Support the Challenger from the Left!

JEREMY CORBYN, MP (Islington Tribune)


...and a message from North of the Border we should note.

First, the good news. There is a Left-wing, anti-austerity candidate standing in the Labour Party's leadership election.  I don't know whether Jeremy Corbyn will even get the 35  nominations from fellow Labour MPs necessary for his name to appear on the ballot paper. But he should.

We saw the hurdles John McDonnell had to face when he made a challenge for the leadership.

The news tonight was that Jeremy Corbyn had obtained ten nominations within 24 hours of announcing his intentions, and I'd guess some are from the new MPs who previously issued an anti-austerity statement.  Adding my vote to an online poll run by the Daily Mirror I was heartened to find myself among 87 per cent for Jeremy Corbyn. It won't count in the official leadership stakes of course, but it should count for something.
 
With the other candidates competing to be most right-wing, complaining that poor Ed Miliband pulled the Party to the Left, and sounding like they've rooted through David Cameron's waste bin for old speeches attacking welfare claimants,  it's good to see anyone making a challenge from the Left.
Not that Jeremy Corbyn is just anyone. He opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and has championed the rights of the Palestinian people, with more principled consistency than George Galloway and none of the latter's tainted links or bloated arrogance.

As a supporter of working people's rights and aspirations for a better society (not the selfish individual "aspiration" some other Labour lights have been extolling), Jeremy Corbyn  ranks close to John McDonnell,  with whom he often shares a platform, in respect from rank-and-file trade unionists.

Jeremy Corbyn is also a good MP, known and liked by people in his Islington North constituency. Many years ago when I read about rumours that right-wing, Blairite  councillors  in Islington were plotting to oust the MP, I mentioned it to a mate of mine long resident in the Holloway Road and active in the community. "They must be mad," he opined, "Everyone here likes Jeremy, even if they have no time at all for the council".  Since then those right-wingers have gone, and as local councils go, in these days of pervasive privatisation and cuts, Islington is not that bad, according to my trade union informants.

As for Jeremy, besides those union activists who'll back him, I know people in Tufnell Park who left the Labour Party in disgust at Blair's lies an war, and joined the Greens. But come election time, as they explain to friends, "We have to vote Labour for Jeremy Corbyn". That's anecdotal of course, but Jeremy Corbyn's 21,000 plus majority is real enough.
     
 Some years back, helping to host a conference of European Jews for Just Peace, I asked Jeremy Corbyn along as a guest panel speaker. Well, we were meeting near Archway, in his constituency, though there were not a lot of votes to be gathered from the delegates from Stockholm, Brussels, Paris and Rome.  Jeremy turned up hotfoot from Heathrow where he had been dealing with an immigration case, spoke and spent more time answering questions and discussion (he is a good listener as well as speaker), before getting away to hold his surgery for constituents.   
  
More recently, I was at a rally held in tribute to the late Mike Marqusee, writer and journalist, who died at the beginning of this year. It was little more than a week after the depressing result of the general election. Jeremy Corbyn was jointly chairing, or compering, the event, along with comedian Mark Steel, who had us all on our feet not for a minute's silence in memory of Mike, but a rousing cheer in recollection of his life.  Indeed, though we were all, family and friends and comrades, remembering a sad loss, we came away from that gathering with a very positive feeling, some of the unity and courageous defiance that Mike Marqusee bequeathed us.

I see Jeremy Corbyn's challenge for leadership as continuing and embodying some of that spirit.  As he says on TV tonight, the party, and the movement, should really be having a policy debate rather than a leadership contest, but he hopes his his challenge can encourage that debate.  If we can get behind it, and especially if Jeremy can get a decent vote, the Left is finding its feet again. Then we will be on the march.


When Scottish Affairs are All Our Affairs

NEIL FINDLAY, MSP  

DAVE SMITH

One of the odd aspects of the campaign against building industry blacklisting was that hearings were held in the House of Commons Scottish Affairs Committee. As anti-blacklisting campaigner Dave Smith explained to Brent Trades Union Council's meeting the other week this was solely because it was one committee where Labour had a majority and so the issue could be pursued.

Like others, Dave was hoping that an incoming Labour government under Ed Miliband would honour its promises to hold an inquiry into blacklisting, particularly with the evidence that has come out about undercover police activity in trade unions and campaigns. Dave, and the Blacklist Support Group, were keen that is should be a full public inquiry.


Though the return of a Tory government is obviously a setback, Dave Smith said we should not be depressed or give up. "Cameron has only got a 12-seat majority. Thatcher had 144 seats at one point, and we still defeated her!"
  
Many people are hoping that Labour and the Scottish National Party can combine to beat the Tories, and I have seen messages complaining that Left-wing Labour MPs have not come out openly for an alliance with the SNP against austerity and Trident.

These are still early days, and too early for recriminations before things have really started, but we cannot ignore the message from Neil Findlay, MSP, who was Jim Murphy's challenger for the Labour leadership in Scotland, and resigned last month from the Party's shadow cabinet over its failure to analyse its disaster north of the Border.

Neil Findlay writes (Wednesday, June ):

"Today in parliament I called for a Scottish Inquiry into the Blacklisting of construction workers. It is clear that the Tories won't do it but the Scottish Government could.

Depressingly only two SNP MSPs turned up for the debate and the only one who spoke, Mike McKenzie actually questioned whether the big construction companies had actually blacklisted people!!!!! I find this astonishing as I thought there was a general consensus given all the evidence that has been unearthed in the information commissioners raid. I will post the video later so people can see the debate."

Two Scottish building workers interviewed by the Daily Record were not amused to hear that what they had experienced might all be imaginary.
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/meet-two-scots-targeted-firms-1868444


And here is that video of the Scottish parliament as promised.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNBW29K3lrY

PS   In a message on Facebook today, Neil Findlay says:

"Great meeting today with Jeremy Corbyn's campaign team - please urge Labour MPs to nominate him and your trade union to support him - let's have the widest possible debate about the future of the Labour Party".

More than Chutzpah Behind the Bulldozers

 

 HOW IT WAS

A historic London pub has been demolished by a developer's bulldozers, without planning permission, and without warning to people in neighbouring properties or any precautions for their safety. Even the landlady was not told.

Now people are watching to see what action Westminster council takes, and demanding the company responsible are compelled to make good what they have destroyed or that the site is taken off them and used for social housing -and a new pub or social club.

 "Passers by stared in amazement as two bulldozers tore into Carlton Tavern in Carlton Vale, destroying its shell and all its contents including a wide screen television, darts trophies, pictures, and a pint glass left on a table.

No safety precautions had been put in place resulting in concerns about security of nearby buildings and if the utilities had been switched off prior.

Patsy Lord, the pub’s landlady, rushed to the scene from her home in Maida Vale after she was alerted to the demolition and told she needed to move her son’s car. After opening for business on Monday and hosting an Easter quiz, she was told the pub would be closed for an ‘inventory'."

Local councillor Tom Crockett said: “Neither the council, my fellow councillors nor local residents had any notice of this demolition which I saw with my own eyes being conducted without any obvious safety precautions such as hoardings, barriers or formal traffic controls. All took place as children on school holidays played outside and unsuspecting traffic went past through clouds of smoke and dust.

(This might well have included asbestos dust - RP)

“The demolition clearly took place under a cloak of secrecy; neither the locals nor the landlady knew. Televisions remained on the walls and the bar appeared fully stocked.

“We are urging officers to take the strongest action open to them. I have personally taken the time to ensure that photographic and film evidence has been collated and passed to officers for referral to the Health and Safety Executive whom I urge to consider bringing prosecutions.”

