Union power

The country didn’t think the mythical strikes reasonable , the 1983 election ?

So the strikes did happen , then you didn’t live in the North
PECS ?

Faux naivety going on here! Of course I saw the power cuts & refuse collection delays! However uncomfortable for me I perceived them to be reasonable as a way to demonstrate the value of the jobs that were not being paid well enough. The employers / gov were intransigent so the decision to invoke the right to withdraw labour was taken.

Hysterical? Rees Mogg ?

It has been said on this thread Gordon Brown caused the banking crisis .

Not forgetting the strikes in the seventies were a myth

This is why I don't do leftwing bashing debates. You all get hysterical and trot out the cliches.
No wonder we're still in thrall to the likes of Rees Mogg. Workers must know their place and not get uppity...

Try looking up Stockholm Syndrome.

I'd rather be associated with a political group that focussed more on caring for all citizens than one that focused heavily on economics that preferenrially benefit a particular group of citizens. The global financial crisis, that hit everywhere, was not caused by socialism!

Gosh the North ? So they didn’t have strikes , so the cries of
The poverty in the North now can be dismissed as a myth .

PECS I always thought it was the socialists who very vocally condemned anyone who didn't agree with them as not caring, especially if they were to the right of them, difficult to be otherwise

I am not sure I have ever heard or read anyone accusing socialists of not caring. The problem with socialists is that they only care, most Labour governments have proved to be economically disorganised and left us worse off than when we started. Even Gordon Brown, who I so thought was going to buck the trend, in the end, took too many risks.

By the way Grandad I did not say anything about disagreeing with union policy, your words, that I re-quoted referred to being a member of the Labour Party.

Maizie, all I can say over your 1970s up north, is 'lucky you'. No we didn't have dead bodies in the streets but there were long delays in burials. It was just a decade of endless inconveniences caused by strikes and the feeling that it was the unions running the country not the government.

Maizie. The power cuts were in the seventies, you say they were earlier? The miners strikes, power cuts, all in the seventies , first you dismiss them as a myth, then you say not really a myth but didn’t take place where you lived .

I was never affected by strikes which hit car workers, there was no car manufacturing where I lived , do I say these were a myth .

PECS I was a young mother with babies in the 70’s, perceived things differently? How can power cuts be perceived differently , no power = no light, no cooking, no tv, no street lights ,

I now understand the defence by some of Corbyn’s dream of giving back more power to unions, they don’t remember the seventies.

Maybe "..no rubbish ... or unburied bodies.." where you were MaizieD - but I remember clearly that my great uncle's funeral could not go ahead - was delayed and delayed - unpleasant times indeed.
And as for Grandad's idea of standing for election within the union's hierarchy - sorry Grandad but it was all stitched up before meetings even took place - the "caucus" meetings beforehand that decided how delegates voted - democracy NOT! I was a shop steward for a number of years but I did not belong to the correct left-wing group (yes there were more than one) so I had no chance of rising higher in the union structure - being a woman in a virtually all-male environment didn't help either.

Many of us were probably young women with babies in the 70s.. we might not percieve things similarly though.
Why do those who fear / dislike/ disapprove socialism always lob in that fallacy that " socialists think they are the only ones who care"?
There are conservatives that care of course.
Just that too often the manifesto of a Conservative Gov appears less care focussed.

I'm not really saying they were a myth. Just that it wasn't as bad as is made out.

No rubbish piling up where I was. Or unburied bodies. The media just made the most of what they could find. As they admitted.

I was a young married woman with a mortgage and a husband on a student grant. Extending the 'social contract' into a 3rd/4th year was just a step too far. As the article says.

The strikes were by the public sector unions, Power cuts were earlier, during the miners' strike.

Maizie I was a married woman with children during the three day week, strikes and general union mayhem in the 70s. I can assure you that they were not a myth.

Days with power cuts, only working so many days a week, rubbish piling up, you name it, I can remember it. It was union power that got Mrs Thatcher into Downing Street.

The 1970s annie

Most of the unions’ industrial actions of the period were reactive, either seeking to resist wage or job cuts, or political attacks such as the 1972 Industrial Relations Act. In industry (private and nationalised) most British companies, instead of prioritising research, reinvestment and restructuring, preferred to simply lay off workers, prompting industrial militancy in response.

After Labour was elected in 1974 the unions showed great patience in abiding by the ‘social contract’ with Labour, reining in pay demands in return for an increase in the ‘social wage’ (rent freezes, pension increases etc). As a result inflation began to come down.

But although the unions had contributed to containing inflation, the banks continued to send money abroad, causing a balance of payments crisis and threatening a further rise in inflation. While Phases 1 and 2 of wage restraint were broadly accepted by the trade unions, Phases 3 and 4 were not.

