A sobering fact is stated in an article in the current edition of the Economist.
Fewer days have been lost through strike action in the entire period 1990 to 2010 than were lost in a single year in 1984. http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15825744
Although 1984 is a stand out year with 175,000 NUM members taking all out action from March onwards, the subsequent decline in large scale industrial action - the demise in militancy in the 1990’s and 2000’s being without precedence in post 2nd world war decades – is testimony to the shackles placed on unions by the 1980’s anti union legislation, the decline in union membership and labour market deregulation in the UK.
Effective resistance to the coming attacks on public services, will require union strategies to take into account these very difficult but not insurmountable constraints on collective action.