A Westminster council spokesperson told Londonist: “Westminster City Council’s Planning Enforcement Team received a report that the Carlton Tavern was in the process of being demolished. A planning inspector of the planning enforcement team visited the site immediately following receipt of the report and noted at 2.30pm that the building had indeed been substantially demolished with only one side wall remaining
This is truly outrageous behaviour which has to be dealt with properly. "

 In the past we have remarked on the mystery fires which destroyed some derelict pubs when owners were waiting for planning permission.  But in this case the company neither took its time waiting nor resorted to subterfuge. It is possible one reason for its hurry was that a preservation order on the building was expected, so the bulldozers were ordered in first.

Councillor Rita Begum, Maida Vale ward for Labour, said: "It was a shock. I have never seen anything like it in my entire life. "I went past just the other day and there were people drinking inside the pub - there was no warning whatsoever.

"They were going to confirm it as a listed building on Wednesday. I think the developers found out it was going to be a listed building and that's why the destroyed it.

Planning permission was sought in June 2014 on behalf of CLTX Ltd by Kieran Rafferty, of KR Planning, who describes himself on Twitter as an "independent planning consultant helping people deal with the anchors on society". 


As for the chances of even Tory Westminster council having to take tough action, this may not be easy.  The company which had applied to build flats on the site  is C. L. T. X., based in Tel  Aviv.

As one commentator says, "The only director of C.L.T.X. Ltd is Ori Calif, born 1977 (Director ID: 915883939) Registered address and Trading Address in London is 21 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3HH. Other registered address for Calif is 8 Shaul Hamelech Blvd, Tel Aviv, Israel 64733. Any lawsuit will be an issue since the company is only worth £942 and has £1,458 Cash It has £5,917 Assets with £4,975 Liabilities. I suppose jail would suffice!!"

This has brought some wry allusions to Israeli house demolitions, and we could also refer to the use of planning regulations to order them.  But more to the point, we must wonder how a company based so far away, and with such modest assets, could find its way among the big boys of the London property market and propose to build a block of flats, with apparently less cash than you would normally need to pay a deposit or raise a mortgage to buy a flat in London?

It must take chutzpah, sure, but surely also require good contacts. My guess, as a mere amateur with no business experience or proper knowledge of these matters, is that this company must have backing. And if they were tipped off that the building was about to be listed, so that they decided to send in the bulldozers right away, that sounds like they or their advisors had a useful contact in Westminster council's planning office.  Only saying....

 


 
http://www.kilburntimes.co.uk/news/heritage/shock_as_historic_pub_in_kilburn_is_demolished_with_no_warning_and_without_permission_1_4027231

http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/news/developer-demolishes-historic-london-pub/8681094.article

http://londonist.com/2015/04/shock-as-historic-pub-demolished-without-permission.php

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/11525262/Bulldozers-level-historic-pub-the-day-before-it-is-due-to-be-listed.html

http://www.endole.co.uk/company/07578871/cltx-ltd 

• C.L.T.X. limited - incorporated 25 March 2011. Companies House has a proposal to strike off, perhaps due the non delivery of their 31 March 2014 accounts which were due 31 December 2014. Registered office 21 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3HH. One director - a Mr Ori Calif of 8 Shaul Hamelech Blvd, Tel Aviv, Israel 64733. C.L.T.X. has a subsidiary Ye Old White Bear Limited - again registered at 21 Bedford Square (this is probably their accountant's office). Ye Old White Bear was founded on 11 June 2013, no accounts or company return ever made so there is again a Companies House proposal to strike off. Our old friend Ori Calif is the sole director, but this time his address is given as 28 Kensington Park Gardens, Notting Hill W11 2QS and his occupation given as lawyer. There is a law firm called Ori Calif & Co registered at 8 Shaul Hamelech Blvd which claims a special focus on international taxation and real estate. Don't know if it is connected but there is a pub called The Old White Bear in Hampstead which was supposedly saved from being developed into a 6 bedroom house last year, but apparently has yet to re-open as a pub.-         'Wolfie Smith'

http://www.urban75.net/forums/threads/carlton-tavern-in-carlton-way-kilburn-is-demolished-with-no-warning-and-without-permission.333913/

Questions worth asking

'BLACKLISTED' is a new book out exposing an old practice which has blighted the lives of thousands of workers and their families in this country, and despite breaching laws about data protection, not to mention human rights, is still no doubt going on.

Having unfortunately missed a book launch in the House of Commons on March 12, I was glad that one of the authors, Dave Smith, was able to make it to the Greater London Association of Trade Union Councils' AGM a couple of days later, to talk about the book, and some of his own experiences, and sign copies. 

As well as getting writer's cramp inscribing messages in books, Dave has kept busy in other ways. He has been fighting his case against Carillion over blacklisting, which has ended with the company winning in the High Court because it appears, having been employed via an agency, Dave had no rights. Maybe he'll have to appeal to the European human rights court in Strasbourg, if the Tories don't win in May and take us out of the court (No Rights, please, we're British!?)

And on Wednesday night, Dave was lifted by police after a building workers' protest outside the Hilton hotel spilled over into Park Lane, stopping traffic. About forty workers were demonstrating  outside the Construction News Awards in the Hilton, over the sackings of workers who raised health and safety concerns on the Crossrail project.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLuP7iYDAfg  

I remember a similar incident a couple of years ago when striking electricians resisting pay cuts blockaded white-tied contractors arriving for a dinner at a Park Lane hotel.  On that occasion the workers and their sound system blocked Park Lane traffic for some time, yet police seemed unsure what to do, and I don't recall any arrests being made. That episode is mentioned in the 'Blacklisted' book. This time it would seem the Met had their instructions, and had decided whom to nick.

Dave Smith is secretary of the Blacklist Support Group. And the book he has co-authored with Phil Chamberlain does not just tell the story of blacklisting by employers and employer-funded organisations, from the Economic League founded in 1919 to its successor Consulting Associations. It looks at the links with police infiltration and spying on trade unionists, environmental campaigners and others.

It is worth remembering that blacklisting and victimisation of workers who raised safety issues does not just hit these workers and their families. It also affects those left in work who fear for their jobs and decide to keep their mouths shut even if they see something which looks wrong. And of course, those workers and members of the public who suffer harm or injury as a result of bad practices or neglect.

Yet while the government has been cutting right back on HSE inspections, and the police are talking about services they may no longer be able to provide, we hear nothing about the cost of police surveillance and infiltration -including use of agent provocateurs -against members of the public and legitimate organisations such as trade unions. Who authorised such operations, and how many are still going on? 

The Blacklist Support Group are demanding a full public enquiry into blacklisting.

It so happened that last week I received an e-mail from the Labour Party, inviting me to "ask Ed" any questions I liked. So I asked whether Labour would launch an inquiry into blacklisting. I am used to chairpersons not seeing my hand at question time, and I was not expecting blacklisting to be an issue our politicians want to discuss, but I was pleasantly surprised to receive this reply - not signed by "Ed" (or anyone else), but I'm not a fan of personality cults, and it is e-mailed from "frontbench" and on record nevertheless.
  

Dear Mr Pottins,

Thank you for your email regarding blacklisting in the construction industry.

Trade unions are an important voice for people at work and in wider society, and have a central role to play in boosting training, pay and conditions for their members and helping Britain win the race to the top. At a time of rapid global economic change and a cost-of-living crisis at home, it is vital that the UK continues to have strong and modern trade unions as a genuine voice fighting against discrimination and abuse.

That is why the next Labour Government will launch a full inquiry into the disgraceful practice of blacklisting in the construction industry. This inquiry must be transparent and public to ensure the truth is set out. We should also learn the lessons of the actions on procurement taken by the Welsh Assembly Government with regards to blacklisting.

