Main Document
On behalf of the Secretariat, we welcome you to the National Congress of Federations, Regional Trade Union Centres, Unions and trade unionists who are rallying to the All-Workers’ Militant Front, the broadest rallying of the working class in the trade union movement in Greece.
Our meeting today marks the 25th anniversary of the foundation of PAME, which coincided with the magnificent struggles of our people against the bombing of Yugoslavia.
25 years ago the thousands of militants who founded PAME rejected the line of social partnership, of submission to the directions of the EU and the governments to promote the cheap and flexible worker.
We rejected the criterion of the “competitiveness of corporations” promoted in the labour trade union movement by the bourgeois parties, the EU, the ETUC, their forces in the trade union movement, by the leaderships of GSEE – ADEDY. We rejected the logic that labour is a cost. It is not a cost, it is the main productive force. The black front of the government, employers and sold out labour leaders at first mocked PAME, slandered it.
We kept the principles of the class struggle that is the driving force of history, the goal of the abolition of the exploitation of man by man, not only in the statutes of our Unions, but in the orientation of our action. Against the line of ” ‘class cooperation’, ‘social cohesion” of the government-employer controled trade unions that leads to compromise with capitalist exploitation and the power of the capitalists.
These are the elements that strengthened PAME and made the class pole in the trade union movement recognised by the whole working class and broader popular strata.
PAME means power. Throughout the years, the trade unions, the Rergional Trade Union’ Centres and the Federations that form it have always been in the front line in defending the interests of the working class against the all-out attack of capital. It is a living expression of the militant processes taking place within the trade union movement in our country.
The creation of PAME was a mature necessity. It coordinated the steps of all those who raise their heads. We took the lead in organising solidarity. We contributed to the change of correlations in the trade union movement in the private and public sector. PAME has been a truly militant way out and a hope for those workers who cannot come to terms with the bad situation of the trade union movement for which the majorities of the administration of the GSEE and ADEDY are mainly responsible.
The participation of dozens of trade unionists who are here for the first time, bringing their experience and their own opinions, is particularly important. We have common concerns regarding the bad situation that unfortunately still exists in many Federations and Regional Union Centres, in many primary unions, and which is an obstacle for workers to organise themselves, to trust the power of the collective struggle.
Our meeting is a militant station and a starting point in the course of the trade union movement in our country. Station for the exchange and assimilation of the struggle experience, the discussion for the strengthening of the struggles of all workers from all sectors in the private and public sector, the joint action and alliance with self-employed and working farmers, the youth.
We welcome our allies in the struggle, the farmers from the Panhellenic Committee of Blockades, the Federation of Craftsmen’s Associations of Athens, the representatives of the Student Associations, the Associations of Apprenticeship and Vocational Training, the Federation of Women of Greece.
We particularly welcome the young men and women who are taking up tasks in the movement, leading the way in organising their colleagues. We welcome the veterans of the work who continue and carve the path of struggle and dignity for the younger ones. We also welcome the dozens of migrant workers who are among us in the trade union delegations and are putting into practice the slogan “Greek and foreign workers united”.
We would like to welcome and thank the trade union delegations from all over the world for their presence at our meeting. We would like to thank the WFTU delegation that is here, led by the President of the WFTU, Mike Mzwandile Makwayiba, from South Africa. From Cyprus the Secretary General Pampis Kiritsis and from Italy the Head of the European Office Pierpaolo Leonardi. We are delighted that they are with us today and we pledge once again that we will do everything in our power to strengthen internationalist solidarity. There is no other way than the common struggle of peoples against capitalist exploitation and imperialist war.
We want to welcome and thank the delegations of trade unions from all over the world for their presence at our congress. We are happy that they are with us today and we pledge once again that we will do everything in our power to strengthen internationalist solidarity. There is no other way than the common struggle of the peoples against capitalist exploitation and imperialist war.
In this year’s PAME Congress there are more trade union organisations than in the previous one: 17 Federations, 22 Regional Union’ Centres, 553 unions , many of them young and hundreds of women colleagues elected to the Boards . The increased participation fills us with responsibility and obligation to do our best to meet the task of leading action to take the trade union movement to the counter-attack, for the life we deserve on the path of subversion.
We are preparing our own counterattack against the jungle regime in the workplaces that deepens exploitation.We will not accept to pay their crisis again, we will not become meat in their cannons.
The main objective of the national congress is, in the face of the war that is escalating and threatening lives, in the face of the new economic crisis or anaemic development, to define as broadly and solidly as possible our own line of struggle in defence of the life of the people, to set our own dilemma “Development for whom?”.
Not only not to compromise, but also to demand our contemporary needs.We are discussing the experience of our struggles with an eye on tomorrow, on how to gain a united footing so that the trade unions, the trade union movement can go on the counterattack.
Which means very concretely to go forward in order to develop a big and strong movement, with the workers’ unions, the militant organisations in the workplaces and the sectors, the Associations and Unions of the self-employed professionals, the farmers, the Students’ Associations against the imperialist war.
- Stop the involvement of Greece.
- Politically condemn those responsible for tying the country to the chariot of NATO, the USA and the EU.
- Do not let our children become meat for the cannons of the imperialists.
- To strengthen solidarity with the people of Palestine, the peoples of the Middle East, all the victims of wars.
At the same time, to make our demands for a life of work and rights more concrete.
- To discuss more concretely how our struggle will be oriented, concretized, organized to put back decisively in our demands the fixed working time, the 7-hour – 5-days – 35-hours for all workers without exception. What in 1886 was a mature conquest for the workers, the 8-hour – 5-days – 40-hour day, today, in 2024, for the capitalists is seen as an obstacle to the development of their profits.
- It is of great importance to struggle to form the conditions for the formation of a large militant, mass nationwide movement for Collective Agreements centred on the workplaces and the sectors. There is no other way if we want to conquer to put a stop to the intensity of the disgraceful exploitation, to the abolition of the anti-worker legislative construction that prevents even the demand for the price of labor power.
- To put a stop to the regulation of working time, to the exhausting timetables, to the proliferation of unpaid work, to “flexibility” for the growth of profits. To put a stop to the dismantling of the social and family life of workers, to hitting the worker’s ability to have free time for his social, spiritual needs. To have free time to organize and develop his collective struggle, to take an active part in social and political life.
Our orientation and our slogan in front of the strike on November 20 “Give money for wages, health and education and not for the slaughterhouses of war ” reflects the core of our struggle in these difficult conditions when our people are paying with blood and sacrifices for the anti-popular attack of capital on the whole of their lives. With this orientation and with such struggles we can make hope shine.
We have all the possibilities to achieve it. This was proved by the strike front that escalated in the past weeks in a number of sectors such as the distributors in the electronic platforms “efood” and “Wolt”, the dockers of Piraeus at COSCO, the health workers, the teachers, the workers in the Shipbuilding Zone, the builders, the engineers and electricians, the workers in the call centres such as “TELEPERFOMANCE”.
Our goal is to unite all these fronts in the sectors in a big strike river on November 20 and to open with the success of the strike a new way for the escalation of a mass militant uprising in every sector and nationwide.
In the coming days we must sound the alarm with all our forces for the success of the strike. Not a minute must be wasted. Every trade union must take responsibility for preparing, organizing and guarding the strike. All together to face the obstacles that the government and the employers will put in the workplaces. To confront the insidious, undermining action of the leadership of the GSEE and ADEDY.
Just as the all-out attack on workers and the trade union movement is escalating, these forces are backing the government. It is striking that they do not say a word about the war, they systematically embellish the policies of the EU, they cultivate the disdain for the struggles of the trade unions. They go to open, shameful slander, together with the employers, of the fighters and trade unionists of PAME, as in Evia. They cover up the employer’s crimes with the hundreds of crippled and dead workers in the workplaces.
We call on the workers who feel the need to stop this denigration of the trade unions, regardless of where they come from politically, ideologically, to isolate them. To take the cause of the success of the strike into their own hands.
