DEMO: Mulberry Place, 6.30pm Wed 8th Dec

The effects of the government cuts on Tower Hamlets are now becoming clear.

In order to set a budget for 2011/12 the council is planning to cut £38m from the budget, which will have a huge effect on jobs and services.

HOOPS is supporting a demonstration called by local trade unions outside the next council meeting on Wednesday December 8th – a flyer for this is attached.

We are asking councillors to join the campaign against the government cuts and to support the TUC national demonstration on March 26th.

We will be redrafting the HOOPS petition against the government cuts and asking councillors to sign it.

Please circulate the leaflet and encourage people to come along.

Lobby Tower Hamlets Council
Wednesday 8 December
6.30pm
Mulberry Place
5 Clove Crescent E14 2BG
Buses D6, 15, 277, Blackwall DLR
 

The cuts in Public Spending announced in the Comprehensive Spending Review will have a devastating impact on communities like Tower Hamlets. They will affect everything from Health and Education, to Benefits and other Services. They will impact on services and on jobs having a huge detrimental impact on the local economy. The Council has already given notice of the loss of up to 500 posts this financial year with more to follow. These cuts will have a real impact on services and jobs in our community. The Con Dem Coalition has no mandate for these savage cuts and the overwhelming majority of people inTower Hamlets have voted for Mayoral candidates and Councillors expressing opposition to them. 

Rather then implementing these cuts we call on the Council to

• Work with Trade Unions and Community Groups to oppose the ConDem Coalition cuts
 

• Expose the impact of the cuts on our community,
 

• Organise a series of community meetings against the cuts
 

• Support the TUC national demonstration on 26 March 2011. 

  Called by Tower Hamlets Council Joint Trade Unions supported by HOOPS Tower Hamlets

Next student protest, Tue 30 Nov

THE OFFICIAL WALKOUT STARTS AT 11AM SO THIS MARCH (UNLIKE THE OTHERS) WILL START MOVING AT 12PM TO GIVE THOSE STUDENTS WALKING OUT TIME TO JOIN EVERYONE ELSE

THE PROTEST ROUTE HAS NOT YET BEEN FINALISED. A LONDON-WIDE ASSEMBLY WILL TAKE PLACE ON SUNDAY THE 29TH TO DECIDE WHAT ROUTE THE MARCH

NEXT HOOPS CAMPAIGN MEETING - WED 24 NOV

Wednesday 24th November at 7:00pm in Oxford House. We are aware that this date is a Day X but we have already postponed this meeting b4 and we really need to meet before the Council meeting. It is possible to go to demo earlier, but yes we know its hard.

Statement about 10/11/10 student demonstration

A statement has been issued supporting Wednesday's student protests

We need unity to defend education and break the Con Dems’ attacks. Stand with protesters against victimisation.

• Stand with the protestors against victimisation
• Hands off our students, our colleges and our universities
• Broken windows cannot compare to the broken hearts and dreams of a generation denied education and jobs

Sign the Unity statement

We need unity to break the Con Dems’ attacks
Stand with protesters against victimisation

Wednesday’s national NUS/UCU 50,000 strong national demonstration was a magnificent show of strength against the Con Dems’ savage attacks on education. The Tories want to make swinging cuts, introduce £9,000 tuition fees and cut EMA. These attacks will close the doors to higher education and further education for a generation of young people.

During the demonstration over 5,000 students showed their determination to defend the future of education by occupying the Tory party HQ and its courtyards for several hours. The mood was good-spirited, with chants, singing and flares.

Yet at least 32 people have now been arrested, and the police and media appear to be launching a witch-hunt condemning peaceful protesters as “criminals” and violent. A great deal is being made of a few windows smashed during the protest, but the real vandals are those waging a war on our education system.

We reject any attempt to characterise the Millbank protest as small, “extremist” or unrepresentative of our movement. We celebrate the fact that thousands of students were willing to send a message to the Tories that we will fight to win. Occupations are a long established tradition in the student movement that should be defended. It is this kind of action in France and Greece that has been an inspiration many workers and students in Britain faced with such a huge assault on jobs, housing and the public sector.

We stand with the protesters, and anyone who is victimised as a result of the protest.

Initial signatories include:

Mark Bergfeld, NUS NEC
Sean Rillo Raczka, Birkbeck SU Chair and NUS NEC (Mature Students’ Rep)
Vicki Baars, NUS LGBT Officer (Women’s Place)
Alan Bailey, NUS LGBT Officer (Open Place)
Kanjay Sesay, NUS Black Students’ Officer
Matt Bond, NUS Disabled Ctte (Open Place rep)
Michael Chessum, Education and Campaigns Officer UCL SU
Jade Baker, Education Officer Westminster Uni SU
Cameron Tait, University of Sussex Students' Union President
Nathan Bolton, Campaigns Officer Essex University Students’ Union
Clare Solomon, ULU President
Jim Wolfreys, UCU NEC
Dr Marion Hersh, UCU NEC and Scottish Executive
Alex Gordon, President, National Union of Rail, Maritime & Transport Workers (RMT)
Lee Hall, playwright ‘Billy Elliot’
Hilary Wainwright, Transnational Institute
Alex Callinicos, Professor of European Studies King’s College London
Billy Bragg Songwriter
Noami Klein Author and Activist All in a personal capacity

  http://www.petitiononline.com/st53231/petition.html

The next meeting of our local anti-cuts campaign is on Wednesday 24th November at 7:00pm in Oxford House.

This is the day after council unions meet with the Chief Executive so we may have some picture of what the budget looks like in Tower Hamlets.

We should take the example of the students and bring some of that feeling to every campaign that fight and cuts.

