Six months after national rail strikes launched a “summer of discontent” against the Conservative government, an urgent discussion is needed among railway workers on a strategy for victory.
The class aims and objectives of rail workers and the union bureaucracy are diametrically opposed. Workers want action to defeat the government’s attacks on pay, jobs and conditions, while the bureaucrats who control the RMT, ASLEF, TSSA and Unite are seeking an accommodation with the government.
Stay informed with the latest news reports and a perspective for rail workers.
What should rail workers make of the rapturous response by RMT leader Mick Lynch and ASLEF leader Mick Whelan to Liz Truss’s new transport secretary?
The working class cannot take a step forward except by wresting control of their struggles from the TUC and the Labour Party—and their defenders.
Sanders visited the UK as a political emissary of Biden and the US ruling class seeking to bolster efforts to contain the class struggle on both sides of the Atlantic.
Point 10 proposes to end the ban in the draconian Civil Contingencies Act on using emergency regulations to stop strike action which the government deems will create a “national emergency”.
The World Socialist Web Site ran live coverage of the UK rail strike, including reports, photos and interviews from picket lines.
The fundamental issue that must be confronted is the role of the trade unions in suppressing a unified industrial and political offensive that is needed to defeat the Tories’ class war onslaught.
It is necessary to draw a balance sheet of last week’s national strikes and the political lessons for the working class.
Not only is the rail strike becoming a focus for the determination of millions of workers to end the savage austerity measures of the government. It is now threatening key foreign policy imperatives centred on an escalation of NATO’s war against Russia and hostile targeting of China.
The strikes and ballots in the UK are part of a growing wave of militancy worldwide provoked by the same desperate cost-of-living crisis.
The World Socialist Web Site is reposting an essay first published in 2004, “20 years since the year-long miners’ strike', to assist workers internationally who are coming into struggle.
The World Socialist Web Site is republishing a lecture delivered in August 2007 by Chris Marsden, the National Secretary of the Socialist Equality Party, “Stalin, Trotsky and the 1926 British general strike”.
The World Socialist Web Site is the voice of the international working class, connecting workers and their struggles all over the globe.
The WSWS calls on rail workers in the UK to get in touch with updates on their conditions and the events of the strike.
For the rail strike to be successful, workers must take the struggle out of the hands of the trade union bureaucracy by forming rank-and-file committees. The Socialist Equality Party and the International Workers’ Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees will provide every assistance possible to aid in the formation of these vital organisations.
Get in touch today to begin organising with your fellow workers in the industry, across the country and internationally.
World Socialist Web Site reporters spoke to workers involved in Saturday’s strikes in Britain. These saw 50,000 rail workers almost completely shutdown the UK’s rail network, alongside a national strike by 115,000 postal workers, and industrial action at two of the country’s largest ports, Liverpool and Felixstowe.
The WSWS interviewed a rail worker of more than three decades on the ongoing national strikes in the UK and the struggle of rail workers in the US.
Two protesters said the strikers “are the only people who are showing any opposition. The Labour Party is absolutely rubbish. They’ve got no answers, they’re not attracting people, they’ve not got a way forward for people.”
Confrontations between a ruling class turning to dictatorial forms of rule and a working class emerging from decades of suppression of the class struggle are on the agenda all over the world.
“The aim of this global initiative is to develop a genuine broad-based movement of the international working class, and to encourage workers in all countries to break out of the prison-like shackles in which they are confined by the existing state-controlled and antidemocratic unions, staffed by right-wing pro-capitalist executives.” – DAVID NORTH
“The London Bus Rank-and-File Committee is fighting for a strategy to win, linking the fight for pay with urgent health measures to stop the pandemic and reverse the decades-long attack on conditions.” - LONDON BUS RANK-AND-FILE COMMITTEE
The London Bus Rank-and-File Committee was founded on Sunday September 13, 2020 to organise bus workers independently of the unions for a fightback against unsafe exposure to COVID-19 and unlivable pay and working conditions. It urges a fightback on the following principles:
1. Unity is strength! The attacks on bus workers are part of a broader assault and can only be defeated on that basis. This month’s strikes on the London Underground and railways must be expanded to encompass bus drivers and engineers in a single fight. The demand must be raised for the complete withdrawal of the Johnson-Khan bail-out measures and Great British Railways privatisation plan. This fight must be developed as part of an international strategy, calling for united action by transport workers across Europe and America who are coming into struggle.
2. Money for transport, not profit and war! All workers must reject the lying claim that there is “no money” for decent wages, pensions or affordable fares. London is a playground for the billionaires, whose wealth has soared during the pandemic, while Johnson and his cabinet of maniacs are funnelling billions into NATO’s proxy war in Ukraine. The income of the top 250 richest people in Britain should be taxed 100 percent and the transport companies expropriated and placed under workers’ control so their wealth can be used for socially useful purposes.
3. Break the grip of the pro-company trade unions! Form rank-and-file committees: To organise a fightback workers need to break the grip of pro-company trade unions that work with the government and build their own rank-and-file committees, controlled by and for workers. While Unite openly suppresses action, the rail unions are using the threat of strikes to reach a deal with Johnson, Khan and the private operators, with the RMT insisting on May 31 that “any changes to structures, working practices, or conditions have to be agreed with our union, not imposed.” RMT and ASLEF are limiting strike action while they negotiate with Johnson’s cronies via the corporatist Rail Industry Recovery Group that was set-up to enforce the Tories’ cuts.
A network of rank-and-file committees would link workers at every depot, garage and workplace, cutting across all divisions and fighting for a strategy that prioritises the needs of the working class and society over corporate profit. We urge bus and transport workers who agree with this to contact the London Bus Rank-and-File Committee: londonbusrankandfile@protonmail.com
