Three points. (1) don’t say “Too many unionists start with the proposition ” because it sounds like you are talking about Orange parties in Northern Ireland – we are Trade Unionists, or Trades Union members. (2) the “tories want mass strikes” isn’t true – especially with the added conspiracy theory about sapping Labour funds. the government might feel strikes are inevitable, and certainly wants to win them. But the idea they want as big and as widespread strikes as possible is nonsense. There are long standing, tactical approaches to striking mostly (but not exclusively) used by tory governments, and these are all about separating off strikers anf taking on unions one at a time. Worth noting that the one member of the government with the most political experience – Ken Clarke, has faced and more or less lost a strike because it generated too much solidarity and was too militant. (3)That said, there is of course a pressing case for winning the war of opinion . It would be very helpful if Labour Party members turned up and waved their banners in support of strikers to help show that striking public servants have broad support (and show Ed Balls is wrong to try and weaken the upcoming strikes)) . However, strikes are not won primarily by public opinion (although that is very important), they are won by the resolve of their members and solidarity from other groups – which is why the “fighting” talk is quite important.

Another element is that pensions are being attacked as a a softening up excercise for privatisation. Public service contracts are much more attractive to the profit making sector if they don’t have to pay decent pensions .
John Cridland of the CBI has said as much ““Pension reforms will help the prime minister’s “big society” programme to really get off the ground.
Public sector pensions remain the biggest barrier to the private and third sectors providing public services” http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/09/public-sector-pensions-pensions
So it is quite legitimate for public service workers to campaign on the basis that “after they have taken our pensions – they will come for your services “

Good article.

The fact which I think more people should know is that government figures show that if we do nothing, then the pensions bill for public sector workers will shrink over the next 50 years.

http://yorksranter.wordpress.com/2011/06/20/there-is-no-crisis-dammit/

Trying to get the media ‘onside’ is all very well and good, but when those media are either a) overwhelmingly owned by proprietors with a vested ideological interest in undermining public services to prepare them for privatisation, or b) a public broadcasting organisation which had its balls removed by one Hutton and has had the wool pulled over its eyes by another Hutton, I think it would be a mistake to expect any balance in their coverage.

Getting Bob Crow or Mark Serwotka to contribute the odd piece in the Standard or Guardian counts for very little when it appears alongside the torrent of vituperation and misrepresentation (“gold-plated pensions!”, “Five-a-day disabled lesbian diversity officers!”) which infests those rags every single day.

Yes, we must get the message out however we can. However, a more direct approach avoiding reliance on the corporate media is essential.

(A proud PCS member who will be out on 30/06 – and whenever else I need to be)

Do you think its fair Sunny ? What about the less well off and their children you want to pay for this free money ?
Let them take their contributions back and see what they get in the market every one else has to live in and see how good their deal is. An index linked defined benefits final salary related scheme is worth huge amounts a teacher in £30,000 for example gets a pot worth £750,000 give or take. None are funded except as an accounting method ( they all require regular tax money injections )
I do not for one second think there is the slightest support for these strikes and for the Labour Party not to condemn them marks a further retreat into core voter territory.
The Conservative Party does not want strikes but if there must be strikes this is certainly the ground where they will want to make their stand

I don’t think lefties appreciate the Tories want widespread strikes. I repeat: they want to see widespread strikes.

I am not a leftie and so you will have to convince me with a proper argument. You might start by being specific. The people who make the decisions are cabinet ministers. Apart from Cameron and Osborne, the key person is Francis Maude.

Maude is clearly spoiling for a fight with the PCS. However, my information is this is because he thinks he can handle a PCS strike (singular) which he expects to be patchy. This is based on his analysis of previous PCS actions: that is, the PCS is weak on the ground and won’t even be able to get its own members out on strike. This is a very long way from wanting “widespread strikes”.

Their plan would be to ride out the strikes through well-managed media manipulation, win over public support, look strong and pass laws to restrict union activity and funding.

would be? This sounds a bit weak. If you have the evidence why not say “Their plan is..”?

