No 124 - 11 June 2021 WORKERS’ price 30p http://www.w-fight.org [email protected]

fight ISSN 2040-400X

“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself” (Karl Marx) JOHNSON, SUNAK AND THE G7: WORLD-BEATING HYPOCRISY he hypocrisy of Johnson’s Tgovernment knows no bounds. It openly boasts of getting one over on almost every other government in the world, having cornered the drastically short supply of vaccines for “Britain first”. Yet Johnson still has the nerve to tell his G7 fellows that “we must all” be generous and share our vaccines with the poor countries! As some will point out, in a poverty- stricken country like Nepal, where Britain recruits Gurkha soldiers for its army, fewer than 3% of its 30m population had been vaccinated by 3 June. There’s no doubt, of course, that Johnson uses his domestic “vaccine triumph”, to distract from his government’s criminal mishandling of the pandemic. The only thing he did get “right” was to save his political neck by gambling with public money on vaccines and giving venture capitalist Kate Bingham a blank cheque to beat off all competition. And of 15%. This could be a much bigger Despite what ministers claim, this now even Dominic Cummings’ horror- problem, as it potentially threatens tax cut had nothing to do with a shortage tale-telling seems to be water off a duck’s havens. In fact, it’s yet more hypocritical of government cash. Throughout the back. So much so, that liar Johnson and hot air. Especially so, given that Sunak pandemic the Treasury has been printing liar Hancock are now taking to lecturing presides over one of the biggest tax money. It could not have done otherwise: others on how to handle a pandemic! havens of all, that is, the City of London. Britain suffered one of the worst economic Not to mention the “Freeports” he is hits out of all the rich countries. But it Incentive for more tax loopholes building ‑ nothing but mini tax havens ‑ still has the world’s 6th largest economy, Of course, the government needed to in an effort to try to paper over Brexit’s thanks precisely to said “City”! look at least mildly competent given its economic cracks and attract back some of A cut of £4bn from the total aid budget hosting of the G7 Summit. Little Britain’s lost foreign investment! is chickenfeed. But Johnson decided it was a “popular” move in front of his xenophobic So, as a prelude to the “big show” British soft power vs workers’ voters. So now the population of Yemen, Sunak led a tax “coup” against the Big power Tech giants. These serial tax evaders will devastated by Britain’s “hard power” in the be asked to pay (up to!) 20% tax on sales It is the big hoo-ha over Britain’s form of British-made Saudi bombs, will in countries where they have a market. overseas aid budget which probably now get less than half the humanitarian How exactly this will be implemented and takes the hypocrisy biscuit. aid it expected. policed ‑ and when (or even whether!) - is The government decided to cut this tiny The British Empire may be long dead, another question! Which did not prevent 0.7% of Gross National Income to 0.5% but “international” imperialism lives on some commentators from proclaiming this last year. Tory backbenchers claim that to oppress, exploit and kill the poor of as the biggest achievement in the G7’s such a cut will lose Britain its “standing this planet. This is why there has to be lifetime! in the world”, undermining Britain’s “soft a class revolution to overthrow it ‑ and Ministers also committed to trying to power”. And, they add, Britain gets back a why, ultimately, this revolution has to be implement a “global minimum tax rate” lot more than it gives. international.  WORKERS’ No 124 - June 2021 fight

Covid-19 crisis Covid: the blame game starts y mid-June, the “Delta” Johnson advisor Dominic Cummings ”It is completely crazy that I should B(“Indian”) variant had become has disappointed the press. When have been in such a senior position… the dominant Covid strain. And asked, ”Did you lie to the Prime just the same as it’s crackers that cases were rising fast in localities Minister?” he said “no”. Of course Boris Johnson was in there”. The in the North of England, Scotland he never lied to the PM. Johnson only surprise was perhaps the fact and around London, making 21 was in on the lie, in fact all of the June Freedom Day less and less lies! And it’s likely that Dominic that Cummings was so willing to likely. The infections are mainly Cummings was too. So all the come forward and stick the knife among schoolchildren and so far mud being thrown now in the Covid in. But he was quite selective in the hospitalisation and death rates blame game, is not going to be his targets. No doubt he is hedging remain low. So Hancock claims that allowed to stick on anyone. As for his bets for the future. In the the vaccine is beating the virus, the Cummings “revelations”, there meantime, the G7 summit has given even though only 43% of the British was nothing new there. Everyone Johnson a chance to make grandiose population is fully vaccinated (but knows that the elderly in care homes against 6.3% worldwide!). did not have a “protective ring speeches yet again, the latest being Hancock’s “testimony” in front of around them” and that yes, tens of to vaccinate the whole world along a Parliamentary Select Committee to thousands died needlessly. with Joe Biden. After vaccinating all answer allegations made by former We didn’t need him to tell us that “Britons” first, of course. 

