Unrepresentative Representatives
The Coalition Government indulged in a bit of 'sabre rattling' last week in response to the latest round of public sector strikes which prompted this rather silly article by Polly Toynbee in The Guardian accusing the Prime Minister of declaring a 'war on strikers'.
Now people have a perfect right to withdraw their labour in a democratic society, but there are legitimate questions to ask about the frequency with which strikes take place in some parts of industry (e.g. London transport) and the extent to which unions have a proper mandate in the event of a low turnout in a strike ballot.
But it is important to note that the comparison Polly Toynbee tries to make between strike ballots and ballots to elect politicians is a completely bogus one - for two main reasons.
Firstly, unlike other situations where people cast their votes the leaders of a trade union have a direct interest in the outcome of a strike ballot, so the whole process from start to finish is controlled by those in favour of a Yes vote - and the normal checks and balances which exist in other kinds of elections do not operate in strike ballots.
Secondly, trade unions are hugely unrepresentative when it comes to party politics - they do not represent the diverse views of their members and, as everyone knows, around 99.9% of senior union officials are card carrying members of the Labour Party - so bang goes another democratic safety net.
Now if you ask me, the unhealthy political composition of our trade unions is much more important than introducing a 40% or even 50% turnout threshold before a strike would have the protection of the law - because the real issue is that trade unions are far too partisan and far too involved with party politics.
One of the lessons of history is that trade unions are not exactly good at embracing change and moving with the times, but these issues won't go away if union leaders simply stick their heads in the sand and pretend there isn't a real underlying problem.
With food banks full, the prime minister is badly out of touch if he thinks there is any public appetite for an assault on the workforce
By Polly Toynbee - The Guardian
‘Divide and rule, pitting public against private-sector employees, is a weak tactic when people see the 600,000 lost public jobs replaced mainly with low-paid self-employment.' Photograph: Jay Shaw Baker/NurPhoto/REX
Bring back yesterday, was ever the Conservative battle cry. But David Cameron's back-to-the- future assault on trade unions is badly out of kilter with the present time and public opinion. The million or so public workers on strike yesterday draw on more goodwill than he thinks. That's surprising, in a world where only a quarter of employees belong to unions – more women than men.
Out there on picket lines, cheerful in a way that belied the seriousness of their cause, were the half a million council workers paid less than a living wage, the dinner ladies and care workers, alongside firefighters, teachers and civil servants who have suffered a 20% fall in income, their pay capped at 1% until the deficit is paid off – mainly by the likes of them. That could be 2018, the chancellor's latest target date, but he's missed one before and might stretch it again.
Cameron's pledge to set a threshold for turn-out in ballots before unions can strike is another of his knee-jerk commitments for his manifesto that may prove more of a millstone than an asset. Labour and Liberal Democrats can have fun with its absurdity, as well as its patent injustice. Low turnout is certainly a danger to democracy but the government's new individual voter registration, rushed in before the election, may make it worse, conveniently, since Conservatives vote most assiduously.
The warlike tendency on Cameron's back benches were out in force yesterday, with rightwing MP Dominic Raab blasting out: "The strikes today are a licensed sabotage inflicted by the union barons on a whim without majority support amongst their members." Where to begin? These days baronial power is all in the hands of financiers, big employers and media moguls. As for sabotage, echoing Thomas Piketty, the IMF itself warns that the growing mismatch of power between capital and labour puts the stability of capitalism at risk, when people are paid too little to buy goods and services, borrowing more than is safe just to survive.
Labour has a nervous tic over its vulnerability on trade union links, as ever mocked for neither supporting nor condemning the strike. (The party did agree the overall cap on public pay – but would pay the bottom more and the top less, and they promise a living wage for government workers and contractors and in the next parliament.) But Cameron has laid himself a trap by re-opening the old war against enfeebled unions when strikes have been at historic lows for years. With food banks full of working people who can't make meagre pay checks last to end of the week, beyond his own diehards there's little public appetite for screwing down the workforce and strong support for a living wage. Divide and rule, pitting public against private-sector employees, is a weak tactic when people see the 600,000 lost public jobs replaced mainly with low-paid self-employment.
