Militant trade unionism an inspiration
by Richie Venton & Eddie Truman
On Wednesday 28th January 2009 workers for Shaw’s construction contractors
at Lindsey Oil Refinery in North Lincolnshire were told by their shop
stewards that the new contractor, IREM, an Italian company that a part
of the contract on LOR's HDS3 plant had been awarded to, was refusing
to employ UK labour.
IREM planned to house hundreds of Italian and Portuguese workers in accommodation
barges in Grimsby harbour, bussing them to and from the plant every day.
They were explicit in their policy of not hiring any UK workers as contractors.
This was particularly offensive to local skilled workers against the
background of Shaw’s having issued 90-day redundancy notices in mid-November,
meaning that they would become redundant mid-February, whilst IREM was
herding Italian workers like cattle on a boat (rumoured to be a prison
ship), keeping them well away from trade-unionised UK workers.
The entire LOR workforce, from all subcontracting companies, met and
voted unanimously to take immediate strike action.
The following day over a thousand construction workers from LOR, Conoco
and Easington sites descended outside Lindsey Oil Refinery's gate to
picket and protest.
Thus began one of the most remarkable episodes of industrial action in
the UK since the uprising in the North Sea in the late 1990's.
Workers the length of the UK began a series of unofficial and therefore
illegal actions from Grangemouth oil refinery and Longannet power station
in Scotland, Sellafield and Heysham nuclear plants, Fiddlers Ferry in
Widnes to the Drax power station in Yorkshire.
In just 3 or 4 days the UK's anti-trade union laws, some of the most
oppressive in Europe, were swept aside by workers in key industrial facilities;
power generation and oil refining.
Workers ignored and defied anti-union laws on balloting procedures, solidarity
strikes and mass picketing, exploding the myth - perpetrated by far too
many union leaders for decades - that the anti-union laws invented by
the Tories and retained by New Labour are insurmountable.
The industrial action was not taking place in isolation. Across Europe
workers have started to take action against the impact of the economic
recession that threatens their jobs and wages and conditions.
For the left the strikes brought complications in the form of the slogan
'British Jobs For British Workers' which although was never raised officially
by the Lindsey workers became prominent from the beginning of the dispute.
Socialists have absolutely no truck with such slogans which promote division
and can and have been used by the far right to promote their racist poison.
When Gordon Brown first used this phrase in November 2007 the SSP was
unequivocal in condemning him for playing into the hands of the BNP and
fuelling racism and xenophobia.
When the strikers used this slogan initially there is no doubt that there
was a large element of throwing the slogan back in Gordon Brown's face.
Here was a situation in which UK workers were specifically being excluded
from UK jobs.
But the slogan very quickly backfired; it was a gift to the BNP who had
in fact been using it for a number of years and it allowed the media
to deliberately and dishonestly portray the strike as overtly xenophobic
and racist.
An interview conducted by Paul Mason which was used on Newsnight showed
a striker making the point that "we can't work beside them, they
are coming in full companies", referring to the segregated accommodation
of the new contractors.
The BBC's 10 o'clock news carried a story about the strike in which Government
ministers accuse the strikers of xenophobia, the Newsnight clip is cut
to the striker saying "we can't work beside them".
But the strikers themselves agreed demands at their mass meetings which
never gained the oxygen of media coverage, but which cut across entirely
the vicious distortions of their portrayal in the press. They demanded
union rights for all workers, including immigrant labour; for union facilities
for the Italian workers to make them an integral part of the trade union
movement here; and for the implementation of the national construction
and engineering industry agreement on the rate for the job, hours of
work, breaks and conditions for all working in the UK – including the
Italians.
Numerous first-hand accounts showed pickets giving short shrift to the
unwelcome attentions of the fascist BNP – who after all sided with the
Tories against the miners’ strike, and didn’t even think firefighters
should have the right to strike.
Strikers demonstrated a core internationalism and solidarity with fellow-workers
that bodes well for the future of this movement.
Union spokespersons repeatedly stated that this strike was not about
race or nationality, not against Italian or Portugese workers, but against
the Italian company that was excluding local, skilled workers from even
getting an interview for jobs.
Strikers rightly saw this as an attempt by EU companies to exploit EU
directives and court rulings on ‘posted workers’ to undermine and break
hard-won national agreements and trade union organization.
