From Dublin and Cork to Belfast and Derry, workers across Ireland are taking to the streets this weekend to mark International Workers' Day.
May Day is Workers' Day. We celebrate the struggle of workers for a better life and a better world.
Today we need to fight more than ever. We face one of the most right-wing governments we have ever had. It refuses to take real action on housing or provide workers' unions with a basic right to collective bargaining.
It is using the excuse of the instability generated by Trump’s tariffs to take wrecking ball to workers’ rights. It's rolling back on commitments to extend sick leave, introduce a Living Wage and extend pension rights. It is removing payments to help with rising energy costs.
This Government is cowing to intense lobbying from business representatives. So workers need to get each other organised. We need a massive recruitment drive in every sector to get workers into unions. But the unions also need to demonstrate a willingness to fight for more and use the strength of organised workers to make real gains. We must bin the illusion that social partnership can deliver for us.
We also need a political alternative. As the Far Right grows across Europe and in Ireland, and the centre parties move to the right, we need a strong left alternative. At the last election People Before Profit campaigned for a Left Government that would exclude parties of the right. Unfortunately other parties did not back this call.
People Before Profit has a consistent record of fighting for workers, whether it be supporting workers in struggle, raising workers issues in the Dáil, or introducing legislation to extend workers’ rights. We have introduced bills to provide for Trade Union Recognition, to abolish sub-minimum pay rates for young workers and to increase the number of public holidays.
In a world that is deeply unstable, more than ever we need socialist voices and activists fighting for a better world. Membership of People Before Profit will put you at the centre of that fight for change.
Joining will allow you to help shape the party we need for the future.
On May Day we remember: it was the socialist working-class, organised in unions, who won the weekend, the 8-hour day, sick pay, pensions, parental leave – every gain we’ve made came from our struggle against the bosses who would erode our pay and conditions at every opportunity were they certain they could get away with it.
The bosses don't stop fighting: from Labour's cuts to disability supports in the North, to delays in increasing the Living Wage and sick leave in the South. The bosses are on the offensive – and it’s time we fight back.
Join us on the streets. March with your union. March with your class.
The workers united will never be defeated.
