Bob Crow (RMT General Secretary)

We are facing the harshest set of economic conditions for over 100 years, yet the bankers that brought the country to its knees are guaranteed their jobs, their bonuses and their obscene pensions. The Peoples Charter for Change is a progressive programme that, unlike the main political parties, offers a clear alternative based upon the needs of ordinary people.

John McDonnell MP

People want to see a real alternative and real change … ordinary people up and down this country are crying out for policies that will protect jobs and see investment in the programmes that will tackle the economic crisis. The Charter provides a voice for the millions of people who aren’t being listened to right now

Matt Wrack (FBU General Secretary)

There is real anger that the banks have been allowed to act with impunity while working people in this country have to pay the price for their incompetence with their jobs and their homes. It’s time we had the policies that will help the vast majority and not a tiny minority from the square mile. That’s why the Charter and what it stands for is so important.

John Mulrenan (Unison) -The Economy

The government is spending billions taking over banks, whilst still proclaiming that the market knows best. We have the worst of all worlds-nationalisation in effect, but no control over ensuring that resources are directed in a way that benefits ordinary working people. We need a People’s Bank, and we need to regain control of our vital service industries: transport, energy and water. Electricity and gas supplies owned by and run for the people will enable us to stop the scandal of 25,000 elderly dying each winter because they cannot afford to heat their homes. And the restructuring of the tax system, ensuring that big business (many multi-nationals pay no tax at all) and the wealthy pay their share. This could begin to address the needs of the one in four children in the UK, and one in three children in London, currently living below the poverty line. A fair economy for a fairer Britain will see new jobs paying decent money, and building workers employed to build the council homes we desperately need. All of this is possible if we win our demand to put people before profit.

Jerry Hicks (Unite) - Jobs

The Tory anti-union laws, still in force, mean that the employers see the unions as a soft target. Our leaders are reduced to simply watching and “campaigning” – as the employers line up to kick us around. The employers, with the connivance of the union leaders, have also developed the technique of using agency staff and temporary workers in a number of industries as a “buffer” to absorb the first shock of job losses. This creates a two-tier workforce, and leaves the union weakened in any confrontation with managers. If agency staff realise their jobs will not be defended, why should they join the union? To unite the workforce, strengthen the unions and take on the employers, we need a policy that puts people before profit, and that recognises that there are more, and more sustainable jobs in the development of green energy and transport policies than there are in nuclear power and airport expansion. To unite the workers, the unions must also fight to increase the minimum wage, to prevent the exploitation of an underclass of unorganised workers, and the under-cutting of hard won pay agreements.

Margot Lindsey (Pensioner) - Decent homes

Council housing is stigmatised by the media. But they forget what it was like before we had it and millions lived at the mercy of unscrupulous landlords. With the credit crunch and economic slump we could return to those dark days. Council housing is unique. It gives tenants a secure’ tenancy, lower rent and a democratically elected landlord easier to hold to account than ‘social’ housing i.e. housing associations. It is not directly subject to the private money market crashes. If a fraction of the public money that has been spent on bailing out banks was earmarked for direct investment in council housing, builders would not be losing their jobs and those in housing need would have somewhere to go. A new approach to home-building could be based on using the value of public land, the power of local democracy and the best in design and management to create places that are genuinely sustainable because people can afford to live there, without relying on the inherent uncertainty of the market. What we need instead is for government to invest in improving existing council estates and a massive council house building programme that would house the 1.7 million households still on council waiting lists.

John Lister (NUJ) - Public Services

The People’s Charter is an important way to alert the wider public to the serious threats faced by our public services. Even Margaret Thatcher realised that she could not privatise health care the way she flogged off state assets in the1980s. But Blair, and now Brown are finding other ways to carve off and profitable slices from the NHS, creating a new private sector sponsored and subsidised from public funds. They have been doing the same with Royal Mail, breaking up its monopoly and handing profitable slices to private firms: now Mandelson wants to hand over even more to profiteers. There has been no public support for this privatisation: but the unions which still fund New Labour have sat back and watched it happen, barely lifting a finger in opposition. Far from privatising more services, PFI-funded hospitals and projects, the rail industry and utilities should be brought back into public ownership. And while we must link up with other unions internationally to ensure that reactionary EU directives are challenged and opposed, we must forget that New Labour has been the most avid proponent of privatisation within the EU.

Ian Drummond (NUS) - Justice

My generation is the first in modern history brought up to expect a more expensive life than our parents. The education system like the economy, is based on debt. Top-up fees and loans hang over us like a mortgage without a house. I first became involved in the fight for free education while still at school and for the last 3 years as a student at the School of Oriental and African Studies. Shamefully the National Union of Students refuses to campaign for free education; I and other left wing students are campaigning to change this ludicrous policy. But NUS is not the main student movement in Britain today. During the Gaza massacre I was involved in a solidarity occupation at SOAS; there have now been 32 such occupations in the UK. There’s a new mood of militancy, greater even than there was during the great Iraq mobilisations of 2003. I see the recent wildcat strikes coming out of that same mood. Much more such industrial, student and street protest is sure to come in the long hot summer the police are predicting for us, and will be needed to secure justice and fairness for all.

Terry Conway (Unison) - Sustainable future

There are no accurate statistics for the total number of human lives lost in Afghanistan since the invasion of 2001 or in Iraq since 2003, but the overwhelming majority of those killed have been civilians, ordinary people like you and me. 126 British troops have died in Afghanistan and 179 in Iraq. Britain’s annual defence budget of £35 billion should be spent on things to improve lives, not destroy them. To meet the challenge of climate change we need a massive programme of investment in house insulation available to all (and without 17 incomprehensible forms to fill in). This will also cut the scandalously high number of people who still die each year in their homes of hypothermia. Let’s see huge investment in alternative production for the car industry – we need much more public transport for a start. Workers and users have lots of ideas about what we need – that’s where public money should be going, not into the pockets of fat cat bankers. Debt is a noose round the neck of working people and the poor across the world. Everyone needs a guaranteed minimum income on which they can live in dignity. And the debts of poor countries should be written.