The attacks on these workers will lead to loss of pay and jobs, worse working conditions, and undermine the safety of our public services.

Unions attacked

The FBU and RMT are also being attacked because they are militant left unions which have defended their members over the years. These attacks are no doubt co-ordinated at Boris Johnson’s London administration and have the full support of the Con-Dem government.

If the RMT and FBU are defeated then this would demoralise other sections of workers who are facing the massive Con-Dem cuts.

Media attacks

The media have vilified both firefighters and Tube workers in attempt to isolate them and soften them up for attack. Workers on strike are rightly angry about the coverage they have been receiving.

We in the NUJleft are also angered by the attacks on our fellow brothers and sisters. Most journalists have nothing to do with these attacks, which are usually orchestrated by management.

The very week that the Firefighters and RMT are on strike, NUJ staff at the BBC are also striking in defence of their pensions. They too have been vilified with claims that staff have gold-plated pensions when it’s the management with the slush funds and pension top up schemes.

Many journalists are suffering from attacks on jobs, wages, and terms and conditions the same as firefighters and tube workers.

Solidarity

We believe that all workers in struggle against the cuts should stand together.

• We encourage all NUJ members to visit FBU and RMT picket lines and hold collections at work for them and the BBC workers.
• Invite strikers to your chapel or branch meetings.
• Get involved in local anti-cuts committees and public meetings. Help spread the message why people are on strike and fighting back
• Challenge where possible poor or partial reporting in the media of the strikes.

Victory to the striking firefighters, tube workers and BBC journalists.

More than 100 trade unionists packed into the London Welsh Centre on Thursday night to hear the NUJ’s general secretary Jeremy Dear and a host of leading union activists call for a powerful protest in Brighton next weekend at Labour party conference.

Fresh from the TUC in Liverpool, Jeremy spoke about the government’s lack of political will – unemployment can be beaten, but it means a change of priorities from the banks to working people, he said.

Mark Flower from the Vestas occupation got a standing ovation before he even spoke. He went on to describe how he and 16 other workers had thrust climate change to the top of the agenda in the union movement, in the face of lies from his bosses, police aggression and government inaction.

Sasha Callaghan of the UCU said now was not the time to stay silent and not “rock the boat” as the election approached – we had to shout now for an alternative. Kevin Courtney from the NUT executive picked up this theme and made a passionate speech for unions to co-ordinate immediate action for jobs.

Lyndsey German for the Stop the War Coalition made the connection between the current crisis and the billions wasted on criminal wars and the Trident nuclear weapons system. The hall applauded the TUC’s historic decision to call for a boycott of Israeli goods.

LSE student Estelle Cooch from Right to Work talked about how her economics lecturers apologise to students every day that what they are about to learn is being proved totally wrong by the recession.

Finally Richard McEwan of the UCU at Tower Hamlets college brought the hall to its feet in solidarity with the all-out strike of teachers there, which is now into its fourth week.

I came away with leaflets, posters, stickers, papers and other material to distribute at work. As well as tickets for Brighton. Please email me on david.crouch10@btinternet.com if you need any.

Accepting the prestigious award on the last day of congress, the annual gathering of trade unionists, she paid tribute to her husband, Kevin, who she described as “a thorn in the side of the bosses”.

Anita, re-elected today as the PR and information rep on the NUJ NEC, listed the advances made in the 20 years since she was a first-time congress delegate and highlighted the work that still needs to be done.

While overall there is now a greater diversity in delegations, she said it is “still far short of being truly representative”.

“More women delegates but still only just over one in three and, at least this year I thought, an increasing number of women speakers.

“The LGBT and disability conferences have become motions-based – as, hopefully, will the young members’ forum – providing lay activists with a greater democratic voice.

“And the voice of the lay members is heard more at our congress now the equality conferences bring a motion to this floor.

“This year, the trades councils finally came home with their conference’s first motion. Again hopefully, the young members will join our debates next year.”

She said there was now more of an international flavour to TUC debates. In a reference to an earlier address by Salvador Valdes Mesa, general secretary of the Cuba Workers’ Group of Affiliated Trade Unions, Anita added: “Comrades, who would have thought 20 years ago that congress would give a standing ovation to a Cuban trade union leader in the 50th anniversary of the glorious Cuban revolution.”

She thanked Kevin, her “husband and comrade of 35 years” for his support, saying: “Kevin was a child of the depression; his grandmother died in the workhouse. He left school at 13, and led his first strike at 15.

“Since then he has been a thorn in the side of the bosses. Sometimes he even took on the TUC. Indeed, the first time I was at Congress House was outside lobbying the general council to call for the repeal of all anti-trade union laws.”

She added that she was proud of the NUJ for its role in making this repeal TUC policy.

“My union now has a young leadership with Jeremy Dear and our new deputy general secretary, Michelle Stanistreet, a sister of whom I am immensely proud,” Anita said.

She closed with a rallying call to continue the fight against the far right, saying: “I learned my politics from my parents – both anti-fascist refugees from Nazi Germany.

“I know they would have been extremely heartened by the way our trade union movement has taken up the struggle against the re-emergence of the far right.

