Jeremy Dear, General Secretary of the National Union of Journalists, reported to a meeting of Hands Off Venezuela in London his impressions as part of a TUC delegation to Venezuela. The text below was transcribed by SR and contains the full speech. An edited version appears in SR issue No. 37.

Thank you for the opportunity to report back. There is no official report from the delegation yet. It has to go to the TUC general council and the executive. These are in effect my observations of the delegation. The original purpose of the delegation was as a fact finding mission when it was set up. Then in between time the TUC became the first TU federation in Europe to pass a resolution of solidarity. Therefore it became both a fact finding and solidarity mission. I think that was quite important inn terms of the actual meetings that we did.

For those of us who haven’t been to Venezuela before, I think there was some sense of trepidation as to what we might find. Clearly we know the statistics. We have UNESCO declaring Venezuela free of illiteracy. We have the huge advances that have been made in terms of addressing infant mortality. About the huge rises in life expectancy. About the people who have been brought into education. The people who have been brought under health coverage. The 1.2 million people originally denied care now being treated in health centres and so forth. We all knew those statistics, but we didn’t know was what the situation on the ground was and how those statistics bore out in reality.

Behind every one of those statistics, there are human stories. What is most powerful about when you visit countries in a revolutionary process like this is that it is the human stories that confirm to you the statistics and the evidence that you get from books and magazines and so on. That is what is particularly inspiring about the situation in Venezuela is the participation of people in this revolutionary process. It is not just a process driven from the top. It is not just a process driven from the top by a small number of people. It is a process in which millions of people are engaged right across the board and in many different ways.

Within that there are people who would describe themselves as liberals, people who would describe themselves as Catholics, people who would describe themselves as socialists, as Marxists and so on. But it is a genuine revolutionary process that is happening there. It is not driven primarily by people at the top.

You saw that by being able to visit a whole number of different projects, the number of different factories that have been occupied, visiting the oil refinery that was at the centre of the oil strike and so on. I think you see it none more so than in the UNT congress which was quite a remarkable event.

Just to give some idea of some of the places we visited and some of what we saw– one day driving through the centre of Caracas we saw this queue of people lined up and it went on for more than a kilometer. We couldn’t figure out what they were queuing for so we followed this snaking line through the streets to where the front of the queue was and it was one of the new adult education centres. It was a registration day for people to sign up for education and we talked to people in the queue about for them what was the first opportunity they had ever had to learn a whole range of different skills and different subjects that were on offer there. There were people there in their 70’s and 80’s and 90’s who were talking about how in the first time in their lives they had opportunities that they had never had before. That sent a powerful message about the role of education in that revolutionary process as well.

The same is true of the new health centres in Caracas. Again, queues of people queueing before it opens. 1,000 people being seen every week in this one health centre with specialist equipment that would put parts of our NHS to shame. The cleanliness and the openness and facilities that were available there. We had a someone on the delegation who was a health specialist here, who represents NHS workers and they were quite jealous about some of what they were seeing in terms of up to date equipment.

Were not just talking here about doctors going into poor neighborhoods and dispensing a few aspirins. We are talking about high tech, in some cases, health centres that are bringing millions of people into or making available to millions of people, health care that was previously denied to them.

We also were able to visit some of the workers cooperatives that were set up, not the factories that were taken over, but the cooperatives set up specifically for the purpose of creating jobs in some of the poor neighborhoods and trying to give people from those neighborhoods the opportunities to learn skills as well as being in employment that pays much better than the kind of employment that they have been in previously.

Within those, there was some real advances that we were able to see. Particularly around these factories there was one other initiative that was quite remarkable which was a supermarket in between these three different factories – a clothing factory and a cooperative making shoes. They were actually making steel-toe capped boots for workers in some of the heavy industries who up until now had to go in with their ordinary shows and this was part of a drive to improve health and safety in a number of the factories as well.

We went into the supermarket and all of the prices were about half or two-thirds of what they were in other supermarkets and the reason for this was that they had cut out the middle man. There was nobody taking profit from it, there was no company taking profit from it. It was simply being reinvested back into buying produce. They effectively had their own brand products. Printed on the front of every one of the packets was one of the clauses from the new constitution.

So not only were you buying cheap pasta or cheap rice or cheap essentials to enable you to have a better standard of living or better health but actually on the front of every one of the packets was a clause from the constitution telling you your rights. This included – we went hunting around the supermarket looking for the actual clauses of the constitution we really wanted – including the ones about the right of recall of the president and the referendum!

So here they are. These great “dictators”, Chavez and his “dictatorial” government, sponsoring these workers cooperatives and supermarkets and providing produce reminding people that they have to right to have a referendum and recall the president.

We also had the opportunity to see some of, though not enough of, the new media. We were given a pamphlet by people of the national assembly detailing more than 200 new or alternative media outlets that had been created in the past few years from TV stations, to magazines, to newspapers, to online services. This really destroys the idea that there is this huge wave of media repression which again we’ve seen repeated in the British media around the release of “” , the film talking about how they are trying to clampdown on everything and close everything down in Venezuela. Far from it. What we saw was not only the 95% of the media that is still in private hands, but 200-odd alternative and community media projects that had also been established to try and counter some of the anti-Chavez propaganda that comes from other parts of the media. So that destroys some of those myths.

As I say, one of the most inspiring parts was seeing the development in the trade union movement. Because it was a fact-finding mission and because the CTV are the official affiliated to the ILO trade union, we agreed that we would meet with them and we would meet with the UNT. Just meeting with them was so instrumental in showing the difference between these organisations.

We went to the CTV’s headquarters. Most of which is now empty, pretty much in darkness, yellowed posters on the wall. We went into this room and met a group of men sat round a black reflective table that looked like a scene out of ‘Reservoir Dogs”. We all kind of stepped back and had a look behind us!

We met with Manuel Cova who as people will know was heavily involved in the coup against Chavez. He was pictured in the palace sitting in one of the chairs with all of the gangsters involved in the coup. We said to him “Why were the CTV involved in the coup?” He looked affronted that we could say anything. He denied that they were involved in the coup. He denied that he personally was involved in the coup. So we produced photos of him sat in the palace and said “But that’s you isn’t it? And this was the coup”. He replied “Ah, now I see the confusion. This wasn’t a ‘coup’, it was a popular uprising against President Chavez.” That is the way that they justify their participation in the coup by saying it was a “popular uprising”. While we were there, the phone never rang and no one ever came into the building.

We left there and went across town to the UNT headquarters which was brightly painted. We met with all the different factions on the executive round a table. People were coming in all of the time, most of them were on two mobile phones at once. There was activity happening everywhere. I know they were in the build up to the UNT congress, but just that one kind of very visual perception of the differences shows that the opposition, certainly the opposition on the trade union movement, have no forces. Those forces that they do have are not from the workers in the factories or from working people but particularly amongst the elite.

When we then went to the UNT congress on the Friday, they spent the first three hours of the congress reading out socialist and Bolivarian and solidarity greetings from virtually every workplace in the whole of Venezuela! It was a slightly laborious but quite inspiring process. You can’t quite imagine the TUC congress with them saying “The people that work at Tescos in Hither Green would like to send socialist and Bolivarian greetings to the TUC.” Every time there was one of these, everyone stood up on the chairs and cheered and the cheering went on for about five minutes after every one until everyone calmed them down and then the next one was read out.

Then they invited the various international solidarity delegates to speak and we didn’t know this was going to happen at this point. We got about 60 seconds notice and they said “And the first one will be Jeremy Dear on behalf of the TUC.” So I went up there and Jorge was there and came to translate. Such was the mood there that you could’ve said “I just went to Tescos” and they would’ve been on their chairs cheering!

It was that kind of fervor. That kind of sense that they were creating something new. People talked all the time about that slogan “Another world is possible” and putting it into practice. There were all kinds of ideas. There were good and bad ideas. There were all kinds of different factions involved. All kinds of differences about the way forward, about whether there should be elections now or whether they should get Chavez elected first and then have their own elections.

