TUC supports industrial action, is it all talk?

[bricolage]

Union delegates have backed joint industrial action if "attacks" on jobs, pensions and public services go ahead. The TUC's annual gathering backed a motion which included calls to build "a broad solidarity alliance of unions and communities under threat".
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11278570

All well and good, but we've been here before. During the miners strike the TUC (alongside the Labour party) passed motion after motion declaring support for the strikers, promising further action but nothing came of it. The TUC has always been prone to speak big but is there any reason to suggest the reality will be different this time around?

[Hit The North]

To be fair, this is the "biggest talk" we've heard from the TUC in more than a decade. But, yeah, the bureaucracy like nothing more than being able to talk militant without being forced to put it into practice.

Until workers actually take action, the opposition remains theoretical, but at least the TUC's rhetoric is a reflection of the growing fear and anger in the working class and its support for the motion reflects an acceptance that we have a fight ahead. But as Socialist Worker explains:


Motions must be turned into action.

http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=22444

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

They will talk big but the likes of Brendan Barber and Derek Simpson will never start cross-Union strikes, political/wildcat/secondary strikes.

It's a shame that the likes of Bob Crow or Mark Serwotka don't have more influence in the TUC. They'd be a far better influence on workers' lives than Barber and Simpson, who are both so typical of the right-wing collaberative union leadership that we have become accustomed to.

[mossy noonmann]

serwotka was excellent

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LebOytsPy-c

from the TUC conference

[red flag over teeside]

Crow or Serwotka doesn’t make any difference they still will hold back any independent working class struggle. Neither of them should have the confidence of the working class because they will betray workers just as the trade union left did during the 1926 general strike. All union leaders live in fear of independent working class action which would be organised in workers assemblies open to all workers and accountable to all workers. The difficulty for revolutionaries is to convince workers that its vital that workers assemblies are built. So when the jobs are cut whether in the public or private sector or services are cut then organisations such as these are needed rather than either the TUC or individual unions.

[bricolage]

Big talk continues.

Early in the new year the TUC (http://www.tuc.org.uk/) will be holding a special meeting to discuss co-ordinated industrial action and to analyse the possibilities and opportunities for a broad strike movement.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/19/unions-students-strike-fight-cuts

[bricolage]

to rehash an old thread big talk makes it way back...

The leader of the largest public sector union promises to mount the most sustained campaign of industrial action the country has seen since the general strike of 1926, vowing not to back down until the government has dropped its controversial pension changes...
"It will be the biggest since the general strike. It won't be the miners' strike. We are going to win."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/jun/18/biggest-strike-100-years-union

[Arlekino]

I raises few times this question but seems nobody open my mind. Why private sector workers are alienated seems we are working more harder and we don't have many privelegies like public sector workers. No unions are representing us, public sector workers wish we have to support them but who supporting us? Please don't throw grenades on me I am supporter of public sector workers.

[Rooster]

Ed Balls said the other day that the unions are "walking into a trap" if they strike. That they've been provoked by the Tories so that they (the unions) can be blamed for the economy. I think Labour have totally lost the plot.

[Coggeh]

The TUC like ICTU in Ireland are made up of unions that are rarely democratic, leaders are paid extortionate amounts of money and thus the common interests of leaders and workers are severed. The TUC only take action when they are under huge pressure from the rank and file. It looks like a lot of talk and little action is on the way but that doesn't mean whatever action is taken should be snubbed at, it should be used as a mechanism to demand further action and going further the introduction of democracy into the unions and the cutting of leaders wages to be in line with the rank and file.