Free Events.

 

          If you are in and around Glasgow on the dates on the poster below, it would be well worth paying a visit to the Electron Club CCA 350 Sauchiehall Street Glasgow. There will be a very interesting series of events, See the poster below. talks/discussion/information/ and all the events are free. Glasgow's Spirit of Revolt will be there, Hope to see you there.

Visit ann arky at htps://spiritofrevolt.info  

Resistance.

  

     For September Read of the Month, we at Spirit of Revolt bring you a fascinating booklet of the occupation of Mainshill Woods in Lanarkshire to prevent opencast coal mining destroying the woods. It is from The Hetherigton Collection, T SOR-2.  It details tactics, strategies and survival techniques. Excellent drawings and descriptions. A wealth of useful information. A must read.

READ ON LINE:

Visit ann arky's home at http://strugglepedia.co.uk   

Again, Direct Action And Solidarity Win.

 

          Once again direct action and solidarity wins the day. The ZAD occupation has been running for years. The project to build a massive new airport in 5,000 hectres of wetlands and small hamlets was first raised in the 1970's, the protests grew larger and took on a more direct action approach during the 2000's, and the area has been occupied since. The protesters have determinedly held their ground and increased their presence, despite heavy and at times brutal, military and police opposition. It has now been announced that the massive destructive project has been cancelled. 

         However the struggle goes on, with the locals and protesters laying out their demands of what is to happen to this extensive piece of land that the state grab for the airport.

This report from Freedom News UK:

         In a communique the famous horizontal community Zone à Defendre (ZAD) has declared a “historic victory” and called for “expropriated peasants and inhabitants to be able to fully recover their rights as soon as possible.”
         The entirety of the land area devoted to the airport project — 1,650 hectares of land declared as being of public utility in 2008 — currently belongs to the State, with the exception of three roads crossing it. the ZAD has argued that this land should be kept in public hands and, rather than turned into an airport, put into forms of public lease for the benefit of the community and wildlife.
         Responding to reports that the Notre-Dame-des-Landes airport project is now officially dead, reps for the ten-year environmental occupation campaign wrote:

         This afternoon, the government has just announced the abandonment of the project.
        We note that the declaration of public utility [key to enabling large projects to function and compulsory purchases to happen] will not officially be extended. The project will definitely be null and void on February 8th.
     This is a historic victory against a destructive development project. This has been possible thanks to a long movement as determined as it is varied.
          First of all, we would like to warmly welcome all those who have mobilised against this airport project over the past 50 years.
        Regarding the future of the ZAD, the whole movement reaffirms today:
         The need for expropriated peasants and inhabitants to be able to fully recover their rights as soon as possible.
The refusal of any expulsion of those who have come to live in recent years in the grove to defend it and who wish to continue to live there and take care of it.
        A long-term commitment to take care of the ZAD lands by the movement in all its diversity — peasants, naturalists, local residents, associations, old and new inhabitants.
To implement it, we will need a period of freezing the institutional redistribution of land. In the future, this territory must be able to remain an area of ​​social, environmental and agricultural experimentation.
       With regard to the issue of the reopening of the D281 road, closed by the public authorities in 2013, the movement undertakes to answer this question itself. Police presence or intervention would only make the situation worse.
       We also wish, on this memorable day, to send a strong message of solidarity to other struggles against major destructive projects and for the defense of threatened territories.
         We call to converge widely on February 10th in the grove to celebrate the abandonment of the airport and to continue building the future of the ZAD.
      Acipa, Coordination of Opponents, COPAIn 44, Naturalists in struggle, the inhabitants of the ZAD.

A new e-book on the struggle,
 Defending The ZAD, can be read HERE:

Visit ann arky's home at radicalglasgow.me.uk

Edinburgh Uni. Occupation.

An appeal from our friends at ACE.