What was clear from everybody was their absolute support for the revolutionary process that is happening. The UNT is growing at a huge rate. One of the reasons that the conference was delayed was because there were so many new union branches that had been formed in the run up to the congress and people that have moved from the CTV to the UNT that they actually had a huge struggle with the registration process of delegates. Something like 2,500 delegates were registered for it. Again, a very clear perception that we got of the difference between the old trade unionism and the old way and the old regime and what is happening now.

What is also important is that it is absolutely vital that we build solidarity with the trade unions, that we build solidarity with the revolutionary process. That we offer support to those who are seeking to build this “Socialism of the 21st Century” but that we also recognize, as they do, that there are issues to be addressed, that not everything in Venezuela is a paradise. I think crime is certainly a huge issue that needs to be addressed. When we met with Chavez we talked to him about this and he admitted that it is something that they still need to be able to tackle because it is something that can undermine the positive aspects of the revolution if crime is allowed to get out of control or is perceived to be out of control.

Transport is another issue, particularly in Caracas, where it can take a long time to get anywhere across the city! We saw one of the greatest pieces of graffiti that we have seen anywhere. We were stuck in the middle of a traffic jam in searing heat with everyone hooting their horns and someone had graffitied on the side of a building “The people who control the roads are employed by the CIA.” It was kind of a flippant comment but it showed the potential to undermine the process by some of what we might consider to be the most basic issues that also have to be addressed.

The other huge issue, that all the ministers that we spoke to in the trade unions and Chavez admit, is the question of housing. There are millions of people who still live in incredibly poor conditions and they know that there is a race against time to use the money to build new houses and there are signs all over the country of new houses being built and so on. That is a process that obviously needs to continue and needs to be developed.

We asked them what it is that they need from us in terms of solidarity because I think it was important that they could tell us. They said the first thing is help with winning the election. Without winning the election the whole process goes potentially into reverse. There are some very important issues about the election. When we met with the CTV, we said to them, did they believe in democracy and they said yes they did. We said did they believe in voting and elections and they said yes they did and we asked them whether or not they would be encouraging their members to vote in the election in December and they said no they wouldn’t. They weren’t boycotting the elections, they were just not going to encourage anybody to vote in the elections. We asked them what the difference was and frankly they couldn’t answer.

We already know what the scenario will be. In the run up to the election the opposition will scream foul. That some rules have been changed or the electoral commission has failed to register so and so and they will use it as an excuse not to take part in the elections and then when Chavez is re-elected they will say that it was a fraudulent election and will use that as the excuse in order to take further action or try renewed action against Chavez. This is because they know they cannot win the popular vote. They will resort to the tactics that they have tried in the past. People there are very aware of this as a danger which is why around the time of the election they want as much international solidarity and as many people in Venezuela to help out as they can possibly get.

One of the things that came up time and time again with people from the UNT that also needs to happen is that they really have to address the question of worker’s control. There are inspiring stories of the factories that have been taken over but they are small in number and there are many others who want the same to be happening in their companies and there are many trade union branches who would like to see this process extended, speeded up and links made between the various factories which are under co-management or worker’s control.

That came across as a potential running sore between the most progressive of the trade unionists and the labour ministry and people we spoke to in those areas. Hopefully that will not develop as a dispute between them but clearly there is a certain period of time that they will give the Chavez government to be able to deliver on this. If they don’t it is quite clear, certainly in some areas, that the trade unions themselves will take action to take over the factories or the workplaces in which they are. There is a clear desire to extend and deepen that workers’ control and genuine workers’ co-management.

The other thing that they really wanted us to talk about is how we address the perception in the outside world that Chavez is a dictator who is centralizing power and represses the media and so on. That is where we had a discussion with president Chavez himself and some other people there about what we can do to try to establish some kind of pan-European campaign that helps to tackle those perceptions and helps to make available real information about what is going on in Venezuela. Particularly from the position of my own union, that’s a very important thing that we can do. We certainly put down some plans for journalistic exchanges, about building contacts. I understand that last weekend there was a meeting of Bolivarian journalists to establish a new Bolivarian journalists organisation and that would give us links to a new group of journalists who we’ve not been able to contact before, who we can put in touch with journalists here.

