Monday, 22 February 2016

SERTUC activities and news February and March 2016

Also Oxford International Women's Festival, Friday 4 to Tuesday 15 March 2016: links here:


https://oxfordinternationalwomensfestival.co.uk/events/


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Megan Dobney
SERTUC activities and news

Paddling furiously. Equality survey launch…

On Tuesday 8 March at 4.30pm at Congress House SERTUC is launching our tenth survey of equality in trade unions. To respond to the government’s attack on trade unions we need to be in the best shape possible. Are we? Join us to find out. With a glass of wine and a peanut… Let Joanne Williams know you are coming please at jowilliams@tuc.org.uk

SERTUC’s Creative & Leisure Industries Committee conference

With Show Culture Some Love and PCS Culture Group on Saturday 12 March 11am at Congress House, covering Campaigns, Equalities, Art & Protest, No to Cuts, and more. Full details and register here https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/show-culture-some-love-no-to-austerity-arts-budget-cuts-tickets-21203096031

Airbus 8 acquitted

I’m not saying the two events are connected, but following the SERTUC meeting on 12 February with comrades from CC.OO and UGT in Madrid, the Airbus 8 have been acquitted! Details are here http://www.industriall-union.org/spain-judge-acquits-the-airbus-8

Regional unemployment figures

·         East of England 124,000 (down 8,000) 3.9%
·         London 294,000 (down 3,000) 6.3%
·         South East 179,000 (down 1,000) 3.9%

Burston Strike School Rally

Sunday 4 September with Mick Whelan ASLEF, Steve White and the Protest Family  https://burstonstrikeschool.wordpress.com/2016-rally/

SERTUC Pensioners Network seminar: Crisis in care and caring

Tuesday 15 March 10.30 at Congress House, with Barbara Keeley MP (Shadow Minister for Older People, Social Care and Carers) andJan Shortt (Vice President of the National Pensioners Convention). Details here https://sertucresources.wordpress.com/sertuc-events/

TUC

#heartunions week Big Workplace Meeting

YouTube of TUC GS Frances O’Grady with Eddie Izzard is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFKhlTLfqwI&feature=youtu.be

Disputes/union actions

Unite International Women’s Day events Tuesday 8 March

Unite House, London
·         12 noon What Next for Women? Public meeting with Kate Osamor MP, Diana Holland Unite AGS, Siobhan Endean Unite Women’s Officer, Jane Stewart Unite Women’s Committee chair. All welcome, Lunch provided
·         2pm Caring & Campaigning: Bloomsbury Women Walking tour with Blue Badge guide Rachel Kolsky. Places limited. Free to Unite sisters, other unions can attend if places are available £5. Register at bridget.clemson@unitetheunion.org
·         6pm Irish Women of Resistance 1916-2016 Public meeting with Bernadette Devlin McAliskey Irish socialist and republican, Liz Deasy and Karen Gearon Dunnes Sotres strikers, Kelley Temple Abortion Rights, Theresa Moriarty Irish socialist historian. All welcome. Refreshments provided

Equity: English National Opera strike ballot

PCS: V&A Museum campaigning against privatisation

Richmond NUT London Elections Question Time event

Thursday 17 March 6.30pm with Kevin Courtney NUT DGS, Merlene Emerson LibDems, Andree Frieze Green, Martin Whetton Labour. Register and details here https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/sw-london-education-question-time-tickets-21448637452?aff=ebrowse

Unite Community South East

Supporting the Stand Up to Racism demo on 19 March (12 noon, London) with a coach from Southampton, contactjoe.dukes@unitetheunion.org

Unite London & Eastern Region public meeting

Thursday 25 February 6.30pm “Big Brother, who’s spying on you. Police spying on trade unionists” with John Lang Wapping Striker, Matt Wrack FBU GS, Helen Steel author, Mark Metcalf political activist, Jim Kelly Unite chair. More info mcmetcalf@icloud.com 

Bromley Unite Library Campaign

Unite is protesting outside Bromley Community Links (the organisation chosen to run 6 Bromley libraries) 24 and 25 February, 2 and 4 March – contact onay.kasab@unitetheunion.org for further details