INFO from the Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh, 17 West Montgomery Place EH7 5HA
ACE is open Sats 12-4pm, Tues 12-3pm, Thursday 6 - 8pm
Advice and solidarity on benefits, debt, housing etc on Tuesdays.
Leith Wholefoods, the Info Shop, Scottish Radical Library and free broadband
available all 3 days.
Open monthly meetings first Wednesday of the month, 7.30pm at ACE
0131 557 6242 ace@autonomous.org.uk
www.autonomous.org.uk

Support Edinburgh Uni occupation at Charles Stewart House, Chambers St

       "We have just occupied one of the main University management buildings -Charles Stewart House – as we’re thoroughly disappointed with the University’s failure to commit to divestment from fossil fuels. "

https://www.facebook.com/edunipeopleandplanet?fref=ts

https://investethically.wordpress.com/2015/05/19/where-is-my-mind-night-6-in-the-occupation/

      The occupiers and supporters have faced violent attacks and threats from security hired by the University.

see also ace facebook

https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Autonomous-Centre-of-Edinburgh/106122676099131

which writes:
     It's important to support the struggle of these students in Edinburgh to build a stronger movement in this city and beyond. This occupation is not just about sustainability and green economy but taking action for the only world we have, against the neoliberal management of our lives and the oppression of local communities all over the world. If we link the fight of the students with those of the workers, unemployed, immigrants and disabled in this city we can be stronger and more successful. Let this be the beginning of a hot summer of dissent.

‪ActionAgainstAusterity‬

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Solidarity Knows No Borders.

      Syriza still playing the financial game and trying for modifications in the financial Mafia's master plan. Still waving the left wing flag, but still ignoring all the political prisoners in Greece hell-holes called prisons. Principled people are putting their lives on the line, in the name of freedom, but still the "party of the people" ignores their cry for justice. However they are not forgotten by their comrades on the outside who continue to show solidarity.

      The latest update on the hunger strikers incarcerated in the Greece's draconian dungeons of despair, from Contra Info:

        Till this day, March 23rd 2015, dozens of political prisoners have gone on hunger strike (most of them since March 2nd), demanding that the following be abolished: the special “anti-terrorist” legislation, and particularly articles 187A (terrorist organisation) and 187 (criminal organisation); the special repressive law (hoodie law); and the type C prisons, which are completing the state of exception for political prisoners. They also demand that the use and processing of DNA as means of evidence be limited; and that Savvas Xiros (who, despite having a 98% disability, is being systematically exterminated by the State for 13 years now), as well as the relatives of Conspiracy of Cells of Fire members be immediately released from prison.

      We, a group of solidarian comrades from the anarchist milieu who support the demands of the hunger strikers, have occupied the ‘105.5 FM Sto Kokkino’ radio station in Athens. We chose to occupy this specific station for obvious reasons: it is the radio outlet of the establishment and currently also of the government, or plainly the speaking trumpet of the SYRIZA-Independent Greeks coalition.

The ‘105.5 FM Sto Kokkino’ radio station, same as the vast majority of media scum, distorts both the overall context of the struggle waged by the hunger strikers and the actions in solidarity with them. This occupation is an action stemming from the broader movement of solidarity with the prisoners, who are giving a fight that concerns us all.

      We of the occupation in ‘105.5 FM Sto Kokkino’ are taking this means into our own hands and making counter-information a weapon! This action is part of the wider polymorphous movement of solidarity with the political prisoners on hunger strike.

Victory to the struggle of the hunger strikers!
Until every prison is torn down!

‘105.5 FM Sto Kokkino’ Occupation

Greek original: Athens IMC (March 23rd 2015)

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Fight For Aylesbury.

 

From “Fight for the Aylesbury”       occupation website.

      Since the “March for Homes” demo on 31st January, we have re-opened and occupied a part of the Aylesbury Estate in Southwark, South London.

     We are tenants, squatters, and other people who care about how our city is being grabbed by the rich, by developers and corrupt politicians, socially cleansed and sold off for profit.

    The Aylesbury Estate is where Tony Blair made his first speech as Prime Minister in 1997, making empty promises about social housing. Since then, for the past 18 years, Southwark Council and their developer friends have come up with one scheme after another. All with the same aim: to dispossess the residents, demolish their homes, and sell the land.

      In 2002 Aylesbury tenants fought and won a campaign against demolition and voted down the original scheme in a ballot. But now big areas of the estate are emptied and sealed up awaiting the bulldozers, while residents are “decanted” away from the area.

       The same bullshit that we have seen on the nearby Heygate estate, and all across London.

No demolition of the Aylesbury.

No yuppy flats.

Homes for all.

We are here to fight for the Aylesbury.

We are here to fight for our city.

We are here to liberate this space and bring it back to life. Come and join us.

