Staffordshire Shop Stewards Network

Staffordshire Shop Stewards Network

A message from

Rob Williams - Chair, National Shop Stewards Network (NSSN)

"Join us on 11th September to tell the TUC - call a 24-hour public sector general strike!"

"For working class people, while the anger and frustration is understandable, rioting is a blind alley. But Cameron is trying to jump on the violence and looting as justification for even more hardline measures which will be used against organised protests in future. They hope 'law and order' debates will distract us from fighting the cuts. Cameron and Co are really terrified of organised resistance, particularly on a mass basis.

Now is the time for the organised trade union movement to act as a powerful alternative force. Who else will? New Labour is compromised by its agreement with the cuts and its echoing of Cameron's hypocritical moralising.

TUC leader Brendan Barber warned of riots in 2009 but has not so far thrown the full weight of the TUC behind coordinating mass working class resistance. If the union movement of still over six million takes decisive action against the attacks of this government of millionaires, it could inspire all those who are both angry and frightened at the moment.

Anyone who has watched the incredible movements of workers and young people throughout the world this year from Egypt to Greece and to Israel/Palestine can see the positive effect of a mass movement of strikes and demonstrations.

The mass demonstration on 26 March of well over half a million in London shook the Con-Dems and resulted in their wobble on their NHS privatisation plans. The strikes on 30 June against the attacks on public sector pensions mobilised 750,000 workers and has posed the prospect of millions joining the strike action in the autumn.

A 24-hour public sector general strike would not only heap pressure on the government on pensions, it would show everyone that there is a powerful alternative force that can fight for ordinary people. But a failure to act, particularly by the TUC and the biggest unions could let this creaking coalition off the hook.

On Sunday 11 September, the NSSN is organising a lobby of this year's TUC conference in London to increase the pressure for all unions across the public sector to coordinate strike action. We will be meeting at the Friends Meeting House in Euston for a rally to hear speakers like Mark Serwotka and Bob Crow - general secretaries of the civil service union PCS and the transport union RMT respectively as well as rank and file workers and young people facing the worst of the cuts.

Help us build a massive rally of workers and anti-cuts fighters, young and old, to send a clear united message to the union leaders - it's time to give a positive fighting lead to defeat this government

Trade unionists from across Staffordshire travelling to London on 11th September
to join thousands of others on lobby the TUC lobby

The CWU North Midland Branch has booked a bus to take local trade unionists and anti-cuts campaigners to this important march & lobby and we are determined to fill it!

Other trade unionists including from Unite, Unison, GMB, NUT. have already agreed to join CWU members on the bus.

We would like to encourage and invite trade unionists from your union branch or workplace to book a seat down to the march & lobby. So, we would appreciate it greatly if you could advertise the march & lobby amongst your members and workplaces that you cover. To assist you, excellent colour leaflets are available and can be dropped off to you or you can copy the leaflet which is attached.

Booking this bus has been very expensive so any financial donation that you as an individual or your union branch could make would be greatly appreciated.

Any donations/cheques should be made payable to "CWU North Midland Branch" and sent to Andy Cawley at North Midlands Branch CWU Office, Stoke City Telephone Exchange, 37 Lytton Street, Stoke on Trent ST4 2AH

For any more info please contact Andy Cawley;

by phone on 01782 845803 or 07841377244 or call 07845893607

by email
northmidscwu@btconnect.com