Bin workers in Birmingham have been on strike since March 11th. When the
Labour council in that city attacked bin workers' pay and conditions,walkouts started in January, leading on to an all-out strike from March
11th. ---- This is an important strike that must be supported with
solidarity action from other workers. ---- Workers are in direct
confrontation with a Labour council that wants savage cuts that will
result in a pay cut of £8,000 a year. In addition, lorry drivers are
being downgraded by this vicious anti-working class council. Hundreds
of bin workers are striking, and are blocking bin lorries run down by
scab outfits paid by the council.
Thanks to their own financial mismanagement and austerity measures
imposed by both Tory and Labour governments, Birmingham council are now
trying to get out on the hole they have dug by attacking the workers
they employ.
The council has paid scabs to break the strike. Police have attacked
picket lines and army officers have been employed to help in the
strike-breaking operation. Workers responded to the breaking up of
picket lines by mounting a mass picket on 9th May, involving hundreds of
people. As a result, the depot at Lifford Lane was shut down.
The following Monday, workers blocked bin lorries leaving the Atlas
depot in Tyseley and Lifford Lane. The mass action has encouraged
workers to take independent action outside the control of the Unite
union bureaucracy.
The Labour council has used Section 14 of the Public Order Act to attack
pickets. However, the determination of the bin workers has increased.
The Unite bureaucracy could not think beyond a legal challenge, when the
police began breaking up picket lines. It was down to workers themselves
organising mass action that has led to increasing confidence.
The council attempted to enlist firefighters to clear rubbish. However,
firefighters have responded with a categorical rejection of such action.
The bin strike has become a beacon for resistance to austerity. But now
we need to up the ante, with further mass pickets and a mass national
demonstration in Birmingham.
The leader of Birmingham council, John Cotton, has not been at any of
the negotiations with bin workers. As to the managing director of the
council, Joanne Roney, she spent the first week of the strike in Cannes
in southern France at a MIPIM real estate conference, attempting to
attract property developers to Birmingham. This was just after she had
declared the strike as a major incident! Meanwhile meetings with the bin
workers have been scheduled by the council to only one a week.
The Labour Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner, has said that the
strike should be suspended, and that workers should accept a "fair"
offer. A cut of £8,000?
The bin workers strike is a direct challenge to this rotten Labour
government. Support it.
https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2025/05/26/workers-challenge-labour-the-birmingham-bin-strike/
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