T&G members demand reinstatement of Mick OReilly and Eugene McGlone

T&GWU Executive members meeting at the unions Transport House HQ in Holborn, central London, this morning (Monday September 17) were greeted by a delegation of their own members from Belfast and Dublin protesting at the continued suspension of the Irish Regional Secretary and Regional Organiser. The two officials, Mick OReilly and Eugene McGlone have been suspended without any consultation, and no reason was given for this unprecedented action (see previous article). The delegation distributed a leaflet demanding OReilly and McGlones immediate reinstatement and found a considerable number of Executive members prepared to support them. However, we understand that inside the meeting any discussion on this issue was postponed until later in the week and would not be dealt with today.

Before travelling back to Ireland, three of the protestors, Dawn Stuart and Flo Stevenson from Belfast and Des Bonass from Dublin spoke to Socialist Appeal.

Flo, a Belfast pharmaceutical worker, began by telling us that the leadership of the union were playing into the hands of the bosses by this attack on union democracy. "This is undermining everything we as a union are supposed to be doing in terms of defending peoples employment rights. We wouldnt let employers get away with treating our members like this."

Dawn agreed, "we are here today to demand the immediate reinstatement of Mick OReilly and Eugene McGlone. Our union should be representing the interests of our members not attacking them."

"This has dragged on for months now," Flo continued "in reality its a whitewash. Its taking them so long because theyre trying to find something to charge them with."

Des from Dublin expressed his anger at the impact the leaderships attack was having on the work of the union. "We were making big headway before this, membership was growing, there was healthy debate in the union in Ireland about the way forward, about the social contract and so on. This couldnt have come at a worse time. Now everythings on hold. Thats what this attack is about really, its about our union. The bosses must be laughing, they are envious of the disciplinary procedures they are seeing in our union. This will set back industrial relations - when they attack workers the bosses will just say well, thats the way you do it in your union. Bill Morris seems to be acting a bit dictatorial in all this. They have refused mediation from ICTU (Irish Congress of Trade Unions), the Irish Labour Party, in fact they have refused to meet with anyone. They are interfering in the internal organisation of our union in Ireland which they have no right to. Mick OReilly and Eugene McGlone have a lot of support amongst our members and if they are not reinstated there will be more demos and pickets."

Socialist Appeal continues to support these trade unionists being victimised by their own leaders. We demand their immediate reinstatement. We appeal to all trade unionists, especially T&GWU members to:-

Please send letters of protest to

Bill Morris
General Secretary
Transport and General Workers Union
Transport House
128 Theobalds Road
Holborn
London WC1X 8TN
e-mail: tgwu@tgwu.org.uk

For more info contact:
Peter Black, ATGWU Irish Regional Committee
peadardubh@hotmail.com
ATGWU
Transport House
102 High Street
Belfast BT1 2DL
tel: 028 9023 2381
fax: 028 9024 0133

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