SIPTU Fightback, No. 7

Many thanks to the person who forwarded this to the Archive. This is the first edition of SIPTU Fightback in the Archive and is a very welcome addition. As noted previously SIPTU Fightback was a newsletter produced by SIPTU members in the 1990s.

The newsletter notes:

SIPTU Fightback is a newsletter for SIPTU activists who believe that the strength of our Union should be used to fight low pay, job losses, wage restraint and cheap labour grades. We think that can only be done effectively when the members have real control of their own union. Our aim is to provide a link-up for the many activists in SIPTU who want a fighting Union, but who feel isolated and powerless. We want to provide news and views, an open forum and a modest service for those activists.

The text of many of the editions are available here . However we think it is valuable to post up scans of editions to get a sense of what the documents looked like when printed. This is the first edition to be posted in the Archive. Our podcast with Mary Muldowney also gives an overview of the genesis and production of SIPTU Fightback.

This edition is ten pages long and stapled at the corner. It consists of a range of articles and the editorial celebrates the fact the publication has now reached its first anniversary. It notes that its mailing list has 450 people on it:

Twelve months ago three SIPTU members decided that something should be done. We knew we weren’t on our own, over one third of members consistently voted against the ‘social partnership’ agreements. But those who want a more militant and democratic union are isolated from each other. Very few know other activists from outside their own workplace or branch.

So, instead of waiting for someone else to kick things off, we decided to do our bit. The first ‘SIPTU Fightback’ last July was posted out to about 100 people in the union whom we had addresses for and thought might be interested in what we were doing.

And:

We were clear (amongst ourselves anyway) when we started this project that we were not going to provide a neverending service for everyone else. Our hope is to work with other activists to improve our union – not to work for them. What we agreed to do was to “fly a flag and see who saluted”. Enough of you “saluted”, if we all get together with each other in some form of a network we can have far more of an impact inside SIPTU.

Now it’s time to move on to the next step – getting more people involved in this bulletin and beginning the work of building that network of militants within our union. Over the next few months we will be organising fairly informal meetings for readers, where we can meet each other and discuss the best way forward from here.

The editorial also notes the wide range of areas covered by the publication – not just SIPTU, but also “the formation of a trade union group within the Anti-Racism Campaign to the Dublin Council of Trade Unions’ minimum wage campaign. And our history spot told the stories of the laundry strike that won paid holidays, how the unemployed organised in the 1930s, the unofficial National Shop Stewards Federation of the 1970s, the tax marches, and the women of Jacobs who stayed out longer than anyone else in 1913.”

Continuing that diversity of contents this edition contains articles on Partnership 2000, a demand for a National Minimum Wage, a critique of Peter Cassels of ICTU discussing ‘his idea of trade unionism’, Bricklayers on strike in developments in Dublin and updates on ‘Partnership’.

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