Green Party Supprt.

[IWW Fellow Worker]

He're a letter of support from the Green Party as published in 'Weekly Worker' (27/9/07) newspaper of the CPGB.


Support CWU


We should all support the Communication Workers Union action against the post office. The significance of this fight cannot be underestimated. What is often forgotten is that the dispute is a product of neoliberal globalisation - in short the strategy of forcing the market onto every area of society. In a decision ignored by the media, the European commission has forced postal services in every EU country to open up to competition.

Multinationals are cherry-picking the easiest mail runs and driving postal services into the ground. The post office has to make a profit to compete, which has meant huge cuts in the service. Remember when there used to be two deliveries a day, when you didn’t need different stamps for different shaped letters? And now Sunday services are going out of the window.

Post office workers are threatened with job cuts and their pensions are at risk and they will be made to jump through all sorts of hoops to reduce costs. More junk mail, fewer post offices - it’s all about profit and we all have to support the fight for a public service. The recent RMT action shows that unions can fight for workers’ rights in the face of privatisation and deregulation, but wider solidarity is vital.

Derek Wall
Principal speaker, Green Party

[strangler]

He're a letter of support from the Green Party as published in 'Weekly Worker' (27/9/07) newspaper of the CPGB.


Support CWU


We should all support the Communication Workers Union action against the post office. The significance of this fight cannot be underestimated. What is often forgotten is that the dispute is a product of neoliberal globalisation - in short the strategy of forcing the market onto every area of society. In a decision ignored by the media, the European commission has forced postal services in every EU country to open up to competition.

Multinationals are cherry-picking the easiest mail runs and driving postal services into the ground. The post office has to make a profit to compete, which has meant huge cuts in the service. Remember when there used to be two deliveries a day, when you didn’t need different stamps for different shaped letters? And now Sunday services are going out of the window.

Post office workers are threatened with job cuts and their pensions are at risk and they will be made to jump through all sorts of hoops to reduce costs. More junk mail, fewer post offices - it’s all about profit and we all have to support the fight for a public service. The recent RMT action shows that unions can fight for workers’ rights in the face of privatisation and deregulation, but wider solidarity is vital.

Derek Wall
Principal speaker, Green Party

Interesting. With the present lack of any political party worth voting for, this might be enough to sway me. Problem is, I`m not at all convinced by a lot of the arguments re climate change. There are a lot of people making a lot of money out of the whole thing, it`s a big industry now with all sorts jumping on the bandwagon.

[IWW Fellow Worker]

Interesting. With the present lack of any political party worth voting for, this might be enough to sway me. Problem is, I`m not at all convinced by a lot of the arguments re climate change. There are a lot of people making a lot of money out of the whole thing, it`s a big industry now with all sorts jumping on the bandwagon.

It's certainly more support than the party Billy Hayes is willing to throw cartloads of cash at. But I think we all know why there union bosses support Labour, and it isn't that Labour are about to start looking after the interests of the working man or woman all of a sudden.

[goinpostal]

that guy is a leftie, will be interesting to see if it is the green's position or if stuff kicks off like wildcats what they would say. Still dont think they will consistently represent workers' needs or interests becaue they are also based on small businesses, green "Lords". so they have to represent them too in other words minimum wage cant be set too high, strikes cant be too militant and so on.

[Big Daz]

Derek Wall Supports Post Office Action
29th Jun 2007


Today Green Party Principal Speaker, Dr Derek Wall offered his support to postal workers as they began action to combat post office closures, redundancies and pay cuts.

Dr Wall comments:

"Todays strike has been caused by effective privatisation of the Post Office. Deregulation forced on our postal services means that the Post Office has to make a profit, this means post office closures, redundancies and pressure to cut pay.

"Action to defend pay and services is in the interest of all post office users - deregulation means that private companies will cherry-pick revenue-generating parts of the service and cheap, universal postal delivery will be under threat. Saturday deliveries are already threatened.

"Postal workers deserve to be paid properly for doing essential work and consumers deserve a cheap and efficient service. Yet Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Ming Campbell all want a deregulated service.

"I think the post man or women fulfils a more useful role than the private equity billionaire, this is why I am supporting their action today."

[Big Daz]

Union chief to address Green Party conference
12th Mar 2002

Historic first - and won't be the last, say Greens as they lay claim to space on Left


"Labour offers Tory policies for a corporate Britain. The LibDems offer bland rhetoric. The Greens offer unions by far the best deal."

Billy Hayes, leader of the Communication Workers Union, will become the first union leader ever to address the full Green Party conference this Friday in Scarborough.

And the Greens hope he won't be the last, as they firm up their policy against Private Finance Initiatives and begin discussing broad-based campaigning to protect public services.

Green Party Principal Speaker Margaret Wright comments: "The Green Party has far more to offer the unions and their members than any other party.

"We offer social ownership of public utilities.

"We want to renationalise the railways.

"We want the Thatcherite anti-union laws repealed and a fresh deal on workers' rights."

And on employment she added: "Green policies of restoring public services, and of massive investment in public transport and in the green sunrise industries, offer the best possible guarantee of sustainable jobs."

