World Affairs
Europe Trampling the Rights of Working Class
In the later half of the 19 th
century and in 20 th century, the
working class of Europe by waging
bitter struggles of untold sacrifices
against the exploitation of its
labour power by the capitalist
system – particularly in the form
of abnormal working hours – had
won the eight-hour working day
besides many democratic rights.
But the neo-liberal economics
of capitalist system that came to
rule the entire globe has been
making every effort to do away
with the rights won by the working
class touting various attractive
slogans such as “reforms”,
“growth and development”,
“competition”, “flexibility of doing
business” etc.
To cover up the failures in
bringing out affluence to all the
people, to cover up the adverse
impact of its policies on the entire
globe in the form of ever widening
inequalities and joblessness and
social strife brought by it, the neo-
liberal capitalist system has
cunningly chosen the divisive
social agenda and is skilfully
channelizing the anger of the
disaffected sections of people with
each other by fuelling racism, anti-
immigrant hate on pretext of
fighting terrorism etc. Thus by only
diverting the attention of working
class against capitalist exploitation
the system has been imposing
itself as the uncontested ruler over
the globe.
These machinations of
capitalist neo-liberal economic
system which were already
practiced during the period of
great depression are clearly visible
in the present day Europe, where
every measure is being taken by
February - 2018
the ruling classes and their
governments to perpetually
enslave the working class and
exploit it as was done in the dark
ages.
The governments in European
countries have started a new
round of attacks on the working
class in various forms at the
behest of the imperialist financial
institutions – World Bank and IMF.
The President of France
Macron of the Republic on March
Party (LRM) decreed many labour
laws to the detriment of the rights
of working class. These decrees
permitted mass sackings of
workers and evisceration of social
rights established by generations
of workers struggles.
The Macron decrees gave
official stamp to the transformation
of trade unions into organs of the
capitalist state. The trade unions
are largely financially subsidised
and controlled by the employers.
They help plan and provide legal
sanction to mass lay-offs,
referendums on whether to
accept pay cuts to keep plants
open and other attacks on their
own trade union members.
In the wake of Macron’s
decrees, the automaker PSA
Peugeot-Citroën announced that
it is preparing to deregulated mass
sackings. It is the second largest
automaker in Europe.
During the time of financial
crisis in 2008, the French state
paid billions of Euros to bail-out
PSA. Now it is preparing to sack
workers to pocket billions of Euros
in wealth created by the working
class. Tens of thousands of PSA
jobs across Europe are
threatened. After the bailout, PSA
slashed the wages of newly hired
workers by half. Now goal is to
impose speed up, increase
flexibility of working times and
transition to a work force largely
made up of temporary workers,
who are being paid little over 9
Euros per hour.
Since the approval for the
mass sackings is required
according to Macron’s decrees,
PSA began talks with the official
trade union.
Macron’s decree of unregulated
mass sackings allows firms to
sack workers even if they are
highly profitable and to deny
sacked workers any training
benefits or rehiring privileges even
if the firm’s financial position
improves. Now PSA is using this
provision to sack the workers.
Already in 2012 the PSA
management had obtained as
massive concessional deal from
the official trade union at the
Sevelnord PSA plant in northern
France. In 2013, its plant at Aulnoy
was closed. The trade union
leader who had overseen the
closure of this plant is presently
in discussions with the PSA
management on behalf of the
General Confederation of Labour
(CGT) in the matter of preparation
of the management for deregulated
mass sackings.
Already in the scenario of
globally coordinated production,
the autoworkers with lower wages
are unable to live with decent lives.
If the PSA succeeds in obtaining
approval from CGT for deregulated
mass sackings, the autoworkers
in Europe will be thrown into
further distress.
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