Labour are right behind you, Harriet Harman tells strike-hungry union chiefs

 

 

By Becky Barrow and Tim Shipman

Last updated at 11:43 AM on 14th September 2010

 

 

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• Harman says unions have democratic right to protest
  
  
• Brendan Barber: 'Every public service is under threat'
  
• Cuts 'will make Britain 'darker, brutish and more frightening'
  
  
• RMT chief Bob Crow: 'We lie down or stand up and fight'
  
  
• Union giants join forces for series of co-ordinated strikes
  
  
• Downing Street says PM wants to work WITH unions
  

Support: Acting Labour leader Harriet Harman backed a union war on cuts at the TUC today

 

Harriet Harman backed a union campaign against spending cuts yesterday by saying Labour would support coordinated strike action.

The acting opposition leader spoke out as union chiefs declared war on the ‘demolition Government’ and warned of ‘a movement of such scale that you have never seen before’.

At the opening of the Trades Union Congress annual conference in Manchester, they said a bitter fight against the cuts had begun – and would not end until they won.

Union members voted yesterday to co-ordinate their actions for maximum impact, with just one delegate – pilot Jim McAuslan – in a room of 700 voting against the plan.

It means Britain is facing a bitter series of strikes, protests, demonstrations and civil disobedience which could start as early as next month and last for years.

In a dramatic lurch to the left by Labour, which condemned widespread strike action while in government, Miss Harman endorsed plans for a nationwide campaign of civil disobedience and workplace walk-outs saying Labour would support union attempts to ‘campaign, demonstrate and protest’.

Speaking at the TUC, she said: ‘We will not be silenced by the right wing charaterising protest as undemocratic. Trade unionists have the democratic right to protest.

‘We will not be deterred by suggestions that this is illegitimate. It is perfectly within the law. We will not be cowed by accusations that this is irresponsible and putting services at risk – the very opposite is true. We will fight back.’

 

'Stand and fight': TUC chief Brendan Barber adopted a more measured tone than RMT boss Bob Crow (right)

 

 

 

 

 

Ready for action: Delegates at the TUC's annual congress in Manchester today

 

 

In a series of furious attacks on the coalition Government, union barons attacked the cuts which they branded ‘a chainsaw to our public services’.

 

 

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Brendan Barber, general secretary of the TUC, said it stood ready to co-ordinate industrial action and slammed the ‘insulting claptrap’ of Government ministers.

He added: ‘But what we’ve now got is not just a coalition government, but a demolition government.

‘The government’s determination to drive through massive spending cuts, which will not only devastate the services we rely on, will do untold damage to our economic prospects.’

He warned that the cuts would ‘make Britain a darker, brutish, more frightening place’.

Gail Cartmel, of Unite, Britain’s biggest union, said: ‘The fight ahead of us is the fight of our lives, and it is the fight we must win.’

 

Union bosses vowed to enlist support from workers who do not belong to unions, but object to cuts.

 

The impact of their actions could be crippling, with unions affiliated to the TUC representing around 6.5million workers.

 

Dave Prentis, of Unison, the largest public sector union, warned: ‘We will move to co-ordinate industrial action to defend all that we hold dear.’ To wild applause, he said it was not his members who should be facing a pay freeze, but ‘greedy and arrogant’ bankers.

Enlarge Opposition: Delegates launching their 'All together for public services' campaign

 

 

 

Strikes: Unison chief Dave Prentis with public sector workers outside TUC Congress

 

 

Matt Wrack, of the Fire Brigades Union, warned: ‘This is not a war on the poor but a war on the majority of the population.’

He said the cuts, which will be outlined at the comprehensive spending review in October, were lunacy.

Mark Serwotka, of the Public and Commerical Services Union, said strikes were inevitable unless the Government changed direction.

 

He said he did not want ‘a single penny to be cut and not a single job to be lost’.

Bob Crow, the militant leader of the Rail Maritime and Transport union, urged delegates to stand up and fight.

 

 

 

Enlarge

But Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said yesterday that government spending was unsustainable.

 

‘We literally can’t carry on like that,’ he said. Speaking to Radio 4’s Today programme, he said the pain will be distributed as fairly as possible.

Labour leadership favourite David Miliband last night spoke out against plans for mass protest.

The shadow foreign secretary refused to say that he would join a union rally against the coalition’s cuts next month.

 

He was the only Labour leadership candidate to stop short of a pledge to turn out for the protest on October 19, the day before details of the spending review are published.

In a stark warning about the dangers of union plans to oppose all cuts, Mr Miliband said ‘opposition was not enough’ and warned that protests risk alienating the public.

He said the focus should be on political action to throw the Tories out. ‘Let’s get voters back on our side. Unless we have got public opinion on our side we are not going to succeed,’ he said.

‘These plans need to be defeated. But they will only be defeated if they are defeated politically.’

In a break with tradition, no Cabinet minister is addressing this year’s TUC after an invitation to Business Secretary Vince Cable was withdrawn.

International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell, who attended a fringe meeting, said: ‘What we’re looking for from the TUC this week is a constructive approach to how we tackle these problems.’ Mr Mitchell is thought to be the first Tory minister ever to speak at the TUC conference.

 

 

Side by side in battle: David Miliband (near) and brother Ed maintain a civilised front in Manchester as they share a platform with other Labour leadership contenders, including Ed Balls (far)

Are we still supposed to take people like Harriet Harman and Bob Crow seriously these days?

Are we still supposed to take people like Harriet Harman and Bob Crow seriously these days?

 

Or the Labour party in general?:rolleyes:

Any of them in general.

I'd trust Labour before Conservatives though.

It's all cyclical though.

Labour got the country into the mess it's in, and surprise surprise they are trying to keep the mess as it is.

 

After-all it's no big secret that a vast amount of Labour's funds comes from Unions

Labour got the country into the mess it's in

 

Yes.

So did the Tories last time round.

Only because Major was a fool

Thatcher fan?

Nope :P

Churchill fan?

Who are you asking?

Actually John Major left the Labour Party with one of the strongest economies in years in 1997 which kind of made up for Black Wednesday and recession in 1992. That wasn't great but what that tit Gordon Brown left was a shambles. A shocking deficit figure because Labour tried putting it off for years, effectively pretending it wasn't there. Quite simply New Labour was a mistake and quite simply Gordon Brown was one of if not the worst Prime Minister the UK has ever had! Let's hope the new Labour leader has more qualities.

Actually John Major left the Labour Party with one of the strongest economies in years in 1997 which kind of made up for Black Wednesday and recession in 1992. That wasn't great but what that tit Gordon Brown left was a shambles. A shocking deficit figure because Labour tried putting it off for years, effectively pretending it wasn't there. Quite simply New Labour was a mistake and quite simply Gordon Brown was one of if not the worst Prime Minister the UK has ever had! Let's hope the new Labour leader has more qualities.

 

This.

Let's hope the new Labour leader has more qualities.

 

Well that's not going to be very difficult, is it.............................. :rolleyes: