We are workers, youth and trade union and political activists from every tendency of the labour movement, and from every country of Europe (members or not of the European Union).
A referendum has been called on 23 June in Britain, with one question on the agenda: “stay” in the European Union or “leave” it.
We salute and support those trade unions, Labour Party branches and CLPs and those British labour activists who, despite the instructions issued by the Labour Party leadership and the leading circles of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), have decided to call for a vote to “leave” the European Union on 23 June!
From Greece to Portugal, from Poland to Germany and elsewhere, for years we have experienced the true meaning of the European treaties based on “free and undistorted competition”, the directives and programmes dictated by the European Union or by the Troika (and implemented by every one of the governments, whatever their political colour).
Our peoples and the workers of the whole of Europe have suffered the same policy, whether their countries are members of the European Union or in Association Partnerships: deregulation, the dismantling of the Labour Code and labour rights (pensions, social security, collective bargaining agreements), the privatisation-destruction of public services and budget cuts in the name of the national debt, and the putting into question of every form of national and popular sovereignty.
We note that the European Union (interlinked with NATO through treaties) supports the foreign military interventions that are driving millions of refugees onto the road to exile.
We note that at the European Summit of 18 and 19 February, the British Prime Minister and the European Commission concluded an agreement which will aggravate even further the process of making workers compete with each other. Under that agreement, any worker originating in an EU country and emigrating to Britain will be deprived for four years of all the social rights won by the British working class through struggle. This can only lead to competition between workers, and to a new offensive to drive down the “cost of labour” of the British workers and to encourage a climate of reactionary xenophobia.
Against this “European Union”, which tries by every possible means to set workers against each other for the great benefit of the capitalists and bankers, we counterpose the union of the workers and peoples of the whole of Europe for defending and winning back their rights, sovereignty and democracy.
Together with the 578 delegates who met at the annual Conference of the Trondheim Trades Council of the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (LO), we support the British workers who will vote in favour of “leaving the EU” and “struggling hand-in-hand with the workers of Europe and the whole world”.
A victory for the British workers on 23 June will be a leverage-point for all workers who in every country are opposing through their own class struggle the destructive plans of the European Union and the governments that are carrying out its policy.
Primary movers
Peter KREUTLER (Vice-Chair Afa Düsseldorf, Ver.di ( member of the executive committee of the 6th Sector shop-stewards conference ( Central and local government public workers ) Düsseldorf
Dr Cornelia MATZKE (former member of the Saxony Regional Assembly after 1989, Ver.di)
Norbert MÜLLER (Ver.di, AfA, Francfurt/Main)
Peter SAALMÜLLER (Ver.di, SPD)
Anna Helena SCHUSTER (Ver.di, shop-steward )
Birgit SCHUTZ Food service Trade Union ( NGG ), member of the company committee , AfA Düsseldorf)
Holger PFEIFFER (Ver;di, shop-steward )
H.W. SCHUSTER (Ver.di, Shop-steward , Chair AfA Düsseldorf)
I publicly endorse this appeal
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Signed in an official / a personal capacity (Delete as appropriate)
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Endorsements to be returned to :
H.-W. Schuster, Liebfrauenstraße 31, 40591 Düsseldorf, Fax +49 211 7599092
E-Mail: h.w_schuster@yahoo.com
