WHILE British pensioners call in vain on Labour and the TUC to take up the fight for their living standards, Italy's unions have threatened general strike action if their new right wing government attempts to cut back on pensions.
Silvio Berlusconi's government is under increasing pressure from the bankers and money markets to slash back on the historically generous pension entitlements squeezed out of previous weak governments by strong It has little obvious base of popular support in its bid to slash up to 10 trillion lire from pensions; even the employers, who use pension funds Maxwell-style as cheap loans, are opposed to plans to privatise the scheme.
Workers retiring now can pick up 80 percent of their average income as a lifetime pension.
But the pensions bill is centrai to a rocketing state deficit predicted to amount to 124 percent of GDP this year: interest payments alone on this deficit consume almost 10 percent of GDP.
Italian ministers hope to cut the benefits for new retirees to 60% of final income. For millions of British pensioners facing winter, even that much would be a treat. A NEW initiative to link up the campaigns, unions and individuals fighting in defence of the Welfare State was launched on September 18.
A full hall of 100 activists turned out to the meeting, convened under the sponsorship of the Socialist Movement Trade Union Committee and the Socialist Campaign Group Network.
From the chair, Trudy Saunders told the meeting that over 300 individuals (including MPs and national trade union officials) and some organisations have already signed the basic policy statement on which the meeting had been called.
Platform speakers included a student nurse from Guy's, pensioner's activist Joe Harris, Islington councillor Liz Davies, John Lister from London Health Emergency, and Tony Benn MP.
A lengthy written message of support from Alan Simpson MP, secretary of the Socialist Campaign Group, was read out.
Platform and floor speakers were agreed on the need to support the various local and single-issue campaigns which have sprung up across the country to defend the existing welfare state against Tory attacks (hospitals, nurseries, nursing homes, pension rights, social security benefits, student grants, education services), and demand improved services, including civil rights for disabled people.
Benn. argued that the Tory drive to strip workers of social security and other benefits goes well beyond any economic motives, and is driven by their strategic desire to restore the power and disciplines of capitalism.
"The Tories don't just want to end the welfare state, they want to take the whole country back to where it was in the nineteenth century," warned Benn.
"We must do more than defend the welfare state, we must campaign for the things we want," he stressed.
John Lister from LHE pointed to the political significance of struggles over pensions and welfare state benefits in Italy and in the Swedish elections.
"We need a campaign like the Network to make sure that these issues punch their weight in British politics, the way they do elsewhere," he said. "We need to break down isolation, inform NEIGHBOURHOOD UNISON DEFEND ON NEHIND THE OFFICIAL PICKET