Francis Maude, talking on Radio 4's Today programme yesterday, was more than a little disingenuous when he expressed shock that unions would shut some old people's centres for the day – as if forgetting how many his own government has closed permanently.
But when he spoke of the strike's "glaring lack of mandate", he really should have paused to consider. There may be some terminological misunderstanding as to what the word "mandate" means to his party. Remember how during the election campaign, Cameron personally ruled out NHS re-disorganisation, cutting child benefit or education maintenance allowances or any "front-line cuts". George Osborne seems just as confounded by the concept of "mandate". In his pre-election conference speech he said "We could not even think of abolishing the 50p rate on the rich while at the same time I am asking many of our public-sector workers to accept a pay freeze." He said it would be "grossly unfair" – that was his mandate.
As for voting mandates, not one MP would pass a threshold demanding support from 50% of the electorate. The nearest is the Lib Dem Tim Farron, at 46%, a rare high proportion. We've recently seen the lowest ever byelection turnout in Manchester Central, at 18.2%. For the comically pointless police and crime commissioners elections, just 15.1% turned out: expect a new record low in the byelection for the West Midlands PCC in mid-August. EU elections have fallen below a quarter, which makes the 38.1% turnout to vote in Boris Johnson by a whisker look like wild voter enthusiasm. So if Cameron means to make strikes illegal without 51% of all eligible union voters, that is in effect an outright ban. He should know there is overwhelming popular belief in the basic right to strike.
Turnout everywhere is in crisis, and democracy hangs by a thread when only 1% belongs to any political party. We rely on those few to select MPs, and Conservatives don't chose representative people. A Financial Times survey finds new Tory candidates in safest seats are predominantly white, male Eurosceptics. So picking on the legitimacy of trade union ballot turn-outs makes Cameron look vindictive. Tennis games with Russian oligarchs probably alarm people more as a method of funding a political party than donations from rather more democratic trade unions. By pledging a near-impossible vote threshold for strike ballots Cameron re-enforces the nasty party imagery he will again need to soften at the election.
If he were sincere about wanting union members to participate in strike ballots, he could ease the failure of postal ballots. Instead he refuses to allow workplace ballots, his ministers yesterday warning that this meant a return to car park votes from the bad old days, intimidating workers in a public show of hands. But the unions say the Electoral Reform Society could scrutinise secure workplace ballots, including online. Why not? All voting urgently needs to be modernised, online, on mobiles, at supermarkets, at work – wherever people are. People need to be able to register on the day they vote, too.
The surprise is how well trade unionism is still supported, when the only face of most of the media ever displays is the one that suits the Cameron narrative – old-fashioned angry men making threats. Far less reported is the more frequent German-style quiet cooperation behind the scenes, as when Usdaw and McVities founded a joint skills training centre or Unite makes a four-year deal to save Vauxhall on Merseyside. If Cameron genuinely wanted peace and cooperation, he'd go for employees on boards. In tactical positioning, he has chosen war – but it may turn out to be a political blunder.
Bring back yesterday, was ever the Conservative battle cry. But David Cameron's back-to-the- future assault on trade unions is badly out of kilter with the present time and public opinion. The million or so public workers on strike yesterday draw on more goodwill than he thinks. That's surprising, in a world where only a quarter of employees belong to unions – more women than men.
Out there on picket lines, cheerful in a way that belied the seriousness of their cause, were the half a million council workers paid less than a living wage, the dinner ladies and care workers, alongside firefighters, teachers and civil servants who have suffered a 20% fall in income, their pay capped at 1% until the deficit is paid off – mainly by the likes of them. That could be 2018, the chancellor's latest target date, but he's missed one before and might stretch it again.
Cameron's pledge to set a threshold for turn-out in ballots before unions can strike is another of his knee-jerk commitments for his manifesto that may prove more of a millstone than an asset. Labour and Liberal Democrats can have fun with its absurdity, as well as its patent injustice. Low turnout is certainly a danger to democracy but the government's new individual voter registration, rushed in before the election, may make it worse, conveniently, since Conservatives vote most assiduously.