“Sisters and brothers, I wish you well in this and all the fights we still face.”

Referring to the silent vigil delegates and visitors held earlier in the week to remember the victims of racism and fascism, she said: “At the beginning of the week we said, ‘not in my name’.”

Clenching her fist in the air, she added: “At the end of the week I say, ‘no pasaran’.”

Surviving NUJ members at the Express titles are currently going through yet another redundancy exercise.

Richard Desmond’s seemingly unquenchable thirst for journalistic blood demands the sacrifice of a further 96 London jobs from a total of 600 across the Daily Express, Daily Star, Sunday Express, Daily Star Sunday and their associated magazines.

The Glasgow office is to lose a quarter of its staff – that is 10 from just 40 serving four national titles.

Initial proposals, full of words like “eliminate” and “review”, indicate that no one is safe. Merging desks between titles and copy-sharing are strong possibilities.

A nine-day fortnight is to be brought in to replace the current four-day week. These are of course four-night weeks as these 10-hour shifts go on until the early hours of the following day.

District reporters look set to be consigned to the history books, replaced by agency copy. Management here have recently been successful in engaging outside suppliers of words and pictures in talks about renewed contracts – where they have agreed to cut their prices by as much as 16%.

The 1 January pay review for this year was postponed until 1 June. Then it was postponed completely. On the day we were due to commence pay negotiations for 2010, the company announced its latest cull.

Daily Express Editor Peter Hill told me in an email: “No one wants to see job cuts but survival is the issue now. Revenues from circulation and advertising are drastically down and there is no prospect of any improvement. The bills have to be paid. The company has to be viable.”

No mention there about the journalistic reputation and credibility of the titles having to survive. No thought of restoring the Daily Express to its former glories.

What has happened to Desmond’s plan to overtake the journalistic juggernaut that is the Daily Mail? He is not going to overtake anyone while he reduces the Daily Express to a title whose staff could easily fit inside a Smart car.

The NUJ chapel has warned management before that it views these constant cuts with anger. We believe they herald the demise of the Daily Express and Sunday Express as national titles. But still the redundancy exercises come – and they are getting closer together.

Redundancy exercises have become as regular as Daily Express splashes on the McCanns, or Jordan and Peter Andre front pages in the Daily Star.

When Desmond bought the Express titles in 2001 I think he thought he was buying Express Dairies as he has been milking us ever since. He has paid himself millions in both salary and pension and then says the company is fighting for survival. I wonder why.

You are demanding a new direction tonight. NUJ members at the Express and Daily Star are desperate for management to take a new direction too – away from badly-managed decline and towards meaningful investment in quality journalism and quality titles.

See you in Brighton.

That’s why NUJ Left is asking for your vote. All our candidates pledge to campaign for strategies based on the most effective and strident action – official or unofficial – to defend jobs, pay, conditions and quality journalism.

This means solidarity action to back our members in dispute and harnessing the resources of the whole union to stop the employers’ assault.

We do not believe the recession should be used as an excuse for preconceived attacks on jobs and standards.

We believe cuts are unnecessary, counterproductive and entirely avoidable. We will not pay for their crisis, while shareholders maintain their returns.

We will fight to defend journalistic and ethical standards. We oppose the latest sordid attempts to whip up support for the UK’s unwinnable wars and will continue to campaign for greater coverage of the anti-war movement.

Where we face editors who insist we must be “balanced” in our reporting of the nazi BNP we will press the case for a truthful and challenging media, and support with all our resolve journalists who refuse to work alongside far right elected members.

We have grown into a fighting union that puts the defence of jobs, journalism and human decency first. Let’s keep it that way.

Vote NUJ Left

• Kyran Connolly – books
• David Beake – broadcasting
• Tom Davies, Alan Gibson, Pierre Vicary and Barry White – London
• Barbara Goulden/Lucy Lynch – midlands
• Julia Armstrong/Phil Turner – newspapers and agencies
• Anita Halpin – PR and information
• Dave Toomer – north west England

Print and distribute our leaflet (pdf).

The NUJ has been campaigning against this attack on press freedom alongside the International Federation of Journalists, the TUC and Amnesty International.

Branches, chapels and individual members are asked to contribute whatever they can to the legal defence fund set up by the union to support our colleagues in Gambia.

The journalists were first arrested in June after articles appeared criticising the country’s president Yahya Jammeh.

We are living through the worst economic crisis for 60 years. No one has any idea how it will pan out or when it will end.

Unemployment is soaring. Yet where are the unions? We should be battering on the doors of parliament.

Like never before we need strong unions that can connect individual, isolated struggles into a powerful national movement.

Millions understand that it is a crime to throw billions at propping up the banks. The G20 protesters at the Bank of England had the right idea – the unions have the muscle to deliver their vision.

This week Vestas has been humbled on the Isle of Wight by an occupation backed by hundreds of trade unionists and climate activists. Unofficial action has recently won stunning victories at Lindsey and Visteon.

These developments have the potential to transform the political situation in this country.

