UNISONActive is an unofficial blog produced by UNISON activists for UNISON activists. Bringing news, briefings and events from a progressive left perspective.

Friday 8 June 2012

After Wisconsin - US public service unions under siege in Republican states

Americans for Tax Reform is the powerful right wing lobby upon which the UK’s Taxpayers’ Alliance is modelled. Its President Grover Norquist uses as a platform on the Guardian website to map out the coming republican offensive against public service unions and the Democratic Party, following the failure to unseat anti-union Republican Governor Scott Walker in Tuesday’s recall election:

‘The Walker law has changed the demographics and correlation of forces in Wisconsin politics. Membership in the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees fell to 28,745 in February, from 62,818 in March 2011... Watch Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Indiana, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Maine, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Idaho, Utah and Arizona to enact similar laws when legislatures reconvene next January’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/07/scott-walkers-win-permanent-defeat-us-labor-unions