• Their “love” of the NHS up and down the country against the fact and 12,000 football fans had the chance to that they are not even being offered a catch the B1.617.2 “Delta” variant. And Intensive care nurse Jenny McGee, who pay rise (1% amounts to a 1-2% pay cut this match has no doubt played a part in had cared for Boris Johnson when he was with RPI inflation hitting 2.5%!). They’re Portugal being taken off the green list, in hospital with Covid, resigned from her exhausted after fighting this pandemic, as only five days later! job last month. She is not alone in this it were, with their bare hands. In Jenny’s UEFA said it discussed holding the decision: 38% of NHS nurses are thinking words: ”We’re not getting the respect and final in England but“it was not possible to of quitting in the next year. They struggled now pay that we deserve. I’m just sick of achieve the necessary exemptions from UK through the pandemic, despite 40,000 it”… quarantine arrangements” ‑ for whom? As nurses’ vacancies, not to mention to the lack of equipment and other shortages. • Exporting Covid? it happened, each fan had to take 3 tests, but of the least reliable lateral flow type. According to the Office of National One might well ask what UEFA was In fact the testing policy for travellers was Statistics, 886 NHS workers have died of thinking, locating the Champions’ (and still is) in disarray. Tests ordered Covid and at least 122,000 are suffering League final between two English clubs from long Covid. And today the number (Manchester City and Chelsea) in Oporto, online from private government-accredited of vacancies has gone up: it now stands Portugal? It was moved at short notice contractors and costing up to £390 (!) did at 90,000! from Istanbul after Turkey got placed not arrive on time. Returning travellers When Boris Johnson left hospital last on the British government’s “red list”. were able to book tests at clinics after Day March, he effusively claimed that the NHS Portugal’s sudden and short-lived green- 2 and Day 8, only to be told that attending was powered on “Love”. It has had to be. listing looks rather suspicious in this light! them would breach their quarantine. No But no longer. Nurses have been protesting Anyway, it meant that Oporto’s population wonder self-isolation does not work!

Investigating Wuhan’s labs: the fact that the WHO and all leading the “Chinese virus” blame game? looking for scapegoats western governments were caught totally The initial WHO investigation into the unprepared for this pandemic. And that Wuhan outbreak (done by a team of 25 The theory that C-19 started because thanks to the ridiculous profit-first system scientists from around the world) said a of a leak from a lab in Wuhan has been we all live under, none of them could laboratory accident was “very unlikely” revived. The head of the World Health respond to the Covid virus in an effective and that a natural origin of the virus Organisation (WHO) and US President Joe way. So hundreds of thousands of lives (jumping from wild animals into humans) Biden have joined others (including British have been lost, many needlessly. The was “likely to very likely”. Nor did they politicians and a few odd scientists) in global death toll is now 3.76m. In the find any evidence that SARS-CoV2 had been recorded in any of the Wuhan labs starting where Trump left off. Of course context of the ongoing trade war against prior to December 2019 or that lab staff it’s one way to divert attention from China, what better way than to revert to had contracted any mysterious illnesses. The safety of the labs was as good as any in the West. As for this being a man- made virus, all accredited virologists say this too, is nonsense! That hasn’t prevented politicians, conspiracy theorists and anti-Chinese xenophobes from wading in with all kinds of “evidence”. So no doubt there’ll be more investigations and those who understand little about the complex lives of viruses will make more exorbitant claims. The politicians and have their own agenda defined by capitalist competition. They will bend the truth or even lie blatantly just as they do on other vital matters ‑ and in this case, knowledge and science be damned! WORKERS’ No 124 - June 2021 fight

●● Hillsborough: still no “closure” This society The abandoned trial of 2 retired cops and of turnstiles, inadequate stewarding statements “did not pervert the course of a solicitor for altering police statements that led to the crush in the central pens, justice”! For the families who’ve fought to the Taylor inquiry into the 1989 the strong fences trapping the fans, or for the truth to be told, this is a 3rd failed Hillsborough disaster, was another rebuff the delay registering the emergency. trial out of 4. The police forces have now to the families of the 96 Liverpool football West Midlands Police, charged with agreed to compensate 600 complainants supporters who died. The defendants investigating South Yorkshire’s conduct, removed anything in the statements which just joined the cover-up. financially. But the bereaved families’ could suggest police negligence. South The judge ruled that since the Taylor losses, added to by exhausting decades Yorkshire Police had blamed the fans for inquiry wasn’t “statutory” with full powers of fighting official obstruction can’t ever the disaster, instead of the late opening to question witnesses, this doctoring of be compensated.