For this reason four unions – NUJ, NUT, UCU and PCS – have come together nationally with the mass anti-war movement to call a joint protest at Labour’s conference in Brighton on 27 September.

The government is weak and desperate to save its skin. A large and radical protest in Brighton can pile the pressure on Labour to change track. The day before the protest the Convention of the Left will rally left activists and continue the urgent work of building unity.

Last Friday representatives of all four unions met at the UCU to hammer out some details. But the initiative from Headland House won’t build a demo on its own – it needs to be backed up with grassroots activism.

Time is short, so there will be a first stab at creating an NUJ organising committee from 7pm on Tuesday 4 August at NUJ headquarters, 308-312 Gray’s Inn Road, London. Nearest station is King’s Cross.

As a former chief reporter who covered Bromley for a south east London weekly, one of my reliable contacts was Glenn Kelly, the local council’s Unison branch secretary.

I can attest to the fact that, as you would expect from a socialist, he worked tirelessly to protect and promote the rights and interests of council workers and service users. My former colleagues who covered Greenwich would say the same about Onay Kasab.

As well as fighting for their members’ terms and conditions, they always ensured Unison’s concerns and campaigns were kept in the public eye, bringing to wider notice important issues that might otherwise have gone unreported.

I have no doubt that they have significantly contributed to raising the public perception of workers at those two councils over the years. And as a result of their work, the public is also more informed about the consequences of outsourcing and cost-cutting in local government.

Crucially, again as you’d expect from socialists, they always acted with integrity in their dealings with us as journalists. This of course not only made them trustworthy sources – both on and off the record – but raised the profile of trade unionism, which can only have had a positive effect on our chapel.

The Unison leadership must be aware how well served workers, service users and the wider public have been by these long-standing activists, which makes this ruling even more troubling.

It is not just these activists’ contributions to building a fighting union at grassroots level that is at stake here. Glenn and other trade unionists like him recognise the power of the press and the benefits of keeping in close contact with journalists, particularly in local media.

While the Unison leadership have blatantly sought to rid themselves, at least for a few years, of four activists who provided a visible and vocal counterpoint to New Labour orthodoxy, Prentis and his allies also risk undermining the ability of the union to communicate effectively with the public its members serve.

This is not just an attack on militant trade unionism and socialism; on a wider level it has implications for accountability and democracy in local government.

Supporters of the four activists will be protesting outside Unison headquarters in Mabledon Place, London, at 12pm on Thursday 30 July.

To donate to the campaign make cheques payable to ‘Stop the witch-hunt’ and post to: Defend the Four campaign, PO Box 858, London, E11 1YG.

The campaign is also asking for messages of protest to be posted to Unison HQ or emailed to general secretary Dave Prentis d.prentis@unison.co.uk

Send copies of protest statements to the campaign postal address above or info@stopthewitchhunt.org.uk

The gathering is held annually in the Dorset village made famous by six 19^th century agricultural workers who took an oath of allegiance to fight to improve wages and conditions for their fellow workers.

They were sentenced to seven years hard labour in Australia in 1834, but the conviction was lifted and they returned to Dorset in triumph after a massive public campaign across England, which helped seal many of the rights to organise and fight which form the basis of modern trade unionism.

Former NUJ president Tim Lezard is a long-standing organiser of the festival and chaired one of two key all-comers debates held on the second of the three-day event – on how to link unions with communities and new methods of organising workers.

Current vice president Pete Murray stood in for NUJ general secretary Jeremy Dear for the first debate, chaired by Sue Fearns from the campaign group Unions 21, on how UK unions have responded to the recession.

At both, NUJ Left members, assistant northern organiser Jenny Lennox and NEC new media rep Donnacha DeLong, made substantial contributions from the floor.

The festival itself has none of the laminated cards, heavy-handed security or cosseted, aloof artistes which are – sadly – such a feature of the summer festival season.

Nor has it lost the strong political and trade union message at its heart.  Indeed, this year’s Tolpuddle was clearly energised by the presence of a group of workers and supporters from the Vestas wind turbine plant on the Isle of Wight – where more than 600 workers are threatened with redundancy if the company goes ahead with plans to close the plant.

NUJ Left members will already know that the workforce has taken strong and determined action to resist closure by occupying the factory.

In the course of the Unions 21 debate, the local MP and employment minister Jim Knight pledged to “do what he could” to save the jobs in a vital sustainable energy sector.  NUJ Left members will want to do all we can to support the Vestas workers.

One demonstration was already held outside the Department of Energy and Climate Change in Whitehall this week. It is likely further protests will take place as the campaign grows.

In the meantime, please send messages of support to savevestas@gmail.com and for more information visit the Save Vestas website.

Of those who voted, 84% opted to take industrial action and 97% for action short of a strike after the company announced plans to close nine titles and cut 17 journalists’ jobs in the region.

Michelle Stanistreet, NUJ deputy general secretary, pledged the union’s full support if members are forced to take action to defend their colleagues’ jobs.

Other Trinity members also considering their futures will hopefully take heart from this result and have more confidence that the battles they face are better fought together.

Solidarity to the Trinity journalists and practical support where its needed.