Do you have any evidence that either the Government or Conservative Party (let’s use their real name) have made any preparations for any “well-managed media manipulation”?

My understanding is that the present Conservative Party leadership think that they beat the unions in the 1980’s and that was that. The union leaders have accepted defeat and will not dare to take a stand. If there are some strikes the Conservatives are confident that the union leaders will rein them in. This is not a ‘class war’ for them, it’s merely enforcing the terms of the peace: their victors peace.

The Conservative’s weakness is that, in terms of social struggles, they have been on the winning team too long. They just don’t remember how tough it can be. Even the more senior people like Maude was still at university during the Heath government.

“Do you have any evidence that either the Government or Conservative Party (let’s use their real name) have made any preparations for any “well-managed media manipulation”?

Naive.

How much money do you think they spend on press officers, spin doctors etc?

Are you seriously suggesting that at no point has a conservative minister or official raised the issue of “how do we sell our point of view to the public?”

I don’t doubt that the unions may have sympathy for public-sector strike action, but since this will be of limited effect on most people (even those using key services should not be affected) then this will be unsurprising.

But the effects of the strikes will be minimal (and perhaps unfairly focussed on those that the unions somewhat disingeneously claim to care for – the unions (rightly and correctly) care for their members as the first priority). Bins may not be collected (although it turns out that in periods of unemployment you can get non-unionised temporary labour to do the same job in the main!) and the like, but there will not be strikes on most transport systems (since these are mainly not public sector) or effecting power generation etc.

This is not shaping up to be a titanic struggle, but rather to most people an irrelevance or a minor inconvenience, which will probably receive broad public support and likewise probably lead to an anti-Labour backlash at the next set of elections if Labour support the strikes too closely – there is no contradiction there as most of those who support the strikes will not change their votes, whilst some of those affected by them adversely or who oppose the strikes may do so.

” The real average figure is around £6,500. ”

Maybe the median figure would be more interesting than the average.

Is the real value to the recipient rising or falling?

If the real value to the recipient is rising is it unreasonable to ask them to contribute more?

If people are living longer does that not mean that they are receiving pension payments funded by general taxation for longer? Think about an analogy with booking into a hotel for a week and deciding to stay for two. Would it be completely unreasonable to be expected to pay extra for the longer stay?

The cost to the taxpayer as a share of GDP is extrapolated on UK GDP rising on trend. What if our trend rate of growth has fallen and our trend rate is lower. Would that not mean GDP will be lower going forward and as consequence the share going to pensions be higher from a smaller pool of tax contributions?

Is it ethical to ask young taxpayers to finance the retirement of the likes of the baby boomers who could not even be bothered to replace themselves leaving a gap in the population pyramid? A gap that means a smaller pool of taxpayers in the middle are left to fund the retirement of a growing group of retired public sector workers.

I don’t blame unions for trying to protect the benefits of their members. However, it is silly to pretend that rising life expectancy does not create funding and ethical problems. There is nothing progressive about asking young taxpayers on modest incomes to pay benefits to others that they themselves have no hope of attaining. It is a contemporary form of feudalism.

@8

“although it turns out that in periods of unemployment you can get non-unionised temporary labour to do the same job in the main!”

isn’t hiring strike-breakers illegal?

Also you touched on an important point re:transport being unaffected because it’s not in the public sector. One of the victories of Thatcherism over the working class wasn’t simply crushing the unions but privatising essential services like energy, like transport, like water so that the workers there are no longer public servants but slaves to the corporate shareholders and no longer in solidarity with their fellow workers in the public sector (teachers, nurses). whether that situation stays the same remains to be seen – there is a broad support for striking public sector workers as most workers see them as the canary in the mine – once they go down it’s the rest of us that’ll suffer.

S.Pill,

isn’t hiring strike-breakers illegal?

