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Protesters outside the Houses of Parliament in London, as the Bill on minimum service levels during strikes reaches its second reading. Picture date: Monday January 16, 2023.
THE trade union movement must build a mass campaign of resistance to defy the Tory government’s “pernicious and draconian” anti-strike legislation, the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) is demanding today.
General secretary Matt Wrack urged “mass non-co-operation and non-compliance” with the widely condemned Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill, which is currently at committee stage in the Lords after being rushed through the Commons earlier this year.
The proposals would empower bosses, and even ministers, to sack workers who refuse to cross their own picket lines and provide an as yet undefined minimum service level during walkouts across six key sectors, including health, education and public transport.
It is only trade union power at work that will materially improve the lot of working people as a class but without sector-wide collective bargaining and a right to take sympathetic strike action, we are hamstrung in the fight to tilt back the balance of power, argues ADRIAN WEIR