The choice at this election is between a failing plan and a better plan for working families. Only Labour understands that Britain only succeeds when working families succeed. That’s why Labour’s plan offers a better future: for living standards, for the next generation, and for the NHS. You can read more about Labour’s better plan in our Changing Britain Together booklet.

With kind regards,

On behalf of the Labour Party

 It's worth asking the questions like this, because you might get an answer, and if nothing else the politicians can't pretend no one is interested and they have not received any questions about the subject.

I won't be holding my breath waiting for Labour to hold a full public enquiry, but nor will we be holding our fire if Labour having got in fails to honour any such pledges it has made. And whatever public cynicism says about politicians and pre-election promises, you have a much better starting point for protest if the promises have been made.  

On Dave Smith v. Carillion case:


http://www.constructionenquirer.com/2012/01/18/carillion-confirms-worker-was-blacklisted/

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/no-hope-justice-blacklist-victim-5359392

A well-earned tribute, and a timely book

MICK ABBOTT, in white Justice for Pickets tee shirt, with Ricky Tomlinson at Westminster


WIGAN building worker Mick Abbott, a dedicated fighter against the blacklist, and for justice for the jailed Shrewsbury pickets, has been honoured with a memorial plaque at the Casa, the club started by locked out and victimised Liverpool dockers.

A plaque commemorating the late Michael Abbott has been unveiled at The Casa on Liverpool’s Hope Street.

The anti-blacklisting campaigner, who died, aged 74, last year after a battle with cancer, discovered files that showed he was blacklisted due to his trade union activities and his raising of concerns towards health and safety on construction sites. The plaque marks the first anniversary of his death.

Abbott discovered that the first file against him dated back to 1964 when he was working on the construction of the Fiddlers’ Ferry.

Upon this discovery, he fought for the rights of other men that had also been blacklisted from working on building sites.

Researcher and Secretary of the Shrewsbury 24 campaign, Eileen Turnball, told JMU Journalism: “We meet in The Casa every month at The Casa to discuss blacklisting in Liverpool. Michael Abbott left us in 2014, but the blacklisting in Liverpool has always been prevalent, but it mushroomed after the 1972 building workers strike.”

 http://jmu-journalism.org.uk/anti-blacklisting-campaigner-remembered/

This is a well-earned tribute.

This year will be forty years since the march from Wigan to London, of which Mick was one of the leaders, to demand the release of the Shrewsbury Two, trade unionists jailed on "conspiracy" charges after the 1972 building workers' strike.

The previous year I'd met some of the Wigan lads on a march against the 'Lump' system, called by UCATT, in Preston.  They had brought placards about the Shrewsbury pickets on to the march, and a few of us came down from Lancaster to join them. Mick Abbott and his pals were surprised to hear that I was working on the Heysham power station site, as they told me they'd been unable to get jobs there, having previously worked on Fiddlers' Ferry. (My lack of power station background might have been an advantage, as was the irregular way I was smuggled on site by an Irish acquaintance, bypassing the main contractor Taylor Woodrow's procedure).

Determined not to let the jailed pickets issue be dropped or forgotten, Mick was with Ricky Tomlinson when, after his release, he protested at the 1975 TUC over the continued detention of Des Warren. Ricky had been refused permission to speak from the platform, while right-wing bureaucrats were allowed to slag off the pickets. 

One of 12 siblings born in Kirkdale, Liverpool, Mick Abbott worked most of his life -when he could -in the building trade. He was a scaffolder, and a TGWU shop steward on several sites. Married with four kids, he was known as a warm, friendly man with a typically Scouse sense of humour, as well as a dedicated trade unionist.    

There were 400 people at his funeral. 

But even before their tributes, or the plaque at the Casa, Mick had been honoured, by being among more than 3,000 building workers on the blacklist. Documents he was able to obtain after the so-called Consulting Association was exposed refer to his involvement in the Fiddlers' Ferry strike and to his serious concerns over site safety.  

Des Warren, at his trial over picketing, famously said that there had been a real conspiracy - between the Tory government of the day, the building industry bosses, and the police. Labour Home Secretary Roy Jenkins, one of the "gang and four" who went on to found the SDP,  refused to release the two pickets, so that as Ricky Tomlinson says, "We spent more time in jail under Labour than we had under the Conservatives".  A later Labour Home secretary, Jack Straw, told MPs that government documents concerning the Shrewsbury trial must be kept secret for reasons of "national security".

But then this Straw, recently in the news over his readiness to take remunerative retirement work, declined the chance to peek at his own file with the security services, when he was Home Secretary.  

Talking about the CA blacklist, Mick Abbott said last year; “My file goes back to 1964, and the last entry says that I rekindled the campaign for justice for the Shrewsbury picketers in 2006. They have been watching me all these years and passing this information around, blighting my life over four decades.”


The struggle for justice for the Shrewsbury pickets, demanding that secret files be opened so that the sentences can be squashed, the construction safety campaign - revealed to have also been subject to police spying, - and the battle against the blacklist, have been shown to be interlocking.


A new book about the blacklisting is being launched this week.

'Blacklisted: the secret war between big business and union activists' published by New Internationalist Magazine

http://newint.org/books/politics/blacklisted-secret-war/

Speakers:
Dave Smith , author
Phil Chamberlain , author
John McDonnell MP
Gail Cartmail Assistant General Secretary, Unite

Committee Room 15
Houses of Parliament
Westminster

Followed by drinks and book signing at the Red Lion, Whitehall.

Anyone coming to the event in the Commons is advised to come half an hour early to get through security procedure. 

see also:  http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/feb/27/on-the-blacklist-building-firms-secret-information-on-workers

Freedom of Speech, so long as you keep shtum?

"FREEDOM OF SPEECH" has been much talked about lately, in the wake of the 'Charlie Hebdo' killings and with regard to such slightly less serious matters as the enthusiasm with which some groups of students, feminists or whatever want to ban or boycott others, burn their papers, and so forth, in the name of creating "safe spaces". Having regard for my own safety, not to say sanity, I won't go there, but will stick to the relative comfort zone of things I know and can understand.

"Freedom of Speech" is not a new idea, of course, but more like a retro fashion. I can remember it as the first of the Four Freedoms proclaimed by President Franklin D.Roosevelt a year before I was born (and given the middle name Franklin), the other three being freedom of worship, and freedoms from Want, and from Fear. Maybe if freedom is back in fashion we should consider the rest of the package, particularly the last two, which are missing from much of the world, and being increasingly denied a lot of people in this country.

After the war, when the UN was established with such great hopes, Roosevelt's four freedoms were woven into the preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which reads, "Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed the highest aspiration of the common people,...."

I also remember seeing my first live fascists, with placards proclaiming "Let Mosley Speak" and "'Action!' (their paper) "banned from your library. Why?". At that time most town halls were banned to the fascist leader, and if anyone quoted Voltaire, the more recent "barbarous acts" were more uppermost in people's minds, along with the thought that had the War turned out differently, Mosley would most likely have been the only politician to enjoy freedom of speech. As it was, Tory Kensington kept its doors open for Sir Oswald when he wasn't stirring the Teds in the north end of the borough.

 So I was not altogether carried away with the recent fervour over "free speech", nor entirely surprised when a Labour councillor friend in the North East who'd said something about the EDL and Pegida marching in his his city received hate mail saying he was attacking "Free Speech", and going on to accuse him of a string of other offences, as libellous as ridiculous. (Naturally the kind of heroes who send this stuff are always anonymous).

