HUNDREDS of people marched through the city’s streets to call for pay increases and action on the cost of living crisis for working people.
Members from the striking RMT and CWU unions gathered outside Brighton station for the protest, alongside members of Unison, the Unite union, community union Acorn and climate activist group Extinction Rebellion.
The protest was one of 50 protests across the country as part of a “national day of action” by the Enough is Enough campaign, which calls for a real-terms pay rise, an end to food poverty, cuts to energy bills, and tax increases for the rich.
It comes as rail and postal workers walk out in the latest in a series of strikes in an ongoing dispute over pay.
Gary Hassell, a representative of the RMT for Brighton and Hove, said: “Our workers, in this cost of living crisis, desperately need something to keep their heads above water.
“Ultimately, the government haven’t played fair and haven’t looked after them. During the Covid crisis, they were heroes and now they’re zeros.”
The march started outside Brighton station before heading through the city towards The Level, stopping briefly outside the Royal Mail delivery office on North Road, with cars honking their horns in protest as they drove past.
Among those attending today’s protest was Labour MP for Brighton Kemptown Lloyd Russell-Moyle.
He told The Argus: “I am supporting the unions and Enough is Enough because the current economic model of this country is not working and we need something different.
“We’ve now seen the Conservatives’ real face, which is about taking from this country, extracting wealth and giving it to their mates.
“It’s what they’ve been doing for the last ten years, but now the mask has slipped and we can actually see it.”
Those attending the strike waved banners for different unions and signs that read “freeze profits not people”, “Truss has trashed the economy” and “we can’t live like this”.
At a rally at Brighton station before the march set off, one speaker told the crowd: “Something is changing in this country now. It’s not changing in Westminster, it’s not changing in parliament, it’s happening in the streets, in workplaces and in communities.
“People are waking up. They’ve had enough. They’re not going to be kicked about. We are taking back what is ours; one workplace at a time, one city at a time, one rally at a time.”
A Brighton branch official with the CWU, who did not give his name, said many members have been left struggling with the cost of living crisis.
He said: “I have members on the brink of homelessness and using food banks. We won’t accept our pay and conditions being driven down while bosses award themselves huge payouts.”
Sally, a Brighton resident who didn’t want to give her surname, said that she was extremely angry at the actions of the “unelected government”.
She said: “It’s tax cuts for the rich, talking about cutting benefits for the poor, it’s trashing the environment - there’s a whole list of ultra-right wing promises which no people in Brighton would back. They’re unelected idiots.”
Activists from the Don’t Pay campaign - which calls for people to hold an “energy bills strike”, are set to hold another protest this afternoon at the Clock Tower in North Street, burning energy bills and calling for the government to do more to help people with the cost of gas and electricity.
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