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Dont let UKIP benefit from Tory and Labours failings...

UNITE TO SAVE THE NHS

BACK THE HEALTH STRIKES
T

his Monday health workers

across England will strike for a
second time against the Tories
insulting pay offer. The government has
offered some NHS workers a 1 percent
rise, but tens of thousands of them
dont even qualify for that!
Everyone who wants to defend our NHS
from Tory cuts and wants an end to the
assault on working class living standards
(the longest squeeze since the 1850s),
should get behind this strike.
Health workers arent the only people
fighting back. Firefighters recently struck
for four days and could soon walk out
again. FBU members were outraged by the
sacking of their unions Buckinghamshire
Executive member Ricky Matthews.
And we have seen inspiring local fights
too, some of these have been incredibly
bitter disputes. Having already struck for
five weeks this year, UCU members at
Lambeth College just voted for further
strikes by 83 percent. And the brave fight
by care workers in Doncaster employed by
Care UK has seen a determined 90 days of
strikes.
Weve seen our side win too, the
stunning victory by over 600 Unite
members at the homelessness charity St
Mungos Broadway beat off the bosses
attacks. A seven day strike, followed by the
threat of a ten day strike forced a retreat.
And a national strike by 800 Unite
members who work in the defence industry
has just seen an escalation to a four day
strike over pay which ends on Thursday.
But the scale of the resistance to the
Tories is much less than we need.

Thousands

Welsh NHS workers were set to strike on

10 November, but unions pulled the action.
In October union leaders suspended
local government strikes that were set to
involve hundreds of thousands of workers.
They did so on the basis of the repackaging
of a lousy 1 percent pay deal.
We cant afford to let our union leaders
back off from a fight. If we retreat then the
Tories will just keep coming for more.
And its no good waiting for Labour
to save us. They have signed up to Tory
spending plans and their 1 percent pay cap.
Milibands failure to connect with core

Plymouth radiographers on the picket line

Labour voters is so obvious that some
of the partys leading MPs want him to
be replaced as leader before the general
election! The Tories are in a mess too.
Camerons response to the growth of
UKIP and defections from his own party is
to turn up the rhetoric against migrants.

Rochester

With UKIP looking likely to win the

Rochester by-election, Mondays NHS
strike is even more important. Migrant
workers built our NHS, we have to unite
to defend it, and strikes are the best way to
do that.
The Tories and UKIP want us to blame
migrants for our economic problems. But
it isnt migrants that are cutting our pay or
closing our hospitals its the Tories and
the bosses.
Disgracefully Labour has gone along
with this divide and rule rubbish.
We need a united fightback to stop the
Tory attacks.
Thats why we need to get delegations
of trade unionists and campaigners along to
the NHS picket lines.

We should take collections for strikers

in every workplace and invite health
workers to speak at our meetings.
In Scotland and Wales where there
arent health strikers, we could follow the
example of Glasgow Unison members
who are planning to twin with hospitals
South of the border to raise support for the
action.
We have to argue that every union
should be fighting now to win better pay
for their members, and to beat off attacks
from the employers and the government.
As we saw on 10 July when 1.5 million
workers struck together over pay we are
stronger when we fight together.

Failing

We also need to raise the issue of political

representation. Labour is failing to lead
any real resistance to the Tories.
We need an alternative. At the next
general election the Trade Unionist and
Socialist Coalition will stand candidates
who will side with working class people.
We need a stronger more united left
wing challenge to austerity.

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