●● The housing crisis just gets worse The government recently announced 9 out of 10 local authorities didn’t have thousands of households on waiting lists £200 million to be given to councils enough cash to cover their spending or living in temporary accommodation. (in total!) towards eliminating rough plans: the total estimated shortfall for And many of these temporary premises sleeping. According to the Combined England and Wales was £3.7bn! are in an appalling state of repair. This is Homelessness and Information Network To make matters a thousand times the root of the problem: the drastic lack (CHAIN), last year there was a 21% worse, the government “Covid” ban of decent social housing. But instead of increase in rough sleeping in London on evictions came to an end on 1 June alone. 2021. The National Residential Landlords councils erecting good quality prefabs as The £200m is meant to fund 14,500 Association estimates that as many as was done after WW2, private developers placements and 2,700 support staff. 850,000 private tenants are in arrears, are left to build “unaffordable” homes But councils have seen their funds with half facing eviction. and the destitute remain without a progressively cut since 2010. In 2020, Councils already have tens of proper roof!

●● Windrush compensation: a hostile scheme Back in 2019, Theresa May’s government scheme has paid out almost £30 million. The 30 June deadline for the post- was forced to offer compensation to One wonders to whom? Nine of May’s Brexit migrant Settlement Scheme will Windrush generation victims of her “Hostile victims have died while waiting for some inevitably mean that Patel ramps up her Environment for Immigrants” policy. kind of payment. campaign against foreign workers and But 3 years later only 400 claims out And who knows how many more refugees. Her aim is to use off-shore of 2000 have resulted in any payment immigrants have suffered harm under “prisons” to hold would-be immigrants, at all, with each claim taking at least 14 Patel’s reinforced version of this “hostile who, if they don’t use official routes to months to process! What is more, the environment”? What with her forced come to Britain will be denied financial initial minimum amount the Home Office deportations of refugees before they can support or permanent status. Patel covers was trying to get away with was just £250! exert their rights to apply for asylum and herself by saying she is targeting criminal Current Home Secretary, Priti Patel, has her placement of migrants in squalid and people smugglers. But she is actually nevertheless proudly boasted that the unsafe conditions. criminalising all migrants.

●● Ballymurphy and Johnson’s hypocritical apology Fifty years ago, on 9-11 August 1971, one woman were shot dead; one man British paratroopers killed 11 unarmed died of a heart attack when a soldier civilians on the streets of Ballymurphy put a gun in his mouth. After the event, in Belfast. A new inquest has only now blatant lies were told to cover up what forced the government to admit this. had happened, leaving it to relatives to The soldiers responsible were from the fight for the truth. same 1st Battalion Parachute Regiment So this new ruling, albeit 5 decades that shot dead 13 demonstrators in Derry late, was a victory for them. But when just a few months later, on Bloody Sunday, Johnson apologised to families in the 30 January 1972. Around 600 soldiers Commons on 19 May he still did not occupied the poor working class Catholic acknowledge that British soldiers had area of Ballymurphy from early morning killed innocent civilians. He wouldn’t. on 9 August 1971, raiding houses. For He plans to go ahead with legislation the first time “internment” law was exempting British soldiers from used, which allowed any “suspect” to be prosecution for crimes committed in incarcerated without trial. Nine men and Northern Ireland before 1998...

They’re after the Beeb One only has to recall the sexual even had a role in killing his mother, who predator, Jimmy Savile operating under died one year later in a car crash while Over 25 years after the event, the its auspices for years. being pursued by paparazzi... BBC Panorama interview with the late The real reason for this scandal- There is no doubt that those high up in princess Diana conducted by Martin Bashir has again come under the revival is, of course the drive to the BBC organisation are unaccountable spotlight. The Dyson review raised all commercialise the Beeb, whose charter and overpaid, even though the BBC is the old questions and asked why Bashir for renewal comes up next year. So the meant to be a public broadcaster. But had been re-employed by the BBC after ground is being prepared and prince turning it to a profit-making machine his misdemeanours. Of course this isn’t William, son of Diana has obligingly with advertisements every 10 minutes even the BBC’s worst transgression. stepped in to claim that “that interview” will only make it worse. WORKERS’ No 124 - June 2021 fight

Our society Strikes win against “fire and rehire” ince the start of the pandemic bosses Shave been using the opportunity to cut jobs, pay and conditions. British Gas, British Airways, Heathrow Airport, Tesco, Go North West buses, coffee company JDE, have all tried to force new contracts on workers who’ve been told to sign, “or else”. The TUC reckons that 10% of all workers had been threatened with this “fire rehire” blackmail. But workers haven’t taken it lying down. Last July, Centrica, owner of British new contracts! 400 Manchester bus drivers who took Gas, having made £901m profit in The policy of their GMB union all-out, indefinite strike action at the 2019, told its 20,000 workers that they leaders was, however, to negotiate with end of February, lasting for 85 days. were to have their pay cut by 15%, the bosses throughout the strike period They stopped fire and rehire, but the their working hours increased, and if ‑ and behind closed doors. Workers offer which Unite eventually agreed they didn’t accept it, they’d be fired. were told nothing, while new contracts with management on their behalf, still So on 7 January, 7,000 engineers went were accepted with minor adjustments. included cuts to conditions. In both on strike and were out, intermittently, On 14 April, 500 engineers who still cases, the control of the strikes was left for 43 days. They held pickets all over refused to sign these contracts were in the hands of the union leaderships. the country, including outside British sacked. To avoid future sell-outs, strikers need Gas HQ in Leeds, and they burnt the The outcome was different for to take over full control themselves. 

