public services

Friday 13th of March saw an estimated 50,000 public service workers on strike across Northern Ireland in opposition to the Stormont House Agreement. Between 6 - 8,000 striking workers and their supporters marched in Belfast, up to 2,000 marched in Derry and hundreds more took part in rallies in other towns across the north.

Friday's strike action showed the depth of opposition to attacks on working class people that are already being implemented, and those proposed, by the Stormont executive. If we are to defeat the cuts the action needs to be built upon and broadened to include workers in areas that have already been privatised and the private sector in general. Belfast Solidarity Federation support calls to declare May 1st the next strike date.

Attached is the copy of the Leveller that we produced for the strike. 

The latest issue of the Leveller is out not. With articles on opposition to Belfast City Council privatisation of our leisure centres, 'On The Runs', crisis in the Ukraine and more...

Opposition has succeeded in stalling Belfast City Council's moves towards outsourcing and privatisation of the cities leisure centres and facilities.
On the 22nd of February the council’s strategic policy and resources committee voted to hand our leisure centres over to a trust. In a move to offload essential, but underfunded, services city hall will be ditching 10 leisure centres (11 when the council expands in May).
The council are looking to shed the £8 million a year that it spends to barely maintain our underfunded and rundown leisure centres. 300 workers and thousands of working class families who use leisure centres across the city will be affected. DUP chair of the committee Gavin Robinson has refused to rule out closures. Similar moves in Magherafelt Leisure Centre resulted in the loss of 30 jobs.

Dear Curzon workers,

Congratulations from everyone at North London SolFed for pushing management into finally recognising your union!

That spirit of self-organisation will be all the more important in the coming fight for a living wage, as the bosses will be desperately looking for ways to demobilise you, to push you into accepting recognition as the limit "this time round" so they have time to beef up their anti-union practices for next time.

Don't accept that.

You're on the front foot, you have lots of friends and the chance to win this. Recognised or not, the strength of a union is in the will of its members on the shop floor. Keep going, direct action gets the goods!

In solidarity,

North London SF

Members of the anarcho-syndicalist CNT union and CGT union have gone on indefinite strike and occupied their workplace at the IMESAPI lighting plant in Granollers, Catalunya, Spain, demanding an end to the redundancy package which would see four of the 21 workers let go.

The workers – now 23 days into their strike – are responsible for maintaining the street lights throughout the small Catalan town, and therefore are of critical importance to the town council. IMESAPI itself is a part of the huge ACS conglomerate owned by Florentino Pérez, the multibillionaire engineering tycoon known internationally as the owner of Real Madrid FC.

Crucially, all of the workers at the Granollers plant belong to either the CNT or CGT unions, who have vowed to back the strike as long as it continues, unlike the mainstream Comisiones Obreras union,who signed off on similar redundancy packages at IMESAPI plants in Barcelona (which saw a failed strike) and Tenerife.

Today saw members of the North London Solidarity Federation join civil service workers, lay reps, and members of the newly formed Civil Service Rank-and-File Network (CSRF) in a two hour informational picket outside the London passport office.

Officially called as part of a series of lunchtime protests against government attacks on civil service terms and conditions, the demonstrations have been timed to coincide with the European general strike happening today in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy and a number of other southern European countries.

A private sector worker and SolFed member speaks out about why they have joined in the resistance against privatising public services - and argues for the struggle to spread to the private sector itself.

Originally written for the Oxford Save Our Services blog.

There has been much praise heaped upon the private sector recently. Successive governments have argued that opening up public services to the private markets is a good thing. The private sector is more efficient, more dynamic and more flexible than the old-fashioned public sector, they say. The one thing all this praise of the private sector has in common, however, is that it all comes from people at the top. From the businessmen and their friends in parliament. You'll not hear much praise from someone like me. After all, I'm just the person who makes them their money.

On Saturday 4th February, Hull Solidarity Federation and friends picketed Pizza Hut in solidarity with workers from the IWW Pizza Hut Union, in support of an ongoing dispute over pay and conditions. The picket started at 11:30, lasting around 2 hours in the freezing cold until we had handed out all 400 of our leaflets. Management came and incorrectly told us that we were not legally allowed to hold a picket outside the restaurant and subsequently called the police. The officers, trailed by a cameraman for an as yet unaired police documentary, informed us that what we were doing was perfectly lawful.

Today saw two members of the North London Solidarity Federation join striking gallery assistants and members of the public at a picket line rally at the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square. The strike, over budget cuts and staffing levels, was scheduled to last only two hours and was planned to cause disruption during the Gallery's busiest time.

SolFed members in particular made an effort to flier potential patrons, explain the issues behind the strike, and request they refrain from entering the museum for the duration of the strike. After spending some time at the Gallery itself, the strikers led a short march to the to the Da Vinci exhibition which was taking place next door.

The first picket I went to was at the Western Infirmary, as I knew a couple of people on the picket there. The picket was big enough, but largely symbolic as the RCN nurses were going in. I was told lots of the nurses are planning to join Unison. Later I was told one of the consultants donated £40 to the picket.