PRESIDENT’S COLUMN

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: november/december 2012 :: RMTnews 27 LEARNING FROM HISTORY Today workers face deep cuts, blatant tax- dodging and profiteering by the same private companies that complain the government is not ‘stimulating’ the economy. Richard Branson vociferously opposes renationalisation of West Coast Trains, demanding another 15 years of state- guaranteed, bumper profits, saying: "If the government can't run a [franchise bidding] process, then it'll be even more difficult to run a railway." He didn’t say that when ‘Virgin Care’ won a five-year contract last March to run seven NHS hospitals in Surrey and other community services in a bumper £650m deal. The same government that signs NHS privatisation contracts and wastes £100 million on an ideological rail franchising casino, is committed to cuts in public spending equivalent to £81 billion before the next general election in May 2015. In this crisis unemployment, 'outsourcing' and precarious, casual work are all being used in a deliberate and concerted strategy by employers to reduce wage costs, in a desperate and vain attempt to restore economic growth to their global capitalist system. And yet the catastrophic austerity policies prescribed by the European Union and loyally carried out by Cameron, Osborne, Clegg and Cable as ‘good Europeans’, is a case of history repeating itself. Following the First World War, the Liberal- Tory coalition government’s programme of spending cuts was known as the ‘Geddes Axe’ after businessman, Sir Eric Geddes was appointed to a Committee on National Expenditure. Railworkers who had formed a new industrial union, the National Union of Railwaymen (NUR) in 1913, won the first round in the war on jobs and wages. In eleven days of strike action in 1919, NUR members showed unswerving loyalty to their union’s principled stand against austerity. Prime minister Lloyd George denounced the strike as an ‘this anarchist conspiracy’ and sent troops and ‘volunteers’ to scab on the strikers. When his government capitulated by scrapping wage cuts, the rail unions won national conditions of service and statutory recognition and NUR executive committee members sang the ‘Red Flag’ in 10 Downing Street. Over the next decade an insidious political strategy promoted the false idea that capitalists and workers had common interests and should collaborate to run the economy to ensure companies remained profitable. The TUC and Labour Party leaders (including NUR general secretary Jimmy Thomas, MP) who proposed this, the 1926 general strike and ended by forming a coalition with Tories and Liberals to form the most reactionary government in a generation in 1931, while mass unemployment soared and fascism took hold of much of Eur ope. It took another world war to defeat fascism and force nationalisation of railways and other strategic industries, including the creation of the NHS. RMT has published ‘Unity is Strength’, a short and beautifully illustrated pamphlet explaining how the NUR was built and why its history contains important lessons for workers today. It is available free to RMT members see page 35. The 2013 centenary of the founding of the NUR will be a source of great pride for RMT members, railworkers and all fighting trade unionists today. The NUR blazed the trail for industrial trade unionism in Britain and brought about railway nationalisation from 1948. I am very proud that today RMT is building the legacy of industrial trade unionism, demanding renationalisation and leading the call for a general strike to defeat austerity policies that no one voted for. Allow me to conclude my final column as your president by thanking all members, representatives and officers for their hard work and inspiration in defending our members’ interests. It has been an honour to serve you. I wish you all a happy New Year and look forward to seeing some of fighting for what is right in 2013. Solidarity Forever! Alex Gordon President’s column This is not an exhaustive list and hopefully by circulating it signallers or COSS’s they will be able to provide us with any other issues as well as examples which we vitally need. The other main issue that signaler’s are concerned with is granting a block with a train in section. A few irregularities have revolved around this and work is in practice. However there are still many examples and practices that you do that we do now know of and it is no good just complaining to each other, we need you to contact us. I know that for many of you these issues have been raised before and sometimes nothing has been done. Signallers report that sometimes even their SSM’s are reluctant to report issues as they have done so many times before. Whatever has been reported before please don’t be put off reporting it now. Apathy will not help us resolve this issue but actions will. We signallers protect the safety of people on the ground and we owe it to them to report issues that affect safety and always keep them safe. Health and safety is not an additional cost, we should operate safely at all times. I cannot help change things for the better for all of us unless you let us know the problems and give us examples. We need to find root and common causes to reduce risks and workloads so send us an email. It won’t take long but it could be the piece of information that is the catalyst which changes a lot. I just need a few minutes of your time and it may be all I need to help improve your week of nights! The more effort we can put in now the more risk we remove for everyone and thus we reduce how many signallers may end up getting disciplined, but more importantly we try and stop someone getting hurt. Please send any details to p.clyndes@rmt.org.uk or a.yates@rmt.org.uk