●● Politicians’ lip-service A House of Commons debate over “Hire, be outlawed. The right-wing Father of to be heard standing up for working fire and rehire” was called by Labour the House Jacob Rees-Mogg added his class constituents ‑ some of them on MPs in April. Even Tories stood up to call two-pennies of advice: ”I would say to strike ‑ but many of them even went to this practice “unscrupulous”. However, my capitalist friends: that capitalism the picket lines, including Keir Starmer only 75 out of 650 MPs in parliament works when capitalists behave well and signed a motion calling such tactics ”an treat their employees well”. himself! Two months later, while some of unacceptable abuse of power by rogue Of course this was ahead of the May these workers are still fighting for their bosses” and demanding that the practice elections. And not only did MPs want jobs, MPs are nowhere to be seen.

●● Fighting the bosses... and the union leadership! Given workers’ militancy over “fire and appeared on picket lines, to boost their they wouldn’t have got such a good deal! rehire”, union leaderships seized upon the own campaigns. One of three so-called Hmmm. issue to try to win back some of their lost “left-wing” candidates is Sharon Graham, In fact whichever leader ends up credit. Their big problem is, of course, that whose election slogan to replace outgoing replacing McCluskey in Unite, or any other this tactic completely bypasses the need for Len McCluskey is ”Let’s get back to the union, it is the fights on the ground, with negotiation with them. They have a direct workplace”! Which is an unfortunate workers electing their own fit-for-purpose interest in getting it outlawed, so that the admission that the unions are indeed strike committees, accountable to all bosses are forced to talk to them! somewhere else! She turned up on the workers, (regardless of which union they At the same time, candidates in the Manchester bus drivers’ pickets, to point out may, or may not, be in), that will count. It’s upcoming Unite general secretary election that without her ”leveraging department” (!) the only way forward.

• Taking Liberties with Even if the government steps in, as Labour Umbrella Companies” (MUCs). MUCs are workers’ jobs MPs (including Ed Miliband) are suggesting almost always created just to exploit a tax it should, it will just be using taxpayers’ “loophole” that gets them out of paying Liberty Steel plans to sell off three British money to prop Liberty up until a new asset National Insurance contributions. They’ve steel plants, as part of the fallout from stripper comes along, who may or may not existed since 2014, in every industry that the collapse of Greensill Capital in March. save the jobs. The only way workers can includes low-paid, precarious workers Liberty employs around 3,000 workers in truly protect their jobs is to kick out these ‑ especially construction, warehouses and Britain, including 1,400 at the threatened parasitic owners altogether. factories. plants in Stocksbridge, Rotherham and To keep exploiting the loophole, new West Bromwich. • Getting a-”Uzura-way Ltd” MUCs have constantly to be recreated. Owned by GFG Alliance, it’s a global with it Often dozens are registered at the same conglomerate that owed Greensill £3.6bn. address, with obviously fake names. And so The investment bank Credit Suisse is now The government’s response to the workers find that the company paying their trying to claw back this money ‑ partly by pandemic, including the Test-and-Trace wages can change every week! Because making debtors such as GFG sell ‘assets’ service, created tens of thousands of of this, they don’t accrue holiday pay, like the steel plants. precarious, low-paid jobs in call centres, often don’t receive pension contributions, Steelworkers’ jobs have been repeatedly testing centres and laboratories. Huge and can end up constantly overpaying on threatened in recent years, including when companies, including Serco and G4S, emergency tax codes. The jobs themselves British Steel and Tata plants were sold to which received £37bn 3-year contracts for are already precarious, but MUCs make the Jingye Group and GFG. These deals Test-and-Trace, usually outsource tasks them even worse. Who could trust that are touted as ‘rescues’, but they treat like recruitment and employment of temp a company called “Aeonofwhitewashing plants and workers as “assets”, to be sold workers. This creates a massive, complex Limited”* would continue to pay you?! off when the financial world demands it. web of companies, which can include “Mini * Yes, there is one! WORKERS’ No 124 - June 2021 fight

