April 2013

Dub: Finance Under Foot walking tour

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 “Finance Under Foot” is a walking tour through Ireland’s most important sites of financial power, past and present. The idea behind the tour is to make the nature of organised money power accessible, understandable and even entertaining. Your Tour Guides: Conor McCabe and Tom Murray

Sunday 7th April, Time: 2:30p.m.
Starting point: Central Bank, Dame Street, Dublin 2

Sign up at the Facebook event at https://www.facebook.com/events/453899021353700

Why Fracking of the Loch Allen Basin is being opposed

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One of the final acts of the last Fianna Fail government was to award licences to a number of companies to explore for commercial gas in the Northwest Carboniferous Basin (more commonly known as the Lough Allen basin). The Lough Allen Basin is a huge area that covers parts of counties Cavan, Donegal, Fermanagh, Leitrim, Mayo, Monaghan, Roscommon, Sligo and Tyrone. It is an area of 8000 square kilometres in total.

Exploring the Lessons of the 1913 Lockout and its Legacy for Today - DABF 2013

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2013 marks the 100th anniversary of what many see as the most significant industrial dispute ever to have taken place in Ireland - the Dublin Lockout. The employers of Dublin, led by William Martin Murphy, locked out over 20,000 workers in an attempt to starve them into submission and to smash the increasingly popular Irish Transport and General Workers Union (ITGWU).

Fighting for abortion rights in Northern Ireland

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In the North of Ireland, abortion is prohibited under the Offences Against the Persons Act (1861) - with some common law exceptions.  If continuation of the pregnancy threatens the life of the woman, or would adversely affect her mental and physical health where the effects are ‘real and serious’ or ‘long term’, are two such examples.

Direct action prevents eviction of 70 year old woman in Madrid

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On April 5, 2013 Mónica, a 70 year old woman with Alzheimer’s, was scheduled to be evicted from the apartment she has lived in since 1974. In the shadows of Real Madrid’s Santiago Bernabéu Stadium located right around the corner from her apartment building, community members and organizers from the Popular Assembly of Tetuan of the 15M movement (indignados) and the Mortgage Victims Platform (PAH) gathered outside her building at 10AM chanting “This eviction! We’re going to stop it!”

Austerity and the PIIGS - anarchists from around Europe - DABF 2013

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The austerity policies of the latest phase of capitalism have wreaked havoc on the lives and living standards of working class people across Europe and beyond.  The struggles in which communities find themselves as they attempt to resist these policies have a lot to learn from each other.  As we strive for a better world and to build communities free from poverty, exploitation and hopelessness we need to find time and space to listen to each other, to find common cause and to support each other’s struggles.

The state of the unions - the legacy of 1913 and the trade union movement today

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Having spent the early part of this week at the annual conference of my union – the Irish National Teachers Organisation – I’m struck by the view that unions today appear to be a different world entirely from that of 100 years ago.  My talk will focus less on 1913 and more on where the trade union movement finds itself today

Fighting the Property & Water Taxes - how to fight and win - DABF 2013

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Kevin Doyle (a supporter of the WSM) and Alan Gibson, both of whom have been actively involved in helping to build the Campaign Against Home And Water Taxes, talked about the lessons learnt from the fight thus far against the household and property taxes and explored what type of campaign and campaigning is needed for the fight against the property tax (and the forthcoming water tax) to be successful.

 

Four Public Service Unions will not be bound by ICTU vote

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Four unions have indicated today (Thursday) that they will not be bound by a majority vote by ICTU affiliated unions in favour of the new Croke Park agreement. The INMO, CPSU, IMO and Unite made this known after a meeting this morning which was also attended by representatives of the TUI, ASTI and AHCPS all of whom are advocating a rejection of the agreement.

Elections: Quicksand for Socialist Ideas

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We don't live in a socialist world. In fact never before has capitalism exercised such total hegemony. Despite huge disaffection with austerity and global capitalism, for billions of people the world over, an alternative is impossible to imagine. One of the key tasks of the left then, is not just to oppose attacks on the living conditions of working class people, but to provide an alternative vision of a society where we do not exist to serve the economy, but rather the economy exists to serve us, a society where the slogan "from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs" becomes a reality.

Queer Anarchism: Equality or Liberation? - DABF 2013

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A talk from the 2013 Anarchist Bookfair which will discuss emergent radical queer politics which resist assimilation and question the foundations of gender and sexual identity

 

CAHWT – inspiring people to demand participatory democracy

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At a public meeting of the Campaign Against Home and Water Taxes (CAHWT) in Kildare last month, a query was raised from a woman anxious about the upcoming local elections. She explained her complete frustration with the austerity policies of the Fine Gael-Labour Government, and described her despair at not having the power to challenge policies that were ravaging her community, stating there “really is no one legitimate left to vote for.”

Only mass action can defeat Austerity - WS129 Cover story

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Five years into an austerity program that is only working to make the rich richer, most of us are very unhappy about the lack of resistance from the unions. During the Croke Park campaign the SIPTU National Executive Council released a statement that included: "There is, of course, a wider issue of fairness in the Country as a whole because the wealthy are not contributing to the degree that they can or should. This is a consequence of the political choices made by the voters at election time.”

1000's of anti-home taxes campaigners march on EU ministers

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Thousands took part in the CAHWT march yesterday on the EU Finance ministers march in Dublin castle.  You can see more photos of the protest in our Facebook  album of march on EU ministers.

A round-up of WSM activity at the start of 2013

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Our members in Cork and Dublin have been active at local, regional and national levels in the Cam- paign Against Home and Water Taxes, helping with stalls, leaf- letting and demos, and arguing for greater grassroots democracy within the campaign. WSM members were also invloved in occupations of council offices and TDs offices in Cork and Dublin as part of the campaign.

The WSM & fighting the last war - a reply to James O’Brien

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The left is fond of military analogies so I want to open this piece with the observation that poor generals plan for the last war rather than the next one. Those militaries that planned for World War Two by perfecting the trench systems that dominated World War One had their powerful & expensive fortifications quickly overwhelmed in the opening weeks of the war through blitzkrieg. And in turn by 1943 Blizkrieg was defeated though defence in depth at Kursk.

Friends

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This listing is a partial list of the organisations our members work in & with.

Workers Solidarity Movement
PO Box 1528, Dublin 8.
www.wsm.ie
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Workers Solidarity 128 - Nov/Dec 2012

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The November / December issue of Irelands anarchist paper Workers Solidarity.  This is issue 128

Rossport Solidarity Camp bulletin April 2013

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This is the latest bulletin from the Rossport Solidarity Camp about the struggle against Shell in Erris.  For the background and history to this stuggle see our huge archive of articles tagged Rossport.

Why we said No to Croke Park Two

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Vote NO to

  • Further deterioration of the public services we all use
  • A freeze in pay & increments
  • A huge increase in hours for many workers & the subsequent loss of jobs
  • The loss of 6 days holidays for many workers
  • Unpaid overtime & cuts to overtime
  • Restrictions on flexitime & work sharing