Build a Rank and File Movement in the CWU

[goinpostal]

The events of the last month, which have weakened the strike, show that we need a rank and file movement in the CWU imo. This article explains it well:

Build a Rank and File Movement
WP Postal Workers Bulletin 12 • June 2007 CWU Conference
http://www.workerspower.com/index.php?cwu_union

Accepting cuts in exchange for a token pay boosts with no-strike clauses (March 2006 Efficiency Agreement)... Dropping ballots for a crap below-inflation pay deal (last year's dispute)... Lobbying Labour and MPs instead of building strikes and a mass movement against privatisation since 2000... Why do our officials behave like this?

Union leaders aren't simply “badâ€

[Wild Cat]

You do not represent the workers in the CWU.

You are interested in creating the B.S.S.R(The British Soviet Socialist Republic).

You are only interested in shoving P.C crap down our throats and trying to remove our National Identity in favour of your left wing extremism.

We are slaves of capitalism at the moment and you would simply make us slaves of the government.

Be careful people as they are communists trying to hijack our struggle to gain political advantage which is what put the tories in power in 1979.

Keep your politics off our forum this is for workers to genuinely improve their working conditions and not for the likes of you and your marxist friends.

[IWW Fellow Worker]

This sounds a bit like the 'Broad Left' organisation which sprang up during the days of Alan Tuffin in the early 80s. If I remember correctly, the then UCW threatened to throw people out of the union for becoming involved with it. Personally, I think there is a need for an organisation within the CWU which will take on the bureacrats and speak for the ordinary member. The last thing we need is for such a movement to become just another recruitment drive for a political party. What we need is something within the CWU which unites the rank and file members whether they are socialist, anarchist, syndicalist or communist and puts aside factional interest. I wouldn't be interested in such an organisation being used to build a new workers party though. That must be something for members of left-wing parties to decide on amongst themselves. As for the rest of the article, it sounds alright to me. I'm all for the workers taking the initiative and not leaving it to those with an interest in maintaining the present state of things

[L Tommo]

Wot if someone is Right wing and in the CWU????

They have as much right to speak up as the next!!!!



OUT

[IWW Fellow Worker]

Wot if someone is Right wing and in the CWU????

They have as much right to speak up as the next!!!!



OUT

Whould they agree with the aims of the CWU though Tommo?

[goinpostal]

This sounds a bit like the 'Broad Left' organisation which sprang up during the days of Alan Tuffin in the early 80s. If I remember correctly, the then UCW threatened to throw people out of the union for becoming involved with it. Personally, I think there is a need for an organisation within the CWU which will take on the bureacrats and speak for the ordinary member. The last thing we need is for such a movement to become just another recruitment drive for a political party. What we need is something within the CWU which unites the rank and file members whether they are socialist, anarchist, syndicalist or communist and puts aside factional interest. I wouldn't be interested in such an organisation being used to build a new workers party though. That must be something for members of left-wing parties to decide on amongst themselves. As for the rest of the article, it sounds alright to me. I'm all for the workers taking the initiative and not leaving it to those with an interest in maintaining the present state of things

Agreed. The problem with the broad lefts is that they based themselves on unaccountable left wing leaders and weren't very democratic in many cases. If it is democratic it will not be a recruitment drive but a genuine rank and file organisation, though of course different strands would probably have different tactics to put forward, so you have a debate and vote. Don't think unions are enough though, we need a party too.

If you've got a better idea Wild cat, would love to hear it. Many people seem to agree that the current state of affairs isnt working - suspending the strike for talks, offering further talks when RM says their going to impose change anyways, not preparing for Sept. 17.

Mass struggles would make people see that workers make everything in society and should therefore run it instead of billionaires - the rule of the producers not the parasites.

Any postal worker who stands for the workers - all of them - should have a voice on this forum, unless imo like the BNP they want to divide workers.

[Wild Cat]

If the workers run the economy they then become the establishment the bureaucracy what ever you want to call it.

The entrepreneurs and the risk takers are the people who create wealth with the help of the workers,they have the ideas and creativity and we implement their ideas and add our own creativity as well.

Our job is to make sure that we gain our fair share from the overall prosperity that both parties create the problem at the moment is that the bosses want it all for themselves and don't care about us.

We have to make them see that we will not stand idly by whilst they use such practices as paying immigrant workers peanuts and throwing local workers onto the dole.

There will always be a struggle between the workers and the bosses however it doesn't mean we have to overthrow the political system to achieve our goals.