PS: Thank you to everyone who has come down to show support, to all our neighbours and to those who have even come from as far away as Hackney bringing tea!

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Workers Know Your History, 1984/5 Miners strike.

      It is important that we, the ordinary people, remember our history, our struggles to improve our communities and conditions. It is important for several reasons, one is that if we don't remember, record and celebrate our struggles of the past, they will be airbrushed out of history, and our kids will have a distorted view of history. Another reason is to bring home to each and all of us, that the struggles of today are not a blip in the capitalist system, but are part and parcel of a continuing struggle, over generations, by the ordinary people to wrestle a decent standard of living from a repressive and exploitative capitalists system. We should never forget the sacrifices of those who took up that struggle in past, we most understand that those struggles are inextricably linked to our struggles today. It is one long battle that hasn't been resolved yet, but victory will be ours eventually, but only if we hold onto that wonderful spirit of revolt, born from our past struggles.

     This year sees the anniversary of the start of one of our many bitter struggles that we should celebrate with pride, the 30th anniversary of the 1984/5 miners strike. A strike where the people felt the full force of the state, where the state apparatus pulled out all the brutal, duplicitous tactics in its armoury to crush the fighting spirit of the workers. The history of this strike is also a catalogue of the brilliant tactics, ingenuity, resilience, determination, solidarity and courage, of the ordinary people.

     Here in full is one such effort of support, solidarity and direct action, that you may not find in the official recoding of the the 1984/5 miners strike.

The Day we took the White Tower.

      An account of the occupation of Accountants Price Waterhouse offices in Glasgow in support of the South Wales Miners.

At 7:30 am on Tuesday, 4th September, 1984, 12 anarchists stormed a multi-story office block in Glasgow city centre. They went in to occupy the headquarters of Accountants Price Waterhouse, the millionaire outfit which sequestrated the South Wales Miners' Funds. As the newspapers reported, the operation was executed with military precision. It took the team 10 minutes from entering the building to securing themselves behind metal-sheeted doors on the 13th floor.

      About 600lbs of equipment, including hammers, drills, saws and timber, were carried past the startled staff. Lifts were occupied and protests ignored. All the keys were lifted from the security guards desk. Everyone knew his task and skillfully completed it.

     Not that everything was perfect. The security guard managed to regain entry to the foyer before all the equipment had been moved in. The elevators were too small to easily accommodate the 8' x 4' metal sheeting. An officer had to be ejected from Price Waterhouse as the occupation got under-way. It proved impossible to commandeer all three lifts for the 13th floor and so that area came under police control sooner than planned. An early casualty was the driver who was arrested at the Hire Depot as he was returning the van which the team arrived in.

     In spite of these reverses the operation was a complete success. Fire doors leading to the common stairway were nailed-up. The twelve had captured the offices of Price Waterhouse and were securely barricaded-in. The police who arrived at 7.50 am could only rage, threaten and kick impotently at the steel doors out in the corridor as those inside calmly outlined their reasons for their peaceful occupation.

      For this was no exercise in bravado but a serious social act. The anarchists were convinced of the need for direct action against Price Waterhouse. Contrary to popular report, this company did not simply carry out a mundane legal job of sequestration against miners; they entered the fight with all the commitment of partisans. Price Slaughterhouse went much further than their law demanded. Not content with seizing the £350,000 administrative funds belonging to the South Wales miners, the proceeded to grab an additional £400,000 in the Provident fund and money collected for hardship cases, food and clothing for families. To permit these gangsters to commit legalized robbery seemed to all Clydeside Anarchists an invitation to ,ore adventurous tactics by the boss class.

By 8.30 am, a senior officer was knocking at the door seeking to parley. He was told: 1) That his minions has threatened violence (true); 2) that all anarchists had been medically examined and photographed the previous day (not quite true); 3) that they had nothing more to say to him and that he should fetch a representative of Price Shithouse to consider some important questions.

     At 9 am, a Mr. Campbell arrived. He said he was a Partner and senior executive of the company in Scotland and that he and the staff (30) were seriously put out by the occupation and were anxious to come in and start work. He was informed that the Welsh miners and their families were being even more seriously inconvenienced by the actions of PW. Two conditions were put to Campbell for the evacuation of the building: 1) That the funds of the South Wales Miners be restored to them; 2) that PW undertake no further sequestrations. Campbell said it would take a little time to get a response from the Head Office in Birmingham. The occupants promised to be patient.

