uniteWORKS Comment
NEWS in pictures LANDWORKER CENTENARY/TOLPUDDLE RALLY
CORBYN PRAISES LANDWORKER
Len McCluskey General Secretary
Inspired? Make sure you’re heard One thing that can be said about Unite members for sure is that they don’t take things lying down. If they come across an injustice, they’ll take it on. More often than not they will win too.
Every battle, and every victory, fills me with pride because every effort to combat a bad employer or a harmful policy reminds me that this union’s heart beats strongly.
No more so today than in the shipyards of Belfast and on the streets of Lincolnshire where the men and women of this union are fighting for what is right.
At Harland and Wolff, Unite members are working night and day to give their historic shipyard a future. It is of course shameful that it is being left to the workers alone to make the case, embarrassing the political class into taking notice, but they have their community, and their union, them every step of the way.
So too with the health visitors in Lincolnshire. Sick to the back teeth of being holding together a crumbling service, he straw that broke the camel’s back was the cut of up to £3,000 from the annual salary – and then demoted to more junior roles. The only option for this dedicated workforce was to join the swelling ranks of mistreated health workers across the country.
Both stories tell us much about our nation today. The decades’ long political mismanagement of our manufacturing realm is a scandal. Successive governments have been incapable – and unwilling – to nurture our skills and resources, to invest in our people and communities. And of course they confirm again that austerity was nothing other than a massive swindle bringing misery and insecurity to everything it touched.
Comedian Alexei Sayle, a fellow Scouser, nailed it when he said that austerity was sold to the country on the basis that the global crash occurred because there were too many libraries in Wolverhampton. It is a cynical, nasty policy with us now for nine years but unless we change our government, it will hang around for a whole lot longer.
If you are inspired by the fight of our members, if you are dedicated to a better fairer country for our people, take the first step towards change. Register to vote – check our backpage ad. Don’t be hacked off – be heard.
uniteWORKS’ sister publication, Landworker, celebrated the launch of its Centenary celebrations at this year’s annual Tolpuddle march and rally in July. Landworker is available to our agricultural and rural members, now part of the food, drink and agriculture sector. Landworker is widely believed to be the oldest trade union journal still in circulation.
Pictured below Tolpuddle farm worker John Burbidge told the story of his life in farming and in the union as the rapt audience all wore special Landworker Centenary t-shirts. Behind him is an exhibition, The everlasting thread, currently on show at the Burston Strike School Museum in Norfolk.
Below right, Jeremy Corbyn paid homage to the publication’s long history, saying he remembered seeing the magazine as a young man and praising its “important” role in providing a voice for rural workers.
The Labour leader added that the Conservatives do not represent the interests of rural communities, warning that Tory threats to leave the EU without a deal will cause “devastation” for the agricultural sector.
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uniteWORKS No:33 Published by Unite the union, 128 Theobalds Road, London, WC1X 8TN. Phone 0207 611 2500. Editor – Amanda Campbell Magazine enquiries to the editor, by post, phone, or email
uniteworks@unitetheunion.org Distribution enquiries contact your regional office Available in alternative formats from Taylor Humphris 020 3371 2557
4 uniteWORKS Autumn 2019
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