Northern Ireland
Union suspends Northern Irish classroom strike
Members of the Nipsa union have voted to suspend their strike in the dispute over classroom assistants' pay.
Members will take part in industrial action today (Monday), which was voted on at the weekend, however the overall strike will cease from Tuesday.
Three other unions representing assistants have accepted a deal which added an extra £15m to compensate for changes in work conditions. Nipsa represents more than 3,300 classroom assistants in NI.
Classroom assistants to renew strike action in Northern Ireland
Thousands of Northern Ireland classroom assistants are to resume their strike action next week.
The Nipsa union's 3,000 members will be out on picket lines two days a week until Christmas, and many special schools will be affected. The union says the action was agreed unanimously at a meeting of its strike committee in Cookstown on Thursday.
Unofficial action at Royal Mail continues
Despite official strikes being called off, wildcat strikes and other disputes continue in the postal service.
Belfast
Postal workers in Belfast have won an important victory against management after unofficial action on Friday of last week. It took the workers just one and a half hours to force down bosses’ attempts to change start times.
Managers insisted that the workforce put forward their start times by two hours.
Northern Ireland: classroom assistants' talks continue
Employers and unions in the classroom assistants' dispute are meeting for an eighth day of face-to-face negotiations at the Labour Relations Agency.
A confidentiality clause has been agreed by employers and unions meeting at the agency, but it appears there has been little progress.
NI classroom assistants begin one-day strike
Pickets are being held outside special schools and some other schools in Northern Ireland as a strike by classroom assistants gets under way.
The dispute involves up to 7,000 classroom assistants and has been dragging on for over 10 years. It centres on salaries and pay grades. Most special schools are expected to be closed by the strike and many other schools are likely to have to send pupils home at lunchtime.
Ireland, nationalism and imperialism, the myths exploded, 1972-1992 - Subversion
Written before the Good Friday Agreement at a time when the 'armed struggle' was still part of daily life in Northern Ireland this article, though inevitably somewhat dated, this remains a cogent analysis of the recent history of Ireland.
TWENTY YEARS ON A KNIFE EDGE
'... the fate of the province [Northern Ireland] is still, as it has been for so long, poised on a knife- edge between a slow climb back to some form of ordered existence, or a swift plunge into unimaginable anarchy and civil war.'
Belfast anti-water charges picket forces recruitment cancellation
Campaigners claimed their protest today a victory after it was announced that Echo Managed Services, the company responsible for recovering unpaid water charges had cancelled its much publicised open recruitment day.
Echo would collect on behalf of the new water company Northern Ireland Water Ltd.
Secretary of the We Won't Pay Campaign Gary Mulcahy speaking at the protest today warned Echo that today's protest was the first of many to target it's headquarters on Upper Queen St in Belfast.
Bombardier plans mass job losses in Belfast and Montreal
Aerospace company Bombardier are to cut hundreds of jobs in Belfast and Canada in January, whilst creating more than 1,000 new jobs in Mexico.
More than 600 jobs are going at the Belfast aerospace company Shorts, parent company Bombardier has said.
FE lecturers on strike in Northern Ireland
Further Education lecturers in Northern Ireland have been on strike this week over pay parity with schoolteachers.
Lecturers in England, Wales and Scotland have equivalent pay to schoolteachers. However due to "government caps on public sector pay", they fall around £2,500/year behind in Northern Ireland. Lecturers are involved in an ongoing work-to-rule and "withdrawal of goodwill" at all 16 Further Education colleges, with Monday's strike action the fourth in recent weeks.
1932: Belfast Outdoor Relief Strike
The Falls and the Shankhill united, Catholics and Protestants fighting together. That is the story of the Outdoor Relief Strike launched by the unemployed of Belfast in 1932.
It is important today not only because it is a part of our history that has been denied space in the school books but also because it was a living demonstration that the sectarian barrier can be breached.