Today we are holding a militant assessment, measuring the steps taken towards the great goal of rebuilding the movement that we set in Drapetsona in 2022.
- To the massification of the trade unions.
- In the strengthening of their action.
- We set new goals of changing correlations based on the real organization of workers, against the degenerative phenomena that we have encountered in previous years in Federations, Union’ Centres, in the GSEE Congresses themselves, with the overt fraudulent and corrupt practices, the devaluation of the collective action of the Unions themselves, which affects the entire trade union movement. For Trade Unionsstrong, rooted in everyworkplace.
- To strengthen coordination and alliance with other social strata in cities and rural areas for our common rights and needs.
This is the character we want our congress to have, to have a rich discussion on how to change this situation as a whole, to generalize the steps taken in many sectors and workplaces, to become an example for all! The large attendance at the congress is a first response, but we will not stop there.
We live in a world that is boiling with the consequences of new antagonisms and upheavals, of imperialist wars. But also in a world boiling with the anger and indignation of workers who cannot bear to count any more victims. These are the results of a policy that treats as “costs” even measures to protect human life! They insist on hiding this truth, which is the essence of the EU’s guidelines.
In Spain, the ‘socialist’ government of Sanchez and the ‘right-wing’ Local Government of Valencia have left the people unprotected! And in the face of a phenomenon that had been foreseen and we ended up with more than 200 dead and an unknown number of missing persons!
We have experienced many such crimes in our country, such as in Mati, Mandra and Tempe. Just as happened in Thessaly last year with storm ‘Daniel’. It confirms that for capital, the protection of human life is a cost, they do not take it into account. That is why a few days ago the government of the New Democracy, instead of making the seasonal firefighters permanent, awarded them the ‘badge’ of dismissal and repression, as the previous governments of PASOK and SYRIZA did.
Inflation, debts, auctions, the dangers of the lack of safety measures in public transport, protection from natural phenomena, but also the lack of stable work, irregular working hours, part-time work, seasonal employment, unemployment all exist because of exploitation that become profits for a few, not because there are no resources, not because there are no “money trees” as we are ironically told.
We are aware that the situation may deteriorate even further – perhaps even abruptly – for the peoples, as in our country. The international economic capitalist staffs, the EU, the IMF predict that we are entering a new phase of recession of the capitalist economy, a new generalised capitalist economic crisis is expected sooner or later.
Besides, the signs in the economy of Germany, France and other large capitalist states confirm this. This phase is accompanied in all these states, including our country, by anti-worker regulations on insurance rights, working time, wages, and in general on all aspects of the lives of workers in these countries. Besides, this is the main reason why workers and their trade unions, farmers and youth respectively, are taking to the streets.
The experience of the workers here in Greece shows that whether in a phase of growth in the profits of the monopolies or in a phase of crisis, we are the losers. Because during the period of great capitalist growth up to 2008, the governments in Greece, in the name of budgetary objectives, imposed a series of anti-labour bills such as the implementation of flexible forms of employment and major changes to the social security system, while breaking all records in the area of supporting business groups with state money in order to achieve the objectives of EMU and the euro.
Then, in the years of the capitalist crisis, they passed over 1 000 anti-worker laws in record time. This was the character of the three memoranda voted by PASOK, ND and SYRIZA. Within a short period of time and in a violent way they passed measures to abolish labour rights and impoverish workers that they had been pursuing for 30 years, since the beginning of the 1990s, and had planned in the EU with the “White Paper” and the Maastricht Treaty.
Then, with the emergence of the pandemic, they left us unprotected, thousands died because of huge deficiencies in public health infrastructure. Then we were told to stay at home, “to settle the score later”, to keep quiet, and that development would start immediately afterwards, to be shared “fairly”.
And even before the restrictions on social life were lifted, ostensibly for health protection reasons, they passed the Hatzidakis law in the middle of the pandemic, imposing the 10-hour working day and the regulation of working hours, abolishing the right to strike and targeting the trade union movement. Then the law of the ND, the Georgiadis law, which legalises working up to 13 hours a day, 6 days a week.
All these years the business groups have been getting rich!
Only in the first 6 months of 2024 the banks had a profit of 2.3 billion euros! Greek shipowners placed new ship orders worth almost 200 billion euros this year alone! Energy groups had total profits in the first half of 2024 alone of 770 million euros! The listed companies on the stock exchange had profits of more than 11 billion euros in one year!
Where do their profits come from?
From the increase in the exploitation of labour, which is deepened and shielded by the passing and implementation of all the anti-labour laws, the commercialisation and privatisation of critical sectors and services, the direct and indirect financing of conglomerates by the bleeding of the people.
Every year spending on the needs of the people is reduced and taxes are increased to be channelled through subsidy programmes to the business groups.
At the same time, for NATO purposes, EUR 500,000 a day is given to send a frigate to the Red Sea, 2,500 km from our borders, a total of over EUR 7 billion a year for NATO armaments!
- The reduction in the real average salary compared to 2011 is 14.81%!
- In schools we have a 70% cut in school construction funding for 2024 and at the same time a lockout of hundreds of school departments to “save costs” on teachers.
- The tragic situation in the public health care system widens the gap in meeting the health needs of workers with tragic results, while skyrocketing payments to insured people directly and indirectly for diagnostic tests, drugs, hospitalizations, surgeries, etc. The understaffing of medical and nursing staff and infrastructure goes hand in hand with the further commercialisation of the state health sector and the expansion of private health care groups.
- More than 10,000 foreclosures of first homes are planned for the second half of 2024, while we have a 37% increase in rents, reaching the point where 74.6% of tenants spend more than 40% of their monthly income.
- The environment is also a victim of underfunding and understaffing. From 2017 to date, 37% of the forest area in Attica has been burned. Less than 1 m2 of greenery is allotted to each resident of Attica. 70% are vacancies in Forestry Offices and 4,000 organic vacancies in firefighters in the last 3 years.
We have new battles to organize in front of us!
- The government of the New Democracy is making permanent with a new mechanism (electronic algorithm), the miserable law Vroutsis – Achtisioglou that abolished the National General Collective Labour Agreement. It announced a new legislative initiative, which concerns the adaptation of the European Directive of the EU on the setting of minimum wages and collective agreements. In the context of serving competitiveness, entrepreneurship and fiscal adjustment, in line with the EU Directives, it further promotes so-called flexibility, i.e. work-flexibility, flexible forms of employment, working time ceilings of 13 hours, a declared strategic objective of the EU since the 1990s and 2000s.
- In the government’s crosshairs, based on the demands of the business groups for the coming period, is once again the social security system. Its further commercialisation, with the promotion of occupational funds and the capitalist system, which will launch the complete abolition of any concept of public and social security. They aim at a new increase of the retirement age, the activation of the law existing since the 1st memorandum of PASOK-LA.O.S. to link the retirement age to the “life expectancy”, the reduction of pensions and health care benefits. It is a major and crucial front that concerns all the people, all social strata, and is a field of joint action between the trade union movement and the agricultural associations and the unions of self-employed professionals.
The New Democracy, PASOK, SYRIZA, Velopoulos’ party and the New Left have voted for these things. This strategic agreement is also expressed in the leaderships of the GSEE and ADEDY, which are composed of central trade unionists of these forces, who played a leading role in its political and ideological promotion through the “social” dialogues to mitigate social reactions long before the memorandum laws passed by their parties.
- All these developments are taking place on the ground of the imperialist war conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine, paid for by the peoples with their blood, with whole genocides, with huge “waves” of refugees and migrants.
It is necessary to decisively strengthen the struggle of the trade unions and workers against the war and solidarity with the refugees. Our country must be disengaged from war in whatever form it participates, either by sending military material or by using Greece as a base for war. No soldier outside the borders. Stop the persecution of cadet officers and Greek soldiers who oppose imperialist wars. Cancel the Greek-American Agreement and close all bases of death.
