Socialist Appeal - Ireland: Civil Servants fight: No pension levy! All out on the 26th!

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Ireland: Civil Servants fight: No pension levy! All out on the 26th!

By Seamus Loughlin

Tuesday, 24 February 2009

Demonstration through Dublin last Saturday

It’s a sign of the times. The Public Service Executive Union has voted 71% to 29% in favour of up to two days of strike action against the government’s pension levy on a 75% turn out. It comes after the recent vote by the Civil and Public Service Union to take action this Thursday February 26. The pension levy is just the first attack on the public sector as the government tries to place the burden of the crisis on the backs of the working class.

Such is the mood however in Ireland that there is no guarantee that they will get away with it. Saturday’s mass demonstration was originally called to oppose the pension levy, but it struck a chord with the working class as a whole and the result was a monster of a march.

Other groups of workers like the teachers are being balloted at the moment. The key thing however has to be unity in action and a strategy to draw the widest possible numbers into the fight. This is absolutely vital if we are going to stop Cowen’s government dead in its tracks.

Public sector workers need maximum unity and a strategy to escalate the action. Saturday showed the potential that exists to fight these plans; we need to win every strike ballot. As for united and coordinated action a one-day public sector general strike would unite the movement and take it onto a higher level.

The first step though is to ensure full support for this Thursday’s Civil Service strike.

- All out on the 26th

- No pension levy

- Make the bosses pay for the crisis

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