STUC leader: 'The cost of living will crush us — and Scottish independence won't help'

No-one in power is sticking up for ordinary people, she believes, and with a crippling cost-of-living crisis mounting, Foyer is ready to bring thousands of people out onto the streets in protest.

Would independence help ordinary Scottish workers facing this dire economic downturn? Definitely not in its present form, Foyer says – the current SNP plans are far too centrist and just not radical enough.

Covid lies

WITH governments claiming we are “exiting” the pandemic, high on Foyer’s list of hates is the lies told by politicians that post-Covid we would build a better, fairer world. As Downing Street’s partygate scandal has shown, Foyer feels, ordinary folk were fools to believe claims that “we’re all in it together”.

“Why would we expect the powers that be to change anything?” she asks. “Society is built on neoliberal capitalism – which itself was built on slavery. The people who run our world aren’t the people who play fair. If we want change, we need to get angry. Unless politicians are willing to change the fundamental inequalities that were already there as we entered the pandemic then it’s all really just rhetoric and b*****t.”

There are around 600,000 people in Scottish trade unions and one million key workers, a third of them paid under £10 an hour. “These workers were 40 per cent more likely to die during pandemic,” she says. “It’s incumbent on people like me to organise these workers and tap into their anger.

“Sick pay is a joke, the benefits system is a joke. People have died because of the decisions our governments made. We have to agitate and start talking to people about changing the system.”

Policies like furlough show that the “neoliberal” notion of minimum state intervention was wrong all along, Foyer believes. “We’re facing so many crises today

– from the need to go to net zero, automation threatening jobs, the cost of living. Covid was just the tip of the iceberg. It proved you need big government,” she says. “You need community – society.”

Foyer adds: “We should hang our heads in shame when we look at UK death figures. There’s a direct link to our social policies.”

Cost of living crisis

THIS year, we are facing a perfect storm of higher taxes, and rises for energy and food prices. “It’s going to be really, really tough,” says Foyer. “We’re talking about a third of families plunged into fuel poverty, massive hikes in bills for people already suffering. There’s going to be a hit on jobs. People are going to be squeezed and we’ll see real hardship.”

The crisis, Foyer admits, is “an opportunity for us to change the political dogma that’s dominated for decades”. She adds: “Since the late 1970s, we’ve had that neoliberal ideology – the financialisation of capital; lack of investment in innovation, business and the public sector; privatisation; attacks on trade unions.

“All that’s meant working-class people have gone backwards since the post-war years when we came out of huge crises – war and depression – and managed to build an NHS, council housing, good education, secure jobs, an expectation of a decent old age, dignity through work and a decent standard of living. There’s no reason we can’t shift the dial and regain that.”

Trade unions and left-wing politicians need to “stop being shy when it comes to talking about class and renationalisation of transport, energy services and essential public services”. Foyer says: “We need to be really loud and proud about the fact that we should tax the rich, that wealth inequalities have widened to an obscene extent.”

She notes the wealth of the world’s top 10 billionaires doubling during Covid, while 99% of the planet saw incomes fall. “Yet people seem scared to cross the rubicon,” she says. “It’s almost taboo in mainstream politics to talk about these things. We need to build a big, bad, angry movement for change. Working-class people have more power than they dare imagine and we need to start exercising it. Sometimes you get a spark that ignites anger. There’s a lot of tinder out there so the spark can take light.

“Being a trade unionist is like joining a gym – you don’t just passively sit back and hope for change. You need to be out there on the streets, you need to sweat. There’s no shortage of wealth – we’re one of the richest countries in the world.

“The question is how those resources are shared. Nobody is going to hand it to you – we have to fight for it.

“We need to get more militant. I can make the best arguments in the world in the corridors of power but if I don’t have hundreds of thousands of trade unionists standing behind me ready to vote a government out then that government isn’t going to listen.”

The notion trade unions are a thing of the past is nonsense, she says. Over recent years, membership has grown and young people are increasingly joining, given their experiences of zero-hours contracts and the gig economy. “Just look at taxi drivers,” she says. “Five years ago, you’d never meet a taxi driver who was in a union – today you’ll find most of them members because they’ve realised they need a powerful collective voice. The penny has dropped in hospitality, retail, the entertainment industry.”

