20th October

[Retog]

There is a huge protest this Saturday in London. (I could not find a thread about it so I thought I'd post the news here)

[GiantMonkeyMan]

Will be there. Red flag in hand.

TUC is debating General Strike action again as well and if turnout to this is high it'll easily pass. Although it kinda sits wrong with me because it'll just be the same old shit as the pensions debacle. A twenty-four hour strike to essentially let the workers blow off some steam and then the union leadership back down.

[Mather]

Here is the LINK (http://afuturethatworks.org/) to the demo's website.

[Igor]

Why London has to be so far away, dammit? I'd love to attend more of this shit, but it's not really possible for me. I'll probably be attending the national demo in november with my local org though.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

Why London has to be so far away, dammit? I'd love to attend more of this shit, but it's not really possible for me. I'll probably be attending the national demo in november with my local org though.
I think there's a similar march on in Glasgow and Belfast as well if that's any help.

[Bronco]

Here is the LINK (http://afuturethatworks.org/) to the demo's website.

Pity that the top article on there is a message of solidarity from the Police Federation

[Igor]

I think there's a similar march on in Glasgow and Belfast as well if that's any help.

Yeah, I know of the Glasgow one and Glasgow seems to be generally great city for everything like this. But even Glasgow is kinda far away and I can't afford going there that often, so I'm stuck with my grey blob of grey things.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

Pity that the top article on there is a message of solidarity from the Police Federation
Tell me about it. The call for a general strike was made by the prison officers' union as well.... D:


Yeah, I know of the Glasgow one and Glasgow seems to be generally great city for everything like this. But even Glasgow is kinda far away and I can't afford going there that often, so I'm stuck with my grey blob of grey things.
Lol, I emailed my local Socialist Party branch and they got me a free ticket on the union coaches they were going up on. Might be a bit late for you though, comrade. :lol:

[Igor]

Pity that the top article on there is a message of solidarity from the Police Federation

what's wrong with that? yeah acab and shit but cops are still in the end working class and their wages and pensions being cut is to be opposed imo and i think it's only great that we have cops who are actively against austerity. the more the merrier, really.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

what's wrong with that? yeah acab and shit but cops are still in the end working class and their wages and pensions being cut is to be opposed imo and i think it's only great that we have cops who are actively against austerity. the more the merrier, really.
They act against austerity but there's no way they would act against the state. Just goes to show the lack of revolutionary character in the TUC, to be honest.

[Mather]

Pity that the top article on there is a message of solidarity from the Police Federation


I know.

I have also heard that Ed Miliband will be speaking at Hyde Pak after the march.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I have also heard that Ed Miliband will be speaking at Hyde Pak after the march.
N-NrPOMBKnw

If only it was ed miliband instead. ;)

[cynicles]

Far away? The UK isn't even the size of Ontario, oh you silly old worlders and your quaint customs.

[sixdollarchampagne]

Here is the LINK (http://afuturethatworks.org/) to the demo's website.

They had to ruin the website by highlighting a message of "solidarity" from the police federation. Reflects the fact that a majority of "Trotskyists" in Britain (and maybe other "socialists," too) believe that cops are allies of working people, despite all historical experience to the contrary.

When I lived in Boston, one Sunday, there was a demonstration by maybe a dozen homegrown fascists from Arkansas. So the left mobilized, and we greatly outnumbered the Arkansas nazis, but the Democratic Party Mayor of Boston, Menino, sent his cops to guarantee that the backwoods fascists could hold their demonstration.

I remember there was an older Russian gentleman at the very front of our demonstration, near the police line that was protecting the fascists, and that Russian really wanted to get at those nazis, and one of the Boston cops assaulted the Russian anti-fascist by hitting him hard, directly in the chest, with a billy club (truncheon). – Some ally! Of course, the ISO was, in effect, running the demonstration against the nazis, so all we were permitted to do was "protest peacefully."

[brigadista]

its on a saturday and will probably be the same as last time....meanwhile....gov is taking everything

[bricolage]

there definitely seems a lot less buzz about this one than the one last march, that one had the hype of being 'the first big thing' and was off the back off the student demos, plus we hadn't had the two demoralising 'general strikes'. ironically for 'a future that works' I can't go to tomorrow because I'm working (and in terms of 'a future that works' does that make me a scab or a role model?) but sure I would have otherwise, I just picture this one being even more of a trudge than the last one with lower attendance and probably less of the smashy smashy spectacle as well.

here's a good critique of the TUC pamphlet - http://www.junge-linke.org/sites/default/files/future.pdf

[Dennis the 'Bloody Peasant']

Despite the fact that it will have Ed in attendance and may not be as big as the last one, still wish I could go.

[helot]

The obsession with the message from the Police Federation is amusing. It's not like they'll be on wildcat strikes or anything, the Met will be there repressing and the TUC bureaucracy will probably be sat in the Met's observation room again. The Met and the TUC, hand-in-hand, trying to make sure the march is irrelevant.

I'll be there anyway, flag in hand, thanks to my local trades council.

[brigadista]

...what will this achieve?

[Blake's Baby]

1 - it will show the Labour Party that the unions are still a force to be reckoned with and that 'traditional Labour voters' need to be appeased;
2 - it will show the government that the unions still have some support (6 million unionised workers in UK out of about 29 million workers) allowing them a space at the negotiation table when the next round of cuts are being discussed;
3 - it will demoralise the class generally when nothing important comes of it;
4 - it will make my feet sore as I trudge round London in the rain telling 250,000 trades unionists that there is an alternative to A-to-B marches and listening to Ed Milliband.

