The National Federations, the Regional Trade UnionCentres, the hundreds of unions of the public and private sector that are rallied in PAME, have called the PAME National Congress on 9-10 November, in Athens, with the slogan:

“Their profits or our lives!

We claim the life we deserve, on the path of Overthrow!”

Together with unionists who are concerned on the situation of the trade unions and the trade union movement we will discuss and decide on the militant planning, to strengthen a large workers’ – people’s front of claim against the antipeople’s policy of the government and the business groups that oppress our lives. For the disengagement of our country from the imperialist wars, which our people are paying for with bloody economic consequences and with dangers generated by the expansion of the imperialist war and the possibility of a new generalised capitalist economic crisis. To accelerate our pace to reverse the ugly situation of the trade union movement, the demassification of the trade unions and the underminingof collective action for which the known leaderships in the GSEE and ADEDY -members of ETUC- are responsible.

It is 15 years since the onset of the capitalist crisis, the memoranda and the thousands of implementing laws that passed as a steamroller on labour and social rights, impoverishing and destroying our lives to save the profits of bankers, industrialists, shipowners and other capitalists. We saw the same situation during the pandemic, the brutality of the system, the visible enemy that is capitalism. We are living it with the consequences that we are paying the price of two murderous wars in our neighbourhood and the involvement of our country.

The struggles that have developed over the years have given impetus to the organization of the workers, have strengthened hope, have shown the path that our class must and can follow.PAME has made a decisive contribution thatis recognised by the whole of our people.

The attack of capital on the rights of the workers continues. In the last two years alone, the companies listed on the Athens stock exchange have accumulated more than 22 billion euros in net profits, while the workers and the popular strata suffer from the high level of inflation, the very expensive electricity, the housing problem, the predatory prices for basic goods and the exorbitant taxes that eat away at the people’s income. They are faced with a broken health system and the great commercialisation of health and education and are exposed to natural disasters.

The average wage of workers remains down by 14.81% compared to 2011. The situation for our people is exacerbated by the great economic bleeding from our country’s deeper involvement in imperialist plans and wars, an involvement that naturally generates risks of incalculable disasters in case of retaliation. The standard of living of our people is constantly falling.

The aim of the New Democracy government, which has the support of all the other parties that support the EU and NATO, SYRIZA, PASOK and Velopoulos’ party, is to further shield the profitability of the business groups in the face of the possibility of a new capitalist crisis. That is why they are stepping up the attack on workers, generalising flexibility in employment, keeping wages frozen, and further commercialising the operation of critical sectors such as health, education, energy, water, transport, social security, infrastructure and civil protection services for natural disasters.

In the face of the clouds that darken our lives and our future, there is no other way out than to strengthen a trade union movement that demands massively and militantly, that is not integrated into the dominant politics but advances the goals of meeting the modern needs of workers in terms of income and working and living conditions.

A workers’ trade union movement free from the compromising notion of governmental change that breeds demobilisation, defeatism and fatalism.A movement that is demanding, militant, that puts the real causes of the barbarism we are experiencing, capitalist profit, the policy of support for business groups that elevates exploitation, the unjust state that serves capital and oppresses our lives.

With strong unions in the workplaces and sectors that ensure the mass and democratic participation of the workers themselves.A united, mass, militant movement that will not sit at the tables of ministries and business groups, in the bargaining of class cooperation as the GSEE and ADEDY do.

The huge mobilisations on the occasion of the crime-train crash in Tempe proved the strong power of the organisation and the potential of the labour movement to put its stamp on developments. Thus we have cancelled the attempt of the government, the other bourgeois parties, the TRAINOSE company, the EU to cover up the crime and the real culprit, the system of capitalist barbarity. We brought to the fore the real demand that expresses our needs, “THEIR PROFITS OR OUR LIVES”!

In these conditions we have seen the possibilities that exist to actively face the difficulties. We have seen once again the great obstacles that a low degree of organization poses. We have seen the role played by the leaderships of the trade union movement at the level of the GSEE and other organisations, which betray our interests. Facing large-scale mobilisationsthey openly supported the government and the big interests without any pretexts.

This can change and is changing every day with emblematic examples in Regional Trade UnionCentres, Federations, Trade Unions, from the tireless work of trade unionists who rally in PAME.

We join forces for a faster step. More forces can enter the struggle, investing in the organisation and in the great weapon of class orientation which is confirmed as the necessary condition to count more results, more victorious battles.

The great struggles of the past years show us the way

In the face of difficulties, fatalism, the logic of “nothing can be done”, “nothing changes”, with our planned intervention and action, with a framework of struggle and demands that puts the needs of the many and not the profits of the few at the centre, we have fought great and important battles:

Against emblematic anti-worker bills that targeted fixed daily working hours, worsened labour relations, and strengthened intensification and exploitation.

