As rail and other workers fight for their jobs, pay and conditions, Labour ‘leader’ says ‘strike should not go ahead’
Keir Starmer expressly betrayed striking rail workers yesterday, during a speech in which he said that ‘the strike should not go ahead’ because it would inconvenience the public:
Workers are fighting for their jobs, pay and conditions against employers who exploit them. Strikes are supposed to cause inconvenience – it’s the whole point. And it’s up to the government and the management they impose on the workers to solve that issue rather than expecting exploited employees to bend over and take whatever they feel like doing to them.
After all, according to activist Ali Dogan, the seventy highest-paid managers at Network Rail earn plenty:
This is far from Starmer’s first such betrayal. During the pandemic, as teachers fought for safe conditions, he sided with the Tories and demanded schools reopen, no ifs or buts and betrayed them over masks in the classroom – and when asked whether he would back other unions fighting to prevent workers having to return to unsafe workplaces, he answered ‘We’d have to look at it’.
With rail, education, NHS and other staff all balloting for strike action, the country is moving toward a de facto general strike this summer. It’s about time – and the place of a Labour leader is backing them to the hilt to bring about change for the better at last. But Keir Starmer is no Labour leader.
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