British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in the House of Commons on June 15. Jessica Taylor (Europe Press)
Whenever Britain faces an economic, political, social or existential crisis, it resorts to Shakespeare’s Richard III formula, even if the seasons vary. The “Winter of our Discontent” that christened the wildcat strikes that led to Margaret Thatcher’s victory in the late 1970s was last year’s “Autumn of Discontent” when Boris Johnson ran out of trucks to fill up petrol stations on end of the pandemic. And what comes after is dubbed the “Summer of Dissatisfaction.” The strike by maintenance and signaling staff on the public railways – some 40,000 workers across the country – is being called for this Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
The reality is that with minimum services greatly reduced and timetables absolutely compressed, the chaos will continue throughout the week, and both government and unions have already advised the millions of people who rely on the train to get to work and to look for alternatives to transportation or working from home. The strike affects Network Rail, the public company that manages most of the stations, and the rail network, along with 13 other private operators. Together they cover practically all connections on the island. It will be the largest strike in the industry since the 1989 walkouts, which swept across the country and also came in response to a heated wage dispute.
“Railway companies have proposed wage increases well below the current rate of inflation, adding that wages have been frozen for several years,” Railway, Maritime and Transport (RMT) workers general secretary Mick said on Monday Lynch, at the head of the negotiations, has failed so far. “Companies also intend to cut thousands of jobs, at the express request of the government, and have not been able to ensure they are not making compulsory redundancies,” Lynch said.
In principle, during the three days that the strike was called, about 4,500 of the 20,000 services available daily will function, but the reduction in working hours (from 07:30 to 18:30) that will cripple well in advance will be essential Prep tasks, guaranteed to spread the mayhem throughout the week. London Underground maintenance workers, who rely on the city’s Transport For London (TfL) company, have also approved a strike call this Tuesday that will help to complicate the situation in the metropolis even more. .
inflation
Economic forecasts predict the UK could end the year with inflation approaching 11%. It is currently around 9%. Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey was the first to warn last February of the risk he says of responding to public officials’ demands. “We’re hoping for some restraint in the salary negotiations, otherwise this will all get out of hand,” Bailey said at the time.
The salary increase offered by the railway companies is around 2%. The Johnson government, on the other hand, which sold Brexit’s stifling of the free movement that EU membership meant as a victory for British workers, had spent months promising a new economy “with higher wages and greater skills”. .” .
Faced with the threat of a mass strike, the Johnson administration has used aggressive language. Transport Secretary Grant Shapps warned unions last Thursday that they risked “losing their jobs” as the strike was perceived as inevitable. “These strikes are not just an attempt to thwart the reforms needed to secure the future of the rail network, they are designed to be damaging at worst, and the union has dealt itself a serious blow,” Shapps said.
Both the union leaders, who see the government’s “dead hand” behind the failure of the negotiations, and the Labor opposition accuse the Johnson executive of using its passivity to provoke a conflict that suits it politically. “They want to put the country into a total blockade to feed the division. Instead of influencing the negotiations last week, they refused to speak to the unions or to the companies,” Starmer accused on Sunday.
Workers from other sectors will join the “industrial action” (the euphemism the media and politicians use to refer to the strike), such as teachers, public health workers or even on-duty criminal defense lawyers. Everyone has been protesting for years against low wages, which the galloping inflation threatens to pulverize. “Right now it’s the workers themselves who are organizing among themselves,” said Frances O’Grady, deputy general secretary of the Trades Union Congress (TUC), the UK’s largest trade union, on Monday. “And they’re not doing so in response to any conscious strategy, but because millions of them face low wages, insecurity and cutbacks. So they have no choice but to vote for the strike,” he added.
Playwright Michael Frayn ironically quipped years ago that “the British are capable of defending to the death a worker’s right to fight for his job, but they will not tolerate a strike”.
The unions and the Labor opposition cannot help but suspect that at a really dark hour among members of his party and among his constituents, Johnson would have no qualms about imitating the legendary Thatcher and using a speech and tough action against the strikes if The Degree of boredom was enough to win back popular support.
Chaos at Heathrow Airport
The chaos at UK airports during the mid-term break (the schools’ bi-monthly rest week) in early June has not gone away. Hundreds of flights were then canceled and thousands of passengers grounded due to staff shortages at British airlines. Staff cuts at thousands of flights and airports during the pandemic have not been replenished. This weekend, mountains of suitcases blocked at London’s Heathrow Airport revealed the industry’s labor shortage. Port authorities on Monday urged airlines to cancel most of their scheduled flights to buy time and bring some order to a chaotic situation.
The low-cost airline Easyjet also announced this Monday that it would cancel almost 11,000 flights planned for this summer. Staff shortages have prompted him to plan operations at 90% capacity compared to what they were three years ago at this point. They will offer alternative routes and dates to customers who have already made their reservation.
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