Communist Party industrial organiser Andy Bain has welcomed recent statements by trade union leaders who want to build a united mass movement against Tory government and big business policies.
‘We face a growing cost of living crisis, one for which the ruling class has been preparing with new laws designed to divide us and restrict protest’, he told the party’s Political Committee on Tuesday evening (June 14).
‘They are, however, divided on whether Johnson is a liability, on the Irish border question and on the balance between neoliberal and interventionist economics – but they will unite against workers who challenge them’, he added.
Mr Bain urged not only a massive turnout for Saturday’s ‘We Demand Better’ demonstration in London called by the TUC, but for a range of trade union and campaigning bodies to escalate the fight-back in the period to follow.
‘We need unions, trade councils, the People’s Assembly, Labour Party organisations, women’s and pensioners’ campaigns, health service and housing activists, student unions and others to agree an action programme up to the next General Election’, he proposed.
The former trade union president said the movement around such a programme could grow rapidly at local as well as national level, with councils of action formed to prepare the ground for coordinated action across Britain.
‘Workers in health, education, the Royal Mail and the civil service face deep cuts as millions of people face a cost of living crisis’, he pointed out, ‘yet the Tory government promotes more outsourcing and privatisation while public opinion favours the renationalisation of energy, the railways and the postal service’.
Britain’s Communists reaffirmed their support for a determined effort by non-aligned governments and the UN to broker a ceasefire in the Ukraine War.
‘This is the only path to a permanent settlement that respects both Ukrainian sovereignty and Russia’s legitimate security concerns in the face of NATO’s aggressive expansion’, CP general secretary Robert Griffiths commented after Tuesday’s meeting.