Older workers in an age of austerity

Colleagues,

On 29-30th January the GFTU is launching its two-year European project aimed at supporting the employment needs of older workers facing workplace vulnerability.

The project (supporting the needs of older, vulnerable employees) brings together a partnership of organisations (trade unions, academic and employer) from France, Finland, Bulgaria and the Netherlands.

Embedded here is a short clip (largely show it can be shown at the launch event) of the fund that the project is backed by.

Further details of the project can be seen at: http://www.gftu.org/content/3/1/13/article/77/

Can Globalisation Work for Women?

Colleagues,

Apologies for not posting an item at the start of the year, but I was tied up with deadlines/workload in both of my jobs at the GFTU and Ruskin.

And, I will have to make this first post of 2012 relatively short.

Despite this, the item under focus should be of interest to anyone in the labour movement with an interest in gender, social rights and leadership.

This new book edited by ValentineMoghadam, Suzanne Franzway and Mary Margaret Fonow is a timely analysis of the potential of trade unions globally to defend the socioeconomic rights of women with an examination of the relative strengths of weaknesses of trade union leadership in this context.

Without wanting to give the game away you can imagine what the conclusion is. Despite this it is still worth reading as the analysis and prescriptions are contemporary and they provide a modern perspective on a historical issue.

Helpfully you can read the first chapter and selected elements from Google preview via the publisher's promotional page: http://www.sunypress.edu/p-5286-making-globalization-work-for-w.aspx

Comments/feedback are very welcome.

In Solidarity

Ian

I lost my job, but found an occupation!

Colleagues,

This is my last post for 2011, as I am calling it a day from tomorrow afternoon.

And what a year it has been! Both of the major strikes this year have sent a clear message to the government that they simply do not understand the anger across the public and private sectors and the frustration with the corrupt notion that we are somehow all in this together.

That this anger has manifest itself as part of the international occupy movement is something that we should all be justifiably proud of - and I hope that the movement continues to grow during 2012 and beyond.

There has of course been many other reasons for optimism amngst trade unionists in particular and from a global perspective, and I hope my blog has been able to capture some of this momentum during 2011.

I will continue to provide a method to survey global developments across the spectrum of interests for trade unionists in the UK and internationally.

I do hope that you have a good break over Christmas and I extend a hope for continuing solidarity during 2012.

In Solidarity

Ian

Support SOLIDAR

Colleagues,

Multinationals think they can get away with anything - and this includes Nespresso in its coffee-growing activity in Latin America. Support the campaign by the fine people behind SOLIDAR buy watching the video and sending an e-mail to George Clooney.

SOLIDAR backs its campaign against Nespresso with the following statement:

“Solidar Suisse has been committed to improving these intolerable conditions on the coffee plantations in Nicaragua for years. And we have been successful. Last year, we advised more than 15,000 people and were involved in over 4,000 court cases, 95 per cent of which reached a successful conclusion. And we are not going to give up. Not until the last plantation owner notices that every plantation worker is a human being and not a slave. And when all the multinational coffee dealers ensure that coffee pickers finally earn a decent wage, too.”




In Solidarity

Ian

N30: from DC to Dhaka

Colleagues, although there was great media coverage of the national public sector strike last week, there was less attention paid to global solidarity action.

There is a good, short summary note on the blog of the International Labor Rights forum website: http://laborrightsblog.typepad.com/international_labor_right/2011/12/from-dhaka-to-dc-global-solidarity-for-striking-uk-workers.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2FILRF%2Finternational_labor_right+%28Labor+Is+Not+A+Commodity+Blog%29

In Solidarity

Ian

N30: Oxford



Ruskin Staff on our unofficial picket line





Guy, Fergus, Rachel and Nige

 


Our very own UCU banner






Showing Solidarity with Oxford Univ UCU



Nige and Guy do the Banner Proud



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He has to get his photo in!



4,000 strikers March in Oxford



Oxford Brought to a Standstill



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We Say Fightback! (Unless you are that nice woman from NASUWT who harangues PD for upsettting a 'nice civilised, middle class march')

  

To return home safe

Colleagues,

Just announced is the outcome of the Lofstedt review which prefigures the Coalition's bonfire of health and safety law in the UK.

Coming on the back of my last post about protected conversations it is clear that the trajectory of the Tories is a wholesale attack on the relatively minor protections that UK workers have in comparison to workers across the Continent.

Details of the Lofstedt predictions on what must go are in a BBC news item: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-15919238

What is clear is that, regardless of what conclusions Lofstedt has arrived at, the Tories are adopting their historic 'it's elf and safety gone mad' mantra citing banned conkers and village fetes as a smokescreen for further weakening the HSE and freeing up employers to quite literally get away with murder.

And where, oh where, are the Labour Party in response? Answers on a postcard - if you do indeed get an answer.

By the way, the title for this post comes from a quote I remember being cited years ago by MSF (and I am sure used across the movement) of the simple position we take as trade unionists on the issue of workers' health, safety and welfare, which is that the simple guarantee a worker wants from their employer is to be able to return home to their home and family as safe and free from ill-health as they left home that morning.

Follow this story, the outcomes will not be good.

In Solidarity

Ian