Days lost to strikes by workers top 1m

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http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/59c5bf88-ddc3 ... ck_check=1

By Andrew Taylor, Employment Correspondent

Published: February 18 2008 02:00 | Last updated: February 18 2008 02:00

The number of days lost through industrial action topped 1m last year for only the second time in a decade as government experienced anger from public sector job cuts and below-inflation pay increases.

According to official figures, strikes by postal workers, job centre staff, driving test examiners, Revenue & Customs staff, passport staff and prison officers helped lift the number of days lost by 37 per cent to 1.03m - the highest level since 2002 when 1.3m days were lost following a rash of one-day strikes by teachers.

Unions have warned that there could be even greater industrial strife this year, if Gordon Brown sticks to his pledge to keep public sector pay rises in line with the government's 2 per cent inflation target as measured by the consumer price index.

Feelings are running high over ministerial decisions to stagger or delay last year's recommended 2.5 per cent pay rises for health workers and police officers, reducing their value to 1.9 per cent in the current financial year.

Health unions, representing more than 1m workers, are insisting that pay rises this year must be greater than retail price inflation, currently running at 4 per cent and considered by unions to be a much better guide to the cost of living. Local government unions are also expected to press for inflation-busting increases.

Civil servants at the Department for Work and Pensions, working in job centres, pension offices and the child support agency, meanwhile, are expected to stage further rolling stoppages next month over the imposition of a three-year pay deal, while police officers have won permission to mount a High Court challenge against the government's refusal to backdate their pay rise. The courts are due to decide this week whether to continue an injunction won last year by the government, preventing industrial action by prison officers.

Brendan Barber, Trades Union Congress general secretary, said: "Our hard-pressed nurses, teachers and firefighters do vital jobs, and only take industrial action as a last resort. However, for the last four years they have been given pay rises below the rate of inflation. It's unreasonable to expect these hardworking public servants to accept cuts in wages and living standards, so they have had no choice but to fight their corner.

"Days lost to industrial action are far lower than days lost to sickness, suggesting workers may be making themselves ill with hard work."

The number of days lost to industrial action last year was well below the average of 12.9m days lost annually during the 1970s and 7.2m in the 1980s. Some 29.47m days were lost in 1979 during the "winter of discontent" and 162m days were lost in 1926, the year of the General Strike.

Workers are more reluctant these days to stop work for more than a few days at a time. This has led unions to stage a series of short, sharp stoppages, aimed at causing maximum disruption at the least cost to members. The impact on business, however, can still be damaging, as was seen during last summer's strikes by postal workers, which employer organisations estimated cost several hundred million pounds in delayed payments and orders.

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According to official figures, strikes by postal workers, job centre staff, driving test examiners, Revenue & Customs staff, passport staff and prison officers helped lift the number of days lost by 37 per cent to 1.03m - the highest level since 2002 when 1.3m days were lost following a rash of one-day strikes by teachers.

So it wasn't just us then. Maybe this Tory government, sorry Labour government should be providing the public sector workers a decent pay rise and protecting their pensions instead of stitching us up and bailing out privately owned banks and helping the city boys to screw over the rest of the country. I'd better stop now