An example of a decisive militant confrontation against the involvement of the country in NATO plans, against the support of the killer state of Israel, is the mobilization of the dockers at the port of Piraeus, led by the ENEDEP (COSCO) union, which succeeded in cancelling the secret shipment of war equipment to Israel and which is part of similar militant mobilizations by dockers in Italy, France and elsewhere. We welcome the blockade of the Tirnavos convoy of ammunition bound for Ukraine!
The contribution and accumulated experience of the struggles developed in the past years illuminate the possibility of strengthening the confrontation with the policy of the monopolies.
In the face of the difficulties caused by the negative correlation of power we fought great and important battles such as:
- The big strikes to face the attack of government and capital with 3 nationwide general strikes without the support of the GSEE in the last 2 years, even reaching a record number of decisions and participation this year, on 28 February, where 22 private sector federations, 37 Regional Union Centres and hundreds of primary unions participated. Together we neutralized provisions, we left on paper the attack on the right to strike with the attitude of organized indiscipline that we decided at the Athens Trade Unions’ meeting in Sporting in October 2021 and at the PAME congress in Drapetsona in June 2022.
- The magnificent mobilisations to condemn the crime in Tempe proved the strong power of the organisation and the potential of the labour movement to put its stamp on developments. Together with the parents and relatives of the victims’ children, we cancelled the attempt of the government, the other bourgeois parties, the railway company, the EU to cover up the crime and the real culprit, the system of capitalist barbarity. According to official figures, more than 3,000,000 people were on the streets for 20 days with strikes, occupations of stations and roads, rallies, closed schools and colleges, all-night protests. It was an outbreak of our people, and especially of the youth, which brought to the fore in a militant way the slogan ‘Either their profits or our lives’. That this crime will not be forgotten because it brought to the surface the enormous responsibilities of an unjust social system and the political system that serves it, the responsibilities of the New Democracy, PASOK and SYRIZA that left the railway and passengers without staff and safety systems on the rails of the privatised railway. And we will do everything in our power to hold them accountable, but also to overturn this system of barbarism that is criminal in nature and breeds such misery.
- We have given our all for steady work with rights. The struggle of the workers of LARCO is a shining example that signals the decision of the workers that they will not stand idly by, that they will not stand idly by in the face of the destruction of their lives. The struggle of the workers of LARCO fills us with class pride and self-confidence that we can succeed, organized, rallied in our Unions, in joint action with the people who are next to us, our colleagues from other workplaces, with the subsistence farmers and self-employed. It is no small thing for 48 months to take on the government and the parties of the plutocracy, the courts, the repressive mechanisms, the employers’ coalition, the capitalists’ media, the undermining of the workers’ bosses, and to come out victorious with your head held high and looking proudly into the eyes of your children.
- Putting the slogan “All for one and one for all ” into practice, we supported with all our forces militant examples, such as the dock workers of Piraeus who won after 12 years of struggle their heavy duty pay, the delivery workers of “efood” who won stable work with rights by abolishing the slave trade in practice, the Fertilizers and Oil of Kavala, “Malamatina” who made the anti-labour laws a rag paper, the miners of Chalkidiki who signed their contract against gods and demons – they show the way.
- We continued to demand for the protection of our health and safety at workplaces, in sectors. Every year we count over 150 colleagues dead in the workplace, that is one every two days and even more now unable to work because of workplace accidents and occupational diseases. We have demanded and succeeded in obtaining collective agreements that include important measures and means of protection.
- We fought a great battle against the auctions and evictions, hundreds of houses of poor people were saved, people’s neighbourhoods and cities were shaken by mass demonstrations in Zografou, Elefsina, Petroupolis, Thessaloniki, Chalkidiki, Thebes and elsewhere. The “crows” of the banks and funds do not hesitate to squeeze even families with Disabled Persons, families living on the poverty line, since disability is the main cause of impoverishment in the 21st century.
- Together with the organisations of the people’s movement we are fighting the battles for the defence of the public health system, overwhelming our people in big cities, such as Crete, Xanthi, Drama, the Aegean islands where people are dying helplessly in trolleys because there are no ambulances.
- We stood side by side with the students in the big rallies and occupations against the privatisation of higher education and we continue.
- Together we stood side by side, we stood in the struggle with our natural allies, farmers, professionals to face the devastating effects of a policy that leaves us unprotected in the face of floods and fires. The tree of solidarity in Thessaly has grown and blossomed in order to get villages out of the mud, to deal with the disastrous consequences of the fires in North Evia, so that the people can stand on their own land. To our brothers and sisters in Turkey to stand up after the devastating earthquake and everywhere where the selectively incompetent state leaves working people at the mercy of natural disasters.
- We have fought a great battle for support and solidarity with refugees and migrants, so that the unacceptable and horrific crime in Pylos is not covered up by the Greek government, the EU and NATO. We fought together for humane living conditions, so that they can reach their real destination countries. For all migrants to have equal rights to work, to children’s education, to health care, to family reunification and against the slave trade agreements of the Greek government.
- We stood by the struggling farmers against the EU policy, so that they can have a decent income and we can have quality and cheap products, we organized together the shocking rally in Syntagma in February last year.
In these circumstances, we saw the potential that exists for actively facing up to the difficulties. We have seen again in practice the major obstacles that a low level of organisation poses. We have seen the role played by the trade union movement leaderships at the level of the GSEE and ADEDY, which betray our interests. They have been confronted with large-scale mobilisations and have supported the government and the big interests without any formality.
We joined forces for a faster step. More forces joined the struggle, investing in organization and the great weapon of class orientation. It is confirmed that the orientation of the struggle is a necessary condition to measure more results, more victorious battles.
These struggles had important conquests because they had broad support and enormous solidarity from all the people, they had right on their side.They succeeded because we managed to become a center of coordination and solidarity at the city and district level, at the sectoral level, nationwide.They went out of the boundaries of their space and their sector and entered the centre of the political confrontation with the strategy of capital, the attitude of all political forces and the laws of the governments.
All the above are essential contents of discussion, strengthening the reflection and the effort made to increase the number of trade unions that started from a different starting point and today there are conditions to be found together in the struggles, to walk on the basis of the central message of the conference “We are claiming the life we deserve, on the road of subversion”.
The experience of the emblematic struggles that have developed so far in the past two years shows that conditions are objectively being created in the workplaces to change the situation in the working class trade union movement.
Militant struggles are breaking out that leave their imprint, they have small victories of great importance. They are struggles that, with the intervention of the class unions, conquer a correct orientation, give birth to and multiply organisation, mass collective and democratic processes. New unions are created in workplaces where they did not exist, existing unions are massed, especially with young workers and immigrants.
Such unions that were born in the struggles are those that were created at the largest construction site of the country in Elliniko, at “efood” and “Wolt”, at “Teleperfomance”, at large food factories such as “DELTA” and all of them are here today, with us!
It has been proven in many cases that even a pioneer worker-organizer existing in a workplace can draw a multiple number of workers to the organization and struggle, forming a framework of demand with initiative, determination, collectivity in the choice of forms of struggle.
We do not in any way underestimate the new contemporary problems generated by capitalist exploitation in the workplace. Particularly serious are the issues relating to all forms of violence (workplace bullying, sexual harassment). With the development of technology and AI applications, new problems are also multiplying in the workplace, such as electronic monitoring, recording of personal data, productivity timekeeping, evaluation, the abolition of the distinction between working time and free personal time and, at the same time, the abolition in practice of the distinction between professional space and private space, phenomena that have been magnified in the teleworking pandemic. We have no tolerance for such phenomena because this is an issue that is exclusively related to the exploitative nature of production. Such issues are in our orientation, collectively we have to work out a framework of demands and struggle within the sectors and workplaces, against the existing legislative framework and in conjunction with issues relating to motherhood, the demands of parents with young children.
The course of PAME over the years has shown us that the trade union movement must draw its own strategy, emancipated from the employers and governments. It must constantly have an open confrontation with them, because it is detrimental not only to turn into an applauder of the government’s choices, but also to become a lever of pressure for governmental change. As demonstrated with the recent Syriza government and earlier with PASOK, and all over the world led by social democratic governments, they have escalated the anti-people attack, just like the “conservative, liberal, neoliberal” ones. They also escalated participation in imperialist wars. They took the baton from the “right-wing” governments to hand it back to them, only enriching an anti-people’s legislative arsenal which we face, we find it our opponent in the face of every struggle. The people in France, Italy, the USA and elsewhere are facing the same.
