Saturday, February 27, 2016

Factory Co-Operatives Built by UNIONS

Unions and Cooperatives: How Workers Can Survive and Thrive

Saturday, 27 February 2016 00:00By Brian Van Slyke, Truthout | News Analysis

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Union Cab of Madison, a worker-owned cooperative, takes part in the 2011 pro-worker Wisconsin protests. (Photo: CindyH Photography / Flickr)

The year 2008 was when the big banks were bailed out, but it was also the year that catalyzed one group of window makers into democratically running their own factory.

On the former industrial hub of Goose Island in Chicago, the employees of Republic Windows and Doors made headlines after they were locked out of their jobs just before Christmas without the back pay or severance they were owed. Organized by the United Electrical Workers Union, these displaced workers did exactly what the ownership hoped they wouldn't do. They refused to quietly accept the layoffs. Instead, the workers engaged in a sitdown strike at their factory, garnering local and national media attention. Eventually, the employees won the occupation, forcing Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase (Republic's primary creditors) to create a fund to give the workers their back pay, benefits, and health insurance. This became viewed as a much-needed victory for workers and unions in a desperate economic time.

And this January, more than seven years after their initial takeover, the workers finally received their last payment won from their struggle. According to the Chicago Tribune, "The National Labor Relations Board announced Wednesday that it will distribute to 270 union workers $295,000 in back pay stemming from labor law violations."

While many people know about the takeover of Republic Windows and Doors, the story of what happened next has flown under the radar. In early 2009, not too long after the workers' sit in, a company by the name of Serious Materials chose to partially re-open the factory, and many of the worker's jobs and livelihoods were restored. That is, until Serious surprised everyone by shuttering the factory again. The country was still in the height of the great recession that put the housing market in ruins, which had devastating consequences for the window industry. And, according to the workers, Serious never made their Chicago factory a priority in its business plan. This meant that in only a few short years, these same workers had to face the prospect of job loss once more, and they had to go through the hardship of another sitdown strike.

This time, however, after the factory permanently closed, some of the workers were fed up with business as usual. In 2012, they re-started operations under new management: their own. With the help of their union, as well as organizations like the Center for Workplace Democracy and The Working World, these employees formed a cooperative, calling themselves New Era Windows, where workers were given one equal share in the business and one vote in its governance.

Workers that had to twice occupy their factory form the New Era Windows Cooperative. (Photo: peoplesworld / Flickr)

The best part? This co-op factory has survived in an industry where two previous non-democratic ownerships couldn't, and it's only growing. New Era had revenue of $750,000 in 2015, an increase from its first year's revenue of $205,000, and all of that wealth is democratically controlled by the people that created it, going to directly benefit the workers and their families.

This co-op factory has survived in an industry where two previous non-democratic ownerships couldn’t, and it’s only growing.

Yet none of these achievements would have been possible if it weren't for the workers' union, which fought to get the employees what they were owed in the first place way back in 2008, and then helped them to form their worker co-op in 2012.

I'm also a member of a worker-owned cooperative, the TESA Collective, that has been educating and organizing for worker co-ops since 2010. We've traveled the country promoting the cooperative movement with tools like our board game Co-opoly: The Game of Cooperatives. Over the past six years, we've seen a steady rise in interest in worker cooperatives from unions. This is a promising development, because when we use the power of collective bargaining to build collective ownership, workers win.

Centuries of Working Together

Unions and worker cooperatives have had a storied history - sometimes allies, sometimes antagonists. Still, since the late 19th century, the two movements have found ways to aid one another. As far back as 1877, the Knights of Labor (KOL) were helping to organize worker cooperatives. And from 1880 to 1888, they were part of launching hundreds of co-ops. KOL's goal was to create the "stepping stones for self-employment" that would lead to a "cooperative commonwealth."

Through more modern times, unionized workers have continued to find ways to use the cooperative model to protect their jobs and improve their livelihoods. Union Cab of Madison, a cooperative taxi company with around two hundred and sixty members, was born in 1979 after union drivers struck for better conditions, and the owners responded by permanently shuttering the company. But some of these laid-off workers realized that this turn of events didn't have to mean the end - because they were the ones who had the skills and expertise that kept their old taxi company running. It took hard work and personal sacrifice, including struggling to raise $150,000 in start-up capital and initially only paying themselves an average wage of eighty-cents an hour, but they managed to found a business where all the workers, from the drivers to the dispatchers, own and run things together. Because of this,Union Cab today has some of the best conditions and pay in the taxi industry.

Similarly, Collective Copies is a print shop in Massachusetts with eleven worker-owners, which was formed in 1983 after a strike for better pay and conditions against Gnomon Copies. The workers were actually successful in their strike, but unfortunately, two weeks later, Gnomon, which didn't have a lease, was evicted from the building by the landlord. After months of picketing and organizing, the workers had won - but now they were out of jobs anyway. Instead of despairing, the workers decided to take action. They were inspired by their collective efforts with the union and were managing to (barely) stay afloat with their strike pay. So the workers turned to the cooperative model to launch a company that they wouldn't have to strike against. They pooled their resources and expertise, forming Collective Copies, which is still in business more than thirty years later.

Big Unions, Big Worker Cooperatives, Big Changes

There's been a sea change in the US over the past few decades, and unions have lost some of their historic power.

"Unions today are under siege from the private as well as the public sector," says Mary Hoyer, Co-Chair of the Union Co-ops Council of the US Federation of Worker Co-ops. "Very few people in the US have ever been a member of a union or understand the enormous benefits of unionization."

Hoyer believes that this is why more unions are beginning to intentionally turn to the worker cooperative model to fight for workers' rights.

"Several labor unions are working with community and co-op coalitions to develop unionized co-ops from the ground up," she said. "They include United Steelworkers in a ground-breaking agreement with Mondragon, United Food and Commercial Workers in their work in Cincinnati, Communications Workers of America, and the United Electrical Workers."

In 2009, the United Steelworkers (USW), the largest industrial labor union in North America, and Mondragon, the largest system of worker cooperatives in the world, based in the Basque region of Spain, announced that they were teaming up to build unionized worker cooperatives.

What these stories demonstrate is that long after the traditional bosses are gone, we workers can thrive on our own.

This was an incredible turning point for the two movements. And its significance is even greater if one knows the USW's history with worker cooperatives: In 1977, the USW stopped efforts by workers to form a cooperative to take over theYoungstown Sheet and Tube steel mill, a plan that might have been able to save hundreds or thousands of jobs.

