Morning Star workers win posted by Richard Seymour

After having covered the strike by NUJ members at the Morning Star, it's only right to congratulate them on their victory. This is the NUJ's press release:

Morning Star journalists prove the power of a union

Workers' fight ends in decisive win

Journalists at Britain's 'daily paper of the left' have won a decisive victory over bosses who claimed they were 'betraying their class' by fighting for fair pay.

The sub-editors and reporters at the historic newspaper, which has a solid reputation backing workers fighting back, won their claim for a £19,000 a year minimum wage.


Bosses at the paper had offered the workers just a 3 per cent rise for the 2008 pay deal — effectively a pay cut as last year's average inflation rate was 4 per cent — claiming that there was no cash to pay more.

But this year, the Morning Star is benefiting from the largest investment of cash in it's history, some £600,000.

The journalists claim for £19,000 translated into a 5.7 per cent pay rise for the lowest-paid staff, but management insisted on ignoring their commitment to follow through on a previous pledge to try to raise wages when money was available.

Faced with management's refusal to put even a fraction of the hundreds of thousands of pounds in new investment towards improving low pay, the journalists voted 80 per cent to strike.

This move forced their bosses to concede the workers' full 5.7 per cent claim - plus a 3 per cent lump sum bonus - and exposed management's claim that the paper could not afford to improve pay.

Labels: class struggle, morning star, strike

More class struggle at the Morning Star posted by Richard Seymour

From the NUJ:

Morning Star journalists set to strike

NUJ members at the Morning Star have called a strike over pay, with journalists set to walk out next Monday (23 February).

They've voted 11 to three for industrial action and last night called a one-day strike for Monday 23 February - followed by a week of strike action if management refuses to compromise.

NUJ Father of Chapel Steve Mather said: "We're not going to take any more of our bosses' broken promises."

Two years ago, management at the socialist daily averted strike action by pledging to boost pay as soon as money was available.

But, after a £600,000 investment from an "anonymous consortium", staff have been told that none of it will go on their wages. NUJ members have roundly rejected an offer close to 2008 inflation - effectively a pay freeze - alongside a one-off four per cent bonus, because it does nothing to address low pay at the title.

Steve explained: "We don't need one-off bribes, we need a step towards decent pay.

"We all work hard to bring out a decent paper against all the odds, yet our bosses won't even pay us £19,000 after the biggest investment in our history."

NUJ General Secretary Jeremy Dear backed the Morning Star chapel, saying: “Our members feel forced into this action by a management that is refusing to pay its staff a fair rate for their work. They don’t want to go out on strike but if that’s what it takes to win fair pay then they are clear that is what they’ll do."

Deputy Father of Chapel Carl Worswick added: "It's time for management to put its money where its mouth is. We write about workers fighting for fair pay all the time - now it's our turn."

The paper's management committee, which includes several leading trade union figures, has already unilaterally imposed an offer of three per cent on the journalists. The imposition of a pay deal has only served to intensify the dispute.

Labels: class struggle, morning star, socialism, strike, trade unions

Class struggle at the Morning Star posted by Richard Seymour

Since I've written for the Morning Star and allowed them to use materials from my blog (all free of charge, naturally), I feel I should briefly point out that the bosses there are currently tearing up existing agreements with the staff union. Those staff members are now balloting for strike action. The new deal imposed by management amounts to a real terms pay cut, and as such has been rejected by the union. The bosses are crying poverty, but they are actually planning to hire new staff and have just received half a million pounds in new investment to expand the paper. They claim that when the investors gave this money, they insisted it be 'ringfenced' for expansion of the paper. Even if this is true, there is no excuse for terminating negotiations and imposing a unilateral deal that breaks previous agreements. The former editor John Haylett (himself the beneficiary of successful industrial action by the paper's staff back in 1998) is now acting as the management committee representative, and is responsible for sending out the letters imposing the deal unilaterally. He has accused NUJ members of being "a group of workers who are putting their own interests before those of our class as a whole". Supporters of the management position have flooded the blogs with vitriolic claims about the journalists, including the charge that they are going to do what "a government ban, Hitler’s bombs and the triumph of revisionism in the CPGB and the Soviet Union failed to achieve", by finishing off the Morning Star. This is a lavish Stalinist variant on the old management excuse that "if you strike, you'll ruin the business". Well, until this dispute is resolved, my advice to anyone approached to contribute to the Morning Star would be to politely remind them that socialists do not cross picket lines.

Labels: class struggle, morning star, stalinism