Spanish and South African strikers show the way to fightFight back now for jobs and public services! |
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Tens of thousands of South African public sector workers have been on strike for over two weeks as this issue of Socialist Resistance goes to press. They have defied police violence and held solid in their fight for a 12% pay increase, having rejected an insulting 6% offer from a government that is paying its ministers a thumping 57% extra. In Spain, thousands of car workers in Cadiz have also taken swift and solid action to defend their threatened plant, with strikes and demonstrations that have drawn solidarity from workers in many other industries. What a contrast with our feeble unions! Faced with a brutal wage cut for 1.3 million NHS staff, who have been offered a below-inflation 2.5% pay rise, and then seen even that cut further in value by Gordon Brown’s insistence it be paid in stages, UNISON the largest public sector union voted unanimously to… endorse Brown for Labour leader, and has spent months vaguely threatening to ballot for some form of industrial action, hoping the membership will get bored and forget. Meanwhile some health campaigners, defenders of council housing and the courageous school meals campaign in Waltham Forest have shown that broad support can be built, and attacks can be beaten back. The basic lesson that has to be learned is that without a fight, there can be no victory, and without some victories the unions become weaker and more prone to fresh attack. Fight back now!
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