But when Mondragon and the USW launched their collaboration over thirty years later, union president Leo Gerard had a very different perspective. He stated:

"To survive the boom and bust, bubble-driven economic cycles fueled by Wall Street, we must look for new ways to create and sustain good jobs on Main Street... Worker-ownership can provide the opportunity to figure out collective alternatives to layoffs, bankruptcies, and closings."

The benefits from this collaboration have already started to bloom. The Cincinnati Union Cooperative Initiative, made possible because of the USW and Mondragon partnership, has helped launch two cooperatives: Our Harvest and Sustainergy. And even more are on the way. There are also union co-op initiatives being cultivated in roughly ten other cities, including Buffalo, New York, Pittsburgh, San Francisco/Oakland, and St. Louis. 1Worker1Vote, similarly created through the USW - Mondragon agreement, is an organization dedicated to advocating for and supporting the development of unionized co-ops nationwide.

But why would a business that's democratically owned by its workers also want to have a union? That's because worker cooperatives are not immune to labor disputes, especially as they grow larger. After all, cooperatives are systems of people, and people don't always see eye to eye. That means that even if workers democratically run a business together, there are times when they might need someone else to defend them. While representing worker-owned cooperatives requires adjusting certain long-held frameworks and practices, unions can be critical in settling internal issues.

Working for a New Economy

Even though unions and worker cooperatives are increasingly standing together, there's still common ground to be built.

"Getting unions to understand that worker cooperatives can be more than a small niche in the larger economy is a key hurdle to overcome," says Tim Palmer, Research Director at the Democracy at Work Institute, which supports worker co-op development. Palmer, who previously worked with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), added, "Just as importantly though, cooperatives need to understand that the larger size of the union world is not, by itself, a threat to democratic principles."

Despite these hurdles, Palmer believes that worker cooperatives and unions can do much more to achieve their common goals.

"By developing genuine partnerships with unions and other worker organizations, the cooperative movement can gain some valuable allies in those efforts," he said. "Unions could also play a key role in talking to business owners without succession plans about selling their business to their workers. Overall such partnerships hold a lot of potential to create new cooperatives, strengthen existing ones, and bring the cooperative message more squarely into the heart of American culture and politics."

If unions do take on a larger effort to transfer ownership of existing businesses to their employees, we could see many more cases like New Era Windows - without the burden of having to occupy a factory twice.

And that would be one way we could truly transform our economy. After all, what these stories demonstrate is that long after the traditional bosses are gone, we workers can thrive on our own.

BRIAN VAN SLYKE

Brian Van Slyke works at the TESA Collective, a worker cooperative that develops resources for social and economic change, such as Co-opoly: The Game of Cooperatives. Follow TESA on Twitter @toolboxfored.

Monday, February 22, 2016

DEEP STATE by Mike Lofgren

How the Powers That Be Maintain the "Deep State": An Interview With Mike Lofgren

Sunday, 21 February 2016 00:00By Leslie Thatcher, Truthout | Interview

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The US Capitol building. "Membership in the deep state in Congress boils down to the leadership and a handful of Defense and Intelligence Committee members," says Mike Lofgren. (Photo: Brian Hoffsis / Flickr)

Retired congressional staffer Mike Lofgren illuminates the shadowy influencers behind US politics in his incriminating new book, The Deep State. Explore in detail the involvement of Wall Street, Silicon Valley and the military-industrial complex in the decisions that will shape the future of the United States. Get a copy of this book by making a donation to Truthout today!

In The Deep State, author Mike Lofgren, whose 2011 commentary, "Goodbye to All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult," remains the most-read article at Truthout.org, connects the dots between apparently disparate aspects of our current dystopia. "The deep state," argues Lofgren is "the red thread" linking the "ideological syndrome" of McMansions; DC's culture of careerist strivers; thefinancialization, deindustrialization and ultimate mutation of the US economy into "a casino with a tilted wheel"; the burgeoning of government secrecy even as individual privacy has been demolished; the consistency and persistence of unpopular policies regardless of which party wins elections; militarized foreign policy, "defense" and "security" establishments that thrive on failure and enjoy essentially unlimited funding whatever nostrums about the national debt and the necessity for austerity are being peddled for every other function of government; the prevalence of incompetence and ineptitude in government response to crises; unequal justice, including impunity for the wealthy and corporations, a corrupt Supreme Court and a strikingly punitive criminal legal system for ordinary people; legislative gridlock; perpetual war; political extremism and other ruinous epiphenomena.

Lofgren agreed to speak with retired Truthout editor Leslie Thatcher about his new book on January 27. The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Leslie Thatcher: Thanks so much, Mike, for talking with Truthout. First off, what do you want readers to know about your new book? Why should they read it?

Mike Lofgren: I think they should read it because we get a lot of pseudo-information from corporate media that focuses very intently on the horse race between the two parties to the exclusion of more fundamental issues. Meanwhile, regardless of who is elected, government policy regarding issues like economic regulation or national security doesn't change very much. I wasn't totally satisfied that my first book, The Party Is Over: How Republicans Went Crazy, Democrats Became Useless, and the Middle Class Got Shafted, answered the question, "What is it that happened to the US in the last 30 to 40 years such that both parties seem to enact the same policies on big things like militarism, Wall Street, or trade?" While there are considerable differences between the parties on cultural and identity issues, there is very littledifference in the big money issues, which is what a certain class of people who run the country are really interested in and that is what I try to explain.

You describe the "deep state" as the iceberg beneath the visible tip of the official US government "that is theoretically controllable via elections." How does it function and what are its main components?

It's a hybrid association of elements of government and parts of top-level finance and industry effectively able to govern the US without reference to the consent of the governed. Its nodes are the national security agencies of government, Treasury, the FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] court (whose dealings are so mysterious not even most members of Congress know what the court is doing).

Mike Lofgren. (Photo: Alisa Lofgren)Most congresspeople just vote according to what their party leadership tells them. Membership in the deep state in Congress boils down to the leadership and a handful of Defense and Intelligence Committee members. The private part of the deep state is the military-industrial complex Eisenhower warned about in 1961. There is also Wall Street and its symbiotic relationship with the Treasury and its regulatory agencies, like the SEC [Security and Exchange Commission]. People like Hank Paulson, who worked for [George W.] Bush, or Tim Geithner, who worked for Obama, are essentially interchangeable: Their worldview is much the same despite being of different political parties.