But rather than discuss the ethics of free speech or pontificate about its proper limits, and what the law says or what it ought to say, I would like to look at how much free speech there really is, as illustrated by a few recent instances.

One of the things we ought to be able to freely hear and talk about, because it could affect all our lives, is the treaty being cooked up behind closed doors by European Union(EU) and United States officials, called the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). Ostensibly about removing obstacles to trade, there are fears that it could force countries to remove restrictions on food additives and genetically modified crops, lower safety standards, and drop the minimum wage. Some court cases already being brought by big companies could be the shape of things to come. Philip Morris wants to sue for loss of profits caused by the Australian government's legislation on cigarette packaging, while Germany is facing legal action because it decided to phase out nuclear power.

Under TTIP big companies with their seemingly limitless resources and high powered lawyers could take any  government which got in their way to special, secret courts. The threat of billion dollar fines could deter a future Labour government,say, from renationalising the railways, or reversing the inroads of privatisation in the NHS. What price then your voting in elections, passing conference resolutions, or - if the Met will still allow it - even marching in the street?

No wonder there have been protests in Brussels about TTIP, or that 97 per cent of European citizens said they were against it in an EU poll. Even European commissioners are expressing caution, as are MEPs, and trade unionists both sides of the Atlantic oppose it, though the British government seems content to let it go ahead.      

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/feb/19/ttip-brussels-cecilia-malmstrom-eu-trade-us-nhs

The wonder though is how little we hear from politicians or on TV about TTIP, and why it is not being raised in an election year. It seems not even elected members of the European parliament are trusted, and they have to take a vow of silence, forbidding them from telling us what they have seen.
 As Molly Scott Cato, a Green MEP for the South West of England, wrote recently:

'... I have now been granted privileged access to the European parliament restricted reading room to explore documents relating to the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) deal. But before I had the right to see such “top secret” documents, which are restricted from the gaze of most EU citizens, I was required to sign a document of some 14 pages, reminding me that “EU institutions are a valuable target” and of the dangers of espionage. Crucially, I had to agree not to share any of the contents with those I represent.

The delightful parliamentary staff required me to leave even the smallest of my personal items in a locked cupboard, as they informed me how tiny cameras can be these days. Like a scene from a James Bond film, they then took me through the security door into a room with secure cabinets from which the documents were retrieved. I was not at any point left alone.

This week hundreds of protesters against TTIP have descended on the European parliament. They are quite rightly concerned about the threat that this treaty poses to the British government’s ability to conduct its affairs in their interests. On a range of issues, from food safety standards and animal welfare to public services and financial regulation, there are deep concerns that the harmonisation of standards across the Atlantic really means a reduction of standards on both sides.

But how are we to know for certain? All discussions about TTIP have been hypothetical, since the negotiations are taking place in secret. In order to read even brief notes of what has been discussed I have to be reminded of my duties not to undertake espionage for foreign powers. Repeated complaints about secrecy from my fellow Green members have resulted in our being admitted to the restricted reading room but we are still not able to share what we discover there with our constituents or with journalists.'

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/feb/04/secrets-ttip-corporations-not-citizens-transatlantic-trade-deal

Of course, an important part of free expression is the freedom of the press. As people say, if you don't like what you see in a particular paper you can stop buying it. Whereas, if you are wealthy enough you can buy the paper and change its politics.

We all know better than to trust the tabloids for our information, but there's the 'quality' press- papers like the Telegraph.Until recently its chief political correspondent was Peter Oborne, a conservative even if independent.

On February 17, 2015 Oborne resigned from The Daily Telegraph. In a letter posted to the online news website, OpenDemocracy, Oborne criticised his former employer for the relationship between their editorial and commercial arms. Oborne outlined how the paper would suppress negative stories and drop investigations into the HSBC bank, a major source of their advertising revenue, which, in his opinion, compromised their journalistic integrity calling it a "form of fraud on its readers".

He also alleged that the Telegraph’s coverage of stories relating to UK supermarket chain Tesco, shipping company Cunard and the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong had been influenced by commercial considerations, adding, “There are other very troubling cases, many of them set out in Private Eye, which has been a major source of information for Telegraph journalists wanting to understand what is happening on their paper”.


http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/feb/18/peter-oborne-telegraph-hsbc-accounts

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/feb/20/peter-oborne-resignation-media-serve-rich-telegraph-hsbc

 It would not be the first time a newspaper has considered its advertising revenue before running a story that might upset a company.  What was newsworthy was that someone like Oborne felt he had to speak out. In other cases journalists newer to the profession have come across what looked like a big story to pursue, but reluctantly had to dump it when they were told it would never get printed, or realised it might break rather than make their career.

I' imagine the Ritz-owning, Channel Island-dwelling Barclay brothers who own the Telegraph might be sympathetic to some of HSBC's tax avoiding customers anyway, aside from the advertising. A much bigger newspaper owner, whose interests' ability to avoid UK taxes did not prevent a mutually understanding relationship with British governments is Rupert Murdoch. The Sun's infamous Hillsborough story was a political matter. And Sun journos who we're told were horrified by what they saw were free to go up the road from Wapping, or keep their heads down and mouths shut, remembering that all that took Prince Rupert's shilling had waved goodbye to conscience along with union rights.

Free Speech at Work?

Are you free to say what you like at work? "Have a nice day?", click, click and/or "would you like fries with that?" may not be the full extent of your repertoire, but it can be pretty well circumscribed. Elsewhere, that nice office where everyone's on first name terms and you can dress down Friday may seem free, but have you noticed how the receptionist looked nervously over her shoulder before she whispered her confidence to you?
How free people feel to speak their mind depends generally on how secure they are and if the place is organised. In some casual jobs people are afraid to talk to the person they are working with, in case what they say is eavesdropped, or reported, and next day they are out of a job.
As for government departments, undermining job security and union organisation is not just about pay and conditions, but one way of intimidating civil servants from speaking out about stuff they know, or telling the public things we should know. Of course it may have the opposite effect.
In the past the Official Secrets Act was used to cover a multitude of sins, and probably still is, but now it is being supplemented with commercial businessspeak.

Members of the Public and Commercial Services(PCS) union at the National Gallery are starting their second strike today in the fight against their work being handed over to a private security firm. But they have an additional issue since management suspended senior union representative Candy Udwin, an art handler, for allegedly “breaching commercial confidentiality,” PCS said, by giving information to a full-time union official, including information about the costs of using profiteers.

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-bce7-National-Gallery-union-convenor-suspended-on-eve-of-5-day-strike/#.VOlzRy6E3jk

http://artforum.com/news/id=50134

Now hang on. We the public still own the National Gallery, right? In fact the management claims it must get more "commercial" because there are limited public resources available. But the private company coming in is not a charity. It must see a profit in taking over the work. So how come the cost of bringing the privateers in is not something the public, including people who work at the gallery, are supposed to know?

Another aspect of freedom of speech at work is safety. In the construction industry, where many workers were blacklisted after taking up safety issues, and HSE inspections are few and far between, responsible workers will not cut corners, but they may hesitate to raise issues, hoping someone else will, if it means losing your job and having your card marked henceforth.

Electrician Frank Morris lost his job on the Crossrail project after raising concerns about safety, and it took over a year for him to win reinstatement.  Frank was not the last, either. But last week a worker who was sacked in similar circumstances was reinstated within half an hour of workers taking militant action on his behalf.  This may have to do with a demonstration at company headquarters spilling over into London's Oxford Street and stopping rush hour traffic. It is probably also not unconnected with the inquest opening tomorrow at St.Pancras Coroners' court into the death of Rene Tkacic working on Crossrail, and the vigil planned by trade unionists and safety campaigners outside.

