United Kingdom

Tories Collapse Amidst a Growing Strike Wave

The Tory government collapsed on October 20, 2022 after sinking the pound, triggering a rise in government borrowing. Their budget, set to be implemented on November 17, will hammer indebted families already struggling with the highest inflation levels in forty years. The crisis takes place against a backdrop of growing discontent which is finding its expression in a rising wave of strikes. This article looks at the growing wave of strike action, its causes, and some of the challenges facing striking workers and the left.

GROWING WAVE OF STRIKES

The nationwide strikes on the railways at British Telecom (BT) and by postal workers at Royal Mail have transformed the atmosphere inside the trade union movement and the wider working class. Pay is not the only issue, with major assaults on jobs and working conditions taking place on the railways, at Royal Mail, and at BT.

The rail strikes involve the Rail Maritime and Transport union (RMT), the Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen (ASLEF) and the Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association (TSSA), with Unite engineers also striking on Great Western Rail. The dispute is part of a much more generalized attack affecting almost every grade of rail worker. The employer’s plans include mass job losses alongside radical changes to terms and conditions and attacks on pensions. As with BT, the strikes by the Communications Workers Union (CWU) in Royal Mail are over pay, but also come against a backdrop of wider attacks on jobs and working conditions. Following the unilateral pause in the action called by the RMT and CWU after the death of the queen, Royal Mail raised the stakes by withdrawing from a range of pre-existing agreements with the CWU. The CWU have in response planned an escalation in strike days throughout October and November.

BEYOND THE NATIONAL STRIKES

The rise in single-site strikes at individual employers in the private sector predates the national strikes. Most of these disputes have been led by Unite. Its new leader, Sharon Graham, claims that in her first year as general secretary Unite members took part in over four hundred and fifty disputes involving seventy-six thousand members. During that year in post, Unite has run one hundred and twenty-two strike ballots. The union claims a win rate of 80 percent with £150 million extra won for Unite members. In the current climate, many of these disputes don’t lead to strikes as the threat of action often results in concessions from employers. 

Some of the most significant sectoral disputes have been in local authority trash collection departments, where victory in one borough leads to action in the next. On the buses, we see a similar pattern following a number of victories over pay with a potential strike of two thousand London bus drivers averted after an 11 percent pay deal. We have also seen strike action by dockers. Two eight-day strikes by nineteen-hundred Unite members over pay at Felixstowe, the port through which nearly half of all containers enter Britain, threatened around £680 million worth of trade. Unite members’ strike action at the Port of Liverpool, Britain’s fourth largest port, started on the day of the queen’s funeral. Unlike some of the other unions, Unite left it up to reps to decide if they wanted to postpone their action during the period of “national mourning.” Thankfully, Liverpool Dockers ignored the demands for “national mourning” and struck to their own timetable. Dockers in Southampton refused to handle ships rerouted from Liverpool in a significant escalation of the dispute—such action is unofficial and potentially illegal. It is also a magnificent demonstration of solidarity from rank and file dockers. The strike in Liverpool has intensified with dockers starting two more weeks of action on October 24.

Although on a smaller scale, alongside the official action there has been an important outbreak of unofficial or wildcat action. In May, workers across multiple oil and gas rigs in the North Sea were refusing to work over demands for a £7-an-hour pay increase. The response from the RMT, Unite and GMB unions, was to distance themselves from the unofficial action as it was “unlawful.” At a food factory near Bury, around one hundred workers walked out—despite not being in a union—over pay as well as a host of issues related to their treatment by managers. In August, unofficial action took place at the Grangemouth oil refinery in Scotland, when hundreds of workers on maintenance and repair contracts walked out over pay, with around two hundred and fifty workers temporarily blocking tankers from accessing the site. This action was part of a wider unofficial dispute covering eleven sites. At the end of October, at the Essar Stanlow refinery, unofficial action involving fifteen hundred construction workers led to a 12.3% increase, all loss of earnings from unofficial action repaid and a £1500 lump sum to settle a dispute over ‘walking time,’ the time it takes to walk within the site to get to the job. This victory was a fantastic example of rank and file workers taking immediate action with no reference to the law or the trade union leadership and winning conclusively with determined action. Inspiring action has also been taken across a number of giant Amazon warehouses in August, after workers at Amazon’s huge “fulfillment center” in Tilbury, Essex, were told that they were getting a pay ‘increase’ of 35p an hour. As videos of the action spread on social media, it sparked action by hundreds of Amazon workers in its warehouses in Coventry, Rugeley, Bristol, Leicestershire and Swindon. Both Unite and the GMB have been organizing across Amazon, but these walkouts were led largely by unorganized workers. Following these actions, the GMB balloted their members at the Coventry Amazon fulfillment center for strike action, but missed the undemocratic 50 percent turnout threshold imposed by the Tories by just 1 percent.....

How Corbyn's Mass Movement Was Destroyed By Anti-Semitism Smears (and vid)

https://asawinstanley.substack.com/p/how-corbyns-mass-movement-was-destr...

"I appeared live on the Jimmy Dore Show this weekend past, talking to guest host Aaron Mate about the fabricated Labour 'anti-Semitism crisis', which successfully stopped Jeremy Corbyn from becoming Prime Minister of Britain."

MOATS, Ep 185 with George Galloway, 11/6/2022

https://youtu.be/iXEYPDbROa4

Imran Khan and the long arm of US regime-change, COP27 (sponsored by Coca Cola!), US Midterms, War with Russia, and more!

