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PCS at Glastonbury

26 June 2008

PCS once again has a presence at Left Field at this years Glastonbury Festival. Festival goers are able to find out about our campaigns by visiting the PCS stall. There will also be PCS speakers in the Left Field tent including deputy general secretary Hugh Lanning who will be talking about our international work with unions across the world on Thursday, and general secretary Mark Serwotka who joins Tony Benn for his Sunday lunchtime debate.

PCS at Glastonbury

Tracy Edwards from PCS young members has sent this blog from Glastonbury:

Day one at Glastonbury

We have set up our tent right at the entrance to Glastonbury, it's 10am and already there are a few hundred people gathered round inside the tent and outside.

We have our PCS@Glastonbury t shirts hanging all round. Jeremy Dear, general secretary of the National Union of Journalists is the first person to donate £10 to our hardship fund.

As well as buying the PCS t-shirt Jeremy, alongside Tim Lezard, chair of the south west region TUC signed our petition for fair pay for public servants.

We've brought along 100 of these t-shirts, it's now 2pm we've sold four and have raised nearly £50.

Festival goers oppose public sector cuts

Chris Carree from the Land Registry in Swansea has been spending most of his time collecting signatures and speaking to mainly young festival goers about the threats that are occuring in the public sector and what they think about trade unions.

Most people at Leftfield today have a fair idea about what's happening in the public sector and are telling us that they are very worried about the governments 'quick fix' solution to public sector pay is having longer term.

They see it as another way for the government to sell off our services while we pay the price by enduring higher food and energy costs and at a time when it is really starting to bite for most people.

Already over 200 people have agreed with us that we should campaign against what's happening and have signed our petition. At our stall, loads of people have been asking us about trade unions, many asking what is the relevant union for them to join.

Because we are right near the entrance, people have been asking for information about the line-ups in the Leftfield tent - we have been providing this info - for a small donation!

The music has been good too. The Brit School Ska band having been getting hundreds of people jumping up and down and there's plenty of diverse music to join from provided by Moviemientos.

Supporting our brothers and sisters in Colombia

It's now the Latin American section and our deputy general secretary Hugh Lanning is on stage to introduce the next act, Palmeras Kanibales, a Venezuelan Ska band.

Before he does, Hugh mentions that he's pleased to be representing PCS at the international session at Leftfield this year again beause we're here to support what happening internationally.

He also told the crowd of 1,000 festival goers that we've just about to ballot all PCS members over the attacks on conditions, pay and services in the civil service.

Last year we accompanied a delegation to support our brothers and sisters in Colombia and when they were asked about why they risk their lives to speak out - they told us that we need the world to hear - and we have a duty as a trade union to further their cause.

Following Hugh's speech, Becky and Gemma from the anti slavery stall came down to vist, sign our petition and show solidarity with PCS. We will be heading down to their stall to ask about the work they do and how we can support them.

  • Tracy Edwards from PCS young members signing the public sector pay petition

  • Alison a PCS rep from MoD Innsworth enjoying the festival

  • The Leftfield tower at Glastonbury

  • A message of solidarity from PCS to our colleagues in Unison.

PCS members get the party started

We are also visited by Gethin Jones, a PCS member from the Land Registry in Swansea.

Gethin said this about our presence:

"I stumbled across the impressive PCS stall at the Leftfield Stage - refreshing to see his fellow union members and reps having an influencial presence at the most meaningful stage of the site. Good show guys and girls, have a ball."

Our very own Mark Barker from the HMRC in Liverpool is due to take up the decks soon and perform during the 'Liverpool Capital of Culture' session. Apart from DJ ing on stage, Mark will mention our work in the North West and in particular, our campaign against office closures in the HMRC.

Now 7pm, Mark Barker from HMRC Liverpool is due to introduce The Rascals, a local Liverpool band who played during the Liverpool Capital of Culture session. This is before he fits in his dj slots in between acts for tonight, Saturday night and Sunday morning.