I don’t think so – firing striking workers and replacing them is up to a point I belive, but using the non-paid wages to hire others to do the work in the meantime is, I belive, fine. Birmingham Council did it during a dispute with the binmen last winter, and apparently the collections got quicker (presumably the effect wouldn’t have lasted as the new workers settled in though…).

Also you touched on an important point re:transport being unaffected because it’s not in the public sector. One of the victories of Thatcherism over the working class wasn’t simply crushing the unions but privatising essential services like energy, like transport, like water so that the workers there are no longer public servants but slaves to the corporate shareholders and no longer in solidarity with their fellow workers in the public sector (teachers, nurses). whether that situation stays the same remains to be seen – there is a broad support for striking public sector workers as most workers see them as the canary in the mine – once they go down it’s the rest of us that’ll suffer.

I suspect the class consciousness that is required to be ‘in solidarity with their fellow workers’ died in the 1980s at the latest – perhaps it was a victim of the social changes of the the 1960s when the post-war acceptance of place within a heirarchy seems to have collapsed amongst the young (yes, that’s a broad generalisation of a complicated situation), which would explain how Mrs Thatcher’s reforms in the 1980s could be passed and she could still be re-elected (she was not really that charasmatic, so I doubt she won people over from nothing, despite Mr Scargill et al’s best efforts…). Would be kind of ironic, as the 1960′s social revolution was very much one of the better products of socialism…

And I am not sure that many people see the public service as a model for what happens to them – because the security and terms in public service are better than most private employers can offer, so the loss of these is hardly leading the way – it is catching up.

To be honest, strikes are probably not effective long-term weapons against large corporations anyway – unlike governments, they are not tied down to one workforce.

there is a broad support for striking public sector workers as most workers see them as the canary in the mine – once they go down it’s the rest of us that’ll suffer.

More like the last dodo on Mauritius.

I hope the public sector strikes last six months- because, by then, most people will have realised that the majority of these workers were never needed in the first place.

My problem, one that I suspect is shared by others, is what is the aim of the strike on June 30th? On July 1st what government position is it hoped will be different from June 29th because of the strike? As I understand it, negoiations are ongoing. Both Unions and government have to some extent jumped the gun – the unions by calling for strikes before negoiations are complete, the government, through Danny Alexander, making a premature speech. It seems to me that negotiations should continue in an attempt to find an agreed package – or they break down without agreement. At which point the unions can look for strike action as the next step. To strike before then is to invite defeat because the government will be handed the perfect propaganda weapon.

Einstein said something about insanity being doing the same thing twice and expecting different results.

The conservatives took on the miners and won, and with that permanently reduced the capacity of trade unionists to fight. I don’t know what percentage of strikes since then have resulted in victory, but I’d bet it was less than a quarter. In the non health or education parts of the public sector even less so, where public opinion is – rightly or wrongly – more hostile. In fact many people see pcs members who work in job centres as a bunch of jobsworths incapable of critical thinking, but who have on numerous occasions made people destitute through bureaucratic decisions.

So it’s always an uphill struggle from the start. When the issue causing people to go on strike is self interest (pensions) rather than an issue of principle such as protecting vulnerable people from cuts, it becomes impossible. In fact the level of leadership and decision making from the entire trade union hierarchy has been so incompetent and politically illiterate that had MI5 decided to place an agent in charge of the trade unions they would have performed better so not to give cover away!

The conservatives want a summer of strikes. This fact cannot be repeated enough. Striking over pensions rather than service quality is a big own goal.

