#n30 some first thoughts

So, it's finally #n30. The biggest day in the last generation for trade unions, and the media has been doing everything they can to belittle it.

i'm not one to accuse the bbc of having an inbuikt bias, but, just this morning, on the breakfast news, they had live segments from Bury St Edmunds. Don't get me wrong, I do like the town of BSE, but, it has a reputation as being an incredibky well to do town, with the most famous current resident being Norman Tebbitt.  The segments that they did were from a.coffee shop, and, if you don't know the town like I do, you'd be under the impression that this was in the town centre...oh no, it's in an expensive new build estate, two miles out.of the centre, the opposite side of town to where the majority of people who are affected by the governments proposals live, the public sector workers, the users of public services. This estate is full of "businesspeople" you all know the type, the ones who "can't afford to pay my staff any more, we're all in this together" while still buying brand new top of the range ferrarris every five months, and sending their kids to the highest paying independent schools, and then flying off to necker island for a two week break "from the stress".  This coffee shop caters for these people, £5 for a bog standard cup of tea...

In the town itself this morning, everybody was so so supportive. I had on my badges from various unions, and when I went into town to get the pcs jobcentre pickets a cuppa, the market traders all asked me to pass my best on, and, in the local independent cafe, the owner refused to accept any  money at all for the 8 cups of tea and coffee I got, because, as she said "they're fighting for us, they do all the shit work that we need to get on with our lives" 

This is correct in every sense. Think of who the strikers are

Teachers - educating the citizens of tomorrow
Hospital staff - helping to ensure we're all well
Bin collectors - we don't want our rubbish going rotten on the doorstep
Library staff -one of the most essential community services
Jobcentre workers -giving the help to those in the worst places in society

This is just A sample of the.millions of different public sector workers.

I'm currently on a train on my way yo ipswich, to hear megan dobney (Sertuc secretary), Richard Howett (labour mep) and Kerry fairless (pcs regional chair for eastern region) speak after a march through the town. I know that we will all get the same support there as we have had in bury.

So, a quick message to every single one of you who is on strike.  DON'T BE DISHEARTENED, THE COUNTRY IS BEHIND YOU, it's just the.media, the coalition, and the labour leadership who aren't, which is why all of the media is whitewashing the facts....they're all running scared.

Stay strong comrades

Sleeping (or not) and the art of being a liberal hippy

Once again, i'm having trouble sleeping. Getting 5mins, then being wide awake again. I just can't wait for this week to be over, then maybe, finally, I can actually get some well jeeded sleep.

I need sleep

I can't function without sleep

Time without sleep makes me stressed

Stress makes me sleepless

Therefore, I cannot function as a human being.

I hope that once this week is over, once wednesday november 30th is out of the way, and the immediacy of the biggest strike in the uks history is gone, I will be able to sleep, but I aint'nt counting on it, coz there's always other thkngs to make me stressed, mainly financial.

Sleeping tablets.are ok, but they just make me even tirederer, and even more grumpy in the morning. I just wish I had a button on the side of my head that I could push to go straight to sleep.

I say all this now, but in a couple of weeks, the exact opposite will be the problem, I won't be able to keep awake, I will be sleeping for whole days at a time. It always happens, but it's just annoying...

And, on another note...i got a text from a good friend up in the midlands, he's decided that the best words to describe me are liberal hippy...i'm not sure I should be admitting that, especially the first one when liberals seem to be helping the tories in destroying the social fabric of the.country, but it made me chuckle.  And hippy?? Maybe in some ways, but thats coz I were bought up in the middle.of the countryside, by a ginger hippy!

No connection between any of this except for sleepdeprived ramblings.

Somebody please get a gun and shoot me. At least it means I won't be awake

The hierarchy of evil

There is evil, and then there's evil...Evil has many incarnations, and many different varieties of evil.

This weekend I have been thinking long and hard about my own personal hierarchy of evil, and the reasoning for the evil things being in there, so, here we go, from the top down

1. Ventriloquists dummies: These are the one thing I have a true, geniuine fear of. Automatonaphobia. Just seeing a picture of a ventriloquists dummy makes my heart race and my skin go clammy. It's so bad, that there was even a weather presenter who I could not watch without freaking out, purely because he looks like a ventriloquist dunny...

2. Morris Dancers: Morris dancers are just pure wrong, they are evil on every single level of the word evil. A pot of people say that you shouldn't hate them, because "they're traditional" , so what, racism and slavery are.traditiknal, and it doesn't stop me hating them!

