Month: June 2022

Across the country rail workers are striking for better pay and protection from job cuts. Rail workers, like Civil Servants, kept the country running during the pandemic. Many of them face pay freezes that amount to real-terms pay cuts, as pay does not match rising cost-of-living and inflation. They have also been told that there will be redundancies on the horizon.

Does this sound familiar?

Of course, the pay freezes don’t hurt rail bosses, who take home pay packets worth millions of pounds. Of course, it isn’t the bosses facing job cuts. And of course, it’s the workers, not the bosses, being told to make do with their pay and weather the cost of living crisis, despite the face that some low-paid rail workers are facing homelessness despite working six-day weeks.

“Some of the cleaners are homeless: they’re working six days a week, full time, and sleeping at a bus shelter at night.”

I spoke to four young RMT members from across the board about why they are striking this week and why we should all support them https://t.co/jkPi5dv32L

— James Greig (@jamesdgreig) June 21, 2022

Predictably, the press is working its hardest to demonise the rail strikers, stating they are disrupting the country by preventing rail services from going ahead. This of course, is the point of strike action: if they weren’t disruptive, no-one would care. Ultimately, it’s only fair for an employee to withhold their work if they aren’t being paid enough to live and if their workplaces aren’t safe, and this is what striking RMT workers are doing.

PCS wholeheartedly supports rail workers taking action. Activists from PCS Leeds branch will be visiting the RMT picket to show solidarity with rail workers, and we encourage our members to show solidarity in whatever way they can: tweet about it, bust one of the many myths going around, share the infographic below, be public about your support, and don’t buy the Sun, the Daily Mail, or any of the papers demonising striking workers—their millionaire owners personally benefit from a system that thrives on unfairness and inequality, so why on earth would they support workers asking for fair pay and conditions?

This September, we will be balloting our own members to take industrial action, meaning in autumn, it could be us on the picket. The papers, Tories, and bad bosses will try to pit workers against each other, so we need to build a national movement of solidarity between unions and workers across the UK, support industrial action where we see it, and campaign for fair pay and conditions for everyone.

They say give back. We say fight back.