Speech by Brian Forbes at the Sinn Fein Ard Fheis 2013

Given the year that’s in it with the Centenary of the Lock Out it’s perhaps appropriate to have a representative of a union with a predominantly female membership and with many of our members on relatively low pay and low incomes address this important conference.

Back in the early 1900’s the Irish Drapers Assistants union the IDAA – one of the forerunners to Mandate – and under the stewardship of the charismatic Michael O’Lehane pioneered the recruitment of women into trade union membership in Ireland. In 1912 the IDAA through the enactment of the Shops Act won their struggle for a weekly half day holiday, a dinner break of 45 minutes and a half hour for tea in the afternoon. Little perks many of us would today take for granted but which were fought for and won by those a century before us. Many members gave up their half days in 1913 to help unload and distribute supplies to strikers and families off the Hare on the South Quay in Dublin. O’Lehane maintained his position that a strike was the concern of the whole trade union movement and by 1914 IDAA had 4,000 members and 1,400 were proudly female.

Reminiscing about 1913 one thing came to mind and that’s the fact there was a distinct whiff of trade union militancy in the air in those days – I miss that type of trade unionism! Bosses since 1913 have engaged in relentless class struggle. Employers always seeking concessions from workers and we all in many ways have been complicit in allowing that to happen. An important question that remains unanswered in Ireland is Are Rights Permanent?

One of the biggest lessons from history is that we are told rights are arbitrary – if you organise to defend them then you can have them. Unions exist to protect and advance workers interests and back in 1913 unions and their leaders were labelled dangerous and subversive by bosses. Trade unions today have largely lost that dangerousness and subversiveness in favour of industrial peace and partnership.

Social partnership delivered for some but left many more behind economically and socially including many of our members. Social partnership neutered our ability to agitate, educate and organise in workplaces. It provided a comfortable environment for capital and the bosses to grow and prosper off the backs off labour without fear of retribution.

Jumping from 1913 to 2013 and the week that’s in it. It would be remiss of me not to mention the role Thatcher had in politically educating me and many others of my generation passionately in opposition to her brand of misery. She rallied us against the excesses of greed and the markets, the transfer of wealth from the people to the rich, individualism and the anti-union anti-worker legislation that still exists today including here in Ireland. She unwittingly as Johnny Cash would say,

“Put the gravel in our guts and the spit in our eyes”.

The Irish ideological political sons and daughters of Thatcher continue lemming like along the Albert Einstein definition of insanity, “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Capitalism is a busted flush, it didn’t work then and it won’t work for us now.

People on the left keep using the slogan, “Austerity isn’t working” – It bloody well is working. It’s doing exactly what it says on the tin and exactly what it was designed to do. Weakening social security payments, paring back public sector wages, raising the retirement age, additional tax burdens on labour, selling state assets and so on weakens household and domestic demand but helps turn around profitability for the wealthy elite. Doing exactly what it is designed to do. So it is working fine, it’s just not working for us.

Over the past while listening to Government spin doctors feed us their propaganda, I’ve seen more green shoots than Diarmuird Gavin and turned more corners than a circuit of Ireland rally driver. As a movement and as a society we need to open our eyes to exactly what’s being perpetrated on our people and organise sustained resistance to these austerity policies across the public and private sectors. A worker is a worker is a worker!

1913 Was all about union recognition. 2013 is still all about union recognition. Decades of social partnership and workers still don’t have legislative protections. That was a partnership built on dishonesty and the divorce was inevitable so all we need now is for the union movement to realise there will be no reconciliation or second coming. The Government are just screwing everyone now.

The position of the Irish working class has witnessed a fairly marked and progressive decline over the past 30 years. Unlike most European countries there is no statutory right to trade union recognition.

The absence of these institutional supports can be partly attributed to the decline in unionisation levels across the private sector economy since the 1980’s. Combined with the “love affair” with social partnership, local level union organising has significantly eroded. But some unions are fighting back and winning that fight.

Every day we make decisions as consumers as to where we spend our hard earned cash in shops. Many retailers do not respect their workers right to be collectively represented by a trade union. The impact is the constant attack on agreed wages and conditions. In a shrinking market it is important that consumers support companies who voluntarily collectively bargain with workers and their union. Mandate launched a campaign Fair Shop with website fairshop.ie which conveniently provides a store locator so you have no excuse wherever you live not to support Fair Shops. On behalf of workers in Fair Shops, who are better of by being in a union, we’d urge you all and your families to support those workers and Fair Shops by spending your money where workers count.

Our Fair Shop campaign neatly links to Mandate’s Decent Work campaign as we fight back against the growing spectre of precarious work which is becoming the norm for the Irish Working class. Special mention to the work of Senator David Cullinane in this field and Mandate is establishing a strong and growing relationship with Sinn Fein TD’s on many worker related issues. We are seeing wage stagnation, increased hours of work, increased use of short term contracts, huge flexibility requirements on workers, zero hour contracts, 7 day week and continuing high levels of unemployment.

It would seem our Government is intent on making our country more attractive to monopoly capital which can use Ireland as a base for exports into the Euro-Zone. They are attempting to make permanent full time work a thing of the past to be replaced by a precarious fully flexible workforce, where the working week can be whatever the employer needs it to be.

Attacks on JLC’s and the constant threat to our minimum wage (8th highest in Europe???) are prime examples of the class struggle trade unionists in the private sector face every day.

We are fed constant lies that “It’s all common sense! Stupid!” • Pay the Debt – Accept Austerity as Necessary • Workers paid too much – workers rights are restrictive to employers • Boss is always right and knows best (just like in 1913) • Privatisation is right (Just like the disaster that is Eircom)

We must provide an alternative to counter these lies • Debt = Poverty and Austerity • Cutting wages = hardship and poverty • Bargaining away rights = loss of those rights. Permanently

Unless we combine and Organise across the public and private sector and fight against the attempts to demonise the public sector workers – we lose! The insidious attempts to create a split between those working in the public and private sectors must be resisted at all costs and unions must be at the vanguard of making sure the media propaganda does not succeed in dividing workers.

Unions in the public and private sector must work collaboratively and much closer together. We are organising workers in challenging times and organising is the driving imperative for restructuring our movement for the battles that lie ahead.

Labour is not a commodity yet the trend in Ireland is in the opposite direction. People have less security in their jobs, they suffer from more stress due to financial demands, the public safety net is shrinking, making them more vulnerable and public services are being contracted out for more profit no matter the devastating consequences.

Organising is a core trade union value and that’s where we need to return as a movement. We are living in William Martin Murphy’s vision which has become Margaret Thatcher’s reality. We are all in a Global class war whether we know it or not and families on low and middle incomes are ultimately paying the price.

We can’t sit around waiting on another Big Jim Larkin to appear on the horizon. We must immediately set about creating a new Larkinism before its too late!