DTUC New Year Message: 2023 will provide 365 opportunities to join a union and pursue your own economic interests

The workers’ lobby predicted the momentum developed by the trade union movement last year will continue in 2023.

“The new year arrives bringing with it another 365 opportunities to make the decisions and take the necessary coordinated action to end the perpetual punctuation of our lives by those who operate against our best interests; 365 opportunities to become a trade union card holder and get active in your local trade union branch.

“In 2022 we witnessed how the trade union movement can be the magnet that brings together and renews all those who live for, want and demand better, those who have had enough of being mugged by the establishment.

“The collective influence and power of trade unions is the one thing the establishment fears above all else.

“The movement that has the ability to deliver a society in which everyone is seen as valued and worthy.

“DTUC will continue to play our part in 2023 - in this reawakened fight back,” said the DTUC chair Niall McCarroll.

The statement paid tribute to a number of prominent activists who died during the course of 2022.

“We said slán go fóill to Donncha Mac Niallais, Stephen Gargan and Dermie McClenaghan all of whom being immovable objects in the face of oppression; moral pillars of justice and decency and whose power was in their independence.

“In their spirit and in the memory of others who we also bid farewell in 2022, we must push on, with them and for them,” said Mr. McCarroll.

The DTUC struck a militant note, stating that ‘a key objective for the incoming year must be to cause maximum economic damage to those who refuse to share the wealth or believe in negotiating a fair deal for everyone’.

“We can no longer accept profiteering in times of crisis. This year communities and people must come first - the year of the collective not the elite. Decisions must be made in the interests of ordinary people, not the individual, the global markets or the growth of capitalism,” the statement reads.

Mr. McCarroll claimed those at the top of the banking sector were ‘poised to make over £33bn in 2022’.

He said a projected £200bn in excess profits was forecast for the next two years for energy companies. Mr. McCarroll said it was unfair people are living in poverty when so many billionaires are living in Ireland and Britain.

“Something’s wrong and it’s about time it was corrected. The consistent message from the establishment being that there just isn’t any excess money available for workers to be given above inflation pay rises or the necessary funds to expand and protect our public services,” said Mr. McCarroll.

DTUC called for greater investment in public services across health and education in particular.

“Enough is enough. The call to protect our public services has never been more needed,” the trade union lobby said.

Mr. McCarroll pledged: “DTUC will as always continue to support our colleagues on their picket lines in 2023. It is on the picket line and through mobilising on the streets that this battle will be won.”