The policy of “digital transition” and the “green economy” are becoming the new noose that tightens and shrinks our labour and social rights. The preparation for the escalation of the war in Greece and throughout Europe will intensify the blackmail for submission to the needs of capital through the false slogans of “unity” with our exploiters and the “national goals” of capital.
In the coming years, the attempt to trap popular indignation within the limits of parliamentary rotation will again intensify. The illusions and expectations of seeking new “saviours” in the attempt to resurrect and disguise the sinful social democracy in an attempt to restore its ability to manipulate and trap masses of workers and popular forces in the line of compromise and capitalist barbarism will be fanned. To dominate in those who struggle the line that there is no alternative but to accept the unpopular governments, that we must learn to live with little. That the path of prosperity of our people is judged by the path of prosperity of capitalist profits and we must be content with the crumbs of the capitalists that fall from the table.
In the opposite direction we continue to fight and illuminate why our modern needs will not be completely met unless the business groups lose.
A crucial issue is to strengthen PAME with new forces and to change the correlation of power.
Compare PAME’s national congress with the congresses organised by the leaderships of the GSEE and ADEDY and the bourgeois parties these days!
The confrontation that is developing within the organs of the GSEE and ADEDY is about the orientation and the attitude that the trade unions should have, their disengagement from the line of the employers, against the adoption of the goals of competitiveness and class cooperation, against the phenomena of degeneration and fraud, for the liberation of the trade unions from the deadly embrace of the state and the employers and not for the state funds, the chairs that ensure privileges and access to power.
This battle that we have been fighting for years in Regional Trade Union Centres, Federations, Trade Unions, in the GSEE and ADEDY itself, contributes to making the defence of the functioning of the Trade Unions, the resistance to the new attack on the guaranteed trade union rights, the struggle to prevent them from being transformed from collective bodies of workers into electronic faceless platforms, from workers’ organisations into closed clubs for the management of financial programmes and bureaucratic bodies, a matter for the workers.
The difference is obvious when comparing the before and after of the change of correlations in a number of Regional Trade Union Centres and Unions, such as those in Patras, Evia, Trikala, Corfu, Piraeus and others, in Federations and primary unions of the private and public sector, such as large unions of hospitals, teachers’ unions, the largest Federation of the Public Sector, the Teachers’ Federation of Greece, where the ballot paper supported by PAME’s militants became the leading force, prevailing over the government party!
That is why we must all contribute to the establishment of unions in all regions where they do not exist, in large companies and in the sectors of strategic importance, to the change of correlations with the active participation of the workers in the existing ones. In the energy, transport, telecommunications and retail sectors.
We are making a broad call to change the correlations in Federations and Workers’ Centres that are going to hold congresses and elections in the coming months!
A crucial issue for the massification is the action of the trade unions to address the problems of migrants, taking into account that they are objectively part of the working class in Greece. Our experience from the land workers of Manolada, the fields of Marathon, the Egyptian fishermen, the construction sites of the Construction Industry and the bean counters of Attica has shown that the development of action in defence of their rights is a task for the class-oriented workers’ trade union movement. We continue our struggle in opposition to the capital’s pursuit to exploit them to further reduce the price of labour power as a whole, with transnational agreements of modern slave trade already signed by the Greek government on the grounds of the demographic problem and the lack of workers’ hands.
A similar crucial issue is the mass participation of women in the trade unions, their elevation to the leadership of the trade unions. A substantial step must be taken in the elaboration of frameworks of struggle that take into account their specific needs to draw them into action at a time when they are confronted with all the consequences of anti-people’s policies, the shrinking of critical social services and infrastructure.
We must face with boldness and determination the inertia and poor functioning of many trade unions. The pressure exerted by the government and employers against trade union rights and the economic independence of trade unions will only grow stronger. We oppose the compromise and the difficulties generated by the attack of capital and the negative consequences on the lives of workers that generate additional obstacles. The vitalisation of the activity of the Unions, the formation of Boards and Committees by active militants, the collective, mass, democratic processes, the collection of dues and the events for the financial support of the Unions are the first concern of the trade unionists of PAME. Without such work we cannot talk about reorganization and counterattack of the trade union movement.
We strengthen the joint action with the mass organisations of the poor farmers and the self-employed, the women and children of working and popular families.
The three years that have passed have strengthened the river of common action of the popular strata and solidarity in the great struggles, in the struggle to protect the life and property of the people from natural disasters, in the conflicts to prevent poor people’s families from being wiped out, in the struggle to prevent the collapse of the public health system, against the privatisation of higher education, for the just demands of the peasants.
These struggles have made a huge contribution to boosting the morale of people who have been hit by anti-people’s policies and abandonment.To strengthen popular organization, coordination and solidarity.The infinite potential of the popular struggle, initiative and self-activity were revealed.The confidence of popular sections in the trade unions, PAME and the joint action was strengthened even more.
First and foremost the contribution of the organised working class, the catalytic intervention of the class trade unions and especially of the local Regional Trade Union Centres that are rallying in PAME was confirmed, so that the struggle could focus on the real causes that oppress the life of the popular strata, the unpopular policies of the bourgeois governments, the municipalities and regions, the business groups. To work out the appropriate slogans, to promote not only immediate relief measures but also the prospect of a better life for our people.
The example of these struggles shows the path that all trade unions must follow in the coming period. Above all they show the orientation that must be held, strengthened by the trade union movement for the alliance with the other movements. With an elaborated framework of demands based on the common problems created by capitalist development.
The trade unions with meaningful collective processes, meaningful discussion in their managements, joint meetings with the mass bodies of the popular strata put in the centre:
- Health to be a guaranteed social good and not a commodity. For a single, exclusively public and free system of Health – Welfare, for all, for the satisfaction of all the needs of the people in modern prevention – treatment – rehabilitation services.
- Exclusively public and free, upgraded Education for all. Abolition of business and all class barriers and filters that enter Education.
- Strengthen the front against foreclosures and evictions. Demand measures for popular housing and legal protection of first homes.
- To strengthen the demand for measures for protection from natural disasters, with infrastructure projects for fire protection, flood protection, anti-seismic protection, ensuring logistical infrastructure and recruitment of permanent staff.
- Disengagement of our country from the imperialist plans and wars organized by the USA – NATO – EU. Stopnow the genocide of the Palestinian people.
This is the way to strengthen the struggle against those who oppress our people, the big monopoly groups and the governments that serve them, for the great social upheavals that prioritize the modern social needs of all the people.
It is promising that in recent years in Europe, but also in many countries of the world, we have mass workers’ and people’s struggles. We have the huge mobilisations against the genocide of the Palestinian people, the most characteristic being the mobilisations organised a few months ago by student associations in a number of countries around the world, including in the USA and in European countries. All together as one fist we send the message from the PAME Congress for Free Palestine!
It is also promising that in most of the mobilisations are led by Trade Unions and mass organisations “from below”, Federations and Centres, business and sectoral unions, some of which are also members of the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU). They are led by unions formed in the heat of battle and because of the very acute problems faced by workers in all countries of the world. Such is the example of the Amazon workers.
These mobilisations were mainly against the national confederations of workers, against the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) and the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) which are instruments of capital. They are instruments of the bourgeoisie and the business groups within the trade union movement, official interlocutors and social partners of the governments and the imperialist organisations, NATO and the EU.
PAME will continue to give all its forces through the World Federation of Trade Unions to strengthen and expand the class, anti-capitalist, internationalist struggle of the working class.
Colleagues, colleagues, dear comrades,
we shake the hand of each and every one of you.
We join forces and organise the struggle with optimism and faith in the strength and justice of our class.
We shout loudly the slogan that was born in great conflicts and confrontations and is the flag of PAME.
Without you, the cogs will not turn!
