The German Socialist Equality Party (Partei für Soziale Gleichheit —PSG) is the only party that unreservedly supports the current strike by train drivers and has consistently supported them against the vehement attacks of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the German Federation of Trade Unions (DGB). We call upon all readers of the WSWS to participate in meetings to learn more about the aims of the strike and the broader significance of this dispute.

The conflict between the train drivers and the management of German Railways (Deutsche Bahn—DB) has long since gone beyond the limits of a normal contract dispute. The DB is determined to deliver a decisive blow to a militant layer of its workforce and smash the train drivers’ trade union. To this end, it is stubbornly refusing to make any concessions, and it has the active support of the German government, the courts, big business federations and the DGB.

If the DB management is successful, this will have serious consequences for all other workers. Any resistance to wage and welfare cuts, any opposition to the policies of the redivision of social wealth in favour of the rich, will be intimidated and criminalized. A defeat for the train drivers would open the floodgates for new attacks on the working class as a whole.

The Socialist Equality Party therefore calls upon the entire working population to express its solidarity with the train drivers. Do not allow the DGB trade unions to isolate the strikers and create conditions in which their struggle can be broken by DB management and criminalized by the courts! Build solidarity committees and make the struggle by train drivers the starting point for a broad offensive against wage and welfare cuts, and against the grand coalition government in Berlin.

Berlin
Tuesday, October 30, 2007, 19.00
Jugendgästehaus der Berliner Stadtmission
Seminarraum 007
Lehrter Straße 68
(close to Hauptbahnhof)

Frankfurt/Main
Friday, November 2, 2007, 19.00
Saalbau Griesheim, Raum 4
Schwarzerlenweg (adjoining the Metro station)