Reports from the pickets lines of the Nov 24th national strike in Ireland

ireland / britain | workplace struggles | news report Friday November 27, 2009 22:49 by various WSM members - WSM wsm_ireland at yahoo dot com

WSM members report on the strike

On 24 November 2009 250,000 public sector workers in Ireland took part in a national strike against planned pay cuts. Many WSM members who work in the public sector played a direct part in the organisation of the strike and student members helped organise solidarity actions at the universities where strikes were happening. They also toured other picket lines to send in reports and photos. Here we present these reports and the reports sent in by members on strike who had access to smart phones with which they sent live news on the day to the WSM twitter feed

Mass picket of department of Education - see WSM site for more pictures

WSM press release: Anarchist organisation welcomes public sector strike and calls for further action
Anarchist organisation Workers Solidarity Movement has congratulated public sector workers who took part in today’s 24-hour work stoppage and called for further stoppages “in order to force a change of direction from the government”.

Report from the mass picket of the Department of Education (with text of INTO leaflet)
From before 8a.m. this morning, members of the Irish National Teachers Organisation were on the picket line outside the Department of Education and Science in Dublin’s Marlborough Street, alongside Special Needs Assistant colleagues, members of IMPACT, and workers based in the DES building itself, members of SIPTU, CPSU and PSEU.

Reports from Cork from the General Strike
Strikes took off across Cork city and county this morning as workers took direct action to stop the Government's attack on wages and conditions. We bring brief reports and images from three locations.

Interview with CPSU pickets in Cork
During the 24th November general strike Paul spoke to two of the 15 CPSU members picketing a workplace in Cork about the strike.

"This Is A Statement ..." Kinsale Strike Report
In Kinsale the Further Education College (FEC) and the secondary school were picketed for several hours this morning. I was unpleasantly surprised to find out that the social welfare office is privatised and so was running as normal today.

During the strike the WSM experimented with using our twitter account to provide a live news update feed and photos from the couple of picket lines where our members had smart phones (Maynooth & UCD) interspersed with reports sent by SMS from other members at other picket lines in Dublin. Below is an edited version of that feed re-arranged in chronological order. We were quite pleased with the results as it enabled our members with smarthphones to keep other people on their pickets updated with news from all around the city. We'll probably do the same during major struggles in the future so be sure to sign up to our twitter feed.

We'll be sending live updates and images from the picketlines to this feed tomorrow
Final pre strike planning meeting underway in UCD
Solidarity poster in Maynooth http://yfrog.com/358ngj
SIPTU posters for tomorrow http://yfrog.com/1dpm3sj
SIPTU explains reasons for strike http://www.siptu.ie/PressRoom/NewsReleases/2009/Name,11275,en.html
1st pickets on in UCD so far just students in their way home after a night out (5.30am)
1st delivery turned back at UCD
1st student joined us on UCD picket line (6am)
About 1 third of cleaners refuse to pass UCD picket (6.10am)
Reported that there are now 100 picketing at TCD (8am)
At UCD public transport buses refusing to cross picket
Part of picket at UCD http://yfrog.com/3nfk9uj
Over a quarter of a million people on strike today
Over 100 INTO members picketing DES building on Marlbourough St. along with members of CPSU, IMPACT, SIPTU, & PSEU
Strong Picket of Local Authority Workers on Boombridge Road - Cabra D7
Pickets at the Aras, and at other places in the Phoneix park.
Lively IMPACT picket at Parkgate hall
Good crowd at local government computer services centre
Huge picket at St Johns hospital
30 or so CPSU on the Picket at the DSFA building in Kilmainham, not too many have crossed the line; Mood is good!
Main gate to Trinity College Dublin closed and 30 strong SIPTU picket outside
Picket shift change happening at UCD carparks quite empty although some students and many managers going in
Car park very empty in Maynooth university. College quiet. IFUT, UNITE and SIPTU pickets on the gate.
CPSU Branch Sec. Anne Quinlan at Dept. of Tansport says there's 'no option' to go on strike 'the public sector is under attack'.
Supporter delivers sweets to picketers at Maynooth university
Students from Free Education for Everyone march down and join the picket in solidarity with the strikers. http://yfrog.com/3gwghj
Students from FEE http://yfrog.com/4fa1oj
Couple of students went into UCD to check it put report a lot of stuff closed down
Trinity College solid, only one gate open and large picket of UNITE, SIPTU & IFUT. Campus deserted.
Raining now in kildare http://yfrog.com/37yruj
RTE and Irish Times reporting unions may be about to announce strike next week
Local Business supplying workers at Bishops Sq. SW office with Free food and coffee! 20 pickets outside DSFA in Store Street
About 3000 people attended INTO rally at DES a few hours ago. Still 500 on rolling picket.
NCAD in Thomas Street closed down and SIPTU picket of seven people in place on the front gate.
Thomas Street Social Welfare office closed with twenty strong picket outside
INTO Picket at the Department of Education has swollen to about 1000 people
All Dublin City Public Libraries closed due to strike. Some cranks giving gip though most of the public appear supportive
A man in 09 Jag speeds past the picket in Kilmainham shouting 'get a job' to the assembled pickets - Brave man! :)
INTO picket on DES has just finished. Over 5000 including SNA members of Impact - took part during the day

More images on the WSM site