LTB 909/12 - A GENERAL STRIKE IN BRITAIN?

[Geezer]

To: All Branches

Dear Colleague


A GENERAL STRIKE IN BRITAIN?

Please find attached a report from Professor Gregor Gall examining the various practical challenges in organising a general strike against Government austerity measures.

I am sure the report, in particular Page 1 - Paragraph 3, will be of interest to Branches.

Any enquiries on this LTB should be addressed to the General Secretary's Office quoting the reference GS 2.3.

Yours sincerely

W HAYES
General Secretary



More info +

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Capture.GIF

Introduction

At its annual conference in early September 2012, the TUC passed a motion instructing the general council to look at the technical, logistical and legal challenges in organising a general strike against austerity measures. There was no prospect of workers in Britain joining their fellow workers in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain for a European general strike on 14 November this year. This was not merely a matter of timing for the motion to consider the practicalities of organising a general strike was not synonymous with the will or intention to call a general strike itself. This research paper looks at the prospects, potency and alternatives concerning a general strike. It does not examine the (overall) political need or case for a general strike but rather the organisational and mobilising issues involved. So in these terms, what would be the point of a general strike? Whether in the public or private sectors, the point would essentially be to put political pressure on the government, and not the employers (as a whole or individually), in order to stop cuts to jobs and the welfare state. It might then have less purchase for private-sector workers because it did not seek to put pressure on their own individual employers in terms of pay, pensions and job security. If, however, the general strike concerned reforms of the labour market or betterment of workers’ rights this would be a different case.

Different scenarios

There are broadly three ways in which a general strike could happen in Britain. The first would see the TUC general council instruct its affiliates to call out all their members, pretty much as did happen in 1926. This would be without ballots and prior notification to employers. If there was no trade dispute between unions and workers, the strike would also be unlawful by virtue of being a political strike. As the union movement in Britain has a very slim history of such action (unlike its southern European counterparts), this is a highly unlikely scenario. The only union to have shown such an ability of its national leadership to call out is members with balloting in official action has been the Prison Officers’ Association (for example in 2007, 2009 and 2012). It would need a majority of members of the general council to make the instruction, where it would be likely that of the larger unions, Unite and the PCS would be for and Unison, USDAW and the GMB against, meaning the latter would won out because of their greater aggregate size.

The second would see workers come out on strike in solidarity with others that were already on strike, whether instructed or not by their unions (again having echoes with 1926). The state of workplace union organisation and union membership is such that this is again unlikely. Even during the miners’ strike of 1984-1985, the prospect of this kind of action was slight. The only sector in which this has taken place in living memory has been the Royal Mail (such as the 1988 postal strike) or in the engineering construction industry in 2009. Both these actions were highly sector specific and do not give a portent of a more general phenomenon. Moreover, the two most militant unions – PCS and the RMT – have almost no tradition of such unofficial, grassroots actions.

The third would be to see a de facto general strike as a result of the co-ordination of thousands upon thousands of lawful strikes on the same day after the process of balloting and notification so that all actions were lawful actions. This may be better termed a generalised strike as the memory of the 1926 strike is still pervasive. It is not just the issue of finding a common issue that can be the subject of a suitable trade dispute across and throughout the sectors of the economy that presents a challenge but also the ability to time this simultaneously. The 30 November 2011 pensions strike was a relatively easier challenge to meet because the bargaining groups in the public sector are relatively large and few compared to those in the private sector.

An unlawful general strike of the first scenario would reckon upon no government or employer seeking injunctions and damages for loss of business in an unlawful strike for fear of escalating the political crisis in a dangerous way. The second would see the possibility of government or employer seeking injunctions and damages for loss of business as unlikely so long as it could not be proven in court that any union had given support to such action. In the third scenario, a union would contest any attempt by government or employer seeking injunctions and damages for loss of business.

In practice today, a general strike of either unlawful type or a generalised strike of the lawful type would be primarily a public-sector strike with a key presence in the private-sector parts of transport, communication and the utilities. This is because there are whole arrays of the private sector that are virtually union-free and overall union density in the sector is just 14 per cent. It is hard to know to what extent non-union members in both organised and unorganised sectors would take part in the strike. The probability would not be high unless the senses of anger, confident and self-belief were high. In Britain, there is not the same tradition of non-union workers mobilising as there is in many other European countries like France. But even in the public sector, there are many parts where union membership is less than 50 per cent so it would be wrong to assume that there would be a total shutdown of the public sector.

Reach, length and potency

The most likely duration of a general strike in Britain is an eight hour strike over 24 hours, i.e. a single one day strike. By contrast, in Europe over last decade, general strikes have ranged in length from 3-4 hours to 2-3 days although the most common duration has been a one-day (or eight hour) strike. And, they have been taken numerous times, especially in Greece, Spain and Portugal. That general strikes take this form suggests that they seek to either influence and inform ongoing negotiations with the government or establish (or re-establish) negotiations with the government. There is no sense that – unlike the 1926 general strike which began as an indefinite one and lasted nine days in the end – that the fight is one to the finish with only complete victory in gaining objectives being contemplated. However, a single one-day strike in Britain would probably be more inclined to be a show of protest and a possible shot across the bows of the government with the hope that some negotiations with the government would come out of the action. In order to influence any negotiations which did then begin, further and possibly greater general strikes would need to be undertaken. A single one day strike would also not engender a huge sense of political crisis, so the notion that a single action could sweep the government from office is fanciful. However, the case for a one-day general strike rests as much on its mobilising ability and success (in terms of participation or turn out rates) helping create the possibility of further general strikes as a result of increasing capacity and confidence to undertake further such actions. So any discussion of a general strike in Britain must address the issues of for how long a general strike should last or how many times general strikes would need to be called to have the desired effect (with that desired effect being clear in advance).

