Workers Solidarity Movement

What should happen to the €51bn gasfield off Rossport? Let Shell keep it and let the fat cats get fatter? Try to make Bertie’s government nationalise it and use the wealth for our benefit?

In Ireland we like to think that we’ve long ago abolished the death penalty; that we’ve progressed beyond such primitive practices, that we’re too civilized for that. But Irish people are still being sentenced to death, and not even for crimes they have committed but for the crimes of our murderous health system. Long waiting lists, unhygienic hospitals, downgrading of regional hospitals, are all symptoms of a rotten institution that refuses to reform.

A report by the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture has found that conditions in several Irish prisons are extremely unsafe.

How accountable are the gardaí to the Irish people

The Workers Solidarity Movement held its Autumn 2007 National Conference in Dublin on the 3rd/4th November. National conferences take place every six months and are the prime decision making body on positions and priorities for the organisation. All WSM members can attend, vote and submit motions and amendments either as individuals or as groups.

This is the 100th issue of Workers Solidarity. Why do we bother? After all, nobody gets paid for writing, or doing layout, or stuffing envelopes, or putting copies through neighbours’ letterboxes, or giving them out at union meetings or in city centres. 

Well, we are sick and tired of a system that won’t provide us with decent health care, or economic security, or affordable housing. We are sick and tired of a system that pays farmers in one country not to grow food while people in another country starve to death, a system that spends billions on weapons of mass destruction but won’t cough up to keep people alive.

La huelga que iba a precipitar la formación del Soviet de Limerick fue convocada por la muerte de Robert Byrne un republicano y Trade Unionista.

This article in English

Byrne había trabajado como telefonista en la Oficina de Correos de Limerick. En enero de 1919 perdió su trabajo. Fue expulsado por asistir al funeral de un volutario de Limerick (John Daly). Algunos días más tarde la casa de sus padres fue tomada por la policía. Byrne fue arrestado y sentenciado a 12 meses de prisión con trabajos forzados por posesión ilegal de un revolver y munición.

Friday 9th November saw hundreds of people travel from around Ireland to show solidarity with dozens of local Corrib protesters in the latest 'day of action' against the attempt by Shell to impose a dangerous experimental gas pipeline on the community. WSM members from Dublin and Cork took part in the protests, here we present their account of what happened along with a selection of photographs from indymedia.ie.

This is an archive of some talks given to WSM meetings between 1991 and 2007 on the general subjects of class politics, trade unionism and the changing nature of the working class.  For more articles and talks check the relevant subject indices

This is the text of the old 'Environment & Animal Rights' position paper.  It was removed at the 2007 National Conference and is kept here for archiving purposes. You can read the current paper 'The Environment'