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The Tory Government’s plans to bring forward anti-strike legislation represents a significant clampdown on workers’ fundamental right to strike. In response, unions are gearing up for a huge day of action on February 1st, when up to 500,000 teachers, civil servants and rail workers are set to strike together and join the TUC’s ‘protect the right to strike’ day. Adwitiya Pal spoke to trade unionists about the attack they face and how to respond.

By Adwitiya Pal. Cover image: Mick Lynch addresses a packed crowd in Aberdare, by Adwitiya Pal

Rising prices, soaring inflation, crumbling services and deteriorating pay — this is the reality facing millions in Britain today. As the public finds itself struggling to escape the cost of living crisis, almost 1.5 million workers have moved towards strike action in their fight for liveable conditions for themselves.

However, the Government’s Minimum Service Levels Bill, dubbed the ‘Anti-Strike Bill’ poses an imminent threat to the fundamental nature of taking industrial action.

The legislation seeks to impose a basic level of service in the public sector by forcing selected employees to work, even if the unions have won the vote for industrial action. In case the staff decide to exercise their right to strike, they face the danger of being sacked or fired by their employers.

The decision to bring forward these laws at a time when people with jobs are struggling to put the heating on in their homes and having to rely on food banks has resulted in a wave of scathing criticism from union leaders.

Wales Trade Union Congress’ (TUC) General Secretary Shavanah Taj told voice.wales, “It’s a human right to take industrial action and withdraw your labour as a last resort to get an improved offer on the table. Instead of sitting down with trade unions and finding a negotiated settlement, they are looking to sack workers.”

“They are doing everything they can to destabilise the union movement. This is an attack on workers’ rights, an attack on democracy. This is about scaring people, about the powers that be controlling the ordinary person, about tipping the balance even further in the hands of the bosses. It’s basically saying, ‘You work for us. We are the ones that set the rules for what happens’,” said Shavanah.

The introduction of the bill has been prompted by the massive wave of strikes in the country, but Wales TUC’s Organising and Development Officer Amarjite Singh said that he doesn’t think that it’s anything new. “Every Conservative Government has sort of attacked workers’ rights slowly,” he said.

Paul Stringer, representative at Unite Wales, speaking to voice.wales at an ambulance workers’ picket line in Cwmbran dubbed the bill as a very ‘Maggie Thatcher-style law’. “It is one of the most atrocious laws that I have ever heard of,” he said.

One of the key MPs behind pushing this legislation is UK’s Business Secretary Grant Shapps, who said that the bill was needed to ensure a ‘minimum safety level’ of services like ambulances and rail for the public even on strike days. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has also openly backed the bill, incorrectly stating that such laws are already present in France, Italy and Spain.

Speaking to a packed church of 300 people in Aberdare on Saturday, RMT leader Mick Lynch attacked the proposals as “the conscription of labour” that would give Shapps executive power to name individual workers who had taken strike action and suspend the funds of trade unions. “If Putin, or China, or Iran did that, it would rightly be condemned,” he said. “But that is what is happening here.” 

Lynch said that if the bill is rushed through on 30th January, it will put future strike action in serious jeopardy. 

Steve Skelly, Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers Union’s (RMT) Regional Organiser agreed with Lynch that there needed to be a huge response. “I believe there should be mass mobilisation against this and a huge campaign led by the TUC to oppose this on the basis of its undemocratic nature,” he told voice.wales

Paul Nowak, General Secretary of the TUC has set the stage for unions to take the government on over this legislation, saying that “trade unions will fight this every step of the way”. On 10 January, TUC announced plans for a ‘Protect the Right to Strike’ day that will see rallies and strikes across the country, with tens of thousands of workers in education, transport and the civil service walking out together on February 1st. 

This is effectively going to bring 50,000 RMT and ASLEF members from 14 rail companies, 370,000 teachers from National Education Union (NEU) 70,000 from the University and College Union (UCU), and 100,000 civil servants from Public and Commercial Services (PCS) Union for one day of co-ordinated strike action for the first time in decades. Unions in Wales are following suit, with Wales TUC leading the Right to Strike rally in Cardiff, set to take place at 11.30am outside the UK Government building near Cardiff’s Central Square. 

It seems hard to believe that the UK Government hadn’t anticipated the result. The impact assessment report of the Minimum Service Levels Bill states an increase in industrial action prior to the bill becoming a possibility, as well as that it could lead workers to take action short of strike, such as refusing to do overtime or deliberate slowing of labour to disrupt services.

UK’s Transport Secretary Mark Harper himself went on record a few days ago, saying that the laws were “not a solution to dealing with the industrial action we see at the moment”. 

Shavanah Taj said that the legislation is bound to further poison industrial relations and increase industrial disputes, which is now evident as the proposal of the anti-strike law has given unions the necessary push to band together for the first time since 2011.