Lifetime Award For Noted British Playwright Caryl Churchill Cancelled in 'Anti-Semitism' Smear

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/11/21/chur-n21.html

"The decision is the result of more than a decade of political vilification of Churchill as part of a broader right-wing campaign to recast anti-Zionism and any criticism of the [Apartheid] state of Israel as anti-Semitic..."

7 Jewish Children by Caryl Churchill - [A Dramatic Reading]

https://youtu.be/fKiArxZ2Xwk

"Caryl Churchill wrote 'Seven Jewish Children' in response to the 22-day assault by Israel on Gaza."

This winter the citizens of English cities are facing uncertain energy costs. The Chinese use a very different system. I had no idea that heating was doled out this way. It seems to be maybe five times cheaper than the UK and if you are a public servant you get it as part of your salary. For those that watch, 100m2 is just under 1,100 sq ft.

In this China Vlog, I take a closer look at the heating system in Beijing as we switch on the heating system across the city. I reflect back to the situation in the united kingdom with the energy market and the cost of living crisis and the impact on that from the cost of heating.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvBuqiQ8aPw

Here is the UK government telling nurses to suck it up because they are not the worst off and all Brits need to shoulder the effects of the Ukrainian war. It looks like even the Conservative friendly media is having a hard time choking on a millionaire telling low paid health care workers that others are more vulnerable. Nadhim Zahawi is the quite the piece of work given the shady deals his wife is alleged to have been involved in.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=388N5JJVuA8

kropotkin1951 wrote:

This winter the citizens of English cities are facing uncertain energy costs. The Chinese use a very different system..

Keir Starmer, who will now be remembered as the MOST antisemitic leader in Labour history, continues his barbaric purge of Jewish antizionists- days after expelling Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, the only Jewish member of the Labour NEC(National Executive Committee) just for being non-Zionist, committing truth by stating that antisemitism has been weaponised against the Left, and attending a meeting of Labour Against The Witchhunt(an organization whose only "crime" was helping those Labour members falsely accused ot antisemitism defendn themselves against unjust suspension or expulsion), Labour has now expelled Jewish antizionist Heather Mendick.

Let's call this what it is.  It's not just a purge of Jewish antizionists- it's a purge of Jews.  It's a disciplinary pogrom:

https://skwawkbox.org/2022/12/21/labour-expels-another-jewish-woman-heat...

"Anyone under the illusion that Starmer's Labour Party is an abberation from the norm should read this book.."

https://twitter.com/Louis_Allday/status/1602663233562836992

#ICYMI: Tanks But No Thanks, MOATS Ep 207(and vid)

https://twitter.com/georgegalloway/status/1618414012580106241

MOATS with Chris Hedges, Lori Spencer - Biden & US politics, JFK, Ukraine-Russia war, Leopard 2 tanks and more!

Revealed: America's Secret Military Deployment on British Cyprus

https://declassifieduk.org/revealed-americas-secret-military-deployment-...

"Declassified now reveals the increasing US military presence on the Mediterranean island..."

Miserable...(and vid)

https://twitter.com/AliAbunimah/status/1620946160159707137

WATCH: "Labour member of the British parliament Kim Johnson apologizes for calling 'Israel' an 'apartheid' state and the newly elected Israeli government 'fascist' during Prime Minister's Questions after Labour Party publicly condemned her..."

NDP MPP Joel Harden had to do the same. 'The party told you to reject the evidence of your own eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.' - Orwell, 1984.

TMOATS with George Galloway, Ep 211, 'The Day the Earth Stood Still (and vid)

https://twitter.com/georgegalloway/status/1623425266218328066

On Seymour Hersh's Biden bombs Nordstream story, the balloon is burst, Roger Waters and more!

'I said just a couple of weeks ago I never thought it would ever so quickly come to what it is becoming - actually impossible for someone like me to work and to operate in this kind of country, politically. In this 'free country' for which our fathers and grandfathers fought and died..."

TMOATS, Ep 215 with George Galloway: One Year On

https://www.youtube.com/live/ZgXUEVI9dy0

"Mass murder by Israel in Nablus, the city I twinned my city with. Joe Biden is not running the White House, so who is? And, the longer range the weapons, the further Russia will advance..."

'The open university of the airwaves'. Listen, learn, or stay stupid.

Prince Harry Bares His Oozing Stigmata Yet Again

https://the-cat-with-the-emerald-tiara-1.tumblr.com/post/710906850187657...

"...Harry's trauma livestream, a one-hour live therapy session slash interview arranged by his publisher with the Hungarian-Canadian psychologist Gabor Mate, is the latest mutation in the Harry-Meghan industrial complex..."

How bad are things in the Anglo Imperialist state? This bad! At least us Canadians can get the good stuff (Bullwinkle) when our government is squeezing us dry to feed the war machine.

https://twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1633136675567153153

Honestly, I don't think so. They aren't stupid.

But do Q-Anon supporters like eating squirrels?

On a less jocular note, the poor Ozark family portrayed in Winter's Bone hunt and eat squirrels.

From Big Ben to Baghdad: MOATS Ep 224, with George Galloway (and vid)

https://twitter.com/MoatsTV/status/1640049857518792705

"Menu: MPs for rent, France on fire, the (be) head of state King Charles ducks out of a meeting at Versailles and the Iraq War in the rearview mirror..."

TMOATS - Ep 228 with George Galloway (and vid)

https://twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1OdKrzZpVYAKX

'Easter Rising', and more! Fasten your seat-belts it's going to be a bumpy ride...