The G7, Northern Ireland and a sausage Their Society ohnson has renamed the special the way for, among other things, In this context Biden and Johnson Jrelationship with the USA the the global trade referee known as have vowed to ”vaccinate the “Indestructible Relationship”. It the World Trade Organisation. At world... by the end of 2022”! And needs to be, given the current the time it was meant to “further Johnson has defended his offer of attempts to dismantle the the enjoyment by all States, great just 100m surplus vaccines when the relationship with the EU ‑ over or small, victor or vanquished, of total world need is at least 10 billion! sausages. Or to to be more precise, access on equal terms, to the trade In fact the government claims it over checks on chilled meats going and to the raw materials of the world already did its bit by promoting the from Britain to the EU single market, which are needed for their economic AstraZeneca vaccine and ensuring it into which Northern Ireland was prosperity”! Never happened of is available to poor countries at cost placed by Johnson under the terms course! But today, with goods like price! ”We will have a colossal sum of Brexit’s Irish Protocol. This semiconductors in short supply of vaccines that we’ll be distributing Protocol is currently back in dispute around the world, not to mention ‑ the fight against Covid would not be and the EU-British Brexit deal seems supplies of vaccine doses being possible without the UK’s efforts on to be unravelling. And all the more hoarded by rich countries, it’ll be vaccines,” said Johnson. Meaning reason for Trump’s successor to be interesting to see if this new charter the poor countries will get “not a Johnson’s new best friend! makes the slightest difference. sausage”.  Biden, who has Irish roots, is said to have an interest in the NI protocol ‑ which upholds the 1998 Good Friday peace agreement after 30 years of the “Troubles”. And while sorting out the Irish border after Brexit might not be comparable to this, the easy answer of rubbing it out completely, is obviously not on the cards of these reactionaries. In the meantime Johnson and Biden are signing a new “Atlantic Charter”, allowing Johnson to posture as Churchill, who signed this with Roosevelt in 1941, paving

●● Crypto-currencies: one of many asset bubbles… A trillion dollars was wiped off the value an online hacking ring called DarkSide. value of all assets goes up and down of cryptocurrencies, hitting Bitcoin, Part of this haul was ransom paid according to confidence in the market, Ethereum and Dogecoin, in a market- after this criminal ring hacked into the but cryptocurrencies, even if paid for wide crash on 19 May. This wasn’t the computers of the major US gas Colonial with real currencies, are based on thin first crypto-crash. These have happened Pipeline. Indeed, the “cracking” of the air! This really says everything about the almost from day one of the existence of secret codes which keep the currency degenerate state of world capitalism. If these virtual “currencies” ‑ referred to anonymous further undermines Bitcoin’s this system, based purely on what turns as a “fraud” by some and “shitcoin” by status. a profit was irrational and inhumane to others. This time the free-fall followed Virtual currencies were invented start with, it is now totally insane. the withdrawal of recognition for by computer scientists a decade back, Given the huge amounts “invested” cryptocurrency by Chinese regulators precisely for anonymous internet and also by Elon Musk, who said he’d no transactions ‑ perfect for tax evasion, in crypto, around 1.8% of the world’s longer accept them as payment for his money-laundering, etc. And thanks to money (maybe now $1 trillion), it’s e-cars. their volatile price they became a target unsure whether further crypto-bubble- And now it’s happened again: on 8 for speculators. But they’re not like other bursts could precipitate a world-wide June, speculators started selling crypto tangible speculative assets, like gold, for financial crash ‑ and whether this would assets after the US Department of Justice instance, nor “real” currencies, which have the same effect as a crash in “real” seized 63.7 Bitcoins, worth $2.3m, from governments guarantee. Of course, the assets. But we may be about to find out.

●● Bosses’ “British made” labour shortages! ONS figures this April show that 1 in 10 the new immigration conditions. hidden by the massaged statistics, in the hospitality workers left or were sacked in So economists are sounding alarm bells! context of the underlying recession, which the 2020 ‑ accounting for 660,000 jobs! And They say that since the price of labour follows pandemic only exacerbated. now that the economy is “reopening”, there’s the same law of supply and demand as the What’s more, there’s talk of reducing a desperate labour shortage. It’s the same price of all other commodities, and supply is “demand for labour” further (as advocated by situation in social care, logistics and security. down, its price (wages!) will go up! And this Brexiteer Tim Martin who owns Wetherspoons UKHospitality, the bosses’ lobbying might give workers some “bargaining power”! pubs) by introducing a special “flexible” visa group, also blames the shortage on Brexit, However, after falling by an average 5%, since migrant workers (many from the EU) wages still haven’t risen to pre-pandemic scheme. Certainly the 30 June deadline found themselves unemployed or on furlough levels. In fact wages advertised for hospitality ‑ after which EU workers will have to prove in an insecure job, and decided to try their jobs have risen by just 1%, to £9.35/hour, “settlement status” might force even more to luck back in their own countries. And it’s now and by 2% in social care (to £9.71/hr). This leave. And heaven forbid having to pay decent much more difficult for them to return due to may well reflect the reality of unemployment, wages to this over-exploited workforce! WORKERS’ No 124 - June 2021 workplace news fight

King’s Cross railway station (London)