And then, of course, you have Silicon Valley - necessary for the technology which totally enables the NSA [National Security Agency] (which informants have told me couldn't do its job without that technology). Silicon Valley is also significant as an enormous center of new wealth. You also see their self-glorifying statements about being innovative disruptors. They certainly are disrupting the economy. There is little evidence that technology will do anything in a macroeconomic sense other than concentrating wealth even further so that we're left with CEOs on top and everyone else in the gig economy, like contractors for Uber.

How did you personally become aware of the deep state and what is the explanatory power of its existence for understanding current affairs?

I became aware that there were forces at work in the period between 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq that were bigger than the government and were operating on their own compass heading. We have a supposedly free press, but when you saw people like Phil Donahue and Ashley Banfield fired or demoted for being critical of invasion, you have to wonder. I'm pretty sure nobody in the White House picked up the phone and asked somebody at NBC to fire those folks, but the NBC executives were sufficiently conditioned to perform a service to the government by firing those folks and creating the propaganda for the war.

In the correspondence leading up to this interview, you mentioned "developments in the past six months that have surprised even me, and not in a good way." Can you briefly outline what these are and their pertinence to The Deep State's premise?

I should correct that: They've surprised me in a mixed way. Certainly, six months ago I would not have imagined Donald Trump had as much staying power as he's demonstrated. Trump in many ways represents the culmination of the deep state. He's a plutocrat who's used the laws, such as business bankruptcy procedures, for his own gain and yet in a way he is frightening people in the deep state because he is so far out, that he's upsetting their business model. The standard model is for billionaires to dictate the candidates' positions on free trade, austerity etc. On the upside: He is scaring the daylights out of members of the deep state. On the downside: He's moving away from the current model of corporate oligarchy with a façade of free elections. Instead, he's using all the populist themes developed by the Republican Party in the past to keep their base happy, but he's actually making promises to act on them and moving towards out-and-out fascism.

On the other hand, you have the [Bernie] Sanders campaign also scaring the daylights out of Democrats. He doesn't have to go to David Geffen's house or to Wall Street with his hat in his hand or fundraise among the glitterati. The last time I looked, his average donation was reported as less than $30. That upsets the whole notion of fundraising described by a New York Times report that half of all political donations came from just 158 families. Unfortunately, that's the business model we've got post Citizens United. The Democrat pooh-bahs are clearly upset and Michael Bloomberg has said he would jump into the race only if Sanders won in the Democratic primaries: that tells me who his friend is and who his enemy is.

Obama appeared to have a similar fundraising model, but it was clear he was bought off in summer 2008 when he voted in favor of the FISA Amendments Act [a bill to indemnify the telecommunications companies over participation in illegal surveillance] that he previously had said he would filibuster. By then he had already taken on John Brennan as a foreign policy adviser. The extraordinary loyalty and indulgence Obama has shown Brennan was demonstrated in his waiting until it was politically possible to get Brennan appointed CIA director, after which he then promptly embarrassed Obama with the scandal of spying on the Senate Intelligence Committee as they were writing a report on CIA torture. Although he made all kinds of bombastic statements about expecting an apology from the committee chair, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Brennan ended up apologizing instead to Senator Feinstein. Yet Obama sticks by him.

You trace the transformation of Washington, DC, and the explosion of the deep state to the 1970s, the Powell Memo and the explosion of tax-exempt foundations and its origins to the secret development of the A-bomb. A recent National Review article uses the term, "Government of, by, and for Special Interests," and ascribes that to progressive politics and the New Deal. Are these views reconcilable?

Well, their view is certainly not my view. Enough people know that something is wrong, even if they can't put their finger on exactly what it is or how it works, so the editors at the National Review have had to craft a counternarrative to muddy the waters; that's all it is. For crying out loud, William Buckley Jr. came out of the CIA; I wouldn't be surprised if he were part of Operation Mockingbird. Time-Life and other media outlets were on the payroll of the CIA during the 1950s. Their role was to reflect the CIA's point of view. Buckley, after graduating from Yale, a favorite recruitment center for CIA, went into the CIA, but only for two years. Why? [CIA director Allen] Dulles would have gravitated to him because he was a Yale man and because his father was rich. It seems very possible that Dulles, or some other CIA executive, told Buckley he could do more for the cause by creating a conservative front group to push the CIA's Cold War line and to denigrate the isolationist posture of conservatives like Sen. Robert Taft.

One of the inflection points you mention in the development of the deep state was the fall of the Berlin Wall. How did "the end of history" connect to the present dystopia?

Instinctively, you would have thought the end of the Cold War meant we could demobilize and become a normal country again, but apparently the Cold War had gone on so long and created so many institutions and so much infrastructure with no other purpose than the creation of new threats. The powers that be essentially directed the same Cold War state into the post-Cold War world. What I saw from my perch in Congress was that defense procurement continued exactly as before. They continued to buy expensive weapon systems designed to fight the Soviet Union.

I also think there was a psychological angle: Once we had defeated the Soviet Union and there was no alternative system to compete with, we could unleash unencumbered laissez-faire policies, what Naomi Klein calls the shock doctrine.

And you've seen where that's led in Hungary. People deprived of any reasonable alternative have opted for fascism, just as they did in the 1930s.

I think you saw the same thing to an even greater extent in Russia. After the 1990s orgy of asset stripping, the Russian people were so disgusted they accepted a strongman like Putin who could at least keep the oligarchs from challenging the state.

In your book and elsewhere, you refer to the historical precedents similar to the conjuncture in the United States you describe in The Deep State - the French Third Republic, the ancient régime, the Hapsburgs, the Romanovs, ancient Rome, the USSR. You have emphasized that it is most important to consider how the United States arrived at its specific present circumstances, but is there one particular historical instance you would consider most salient?

Not really: History does not repeat itself. These are simply analogies. But a good analogy that is also relatively recent and deals with another state with an overdeveloped military-industrial complex is that of the USSR. There, in spite of all the propaganda organs, people simply gave up believing in the system. The development of US demographics - and particularly the new study of excess middle-aged white mortality - primarily due to alcoholism, drug abuse and suicide - which heightens the USSR analogy.

How does the deep state survive and even thrive in spite of its obvious failures from the war on drugs to the "war on terror," from economic to political and social justice?

Well, although it doesn't do much to help the res publica or the economy as a whole, it does help certain people. This circumstance creates a kind of perverse Darwinism in the short and medium term, so thatharmful traits are the ones that are selected for. And most people simply don't look at the long-term results of their actions, but mirror the typical corporate executive whose timeline is the next quarter's results and how they will impact the price of the stocks he owns.

