Bob Crow and RMT Union Strike

In case you missed it, the 48 hour strike has begun of London Underground workers in the RMT Union. And with it, the TV spoonfeed tower has responded accordingly at the behest of their commercial masters, by demonising the actions of the union, failing to represent any public opinion which is sympathetic to the plight of these workers, instead alluding to the artificially constructed British Bulldog mentality that we are meant to adopt in times of crisis, and attacking the evil communistic union leaders. Going on strike is no bed of roses. Raising your head from the rut of wage drudgery and paying the price at the end of the month, when the rent needs to be paid, takes courage and solidarity.

The 'dinosaur unions' cat- calling by Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight last night was facile and embarrassing, betraying an intellectually bereft trivialisation of the conflict by the media. Instead of addressing the details of this legitimate industrial dispute, where 950 jobs are on the line... 950 FAMILIES thrown onto the unemployment scrapheap of minimum wage London;  we get patronised by the Babel Tower, supposed to be the flagship intellectual current affairs magazine, with childish curmudgeonly mudslinging.

Who elected Jeremy Paxman? A manikin robot, installed for the sole purpose of mass mind obfuscation, on the back of an unsolicited TV Licence TAX, has no right even to sit at Bob Crow's feet. Crow at least has a democratic mandate to represent his workers and yet has to deal sincerely with such tripe. And it was interesting to see the Bullingdon Gherkin King Boris Johnson, the self- styled Churchill reject of Big Business saying he thought the RMT should only be allowed to strike if 50% of the workforce had voted for it. Until he was reminded that less than 50% of Londoners had voted for him. Of course it's different for the elites and their rarefied circle.

I support the strike. The demand is clear: take the swathing 950 job losses off the table, sustainably make use of their skills and training, and the RMT workers will return to what they do best, put people before profit, and invest in an environmental and efficient transport system befitting of a 21st century country.

Update: tonight the Government have announced their intention to designate London Underground workers "Essential Workers" which will effectively deny them the right to withdraw their labour in strike action. There is a name for such enforced labour: it's called slavery.

by South Utsire