The Good Old Days

A blast from the past

It's highly unusual for me to quote that renowned journal, Socialist Worker, however now I shall do it for the second time in less that a week.

Anyone who wonders whether or not the less thinking type of unionism that blighted this country for decades has been wholly eliminated by the actions of the Thatcher administration, and the merciful inaction of Blair and Brown thus far, should take a look at this gem.

Fortunately strikes such as the current postal workers' dispute and the recent shenanigans by Bob Crowe and his merry men are now sufficiently rare that for all the inconvenience and disruption they cause it is possible see such neanderthal rubbish as amusing from time to time.

I don't know why I found this particular effort so amusing, just something about the breathless style of the coverage of the posties' misguided actions, as they wreck their own job security. It finally struck me that it came over like a report in the local rag about the local soccer team's latest outing in the lower reaches of the football leagues, with a bit of Sid James 'Carry on at your convenience' style unionism as a bit of an afterthought.

Just to show you how some parts of the union movement have moved with the times:

The last day of the national postal strikes saw a fantastic spontaneous march by 100 postal workers through the centre of Ipswich chanting "What do we want? Fair pay! When do we want it? Now!".

...

Monday's strike saw four deliveries turned away including the weekly delivery of the canteen's food.

Source: Socialist Worker

"What do we want? X! When do we want it? Now!"...for God's sake this is the twenty-first century. Hmm, and I wonder who they will blame their empty bellies on when they finally do get back to work?

It even has the equivalent of the Opta statistics for the game, with 'shots on target' replaced with 'scab numbers'.

On a serious point, I've always despised the language of hate that fuels so much of left-wing rhetoric. As little time as I may have for the Human Rights Act, I do hope one day that a 'scab' takes legal action under it against one of the old-school unions - there seems to be ample cause.

For now, the CWU's campaign to destroy their member's job security Scargill-style continues unabated. Postal services across the continent face a very uncertain future, thanks to the CWU the Royal Mail faces probably the future with even less confidence than their European counterparts.