Unlocking the potential of trade unions for working people

TULF submission to the Right2Water

Overcoming common misunderstandings about trade unions There are some common misunderstandings about unions that fall wide of the mark and lead to a lot of confusion; and some of this comes from within the movement itself and is given life by some unions’ language and actions. For example, a union is an insurance policy for workers when something goes wrong at work; it’s a professional representative body; it’s an interest group . . . These are all common answers to the question “What are trade unions?” but none are right. Trade unions are the collective and pooled effort and resources of working […]

TULF May Day Statement – Solidarity is alive in our class

TULF submission to the Right2Water

The Trade Union Left Forum encourages union members and workers to join the Dublin Council of Trade Unions May Day rally. The annual May Day parade will take place on Sunday May 1st, assembling at 2.30 pm at the Garden of Remembrance and from there going to Liberty Hall/Beresford Place. Working class consciousness and militancy is growing in Ireland. Our class is on the verge of a win on resisting the commodification of water through water charges and the maintenance of public ownership of this important resource and utility. We have got to this point through communities, unions and workers […]

Rejecting the slurs and seizing the moment

In recent weeks we have seen a concerted and co-ordinated effort by the Government, the Gardaí and the media to paint protesters as dangerous and violent, with an agenda of manipulating communities into confrontation for the sake of confrontation. This is a deliberate and outrageous misrepresentation of protesters and communities that are opposing Irish Water, the installation of meters, and water charges more generally. It is insulting to our class and shows the contempt in which the establishment hold us. Reports of violence against Irish Water employees and gardaí are spun and widely commented on without a shred of evidence. […]

What kind of movement do we want?

WFTU present at the 39th Congress of FNIC – CGT in France The WFTU participated in the 39th Congress of the FNIC – CGT Federation in France and was represented by its General Secretary, George Mavrikos, who delivered the following speech. Dear comrades, On behalf of the World Federation of Trade Unions, we salute the workers of the chemical Industry Sector in France, the members and cadres of FNIC. We convey a comradely, militant greeting to the Working Class and all the Workers in France. The Working Class of France has played in the past an important role in the […]

Solidarity – More Than Just Support

What is solidarity? The dictionary definition online said “mutual support within a group”. Not very dramatic, rousing, or uplifting I agree. But it is still one of the most important, yet sadly underused, tools of the trade union movement. A prime example of the need for solidarity is what was happening in Ireland coming up to the Christmas period, regarding the media portrayal of the ESB workers and their then-threatened strike action. They were being labelled as “selfish”, “greedy”, “holding the country to ransom”, just because they were standing up and fighting for their rights to reclaim the pension deficit […]

Links

Below is a selection of links and online resources which may be of interest. Magazines Trade Union Papers Radical Left Labour Resources Solidarity