LONDON—Britain faces widening labour unrest in the year ahead, with workers across the economy frustrated by the prospect of pay curbs and unsettled by the likelihood of a new Conservative government.
Agitation is bubbling in industries as diverse as refuse collection and postal delivery, with a combination of recession, rising unemployment and worsening take-home pay fuelling anger.
Employees at Royal Mail, the state-owned postal service, voted overwhelmingly last week for a nationwide strike, while staff at British Airways are considering similar steps.
In the northern city of Leeds, rubbish collectors have staged informal strikes for six weeks, leaving mountains of trash collecting on street corners. Millions of public sector workers also face the probability of pay freezes in 2011 if the Conservatives win the election due by next June.
"What you've got here is a squeeze on employees which is brought about by changing economic circumstances that are largely linked to the recession," said Tony Travers, a professor at the London School of Economics.
"If the Conservatives take office, there is little doubt that all this is a leading indicator for a risk of significant industrial unrest. There will have to be reductions in public spending, leading to a prolonged squeeze on public sector pay."
Britain is still in recession, unlike Germany and France. The cost of fighting the downturn, plus diving tax revenue, has forced a huge rise in public borrowing and state workers are set to suffer when the time comes to reduce the national debt.
Far fewer Britons belong to unions these days — membership fell to 6.9 million at the end of 2008 from a peak of 13 million in 1982. However, those that remain are more militant and more inclined to strike, labour experts say.
The chief threat of industrial action is among public sector workers. More than four million of them are unionised and most — those earning more than 18,000 pounds ($28,780) a year — will have their pay frozen if the Conservatives are elected.
Yet the private sector, which has seen relatively little industrial action since the late 1980s, is not immune. British Airways, which has plans to lay off up to 4,000 workers, could face widespread work stoppages in the run-up to Christmas.
"The unions have radicalised over the past 10 years to a large extent," said Mark Wickham-Jones, a professor at Bristol University and a specialist in labour issues.
"Certainly the potential is there for unrest to widen under either a Labour or a Conservative government, with the public sector a particular area of concern."
Radical but Restrained
The Labour government has promised a salary freeze or minimal rises for only the best-paid 750,000 public workers such as judges, senior health service managers and family doctors.
The Conservatives, whose labour policies are inextricably linked with former prime minister Margaret Thatcher and her largely successful battle to break the major unions in the 1980s, took a bold step at their annual conference last week, promising to cap most public sector salaries in 2011.
That commitment is part of efforts they will have to undertake to rein in Britain's soaring budget deficit, forecast to rise to 175 billion pounds this year, or 12 percent of GDP, if it wins the election, as widely expected in opinion polls.
The freeze will certainly aggravate public sector unions, and increase the likelihood of labour unrest and even strikes. But the Conservatives appear to be wagering that the impact will be muted and the alternative — bigger deficits — far worse.
The fact is that while worker unrest may well increase, it will do so from a very low base and in a legal environment in which it is very difficult to go on strike, making the disruptions a far cry from the militant early 1980s.
Since the early 1990s Britain has lost only around one million working days to strikes each year, compared with a peak of around 12 million working per annum in the 1980s.
Smaller unions and those representing the worst-affected public sector workers may end up staging nationwide strikes. But despite their frustrations, the biggest unions may find it preferable to hold off on action.
"There will be acute pressure on public sector pay that could trigger substantial industrial unrest, but it does depend on how much of a mandate the Conservatives get and how much the unions think that accepting lower pay is a deal worth striking for not losing as many jobs," said Travers.
"It will all depend on how far the government of the day can convince trade unions that it's in their best interests to have pay rises that are low or zero but with job security, rather than pay increases and the risk of losing lots of jobs."