3. Large Crowds: They are just wrong, and evil, and I don't like them.

4. Brian Cox, the physicist:  The man who makes me shout CUUUUNNNNNTTTTTT at high volumes if I see him on tv...Brian Cox is evil. Full stop.   Admittedly this may not travel, as a lot of people apparently love him, but I have very very personal issues with him, related to his role at university as a lab tutor...

5. Mime Artists:  Just learn the fucking lines, it's not that fucking hard.

6. Scabs: Why should you get the benefits of any negotiations when you've destroyed any notion of solidarity...Only scabs scab.

7. The EDL:  people who unfortunately haven't learnt the lesson of scapegoating down the ages, and will not listen.  I will not say any more on this, at this time.

8. Robert Webb: Again, this is a personal one. I come from a flat area in the middle of the east coast. Robert Webb and his family come from the same area. I have worked with members of his family, I know ex-girlfriends of his, I know school friends of his, from when he were a redcurrant, and they have told me stories that would be shocking for most people to hear.

9. Shiny Faced Tory Cunts:  Completely self explanatory!!

Every single one of these appeared in my nightmares last night. A long long sleep, but filled with dread and foreboding :(

Question time - your daily 2.35 minutes of rage!

This morning, when I woke up after a deep deep sleep, after a day of ultimate stress, I realised something that has beeb niggling at the back of my hrain for a long time.

Question time, supposedly the bbcs flagship Political Discussion programme is actually a government plot to control us all.

Think about it, they always choose the people who the normals in society would disown, the daniel hannetts, the theresa mays, and never have anybody who can shoot their wrong arguments down. This means that those of us who are activists, those who of us who are the most risk to the government, waste all of our energy, which we could put into overthrowing the coalition into screaming our heads off at the tv...

A bit conspiracy theorist I know, but that doesn't mean it's not true!!

invisibility in disability

I am disabled. I have both physical, and mental disabilities. I call them disabilities, not illnesses as they have lasted a long time, and are going to last a long time more.  My disabilities are hidden, and so a lot of people don't believe i am disabled as "i can't see it"

I have had depression for as long as i can remember, to such an extent, that i had to be "rescued" from University, and dragged back to family home, for fear that i may actually follow through with the attempted suicides that had happened. I am forever grateful for the help that was given to me by the mental cre trust where i lived, and then for the advisors at the jobcentre, who helped me get a job, eventually, after a long time on incapacity benefit because of this.

I am also on the autistic spectrum, and i find it very hard to tell facial expressions, i have Safe places, and feel incredibly uncomfortable if i'm not in one of my safe places.  I like pushing myself, and in the job i have, i have to do this day out, day in, going into new building, meeting new people all the time! I also can't live with people, which is annoying financially,  as i need my own place, where i can feel relaxed and not have to worry about other people!

I can cope with these,  the disability that fucks me up, that makes me cry out in agony at times, is my ears. I have had over 30 operations on my ears, for everything from grommetts, to entirely replacing the auditory canal between my cochlea and the outer ear.  I am officially deaf as well, even though i manage to hide it quite well on the whole.  90 of the time, my ears do the job they are meant to, with just a small bit of background pain - i'm used to this, and it makes me feel human.  The bit i don't like is when my ears do what they have done tonight, and just suddenly, and without warning, go into incredibly high levels of pain, where my hearing goes super super sensitive, and i can hear everything that happens, and where each little sound adds to the ultimate and incredible pain that i have. Each breathe is like a little dagger as the pressure changes in my eustachian tube. each heartbeat adds agony as the pulse beats through my ear, ooze pours out of the many scars running through the auditory canal, and by ooze i mean minging badly ooze! Yet, people, even people who know i have these problems don't understand just how badly this hurts, and how debilitating it is. This is whats happening now, and i just want to cut my head off, i never know how badly it's gonna last.   FFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK

We are many, we are one. Lets work together...

I've been  part of a few music scenes in my lifetime, strictly as a bystander/general dogsbody, never as an active participant,  some of these were good - the great North Hykeham Ska Revival of 1998, the Heartland of Nottingham Industrial in the mid 90s, the defiant outbursts of the late 90's polish incursion of Fulham - and some bad (incredibly incredibly bad) - The Wolds Crusty Convoy, the Fenland Glam revival of 2001, and worst of all, the Worksop symphonic metal bands of the mid 2000s.

The one thing that all if these scenes, and all of the bands involved had in common, apart from me of course, is the passion that was there. The absolute and utter passion that success would be had, that the music was amazing, and that things could be changed!