      An hour later (10 am) Campbell slipped a typed letter over the steel door. In it he acknowledged the anarchist action but replied negatively to both points. However, the note went on to say that if the South Wales Miners would identify those funds which were ear-marked for clothing and food-relief, PW would release them. Campbell was told to wait half-an-hour while a meeting was held to consider the letter. He was reminded by one of the group that there was a lot of valuable equipment in the offices and that any violent action could inadvertently result in an awful lot of damage. (The suite of offices contained about 18 rooms – the entire floor – and was ultra-modern. There were no manual typewriters, only a few IBM golf ball typewriters. But the place was stuffed with terminals, VDUs, word processors, telex machines, photocopiers, etc. - certainly £100,000 worth of equipment. The really valuable stuff, however, was the Diskettes; mini discs containing all the files plus work in progress. About 900 of these were lying around all capable of storing 10,000 words. However, the threat was an empty one as the group had decided not to cause any malicious damage. Nevertheless, it seemed to give Campbell some cause to stay the hand of the gendarmes.)

      By this time the building was surrounded by the guardians of law and order. Two 60-foot banners were stretched round the 13th floor reading: GLASGOW BACKS THE MINERS and UNEMPLOYED SOLIDARITY. Electricity had been cut-off, several phones were out and large numbers of police occupied the corridors.

      At 10.45 am Campbell was informed that the meeting had considered his letter and would investigate the authenticity of this claim about their willingness to release identified funds.

     The next several hours were spent in talks with the South Wales Miners' headquarters and to PW's Man outside the Door. This period was afforded many opportunities to go through extensive filing system. It was a real eye-opener. This multi-million pound outfit has accountancy as only a small part of its business. It concentrates on handling take-over bids, forecasting money market trends, overseas investments, etc. It was clear that a big percentage of the bog monopolies are clients of PW.

      Dinner was served at around 12 but almost all resisted the temptation of PW's extensive cellar (Barsac '79, not a great year, but …) Leaflets were scattered at 5 minute intervals. Supporters were gathering in the streets below and press and news agencies contacted about the occupation and the reasons for it. The South Wales NUM said it was being reported locally and were delighted by the action. Meanwhile, the cops were bored and were boring! Stealthily, they were trying to gain access through the fire door; but it hadn't simply been nailed up – it was the subject of a superb piece of civil engineering by Castlemilk Constructors (unemployed). The boys in blue were disappointed.

       The discussions with the South Wales NUM revealed that they were not prepared to identify those funds which were for the relief of hardship. They claimed that to do so would be to recognise the Courts which was contrary to union policy and in conflict with the Wembley Conference decisions which had been reinforced by the Brighton TUC the previous day. One of the team, Enrico (Malatesta?) in speaking to Emlyn Jenkins (SWNUM) observed that they would prefer not to recognise any court. However, the anarchists did not see the task of making demands of the miners but of exposing the scab outfit of Price Waterhouse.

       Certainly some publicity was being gained: radio, TV and newspapers were carrying reports of the action and giving garbled accounts of the reasons for it. Leaflets were being distributed at job centres and DSS offices but sympathisers were being warned-off by cops from giving out material near the occupation.

As the afternoon progressed several things became clear: 1) It was not possible to force PW into restoring the miners' funds; 2) the cops were becoming increasingly restive and seemed likely to indulge in heroics; 3) one of the doors was less secure than the others and seemed vulnerable to a determined assault. Considering these factors it was decided to dismantle the barricades. Campbell of PW conceded that if no malicious damage had been done then charges would not be brought against the occupying anarchist force. There were serious doubts about this.

      At 4.15 pm, having removed most barricades, the police were allowed to enter by one door. The 12 militants were invited to collect their tools and belongings and proceed to the exit where large quantities of police awaited them. The steam coming from the Inspector's ears warned the anarchists what was to come. “I'm In Charge Now” he cried, and went on to announce that the group would be hand-cuffed in pairs, taken to the local station and charged with breach of the peace and criminal damage.

      Thereafter, the 12 were subjected to the usual indignities: photographed, finger-printed, given a body-search and locked in single cells for the night. No violence was used but it was particularly hard for those 9 members of the group who were vegans and had nothing but bread and water for 24 hours.