It’s fucking depressing that the unions keep making the same mistake over and over. You cannot win a strike without massive public support – i.e. 80/90%. So before you even think about striking at least try to obtain a level of support that means you can win. And instead of taking an action that will either: (1) massively hit vulnerable and poor people who disproportionately rely on a service, or (2) have no effect on the public and thus demonstrate the service wasn’t necessary in the first place, why not try some different tactics. Here are some suggestions:

(1) with over a million members UNISON has some massive consumer power. An organised boycott of businesses run by key conservative party funders would hit them where it hurts.
(2) Work to rule usually significantly reduces productivity without losing public support. Although in the DWP that would probably be a normal day….
(3) Some union members somewhere have some pretty dirty information on senior management and politicians. An act of leaking someone’s expenses every day…..
(4) Adopt an ashcroft style political strategy of targeting marginal seats to ensure tories become vulnerable.
(5). Focus on offering decent services to union members that may persuade younger people that union membership is worthwhile. In particular try and expand into the private sector by offering services to members that don’t require employer recognition (i.e. you recruit people regardless of where they work) – e.g. Legal advice, funds for re-training people, access to publicity etc.
(6) Focus less on funding the labour party and more on promoting the ideas that will make people support labour.
(7) If you have to become militant, target the upper class not members of the public. E.G. BA staff should have decided simply to not run first class (or spit in the wine or something) not stop people going on holiday.

Planeshift,

Not sure I agree with you on a lot of that…

The conservatives want a summer of strikes. This fact cannot be repeated enough. Striking over pensions rather than service quality is a big own goal.

It is a lot easier to portray the unions as playing politics if they are striking over service quality – and that alienates people a lot as well, plus risks dragging Labour into the picture far more. Politically I do not think that is a good idea – especially since suggestions for improvement in services do not traditionally receive warm welcomes from unions (representing their members, who like most people tend to dislike change – the nature of the beast in this case).

It’s fucking depressing that the unions keep making the same mistake over and over. You cannot win a strike without massive public support – i.e. 80/90%. So before you even think about striking at least try to obtain a level of support that means you can win. And instead of taking an action that will either: (1) massively hit vulnerable and poor people who disproportionately rely on a service, or (2) have no effect on the public and thus demonstrate the service wasn’t necessary in the first place, why not try some different tactics. Here are some suggestions:

(1) with over a million members UNISON has some massive consumer power. An organised boycott of businesses run by key conservative party funders would hit them where it hurts.

I’d suggest that UNISON’s ability to bring this about is much less dramatic than the numbers suggest – many union members are not political, or even (shock horror) Conservatives themselves.

(2) Work to rule usually significantly reduces productivity without losing public support. Although in the DWP that would probably be a normal day….

Agreed – but perhaps undermined if your job is helping the public and you won’t go that extra mile?

(3) Some union members somewhere have some pretty dirty information on senior management and politicians. An act of leaking someone’s expenses every day…..

This is assuming that there is information there – for some reason expenses have got a lot cleaner of late. Plus of course it would be fairly bad for a union to encourage members in activities that got them fired – politics before members’ welfare is not a good union policy.

(4) Adopt an ashcroft style political strategy of targeting marginal seats to ensure tories become vulnerable.

Isn’t there a union fund doing this already?

(5). Focus on offering decent services to union members that may persuade younger people that union membership is worthwhile. In particular try and expand into the private sector by offering services to members that don’t require employer recognition (i.e. you recruit people regardless of where they work) – e.g. Legal advice, funds for re-training people, access to publicity etc.

Sensible, but aren’t the unions aware of this?

(6) Focus less on funding the labour party and more on promoting the ideas that will make people support labour.

I’m not sure that would work – if you cut the link, why would Labour support the unions ideology (especially if they remain as politically insular as they are at the moment). Also, would that not risk Labour not being able to afford to compete?

(7) If you have to become militant, target the upper class not members of the public. E.G. BA staff should have decided simply to not run first class (or spit in the wine or something) not stop people going on holiday.

Can’t do it – work to rule or strike are fine, but breach of contract or deliberate sabotage are dismissable offences, which is something unions advice people not to do.

I can’t help but think you are considering unions generally as political machines here and forgetting that they have to protect not expose their members. This is their weakness in politics – but also the reason they can continue to exist.

