Britain’s strikes… Loss of 2.5 million work days
The British economy lost nearly 2.5 million workdays due to strikes in the country last year as Britain suffered its worst industrial strike since Margaret Thatcher was in power.
On Tuesday, the Office for National Statistics said 843,000 working days were lost due to labor disputes in December, making it the worst month in more than a decade. This brings the total number of lost work days from June until the end of the year to 2,472,000.
The last time the situation got this bad was between 1989 and 1990, towards the end of Thatcher’s term as prime minister. Until June, the National Statistical Office paused measuring data due to COVID. Unions in the UK are protesting rising inflation and eroding wages.
Protests have escalated this year, with hundreds of thousands of railway workers, civil servants, teachers, workers in the National Health Service and elsewhere in the public sector staging major strikes.
On February 1st, up to half a million people strike together. “The wave of industrial action across the UK is not going away,” said Sharon Graham, general secretary of the United Union.
Responding to the ONS data, she said that workers “have no choice but to fight for better wages”. The RMT transport workers’ union rejected another wage offer for rail workers last weekend, raising the prospect of more train strikes. Nurses’ strikes lasting two days in a row may become more common, according to reports.
“The 48-hour strike involving staff from emergency departments, intensive care units and cancer care services is likely to have the biggest impact we’ve seen on patients,” said Svron Cordery, deputy chief executive of the NHS.
Junior doctors are expected to vote in their thousands in support of the strikes as polls close next week. More ambulance drivers in the south of England and Yorkshire also joined a dispute with the wider NHS over the weekend and will take part in upcoming strikes.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s government has refused to raise public sector wages for the current financial year beyond levels proposed by wage review bodies, which it insists are independent. Unions say they will continue to fight, with rail workers and Royal Mail staff re-voting for the right to strike in the summer and possibly beyond.
Graham said that “Sunak” resembles “the captain of the Titanic” after he reconfigured his government in the face of mass protests and low voter turnout.
Private sector wages have outperformed the public sector in the past two years, but the rate of increase in government roles has jumped to 4.2%, according to official data released on Tuesday – the fastest since 2006.
The rise in wages raises concerns about the continued rise in inflation. While the strikes did not have a significant impact on the GDP, downtown shops and restaurants suffered disruptions to the public transportation system. The number of visitors to shopping areas near central London offices rose by more than 36% year on year last week as commuters returned after strikes by train drivers at the start of the month.
Eamonn Aqil Farhat*
* Journalist for Bloomberg.
Published by special arrangement with The Washington Post Writing and Syndication Service.
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