Public meeting: Support NUJ and FBU strikers

A public meeting in south London on the eve of the BBC and FBU strikes will be addressed by leading members of the unions involved:

• Jeremy Dear, general secretary of the National Union of Journalists (NUJ)
• Becky Branford, BBC NUJ member
• Ian Leahair, from the national executive of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU)

Salvation Army Hall, Princess Street, Elephant and Castle, SE1 6HH, at 7pm on Thursday 4 November.

The meeting has been organised by local campaign group Southwark Save Our Services.

More details on NUJ website, what you can do to help.

Background to the BBC dispute

The NUJLeft offers its full support to London firefighters and tube staff who are on strike this week and in the coming months.

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

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Statement from NUJ asking for support for BBC journalists on strike

Dear colleague,

Can you afford to simply give away £100,000, £25,000 or even ‘just’ £10,000? Of course not.

But those are the kinds of sums every journalist faces losing under the BBC’s latest pension proposal.

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The BA cabin crew have shown extraordinary spirit in the face of bullying management and a hostile press.  Their two resounding YES votes for striking show that they determined to force BA to negotiate. The cabin crew are out again on 27 March. Here an NUJ Left member reports on the first Saturday of the strike.

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This time next week, journalists on Trinity Mirror’s titles in the midlands are likely to have staged a strike in defence of jobs and journalism in the region and be planning their next move.

After a massive vote in favour, the members at the Birmingham Post and Mail, Coventry Telegraph, Sunday Mercury and Midlands Weekly Media titles plan to walk out on Thursday 30 July.

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NUJ members working for Trinity Mirror in the midlands will meet later this week to discuss what action to take after a resounding strike vote.

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.

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News today that NUJ members in Middlesbrough are to ballot over threatened compulsory redundancies brings the total of Trinity Mirror chapels currently considering industrial action to five.

Members at the Evening Gazette are particularly angry that they are facing more cuts after jobs went six months ago, the NUJ reports.

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Apparently London mayor Boris Johnson thinks getting £250,000 a year for being a part-time journalist isn’t an obscenely massive salary and he defends it by saying he makes a “substantial donation” to charity.

If he’s looking for worthy causes to assuage his conscience, as a fellow journalist he could do worse than sling a few of his hard-earned quids this way. Or this way if members go out on strike. Or, similarly, this way etc.

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Members in east Lancashire have proved the only way to see off the bosses’ cuts is by standing together.

Collective action which manifested itself in a massive vote for a strike at the Johnston-owned Burnley Express, Clitheroe Advertiser and Nelson Leader has forced the company to back down.

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By Pete Murray, NUJ vice president

A one-day strike at the Glasgow-based Daily Record and Sunday Mail titles has brought the NUJ’s campaign of resistance to the jobs carnage across the UK and Ireland to Scotland in the most forceful and determined way so far.

Following weeks of unproductive talks – and management’s refusal to consider dozens of volunteers for redundancy as an alternative to forcing through at least 20 compulsories – the NUJ chapel voted by 85% to strike.

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