PCS petition against BIS Sheffield closure plans


Trades Council actions

Peterborough International Women’s Day festival

Saturday 5 March 11am with Megan Dobney SERTUC, Nicola Oldfield Civil Engineer, Sophie Antonelli Green Backyard, Gillian Beasley Peterborough City Council, Charley Genever and Keely Mills Poets, plus info and craft stalls, refreshments, traditional dancing and exhibitions. http://www.ptuc.co.uk/2016/01/international-working-womens-day-5-march-2016/

GLATUC celebration: Reclaim International Women’s Day

Saturday 12 March 2pm in London, with Megan Dobney SERTUC, Sarah Jackson author, Christine Blower NUT GS, Louise Raw author, Kate Smurthwaite comedian. More information here http://www.glatuc.org.uk/news_detail1.php?id=243 and register heres.aitouaziz@hotmail.co.uk


Other actions/events

University of Greenwich seminar on China, Russia and the Unions

Wednesday 9 March 1pm with Professor William Brown (Cambridge), Professor Richard Croucher (Middlesex), Margaret Renn (Witwatersrand). http://www2.gre.ac.uk/about/news/articles/2016/a3602-china,-russia-and-the-unions-public-seminar-at-greenwich Register atwg08@gre.ac.uk

Cambridgeshire Keep Our NHS Public public meeting

Wednesday 24 February 7pm with Dr John Lister, Val Moore, a Junior Doctor. Details cambskonp@gmail.com

Women’s rights campaigners in East London, oral history project

Eastside Community Project is promoting East End women’s history as a response to the Jack the Ripper museum on Cable Street. Do you know anyone willing to be interviewed on the subject of working women’s rights? Contact Kirsty Parsons Kirsty@ech.org.uk

Stand up to Racism public meeting

Goldsmiths College Tuesday 1 March at 7pm with Imam Shakeel Begg, Denis Fernando, Vicky Foxcroft MP, Mary Goodfellow journalist, Laurie Heselden SERTUC, Shakira Martin NUS, Marcia Rigg, Rabbi Sylvia Rothschild more info laraginfo@yahoo.co.uk

Kill the Housing Bill march

Ruskin College International Women’s Day

“Over the Top” Friday 11 March 7pm two-handed performance about a forgotten Wiltshire heroine Dorothy Lawrence, more info https://oxfordinternationalwomensfestival.co.uk/events/ and contact twalsh@ruskin.ac.uk 

Marx Memorial Library

·         Film night “Struggles of the 1960s and 1970s” Saturday 27 February 3pm The UCS Struggle and Film from the Clyde £5http://www.marxlibrary.org.uk/education
·         Education classes Trade Unions and Power Tuesdays 1, 8, 15 March at 7pm at MML London £30 http://www.marxlibrary.org.uk/education
·         International Women’s Day benefit gig Monday 7 March 7pm with Maddy Carty, Nia Wyn, Kate Smurthwaite £10http://www.marxlibrary.org.uk/index.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/event/info&Itemid=218&reset=1&id=68
·         Explore Radical Clerkenwell walking tour etc Friday 6 May 1.30pm £12/9 http://www.marxlibrary.org.uk/index.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/event/info&Itemid=218&reset=1&id=69
·         Book Sale Saturday 12 March 11am http://www.marxlibrary.org.uk/index.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/event/info&Itemid=218&reset=1&id=66

Independent Working Class Education Network

The Labour Movement: where’s it from? Where’s it going? Day school Saturday 19 March 10am Norwich £10 http://iwceducation.co.uk/images/PDFfiles/Norwich%20flyer%20final.pdf

People’s Assembly Against Austerity national demonstration

Saturday 16 April, 1pm Gower Street, London http://www.thepeoplesassembly.org.uk/hhje

Ruskin College BA and MA beginning in October 2016

·         BA International Labour and Trade Union Studies http://www.ruskin.ac.uk/BAILTUS
·         MA Global Labour and Social Change http://www.ruskin.ac.uk/GLOBALLABOUR

 

To add to this newsletter contact mdobney@tuc.org.uk

Saturday, 20 February 2016

Feminist Library faces eviction on 1st March – start of Women's History month

Feminist Library faces eviction on 1st March – start of Women's History month
Dear Sisters,

As you can see from the title of this email and the attached press release, the Feminist Library is in an emergency situation, facing eviction within the next 2 weeks after over 30 years in the current building!

