tag:theconversation.com,2011:/nz/topics/trade-unions-4345/articlesTrade unions – The Conversation2024-03-08T13:24:16Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2253742024-03-08T13:24:16Z2024-03-08T13:24:16ZEdward Webster: South African intellectual, teacher, activist, a man of great energy and integrity, and the life and soul of any party<p>Eddie Webster (82), sociologist and emeritus professor at the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, who <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/news/latest-news/general-news/2024/2024-03/wits-mourns-the-loss-of-professor-eddie-webster.html">died on 5 March 2024</a>, lived a huge life, applying himself to many different arenas with great energy and insight. </p>
<p>His achievements are quite extraordinary. He was an intellectual, a teacher, a leader, an activist for social change, a builder of institutions, a rugby player and jogger, a man of great energy and integrity, and the life and soul of any party. </p>
<p>As an intellectual and activist he was always independent and critical, and always engaged, whether <a href="https://saftu.org.za/archives/7862">working with trade unions</a> or with South Africa’s new democratic government. It was important to get your hands dirty working for change, he always said, but as important to retain your autonomy and intellectual integrity. This held for the university itself, an institution to which he was wholly committed but at the same time found deeply disappointing when it came to social justice. His life was shaped by these kinds of tensions. </p>
<p>Eddie was one of that <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/news/latest-news/graduations/2017/a-life-servicing-many-generations-.html">pioneering</a> generation of scholar-activists at the university, white academics who identified with and supported the black resistance movement, and who saw the world in new ways and pioneered the production of new knowledge: his close colleague, feminist and environmental sociologist <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jacklyn-cock-201078">Jacklyn Cock</a>, anthropologist and democratic activist <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/david-joseph-webster#:%7E:text=On%201%20May%201989%2C%20South,Mandela%20was%20released%20from%20prison.">David Webster</a> (assassinated in 1989), and distinguished historian Phil Bonner. </p>
<p>Eddie inspired generations of us with his vision and practice of critically engaged scholarship – not only in South Africa, but <a href="https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/critical-engagement-with-public-sociology">across the world</a>.</p>
<h2>Independent streak</h2>
<p>In 1986, believing that the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) was out of touch with the majority of South Africans, he drove an investigation called the <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/news/latest-news/research-news/2022/2022-10/wits-at-a-time-of-national-crisis-then-and-now.html">Perspectives on Wits</a> with his colleagues. They explored the views of trade unionists and community activists about the university. The university had agreed to fund this investigation. But it was unhappy with the results. These revealed that the institution’s own narrative about its liberal opposition to apartheid was not shared by black South Africans, who saw it as serving white and corporate interests.</p>
<p>A few years earlier, at a time of great repression of unions, he and <a href="https://www.wits.ac.za/news/sources/alumni-news/2017/distinguished-historian-passes-away.html">Phil Bonner</a> had attempted to set up a worker education programme on campus. But the university refused to let it happen. The university’s main funders, such as <a href="https://www.angloamerican.com/">Anglo American</a>, would have been greatly displeased by such a programme – a nice illustration of the point made in the Perspectives document. </p>
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<p>A decade later the indomitable Eddie was able to establish a branch of the Global Labour University at Wits, and bring trade unionists into the heart of the institution. He was not someone to give up easily.</p>
<h2>Insatiable curiosity</h2>
<p>Eddie worked closely with South Africa’s emerging trade union movement in the mid-1970s. At the time black workers were a tightly controlled source of cheap labour for South Africa’s booming industrial economy, and the unions were not recognised legally and suffered severe repression by employers and the state together. Eddie believed that a strong trade union movement democratically controlled by workers would be a powerful force for change.</p>
<p>He contributed to educational programmes for trade unionists, advocating for the recognition of the unions whenever he could. He co-founded the <a href="https://www.southafricanlabourbulletin.org.za/">South African Labour Bulletin</a>, which served as a forum for the interaction between academics and trade unionists, and the Industrial Education Institute with his comrade <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/rick-turner">Rick Turner</a> and others. Turner was assassinated by the apartheid government in 1978. </p>
<p>Eddie went on to support the unions, and <a href="https://mediadon.co.za/2024/03/06/cosatu-mourns-the-passing-of-revolutionary-professor-eddie-webster/">conduct research</a> with and for them, his entire life. Generations of union shop stewards and organisers knew him through his support, teaching and research, and he was widely loved and revered as “comrade Prof”.</p>
<p>As an intellectual Eddie was insatiably curious about the world and how it worked and about new possibilities emerging for progressive change. While the sociology classics were a foundation for his thinking, he kept up to date with new literature and ideas. </p>
<p>He founded Industrial Sociology at Wits and established the Sociology of Work Unit (now the Society, Work and Politics Institute <a href="https://www.swop.org.za/">SWOP</a>) as a research unit in the early 1980s as a way of stimulating labour research and deepening his work with unions. The unit organised and financed research, held seminars and workshops, provided a home for students, and increasingly collaborated with colleagues at other universities and overseas. </p>