Introducing The Rascals Mark gets the crowd cheering by telling them about fighting back against imposed pay cuts for staff who work in the culture sector in Liverpool - 1.3% pay rise was imposed on museum staff last year whilst the money that all the money which the government gave to the city council last year went on the Capital of Culture project.

Anti-fascist night

Thursday night and it's the anti fascist night. Hackney born reggae punk artirts the King Blues attract a massive crowd who seem to have came to Leftfield especially to see them.

Following a lively, jumping drum beat intro, Lead singer Itch set their peformance off by saying loud and proud "This is anti fascist night at Leftfield, we're an anti fascist band, we don't stand in the middle when it comes to that!"

A massive cheer comes from the crowd, the King Blues have tapped into the amazing feeling that is going round Leftfield and perform a blinding set.

Day two - Friday morning

Friday morning and it's been raining all night. Despite this, the PCS stall is still visited by many Leftfield goers.

There's some PCS members who have came down, one member who PCS campaigns officer James Davies has been chatting to from the DfT in Swansea congratulated our presence and went to say that PCS should continue to campaign as the lack of pay coherance in her department has left many members angry.

Righting wrongs

Friday night is the MOJO - Miscarriages of Justice Organisation - night. MOJO is a human rights charity dedicated to assisting innocent people unjustly imprisoned during their incarceration and after their release. Paddy Hill (Birmingham Six) and Gerard Conlon (Guildford Four) are on stage with Alabama 3 - it could only happen at the Leftfield.

Since 1985 tens of thousands of people have suffered miscarriages of justice. Tens of thousands of individuals wrongly convicted. Tens of thousands of people unjustly imprisoned. Tens of thousands of families denied a father, brother, mother or sister. Families like that of Paul Blackburn who spent more than 25 years inside for refusing to confess to a crime he didn't commit.

It's a brilliant night – with mixture of legends (Neville Staple from Two Tone band the Specials) and really good music. Alabama 3 rocked out the tent and Frank turner played a melodic soothing set at 1am.

Day three - Saturday

Saturday morning and our tent outside the Leftfield is a mud bath. We're moved up to the west entrance beside Unison and is a really good spot to catch people wandering around the site.

In the space of half an hour we're already sold 10 T-shirts. Steve Ryan is chatting to PCS member Alison Brookes who saw on the website we were coming but was worried she wouldn't find us!

Alison is on the branch executive in MoD in Innsworth. Alison was involved in the campaign to save RAF Innsworth from closure last year. The campaign resulted in 150 jobs being saved as the MoD announced last November they were planning to move to Gosport.

Alison said our tent was in a good spot and to see so many trade unions present gave a brilliant feel and atmosphere to the event, brings back the message about what trade unions are all about.

We're rushed off our feet as people are descending down to sign our petition and buy a t-shirt. The Unison stall next to us is doing well too - Ollie and Carolina tell me that they're getting a really positive response.

They have two giant boards where people can write up messages of support as they battle against the 2.45% pay rise imposed on public sector workers.

When not staffing the stall, they catch a bit of the Leftfield too. Ollie was well impressed with the Moviemientos session Thursday afternoon.

There's a good buzz about as people are looking forward to the Tony Benn rally tomorrow. Mark Serwotka is en route down to the site and will be introducing the Automatic tonight before joining Tony on stage tomorrow lunchtime for the rally.

The weather’s holding up and we expect a huge crowd later on for Reverend and the Makers.

Saturday afternoon and Mark Serwotka has arrived. Mark will be wowing the crowd later on when he introduces fellow Cardiff City fans the Automatic.

In the Leftfield tent, the RMT union are sharing a stall with the MOJO people. Dave Marshall from the RMT sends fraternal greetings to all PCS members and tells me that it's a real honour to share a stall with the MOJO crowd when you see the fantastic response they are getting from festival goers.

He also says it's all great to see different unions come together, as they always do each year at the Leftfield.

 

The PCS@Leftfield intervention raised over £450 for our hardship fund and Love Music Hate Racism.  Over 700 people signed our petition calling for fair pay for public servants. 

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