💾 Archived View for library.inu.red › file › workers-solidarity-movement-lets-get-together.gmi captured on 2023-01-29 at 14:53:51. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Title: Lets get together Author: Workers Solidarity Movement Date: 1994 Language: en Topics: Ireland, Workers Solidarity, austerity Source: Retrieved on 18th November 2021 from http://struggle.ws/ws94/together43.html Notes: Published in Workers Solidarity No. 43 — Autumn 1994.
THE ATTACKS on jobs, wages & working conditions at TEAM and Irish Steel
are only the beginning. The government wants to slim down a lot of
public sector jobs, with a view to privatising the most profitable
sections. They also want to defeat traditionally strong groups of
workers. Such a defeats will demoralise a lot of people, and thus lower
expectations of secure jobs and good wages.
Likely targets are An Post, Telecom and the ESB. Each group faces the
same enemy, it makes sense to fight together. The leaders of most unions
have no intention of going beyond aggressive speeches, empty threats and
token action. In many cases this is as much to con the members as it is
to frighten the bosses. The union leaders are, after all, in a “social
partnership” with the employers and government through the Programme for
Competitiveness & Work.
What we do not need is the ICTU bringing together a collection of
General Secretaries to arrange yet another ‘orderly retreat’ (i.e.
surrender). What we do need is an understanding that if we fight
individually we will be beaten individually, but if we support each
other we can unleash great power. A public sector wide strike could stop
almost everything. No buses, no post, no phones, no electricity... the
government would have to give in, and very quickly.
To pull this off would require a lot of explaining, convincing,
organising. The first step is to bring together active trade unionists,
who are prepared to argue for strike action, from the commercial
semi-state sector. Such a body could organise a real fightback by trade
unionists, and keep it independent of bureaucrats like Phil Flynn and
Peter Cassells. Despite the hostility it will provoke from some union
head offices, representative bodies like Trades Councils are well placed
to take the initiative to launch a rank & file public sector alliance.