Hitting the phones at Jack Jones House

If the 1% pay cap had been imposed on MPs,
they would receive £6832 less now.

Merseyside ARMS members, myself, Steve Ion and Steve Hughes hit the phones recently reminding members to vote in the strike ballot.

Based on the responses of the members we spoke to, we can report overwhelming support for the proposed action and, where members declined to say which way the voted, they had returned their ballot paper.

Encouraging, but no time for complacency. As many members as possible should hit the phones and speak to the shop floor. The members appreciate the time given to contact them.

Tony Mulhearn

ARMS Mersey

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P.S. A message received today from the PCS NWRC in Liverpool:

Firstly thanks to all of you who have volunteered to participate in phone banking thus far. This is just a brief reminder that we are still looking for volunteers to participate in phone banking for the forthcoming weekend and week.

Phone banking will take place this weekend, Saturday 14h July from 10:00am and the office will be open until 2:00pm. If you can spare some time to help please contact NW Regional Office as soon as possible via e-mail: NWRC@pcs.org.uk and let us know what time you are available to come in to help.

Phone banking is also continuing on weekdays up to 7:00pm each evening until Wednesday 18th July inclusive. At this stage in the ballot we need to make all efforts to contact as many members as possible, so if you are able to give some time to help the campaign, please email the NW Regional Office.

The more reps and members help with the campaign, the greater the likelihood of our success, so please consider sparing an hour or so to assist.

Full instructions, together with a script will be provided and a full time officer will be on hand to assist you with any questions you have. Reasonable travel costs will also be met.

Thank you in anticipation of your support.

PCS North West Regional Centre

By-election results - ARMS motion

This emergency motion was proposed at the NW ARMS AGM on Wednesday 1 March by Tony Mulhearn and passed by the meeting.

North West ARMs welcomes the victory for Labour in Stoke but also recognises the setback in the Copeland by-election.

We believe that major factors in the Copeland result were:

1. The wrecking intervention by the Mandelson and Blair who days before the election slandered Jeremy Corbyn, and the continuous sniping by Blairite MPs in the PLP.
2. The Tory and right wing-inspired media distortions about Corbyn's policy on nuclear power. He has categorically stated that no nuclear industry worker will lose their jobs under a Corbyn-led Labour government.
3. The Blairites' responsibility for the defeat shown by the decline in Labour's majority in Copeland which had declined from nearly 12000 in 1997 to 2564 in 2015.

We believe it essential that the treacherous Blairite MPs who continually undermine Corbyn should be held to account by the membership who should be empowered to deselect those MPs who sabotage his leadership, including Frank Field who has called for an end to the triple lock which would undermine the already inadequate state pension.

This government is determined to continue with its attacks on working class living standards, pensioners' entitlements, the NHS and the trade unions. We reaffirm our support for Jeremy Corbyn and the policies he represents and call for the fight to be stepped up to force the government to retreat.

EU vote: what next?

North West ARMS committee member Tony Mulhearn proposes the Labour Movement's response to the referendum result.

The result shows a clear majority rejecting a system which has seen inequality reaching the highest levels in modern history. Endless austerity and attacks on workers' rights has been rejected. The Tories have been given their marching orders and are in complete disarray. Jeremy Corbyn and the TU leaders should demand a general election now.

Farage’s temporary triumphalism, which can only flourish in times of shortage, can be crushed by a confident Labour Movement mobilising all anti-austerity forces to finish the job off by throwing the Tories into the dustbin of history and returning a Corbyn-led Labour government committed to rolling back the cuts and bringing our utilities and the NHS back into public ownership. We can reach out to the European Labour and anti-austerity movement to join us in this objective.

EU Ballot - D-Day Minus One

By Tony Mulhearn, ARMS NW committee member.

When you cast your vote remember this:

1. The institutions of the EU are controlled by unelected people with extremely dodgy political connections. EU President Junker, for instance, presided over Luxembourg which was a haven for every tax-dodging fat cat on the planet.
2. He was the bloke who patted Tsipras and Varoufakis on the head, ignored their pleas for a more caring capitalism, and chased them back to Greece to inflict the most appalling cuts in working class living standards in Greece’s history while that country’s fat cats who caused the crisis continue to live in opulent splendour and plunder state-owned institutions.
3. The EU blocked Portugal from implementing a no-cuts budget
4. It was the EU that ordered an increase in women’s retirement age from 60 to 65.
5. EU treaties protect freedoms for Business to move labour from member state to another and to ensure there is ‘no distortion of competition’. That means freedom for unscrupulous employers to pay the lowest rate of any EU country.
6. A condition of receiving EU ‘bale-outs’ is also that the recipient countries degrade the ability of trade unions to defend their members. National wage bargaining in Greece has all but disappeared.
7. Remaining will ensure that a more confident EU will act as an obstacle to a future Labour government from bringing back into public ownership the NHS, Rail, and the other public utilities that have been flogged off with the poisoned brew of TTIP as an additional weapon in their hands.
8. Unity of the international working class will not be achieved via this reactionary institution but via the struggle against austerity organised on a European basis. 

EU vote: a message from Mark Serwotka & Janice Godrich

We urge you to use your vote in the EU Referendum on 23 June and to challenge politicians on both sides of the debate to say how remaining or leaving the EU will best serve your interests as a PCS member.

The debate in the national media has been dominated by myths and wild claims about the dangers of leaving or remaining in the EU. So our annual delegate conference last month agreed to launch a "PCS informs - you decide" campaign - challenging politicians on both sides of the debate to provide concrete information on how your jobs, pay, pensions and public services would be affected by a vote to leave or to remain in the EU.

Our special EU referendum publication outlines the issues that we need solid factual information on, including:

• Public services
• Trade union and workers' rights
• Economic growth and living standards
• Democracy
• Human rights
• Impact on women
• Immigration.

We hope you use the questions in this publication to challenge the 'remain' and 'leave' campaigners at hustings, on the streets and on the doorstep.

MARK SERWOTKA
General Secretary

JANICE GODRICH
President

Political Fund Ballot

ARMS members: it's nearly the deadline. Make sure you return your vote. For more info, click here.