The TUC has named Saturday March 26th as the day for the national demonstration and we need to make sure that this is huge, but there will be a lot of campaigning and activity before then.

Hope to see you on Wednesday 24th.

Protests against Comprehensive Spending Review

People around the country are protesting against the savage Tory cuts in George Osborne's Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR). These reports will be updated through the day.

Lunch time protests in Tower Hamlets

HOOPS organised lunch time protests across the borough on the 20^th October.  Around 175 people turned up.    100 people assemble at Crisp Street Market in Poplar. Across the road from the picket, fire fighters from Poplar fire station pulled an engine onto the forecourt and held placards.

About 30 people from schools, the tube and others workplaces meet outside Mile End underground.  

Evening demo in Central London

Some 2,500 people had marched from Lincoln’s Inn Fields to join several hundred already at Downing Street for a rally. People joined the march as it went along.

On the way to Downing Street protesters chanted, “David Cameron, get out, we know what you’re all about—cuts, job losses, money for the bosses”.

Others shouted, “Unite and fight—general strike!”

Banners on the march reflected the diversity of those protesting. They included Waltham Forest Unison, Islington Trades Council, Holborn & St Pancras Labour Party, Camden Keep Our NHS Public, the Defend Whittington Hospital Campaign, Tower Hamlets Unison, Greenwich NUT, Burslem CWU, GMB Ealing, Defend Council Housing and Goldsmiths UCU.

Demonstrators reached Downing Street and were welcomed by more protesters from the Coalition of Resistance group who had already gathered there.

There were some scuffles with police, who bizarrely tried to snatch the Right to Work campaign banner from women activists at one point.

Demonstrators heard from speakers including Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the PCS union, George Binette, secretary of Camden trades council, and Matt Wrack, general secretary of the FBU.

George Binette described the “insanity of Eton educated, Bullingdon Club Cameron bringing in cuts not seen since the 1920s.” He said the Tories would force thousands of people to face “the awful prospect of eviction from London or homelessness”.

But, he added, “The resistance has begun.”

Many others spoke of the need to fight back together.

“If students and workers march in France, we can do it here as well,” Mark Serwotka told the crowd. “The Tories are a bloody disgrace—it’s daylight robbery.

“What are we going to do? Industrial action is absolutely inevitable—and we should coordinate it across the unions.”

Matt Wrack spoke of the impending strikes in London, as firefighters prepare to walk out this Saturday. “Firefighters in London are on the frontline of Tory attacks,” he said.

“The bosses are saying—toe the line or we’ll sack you. Well we’re walking out on strike.

“Join us on the picket lines on Saturday and support your firefighters.”

As demonstrators gathered in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Lucas Tivili, a teacher from Lewisham, said “We have to start fighting back against the government. What I heard today from George Osborne sent a chill down my spine—we can’t let them destroy everything generations of workers have fought for.”

Michelle from King's College was one of the hundreds of students who marched from their universities to join the protest.

“The government wants education geared towards what their friends can make money out of.” “I find that disgusting. They know the price of everything and the value of nothing. I think about my little sister who will now be terrified about coming to university because of the bill at the end of it—but because unemployment is so high what choices are left for people like her?”

Doug, a Unison member from Camden, helped build the protest. He said, “We worked really hard to make sure that all parts of the community are represented here today. I am so proud to see all of the banners from trades councils and different unions. It shows how united we can be and it is this unity which we have to remember over the coming weeks and months. We have to beat these cuts—there is no other way to say it.”

Kerry from Camden joined the protest with two of her friends and their children. She said “This is the first demonstration I’ve ever been on. I had to come—I’m so frustrated and angry because of the cuts to schools

Earlier hundreds of students had marched from the University of London Union through central London to the assembly point. Sandy, a student at the London School of Economics, said, "It feels fantastic to be marching down Kingsway stopping traffic. It gives me a taste of not only what we have to do, but what we are capable of."

PROTEST THIS WEDNESDAY 20th OCTOBER

Local lunch time protests are taking place across Tower Hamlets this Wednesday to coincide with the ConDem's Spending Review 

LUNCHTIME – 1:00PM 

Mile End Tube
Chrisp Street
62 Roman Road
Queen Mary College (library square)

 
THE LONDON DEMONSTRATION

will start from 4.30pm Lincoln's Inn Fields, Holborn WC2 - assemble for a
demonstration to Downing Street

6pm Rally at Downing Street - speakers include Tony Benn, 

Rev Jesse Jackson, Caroline Lucas MP and Mark Serwotka.

FBU STRIKE ACTION
Also great news on Fire Fighters hitting back at cuts, FBU members in London have voted overwhelmingly for strike action in defence of London’s fire service and their working conditions

The first day of strike action is on Saturday October 23rd when FBU members will join the march starting from the RMT headquarters in Chalton Street.

here is a list of all six fire stations in Tower Hamlets.Bethnal Green.
11 Roman Road
E2 0HU

Bow
64 Parnell Road
E3 2RU

Millwall
43 Westferry Road
E14 8JH

Poplar
168 East India Dock Road
E14 0BP

Shadwell
290 Cable Street
E1 0BX

Whitechapel
27 Commercial Road
E1 1LD

Phone: 020 7364 5791

Local response last Saturday

Last Saturday a dozen local activists from Hands Off Our Public Services
spent lunchtime asking people in Whitechapel to sign a petition
opposing government cuts to public services.

The response was overwhelming from all parts of the community. People
lined up to sign the petition and many spoke of their fear for the
future as services start being slashed.

No one we spoke to supported the cutbacks. Many pledged to protest on
this Wednesday, the day of the cuts are announced