Phase 3 allowed a maximum wage increase of 10 per cent, although inflation was higher. By 1978 inflation had fallen to 10 per cent but the government unwisely chose to go to Phase 4, which limited pay increases to 5 per cent.

This set off the strikes of the ‘winter of discontent’, which were in response to pay increases lower than the rise in the cost of living and large cuts in public services demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in return for its loan in 1976.

Myth becomes fact

The media greatly exaggerated the size and impact of the strikes to discredit Labour and assist Thatcher. In reality the strikes inconvenienced relatively few and, compared to genuine catastrophes like the collapse of UK manufacturing in the 1980s or the banking crisis of 2008, had no permanent economic impact.

Despite this, the legend of the winter of discontent is now set in stone, impervious even to the admission of Derek Jameson, editor of the Daily Express in 1979, that: " We pulled every dirty trick in the book. We made it look like it was general, universal and eternal, whereas it was in reality scattered, here and there, and no great problem .”

dscross.wordpress.com/2017/07/29/debunking-the-myth-of-the-winter-of-discontent-what-was-1970s-britain-really-like/

I was working in a northern city that winter. There were no piles of rubbish and no unburied bodies.

M0nica Quote [Er, I thought you just said those (Labour) politics do not normally come to the fore until any member gets elected to district or Reginal Committee level, or as a delicate to the union's annual conference.] End Quote.

Yes M0nica, if a member does not agree with any union policy, they can put themselves forward to become a delicate at the Unions annual conference which is the highest policy making body in a union. The alternative to that is to stand for election to a trade sector committee, district or Reginal committee where the polices of the union are implemented at those levels.

With the Unite Union, a member can put forward a new policy at branch level. If accepted by the Branch members that policy idea will be forwarded to one of the above committees for discussion and possibly support at that level.

In the above, it would then be put forward for discussion and possible adoption at the union annual delicate conference and possibly become policy for the whole Union.

So M0nica with the Unite union policy changes can be brought forward from even branch level. However, it is obviously far better if the member who brought forward any new policy idea is then present on the other bodies that will discuss the fledgeling policy to support the policy idea.

In short, the more they engage, the higher a member will in all probability to be elected in the structure, and the more influence they will gain to fight for the changes they wish to see.

P.s. One can believe in and fight for workers rights without being a socialist.
Having actually visited socialist countries, socialism is NOT something I think we should embrace. Workers are not IMO better off under socialist regimes.

When labourites accept that they are not the only ones who "care", they might then begin to see that unions and workers rights can be better achieved without party ties

The strikes in the seventies are a myth Mazie ? Ask your parents if you were too small to understand what damage all those strikes caused .

I expect an elected government to run the country , we are not a communist country , yet

Er, I thought you just said those (Labour) politics do not normally come to the fore until any member gets elected to district or Reginal Committee level, or as a delicate to the union's annual conference.

M0nica, as with all trades unions it is the members who set the policies whether that be industrial or political.

All any member has to do if that person does not like any policy of the Union is to put themselves forward for election to the various committees or conferences that make up the unions structure and fight for change. If enough other members then agree with their views, on ballot the policies will change.

That is the whole ethos of the trade union movement, to fight for change, and members must engage if they wish to see that, externally or internally.

I know the discussion has moved on a bit, but I was struck by this:

the unions were formed to fight for workers not to run the country

I'd like to know, annie, who do you think should run the country?

Because I think that this is a much bigger topic than just repeating myths abut the 1970s.

Grandad1943 as I stated it is not a written rule, but when people are forgoing even being members and getting cover because of the labour links it is clearly an issue that it also felt by non labour supporting members, who would not necessarily be prohibited from involvement but none the less feel unable to increase or progress their involvement.

Grandad that restricts the part a non-labour member can play in the running of their union. Once District level looms, commit to Labour or go no further. You could almost call that restraint of trade. It is certainly discrimination against those not professing one particular political allegiance, which is just the kind of thing that the unions should be opposing. That is why the link between the Labour party and the unions needs to be broken.

Thatcher curbed union power following the collapse of the Heath government and the Callaghan government which was caused by the public being totally cheesed of with the strikes , miners, postal workers, power cuts, rubbish piled in the streets causing rats to scuttle around pavements, the dead couldn’t be buried

notanan2, in regard to your post @15:58 today, a union member does not have to become involved with the politics of the union. Indeed, those politics do not normally come to the fore until any member gets elected to district or Reginal Committee level, or as a delicate to the union's annual conference.

Should a member just wish to engage at his/her trade sector level, then they can engage with their branch whether that be at district or trade sector, and put themselves forward for trade conferences or education courses as takes their interest. Or just take an interest in branch matters.

I might add DS is also a union member - and an active one as well.