We request that you show your support by sharing the press release below to spread the word far and wide and by telling your friends how much the campaign means to you. Other ways that you can help us immediately include:

- by signing our petition
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/p/savefeministlibrary
- by sending letters to Southwark local councillors and Southwark MPs: Neil Coyle, Labour Party Member of Parliament for Bermondsey & Old Southwark (the Feminist Library’s constituency) Tel: 020 7219 8733. Email:neil.coyle.mp@parliament.uk; Helen Hayes, Labour Party Member of Parliament for Dulwich and West Norwood Tel: 020 7219 6971. Email: helen.hayes.mp@parliament.uk; Harriet Harman, Labour Party Member of Parliament for Camberwell and Peckham Tel: 020 7219 4218 Email: harriet.harman.mp@parliament.uk
- by donating to our Emergency Fund that has been set up to ensure that the Feminist Library collection's future is safe regardless of the final decision of the council on our current premises
http://feministlibrary.co.uk/support/emergencyfund/;
- by offering a hand with the campaign (we are always on a lookout for new volunteers, but at the moment we urgently need help with events, media, marketing and premises work).

Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you need any further information.
The Feminist Library collective
admin@feministlibrary.co.uk
------------------------------------------
Feminist Library faces eviction on 1st March – start of Women's History month!
  • For immediate release, 17.2.16
The Feminist Library is about to be thrown out of the building that has been its home for 30 years. [1]
Southwark Council is threatening to close down the Feminist Library on 1st March unless the Library agrees to an immediate increase in our rent from £12,000 to £30,000 a year. The Council's actions could cause the closure of a unique archive with a 40 year history. The Feminist Library has launched a wide-scale campaign, fast gaining international support, to fight the council's decision, including a special appeal to donate to its Emergency Fund. [2]
On 10th February, Southwark Council Cabinet approved a report [3] that ‘highlights the need for a thriving Voluntary and Community Sector that mobilises community action and makes best use of community resources, skills, knowledge and spaces’. Una Byrne, on behalf of the Feminist Library, said: ‘We cannot understand how treating our organisation in such a way is consistent with approving this report.’
Last year the Feminist Library launched a campaign to find a new, permanent home to house this unique resource and community space, currently at risk of being lost forever, and all this effort is now under threat. The Feminist Library is an archival resource which is internationally recognised as of cultural and heritage significance, as well as providing facilities for various women’s and community groups, both local and London-wide.
It is ironic that the Feminist Library is in danger of being made homeless on 1st March, when March is Women’s History Month and 8th March is International Women’s Day.
Many libraries, women’s organisations, and longstanding community projects have been forced to close in the current climate of austerity, including Lambeth Women's Project, Peckham Black Women's Centre, and the London Irish Women's Centre. Southwark Council forcing the Feminist Library to pay market rent immediately is another symptom of this.
Other longstanding tenants in the building are also suffering from this onslaught by Southwark Council. GHARWEG Advice, Training & Careers Centre, which provides vital services for Southwark residents, was given notice of repossession of its lease on 9th February. Like all community organisations, GHARWEG has faced financial constraints recently, and so has been unable to afford market rent. They have been locked out of their offices and their services are being severely affected. This is also ironic, as GHARWEG was an early tenant of the building, which was originally donated by the Greater London Council to Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic community groups.
As part of its campaign, the Feminist Library is launching a petition to ask Southwark Council to reconsider its stance. [4]
Minna Haukka, local resident, said: ‘As a Southwark resident I’ve been devastated to hear that we might be soon losing this unique cultural organisation. The Feminist Library is just what we need to hold on to in the Elephant and Castle area right now; a place that brings together women from all backgrounds and of all ages. It’s not only a valuable historical archive – it’s a very much alive and passionate community that Southwark should support and be proud of.’
Dr Laura Schwartz, Associate Professor of Modern British History, University of Warwick, said: ‘The Feminist Library is a wonderful cultural resource that needs to be defended at all costs. Generations of my students have used it for their academic research [...] If the Feminist Library is evicted from its current premises, Southwark Council will not only be guilty of cultural vandalism but also of silencing women.’
NOTES
  1. The Feminist Library is currently celebrating its 40th anniversary. Since 1987, it has occupied premises in Westminster Bridge Road owned by Southwark Council.
The Feminist Library has an incomparable collection of over 7,000 books, 1500 periodical titles from around the world, archives of feminist individuals and organisations, pamphlets, papers, posters, and ephemera. We also provide space for meetings, readings, exhibitions and events, a space which supports and encourages research, mutual support, activism and community projects, with well over 20 groups having used the events space just in the past calendar year, a number of them national and international. We are volunteer led, as we have been all our life; we are intergenerational, being significant custodians of our feminist heritage, whilst looking to the future; and our approach is intersectional – we provide a space for different feminisms to co-exist. We support not just archiving work, but also publish our own zines and support independent producers and artists. We are a registered charity, and completely self-funding.
  1. More information about how people can help, including donating to our Emergency Fund, can be found athttp://feministlibrary.co.uk/support/emergencyfund/
  1. Details of report http://casouthwark.org.uk/focus-southwark/southwark-council-agrees-new-voluntary-sector-strategy ‘Southwark Council Agrees to New Voluntary Sector Strategy’
  1. Link to petition https://you.38degrees.org.uk/p/savefeministlibrary
  1. For further information, for pictures of the Feminist Library and its activities, and of the plaque commemorating the donation of the building to BAME groups, please contact Emma Jennings on press@feministlibrary.co.uk
acknowledgements to Mike Shaughnessy

