Brighton rocks...

...and no more when the TUC is in town. These days the TUC’s annual conference is little more than a talking shop for the union establishments and Brighton was no exception. Every year the assorted full-time officers get together for this annual jamboree to formulate policies that reflect the views of the senior full-timers and the lay officers that lead the factions that run our unions today. In the coming months motions which reflect the views of the bureaucrats will doubtless end up as material for mediocre TUC campaigns and lobbies  – those that genuinely reflect the demands of the street on pay, terms and conditions and social justice will be sidelined or ignored.
Though some motions challenged the bourgeois consensus the bureaucracy ensured that nothing was done to embarrass Sir Keir Starmer who turned up to tell delegates that what he called “Changed Labour” would need to make “tough choices” and provide no “special favours” to unions.
Conference as a whole did however take up the fight against racism calling on the movement to do all it can to mobilise on the streets against the far right and delegates unanimously
passed an emergency motion on the danger of a wider war in the Middle East and in support of a national day of action for Palestine on 10th October.
Though the days when the TUC was called the “general staff of labour” are long gone it still pompously calls itself the “voice of Britain at work”. In reality it is, of course, the ‘voice of the union bureaucracy at work’ so we shouldn’t be surprised when, at the end of the day, nothing is done...

No arms for Israel!

While the Zionists may talk about teaching Hezbollah a lesson with their pager bomb terror campaign the only thing they have actually taught the Lebanese resistance is to never again compromise their security with electronic equipment made in the American empire. Meanwhile Britain continues to aid and abet the Israeli war-criminals by supplying sophisticated arms to the Zionist state.
The Western powers, who routinely brand all resistance to imperialism as “terrorism”, say little about Israel’s current wave of terror in Lebanon, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and rarely go beyond their hypocritical calls for restraint “on all sides” that are actually calls for a complete Arab surrender to Zionist demands. 
A few weeks ago the Starmer government suspended 30 out of the current 350 UK arms export licences to Israel. But this token gesture, given to try and stave off the mounting pressure to halt all British arms exports to Israel, is nowhere near enough. Or as CND’s Kate Hudson put it: “Israel is committing a genocide against Palestinians and is using both conventional and hybrid warfare to kill and injure people in Lebanon. The Middle East stands on the edge of a wider regional war and the British government is more than happy to cheer it on. This has to stop”.

When the going gets tough…

 

...the TUC gets going – often out of the back door under a cover of the usual platitudes the full-time officers reserve for times like these. The furore over the pensioners’ winter fuel cuts in the House of Commons and at TUC conference in Brighton may have reflected the anger on the street at this blatant attack on one of the most vulnerable sections of society but it also showed the weakness of the labour movement, that was unable to halt or water down the demand of the Starmer government to means-test the pensioners’ allowance that some say could lead to over 4,000 excess deaths due to hyperthermia in the winter months. 
Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader who now heads the Independent bloc in Parliament says “cutting winter fuel allowance is not a tough choice. It's the wrong choice - and we will not be fooled by ministers’ attempts to feign regret over cruel decisions they don’t have to take”. But sadly some union leaders fool themselves into believing that Starmer can be swayed by fine words and back-room lobbying while others believe that the Starmer’s cruel necessity is a price worth paying for the very modest concessions on pay and union rights that the Government has made during its first hundred days. 
It’s long been clear that the only people this Labour government heeds are those they believe represent the dominant bloc within the British ruling class; the City of London and the American diplomats that Starmer apparently liaises with on an almost weekly basis.
Labour was founded by the trade unions to give the working class its own voice within Parliament but the Parliamentary Party leadership has been dominated by the middle class intelligentsia since the days of Ramsay McDonald. In Parliament, even in Corbyn’s day, the Labour benches were dominated by right-wing factions. In the past left social-democratic and Trotskyist factions were tolerated to provide a “left” cover for the Cold War politics of the post-war Labour governments. No longer needed following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the people’s democracies in eastern Europe they were purged much like the Corbynistas in recent years. 
Though the Labour Party is dominated by the class‑collaborating right wing in the parliamentary party the possibility of their defeat exists as long as Labour retains its organisational links with the trade unions that fund it. The defeat of the old right‑wing union factions in most of the major unions over the past ten years demonstrates this possibility.
A Labour government, with the yet unbroken links with the trade unions and the co‑operative movement, still offers the best option for the working class in the era of bourgeois parliamentary democracy. Our strategy is for working class unity and our campaigns are focused on defeating the right‑wing within the movement and strengthening the left and progressive forces within the Labour Party and the unions. Day‑to‑day demands for reform, progressive taxation, state welfare and a public sector dedicated to meet the people’s needs are winnable under capitalism, particularly in a rich country like Britain today.
We support these demands and back the demands of those within the Labour Party and the  unions who are campaigning for greater social justice. We support those in the Labour Party fighting for left policies. It is part of our struggle against austerity.
In July we saw the election of independents including Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader hounded out by Starmer and the Blairite gang. They have now formed an Independent bloc in Parliament. They are all supporters of the Palestinian cause and other anti-imperialist struggles across the globe. Hopefully, they will soon become a focus of resistance to austerity in parliament – and on the street.

