Come Here To Me!

Every Christmas Eve, a group of my friends organise an event they’ve taken to calling ‘Real Dubs’.

Like 28 Days Later, the streets of Dublin empty as those from beyond the pale return to their farms and creameries, leaving just us. Waking up in a friends flat over in Smithfield, I was half tempted to make my way home and pop back in for the ‘Real Dubs’ session later, but a friend told me he was heading up to ‘the picket’ on Grafton Street for a while.

Picket on Grafton Street? I couldn’t place it at first. I’d heard so much of the Laura Ashley picketers, but I’d yet to see them as I’m not frequently on Grafton Street. I head up with Jimmy, to have a look.

We stop off outside Marks and Sparks, where ‘Talk To Joe’ Duffy himself is presenting his show live on Grafton Street. It really is stomach turning stuff when none other than Uachtarán Máire Mhic Ghiolla Íosa arrives, to tell us all we can ‘overcome’ the recession, and we’re ‘fighting people’ and every other cliché she can chuck at us. I turn to Jimmy and ask, is there any other country in the world where the IMF can roll into town, yet the President would have the cheek to address Christmas shoppers? Probably not. We shuffle off, past the RTÉ vans and cheering crowds.

We get up to Laura Ashley, and one of the workers there fills me in. Since October they’ve been here, every single day. The company made pre-tax profits of £10.5 million in the first half of this year, and this branch was their flagship. 22 workers, members of the Mandate Union, have remained a thorn in the side of the company since losing their jobs at short notice, and it’s hard not to be reminded of events at the bottom of this very street in Thomas Cook not too long ago.

One thing that strikes you immediately, is that the old Irish psyche with regards crossing picket lines is sadly vanishing. It’s in the older generation still, but the youth don’t seem to have it. I remember as a child wanting to buy something in Argos on the day some workers were mounting a picket outside, and being told by my mother it was just something you didn’t do. Ever. It stuck with me. Many younger people seemed to be saying that while they completely supported and sympathised with the workers, they loved the brand etc. and missed the shop. These aren’t ‘bad people’ of course, it just shows a huge difference in consciousness over recent years.

Yet many of the Laura Ashley workers themselves are young, and they’ve learned a lot from their experiences. Like at Thomas Cook, it is a mainly female work force, and like there several of the workers have put many years into this company. To be left in the cold (quite literally) after years working for a company is not nice at all. They seem a close-knit community, with one even joking that a nearby trade-union staffed public house might become the spot for future reunions!

If you pass them, sign the petition. Give them a few words of support. In a wrecked economy, picket lines may become an all too familiar sight and perhaps younger Dubs will come to appreciate what they mean. Montrose and the woman from the Phoenix Park were probably still blabbering away at the bottom of the street, but I was far more impressed by what I saw at the top of it.

More information from Mandate online.