Worker, you can do without bosses!”.
We define in the national congress of Federations, Regional Unions’ Centres, Unions and trade unionists who are rallying in the All-Workers’ Militant Front, the broadest rallying of the working class in the trade union movement.
Our meeting today marks the 25th anniversary of the founding of PAME, which coincided with the magnificent struggles of our people against the bombing of Yugoslavia.
25 years ago the thousands of militants who formed PAME rejected the line of social corporatism, of submitting to the directions of the EU and the governments to promote the cheap and flexible worker.
We rejected the criterion of the “competitiveness of enterprises” promoted in the workers’ trade union movement by the bourgeois parties, the EU, the ETUC, their forces in the trade union movement, by the leaderships of GSEE – ADEDY. We rejected the logic that labour is a cost. It is not a cost, it is the main productive force. The black front of the government, employers and labour leaders at first ridiculed PAME, slandered it.
We kept the principles of the class struggle that is the driving force of history, the goal of the abolition of the exploitation of man by man, not only in the statutes of our Unions, but in the orientation of our action. Against the line of “cooperation of classes”, the “social cohesion” of government-employer trade unionism that leads to compromise with capitalist exploitation and the power of the capitalists.
These are the elements that strengthened PAME and made the class pole in the trade union movement recognised by the whole working class and broader popular strata.
PAME means power. Throughout the years, the trade unions, the Workers’ Centres and the Federations that make it up have always been in the front line in defending the interests of the working class from the all-out attack of capital. It is a living expression of the militant processes taking place within the trade union movement in our country.
The creation of PAME was a mature necessity. It coordinated the steps of all those who raise their heads. We took the lead in organising solidarity. We contributed to the change of correlations in the trade union movement in the private and public sector. PAME has been a truly militant way out and a hope for those workers who cannot come to terms with the bad situation of the trade union movement for which the majorities of the administration of the GSEE and ADEDY are mainly responsible.
The participation of dozens of trade unionists who are here for the first time, bringing their experience and their own opinions, is particularly important. We have common concerns regarding the bad situation that unfortunately still exists in many Federations and Labour Centres, in many primary unions, and which is an inhibiting factor for workers to organise themselves, to trust the power of the collective struggle.
Our congress is an agonistic station and a starting point in the course of the labour trade union movement in our country. Station for the exchange and assimilation of the struggle experience, the discussion for the strengthening of the struggles of all workers from all sectors in the private and public sector, the joint action and alliance with self-employed and working farmers, the youth.
We welcome our allies in the struggle, the farmers from the Panhellenic Committee of Blockades, the Federation of Craftsmen’s Associations of Athens, the representatives of the Student Associations, the Associations of Apprenticeship and Vocational Training, the Federation of Women of Greece.
We particularly welcome the young men and women who are taking up tasks in the movement, leading the way in organising their colleagues. We welcome the veterans of the work who continue and carve the path of struggle and dignity for the younger ones. We also welcome the dozens of migrant workers who are among us in the trade union delegations and are putting into practice the slogan “Greek and foreign workers united”.
We would like to welcome and thank the trade union delegations from all over the world for their presence at our meeting. We would like to thank the WCO delegation here led by the President of the WCO from South Africa, Mike MazuadleMakiwaiba. From Cyprus the Secretary General Pampi Kiritsis and from Italy the Head of the European Office Pierpaolo Leonardi. We are delighted that they are with us today and we pledge once again that we will do everything in our power to strengthen internationalist solidarity. There is no other way than the common struggle of peoples against capitalist exploitation and imperialist war.
We want to welcome and thank the delegations of trade unions from all over the world for their presence at our conference. We are happy that they are with us today and we pledge once again that we will do everything in our power to strengthen internationalist solidarity. There is no other way than the common struggle of the peoples against capitalist exploitation and imperialist war.
In this year’s PAME conference there are more trade union organisations than in the previous one: 17 Federations, 22 Workers’ Centres, 553 unions and many elected colleagues on the Boards, many of them young and hundreds of female colleagues. The increased participation fills us with responsibility and obligation to do our best to meet the task of leading action to take the trade union movement to the counter-offensive, for the life we deserve on the path of subversion.
We are preparing our own counterattack against the jungle regime in the workplaces that deepens exploitation.We will not accept to pay their judgment again, we will not become meat in their cannons.
The main objective of the national conference is, in the face of the escalating war that threatens lives, in the face of the new economic crisis or anaemic development, to define as broadly and solidly as possible our own line of struggle in defence of the life of the people, to set our own dilemma “Development for whom?”.
Not only not to compromise, but also to assert our contemporary needs.We are discussing the experience of our struggles with an eye on tomorrow, on how to gain a united stride so that the trade unions, the trade union movement can go on the counterattack.
Which means very concretely to go forward in order to develop a big and strong movement, with the workers’ unions, the militant associations in the workplaces and the sectors, the Associations and Unions of the self-employed professionals, the farmers, the Students’ Associations against the imperialist war.
- Stop the involvement of Greece.
- Politically condemn those responsible for tying the country to the chariot of NATO, the USA and the EU.
- Do not let our children become meat for the cannons of the imperialists.
- To strengthen solidarity with the people of Palestine, the peoples of the Middle East, all the victims of wars.
At the same time, to make our demands for a life of work and rights more concrete.
- To discuss more concretely how our struggle will be oriented, concretized, organized to put back decisively in our demands the fixed working time, the 7-hour – 5-days – 35-hours for all workers without exception. What in 1886 was a mature conquest for the workers, the 8-hour – 5-days – 40-hour day, today, in 2024, for the capitalists is seen as an obstacle to the development of their profits.
- It is of great importance to struggle to form the conditions for the formation of a large militant, mass nationwide movement for Collective Agreements centred on the workplaces and the sectors. There is no other way if we want to conquer to put a stop to the intensity of the disgraceful exploitation, to the abolition of the anti-worker legislative construction that prevents even the demand for the price of labor power.
- To put a stop to the regulation of working time, to the exhausting timetables, to the proliferation of unpaid work, to “flexibility” for the aggrandizement of profits. To put a stop to the dismantling of the social and family life of workers, to hitting the worker’s ability to have free time for his social, spiritual needs. To have free time to organize and develop his collective struggle, to take an active part in social and political life.
Our orientation and our slogan in front of the strike on November 20 “Give money for wages, health and education and not for the slaughterhouses of war ” reflects the core of our struggle in these difficult conditions when our people are paying with blood and sacrifices for the anti-popular attack of capital on the whole of their lives. With this orientation and with such struggles we can make hope shine.
We have all the possibilities to achieve it. This was proved by the strike front that escalated in the past weeks in a number of sectors such as the distributors in the electronic platforms “efood” and “Wolt”, the dockers of Piraeus at COSCO, the health workers, the teachers, the workers in the Shipbuilding Zone, the builders, the engineers and electricians, the workers in the call centres such as “TELEPERFOMANCE”.
Our goal is to unite all these fronts in the sectors in a big strike river on November 20 and to open with the success of the strike a new way for the escalation of a mass agitational uprising in every sector and nationwide.
In the coming days we must sound the alarm with all our forces for the success of the strike. Not a minute must be wasted. Every trade union must take responsibility for preparing, organizing and guarding the strike. All together to face the obstacles that the government and the employers will put in the workplaces. To confront the insidious, undermining action of the leadership of the GSEE and ADEDY.
Just as the all-out attack on workers and the trade union movement is escalating, these forces are backing the government. It is striking that they do not say a word about the war, they systematically embellish the policies of the EU, they cultivate the disdain for the struggles of the trade unions. They go to open, shameful slander, together with the employers, of the fighters and trade unionists of PAME, as in Evia. They cover up the employer’s crimes with the hundreds of crippled and dead workers in the workplaces.
We call on the workers who feel the need to stop this denigration of the trade unions, regardless of where they come from politically, ideologically, to isolate them. To take the cause of the success of the strike into their own hands.
Today we are taking stock of the struggle, measuring the steps taken towards the great goal of reorganising the movement that we set in Drapetsona in 2022.
