Workers Solidarity Movement

Imagine that, leaving the pub on Saturday night, you find a fight outside. The Gardai turn up, grab a load of people, including you, and drag you off to the station, and throw in a beating in the back of the van. Next morning you are taken to an interview room and an old garda gives you a cup of tea, apologises for the “mix-up” earlier and says you can go as soon as you’ve signed a 6 page statement he’s prepared for you.

The 1st of May as International Workers’ Day dates back to the struggle for the 8-hour working day in the USA. 
In 1886 the American Federation of Labour declared that after May 1st, “8 hours shall constitute a legal days labour”. Between that declaration and May 1st workers all around the United States went on strike to make their employers agree to a shorter work day.

Nine people from Derry are facing jail sentences for their part in ‘decommissioning’ weapons of war. The silence from official Ireland is striking. Not a murmer from Nobel Peace Prize winners John Hume and David Trimble, or from Cowan or Paisley, or Adams or Gormley, or Gilmore or Empey. Not even an empty platitude from Bono or Bob Geldof. Nobody was harmed but computers belonging to a multinational arms firm were tossed from windows and destroyed. It seems that the right of arms dealers to make big profits is a lot more important than the right to life of people in the Lebanon.

The Paddington Rail crash in London in 1999 led to 31 deaths and well over 400 injuries. At fault was a simple set of rail signal lights which were difficult to see (from the train driver’s point of view). When the crash was investigated it quickly emerged that Network Rail (then called Railtrack), the company responsible for rail line maintenance, had been repeatedly warned about the danger. A number of drivers had been involved in near misses and reported this to management, yet nothing was done. Then two high-speed trains collided.

Issue #1 of Cork's newest anarchist publication, the Rebel Worker will be appearing bimonthly (when possible) and will be distributed both on its own and as an insert in the WSM's long-standing free newspaper, Workers Solidarity. The current issue features articles on the health service, May Day, abortion rights in Ireland and info on the WSM's involvement in ongoing workers' and community struggles.

While in Florida, Andrew Flood of the WSM attended a local 'Winter Soldier' hearing. These are public meetings where United States ex-soldiers of the Iraq testify against the war.

Appoximately 5,000 people turned out for the “March for a Decent Public Health Service” held on Saturday, 29th March in Dublin. Various Trade Unions, patients groups from around the country and political organisations were represented.

The March-April 2008 issue of the Irish anarchist paper Workers Solidarity.  This is Issue 102

26 county edition

The Ulster edition of Workers Solidarity 102
http://www.wsm.ie/attachments/apr2008/ws102.pdf

The southern edition of Workers Solidarity 102
http://www.wsm.ie/attachments/apr2008/ws10226.pdf

Last year, the EU Constitution was defeated in referenda in France and the Netherlands. Europe’s governments quickly got together and rewrote the constitution as an incredibly complicated list of amendments to existing treaties. Together these amendments make up the “Treaty of Lisbon.” Valery Giscard d’Estaing, the president of the Convention on the Future of Europe which did much of the ground work in drafting the constitution, has concluded that “the difference between the original Constitution and the present Lisbon Treaty is one of approach, rather than content”.

Welcome to the new era in the north, in which waiting lists for social housing are at their highest in over 30 years, landlords like the local Rooney brothers continue to plunder our communities to make way for ‘yuppie’ flats. Meanwhile, our local politicians are expected to receive a 16% pay increase while we are expected to bend over backwards for the bosses and supposedly wait for the ‘trickle down effect’.