Victory - EC forced by members to

abide by ADM proposition rules

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the Activist
Issue 53
September 2014
Bulletin of Socialist Party members in
Inside:
p2 - IKEA lockout / Quick News
P3/4 - Retail Workers & BDS
campaigns
p5 - Review: A Land Fit for
Heroes
Earlier this year the Activist
commented on the outrage
after a whole swathe of ADM
propositions were ruled out of
order by the EC without
branches being given the op-
posrtunity to make minor
amendments as per USDAWs
rulebook.

This caused outrage amongst
activists as several proposi-
tions were thrown out on the
most minute of considera-
tions, particularly as this
years ADM was the only year
in three when branches could
submit propositions to change
the unions rulebook (The EC
can do so at every ADM).

Despite not forcing the ECs
decision back on this matter
for the 2104 ADM, a recom-
mendation was passed at the
July EC meeting to implement
a procedure which would al-
low for the provisions of
clause one of the Standing
Order for Delegate Meetings.

This is a victory for union de-
mocracy. Any delegate who
has attended ADM will be ap-
palled at the way that the un-
ions leadership attempt to
sweep aside propositions that
they politically disagree with
rather than debate the issues
out openly.

Worse is way that proposi-
tions which have been de-
mocratically passed by ADM
often get left with only action
being to write to the govern-
ment about the issue rather
than campaign.

The Activist would like to pay
tribute to those members who
have complained about the
way their propositions were
treated and to the few EC
members who have backed
them in challenging this.

However, the fight for the un-
ion to adopt a fighting stance
on issues affecting members
continues. Activists will now
have to prepare propositions
for the 2015 ADM in mid-
September and early October.
The Activist looks forward to
seeing propositions arguing
for a campaigning stance on
the many issues that affect
our members.

But if we wish to see such
propositions fully imple-
mented, we must campaign
to ensure the election of
fighting EC members in the
upcoming elections too.

ADM and the unions democratic structures must be defended and ex-
tended by activists if we want to see USDAW adopt a fighting stance
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IKEA workers at Richmond Ikea
store in Vancouver, Canada have
been locked out for almost 14
months in a dispute over wage and
benefits. The company wants to
implement a two-tier wage system
(a system workers struck success-
fully to get rid of in 2006) as well
as force family workers to work 24
hours instead of 20 before claiming
workplace benefits. This is despite
the company setting a worldwide
profits record in 2013.
The threat of having to work extra
hours is especially galling as only
110 of the 350 strong workforce
actually have guaranteed hours. In
the two weeks running up to the
strike only 13 out of 32 cashiers
had shifts!
Initially the workers, members of
the Teamsters union, planned a 72
-hour strike against this, but have
been locked out since May 13
th

2013. Although 36 workers have
crossed the picket line (after IKEA
offered extra payments to do so
an act that the BC Labour Rela-
tions Board has found illegal),
around 300 remain out, manning
24-hour pickets. The strike has
shut the childrens play area, res-
taurant and reduced the stores
opening hours. To escalate the ac-
tion, a call has gone out to boycott
IKEA stores. The Richmond store is
one of only 12 across the country,
with only one other store union-
ised.
In contrast, IKEA in the US has just
announced a rise in its minimum
wage of 17%, from $9.17 an hour
to $10.76 starting January 1
st

2015, which will benefit around
50% of its workforce across 38
stores. In a statement the com-
panys acting President says that
they wont raise prices, cut staff or
stop hiring, they will absorb the
pay rise from the companys prof-
its. IKEAs only factory in the US, in
Virginia, voted to unionise in the
International Association of Ma-
chinists and Aerospace Workers 3
years ago, followed a year later by
its Maryland distribution centre.
The difference in the fate of IKEA
in the two countries is striking, but
comes down one crucial factor
the huge movement that has de-
veloped fighting for $15 an hour
across the US, from striking fast
food and retail workers to the elec-
tion of Kshama Sawant in Seattle
and the pushing through of the city
wide wage rise there. As well as
building and taking industrial ac-
tion in defence of our interests, we
have to build links in soli-
darity with other move-
ments and ultimately, our
own political representa-
tives to give voice to our
interests and demands.
Visit the locked out workers
facebook page https://
www.facebook.com/pages/
IKEA-
Lockout/519299924818132
Quick News:
The Partys Over for Mid-
counties Co-operative

Early in July Midcounties co-
operative announced they were
withdrawing from paying sub-
scriptions in October to the Co-
operative Party, whose 32 MPs
sit in parliament as part of the
Labour Party.

In a statement to the press they
said that the move was
prompted by a survey which
showed 25% of people were
less likely to shop there if they
knew about the Co-ops dona-
tions, as opposed to 3% who
were more likely.

However, the Activist wonders
whether its got more to do with
them propping up a party who
are doing the Tories dirty work
in councils up and down the
country and promise to carry on
with austerity if they win the
general election.

Further US Fast Food
Strikes

On Thursday 4th September
another wave of the huge
movement of Fast Food Strikes
for decent working conditions,
regular hours and a $15 an
hour minimum wage.