Nowadays, i tend to associate these levels of passion with the left. By the left, i don't mean the Labour party, or mainstream politics, i mean the small groupings that spring up at a moments notice, the anarchists, the solidarity campaigns, the campaignining Trade Unions (by which, i mean of course PCS) and the occupy camps.

Over the last few days, many of you will have received an email, a tweet, a message, asking you to purchase "The workers; We can work together."  Like many of you, i followed the link, and watched the youtube video, and like many of you, i was appalled and disgusted.

We are at one of the defining moments in History for the working class, in the future, November 30th will be seen as either the point when the masses gave up, and rolled over to die, or, hopefully, when they rose up, and fought off the shackles of the rich, and the corporations who try to keep us down.

As such, you'd hope that the TUC would have chose to release a song with the anger and passion felt by millions, to try and rally the troops to the cause, but no, they choose to release the most anodyne pile of steaming dog turds this side of the X-Factor (and the other side as well) with a wishy washy sentiment "lets work together" - no, lets smash the system, lets recreate the world in the image of most of humanity, lets have anger, passion, desire for change, belief, hope, inspiration. A song that can bring together the whole country in legion to stop the attacks.   Yet again, the TUC let's us down...

I wasn't going to write anything at all about this, as it didn't think it was worth even this little effort, but my phone gave me inspiration on my walk home from work during the dark. First of all, it played Get up while you can - one of the best songs by Atari Teenage Riot - a band who fused techno with hardcore in an attack against neofascists in early 90s germany, and then, it followed it by one of my favourite artists of the last five years, the strictly none political (or so he says) Frank Turner.

Frank Turners beautiful Track Love Ire & song is the sort of song that i think the TUC should have commisioned, an acceptance of the failures of the past, and the lethargy felt by many, followed by a heartfelt and powerful call to man the barricades.

Whoever was in chrge of the commissioning of "The Workers", i undertsand the thining behind it, but you have failed on every single level imaginable, and then on thousands more. If anybody actually pays to buy this song, i may have reached the end of the line in my despair with the british isles

Everything will be discombombled

An admission to start with. I am what you can call a "bad drinker" I go days without eating and then load the grain straight in, and slowly go from bad to "that twat sat in the corner swaying".

This wouldn't be so much of a problem, except that, I also have a habit of flirting (incredibly badly) through the medium of t'interweb, and just generally being a cunt!

This isn't every time, just so you know, when i'm in the company of great friends, and likeminded people, i'm actually a good drunk, hapoy go lucky, chatty, lovely and loveable, it's only when i'm in the company of closed minded bigots that the twat comes to the forefront, and unfortunately, due to where I live, this is more and more so, I live in what could be politely called a tory town..

There is only one person, bar myself, who is hapoy to call himself left, and he is an unreconstructed stalinist...

So yeah, me and alcohol, NOOOOOOOOO... And, heres a little ditty http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCgX4ixCRcQ&sns=tw

Money is the root of all evil

Some of you who've read this know who I am, some of you don't. Those who do I think know that i'm not having a great time money wise, and this is helping me to sink deeper and deeper into despair

Currently, even though I get paid what I call a "Decent Salary", I can not afford to live. I do not pay into my employers occupational scheme, because I can't afford it. My rent takes up 40% of my take home wages, and even if the town I live in did have cheaper flats (I can not do house shares, as due to the stress of my job, I need somewhere I can just be me, with no worries), I wouldn't be able to afford the deposit.  Most people say, it'll be fine, just stay at mates once you move out, until you get your deposit back, but, that doesn't come to me, it goes to the people who very very kindly paid my deposit and a couple of months rent when I moved down here.

I pay a large amount of my wages to a debt collection agency, in respect of many debts I incurred when I was a student, and the nice friendly debt collection agency, who bought up all of my debts for Pennies in the Pound, decided to wait to contact me, until 3 days before the 6yr statute of limitation, even though they had access to all addresses I was connected with...I can hear a lot of you asking why I hadn't tried to contact the companies I had the debts with previously, it can be answered quite simply.  Nervous Breakdown, a forced repatriation by my family from the beautiful Northern City I was living in, for fears I would take my own life (not unfounded), and then spending 3 yrs in intense councelling, and on Incapacity Benefit.  It's enough to make you forget things.

I haven't been able to pay my gas, electric, or tv licence for 4 months, because I only have £100 a month (plus or minus £10), and I need to use this to pay for my travelling with work, admittedly, I get this money back (eventually) but I have to pay it upfront...i have to take out multiple payday loans each month, just to survive, because they don't check your credit rating on the whole. Each one of these incurs quite high interest and fees each month, so to cover those, I have to take out further and further payday loans.