The warlike tendency on Cameron's back benches were out in force yesterday, with rightwing MP Dominic Raab blasting out: "The strikes today are a licensed sabotage inflicted by the union barons on a whim without majority support amongst their members." Where to begin? These days baronial power is all in the hands of financiers, big employers and media moguls. As for sabotage, echoing Thomas Piketty, the IMF itself warns that the growing mismatch of power between capital and labour puts the stability of capitalism at risk, when people are paid too little to buy goods and services, borrowing more than is safe just to survive.
Labour has a nervous tic over its vulnerability on trade union links, as ever mocked for neither supporting nor condemning the strike. (The party did agree the overall cap on public pay – but would pay the bottom more and the top less, and they promise a living wage for government workers and contractors and in the next parliament.) But Cameron has laid himself a trap by re-opening the old war against enfeebled unions when strikes have been at historic lows for years. With food banks full of working people who can't make meagre pay checks last to end of the week, beyond his own diehards there's little public appetite for screwing down the workforce and strong support for a living wage. Divide and rule, pitting public against private-sector employees, is a weak tactic when people see the 600,000 lost public jobs replaced mainly with low-paid self-employment.
Francis Maude, talking on Radio 4's Today programme yesterday, was more than a little disingenuous when he expressed shock that unions would shut some old people's centres for the day – as if forgetting how many his own government has closed permanently.
But when he spoke of the strike's "glaring lack of mandate", he really should have paused to consider. There may be some terminological misunderstanding as to what the word "mandate" means to his party. Remember how during the election campaign, Cameron personally ruled out NHS re-disorganisation, cutting child benefit or education maintenance allowances or any "front-line cuts". George Osborne seems just as confounded by the concept of "mandate". In his pre-election conference speech he said "We could not even think of abolishing the 50p rate on the rich while at the same time I am asking many of our public-sector workers to accept a pay freeze." He said it would be "grossly unfair" – that was his mandate.
As for voting mandates, not one MP would pass a threshold demanding support from 50% of the electorate. The nearest is the Lib Dem Tim Farron, at 46%, a rare high proportion. We've recently seen the lowest ever byelection turnout in Manchester Central, at 18.2%. For the comically pointless police and crime commissioners elections, just 15.1% turned out: expect a new record low in the byelection for the West Midlands PCC in mid-August. EU elections have fallen below a quarter, which makes the 38.1% turnout to vote in Boris Johnson by a whisker look like wild voter enthusiasm. So if Cameron means to make strikes illegal without 51% of all eligible union voters, that is in effect an outright ban. He should know there is overwhelming popular belief in the basic right to strike.
Turnout everywhere is in crisis, and democracy hangs by a thread when only 1% belongs to any political party. We rely on those few to select MPs, and Conservatives don't chose representative people. A Financial Times survey finds new Tory candidates in safest seats are predominantly white, male Eurosceptics. So picking on the legitimacy of trade union ballot turn-outs makes Cameron look vindictive. Tennis games with Russian oligarchs probably alarm people more as a method of funding a political party than donations from rather more democratic trade unions. By pledging a near-impossible vote threshold for strike ballots Cameron re-enforces the nasty party imagery he will again need to soften at the election.
If he were sincere about wanting union members to participate in strike ballots, he could ease the failure of postal ballots. Instead he refuses to allow workplace ballots, his ministers yesterday warning that this meant a return to car park votes from the bad old days, intimidating workers in a public show of hands. But the unions say the Electoral Reform Society could scrutinise secure workplace ballots, including online. Why not? All voting urgently needs to be modernised, online, on mobiles, at supermarkets, at work – wherever people are. People need to be able to register on the day they vote, too.
The surprise is how well trade unionism is still supported, when the only face of most of the media ever displays is the one that suits the Cameron narrative – old-fashioned angry men making threats. Far less reported is the more frequent German-style quiet cooperation behind the scenes, as when Usdaw and McVities founded a joint skills training centre or Unite makes a four-year deal to save Vauxhall on Merseyside. If Cameron genuinely wanted peace and cooperation, he'd go for employees on boards. In tactical positioning, he has chosen war – but it may turn out to be a political blunder.