[IWW Fellow Worker]

If the workers run the economy they then become the establishment the bureaucracy what ever you want to call it.

The entrepreneurs and the risk takers are the people who create wealth with the help of the workers,they have the ideas and creativity and we implement their ideas and add our own creativity as well.

Our job is to make sure that we gain our fair share from the overall prosperity that both parties create the problem at the moment is that the bosses want it all for themselves and don't care about us.

We have to make them see that we will not stand idly by whilst they use such practices as paying immigrant workers peanuts and throwing local workers onto the dole.

There will always be a struggle between the workers and the bosses however it doesn't mean we have to overthrow the political system to achieve our goals.

Don't you think the workers are capable of coming up with ideas or of being creative? I think they do. I think it was Albert Meltzer who said the working class is the only revolutionary class because it is the only class which has no need to exploit other people.

[Spartacus]

The events of the last month, which have weakened the strike, show that we need a rank and file movement in the CWU imo. This article explains it well:

Build a Rank and File Movement
WP Postal Workers Bulletin 12 • June 2007 CWU Conference
http://www.workerspower.com/index.php?cwu_union

Accepting cuts in exchange for a token pay boosts with no-strike clauses (March 2006 Efficiency Agreement)... Dropping ballots for a crap below-inflation pay deal (last year's dispute)... Lobbying Labour and MPs instead of building strikes and a mass movement against privatisation since 2000... Why do our officials behave like this?

Union leaders aren't simply “bad” people. Most genuinely want to better their members' lives. But they will only do this within the limits set by capitalism. Hence, Billy Hayes and Dave Ward accept that the market means efficiency savings, i.e. job cuts and casualisation. What they should say is “The market is your problem, we're not accepting these cuts.”

There is a bureaucracy within the CWU, and in every union in Britain. Officials have made their peace with capitalism, and the last thing they want is pesky rank and file members upsetting the apple cart. “Normal” industrial relations are what count, even if the resulting deal will mean some members lose their livelihood. Left wing or right, union tops earn far more than their members and have a comfortable office existence. Even ordinary full-time officials don't face the increased workload and daily pressure from managers we do. When our jobs go, the officials will still have theirs. Their interests are not the same as the members'.

Organise the militant minority

To overcome the dead hand of the bureaucracy in the CWU - and at the helm in every union - we need a democratic organisation of activists that can spread the news of strikes, organise solidarity to defend them and extend the action. Such an organisation would be open to all members, who agreed to fight for its policies, which would be decided in meetings and conferences. Elected leaders, and officials who wanted the organisation's support, would have to fight for its agreed policies, accept the average wage of the workers they represent, and agree to be recallable.

This is not pie-in-the-sky. Such movements have existed before, such as the Militant Minority Movement of the 1920s that led a revival of the unions and militant struggles, leading up to the great General Strike of 1926. The shop stewards movements of the 1960s and 70s, which saw the unions top 13 million, over twice the size they are today. The decline of shop-floor democracy- in favour of control by full time officials - led to series of disastrous defeats in the 1980s and the fatal weakening of the unions in the private sector.

The key principle of such a movement is independence from the bureaucracy: with them when they fight for what workers needs; without them when they don't. The goal would be to eventually dissolve the bureaucracy altogether and transform the CWU into a democratic, class struggle trade union, with officials paid the same wage as their members, regularly returning to work, and removable if they failed to do what their members told them to do.

If we don't build such a movement, then, every time a wildcat strike happens, it will be isolated. Whenever we need a strike we will have to wait on the leaders to do something. Action will be too little, too late, achieving far less than was possible. In the context of competition and Royal Mail's plan for massive cuts, leaving the struggle to the initiative at the top will prove disastrous.

There is tremendous scope for a rank and file movement in the CWU today. A layer of militants and strong branches exists across the CWU able to take unofficial action or spread it. We need to found a formal organisation across the union not just to organise the left but to draw in wider layers of workers, angry at the attacks by Labour and Royal Mail.

What policies?

Our immediate goal should a national strike against the cuts. But a rank and file movement needs to have a bigger political strategy too. We should aim to split from Labour and campaign for a new workers party. We should fight for the transformation of the entire sector we work in, nationalising the private postal operators, without compensation, and placing the communications sector - post, telecoms, and internet - under the control of the working class, running it for need not profit.

The bureaucracy limits the trade union struggle to what is acceptable to capitalism. A rank and file movement should set its goal as the overthrow of capitalism and the establishment of a new socialist society.