In many southern European countries – despite successive general strikes – the results of the strikes have not been as positive and significant as expected. Governments have more often than not stayed office, the same political parties have dominated the political terrain and neo-liberal and austerity programmes have continued apace. This indicates not only are general strikes not a silver bullet or magic panacea but that, paradoxically, the more they are used the less each one becomes effective. Indeed, prior to the November 14 action, Greece has witnessed 20 general strikes since 2010. Moreover, the tendency has been for the general strikes in these countries to be a response to being shut out of social partnership and national negotiations over labour market and social wage reforms. There is, therefore, an institutional as well as political imperative to the actions. The former is not present in Britain.

The danger in holding a general strike - of a single one-day kind - is not the prospect of defeat per se but the prospect of making no discernible impact. Defeat is hardly on the cards as a one-day strike would be a protest strike rather than an attempt to bring the economy to a halt as in 1926. In other words, the danger is of it being a damp squib so that this becomes an obstacle to taking any further action or any more general strikes.

The TUC consultation process

After the consultation process has ended, the probable outcomes are that there was insufficient support for a general strike, turnout would be patchy and it would be unlawful. That much was evident beforehand. However, a generalised is likely to be more possible and practical but again that much was evident beforehand. It remains the case that the issue(s) for such a strike need to be found if it is to be a runner. So far issues of pay rises and job security have not been discussed in the same serious way as was the case with public sector pensions. Whatever form of general striking is considered, it will have to contend with the loss of momentum since late 2011 (as exemplified by the difference in turnouts between the 26 March 2011 and 20 October 2012 London demonstrations) and the disillusionment that has set in since as attempts to replicate the extent of the 30 November action have failed. This is not an auspicious basis for doing so.

What would make the holding of a general strike much more probable and potent would be if the general level of strike activity was much higher. If there was then there would a more palpable sense that a general strike came out of and feed back into a rising level of more confident struggle by workers. To envisage such a situation would be to recall the early the 1970s when the TUC was forced to call a general strike over the jailing of five dockers for breaking an industrial relations law. But before the strike took place, the government caved in and released the dockers - the Pentonville Five as they were known – so the strike did not proceed.

Legal measures

In a summary of their recent pamphlet for the Institute of Employment Rights called Days of Action: the legality of protest strikes against government cuts, John Hendy and Keith Ewing (Morning Star 14 September 2012) argued:

It is our contention that the right of workers to strike as a form of political protest is protected by the ECHR and as a result the Human Rights Act 1998 must protect it in British law. Faced with an application for an injunction by an employer to stop any such action, our courts would be bound by the Human Rights Act to interpret British law consistently with the ILO and ECHR convention rights of British workers. It is also our contention that it would be possible to interpret domestic law consistently with convention rights to outflank the current statutory restrictions on trade union freedom. But even if our courts felt unable to go so far, it is difficult to see how they could avoid making a declaration that the existing restrictions are incompatible with convention rights. That would then form the basis for an inevitable application by British trade unions to the European Court of Human Rights, asking that court to guarantee for British workers the rights it has already declared for Turkish and Russian workers, where trade unions are also subject to swingeing restraints. Either way, there is now an opportunity for trade unions to reclaim their rights by legal action. … But trade unions ought not to be intimidated by the fear of legal action, given the direction of travel from ILO Convention 87, to the ECHR, to the Human Rights Act 1998.

Their point was the political protest strikes like a general strike could be shown to be lawful. Whether this will be a spur to organising of a general strike or the willingness for the case to be tested in law remains to be. So far it does not seem to have been a game changer.

Alternatives

The danger with a general strike is that it becomes a case of putting too many eggs in one basket. The use of the general strike weapon needs to be part of a wider strategy unless the aim is to carry out an insurrection by an indefinite general strike. Consequently, the role of political parties must be considered, most obviously the Labour Party. Whether any advance can be made through this avenue is the key question. No matter Ed Miliband’s advocacy of pre-distribution and one-nationism, Labour’s policies on austerity have not changed in any significant way. The other main alternative is the mobilisations of organisations of civic society, especially the alliances of users and producer of public services. Whatever else is to be part of a strategy of resistance, the key cog in the wheel remains the national leaderships of unions. It is worth recalling that one of the most successful strikes of recent years – the 1989 (selective) strike for a 1989 shorter working week in engineering – was led by two stalwarts of the right. They played a key part in mobilising their members by touring round the country carrying out mass factory gate meetings. In the same year, Nalgo carried out a highly successful pay strike by escalating action from one day a week to two and then three. Both examples suggest that more attention needs to be paid to developing leadership and tactical capability.

[fishtank]

The first would see the TUC general council instruct its affiliates to call out all their members, pretty much as did happen in 1926.

I nearly wet myself at the likely hood of that happening.
That would be the same TUC that offered the post of deputy general secretary to "graduates only" and had to backtrack rapidly when they realised who they were supposed to be representing.
The backtracked so far they scrapped the post entirely and replaced it with assistant general secretary.

It would be interesting to see the 50 odd members of the TUC General Council trying to organise a general strike.
It would take a year to decide on the date.