TUC general secretary PAUL NOWAK speaks to the Morning Star’s Berny Torre about the increasing frustration the trade union movement feels at a government that promised change, but has been too slow to bring it about

SINCE THE 1970s media commentators and right-wing newspapers have demonised trade unions, showing images of rubbish piled high in the streets coupled with references to “the winter of discontent.”
Well, if they are looking for a phrase to describe the most intense and inspiring period of industrial action since the ’70s let it be defined by our movement, not them. For me 2022-23 is “the year the workers fought and won.”
Across the economy train drivers, civil servants, doctors, council workers, nurses, firefighters, posties, teachers, physiotherapists, lecturers, railway workers, ambulance crews, airport staff and many, many more have either been on strike or threatened strike action in pursuit of fair pay and conditions.

From Grangemouth’s closure to Europe’s highest drug deaths, 23 per cent of children in poverty and ferries seven years late, all parties who’ve governed in the last 20 years lack vision or inspiration — we need a new way forward, writes NEIL FINDLAY