The debate in the comments above seems to be based on the entirely false premise that three quarters of strikes “lose” when they just don’t. Millions of people remain union members for good reasons, despite the setbacks of the Thatcher years. there is still a union premium on wages – unionised workers still get higher pay thanks to their unions. Recent high-ish profile strike – FBU, Scottish Nursery Nurses , Teachers (2008) have all won something – not their full claim, perhaps not as much as they should have, sometimes just a little , sometimes a lot – through striking. And the role of public opinion is important, but not the deciding factor. Pay rates for RMT members are , on the whole, better than they were, thanks to a firm stand by they union. I think the “unpopularity” of Bob Crow is always very exaggerated, especially thanks to noises from the Evening Standard and other “voice of the commuter” journalists. But even so, you can see from the industrial success of the RMT that “public opinion” is not the central factor.

Soloman,

You missed out the success of the UCU in getting huge pay rises about three years ago (albeit that has not helped the sector greatly now…).

It’s a good point though. But the key thing with all the disputes is they were based on the workers not the politics. A dispute over pensions would be, so long as the unions didn’t also try to make them about the reforms in general. That may be the strategy to win – but it doesn’t help the strategy of people who want the unions to be a political tool.

The FBU and the RMT are examples of unions who have successfully negotiated on behalf of their members with pusillanimous management to the point where their members are paid way over the market rate for the jobs they do.

There are 35 applicants for every fire service vacancy and almost nobody leaves the service until they are pensioned off at 50. There is massive over-manning and the restrictive working practices the union has protected are Neanderthal. This has been possible because of huge support from the public for strike action whenever they have taken it- a public confused enough to believe that it is not possible to overpay a brave man who might, one day, pluck them from an inferno.

On the one hand, you could argue that the union leadership have done a good job for their members but, on the other, we could be discussing what to do with the £1bn we could be saving by running an efficient service.

Thanks Watchman, plus I shouldn’t have included the 2008 teachers strike.

“a public confused enough to believe that it is not possible to overpay a brave man who might, one day, pluck them from an inferno.”

Well pagar, thanks for volunteering. Here’s £5.93 and a burning building – off you go son, do your worst!

The public sector will get no sympathy at all from people in the private sector. We don’t get pension – simple as – never mind stonking good pensions like the public sector. I wish I could look forward to £6.5K. No chance. Strikes will back fire; Ed Balls is right – it’s a trap.

“Well pagar, thanks for volunteering. Here’s £5.93 and a burning building – off you go son, do your worst!”

Pagar has a point here, though: there are certain groups that the public always seem to think should be paid more than they are. Firefighters are one, soldiers are another. Triple it for either of those who get injured in the line of duty.

I’m not saying that firefighters or soliders are currently underpaid or even fairly paid. But there has to be an upper limit: you wouldn’t pay firefighters £1,000,000 a day. But “Government To Cut Pay For Firefighters” is a headline guaranteed to cause outrage before anyone has even checked how much they’re paid in the first place.

Unions absolutely do NOT have a “good base of public support”.

We live in a modern day and age where health, safety, salaries and pensions have swung far in the favour of public sectors. Unions have no justification whatsoever. Their action simply hurts the economy for the hard working, economy-supporting private sector, many of whom are earning far less than a tube driver or council bureaucrat

@ 21 Northern Worker

“The public sector will get no sympathy at all from people in the private sector. We don’t get pension – simple as – never mind stonking good pensions like the public sector. ”

Um, I work for the private sector, and my employer’s pension scheme involves them meeting my own contributions (in other words, doubling my money). If my employer didn’t have a pension scheme, I could set one up independently. Obviously there are some private sector workers who are close enough to the breadline that they literally can’t afford to take out a pension scheme, but it’s simply untrue to claim that people in the private sector don’t get pensions.