SNP empty words?

WHEN it comes to making changes that matter to ordinary people, the Scottish Government “talks the talk but it doesn’t walk the walk,” Foyer says.

“This is a government which talks the language of ‘the wellbeing economy’, ‘inclusivity’ and ‘tackling the wealth gap’ but these are just warm words, and the time for warm words is over”.

The SNP “wears progressive clothes but we need real solid action as we’ve seen some catastrophic failures”, Foyer adds, pointing to scandals such as the collapse of the Scottish engineering firm BiFab, the failure to generate green jobs, and social problems such as the highest drug death figures in Europe.

She does praise the Sturgeon Government, however, for “a degree of access and dialogue that you don’t get at Westminster. That’s very welcome, and we certainly wouldn’t want to give up that seat at the table. However, there’s no point in that dialogue if your words aren’t being heard”.

The Scottish Government should make its support for companies and contractors – through its £13 billion procurement budget – dependent on them signing up to “tough requirements on fair work that include a commitment to collective bargaining to address the endemic low pay that exists across many sectors in Scotland”.

“For us, it’s about Government putting their money where their mouth is, walking the walk as well as talking the talk,” says Foyer. “Putting on progressive clothes certainly seems to have been part of the strategy over the last 10 years. It’s beginning to wear thin – like the emperor’s new clothes. You can only just talk about things for so long before you eventually have to take responsibility.”

No to indy for now

“THE constitutional debate has been very difficult for the trade union movement,” Foyer says. “It’s dominated everything and effectively split the working class, stopping us from really having the debate about how we get a fairer share of wealth and power in this country.”

The STUC has no affiliation with Labour – despite what many think – so its attitude towards independence and the union isn’t based on support for the party. When it comes to the constitution, Foyer questions whether the SNP has even used the powers already at its disposal to help ordinary people.

She says: “Whether you’re talking independence, the status quo, or devo max, what will be done with the powers available to make a real difference to working people?

“Having gone through Brexit, the devil is in the detail. When it comes to constitutional change, a lot of big fiscal questions need to be answered.

“At the moment the SNP [Sustainable] Growth Commission version of independence does nothing to change or make life better for working people. Similarly, the status quo with Tories dominating Westminster does nothing for working people either. We need to shift the debate to being around the powers we need to transform our economy. We support the right of the Scottish people to make the decision about whether there’s another referendum, and that decision should rest with the Scottish Parliament. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean the STUC supports independence. So, come up with options – tell us how they’ll make a difference to workers.”

The Sustainable Growth Commission vision of an independent Scotland – set out by the SNP in 2018 and yet to be updated – has been criticised for being too centrist. “It’s not going to transform our country,” says Foyer. “If there was a prospectus which offered a really progressive vision of independence, or further devolution of key powers, then we might be inclined to consider that. But right now, the jury is out until we see what’s on offer.”

Woke wars

FOYER isn’t someone on the left “upset about the woke brigades”, she says, adding: “I actually think you need to embrace the ‘wokeness’.” Foyer feels the entire narrative around “wokeness” is a diversion concocted by the right to split the progressive left – similar to the attack on “political correctness” in the 1980s. Both terms simply mean “being decent to other people”, she believes.

“The attack on ‘wokeness’ is an attempt to influence working-class people. We need to be building alliances. Not split. Whether you’re trans or feminists or whatever your identity – if you’re progressive and believe in workers’ rights then we’re all on the same side. We aren’t going to get involved in pitting one group against another in terms of equality. Nobody should be discriminated against.”

Foyer says she understands “why people of a certain age may feel intimidated” by the pace of social change, but accepts that it’s the younger generation now shaping the future. She believes “trans people are some of the most discriminated against in our society who suffer great levels of violence. We don’t see that it weakens women to support trans women. That’s our stance and I’m proud of it. We’re stronger when we’re together.”

She feels much of the “anti-woke agenda” stems from the American ‘alt-right’ and evangelical Christians, and has been picked up by “populists” across the UK. “We need to be cognisant of history,” she says, “about fascism on the rise. You can sense that, even in some of the support around the Johnson Government. The rise of fascism in the 1930s was on the back of depression, war and crisis – there was an opportunity there for extremists to fill a political vacuum with hate and blaming others.”