Next day, they were packed sic to a cell (5' x 10') and later appeared at the Sheriff Court. There they pled not guilty to all charges and were released on bail. Trial was fixed for 10th December.

       In retrospect, the group felt that the action was relatively successful - not from the narrow view of publicity for the Clydeside Anarchists – but because it was a positive action on behalf of the miners to the ruling class offensive. The negative aspect lies in the anarchists having to to do the job at all. The impotent and ossified Trade Union seems incapable of anything but a negative reaction to the the boss class.

     Social democracy and the bureaucratised TU movement have disarmed the working class. Lullabies of class peace, parliamentary and legal paths to social harmony have virtually paralysed the proletariat's instinct for self-defence.

The group hopes that the action has helped to forge closer links between Clydeside Anarchists and the miners for whom they have campaigned and collected more than £2,000. Perhaps it will galvanise more workers into direct action and show them that defence against the boss is not confined within the narrow limits of branch resolutions and letters to MPs and councillors. At the very least, Clydeside Anarchists have given the lie to those who charge that we couldn't organise a booze-up in a brewery. Price Waterhouse can testify to that.

Brian Biggins
Glasgow, 13th September, 1984 

This and more of Glasgow/Clydeside people's struggles can be found at:

www.spiritofrevolt.info  

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

The Innate Desire To Be Free.

     In spite of the state brutality, the people of Greece are still battling to gain control over their lives. Recently, the now fascist government of Greece, shut down ERT, the national TV broadcasting station, without so much as dialogue or comment. In a direct action of defiance, the staff with supporters occupied the building and supporters massed round the building to show solidarity with the occupation. The broadcasting antenna had been disconnected, but on July 29, some technicians and supporters went to Imittos, the mountain area where the antenna is based, and in solidarity with the occupation, re-connected the antenna. This allowed the ERT to broadcast an analogue signal to the Greater Athens area.

     Shortly after this the riot police and DELTA arrived at the antenna and beat up and detained some of those who were still on site at Imittos. They were taken to the police headquarters on Alexandras Avenue, where a large crowd have gathered in solidarity with those beaten and detained.

      Greece is not doing anything different from any other state apparatus when ever it feels threatened. It is only through propaganda, control, intimidation and repression that the state can survive. People will always strive for control over their own lives, this will always come into conflict with the state, whose control will be administered in various methods. First the usual propaganda, through the education system and the mainstream media. When this fails, off come the gloves and it is police brutality, intimidation and repression, then troops on the streets. This conflict can only be resolved when the people give up their desire for freedom, our the people abolish the state and all its apparatus.

ann arky's home.

We Can Do It Ourselves.

This From globaluprisings:

      The workers at the Vio.Me. Factory in Thessaloniki, Greece have quickly grown into a symbol of self-management internationally. After going on strike and occupying their factory, on February 12, 2013 they re-opened the factory and started production under worker’s control. For many, the factory represents a new potential way forward for unemployed workers in Greece – seizing the means of production, running factories without bosses, producing only goods that are needed, and distributing them through solidarity networks.

     “Every extra profit we make will be given out to people who need it. Our plan is to offer help to unemployed people or others who are in great need,” says  Dimitrios Koumasiouras, a worker from Vio.Me.

      This film tells the story of how the worker’s re-opened the factory under self-management and looks to where the factory is headed now.

ann arky's home

WHAT REALLY HAPPENED IN GAZA.

       It is always good to hear somebody speak of Israel in terms that we don't usually hear on TV. I got some pleasure watching the expressions on the faces of the rest of the panel, that alone makes it worth watching. 

ann arky's home.

ISRAELI APARTHEID.

       A state and religious enforced injustice that has gone on under the eyes of the world, is reinforced by America and ignored by the UN. How much longer can the Zionist state of Israel get away with this crime. A crime that a multitude of labels seem to fit, occupation, apartheid, genocide, all labels that have no place in the 21st. century. How much longer must the Palestinians suffer this barbarity at the hands of those blinded by religious fervour?

ann arky's home.

GREECE BURNS AS THE BANKERS DEMAND THEIR POUND OF FLESH.

