An eyewitness account by a Hackney picket:

I went from my picket line to the CLR James library picket at about 10. On the bus up there I was a bit disturbed to see a police helicopter hovering above Dalston Junction. When I got to the library there were a huge number of TSG kettling about 35 people with a mobile sound system. I managed to speak to people in the kettle and they told me that two people had been beaten up and arrested earlier when people had tried to block the road.

I called people on my picket line and asked them to come quickly to the library. A small group of us stood around for ages occasionally having short conversations with the kettled protesters or telling the police that they were disgusting. I phoned my picket again and was dismayed to find out that they had all gone to another picket line that was nearer.

Brighton SolFed were out in force today for the public sector strikes, which saw a huge turnout of perhaps 10,000. Three feeder marches converged on Victoria Gardens in the city centre before marching around town and ending with a rally at the Level. A brief personal report and pictures are below:

Biggest march I've seen in Brighton, I'd guess 5-10,000. Couldn't see the back or the front of the march and it was overflowing the Level where it ended. Cops tried to randomly arrest a bystander and apparently some black bloc types dearrested them.

 

WYSF attended pickets and demos across the north:

Leeds report:

In Leeds WYSF joined a picket of a public sector building (name omitted to protect the individual member), before joining the march and demo.  An estimated 10,000 took part, the biggest demo in Leedsin a long while.  SF were joined by AF and quite a few people came up and took papers and expressed support for the Red and Black flags.  Lots of support from the public and the march was “clapped” all the way into the city centre.

N30 report from Hull:

Plans to have a twenty-four walkout by public sector workers have led to Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude branding the protests as “stupid and wrong”. He also threatened tough new laws to make it harder to strike.

Bristol Solidarity Federation members will be joining and supporting the “Day of Action” from start to finish. We call on workers from all industries to also join the strike. Stop work, refuse to cross picket lines, support the striking workers anyway you can and join the rally from College Green. Join the picket lines that will be going on right up to midnight.

A pub worker and South London SF have together won 6 weeks in stolen wages after a campaign of direct action and threatening pickets of a London pub. Laura was employed by ‘The Hartley’ pub in South London. She was let go after she refused to work because she hadn't been paid for 6 weeks - owed over £700 dating back to mid-September.

Laura got tired of waiting and spoke to South London Solidarity Federation (SLSF). The first step of the campaign was for Laura and members of SLSF to deliver a letter demanding her back-pay on Friday 19th. While waiting for action from the boss, Laura organized a mass phone-in of her employer with her friends and family. The boss was clearly rattled:

"Tell your people to stop calling me. I've got everyone's numbers, I'll report you, I'll report you to....to..... your networks!"

Sir Ian Blair, ex Commissioner of the Met Police was meant to give a talk at Sussex university last night, but faced disruption from students - see the report below.

This morning the weekly protests got very lively as the rank and file electricians occupied the Grattes Brothers HQ. With only a few days left of the ballot for strike action, we gathered at 6.30 outside the gates of the building site at Kings X. Electricians and supporters leafletted the workers going in and there was a short attempt to block the gate but the police kept a pathway open so people could still go in to work.

Workfare is a growing problem, as demonstrated by recent stories of a number of supermarkets had volunteered to be providers for the scheme and that young people were providing 30 hours a week of unpaid labour. This presents a problem both for the claimants trapped by this scheme, essentially as slave labour, and for the providers' workforce who are being undercut by those doing their job at practically no cost. Equally worrying is that, despite the growing anger over government attacks and emergence of anti-cuts groups across the country, nothing is being done to challenge this.