UK
Higher education: It's become our crisis
Already faced with cuts before the crisis, education now looks to be one of the sectors hardest hit, and not merely financially. Kirsten Forkert looks at the current conflict in higher education and the difficulties faced by those trying to protect it
We need to consider UK higher education in the context of a situation where neoliberalism, in some ways, has been destabilised economically but remains hegemonic on an ideological level.
Why did we risk it all? Because we won't go down without a fight.
In August and September 2009, about 250 members of teaching staff at Tower Hamlets College went on strike over compulsory redundancies and cuts to course provision. Catalyst spoke to one of the strikers, Rachel, in the aftermath of the strike, about the up and downs of the battle against the bosses.
While the recent media spin is suggesting that we're 'on our way out of recession', the reality on the ground is that workers are still facing attacks across sectors in the forms of job cuts and community provisions.
In the Sorting Office - on the 2009 post strikes
A postman explains Royal mail's "modernisation" programme and how it affects workers and service delivery.
Like Roy Mayall writing in your issue of 24 September, I am a postman and concerned at the absence in the media of any account of how mail delivery is organised and what Royal Mail’s modernisation programme entails. The programme was introduced because the popularity of email and texting has caused a drop in mail volume.
Post strikes suspended: this deal is no deal! Resume action!
Joe Thorne from the Commune examines the CWU's decision to call off postal workers industrial action in order for "negotiations" to occur, and calls for postal workers to take the struggle into their own hands.
At the top of the CWU-Royal Mail agreement is a header. “Final Draft – 5 November 2009 —- 1.10AM” (available as PDF attachment below). This innocuous line is emblematic of the CWU negotiating team’s strategy: it indicates that the text was agreed more than 7 hours after the strikes were called off.
Fujitsu UK workers set to strike
Union members at Fujitsu Services have voted for strike action over pensions, pay and job cuts.
The action is not yet decided. Senior Unite union reps are meeting today to decide the next move after 74 per cent of members who voted called for a walk out. Some 92 per cent agreed to industrial action short of a strike.
Strike ballot for BA cabin crew
British Airways has said it is "disappointed" by the Unite union's decision to ballot 14,000 cabin crew about whether to take strike action.
Unions and management have been in talks since the announcement of cost-cutting measures earlier this month.
BA had said it would cut 1,700 jobs and freeze pay for current staff.
"Management's determination to impose unacceptable contractual changes on cabin crew leaves us no alternative," said Unite union boss Derek Simpson.
Get this racist Jack Straw off the BBC
Leaflet distributed at the Unite Against Fascism demonstration against British National party leader Nick Griffin's appearance on Question Time arguing against censorship and "ruling class anti-fascism".
The recent row over the British National Party’s appearance on BBC Question Time displays the level of anger at the rise of the far-right party. All of us have turned out today because we oppose Nick Griffin’s racist effort to blame immigrants for all of society’s ills, including the economic crisis, and do not want his rubbish to gain more of an audience.
When hospital is a prison
Ben Goldacre on the use of psychiatry as a form of social control, and the politically-motivated diagnosis of mental illness. Feb 2003.
When I hear the phrase “political psychiatric diagnosis”, I start thinking about Soviet dissidents, dosed up on thioridazine, being physically restrained on lock-up wards. I like to think I would have had nothing to do with that kind of business, because I went into psychiatry to help people, not to be a jailer.
Initial impressions: Royal Mail Strike
Reports coming in from picket lines suggest a solid response from postal workers, with near 100% turnout in Bromley By Bow and Nine Elms, London, few in at Bristol and similarly tiny numbers crossing lines at Middlesborough.
Photographers have been down at Mount Pleasant and Bromley by Bow sorting offices, where they report good spirits from the strikers despite the early start and very few people crossing the picket lines.
Ford Visteon Enfield Workers Occupation - Alan Woodward
An eyewitness account of the 2009 Enfield Ford-Visteon factory occupation, written immediately after the event. The author was the only full-time occupier who was not a former worker at the plant.
An eyewitness account and first thoughts
Note to readers
