HERE we go again.
With grim inevitability, the public sector unions are now gearing up for a fresh wave of strikes that could bring misery for millions.
This is just the sort of chaos the Labour Party promised to avoid when they came to power.
Having denounced the Tories for their poor record on industrial relations, Sir Keir Starmer and his crew boasted that their willingness to “get round the table” and negotiate properly would herald a new era of harmony.
How empty that pledge now sounds as the perpetually aggrieved militants plot to hold the country to ransom. “It is the season to be striking,” proclaimed a social media message yesterday from the PCS civil servants’ union to mark a walkout at a government office in Liverpool.
The contagion is spreading. Civilian staff at the Metropolitan Police and ticket inspectors on London’s transport network have just voted for strikes, while there are continuing disputes at several universities, sixth form colleges, NHS mental health units, train operators and municipal offices.
But far greater turmoil looms on the horizon.
The Labour Government has just recommended to the independent review bodies that pay increases for public sector staff — including teachers, civil servants and nurses — should be limited to 2.8 per cent, marginally above inflation.
Given the scale of the state’s debts, that is a perfectly fair offer. Yet in a hysterical over-reaction, the unions painted this proposal as a weapon of mass destitution for the state payroll.
Describing the offer as “deeply offensive”, the Royal College of Nursing warned of “further disruption and ballots”.
Joining the chorus of disapproval were the British Medical Association, which spoke of “the very real risk of further ac- tion”, and the National Education Union, which declared in menacing tones that it has put Labour ministers “on notice”.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves points out the “challenging financial backdrop” to next year’s pay awards, but she is wasting her breath.
The unions care nothing for the wider national interests.
Their blinkered focus is entirely on featherbedding their members with better conditions, higher pay and less work.
Tragically, Labour have played directly into their hands.
On their arrival in office, Sir Keir Starmer and his Cabinet immediately proved they were a pushover by agreeing to a series of inflation-smashing deals with the unions, like the junior doctors who received an incredible 22 per cent and the rail workers of the RMT who were awarded 14 per cent.
Far from satisfying the unions, Labour’s surrender has only fed their ravenous appetites. The weakness of Starmer’s party is worsened by its subservience to the union bosses.
Labour was, after all, founded at the beginning of the 20th century as the political wing of the trade union movement, which still supplies much of the party’s funding, campaign muscle and policies.
For instance, the plan from the Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, herself a former Unison official, for a new charter of workplace rights has been driven by the unions, who yearn to regain the power they held before Margaret Thatcher’s reforms in the 1980s.
There is talk at Westminster of Labour’s forthcoming “battle” with the unions, but that is a delusion. In reality it seems far more likely there will be another pathetic cave-in.
And that will be bad news for the private sector, on whose productive capacity the public sector depends.
Large pay rises for state em- ployees can only be met by increasing taxes on businesses, which in turn undermines wealth generation and job creation.
That is precisely what is happening now with the British economy, as the whopping pay settlements of the summer have helped to drive the recent massive hikes in national insurance.
Rachel Reeves continually refers to the “black hole” in the Treasury’s finances, but that problem is partly of her own Government’s creation because of its reluctance to stand up to the unions.
Further capitulation would be financially unsustainable, and politically unjustifiable.
Supporters of strikes pretend that big pay rises are needed in the public sector to address recruitment crises but that is deeply unconvincing, for excessive rewards can be counter-productive.
The pay of general practitioners has soared in recent years, with the average salary for a GP partner now reaching £153,400.
Yet these colossal rates mean huge numbers of GPs can afford to retire early or work part-time, so local practices remain hopelessly over-stretched.
Irresponsible, economically illiterate trade unions are fomenting discontent for their own ends
Leo McKinstry
Moreover, money for any pay settlement has to be diverted from elsewhere in an organisation’s budget, which means front-line services have to take a hit.
It is estimated that for every 0.5 per cent rise in NHS staff pay beyond 2.8 per cent, 700,000 operations and appointments have to be cancelled.
For all the bleating from the unions, public employees are often in a privileged position compared to their private sector counterparts, enjoying shorter hours, longer holidays, far better pensions and greater job security.
The irresponsible, economically illiterate trade unions are fomenting discontent for their own ends, just as they did in the 1970s when brought the country to a halt with their recklessness during the enfeebled rule of another Labour Government.
As the picket line became the symbol of the country’s addiction to idleness and intimidation, Britain was nicknamed “the Sick Man of Europe”.
In 1979 alone, more than 29million working days were lost to industrial action. The return of even a small fraction of that unrest would be a disaster.
