Unite to fight school closures

Education Minister John O’Dowd has announced that all primary and secondary schools in Northern Ireland will be reviewed for “teaching quality” and “possible financial savings” by the end of the school year. The reality is O’Dowd is drawing up a hit-list of schools he wants to close.

Up to 400 schools are under threat as they are bracketed as being under the pupil quota for schools in Northern Ireland. Taking into account the potential for amalgamations of schools, it is a real threat that hundreds of schools will be closed by the Assembly.

The Department for Education budget is to be cut by £700million over the next four years. Typically, the sectarian politicians are attempting to hoodwink us by stirring up sectarian arguments over which schools “should” close. DUP Education Committee Chairman Meryn Storey has stated “I’m very focused and determined that there will be an equality of distribution, rather than what has seemed to be the case to date with one sector taking a disproportionate hit over another.” Storey doesn’t oppose the closure of any schools – either Catholic maintained or ‘state’ controlled, but wants to inject a sectarian division between ordinary people on the question of school closures.

Peter Robinson has been particularly cynical in his approach arguing that this would be a good opportunity to attempt to unify education on non-sectarian lines and called the education system a “Form of Apartheid”. Robinson’s sudden “conversion” to integrated education truly takes the biscuit and in reality is an attempt to stir up sectarianism by threatening to do away with Catholic schools altogether. Nationalist politicians have replied in kind. John O’Dowd described Peter Robinson’s comments as “little more than a thinly disguised sectarian attack on Catholic education, parents and children”. This pantomime between sectarian politicians is sickening – they are jointly responsible for the closure of schools affecting both Catholic and Protestant children and communities.

School closures will bring further hardship to working class communities. There will not just be redundancies in teaching staff, but across the board affecting caretakers, classroom assistants and cleaners all faced with losing their jobs.

The closure of rural schools will mean that many pupils will have to travel very long distances at the same time the transport budget has been cut vigorously. We need a fully-funded integrated comprehensive education system, democratically controlled by staff, parents and student representatives to cater for the educational needs of all.

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Council workers need a fighting union

Roger Bannister is a member of the Unison union's national executive, and campaigning to stand for election as Unison general secretary. Roger says the union must fight the cuts in Birmingham, which are being repeated by councils, health authorities and the education sector nationwide:

"THE PROPOSED culling of jobs, conditions, pay and public services has begun. Dave Prentis, Unison's present general secretary, attacks the Tories who run Birmingham council but Labour councils will make similar cuts. Will he attack them? Why can't the Labour government bail out our public services as they did with the banks?

News in brief – October 2009

Electricity price rip-off - More pay rises for the rich - £106 million wasted on consultants - Bosses spell out attacks on third level education - Scrap Invest NI

By Owen McCracken, Socialist Party

NIE’s decision to cut electricity bills by a mere 5% from October will mean little to those currently living in fuel poverty in Northern Ireland. After electricity prices rocketed by 52% between July 2008 and January 2009, NIE has now reduced bills by a mere 15.8% over a period when wholesale fuels costs have fallen by 40%. This situation is a direct result of privatisation. As householders are being ripped off this company is exploiting its monopoly position to make huge profits. The only way to provide affordable energy is to bring NIE back into public ownership and run it democratically in the interests of ordinary working people.

East Belfast Councillor challenged to justify library closures

Jim Rodgers (Right), the Ulster Unionist Party councillor for East Belfast and a board member of the Northern Ireland Library Authority was today challenged to “publicly justify the closure of local libraries” proposed in a current consultation paper.

Tommy Black, East Belfast Socialist Party representative said “Eleven councillors from the four main political parties are on the board of the Library Authority which is proposing the closure of fifteen libraries throughout Belfast, including six in East Belfast.”