A disgusting spectacle in Liverpool

This year’s TUC annual conference summed up all that is rotten in the British labour movement. The bureaucrats, left-wing posers and the rest of the gravy-trainers were all there in Liverpool to pass the usual platitudes that pass for working class solidarity these days.
Sir Keir Starmer joined the assembled general secretaries for a back-slapping eve of conference dinner but left it to his deputy Angela Rayner to assure the union bureaucracy and the bourgeoisie as a whole that they can sleep soundly in their beds when Starmer gets to Downing Street.
The most sickening episode was when delegates voted overwhelmingly for a motion backing the provision of “moral and material aid”, including arms, to the puppet regime in Ukraine.
Moving the motion, Barbara Plant, the president of the GMB, said Ukraine was fighting for its survival in the face of a brutal Russian onslaught and claimed that denying the Ukrainians of the means of self-defence would be like the arms embargo that crippled the Spanish republic in the 1930s.
Seconding the motion, Aslef Assistant General Secretary Simon Weller claimed Ukrainian unions were not subject to bans, while Russia’s recent declaration that the International Transport Federation was an “undesirable organisation” would put the rights of many workers, particularly seafarers, at risk. And needless to say, TUC general secretary Paul Nowak got up to tell conference that the General Council backed the motion.
Though a handful of unions including the RMT, UCU and the NEU abstained only the firefighters’ and the small bakers’ union took the principled stand to oppose the motion. Jamie Newell of the Fire Brigades Union, condemned the way debate on Ukraine has been shut down in Britain. “We do not think the escalation of war is in the interests of the Russian or Ukrainian working class,” he said.
The “Solidarity with Ukraine” motion committed the TUC to supporting “Ukrainian unions’ calls for financial and practical aid from the UK to Ukraine”, and “the immediate withdrawal of Russian forces from all Ukrainian territories occupied since 2014”— including Crimea and the eastern Donbas regions – exactly the  same demands of Anglo-American imperialism and the rest of the NATO pack.

Support the doctors!

Junior doctors joined consultants in industrial action called by the British Medical Association (BMA) this week. For the first time in the history of the NHS  consultants and junior doctors stood together in joint strike action for the first time. Ss with previous strikes the union ensured that patients are kept safe by ensuring that emergency services remain in place. 
Junior doctors account for nearly half NHS doctors - from medics fresh out of university to those sometimes with 10 years' experience. Their pay has been cut by more than 26 per cent in real-terms cuts since 2008/09. This mean newly-qualified medics earn just £14.09 an hour. This is in comparison to baristas at Pret a Manger, who can earn up to £14.10 an hour, after the coffee chain recently announced it has raised wages by 19 per cent this year. Consultants too have seen their real-term take-home pay fall by over a third over the last 14 years. his can’t going. Support the striking doctors! Defend the NHS! 

Support the strikes!

