In this issue:
LRC proposals provide job security for lower paid workers
SIPTU members to oppose job losses at Killarney Golf Club
Body of miner killed in rock fall repatriated to the Philippines
Chomsky meets Vita Cortex workers
Thatcher leaves trail of destruction behind
Glenda Jackson speaks about Margaret Thatcher
1913 LOCKOUT - a new play by Ann Matthews
School pupils’ work on 1913 Tapestry celebrated
President says workers' rights must be at centre of rebuilt economy
Dublin youth projects bring campaign to the Dáil
Suspended Cork County Council workers return to work
SIPTU calls for immediate action on youth unemployment crisis
MANDATE Trade Union
Hands off Public Water
Thatcher leaves legacy of social destruction and economic collapse
NERI: 3% Troika deficit target unlikely to be achieved by 2015
IMF issues stark warning on challenges facing Ireland
Ireland linked to global web of tax avoidance
Global Labour Report
A terrible beauty! – Gaza
Congress welcomes Government commitment on domestic workers
Hugh Geraghty Memorial Lecture
Robert Ballagh Exhibition
Venezuelan Stories: In honour of Hugo Chávez
Jim Connell Society
Tadhg Barry Film
Galway Trades Unions 1913 - 2013
The James Plunkett Short Story Award
SIPTU Solidarity with Cuba Forum
Book Sale in aid of Docklands Senior Provider Forum
Larkin Credit Union
Supporting Quality Campaign!
SIPTU Basic English Scheme
Win a One4All Voucher Worth €250
Cycle Against Suicide
Discount for SIPTU members
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Thatcher leaves trail of destruction behind

The general secretary of the Trade Union Congress in Britain has said that Margaret Thatcher’s unwavering belief in the invisible hand of the market “meant that she did not believe it was part of her job description to put anything in its place.” Writing in the Guardian on Wednesday (10th April) two days after the death of the former prime minister, Frances O’Grady said that Thatcher had “assumed” no responsibility to minimise social disruption or to create new jobs and industries” following the collapse of traditional industries across Europe and the US in the 1980s and 90s.

Thatcher, who served as British prime minister from 1979 to 1990, provoked almost as much division in her death as she did over her many years as the most influential Conservative Party leader in decades. In Ireland, it brought back memories of her role in exacerbating the conflict in the North following her disastrous, and inhumane, response to the republican hunger strikes in 1980 and ’81, the shoot to kill policies by British security forces that followed and her refusal to countenance, at least initially, any role for the Irish government in the administration of Northern Ireland. Unionists recalled their opposition to her endorsement of the Anglo-Irish Agreement in the mid-1980’s while praising her forceful reaction to the occupation of the Malvinas Islands by the Argentine military during the same period.

In Britain, her death also provoked mixed reaction with lavish tributes paid to the former leader by her own party and the establishment generally and scorn and vitriol poured on her by many in the working class, mining and other communities that suffered under her policies. Her imposition of the poll tax  backed up by brutal police enforcement, her war crime role in the sinking of the Belgrano during the Malvinas conflict and her slashing of health, education and unemployment budgets during her three terms as prime minister also unleashed widespread criticism. In the House of Commons, former actor and MP, Glenda Jackson, spoke eloquently (link below) of her callous social policies while Frances O’Grady wrote of the ultimate failure of her neo-liberal economic vision which led to a sharp deterioration in living standards for many working families and the unemployed across Britain.

“Thatcher was suspicious of democracy. She preferred markets, and a strong but minimal central state that backed their rule. She abolished city-wide local government, capped spending and expected the poll tax to further undermine alternative voices,” O’Grady said.

“State assets and a huge income stream from North sea oil were used to fund a populist programme of tax cuts, privatisation and council house sales. The family silver was squandered on bribing voters rather than modernising the economy.

“The 70s was Britain's most equal decade. The jobs that went during the 80s tended to be good, skilled jobs, delivering decent incomes and some security. She failed to replace those jobs with well-paid equivalents. Demonising unions and stripping the great mass of private-sector workers of a voice and power in the workplace is still the root of the great living standards crisis that saw the share of wealth going to wages slide long before Lehman Brothers failed.

“Even the nasty politics of "welfare reform" is driven by the high cost of subsidising low pay through in-work benefits, and indifference to the plight of jobless communities who have never recovered from de-industrialisation.

“The financial crash of 2008 was a direct result of the policies Thatcher championed. The dominance of finance in the economy and the failure of bank regulation flowed from her belief that markets should always be left to themselves. The credit boom – both here and in the USA – may have gone against her Grantham roots but was an equally inevitable result of deregulation and the temptation of easy loans for people hungry to improve living standards,” the TUC general secretary wrote.

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