ITUC press release – 31 March 2009

Trade union leaders from around the world are converging on London this week to press their case at the G20 Summit on the global economic crisis. Meetings with the Summit host British Prime Minster Gordon Brown today (Tuesday) and Australian Prime Minster Kevin Rudd on Wednesday will round off dozens of similar meetings with heads of governments, organised by national union leaders in their home countries since the beginning of last week. Read more…

March 31st, 2009 TUC

This video was shown on the stage screen at the Put People First London G20 rally in Hyde Park on Saturday 28 March 2009. From CongressTV.tv

March 31st, 2009 TUC

Church and agency leaders joined with 1500 Christians in an ecumenical service that formed part of the “Put People First” event on Saturday. Entitled “Standing for Justice, United in Hope,” the service took place at Central Hall in Westminster.

Keynote speakers were Christine Allen, Executive Director of Progressio; Fr. Joe Komakoma, Secretary General of the Zambia Episcopal Conference; The Rt Revd Dr Richard Chartres, Bishop of London; and the Revd. Joel Edwards, International Director of Micah Challenge and former General Director of the Evangelical Alliance. Read more…

March 31st, 2009 Put People First

This is the press release we put out yesterday at about 1:30 while the march was still under way.

Press Release from Put People First

28/3/09 – immediate

Statement by Glen Tarman, Chair of the Put People First co-ordination team.

“Today’s march has brought thousands of people together from more than 150 organisations drawn from a huge range of development, union, faith and environmental groups.

“More than a thousand have joined the march from a huge ecumenical church service led by the Bishop of London.

“Similar events have taken place in towns and cities across the globe.

“All have been united by the clear message that the G20 leaders at their summit next week cannot go back to business as usual. They must take action for jobs, to stop climate chaos and to fight poverty and inequality throughout the world.

“But today’s march is not the end of our campaign, but the start. The UK holds the chair of the G20 group for the rest of this crucial year when the G8, the G20 and the United Nations all meet to chart a way through the recession. And 2009 ends with the vital Copenhagen climate conference.

“An exciting alliance has been born today. We will keep up the pressure on world leaders and the UK government to address our demands and put people first.”

March 29th, 2009 TUC

Our thanks to everyone who turned out from all over the UK and even further afield for today’s Put People First March for Jobs, Justice, Climate.

The police estimated thirty-five thousand of us marched peacefully through London today. That’s a strong, clear signal, calling for a radical break with the failures of the unfettered free market.

Faith and women’s groups, trade unions, development and climate campaigners were all mixed together on one of the most colourful demonstrations in years. Not even sleet showers and heavy rain put off the thousands who made it the four miles through central London to Hyde Park, to hear the speakers, films and music.

Thanks especially to everyone who covered today’s events on the internet – so people all round the world have a record of what happened in London today. Check our Twitter buzz page, where you’ll find some links to great videos, photos and text reports.

Next week, the Put People First coalition will be working to ensure the G20 leaders know we’re still watching them. Today’s action, and those staged in cities around the world, will have given them food for thought as they start their meeting.

Make sure you get a ring-side seat by following the G20Voice project. 50 expert bloggers, given a high level of access to the G20 Summit, to let you know exactly how well the leaders are getting on towards the action we want to see from them. www.g20voice.org

Media from today: BBC, Guardian, Al Jazeera, Telegraph, Times, Wall St Journal, Le Monde, Huffington Post

March 28th, 2009 Put People First

Are you coming to London by coach or by car for the Put People First march on Saturday 28 March? Get your spirits up and help generate some great media coverage as you pass through the country by playing the request game.

Listen to the radio as you go, and call local and national radio shows, asking for Put People First related requests: Read more…

March 27th, 2009 Put People First

This article first appeared at http://www.newstatesman.com/global-issues/2009/03/climate-change-crisis-g20 on 27 March 2009

G20 leaders must decide to turn this crisis into an opportunity. We want to see radical change that will make this a world fit for purpose in the 21st century

How times change. Seems like only yesterday that those of us who dared to oppose and expose the failures of free market economics were shouted down. Now a movement openly challenging the system and calling for the G20 to Put People First is gaining broad support.

The first manifestation, on Saturday, will see thousands of protesters drawn from a hugely diverse range of interests gather and demand fundamental change. We are spending billions of pounds of our money; we want a lot more bang for our buck than propping up banks. Put People First, represents unity amongst all sectors of society, and has a solid vision for what the G20 leaders must decide in order to turn this crisis into an opportunity. We want to see radical change that will make this a world fit for purpose in the 21st century.

We are calling for jobs and public services for all. Globally, millions are in danger of losing their jobs and their homes because the banks gambled the economies money away and the government cheered them on. Now ordinary working people are paying a huge price for the greedy deals that were allowed to take place virtually unchecked.

A typical government response would be to use the global economic slowdown as an excuse to cut back on public expenditure programmes.

Not good enough! Public service must be assured so that the people who did the least to cause this problem do not pay the highest price. Bringing forward public works programmes could also help create jobs and help countries out of recession.

We are demanding an end to global poverty and inequality. No one is pretending poverty is a consequence of the crisis. Long before the collapse of Bear Stearns rang alarm bells on Wall Street, people in the developing world have faced crisis after crisis in: food; energy and climate. This latest crisis has just compounded that. It’s now time to take their unemployment, cuts in public services and deepening poverty as seriously as we take our own.