What is the position of finance in the deep state? What does it mean to "fight for an open economic system?"

A macro explanation of the trade deals of the last 25 years - NAFTA, CAFTA etc. and now the TPP [Trans-Pacific Partnership] - is to forget about tariff schedules and what textiles cost. These agreements are a bargain between the United States and other countries whereby the US gives privileged access to US markets in exchange for submission on foreign and economic policy. The powers that be are perfectly happy to destroy the economic seed corn in the USA in exchange for temporary dominance abroad. They're willing to sacrifice Detroit for the UAE [United Arab Emirates].

As a congressional staffer, I presume you interacted regularly with people you would now consider operatives of the deep state. What can you tell us about them as people? What motivates them? Whatimmunizes them so thoroughly from democratic concerns?

I think it's hard to improve on Upton Sinclair's dictum, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it." I think they're all about the logic that if it pays for their kids' cornflakes and their scholarship fund, they will do it without their conscience bothering them too much.

So you don't see them as malevolent?

Oh no, it's much more banal than that.

Like Hannah Arendt on Eichmann?

Exactly, the banality of evil.

You mention the outsourcing of congressional staffing to ALEC [American Legislative Exchange Council] post-Gingrich in the book. Let's take one concrete instance of US legislation - the 342-page USA Patriot Act of 2001, initially introduced by the Bush administration less than a week after September 11. Can you explain a little how the deep state would have been involved in its drafting and enactment and how it continues to serve the deep state's - rather than Americans' - interests? Also, what were your own thoughts at that time?

We can assume that all those provisions that didn't quite get into all the crime and intelligence bills introduced earlier just sat on a shelf somewhere in the Justice Department and were dusted off. The Patriot Act was drafted by the government in an executive agency. Now what we have 15 years later is pretty much ALEC-template bills in statehouses - and even on Capitol Hill, legislative drafts originate with the tech industry or K Street so congressional staffers don't have to worry their pretty little heads about drafting legislation.

You have elsewhere described the inequality of the US criminal legal system and the flat-out "corruption" of the Roberts court. Would your proposals to abolish corporate personhood and get money out of politics be adequate to remedy these abuses?

No single nostrum will be a miraculous panacea. But getting money out of politics is the precondition for anything else, including abolishing corporate personhood, enforcing anti-trust law and reforming health care. You have to align politicians' incentives with the public interest rather than the interests of political donors.

Your second recommendation for downsizing or dismantling the deep state is to "sensibly redeploy and downsize the military and intelligence complex." Andrew Bacevich - whom you cite extensively in your book -recently argued that there is no effective civilian control of the Pentagon. How then can we mobilize its downsizing, let alone the reallocation of resources to domestic infrastructure?

Congress doesn't really attempt to exercise control. Getting money out of politics is also the first step in exercising civilian control of the military, because otherwise the donor base in the military-industrial complex has too much influence on policy.

With the deep state in control, have our elected government organs become purely ceremonial or do elections still make a difference?

There is a symbiotic relationship between the deep state and surface democracy. And the type of person who holds office does matter on the margins. Individual decisions do make a difference. The incentive structures for all concerned tend to be shared in a certain fashion because of careerist best interests. I'm not pointing to some massive conspiracy. All of this is going on in the light of day. Everyone knows who the Koch brothers are, General Dynamics etc. It's just that most people do not see how it all works as a system and how we've been conditioned to look at it.

You advocate reform of US immigration policy ...

This is impossible to effect at present ... I'm a little different from most people I know in that I am appalled by what Trump says, but I also do not agree with unlimited immigration. Corporations love H-1B visas. Importing temporary labor is analogous to hiring strikebreakers during the coal strikes 100 years ago. Unlimited supply of labor undermines unions and wages. This is not to condemn the people seeking the jobs, just as the strikebreakers 100 years ago were desperate to support their families, but the H-1B visa system has become perverse - a form of corporate-sponsored human trafficking.

But when the US has, by Washington Consensus programs and trade treaties, destroyed livelihoods in neighboring countries or, by its militarized foreign policy and/or support for rapacious dictatorships, destroyed physical security for populations in targeted countries, don't we have some responsibility toward those so displaced?

Oh, it's our fault to a significant degree. Ever since 1954 and the overthrow of Arbenz in Guatemala, we've been destabilizing Latin America. Of course, their population wants to come here. I argue for a different foreign policy, but we are where we are and the problem started decades ago. You can't ask a worker in Toledo or Detroit or Flint to make sacrifices for the greater good of humanity when people in Palo Alto and Wall Street are not willing to give up anything.

With - as you note - the United States living off its principal and saddled with a deeply entrenched, incompetent and unaccountable management, how can we respond to a true existential crisis such as anthropogenic climate disruption?

It's difficult to do anything that matters, especially with respect to a perceived longer-term problem, because we've adopted the corporate model for government as [Gov.] Rick Snyder did in Michigan. People are paid to look to the short term. Campaigns that are financed by rich donors tend to condition politicians to think short term.

You've been very careful to distinguish the deep state from an active, conscious conspiracy, but is it possible or likely in your view that some of its operatives have been involved in, for lack of a better word, plots to dismantle democracy?

They wouldn't put it that way. They think they're legitimately working on political issues. But how it impacts the public is another matter. What the governor of Michigan did was a conspiracy against democracy. He needed to appoint emergency managers with autocratic powers because he needed to undo municipal government and carry out his pro-corporate agenda. His emergency manager plan was rejected in a public referendum, so the Republican-controlled legislature attached the proposal as a rider to an appropriations bill. Therefore it was no longer subject to referendum. Rick Snyder and his cronies are hamstringing the ability of local governments to respond to democratic concerns and consciously doing so in order to pay for the tax cuts they gave to corporations. It was a conscious effort to undo democracy in Michigan, and it ended up poisoning children. What happened was nothing more than racketeering, in my judgment.

You periodically excoriate the US public in the book for failures of good citizenship, but you finish by suggesting that if we "disenthrall ourselves," our ability to live sensibly and peacefully in the world as it is will ensue. How do you suggest those already disenthralled - in which I would include most Truthout readers - proceed?

