THE RCN (Royal College of Nursing) has responded to the rocketing inflation rate. RCN General Secretary and Chief Executive, Pat Cullen, said: ‘Inflation reaching a 40-year high is yet another reason that nursing staff are in dire need of a pay rise.
‘Following over a decade of real-terms pay cuts, nursing – that makes up over half of NHS staff – are financially propping up our health and care services.
‘They are overworked and under pressure, alongside being underpaid. And this puts patients at risk. A pay rise that goes significantly above inflation is crucial to the recruitment and retention of skilled nursing staff.’
ONS statistics released yesterday show the inflation rate for May 2022 rose to 9.1%. The RCN called for a 5% above inflation pay rise for nursing staff in its submission to the Pay Review Body earlier this year.
The RCN is demanding a 14.1% pay rise now and the whole labour movement must see that it gets it!
The TUC, as ever, is grovelling on its knees in front of the Tories. Its leaders led the 100,000 strong march last Saturday in London but they refused to declare a general strike, despite the fact that the RMT leader said he would welcome it.
Commenting on yesterday’s inflation figures, which show CPI inflation up to 9.1%, TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: ‘With inflation rising twice as fast as average pay, we need a government that will stand up for working people. But instead, we have ministers spoiling for a fight with workers who take action to defend their living standards.
‘Let’s be clear, inflation is not being driven by nurses and care workers wanting enough pay to keep food on the table without visiting a foodbank. And if the government does not do more to protect wages and spending, we are at growing risk of a recession that will devastate families and businesses.
‘The government must defend wages with decent pay rises in the public sector and fair pay agreements in the private sector. And we need a long-term plan to make the UK more resilient, including a revival in UK manufacturing. This would protect us from future global shocks pushing up inflation.’
The TUC leaders are calling on the Tories to ‘defend wages with decent pay rises in the public sector.’
The TUC leaders must be the only people in the country expecting ‘fair pay’ from the Tories.
However ‘left talk’ from Unite is not an alternative. As RPI inflation hits 11.7%, Unite says company profits are responsible for nearly 60% of the inflation rise.
As the Retail Price Index hits 11.7%, Unite general secretary Sharon Graham says that corporate profits are fuelling the rise, not workers’ wages.
Criticising further calls for pay restraint, Graham said: ‘The truth is that corporate profiteering is out of control. CEOs are hiking prices while shareholders rub their hands and workers struggle to make ends meet.
‘Unite makes absolutely no apologies for demanding that employers that can pay, do pay. Wage restraint, absolutely not. It’s time for profit restraint.’
Fine words from Unite, but again it is action that is called for, and Unite refuses to call for a general strike to bring down the Tories.
The railworkers are now in a huge battle that they must win. If they lose the whole of the working class loses.
Victory means replacing the anarchy of capitalism with the nationalisation of the means of production and a planned socialist economy replacing the anarchy of capitalist production.
There must be action! The TUC trade unions must demand an immediate recall Trade Unions Congress, to sack the present leaders and to call an indefinite general strike to boot the Tories out!
The bankrupt capitalist system must be replaced by a nationalised and planned socialist economy which produces to satisfy people’s needs, not to make huge super profits for the already rich bosses.
The trade union leaders have the power. After their refusal to use it they must be replaced by a revolutionary leadership that will mobilise the working class for a socialist revolution to put an end to capitalism in the UK for all time.
Such a revolution will spread throughout Europe and create the conditions for the establishment of the Socialist United States of Europe, and for the restoration of the Soviet Union.