We’ve seen the biggest wave of strikes for a decade this week. Hundreds of thousands of teachers, along with train drivers, civil servants, bus drivers and security guards walked out in a co-ordinated day of action on Wednesday. And their leaders warn of plenty more to come if their just demands for more pay are not met. While the mealy-mouthed Labour leader sits on the fence and tells his MPs not to join picket lines the TUC general secretary Paul Nowak rightly says “it really is now the responsibility of Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt to get round the table and make sure resources are available to fund decent pay in public services”.
    Workers are taking industrial action across the public and private sectors, in response to 12 years of falling pay and an environment that has repeatedly asked workers to pay the price while dividends and executive pay have soared.
    For months and months the Tory government has refused to open serious negotiations with the unions. While energy prices soar and inflation rises the Tories smear the unions with talk about “Reds” and “wreckers”. While the Tories bleat on about the “economy” they can still find plenty to give the Western puppet regime fight the Russians in Ukraine. And there’s still plenty of tax breaks to ensure that the ruling class can continued to live their lives of ease while millions of out-of-work or poorly paid workers turn to food banks to survive.
    The bourgeois media have done their best to sway public opinion against the unions. But no-one believes them any more. Support for the workers remains high in the opinion polls and more importantly, on the street. The public want an end to the austerity regime and this is why Labour, if the opinion polls are to be believed, still has an astronomical 25 point lead over the Tories.
    The Sunak government can be forced back to the negotiating table. The new anti-strike laws can be defeated. But only through mass pressure and mass protests. This week’s strike could be the spark that ignites a movement to end austerity once and for all.

rotten to the core

Why it took two weeks for Rishi Sunak to get rid of Nadhim Zahawi is a mystery in itself. The Tory press has been full of stories about to the now disgraced former Tory party Chairman’s breach of ministerial rules in an attempt to cover up the fact he was facing a probe into his tax affairs.
    Now the Sunak camp is saying that this all goes back to the Johnson era and it has nothing to do with the new premier – which is at best slightly misleading as Sunak was, afterall, the most senior minister in Johnson’s Cabinet.
    Though Zahawi seems surprised at the furore in the media that may have ended his political career for ever nothing should surprise us about his antics. Tory politicians, like most of them on both sides of the House, are just in it for themselves. One goes. Another takes his place.

Tolpuddle returns!

By New Worker correspondent

Thousands of people braved the soaring temperatures to take part in the Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival after a two year Covid break and remember the pioneers of the labour movement unjustly transported to Australia in 1834 for setting up a union.
    This year we heard rail workers’ leader Mick Lynch and Angela Rayner, the deputy head of the Labour Party, talk about the cost of living crisis and the way forward for the labour movement.
    The Tolpuddle spirit has been recalled every year since the Thirties, apart from the second world war and the recent Covid crisis, in the village where the modern union movement began.
    In 1834 six agricultural labourers from the village of Tolpuddle in Dorset, England were convicted of swearing a secret oath as members of the Friendly Society of Agricultural Labourers. They were arrested on charges under an obscure law during a labour dispute against cutting wages and sentenced to penal transportation in Australia. Mass protests led to their pardon in 1836 and they returned to England between 1837 and 1839.
    There has been an annual gathering since the 1930s. It began as a Sunday afternoon event with wreaths laid on the grave of one of the Martyrs, James Hammett, followed by a procession of union banners and a rally . Today, the annual event sees thousands of trade unionists from around the world descend on the small village of Tolpuddle, to celebrate the legacy they left behind.
    A Martyrs monument was erected in Tolpuddle in 1934, and a sculpture of the martyrs, made in 2001, stands in the village in front of the Tolpuddle Martyrs Museum.
    The annual Tolpuddle Martyrs festival is usually held in the third week of July, organised by the TUC and featuring a parade of banners from many trade unions, a memorial service, speeches and music.

