By Steve Jones, Communications Workers’ Union
With Steve’s permission, we reproduce here a transcript of his very moving speech at the Labour Party conference last month.
“Steve Jones Communication Workers Union and a proud member of Tottenham CLP.
“Conference, I am going to address you on an issue very dear to my heart – the ticking time-bomb that is mental health and the abject failure of this government to tackle what many rightly believe is a problem of epidemic proportions!
“On April 23rd 2012, the CWU was holding its General Conference – and the very last motion being debated was on the horror that is suicide. During that debate one of our senior field officials informed around 700 delegates about the number of members that had take their own lives and the work his region had undertaken to combat it. He went on to speak bravely about the dark place he personally had occupied and how close he came to ending his own life.
“I was sitting listening to this in complete and utter shock having lost my own son, Alec, to suicide 33 days earlier. Every CWU conference since has had a passionate debate about mental health. This year we carried a motion committing the CWU to developing a major strategy which will cover awareness, mapping, training, support for reps, as well as engaging with employers and putting pressure on politicians.
“In May this year, on announcing that the first ever Global Ministerial Mental Health Summit will take place in London in October Jeremy Hunt said: “When you look at the extraordinary prevalence and impact on people’s lives, it is clear that mental illness is fast becoming one of the defining global health challenges of the 21st century.”
“The thought of Jeremy Hunt lecturing global ministers, let alone us, about the importance of mental health beggars belief! The reality of the Tory hypocrisy has been exposed in headline after headline, here are just three this month:
BBC News: ‘Doctor’s mental health at tipping point’
Guardian: ‘Mental Health issues in young people up 6-fold’
Observer: ‘NHS Mental Health Crisis worsens as 2000 staff quit per month’
“The Tories foster a society where we are encouraged to be in competition with one another and rewarded for ruthlessness. Empathy and emotional understanding are regarded as weaknesses. One percent of the world’s population owns almost half of the world’s wealth. Society is more concerned with house prices than homelessness. Our children are bombarded with images that condition them to feeling crap about themselves. The current social, economic and political climate is creating an environment in which people feel alienated and stressed.
“In reality, we are living in a plutocracy. The likes of Amazon rule the roost and pay little tax while the workers face poverty wages and urinate in bottles out of fear of discipline.
“Conference we do not underestimate the utter devastation this Tory Government and their austerity has caused on behalf of their class – their cuts are responsible for much of the mental health epidemic.
“Conference I will leave you with this. I was talking to a friend recently about the loss of my son and he asked: “with all your campaigning what do you know now, that you didn’t know then” my response was “I didn’t know it was OK to ask my son was he thinking about taking his own life, yet when the police knocked on my door at 10.30pm on 21st March 2012, I knew immediately what had happened”. This will haunt me for the rest of my life.
“But let me tell you this, I will not rest until all the inequalities and all the oppression that leads many people to desperation ends, and I will not rest until Jeremy Corbyn is in No10 and John McDonnell is in No 11.
“The only question I have for you conference is will you join me? Thank you.” (Standing ovation from conference)
October 12, 2018
