The 30 November TUC “day of action”
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SWP placard calling for a mere change of prime minister (photographed in Kingston this morning but also carried on the main march in central London and no doubt elswhere, especially in towns with universities).Headline of this morning’s London edition of Metro showing that trade union consciousness despite its weaknesses is at least a higher level than Leninist consciousness
From John BAbout 8,000 took part in the Tyneside march and rally. Managed to handout all the leaflets (500?) but could have done with more stuff to hand out and more help. With a little organising we could have had a decent stall there.Maybe next time an A3 folded flier (4 sides of A4), which we have produced successfully in the past. From Paddy SThree comrades gave out 200 leaflets in Lancaster, where around 1000 people were on the march, again a surprisingly good turnout (the last one we went to, we outnumbered the marchers), and we should have had more leaflets. But we also had a stock of those little video cards and they went quite well. Might be a good back-up plan for members at future demos, since they’re easy to carry and distribute, and a bit different from the usualfare. From Howard MTwo comrades attended the march and rally in Swansea today where we gave out 200 leaflets. It was a good leaflet, but I’m afraid that the ‘Socialist Party’ heading meant that some of the people who took them immediately mistook us for the ex-Militant lot. Surprised at the number of people – 1500-2000. The rally was full of Labour Party speakers – including local MPs – condemning Miliband for not supporting the strike.
From Pat DThree comrades arrived in Chelmsford town centre before the march -more a noisy parade on a circuit and back to the starting point. Unlike in Luton we ran out of people to hand leaflets to. Had 10 of the 200 left! Everyone of the 500 or so on the march who would take a leaflet had one. A very few of passers by -shoppers- were willing to take a leaflet. Remark from one on the march on seeing the SS, “pleased to see you are still around.” Other remarks from passers by demonstrated the success of the ‘divide and rule’ principle e.g.”I worked until I was 65 before I could get a pension in the private sector!!” and another loudly “I support the cuts”. We remained until after the end of the rally by which time numbers had shrunk as participants left some saying to do shopping… One member held Standards partly as a means of identification -(one of those on the march just walked up got out the money and bought a copy) and wondered about a stick on badge for these occasions.
From Peter HFour comrades distributed 500 leaflets at the Glasgow demo which was very well attended, the largest since the demo against the war in Iraq. We could have distributed more but unfortunately the secretary only received one package of 500, no doubt the other 500 will arrive now that the demo has ended. one member pointed out that he had only seen one Labour Party banner at the demo, a sign of the times from the days when they flooded these demos. “The Scottish Socialist Party” leaflet complained that the SNP had spinelessly passed on Westminster’s cuts instead of defying them urging an “independent socialist Scotland”.
3 comrades from Norwich managed to hand out around 450 leaflets at the event in the city which was a well attended affair with around 2000 attending.
A clearer picture of the front of the march at Kingston dominated by SWP “He’s Got to Go” placards. This gave the wrong impression about what the strike and march were about. Kingston is in fact an administrative centre in its own right and there were pickets outside the Crown Court, Surrey Council County main offices, Kingston University, Kingston hospital as well as Kingston Council. There weren’t any pickets outside the local Jobcentre. In fact I saw strikebreakers there at their desk, no doubt striving to fulfil their quota of hounding people off benefits. At the outdoor rally the chairperson asked those who were on strike for the first time to put their hands up. Over half of the 500 present did. Capitalism is educating a new generation of workers.
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