This time the movement spread
to over 150 cities across the
US, and comes on the back of
the celebrated victory of the
$15 an hour minimum wage in
Seattle, a fight led by recently
elected Socialist Alternative
councillor Kshama Sawant.
IKEA Lockout: A Tale of
Two Labour Movements
Locked out IKEA workers picket line
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The horrendous loss of life which
has taken place in Gaza over the
past few months has shocked
many around the world. Around
2,000 have died and almost half a
million people are internally dis-
placed within the tiny Gaza strip
itself.

Such carnage sparked numerous
demonstrations in Britain, rightly
demanding that Israel stops it on-
slaught on the people of Gaza.

Yet despite the current ceasefire,
the suffering in Gaza continues.
Israel has maintained a land, air
and sea blockade of Gaza since
the election of a Hamas govern-
ment in 2007.

The blockade has reduced exports
from Gaza to 3% of their level be-
fore it was erected. Instead
Gazans have had to resort to us-
ing tunnels across the border to
transport the small amount of
goods in.

Israel alleges that these tunnels
have also been used to smuggle
weapons, including rockets which
are launched over the border at
Israeli villages.
Whilst socialists would support the
right of the Palestinians to defend
themselves from the Israeli mili-
tary, including with arms, we
would question how effective the
rocket attacks are, given almost all
of them are stopped by the US-
financed Iron Dome system and
those that do hit civilian targets
only serve to drive ordinary Is-
raelis into the hands of its right-
wing government.

Gaza is of course only one part of
the Palestinians occupied territo-
ries. In the West Bank well over
hundred settlements have been
built stealing Palestinian lands, as
well as other encroachments on
both Gaza and the West Banks
borders, with one of the most re-
cent land grabs being the erection
of the so-called peace fence.

Boycotts & South Africa

This is where Boycott, Divestment
& Sanctions (BDS) campaigns
come in for a whole layer of activ-
ists. Such campaigns can help
raise awareness of the tragic
situation in Palestine, whilst di-
rectly helping to undermine the
Israeli occupation.
Parallels are sometimes drawn
between boycotts of South Africa
in 1980s and BDS campaigns in
relation to Israel today. Such com-
parisons often ignore the fact that
it was the mass movement of the
working class on the ground in
South Africa which ended the
apartheid regime. Boycotts played
a role as auxiliary to that struggle.

Moreover, the South African work-
ing class which brought about the
collapse of Apartheid was over-
whelmingly made up of black
workers. The situation in Israel-
Palestine is somewhat more com-
plex given the existence of a large
Israeli working class too.

What force can bring liberation?

Ultimately it is the capitalist
classes of imperialism, who benefit
from this division of workers in the
region, for them Israel is their re-
gional policeman. Additionally the
Israeli ruling class use the conflict
both to super-exploit Palestinian
workers in factories in the over
100 Israeli settlements in the West
Bank, where special restrictions on
workers rights apply, as well as
using fear of attack as a national-
ist whip against Israeli workers.
Living standards in Israel have
declined much as they have done
across the West over the past few
decades which sparked a tent city
protest inspired by the revolution-
ary movements across the Arab
world in 2012.

Socialists fully defend the national
aspirations of the Palestinian
masses, including the right to re-
turn, but we also defend the right
of national self-determination for
the Israeli masses too. Only on
the basis of a Socialist Israel
alongside a Socialist Palestine as
part of a Socialist confederation of
the Middle East, taking into public
Retail Workers & BDS Campaigns
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ownership the key sectors of the
economy and using those to pro-
vide a decent standard of living for
all, can the problems of the region
be resolved.

The Role of BDS

For socialists, BDS can play an
important adjunct to this struggle.
But this is on the condition it is
used to aid the struggles of all
workers in the region. This in par-
ticular means targeting companies
and institutions which benefit di-
rectly from the occupation of Pal-
estinian lands.

This can mean companies such as
Soda Stream or the Ariel Univer-
sity - both of which are based in
illegal Israeli settlements on Pales-
tinian lands. It also means compa-
nies exporting arms or other
equipment to be used in the occu-
pied territories. (A fuller elabora-
tion of how socialists approach
BDS campaigns is in the June
2013 issue of Socialism Today
m a g a z i n e - h t t p : / /
www.soci al i smtoday. org/169/
israel.html)

For retail workers, the most press-
ing issue is stocking of goods from
the illegal settlements in the Occu-
pied Territories. These include ol-
ives, dates, wines, diary products
and whole number of other items
which are stocked in supermar-
kets. At present the Co-op is the
only UK supermarket to fully re-
fuse to have dealings with settle-
ment based companies and goods,
although Tesco announced in July
it would stop stocking dates pack-
aged in the West Bank.

Unfortunately, a small minority of
BDS protests recently have re-
sulted in intimidation of retail
staffpotentially cutting across
their sympathy for the plight of
the Palestinians. An approach
which places blame on workers
(and even customers) for the poli-
cies of the supermarket giants to
boost their profits is counter-
productive.

BDS campaigns should work with
staff in the UK companies they are
targeting to conduct campaigns.
Empowering workers through their
unions democratic structure to
join the campaign would also al-
low space for the important de-
mand of democratic workers &
consumers control of a publicly
owned food & retail industry.