Half Full or Half Empty

by New Worker correspondent

The latest trade union membership figures for the UK have been published by the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (that we no longer have a Ministry of Labour is telling). The latest figures show a rise of 118,000 in the course of last year.
    This is not as good as it sounds. The rise was due to an increase of 228,000 public sector workers who account for nearly two-thirds of the 6.6 million trade unionists in Britain. This has been offset by a fall of 110,000 workers in the private sector, where only 2.5 million or 12.9 per cent are in unions. Just over half the public sector workers are unionised. Despite the absolute rise, density is still lower than in 2015. The TUC claim that its affiliated unions account for 5.5 million.
    Coming out on top geographically was Yorkshire & Humber, whose TUC Regional Secretary Bill Adams boasted that: “Trade union membership in Yorkshire is on the rise –especially among women between the ages of 25–34, who face high levels of insecure work and low pay.
     “Thousands have turned to unions during this crisis, to protect their jobs, defend their rights and keep their workplaces safe.”
    Mayor of West Yorkshire, Tracey Brabin, said that union representation in local workplaces has jumped 10 per cent, reaching 58 per cent of all workplaces: “I’m really encouraged to see these figures today, because it has never been more important to join a union.” She should read the small print before breaking out the champagne.
    Although they represent the fourth annual rise in a row, the latest figures are still pathetic compared with the highpoint of 13.2 million in 1979. Frances O’Grady, General Secretary of the TUC, was correct in pointing out: “It’s never been more important to join a union. This pandemic has brutally exposed the terrible working conditions and insecurity many workers face.
    “Unions can play a key role in helping the country recover from this pandemic by supporting good, green jobs and working with employers to level up pay and conditions across Britain.”
    That does not, however, address the question as to why the figures in the private sector are so bad. Whilst public sector workers have had a rough time in the pandemic, particularly in the well unionised NHS, few have actually been laid off. But the lay-offs caused by pandemic-induced closures of businesses have badly hit numbers in the private sector.
    Daniel Tomlinson, senior economist at the Resolution Foundation think tank, has put us in his debt for his useful analysis of the latest figures. He points out that: “It is too early to pronounce a revival. Membership rates are still lower than in 2015,” adding: “The increase in membership levels in 2020 was in large part a product of the growth in size of the public sector.” He also points out that the average union member is not in the spring chicken category.
    Going into more detail, Tomlinson’s analysis shows that education and public administration are the main growth areas. In education, where there have been pay and pension battles, membership rates rose from 48.7 per cent to 51.4 per cent, or 150,000 members, reversing a four-year decline and returning to the 2010 rates.
    In public administration a slight fall in density was compensated by a growth due to there being 300,000 more employees in public administration in late 2020 than in late 2019.
    He notes that in many areas an expanded workforce doesn’t automatically lead to greater union growth. In the last four years union membership increased by 328,000 but the number of employees grew by three times that to one million.
    The current unusual conditions mean that despite public sector membership numbers increasing substantially, actual membership density has fallen amongst public sector employees. As a share of this new, higher total, fewer public sector employees were trade union members in 2020 than in 2019. Surprisingly for a difficult period when one would have thought that union membership was vital, rates also fell in the private sector as employment in the private sector fell substantially. In particular, rates ticked down from 13.3 per cent in 2019 to 12.9 per cent in 2020 in the private sector, and from 52.3 in 2019 to 51.9 per cent in 2020 in the public sector.
    He warns that growth in the public sector, which accounted for 27.3 per cent of employment in 2020 compared with 25.7 in 2019, will not boost membership. That has to come from the private sector, in particular the gig-economy.
    Only the retail sector has seen recent membership growth, where low pay and zero-hours contracts are common. This is due to shop-worker’s union USDAW amongst others signing agreements with the big supermarkets. Density is still low. It has risen slightly – from 10.6 per cent in 1998–2000 to 12.3 per cent in 2018–2020, whilst numbers increased from 410,000 in 2000 to 460,000 in 2020. But 12.3 per cent is still less than one in eight.
    Tomlinson suggests that because employment fell last year in retail, union members were more likely to stay in work as the sector shrunk but, given that, membership levels rose by 17,000.
    Curiously, in many parts of the private sector membership rates are less than 10 per cent for the lowest-paid private sector employees compared with over 60 per cent for the highest-paid public sector employees.
    Younger workers are starting to take an interest in unions – but it takes a clever statistician to work that one out. It is arguable that figures for young people were so low they had nowhere to go but up and depressingly a slight decline in the number of older members helped boost the percentage of youthful members. As the Jesuits say, you need to catch them young.
    Although membership rates are no longer falling amongst younger workers, a great deal needs to be done to recruit them. No branch secretary can assume that a new worker equals a new member.
    Contrasting the 46–64-year-olds with those between 16– 20, shows that those coming up for retirement who are likely to be members are not likely to be replaced in any great numbers.
    Tomlinson warns that if recent trends continue, the membership rate amongst all workers is likely to continue its decline to 18 per cent by the end of the decade. He points out that this prediction is better than one he made a few years ago. He concludes even-handedly that: “The recent upward trend in overall membership may continue. But it could also be too optimistic should the recent rise in membership end abruptly as COVID-19 fades.”

