strike

[Chippy Minton]

It?s illegal for a picket to consist of more than six people so no surprise that they don?t ?look? well supported, but I think the unions are genuinely pleased with the turnout at marches and rallies ? tens of thousands marched in all the major cities and there were 100s of rallies all over the country.

However, they will be furious with the actions of the egotistical idiots at UKUncut in the Haymarket in the past hour.

[Loz]

I was wondering at lunchtime what the unions would really want out of today... a huge knock on effect that would make big headlines but probably annoy the general public and lose support, or a decent turnout but not a big knock-on effect (as seems to be the case).

[Otta]

Some BBC Links

How the UK Has been affected

Public & Private pensions compared

[Loz]

Chippy Minton Wrote:

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> However, they will be furious with the actions of

> the egotistical idiots at UKUncut in the Haymarket in the past hour.

The Beeb reports it is OccupyLSX, not UKUncut. Though probably in reality the same people.

[HAL9000]

200

[StraferJack]

I suspect the main thing the unions want from today is the ability to show the government they can mobilise is such numbers. Job done

For some people it matters not. If the strikes caused chaos they would hit them with that stick. If not much disruption was noticed they will hit them with that stick

But the main message is to the govt, and I suspect there are a few in their ranks "spoiling for a fight"

[Chippy Minton]

The government don't know which stick to try and beat them with - Cameron describes it as a "damp squib," Gove says it's had a "severe impact" :-S

[Loz]

Gave actually said, "severe impact on schools across the country", which was the main area the strike was felt. Other areas hit by strike action were much less obviously effected.

Indeed, border control at the airports seemed to be more efficient, by all accounts.

[Chippy Minton]

Shame Cameron didn't say the "whole strike has been a damp squib, expect of course in schools, where it's been really severe" just to make it clear then.

[malumbu]

I am so proud of myself and my other colleagues. First time my moderate union has had a been on strike for thirty years. First time I have been on strike. Picket line was great. London Ambulance Service up the road was great. The Unison bus was great. The London buses were great. Passers by were great.

We all work five hours plus extra unpaid overtime a week. We will work up our day, which we don't get paid for, in any case. We were not frontline workers so I couldn't give a monkeys what anyone thinks as I caused no disruption to anyone and only hurt my own pay packet.

The union is not an individual. It is membership organisation. It represents staff in negotiating pay and conditions. If I had my way non members wouldn't have any protection! Union members whether they went on strike or not, that was a personal decison. Others, join your union and have your say.

The government has really exposed themselves for their contempt of the common people. New civil servants for the last 7 years have not been on a final salary pension. The supposed gold plated deals that the Daily Hate etc talk about went in 1987. Pay increments went 15 years ago. The pension scheme will change, that is accepted. Pay rises will be non existant or tiny over years to come. We were a scapegoat for the financial crisis so they cut public sector spending. And what difference did thay make? Be honest, say it was a brave decision but it failed, rather than going to roudn two.

It is case of who much (or how bad) the settlements will be, which is up for negotiation but in a very difficult decision, moderates like me have decided to take up our legal right and withdraw our labour for a day. Please don't continue this apples and pairs comparison of private vs public sector.

I am not getting into any debate about this, but I just hope that for a few of you I have opened your eyes a little. So proud, but so disapointed with the government's vindictive and confrontational words.

[Loz]

malumbu Wrote:

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> New civil servants for the last 7 years have not been on a final salary pension.

Did your union tell you that?

[sophiesofa]

Huguenot Wrote:

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> "I don't want to be in the classroom until I'm

> 68"

>

> Well that's kind of the issue in a nutshell

> sophiesofa - you just don't fancy it do you?

Only just seen this, perhaps I could have worded it better as I realise that most workers, whether private or public, don't fancy it either! I don't think anyone should be teaching in a classroom at 67 unless they feel they are able to. The kids will just not have any respect for the teacher unless they have the stamina and enthusiasm to be there, and I honestly don't think I will when I'm in my late 60s. I personally would rather pay more into my pension than work until 68.

