Meeting about ESOL cuts in Tower Hamlets
An advanced warning of possible future cuts in education has been provided by the decision to get rid of 1600 learner places in English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) at Tower Hamlets College, resulting in 60 teachers losing their jobs. Similar cuts are proposed at St Paul's Way Community School in the same borough. Staff have protested against these attacks at a demonstration on 27 June and at a public meeting on 1 July, with strike action planned a week later. We are publishing a critical account of the public meeting, written by a comrade who works in this sector.
I attended the meeting on Wednesday evening. It started at about 5.15pm and at 6.45 they finally asked if anyone else (i.e. anyone who hadn't already been approved to speak) wanted to say something in the meeting.
It was bad enough having to listen to NUT officials (and one member of the NUT executive) spouting on about the need for solidarity and collective action, given the anti-worker history of the NUT, it was something else to have to listen to the political advisor to George Galloway spouting on about how George would have been there but for being in Gaza to help organise humanitarian aid for the Palestinians...
It was clear that there is a real sense of anger amongst the workers about what is happening in their respective places of work and so the unions, in a spirit of solidarity have organised 2 one day strikes... on separate days! Two sets of teachers in the same borough striking over job cuts on different days - this is the real face of the union ‘solidarity' - division and pathetic one day actions.
I said that there was a need to discuss with colleagues at the workplace, not to get narrowed down into just the ESOL department, but to see these as the first of many cuts that are to come. It is important also to have meetings with colleagues which are not separated by union membership, as this is one of the main ways of dividing up the workers.
Also, in response to the idea a few others put forward, I stated that returning to local authority control (as opposed to Trust School status) was no different - in fact the government is in the process of abolishing the Learning and Skills Council (the current body which controls funding for schools) and returning Schools back to Local Education Authority control - and it is these local organs of the state that are going to institute the next rounds of cuts in the public sector.
It says something about this kind of meeting that there was no real discussion of any kind. That's the normal mode of operating for leftists - they don't see collective meetings as a place where workers can discuss and make actual decisions on actions, just a place for workers to come and be told what the ‘official' (i.e. union) line is.
Miles 4/7/9
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Ask a few more questions
Two points - (from person in FE, not schools) I think this was the meeting specifically about the cuts in Esol, within an impressive 30 days of action and debate at THC during which the connections between attacks and struggles in different areas were made many times (30 days because the savage cuts were announced on 5 June, with a 30 day 'consultation period' with people losing their jobs at end of term). Teachers know very well that the cuts are across the college , but it is ESOL that is taking the biggest battering. It's not wrong devote time to this. I wasn't at the meeting and heard it wasn't brilliant, but you make it sound like it was only of leftists and union hacks- I think actually there many Esol students and people from the 'partner organisations' who host classes run by Tower Hamlets College,
As far as the one day strikes, at THC these were very carefully planned for good reasons (and while I agree that the unions operate in ignorance of what others are doing, in this case it didn't make sense to do anything with the NUT). They were nothing like the usual union one day strikes over 2% pay rise or London weighting or whatever. This is why. People were ready to go for an all out strike, but doing this in the last weeks of term, after the teaching had all but finished, would have been totally useless. On the strike days, the strike began at 11 so teachers could walk out of classes, take students with them and move from their various centres across the borough to one centre so people could all assemble together to discuss and plan and take decisions - something not usually possible. Then there were two days back at work, a decision taken so teachers could attend compulsory professional development training, which this year was subverted, suspended, and became another opportunity to strengthen solidarity, meet and plan the next moves. Amazing things have happened at THC recently - it's not good enough to trot out the same old story about the unions.
If you think one day strikes are pathetic (and I usually agree) you will be glad to know that teachers at THC are now planning for all-out strike from the beginning of term. This is not going to be easy or without massive risk. Striking during enrollment, when student numbers determine how much money the college gets, is the strongest hand the FE teachers can play. Give people some credit for thinking. Reading your report makes me question the times I've jumped to my own critique-by-the-numbers conclusions without knowing much about a particular situation.
ESOL cuts meeting
This is a useful contribution, even if I don't agree with the conclusions.
the comrade said:
"I wasn't at the meeting and heard it wasn't brilliant, but you make it sound like it was only of leftists and union hacks- I think actually there many Esol students and people from the 'partner organisations' who host classes run by Tower Hamlets College"
I have no doubt at all that there were many workers there who are not union hacks and many honest workers who believe very strongly in the unions and may be working for the lower levels of the unions. This is always the case so perhaps it's not necessary to make the point every time we mention a struggle. The point here is that despite all this the union/leftist machinery works consistently in a certain way to block real discussion and decision-making at workers' meetings, and this was a clear example of it - a fairly classic set piece meeting where no real discussion is possible. It may well be that in other moments during the struggle workers were able to express themselves more directly and it would be interesting to hear more about it. But would it prove that the unions are not, in this specific case, an obstacle to the further development of the movement?