Together we organized big strikes to face the attack of government, capital. Against the Hatzidakis law, the Georgiades law, we disabled provisions, we left on paper the attack on the right to strike and trade union organisation with the stance of organised indiscipline that we decided in the meeting of the Athens trade unions in October 2021 and in the Congress of PAME in June 2022.

Together we faced the obstacles to the organisation of these great struggles put up by the leaderships of the GSEE and ADEDY, the line of class collaboration that adopts the goals of capitalist development as the goals of the workers’ movement.

Together we stood by each other, we stood with our natural allies, farmers and self employed in the struggle to face the disastrous results of a policy that leaves us unprotected in the face of floods and fires. The tree of solidarity has grown and blossomed in Thessaly to pull villages out of the mud, in Northern Evia to help the people stand up for their land, to our working brothers and sisters in Turkey after the devastating earthquake and everywhere where the selectively incompetent state leaves workers at the mercy of natural disasters.

Together we continue to demand protection and support for our lives. In workplaces, in sectors, we have demanded and achieved collective agreements.

We give our all for steady work with rights. The struggle of the workers of LARCO is a bright example that signals our decision that we will not stand idly by, we will not remain inactive in the face of the destruction of our lives.

We stood side by side with the students in the big rallies and occupations against the privatization of higher education and we continue. We stood by the struggling farmers against EU policies and jointly organised the great rally in Syntagma. Together with the bodies of the popular movement we are fighting the battles for the defence of the health system, against the auctions and evictions.

Building on our own positive experience, we can take a big step forward:

➡ Coordinate more forces into a big, nationwide militant front.

➡ To the massification the unions, to raise the level of organization of the workers, but also the level of functioning and action of the unions.

➡ To multiply the areas of struggle, of demand, of questioning the anti-worker policy and exploitation. In every workplace, in every sector, in every neighbourhood, throughout the country.

➡ To change the correlation in the bodies of the movement, in the trade unions, the federations, the workers’ regional unions in favour of the forces of struggle, of the class struggle, against the forces of compromise and submission.

➡ To strengthen joint action with the mass bodies of the popular movement, the student associations, the peasants, the self-employed and other popular strata.

We call on all the trade unions, the trade union organisations that together we have fought the struggles of the past years to take part in the discussion, for the planning of the struggle, for the coordination of the next steps and stages of our action.

To work out the axes of claim for:

• Increases in wages and Collective Agreements . Restoration of the collective bargaining of the ERA, minimum wage at 950 euros. Restoration of all the gains that have been undermined such as the three-year contracts including the period 2012-2023, the principle of more favourable contract, post-employment, Sunday holidays, overtime pay.
• 7 hours – 5 days – 35 hours, stable work with rights. No to 6-day work, to flexible forms of employment, to unpaid work and unpaid overtime, to working time arrangements. Restoration of the 13th and 14th salaries for civil servants.
• Substantial increases in pensions, incorporation of the personal differential and abolition of the solidarity contribution. No pension below 80% of salary. Restoration of the 13th and 14th pensions.
• Unemployment benefit for all unemployed and without conditions at 80% of salary.
• Measures against inflation and for the protection of the workers’ – people’s income
• Substantial protection of working women and maternity.
• Exclusive public and universal Social Security. The retirement age for employees, farmers, self-employed persons should not exceed 60 years for men and 55 for women, 55 and 50 respectively for workers in heavy and unhealthy occupations.
• Exclusively public and free, upgraded education for all. Abolition of enterprise and all class barriers and filters put into education.
• For a single exclusively public and free Health – Welfare system for all, for the satisfaction of all popular needs in modern prevention – treatment – rehabilitation services. Health is a guaranteed social good and not a commodity.
• Measures for people’s housing and legal protection of first homes.
• Measures for health and safety at work.
• Protection of trade union freedoms and rights.
• Development of a comprehensive, meaningful, scientific planning of a combined assessment for all risks, natural and technological, under the responsibility and funding of the state.
• Disengagement of our country from the imperialist plans and wars organised by the USA – NATO – EU. Stop now the genocide of the Palestinian people. Solidarity with the refugees.

We call on those who are concerned, those who are worried, those who realize that this is no longer possible, those who understand the damaging role of the government employers’ trade unionism and its orientation as an obstacle to the workers’ struggles to dare!!!To get together, to formulate their assessments, their proposals.

The struggle, needs them all.And everyone needs the struggle.

None of the workers can passively wait for positive developments and results to come from saviors and solution contractors from above with the people in the corner as spectators. Positive results will come with our own struggle on the road to overthrow. We will impose them. There is no other way.

Our strength is our organization.Our weapon is solidarity.Hope in the struggle

We write our history through the slogan born of the class struggle itself.

“WITHOUT YOU, NO COG CAN TURN , WORKER YOU CAN WITHOUT BOSSES”