Here’s a truck stop instead of St Peter’s

I’ve noticed women driving trucks recently, usually from Poland, based on the licence plates.

The right-wing neo-liberal government in Poland would do well to note that women don’t usually see their lives as being consigned to the bedroom. If they can drive trucks, operate machinery, write computer programmes, teach children, perform surgery and provide the general cleaning services for the Polish economy, they can also stop doing those things.

On top of this women in Poland, as in many countries, provide immense amounts of unpaid labour in the form of child-rearing and domestic work.

Forty years ago, in August 1980, a strike started in the Lenin shipyard in Gdansk. This led to the growth and development of one of the most powerful grass roots worker’s movements that Europe has ever seen. This is not the time and place to discuss the Solidarnosc movement, but the link is a starting point.

But it’s worth pointing out that women played a key role in that movement. That it was a movement from below. Of united, organised workers.

The trucks below are parked up at MOTIS in Dover. There’s a canteen, facilities for truck drivers, safe parking, custom clearance facilities. The drivers often go down to the sea to get some exercise and air.

I always say hello and sometimes talk to the truck drivers on the beach. I wish I knew more Polish and could speak Bulgarian and Rumanian.

Organised women in the streets of Poland, organised truck drivers, organised women truck drivers, organised workers. This could go in some interesting ways.