Most Truthout readers are not the majority in this country. It's partly a media problem. Forty years ago, commercial media was dominated by 50 to 60 companies. Now it's half a dozen. There's been this tremendous concentration in corporate media and those companies left are not interested in telling the public long, complex stories about where taxpayer money goes. What they do give the public is Kim Kardashian. It's not that the American people aren't bright enough to understand, but many of them don't have the time to consult alternative media and they've been subject to a powerful conditioning program the last few decades. There have been cases in the past when uneducated people - farmers, coal miners in the early 1900s - clearly understood the essential economic relationships at work in the country, and significant reforms like wage and hour laws, prohibitions of child labor and collective bargaining resulted. We did it before and we can do it again. That gives me hope for the future.

LESLIE THATCHER

Leslie Thatcher was formerly Truthout's content relations editor. She contributes French translations and author interviews.

Sunday, February 14, 2016

2002 Rep. Sanders Speaks Against Iraq War

Nicolas Davies <peacetopower@aol.com>: Feb 13 2016

Flashback: Rep. Bernie Sanders Opposes Iraq War 2002, Floor of Congress

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from New Jersey for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I do not think any Member of this body disagrees that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant, a murderer, and a man who has started two wars. He is clearly someone who cannot be trusted or believed. The question, Mr. Speaker, is not whether we like Saddam Hussein or not. The question is whether he represents an imminent threat to the American people and whether a unilateral invasion of Iraq will do more harm than good.

Mr. Speaker, the front page of The Washington Post today reported that all relevant U.S. intelligence agencies now say despite what we have heard from the White House that ``Saddam Hussein is unlikely to initiate a chemical or biological attack against the United States.'' Even more importantly, our intelligence agencies say that should Saddam conclude that a U.S.-led attack could no longer be deterred, he might at that point launch a chemical or biological counterattack. In other words, there is more danger of an attack on the United States if we launch a precipitous invasion.
Mr. Speaker, I do not know why the President feels, despite what our intelligence agencies are saying, that it is so important to pass a resolution of this magnitude this week and why it is necessary to go forward without the support of the United Nations and our major allies including those who are fighting side by side with us in the war on terrorism.

But I do feel that as a part of this process, the President is ignoring some of the most pressing economic issues affecting the well-being of ordinary Americans. There has been virtually no public discussion about the stock market's loss of trillions of dollars over the last few years and that millions of Americans have seen the retirement benefits for which they have worked their entire lives disappear. When are we going to address that issue? This country today has a $340 billion trade deficit, and we have lost 10 percent of our manufacturing jobs in the last 4 years, 2 million decent-paying jobs. The average American worker today is working longer hours for lower wages than 25 years ago. When are we going to address that issue?

Mr. Speaker, poverty in this country is increasing and median family income is declining. Throughout this country family farmers are being driven off of the land; and veterans, the people who put their lives on the line to defend us, are unable to get the health care and other benefits they were promised because of government under funding. When are we going to tackle these issues and many other important issues that are of such deep concern to Americans?

Mr. Speaker, in the brief time I have, let me give five reasons why I am opposed to giving the President a blank check to launch a unilateral invasion and occupation of Iraq and why I will vote against this resolution. One, I have not heard any estimates of how many young American men and women might die in such a war or how many tens of thousands of women and children in Iraq might also be killed. As a caring Nation, we should do everything we can to prevent the horrible suffering that a war will cause. War must be the last recourse in international relations, not the first. Second, I am deeply concerned about the precedent that a unilateral invasion of Iraq could establish in terms of international law and the role of the United Nations. If President Bush believes that the U.S. can go to war at any time against any nation, what moral or legal objection could our government raise if another country chose to do the same thing?

Third, the United States is now involved in a very difficult war against international terrorism as we learned tragically on September 11. We are opposed by Osama bin Laden and religious fanatics who are prepared to engage in a kind of warfare that we have never experienced before. I agree with Brent Scowcroft, Republican former National Security Advisor for President George Bush, Sr., who stated, ``An attack on Iraq at this time would seriously jeopardize, if not destroy, the global counterterrorist campaign we have undertaken.''

Fourth, at a time when this country has a $6 trillion national debt and a growing deficit, we should be clear that a war and a long-term American occupation of Iraq could be extremely expensive.
Fifth, I am concerned about the problems of so-called unintended consequences. Who will govern Iraq when Saddam Hussein is removed and what role will the U.S. play in ensuing a civil war that could develop in that country? Will moderate governments in the region who have large Islamic fundamentalist populations be overthrown and replaced by extremists? Will the bloody conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Authority be exacerbated? And these are just a few of the questions that remain unanswered.

If a unilateral American invasion of Iraq is not the best approach, what should we do? In my view, the U.S. must work with the United Nations to make certain within clearly defined timelines that the U.N. inspectors are allowed to do their jobs. These inspectors should undertake an unfettered search for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction and destroy them when found, pursuant to past U.N. resolutions. If Iraq resists inspection and elimination of stockpiled weapons, we should stand ready to assist the U.N. in forcing compliance.

Saturday, February 13, 2016

UAW: Build Your Union

How to build YOUR union for YOUR future

Solidarity Magazine

We say it often enough: This is YOUR union. Underneath these simple words is the heart and soul of what the labor movement is about. A union isn’t the leaders solving problems for members. Nothing happens unless the membership is part of the union.
It sounds simple enough, yet too many slip into the opposite of the meaning. For example, how many of us have described their union as an insurance plan or a lawyer on retainer to help if we get in trouble? A union is none of those things. Lawyers and insurance agents are hired guns — a job’s a job to them. Unions are movements. The power we have as workers stems from the power of the members and the resources we all bring to the fight.
So what does it take to make this YOUR union? It takes stepping up to the plate and getting involved. “Off-the-clock activism is just as important as on-the-clock activism to build power in supporting our families, jobs and communities,” says Lonnie Everett from Local 686 in Lockport, New York. “I feel it’s my responsibility to have a stake in the change I want to see.”

