IT’S the words of Aristotle which encapsulate the history of May Day: “The end of labor is to gain leisure”. May Day, or International Workers’ Day, this year takes place in strange and often dark political times. Across the world, millions will celebrate “labour day” where workers in their unions come together to mark collective victories, historic struggles and, most importantly, to recognise our future place within society.

Aristotle’s words point to the origins of May Day. The fight for an eight-hour working day in the late 1800s changed trade union history forever. Since the Second World War, there’s been a general, established acceptance of May Day. In the UK, the 1978 Labour Government made May Day a bank holiday, too. But, despite the media’s attempts at obfuscation, it’s nothing to do with May poles, Morris Dancers or ribbon twirling. As Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm once wrote: “May Day is the only unquestionable dent made by a secular movement in the Christian or any other official calendar.” That a workers’ protest for a shorter working day made such a dent in our calendars is testimony to the strength of workers’ power.

Not everyone will be able to enjoy this May Day bank holiday, though. Erosion of workers’ access to time off is endemic and in Britain now, we work the longest hours in Europe – yet productivity is still significantly low. The most sensible solution to the long-hours-low-productivity problem is naturally the oldest socialist demand in history: laws to reduce the working week.

Displaying their usual economic incompetence, it wasn’t that long ago that Tory politicians wanted to do away with our workers’ holiday. Even in 2011, greying right-wing grumps advocated scrapping May Day, a proposal they raise every decade or so in the name of “efficiency”.

But the date is more political than just demanding a shorter working week. Following Glaswegian Marxist John Maclean’s arrest for sedition in 1918, workers in the great city of empire embarked on a mass May Day walkout and protest. It’s fragments of history like this that strike fear into the rich and their spokespeople in the Tory party.

This year, the traditional marches and rallies across the country have a special gravity. While many political activists focus, rightly or wrongly, on their current campaigns for the local and general elections, many other ordinary workers still feel alienated by the electoral system. Perhaps many feel alienated by the history of May Day too. So, in these curious political times, how can renewed calls for a better working life emerge?

Many will argue they’ll transpire through the ballot box. I don’t deny that voting a certain way can improve the lot of working people. But I remain unconvinced that, in 2017, simply casting a vote is enough for radical transformation. The working people I speak to on a day-to-day basis understand the most powerful structures and forces that define our daily lives are ones that you simply can’t vote out. Like your boss, your HR manager, the City of London, the financiers, the right-wing media that have incredible influence. And whilst some parties scramble for working people’s votes, I’d like to remind each of them that we are not just voting fodder for your party’s political power.

The Tories are an enemy of May Day, just as they are the enemy of workers all over the country. Not content to depress our wages and working conditions, they’ve also made into monsters those out of work, thus ensuring that we’ll tolerate the worst in our workplaces because it’s better than being demonised on the dole.

Until June 8, political parties will continue to scrap over hard Brexit versus lite Brexit versus full-English Brexit and we’re in danger of forgetting that the EU, for what it’s worth, did not generously hand out “workers’ rights”. Rights like maternity pay and legal representation were won by the union movement, not because bureaucrats based in Brussels are champions of workers.

Throughout history, when working people have made gains it’s thanks to ascendant organisation and solidarity in unions and workplaces.

Gains for the working class don’t happen just because politicians are “sympathetic” or feel like making grand interventions. And if we really want to take on the Tories, then that’s a history lesson we need to appreciate.

My message is this: don’t vote Tory in any of these elections. When that party wins power, it takes our hard-won concessions and casts them aside: one step forward, 10 steps back. But it’s not enough to just vote against them in this election. The Tories are the party of big bosses, corporate power and elitism. And it’s an insidious power that exists everywhere. To improve our working lives for good, let’s challenge the Tories and their class beyond any electoral process, and on terrain we can really hurt them. That means being part of the workers’ movement.

Power for ordinary working people will not be built in the existing corridors of power, in Westminster or Holyrood or in your local council. So, join a trade union, because it’s only in the workplace and in our communities where we can make long-term gains and build a serious counter power to the abominable party of the right. Vote against the enemy, but remember, making June the end of May will require more than a ballot paper.