We have to be much more up front about taking on the kind of the media coverage that we saw during president Chavez’s visit to London. The kind of Daily Mail line about here was the Taliban-loving-drug-running-dictator of Latin America. I know that Rob on behalf of Hands Off Venezuela made a complaint about some of the press coverage that there was. It is very important that we try to tackle some of those issues in a much more active way. I am talking within the NUJ about how we might be able to help and build alongside Hands Off Venezuela and how we begin to try and tackle some of those issues in a much more concerted way than we have done up to now.

What they said the best thing we could do is to build the “Socialism of the 21st Century in Britain. I told them we would be delighted to take that on as a major project for the coming year! But actually what they want in many cases is an exchange of what they mean by “Socialism of the 21st Century” because it is a slogan which is used but which is actually a living debate on the streets, in the workplaces, in the schools and everything.

One of the concrete proposals that came out is that they talked about having a week-long event in London and a week-long event in Caracas in the course of the next twelve months around the subject of the “Socialism of the 21st Century.” Bringing people from Latin America but also from other parts of Europe. They talked about engaging with us in helping to set up something like that as a real point about taking on the political argument about when we say “Another world is possible”, when we say “Socialism of the 21st Century” what do we mean by that and how can we achieve it.

They recognize that they cannot do it as an isolated country, hence the Bolivarian dream. They also recognize that even just within Latin America that it needs to be a wider socialism that they build. A lot of people talked about some of the ideas coming out of the international movements that they’ve been involved in and they want to re-engage with those international movements. I think it would be very important for us to engage with that and try to help host, in London, that part of it. They are talking about a substantial kind of event happening which opens up the political debate, not just the statistics on health and education but where do we go, why are we doing this and how do we achieve that socialism.

Just finally in terms of what happens from now with the TUC since it was a TUC delegation. A report is compiled – and I have to say that there were four of us on the delegation and our politics were not the same. Whilst broadly we were all supportive of the Bolivarian revolution you went from me on the left to… other people on the right… moderate. So much so that one person even proposed that we should still keep links with both the CTV and the UNT, but that won’t be the position.

What going there did very much firmed up in the minds of those people who were maybe not as involved as I and one or two others had been up to then, that there was a genuine revolutionary process, that there was the participation of millions of people in it, that there were very real and concrete social advances in health and education and other areas that were there to see, not just in statistics, but actually that you could go and physically look at them. That some of the new organisations, social movements and the UNT trade union federation were actually genuine expressions of the debate and discussion that is going on right across Venezuela. There is a genuine attempt to build a form of socialism and that deserves the support of the British trade union movement.

That is what the TUC’s report effectively will say. That gives us very big opportunities to be able to engage a wider layer of people in the UK, a wider range of trade unions and activists and social movements with the resources of the TUC behind some of those campaigns. To get more people involved in the solidarity work because nobody in Venezuela underestimates the difficulties that they have in building that “Socialism of the 21st Century” surrounded as they are by opposition from the US but also how Colombia is being used against them. They still have their own internal opposition who are waiting for the first opportunity to strike against them. They still have the power of the opposition media there that is continually, daily churning out anti-Chavez propaganda.

Rather bizarrely when said to president Chavez at the end of the dinner we had with him, “If you could get us to do one thing in terms of solidarity, what would it be?” He said “Forget about Venezuela, go to Bolivia, they need your help more than we do.” Whilst maybe he was being a little fickle, what he recognized was that the success of Bolivia ties in with the success of Venezuela, ties in with the power to deliver that on a wider international basis. They were very keen that we talk about solidarity for the principles of socialism and not just for the Venezuelan government or the Venezuelan project but actually that it is a wider battle of ideas between the socialism that he and others envisage and the neo-liberal agenda that has brought so much misery to parts of Latin America over a long period of time.

Probably as you can tell from me and I think certainly from the other people who were on the delegation we’ve come back inspired and evermore ready to do more and more to build the kind of solidarity that’s needed.