Martin Blank
11th November 2010, 10:51
Note: I'm posting this here for the benefit of those comrades interested in helping with building solidarity actions. Please take the appeal and call into your organizations and see if they would be willing to organize or join in a protest in your area. Let us know if you're going to have a protest, too, so that the information can be sent to workers in France. -- Miles
Appeal for Workers’ Solidarity
Statement of the C.C. Bureau of the Workers Party in America, November 9, 2010
Brothers and sisters! The Workers Party is reaching out to you to ask for help and solidarity. This is appeal is not for us, but for our brother and sister workers in France. We ask for your help in building a day of action to support them and their struggles.
As many of you know, French workers of all ages have organized and mobilized over the last two months against the legislation pushed by President Nicolas Sarkozy to raise the retirement ages to 62, for a partial pension, and 67, for a full benefit. Workers and their organizations staged powerful strikes in key sectors of the economy (most notably the oil refineries), and built marches and protests involving hundreds of thousands. Young workers still in school also organized protests, as well as occupations of buildings and public spaces.
Even though Sarkozy succeeded in pushing this “reform” of retirement through the National Assembly and the Senate, the workers’ struggle is not over. Many workers remain on strike, workers’ blockades of transport and industries continue to be raised, and workers, both young and old, continue to hold protests against the austerity demanded by the government and its corporate paymasters. While most of the unions, through their officials, have given up on continuing the struggle, preferring instead to plead for “renegotiation” with the government, new bodies of struggle and working-class action have stepped into the breach.
Across France, local General Assemblies have emerged as membership-based alternatives to the main union federations. These Assemblies are committees of action that embrace all sectors of the working class: organized and unorganized, the unemployed, young people and retirees. Their goal is to not let the fight for workers’ rights and livelihoods die out or be strangled, now that the union officials are looking to make peace with the bosses.
Last weekend, the first national meeting of the General Assemblies took place in Tours. The delegates and observers at the meeting drafted a declaration and call for support and solidarity. (See the last issue of WPA for the full text.) Among the calls made from the Tours conference was an appeal for international solidarity protests to be held on November 15.
We are reaching out to you to ask for your help in organizing solidarity protests across the U.S. on that day. Such actions can include protests in front of the French embassy in Washington, D.C., as well as in front of French consulates across the country. It can also include informational pickets in front of French businesses and banks with facilities in the U.S.
We understand that this appeal comes at short notice. We know there is not much time to organize an event. However, any action, large or small, will have a profound effect on the morale and consciousness of our brothers and sisters in France. Now more than ever, working people in France need to know they are not alone in the fight against capitalist austerity.
If you or your organization is interested in building a solidarity protest, please do so. Because Nov. 15 is a Monday, it would be best to organize a late-afternoon event to allow for working people here in the U.S. to attend. But time and place are for you to decide, just as you would be welcome to bring your own signs, banners and slogans to the protests. These protests are for the benefit of French workers, not any one organization or its viewpoint.
If you or your organization do build a solidarity protests, please be sure to take pictures that can be sent to France. You can either send them to us by e-mail at [email protected], with a guarantee that all photos will be sent, or you can send them directly to France by e-mail at [email protected] But do send us a copy, if you would, please.
------------------------------
This is No Time to Give Up!
Call of the national meeting of General Assemblies, Tours, November 6, 2010
On November 6, mandated delegates or observers from 25 local cross-industry General Assemblies, General Assemblies from particular disputes, joint union committees open to non-unionized workers, struggle collectives, inter-sector coordinations met in Tours.
Workers from the public and private sectors, unemployed people, pensioners, and high school and university students have been massively protesting, striking, demonstrating, and blockading streets, motorways or petrol stations, for the withdrawal of the so-called “pension reform”, with the support of the majority of the French population. To these protests the government has only responded with contempt, disinformation, repression, violation of the right to strike, and now it has decided to try to impose a fait accompli.
The fight against the “pension reform” is at a crucial point. While the government and media are announcing the end of the mobilization, blockades and solidarity actions are still going on across the country, and demonstrations are still massive. This law must be repealed. We refuse to bury the movement after the passing of the law.
The strategy of the joint union committee at national level has led to a failure. But we are not going to give up: we are committed to continue the fight. In many towns, those who struggle, members of different unions and non-unionized workers too, have met in General Assemblies and collectives in order to discuss and act together: to inform, to support the sectors which are struggling, to extend the strikes, and to organize blockades. We want this process of self-organization and joint action to be sustained, amplified and coordinated.
This movement is part of a broader struggle to stop the offensive of the government and the bosses, who are preparing new attacks, especially on health insurance. The only way to win is to blockade the economy and organize a general strike.
We call for a common front against the increasing brutal repression used against the social movements.
We have held this national meeting to start discussing, coordinating and carrying out joint actions.
We call all those in struggle to organize general assemblies, if they have not already done so in their localities.
We call on all local cross-industry General Assemblies, General Assemblies from particular disputes, joint union committees open to non-unionized workers etc., to attend the next national meeting in Nantes on Saturday, November 27, 2010, and send mandated delegates.
We invite all trade unions to send observers.