In 2011, when the Cameron Government introduced a new pension scheme damaging almost all public sector workers, TUC led almost 2 million members from 37 different unions to a day of coordinated strike, in what was the biggest bout of industrial action since the 1979 winter of discontent.

However following November 2011’s strike, amidst a perceived lack of public support and mutual desire among unions to secure a collective deal, the Conservative and Liberal Democrat Government undertook a sectoral strategy of entering negotiations with unions. The TUC backed this approach, with unions content to sign deals that ultimately left  workers disenfranchised and demoralised. The movement eventually fizzled out by the next year. 

Ahead of February 1st, Shavanah said that the union movement is in a healthier place now with the hardships of Covid bringing the unions closer..

“This isn’t a new thing for us,” she said, referring to the upcoming February 1 strike. “This is just an accumulation of what’s been going on in the country since then.”

Despite this, there are signs of some division over strategy.  

At a TUC meeting two weeks ago, the Royal College of Nursing’s (RCN) General Secretary Pat Cullen expressed her objection to any coordinated action, fearing that a large-scale disruption will diminish public sympathy for the nurses’ strike. Other health unions also voiced similar opinions, according to The Guardian.

Speaking in south Wales on Saturday, RMT leader Mick Lynch expressed his desire for a general strike in the spring. But he said that this was not a view shared by all union general secretaries, who opposed his proposals at the TUC for a 24 hour general strike in the coming months. 

Acknowledging that all unions would need their own strike mandate, he said: “We need a 24-hour [general] strike in the spring.. We [unions] can coordinate it.”

The government seems to have reverted to an attempt at the sectoral strategy successfully employed twelve years ago. Rishi Sunak has indicated his wish to bring the health strikes to a stop, with an improved pay offer for 2023. A new deal has also been extended to the RMT, with companies offering a ‘final 9% pay rise’ over the next two years.

The TUC has, however, still moved forward with the planned day of action, with most of the striking unions deciding to come together in solidarity against the proposed bill to keep the workers’ rights alive.

Amarjite Singh said that the TUC has learned from 2011. They are making sure that the groundwork has been laid down before the day of action to avoid similar occurrences.

“The TUC had asked for assurances from unions before organising co-ordinated action, that if all of us are calling for this day of action, then we also make sure that we explain to not only our members but also the public why we are having this day of action,” said Amarjite.

“We want the members to be out on the streets, in the town centres on the day of the strike, leafletting, handing out material, and explaining to the public why they are taking industrial action. Right now, we are making sure that we’ve got as many ballot results from unions to strengthen the first of February, as well as meeting with all the union leaders.”

Shavanah Taj has had meetings with health and education unions in Wales in the last few weeks to discuss their participation in the rally. But the TUC is also looking to challenge the bill from becoming law on other fronts.

Paul Nowak said that the law is ‘likely illegal’, and the TUC has already threatened to take legal action against Downing Street. “Our unions will still find ways to take effective action but we’ll challenge it legally and we’ll make them pay a high political price for it,” he told the Financial Times.

Shavanah also said that the TUC is involved in lobbying MPs across the board and reminding them of their commitment. “This is going to be a real test for both Labour and Tory MPs, including those in Wales,” she said. “We are questioning those politicians who said that they are on the side of workers. Where is their commitment to Wales, what role are they playing in demanding better funding for Wales?”

Despite these efforts, the Bill passed in Parliament with 309 votes to 249 at second reading. Prominent Labour leaders like Angela Rayner and Zarah Sultana, among others, have come forward to lambast the Bill and the Tory Government, with Keir Starmer pledging to repeal the law if Labour wins the next general elections. Mick Antoniw, Labour MS for Pontypridd claimed that the bill was ‘an immoral attempt by the Tories to remove the basic right to strike’ at the Senedd. However, there are still murmurings that their stance could be stronger.

“The Labour [party] have been quiet to a certain extent,” said Amarjite. “There are people in the Labour party who are standing up to what Westminster is doing, and I think it’s coming stronger from Wales than actually from the UK. But they could have been noisier.”

Nevertheless, February 1st looks set to be a historic day. With almost half a million employees stopping public services in their tracks and thousands more set to ramp up strikes as new ballot results come out, talks of the TUC organising a general strike could be back on the cards.

But for that to happen, Amarjite Singh said that everyone needs to be prepared. “For anything like that, we’d have to work up to that. We’d have to explain to the public why we are going on a general strike,” he said. “I think personally, where we are in society, the way this government has performed and where the cost of living is going, people would understand us.”

He reaffirmed that anything the TUC plan and organise would be led by the working class members of the unions. “We don’t want to forget who we are leading. We have to bring people along with us instead of pulling them, and then I think our movement can succeed.”

For now, Wales TUC is fixated on getting unions better pay deals and protecting the workers’ right to strike. Shavanah said that she believes they will win the longer fight, irrespective of what happens in the coming few days. “This is about winning, we want to win these disputes, and we will find a way.”