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T
odays protests in London and
Glasgow are the culmination of
a week that saw strikes by health
workers across England and action by
civil service workers in the PCS.
We have witnessed politicians try to
explain why 1 percentor lessis fair
for public sector workers but MPs can
grab a 10 percent rise.
Te strikes and protests are an
expression of the anger millions feel at
years of Tory attacks.
Weve seen that anger expressed
everywhere from the mass Yes
campaign in the Scottish independence
referendum, to the picket lines, to the
E15 mothers housing occupation in
East London.
Working class people are suering
the worst squeeze on living standards
since the nineteenth century.
And while Cameron and the Tory
press boast of an economic recovery its
only a recovery for the rich.
Te pay squeeze on the rest of us
continues, as do the attacks on public
services.
Resistance
Tats why its so good to see resistance
to these attacks. But as impressive as the
strikes were this week, they should have
been far more powerful.
College lecturers in the UCU were
prevented from taking action as their
employers rushed to the courts to halt
strikes. Te Tory anti-union laws were
left in place for 13 years under Labour
and we are still paying the price.
And local government unions pulled
back from a mass pay strike across
England planned for last Tuesday.
Tey suspended action to consult on
a proposal that is little dierent to the
initial 1 percent oer union members
emphatically rejected.
In Scotland action by local
government workers planned for next
week has also been suspended.
Activists are already campaigning to
get the strikes back on. And no wonder.
We literally cant aord to pull back
from the ght on pay.
But there is a danger the union
leaders will repeat history. Back in
2011 we saw a wave of big strikes in
defence of public sector pensions and
in November 2.5 million people struck
together. Te strikes became a focus for
everyone sick to death of Tory attacks.
But some key union leaders pulled
back from action and the movement
lost momentum. Tat cant be allowed
to happen again.
We need to strengthen the networks
of workplace activists to work with
union leaders who will ght, organise
when they wont ght, and to take
independent initiatives.
Tats the purpose of the Unite the
Resistance conference on 15 November
(see box for details). Come yourself, and
bring your workmates.
STEP UP THE FIGHT
AGAINST AUSTERITY
Britain needs a pay rise...
Pickets at St Thomas Hospital in London during Mondays NHS strike Photo: Guy Smallman
Striking together
& organising to win
Saturday
15 November,
12 - 5pm
@ Bloomsbury
Central Baptist
Church, 235
Shaf tesbury Avenue,
London WC2H 8EP
UNITE THE RESISTANCE CONFERENCE
Sessions include
Strategies to win:
How do we beat the
austerity agenda?
The ght against
zero hours contracts
and organising the
unorganised
Migrant workers:
part of the union,
part of the solution
The law and
multinationals:
Do workers still
have the power to
beat the bosses?
For more info and to book go to uniteresist.org
Speakers include
Mags Dalton & Roger
Hutt Care UK strikers
John McDonnell MP
Ian Hodson BFAWU
national president
Peter Pinkney
RMT president
Fast food strikers
from the US
Karen Howell
Support Stafford
Hospital campaign
Matt Wrack
FBU general secretary
Paula Peters
Disabled People
Against the Cuts
Ian Lawrence
NAPO general
secretary
Barbara Pokryszka
Unite, hotel worker
organiser

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TUC demo 15/10/14
We need an
alternative
If Labour wont stand up for working
people, its time for us all to build a real
political alternative for the millions, not
the millionaires.
We need a party that supports strikes,
rather than attacking them. We need to
ght for 10 an hour minimum wage,
tax the rich, renationalise the privatised
industries, abolish all the anti-union
laws and ght racism and all forms of
oppression.
We need the hope of a socialist
alternative to the poverty, war and
environmental destruction that
capitalism brings.
When Ukip comes knocking, the
main parties response is to pander to its
racist lies about immigration.
Tat kind of shameful strategy will
only help Nigel Farage to seem more
credible and more mainstream.
Instead we need systematically to tear
apart his claims that immigrants are the
problem. We have to expose Ukips anti-
working class policies and show who
is really to blame for low wages, lack
of decent housing and unemployment.
And we have to put forward an
alternative.
Te left outside the Labour Party
has to get its act together. Were too
fragmented and inward-looking.
We need socialists in every workplace
and community and standing in
elections, who argue and organise
to target the rich, not scapegoat
immigrants, Muslims, and people on
benets.
Millions of people are alienated from
mainstream politics. But they are not
anti-political.
When up to 15,000 people gather
in George Square in Glasgow for
a Scottish independence rally last
weekend, when 1,300 meet at a Peoples
Question Time in east London,
when 2,000 listen to Naomi Klein on
capitalism and climate change there is
no shortage of interest in politics.
We need a stronger left to focus it.
Te Socialist Workers Party is part
of the Trade Unionist and Socialist
Coalition.
Te SWP is ghting for more
resistance, against racism and war, for a
stronger and more united left, and for a
revolutionary alternative at the heart of
every struggle.
Please join us.
A FIGHTBACK IS EVEN more necessar y
because a Labour government wont
reverse the damage the Tories have
done.
Ed Miliband and Labour have made
it clear that if they are elected they will
stick to Tor y spending plans.
That means austerity will continue
with the pay cap kept at 1 percent for
public sector workers and more cuts to
public ser vices.
Enemy
A united ghtback is also the best
response to attempts to divide our side.
The Tories target Muslims as an enemy
within.
Nigel Farage and Ukip want us
to blame migrant workers for the
economic crisis, not the bankers who
caused it.
But when black and white workers
march together and strike together we
can see that for working class people,
unity really is strength.
Health unions have announced that
they may strike again next month.
That could include Welsh health
workers who are now voting on strikes.
If they do then every group of workers
with a live ballot or a grievance should
strike with them.
Impact
If teachers, civil ser vice workers,
reghters and health workers struck
together imagine the impact it would
have.
And if local government workers vote
to keep up the ght then we could see
the kind of coordinated strikes that
could rock the Tories.
Ever y protest, ever y occupation,
ever y act of resistance is impor tant.
They show that we wont lie down and
take whatever the Tories dish out.
But what the Tories fear most is the
potential power that the unions have.
Thats why their latest attack on the
unions, the Carr Review, opens the
door to yet more anti union laws.
Its time out unions called the kind
of action that can halt the austerity
agenda.
Say no to scapegoating
United we can win
Opposing UKIP in Portsmouth Photo: Jon Woods