Not that Great British Railways n 20 May, transport secretary who advocate renationalisation using OGrant Shapps finally announced the “successful” example of East Coast his plan for transforming the way the Mainline (when the government took it railway operates. So this new body over), they don’t know or care that this called Great British Railways (GBR) will “success” was based on continuing over- now be in charge of timetables, fares exploitation of workers and passengers. and infrastructure. Franchises (well Sky high fares were charged, while most of them...) will be scrapped, to be passengers were (and are still) treated replaced by passenger service contracts like subhumans; standing for hours for private companies to run the train during rush hour. Unless, of course, by cutting labour costs. And with services, for a guaranteed, fixed fee. In they paid double the price for a first class driverless trains looming, nobody’s other words no more risking investment fare… This is how East Coast Directly Ts&Cs will be sacred ‑ not even those for a profit they may not accrue... now Operated Railways managed to pay £1 of train drivers, who up to now have the government takes the risk and they billion to the Treasury between 2010 and remained relatively untouched by cuts. take the money. And of course, this 2013! A fightback is on the cards, bringing isn’t nationalisation as Shapps kept The new passenger service contracts reassuring everybody..! with fixed fees will mean that private every section together, to prevent the As for the suggestion by some critics bosses will try to increase their incomes attacks to come! 

• Can they make up their but our numbers are still at pandemic • Vested interests minds? minimum levels. OK. Minimum staff equals minimum service. [Workers’ Are we meant to be impressed by LNER/ We still don’t know how, or what kind Platform King’s X, 03/06/21] Atalian’s claim that Stabilised Aqueous of catering service LNER expects in a • Go away Ozone (SAO) spray is effective against couple of weeks, when the timetables viruses, bacteria, etc. and “lab tested”? change. If management can’t decide, We see GN managers observing our Obviously they think so - and they’ve we can ‑ and we think it’s best to every move while we’re at work on the even produced laminated “advertising” provide a very socially distanced platform... It’s almost as if they’re for it, which they’ve left in the messroom. service... [Workers’ Platform King’s X, jealous of us, since they’ve nothing 03/06/21] useful to do themselves... Well, if they’re But when we go online to check, we only see private companies vouching for SAO. • Run out of workers so keen to watch our performance, we should insist they buy tickets. [Workers’ The same ones who sell it. [Workers’ Anyway, the trains are getting busier, Platform King’s X, 03/06/21] Platform King’s X, 03/06/21]

Mount Pleasant mail centre (London) Royal Mail’s super-profiteering n 20 May, Royal Mail reported a kept implementing Early Voluntary Orecord £702m operating profit for Retirement programs without replacing 2020-21 ‑ a 116% increase compared anyone. They’ve brought in agency to last year. It also announced it would workers all year round, to fill gaps on re-start paying dividends, at 10p per the shop floor (but we’ve still struggled!) share for 2020-21 and 20p for 2021-22. on lower pay for equal work, of course. Undoubtedly, RM has made the most out And they’re “revising processes and There are signs that RM’s “super” of the lockdown, thanks to the surge in guidelines” to “improve efficiency/ profiteering might already be curtailed, online shopping and parcel deliveries. productivity”, including by automation. as the end of the lockdown looms. But These super-profits, however, So for instance, Parcel Sorting Machines that’s not our problem. Our problem is to are also due directly, to cuts in our are being installed in 8 Mail Centres, find a way to fight to regain the ground conditions. In this same year, our pay including here at the Mount. Although lost over the past years and reinstate “increased” by just 1% ‑ which, with their plan for “efficiencies” (i.e., job cuts!) inflation, is a real pay cut! And despite might come a cropper, as these machines the jobs and conditions which the union workloads skyrocketing, management aren’t all they’re cracked up to be! leaders have signed away. 

• What it would take [Workers’ fight bulletin Mount Pleasant • Whose moment? Mail Centre 3/6/21] So RM’s made unprecedented profits In the meantime, TeePee (General Secretary, out of our sweat, blood and tears • Making light work Terry Pullinger) was very happy to be the first ‑ a record £702m (operating profit) union official to be invited to the shareholders’ Yes, in processing we’ve gone through squeezed out of us in just one year! Annual General Meeting. He tried his best one whole year non-stop ‑ many of us And of course, we saw this bonanza to blend in, but didn’t quite manage. So coming in the form of a packet do feel it in our bones and muscles. when RM’s chief exec Thompson asked “tsunami” that hit us at the beginning And this recent slight fall in the packet him “you feel okay, Terry?”, he answered, of the pandemic. workload is welcome, but who knows “I’m feeling, this is our moment, that’s how But we’ve certainly not seen it in how long it’ll last. I feel”. Oops, a little awkward... Pity he the form of an increase in real pay What’s certain, is that we could do doesn’t realise he would blend in better with ‑ compare RM’s 116% increase this with many more hands. [Workers’ fight us on the shop floor ‑ if he remembers how year to our miniscule 1% “rise”! We bulletin Mount Pleasant Mail Centre to get here. [Workers’ fight bulletin Mount need to shake their (giant) piggy-bank! 3/6/21] Pleasant Mail Centre 3/6/21] WORKERS’ workplace news No 124 - June 2021 fight

Ford Dagenham Engine Plant

Ford electrification: works’ committee shocked! fter Ford announced its “Go Electric” mentioned. But given the ban on petrol/ Aplans in May, which excluded mention diesel from 2030, this is the deadline for of any electric projects for Dagenham, our jobs too! There’ll be an order for Joint Works’ Committee union officials Panther engines for the VW van built in issued a report. They felt betrayed. Turkey from 2024 and for Tiger engines Germany’s Ford Cologne will make the In fact the sell-out union officials fell for a light commercial vehicle built in 1st all-electric passenger vehicle by 2023 for Ford’s blackmail every time. Their Romania from 2023... and plants in Romania and Turkey will outsourcing threw subcontracted workers The union leaders write: ”We made all make e-vehicles and battery packs. The to the wolves. Now they again become the efficiencies asked for... Outsourced only British factory included is the former abject ‑ saying DEP could have a future Getrag-Ford Halewood plant which will Our Laundry, Our Cleaners, Our in the new Freeport! Really? And at produce e-transmissions. Security, Our MPL department, Panther what price our (barely retained) Ts&Cs? However, Ford wants Dagenham Subassembly’s, Our Battery House & It’s true we could have a future, but only engine plant to carry on building diesel Our Orders. All of this done to secure if we on the ground fight for it ‑ and find engines until well into the next decade. a future for Dagenham”. And now Ford true allies among our fellow workers in A figure of 40,000 engines/year is dares to offer nothing? other plants and industries. 

• What, exactly, is he for? • Make up your minds We used to have another mate loading. He/she was taken away after a “helpful” We saw a story this week about a We can’t understand what Panther suggestion, apparently... But it’s unsafe. 1980 Ford Escort Mk111 Ghia made in machining managers are up to. We were [Workers’ Fight bulletin Ford Dagenham supposed to be laid off last week and then Halewood, up for sale ‑ newsworthy, 10/06/21] apparently, because Prince Charles some of us were asked to come back for bought it as a gift for Diana, to make 3 full days! We’d planned better things, • Hands off our annual publicity for Ford... like making the most of the sun. Some of leave! So this Tuesday, Charles drives an us even ended up on Assembly! And then electric mini off the line at BMW Oxford even more “surprising”, mates were asked We (LLL Panther) rejected the furlough- to “celebrate 20 years of modern mini to come in on Saturday... [Workers’ Fight annual leave deal, whereby we were told production” and his campaign against bulletin Ford Dagenham 10/06/21] to use leave days during furlough! Trust LLL to try this on. It’s even against the so- climate change. He called the mini • We can’t drive... and load “silent but deadly” ‑ deadly? For jobs, called “rules” for obtaining government workers, pedestrians? Has he even got It’s just impossible to drive and load the money! Nobody here signed up to it. a clue? [Workers’ Fight bulletin Ford truck at the same time as LLL mates are [Workers’ Fight bulletin Ford Dagenham Dagenham 10/06/21] now asked to do on Panther machining. 10/06/21]

BMW Mini centre (Cowley, Oxford)

