Thousands tell EU: Hands off our railways

[Thinking Man's Idiot]

Thousands tell EU: Hands off our railways

(Thursday 13 November 2008)

by PAUL HASTE in Paris




BANNERS HIGH: The RMT delegation. pic: ANDREW WIARD

RMT union activists took to the streets of Paris yesterday alongside thousands of rail workers from across Europe in a vibrant protest against privatisation.

The demonstration had been called by French rail union CGT and the European Federation of Transport Workers to demand an end to EU-led rail "liberalisation" policies which RMT leader Bob Crow said "fundamentally attack the concept of a social railway."

A sea of flags representing rail unions from Belgium, Portugal, Spain and Britain were carried aloft as demonstrators thronged the Parisian avenues, marching from the Bastille to the huge railway station at Montparnasse in the centre of the city.

RMT Eurostar engineer Alan Crowe said that the protest was aimed at showing politicians across Europe that "rail workers were not going to accept the neoliberal diktats of EU bureaucrats" led by the right-wing French government, which currently holds the presidency of the EU.

RMT union reps and rail workers, some of whom had travelled from as far afield as Wales and Liverpool, handed out leaflets carrying a message in French from Mr Crow.

He warned rail union colleagues on the continent that "rail privateers and their shareholders have bled millions of pounds out of the British rail industry while taxpayers now pay over three times more in rail subsidies than under public ownership.

"Despite this insane state of affairs, the neoliberal mandarins of Brussels are rolling out their dangerous and failed privatisation model across Europe," he cautioned.

Portuguese union confederation CGTP activist Fernando Perreira welcomed the scores of RMT members, who were also joined by white-collar rail union TSSA members, to the demonstration.

"It is very positive to see the British workers here. This shows that we can come together across frontiers to oppose employers and governments who have working together across frontiers for a long time," Mr Perreira pointed out.

Charlie Boothe, a RMT activist working at London's Waterloo station, added that "privatisation is an issue that affects all of us, whichever country we are in.

"It is important to protest and that is why we are here in Paris today," he said.

The demonstration, marked by the setting off of red flares and the singing of the Internationale, was boosted by delegations from Spanish workers' federation CCOO.

Angela Noguera, a member of the CCOO Catalan rail workers delegation, had come from Barcelona to give her message to EU politicians.

"Neoliberalism is not acceptable," she declared. "If these politicians don't listen to us, we should strike and block railway lines until they do.

"We cannot allow them to privatise everything or we will have nothing left," she insisted.

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Tradition of solidarity

(Thursday 13 November 2008)


BRITISH rail workers' participation in the European day of action against rail privatisation in Paris was in the best traditions of international solidarity.

The spectre of privatisation is facing all European rail workers, courtesy of EU directives on marketisation.

It was Paris yesterday and Brussels last month, when RMT seafarers took part in another united protest against the decline in jobs in shipping and against EU regulations that demand the break-up and privatisation of ferry services.

EU member-state governments are united in support of such developments, which are profitable for a tiny minority and a financial imposition on the many.

It is not always the case that the trade unions in Britain can play a vanguard role, but, with regard to rail privatisation, rail trade unionists have seen and experienced the future that faces their comrades on the Continent and they know that it doesn't work.

Even Margaret Thatcher didn't believe that rail privatisation could work, but it took her hapless successor John Major to prove it.

Despite the claims that private-sector efficiencies would create more reliable services without government subsidies, the reality is that, in real terms, the privateers are raking in over three times more than publicly owned British Rail ever did.

British government ministers, all of whom rejected the Major government's privatisation proposals while in opposition, have fallen in line with European Commission plans for the whole of Europe.

Greater co-operation between rail workers and other trade unionists across the borders of EU member states can frustrate the neoliberal dream and make the railways public again.

Single cloud

THE only dark cloud tempering the joy that greeted the government's announcement that the Post Office will retain the Post Office Card Account (Poca) scheme is that it should not have been put out to tender in the first place.

Political pressure has, fortunately, stampeded the government into shutting down the bidding process and opting for the answer that should never have been questioned. The decision goes against the grain in that new Labour has missed no opportunity to belittle communal institutions in education, health and transport and hand over operations to the private sector.

With the government's grossly underestimated official unemployment figures showing the jobless total nearing 2 million, the closure of thousands of local post offices that Poca privatisation would have caused could only have accelerated this process.

In addition, local communities, rural, suburban and inner-city, would have lost their focal point and faced rapid decline and disintegration.

The government has already grievously wounded Britain's Post Office network, closing both crown and local offices on short-sighted grounds of "economic efficiency."


It has underestimated the detriment caused to the fabric of society by this soulless approach that is reflected in the neoliberal philosophy behind so-called Thatcherism and European Union directives that prioritise corporate profit over social cohesion and public service.


While welcoming this decision, the labour movement should press for an end to the "private is best" dogma and demand greater backing for publicly owned and operated services.

[ZingPao]

Looks good.