Con-Dem
cuts mean:
We need
'biggest movement since poll tax'
The Trades Union
Congress (TUC), meeting this year in Manchester, needs to hear clearly
from ordinary trade unionists and activists that the time has come to
get off its knees and organise a fightback against the government's
programme of cuts.
Bill
Mullins, NSSN Steering Committee
Never has a government
been so crude in its attacks. They couldn't wait to wield the axe
against the workers who supply public services, from the NHS to
council social services departments - to the cleaners and refuse
workers who work to maintain our streets and environment.
Public sector workers
are being demonised every day in the press by an unholy alliance of
big business and capitalist politicians.
The main defence that
the workers have is their trade unions. RMT transport union leader Bob
Crow has called for "generalised strike action and community
resistance" on the scale of the anti- poll tax movement. Yet, with the
exception of unions like the RMT and the PCS civil servants' union and
a few others, there is a deafening silence from the leading councils
of the union movement.
The mass lobby of the
TUC conference is an attempt to break this silence and demonstrate
that an increasingly large section of ordinary trade union activists
and members will fight back. The TUC needs to show real resistance.
The general council of
the TUC has met twice since the special budget day on 22 June. At both
meetings Left unions have attempted to move the TUC into adopting a
fighting programme against the cuts. Both the PCS and the RMT unions
have separate resolutions on the TUC conference agenda demanding that
the TUC call a national demo on 23 October (PCS) and an "immediate
summit" of affiliates to "coordinate industrial action" (RMT).
So far the response of
the TUC leadership has been muted, restricting itself to vague talk of
"regional activities".
The lobby of the
conference will have the clear aim of supporting the call by the Left
unions for a national demo in the autumn as a prelude to a one day
public sector strike.
It is almost as if
there are two trade union movements in Britain. One where the
right-wing union leaders mutter amongst themselves that there is no
support for mass action. The other consists of a growing body of
activists and ordinary trade union members who are desperate for a
lead at national level.
Your class needs
you!
The battle has already
started at local level with anti-cuts campaigns springing up. The NSSN
will do its best to organise this growing struggle nationally and at
the same time organise to put the maximum pressure on the union
leaders to act now.
There is very little
time. Get your union to put on transport for the lobby. Distribute
leaflets in work and among local groups.
If anti-cuts campaigns
are developing in your area, inform everyone about this lobby Put it
in your diary and make sure you are there! Your class needs you!
Come on the lobby of
the TUC conference
Sunday 12 September 12noon,
Central Convention Centre, Manchester.
Organised by the
National Shop Stewards Network
Contact the NSSN for more details and report what is happening in your
area in support of the lobby. |