Death Disguised

By New Worker correspondent  

RIDDOR, Covid and under-reporting is the title of a short but damning report published by the Trades Union Congress on Sunday. It demonstrates that there has been massive underestimation by employers, public and private, of the number of deaths from COVID-19 contracted in the workplace.
    RIDDOR is the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations, which was established in 2013.
    According to the bosses, a mere 2.5 per cent of working age COVID-19 deaths were caused by workplace exposure. The TUC, using Office of National Statistics (ONS) and Public Health England (PHE) data, paints a very different picture. They argue that the system for reporting workplace deaths and infections is “letting bad bosses off the hook”, and that under-reporting has badly undermined health and safety regulation and enforcement during the pandemic.
    The precise figures are that between April 2020 and April 2021 the ONS reported that 15,263 people of working age died from COVID-19. On the other hand, according to reports filed by employers only 387 (2.5 per cent) of these deaths came from workers contracting COVID-19 at work.
     Of course it is sometimes difficult to pinpoint whether medical conditions came from work or pleasure. A computer games fanatic might claim his hours in the office were responsible for his repetitive strain injury and it is sometimes debateable if a postman’s bad knees come from his round or the football pitch. But the ONS figures are likely to be more reliable than the claims of bosses who could face a day in court.
    Employers are obliged to report cases of COVID-19 infection where exposure occurs as a result of a person’s work – but it is left to employer who “must make a judgement, based on the information available, as to whether or not a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 is likely to have been caused by an occupational exposure”.
    Between April 2020 and April 2021, a total of 32,022 COVID-19 infections and 387 deaths were reported under RIDDOR.
    Even the official Health and Safety Executive (HSE) accepts that there is “widespread under-reporting”. Of the 387 deaths, only 216 occupational COVID-19 fatalities were worthy of investigation.
    “Ethical” investments consultancy Pirc states that COVID-19 infections at food factories could be more than 30 times higher than reported. In the transport sector there were 608 COVID-19 deaths amongst transport workers between March and December 2020, but only 10 formal notifications.
    An ONS study shows that there are significant variations in infection rates. Those able to work at home had much lower rates and jobs where social distancing was impossible had higher rates. The lack of access to sick pay has also increased the risks of spreading the disease as those showing minor symptoms would come into work because they cannot afford to take time off, thus spreading the disease.
    Only amongst health and social care workers is there a higher is a higher correlation between the number of deaths recorded by ONS and the number reports made by bosses in the NHS and private sector. Here 886 recorded deaths were matched by 271 reports from bosses. As hospitals and care homes are places for less than healthy people, even that is likely to be an underestimate. Food manufacturing is another particularly badly hit area, the Pre-Christmas rush saw more workers in factories.
    The TUC has concerns about how HSE advice on COVID and RIDDOR is being interpreted. The HSE accepts that there is “widespread under-reporting” in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. This appears to be an understatement. It is likely that the official figures – 216 occupational COVID-19 deaths worthy of investigation – are falling well short of the true number of fatalities following work-related COVID-19 transmission.
    Amongst the cases not reported by bosses were two workers at a Kent salad factory in Kent who died after 70 employees tested positive. Here the employer, Bakkavor, refused to report the deaths via RIDDOR. Before the fatalities, concerns had been raised about poor PPE and social distancing.
    In the education sector, at Burnley College bosses refused to report the death of a teacher even after a known outbreak. It was only when her union, UCU, reported it to the HSE did the College properly report it. In such cases the role of effective trade union health and safety representatives is clearly essential.
    The TUC suggests this lack of reporting is due to the official guidance and the HSE needs to take a tougher line to force employers to report such deaths. It points out that both the HSE and local authorities (who also regulate workplace safety) have suffered drastic funding cuts in the last 10 years. In 2009/10 the HSE received £231 million from the Government, and in 2019/20 it received just £123 million. The Government’s pandemic one-year cash injection to HSE largely went on contractors.

