Strikes

[Fiona T]

Whole concept of strikes seems crazy to me.

It's basically blackmail isn't it?

Talking to a train driver friend, she was saying how divisive it is too, with colleagues turning on each other. She was telling us a about a young colleague in tears because they couldn't strike because they were applying for a mortgage and you can't get a mortgage with strikes on your payslip - said colleague was being called a scab by people who were previously her friends.

I realise it's an oversimplication, but if you aren't happy with your pay/terms/conditions then go find a different job. It's what the rest of us do.

(Mebbe I'm turning Tory - this is a worrying development!)

[Gavin Chipper]

Controversial! But anyway, regardless of where someone stands on the right to strike, it's a very asymmetrical situation among workers throughout the country. Not everyone works for a train company and and can mess up the country while they make their demands. Where I used to work (in the public sector), we had a union and would occasionally strike. But the people at the top could just suck it up. We weren't driving trains or doing anything that most people would particularly notice if we weren't there, so the strikes had far less chance of being successful.

[Graeme Cole]

The real question here is why are mortgage vendors allowed to deny you a mortgage for having been on strike? Is it just that the pay shown for that month would be lower, so you might not meet the lending criteria, or is it a strict "one strike = no mortgage for you" rule?

[Gavin Chipper]

The real question here is why are mortgage vendors allowed to deny you a mortgage for having been on strike? Is it just that the pay shown for that month would be lower, so you might not meet the lending criteria, or is it a strict "one strike = no mortgage for you" rule?

I wasn't aware of that. It reminds me of this post I made the other week about credit scores and insurance companies. These self-appointed arbiters of your legitimacy can just make these decisions about what you are able to do, seemingly without any accountability. Effectively these things they use to judge you on are like a criminal record but without any legal basis or due process. It's insane what's allowed to happen.

[Fiona T]

TBF, I haven't verified this myself - twas as told to me by train driver friend.

[Fiona T]

https://www.reddit.com/r/UKPersonalFina ... _mortgage/ would suggest it's just round the amount of the deductions.

But that aside, not everyone wants to (or can afford to) strike - it still drives a wedge through the workforce.

[Marc Meakin]

When there are train strikes in Japan they don't stop the trains they just don't take any money.
Targeting the right people

[Mark James]

No. Being forced to work in a world where billionaires can own yachts that have their own yachts just so you don't starve is blackmail.

[Gavin Chipper]

When there are train strikes in Japan they don't stop the trains they just don't take any money.
Targeting the right people

So who drives the trains?

[Ian Volante]

It's often the only power a worker has to force their bosses not to be a bastard to them. Why do you think US companies are so strongly against unions? It's the only thing that stops them using the workforce as disposal automatons rather than treating them as people who might actually have health, dignity, families etc to think about.

[Callum Todd]

Had a similar conversation with a friend yesterday. Don't know how it was before my time when there were strikes by minors and dockyard workers, etc., but normally the professions I hear about striking today are all quite well paid! Not well paid enough mind, and I do agree that teachers, train drivers, and barristers should be paid more. But they're striking because they're unsatisfied with pay rises offered during the cost of living crisis? If they can't cope than what about those on lower incomes? The minimum wage professions, who will be harder hit by economic pressures, don't seem to strike, probably because they can't afford to!

So I think strikes seem to be a good thing but unfortunately they take away attention from the worst affected and treated workers. As bad as I'm sure barristers have it at the moment, I doubt they have it as bad as factory workers, hospital cleaners, and care nurses. The very fact they are able to strike at all proves that.

[Fiona T]

It's an option only really available to unionised public sector (or public services where they've been privatised) workers - the biggest impact is probably on the people on a zero hours min wage contract who can't get to work so don't get paid.

Just think it's the worst possible way of making your demands known - work to contract, refuse overtime etc, but downing tools is the worst way to go. Also worth remembering that the inflation linked payrise will ultimately be paid for by people who aren't getting inflation linked payrises...

But yep - agree the whole system is screwed.

[Marc Meakin]

When there are train strikes in Japan they don't stop the trains they just don't take any money.
Targeting the right people

So who drives the trains?

Sorry I wasn't entirely clear.
Industrial action involves working as normal but not taking money from passengers

[Jon O'Neill]

I realise it's an oversimplication, but if you aren't happy with your pay/terms/conditions then go find a different job. It's what the rest of us do.

That's not really an option for a lot of the strikier jobs. As a trained train driver it's not like there are lots of different train companies to go and work for. Therefore the normal market forces that mean you risk losing staff if you don't pay a certain wage or guarantee certain conditions don't apply. So strikes are an important weapon to make sure the handful of companies (or the government in the case of nationalisation) don't take the piss.

[Fiona T]

I realise it's an oversimplication, but if you aren't happy with your pay/terms/conditions then go find a different job. It's what the rest of us do.

