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is exploited to replace paid jobs and no bogus pretence is offered about gaining work-experience for jobs that are not there. 2. London buses drivers have been refused a 500 bonus for the extra work during the Olympics, and the Underground led by the RMT are getting such bonuses. For more than a year now Regional Secretary Peter Kavanagh has allowed the bus companies to impose temporary contracts on all new starters which abandon all the gains won back since the last disaster, the wage cutting and privatisation of 1993-4. New starters are paid up to 100 a week less that established drivers, all this without consultations with Unite and without a single word of protest from them on this effective derecognition of the union. The attitude was f*** the new drivers, look after yourself. But there will be 200 surplus drivers in Metroline alone by the end of the Olympics. Every bus driver knows that they will want to sack the 12 + an hour drivers and keep the 9.50 ones to win more routes. We all recognise diversions when we encounter them en route.

he General Secretary of Unite Len McCluskeys comment "the idea that the world should arrive in Lon-don and have these wonderful Olympic Games as though everything is nice and rosy in the garden is unthinkable" caused a terrible outcry from Tory leader David Cameron and Labour leader Ed Miliband. In fact he was only throwing a shape because: 1. The Right to Work and Youth Fight for Jobs have forced a partial climbdown from the government over workfare while he did nothing. McCluskey should have led the fight against workfare himself, having offered cheap union membership to the victims of the system here he should now be ensuring that every job is paid the union rate, no cheap or free labour

This action is part of the National Day of Action Against Workfare Saturday 3rd March 11.30 am outside BHS near Oxford Circus Take action against forced unpaid labourUK Uncut style! If you exploit us we will shut you down!

For more information write to: London Grass Roots Left, PO Box 59188, London NW2 9LJ

Well-known high street shops are taking part in a government scheme to force unemployed people to work for free or risk losing their benefits. Unemployed people are forced to work for several weeks in a shop, paid only their normal benefits (plus expenses). The government thinks this scheme is useful to get people into work because it gives them 'experience'. But the problem is not a lack of experience in the workforce, it is a lack of jobs. And by using unpaid labour, major high street shops don't have to employ more people, they can get the job centre to send workers for free! Despite the fact that some of these companies make millions of pounds a year in profits, they are getting workers paid for by the taxpayer. This scheme undermines the minimum wage, because The average hourly rate for 30 hours at McDonalds on this new scheme is around 2 an hour. All these companies should be hiring the unemployed, not making them work for free. How can you be unemployed yet working 30 hours a week? How can you be working a job where you are paid less than the minimum wage?

for: fighting the corner of working people in the world of politics. In the New Labour era, there were many Labour MPs who would have voted for the murder of the first-born if Blair had requested it; partly, that's because unions helped parachute lobby fodder into safe seats just be-cause the candidate happened to be a member. The working-class Parliamentarian is an endangered species, and it's up to unions to force an increasingly middleclass Parliamentary Labour Party to actually reflect modern Britain. We've seen the power of angry tweets and a few placards parked outside Tesco. The Government has been sent into a humiliating U-turn. With a bit of strategic nous, unions could break out of the marginalised fringes where they've long been confined and unite opposition to austerity. Frustration is rising: if the unions don't tap into it, then somebody else will.

But these TU bureaucrats will never fightback unless forced to by a rank and file movement from below. Grass Roots Left is a national group of Unite members that originated in Jerry Hicks challenge for Gen. Sec. of Unite in Dec. 2010. We fight against Owen Jones, author of Chavs: The De- bureaucracy and for rank and file monization of the Working Class says, control of the union. We aim to replace the sell-out McCluskeys with And it's up to trade unions to force fighting TU leaders. Labour to do the job it was founded
For more information write to: London Grass Roots Left, PO Box 59188, London NW2 9LJ