Simple steps to building YOUR union

Find out what’s going on
Unions are constantly active. It might seem like its only around bargaining time, but keeping the contract strong yearlong involves updating membership on management’s activities, listening to issues on the plant floor, keeping public support for workers alive and strong in the communities and fighting for candidates and legislations that protect us all.
To find out what is going on, always start with your local leadership.
They are the best resource for the latest information and if they don’t have an answer, they will find it for you. Most UAW leaders (officers and workplace representatives such as stewards) are volunteers or paid “loss time” only under narrow circumstances. The next best place is the union meetings. This is where the true democracy of our union takes place. The UAW Constitution requires meetings at least once every three months, but most hold monthly meetings. This is where membership approves many decisions and expenditures of the local union. Another great place to learn the latest is social media, especially Facebook. Here you can connect with your co-workers as well as other union members from across the country. The UAW International has a page, as do many regions and local unions. And don’t forget the tried-and-true way of talking one-on-one with your co-workers. Whether it’s someone you’ve known for years or a new person you just met at lunch, building a union happens every time we have conversations about work issues and work together to solve them.
Get involved
There are so many ways to participate in your union that go beyond attending meetings and voting. Besides bargaining and servicing the contract, much of the work that takes place in a union is through the structure of standing committees. The Constitution outlines the committees, and each one addresses an issue important to membership: political action (CAP), civil rights, women’s issues
community services, veterans, education, to name just a few. These committees make strategic plans for the year and are always looking for volunteers. “The Human and Civil Rights Committee at
our local is built around the idea of inclusion. We celebrate many cultures during the year from Black History Month to Oktoberfest.
It’s a way to build connections with everyone and learn from one another. For me, I find that our
union bonds get strengthened as we celebrate one another,” said Garrett Waters of Local 249, in Kansas City, Missouri.

Show your pride
Though our numbers are under attack, union members still account for 1 out of 10 workers. Imagine if 1 out of 10 people you ran into at the grocery store wore their union colors? One of the reasons people call unions “dinosaurs” is that they don’t see us. Wearing your union colors (whether a shirt, jacket or pin) reminds our community that we are a part of them, just as they are a part of us.
In recent years, many locals have also started “Red Shirt Wednesdays.” The day has several origins — the Communications Workers of America (CWA) started wearing red shirts on Thursdays in 1989 to remember Gerry Horgan, CWA’s chief steward for Westchester County, who died as he worked a picket line when he was hit by a car driven by a line- crosser who was the daughter of a second-line manager. In more recent years, the practice was broadened to support workers in Wisconsin who were under attack by their governor. Now it’s a day when we can all unify to send a message that
we stand together, in solidarity, to defend worker rights. “We wear our red shirts on Wednesday to honor those who have sacrificed so much so we can have our rights today.
But the day also shows everyone that we are united and in this fight together. When you see a sea of red shirts, you know that you are part of something larger than yourself,” said Local 163 President, Ralph Morris, which represents workers at Detroit Diesel in Michigan.

Get trained
Grievance handling, bargaining, organizing, even talking about politics — all of it can be done well with good training. Fortunately, there are many resources available to UAW members to learn how these important dynamics work. Many locals offer training through their education committees, and regional offices also offer classes during the week and on weekends. Programs
at Black Lake, the UAW’s education center in Onaway, Michigan, will give you deep dives into many subjects. The UAW website (uaw.org) has many union resources that are good primers on basic subjects, as well.
And if you are really ambitious, local colleges and universities offer labor education courses. Start by asking your local leadership about opportunities in your area.

Elections matter
Besides bargaining, the other time where we should all stand at attention is during elections. It’s just a simple modern day fact: Politicians make decisions that can change our working lives. From safety to unemployment insurance, electing candidates who don’t support workers can mean that gains we make at the bargaining table are wiped out in one law.
There is so much we can do as UAW members to fight back, but it takes all of us. For starters, look at voter registration. Your co-workers, your family, your neighbors — we all should register to vote. Many locals run voter registration drives early in an election year and they often need volunteers to help canvass the worksite. Next, you can contribute to the UAW’s V-CAP program which is a voluntary program from which we make contributions to candidates we support. As money plays a bigger role in each election, members are stepping up their V-CAP contributions. Learn about your candidates and the important issues at stake in an election. The UAW endorses many candidates after reviewing their record on our issues. And finally, vote! If your state allows early or absentee voting and you qualify, get your vote in early so you can volunteer to get others to the polls on Election Day.
Get going!
Building our union is sometimes as simple as two members talking about an injustice. The simple act of listening to co-workers and learning each other’s ideas is a big first step to finding common ground. But we can’t stop there — we are also about finding solutions. And by standing together, we are stronger and can change history.
So what are you waiting for? We have a lot of work to do, so l.

Friday, February 12, 2016

Why Our Government Never Listens

Why Our Government Isn't Listening: How Greed Is at the Root of US Suffering

Thursday, 11 February 2016 00:00 By Eliza A. Webb, Truthout | News Analysis

(Photo: US Currency via Shutterstock; Edited: LW / TO)

In the United States, children go hungry.
Human beings endure poverty so deep "many people don't believe [it] exists here." US residents pay far more for health care than the people of any other wealthy country, yet their bodies are sicker and more broken. The public school system is unfairly funded and racist. Workers go abused and underpaid. The government throws more people behind bars than any other nation in the world. More than one in four Black and Brown Americans are living in poverty, further undermined by institutional racism and murderous police forces. Hispanic and Latina women are making 54 cents on the dollar compared to white men. More people are buried here because of gun violence than in any other industrialized country.
The American people are suffering.
Yet this is not a poor country. While kids' stomachs rumble and Native families struggle to survive, the top 0.1 percent of Americans are sitting on as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent combined.
The workers of this country see scraps from the tables they set and serve.

Oppression is a highly profitable business.

So why is it that the government of such a fabulously wealthy country does not provide for its people, in fairness or equality? Why are the individuals who make the laws and rule the land allowing this oppression and abuse to persist? Why do they not voice the needs of the people, as is their sole responsibility?
Follow. The. Money.
Long have the powerful few profited from the poor majority's struggle, and the United States in 2016 is no different.
Through complex and convoluted public policy, the politicians in Congress and the executives of large corporations are capitalizing, as humans have for millennia, on an inequitable system to make off with millions.
Oppression is a highly profitable business.
As Johns Hopkins associate professor of political science Steven Teles says, the structure of this system makes "it difficult for us to understand just what the [US] government is doing, and among the practices it most frequently hides from view is the growing tendency of public policy to redistribute resources upward to the wealthy and the organized at the expense of the poorer and less organized."
By perpetuating a government that has not served, represented or answered to its people throughout the majority of its entire existence, these two elite groups are profiting handsomely.
As scholars Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page have found, "Economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence."
This political system - the organization that dictates the rules that control people's lives - is, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren says, "rigged."
There is a reason corporate profits are at an 85-year high, while workers' pay is at a 65-year low.
There is a reason Congress is a millionaires' club.
US legislators and corporate executives are tied together in a reciprocal, remunerative relationship.
A handful of individuals and their corporations openly spend millions in political campaign contributions (and millions more anonymously in dark money), as well as $2.6 billion every year to lobby Congress (more than the Senate and House budget combined).
Corporate executives profit from this investment in corporate welfare (subsidies, grants, incentives, tax breaks and tax loopholes), the preservation of the destructive status quo, and beneficial (or the lack of detrimental) legislation that their lobbyists actually help to write.