           Today in Greece tens of thousands, possible hundreds of thousands of its people have taken to the streets, In Athens it is estimated that more than 50,000 people crowded the streets around Syntagma Square where running battles with the police continued well after dark. Several buildings were on fire as darkness engulfed the city. At the time of writing tear gas and Molotov cocktails are criss-crossing the streets. The Euro-Bank and the first floor of the State's Accounts Office are ablaze. What I find more significant about this demonstration is that as there have been demonstrations across the country and the islands, there has also been many occupations by demonstrators the list of building is quite impressive;

          Protesters and strikers have occupied the following buildings and have transformed them into headquarters for the evening rally:

Athens Law School

Ministry of Health in Athens

Cinema-Theatre Olympion in Thessaloniki

Building of the Regional government of Western Greece in Patras

Building of the Regional Government of Ionian islands in Corfu

Building of the Regional Government of Crete in Rethymnon

Building of the Regional Government of Thessaly in Larisa

Rethymno City Hall

Holargos City Hall

Regional Union of Imathia in Veroia.

“In order to save the banks from bankruptcy, they’ve thrown us into poverty and unemployment. They sold off our country and all that belongs to us. Switch off your TV, take to the streets, for victory!”

          So while the expensive suits, without consulting the people, sit in the parliament building trying to do a deal with the devil, heaping more misery on the heads of the Greek people, the people have been on the streets telling them that deal or no deal they will not accept any more deprivation to protect the wealth of the bankers.

           We should all be out demonstrating in solidarity with the Greek people, what is happening to them is no less than the sacrifice of a people on the alter of bankers greed. Greece is being turned into a third world country and there is no guarantee that it will not come over here. Portugal, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Romania, and Hungary are all teetering on the brink, and when the chips are down the bankers will have no qualms about doing to the rest of Europe, what they are now doing to Greece.

           It was also interesting watching the BBC six o'clock news, and thinking of a previous post, true to form, the main item and the longest spot went to the death of an American singer Whitney Houston, with Greece and what is happening there a very brief second spot.

          Since writing this I have learnt that there are several banks on fire across Athens. How far will the bankers push the rest of the people in Europe??

ann arky's home.

WORKERS KNOW YOUR HISTORY - FLINT OCCUPATION.

       Working class history is a history of struggle, and along the way there have been some defeats, but there has also been lots of tremenndous victories.  75 years ago in America, workers took on the mighty auto industry and won. Just one of the many battles that should give us inspirtion as we continue the struggle today. It is not a new struggle, it is the same struggle, a struggle for a decent life and the right to shape our society.

        THE FLINT OCCUPATION.

       "On this day, December 30th, in 1936 -- 75 years ago today -- hundreds of workers at the General Motors (GM) factories in Flint, Michigan, took over the facilities and occupied them for 44 days. My uncle was one of them. The workers couldn't take the abuse from the corporation any longer. Their working conditions, the slave wages, no vacation, no health care, no overtime -- it was do as you're told or get tossed onto the curb.

       "So on the day before New Year's Eve, emboldened by the recent re-election of Franklin Roosevelt, they sat down on the job and refused to leave. They began their occupation in the dead of winter. GM cut off the heat and water to the buildings. The police tried to raid the factories several times, to no avail. Even the National Guard was called in. But the workers held their ground, and after 44 days, the corporation gave in and recognized the UAW as the representative of the workers. It was a monumental historical moment as no other major company had ever been brought to its knees by their employees. Workers were given a raise to a dollar an hour -- and successful strikes and occupations spread like wildfire across the country."

Read some of Glasgow's class struggle HERE.

 ann arky's home.

PUBLIC SECTOR + PRIVATE SECTOR = VICTORY.

     While the Cameron millionaire cabal in The Westminster Houses of Hypocrisy and Corruption slash at the social sector destroying social fabric of lives of the ordinary people of this country, he is giving the nod to his millionaire corporate Mafia friends to attack the wages and conditions in the private sector. The electricians in the construction industry are being forced, without negotiations, to accept a 30% wage cut and a change in conditions. Of course the electricians are not taking this lying down.

       Of course we have to realise that this is not a public sector struggle and a private sector struggle, this is one struggle against a system that sees workers as an insignificant mass that can be treated as best suits the corporate/financial world, and can be discarded and impoverished if it suits big business. It is time that the private sector and the public sector joined hands and worked as one, only then will we win and then we can change the system to one of justice and fairness, free from the greed of the profit motive.

ann arky's home.