• Crumbs from the table but who says that means we’re paying it back? We can think of ways not to. They BMW must have made their want to cut our pay for 2½ years or more shareholders happy! While they made from July? How long can they go without £5bn of profits last year and they have Minis? [Workers’ Fight bulletin BMW Mini increased their car production in the 1st Oxford 09/06/21] quarter by 30% ‑ the number of electric cars made having doubled! And now • Just our time! BMW has just paid an £86 bonus to the Last Wednesday on the night shift a workers in the plant... [Workers’ Fight lorry was late, and Assembly had to stop bulletin BMW Mini Oxford 09/06/21] of their contract from BMW without because there weren’t enough parts. paying wages... And we wouldn’t be • Lay off pay, now! That says something about their “just- surprised! [Workers’ Fight bulletin BMW in-time” system, but also about how Did BMW think it could get away giving short of stock BMW is right now. What Mini Oxford 09/06/21] us peanuts ‑ or nothing ‑ for the lay off would happen if we refused to make cars days? The loan & pay cut leaves BMW • We want our holidays back when BMW gets hold of some parts, now permanent workers with £15 per lay-off that it’s craving more Mini production? day and Gi agency mates with nothing! Now our new Gi workmates are told [Workers’ Fight bulletin BMW Mini Oxford Now they want to “gift” us +30 hours in they would have to use their annual 09/06/21] our Working Time Accounts, i.e., only 4 leave to cover for the lay-offs! Many of days’ worth.... If this “gift” was meant • Pocketing the furlough us, permanent or agency, were actually to damp down some of the anger on money? the shop floor, it’s having the opposite told to use practically all our holidays effect! [Workers’ Fight bulletin BMW R&H (the logistics subcontractor) called during the last winter shutdown... But Mini Oxford 09/06/21] some workers to come in last Thursday no company can force us to take all our ‑ when we were meant to be at home on • To be cancelled annual leave when they want, whatever furlough! So what money did they pay We may have been blackmailed into us with? Was it furlough money? That the shutdowns! [Workers’ Fight bulletin accepting the “loan” pay cut” for now, would mean that R&H is pocketing 100% BMW Mini Oxford 09/06/21] WORKERS’ No 124 - June 2021 fight India The fight against Covid-19, Modi and the bosses n May, Covid cut through India. As it can be bought on the internet, under- respond to growing opposition due to its Ispread, the skeletal health infrastructure resourced health facilities and conditions criminal mismanagement of this Covid collapsed. Hundreds of decomposed where fungal spores can proliferate. wave? The BJP already did badly in local bodies dumped by municipal authorities Despite the dire health crisis, workers elections in Uttar Pradesh (UP, the largest floated down the Ganges river to hide the and farmers protests continue: on 5 state) which up until recently was its number of deaths upstream. According June farmers organised demonstrations. stronghold. Assembly elections are only to official statistics, between 5 May and And since industrial production went on nine months away. In what could be a sign 5 June alone, 116,000 people died. unabated, turning factories into Covid of things to come, UP’s BJP administration With negligible monitoring, testing and incubators, workers took matters into their demolished a mosque in Barabanki. With research, India has become a giant petri- own hands to protect their health. The nothing to offer the population, Modi’s dish for the mutation of new potentially strike of 16,000 workers at the Chennai party is resorting ‑ as many times before ‑ vaccine-dodging Covid variants. Black Hyundai plant forced the closure of the fungus began to spread too; especially plant for five days. The nearby Renault- to communal incitement against religious lethal in patients with compromised Nissan plant was also shut for five days minorities, “illegal immigrants” and “anti- immunity and the result of the unregulated after workers threatened a boycott. nationals”. We can only hope that the use of immune-suppressing steroids which How will Modi’s BJP government working class calls their bluff.  Palestine-Israel Stopping evictions in East Jerusalem fter the May bombing of Gaza in which so-called ‘mixed cities’ of Lod and Jaffa, light of a 4th failure by his party to win a A240 Palestinians were killed ‑ and the and the West Bank, with the population majority in the space of just 2 years. But Hamas retaliation, in which 12 Israelis holding back attacks from the Israeli his strategy has backfired. It looks as were killed ‑ the ceasefire is holding. police and army. And then came the use if Netanyahu’s 12-year rule will now be But the issues which provoked this of stun grenades and beatings at the Al- replaced by a “fragile coalition”, of eight latest confrontation are far from resolved. Aqsa mosque during Ramadan, to make opposing parties. In the meantime the It began with the Israeli courts’ decision way for a far-right Zionist ‘Jerusalem East Jerusalem evictions are on hold and in April that 300 Palestinian residents Day’ demonstration which escalated the Palestinians ‑ who have also staged of the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of the situation, leading to the bombing of a general strike ‑ remain mobilised. The Sheikh Jarrah could be “legally” evicted. Gaza and the 4,000 rockets fired by the In response, the families held protests Islamist Hamas into Israel. first step on their road to freedom has to and sit-ins and busloads of fellow Israeli prime minister Netanyahu be the removal of the barbed wire around Palestinians came in solidarity, blocking may have hoped this escalation would Gazza and the Apartheid “Wall” along the highways. The movement spread to the reinflate his popularity ratings, in the West Bank.  Spain-Morocco Refugees swim for freedom n 16 May, the Moroccan government jumped on the occasion to condemn the which Spain and the EU (like Britain in Odecided to relax border controls Moroccan government for provoking the the Channel) inflict on youth who are between Morocco and Ceuta ‑ an 18Km situation, insisting on its ”responsibility condemned to starve in their countries or square Spanish-”owned” enclave in to keep the border closed, as part of its risk drowning (or being shot) when they Northern Africa. This was in response duties towards the EU”. But this crisis to Spain’s decision to provide medical exposes yet again the murderous policies try to escape to a better life.  treatment to Brahim Ghali, leader of the Polisario Front ‑ a militia fighting the Moroccan regime for Western Sahara’s independence. In fact Western Sahara has been occupied by Morocco since Spain’s withdrawal from its former colony in 1975. In the space of 48 hours, over 12,000 migrants ‑ mostly teenagers ‑ tried to reach Spanish territory by swimming across the sea. However when they arrived they were held at gunpoint by Spanish authorities and 7,500 were immediately deported back to Morocco, with only a few granted refugee status. At least three children drowned, 100 had to be rescued from the sea (some as young as 6 or 7!) Hundreds were then crammed into a warehouse in “quarantine”, awaiting their fate. Spanish Prime minister Pedro Sanchez

In addition to this paper, we publish bulletins in several large workplaces in the South East, a journal, “Class Struggle” and a series of pamphlets on topical issues. If you wish to know more, contact Workers’ Fight by e-mail, at [email protected], or by postal mail at: BM Workers’ Fight - LONDON WC1N 3XX.