Year of industrial unrest looms

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Year of industrial unrest looms as public sector braces for spending cuts

Threat of strike ballots over modernisation and pay further strains relations between unions and management

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Britain is ushering in the new year with the threat of widespread unrest as civil servants, tube drivers and rail workers are poised to ballot on strike action.

After a year of factory occupations, indefinite walkouts, postal misery and the debacle of the strike ballot by 12,000 British Airways cabin crew, there is a sense of heightening industrial militancy.

Now, relations between unions and management look likely to be further tested. The Public and Commercial Services union is set to ballot its 270,000 members this month, threatening disruption at jobcentres, revenue and customs, immigration, the coastguard and other bodies in a dispute over redundancy terms.

The National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport workers is threatening to ballot 10,000 London Underground workers over pay. It is also locked in dispute with Network Rail over the future of 1,500 track maintenance jobs. The union has ordered a ballot in the new year for industrial action over compulsory redundancies. General secretary Bob Crow said job cuts were "a reckless gamble with rail safety which would create the perfect conditions for another Hatfield, Paddington, Potters Bar or Grayrigg disaster."

Meanwhile, 121,000 postal workers, who called off Christmas walkouts but whose strike mandate remains live, are continuing talks with Royal Mail over modernisation plans. As the year progresses, however, experts predict it will be the public sector that bears the jobs brunt.

"We ain't seen nothing yet in terms of the depth of public spending savings that need to be achieved," said John Cridland, deputy director-general of the CBI. "I think the period of maximum pain, in terms of public spending reduction, is still some way off. If there was a change in government, then changes in public spending are not going to happen immediately. And the current government is clearly nailing its flag to the mast of not cutting in a way that would put recovery at risk.

So the moment of maximum peril probably isn't 2010. It is rather more 2011. I think we'll see the biggest challenges with industrial relations at the point when public sector jobs are challenged."

He said there were differences between private sector culture, where many workplaces were not unionised and there was cooperative spirit over short-time working and pay freezes, and the public sector where "the response to a challenge tends to become adversarial".

Winter of Discontent comparisons, likening the wave of militancy to that of the late 70s and early 80s, are not an approriate analogy, according to Ed Sweeney, chairman of the conciliation service Acas.

Union membership stands at about 7m, half that of the 1980s, though three-fifths of public sector jobs are unionised. Manufacturing has declined, and with it union muscle. Indeed, Acas saw a small decrease last year in the number of disputes.

But the size of disputes and the numbers involved, has increased. Acas sees the public sector as the likely flashpoint. "We are getting ready for … potential for job losses, pay freezes and the impact that has on the temperature of employer/employee relations," said Sweeney.

Last year, wildcat strikes on construction and industrial sites were sparked by the hiring of foreign labour at the Lindsey oil refinery. In October workers rejected an offer from employers which they said did not stop them being undercut by cheaper – and often more skilled – foreign workers.

Dougie Rooney, energy national officer for the union Unite, said: "The problem of foreign labour has not been completely sorted. It's all about jobs, training and opportunities. Pay comes second. People want security and steady earnings."

With some £200bn of investment required to build energy infrastructure such as nuclear reactors and wind farms by 2020, the issue of foreign labour is unlikely to go away. In the pre-budget report this month, the Government announced more funding for training and internships, particularly for hi-tech manufacturers. But Rooney said that more needed to be done, and soon, to make sure that British workers have the right skills to benefit from new infrastructure projects.

[Captain Scarlet]

Who invited these johnny foriengers here in the first place..Nulabour! Was it not about opening up the EU and getting Britain up there with the best and all that bull...now they are stealing jobs and putting our own on the dole cos Broon/Blair thought it a good idea Don't think so cos it is coming home to roost now

[Yahoorsur]

With the greatest respect Cpt.,nobody invited johnny foreigner,as eu citizens they were allowed by the eu to work and live where ever they want,(free movement of labour and capital)just as if i want to work anywhere in the eu i can do so.
It aint fair it aint right,all it encourages is a race to the bottom for terms and conditions for working folk and their families,i really fear that we are heading to a new feudalism or back to the 1920s-30s for the working folk of this country.

[NWpostie]

all it encourages is a race to the bottom for terms and conditions for working folk and their families,i really fear that we are heading to a new feudalism or back to the 1920s-30s for the working folk of this country.

The problem with this approach is that nobody will spend anything not knowing when their next pay packet is coming in, this will have a knock on effect on the economy, in the 1930s conditions were so bad, that the economy was in a deep slump and probably would have remained so if WW2 hadn't come round, if bosses start doing this, then the economy will be in a even longer slump, shops, factories, services will close, downsize, with the consequent effect on finances, housing, tax revenue and local unrest exploited by extreme organisations.

If we are going to have any immigrant workers, we must make it a rule like Germany, France and Spain, that you pay taxes for 7 years before you can claim any benefit, not 12 months as it is now, this only attract the wrong sort of immigrants who will not be in for the long haul, only to claim benefits and send it back to their home Country not invested in this Country.

[BELIAL]

Ah ,one of the myriad of contradictions enshrined in the Fat Cat capitalist system Whack up your bonus and profit margins by screwing your workforce into the ground. Trouble is, when all the Fat Cats go for the pip squeeze at the same time ,shock horror, the market has evaporated. Hold on tight,the ride has only just begun