COMMUNIST Party industrial organiser Andy Bain has welcomed trade union leaders wanting to build a united mass movement against Tory government and big business policies.

He told the party’s political committee on Tuesday evening that the ruling class has been preparing the growing cost-of-living crisis with new laws designed to divide us and restrict protest.

“They are, however, divided on whether [Boris] Johnson is a liability, on the Irish border question and on the balance between neoliberal and interventionist economics – but they will unite against workers who challenge them,” he said.

Mr Bain urged not only a massive turnout for the TUC’s We Demand Better demonstration in London on Saturday, but for a range of trade union and campaigning bodies to escalate the fight-back in the period to follow.

“We need unions, trades councils, the People’s Assembly, Labour Party organisations, women’s and pensioners’ campaigns, health service and housing activists, student unions and others to agree an action programme up to the next general election,” he proposed.
 
The former trade union president said the movement around such a programme could grow rapidly at local as well as national level, with councils of action formed to prepare the ground for co-ordinated action across Britain.