Austria: mass strike looming against cuts
Workers Power Global, Austria: 27 April 2003

The new, old right wing government is ready for a full-blown attack against the working class and youth. The conservative Peoples Party (…VP) and the Freiheitliche Party of Jšrg Haider ö already in power since spring 2000 - formed another coalition after the elections in November last year.

This reactionary government plans a massive austerity package that includes substantial cuts in social welfare. The plan includes the reduction of unemployment benefit and a policy to force people to take any job the bosses offer them. It also includes cuts in the education budget that would lead to teachers being sacked.

The worst aspect of this attack is the planned reform of the pension system. While all the consequences of the plan are still unclear ö unsurprisingly the government tries to keep the public in the dark as much as possible ö there is no doubt that this is an historic attack. In effect it would lead to a reduction of pension payments of between 10-40 per cent!

The main goal of this reform is force people to join the private pension system which offers enormous opportunities for the financial capitalists. As everyone knows from the experience in the USA from the point of view of working class pensioners this is like going to the casino and putting your money on roulette. Most likely you will loose as many US pensioners did when the stock market collapsed in 2000.

It is simply robbery. They want to empty our pockets and enrich the wealthy.

This attack has provoked an enormous outcry. Not only did the social democratic and the Green opposition parties reject the plan there is even resistance from inside the coalition parties. The trade union federation …GB agreed to strike if the government does not withdraw their plans by 29 April. (which is extremely unlikely). Even the conservative and Freiheitliche trade union leaders support the strike proposals.

While strikes are common in most European countries, in Austria the opposite is true. Here the union leaders boast of the absence of strikes since it makes Austria attractive to capitalist investors. In the past the union bureaucracy has avoided again and again transforming the anger of the rank and file into mass strike actions.

But now people say simply: "Enough is enough!" The union headquarters are bombarded by literally thousands of phone calls and faxes from enraged workers that this time the union must take a stand and fight. In public polls most people see strike actions against the government plans as justified. Even sectors of the bourgeoisie criticise the plans as too harsh and too rash.

Unfortunately for the union bureaucracy the government is in no mood for a face-saving compromise. This struggle is in reality much more than just pensions. It is a power struggle between the big bourgeoisie and its executive ö the government ö on one hand and the workersâ movement on the other hand.

So for the first time for more than five decades the union leadership adopted plans for strike actions. On Monday 28 April the union of transport workers will effectively block a central highway with many trucks driving extremely slowly. Another strike action is planned by the printers and on 6 May the tramway and tube workers will strike in the morning. The whole day will see an all-out strike in the schools and universities and on the next day mass strikes are planned across private industry and also a mass demonstration which the organisers expect up to 150,000 to take part.

The drama of the whole situation is also reflected by the reformist leadershipâs unusual willingness to co-operate with the left wing organisations. Normally they plan only in months and reject any initiative for short-term class struggle actions. But this time everything is ready within days. And while they usually ignore the radical left this time they phoned the ArbeiterInnenstandpunkt and the youth organisation REVOLUTION and other left-wing groups to meet on the same day to prepare and organise the school and university strike on 6 May.

Our activists in the schools already gained important experience in the last weeks when we organised together with other radical left-wing groups the mass school strike on Day X ö when the imperialist war against Iraq started. We will try to transform the militant anti-imperialist spirit of the youth into battle-readiness against the new capitalist attacks. As revolutionary Marxists we say: "First it was the capitalist war against Iraq. Now it is the capitalist war at the domestic front against the working class and youth. It is one and the same class responsible for it: the bosses desperate to raise their profit. We fight them always and everywhere!"

We also started an initiative of trade union activists who formulated a model resolution for an all-out strike to force the government to back down and for the election of strike committees. This is particularly important because we have no reason to trust the radical rhetoric of the union leaders. They sold us out in the past and even now they are just waiting for a face-saving offer from the government. The election of strike committees at work place meetings is essential to increase the pressure on the leadership and to be able to take the fight into our own hands.

Last but not least while the planned strikes in the coming 10 days are an important step they can not be more than the first step. Because it is very unlikely the government will back down just because of one strike. We need a general strike to make the government withdraw its austerity package.

One thing is clear: if the union leadership does not capitulate at the last minute than we will see a historic development in Austria: the first mass strike since more than 50 years.