Our individual freedom and even lives as workers depends on our ability to join in collective action. 

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-007b-Crossrail-whistleblower-reinstated-after-sacking#.VOl2xi6E3jk

Crossrail  Vigil at St.Pancras Coroners Court, Camley Street, London N1C 4PP. Assemble 9.15am

Uncovering the Past, Making Sure There's No Cover-up in Present

 ARCHEOLOGICAL excavations due to start soon at Liverpool Street, in London's central business district, will uncover the bones of many poor, forgotten Londoners, buried in part of the 16th -17th century Bedlam cemetery.  

Among them they could find the remains of Robert Lockyer, a Leveller, one of those who fought in Cromwell's army against the monarchy, only to be suppressed when they spoke out against propertied privilege, and demanded the right to vote for all.  Lockyer, who is thought to have lived on nearby Bishopsgate, was elected as an 'Agitator' by the soldiers, but executed by firing squad in April 1649. 

Though the killing was in St.Paul's cathedral churchyard, his bullet-ridden corpse was thrown into a grave in the Bedlam cemetery.  But if the aim had been to crush the Leveller's movement before it gained sympathy among working people in London, it was not entirely successful. Some 4000 people, many wearing Leveller green ribbons, attended Lockyer's funeral at Bedlam.

The cemetery was eventually closed, and in the 18th century it was built over, then in 1829, working-class housing was cleared to make way for Liverpool Street railway station.  In recent times new office building spreading north and east of Liverpool Street has expanded the business area, and raised "market values" of property in adjoining areas, increasing pressure on working-class people to make way for the more affluent and fashionable.

Only now, the story and remains of much earlier generations' hardships and struggles are getting attention.  This bit of history is being brought to light by the Crossrail project.  
The site at Liverpool Street has to be excavated for the construction of  the eastern entrance  of the new east-west London railway, Crossrail’s station complex there.

As well as the possibility that Lockyer's grave might be rediscovered, archaeologists are also hoping that they may find another important Leveller grave – that of John Lilburne, the movement’s most prominent leader. Dying of natural causes at the age of 43, he was buried there in 1657. Known as ‘Freeborn John’, Lilburne had been flogged, pilloried, gagged and imprisoned as a threat to King Charles I. The Cromwellian authorities had him arrested for high treason, and later  exiled and then imprisoned.  He was on parole from his last prison sentence when he died.
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/aug/08/crossrail-tunnelling-unearths-burial-ground-bedlam

A different kind of  investigation will open on Monday, February 23, charged with uncovering the facts about a more recent death.  Rene Tkacik, 43, was fatally injured on March 7 last year, when he was hit by a section of freshly applied Shotcrete. This is the technique of firing concrete mix through hoses at high velocity, so that it hardens on impact on a surface or around reinforcing rods. 

Recalling that electrician Frank Morris was sacked from Crossrail after raising safety concerns, and only  reinstated after a year long campaign (Frank has since been elected to the Unite union executive), London Hazards Centre says there has been much concern over Crossrail safety, including the use of shotcrete. Following Rene Tkacic's death a whistleblower compiled a list of accidents and near misses, including workers injured by falling concrete. He said that having approached contractors BBMV and Crossrail seeking assurances that steps be taken to avoid any further injuries and deaths, they failed to action his concerns. He also notified the Health and Safety Executive.

Last year two enquiries were called.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/aug/02/crossrail-safety-inquiries-worker-killed

On Monday, an inquest on Rene's death will commence, at St.Pancras Coroners' Court. The Hazards Centre and the  Construction Safety Campaign have asked people to gather at 9.15 am  for a silent vigil outside the court.  


For more info. on LHC,  shotcrete, and Crossrail, see:
http://www.lhc.org.uk/

Police and Blacklists:. Hand in Glove

HOW LAING O'ROURKE HANDLE PROTEST. Dave Smith of the Blacklist Support Group being removed after trying to make his point at construction firm's Dartford headquarters

WORKERS fighting against the blacklist in the building industry are angry that the Metropolitan Police would  ‘neither confirm nor deny’  that Special Branch and undercover cops have been snooping on the Construction Support Group.

Phil Chamberlain, an investigative journalist whose work led to the Information Commissioner's raid on the employer-funded Consulting Association, causing it to close in 2009, had made a Freedom of Information request for “copies of any files held by the Metropolitan Police (including Special Branch) on the organisation called the Blacklist Support Group. This is a group campaigning for the rights of those refused work because of their union activities.”

The Metropolitan Police Service S responded on October 9 that it was in the “public interest” for them to refuse to “confirm or deny in order to safeguard national security” the existence of files on the Blacklist Support Group. It did though admit it held information that “some information is held that may ‘relate’ to the Blacklist Support Group.”

The raid on the Consulting Association, a successor to the notorious right-wing Economic League, revealed that data was illegally stored on thousands of people, concerning their personal and family  life and trade union or political activities. Not all were building workers. The companies who subscribed to this service were also interested in environmental campaigners. They also apparently discussed what could be done about a Glasgow university who reported unfavourably on safety in the North Sea oil industry after the Piper Alpha disaster.

But building workers were particularly vulnerable because of the nature of the industry. What has happened is that a trade unionist who tries to organise colleagues on a site, attends meetings, or simply tries to raise concern over health and safety issues at work, is not only liable to be victimised, but becomes the subject of a secret report which follows him or her through life. They can no longer get a job even when there is work about, and of course their families suffer.

If the Special Branch or undercover cops are spying on those who campaign against the blacklist, then as has been revealed in the Stephen Lawrence case, the police have been pursuing the families of the victims of crime, rather than the perpetrators.

As for the claim that they cannot admit anything or disclose documents, on "national security" grounds, this is the very same pretext that government has been using for refusing to release documents on the Shrewsbury building worker pickets that were jailed.

It is as good as an admission that so far as police and the state are concerned, workers who fight for their rights are still what Thatcher called them, that is us, the Enemy Within.
It has been evident all along that whatever the law may say, and whatever we may be told about "equality before the law" and the police force being neutral, the state and private sectors of the snooping industry have been working hand and glove.


A Commons Select Committee investigation found that the undercover police unit known as the National Extremism Tactical Coordination Unit (NETCU) attended and gave powerpoint presentations to meetings of the Consulting Association blacklisting organisation. The head of the covert blacklisting organisation, which was financed and controlled by major construction companies, was prosecuted for holding illegally files on construction workers. Construction firms paid on a case-by-case basis for frequently inaccurate information contained in these files.

The difference between this and the police activity is that whereas the bosses paid for the Consulting Association and private detectives etc, we the public are expected to pay for the Special Branch and other agencies to spy on ourselves!  And we are not allowed to see the results. It is evident from some of the Consulting Association files revealed that their material did not just concern workplace activity or come from employers sharing information.

 The Metropolitan Police service notes there was a pre-agreed police line on queries about the Consulting Association.   “IF ASKED: is it true that NETCU shared information with the Consulting Association? We do not discuss matters of intelligence.”

Supt Steve Pearl, who ran NECTU, is now a director at Agenda Security Services, which provides employment vetting services. His former boss, ex-Assistant Chief Constable Anton Setchell, who was the senior police officer in charge of the UK police domestic extremism machinery between 2004 and 2010, is currently head of global security at Laing O’Rourke – one of the construction companies subscribing to the Consulting Association.

 Following exposure of how the police Special Demonstrations Squad and other secret units conducted undercover - and under- the -covers   - spying on women activists, the High Court ruled in September against them using the "neither confirm nor deny" formula. Some women currently suing the Metropolitan Police are also on the Consulting Association blacklist.
  See    http://www.hazards.org/blacklistblog/

But it seems the Met  are in no hurry to clear up speculation and answer allegations concerning their collaboration with the bosses' blacklist. Blacklist Support Group secretary Dave Smith is one of a
 number of campaigners who have been refused copies of their own personal police files.

