The weekend of March 14 and 15 we attended a conference called by the Bosnian Miners Union. Organised around the slogan 'Defend Social Property, Stop Privatisation; Let the Voice of the Workers Be Heard' it was called to discuss how to fight the privatisation of the Bosnian mines.
Delegates attending the Conference came from England, Scotland, Hungary, France, Croatia, Austria, Russia, South Africa, Turkey, Greece, Spain, Sweden and Serbia. Messages of support came from trade unions in Poland and Pakistan.
The British delegation included members of UNISON, the Transport & General Workers Union (including two Liverpool dockers), the GMB, the National Union of Mineworkers, the Association of University Teachers and representatives of Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Leicester Trades Councils. The deputy general secretary of the Scottish TUC also attended.
The President of the Bosnian Miners Union opened the Conference stressing the importance of protecting workers' interests in the transition from one economic and political system to another. He said that the miners didn't want privatisation to proceed as it would lead to a few people becoming enormously rich while most would become very poor.
'We want to protect the social property and provide security for miners and for other workers', he said.
Both a representative of the Bosnian government and the President of the Bosnian trade unions spoke about the 'inevitability' of privatisation, only disagreeing about which 'model' was preferrable.
In contrast, the Bosnian miners who spoke stressed their opposition to it and determination to fight. One spoke for all when he said that 'the promoters of privatisation say things will be better after it is carried out. But we know the background to privatisation is about supplying profits - no one cares about the workers. Working rights, the right to have a job will go.' He ended by appealing to the delegates to assist the miners to fight the foreign investors and maintain the mines as social property.
Ian Lavery of the NUN Executive supported the Bosnian miners' views. He spoke powerfully about the conflict of interests between investors who make profit and the workers whose labour produces the coal. In 1984Ä85, the year of the miners' strike, there were 210,000 miners in Great Britain, he said. In 1998 there are only 10,000 miners in the privatised coal industry - and they haven't had a rise in seven years.
The majority of the other speakers reported similar experiences, underlining the global nature of the privatisation process and the universal impact it has had on lowering wages, destroying working conditions and creating mass unemployment.
Bill Spiers from the STUC said that the British working class movement 'have lost many of the arguments regarding privitisation' and highlighted the loss of jobs, lower wages and deterioration of conditions of employment which resulted. 'The results of our experience in Britain can be useful for others' he said.
Mickey Tighe, representing the dockers, explained how laws against trade unions always come along with privatisation. Everywhere the working class confronts the same problems, he said. Capitalism works on an international basis and the working class must confront it internationally. That is why the Liverpool dockers had organised three international meetings of dockers during the two years of their dispute.
'It is very important', he said, 'that these meetings continue'.
A Hungarian miner described the role of the old leadership of the miners who negotiated a secret deal with the government behind the backs of the miners resulting in the destruction of the mining industry. Where only several years ago there were 100,000 miners, now there are only 20,000. New unions are now being built which will fight to defend workers.
Liz Leicester spoke about the impact of privatisation in local government in Britain. She highlighted the unemployment, low wages and worse working conditions brought about by OCT and described its disproportionate impact on women. Explaining what happened to the Hillingdon Hospital women, she also stressed their continuing tenacious fight to get their jobs back.
The Labour government was probably replacing COT with Best Value but that also could have the effect of lowering wages, destroying working conditions and lead to privatisation of public services, she said.
She also spoke about the development of Support Groups from the time of the miners' strike which brought together all groups within the community. She paid tribute to the dockers who had successfully built a relationship with young people who had no history of trade union struggle.
Some of the most moving moments of the conference came when the Serbian trade unionists brought greetings to the Bosnian trade unionists. Several of them spoke of their distress at what the Serbian government had done to the Bosnian people - the killing, the destruction of factories and other workplaces, the thousands of homeless people.
A statement presented to the conference by the Bosnian miners declared that 'privatisation is not in the interests of the working class'. It said that since capital is international, the working class must organise internationally and called for the establishment of an international trade union solidarity campaign to assist the Bosnian miners and other workers to resist privatisation.
A letter of support was also sent to the Kossovo miners who had been due to attend but were unable to leave Kossovo. It said that the delegates 'deeply regret that the violence and repression of the Albanian people in Kossova prevented the miners coming to the Conference.' It called for the restitution of basic rights and expressed its solidarity with the Albanian people of Kossovo.
Liz Leicester & Anton Moctonian - Joint Chairs, Camden UNISON