It’s nearly 13 months since the Birmingham bin workers started their heroic strike against de-skilling and pay cuts of up to £8,000 a year. In that time, Labour council bosses have thrown everything at them, running up a bill of at least £33 million in their attempts to break the strike.
You might think that after all this the council would be keen to talk to Unite the Union representatives to strike a deal to get the bin workers back doing the job they’ve dedicated years of their life to. But, despite the false picture painted by councillors and the government-imposed commissioners sitting above them, the council has not been willing to come to the table to negotiate since May last year.
For want of formal discussions, Unite representatives recently attempted to speak to the deputy leader of the council, Sharon Thompson, outside her advice surgery last week – she blanked them on the way between her chauffeur-driven Porsche and the door!
With the backing of Unite, other trade unionists and many ordinary Brummies, the bin workers are prepared to carry on striking as long as it takes, and have shown so in overwhelming strike ballots – not just of the permanent workforce but the 50-plus agency workers who have come over to the right side of the picket line in the last few months.
This means that this May’s council elections – the first across the city since the council declared bankruptcy in 2023 – could take place with the strike ongoing, fly-tipping piling up, and only black bins collected intermittently. If the council want to make it the ‘bin strike election’, then so be it!
Bin workers, their families and the overwhelming majority of working-class Brummies won’t be voting Labour, and Keir Starmer and his stooges running the council know it.
But with each of the Tories, Lib Dems, Greens and Reform currently carrying out cuts at other councils, a change of regime in Birmingham won’t in itself be a guarantee of a fair deal for bin workers, or any other council employees and service users.
That’s why it’s all the more important we do all we can to get genuinely pro-worker candidates on the ballot paper and elected to the council. Birmingham Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) is aiming to encourage this process by hosting a people’s budget conference in February.
This will seek the views of local trade unions, community organisations and campaigns on what services Birmingham needs and how the council could be run with and for working-class communities in this city. The list of demands and policies drawn up from this will form part of the platform of TUSC candidates standing in May’s elections. We’ll be asking other candidates who have opposed cuts in words whether they will pledge to help lead the fight for decent services, not a race to the bottom.
Monday 23 February, 6pm, Comfort Inn, Station Street, Birmingham City Centre B5 4DY