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British union leaders call for global unions to adopt BDS position

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The PSC logo - a one state solution? This the view of Hamas, not the trade union movement.

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign has finally published the statement of a delegation of  a half dozen British trade union leaders representing five trade unions (Unite, RMT, TSSA, PCS, and Napo).

The trade unionists involved were:

Gerry Doherty - General Secretary TSSA; Simon Dubbins - Director International Department, UNITE the Union; Garry Hassell - Executive RMT; Shaun Hoyle - Executive RMT; Hugh Lanning - Chair PSC and Deputy General Secretary PCS;  and Jonathan Ledger - General Secretary NAPO.

It is a one-sided, biased and inaccurate account of their visit and their views — and for some reason it took six weeks to appear on the web.

The delegates write:

The TUC should call again on all its affiliates and allies to maximise their efforts in pursuit of establishing a pro-BDS position in the European and Global Union Federations. The TUC should also raise the issue with the European TUC by calling on it to support the international BDS campaign and pressing the EU institutions to end the EU-Israel regime of trade privileges until the situation is resolved.

The report lists organizations and individuals the delegation met with — these did not seem to include the Histadrut, Israel’s national trade union centre.

The statement strongly supports the campaign of boycotts, divestments and sanctions (BDS) and encourages the British Trades Union Congress to build global support for this, specifically naming the International Trade Union Confederation as a target.