{"id":7880,"date":"2016-02-25T16:35:30","date_gmt":"2016-02-25T16:35:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=7880"},"modified":"2016-02-25T16:47:00","modified_gmt":"2016-02-25T16:47:00","slug":"happy-birthday-harry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=7880","title":{"rendered":"Happy birthday Harry"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Harry Leslie Smith, a political activist who has worked with Unite and the wider Labour movement on various campaigns \u00e2\u20ac\u201c most recently in getting out the vote at the last general election \u00e2\u20ac\u201c celebrated his 93rd birthday today (February 25).<\/p>\n

 
\nHarry knows more than anyone the value of our welfare state \u00e2\u20ac\u201c that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s because he vividly recalls what life was like before it even existed.<\/p>\n

 
\nBefore the creation of the National Health Service, Smith, who was born in Barnsley to a destitute mining family, had to suffer the loss of his sister. She contracted tuberculosis and died in a workhouse infirmary at the age of 10 because their family could not afford medical treatment. She was buried in a pit because they could not afford a proper burial.<\/p>\n

 
\nPoverty blighted Harry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s life and the lives of so many others before the Second World War. But once the war was over, after witnessing years of carnage and destitution both at home and abroad, Harry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s generation decided that they had had enough. And that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s when, in 1945, the welfare state was born.<\/p>\n

 
\nHarry experienced a complete change in fortunes thanks to this very welfare state — the poverty he had known as a child would not follow him into adulthood. After serving as an RAF pilot during the Second World War, he returned to Yorkshire with his German wife. He worked various jobs, bought a home, and raised a family of four boys. He eventually emigrated to Canada, where he worked in the oriental carpet trade.<\/p>\n

 
\nAfter retiring, Harry saw that the great state his generation had built was beginning to crumble as the financial crisis sent shock waves throughout the world, and — just as with the Great Depression of the 1930s — governments were doing little to help ordinary people.<\/p>\n

 
\nWitnessing history repeating itself inspired Harry to begin writing his memoirs, Harry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Last Stand, published in 2014. In the bestselling book, he uses his life experience as testimony to why we must stand up and fight for social institutions such as the NHS.<\/p>\n

 
\nHarry has campaigned with Unite passionately as the Tory government seeks to destroy the all of these institutions we hold dear, and we wish him a very happy birthday as he continues his activism in support of our movement.<\/p>\n

 
\nUnite general secretary Len McCluskey said, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bHave a very happy birthday today Harry. Your work has inspired millions \u00e2\u20ac\u201c warning us of the true cost of austerity and why we must all unite to defeat this threat to our jobs, our lives, our communities, our very futures. You have given us hope \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the one thing that no-one, not even this Conservative government can take from our hearts. Thank you.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Harry Leslie Smith, a political activist who has worked with Unite and the wider Labour movement on various campaigns \u00e2\u20ac\u201c most recently in getting out the vote at the last general election \u00e2\u20ac\u201c celebrated his 93rd birthday today (February 25).   Harry knows more than anyone the value of our welfare state \u00e2\u20ac\u201c that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s because […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1953,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[76,155],"wps_subtitle":"Veteran fighter Harry Smith is 93 today","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7880"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7880"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7880\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7881,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7880\/revisions\/7881"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}