This has been the ninth day of our strike. I cannot recall a more serious withdrawal of labour in academia.
Today is International Women’s Day and this brings a sharper edge to our dispute. Women have always been at the forefront of labour struggles and this dispute is highly gendered. Those seeking to impose the changes to our pensions are fully aware that this dispute impacts on women disproportionately.
Our playlist for today was a real varied one. Some slowies, a bit of jazz and pop and then some heavy energetic stuff towards the end (we thought). The message remains: we stand together in our fight against an unjust group of decision-makers. If you are reading this remember our taglines are #music4thepickets and #USSstrikes and for today #IWD2018
- We started really softly this morning to capture the snowy moment of the picket line. This one is a bit biblical, but beautiful non the less, a 1941 version by Billie Holiday ‘God Bless The Child’.
- And we kept with the oldies with the great Cab Calloway and ‘Minnie the Moocher’. This is an absolute belter of a tune with its origins in the Harlem Cotton Club.
- Staying with a little bit of jazz we played Louie Prima and ‘Just A Gigolo’. While the pickets stood together we wondered who the ‘I Ain’t Got Nobody’ bit referred to?
- The Liverpool bias is built into this playlist I’m afraid and we had a bit of a change with its ‘Sinful’ by local lad Pete Wylie from the 1980s. To paraphrase ‘Hey Janet, I’ve never understood when UUK are so wicked, why should we be good?’ We are pleased to say that Pete retweeted this to show support for our cause.
- What will it be like if UUK are able to impose their mad plans to decimate our pensions? Here’s an apocalyptic view from David Bowie, ‘Five Years’. RIP man.
- Billy Bragg came next. We can’t have a playlist for a picket line without Billy can we? We indulged ourselves with his tune today ‘Scousers Never Buy the Sun’. When he found out Billy retweeted to show his support.
- And then we got a bit lively to finish off. Someone needs to do an analysis of this one and let me know what it is about, but its angry! Its the Subhumans and Subvert City. This lot are really mad at UUK, oh yes.
- Then came Twisted Sister and you know what, ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ – ok? UUK, understand? Got it? In fact, “It’s enough to make you stop believing when tears come fast and furious” and we followed with The Jam and ‘A Town Called Malice’.
- We thought we had finished today with Mick Jones and The Clash in the studio with ‘Stay Free’ – that’s the message to the pickets today.
- But we found two lurking tunes ready to play and first up was Grace Petrie reminding us that we can fight back with her fantastic song called ‘Maggie Thatcher’s Dream’.
- And then finally, finally, came an older thought. Some of us can remember the Allende government back in the 70s and what happened when Pinochet slaughtered people. So too does Alun Parry with this story about ‘Julio From Chile’ and we reflected on how unity and solidarity really does help.
So by the end of today’s playlist we have had support from Pete Hooton from The Farm, Ian Prowse, Amsterdam, Billy Bragg and Pete Wylie, each showing their solidarity with our dispute. Thanks to them and thanks to all for listening and reading. Victory to the UCU pickets and keep your heads held high! #USSstrike #music4thepickets
UCU UoL Management School 