Workers Solidarity Movement

The nurses’ work-to-rule and their threat to escalate the action next week has been met with an outraged onslaught by Mary Harney and Bertie Ahern. The sight of a group of workers standing up and demanding their rights has become so unusual that it seems as if the government cannot believe the temerity of the nurses in doing just that.

On November 15th the Swedish Workers Centralorganiation (SAC) called a 24 hour strike in protest against unemployment laws proposed by the new right-wing government.

The Swedish government wants to cut its financial contribution to unemployment funds by 50%, in order to finance more tax cuts for the wealthy, a move they claim will “stimulate the Swedish economy”. 600,000 people depended on benefits last year.

The threat of strike action at Domino’s Pizzas in Naas saw SIPTU members secure substantial pay increases. A ban on overtime showed management that the workers were serious, when they voted to strike the bosses caved in and conceded a pay increase of 15% over 27 months. The union also won improved holiday and service leave arrangements.

For almost a year Turkish workers at the multi-national construction company Gama waged a struggle to secure trade union rates of pay, improved working conditions and to reclaim wages which had been siphoned from their pay packets and placed in foreign bank accounts opened in their names but without their knowledge. A co-production by the Socialist Party and Frameworks Films, “The Gama Strike: A victory for all workers” is an attempt to document and highlight the exploitation and subsequent struggle faced by the Turkish workers.

Indonesian workers employed by global security giant Securicor have been through a lot. Over a year ago, they took the decision to strike – and were promptly (and illegally) sacked by the company. Since then, they have tried to win back their jobs.

The supermarket giant Asda, a subsidiary of Wal-Mart, has recently taken over 12 Safeway stores in Northern Ireland. It has also been ordered to pay £850,000 in compensation to staff at their huge distribution centre at Washington in the north east of England

Friday February 24th saw one of Ireland’s biggest and most anti-union firms back down. Dunnes Stores wrote to sacked shop steward, Joanne Delaney telling her that she had been reinstated in her job at the Ashleaf Shopping Centre in Dublin.

The dispute at Irish Ferries is about greedy bosses, very greedy bosses who want to replace their staff with modern day galley slaves. Eamonn Rothwell, Managing Director of Irish Ferries, plans to get rid of 543 workers and replace them with migrants on e3.50 per hour. Rothwell earned e687,000 last year. That's e338.00 an hour. But there is no talk about replacing him with a yellow pack boss from Eastern Europe!

The (Irish Ferries) dispute escalated on November 24th when goons from a private security firm brought Eastern European seafarers onto the ships. If the ferries resumed sailing the dispute would be effectively over, with Irish Ferries winning hands down.

The old union motto "an injury to one is the concern of all" is taken more seriously by ordinary union members than by many of our "leaders". The Irish Congress of Trade Unions, sheltering behind the 1990 Industrial Relations Act which makes strikes in support of other workers unlawful, didn't call for a national walk-out. We knew they wanted us to strike and march but their over-cautious approach didn't exactly inspire workers with particularly aggressive employers.