This won’t be a long read. It’s gone midnight already, and I have to be up at 7. I promised the editor I’d get this done tonight.
The new zero-hour contract job let me go home two hours early Tuesday, 6pm, it wasn’t busy. So I wandered up Poole General Hospital to support the junior doctors’ picket line, only to find they’d gone home at 5. Try again tomorrow.
Pulled out the phone to let some people online know about that, and the first thing I saw was a reminder that the ‘JC4PM’ event hosted by the Communication Workers’ Union at Bournemouth International Centre, was starting in an hour and a bit. A friend had said he had a spare ticket – unfortunately he couldn’t make it himself, but took the trouble to get a ticket with my name on it to the door. Andrew, you are a star mate.
This was a spontaneous thing that felt like it had to be done – but my usual has recently been called more ‘activism’ than ‘politics’. Last time I went to something like this was at the TUC in London about a year ago – and a few of the same faces were there. I’d definitely identify more as an anarchist than a socialist. The main difference is top-down heirarchy (as in unions) vs bottom-up (no heirarchy). But we have plenty in common too – as Francesca Martinez said on stage tonight, she prefers to think of us as ‘people who give a shit about people’. John McDonnell applauded DPAC’s storming of parliament. Junior doctors got a few mentions. And Hillsborough, deservedly. 27 years, and finally, some justice.
Supporting the Jeremy Corbyn corner right now, is essential, and probably our best means of toppling the present plague of privatising parasites, who most certainly don’t care about people, much less working class people.
Jeremy wasn’t actually there, which I probably would have known if it hadn’t all been so last-minute. But the event had a rare quality, I’ve only felt at a couple of the best street protests. Dave Ward, CWU general secretary, nailed this during his speech. Politics locally is a ‘sea of blue’. (With some Tories disguised as Lib Dems). That hall was full of Reds. Two or three thousand. The solidarity was absolutely off the chart. It was a first for me, finding out there’s that many of us around here, quite reassuring.
I confess to finding most of the stand-up comics quite forgettable, except for (Joe Burns?) whose special attention to the EDL’s poor grasp of the English language, did amuse. It’s not that they weren’t funny – I just won’t remember their names tomorrow. Sorry.
Punk poet ‘Attila the Stockbroker’, by contrast, isn’t likely to be forgotten any time soon. I got a real sense from him of how the old-school crowd who were there last time battling Thatcher, are thoroughly enjoying this Labour revival.
The musicians, Billy Bragg and Grace Petrie, if you’ve not heard them, I can only recommend you do. Bragg’s ‘Which Side Are You On’, with which he opened the final act, has long been a personal favourite – one I had absolutely no idea I would be hearing performed live when I woke up Tuesday morning. But even that was surpassed, in my opinion, by Petrie’s own ‘They Shall Not Pass’, about the Spanish Civil War, during which she encouraged the audience to singalong during the chorus. An anti-fascist anthem worth a wider audience.
I’ve no idea when or where the remaining dates are on this ‘JC4PM’ tour, but catch it if you can. It’s reinforced two thoughts in my mind: first, by politics or by revolution, we the people are going to win, and tonight gave me a huge sense of honour to take part in that. McDonnell and The People’s Assembly’s Lindsey German pointed to the exact method of how we will win, too – determined, organised and consistent people power – protest, pickets, strikes. And secondly, something I keep hearing more and more… join a bloody union!
by Anonymous
