RMT to ballot for strike action.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/rail-union-boss-vows-to-topple-tories-c0hm3r3sh

A militant union leader behind the rail strikes causing chaos for millions says unions are co-ordinating action to “bring down this bloody working-class-hating Tory government”.
Sean Hoyle, president of the RMT, declared that “rule No 1” for his union, whose members have held a string of strikes on the beleaguered Southern rail network, was to “strive to replace the capitalist system with a socialist order”, telling a meeting of hard-left activists last month, “if we all spit together we can drown the *******s”.
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amigafan2003 said:
I was born in '78, so no, I don't remember.
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Started (near enough) with the three day week and ended with the "Winter of Discontent"

It also saw the general public get so ****ed off with the Unions that Thatcher was elected with a massive mandate to crush the Unions out of existence.

Sadly, in the middle of it all vast swathes of British industry was lost.

(You will often come across ageing Socialists who blame Thatcher and the 80's on this. But really, it was all over by 1979. All Thatcher did was pick up the broken pieces and put them in the bin!)
 
It is funny how the same Union with the same grievance can have a settlement in Scotland but Southern will not settle.
Maybe it is because the Rail firm with the Govt backing wants to do a Maggie and take on the unions.

A casual observer might struggle to equate the man who appeared before the transport select committee looking like a French philosopher with the hatchet man whom unions accuse of driving the Southern rail strike.

But Peter Wilkinson, whose shaven head, polo-neck and thick designer glasses transcend the usual faceless civil servant attire, has become the bogeyman at the Department for Transport for unions since he made an ill-advised speech in Croydon in February.

All aboard the Southern chaos train: the commuters caught in a war on rails

Speaking to local rail users about train drivers, he said: “We have got to break them,” adding that those who resisted government plans should “get the hell out of my industry”.
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Harlequin said:
So you do not remember the 1970`s and what happened when we had a left wing government then?
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What do you actually know about the causes of the three day week or are you just spouting the usual right wing Sun rhetoric?

Here is a clue

Throughout the mid-1970s, especially 1974 and 1975, the British economy was troubled by high rates of inflation. To tackle this, the government capped public sector pay rises and publicly promoted a clear capped level to the private sector. This caused unrest among trade unions as wages did not keep pace with price increases. This extended to most industries including coal mining, which provided the majority of the country's fuel and had a powerful trade union.
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Wages were being eroded quite a bit, the people of that time did not just take it like they did recently.
 
the pay caps were a result of the labour government , which ended in 1978/1979 - after 5 years of mismanagement by labour , as said above , thatcher was brought in on a crush the unions mandate - the 40 odd million people in the country were sick and tired of the abuse by the unions which was perceived to hold the country to random.
 
Harlequin said:
the pay caps were a result of the labour government , which ended in 1978/1979 - after 5 years of mismanagement by labour , as said above , thatcher was brought in on a crush the unions mandate - the 40 odd million people in the country were sick and tired of the abuse by the unions which was perceived to hold the country to random.
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The pay caps were a tool to try to get inflation down. It was no more mismanagement than the Cameron Govt, actually probably much less damaging now we are out of the EU and £120Bn black hole and £trillion debt and rising. Thatcher crushed the unions because of dogmatic stance and revenge for what she saw as having brought down the Heath Govt.
The people did what the people always do vote for the other party when things are bad. By the same token using your logic the Blair Govt was voted in because the people were sick of the Tory corruption.

You obviously know zilch about unions. The union leaders cannot decide to call a strike even in the 70's if the membership did not want a strike.
 
and the social contract worked didn't it , oh wait - 24% inflation in 1975 says it didn't.

seems you must have been a shop steward at some point
 
do_ron_ron said:
The pay caps were a tool to try to get inflation down. It was no more mismanagement than the Cameron Govt, actually probably much less damaging now we are out of the EU and £120Bn black hole and £trillion debt and rising. Thatcher crushed the unions because of dogmatic stance and revenge for what she saw as having brought down the Heath Govt.
The people did what the people always do vote for the other party when things are bad. By the same token using your logic the Blair Govt was voted in because the people were sick of the Tory corruption.

You obviously know zilch about unions. The union leaders cannot decide to call a strike even in the 70's if the membership did not want a strike.
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In the 70's voting for strike action was typically done by "Show of Hands"

And woe betide anybody who voted the wrong way.

"Show of hands" is a very effective way of allowing a militant minority to intimidate and dominate a compliant and reluctant majority.

which was one of the reasons why the new laws were brought in.

One of the issues surrounding the 1984 miners strike was how the changes in law as to how strikes were called resulted in many pits remaining open because the miners didn't actually want to strike after all..
 
Harlequin said:
and the social contract worked didn't it , oh wait - 24% inflation in 1975 says it didn't.

seems you must have been a shop steward at some point
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Wrong, wrong and wrong. Full House.

The Social Contract was another tool to try to combat inflation, a forerunner of Osborne's 'we are all in this together' and like Osborne's version it was seen as being biased against the workers.

The Social Contract was one tool so the link between the Social Contract and 24% inflation as you seem to be implying is tenuous at best.

I was not a shop steward.
 
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