Dave says: “It is without doubt that the police and security services are spying on trade unionists fighting for justice on the issue of blacklisting. They have colluded with big business to deliberately target trade unionism over decades. Shrewsbury, Orgreave, blacklisting; the list goes on and on. The refusal to provide any information whatsoever smacks of an establishment cover-up. Blacklisting is no longer an industrial relations issue: it is a human rights conspiracy.”

Besides seeking legal redress from companies which blacklisted him and others, Dave continues to publicise the issues,  and has asked friends to share the photograph above of what happened when he went with fellow-campaigners to the headquarters of the big construction giant Laing O'Rourke recently.

Safe in their hands

VIGIL FOR RICHARD LACO,  killed on Laing O'Rourke site.
As I've said, blacklisting is often linked  to another issue in the building trade, and that is safety, or the lack of it. The accident rate can even go up when times are hard, because bosses are anxious to cut corners and be competitive, firms push bogus self-employment making workers responsible for their own protection, and workers fear speaking up about conditions and ways of working will result in their being singled out as "troublemakers".

Certainly many of those who found themselves on the Consulting Association files appear to have committed the "offence" of becoming safety reps.  Yet with already insufficient HSE inspections being hit by cuts, the government of Old Etonian toffs who have never done a day's work proclaiming building and other industries "safe", and even regulations like those on asbestos being undermined, the need for workers to organise, and protect their safety at work, has never been greater.

Anyway, seeing that photo of the brother being manhandled from Laing O'Rourke's headquarters reminded me of another protest, that I attended.

 It is almost a year since Richard Laco, a 31 year old labourer, was killed by falling steel and concrete on a Laing O'Rourke site at Kings Cross. 

Union officers revealed they had not been allowed on site, where the company has a £600 million contract to build the Crick medical research centre. Nor were Richard Laco's workmates allowed off site to join a vigil outside the gate. The management claimed they were holding their own event on site, but Richard's gilfriend was not allowed in, and had to plant her wreath of flowers with others at the gate.

Five years ago Laing O'Rourke were fined over the August 2005 death of a worker at Heathrow. The firm was prosecuted by the Health and Safety Executive along with SGB Services Ltd, a supplier of construction equipment. Both pleaded guilty to breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act. Laing O’Rourke Infrastructure Ltd was fined £75,000 and ordered to pay £75,000 costs. SGB Services Ltd was fined £30,000 and ordered to pay £30,000 in costs.

Matthew Gilbert, a 27-year-old carpenter from Plymouth and a 21-year-old engineer’s assistant, Parminder Singh, from Slough, had been standing on a concrete slab when it collapsed and fell 17 metres to the level below. Gilbert was killed in the collapse, while Singh suffered extensive scarring, along with a broken back, broken leg and a broken jaw.

The court heard that SGB failed to ensure Threaded Shoring Adaptors, TSAs which they supplied were able to carry maximum loads. The company had carried on supplying defective TSAs despite a recall programme, and two of these failed, causing the concrete slab to collapse. The HSE investigation also found that Laing O’Rourke Infrastructure Ltd failed to have adequate systems in place to inspect the quality and condition of the TSAs before they were used in safety-critical applications, and had failed to remove sub-standard TSAs from use when warned.

HSE Inspector Karen Morris said: “The tragic death of one man and the serious injuries suffered by his colleague could have been prevented if both companies had had more robust systems in place. “This case demonstrates an extremely serious failure of both the principal contractor and the supplier to ensure the materials they supplied for the work were fit for purpose.”

http://www.building.co.uk/laing-orourke-fined-over-heathrow-death/3152845.article 

Another Laing O'Rourke worker was killed at Heathrow at the beginning of October. Philip Andrew Griffiths, 38, who had been working on the airport's terminal 2 car park on night shift, was hit by a dumper truck that was being used to move a broken down hoist. 

A Met Police spokesperson said: “Police were called by London Ambulance Service at 04:46hrs on Thursday, 2 October to Cayley Road, close to the Ground Floor Car Park at Terminal 2, Heathrow Airport, following reports of a road traffic collision.  “Officers attended and found a man in his thirties suffering serious injuries following a collision with a truck".  The victim died shortly before 5.45.

http://www.constructionenquirer.com/2014/10/02/laing-orourke-worker-killed-at-heathrow/
 
HSE officials say they are investigating.  The £77 million Terminal 2 car park is near completion

Laing O'Rourke say they are aiming to eliminate all accidents not just the fatal ones on their sites.
Perhaps they genuinely are.  But I'd sooner trust workers' self organisation, trade unionism, and safety representatives, along with campaigning for a change in policy and government, for that "health and safety culture" that David Cameron and his friends despise.

World Cup of Blood Overfloweth

 Why Construction Safety Campaigners are going to an Embassy

MONDAY, April 28, will be International Workers Memorial Day, with various events planned in Britain and around the world. Here in London, as in previous years, these will include a rally by the statue at Tower Hill of the Unknown Building Worker. But before that, the Construction Safety Campaign and the London Hazards Centre have invited supporters to join them at 1 South Audley Street, in the West End, from 8.30am, where they intend to hand in a letter at the Qatar embassy.

Many Brits and others have gone out after good money working in oil-rich Gulf states like Qatar, but the embassy protest concerns the hard lives and numerous deaths among the larger number of workers, often from poorer Asian countries, employed in construction projects linked with the 2022 FIFA world cup.

A flyer from the International Workers memorial day organising committee says: "Football world wide is a game largely enjoyed by billions of workers. It must not be stained with the blood of workers".

This isn't the first time the Construction Safety Campaign has turned its attention to a sports-related construction. Ten years ago, on April 28 2004, the London campaigners switched from their more usual routes south of the Thames to march on Wembley stadium, where carpenter Patsy O'Sullivan had been killed when a platform fell 300ft. on to him as he was working below.

After representations by the CSC, the building unions, and Brent trades union council, a plaque was put up at the stadium to commemorate Pat O'Sullivan.

But it will take more than one plaque to remember those who have died so far in Qatar, or the further deaths that are predicted.

More than 500 Indian migrant workers have died in Qatar since January 2012, revealing for the first time the shocking scale of death toll among those building the infrastructure for the 2022 World Cup.
Official figures confirmed by the Indian embassy in Doha reveal that 237 Indians working in Qatar died in 2012 and 241 in 2013. A further 24 Indians have died in January 2014.
These come after the Guardian revealed last month that 185 Nepalese workers had died in Qatar in 2013, taking the total from that country to at least 382 over two years.
Human rights groups and politicians said the figures meant Fifa could not "look the other way", and should be leading demands for Qatar to improve conditions for the estimated 1.2 million migrant workers fuelling a huge construction boom.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/18/qatar-world-cup-india-migrant-worker-deaths

A comprehensive report released earlier this week by the International Trade Union Confederation estimated that 4,000 immigrant workers could die before the 2022 Qatar World Cup – a result of living in squalor, drinking salty water, working excessive hours in extreme heat and living in cramped conditions.

The report begins “Qatar is a country without a conscience” and only gets more damning from there.

“Fundamental rights and freedoms do not exist for workers in Qatar whether for poor migrant workers or highly paid professional expatriates. Foreign workers are enslaved – owned by employers who own the power of recruitment, total control over wages and conditions of employment, the authority to issue ID cards (not having an ID card can lead to prison) and the ability to refuse a change of employment or an exit visa to leave the country. This is known as the Kafala system.”

