Kmflett's Blog

The past weighs like a nightmare. The Tories, strikes & the 1970s and 1980s

Marx noted that the past weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living and that certainly seems to be the case with current Tory attitudes to industrial action on the cost of living as Rishi Sunak promises yet more anti-union legislation.

The Murdoch owned Times paper for example as opined on numerous occasions about trade unions, strikes and what union members must do-primarily stop it and get on with their work.

Yet nowhere in The Times commentaries or indeed those of Tory Ministers and MPs is recognition of what the Thatcher Governments did on trade union law.

The memory is of the 1970s when Tory Prime Minister Ted Heath called an Election in February 1974 asking electors to decide who ran Britain, the Tories or the trade unions. The answer was the latter and Labour was elected. There is also a memory of the big industrial battles of the 1980s- the miners and printers. Of the legislation of that period there appears to be a complete memory loss, except for the ban on unions at GCHQ, reversed after a long campaign but now again in the Tory mindset.

A Times Editorial on 14^th September 2022 was headed Spanish Practices. While the term was not further explained it went on to moan that rail workers won’t accept ‘modernisation’. By this was meant driverless trains- which it mentions, no ticket offices and no staff on stations to help passengers. These are some of the ‘Spanish practices’ the rail employers (and actually the Government) want rail unions to agree to in return for a small pay rise.

The term ‘Spanish practices’ was used in the 1970s and 1980s and refers to industrial practices which were agreed between employers and unions because it suited both. If that changed then the way to deal with it was not by diktat but negotiation.

In fact Thatcher introduced six pieces of anti-union legislation during the 1980s.

The 1980 Employment Act limited  pickets to six during a strike. While the provision is still sometimes enforced by zealous police officers the Tories seem to have largely forgotten about it and large pickets are common.

The 1982 Act removed an immunity that had been in place since 1906 and allowed employers to sue unions for damages if unofficial action was not repudiated by a union. It also outlawed political strikes and restricted secondary action in support of a dispute. Again current Tory Ministers have no memory of this piece of legislative vindictiveness

By the time the 1988 Employment Act came along the Tories had moved on to requiring that not only union executives but also General Secretaries were elected by membership ballot whatever the tradition of a particular union had been. This requirement remains in place. Turn-out is often low because while the Tories happily use e-mail for their internal ballots it remains banned for unions.

It is his aspect of Tory union law that Tory MPs and media find hardest to grasp. Trade union leaders are referred to as ‘bosses’ or ‘barons’. Yet while, unfortunately, such people are not elected, General Secretaries are. There is also frequently a call for union leaders to call off strikes or tell members to return to work. But the days when such orders came from the top have passed at the Tories behest. Strikes are voted for by union members with far more stringent requirements for success than any other balloting process in the UK.

In reality whatever the Tories may dream of the working class and industrial action cant be legislated out of existence