Playlist nº 40 Canciones para una huelga

There is power in a factory, power in the land 

Power in the hands of a worker

 But it all amounts to nothing if together we don't stand 

There is power in a Union 

 The Union forever defending our rights

 Down with the blackleg, all workers unite

 With our brothers and our sisters from many far off lands

 There is power in a Union

(Billy Bragg)

Canciones sobre la huelga y la lucha. Canciones sobre el trabajo esclavo y los accidentes laborales. Sobre la explotación de los jóvenes y las mujeres. Sobre la  solidaridad y la unidad. Sobre  combatir por los derechos, sobre los sindicatos y una de sus más odiosas enemigas (Margaret Thatcher), sobre los esquiroles y sobre el sindicalismo futuro.

They offered me the office, offered me the shop

They said I'd better take anything they'd got

Do you wanna make tea at the BBC?

Do you wanna be, do you really wanna be a cop?

Career opportunities are the ones that never knock

Every job they offer you is to keep you out the dock

Career opportunity, the ones that never knock

(The Clash) 

From the playground to the wasteground
Hope ends at 17
Sweeping floors and filling shelves
Forced into government schemes
11 years spent to dig out ditches,
Forget your schoolday dreams
Guarantees and lie-filled speeches,
But nothings what it seems
Qualified and patronised and with everything to lose.

No choice or chance for the future
The rich enjoy less tax
Dress the girls in pretty pink
The shit goes to the blacks
A generation’s heart torn out
And covered up the facts
The only thing they’ll understand
Is a wall against their backs
The only hope now left for those - with everything to lose.

In desperation empty eyes,
Signed up and thrown away
There’s drugs replacing dignity,
The short sharp shock repaid
There’ll be no money if you dare to question
Working the tory way
The truth is up there carved in stone,
Where 21 dead now lay
A family’s loss for a few pounds saved
With everything to lose.

(The Style Council)