That's not really an option for a lot of the strikier jobs. As a trained train driver it's not like there are lots of different train companies to go and work for. Therefore the normal market forces that mean you risk losing staff if you don't pay a certain wage or guarantee certain conditions don't apply. So strikes are an important weapon to make sure the handful of companies (or the government in the case of nationalisation) don't take the piss.

I do get it (my dad was a shop steward so I grew up with it!) but there's gotta be a better way. Striking pisses off (at best, at worst causes real hardship) the people who use the services, damages the economy, creates a divided workforce and I doubt anyone comes away feeling like they've got what they want.

[Mark James]

People might get pissed off but they also get over it. If they are workers too they will understand. It's the owners who get pissed off and don't get over it. It's the media who attempts to stoke the division. The better way is abolishing capitalism.

[Ian Volante]

Had a similar conversation with a friend yesterday. Don't know how it was before my time when there were strikes by minors and dockyard workers, etc., but normally the professions I hear about striking today are all quite well paid! Not well paid enough mind, and I do agree that teachers, train drivers, and barristers should be paid more. But they're striking because they're unsatisfied with pay rises offered during the cost of living crisis? If they can't cope than what about those on lower incomes? The minimum wage professions, who will be harder hit by economic pressures, don't seem to strike, probably because they can't afford to!

So I think strikes seem to be a good thing but unfortunately they take away attention from the worst affected and treated workers. As bad as I'm sure barristers have it at the moment, I doubt they have it as bad as factory workers, hospital cleaners, and care nurses. The very fact they are able to strike at all proves that.

Read around the barrister issue, and between long hours and poor remuneration for legal aid work, many appear work out at a wage which is below minimum wage. Rail workers striking (certainly initially) were those allied workers who sell tickets, keep stations clean and working, that sort of thing. Drivers I think might have started coming out later, I need to read more on that, but it may be at least partly tied up with the removal of guards (a long-running issue), and the fact that pretty much all pay offers are way below inflation at the moment.

I agree that the workers in the worst contractual conditions are an increasingly-large bunch, and have little power due to the generally low-skill nature of their work.

Would you begrudge me going on strike? I'm somewhere between £100 and £200 per week down on where I was a year ago, and I've not even had a pay offer for the year that began in April, never mind any sort of rise.

[Callum Todd]

Hey Ian,

Thanks for the additional info on the barrister strike. I should have been more clear: I was just presenting my initial reaction to the stories; I really don't know much about the details other than the rough take-home salaries of the folks striking.

Thats pretty shitty working conditions if they're working so many extra hours without extra pay that their hourly rate in effect becomes below minimum wage. It doesn't change the fact though that someone taking home £40 or £50k plus a year is presumably more able to cope with the cost of living crisis than someone on £20k or less. Even if they have more outgoings due to having more expensive commodities, they can always downgrade them. I am absolutely not claiming here that they should have to do that, but at least they have that option, whereas people who take home less than half as much money as them can't take such a drastic measure.

I wouldn't at all begrudge you going on strike and hope your working conditions improve. I don't begrudge the barristers either, I was just remarking that I feel the media coverage of the strikers such as train drivers, teachers, and barristers takes attention away from people who are much worse off than those guys financially. The very fact they can afford to strike, if unpaid, proves that they have more financial security than many other people.

[Dan Byrom]

Many of the leaders and organisers of strike action have said that, if they could, they would continue to e.g. run train services while not taking payments from passengers. But this is illegal, whereas the current strike action is legal.

Perhaps legalising this method of strike action would be a better solution, and supposedly (haven't read too much into it) it has been effective in Japan and Australia. Then it wouldn't affect the general public so badly.

But the current government thrives on division, blaming the public and pitting workers against each other rather than taking accountability and trying to solve problems, so I could never see them allowing something like this.


Personally I'm strongly in favour of the strikes. The balance of wealth and power is tipping further and further towards fewer and fewer people and now it is barely possible for a huge number of people to get by despite working full time jobs. Asking for an inflation-matching pay rise and basic protections is hardly a cheeky ask, and the record profits the majority of big companies all seem to be managing suggest they clearly have the money for it.

Some people are unable to strike, but we shouldn't begrudge those that are able to. It's not us vs them. Instead we should begrudge those at the top with the wealth and power and ability to improve conditions for all workers but don't.

[Callum Todd]

Sounds good to me; nicely put, Dan.

[Gavin Chipper]

One of the most important things that I think should be introduced so that people have more control over their lives, specifically in terms of what job they are willing to accept, is an unconditional universal basic income. People will be harder to exploit when they are not forced to take any crap job due to having no money to live on.

[L'oisleatch McGraw]

Some people are unable to strike, but we shouldn't begrudge those that are able to. It's not us vs them. Instead we should begrudge those at the top with the wealth and power and ability to improve conditions for all workers but don't.

100% this.