Jim , if elected, will only accept the wage of a skilled worker. Jim stands against all cuts and for full funding of NHS, council and social care services. Scottish Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition press release – 5 February 2021
Scottish TUSC announce their candidate for Dundee West
For a socialist recovery from the Covid crisis
Build a mass movement for indyref2 and an independent sociali
st Scotland
Scottish TUSC today announced their candidate to contest the Dundee West parliamentary constituency for the May 6 Holyrood election. Jim is a local government worker and a trade union leader. As secretary of Dundee City Unison and a member of Unison's national executive council, Jim has an outstanding record of opposing austerity and defending workers' rights in the city. Jim was the Scottish TUSC candidate for Dundee West at the 2016 Scottish elections. Jim commented: “It is a privilege to have been selected as the Scottish TUSC candidate for Dundee West. As a trade union activist and council worker I know the incredible efforts and sacrifices made by workers during the pandemic. Both in the public and private sector, it has been the working class who have come to the fore to ensure public services, retail, transport, mail, delivery and logistics, among many other vital services, have been delivered.
“Now, as hopefully the pandemic begins to recede in the next weeks and months, we are demanding a real recovery for the working class. There can be no more going back to even a single penny of austerity and cuts. We need investment in jobs, wages and public services in Dundee. We need socialist policies including public ownership and an end to all forms of privatisation. We must end the scandal of rising levels of poverty and inequality which have rocketed during the last year of the pandemic. Crucially we need to build a new mass working class party based on the trade unions to offer that socialist alternative.
“In addition to a real recovery for the working class majority from the Covid crisis, the other key issue in this election will be the right for a second independence referendum. With Boris Johnson setting his face against the right of the Scottish people to decide their future, it's clear that we have a fight on our hands. Scottish TUSC is clear; a mass working-class movement including demos, strike action and occupations will be needed to defeat the Tories intransigence. I look forward standing as a socialist in this election campaign and playing my part in that struggle in the months ahead.”
Like all Scottish TUSC candidates, Jim has pledged to live on a skilled workers' wage if elected as an MSP, donating the rest back to trade union and socialist movement. Note for editors
Scottish TUSC was established in 2010 by the then general secretary of the Rail Maritime and Transport (RMT) trade union Bob Crow, Socialist Party Scotland among others. Today we are a coalition including the RMT union, Socialist Party Scotland, trade unionists, socialists and anti-austerity campaigners. Contact Scottish TUSC on 07889135533
email: [email protected]
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website: tusc.org.uk