- To the massification of the trade unions.
- In the strengthening of their action.
- We set new goals of changing correlations based on the real organization of workers, against the degenerative phenomena that we have encountered in previous years in Federations, Workers’ Centres, in the GSEE Congresses themselves, with the overt deceit and the takeover, the devaluation of the collective action of the Unions themselves, which affects the entire trade union movement. For Trade Unionsstrong, rooted in everyworkplace.
- To strengthen coordination and alliance with other social strata in cities and rural areas for our common rights and needs.
This is the character we want our meeting to have, to have a rich discussion on how to change this situation as a whole, to generalize the steps taken in many sectors and workplaces, to become an example for all! The large attendance at the conference is a first response, but we will not stop there.
We live in a world that is boiling with the consequences of new antagonisms and upheavals, of imperialist wars. But also in a world boiling with the anger and indignation of workers who cannot bear to count any more victims. These are the results of a policy that treats as “costs” even measures to protect human life! They insist on hiding this truth, which is the essence of the EU’s guidelines.
In Spain, the ‘socialist’ government of Sanchez and the ‘right-wing’ Local Government of Valencia have left the people unprotected! And in the face of a phenomenon that had been foreseen and we ended up with more than 200 dead and an unknown number of missing persons!
We have experienced many such crimes in our country, such as in Mati, Mandra and Tempe. Just as happened in Thessaly last year with ‘Daniel’. It confirms that for capital, the protection of human life is a cost, they do not take it into account. That is why a few days ago the government of the New Democracy, instead of making the seasonal firefighters permanent, awarded them the ‘badge’ of dismissal and repression, as the previous governments of PASOK and SYRIZA did.
Accuracy, debts, auctions, the dangers of the lack of safety measures in public transport, protection from natural phenomena, but also the lack of stability at work, irregular hours, part-time work, seasonal employment, unemployment all exist because of exploitation that become profits for a few, not because there are no resources, not because there are no “money trees” as we are ironically told.
We are aware that the situation may deteriorate even further – perhaps even abruptly – for the peoples, as in our country. The international economic capitalist staffs, the EU, the IMF predict that we are entering a new phase of recession of the capitalist economy, a new generalised capitalist economic crisis is expected sooner or later.
Besides, the signs in the economy of Germany, France and other large capitalist states confirm this. This phase is accompanied in all these states, including our country, by anti-worker regulations on insurance rights, working time, wages, and in general on all aspects of the lives of workers in these countries. Besides, this is the main reason why workers and their trade unions, farmers and youth respectively, are taking to the streets.
The experience of the workers here in Greece shows that whether in a phase of growth in the profits of the monopolies or in a phase of crisis, we are the losers. Because during the period of great capitalist growth up to 2008, the governments in Greece, in the name of budgetary objectives, passed a series of anti-worker bills such as the implementation of flexible forms of employment and major changes to the social security system, while breaking all records in the area of supporting business groups with state money in order to achieve the objectives of EMU and the euro.
Then, in the years of the capitalist crisis, they passed over 1 000 anti-labour laws in record time. This was the character of the three memoranda voted by PASOK, ND and SYRIZA. Within a short period of time and in a violent way they passed measures to abolish labour rights and impoverish workers that they had been pursuing for 30 years, since the beginning of the 1990s, and had planned in the EU with the “White Paper” and the Maastricht Treaty.
Then, with the emergence of the pandemic, they left us unprotected, thousands died because of huge deficiencies in public health infrastructure. Then we were told to stay at home, “to settle accounts later”, to keep quiet and that development would start immediately afterwards, to be shared “fairly”.
And even before the restrictions on social life were lifted, ostensibly for health protection reasons, they passed the Hatzidakis law in the middle of the pandemic, imposing the 10-hour working day and the regulation of working hours, abolishing the right to strike and targeting the trade union movement. Then the law of the Southwest, the Georgiadis law, which legalises working up to 13 hours a day, 6 days a week.
All these years the business groups have been getting rich!
Only in the first 6 months of 2024 the banks had a profit of 2.3 billion euros! Greek shipowners placed new ship orders worth almost 200 billion euros this year alone! Energy groups had total profits in the first half of 2024 alone of 770 million euros! The listed companies on the stock exchange had profits of more than 11 billion euros in one year!
Where do their profits come from?
From the increase in the exploitation of labour, which is deepened and shielded by the passing and implementation of all the anti-labour laws, the commercialisation and privatisation of critical sectors and services, the direct and indirect financing of conglomerates by the bleeding of the people.
Every year spending on the needs of the people is reduced and taxes are increased to be channelled through subsidy programmes to the business groups.
At the same time, for NATO purposes, EUR 500,000 a day is given to send a frigate to the Red Sea, 2,500 km from our borders, a total of over EUR 7 billion a year for NATO armaments!
- The reduction in the real average salary compared to 2011 is 14.81%!
- In schools we have a 70% cut in school housing funding for 2024 and at the same time a lockout of hundreds of school departments to “save costs” on teachers.
- The tragic situation in the public health care system widens the gap in meeting the health needs of workers with tragic results, while skyrocketing payments to insured people directly and indirectly for diagnostic tests, drugs, hospitalizations, surgeries, etc. The understaffing of medical and nursing staff and infrastructure goes hand in hand with the further commercialisation of the state health sector and the expansion of private health care groups.
- More than 10,000 foreclosures of first homes are planned for the second half of 2024, while we have a 37% increase in rents, reaching the point where 74.6% of tenants spend more than 40% of their monthly income.
- The environment is also a victim of underfunding and understaffing. From 2017 to date, 37% of the forest area in Attica has been burned. Less than 1 m2 of greenery is allotted to each resident of Attica. 70% are vacancies in Forestry Offices and 4,000 organic vacancies in firefighters in the last 3 years.
We have new battles to organize in front of us!
- The government of the Southwest is making permanent with a new mechanism (electronic algorithm), the miserable law Vroutsis – Achtisioglou that abolished the National General Collective Labour Agreement. It announced a new legislative initiative, which concerns the adaptation of the European Directive of the EU on the setting of minimum wages and collective agreements. In the context of serving competitiveness, entrepreneurship and fiscal adjustment, in line with the EU Directives, it further promotes so-called flexibility, i.e. work-flexibility, flexible forms of employment, working time ceilings of 13 hours, a declared strategic objective of the EU since the 1990s and 2000s.
- In the government’s crosshairs, based on the demands of the business groups for the coming period, is once again the social security system. Its further commercialisation, with the promotion of occupational funds and the capitalist system, which will launch the complete abolition of any concept of public and social security. They aim at a new increase of the retirement age, the activation of the law existing since the 1st memorandum of PASOK-LA.O.S. to link the retirement age to the “life expectancy”, the reduction of pensions and health care benefits. It is a major and crucial front that concerns all the people, all social strata, and is a field of joint action between the trade union movement and the agricultural associations and the unions of self-employed professionals.
The New Democracy, PASOK, SYRIZA, Velopoulos’ party and the New Left have voted for these things. This strategic agreement is also expressed in the leaderships of the GSEE and ADEDY, which are composed of central trade unionists of these forces, who played a leading role in its political and ideological promotion through the “social” dialogues to mitigate social reactions long before the memorandum laws passed by their parties.
- All these developments are taking place on the ground of the imperialist war conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine, paid for by the peoples with their blood, with whole genocides, with huge “waves” of refugees and migrants.
It is necessary to decisively strengthen the struggle of the trade unions and workers against the war and solidarity with the refugees. Our country must be disengaged from war in whatever form it participates, either by sending military material or by using Greece as a base for war. No soldier outside the borders. Stop the persecution of cadet officers and Greek soldiers who oppose imperialist wars. Cancel the Greek-American Agreement and close all bases of death.
An example of a decisive militant confrontation against the involvement of the country in NATO plans, against the support of the killer state of Israel, is the mobilization of the dockers at the port of Piraeus, led by the ENEDEP (COSCO) union, which succeeded in cancelling the secret shipment of war equipment to Israel and which is part of similar militant mobilizations by dockers in Italy, France and elsewhere. We welcome the blockade of the Tournavos convoy of ammunition bound for Ukraine!