Corporations are concerned with their bottom line, not people, and so are the bills for which they lobby.

Politicians equally benefit in information and legislative support (like policy writing); campaign donations (through loopholes in the law, politicians actually personally profit "from the hundreds of millions of dollars in political contributions that have poured into the system"); company stocks; and the "revolving-door" phenomenon (in which former government officials receive "handsome compensation" to work as corporate lobbyists).
As the Harvard University Center for Ethics reports, "Institutional corruption is, sadly, alive and well in Congress."
This lucrative symbiosis between Congress and corporations is starkly evident in the new 2016 spending bill that gives $400 billion in tax favors to big business.
As Philip Mattera, research director of Goods Jobs First and director of the Corporate Research Project, told Truthout, "It's not surprising ... There are always these kinds of Christmas tree tax bills that politicians like to award their allies in the business world."
Corporations have an inordinate amount of control over what legislation gets passed, and since, as one survey shows, big business is only concerned with protecting "the company against changes in government policy," and improving their "ability to compete by seeking favorable changes in government policy," the laws that CEOs want are often terrible for the rest of the country.
Corporations are concerned with their bottom line, not people, and so are the bills for which they lobby. This stranglehold on Congress sheds light on the reason behind the American people's suffering: Someone is making money off it.
Walmart is the largest employer in the United States, with 2.2 million individuals on its payroll, yet the company only pays a (brand-new) minimum wage of $10 per hour. If you work 40 hours every week of the year (12 months of nonstop full-time work) that wage adds up to a paltry $20,800, a salary below the poverty line for a family of three. You cannot earn a living off this.
In 2014 alone, Walmart gave $2,366,629 in political campaign contributions, and spent $7 million on lobbying. Twenty-seven members of Congress hold investments in the company, and 84 out of 103 (81 percent) of Walmart lobbyists have previously held government jobs.
The company is also freely evading $19 billion in taxes, and receiving $23 million a year (or $1 billion throughout its 42-year history) in government tax breaks, free land, infrastructure assistance, low-cost financing and outright grants - a figure Good Jobs First notes might "very well be the tip of the iceberg."
Walmart pays its workers abysmally, abuses its employees and hurts small businesses - but it has close ties with Congress, and that makes all the difference.
Private Prison Corporations
Since 1989, the GEO Group and Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the two largest for-profit prison companies in the United States, have given nearly $10 million in political donations and spent almost $25 million on lobbying. In 2013-14, 78 percent of GEO Group lobbyists and 63 percent of CCA lobbyists previously held government jobs.
These private prison companies are for-profit in the cruelest sense of the phrase: They lobby for harsher sentencing on nonviolent crimes through three-strikes laws, mandatory sentencing and truth-in-sentencing laws (the abolishment or reduction of parole), and push for new anti-immigrant laws to put more immigrants behind bars.
The effects of this lobbying, donating and revolving are clear.
GEO Group and CCA receive millions in government subsidies each year, adding up to a gigantic bill for taxpayers.Congress now has a quota for how many human beings must be locked in a tiny room per day: at least 34,000 immigrants, a number that continues to grow each year, eventhough the number of undocumented immigrants in the United States has leveled off. If the beds are not filled, the government still must pay the corporation, to the further detriment of the taxpayer.
In Arizona, 30 of the 36 state legislators who co-sponsored an (unsuccessful) immigration law to put even more people in detention received campaign donations from private prison corporations like GEO Group and CCA.
When Republican presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio was speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, GEO Group got a $110 million government contract to build another private prison; GEO has donated almost $40,000 to Rubio's campaigns throughout his political career, the highest amount in career money the company has ever donated to any US senator.
Such "parasitic relationships" have allowed the private prison industry to pull in $2 billion in yearly profits.
Big Pharma
In 2014, pharmaceutical giant Amgen Inc. gave $1.83 million in political campaign contributions, and, in 2013, spent $9.12 million on lobbying. Twelve members of Congress hold company shares, and 78 out of 93 Amgen lobbyists have previously held government jobs.
In 2013, Amgen received a $500 million financial gift from Congress when a handful of legislative aides slipped a provision into the final fiscal bill, allowing Amgen to evade Medicare cost-cutting controls for two more years. The change was supported by Senators Max Baucus (D-Montana), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), all of whom have political and financial ties to Amgen, receiving $68,000, $59,000 and $73,000, from 2007 to 2013, respectively.
Another pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer, spent $10,140,000 on lobbying in 2013, and gave $2,217,066 in political campaign contributions in 2014, while 40 members of Congress hold shares in the company, and 48 out of 84 Pfizer lobbyists in 2013-14 previously held government jobs.
This company has been allowed to evade $69 billion in taxes.
Americans are paying more for their prescription drugs than any other wealthy country on earth (helping to keep us sicker and dying younger than people of other wealthy nations) to the further profit of large pharmaceutical corporations.
Why?
Because, unlike any other rich country's body of legislators, Congress - while receiving campaign contributions from, being lobbied by and investing in Big Pharma - does not regulate predatory pricing practices.
Wall Street
In 2014, through PACs and individuals, JPMorgan Chase gave $1.4 million in campaign donations to lawmakers, TPG Capital gave $1.3 million, Wells Fargo gave $2.6 million ($6 million on lobbying), Citigroup spent $2.5 million ($5 million on lobbying), Bank of America gave almost $3 million ($2.7 million on lobbying), Goldman Sachs gave $4.7 million ($3.4 million on lobbying) etc.
Wells Fargo is the fourth-most popular stock in Congress, and JPMorgan Chase is the ninth.
Congress has yet to pass true Wall Street reform.
General Electric, the company that paid zero taxes in 2010 and helped crash the economy in 2007, is the most popular stockholding in Congress, with $967,038 being the minimum Democratic investment and $1,392,475, the minimum Republican investment in 2014, the last year data is available. GE spent nearly $4 million in political campaign contributions during the 2014 election cycle, and over $15 million in political lobbying.
The company has $110 billion stashed offshore, and is taxed at an effective rate of 4 percent - 31 points lower than what it actually owes the IRS.
Wall Street CEOs are collecting millions while threatening to crash our economy yet again (JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs are all on the Financial Stability Board's 2015 "too-big-to-fail" list). Meanwhile, Americans are still suffering from the last crash - and Congress, while receiving campaign donations from and investing in Wall Street, is doing nothing to curb their growth.
How the United States Could Be
Taken altogether, these billions of dollars, lost on tax breaks and subsidies for wealthy corporations, could be used to fund the impoverished schools serving the United States' impoverished children, job programs to employ the jobless youth, universal health care for the country's sick and dying people, reformation of a racist criminal legal system, higher education for broke young people, nutrition programs for hungry children - the possibilities of using these resources to create a thriving, blooming society and nation are limitless.
Only a corrupt Congress and the lucrative, symbiotic relationship between Democrats, Republicans and rich, corporate individuals stand in the way.
So the next time you hear a politician say change is too hard, or that the real world doesn't include transforming this oligarchy into a democracy, take a closer look at who is padding his or her pockets. If the person benefiting from the status quo is trying to convince you it should stay the same, doubt to high heaven and beyond what he or she is telling you.
After all, a shark won't smile and shake your hand before biting you in the back.
But a politician will.