WP Postal Workers Bulletin 12 contents:
• Why we need to strike
• A big deal with Royal Mail is pie in the sky
• Unite the public sector strikes!
• Break from Labour: For a New Workers Party!
• Solidarity with the G8 Protests
• An Action Programme for the Post
• Build a Rank and File Movement
• The CWU Left

Coalitions like this will never work due to the sectarian nature of the left.

I agree with many of your points, but, what you really want is for you and your party to control the union and not the workers who you claim to represent

[Wild Cat]

If the workers run the economy they then become the establishment the bureaucracy what ever you want to call it.

The entrepreneurs and the risk takers are the people who create wealth with the help of the workers,they have the ideas and creativity and we implement their ideas and add our own creativity as well.

Our job is to make sure that we gain our fair share from the overall prosperity that both parties create the problem at the moment is that the bosses want it all for themselves and don't care about us.

We have to make them see that we will not stand idly by whilst they use such practices as paying immigrant workers peanuts and throwing local workers onto the dole.

There will always be a struggle between the workers and the bosses however it doesn't mean we have to overthrow the political system to achieve our goals.

Don't you think the workers are capable of coming up with ideas or of being creative? I think they do. I think it was Albert Meltzer who said the working class is the only revolutionary class because it is the only class which has no need to exploit other people.

Yes I do think the workers are capable of coming up with ideas and many of them do start their own businesses.

However if you have a communist style system they will have no motivation to be creative,as they will still only earn the same wages as those that don't bother to make the effort.

Think of Richard Branson,if he could only have earned the same money as an average worker would he have bothered starting up all those companies?

We can improve our pay and conditions and still allow people to become millionaires. There is no point stifling peoples creative ability by taking away their financial motivation.

However they must not be financially motivated to be creative at the expense of the workers,as we must reap the rewards of their success as well,which is what we are failing to do now.

I believe a large amount of the blame for our failure to achieve decent pay and conditions lies within ourselves,as we have succumb to decades of mind numbing propaganda and brainwashing by the media and government and no longer believe in ourselves any more,and therefore have given up the fight.

An example being young people today seem to care more about big brother,drink, drugs,celebs,play stations and football more than they do fighting for their jobs.

The average person in my office could tell you exactly how much Beckham earns a week,but when asked how much they earn probably don't know.

People will have to remove themselves from the media dumbing down before anything can be achieved.

[goinpostal]

How can it be controlled by a single party if it is convened by branches and bases itself on democracy, elections etc? What is the alternative, leaving things in the hands of a bureaucratic leadership that already supports a party - the Labour Party?

Wildcat, both the main stream parties are in the pocket of the billionaires, and both are in favour of looting the public services our taxes pay for with privatisation etc. That's why we should all be supporting the national demo against cuts in the NHS on Nov. 3 and unite the public sector strikes. The way to stop the bosses abusing immigrant workers is to unionise them. 1000s of migrant workers from poland africa etc have joined unions in the last couple of years. Unite and fight!

[goinpostal]

If tThink of Richard Branson,if he could only have earned the same money as an average worker would he have bothered starting up all those companies?

We can improve our pay and conditions and still allow people to become millionaires. There is no point stifling peoples creative ability by taking away their financial motivation.

Branson's workers produced his wealth, not him. How could a single person produce "billions" in wealth?!

If you have great concentrations of wealth then inevitably you have great concentrations of power, making a mockery of democracy. After all who owns the media? Or is Rupert Murdoch's biggest power his single vote like you or me? No its his bilions and his control of the media.

A survey found that a third of Britain’s top companies – 220 in total – pay no tax whatsoever! Sure they are responsible for "wealth creation" - wealth for themselves off our backs and sweat.

Socialism means a workers' democracy and publicly owned industries, capitalism is the opposite, a toothless parliament and society run for the profit of a few while billions get poorer. Its a bosses' paradise.

[IWW Fellow Worker]

If the workers run the economy they then become the establishment the bureaucracy what ever you want to call it.

The entrepreneurs and the risk takers are the people who create wealth with the help of the workers,they have the ideas and creativity and we implement their ideas and add our own creativity as well.

Our job is to make sure that we gain our fair share from the overall prosperity that both parties create the problem at the moment is that the bosses want it all for themselves and don't care about us.

We have to make them see that we will not stand idly by whilst they use such practices as paying immigrant workers peanuts and throwing local workers onto the dole.

There will always be a struggle between the workers and the bosses however it doesn't mean we have to overthrow the political system to achieve our goals.

