Sally Kincaid

If you are reading this article online the chances are that some part of the technology you are using will have been produced at one of the Foxconn factories in China.

This company made the international news last year due to a number of suicides among its workers. One of the largest Foxconn factories is in the city of Shenzhen in South East China. Between 300,000 and 450,000 workers are employed in this massive industrial park - a walled campus within Shenzhen dubbed "Foxconn city".

The TUC demo on 26 March started to mobilise people for what everyone knew would be the battle ahead. Better organised schools had delegations on the demo and returned back to school more confident that they were part of a much bigger movement.

But the real momentum started after NUT conference over Easter, spurred on by the fact that another teaching union, the ATL, had voted unanimously to ballot for strike action. This is a union that has never taken strike action in its 127-year history. The feeling was, if they are prepared to strike then things have really shifted.

In Wakefield and District Division we wanted to use this as an opportunity to get into schools across the district. The fact that NUT general secretary Steve Sinnott has written to all members saying they should have school union meetings makes this much easier to arrange.

The publication of this book is extremely timely, coming as it does as the effects of climate change are having devastating consequences in the Southern states of the US. At the same time scientists are organising to put pressure on their governments to take prompt action to combat the effects of climate change.