"Investment" and "Reform" Are Two Different Things

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"Investment" and "Reform" Are Two Different Things

It Is Up to the Working Class to Turn Things Around

US and French Fire-fighters Support the Strikers

On Monday, Tony Blair insisted that any rise to the fire-fighters would have to be linked to reform.

"One thing has got to be very, very clear – we cannot pay more money out unless it is tied to changes within the fire service," he said on ITV1's Tonight with Trevor McDonald.

Meanwhile, Chancellor Gordon Brown attacked the fire-fighters' pay claim. He said it was "the wrong time, exactly the wrong claim, pursuing the wrong methods to demand wage rises so much higher than inflation".

The government in its determination to deny the fire-fighters their claim is trying to create maximum confusion. In doing so, it is revealing how profoundly it stands in opposition to the interests of the workers.

Tony Blair and his government have since the last election come forward with the formula of "investment with reform". Its purpose has been on the one hand to deflect criticism that government is not funding social programmes and investing in their future. On the other, it has been to place the focus on "reform", "modernisation" and the like, in order to suggest that otherwise there is something wasteful about funding these social programmes which are the responsibility of government. When examined, the "reform" that Tony Blair has in mind is the withdrawal of the government from responsibility for the fate of the health service, education, the fire service and other social programmes. Instead they are to be delivered to control of private monopolies and to the enrichment of the financial oligarchy.

The government is now extending this argument to the fire-fighters demand that they be paid their worth. Here again, the purpose is to force through "reform" of the fire service. But the first issue is, is the fire-fighters’ claim just? Is it just that they are the ones which should decide their worth? Should not they be ones who set the mechanism which determines what they, as public service workers, should be paid?

The government will not examine the justice of these issues, but instead is dragging in other issues and demanding that these take priority. The "reform", "modernisation" or the fire service or "changes within" it must be looked at on their own merits. Precisely what is the government proposing, and also what are the solutions that the fire-fighters are putting forward? What contributes to a healthy economy is yet another question, which will not have light thrown on it by condemning the fire-fighters as wreckers of the economy, as the public service workers have been stigmatised as the wreckers of social programmes.

Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, John Prescott and the rest are revealing that their partisanship is against the working class and the claims of the collectives of the people. In deliberately mixing up "investment" with "reform" they aim to dehumanise the issues so that those that oppose the government’s anti-social programmes are seen as the "enemy within". This aim shall not succeed!

The fire-fighters’ struggle is revealing, among other things, how the financial oligarchy and its representatives view the workers, not as the most precious resource in society and the producers of the national wealth, but as a drain on resources incidental to the demand that businesses compete in the global market.

For example, according to the Governor of the Bank of England, giving in (as it is called) to the fire-fighters' 40% pay claim would damage Britain’s economy. Eddie George alleged that if the government agreed to such an increase then other claims would follow.

"There has to be a real risk that other elements in the public sector first of all would say ‘me too'. That would be very difficult to stop if it were allowed to start," he told BBC TV's Breakfast with Frost programme.

"I think one has to recognise that if we got wage inflation driven by the threat of strike in this way then that would impact the whole of the economy," he said. "We would see not just inflation higher, we would see unemployment higher and I think it would be very damaging indeed."

The bourgeoisie has no solution to the crisis, which is a fellow-traveller of the capitalist system, but its spokespeople like Eddie George repeat as if it were the gospel that workers’ struggles to defend their conditions and affirm their worth is the source of economic crisis. It ignores the acute problems facing not only the workers but society as a whole as the government persists in the anti-social offensive rather than seriously addressing the crisis.

This underlines that it is up to the working class, alongside fighting for their demands, to organise to deal with the major problems facing society. Society needs a new direction. It is up to the working class to take the lead in turning things around. No other force has the interest or the capability to do so. The first step is to organise as the Workers’ Opposition. The aim is to ensure that the workers control and direct what belongs to them, and to raise the people themselves to the position of the decision-making power.

Welsh fire-fighters have received pledges from their US counterparts that they will provide a show of solidarity if fire unions decide to go ahead with the eight-day strike planned to start on Friday.

Scores of messages of support have been received from colleagues in New York who fought to rescue victims of the September 11 attacks.

Joseph Miccio, of the Uniformed Fire-fighters' Association of New York City, said his organisation was considering sending over some of the city's fire crews if next week's action went ahead.

"New York City fire-fighters are 100% behind British fire-fighters in their claim for more pay," he said. "I don't think people understand what it takes for a fireman and woman to go on strike. The British crews must be at their lowest and really struggling financially to make the decision to strike. These people, as with all fire-fighters, work with honour and commitment. The job is a calling and they would not have taken the decision lightly."

French fire-fighters also pledged their support following meetings between the Fire Brigades Union and the French fire-fighters Union (SNSPP). Daniel Dremiere, Chairman of the SNSPP, assured the British fire-fighters of their full support in the action. "The members of the SNSPP are with you wholeheartedly. Good luck," Daniel Dremiere wrote in a letter to FBU General Secretary Andy Gilchrist.

The SNSPP has notified the French authorities that, under no circumstances, will it agree to French fire-fighters being used to jeopardise their action while ensuring assistance in the Channel Tunnel. It has also indicated the grave danger to tunnel users and to emergency teams if provisional measures are introduced with untrained personnel.

The SNSPP is not ruling out any form of action to maintain the safety of users and the SDIS-62 emergency teams and to assure British colleagues of their support the SNSPP said in a press release. Its Chairman also wrote to the appropriate French government official advising him of the union’s position with regard to the organisation of assistance in the tunnel.

Mark Simmons, Kent Brigade Chair, said, "The position of our French Fire Fighting colleagues is quite clear, so it’s surprising that Euro Tunnel see it is business as usual whilst we are on strike." Harry Sawyer, Kent Brigade Secretary, said, "This pledge from the SNSPP demonstrates the strong working relationship we have at the tunnel."