Friday, 19 February 2016

“REBELS RADICALS AND THE RED FLAG”

Fundraising walking tour for GLA elections

Meeting place : Farringdon tube (exit on Cowcross Street).

3 April

Time: 2.30pm – 4pm.

 “REBELS RADICALS AND THE RED FLAG”

Description:

Join qualified London Blue Badge Tour Guide and Historian Diane Burstein for
a guided walking tour in Clerkenwell. Sometimes referred to as “London’s
Secret Village” this is an area that has retained its character and has
history around every corner. You’ll see the ancient well which gave the area
its name and visit Clerkenwell Green, the scene of numerous political
rallies. Stand on the spot where Chartists, supporters of the Paris
Communards and other radical groups met throughout the years. View the 16th
century gatehouse of the Priory of St John, a target of Wat Tyler’s rebels
during the Peasants Revolt. See the building which now houses a library
dedicated to Marx where Lenin once worked printing his journal “Iskra”.
Learn about the area’s connection with the Fenians and see the site of the
prison where they were incarcerated. Discover how this area in the former
radical Borough of Finsbury led the way in health and housing for the poor.
Walk through Spa Fields, scene of the famous 1816 riot and finish with a
drink at one of the area’s historic pubs.



Diane is one of London’s best known tour guides, thanks to  her regular
contributions to local radio stations LBC and, currently, BBC London on the
subject of “Secret London”. As a Further Education lecturer, Diane teaches
“Discovering London” courses at London’s leading Adult Education colleges,
City Lit and  Bishopsgate Institute. She loves to show both Londoners and
visitors the more unusual sites away from the tourist trail.  She was a
Green Party candidate in the last local elections.



£10 per head.  Contact 
noellynch@lineone.net



This tour is not confined to Green Party members, so bring everyone you can.

Save the Cass at Aldgate.