I had fun on the march today - there was a great atmosphere (where I was at least).

[Undisputedtruth]

Chippy Minton Wrote:

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> The government don't know which stick to try and

> beat them with - Cameron describes it as a "damp

> squib," Gove says it's had a "severe impact" :-S

CM, ever wondered why Cameron often been called "Conman Cameron"?

[Annette Curtain]

Otta Wrote:

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> thing is keef, there is nothing inherently "wrong"

> about a company or a government reviewing the

> supply against the demand, and either hiring or

> resizing accordingly

>

> Oh, and why have people started calling me Keef

> all of a sudden?

Yeah.

Keef's dead man.

As it were:-S

[Atticus]

forget all previous conjecture, il maestro has spoken

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/30/jeremy-clarkson-one-show-apology?CMP=twt_fd

[Jeremy]

malumbu Wrote:

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> We all work five hours plus extra unpaid overtime

> a week. We will work up our day, which we don't

> get paid for, in any case.

Yeah, but surely unpaid overtime is commonplace? It is expected in almost any professional role, why should the public sector be different?

sophiesofa Wrote:

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> The kids will just not have any respect for the

> teacher unless they have the stamina and enthusiasm

> to be there

If a teacher genuinely cannot be effective when they are in their late 60s, surely there is other work they could do within the education system?

As I said earlier in the thread, if an employer is going back on contractual T&C, then that is not reasonale. But I don't see why the public sector should be automatically entitled to better pensions, shorter working hours, and earlier retirement than the rest of us.

[StraferJack]

I don't think the public sector workers who retire at 60 and 65 then kick back and don't do any work - their pensions might be "better" than private sector but they are unlikely to keep many of them going

But a teacher retiring at 60, and then going into the private sector doing some part time work seems more likely

There will (hopefully) be young teachers looking to get started in the system who need these old fogies to get out. You can't think out the public sector on the one-hand and then keep people on in old age "doing something else" on the other

If people live longer now then that's great but there is no reason to suppose that will remain the case. Health improvements have played a massive part in this, but between people working longer, changes to the health service and possibly poorer diets (processed food etc) then I wouldn't be surprised to see that average age start to come back down

[david_carnell]

DaveR Wrote:

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> d_c, I specifically said that it doesn't make me

> an expert - just expert enough to call you out on

> cheap sloganeering.

>

> So you're position is:

>

> - the strike is not just about pay and conditions

> but you have to pretend that it is

>

> - you recognise that changes to pension

> arrangements are needed, but not now, because

> we're in a recession

>

> - the strikers position is reasonable because it

> involves reasonable people

>

> - you believe that the governments plans for the

> public sector are (i) ideologically motivated

> rather than economically driven and (ii) not

> likely to be effective in economic policy terms.

>

> It's helpful when you set it out clearly because

> then we can ignore the first three points, which

> are essentially irrelevant to the issues, and just

> deal with the last one (in two parts). On the

> first, I would say that it is one of those happy

> coincidences where ideology and necessity are in

> harmony. As has already been pointed out,

> Conservative ideology is inherently more likely to

> favour small government, and all they are doing is

> reversing in some part the huge expansion in the

> public sector 'payroll vote' that successive

> Labour governments presided over. All those public

> sector jobs in Northern cities didn't get there by

> accident, you know. On the second part, I

> disagree. The reason why borrowing will still be

> rising has b*gger all to do with public sector job

> cuts and a whole load to do with problems in the

> Eurozone, the UK's biggest export market, and the

> associated and ongoing credit squeeze. I notice

> that Ed Balls appeared to suggest that future

> borrowing should be both higher and lower - nice

> and clear. You appear to be saying the same.

