Defend our communities from far-right attacks
Fight for council homes and services, not racism
A rash of protests, including among them far-right agitators, have sprung up outside of hotels the government is using to house asylum seekers – intimidating those living and working inside, and many in the local community. Those protests include a number in Scotland.
When racist riots spread across Britain in summer 2024, they were brought to an end by the mobilisation of tens of thousands to anti-racist counter-protests to defend our communities, reflecting the overwhelming public mood of revulsion against racism, hatred and violence.
It is communities themselves, with their workers’ movement and trade unions, that can best organise to defend themselves and drive the far right and its influence out. The Socialist Party puts demands on the trade unions, with over six million members organised in workplaces in every community, to take a lead.
In the north of Ireland, the biggest public sector union Nipsa, which has a socialist leadership, has led and is fighting for the trade union movement more widely to organise working-class defence of our communities.
In east London, Waltham Forest Trades Council, in which Socialist Party members play a leading role, has brought together trade union activists to plan how to build and strengthen the workers’ movement in Epping – a town just to the north of London where the far right has been involved in violent, racist attacks on a hotel.
Trade unionists leading the fight against racism in the North of Ireland
Interview with Carmel Gates, General Secretary of Northern Ireland Public Service union NIPSA, and a member of Militant Left (sister party of the Socialist Party)
NIPSA is an Irish trade union of 47,000 members. Health workers, education workers, civil service and more. The left have a majority on the union executive.
Since I got elected in 2021, we’ve grown from 39,000 members. That is largely as a result of the campaigning work we have done. From 2022 until 2024 every section of the union was engaged in industrial action. When workers see unions take action and see what unions do, they join. The union has grown, built on a programme of struggle and taking the battle to the government. That included the first ever public service general strike in January 2024, which succeeded in winning extra money for the Northern Ireland budget.
NIPSA’s fighting stance has given members the confidence to take the lead on fighting racism.
Trade unions are the only organisations that can organise workers and organise them safely and so NIPSA put forward a proposal to have trade union-trained stewards on demonstrations to ensure that counter-protests against the racists are well organised and safe. If the trade unions lead, with stewards who are properly trained, then we can drive the racists off the streets.
Our action has been in response to the racist activity that has grown in the North since the summer of last year, when a group went on a rampage in Belfast. They were attempting to march to the mosque to attack it and although they didn’t get there, they did attack businesses and shops on the way.
We called on the rest of the trade union movement to engage and be part of the counter-demonstration that day. Many individuals did turn out and as the campaign went on more trade unionists did mobilise.
We used that experience to bring a motion to the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) Northern Ireland conference in November, that it should organise a trained group of stewards who would be ready and able whenever the racists took to the streets. The motion was passed at the conference in November.
We made that call because we learned from the work that we’ve done previously. In the North of Ireland during the 1980s there were sectarian killings, and families forced to move out of their area. ‘Militant’ called for trade union defence. For united, democratic defence of workers and communities.
That is the experience that we have brought to this issue now.
But we need to fight on the things that give rise to racism. Significant poverty has affected a whole layer of working-class people who now feel they have been left behind. People are without homes, without jobs, and without proper services. Unless we take up those issues then there is fertile ground for racists to blame refugees and migrants.
Building a working-class political alternative is also part of the fight against racism. A meeting has been called on 11 August to bring together trade unionists to begin a discussion to establish a new working-class political voice.
Because of sectarianism divisions, that task has always been difficult. Nonetheless, we have always called for workers’ unity and socialism. What we do know is that 3,000 people signed up to the Labour Party in the North when Jeremy Corbyn was leader. Those 3,000 haven’t gone anywhere, and more and more young people are now very disillusioned with ‘politics’ and sectarianism. I believe there will be a thirst for a new party based on workers’ unity and socialism.
In fact, ‘For workers’ unity and a socialist economy’ was the backdrop and the slogan of NIPSA conference this year. It’s now in the NIPSA constitution. Through our role in the union we’ve normalised the language of socialism so much that when we have the privilege of speaking on behalf of members in the media, the presenters often joke to us, ‘So when you are you going to mention a socialist economy’!
Waltham Forest Trades Council responds to Epping events
Waltham Forest Trades Council (WFTC) convened a meeting on 29 July to discuss giving assistance to the trade unions and communities of Epping to help build a united campaign for the resources all residents need and against the far right.
Local trades councils, regional trade unions, and our delegates and branch secretaries were invited. Over 30 trade unionists attended in the room and on Zoom, including representatives of:
- Several trades councils in north and east London and two in Essex
- RMT members and officers at branch and regional levels
- NEU officers at district and national levels
- Members and officers of other trade union branches, including WFTC delegates
- Representatives of Day Mer, a Turkish and Kurdish community organisation
The meeting was introduced by WFTC president Nancy Taaffe and secretary Kevin Parslow, who both emphasised the role that trade unions could and should play in defeating the far right, as we had done in Walthamstow last year. Both made the case for the trade unions to offer assistance to the workers’ movement and communities in Epping to sink roots and build a movement that can drive out the influence of the far right. That this can be achieved by offering a lead fighting for the resources our communities need: council homes, fully funded services, and well-paid jobs, by uniting the working class, rejecting racism and division.
An Usdaw activist reported on visits to workplaces in the Epping Forest district to discuss with workers and union reps. Also raised was how an anti-racist campaign among students and young people could be given confidence by a trade union lead.
RMT activists said they would put such a campaign to the regional council and the union’s general secretary Eddie Dempsey.
There was also discussion on the organisation of anti-racist counter-protests, including on the leading role trade unions should be playing in planning them and mobilising members, as well as having a democratic say over slogans and stewarding, including on transport to and from protests.
We concluded with the proposal for unions to help local organised workers to convene a labour movement meeting in Epping Forest:
To produce a model motion to help push this to happen, which would include organising public meeting(s) aiming at involving more trade union branches in an organised and planned way, and get prepared, not just for Epping but for other far-right manifestations, and against Reform on the electoral front.
We appeal to all other trades councils in the east London and Essex areas to distribute our statement (see ‘Epping asylum hotel: fight racism and for jobs, homes and services for all’) and to visit local workplaces with it, to both get our message across for the unity of all workers; and to get involved with WFTC in preparation to establish a coordinating committee.
We call on London, East and South East (LESE) TUC to prepare materials based on the TUC policy passed in 2018 for a campaign based on ‘Jobs, Homes and Services, not Racism’, as a matter of urgency. We also call on LESE to devote time and resources to setting up a trade union council in the Epping Forest district, where there is a small number of activists prepared to help.
