London Follow

BECHTEL, THE biggest vulture to have got its claws into Iraq since the invasion, planned to be in London on Friday this week. It wanted to hand out a few scraps to British firms linked to government projects here. Bechtel is a byword for ruthless privatisation. The US government has given it the principal contract, worth $680 million, to "reconstruct" Iraq.

FOOTBALL USED to be called "the people's game". Not any more. The professional game now mirrors Blair's Britain, with a growing gap between the handful of rich clubs at the top of the Premiership and the also-rans in the Nationwide leagues. Clubs used to be owned by local businessmen with big cheque books and even bigger egos. But now the top clubs are listed on the stock exchange and are controlled by the City of London institutions.

"WE'VE NOW got to go out and win a resounding vote against this deal on the stations, and then at the recalled conference." With those words Paul Embury from the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) at Islington station, north London, summed up the feeling of many hundreds of activists in the union.

POSTAL WORKERS in London are continuing their pay campaign although the prospect of unofficial action is unlikely in the short term. London branch secretaries and reps met the CWU union's general secretary, Billy Hayes, last week.

AROUND 1,000 workers employed by local councils in London were striking for three days this week from Tuesday to Thursday. The action is part of council staff's ongoing fight to win an increase on the London weighting allowance - the money they get for working in the capital.

PARENTS AND teachers at Crofton School in Lewisham, south London, have launched a campaign to stop 11 teaching staff being made redundant. Members of the National Union of Teachers (NUT) at Crofton are balloting for strike action. If the proposed job cuts go ahead, one in seven teachers at the school will be made redundant.

WORKERS IN schools, council offices and universities - some of them among the lowest paid in London - struck last week as part of their union's campaign for decent allowances for working in the capital. The council workers' action was over three days and involved about 1,000 Unison union members in selected schools and offices.

SOME 75 tube union activists attended an impressive meeting last week to defend victimised RMT union rep Glenroy Watson. Among the platform speakers were RMT general secretary Bob Crow, London organiser Booby Law and Brian Munro, secretary of the London Transport Regional Council of the union.

IN THE latest phase of the revolt against low pay in the NHS, hundreds of health workers in east London plan strikes later this month against their private contractor employers.

POSTAL WORKERS in London last week voted by 99.5 percent for action over pay. The result, 19,803 votes to 91 in an unofficial ballot, could lead to action that will shut down postal services across the capital. The remarkable sign of unity and anger came just as Tony Blair was blustering that he would allow no return of "trade union militancy". It isn't just postal workers who are defying Blair.

TEACHERS AT one of the government's flagship schools in north London are balloting for strike action over intolerable conditions. The Greig City Academy in Hornsey opened in September 2002. Tony Brockman, an executive committee member of the National Union of Teachers (NUT), says, "City academies were one of the quick fix wheezes dreamt up by the government's spin doctors. They were given extra cash by the government and in return were allowed to opt out of the state sector, becoming 'independent' schools."

AROUND 200 people attended the first Greenwich Stop the War Coalition meeting in south east London on Tuesday of last week. Speakers included Tony Benn, Dr Siddiqui of the Muslim Parliament and Lindsey German. Laura Nolan