I don't know why the first three issues are irrelevant? I said the strikes were also about wider issues. The key word here is also. One of the reasons that people are so angry about their pensions is that it is part of wider pay and condition issues.

And when I say that I'm willing to negotiate on the deal I don't think you should mirror the government and adopt a position of intransigence. That surely marks me as a sensible moderate who would be willing, should I be in the position to, to remain at the negotiating table. Instead we have a government refusing to budge on any key issues thus forcing the hand of the trade unions.

And nor do I see how the fact that many of the unions involved lack a history of militancy is one of no consequence. The Society of Radiographers is hardly a hotbed of Bolshevism. That must tell you there are some serious problems that hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of reasonable people feel so strongly about that often for the first times in their careers they are resorting to industrial action.

You accuse me of idealistic naivety - I reply that with a swipe of your hand you are guilty of truculent ignorance of the plight and feelings of many.

[Huguenot]

"That must tell you there are some serious problems that hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of reasonable people feel so strongly about"

NO! YOU'RE KIDDING!! Serious PROBLEMS at the MOMENT!!

;-)

Of course there's some serious problems, but they aren't going to be solved by the public sector striking with unreasonable demands.

[Jeremy]

StraferJack Wrote:

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> I don't think the public sector workers who retire

> at 60 and 65 then kick back and don't do any work

Actually, this is exactly what is happening in many cases! Admittedly because cost of living has been cheaper in the past, and people have been able to pay off their mortgages more easily... but then, we all have to deal with that problem.

Sorry - don't understand the "you can't think out the public sector" sentence!

[david_carnell]

Well perhaps I should quote from Paul Krugman then:

When the Cameron government came in, it was fully invested in the doctrine of expansionary austerity. Officials told everyone to read the Alesina/Ardagna paper (which is succinctly criticized by Christy Romer (pdf)), cited Ireland as a success story, and in general assured everyone that they could call the confidence fairy from the vasty deep.

Now it turns out that contractionary policy is contractionary after all. As a result, despite all the austerity, deficits remain high. So what is to be done? More austerity!

Underlying the drive for even more austerity is the belief that the underlying economic potential of the British economy has fallen sharply, and will grow only slowly from now on. But why? There?s a discussion in the Office for Budget Responsibility report, p. 54, that basically throws up its hands ? hey, these things happen after financial crises, it says, and cites an IMF report(pdf).

So I wonder: did they read the abstract of that report? Because here?s what it says:

Short-run fiscal and monetary stimulus is associated with smaller medium-run deviations of output and growth from the precrisis trend.

That is, history says that a financial crisis reduces long-run growth potential if policymakers don?t limit the short-run damage it does [italics his].

And yet what?s happening in Britain now is that depressed estimates of long-run potential are being used to justify more austerity, which will depress the economy even further in the short run, leading to further depression of long-run potential, leading to ?

It really is just like a medieval doctor bleeding his patient, observing that the patient is getting sicker, not better, and deciding that this calls for even more bleeding.

And the truly awful thing is that Cameron and Osborne are so deeply identified with the austerity doctrine that they can?t change course without effectively destroying themselves politically.

[david_carnell]

Oh and for those who aren't familiar:

Paul Krugman is is an American economist, professor of Economics and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University, Centenary Professor at the London School of Economics, and an op-ed columnist for The New York Times. In 2008, Krugman won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his contributions to New Trade Theory and New Economic Geography.

So he kind of knows what he's talking about.

[Huguenot]

I don't think he mentions keeping public sector early retirement and making more private sector workers pay their premiums.

I can see the argument and am persuaded by it, but investing during crises refers to economically productive activities, not pensions and retirement ages.

[david_carnell]

A government adopting a position that causes workers to strike doesn't seem very economically productive to me.

[Huguenot]

Increased taxation to pay for early retirement, inflated pensions, longers holidays, fewer working hours and more admin isn't productive either. It's a dangerous task throwing Krugman about - he's talking about infrastructure, productivity and consumption.