RIDDOR, Covid and under-reporting can be freely downloaded from the TUC website.

Help those who need it most

Last week Boris Johnson was telling us that “many more families are going to lose their loved ones before their time” because his government going to allow the deadly coronavirus to spread to about 60 per cent of the population, so that this would develop future “herd immunity” for those who survived.

This could lead to the infection, in a matter of months, of around 40 million people and some 300,000 to over a million deaths amongst the frail and the elderly. Whilst this didn’t seem to bother the crackpot advisers who surround the Prime Minister, there was an enormous backlash from the medical community and the vulnerable pensioners who are the mainstay of the Tory vote in the Home Counties these days.

Under pressure from his own back-benchers, Johnson has backtracked to return to a conventional containment policy that Labour supports but argues doesn’t go far enough to deal with the crisis.

It’s all very well telling the over-70s to stay at home for the next four months but telling them to rely on relatives, friends and neighbours for food and supplies, and expecting the local council to act as the agency of last resort, is largely wishful thinking in boroughs where social services have been cut to the bone. It does nothing but spread panic and despair amongst those who have no-one to turn to.

It’s all very well introducing a partial lock-down, but what’s to be done about the workers who will be suspended or put on short time as a consequence of the emergency measures to counter the coronavirus outbreak?

The Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, says he’s willing to talk to the TUC about their concerns. But what the unions want is a national taskforce that brings together unions, business and government to co-ordinate support and ensure that measures are being effectively targeted, delivered and accessed by those who need them.

The TUC’s key demand is that the government provides wage subsidy schemes to support people in jobs, and that businesses and employers should set out Jobs and Fair Wages Plans, agreed with recognised unions. The second is to fix the sick pay system to provide sick pay at a living wage for everyone, including the two million workers not covered by the scheme, along with a refunded benefit system worthy of a country with the fifth largest economy in the world.

Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, says: “The government must be bold, decisive and do all it can to help those who need it most: those without jobs, those locked in to zero-hours contracts and insecure work, our front-line health workers, the self-employed, and businesses of all kinds across the country who need to know the government is on their side.

“The market cannot deliver what is needed. Only collective public action led by government can now protect our people and our society and do what is necessary to get us through this crisis.

“A decade of damaging and destructive cuts means our public services are ill equipped to cope. Too many people are already drowning in debt, trapped in insecure jobs and housing, or left reliant on a broken Universal Credit and benefits system. But no one can be left behind.

“Every resource we have must be harnessed to help those who need it and to get our whole country through this crisis. Now is the time for collective public action, for the good of us all.”

Modern day branding

In the past slaves were branded like cattle to enable their masters to clearly mark out their property while the Nazis tattooed prisoners in their concentration camps for similar reasons. These days most workers are forced to walk around with a large ID tag round their necks in company time. Now some employers are thinking of microchipping them to keep tabs on workers they increasingly treat as personal chattels.

Microchipping is commonly used in Britain to enable their owners identify lost cats. But this week the TUC and the Confederation of British Industry, which represents 190,000 UK businesses, have expressed concern at extending it to humans.

Apparently 150 workers have already been injected with small chips, inserted between the thumb and forefinger, produced by BioTeq, which claims to be Britain’s “leading human technology implant specialists”.

Several thousand hapless workers have already been ‘biohacked' in Sweden where the state-run railway is even considering replacing tickets with implants in the future.

TUC General Secretary Frances O'Grady says workers are concerned at the way some employers are using new technology to control and micromanage their activities, all the while “whittling away” their employees’ right to privacy.

“Microchipping would give bosses even more power and control over their workers. There are obvious risks involved, and employers must not brush them aside, or pressure staff into being chipped,” she said.

            That’s putting it mildly, to say the least. Microchipping workers is a disgusting, degrading practice. It may be fit for cats and cows but it’s totally unacceptable for workers.