The last one, 18 months ago, was bad enough - people were coming home quite cynically saying 'well, we've done our duty and marched, so that's all sorted out now', ie it was a waste of time. This one I think will be worse, and generally more dispiriting. Anyone thinking that the TUC has any credibility needs to take a long hard look at the real situation I'd suggest. The call for a 'general strike' is ... laughable. Or it would be if the situation weren't so depressing. There is little wildcat activity, little sign of linkage of the struggles that there are, little sign tthat the working class as a class is struggling against the austerity measures.

On the other hand, 250,000 pissed off workers in one place (even if some of them work for the cops) so you've gotta go, right?

[brigadista]

1 - it will show the Labour Party that the unions are still a force to be reckoned with and that 'traditional Labour voters' need to be appeased;

They haven't been a force to be reckoned with since the reform of TU laws an the abolition of the closed shop and criminalisation of secondary picketing

UK TUs are a place to sell insurance and offer members other concessions - [exceptions are possibly RMT and rank and file branches of some building unions]

2 - it will show the government that the unions still have some support (6 million unionised workers in UK out of about 29 million workers) allowing them a space at the negotiation table when the next round of cuts are being discussed;

Yout think so? this gov is going to completely reform rights of workers to sue employers for unfair dismisal amongst other things..and proper strike action has been criminalised .

3 - it will demoralise the class generally when nothing important comes of it;

This is the truth

4 - it will make my feet sore as I trudge round London in the rain telling 250,000 trades unionists that there is an alternative to A-to-B marches and listening to Ed Milliband.

Im feeling you on this

The last one, 18 months ago, was bad enough - people were coming home quite cynically saying 'well, we've done our duty and marched, so that's all sorted out now', ie it was a waste of time. This one I think will be worse, and generally more dispiriting. Anyone thinking that the TUC has any credibility needs to take a long hard look at the real situation I'd suggest. The call for a 'general strike' is ... laughable. Or it would be if the situation weren't so depressing. There is little wildcat activity, little sign of linkage of the struggles that there are, little sign tthat the working class as a class is struggling against the austerity measures.

On the other hand, 250,000 pissed off workers in one place (even if some of them work for the cops) so you've gotta go, right?

I dont think it will be this many

The question is - will anyone have a job in 18 months or if they have will they get paid? i know just been made redundant

[Retog]

Yeah, I know of the Glasgow one and Glasgow seems to be generally great city for everything like this. But even Glasgow is kinda far away and I can't afford going there that often, so I'm stuck with my grey blob of grey things.

We have 14 spare train tickets from the trade union. We are giving them away at Chester tomorrow.

[Blake's Baby]

I dont think it will be this many

The question is - will anyone have a job in 18 months or if they have will they get paid? i know just been made redundant

On 1 & 2... what do you think unions are for? My view is that they exist to negotiate the sale of labour power. I don't think that they're really fighting organisations of the working class. My comments about them being a 'force to be reckoned with' don't mean I think they're capable of challenging anything, but that the union bureaucracy can call on a certian number of supporters and that means they have to be listened to in bourgeois political circles. I regard them as being entirely part of the establishment (going back to before WWI). Just, part of the political apparatus that disagrees to some extent with the dominant faction of the political apparatus about the austerity budgets, is all. It's just about the different factions vying for position around the table where they carve up the working class.

[Mather]

what's wrong with that? yeah acab and shit but cops are still in the end working class and their wages and pensions being cut is to be opposed imo and i think it's only great that we have cops who are actively against austerity. the more the merrier, really.

The police are an armed body of thugs in service to the state and the ruling class. Their main purpose is not to solve crimes and protect people but to protect the state and ruling class from all froms of social unrest and opposition.

The very nature of policing means that a policeman will never have the same class interests as the rest of the working class. The interests of the police rely on there being a state and a clear division of power between the state/ruling class and the working class. These interests are the total opposite to those of the working class. When the police protest their own working conditions they are protesting their inability to do their job 'properly' without the necessary wages and resources. Given that the job the police is to oppress the working class, when the police protest their conditions they are protesting at their inability to oppress the working class in the manner they are accustomed to.

If individual members of the police wish to change sides in the class war then they must first leave the police and renounce everything they once stood for and believed in. Otherwise, they remain our class enemy.

[Mather]

Far away? The UK isn't even the size of Ontario, oh you silly old worlders and your quaint customs.

For a lot of people in Britain it is not so much a question of distance as opposed to cost.

Britain has the most expensive rail fares in the EU and I think it has the most expensive public transport system as well. It is more expensive for me to go to many of the places in Britain by train than it would be if I were to get a flight to Spain or somewhere else in Europe.

[Mather]

They had to ruin the website by highlighting a message of "solidarity" from the police federation. Reflects the fact that a majority of "Trotskyists" in Britain (and maybe other "socialists," too) believe that cops are allies of working people, despite all historical experience to the contrary.

To my knowledge, only the Socialist Party (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Party_(England_and_Wales)) considers the police and prison officers to be 'workers in uniform'. I know that Workers Power (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workers_Power_(UK)) opposes this view and that they consider the police to be our class enemy.

As for the other Trotskyist parties, I don't know what their view is on this matter. Hopefully somebody can clarify this.


Of course, the ISO was, in effect, running the demonstration against the nazis, so all we were permitted to do was "protest peacefully."

Then why not ignore the ISO and use more militant methods?

This is the trouble when parties try and hijack and co-opt demonstrations for their own ends.