AUT: FBU Strike in UK and solidarity (was General Strike in Italy)

[Scott Hamilton <s_h_hamilton@xxxxxxxxx>]

I don't know much about Italy, but if unions hold a
general strike surely it is usually because of
pressure from below. Here's something I just sent off
to a couple of local lists about a strike in Britain:

Hi lists,

Reproduced below is an editorial on the upcoming
firefighters' strike in the UK. This dispute in many
ways parrallels the dispute between the ILWU and the
Bush government - in both cases, a service deemed
vital to national security and the war effort is
threatened by workers' action, and the 'War on Terror'
is revealed as a war on workers in the First World as
much as the Third.

Whereas the ILWU leadership supports the War of Terror
and has tried to 'out patriot' Bush, the Fire Brigades
Union has taken an anti-war stance, inviting an Iraqi
unionist to its national conference and passing an
anti-war motion there. Like many other unions, the FBU
was represented on the big anti-war march in London
recently. It looks that this dispute might be one
place where the growing trade union opposition to
Blair over 'economic' issues like state sector wages
and public private partnerships might fuse with the
growing opposition to him over the 'political' issue
of war on Iraq.

There has been solidarity with the ILWU in a number of
different places around the world. In Auckland, the
Anti Imperialist Coalition leafleted meetings of the
wharfies and seafarers a few weeks back over the ILWU
issue. We were pleased when the wharfies and seafarers
sent reps to the States to support the ILWU, and voted
not to allow any ships loaded by scab labour to unload
in NZ. Last week the first meeting of the AIC-initated
Christine Clark Trade Union Forum discussed ways of
supporting such action, if it occurs in Auckland, and
also of pushing for solidarity with the ILWU in other
unions.

I think it would be good to start thinking about
arguing for international solidarity with the FBU, as
well as the ILWU, and also to begin to raise both
issues inside the global anti-war movement, where we
can use it to point up our argument for industrial
action to stop the war. In New Zealand, the
firefighters were one of the few groups of workers to
win a major industrial struggle in the 90s, and many
people in Auckland remember the solidarity committees
which were set up to support them. Perhaps we could
argue that the firefighters here should show
solidarity with the FBU, and connect that solidarity
with opposition to the War of Terror? The world day of
action next Saturday would be a good place to raise
the issue of the FBU and the ILWU inside the anti-war
movement. Just some ideas.

Cheers
Scott (can someone fwd this to the AIC loop - I've
lost the addresses)

>
> News Line Editorial: Monday October 20, 2002

> General Strike to back the firefighters!
>
> DESPITE the overwhelming support of the public and
> the whole
> working class
> for the firefighters - and in the teeth of a 9-1
> vote by the firefighters
> themselves for strike action - the Labour government
> is going to take
> on the
> Fire Brigades Union (FBU).
>
> Rainsford, the government's minister, spelt out at
> the weekend that the
> Blair regime will not budge an inch from its
> position - which is that the
> firefighters must accept a phoney 'pay review'
> imposed on them by the
> government, and that they will be 'criminally
> irresponsible' if they go
> ahead with a planned series of strikes. This can
> only mean that the
> government is planning to declare the industrial
> action illegal.
>
> At the same time as the firefighters are set to
> strike, beginning with the
> first walkout on Tuesday October 29 - the rail
> workers' union, the RMT,
> has
> informed its employers that it will ballot members
> for strike action on the
> same days, if rail workers are told by management to
> work in conditions
> which they believe will be unsafe without adequate
> fire cover.
>
> The prospect is for a safety stoppage of the London
> Underground,
> alongside
> the closure of the disaster prone privatised British
> Rail network, at the
> same time as the fire fighters' strikes.
>
> As everyone knows, the reason the government is
> taking on the Fire
> Brigades
> Union (FBU) is that their claim for a 40 per cent
> pay rise to bring their
> pay more in line with the vital job they do will
> smash Blair and Brown's
> efforts to keep all public sector workers in low pay
> and to press ahead
> with
> the privatisation (annihilation) of the Welfare
> State.
>
> A victory for the firefighters will be a massive
> blow for Blair's bosses'
> government and wreck its plans to smash up the NHS
> through PFI and
> Foundation Hospitals, demolish all council housing
> and destroy
> comprehensive
> state education completely.
>
> It will also be a victory for the whole of the
> working class and the low
> paid especially. The council workers have already
> taken action
> because their
> pay is so paltry that many are getting just £5.00 an
> hour to deliver
> massively under-funded services.
>
> The government would like to impose a no-strike law
> on the whole
> public
> service and would like to 'merge' fire stations with
> ambulance stations
> and
> reduce the 999 service to a skeleton service where
> firemen double up
> as
> paramedics!
>
> Yesterday, John Edmonds, leader of the GMB union,
> said the
> government
> shouldn't 'pick out' the firefighters for a battle
> over public service pay.
> But that is just what they are doing!
>
> Blair is not going to change course. The Labour
> government is a
> counter-revolutionary government which proves every
> day it is in office
> that
> it is anti-working class to the core, from the very
> first day that it was
> elected to office by a landside in 1997 and declared
> that it would stick
> to
> Tory spending limits and hand over interest rates to
> the Bank of
> England.
> It is now driving to war with Iraq and war with the
> working class in
> Britain. It wants an end to all tube, fire, school
> and council strikes. Its
> aim is to put an end to the trade unions that
> brought the Labour Party
> into
> being in the first place.
>
> This is why the trade unions are being forced to
> break with the Labour
> Party
> and show the Blair regime that they will not stand
> for this war against
> them
> and against Iraq.
>
> Be sure that as Blair will make every effort to
> support Bush's attack on
> Iraq and the imperialist drive to 'reorder' the
> world, so his regime will
> make every effort to smash the FBU and its planned
> strike action.
>
> The working class in Britain must have free trade
> unions, living wages
> and a
> free health service, affordable council housing and
> state education.
> The
> trade unions must therefore join the FBU in a
> general strike to bring
> Blair
> down and go forward to a workers' government and
> socialism.
>
> This is a fight to the finish in which the Blair
> regime is driven on by the
> historic crisis in world capitalism which is
> destroying the last remnants
> of
> British capital.
>
> This is not just about the firefighters, it is about
> securing the future for
> the whole of the working class.
>
> The working class must use all its strength so that
> the firefighters win.
> The declaration of the RMT not to work in unsafe
> conditions is a step in
> the
> right direction.
>
>
> --
> newslinewrp@xxxx
> http://www.wrp.org.uk









=====
"Revolution is not like cricket, not even one day cricket"

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