PFI "loan sharks"

At their Scarborough conference the Greens will firm-up their policy against Private Finance Initiatives - which current Green Party campaigning literature describes as "like going to a loan shark" - and will debate ways of campaigning to defend public services against the Blairite centre-right agenda of creating a country for the corporations.

Long-term partnership with unions?

The Green Party's leadership is discussing ways of getting its message across to union members and others disillusioned by New Labour's metamorphosis into yet another neoliberal party like the Tories and LibDems.

Margaret Wright comments: "We already have the policies which many disillusisoned ex-Labour supporters are looking for. A high proportion of our new members are former Labour supporters. We pick up support merely by getting our message across, because our policies are increasingly popular with the public."

The Greens also warn trade unions against the seductive rhetoric of the Liberal Democrats at their current conference. Margaret Wright concludes: "The unions should be warned that the LibDems are gung-ho in favour of privatisation.

"As with their environment policy, the LibDems are big on rhetoric and small on content."

1. See Best of Both Worlds: Green policies for job-creation and sustainability at www.greenparty.org.uk/reports . 2. Exhaustive analysis of opinion polls on policy issues shows that the Green Party's policies are overall far more popular than those of Labour or the Tories - although most people don't know enough about Green Party policies to realise this. See Green Party: The Strongest Link at www.greenparty.org.uk/reports.

[Big Daz]

It seems to me its the greens vs SWP for our vote.

[F0zziebear]

The Greens talk about reducing waste and environmental issues. Surely they are contradicting their own policies.

They would want to scrap things like D2D and ideally as much Direct Mail as possible, the same stuff that pays your wages.

Don't get me wrong, they say some pretty important stuff from the fringes, but their maths doesn't add up

[BELIAL]

Or Postcomm could set a far higher tariff for junk mail. This effetively green tax would reduce the volume of junk mail yet maintain revenues. It would encourage companies to target thier mailings more efficiently thereby improving the cost/response ratio. everyones happy, less waste more revenue more profit.

[mdtomuk]

I'M PROUD TO BE LEFTIE!

[kinmad4it]

The Green party are the only party that I'd even consider giving my vote to. They're the only ones that seem to acknowledge the importance of tackling climate change or global warming whichever way it's described.

[goinpostal]

there are real contradictions between the environment and our jobs. During the miners the slogan was "coal not dole" when coal burning creates loads of pollution. Same with our jobs, lets face it 80% or more of what we deliver is junk or could be done by email. We should argue for conversion of the industry with training and new jobs on trade union wages. For instance why not save all the post offices (expand them even) as multi-media hubs with safe internet etc like the CWU put forward?

Its the same argument as machinery, rather than smashing them up like luddites we should argue that workers and consumers not bosses and city shareholders benefit from machinery by shorter working week (without loss of pay) and lower costs of post. Leighton and crozier want to capture the benefits for profits and restructuring royal mail, and the tories wanted to shift away from coal to smash the miners. But workers organisations should put forward their own plans for transforming industries and fight for workers' and users' control.

In terms of the Greens they are like the Lib Dems, a cross class party that wants to be all things to all sections of society. but unfortunately workers, small business people, middle classes, and big business all pull in different directions so a party that tries to square the circle, with keeping capitalism going as its main focus, just ends up selling us short at some point. When you add in the fact that they make the environment into their main obsession, then that is even more true. They will tell us what we want to hear no doubt, in Germany where greens got elected they are in the forefront of privatisation. Same is true here in Leeds where a tory-libdem-green coalition is privatising council housing, schools, hospitals etc!

Really they are just a smaller version of the lib dems dressed up in green clothing.

Nope nothing short of a total break with the bankrupt parties and the unions devloping a new workers party that fights consistently for our interests will do. Lets build something that will last, not just jump on board another bandwagon driven by politicians not really having our interests at heart.

Why are unions funding Brown’s turn to bosses?
http://www.workerspower.com/index.php?i ... 07,0,0,1,0

[IWW Fellow Worker]

Its the same argument as machinery, rather than smashing them up like luddites we should argue that workers and consumers not bosses and city shareholders benefit from machinery by shorter working week (without loss of pay)

When the Luddites smashed the looms, they were arguing for the same things as you mention there. It's a myth perpetuated by capitalists that the Luddites were opposed to progress, and a myth that E. P Thompson lays to rest in his classic 'The Making of the English Working Class'. As Marxists go, Thompson, and his pal Christopher Hill are worth reading.

[goinpostal]

thanks IWW not read any of them. still dont think we should be against machinery coming in! It could make our job alot easier if it was used to benefit workers not bosses.

[IWW Fellow Worker]

thanks IWW not read any of them. still dont think we should be against machinery coming in! It could make our job alot easier if it was used to benefit workers not bosses.

Which is what the Luddites said. None of them ever argued against the use of machinery as long as it was used to benefit the workers and consumers. They're in the same position as we are. We should all be on a 30 or 35 hour week now with no loss of pay in a properly run society.

General Ned Ludd and Captian Swing, the two finest officers Britain ever produced and King Mob, the only monarch we should swear allegiance to.