Though Cowards Flinch

Over on Members’ Net, there have been arguments doing the rounds (as they usually do) that the teachers shouldn’t have gone on strike. It’s the same old rubbish. Public sector workers shouldn’t be going on strike. The strike was called without enough negotiation. The strike will cause too much disruption to the public.

It was just the same at Canterbury CLP last year. Several members voiced objection to a motion of support for the CWU strike, on the grounds that it was worded in support of the actual strike, rather than just a vague nod in the direction of the CWU itself. The relevant wording was stricken from the motion and words deploring the strike were inserted.

I wonder how many of the people in question support the decision of Ineos workers to strike? Incidentally a very good collection of comments can be found here: apologies for the shameless immodesty! It’s a relevant question to ask. After all, Ineos is a private firm, it’s not part of the public sector. Arguably, however, it has a greater potential impact than the teachers’ strike.

For the Ineos workers, far from being a selfish act, the workers aren’t merely striking in defence of their own pensions etc, they’re trying to defend generations of future Ineos workers at the Grangemouth plant in Scotland. This is something that, during my long membership of USDAW, I have often wished that union would do, instead of being so utterly inert.

Instead of protecting future employees of Tesco, Sainsbury and the other major supermarkets, USDAW bought much too readily into social partnership. As a result, the supermarkets have been able to decrease overtime from double rate, to one-and-a-half rate, to one-and-a-quarter rate last I heard. I left USDAW almost two years ago, so it could well be worse by now.

A USDAW strike could wreak greater havoc than either of the aforementioned. It’s not a public service, being almost entirely subsumed within massive commercial enterprises. Yet the public totally relies on just those enterprises. Disruption to food supplies, panic buying…the consequences could be severe. I wonder would those opposing public service strikes support them?

The point I am making has, I think, been well and truly guessed at. No few of the people making this arguments are unlikely to support strike action in many instances, except those where it is small and unlikely to succeed.

At the moment, many unions in Western Europe are engaged in or preparing for industrial action (hat tip). Many of these, nurses in Sweden and port workers in France for example , are public sector workers. Why shouldn’t we support them, as much as we support any union which represents workers in the commercial sphere?

Government bureaucrats have little respect for the responsibilities which public servants such as the civil service or teachers bear. Ministers, like any private sector boss, are just as likely to slash wages and pensions if they feel they can get away with it. Cutting public spending makes the government look effective to the middle class constituents it endlessly seems in pursuit of.

In essence, therefore, the public sector is little different to the private sector. Both sectors have departments upon which the country relies heavily. Both sets of bosses are willing to make inroads to terms and conditions if they feel the situation demands it, and neither have any great claim to being free of self-interest in the matter.

Why then should we not support either sector equally whensoever unions manage to summon the courage to go on strike? I think we should, obviously.

One argument is that public taxes run public services, therefore the needs of the public come first. As I’ve argued previously, particularly with regard to the teaching profession, all industrial disputes are motivated by a great deal more than merely money. Money is the surface issue, but discontent is often triggered over a good deal more than that.

Though NASUWT didn’t come out on strike, and no motions proposing strike were mooted at their national conference, it is apparent to anyone with eyes to see that they are grievously unhappy over the workload of teachers. The NUT has been campaigning on this also. It is in the interest of parents to have rested, relaxed, well prepared teachers.

Even for those branches of the government where the public interest in the strike is not so clear, people on strike are so rarely motivated solely by monetary desires. The PCS, for example, which was also on strike on April 24th, are more motivated by the proposed inroads into staff numbers, at least those members whom I have spoken to.

Overworked civil servants, leaned upon by management and performance managed out of their pittance-paying jobs, are hardly in the public interest.

Also, far be it from me to point this out, but just because something is tacitly assumed to be the majority opinion, even where polling data is available, doesn’t mean it is, or that the majority is correct. It means that we, as a labour movement, haven’t done a good enough job selling our case.

That’s difficult when at every opportunity employers use emotional blackmail and the press reprints it ad nauseam. For the teachers, it was attacks on how insensitive we all are about the children. For the Ineos workers, it’s about the British oil supply – the BBC has had six different articles in the last ten days. For the prison officers and police, it was scaremongering over what might happen during their strike / protest.

In some instances there is no real public interest either way, except insofar as the public should support a strong trade union movement because it represents the best safeguard of their own wages and terms and conditions.

At Shelter, the TGWU workers went on strike when their employers literally tore up their contracts and imposed new ones, with little consultation. Even had their been prolonged consultation, I have to admit, the act still deserves unrelenting strike action. These people look after the homeless. They damn well deserve a decent wage to do so.

I’m sick and tired of listening to the nay sayers. They remind me of Martin Niemoller’s poem about dark forces coming for different groups, and the narrator not speaking up because it wasn’t his group. It’s high time we had a bit of solidarity.

For example, the teaching unions all expressed their support for the Teaching Assistants. Had I had my way, the government would have repealed legislation against secondary strike action and the teachers would have come out in support of TA salary rises.

So far as I’m concerned, that’s the sort of thing we want to see more of. The workers I’ve spoken to on picket lines are less often motivated by private concerns about money (though some are and should be!) and more concerned with what the government is doing to their field of expertise.

Even were the FBU not trying to stave off government proposals designed to undermine the union membership base, their campaign for £30k per annum was entirely justified. It’s not about the money, it’s the principle of the thing. Inequality is running rampant. Despite not getting it, those firemen found plenty of time to donate time and money to other causes, in support of other workers.

It seems that, according to the right wing view, greed is good so long as it isn’t expressed by a union in collective defence of its members!