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Unionists throughout Russia have staged a 1st December protest against the Putin government’s punitive new labour code. This follows previous protests in May. The laws, at the behest of the IMF, will impose a system of casual labour and remove from trade unions their powers to act. The code increases the length of the working day from 8 to 12 hours and allows a 56 hour week without overtime pay. It also legalizes child labour. Mexican workers also took protest action against the IMF austerity measures against Mexico. Organisers of both Mexican and Russian actions sent messages of solidarity to each other & delegations to the embassies of their respective countries. The struggle against job losses must be turned into an offensive against the current system itself. The unions need to commit to a course of nationalisation of the chaebols, or allow their ‘internationalisation’ – ie let the global rivals buy them out, then organise in industry globally. Either way a drastic reduction in working hours – immediately to 40 and quickly to 35 from the current 48 to 50 hours a week (adopt the ‘25 hr by 2010’ standard!) is the only way to guarantee job security, allow restructuring, write off debt (close insolvent firms) & let investment flow into new & more productive industry ie it revitalizes most effectively economy wide.
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