London May Day 2006 – Rally needs to be followed by action to defend jobs and the NHS

Despite the early threat of rain, London’s May Day march set off from Clerkenwell Green in glorious sunshine. Up to 10,000 workers, youth, and activists had gathered at the start of the demo, though its ranks swelled significantly along the route to Trafalgar Square. The march was led from the Green by a joint London May Day Organising Committee/TUC Banner that read “Campaigning for Workplace Justice”.

The slogan was weak but nevertheless it reflected the presence of many workers on the march who had fallen foul of Britain’s ‘flexible labour laws’ – the envy of bosses across Europe - in recent years, notably the Gate Gourmet workers, and representatives of the 2,300 Peugeot workers from the Ryton plant in Coventry currently facing the axe. The TUC is keen to promote its trade union freedom bill as a means of regaining those rights taken from workers by the Tories’ anti-union laws which Blair’s government has scandalously kept on the statute books. That was the meaning of their slogan. Overturning those repressive Tory laws and gaining new rights would, of course, be a great step forward, but on their own legal rights cannot be a substitute for militant, fighting trade unionism. The workers who took solidarity action to support their brothers and sisters at Gate Gourmet were breaking the law, in the same way that the founders of the trade unions had to break anti-union laws. With Labour in office for nine years the TUC leaders have done precious little to take the fight to repeal the hated anti-union legislation into the Labour Party. Nor have many of them been willing to struggle against those laws, instead choosing all too often to hide behind them as an excuse not to take action for fear of the threat to ‘union assets’. In the meantime one million manufacturing workers have heard the TUC leaders words of support since Blair was elected, but their lack of deeds means they still ended up with their P45s.

This year’s march included an impressive array of trade union banners and flags including those from the TGWU, RMT, AMICUS, GMB, CWU, NASUWT, BECTU, MU, ASLEF, NAPO, UNISON, NUT, PROSPECT, USDAW, FBU, UCATT and many more. Mingling amongst all these were musicians including the Big Red Band and the brass band brought by the RMT.

As usual many campaigning bodies from around the world added an internationalist flavour to the day. A large presence came as always from the Turkish & Kurdish community, and others from Latin America, Africa, India, Pakistan, Caribbean, Iran, Iraq, and Ireland, amongst others. There were several campaigning groups for Iranian workers, Colombian workers, Cuban solidarity, and a strong presence from Hands Off Venezuela.

HOV held a stall at the beginning and the end of the march, as well as organising a meeting following the rally. Together with 23 comrades from Socialist Appeal, HOV supporters gave out leaflets to advertise the meeting, and sold 200 copies of the new HOV magazine, dozens of Socialist Appeals, £130 worth of Marxist literature, and £170 worth of HOV T-shirts.

As every year there was a sizeable police presence around the demo, but they seemed to be mainly interested in the (smaller than usual) anarchist groupings who invariably provide them with some target practice along the way.

All in all, it took forty minutes for the tail of the march to finally leave the start. Then the march made its progress along Theobalds Road, down to Holborn Kingsway, Aldwych and the Strand being joined at every turn by new marchers. With bands playing music from Asia and the Middle East, a socialist choir, balloons, streamers, banners, and placards, the whole colourful carnival finally marched into Trafalgar Square, serenaded by the Big Red Band.

The crowd, now swollen from the 10,000 who had set out, then gathered in front of the stage under the National Gallery to hear a long list of speakers.

Led off by TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber we heard Marie Helena Andre of the European TUC; Tony Woodley, General Secretary of the TGWU; S Singh Dillon, a Gate Gourmet dispute activist; then TUC President Gloria Mills; GMB Regional Secretary Ed Blissett; Ken Savage, Secretary of the Greater London Pensioners Association; Bob Crow RMT General Secretary; Derek Simpson, AMICUS General Secretary; Randall Howard of the South African Transport & Allied Workers Union; a speaker from London’s Turkish & Kurdish communities; then Unison Greater London Secretary Linda Perks; Joe de Bruyn from the Australian Council of Trade Unions; Jonathon Neale of Globalise Resistance; and, finally, Tony Benn.

The chair gleefully read out the titles and slogans of many of the banners as they gathered before the stage to hear the speeches, but seemed oblivious to the large hand-painted one reading “Simpson Sacks His Own” being carried by supporters of the campaign for democracy in Amicus, fighting against the witch-hunt in that union. Three leading activists have been sacked by the union on trumped up charges, as Simpson and his supporters attempt to jettison the left-wing programme that was responsible for him being elected as General Secretary.

The banner certainly had an impact on Simpson, however. It was clear that many Amicus full time officials were ordered to stand in front of the banner waving flags to obscure its message from the television and newspaper cameras.

In his speech to the rally TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber called for strong laws to tackle poverty pay, the gender wage gap and work discrimination against ethnic minorities. He told the rally: "No longer should British workers like the Peugeot workers in Coventry find that they are the cheapest and easiest in Europe to get rid of when the going gets tough - and we send them a message of solidarity today… That's why we called for a Trade Union Freedom Bill to allow unions to properly protect their members." On the eightieth anniversary of the General Strike it is woeful that the leader of the most powerful force in British society does not understand the potential might of the trade union movement. The trade union movement was never “allowed” to protect its members, those members fought against employers and governments for generations to demand their rights. If the millions of workers in the TUC were given a fighting lead they could tear up the anti-union legislation like the worthless paper that it is. They could prevent the break-up and selling off of the NHS in a day.

We are not opposed to demanding legal rights, but they will not be granted without a fight. Capitalism is busily undermining our rights, our welfare system, our pensions and our jobs for a reason, not simply because of their greed, but because their decrepit system cannot afford those reforms anymore. Those reforms that were conquered in the past were never given out of the kindness of the capitalists’ hearts, they were wrenched from them by heroic struggles. It is precisely those struggles in Britain and around the world that we were celebrating on May Day, and it is precisely those kinds of struggles that will need to be repeated if the attacks of the bosses are to be stopped.

Workers cannot simply sit back and wait for such a bill of rights to be passed, nor even for next May Day’s rally, but need to take action now, including solidarity action, to prevent job haemorrhages like that at Peugeot, and of course, the decimation and privatisation of the NHS.

The London May Day demonstration as ever provided us with a little glimpse of the strength of the trade union movement. The TUC must follow this up with a national demonstration in defence of the NHS before it is too late. Words must be turned into deeds.