The worst bit about it, is, if I had a decent credit rating, I could get a loan which would be able to pay of the collection agency, the payday loans, pay my bills, and still have £400 a month "me money" but because I don't have a good one, nobody will lend me this!  It's enough to force anybody into depression and despair.

It is because of this that I absolutely and utterly support the trade unions who have balloted/are balloting their members for strike action on the 30th november. These ordinary workers will be forced into the position I am currently in, paying more each month, having a reduced standard of living, and being forced into debt to survive, all because the government decided to bail out the banks who got us into this mess, who refused to give people who could afford it loans, but were more than happy to lend other companies billions, which they couldn't afford back.

All out on the 30th!

stressed

Stressed.  Shit Day.....GGGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

an Open Letter to Mr Cunty McCuntface (Or franics maude as he is known in public)

Dear Mr Cunty McCuntface,

I'm a bit late getting on here to reply to you about you suggestion of a 15 minute strike, and i know that there are a lot of people all around the country who will have responded in a measured and literate style, however, that isn't my Forte, so, here goes.

Mr Cunty McCuntface, you really are a cunt of the highest order, when public sector workers all over the country are united in opposition to your plans to completely rip up public sector pension schemes, including Headteachers, who haven't striked in more than 100 years (YES, I SAID 100 Years), and you completely and utterly show a disrgard to them, and also a disregard of what striking actually entails...Public Sector workers are only trying to keep hold of the pensions they currently have, not gain more.

A Strike is only called if it is a very last resort, and it is a last resort now, coz you have refused to negotiate (definition "Try to reach an agreement or compromise by discussion with others: "his government's willingness to negotiate""), and the whole point of  strike action is to disrupt the business of them who the dispute is against.

A 15 min strike will not disupt business. it will be a longer teabreak,  and will be impossible to do in schools, because of in loco parentis.

that's all i'm going to say now, apart from FUCK OFF YOU FUCKING CUNT, AND SIT DOWN AND HAVE MEANINGFUL NEGOTIATIONS

Stuff that is stuff!

So, I went down to occupylsx last night, after having had a major train fail (First.capital connect, i'm looking at you, don't try to hide, it's you) and was just so impressed, and so inspired by the hundreds of peoe who care so passionately for their cause, that they are willi.g to camp out, in late autumn, in the middle of one of the busiest cites in the world.  I couldn't do it, but Kudos to those who are!!

After being there for a while, I realised i'd missed my last train home, so rang a friend I haven't seen for a year or two, and told her I was staying on her sofa (no ifs, no buts, I was staying).  Ended up having a good laugh, and a catch up. She's one of these people, who, because i've known her a hell of a long time, we can just start chatting about anything and everything like it hasn't been a whole year! And we were having a lot of a giggle at my girlfriend and her drunk conversations!  Sorry darling, but they were so so so funny!

Time to try and head home somehow I think!

Loud music and early mornings

For those of you who know me, you'll understand exactly what this time of day means to me, for those who don't, the simplest way of putting it is "Jesus Fucking Christ, there's two 8 o clocks in the day". I do not do mornings, yet for some strange reason, I am up, about, and heading by train into london.

How does this connect with the title of this post??  I think it's the look of disgust on the face of the commuting public as my ear phones shout raw blooded screams of defiance into my ear, the scientifically proved one and only way of forcing the little switch into my brain from the "you're still meant to be asleep, lie down and shut your eyes" position to the "what's going on, where am I, how did I get here, lets start waking up position".

The shocking thing (to me anyway) is that the looks of disgust seem to be aimed more at the protest/political type songs that come raring out of the buds, the akalas, ratms, propagandhis, king blues, billy braggs, rather than the straight forward screamers  -your slayers, deftones, stormtroopers of death, slipknot and the like.

I have decided why this must be.  I am on a commuter train, in my shirt, tie and jacket, ready to go to a members meeting, and it appears to be that by listening to political music I am breaking the unwritten rule of commuterdom - don't do anything that's not grey.

I have one answer to that, thanks to the wisdom of zach de la rocha..."FUCK YOU (COMMUTERS) I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TOLD ME"

The joys of a refreshing pint

I think that the title says it all, but in case it doesn't, here goes...

