New British Jobs for British Workers’ Protests Shake Pro-EU Parties
The new series of wildcat strikes to affect a number of plants in Wales and Cheshire have underlined once again just how badly British workers have been betrayed by the Tory and Labour Party drive to pressgang this country into the European Union.
The latest strikes started after fifty workers at the South Hook liquid gas plant in Milford Haven, west Wales, walked out after Hertel UK management disregarded an earlier agreement to employ local workers.
Instead, preference was given to a number of Polish labourers, leaving the locals out in the cold. Humberside Police said that around 800 protesters were blocking roads near the refinery at South Killingholme.
Following news of the walkout in Wales, 200 staff at the Fiddlers Ferry power station in Widnes, Cheshire, also stopped working in sympathy, and another 200 workers walked out at the ConocoPhillips Humber refinery in north Lincolnshire.
Workers at Aberthaw power station in south Wales and the Dragon LNG site also walked out.
Hertel UK has confirmed that it has employed foreigners to do the jobs, claiming that it could not find local British people with the “necessary skills.” This laughable claim has been dismissed by protestors, who say that it is merely an excuse.
Worse yet, the GMB union has tried to muscle in as a so-called protector of British workers. Observers point out that the GMB is officially affiliated to the Labour Party and supports that corrupt organisation financially.
“It is the very same Labour Party which has allowed all the foreign workers into this country under EU rules to take those jobs away from British workers in the first place,” said Tim Rait, the BNP’s spokesman on EU matters.
“There is no such thing as ‘British jobs for British workers’ while this country remains a member of the European Union,” Mr Rait said. “Never forget that it was a Conservative government which first brought in the free movement of EU nationals within the UK rule, so that party bears equal blame for the increasing unemployment rate amongst our people.
* New research released by the Financial Times today has shown that the number of British-born workers in employment fell by 451,000, or 1.8 percent, in the first quarter of this year compared with a year ago.
Over the same period, the number of foreign-born workers with jobs rose by 129,000, or 3.5 percent.
In the first quarter of this year, British-born workers left employment at roughly four times the rate of foreign-born workers.
The Financial Times survey showed that employment amongst non-EU nationals in the UK also rose, particularly amongst those born in India, Pakistan and Africa.
Roughly the same proportion of British nationals and foreigners are unemployed — one in 12 — but joblessness among Britons rose by 600,000, or 43 percent, in the past year compared with a rise of 16,000, or 15 percent, among foreign workers.
Only the British National Party is genuinely committed to protecting the interests of British workers. The only way our workers can be protected is by withdrawing from the EU, and adopting an unashamedly protectionist industrial policy.
The time has come for change.
* Workers who are interested in a real pro-British trade union should join Solidarity. Visit the Solidarity website by clicking here.
