LIVERPOOL, England — “We’ve seen powerful solidarity across the U.K. from different unions and communities. That support has lifted us because we know we’re not just fighting for ourselves,” Danny Taylor, a refuse worker and Unite steward representing hundreds of Birmingham workers on strike, told a June 27 social here.
Hosted by The Casa Liverpool and organized by Unite the Union, the event was a fundraiser for the refuse workers, who have been on strike since March 11 fighting pay cuts demanded by the Labour-led Birmingham City Council. Their annual pay would be slashed by up to 8,000 pounds ($10,985) for bin loaders and drivers!
“The council has now taken us to the High Court and gotten an injunction to prevent us from ‘disrupting’ their operations, but disruption is exactly what a strike is supposed to do,” Taylor said. “It’s the power workers have when we withdraw our labor.
“It’s a dangerous precedent, one that can be used to shut down other picket lines. Its purpose is to weaken strikes and demoralize and make people feel their picket lines are powerless. But we will not back down and we will not be broken.
“This isn’t just about bin workers anymore,” he said. “This is a fight for every council worker in the U.K.”
Mike Masters, a driver and Unite representative at Perry Barr Depot, thanked everyone for their “solidarity, the generous donations, including the Merseyside pensioners who came down to Birmingham to visit all three of our picket lines.”
“This strike has been compared to strikes from the past,” he said. “I’d like to think this is the strike that shapes the future.”
Earlier in the day, Taylor and Unite union officer Pete Randle visited the picket line of strikers at Alpla, a plastics packaging plant in Warrington. They’re fighting attempts by the bosses to change their shifts in ways that would increase their hours and add more weekend and night-shift work — all without a corresponding raise in pay.
As this Militant worker-correspondent was there, a picket went around with a bucket and took a collection among the strikers, raising over 300 pounds for the Birmingham bin strike.
To make a donation, please send contributions to the strike fund at UNITE WM/7186 Branch, account: 20308397, sort code: 60-83-01. Title donation: BCC Strike Donation.