Strike Follow

Workers at plastics firm Wardle Storeys in Brantham, near Manningtree in Essex, were to strike on Wednesday this week over pay. It is the first in a series of three one-day strikes. Bosses have offered a pay rise of just 2.1 percent to the 300 workers at the site. Peter Stephen, the TGWU union's regional industrial organiser, says, "Our message to the company is that our members are solid. We don't accept pay cuts."

Railtrack bosses sent the government a blackmail note this week-"Give us £1 billion or the passengers get it." And New Labour is considering coughing up.

Nearly 800 workers walked out on 24-hour unofficial strike at Royal Mail's main Nottingham depot in Beeston on Thursday of last week. About 130 workers picketed the depot while managers struggled to deliver a small portion of the more than two million letters that have piled up. The walkout was in response to the sacking of driver Alan McCrackle for taking too much sick leave. It followed the rejection of appeals by two other drivers sacked for the same reason last year.

Hackney council workers in east London are to strike for three days from 29 to 31 January. Urgent action is needed. The leaders of the Labour-Tory coalition that runs the east London council have agreed cuts of £50 million over the next three years. This will mean assets flogged off to private developers and more privatisation of vital services such as school transport for special needs children.

Solidarity is flowing in from trade unionists around the country for the strike by health workers in Dudley in the West Midlands. Trade unionists have countered the mainstream media's news blackout on the strike by raising solidarity in their workplaces. The 600 ancillary workers were set to begin a further three-week strike on Wednesday in their battle against being transferred out of the NHS under the Private Finance Initiative (PFI).

LONDON Underground workers were to begin ballots for strike action this week after management rejected union demands to preserve safety and staffing levels. The ASLEF and RMT unions are fighting the effects of New Labour's proposed PPP privatisation of the tube. The dispute hits at the heart of New Labour's privatisation mania. Strikes on the tube have the potential to kill the sell-off and add to the pressure on the government to renationalise the railway.

THE BOOK Oil by US author Upton Sinclair was a bestseller when it was published in 1926. The story of the oil boom in California is told through the eyes of Bunny, an oil tycoon's son who has sympathies with workers. But the real hero is Paul, a committed socialist, who leads an oil workers' strike and returns from a visit to Russia full of excitement for what the Bolsheviks are doing.

TRADE UNION officials rammed through an appalling deal at Luton airport just as workers were expecting to launch strike action over the Christmas holiday. Members of the TGWU union voted narrowly to accept the deal, by 217 to 179, the week before Christmas.

BUS DRIVERS in the West Midlands last month voted to reject a five-year pay deal which could lead to a ballot over strike action in the new year. This was the fourth time Travel West Midlands bosses have put the offer to the drivers, who rejected it by 1,509 votes to 1,292. The drivers are angry that the deal still means new drivers will get less pay than longstanding workers.

POSTAL workers on Merseyside have won an inspiring victory after around 1,000 walked out on unofficial strike in support of their mates at the Bootle office. "The atmosphere is brilliant. Everyone is buoyant. The strikes were a breath of fresh air and really stuck one on the managers," says a Liverpool postal worker.

Manchester BUS SERVICES around north Manchester and Lancashire were brought to a halt again this week as drivers in two of Britain's leading bus companies went on strike over pay. Around 1,750 drivers on Manchester's First Group buses were on strike on Friday of last week and Monday of this week. The battle is over two issues-a decent pay rise and to get rid of the differences in pay rates that drivers get. This is the fourth time the drivers, members of the TGWU union, have taken action.

"The strike is justified. You could say it's about a specific individual, but there is a whole principle of not having victimisation and fear." These are the words of one of the strikers at Oxford University Press (OUP) who began an all-out strike on Tuesday of this week. This is only the second strike in OUP's 500-year history.