WE WON’T PAY FOR THEIR CRISIS
7.30pm Wednesday 29th October
Upstairs at the Cock Tavern Pub
Corner of Chalton Street and Phoenix Road
London NW1
‘Please spread the word widely, there are some inspiring ideas being circulated and some momentum to make this happen. From the informal discussions at the @ bookfair it was hoped that this initiative grows beyond London and similar groups are formed to build towards a co-ordinated day of action in December.
The idea of Price Reduction is born out of the need to express the antagonisms which exist by an increasingly unaffordable existence and the rise in commodity prices. This is an antagonism which we face whenever we buy and consume the food, services, rents, culture, entertainment. Price Reduction is aimed at being a social and creative action which will take many forms. A way of politically articulating a means of action, to give confidence to those who are struggling to make ends meet and a way which we start to recompose an offensive class movement against the extremities of the credit crunch.’
Come to contribute, discuss and get ready to participate!
Contact email: pricereductioncampaign@riseup.net
Join the facebook group: Price Reduction Campaign – We won’t pay for their crisis (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=59350085760)
Plain English Price Reduction campaign:
Price Reduction Campaign
– call for a public national day of action in December in multiple cities
– its not shop lifting it is forcing the supemarket to permanently reduce their prices
– there should be a lead up campaign where we ask people to send letters to their local supermarkets
explaining why they need to reduce their prices on certain items
– an online petition should b created to build interaction and support
– stalls outside certain large supermarkets, every saturday from when we decide the date.
– If people belong to local groups they should all send a letter to their local paper about price reduction weekly
– mass run of stickers, leaflets, and posters to flood the area of the site of the action
– The action is non-threatening to other customers, non-aggressive, sober, no dogs on strings
– The negotiation is handled by two people (man and women) with clear demands
– There should be several options we take if the negotiation fails and these should be clearly decided upon
before
– we encourage price reduction groups to set-up and join a national network
– we make provision to organise a reduction campaign every month, so next one in end of January
Ian Bone 
This post has been reported to the plain english campaign.Why not just say prices have gone up more than people can afford…simple aint it. Sure beats ‘the antagonism of the articulating antagonism of commodities’ or whatever it was. If you truly want to involve real working class people then at least speak our language not political gobbledegook. who the fuck, outside of steven fry and jeremy paxman, uses the word recompose in everyday conversation? you get my drift?
Good translation of the Womblese call-out.
See you at the meeting then or are you another prolia-than-thou wadical. I understood, ‘cos I wrote it :-0), and I’m sure you understood it but maybe working class people are too thick to understand
I’m with ‘Not that Bright’.
The part explaining why there is a need for this important action/campaign,reads like it was written by a situationist rocket scientist.
‘N.T.B.’ is exactly right.
If you want working class people to rally to this ,then just use very simple wording.
In fact,I’m being too nice,just fucking get rid of it.
Leave that in it,and the only people who will turn up will be the people you don’t want to turn up,cos it sounds like the beginning of a political manifesto.
This campaign is too important to be allowed to tumble at the first hurdle,because the founding statement was put together by a would be Noam Chomsky.
Simple,to the point,and a call to real,immediately effective action-is all we need.
Break out the eraser,Ian.
Fuck the language – both bits were wrtten by Alessio who puts tons of fucking effort in and doesn’t stay hunched over his hyper-critical keyboard all day but will actually get out on the fucking street and put the hours in! It’s the content that counts – this price reduction campaign has great possibilities so anyone who’s serious about getting off their arse needs to come to this meeting and put some fucking effort in.
It’s written in anarchist political jargon,and I don’t give a fuck who wrote it.
It had me almost reaching for the dictionary.
And for the record,if we don’t ‘modify’ the way we
word our attempts to reach the people we WANT to be the backbone of this campaign,then,like I said,we will only get the attention of political head bangers,and we all know that is NOT our desired intention.
East Ham Dave, could you write a text for the public leaflet – the little tidbit was just meant to get the ball rolling. I’m serious.
If you can email it to pricereductioncampaign@riseup.net before next wednesday that will give me time to print it to be discussed at the meeting. Fuck it – if anyone wants to write some text for the leaflet then email the above address and we will consider it! :-0)
It’s all about marketing (why not use the capitalists tools against them). Know your market and give them what they want and they’ll buy into it (just ask nick griffin). A grassroots campaign hoping to get popular support won’t succeed if half it’s target audience feels they’re gonna need a dictionary to help them read the fliers was all i was getting at. Come on you should know this, it is after all what made class war so popular back in the day.
P.S. Work, life, distance, time of day, day of the week, etc all combine to make it impossible to get off my arse for this one.
