Workers Solidarity Movement

Just 1% of the population owns 34% of the wealth in the 26 counties (excluding the value of residential housing). That’s according to the Bank of Ireland report ‘The Wealth of the Nation’.

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May saw absolutely no job losses announced. May was also the month of the Dail election. Did Fianna Fail ask their business pals to hold off any bad news? In June things got back to ‘normal’ with job losses at Eircom, Dell, Lapple, Wrapite, Molex, the ESB and Hovid.

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For the past eight years the people of Rossport in North West Mayo have been struggling against an at- tempt by Shell and other companies to build a dangerous and destructive gas processing terminal near to their homes and their community. This development would benefit no-one but wealthy shareholders as the Irish Government handed over the extraction rights to the oil companies in the 1980s and 1990s.

The boss is shown the door and the workers take over. That’s what happened for a month at Reilly Bookbinders on the Murrough Industrial Estate in Wicklow town.The company had been in Wicklow for 30 years. Then four years ago it was taken over by Dunne and Wilson (Ireland) Ltd.. Two years later the building from which the company operated was sold to the Wicklow Enterprise Centre for over €900,000. It is understood to have been acquired by Dunne and Wilson for between €400,000 and €450,000. Then, this summer, boss Richard Geraghty told staff that the lease was up on August 1st and their work was being relocated to the Czech Republic.

The campaign against Shell’s attempts to force a high-powered gas pipeline through the Rossport area of Co. Mayo continues as locals and supporters gather at the site of the proposed refinery at Bellanaboy in the early hours of Friday the 14th.

The morning began with a good turnout – aprox 200 people were outside the gates and blocking trucks by 7.30.

The day after online footage revealed the presence of police provocateurs at the Montebello SPP summit protest the Quebec police have been forced to admit that the rock wielding men initially confronted for being in the agreed 'family friendly' zone by a union leader were indeed police agents.

Would you accept a job without signing a proper legal contract? A job that means working long days for 400 euro a month doing chores like ironing, cooking, laundering, cleaning a 4 bed house and even mean babysitting four children aged between two and seven years old?

Terence Wheelock’s death is by no means extraordinary, in that his death was one twenty two deaths reported in Garda Custody since 1997. Of these figures, a majority of those who died are under the age of thirty, and, in the case of Brian Rossiter, the victim was just fourteen years old.

The camp will take place from the 11th to the 20th of August 2007 in the main region of transit and labor migration in Ukraine: Transcarpathia.

In July 2008, heads of the states that monopolize two thirds of earth’s
wealth will gather at Toya Lake in Hokkaido Japan. Although the
so-called Group of Eight does not have any legitimate right for deciding
planetary affairs, they have self-appointed themselves world rulers. Thus
the G8 has driven neo-liberal globalization at the same time as
spreading poverty, violence, hatred, segregation, and environmental
destruction.

The Workers Solidarity Movement held its Spring 2007 National Conference in the Teachers' Club at the end of April. Our conference saw around 70% of the membership attending with many new faces since our last conference 6 months ago.

Full list of amended papers from this conference is below

Short Term Perspectives - http://www.wsm.ie/story/454
Constitution - http://www.wsm.ie/story/32
Trade Unions (short term) - http://www.wsm.ie/story/423
International - http://www.wsm.ie/story/848
Partition Of Ireland - http://www.wsm.ie/story/804
Publications - http://www.wsm.ie/story/456