By John Pickard, President, Central Essex District NEU, personal capacity
Workers’ Memorial Day, Tuesday, April 28, is assuming a special significant this year, for the most obvious reasons. The TUC has called for a minute’s silence at 11am, to mark the deaths of the scores of NHS workers from coronavirus, as well as those in other essential services like social care, transport, retail and refuse. Calls have gone out to make this a global day of action.
An international Zoom call is being made asking people not to work on that day if they are not doing essential work, and instead, to stand alongside key workers who are taking action. “We are calling on workers everywhere”, the organisers have said, “to join our global day of action for safety, security and a safe shutdown.”
At 11am on April 28th, workers at both Guy’s and St Thomas, two of the biggest hospitals in London, will assemble in the gardens (leaving emergency cover in place) to remember their dead, whilst fighting for the living. They will observe the one minute silence called by the TUC, but will then hold a rally (with appropriate social distancing) to call for action to secure the PPE and proper testing that they desperately need to keep their patients and themselves safe. They will then go back to work to continue saving lives.
They are also calling on all workers to walk out at 11am – and to stay out for the rest of the day. “The continuation of non-essential work”, the organisers have said, “particularly in construction, is allowing COVID-19 to continue to spread like wildfire. It’s not safe for people working, it’s not safe for the communities they live in, and it’s putting extra pressure on the NHS”.
“Remember the dead”, their declaration has said, “Fight for the living”.
“Too many of our colleagues, our friends and families, have already paid the ultimate price for the failures of our governments and employers around the world.”
This scandal needs to end
“Health workers are on the frontlines without, or with inadequate, Personal Protective Equipment or testing. Care workers are turning away from older people to sneeze. It’s the only protection they both have. Non-essential work in construction, the service sector and industry undermines the lockdown, fuels the pandemic and puts workers and their families at risk.
“This scandal needs to end. In any other circumstances of a disastrous death toll of this scale, governments would be calling a national day of mourning and give people the day off to properly remember and mourn our dead. This time we will have to do it ourselves – and every action we take from now on will help to stop avoidable deaths.
This is a call that should be supported by the whole of the TUC membership and it should be endorsed by the TUC leaders. This week, nurses in Leeds were reported to be refusing to attend wards where there was not adequate PPE and where their own safety was on the line. On a Leeds dementia ward, the Yorkshire Post reported, One nurse said “there were one pair of plastic glasses to share between staff” Most of those on the mental wards, a nurse pointed out, “don’t have the capacity to cover their mouth so they’re coughing and sneezing into the air.” Instead of the proper FFP3 surgical masks, the staff were being asked to use paper masks. “I might as well just have a tissue over my face,” one nurse said. Another added, “I want the government to be held accountable and for people on band 2 wages (a salary of £15,400 per year) to not be emotionally blackmailed to work in a risky environment but I also don’t want to lose my job.”
Instead of merely calling for a minute’s silence, which is not much more than a token, the leaders of the TUC and the NHS unions especially, should be backing their members 100 per cent. We can hear the media and Tory MPs already, bleating about ‘neglecting patients’ but any if today’s patients are treated by unprotected staff, it will be tomorrow’s patients who might have no staff to treat them.
The organisers of the Zoom meeting expect a huge response and there are simultaneous meetings in English, Spanish and Italian. They are reaching out, particularly to health workers to bring ideas for action, work out how best to do them, and to coordinate across hospitals, across countries, and across sectors.
Call for day of action on May 1
As well as British health workers, the meeting will be hearing from doctors in Lahore, Pakistan, who are on hunger strike in occupation, US Amazon workers who have organised a mass sickout, Kali Akuno, from Cooperation Jackson, who have called a day of action in the USA for May 1, among others.
By the end of the meeting, organisers are hopeful they will have a coordinated plan of action to shut down all non-essential workplaces, to get proper PPE and testing for key workers. “Our governments and politicians have failed us all over the world,” they’ve said, “It’s time for the people to act.”
International Workers’ Memorial Day, which has been going now for nearly forty years, is a day of commemoration for all those workers killed and injured in the workplace. It is often the case that workers in mining, building trades and other heavy industries get a special mention, because their work is often dangerous. But no-one would have anticipated the huge sacrifices being made and the risks being taken by those on the front-line of health and essential services today. This special day should be supported by all workers. But it should be more than just a day of commemoration, it is a day for solidarity with those on the front line.
April 24, 2020
