Teachers pensions are again under threat again with those of all working people in both public and private sectors, and we again have to organise to defend them.

The fundamental battle over wages and pensions – properly described as “deferred wages” - never goes away – it as much part of the capitalist system as corrupt politicians, greedy bankers and economic crises. They are not aberrations that can be “reformed away” – they will be with us for as long as we tolerate this dog-eat-dog society, run by the rich with the determined assistance of their State.

Just four years ago a determined and broad alliance of public service unions including the teaching unions stood up to a full-on Government attack on our pensions. We lobbied together, campaigned together and balloted for strike action together… and we won the day.

Alan Johnson, then Secretary of State for Work and Pensions – and now jockeying for position to replace Brown - insisted that they would not even discuss the issue. Faced with such united opposition the Government backed down and put “everything back on the table”. And the outcome was a resounding victory for the workers who took them on

There were those within our movement who didn’t recognise the scale of the victory at the time. Attempting to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, they suggested that we continue the strike action, as “new entrants” to the pensions schemes would be subject to a raising of the pension age.

What they failed to recognise was that the pensions “agreement” would never last to the time – 30 or 40 years ahead for most - when those new entrants would reach retirement age. Every generation of workers needs to be prepared to fight for themselves – there are no “lasting settlements” under capitalism – only continuing class struggle. The attacks never stop.

This truth is now clear to all. Just four years after the victory, we have to do it all again. Can we do it again? Of course we can! Will the outcome of the coming struggle protect workers into the indefinite future? Of course it will not! But that doesn’t make the struggle less necessary – in fact it simply underlines the fact that workers, in both private and public sectors, need to be constantly vigilant and increasingly well organised and united to fight off the attacks that will come again and again – until we finally seek a fundamental political reconstitution of society that puts working people in control, rather than accepting “constant defence”.

The current capitalist crisis leaves any Government administering that system with “no alternative” but to attack workers – no alternative as they are clearly not willing or able to make those responsible for the crisis pay for it.

As “the General Election debate” is focusing on what types of destructive public sector cuts we can expect from New Labour or from the Tories, so we can be assured that, whoever wins the election, we will be in for attacks on pay and pensions in the process and aftermath of the economic crisis.

And we can be pretty sure that, unless something really dramatic happens in the Labour Party, the Tories will win as workers will refuse to vote for a New Labour Party if they continue to attack us. Only if the Labour Party grabs the lifeline of such programmes as the People’s Charter and adopts it as the basis of the Manifesto do they stand a chance of winning – and the likelihood of that would seem just a little remote!

One of the six points of the Charter contains the following simple proposal. “Link state pensions and benefits to average earnings. Protect pension schemes and restore the lost value of private pensions.” Why is this seen by some to be such a “threat” to the Labour Party – the historic mass party of the working class?

The fight for pensions four years ago took place in the run up to a General Election, which gave us a real opportunity. We are here again – the same attacks, the same dangers, the same opportunities… the same old struggle.

As we prepare for the pensions fight again, we have to ask ourselves, “How long will we put up with this corrupt and vicious system that exists to make the rich even richer at the expense of ordinary working people?”