I do support the rail strikes. I think employees should get better pay for the hard work they do. Sure it may affect customers but in life, you gotta do what's necessary to get fair treatment even if it affects people. Ironically, last month there was a strike on NJ Transit in which train operators went on strike because the union representing train operators wanted NJ Transit to give train operators a day off on Juneteenth which was on June 19th (although the State of New Jersey celebrated Juneteenth on June 17th since that's when New Jersey celebrates the holiday)
https://www.theguardian.com/comment...ke-summer-britain-unions-spiralling-inflation https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-61872041 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-bristol-61939198
We are fast heading into a post-Labour era where jobs disappear to be replaced by AI or bots. Self-driving vehicles will end the work of many drivers of all types, deliveries by drone etc. One of the reasons for strikes has been people losing their jobs to machines or just finding out they aren't required any more. I was trying to get hold of a human at Vodafone last week, it was very difficult. Bizarrely when I went into a shop the humans there told me to go home and call a number! When I did the automaton on the other end of the line tried very hard to re-route me to their website. I had to ignore all prompts and hold before I was able to speak to someone who I suspect was an offshore call centre worker. It is sobering stuff, especially if you define your identity by the work you do. But all the more reason to find something else to define yourself by. Times are moving on and you need to be moving along too. We don't want a world of fake jobs just to make people feel better. Universal basic income is coming and then people will have to rely on their nouse to get by, I foree a return to cottage industry - we already see people working from home more and more, and it will be small artisans etc making items to sell to supplement thier basic income. Even youtube and twitch is a part of it, people who used to work for a company now working from home for themselves. Is it work? I suspect if you do it all day and it becomes an obligation then it certainly feels like it.
This is a possibility but certainly not inevitable or something to passively accept. I agree we don't need fake jobs to give people income, if the profits of that automation are more equally shared (with a larger welfare state, UBI, guaranteed housing etc etc). The issue is that something like UBI would probably only come after much suffering rather than preemptively
Looks like there’s another rail strike tomorrow. ( Wednesday ) Q lots more teeth gnashing from the public, name calling towards the striker’s, etc. I hope everyone is going to leave those trains in TSW2 Idle in support of the RMT and ASLEF.
110%, i am an ex-NUR\RMT union member. I would also fully support any action by NHS staff and the various ambulance services, UK wide. The actions of the unions over the last 200 years. Has given most of you. The workplace conditions and safety in the workplace. That most of you (i am retired), enjoy today.
Next question would be what do you think of LABOUR removing support from the unions by saying no leaders of the party should attend any picket lines... Was quite surprised yesterday
Wasn’t there more to this? Not simply just a Picket Line issue - whatever the case it was at the very least, poor timing. Then again, Labour has been a lost cause for a while now.
I don't think there was any surprise in what happened with that, when that's all Starmer has done after being elected as leader - endless backtracking on his pre-election promises and pronouncements on visions (which have basically turned out to have been lies), and a complete repositioning from the idea of Labour as a party representing labour to one serving rich donors. It's basically a Tory Lite party under him.
Sam Tarry was apparently dismissed because he was giving media interviews that weren’t officially sanctioned by the Labour Party. Absolute rubbish! That’s just a smokescreen. He was dismissed because Starmer doesn’t want the Labour Party to be seen as leaning towards the left or shown to be giving support in any shape or form towards the unions. Starmer needs to realise where the Labour Party came from and what it’s supposed to stand for but it’s all about votes and nothing else matters. It’s also things like this why the working class can no longer really identify with them anymore and why a lot of working class people don’t even bother to vote these days because no one really represents them. It’s also why as a union member I stopped part of my union fees going to support the Labour Party. The Labour Party needs to get back to basics and realise that a lot of Labour MP’s are still fully paid up members of a trade union and have every right to show their support on a picket line without repercussions like this.
If they don't represent "the common man" (or person) then they don't represent anyone really simply because the rich vote is already done with the Tories...
Unlike his party leader, the Labour front bencher sacked by Starmer does not fail the conscience test: https://www.theguardian.com/comment...s-im-proud-to-be-on-the-picket-line-with-them
Article in the Chicago Tribune yesterday about the big 1922 railroad worker strike: https://www.chicagotribune.com/hist...0220731-qtjymfpbxzg5ppfjxqidy44q2u-story.html
Labour seem to be following the US Democrats in abandoning the working class entirely (greasy-fingered illerate yobs, they think of them now), in favor of affluent urban lefties bolstered by block-voting minorities.
Turn of ASLEF and the train drivers today and shortly Royal Mail workers will take strike action on pay and and possible separate strike action from their pay dispute depending on the result of a ballot on attacks to their terms and working conditions. I can feel things moving towards a general strike here in the UK because no one is happy, in fact I’ve heard on the grape vine that the Trade Union Congress are in discussions with all the different unions to make plans for one.