris, an electrician sacked from his job on a Crossrail construction site in Westbourne Park, London, in September 2012 for raising health and safety concerns in his capacity as a trade union representative, has been reinstated. The deal between Unite and Bam Ferrovial Kier (BFK, the construction consortium operating construction work on Crossrail sites) is the result of a year of relentless campaigning by rank-and-file trade union activists. Frank and his supporters conducted near-daily pickets at the Westbourne Park site, as well as regularly picketing the flagship Crossrail...

Two “red lines” in union link fight

In his speech at the TUC (10 September) Ed Miliband said: “I want to make each and every affiliated trade union member a real part of their local party. Making a real choice to be a part of our party. So they can have a real voice in it...We could become a Labour Party not of 200,000 people, but 500,000 or many more”. This is a shift from the 9 July speech about “opting-in”, where he said only that unionists paying the political levy to Labour should have to “opt in” to pay, rather than just not “opting out”. What Miliband seems to propose now is a drive to get affiliated unionists to become...

Evictions loom with Bedroom Tax

Early in September Lawrence Keane walked into a Fife housing office and slit his wrists, telling the horrified staff and users it was because of despair over the Bedroom Tax. Thankfully Lawrence survived. He told the press: “I got a letter from the council last week and I have stayed inside for 10 days worrying about it. It told me I owed a lot of money and that my rent was going up £28 a fortnight because I had an empty room in my flat... I was getting more and more angry and stressed about it. I woke, got a vegetable knife and went to the community centre.” The Bedroom Tax is now five months...

US fast food workers fight for $15

On August 29, low-wage workers in some 50 cities across the United States walked off the job at various fast-food restaurants as part of the latest action in the “Fight for 15” campaign for union recognition and a $15 an hour wage. Here are reports from activists in [two] of the cities where Fight for 15 workers walked off the job: More than 100 people in San Diego, California marched and rallied in front of a Wendy’s restaurant to demand a raise and union rights for fast-food workers. Six workers from Wendy’s, McDonald’s and Subway left work and spoke to the gathering of fellow workers and...

Labour clears Unite of rigging

The Labour Party has officially cleared Unite of attempting to rig Falkirk Labour Party’s selection process for its next general election candidate. Over the summer months Unite had been accused of signing up union members as Labour Party members without their consent and filling in direct debit instructions by forging their signatures. Two Unite members of Falkirk Labour Party, Karie Murphy and Stevie Deans, were suspended from party membership. The former was Unite’s preferred candidate for the selection process. The latter, a deputy convenor in his workplace, was subsequently suspended by...

Solidarity with arrested anti-fascists!

Nearly 300 anti-fascists were arrested on Saturday 7 September as a bloc of around 650 activists attempted to oppose an English Defence League march and rally of around 400. The police blocked, kettled, and then arrested activists after they left a static Unite Against Fascism protest in Altab Ali Park. A small number of the bloc, which was coordinated by the Anti-Fascist Network, managed to visibly confront the EDL, meaning that the racists’ march and rally did not pass off without encountering any visible opposition – as the police and, apparently, UAF, had intended and hoped. The UAF rally...

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