The neoliberal era has failed to prevent and solve the many crises we have been facing in the last 40 years. The latest one brought by the coronavirus, revealed for many countries the dismantling of the healthcare system and other crucial public services resulting in a devastating health and economic crisis.
While we hear more and more calls to bring back state intervention, often only to mitigate the effects of years of privatization, we are currently witnessing at the global level the continuation and increase in marketization and financiarisation of many key sectors.
The energy sector is a good example but often overlooked of the failure of privatization and liberalization altogether.The recent energy crisis and the hikes in gas and electricity prices in Europe is an acute symptom of this failure, putting the majority of the burden over the shoulder of the working class and the most vulnerable of our societies.
COP 26 has been another striking recent example that the push for market solutions is a definitive recipe for failure both in terms of emissions reductions and the development of renewable energy as well as organizing any kind of real Just and fair transition.
It is in this context of urgency and need of providing concrete and fact based solutions, that the TUED network has been developing a concrete program.
The Programme is the result of a year of work by the Trade Union Task Force for a Public Energy Future consisting of more than 30 unions from nearly 20 countries around the world.
Anchoring the programme is a major report that explains the failure of private markets to deliver on climate targets. The report details how major companies in the power sector — reclaimed to public ownership, governed democratically, and operating under a new “pro-public” mandate — can advance energy conservation and efficiency, and work in partnership with other public entities at national and global levels to carry out the energy transition we need while meeting the needs of users, workers and communities.
Organized by: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung
Special guests: Daniel Chavez, Katie Swan, Nessim Achouche, Sam Mason