Thursday, January 18th will see the biggest-ever strike in the North as workers from across the public sector join forces.
The fight is for higher pay. Workers are fed up with seeing their wages drop below prices. One man, Christopher Heaton-Harris, has taken control of the budget and is refusing to pay out.
He is a true-blue Tory who wants to punish Northern workers by making sure that their pay levels drop below England, Scotland, and Wales. He is using the excuse of the DUP’s boycott of the Stormont Executive to impose a wage freeze.
But workers are in revolt and their mighty power can put a real dent in his Tory arrogance. The movement needs to continue beyond January 18th – escalating into a full-scale action.
The contrast with the Southern labour movement, however, could not be more striking. There, workers have seen real pay decline as prices escalate.
Current predictions for inflation and the need to compensate for last year mean that we need a minimum increase of 7.5% this year.
Yet Pascal O Donoghue, who earns €175,000 a year, says the country cannot afford it. He has made a miserable offer that effectively defers most pay rises to October and ties workers into a two-and-a-half-year deal.
But the government is boasting about its budget surplus. It has plenty of money to both pay workers and tackle the housing crisis. It just refuses to do so.
The Southern unions should follow the Northern example. It is time to put up a real fight for workers’ rights. It is the only way to stop union decline.
That is why People Before Profit says: Let’s ballot for coordinated public sector action in the South.
