Pakistani doctors suffer brutal ‘strike breaking’ tactics by the state
Submitted by working class s... on Jul 13 2012 17:10
The Punjabi state government renege on promises made to striking doctors and then launch a brutal wave of reprisals in order to break the strike.
Hundreds of young Doctors are currently in the third week of a strike in Pakistan. The current strike is latest in a long line of strike action that has taken place over the last year.
The Doctors are striking for improved pay, reduced workloads, and career progression issues.
Contrary to what is portrayed in the media, they are still undertaking ‘emergency’ work.
No compensation for victims of eugenics programme
Submitted by working class s... on Jul 11 2012 17:42
Politicians in North Carolina have knocked back a proposal that would have seen all living survivors of the state’s eugenics and forced sterilisation programme receive compensation. The reason for the knock back has been cited as ‘budgetary’ concerns.
The programme emerged from a eugenics law that was passed in 1929. It allowed the state to forcibly sterilise women who may have been ‘sick’, who had epilepsy, or who had the label of, ‘feebleminded’, which would now relate to people with a ‘learning disability’.
Health care reform: the insurance lobby's triumph
Submitted by John E Jacobsen on Jul 3 2012 05:03
The American people are acutely aware that the healthcare reform they received from the Obama administration has been the result of an immense number of compromises with both conservatives and private business interests. But few recognize just how corrupt those compromises became as deliberations over healthcare proceeded.
The Individual Mandate:
From compromise and things half done,
Keep me with stern and stubborn pride;
And when at last the fight is won,
God, keep me still unsatisfied.
Louis Untermeyer (1885 – 1977)
Mental Health workers in Birmingham strike
Submitted by Django on Jun 6 2012 19:31
Staff at Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Foundation Trust have struck over the removal of a payment which amounts to a £1,400 annual pay cut.
The recruitment and retention primia payment has been removed by management after 10 months of talks broke down.
The removal of the payment comes on top of other changes to pay, pensions and conditions resulting from the massive cuts taking place across the public sector. Workers are already suffering from a two year pay freeze - a real terms cut given the rate of inflation, currently 3.6%.
Bathrooms
Submitted by Recomposition on Apr 23 2012 00:16
Our series on sleep continues with a piece by Gayge Operaista discussing divisions and oppression within the working class.
I wake up with a start, and do my usual “where the hell am I?” look around. When you’ve been couch and guest room surfing for months, because you moved back across the country and still haven’t found steady work, it’s a reasonable “why am I awake?” question, especially when there’s no urgency to get up out of bed.
New public sector walkout over pensions set for May 10 (with updates)
Submitted by Steven. on Apr 17 2012 17:26
Civil servants and health workers in the PCS and Unite unions, respectively are set to strike on May 10 against the government's slashing of public and private sector pensions. Unison, the biggest union, won't be with them.
Other public sector unions could be set to join them in what would be the largest industrial action since November 30th, with union-news.co.uk stating that another date is proposed for the end of June.
Work dreams
Submitted by Recomposition on Apr 15 2012 19:27
Scott Nappalos writes about the problems of working in a hospital and how conditions seep into his dreams.
Within a few months of being on my own, the dreams started. I won’t say nightmares, because nightmares have a distinct sense of terror and harm; my dreams weren’t always like that. I was working as a nurse on an medical-surgical floor for oncology patients in a major urban hospital. Just out of school, I managed to fall into one of the most hostile units in one of the worst hospitals in Miami.
Kenyan Government fires 25,000 striking nurses
Submitted by working class s... on Mar 9 2012 16:02
The Kenyan Government has sacked 25,000 striking nurses who refused to return to work after their trade union called off the official strike.
Last week, striking Kenyan nurses defied their trade union instruction’s to return to work, after they had called off the strike due to reaching a sordid back room deal with the Government.
Their interests and ours
Scott Nappalos talks about union-management cooperation at a hospital he works at.
“The employers interests are our interests. We are all in a circle with the patients in the center,” a union president told us at the first meeting of nurses in my moribund hospital local. The union administrator had been sent from out of state to develop a labor-management partnership committee and try to create a collaborative relation between the bosses and the union.
Kenyan nurses reject the union & bosses deal and continue striking
Submitted by working class s... on Mar 6 2012 16:12
Kenyan nurses have been on strike for the last four days over pay. Yesterday, their trade union reached a deal with the bosses and called the strike off. Nurses are angry at the lack of consultation, and at the content of the deal. They have responded by ignoring the official call to end the strike, and have again walked out.
Nurses and other healthcare workers in Kenya have been on strike for the last three days over pay and conditions.
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