This blog assesses the power of the modern day union and with public cuts and people being forced out of jobs how likely is it that we will see the mass demonstrations and strikes that are common place across Europe.
However, unite effectively handed power to Ed Miliband the leader of the Labour party. Most of the big unions are in support of him due to his support of the worker and his belief that drastic cuts in public expenditure will increase our time in the red, rather than decrease it.
With the Conservatives in power we are seeing the biggest cuts in living memory, spending on public services is likely to be decreased by 40%. Public spending is likely to decrease by £60 billion and around 700 000 public sector jobs lost, not to mention the private sector jobs lost as a result of the lack of spending and services. The unions see this as a personal attack on their working class members, taking a problem that was caused by the rich (financial industry) and dumping it on the poor to suffer for. The unions see this as their biggest battle since Thatcher and in some respects it’s a bigger battle as the Governments actions has the ability to affect all people living in the country, rich or poor, young or old.
As hardliner Lee McLusky is set to become the most powerful union baron in Britain, yesterday (24th Oct 2010) threatened a new wave of militancy saying there is, ‘no such thing as an irresponsible strike.’ This is worrying as it comes from the likely General Secretary of the UK and Ireland’s biggest union. Are we going to see a battle between the unions and the government? I’m not sure, but I do know that many are preparing for such an event. People are starting to come together because they are feeling as though they are under attack, their pensions, wages, taxes, public services etc. The only voice they have is that of the unions. Bob Crowe (RMT), probably the best known General Secretary of all the unions is calling for an organised fight back, including strikes and demonstrations. Mr Crowe is not one to make empty threats as he was behind the tube strikes on Sept 7th. Is Bob Crowe the class warrior he likes to think of himself or is he a relic with out-dated fascist political views? He is a former Communist who insists that Capitalism has failed mankind. He has quite a confrontational and boisterous nature.
Do the unions have the same power they had in the 70’s? The simple answer is no, membership has dropped from over half the population to a quarter only seven million members of the workforce are now unionised. However most of these members are in the public sector in roles that if not present can do real damage to services. For example, look at the RMT Unions strikes at the London underground, only for one day but the chaos it caused for the six million or so passengers that use TfL was immense. There are also laws put in place now that discourage the long drawn out strikes that took place decades ago, but as the RMT has shown short one day strikes can have a real effect.
If effective strikes are to take place there needs to be cooperation between large sections of the population and I believe for this to take place there has to be a unifying force. This could come in the form of people personally being affected by the cuts the Conservatives are making. I feel people will need a very good reason to mobilise, strike, boycott and hold demonstrations to change the Governments actions. I feel we differ from our European cousins in this way.
Looking into unions in a bit more detail it is hard to tell if they are there to protect and serve their members or for their own financial gain. General Secretaries earn six figure salaries and are given countless perks, it’s a far cry from the people they are representing and who they are supposedly in-touch with. There are also allegations of corruption at the highest levels of some of the biggest UK unions. None of which has been proven in court, however the evidence is there for all to see. There are also thousands of allegations of sexism against union officials as it seems the unions have not lost their mind-set from the 70’s and 80’s when representing coal miners and other traditionally male jobs. Union bosses are all male and high in rhetoric and very brutish in nature. The allegations of sexism stem from the fact that typically male jobs (90%) such as refuse collection, gardening and road workers would almost double their basic pay with the bonuses secured for them by the unions. For example road workers would get a bonus for digging up each tree stump in a certain area. Councils later found out that a lot of works were said to have been carried out but were not, resulting in fraudulent bonuses being paid. This is in comparison to jobs predominantly carried out by women such as carers, cleaners and caterers with less than 10% of them receiving bonuses for targets met. The councils and unions argued it was justified as the male workers needed the monetary incentives for motivation and it was necessary to pay them more money as they were commonly the main bread winner in the family. It is interesting to note that these bonuses were all negotiated for by Unison and other unions and they worked with the councils to head off the legal action from the women. I find it unbelievable that women are still fighting equal pay battles in 2010.
In conclusion I believe the need to strike has to come from within individuals and should only be a last resort when all other avenues have been exhausted. However, I do believe we will see an increase in strike action particularly in the next six months. The country is in a mess and it is too easy to blame the faceless international banks that undoubtedly got us into this mess. The point is we are in a situation and have elected a Government to get us out of it and they have decided to take a very hard lined approach to cut the deficit by as much as possible as quickly as possible. It will now be very interesting to see what Britain does in the future, will they come together and take a stand or swallow the inevitably bitter pill. I believe this decision will be based on how well the economy does in the next six months. Will the Conservatives be hailed as heroes or detested for being wrong?
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