DIRECT ACTION - THE ONLY WAY.

         As the savage attack on the living standards of the ordinary people by the financial Mafia, bites deeper and ever deeper, in country after country, perhaps we should look carefully at Greece. The Greek people have seen their living standards decimated, the cuts there have been deeper and far more wide spread than in other European countries. The Greek people have been sacrificed on the alter of financial greed, but that will not be enough to satisfy the financial beast. What is happening in Greece is on the cards for the rest of Europe, so we should be prepared and take some lessons from the Greeks. Recently the Greek government introduced a new property tax, to make it almost impossible to avoid they lumped it in with the people's electricity bill. This has pushed these bills so high that people are now defaulting on their electricity bills and disconnection notices are being issued. However, the unions have acted in true direct action method and occupied the offices that send out the disconnection notices.

On Sunday, trade unionists of GENOP-DEI, the union of the Public Power Corporation, occupied the building issuing the electricity disconnection orders for households that have failed to pay their bills. As of a few weeks ago, the latest bills now include the latest property tax imposed by the government, typically including hundreds of euros per property, making payment for thousands a non-option.

The full statement by GENOP-DEI can be read HERE.

 ann arky's home.

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MIGRANT WORKERS.

     
           Another appeal for solidarity from LabourStart. It only takes a few seconds to show your support.

           This is an extraordinary story about resistance and courage - and an appeal for you take one minute of your time to show your support. Leather workers in Turkey have been engaged in a bitter dispute with an employer which has included mass sackings, factory closures, and more. At one point the employer invited the workers to come to work in Istanbul, but refused to give them a day to find a place to live. So workers stayed overnight in the factory. Here's the amazing bit: the employer decided that this constituted an "occupation" of the factory and tried to call in the police. When that didn't work, they sacked 36 workers. The struggle has gone on since May 2011 and the union has called for an international campaign to protest these anti-union measures.

Please take a moment to send your message - clickhere .

And please - forward on this message to your fellow trade union members.

Thank you.

Eric Lee. 

ann arky's home.

POLICE CAN'T BE TRUSTED.

        There will lots of people and groups handing out advice to the Occupy Wall St. movement and no doubt some of it will be positive advice and some will be destructive. However this open letter from "anarchists" is probably the best advice they could get, I sincerely hope they read, digest and act on the sound advice contained in the article. Of course it is not just Wall St occupation that should read and act upon the letter, but all those occupations present and to come, and I have no doubt that there will be many more in the not so distant future, be it street, factory, school, public building or community, the advice holds good.

Short extract of the open letter from: CrimethInc. Ex-workers Collective.

   

Police can’t be trusted.

        They may be “ordinary workers,” but their job is to protect the interests of the ruling class. As long as they remain employed as police, we can’t count on them, however friendly they might act. Occupiers who don’t know this already will learn it first-hand as soon as they threaten the imbalances of wealth and power our society is based on. Anyone who insists that the police exist to protect and serve the common people has probably lived a privileged life, and an obedient one.

Don’t fetishize obedience to the law.

         Laws serve to protect the privileges of the wealthy and powerful; obeying them is not necessarily morally right—it may even be immoral. Slavery was legal. The Nazis had laws too. We have to develop the strength of conscience to do what we know is best, regardless of the laws.

To have a diversity of participants,

      a movement must make space for a diversity of tactics. It’s controlling and self-important to think you know how everyone should act in pursuit of a better world. Denouncing others only equips the authorities to delegitimize, divide, and destroy the movement as a whole. Criticism and debate propel a movement forward, but power grabs cripple it. Th e goal should not be to compel everyone to adopt one set of tactics, but to discover how different approaches can be mutually beneficial.

Don’t assume those who break the law or confront police are agents provocateurs.

       A lot of people have good reason to be angry. Not everyone is resigned to legalistic pacifism; some people still remember how to stand up for themselves. Police violence isn’t just meant to provoke us, it’s meant to hurt and scare us into inaction. In this context, self-defence is essential. Assuming that those at the front of clashes with the authorities are somehow in league with the authorities is not only illogical— it delegitimizes the spirit it takes to challenge the status quo, and dismisses the courage of those who are prepared to do so. This allegation is typical of privileged people who have been taught to trust the authorities and fear everyone who disobeys them.

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