The reality is that the stadiums for the 2022 World Cup are being built on the backs of the 1.4 million immigrant workers living and working in Qatar but are being under-compensated and subjected to unfair labor practices. Many of these workers are Nepalese and Indian.

The report goes into specific details about the conditions, allowing workers a first-person account of the situation.

One 26-year-old worker from the Philippines wrote: “After being in Qatar for five years, I would like to take my annual leave and go back home for a short visit. The company practice is that the manager demands a deposit payment of $275 -- an amount which I cannot afford in addition to the price of the ticket.” The worker also notes his living conditions, which include “eight people to one bedroom, sixteen people share a bathroom and thirty five people share a kitchen.”

The statistics cited say that 191 Nepalese workers and 218 Indian nationals died in 2013 alone, and the potential for 4,000 pre-World Cup deaths is based on mortality trend data from the Nepal and Indian embassies.

In response, Qatar has created two separate charters – the Qatar Foundation Mandatory Standards and the Committee Workers' Welfare Standards – but both appear to be ineffective. First of all, the QF appears to allow workers to merely raise objections to conditions as opposed to enact substantial changes, but more importantly, it's self-policed by the contractors themselves. The report notes it periodically conducts self-audits, which consistently fail to yield anything of merit.

The second charter is even more of a joke. Workers meet with management once a month (at an accommodation site, not the actual work site) and are barred from raising topics such as wages, hours of work or potential to switch companies.

FIFA is aware of the issues and has called on Qatar to amend its practices, but it seems that there's little fear of re-locating the World Cup (despite the very bright idea to host a World Cup in Qatar's searing climate). What's more, FIFA is currently under federal investigation because its former VP allegedly accepted bribe money from a firm linked to Qatar's bid.

If that's still not enough to make one question the entire bureaucratic process for soccer's governing body, a Reuters report on Tuesday said that FIFA considered halting an investigation being conducted by an independent ethics committee into the alleged bribes for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. Thankfully, they thought better of intervening and the investigation is still on-going.

Given all the recent revelations, it's no wonder MLS commissioner Don Garber recently quipped that the Qatar World Cup could become a "monumental disaster." At this point, that seems all too likely.

http://www.cbssports.com/general/eye-on-sports/24499925/report-preparations-construction-for-qatar-world-cup-could-kill-4000

The Daily Mirror too has reported on Qatar:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/2022-world-cup-qatar-accused-3303458

The IMF has expressed concern that the row over workers' conditions and deaths in construction could effect Qatar's whole economic development. Roads and hotels along with other infrastructure projects are linked with the world cup.
http://www.thenational.ae/business/industry-insights/economics/20140309/qatar-faces-fifa-world-cup-2022-cost-and-labour-risks-imf-says

Qatar is not the only Gulf state where labour conditions and prestigious construction projects have aroused attention. There is an international campaign, involving artists, concerned about the rights and conditions of building workers on the new Guggenheim museum an gallery being built in Abu Dhabi.
http://gulflabor.org/

But Qatar could be special both for the horrific scale of the casualties and the possibilities which international interest in the World Cup provide for publicity and leverage.

And in London ...MEANWHILE the Construction Safety Campaign and London Hazards Centre are not taking their eyes off what's happening in this country. While people may be patting themselves on the back over the lack of fatalities in the Olympic project - itself owing much to union organisation and public campaigning, - the construction industry continues to take its toll, not least in London, both of workers on the sites and members of the public.

In November it was Richard Laco, killed under a fall of steel and concrete from a collapsing stairwell on the Francis Crick site at St.Pancras, Laing O'Rourke main contractors.

In February, Julie Sillitoe, a cab driver, was killed when falling concrete fell on top of her car in Holborn.


On March 2, Kevin Campbell was killed by a falling object at the Dockland Light Railway site in Stratford, E15.  As with the Crick site it was reported that the employers would not allow union safety representatives on site. The contractor, Clancy, would not comment.
http://www.newhamrecorder.co.uk/news/construction_worker_death_on_stratford_building_site_prompts_calls_for_action_1_3491499

A few days later a concrete sprayer employed on the Crossrail project died after a concrete slab fell on him in a tunnel at  Holborn.
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/crossrail-confirms-first-worker-death-tunnel-sprayer-killed-by-falling-concrete-1439326



On April 14, Dainius Rupsys, originally from Lithuania, was killed when part of a building collapsed on him while he was working, in Grosvenor Square. A mini-mechanical digger being used on the second floor of the former US navy premises fell through the ceiling.  The Construction Safety Campaign called a vigil outside the McGee site, and UCATT has called for an investigation.
http://uniteresist.org/2014/04/vigil-after-death-on-grosvenor-square-site-this-thursday-17-april-12-noon/.

http://union-news.co.uk/2014/04/ucatt-calls-investigation-grosvenor-square-death/



With cuts in already inadequate HSE inspections, and contractors tempted to cut corners by the economic situation as well as David Cameron's assault on what he calls "the health and safety culture", the need for union-backed safety campaigning is as clear as ever.  So is the link which union activists point to between injuries and deaths on sites and the employers use of the blacklist against safety reps and anyone else who shows too much interest in working conditions and safety.

Incidentally, remembering the saying "Cuts can Kill", among the lives that have been saved by campaigners is that of the London Hazards Centre. Its demise had seemed possible after local authorities withdrew funding, but thanks to unions and other supporters stepping into the breach, its valuable work continues.


                                      International Workers Memorial  Day

Thursday April 28

Assemble at Qatar Embassy, 1 South Audley Street, W1K 1NB

(nearest tubes Hyde Park, Green Park).

                                     8.30am to 9am. Letter to be handed in 9.15am


Rally and Memorial by the Statue of the Unknown Building Worker, Tower Hill, EC3, 10.30am

Speakers include:  Steve Murphy (UCATT), Gail Cartmel (Unite), Tony O'Brien (CSC), and someone from London Hazards Centre.

Construction Safety Campaign:      cscuk@outlook.com
London Hazards Centre: mail@lhc.org.uk











http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/apr/12/death-richard-laco-britain-builders-safety-construction

Two very different fighters lost

TONY BENN at Bread and Roses club in Clapham, welcoming American trade unio nits from US Labor Against the War.


Below, MICK ABBOTT, wearing Shrewsbury pickets tee shirt, with Ricky Tomlinson and other campaigners, at Westminster.   

AS though the death of RMT leader Bob Crow was not enough, we have lost two other fighters from our side, two men from very different backgrounds, TONY BENN and MICK ABBOTT, both of whom dedicated their lives to the cause of socialism and the working class, and both of them sadly missed. 

Warm tributes have poured in to Tony Benn from all sorts of people who genuinely admired him and appreciated his contribution to the movement and British politics. Often they come with memories of this or that speech which inspired the listener, or occasions when  they were grateful for Tony Benn's support. It must niggle Labour's self-styled "modernisers", if they are not too thick-skinned, to reflect that Benn's popularity is unlikely to ever accrue to the likes of Tony Blair.

There's some question which the genuine Benn admirers have found more sickening, the hypocritical and patronising praise for Tony Benn now he's dead from politicians who opposed eveything he stood for when alive; or the way some old adversaries have been coaxed back out of obscurity to denounce Benn before he is buried. He has been accused of splitting Labour, and being "destructive", and this by people like Shirley Williams who broke from the Labour Party to form the SDP and encourages her Lib Dem colleagues to back the coalition's attack on the NHS. 

They accuse Benn of "resisting new ideas", and Williams, whose own "new idea" when a Labour minister of Education was to propose replacing student grants by loans, says "Tony was yearning for a world that was gone. …He didn’t really recognise that the world was becoming global." Really? Is that the man I remember as Anthony Wedgwood Benn, dragging Parliament into the 20th century so he didn't have to become Lord Stansgate? The Postmaster General who opened the GPO Tower in London to the public? The champion of Concorde (part built in his Bristol constituency) who restored that "e" at the end as an earnest of Anglo-French co-operation?  

I was never one of Tony Benn's uncritical fans, and won't pretend so now. I even attacked him on occasion. (Like when he fell into bad company -i.e. Socialist Action and its Serb nationalist chums who formed the 'Committee for Peace in the Balkans'.) 

But on the positive side, I remember my Mum and Dad, admonishing my youthful cynicism, saying that " At least he fought to stay out of the House of Lords when most of them could not wait to get in there". My Dad, one of the disappointed generation,  still jeered bitterly about "Earl Attlee" and rarely had a good word for any politician, so praise from him was praise indeed. Benn earned it,and thus probably persuaded a lot of people that politics and voting was still worthwhile..

Second, I saw a message on Facebook (unfortunately I did not save it) from someone involved in support for the Hillingdon hospital cleaners' fight. These were mainly Asian women, who found themselves in the frontline fighting the privatisers, as they resisted having their wages cut. They were delighted when Benn accepted an invite to speak at a public meeting in their support in Southall. Apparently more than they got from Southall's then Labour MP (or some in the union).

Thirdly, talking of new ideas, during Benn's time as Industry Minister he took his belief in democracy beyond the palace of Westminster by supporting workers who took over their factories to resist sackings and closures. Skeptical as we were about things like the Meriden co-op for their utopian aspect, and the danger they could descend into class collaboration before reaching a dead end, it is worth thinking about them again today's context (as well as contrasting Benn's efforts with New Labour's distance from anything involving workers). One workers' occupation may be worth a thousand words about "nationalisation" in a left-wing paper.  And  even naive co-operatives are better than Labour MPs and councils demanding, as some recently did, tougher action against squatting.


I don't know whether Tony Benn was ever associated with the campaign for the Shrewsbury building pickets. (perhaps someone can tell us?) .But Mick Abbott, who died at his home in Wigan on February 27, most certainly was. I think Mick was one of the Wigan building workers who brought the issue of the jailed pickets on to a march in Preston called by the union in 1974, and he was one of the leaders of the march from Wigan to London the following year, as well as accompanying Ricky Tomlinson to the TUC in Blackpool. Having worked so hard to keep the issue alive when others, not least the Labour and trade union leaders, preferred trying to bury it, Mick came to the fore in the more recent campaign to bring out the truth about what happened to the pickets, hidden in still secret government documents, as w ell having the sentences squashed.

Unlike Benn, Mick was not born into a privileged background and did not have a career in politics. He was one of 12 siblings born in Kirkdale, Liverpool, on March 24, 1939, and he worked most of his life -when he could - in the construction industry. Married to Mary, and a father of four, he was a warm, friendly man with a typically Scouse sense of humour, but he could be serious, whether patiently reasoning with employers, or winning the confidence of fellow workers.

There were 400 people, relatives and friends, at his funeral to pay tribute, but as for fame, if his name did not make the papers or television, he had a different kind, in the dossier compiled on him for over 40 years by the secretive Consulting Association, financed by big construction companies. Like more than 3,000 other building workers and others, having acquired a name for asking for decent conditions and reporting safety breaches, Michael Abbott found himself not wanted time and again for work that was going on the sites.     

 Working as a scaffolder, Mick was also a TGWU shop steward on several sites, and with his brother Terry, also TGWU, he led a strike at  Stanlow oil refinery in Cheshire. An earlier major dispute came during the construction of Fiddlers Ferry power station near Warrington. A 1964 CA entry states: “Mr Abbott said: ‘I started on the Monday morning and the guy who was in charge said to us he wouldn’t take his lads up on the wet steel. At about 10.30am that morning an old man about 62, a steel erector, came hurtling down and was impaled on the steel barriers. We are always having to fight for safer conditions in the construction industry.’”

When I met the Wigan building workers contingent on that Preston march in 1974 they were surprised to hear that I was working on the Heysham power station site, having used somewhat irregular methods to get on site without going through Taylor Woodrow, the main contractor. They told me that none of them, who had been at Fiddlers Ferry, had been able to get a job at Heysham.

Taylor Woodrow was a major subscriber to the Consulting Association, and before that, to its predecessor, the right-wing Economic League. When the the CA's offices in Droitwich were raided in 2009 as part of an investigation by the Information Commissioners Office, a total of 3,200 names were discovered on its database. Among documents found were invoices showing that 44 construction firms, including some of the UK’s biggest, were regularly using the database. David Clancy, ICO investigations manager, gave evidence to an employment tribunal that some of the information in files used to blacklist workers “could only be supplied by the police or security services.”

It was during the 1972 building strike, the first national strike in the industry, that Mick Abbott got to know Des Warren and Ricky Tomlinson, who were later jailed on "conspiracy" charges for their part in organising pickets during the strike. At his trial, Des Warren famously said that the only conspiracy had been betwen the big employers, the Tory government, and the police. When Labour got in Home Secretary Roy Jenkins -another of the SDP "gang of four" - refused to release the two pickets, who spent more time in jail under Labour than they had under the Conservatives. A later Labour Home secretary, Jack Straw, told MPs that government documents concerning the Shrewsbury trial must be kept secret for reasons of "national security".

Talking about the CA blacklist, Mick Abbott said last year; “My file goes back to 1964, and the last entry says that I rekindled the campaign for justice for the Shrewsbury picketers in 2006. They have been watching me all these years and passing this information around, blighting my life over four decades.”

Banned from sites, Mick became self-employed, installing kitchens. But he continued campaigning, including support for the Construction Safety Campaign, and the Blacklist Support Group, as well as the Justice for Shrewsbury 24 pickets campaign. In 2012 he met MPs on the Scottish Affairs select Committee who were discussing the effect of blacklisting. He had previously been with Ricky Tomlinson and other activists to a meeting in the Commons about the Shrewsbury case, and he carried on campaigning even though he was seriously ill.

But then Mick Abbott along with other campaigners found themselves up against another kind of obstruction, something which we have been aware of for some time, but refuses to explain itself and therefore remains to be explained. Some people within the Shrewsbury campaign have set themselves up as the "official" campign, according to their website, casting aspersions on activists, and winding the campaign down. Here, added to a tribute to Mick Abbott, is some experience narrated by Pete Farrell:
 

In December 2013 Mike dispite suffering from just having had chemo went along with others from the Justice for Shrewsbury National committee to the press conference at Parliament. We were prevented from going in by Police who had been told by E.Turnbull we were not invited.  (Eileen Turnbull is a researcher and treasurer for the campaign) Mike had re-established the present campaign in 2006 after having looked after Des Warren and promised Des before he died he would, a man of his word. Mike had as a young man marched from Wigan to London with others demanding their release ! Why is this woman so frightened of the truth ? Why did she walk away without explanation from the National Committee which had a democratic constitution and ignore it ? Why did the Annual Shrewsbury march get cancelled listen to Bob Crow and R.Tomlinson at the rally Ricky states Mike Abbott has spent 30 years fighting for Justice, where's Justice for Mike ? Lets have the truth !

SHREWSBURY marchers ready to start. The marches attracted a wide range of trade union activists and some young people learning about the pickets' case for the first time. Why did the marches stop?


Obituary for Michael Abbott 

liverpool-news/politicians-call-release-secret-documents-3338978 

MPs vote for release of papers