After a long week of working hard at the coalface of industrial relations, then spending all weekend in bed, just relaxing, nothing can beat a nice quiet sunday night pint in a proper local pub to set yourself right for the week ahead.  Now, many people have their own description of what a local may be, but for me, my pub of choice is well known on the tourist trail, for its size, yet it is still a local, as the barman knows me name, knows me poison of choice, and will natter to me about the joys of sci-fi (it takes my mind off of the heavy thoughts of organising), and, most important of all, when the pub is packed with all of those tourists, myself, and the other locals move up the pint pouring queue,  so, on that point, to the pub!

Ed Milliband, and why he is officially now known as Ed "Spineless fucking Political Class Tory Wannabe Tosser"

A Confession,  I am not currently a member of any political party, even though i have been a member of the Labour Party at various times in the past,  however, i would class myself purely and simply as an unaligned socialist.

After Gordon Brown finally decided to stand down, i rejoined the labour party, as, i thought with people like John McDonnell putting their name forward as leader, there may have been a chance that the "Party of the Working Class" may finally go back to its roots, and actually work for the betterment of the working class in the UK, not just for the bankers and large corporations for whom all 3 of the main political parties seem to be the dancing puppet for.

Obviously, as anybody who has even the slightest interest in the British Political Scene is aware, this did not happen, and, the party gained as its Leader, Ed Milliband - seen at the time as the lesser of the 2 Milliband evils...

Ed Milliband,  has fucked over the working class consistently since,  especially with his comments on the July 30th Strike  "Striking is wrong if negotiations are ongoing"  this is fair enough, however, as we all know, meaningful negotiations were not ongoing...Negotiating involved both sides going in with a set of demands, and a compromise being reached,  not one side being willing to make a compromise, while the other sits there with their arms crossed saying "Fuck you, we ain't moving an inch, we're gonna fuck over all of your members purely because we are able to, and we want to finish off what Thatcher started"...

The thing that has really really got my goat this weekend is Ed trying to take on the Kudos of the occupy movement, while avoiding commenting on any of the issues that have been consistently raised by the movement, and whilst also avoiding consistently backing the Unions who are due to take part in the 30th November Pensions Action (Collectively covering over 3 million mainly working class members).   This has pissed me off majorly, How on earth can the so called leader of the labour party, not back millions of working class people in a struggle to receive the pension that they have signed up for, and which is affordable...This, my fellow people, is why, whenever i say the name of the current leader of the labour party, it will now be followed by the apt descriptor "Spineless Fucking Political Class Tory Wannabe Tosser", while feeling that his late lamented father, Ralph, will be turning in his grave, wondering what on earth he did wrong in both Ed & Daves upbringing!

Quick Introduction...

Ok, well, i've never blogged before, but, with everything thats going on at the moment,  i felt it the time to pick my writing hands off the dust covered shelf, and try and engage that gear that lives between the brain, and the typing fingers...

Why have i decided to blog?

right, i work for a UK Trade Union, who shall remain nameless for various reasons, but, hopefully it will be enough to say that they are one of the many involved in #n30.  I may work for this union, but as all of those who know me know,  this is not where my heart lies.  Before becoming a full time Organiser for the unnanmed TU, i was a very active member of the Trade Union who i still believe is the most active, and does the most for it's membership, as well as keeping the true values of trade unions to the forefront...I am talking of course about PCS.

Most people in the UK Trade Union movement are fully aware that once a PCS activist, always a (secret) PCS Activist, and i think that this is true in my case.  All of the people who i am happy to class as very good friends, and even Family Members (None Genetically, and None Legally) are all involved in PCS still
at varying levels of involvement.


Once i gained my current job (at some point in the last 10 years), via the wonder of the TUC Organising Academy, i received the shock of my life...Not all Trade Unions have the same view of organising, and how it works, as PCS, and also didn't have the same actively involved members at every level within the organisation.  This has been something i have tried to work on over the years, but it always seemed like one step forward, two steps backwards,  until the last six months...

I am now proud of my employers, and their membership, and i will back them to the hilt with other trade unions members all across the country.

Why has this happened?  Well, the government seems to have finally awoken a sleeping monster,  my members, who on the whole were happy to just bumble onwards without a thought about what was going on politically, have finally decided that they need to fight for their rights. They are getting involved in Trades Councils, Anti-Cuts groups, Town Committees, and are leading the way in some aspects.  DO NOT FUCK WITH PUBLIC SECTOR WORKERS PENSIONS OR YOU WILL GET RIPPED TO SHREDS...

i will try to write more later, but my mind has gone as balnk as blank can be.

Ta ra for now