Update: Save the Cass at Aldgate.
Support the nomination for Central House as a Community Asset (London Borough Tower Hamlets). Join the Community Group at:
Petition the LMU Board of Governors: Change your current strategic plan ‘One Campus, One Community’, and pursue a two-site solution.
Read this:
Open Letter 
We, the undersigned, call on London Metropolitan to review its current Strategic Plan, ‘One Campus, One Community’, in light of its consequences for the Sir John Cass Faculty of Art, Architecture and Design. We call on London Metropolitan to pursue a two-site solution that keeps the education of art, making and design alive and kicking where The Cass began in London’s East End. 
The Cass is a wonderful example of interdisciplinary activity – an outward facing community located in London’s East End, making everything from architecture to city plans, furniture to film, fine art to precious objects. It engages the most up-to-date industries and practitioners; works with local partners and communities; hosts an enviable diversity of students from all walks of life and travels the world with its work; a model that is successful, dynamic and a civic asset. 
Its future is endangered by a homogenised vision of academic education, part of a short-sighted national trend in the new universities. As Jonathan Ive, Apple’s Chief Design Officer, has said, it is essential to develop the skills of making through hands-on learning. At university level this means taking responsibility for accessible practical education and embracing the opportunities this creates for the success of British industry and society as a whole. It means we need to fully understand the national enterprise of educational reform that began in the mid-nineteenth century, sponsoring the arts and crafts movement and the establishment of colleges and technical institutes, which informed the polytechnics as well as Russell Group universities such as Imperial College, Queen Mary University and Goldsmiths. We should know by now that learning is not restricted to the purely academic. Making is also learning. It can be done well or badly. The Cass does it well.
The Cass is named after Sir John Cass, who established one of London’s oldest education charities with a historic mandate to found a polytechnic institute at Aldgate to serve the population of east London. The question of place is significant. Universities are not silos but play a dynamic role in their communities. Threats to move the Cass, dubbed the ‘Aldgate Bauhaus’, out of Aldgate would destroy its own rich ecology and diminish the diversity and opportunities of its East End location. The Mayor of Tower Hamlets, John Biggs, has expressed his opposition strongly. 
The Cass inhabits one of the last architectural assets of London Guildhall University, a bold 1960s building opposite the Whitechapel Gallery. The building is being sold to help finance London Metropolitan’s vision for ‘One Campus, One Community’ in Holloway. The plan is to deconstruct the schools of art, architecture and design, uproot 2300 students, and close courses that don’t conform to the new vision. The prestigious silversmithing and jewellery, and the country’s last musical instrument making courses, were among those announced for closure last week. Despite the University’s claims, the most recent survey shows the ‘One Campus, One Community’ plan does not have student backing.
The issue is not just about changing address and revisiting the menu, it is about a failure to respect the integrity of hands-on creative education or understand the real skills involved that make it attractive to students and their employers and enable it to thrive. Homogenisation is not the way forward.
London Metropolitan as an institution has had a troubled record of senior management. But the Cass is successful. It is doing everything a more robust institution might hope for in attracting students, improving results, winning awards, engaging with commerce and the community, inventing new ways to work. Cass graduates helped found Assemble, a collective of architects, artists and designers creating projects in tandem with communities, recently nominated for the 2015 Turner prize. 
We, the undersigned, call on London Metropolitan to review its current Strategic Plan, ‘One Campus, One Community’, in light of its consequences for the Sir John Cass Faculty of Art, Architecture and Design. We call on London Metropolitan to pursue a two-site solution that keeps the education of art, making and design alive and kicking where The Cass began in London’s East End.
 Sir Nicholas Serota, director of the Tate; Lord Rogers, architect; Sir Kenneth Grange, Royal Designers for Industry; Sir David Chipperfield, architect; Rushanara Ali, MP for Bethnal Green and Bow; Earl of Clancarty, crossbencher; Lord Baker of Dorking, chairman, Baker-Dearing Educational Trust; Tom Dixon, designer; Jasper Morrison, designer; Rohan Silva, entrepreneur; Eric Parry, architect; Iwona Blazwick, director of the Whitechapel Art Gallery; Deyan Sudjic, director of the Design Museum; John Kampfner, chief executive, Creative Industries Federation; Anish Kapoor, artist, Turner prize winner; Rosy Greenlees, executive director, Crafts CouncilJeremy Deller, artist, Turner prize wnner; Associate Professor Patrick Brill, artist known as Bob and Roberta Smith; Professor Florian Beigel, Diploma architecture tutor, The Cass LMU; Associate Professor Philip Christou, Diploma architecture tutor, The Cass LMU; Professor Peter Carl, Director of PhD programme in architecture, The Cass LMU; Associate Professor Mark Brearley, Head of Cass Cities The Cass LMU; Associate Professor Maurice Mitchell, Diploma architecture tutor, The Cass LMU; Peter St John, Partner Caruso St John Architects, Visiting Professor, The Cass LMU
Note: Open Letter to the Board of Governors of London Metropolitan University, published in the Observer on Sunday 22 November 2015:  http://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2015/nov/22/dont-destroy-sir-john-cass-faculty-london-metropolitan-university-open-letter#start-of-comments
VISIT for info on campaign / presswww.savethecass.org
SEE video clips for background

