STRIKES

[Davy King]

Huge crowds join French strikes

Huge crowds have taken to the streets in France to protest over the handling of the economic crisis, causing disruption to rail and air services."

(29th January 2009)


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7857435.stm


Please add any other examples of Strikes as they happen..... while we are trying to advertise the GENERAL WORLD STRIKE against Capitalism & money.

[michael dickinson]

John Pilger on UK postal strike
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=9617

MORE:
Royal mail workers are the most significant combative, well-organised section of the working class in the UK.
In the current context, the government are preparing everyone for austerity measures - significant cuts to public services and jobs.
As the strongest part of the public sector, if they break the postal workers it will open the floodgates to huge further cuts in jobs, pay and conditions.
http://www.cwu.org/news/archive/support-for-striking-postal-workers...

Some background is in this article written during the strikes two years ago:
http://libcom.org/library/dispatch-public-sector-pay-dispute-1-augu...

And the best background to this dispute is here:
http://libcom.org/library/letter-postman

http://libcom.org/news/initial-impressions-royal-mail-strike-22102009

http://www.supporttheposties.net/

In the meantime, more agencies of the state are becoming involved. The Observer reports yesterday that the Association of Chief Police Officers has already, probably in conjunction with government meetings, etc, issued guidelines to police forces on dealing with large-scale strike action. The article deliberately wound up the question of “possible violence on the picket lines” and Acpo said it “was closely monitoring the situation”.

http://www.managementtoday.co.uk/channel/HumanCapital/news/946559/t...

Scope for extending the struggle?
http://www.atherstonerecorder.co.uk/100258-tnt-workers-protest-over...

"Britain's largest private mail operator, has selflessly offered to fill any gaps left by post strikes."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8309736.stm

'Royal Mail 'strike plan' revealed'

They're recruiting temp workers to sort on the frames in the South East, but not delivery staff as far as i can see:
http://rmg.i-grasp.com/fe/tpl_royalmail01.asp

[michael dickinson]

4,000 undocumented migrant workers strike and occupy in paris
27 10 2009 - by Antoine Boulangé

A new wave of strikes by undocumented migrant workers began on 12th October. The striking workers, greater in number than in April 2008, are determined to win regularisation for all. But to do that, they need solidarity from all workers.

“Colonised yesterday – exploited today - tomorrow regularised”
That is the slogan of the thousands of undocumented migrant workers who are taking part in the new strike wave, initiated by the unions (CGT, CFDT, SUD, FSU and UNSA) and associations (Ligue des droits de l’homme, Cimade, RESF [Education Without Borders Network], Femmes Égalité, Autremonde, Droits devant!! etc.) Since 12th October the movement has not stopped growing, from 1,000 on the first day to 3,000 a week later. There has been a qualitative and quantitative leap from the strike wave of April 2008, which involved 600 workers and won 2,000 regularisations.

Over a period of a few days, over 700 “isolated” workers, employed on a temporary basis by unscrupulous employment agencies, invaded the Synergie and Adecco agency offices in Paris. 400 occupied the restaurant bosses’ association, and 380 occupied the offices of the national federation of construction employers. More than 30 workplaces are occupied. On the picket lines which “isolated” workers have organised, there are representatives of every job – butchers, bakers, gardeners, etc. At Vitry-sur-Seine, migrant workers have occupied a tax office in order to denounce the state’s complicity in pocketing the taxes and social security contributions of undocumented migrant workers without giving them access to the basic rights of citizens. It is without a doubt the biggest movement of precarious workers ever organised in France.

Undocumented migrant workers are starkly bringing to light the inhuman working conditions and exploitation suffered by hundreds of thousands of people. They are highlighting the way capitalism uses the worst forms of casualisation in order to create maximum profit. They are at the heart of the system, employed by both public and private sector employers, to renovate the Paris métro and the trams, in nineteenth Century working conditions. In the security sector, of 150,000 workers, 15,000 have no papers.

This exemplary movement perfectly illustrates the contradictions of capitalism. In order to maintain profits, this system has for years carried out a policy of outsourcing and casualising the labour force. This logic is pushed to its extreme with undocumented migrant workers. Furthermore they suffer growing state and police repression with the development of Fortress Europe, a racist Europe, which lauds the free circulation of capital yet allows thousands of people to die every year in the Mediterranean. There have been far more deaths at Gibraltar than at the Berlin Wall, which fell 20 years ago, but has been rebuilt across southern Europe. This situation is also sparking rebellion!

The striking workers and their supporters oppose the government’s immigration policy. The unions want Besson to formally put an end to the treatment of migrants on a case by case basis according to the whim of each local prefecture. This is a first step, but the only real solution to put an end to super-exploitation, is papers for all. That is something that migrant workers cannot win by themselves: they need the widest support possible.