Anger and protest

“THE rich did nothing to get us through the pandemic, it was all down to ordinary people – people on low pay, precarious contracts, people who’ll struggle to heat their homes this year,” Foyer says. “There’s something wrong with society if we can’t take care of the vast majority of people given the huge profits that are made. Yet the working class is told it’s migrants coming in rowing boats who are their enemy. The real enemies of the people arrive in this country on private jets – the ruling class.

“We need change on a global, not just domestic level, and I don’t underestimate the struggle ahead to achieve that. Certainly somebody has to put socialism back into public discussion. Under my leadership, I’ll do everything I can to shout that from the rooftops.”

So, is she ready to get people out on the streets in mass protests? “I’d predict that this year people will be out on the streets over the cost of living. This is going to be really tough for workers.”

Green agenda fear

FOYER says she understands “why some trade unionists are hesitant about the ‘Green transition’ and suspicious that whole communities are going to be flung on the scrapheap”. There are fears that areas dependent on the oil and gas industry in the north-east could end up devastated like mining communities under Thatcherism as the economy goes green. Any transition “must be just”, Foyer adds.

“When the last round of offshore wind contracts went out we had around £5bn in awarded but almost no jobs created here in Scotland. With the new ScotWind contracts awarded this week, the Scottish Government now has an opportunity to show they’ve learned the lessons of the past.”

There has been criticism over the failure to ensure Scottish firms build the equipment for wind turbines and other green technologies to ensure jobs and wages. “We don’t want to see that kind of failure again.”

Trade unions “need to be more green, but environmentalists need to be more red”, she adds. America is investing around £3,000 per person in green jobs – in the UK it’s £180, Foyer says. “We’ve got all these shiny announcements that don’t add up to anything.”

When it comes to green retrofitting homes, upgrades should be done by councils giving work to local people.There has been talk of Sturgeon becoming “the Thatcher of the north-east”.

The First Minister, says Foyer, can “take the high road or the low road when it comes to the green transition”, adding: “The low road means selling off the family silver, not bothering about job creation, leaving it to private companies to make huge profits but no benefit for the people.

“Or we can take the high road and make sure any private investor who we allow to come in brings benefit and opportunities for the people because remember, we’re doing them a favour, they aren’t doing us a favour. Tax them, ensure there’s fair work and good jobs – make any contracts conditional on that. These are simple political choices. My message to Government is: put workers at the heart of your transition strategy. Deliver with skills, training, jobs and investment.”

Fighting talk

FOYER has no problem with the idea of more bosses ending in court or jail for corporate wrongdoing. Sick pay should be tripled as the level is so low that many workers don’t take time off when they’re unwell. “In the context of Covid, it’s tantamount to manslaughter,” she adds.

It’s also time for a universal basic income, Foyer believes – where everyone is guaranteed a living wage even if they’re unemployed. This would help the huge numbers of people – mostly women – working as unpaid carers for elderly relatives.

Foyer says it rebalances the scales for ordinary people in a society where “no political party has a policy of full employment”.

Likewise, the four-day week – with no loss of earnings – is “an excellent idea” which promotes the “wellbeing of workers” and makes sense in the age of automation and AI devastating jobs. We should also “be taxing business appropriately so workers can retire earlier”. The current age of retirement is 66, but set to rise.

“Work brings dignity and society needs to elevate the idea of what work really means,” she adds. “It’s obscene that we live in a world where a venture capitalist can shut down a company because they’ll get more money for selling off the land and machinery than they would for creating employment in the community.”

Buses and trains should be taken back into public ownership, and “the current market failure across our energy providers opens up the debate about ownership here too”.

Foyer knows that the changes she wants to see happen in society demand an almost unimaginably difficult struggle.

“I’ve had my fair share of battles, though,” she says. Foyer rose to the top of the Scottish trade union movement, after all – which, she adds, “is no less misogynistic than any other part of society”.

She says: “I joined a trade union to change things for the better. That’s what I’m still trying to do, so I’ve no problem with a fight.”