@21

Who do you work for? Name and shame.

i am a teacher going out on strike and demonstrating next week against pension reforms. so far parents have been supportive. one said she would be very shocked if we weren’t striking

I have children at the local school and that means teachers have a decisive role in our children`s lives . Naturally parents are wary of making enemies .I can promise you that in private there is considerable irritation at what is patently an unfairly Public Sector biassed reward structure which sheer common sense tells you cannot be afforded.
Chaise- most people in the private sector get no employer contributions and certainly get nothing like the astonishingly generous pensions teachers and others grab.Index linked defined benefits final salary related pensions are funded by tax payers one way or another ,out of current taxation .They are impossible to buy in a real market so unquantifiably vast is the pot required . The short fall in the funds is set to become increasingly unfair and don`t forget these are some of the most privileged people in society already and getting more so as private sector wages fall.
I am surprised to see Mr. Hundal is so gung -ho. He must be aware of the impact on potential Labour voters in the South a naked defence of vested interest and sinecures will have.

I support the trades union movement, they are vital in a world where unscrupulous bastards would gleefully exploit a workforce at every opportunity. However, the unions need to get the non-members on side, they need to give them a reason to think about joining, rather than reasons to think they are no better than the politicians. A HEFTY PAY CUT WOULD BE A GOOD START, union leaders ca’nt complain about greedy bastards in the private sector, and take a massive salary, paid for by the people they represent. MPs get 65k a year, why do they need more than that? I do’nt doubt the intentions of union leaders, they are genuinely concerned with the welfare of the members, but it might gather greater support in the wider public, if they made such a signifigant gesture. As for the pensions problem, why not transfer responsibility for public sector contributions to the TUC? Let them administer the whole thing, contributions, investment, payments. That way, you take the private sector out of the equation, union members paying into a fund exclusively for union members. Several million people the government would no longer have to include in their calculations, saving time and money.

@27

So rather than fight for better conditions and pensions in the private sector you’d rather drag public servants down to that low level. Sheesh, you must be fun at parties *rolls eyes*

ps don’t believe what you’re fed by the tabloids, by the way – the majority of public sector pensions are not the gold-plated diamond-encrusted jewels of paradise you appear to think they are.

29 – Don`t believe what you are told by the unions who commonly misrepresent the figures. For example quoting an annual average Pension figure across the industry as if it were the annual average received after full service that people assume it is.
The publicly funded arrangements not received by some-time teachers whilst doing other jobs is hardly germane. The cost to the tax payer of the yearly pot requirement is the point.
Or… the claim that funds and “funded” this a trick of nomenclature is just a different hole to put the inadequate amounts in. Treasury balancing amounts are required either way. Same black hole .
There is a simple test , give the contributions back and tell the teachers , say to buy the best pension they can.Index linked, actuarially calibrated to about 25 years defined benefit and guaranteed .

Good luck with that …and that of course is what those paying for all these goodies get except without any contributions , ie nothing qand thats onj top of 15% and grlwing differences in the growth of wages

Frankly its disgraceful class entitlement and greed with no place on a left wing site

A small flock of anti-union, stop the strikes comments seem to have landed, on wobbly legs.
Firstly, this Daily-Maily “public sector are not productive, all bureaucrats” argument is very weak. Take the argument about the “hard working, economy-supporting private sector, many of whom are earning far less than a tube driver or council bureaucrat”. It is a very wierd idea that tube drivers do not support the economy: How effective would the London economy be without the tube ? I think the underground is probably a pretty essential piece of support to the London economy.
Similarly, great swathes of local government – fixing roads, keeping on street lights , shifting bins – what do you think happens to the economy without these ?

Secondly the “let me tell you, I know, all this striking will be unpopular ” argument – Sunny went to the trouble of presenting some polls , and simply ingoring them to throw around a lot of anonymous anecdote – it’s very unconvincing. I live in Southampton, we are in the middle of a big local government dispute, including the bins, and I can tell you the Conservative PArty’s desparate attempt to whip up public anger against strikers- with dubious leaflets they stuck on bins attacking the union – just fell flat.