Poets on Picketlines

In Red Shed, comedian Mark Thomas begins by asking that age old question for lefties:  Where do your politics come from?

A question myself and some mates asked ourselves as we sat at the gates of Kirby Misperton’s anti-fracking camp last week, watched steely by more-than-enough Police Officers.  We wandered up the road, and were stalked by three Officers (one each) who referred to us as “young people” in their radios.

Mark’s question leads him to talk about his experience of the 1984-1985 miners’ strike as a student living in Yorkshire’s West Riding and the gut-wrenching pain of revisiting old struggles and battlefields.  It’s a cracking show.

It wasn’t a hate preacher who radicalized me, and I won’t lay the blame at David Cameron’s posh door.  It was Michael Arthur, the Vice Chancellor of Leeds University who, in my third year, stated that cuts will occur across departments.  With my precious theate and English course under review, and therefore the knife, I got involved in Leeds University Against Cuts, at that time a localised collective of lefties and concerned students who would oppose cuts and, critically, defend strike action which opposed cuts.

This led to a great deal of conflict with the current crop of Student Union Officers who essentially backed management and did very little to represent the student’s concerns.  In fact, it felt like they did a super job of representing management’s stance to us.

So my first picketline was a simple batch of students and lecturer’s with a few signs.  Hardly the warring battlelines of cops and miners, or other such struggles across the globe.  People casually sauntered past us, it was all quite civil.  But leading up to this picketline had been a continual battle of debates in seminars, in the Union, in the Student Paper and on the Student Radio.  That’s the environment I learnt:  Do Not Cross A Picktline.  We marched and demonstrated against cuts, it ws the first time I chanted or used a megaphone, and we even did a sit-in outside the Student Officer’s offices.  It was actually the picketline itself that seemed quite tame by comparison, in all honesty.

But the UCU members on strike we fighting for all us students.  We could feel the tide of cuts were coming, not those promised by the VC, but the looming coalition government.  A few months later, Nick Clegg would break his promise, the Tories would test their newfound power against the student and college campuses.  Leeds University students, amongst many, would go into Occupation and the student movement was at the forefront of resisting Tories between 2010-2011.  But by then, I was totally radicalised…er…I mean…politically engaged.  And now UCU are going on a huge strike to defend their pensions, and of course beneath the surface is the issues around the marketability, privatisation and exclusivity of education.

I popped down to the pickets on Thursday, and can confirm the dedicated student body who support their staff and support their strike.  Love, rage and solidarity to all xxx

I’ve read poems on picketlines, and rallies to support strike action.  Picketline poetry is always quite simple and to the point.  From the work of Joe Hill to this day, it’s about giving confidence and inspiration to people constantly and consistently demonised for defending their rights, and by extension other people’s rights.  I’d never claim this poetry is particularly complex, and indeed the romanticism cooked up by artists like Dropkick Murphys and Billy Bragg in songs never quite filters to the ground level, stood in the cold, with flyers, as people filter past without a second glance.  The issues surrounding a strike are always very complex, and people striking need a lot of courage.  But at the end of the day, there’s some very simple rules around pickets and strikes:

Don’t cross a picketline.  Don’t scab.