Over 1200 at Solidarity meetings in one day

Wednesday was a tiring but very uplifting day as we welcomed George Galloway to Scotland to join the Solidarity campaign.  George took time out from RESPECT’s council campaign in England to come up and lend us his support.

It was standing room only at a Solidarity lunchtime meeting in Edinburgh with over two hundred and fifty people packed the St Augustine Church to hear George also give his reasons and motivation for coming to Scotland to support Solidarity's campaign.

"Tommy Sheridan and I go back 20 years and I would have walked here from London to support him. He is a class act, a working class act, indeed a working class hero - which is something to be. Solidarity is the credible progressive party in Scotland and I ask the people of Scotland to support and vote for Solidarity candidates wherever they are standing on May 3rd."

From there we traveled through to Glasgow for two afternoon meetings, one in Pollokshields and another with over 200 students at Glasgow University.  The day ended with a fantastic public meeting in Glasgow’s Royal Concert Hall, chaired by Glasgow Solidarity candidate and leading anti-war campaigner Angela McCormick,  where over 600 turned up to hear not just George and myself but also speakers from The Sunvic workers, PCS union and respected campaigner Mohammed Asif.

That Mohammed has chosen to support our campaign is a major boost for Solidarity.  Mohammed has quite rightly emerged as one of this country's leading voices for the rights of asylum seekers and refugees and against the illegal wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.  He spoke emotionally of Bush and Blair’s war in his home country of Afghanistan and his experiences since arriving here in Scotland 7 years ago.

People often say that public meetings and political rally’s are a thing of the past and that the general public are not interested.  I think that the 1200 people who turned up at our meetings in one day shows that it isn’t the concept of public meetings that is the problem, it is who is speaking and what they are saying that puts people off.

George Galloway was in superb form,  highlighting how far Labour have come from their socialist roots to being the party of war and big business.  We are grateful; for his support and proud that George, Mohammed, and the trades unionists and working class people who took part in the rally have decided that Solidarity is the only option for socialist on Thursday May 3rd.