The contribution and accumulated experience of the struggles developed in the past years illuminate the possibility of strengthening the confrontation with the policy of the monopolies.
In the face of the difficulties caused by the negative correlation of power we fought great and important battles such as:
- The big strikes to face the attack of government and capital with 3 nationwide pan-worker strikes without the support of the GSEE in the last 2 years, reaching even a record number of decisions and participation this year, on 28 February, where 22 private sector federations, 37 Labour Centres and hundreds of primary unions participated. Together we invalidated provisions, we left on paper the attack on the right to strike with the attitude of organised indiscipline that we decided at the Athens Trade Unions’ meeting in Sporting in October 2021 and at the PAME meeting in Drapetsona in June 2022.
- The magnificent mobilisations to condemn the crime in Tempe proved the strong power of the organisation and the potential of the labour movement to put its stamp on developments. Together with the parents and relatives of the victims’ children, we cancelled the attempt of the government, the other bourgeois parties, the railway company, the EU to cover up the crime and the real culprit, the system of capitalist barbarity. According to official figures, more than 3,000,000 people were on the streets for 20 days with strikes, occupations of stations and roads, rallies, closed schools and colleges, all-night protests. It was an outbreak of our people, and especially of the youth, which brought to the fore in a militant way the slogan ‘Either their profits or our lives’. That this crime will not be forgotten because it brought to the surface the enormous responsibilities of an unjust social system and the political system that serves it, the responsibilities of the New Democracy, PASOK and SYRIZA that left the railway and passengers without staff and safety systems on the rails of the privatised railway. And we will do everything in our power to hold them accountable, but also to overturn this system of barbarism that is criminal in nature and breeds such misery.
- We have given our all for steady work with rights. The struggle of the workers of LARCO is a shining example that signals the decision of the workers that they will not stand idly by, that they will not stand idly by in the face of the destruction of their lives. The struggle of the workers of LARCO fills us with class pride and self-confidence that we can succeed, organized, rallied in our Unions, in joint action with the people who are next to us, our colleagues from other workplaces, with the subsistence farmers and self-employed. It is no small thing for 48 months to take on the government and the parties of the plutocracy, the courts, the repressive mechanisms, the employers’ coalition, the capitalists’ media, the undermining of the workers’ bosses, and to come out victorious with your head held high and looking proudly into the eyes of your children.
- Putting the slogan “All for one and one for all ” into practice, we supported with all our forces militant examples, such as the dock workers of Piraeus who won after 12 years of struggle their heavy duty pay, the distributors of “efood” who won stable work with rights by abolishing slave trade in practice, the Fertilizers and Oil of Kavala, “Malamatina” who made the anti-labour laws a rag paper, the miners of Chalkidiki who signed their contract against gods and demons – they show the way.
- We continued to demand for the protection of our health and safety at workplaces, in sectors. Every year we count over 150 colleagues dead in the workplace, that is one every two days and even more now unable to work because of workplace accidents and occupational diseases. We have demanded and succeeded in obtaining collective agreements that include important measures and means of protection.
- We fought a great battle against the auctions and evictions, hundreds of houses of poor people were saved, people’s neighbourhoods and cities were shaken by mass gatherings in Zografou, Elefsina, Petroupolis, Thessaloniki, Chalkidiki, Thebes and elsewhere. The “crows” of the banks and funds do not hesitate to squeeze even families with Disabled Persons, families living on the poverty line, since disability is the main cause of impoverishment in the 21st century.
- Together with the bodies of the popular movement we are fighting the battles for the defence of the public health system, overwhelming our people in big cities, such as Crete, Xanthi, Drama, the Aegean islands where people are dying helplessly in trolleys because there are no ambulances.
- We stood side by side with the students in the big rallies and occupations against the privatisation of higher education and we continue.
- Together we stood side by side, we stood in the struggle with our natural allies, farmers, professionals to face the devastating effects of a policy that leaves us unprotected in the face of floods and fires. The tree of solidarity in Thessaly has grown and blossomed in order to get villages out of the mud, to deal with the disastrous consequences of the fires in North Evia, so that the people can stand on their own land. To our brothers and sisters in Turkey to stand up after the devastating earthquake and everywhere where the selectively incompetent state leaves working people at the mercy of natural disasters.
- We have fought a great battle for support and solidarity with refugees and migrants, so that the unacceptable and horrific crime in Pylos is not covered up by the Greek government, the EU and NATO. We fought together for humane living conditions, so that they can reach their real destination countries. For all migrants to have equal rights to work, to children’s education, to health care, to family reunification and against the slave trade agreements of the Greek government.
- We stood by the struggling farmers against the EU policy, so that they can have a decent income and we can have quality and cheap products, we organized together the shocking rally in Syntagma in February last year.
In these circumstances, we saw the potential that exists for actively facing up to the difficulties. We have seen again in practice the major obstacles that a low level of organisation poses. We have seen the role played by the trade union movement leaderships at the level of the GSEE and ADEDY, which betray our interests. They have been confronted with large-scale mobilisations and have supported the government and the big interests without any formality.
We joined forces for a faster step. More forces joined the struggle, investing in organization and the great weapon of class orientation. It is confirmed that the orientation of the struggle is a necessary condition to measure more results, more victorious battles.
These struggles had important conquests because they had broad support and enormous solidarity from all the people, they had right on their side.They succeeded because we managed to become a center of coordination and solidarity at the city and district level, at the sectoral level, nationwide.They went out of the boundaries of their space and their sector and entered the centre of the political confrontation with the strategy of capital, the attitude of all political forces and the laws of the governments.
All the above are essential contents of discussion, strengthening the reflection and the effort made to increase the number of trade unions that started from a different starting point and today there are conditions to be found together in the struggles, to walk on the basis of the central message of the conference “We are claiming the life we deserve, on the road of subversion”.
The experience of the emblematic struggles that have developed so far in the past two years shows that conditions are objectively being created in the workplaces to change the situation in the working class trade union movement.
Militant struggles are breaking out that leave their imprint, they have small victories of great importance. They are struggles that, with the intervention of the class unions, conquer a correct orientation, give birth to and multiply organisation, mass collective and democratic processes. New unions are created in workplaces where they did not exist, existing unions are massed, especially with young workers and immigrants.
Such unions that were born in the struggles are those that were created at the largest construction site of the country in Elliniko, at “efood” and “Wolt”, at “Teleperfomance”, at large food factories such as “DELTA” and all of them are here today, with us!
It has been proven in many cases that even a pioneer worker-organizer existing in a workplace can draw a multiple number of workers to the organization and struggle, forming a framework of demand with initiative, determination, collectivity in the choice of forms of struggle.
We do not in any way underestimate the new contemporary problems generated by capitalist exploitation in the workplace. Particularly serious are the issues relating to all forms of violence (workplace bullying, sexual harassment). With the development of technology and AI applications, new problems are also multiplying in the workplace, such as electronic monitoring, recording of personal data, productivity timekeeping, evaluation, the abolition of the distinction between working time and free personal time and, at the same time, the abolition in practice of the distinction between professional space and private space, phenomena that have been magnified in the teleworking pandemic. We have no tolerance for such phenomena because this is an issue that is exclusively related to the exploitative nature of production. Such issues are in our orientation, collectively we have to work out a framework of demands and struggle within the sectors and workplaces, against the existing legislative framework and in conjunction with issues relating to motherhood, the demands of parents with young children.
The course of PAME over the years has shown us that the trade union movement must draw its own strategy, emancipated from the employers and governments. It must constantly have an open confrontation with them, because it is detrimental not only to turn into an applauder of the government’s choices, but also to become a lever of pressure for governmental change. As demonstrated with the recent Syriza government and earlier with PASOK, and all over the world led by social democratic governments, they have escalated the anti-people attack, just like the “conservative, liberal, neoliberal” ones. They also escalated participation in imperialist wars. They took the baton from the “right-wing” governments to hand it back to them, only enriching an anti-people’s legislative arsenal which we face, we find it our opponent in the face of every struggle. The people in France, Italy, the USA and elsewhere are facing the same.