That demand linked to the nation-
alisation of production under
workers control and the socialist
transformation of society is the
only way to guarantee the ethical
production of the food and goods
we use everyday, not just in rela-
tion to national oppression, but
also in relation to the environment
and other issues.

Usdaw & BDS campaigns

The last time that Usdaw debated
the situation in relation to the Is-
rael/Palestine conflict was at the
2012 ADM where a proposition to
affiliate to allow branches to affili-
ate to the Palestine Solidarity
Campaign was lost. In that debate
the EC changed its stance mid-
debate from opposing to support
with very heavy qualifications.

Usdaws leaderships position on
these issues has been poor, with
them donating money to Labour
Friends of Israel, a right-wing
lobby group which defends the
repressive actions of the Israeli
ruling class. Moreover, at the 2011
ADM debate over an emergency
proposition on the Middle East,
John Hannett argued that western
intervention into Libya was not
imperialist. Whilst socialists were
not upset to see the end of the
repressive Gaddafi dictatorship,
the intentions of the US, UK,
France and others were imperialist
in wishing to regain the influence
over the region which had been
weakened by the mass revolts in
Egypt & Tunisia. It precisely
...further(ed) American and British
strategic and economic interests.

To contribute to an end of the
conflict, Usdaw should offer practi-
cal assistance to the organisation
of Palestinian & Israel workers. It
should also support BDS cam-
paigns to force supermarkets and
retail companies stocking products
produced in the Occupied Territo-
ries.
One of the large protests over the recent Israeli onslaught on Gaza
A Land Fit For Heroes: War and the
Working Class 1914-18
Exhibition at the Peoples History
Museum Manchester funded by
TUC & USDAW
Free entrance
Runs until March 2015

A Land Fit For Heroes is a small
exhibit in the Peoples History Mu-
seum in Salford, funded by the
TUC and Usdaw to show the ex-
periences of workers in the First
World War. Disappointingly the ex-
hibit neglects the some of the con-
text of the war, where prior to it
the Second International had
pledged to organise mass strikes to
stop war coming about, which is
perhaps to be expected given Us-
daw leaderships opposition to any
such militant action. Nevertheless,
the exhibit still provides a glimpse
into the way the war affected the
lives of many workers and their
families.

The exhibit shows the horrors of
the xenophobia whipped up during
the war a large poster advertis-
ing the Anti-German Union featur-
ing a picture of John Bull grappling
with a many headed snake. A pho-
tograph shows a mob outside a
shop with the words We Are Rus-
sians inscribed on the windows.

The signage makes great play of
the fact that many trade union
leaders supported the war . There
are some letters from John Ward
a liberal MP and trade union leader
displayed who went to join the
whites under Admiral Kolchak
against the Bolsheviks in Russia.

Conversely, there is only a limited
section of the exhibit about those
opposed to the war, a banner is
displayed from the No More War
Movement, founded by ILP mem-
ber and Labour leader editor Fen-
ner Brockway. Neither is there any
mention of the Shop Stewards
Movement that developed during
the war, the only reference to in-
dustrial action taking place is a
1918 photo of striking print work-
ers who were evicted from their
homes. No reference is even made
to members of Usdaws predeces-
sor union, AUCE, whose members
in Coalburn in Scotland were on
strike for the whole of 1914. Nor
any mention of the 11 week strike
of Plymouth Co-op workers led by
Ellen Wilkinson.

The impact of the war on women
workers is not overlooked in the
same fashion. A letter hints at the
profiteering going on by employers
who only paid women youth rates
for their work. Most of the com-
mentary is devoted to the role of
the suffragettes during the war,
with photos of Emmeline Pankhurst
leading marches demanding war
work for women.

In the same vein as much of the
rest of the exhibit, it attempts hints
to this as being the main driver of
improvements in the position of
women in society. However, the
exhibit points out that The Resto-
ration of Pre-War Practices Act
gave returning men priority of em-
ployment over women. By 1921
the number of women employed
was less than 1911. Propaganda
posters encouraging women to re-
enter domestic service are dis-
played, as well as a poster implor-
ing the ruling class Dont keep
more servants than you really
need

Prominence is also given to those
Labour MPs who joined the war-
time coalition government, such as
Labour Party leader Arthur Hender-
son. Indeed the exhibit explicitly
states This helped persuade a pre-
viously sceptical population that
Labour could be trusted as a party
of government.

It is often well known that many
Labour MPs who had been in op-
position to the war lost their seats
in the 1918 coupon or khaki elec-
tions. What is often not mentioned
(including by the exhibit) was that
a number of Labour seats had
been in two-seat constituencies, all
of which were abolished alongside
the extension of the voting fran-
chise to men over 21 and women
over 30, as well as elections being
held on a single day for the first
time ever.

Overall, many of the pieces dis-
played at the museum will be of
interest to many workers, but the
narrowness of the context they are
put in will make it difficult to draw
conclusions about the real lessons
for today.
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Review: A Land Fit for Heroes?
One of the few anti-war exhibits