We call for the following actions, in order to reinforce those which are already taking place daily:
A symbolic action on November 11 at 11 a.m. for the repeal of the law and as an homage to all those who die at work before having the possibility of retiring;
A day of economic blockade on November 15, with international support;
A symbolic burning of the text of the law on the day of its promulgation.
Appeal for Workers’ Solidarity
Statement of the C.C. Bureau of the Workers Party in America, November 9, 2010
Brothers and sisters! The Workers Party is reaching out to you to ask for help and solidarity. This is appeal is not for us, but for our brother and sister workers in France. We ask for your help in building a day of action to support them and their struggles.
As many of you know, French workers of all ages have organized and mobilized over the last two months against the legislation pushed by President Nicolas Sarkozy to raise the retirement ages to 62, for a partial pension, and 67, for a full benefit. Workers and their organizations staged powerful strikes in key sectors of the economy (most notably the oil refineries), and built marches and protests involving hundreds of thousands. Young workers still in school also organized protests, as well as occupations of buildings and public spaces.
Even though Sarkozy succeeded in pushing this “reform” of retirement through the National Assembly and the Senate, the workers’ struggle is not over. Many workers remain on strike, workers’ blockades of transport and industries continue to be raised, and workers, both young and old, continue to hold protests against the austerity demanded by the government and its corporate paymasters. While most of the unions, through their officials, have given up on continuing the struggle, preferring instead to plead for “renegotiation” with the government, new bodies of struggle and working-class action have stepped into the breach.
Across France, local General Assemblies have emerged as membership-based alternatives to the main union federations. These Assemblies are committees of action that embrace all sectors of the working class: organized and unorganized, the unemployed, young people and retirees. Their goal is to not let the fight for workers’ rights and livelihoods die out or be strangled, now that the union officials are looking to make peace with the bosses.
Last weekend, the first national meeting of the General Assemblies took place in Tours. The delegates and observers at the meeting drafted a declaration and call for support and solidarity. (See the last issue of WPA for the full text.) Among the calls made from the Tours conference was an appeal for international solidarity protests to be held on November 15.
We are reaching out to you to ask for your help in organizing solidarity protests across the U.S. on that day. Such actions can include protests in front of the French embassy in Washington, D.C., as well as in front of French consulates across the country. It can also include informational pickets in front of French businesses and banks with facilities in the U.S.
We understand that this appeal comes at short notice. We know there is not much time to organize an event. However, any action, large or small, will have a profound effect on the morale and consciousness of our brothers and sisters in France. Now more than ever, working people in France need to know they are not alone in the fight against capitalist austerity.
If you or your organization is interested in building a solidarity protest, please do so. Because Nov. 15 is a Monday, it would be best to organize a late-afternoon event to allow for working people here in the U.S. to attend. But time and place are for you to decide, just as you would be welcome to bring your own signs, banners and slogans to the protests. These protests are for the benefit of French workers, not any one organization or its viewpoint.
If you or your organization do build a solidarity protests, please be sure to take pictures that can be sent to France. You can either send them to us by e-mail at [email protected], with a guarantee that all photos will be sent, or you can send them directly to France by e-mail at [email protected] But do send us a copy, if you would, please.
------------------------------
This is No Time to Give Up!
Call of the national meeting of General Assemblies, Tours, November 6, 2010
On November 6, mandated delegates or observers from 25 local cross-industry General Assemblies, General Assemblies from particular disputes, joint union committees open to non-unionized workers, struggle collectives, inter-sector coordinations met in Tours.
Workers from the public and private sectors, unemployed people, pensioners, and high school and university students have been massively protesting, striking, demonstrating, and blockading streets, motorways or petrol stations, for the withdrawal of the so-called “pension reform”, with the support of the majority of the French population. To these protests the government has only responded with contempt, disinformation, repression, violation of the right to strike, and now it has decided to try to impose a fait accompli.
The fight against the “pension reform” is at a crucial point. While the government and media are announcing the end of the mobilization, blockades and solidarity actions are still going on across the country, and demonstrations are still massive. This law must be repealed. We refuse to bury the movement after the passing of the law.
The strategy of the joint union committee at national level has led to a failure. But we are not going to give up: we are committed to continue the fight. In many towns, those who struggle, members of different unions and non-unionized workers too, have met in General Assemblies and collectives in order to discuss and act together: to inform, to support the sectors which are struggling, to extend the strikes, and to organize blockades. We want this process of self-organization and joint action to be sustained, amplified and coordinated.
This movement is part of a broader struggle to stop the offensive of the government and the bosses, who are preparing new attacks, especially on health insurance. The only way to win is to blockade the economy and organize a general strike.
We call for a common front against the increasing brutal repression used against the social movements.
We have held this national meeting to start discussing, coordinating and carrying out joint actions.
We call all those in struggle to organize general assemblies, if they have not already done so in their localities.
We call on all local cross-industry General Assemblies, General Assemblies from particular disputes, joint union committees open to non-unionized workers etc., to attend the next national meeting in Nantes on Saturday, November 27, 2010, and send mandated delegates.
We invite all trade unions to send observers.
We call for the following actions, in order to reinforce those which are already taking place daily:
A symbolic action on November 11 at 11 a.m. for the repeal of the law and as an homage to all those who die at work before having the possibility of retiring;
A day of economic blockade on November 15, with international support;
A symbolic burning of the text of the law on the day of its promulgation.