PPS. prolier than thou. lol. i like it, its been nicked its now mine. 🙂
Sign me up for this. A wide spread campaign that ordinary folk might feel can do them some good and will then support.
Don’t piss off the people shopping there, get them behind you, give em a big sticker to wear saying ” your prices are ripping us off”.
Talk to the shop staff- they have to buy stuff too.
One problem I see with my local tescos is that its one of the big ones with a huge carpark. Security and cops can easily move you off tescos land and to the entrance. Where you will watch cars drive past to no effect.
I’ll take you up on that one Alessio.
By next Wednesday-no problem.
The car park problem that Dave bought up will be an obstacle that we can get around.Anarchists are truely gifted at coming with ways to circumvent
human road blocks like security guards.
Anyone got some suggestions because this will be something we gonna come up against.
Hi East Ham Dave,
Nice one, would be good to meet you anyhow if you can make it to that meeting.
Will the outcome of the meeting be posted online for those of us that can’t afford to go to london?
Here’s some advice for budding writers from one of my patron saints, George Orwell put forward in an essay on the politics of the English language:
“(i) Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
(ii) Never us a long word where a short one will do.
(iii) If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
(iv) Never use the passive where you can use the active.
(v) Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
(vi) Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.”
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm
I won’t make the meeting as I live too far away, but I will start advertising the basic ideas of the campaign to the activists here, and take it from there. I was at the meeting in London on Saturday – would have said hello – but I dashed out in the question and answer section to grab some lunch as I was as hungry as a hawk.
Hi folks, and good luck with the meeting.
Sign us up to be the North East representatives, we badly need some good street propaganda up here. If you can get a text to me by the end of October it can be circulated at the large Labour movement conference we are organising on the 1st of November. There will be a lot of good folk at it, and without whom we could never mount a serious campaign straight away.
Good luck with writing it Dave.
Alessio, if you forward it to me with comments/minutes from the meeting as well that would be fine. Ta.
Here is my contribution for the intro. to the Price Reduction Campaign….I want to hear what other people think so changes can be made, if necessary.I think the ‘point’ form of the course of action planned in Alessio’s leaflet was good,so that is what I lead up to…….
“If you’re feeling the hard times at the moment like the rest of us,then you’ll know that the weekly trip to the supermarket
has become a bitter experience in downsizing to meet your budget.To put it mildly,food price are ridiculously high when most
of us are struggling to keep our heads above water.
And we’ve all got to eat.Why should we have to suffer increases in the price of basic essentials, like food,because banks and
insurance companies are going belly up.
We will not take these price increases on the chin,and sod off back to our homes in silence.
The time for action has come.
The Price Reduction Campaign is being organised by ordinary working class people,as lawful way to get a better deal from
supermarkets in their shopping trolleys.If you want more food for your pound, then join with us.
This is what we are going to do……”
you should make mention that Tesco recently were celebrating their profits increasing by 10% in the last 6 months alone.
text from the price reduction facebook page-
Exceptional times call for exceptional measures.
The government and big business say these are exceptional times. They’ve made exceptions to normal rules and laws, suspending competition laws to let Lloyds banking group buy HBOS.
At the same time those who can least afford to pay have had to put their hands in their pockets and bailout the richest people in the country.
They get to keep all of their profits but we have to pay for all of their losses.
This bailout has coincided with an inflation in food and utility bills putting ordinary people under more financial pressure than ever. Many of us find it increasingly difficult to meet the cost of our bills and our grocery shopping out of our wages.
If the worlds richest can be bailed out then why cant we?
No one believes the government is going to help us out so we should meet to help each other.
Lets get together and discuss what we are prepared to pay and then ask to meet the supermarket management and demand from them a reduction in prices.
The advertised price of goods under UK law is only an offer anyway!!!- called an ‘invitation to treat’. It is legal to negotiate and managers of stores have leeway on prices. This is legal, possible and fair.
Exceptional times call for exceptional measures.
If its a bailout for them then it must mean reductions for us.
Hi wntrmute,
the minutes of the meeting will be posted on the campaigns facebook page (as well as on its website- currently under construction!).
That could probably even be cut down a bit more Dave:
“If you’re feeling the hard times like the rest of us, you’ll know that weekly trip to the supermarket has become a bitter experience.
Food prices are way too high when most of us are struggling to keep our heads above water, and we’ve all got to eat.
Why should we have to pay more for basic essentials when banks and insurance companies go belly up?
We will not take these price hikes and sod off back to our homes in silence.
The time for action has come.
The Price Reduction Campaign is being organised by ordinary working class people, as a legal way to get a more in our shopping trolleys, for less. If you want more products for your pounds, then join us.
This is what we are going to do……”
Well done,Rob-‘to the point’, is always better.