Far from being instinctively against migrant workers from Italy or Portugal,
many of the strikers are themselves ‘migrants’ – forced to uproot themselves
to find work in other regions of the UK or even across the EU. So they
will have felt particularly bitter towards Labour’s Lord Mandelson who
in effect told them to “get on their bikes” and trek across Europe for
work – because after all the EU regulations are for the workers’ benefit!!
Seumas
Milne in The Guardian called it exactly right when he described
the strike as "a fight for jobs in the middle of a deepening recession
and a backlash against the deregulated, race-to-the-bottom neoliberal
model backed by Brown for more than a decade which produced it."
In
the Glasgow Herald Professor Gregor Gall described the strike as essentially
being about "the underlying issues of the race to the bottom under
capitalism, the drive to neo-liberalism and the European Union's deregulatory
preference."
The specific European Union legislation and court rulings that were inevitably
going to ignite labour disputes at some point is the EU Posted Workers
Directive and the judgements by the European Court in cases including
Viking, Laval and Ruffert.
The judgements have had the effect of undermining union negotiated collective
agreements which are not recognised as `universally applicable' in the
UK.
For trade unionists this strike was waiting to happen and the response
of workers across the UK has been inspirational.
Linda Somerville, formerly a member of the Unite National Executive,
says that there were three things that stood out;
"Firstly that the strike took place in the first place" she says.
"We have been told repeatedly that workers in the UK are no longer interested
in militant trade union action. That clearly is not the case.
"Secondly, the strength and depth of the secondary, solidarity, action
was immense.
"Workers in key industrial locations across the UK held mass meetings
and took action.
"Thirdly, the strikes were all against UK trade union law which is amongst
the most oppressive in Europe. The legal tools were there for employers to
launch a major assault on trade unions involved in the action but the sheer
size of the strikes, protests and walk outs rendered the laws impotent.
"Workers at Grangemouth refinery who were very quick to come out in support
of the strike have been emboldened by recently winning their pension dispute
with INEOS which saw them take strike action in April 2008."
For socialists and trade unionists this dispute has been an important
test, with many more to come.
The SSP has repeatedly said that the economic recession and world wide
crisis of capitalism will inevitably mean that workers will be pushed
into struggle.
But these struggles will be complex and contradictory with the enemies
of the working class seeking to muddy the waters and cause confusion.
For that reason it is vital that we take a sober and detailed analysis
of the situation and in particular understand that in Europe it is the
rabidly neo liberal and pro big business measures of the European Union
that seeks to drive down wages and terms and conditions across the board
that organized workers are now resisting.
We need to see the essence of the issues, even when accidental slogans
cloud the image. Instead of ‘British Jobs for British Workers’ the SSP
from the outset of this strike wave supported the strikers in demanding
the right to work, the right to an equal chance of being employed, and
for defence of the wages, conditions and union rights won by hard struggle
in this harsh, dangerous industry.
The SSP from day one of this strike movement called on unions in the
UK to urgently seek active links with unions in Italy, Portugal and the
EU, to unite in action against attempts to divide and conquer, against
the use of cheaper labour and worse conditions in the bosses’ race to
the bottom.
We also need to raise demands such as trade union registers of unemployed
workers in the industry as the pool for employment when jobs are on offer
– at least a small step forward to the days when unions had elements
of control over hiring and firing in a few of the better-organised industries,
such as printing. That would help counter the conscious ‘race to the
bottom’ of conditions by companies at home and abroad, by use of cheap,
disorganized workers to undermine the rights won by unionised workforces.
This dispute highlights the broader issue of ownership of the power
and energy industry, where multi-nationals seize advantage of the de-regulated,
cheap-labour EU market – championed by Blair and Brown – to maximize
profits – and the SSP’s counter-proposal of public ownership and democratic
control of the industry, where workers’ elected representatives would
have a direct input to all aspects of employment, production and planning.
The wave of tremendously courageous strike action seems, at time of writing,
to have won a major climb-down from IREM, with UK workers to get 50 per
cent of the jobs, but with no lay-offs for the Italian workers, and for
all to get the nationally agreed wages, hours and conditions.
This example of militant trade unionism, in defiance of the laws, will
inspire others to similar defences of their jobs and right to work –
starting with others in the same industry.
The job of socialists and good trade unionists is to match the courage
of these strikers and seek to influence the slogans and demands of their
movement in a fashion that reduces confusion, limits the opportunities
for the media and reactionaries to distort workers’ aims, and to consolidate
the powerful elements of workers’ unity and internationalism already
on show in this current powerful movement.