In the coming days Put People First will be crystal clear about our demands. The G20 leaders cannot be allowed to simply reaffirm pledges on aid. Aid alone is not enough. And we must not be drawn into an overly simplistic argument between protectionism vs free trade. Trade is vital for the economies of developing countries, but this trade system is fundamentally flawed because it is rigged in favour of the rich nations.
And we are imploring the G20 to deal with the climate crisis. The G20 leaders don’t want to talk about climate change; but they must. Climate change is affecting us all and fundamentally challenging our economic system, hitting the world’s poorest people first and worst. Poor people are already experiencing the climate crisis and are suffering from loss of livelihoods and lives in increasingly unstable environments.

The G20 must recognise that ever increasing consumption and reliance on fossil fuels is unsustainable will lead us to runaway climate change. The G20
must agree a Green New Deal which prioritises a transition to a global low carbon economy.

If it sounds like we are asking for a lot, we are unapologetic. This time, the stakes are too high for our voices to be side-lined, fobbed off or shouted down.

Benedict Southworth is director of the World Development Movement

March 27th, 2009 BOND

It’s not just the Put People First London march and rally happening tomorrow, but there will be popular actions all over the world.

Berlin and Frankfurt are holding big rallies on 28 March, named “Wir zahlen nicht für eure Krise!” (We’re not paying for your crisis). Organisers in Austria are using the same slogan for a big event in Vienna. Translating that into French, Parisiens will be marching on the same day, under the banner “Nous ne paierons pour leurs crises“. In Madrid, protestors will be declaring “Es hora de cambiar” (it’s time for change). There will also be events happening in Italy, India,  Indonesia and the Philippines. A big Tokyo event is planned for 2 April.

We’re not going to be marching alone on 28 March, but as the G20 leaders are coming to our home turf, the world’s eyes are going to be on what happens in London, and what happens on this demonstration. Make sure you don’t miss it!

March 27th, 2009 Put People First

New speaker confirmations for the Hyde Park rally include Bianca Jagger (Chair of the World Future Council and President, of the Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation),  Eulogio Rusoke (Fairtrade Coffee producer),  Leo Gerrard  (US Steelworkers’ Leader) and Father  Joe Komakoma,  (General Secretary of the Zambian Episcopal Conference).

They will join Susan George (groundbreaking academic and author), Mark Thomas (activist comedian), Mary Lou Malig (Trade campaigner), Brendan Barber (TUC General Secretary), Sharan Burrow (ITUC President), Tony Juniper (Environmentalist), Tony Robinson (Actor/TV presenter), Derek Simpson (UNITE General Secretary), Dave Prentis (UNISON General Secretary) and others.

Musical entertainment will be provided by Kooks frontman Luke Pritchard and Malian megastar Daby Toure.

March 27th, 2009 BOND

War on Want report: Millions face free trade axe

Millions of people will lose their jobs in developing countries and millions more in Europe under free trade plans to be promoted by British prime minister Gordon Brown next month at the G20 summit of the world’s leading economies.

This warning comes today from the charity War on Want in the first-ever report to calculate the numbers of jobs lost globally in the wake of trade liberalisation and to analyse the impact of free trade on employment.

It comes at a time when global unemployment is already rising fast, with the International Labour Organisation forecasting over 50 million more people worldwide could lose their jobs by the end of this year, and 200 million workers fall into extreme poverty. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development says that by next year jobless numbers in rich nations could rise by eight million to 42 million. And last week British unemployment rose above two million for the first time since 1997.

Now Brown’s call to other G20 leaders to complete the Doha trade round puts 7.5 million workers at risk in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Indonesia, Mexico, Philippines, Tunisia and Uruguay, and millions more in other rich and poor countries, according to War on Want.

War on Want Executive Director John Hilary said: “Our report exposes how trade liberalisation has thrown millions of people into grim poverty and threatens to devastate many further lives. Gordon Brown’s free market fundamentalism will condemn millions to a bleak and jobless future. Instead of repeating the failed policies of the past, the prime minister and the other G20 leaders must put people first.”

Following two decades of free market policies, 50 million more Africans are now trapped in poverty than in 1997.

Three in four workers in sub-Saharan Africa now face insecure employment as a result of three decades of neoliberal economics, with only a quarter in waged and salaried posts, according to the study. Four in five Zambian workers struggle to survive as street traders, 95 per cent of them earning only two dollars a day, and over three quarters less than a dollar a day.

Zambian tailor Matthews Nkhoma says of big foreign exporters: “Instead of bringing raw materials, they bring finished goods at a cheaper price. We cannot compete and have really lost out.”

Malawi’s real wages in manufacturing plunged by 73 per cent between 1990 and 1995. Trade liberalisation in the 1980s and 1990s also brought huge job losses in Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Morocco and Zimbabwe.

During the free trade 1990s, the jobless in Latin America soared from 7.6 million to 18.1 million, with unemployment rises in Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela. Between the early 1990s and 2006, farming jobs in Mexico slumped from 8.1 million to around six million as a result of trade liberalisation. Now a third of all the region’s workers face insecure employment.

Trading Away Our Jobs: How free trade threatens employment around the world can be downloaded here

March 26th, 2009 BOND