Don't you think the workers are capable of coming up with ideas or of being creative? I think they do. I think it was Albert Meltzer who said the working class is the only revolutionary class because it is the only class which has no need to exploit other people.

Yes I do think the workers are capable of coming up with ideas and many of them do start their own businesses.

However if you have a communist style system they will have no motivation to be creative,as they will still only earn the same wages as those that don't bother to make the effort.

Think of Richard Branson,if he could only have earned the same money as an average worker would he have bothered starting up all those companies?

We can improve our pay and conditions and still allow people to become millionaires. There is no point stifling peoples creative ability by taking away their financial motivation.

However they must not be financially motivated to be creative at the expense of the workers,as we must reap the rewards of their success as well,which is what we are failing to do now.

I believe a large amount of the blame for our failure to achieve decent pay and conditions lies within ourselves,as we have succumb to decades of mind numbing propaganda and brainwashing by the media and government and no longer believe in ourselves any more,and therefore have given up the fight.

An example being young people today seem to care more about big brother,drink, drugs,celebs,play stations and football more than they do fighting for their jobs.

The average person in my office could tell you exactly how much Beckham earns a week,but when asked how much they earn probably don't know.

People will have to remove themselves from the media dumbing down before anything can be achieved.

I agree with some of the things you say, but the capitalist system stifles the creativity of the working class. Every one of us can look around us and see things which could be improved inside and outside the workplace. Why should any of us bother to come up with ideas to make the job more efficient when all we would be doing would be lining the pockets of the rich? There is no form of socialism that I am aware of which thinks kids hanging about on street corners drinking or using drugs as a means of escape is a good thing, but capitalism actively encourages this sort of behaviour. It welcomes it because it keeps people from thinking about their lives and how better things could really be if society was run for the benefit of everyone and not just a handful of grabbers and parasites.

[Wild Cat]

How can it be controlled by a single party if it is convened by branches and bases itself on democracy, elections etc? What is the alternative, leaving things in the hands of a bureaucratic leadership that already supports a party - the Labour Party?

Wildcat, both the main stream parties are in the pocket of the billionaires, and both are in favour of looting the public services our taxes pay for with privatisation etc. That's why we should all be supporting the national demo against cuts in the NHS on Nov. 3 and unite the public sector strikes. The way to stop the bosses abusing immigrant workers is to unionise them. 1000s of migrant workers from poland africa etc have joined unions in the last couple of years. Unite and fight!

There you are just showing your middle class arrogance.

[Spartacus]

How can it be controlled by a single party if it is convened by branches and bases itself on democracy, elections etc? What is the alternative, leaving things in the hands of a bureaucratic leadership that already supports a party - the Labour Party?

Wildcat, both the main stream parties are in the pocket of the billionaires, and both are in favour of looting the public services our taxes pay for with privatisation etc. That's why we should all be supporting the national demo against cuts in the NHS on Nov. 3 and unite the public sector strikes. The way to stop the bosses abusing immigrant workers is to unionise them. 1000s of migrant workers from poland africa etc have joined unions in the last couple of years. Unite and fight!

There you are just showing your middle class arrogance.

I have watched as the bosses and the labour government have let hundreds of thousands of immigrants legal and illegal flood into this country whilst the local population is being pushed aside.

The local population were not given any say in whether or not they wanted mass immigration.

The majority of people in this country do not want continued mass immigration.

I have nothing against a limited amount of immigration and it is welcome,however I object to some patronising middle class twat telling me that the local neighbourhood where I grew up being swamped by people that have a totally alien language and culture(actually several different languages and cultures) is good for me as I and others are fining out pretty quickly that it is not.I don't care if they are unionised or not it still doesn't change the fact that in large parts of inner cities the local population is being displaced.

The point you made about the mainstream parties in the pockets of the billionaires brings me back to a previous point I made.

The fact that the media have played such a big part in dumbing people down over the last 30 years has allowed this situation to occur.(the point I made about football etc)
It is only because workers and the public are not acting against what the government and big business are doing that they are getting away with it.

I have watched a miniature version of this going on in my own office where a corrupt union official in bed with the management has allowed them to massively gain the upper hand.

All it took was a few people to expose what was going on and to get everyone and I mean everyone on board and the situation was quickly turned around.

The media dumbing and mass immigration have created a situation of confusion and chaos which the bosses have exploited for all its worth.

That is why I say an end to mass immigration now and lets rebuild and focus our attack and gain the conditions back we have lost.

Yer true colours are showing now aren't they, I fail to see any link with building a rank and file movement and immigration, perhaps you can enlighten me.