The CGT’s strategy has evolved positively since the April 2008 strikes. From the outset, the movement has been larger and the CGT has been favourable to the setting up of support committees, although its leaders do not want to be overtaken by events and lose “control”. Solidarity committees have been set up all over. The occupation of the Paris tramway has therefore been able to continue for a whole week. The organisations and associations of the 19th and 20th arrondissements [districts of Paris] brought tents and duvets to the strikers from day one, and the “Chorba for all” organisation supplied food. Without this, it would have been difficult to resist the pressure of the police and the bosses. At Vigneux-sur-Seine, a collection was organised, and at Boissy-Saint- Léger, the CGT organised a solidarity barbecue. We must spread such initiatives.

The workplace occupations put the bosses and government in a difficult position on the question of immigration. It is possible to win victories and regularisations. This strike wave must make large numbers of people realise that immigration is not a problem. The left must rally around the migrant workers and raise the old slogan, “French workers, migrant workers, same bosses, same struggle!” Migrant workers are showing the way.

http://thecommune.wordpress.com/2009/10/27/4000-undocumented-migran...

more:
http://thecommune.wordpress.com/2009/11/01/interview-with-migrant-c...

http://dreaming-neon-black.blogspot.com/

VIDEOS
http://www.youtube.com/user/thecommune1

Striking museum workers spoof exhibit
Striking Canadian Museum of Civilization employees displayed photos of 200 picketing workers outside the institution.
The workers' exhibit, called Striking Treasures, features 200 photos of museum employees who have been on strike since Sept. 21.
"The purpose was to show people the real treasures of the museum, … unfortunately on the sidewalk," said Patrice Remillard, a striking museum collections manager.
The sidewalk exhibit parodies Afghanistan: Hidden Treasures —a show featuring 200 pieces of jewelry, sculptures, glassware and other objects from the National Museum in Kabul.museum employees completed their work on the exhibit well before the strike began, and eight curators from Afghanistan and National Geographic installed the artifacts. The museum is expecting Hidden Treasures to draw crowds, even though people will have to cross picket lines to see it.
The 420 guides, hosts and other unionized staff at the Canadian Museum of Civilization and the Canadian War Museum have been without a contract since April 1. Negotiations between their union — the Public Service Alliance of Canada — and the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corp., a federal Crown entity, broke down over wages and job security.
http://topics.treehugger.com/article/0gMTaJq8RV2wV

POSTMAN PAT update

Postal workers in the UK have now taken five days of strike action against the attacks on their jobs and working conditions, spearheaded by Royal Mail and backed by the government. RM are responding by rolling out Britain's largest strikebreaking operation since the pivotal miners' strike of 1984-85. However, Communication Workers Union bureaucrats - who have been doing their best to dampen down rank and file anger since the early summer - have claimed this is "not a sticking point".

Last Wednesday, members of the Nottinghamshire Industrial Workers of the World branch leafleted outside the Station Road Jobcentre Plus branch, urging centre users not to cross picket lines and undermine the strike (http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/10/440926.html?c=on#c236150).
http://iww.org.uk/
Actions like this are vitally important, because the new workers' movement is starting from a historical low in terms of class consciousness and knowledge of industrial tactics, and under-25s make up nearly four in ten on the UK unemployment roll.

Two days of all-out strikes are scheduled for Friday and next Monday.
The 'I Support the Postal Workers!' Facebook group is at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2394038466&ref=search&...

FRAUD
In another historical milestone struggle, Ford workers in the US have emphatically rejected the latest sacrifices proposed by United Auto Workers president Ron Gettelfinger, with nearly three quarters voting no on the deal (www.wsws.org/articles/2009/nov2009/pers-n02.shtml). It is the first time a national deal has been rejected stateside since 1976, and the first time at Ford since 1972. Since then, the UAW has helped to wipe out 750,000 US auto industry jobs, leaving Detroit and other manufacturing centres utterly devastated.

Ford workers speak out against concessions contract
WSWS reporters speak to Ford workers during the contract vote at UAW Local 600 in Dearborn, Michigan.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbvajpN81vY

Union executives around the world and in every industry have argued that economic globalisation means that cuts are necessary sacrifices, and a whole generation of workers have grown up in that environment, giving more to their bosses, and getting less back, while the bureaucrats have enriched themselves. Ford workers have seen 45% of their colleagues made redundant since 2006, and have overwhelmingly decided that enough is enough, drawing a red line in the sand. They must link up with their counterparts at Chrysler and General Motors (the other two members of the 'Big Three', who had similar deals foisted upon them by Gettelfinger and President Obama at the start of the year), and workers internationally. The nationalist, pro-capitalist perspective of the business unions has been exposed as a dead end, but now the case has to be made for workers' control.

http://athomehesaturista.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/kansas-city-uaw-p...