Wednesday, 17 February 2016

NUT call on the next Mayor of London to defend education and help teachers create a just society for all.

Wednesday, 17 February 2016 from http://www.wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/nut-call-on-next-mayor-of-london-to.html 

 NUT call on the next Mayor of London to defend education and help teachers create a just society for all.

 The NUT will be holding a London Mayoral Hustings on Monday March 7th 6pm at the union's headquarters at Hamilton House, Mabledon Place, WC1H 9BD, near Kings Cross, off the south side of Euston Road. 

The meeting will be introduced by Christine Blower, NUT General Secretary. The flyer advertsing the event lists the issues that matter to London teachers: London's schools are under threat London is a city full of creativity, talent and potential. Our schools and teachers are amongst the best in the world. Yet this sucess is under real threat. Spending cuts School budgets across London face 12% cuts under Government spending plans. In some boroughs, the losses could be over 20%. That would mean understaffed schools, bigger class sizes, more children's needs unmet and a narrower curriculum. 

 Teacher shortages
 Talented, hardworking teachers are being driven out of London's schools by excessive workload, the lack of affordable housing and an exam factory culture which demoralises both staff ansd children. Poverty and unaffordable housing Almost 4 in 10 children in the capital grow up in poverty. Unaffordable rents force too many families into unsuitable housing. These conditions impact heavily on children's education and their schools. Lack of school places London needs 113,000 more school places to meet demand. Yet our Councils have neither the funds nor the legal powers to open new schools. Stand Up for London's Education 

The NUT belives that every child deserves the best. We have produced a Manifesto for London's schools calling on the next Mayor of London to defend education and help teachers create a just society for all. Help stand up for education Come along to our hustings and other local campaign activities across London.

Distribute our manifestpoand talk with friends, colleagues and candidates about our demands. Mail manifesto@nut.org.uk for the NUT's Manifesto for London's schools and colleges

Meet tomorrow to help plan Grunwick commemoration 40 years on


Wednesday, 17 February 2016 from http://wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/meet-tomorrow-to-help-plan-grunwick.html
Meet tomorrow to help plan Grunwick commemoration 40 years on














Painting by Dan Jones


Plans are forging ahead to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Grunwick strike, one of the most significant events for trade unionists and anti-racists in the last century.

Plans include a mural, a major exhibition in conjunction with Brent Heritage,  a conference and other events initiated by Brent Trades Council and the Willesden Town Team. LINK

There is a meeting tomorrow (Thursday) at 7pm at Brent Trades Hall to further the plans. Everyone welcome - you don't have to be someone who remembers the strike to take part!

Brent Trades Hall (London Apollo Club) 375 High Rd, Willesden, NW10 2JR Dollis Hill tube / Near Willesden Bus Garage

Tuesday, 16 February 2016

CATASTROIKA

'Debt Resistance UK is hosting a FREE screening of 'CATASTROIKA: Privatization Goes Public' on Tuesday 23 February 2016.

It starts at 7pm at the Hive260-264 Kingsland Road, E8 4DG (map)

After the documentary, we will be joined by activists for a discussion on anti-privatization movements in Greece and the UK.

There is more information about the film below. Please also help us publicise the event by passing on this email or sharing the following:

Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1551827498467063/ 

Hope to see you there!

Debt Resistance UK'