Business secretary Lord Mandelson’s plans to hand a chunk of the Royal Mail to a private equity firm are set to receive a blow on Friday, as 10,000 postal workers in London prepare to strike.
Royal Mail’s challenge to some of the London strike ballots means that three big offices – Nine Elms, Mount Pleasant and Rathbone Place – will not be on strike this week.
Solidarity from other workers is critical to the fight against post privatisation, says CWU rep Mark Dolan.
Boat workers at the Port of Liverpool who were on the verge of striking have been threatened with losing £5,000 and further redundancies if they take action.
A 600-strong rally against the Nazi British National Party took place in Leeds on Saturday of last week. Trade unionists, community representatives, LGBT and disabled groups and Unite Against Fascism all addressed the rally.
Workers at the Stead McAlpin textile factory in Cummersdale, near Carlisle, have voted to accept cuts to their pay, and terms and conditions to keep the factory open.
Last week’s planned indefinite strike action by 1,300 GMB, Unison and Unite union members in Glasgow council’s land and environmental services department was called off after concessions were made.
Delegates to the Unison union’s national conference met in Brighton against a backdrop of political turmoil, economic crisis and a profound threat hanging over the future of public services.
The government should call time on the Private Finance Initiative (PFI), which will cost £217 billion in repayments over the next 25 years, says a report from the Unison union.
At the beginning of conference a number of delegates challenged the standing orders committee over motions and amendments that had been ruled out of order.
The scandal surrounding the victimisation of Yunus Bakhsh, the widely-respected black trade unionist from Newcastle, has plumbed new depths.
With journalists sighting "green shoots of economic recovery" everywhere, Socialist Worker lists a few sobering facts about youth unemployment and poverty that present a different story
