Strike Follow

TORY-CONTROLLED Westminster council has thrown down a major challenge to the Unison public sector workers' union. It was trying to use anti-union laws, introduced by Margaret Thatcher's Tory governments but kept by New Labour, to stop our strike action against privatisation.

OVER 250 social workers in Leeds went on strike to demand higher wages on Wednesday of last week. The workers were demanding better pay rates and faster progression up the pay scale.

THE ANNUAL Burston school strike rally was held in Diss in Norfolk last Sunday. It celebrates Britain's longest school strike, which took place in 1914. Between 400 and 500 people attended the event. It was a bigger and younger audience than in previous years.

VICTORY. That's the verdict of low paid health workers in Scotland after they took nine days of unofficial strike action. "We are over the moon with the outcome. This is a victory for all low paid workers in the NHS," said hospital porter and Unison union shop steward Bobby Reed.

DRIVERS ON First North Western (FNW) trains are due to strike for 48 hours next week after management broke off negotiations. FNW boss Vernon Barker had the cheek to tell negotiators from the Aslef train drivers' union that "the dispute would not be settled until Christmas" if union district secretary Colin Smith continued to take part in the talks. Aslef general secretary Mick Rix said:

WORKERS AT the Massey Ferguson tractor plant in Coventry have voted by four to one in favour of strike action to stop the closure of the plant. Members of both trade unions at the plant, the TGWU and Amicus-AEEU, have voted by four to one in favour of action.

WORKERS AT Caparo Steel in Scunthorpe, Tredegar and Wrexham held a second one-day strike over pensions last week. They planned another strike this week. The dispute is over plans to replace their current final salary pension scheme with a stakeholder pension scheme.

JOURNALISTS AT the Rotherham Advertiser launched their first six days of strike action over pay with a solidarity rally last Saturday. The NUJ chapel (union branch) has decided to fight low pay, following the successes at Bradford, Spalding, Guardian Media in Manchester and elsewhere. Suzanne Roberts, mother of chapel at the Spalding Guardian, and a representative from the EMAP Health Magazines NUJ chapel - who are on a 24-hour strike over pay this Friday - spoke of a changing mood among journalists.

WORKERS AT the Massey Ferguson tractor factory in Coventry are set to ballot for strike action against the closure of the plant. Over 1,000 angry workers, members of the TGWU union, packed into a mass meeting on Wednesday of last week. They overwhelmingly rejected a redundancy package from Agco, the US company which runs Massey Ferguson.

"LISTEN TO the workers!" "Could you live on our pay?" These were some of the shouts which met Scottish health minister Malcolm Chisholm as his car swept into the Inverclyde Royal Hospital in Greenock, near Glasgow, on Friday of last week. Chisholm was officially welcomed by a row of suited hospital managers. But first he was challenged by a lively demonstration of over 100 angry and militant pickets, on their fifth day of an unofficial strike against low pay. The strike was continuing at the beginning of the week.

COUNCIL workers' unions last week reaffirmed their determination to fight for higher London weighting allowances for the capital's council workforces. Unless the employers come up with a satisfactory offer another one-day strike could be called later in September.

WESTMINSTER council workers are continuing their fight against plans by their Tory council to privatise up to 80 percent of council services. National union officials of their Unison union were due to meet this week to discuss possible escalation of the action. This is a crucial strike which has bosses worried.