Political bulletin for 2 November 2022

By KD Tait ON SATURDAY 18 June, tens of thousands of people marched through central London to demand action to fight the growing cost of living crisis. Protesters gathered from across the country in the first national demonstration called by the TUC since 2018, calling for pay rises to beat inflation, better working conditions, and […]

By Jeremy Dewar “A new deal for working people, a new social settlement for the UK” A LONDON TUC rally for the 18 June national demonstration heard speakers from a variety of disputes and strikes. Rail workers, teachers and lecturers, caterers and cleaners, civil servants were all represented. The eve-of-rally meeting, held at Congress House […]

Editorial June 2022, No. 394

Editorial May 2022, No. 393

It will be up to the rank and file to lead the resistance.

Instead of waiting for the leaders, rank and file activists and reps need to make the start.

Resist the return to Blairism.

The long running dispute at Southern Rail has taken a further dramatic turn after drivers in the Aslef union voted down a deal recommended by their General Secretary Mick Whelan and the TUC by 54 per cent to 46 per cent. A successful and defiant strike by RMT drivers and conductors on the same day […]

Union leaders across the public services have called off many of their planned strikes in the run-up to the TUC’s “Britain needs a pay rise” demo. In a matter of just a few days, the union leaders managed to tear up their own flawed battleplan for smashing the pay freeze. First to tear up their […]

Union leaders complain that their hands are tied by the anti-union laws, but where is the campaign to abolish them? Jeremy Dewar outlines how we could launch one When the TUC voted to “consider the practicalities of a general strike” a few years back, union leaders’ response was to send some lawyers away to see […]

By Jeremy Dewar As union leaders prepare to wind down strikes and settle for a pro-austerity Labour government, workers need to fight for a pay rise now and demand Miliband reverses the cuts Hundreds of thousands of workers will walk off the job and take to the streets this month in pursuit of a pay rise. […]

The TUC’s recent call for a mid-week day of action was a response to pressure from the rank and file – and pressure from the rank and file is needed to make it happen. Twelve months ago, the 2012 TUC Congress passed a motion from the Prison Officers’ Association (POA) calling on the unions to […]

When the Tories cobbled together the Con-Dem Coalition in May 2010, they were clear about how they were going to tackle the economic downturn – by making the working class pay for the capitalist crisis. With the Lib Dems limping lamely behind them, the Tories set their plan to rip society apart and rebuild it in […]

The 1926 General Strike is rich in lessons for today. Dave Stockton looks at how the ruling class prepared for it while the unions leaders did not. In the mid-1920s the Miners Federation of Great Britain (MFGB) had almost a million members, and was the militant core of the working class movement. Coal was still […]

Millions are going on strike against government cuts but to see success we need to keep the pressure on the union tops, writes John Bowman

Jeremy Dewar monthly industrial overview updates us on the pensions dispute

The Trade Union Congress called the 26 March demo under the slogans: jobs, growth and justice. Countering the Con-Dems’ rhetoric that that there is no alternative to cuts, the TUC bases its economic strategy on three demands: • Crackdown on tax avoidance and loopholes • Raise Robin Hood tax on banks and finance • Policies […]

Over the next four years the Tories and the Liberal Democrats want to destroy the welfare state as we know it, writes editor Simon Hardy

Industrial overiew from Jeremy Drinkall

Workers Power believes thousands of activists will be striving to make the 26 March demonstration as big as possible in order to make it a platform for action that can defeat the government.