The policy of “digital transition” and the “green economy” are becoming the new noose that tightens and shrinks our labour and social rights. The preparation for the escalation of the war in Greece and throughout Europe will intensify the blackmail for submission to the needs of capital through the false slogans of “unity” with our exploiters and the “national goals” of capital.
In the coming years, the attempt to trap popular indignation within the limits of parliamentary rotation will again intensify. The illusions and expectations of seeking new “saviours” in the attempt to resurrect and disguise the sinful social democracy in an attempt to restore its ability to manipulate and trap masses of workers and popular forces in the line of compromise and capitalist barbarism will be fanned. To dominate in those who struggle the line that there is no alternative but to accept the unpopular governments, that we must learn to live with little. That the path of prosperity of our people is judged by the path of prosperity of capitalist profits and we must be content with the crumbs of the capitalists that fall from the table.
In the opposite direction we continue to fight and illuminate why our modern needs will not be completely met unless the business groups lose.
A crucial issue is to strengthen PAME with new forces and to change the correlation of power.
Compare PAME’s nationwide conference with the conferences organised by the leaderships of the GSEE and ADEDY and the bourgeois parties these days!
The confrontation that is developing within the organs of the GSEE and ADEDY is about the orientation and the attitude that the trade unions should have, their disengagement from the line of the employers, against the adoption of the goals of competitiveness and class cooperation, against the phenomena of degeneration and fraud, for the liberation of the trade unions from the deadly embrace of the state and the employers and not for the state funds, the chairs that ensure privileges and access to power.
This battle that we have been fighting for years in Workers’ Centres, Federations, Trade Unions, in the GSEE and ADEDY itself, contributes to making the defence of the functioning of the Trade Unions, the resistance to the new attack on the guaranteed trade union rights, the struggle to prevent them from being transformed from collective bodies of workers into electronic faceless platforms, from workers’ organisations into closed clubs for the management of financial programmes and bureaucratic bodies, a matter for the workers.
The difference is obvious when comparing the before and after of the change of correlations in a number of Labour Centres and Unions, such as those in Patras, Evia, Trikala, Corfu, Piraeus and others, in Federations and primary unions of the private and public sector, such as large unions of hospitals, teachers’ associations, the largest Federation of the Public Sector, the Teachers’ Federation of Greece, where the ballot paper supported by PAME’s fighters became the leading force, prevailing over the government party!
That is why we must all contribute to the establishment of unions in all regions where they do not exist, in large enterprises and in the sectors of strategic importance, to the change of correlations with the active participation of the workers in the existing ones. In the energy, transport, telecommunications and retail sectors.
We are making a broad call to change the correlations in Federations and Workers’ Centres that are going to hold congresses and elections in the coming months!
A crucial issue for the massification is the action of the trade unions to address the problems of migrants, taking into account that they are objectively part of the working class in Greece. Our experience from the land workers of Manolada, the fields of Marathon, the Egyptian fishermen, the construction sites of the Construction Industry and the bean counters of Attica has shown that the development of action in defence of their rights is a task for the class-oriented workers’ trade union movement. We continue our struggle in opposition to the capital’s pursuit to exploit them to further reduce the price of labour power as a whole, with transnational agreements of modern slave trade already signed by the Greek government on the grounds of the demographic problem and the lack of workers’ hands.
A similar crucial issue is the mass participation of women in the trade unions, their elevation to the leadership of the trade unions. A substantial step must be taken in the elaboration of frameworks of struggle that take into account their specific needs to draw them into action at a time when they are confronted with all the consequences of anti-people’s policies, the shrinking of critical social services and infrastructure.
We must face with boldness and determination the inertia and poor functioning of many trade unions. The pressure exerted by the government and employers against trade union rights and the economic independence of trade unions will only grow stronger. We oppose the compromise and the difficulties generated by the attack of capital and the negative consequences on the lives of workers that generate additional obstacles. The vitalisation of the activity of the Unions, the formation of Boards and Committees by active militants, the collective, mass, democratic processes, the collection of dues and the events for the financial support of the Unions are the first concern of the trade unionists of PAME. Without such work we cannot talk about reorganization and counterattack of the trade union movement.
We strengthen the joint action with the mass organisations of the poor peasants and self-employed, the women and children of working and popular families.
The three years that have passed have strengthened the river of common action of the popular strata and solidarity in the great struggles, in the struggle to protect the life and property of the people from natural disasters, in the conflicts to prevent poor people’s families from being wiped out, in the struggle to prevent the collapse of the public health system, against the privatisation of higher education, for the just demands of the peasants.
These struggles have made a huge contribution to boosting the morale of people who have been hit by anti-people’s policies and abandonment.To strengthen popular organization, coordination and solidarity.The infinite potential of the popular struggle, initiative and self-activity were revealed.The confidence of popular sections in the trade unions, PAME and the joint action was strengthened even more.
First and foremost the contribution of the organised working class, the catalytic intervention of the class trade unions and especially of the local Labour Centres that are rallying in PAME was confirmed, so that the struggle could focus on the real causes that oppress the life of the popular strata, the unpopular policies of the bourgeois governments, the municipalities and regions, the business groups. To work out the appropriate slogans, to promote not only immediate relief measures but also the prospect of a better life for our people.
The example of these struggles shows the path that all trade unions must follow in the coming period. Above all they show the orientation that must be held, strengthened by the trade union movement for the alliance with the other movements. With an elaborated framework of demands based on the common problems created by capitalist development.
The trade unions with meaningful collective processes, meaningful discussion in their managements, joint meetings with the mass bodies of the popular strata put in the centre:
- Health to be a guaranteed social good and not a commodity. For a single, exclusively public and free system of Health – Welfare, for all, for the satisfaction of all the needs of the people in modern prevention – treatment – rehabilitation services.
- Exclusively public and free, upgraded Education for all. Abolition of business and all class barriers and filters that enter Education.
- Strengthen the front against foreclosures and evictions. Demand measures for popular housing and legal protection of first homes.
- To strengthen the demand for measures for protection from natural disasters, with infrastructure projects for fire protection, flood protection, anti-seismic protection, ensuring logistical infrastructure and recruitment of permanent staff.
- Disengagement of our country from the imperialist plans and wars organized by the USA – NATO – EU. Stopnow the genocide of the Palestinian people.
This is the way to strengthen the struggle against those who oppress our people, the big monopoly groups and the governments that serve them, for the great social upheavals that prioritize the modern social needs of all the people.
It is promising that in recent years in Europe, but also in many countries of the world, we have mass workers’ and people’s struggles. We have the huge mobilisations against the genocide of the Palestinian people, the most characteristic being the mobilisations organised a few months ago by student associations in a number of countries around the world, including in the USA and in European countries. All together as one fist we send the message from the PAME conference for Freedom in Palestine!
It is also promising that in most of the mobilisations are led by Trade Unions and mass organisations “from below”, Federations and Workers’ Centres, business and sectoral unions, some of which are also members of the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU). They are led by unions formed in the heat of battle and because of the very acute problems faced by workers in all countries of the world. Such is the example of the Amazon workers.
These mobilisations were mainly against the national confederations of workers, against the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) and the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) which are instruments of capital. They are instruments of the bourgeoisie and the business groups within the trade union movement, official interlocutors and social partners of the governments and the imperialist organisations, NATO and the EU.
PAME will continue to give all its forces through the World Trade Union Federation to strengthen and expand the class, anti-capitalist, internationalist struggle of the working class.
Colleagues, colleagues, dear comrades,
we shake the hand of each and every one of you.
We join forces and organise the struggle with optimism and faith in the strength and justice of our class.
We shout loudly the slogan that was born in great conflicts and confrontations and is the flag of PAME.
Without you, the cogs will not turn!
Worker, you can do without bosses!”.