That’s right, OnlyForKoolKids is going on strike. Before the collective weeping and wailing begins, hold that thought: this does not mean we are going to stop bringing you our own peculiar brand of music, movie and television coverage.
No; tomorrow (November 30) OnlyForKoolKids will pursue something far less frivolous by reporting on the biggest day of national public sector walkouts the UK has seen for decades. As many as two million teachers, firefighters, dustbinmen, border control staff and other public sector workers will join the 24-hour strike, called to oppose the coalition government’s plans to reform pensions, forming picket lines and closing schools, council offices and other services across the country (click here for the BBC’s excellent table of who is involved and what will be effected).
The unions say the proposal would see their members having to pay more in contributions and working for longer, but getting less in their retirement. That may sound unfair to most normal people, but not the government, which says that because too many of us now have the audacity to live for longer, and because it in no way wants to upset the financiers, investment bankers and hedge funds who helped give this country its biggest ever budget deficit (and who account for over half the donations the Conservative Party receives) by asking them to contribute a larger percentage of their multi-million pound bonuses, it must instead plunder from the public sector.
Arrrrrrr, or, as pirate Captain David ‘Davy Jones’ Locker’ Cameron would say: “We are all in this together…”
Whether you agree with us or not, the day’s events are going to be the lead story of every newspaper, website and news broadcast you see tomorrow and Friday, which is why we are going to use our shiny new tumblr. blog to bring you live coverage of the strikes and picket lines in Brighton. Up to 10,000 people are expected to march through the city, and OnlyForKoolKids will be at the heart of the action, posting up live pictures, video and commentary as it all happens.
Unfortunately we couldn’t think of an exciting clip to go with this post, so instead please excuse our rather clichéd attempt to invoke the spirit of protest with this classic track from the fantastic Public Enemy:
