The Big Strike

Tromking

I'm a civil servant who is precluded by law from striking. That said, the one day (in 27 years) I did withdraw my labour was probably the proudest day in my career. Some typically British 'nation of shopkeepers' attitudes to workers rights on this thread. We could learn a lot from the French in this regard.

michaels

Tromking wrote: »

We could learn a lot from the French in this regard.

If we wanted a French style economy where those in work are 'I'm all right, Jack' but unemployment is always over 10%....

Snakey

Multinationals don't set up in France if they can avoid it, in part because the labour laws make it so expensive and difficult to employ staff there. If I had to pick a European nation to model the UK on, it wouldn't be that one.

Tromking

Snakey wrote: »

Multinationals don't set up in France if they can avoid it, in part because the labour laws make it so expensive and difficult to employ staff there. If I had to pick a European nation to model the UK on, it wouldn't be that one.

Isn't the French economy despite its current travails still larger than the UK' s?
I just think the French have a generally healthier attitude toward workers exercising their basic human right to withdraw their labour and unless they were a boss of a multinational company probably wouldn't worry too much about the desire to find the cheapest and nastiest country to relocate to.

lisyloo

I don't agree with the premise that just because 1 day goes unnoticed the jobs are redundant.
If your rubbish isn't collected for 1 day it's not a big deal but if it was never collected the clearly that's an issue.

I don't think tube drivers should be able to strike. I was expecting someone to die by being delayed but it didn't happen or at least wasn't casually linked.

Snakey

No idea, I'm not an economist. I just happened to know that interesting fact about investment attitudes towards France so I thought I'd share it.

I suppose the problem is that you end up (in the worst case) with only the jobs that require a physical presence in the country, while anything internationally mobile goes elsewhere - together with the sort of people who are good at those jobs. There has to be a reason why the Government are keen to attract foreign investment and advertise the UK as a great HQ/holding company location, and if we ruled the world we'd probably want to find out why before we threw it away as unimportant.

Vectis

lisyloo wrote: »

........I don't think tube drivers should be able to strike......

I'm wondering why you single out tube train drivers? Why not extend it to all transport workers - trains, buses, trams, planes. Why are tube train drivers more important?

lostinrates

lisyloo wrote: »

I don't agree with the premise that just because 1 day goes unnoticed the jobs are redundant.
If your rubbish isn't collected for 1 day it's not a big deal but if it was never collected the clearly that's an issue.

I don't think tube drivers should be able to strike. I was expecting someone to die by being delayed but it didn't happen or at least wasn't casually linked.

When I moved house my rubbish was not collected for something like 16/17 weeks. They collected my recycling. I just got used to building in the tip to my routine. Tbh, mid week( I appreciate a luxury for many) was in some ways easier for me. Now they haven't collected my recycling for over a year and I cannt be bothered to go through the palaver of sorting it out, we just go to the tip for that every now and again. Might change that when they remove local banks or if they also forget the plastic bottle bin ( and cardboard) collection. I find that handy, and it divide enough stuff now on my trips.

Graham_Devon

A one day strike isn't going to effect the country that much. We need to bear in mind that the US had a public sector "shutdown" for a few weeks and things still happened. Various services were simply not booked on that day, or held back.

But you'd notice sooner or later. Little did I know that no one had to pay for parking on the day of the strike - there were no traffic wardens.

For a day, it's OK, no one really takes the chance and instead follows the rules "just incase". Should those traffic wardens dissapear altogether? Well, I know parking would be a nightmare for a start... as would dodging the cars parked all over the place.

PlymouthMaid

The people moaning about teachers are usually upset because of losing their free childcare.