Eliza A. Webb

Eliza A. Webb is a published writer on politics in The Hill, Salon and The Michigan Journal of International Affairs.

Thursday, February 11, 2016

Strong Unions

We Need a Strong Trade Union in Every Workplace

Feb
2016

Thursday 11^th

posted by Morning Star in Features

Unions are the most effective force for social equality – which is why we should be proud of their link to the Labour Party, writes JEREMY CORBYN

BEFORE being elected to Parliament I worked as a trade union official, with garment workers who were owed back pay by unscrupulous employers.
Later I worked with public-sector workers fighting to protect their jobs and services and low-paid women fighting for equal pay.
And I know how much harder it is now today for the trade union movement — with the most restrictive anti-union laws in Europe, which are about to get even more restrictive.
As leader I am proud of the link between trade unions and the Labour Party — it is not just a historic link, it’s what makes Labour succeed.
We win when we’re in touch with the needs and the concerns of millions of working people and their families — the people trade unions represent.
Too often in the past Labour has been cowed into acting like it is ashamed of our relationship with trade unions.
Well, I’m proud of it. Proud to be a party funded in large part by the cleanest money in politics — democratically voted on by thousands of ordinary workers.
Proud of being connected to the largest democratic organisations in this country, with over six million members, and proud that the Fire Brigades Union has recently voted to reaffiliate to Labour.
Labour has a mountain to climb to win in 2020 and tough elections this May. To succeed we have to become a social movement again — campaigning together in every community for our shared goals.
Labour membership has doubled since the general election defeat, and many of these new members are trade unionists. Nearly 400,000-strong, Labour can reach parts of our country and our communities that no other party can.
Trade unions don’t just organise in the workplace, we organise in our communities too. The labour movement is a social movement.
At the last election the 34 per cent of the electorate who didn’t vote at all should have been Labour voters, but we didn’t reach them and didn’t inspire them.
The more we sit in our Westminster bunker, the weaker we are. The more we involve our members and supporters and affiliates, the stronger we will be. So to win Labour must draw on its greatest strength: its people.
More public-sector workers are now having to claim working tax credits and housing benefit just to make ends meet. What sort of example is government setting when so many in its own workforce are paid so little they need to claim benefits?
But the Tory government’s solution was not to abandon the public-sector pay cap but to cut tax credits.
Strong Labour opposition and campaigning by trade unions and others stopped those cuts which would have seen three million families lose over £1,000 this April. But we have recently learned that 800,000 families will still see a cut in April.
But the best guarantee of decent pay is a strong trade union in every workplace — and some of the worst examples of low pay and job insecurity are to be found in the private sector, where trade union membership is just 14 per cent.
British company profitability is at record levels. But without unions, any increase in returns only gets shared in the boardrooms and between shareholders.
This is a global issue, with capital trying to force down wages and employment rights across the globe. That is why Labour is making the case for a real social Europe as part of the referendum campaign, and our MEPs are opposing any dilution of employment rights in TTIP negotiations.
Trade unions are the most effective force for equality in the workplace. The evidence is clear both in Britain and across the developed world — greater pay equality correlates with higher trade union membership.
It is for precisely that reason that the Tories are attacking trade unionists, trade unions and the Labour-trade union link.
They are attacking trade unions in workplaces by cutting facility time and check-off; they’re attacking trade unions by making the most restrictive trade union laws in Europe even more restrictive; and they’re attacking the collective will of trade unions to fund political activity.
Labour MPs and peers are opposing the Trade Union Bill in Parliament, because we know it is a cynical attempt to weaken opposition to the Tories’ austerity agenda: cut, run down and privatise.
We have made it clear: a Labour government in 2020 will strengthen employment and trade union rights.
When Labour leader John Smith addressed the TUC in 1993 he set out a Charter for Employment Rights to “give all working people basic rights that will come into force from the first day of their employment. We will give the same legal rights to every worker, part-time or full-time, temporary or permanent.
“We will give every working man and woman the right to protection against unfair dismissal, and access to health and safety protection. And every worker will have the right to join a trade union and have the right to union recognition.”
That vision is being brought back into the heart of Labour. Our shadow minister for trade unions and civil society Ian Lavery MP, a former NUM president, is starting work on a new commission into workplace rights for 2020.
We will want your input and engagement in that process, launching later this year.
In the here and now, Labour will campaign for a public inquiry to ensure that the scourge of blacklisting is never repeated, and to ensure all the government papers are published relating to the miners’ strike, including Orgreave, and to the Shrewsbury 24 pickets.
When 120 years ago a former trade unionist first entered Parliament to fight injustice, Keir Hardie didn’t just fight for workers, he fought for universal suffrage, a universal pension, free education for children, decent homes for all, against powerful monopolies and for peace.
We must oppose privatisation, build council housing, and never let ourselves be divided: workers against the unemployed; British workers against migrant workers; young versus old.
Our strength is unity. The Labour Party took off over a century ago when the existence of trade unions was under threat. Unions are too much of a force for a good, a force for equality, to allow the Tories to put that at risk.
We will only have a strong trade unions if we get a Labour government in 2020. If we work together, we can achieve that and many campaigning victories along the way.

Jeremy Corbyn is leader of the Labour Party.

Unions United