Friday, May 12, 2006
Brown to push further post privatisation. posted by Richard Seymour
So, the louring saviour of New Labour, our deformed and quite unfinished Chancellor, has decided that he will support moves to continue the partial-privatisation of the postal service. The tactic being used by Royal Mail management to win support for this move among a hostile workforce is not new - do you want free shares? Oh, come on, it's free money! Don't let your union tell you what to do, take it take it take it!! The Times reports that 199 Labour MPs have supported a motion opposing such a move, while the CWU has been opposed to privatisation all along.This comes as Royal Mail management impose a pay deal on workers that they have already rejected. The union was supposed to be consulted on this, but the company is now withholding all information, pressing for job cuts and imposing the arrangement without further ado. The CWU's deputy-general secretary David Ward has obligingly stated that "We are refusing to be pulled into the punch", which is about as endearing a way to roll over and play dead as ever was conceived. The intervention by rank and file posties in Socialist Worker is important in this regard. Their leaflet, published as a late Wednesday update says:
The only guarantee is that if we don’t fight now then we’re on the road to disaster, a much weaker union, privatisation and relentless competition from private firms, more part-timers and fewer full-time jobs, and pay based on gimmicky bonuses rather than decent increases in basic pensionable pay.
There is no reason why Leighton should be allowed to get away with his plans. The Blair government (which is his ultimate backer) is incredibly weak. Real resistance can force it to drop the shares plan.
We need an industrial and a political strategy. We have to fight and we have to stop shovelling money to a party and a government which is wrecking our lives. Labour takes our £500,000 a year – and kicks us in the teeth.
Every CWU member must push now for four things to happen:
1) We need to start a strike ballot over pay, the way it has been imposed, and the share issue.
2) We need to suspend money to Labour until the share issue is withdrawn.
3) We need to make the CWU conference, which starts soon, a council of war and a launch pad for resistance.
4) We need to sweep away the north/south divisions which have bedevilled the union. We need unity to fight, and in fighting we will rebuild the unity.
In short, the rank and file is going to have to take the initiative to save the union and their industry. The CWU conference is in a couple of weeks' time. It is expected that there will be another campaign to withhold funds from the Labour Party. Last year, this resulted in a very close victory for those who argued to retain the link. There will be fewer people ready to make that argument this year, and those who do will have a much tougher time. I would anticipate - hopefully, wishfully - a break from the Labour Party and industrial action.
Brown may be hoping for a big showdown with the unions to demonstrate who's going to be boss, and undoubtedly the government has a vendetta with the posties after their wildcat strike during the 2001 election forced a humiliating retreat by management. The British state has not felt obliged or confident enough to take on the unions in any big way since the poll tax riots, but after successive bust-ups with the RMT, Aslef, the FBU, and even Unison, they must now be thinking of how to break the new militancy once and for all. Brown's economic strategy depends on a pliant, 'flexible' workforce and passive acceptance of the neoliberal agenda. Narrow escapes from bruising encounters with mass action cannot continue to be the pattern if the government is to have its way. However, if this is a sign that the Chancellor is picking a fight with the unions, he may well have picked the wrong one.