James Connolly

A union chief boss in the UK has become a viral sensation after declaring James Connolly as his 'hero' in a primetime TV interview.

Without skipping a beat Lynch replied: 'Is that the level you’re pitching this at, Piers? That is a joke amongst me and my friends, and you can see the likeness if you like... Just as you’re doing health, education and care,' he said. Do you know how a picket line actually works?' Good on ye Mick, keep up the good fight.' While one person said: 'Mick showing his Irish roots. The Irish socialite Republican, he educated himself and he start non-sectarian trade unionism in Ireland. He was a hero of the Irish revolution,' Lynch said without skipping a beat.

Asked who wins his affections the most during an appearance on Peston, the RMT leader named James Connolly, and after the presenter repeated the name in a ...

"An Irish, socialist republican," he said. "He educated himself and he started non-sectarian trade unionism in Ireland, and he was a hero of the Irish revolution." Connolly founded the Irish Socialist Republican Party in 1896, and was one of the leaders in the Easter Rising in 1916 against British rule in Ireland.

Amid rail strikes in the UK, RMT leader Mick Lynch has been at the centre of debates.

His term in this role was cut short when he stood down due to “toxic” atmosphere among the executive. In 2020, he stepped up to the role of acting general secretary as the previous leader, Mick Cash, became unwell. He was blacklisted because of his involvement in unions, so then moved to work on the railways in 1993. Piers said: “I’m just wondering where the comparison goes. Mick is the son of Irish Catholic parents, who moved to England during the Blitz. He told BBC’s Nick Robinson on his podcast that being a Catholic was an “everyday, permanent experience” rather than a lifestyle choice. He was brought up on a council estate in Paddington in London and later qualified as an electrician, working in the construction industry.

Just in case you haven't , he is the General Secretary of the RMT union, which is currently in dispute with the railway employers. The union itself was an ...

On the wall of my study is a collage which is the featured image of this piece. For the avoidance of doubt, if the Scots are so keen to claim Connolly then they might want to have a statue of him on a plinth in the city of his birth. I rather doubt that the person in the TV studio had any idea who Lynch was talking about, so he politely and patiently gave her a quick synopsis of the man they shot in a chair in Kilmainham. My shop steward grandfather occasionally quipped that it was no surprise that the leader of a strike in Britain, someone leading from the front for the common good, often had an Irish surname. The union itself was an amalgamation of the NUR (National Union of Railwaymen) and the National Union of Seamen in 1990. He was a wagon builder and a shop steward in the NUR for decades.

TRADE union leader Mick Lynch, head of the union leading the biggest rail strike in Britain in decades, has named Easter Rising leader James Connolly as his ...

Railway workers across Britain are holding a three-day strike this week over pay, redundancies and changes to working practices in the biggest rail strike in more than 30 years. Connolly, who founded the Irish Labour Party, was one of the signatories of the Proclamation and led the Dublin Brigade in the Rising. He was later executed. The James Connolly Visitor Centre on the Falls Road was established several years ago.