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<p>Eddie loved working with others, whether students or colleagues or trade unionists. He knew that ideas arose from wide reading, discussions and interactions, and frequently said “there is no such thing as an original idea”. For its students, staff, colleagues and associates SWOP stood out as a place of vibrant intellectual exchange and curiosity about each other’s work: it was an intellectual home and a place of comradeship and critique that felt unique in the university.</p>
<h2>Academic and teaching legacy</h2>
<p>Eddie was also a great teacher, bringing all of his passion for ideas and his vivid sense of history and change and struggle into the classroom, exciting students about the life of the intellect and the life of struggle. At SWOP he established the first internship programme for black postgraduate students to support and encourage them in what they often experienced as a hostile environment.</p>
<p>Eddie regularly undertook large-scale research projects and recruited numbers of students to participate in field research. This was another learning opportunity, where students immersed themselves in the collective quest for knowledge and began to see themselves as researchers.</p>
<p>In the midst of a multitude of projects, Eddie remained committed to his academic work, publishing a great volume and range of articles and books, and achieving honours and recognition globally.</p>
<p>His first book, <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Cast_in_a_Racial_Mould.html?id=ewPUAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">Cast in a Racial Mould</a>, based on his PhD, provided the intellectual foundation for the new discipline of industrial sociology in South Africa, developing an analysis of changing workplace technology and its impact on trade unionism – specifically the workings of race and class. This provided a material basis for understanding the emergence of the new black mass unionism. </p>
<p>His co-authored book <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781444303018">Grounding Globalisation</a> provided a new account of globalisation and trade unions through a comparison of South Africa, Korea and Australia. Global scholars were inspired by it and it <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781444303018">won a major prize</a> from the American Sociological Association. </p>
<p>His most recent book, <a href="https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/Recasting-Workers%EF%BF%BD-Power/?k=9781776148820">Recasting Workers’ Power</a>, written with Lynford Dor, returns full cycle to the themes of his first book, exploring the impact of technological change on the nature of work in the gig economy, and drawing lessons from forms of worker organisation and collective action that have been emerging across Africa.</p>
<p>Each of these books extends the boundaries of our knowledge by exploring the cutting edge of social change – in a sense helping us see the future and, indeed, helping to make it.</p>
<h2>A great love for life</h2>
<p>It is impossible to think about Eddie without thinking about <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/luli-callinicos-416446">Luli Callinicos</a>, historian and biographer, and the great love of his life. Indeed, she was the rock on which he built his achievements. I remember with great fondness the Greek Easter feasts shared at their home, and the many other gatherings with family, friends and colleagues.</p>
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<p><a href="https://sociology.berkeley.edu/alumni-manager/michael-burawoy">Michael Burawoy</a>, the great American sociologist and lifelong friend of Eddie, once told me that he had never laughed as much as he did when he was with Eddie and his colleagues from SWOP. Eddie enjoyed people and was deeply generous; he was a great raconteur, he loved being alive. Three weeks ago he was celebrated for his <a href="https://www.facebook.com/bezparkrun/">200th Park Run</a> in one of Johannesburg’s large parks. Whatever he did he did fully, heart and soul. He was not bigger than life, he was big with life.</p>
<p>In later years he introduced himself as “a living ancestor”. Now he is simply our ancestor, one who has given us a huge legacy, a living legacy. It is time for us to reflect on his inspiration, burn <a href="http://phytoalchemy.co.za/2018/06/30/imphepho-is-not-a-smudge/">imphepho</a>, slaughter a cow and pour out the wine.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/225374/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Karl von Holdt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Eddie Webster inspired generations of scholars with his vision and practice of critically engaged scholarship, in South Africa and worldwide.Karl von Holdt, Senior Researcher, Society Work and Politics Institute, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2158422023-11-09T17:25:52Z2023-11-09T17:25:52ZTrade unions in the UK and US have become more powerful despite political interference and falling memberships<p>In September 2023, Joe Biden became the first sitting US president to <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-us-canada-66917039">join strikers</a> on a picket line. He told car workers that they “deserve a significant raise and other benefits”.</p>
<p>Even more surprisingly perhaps, those same workers – in a dispute with three of America’s biggest car manufacturers – were later <a href="https://apnews.com/article/labor-union-auto-workers-trump-strike-dfcb805fd4e749b13aaf827e1463da73">praised by Donald Trump</a>. Meanwhile in the UK, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has pledged to <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/sir-keir-starmer-pledges-to-repeal-any-new-anti-strike-laws-in-first-big-speech-of-the-year-as-rail-union-warns-legislation-could-lead-to-longer-strife-12780233">repeal anti-strike laws</a>, and “unequivocally” <a href="https://labourlist.org/2022/10/starmer-tells-tuc-congress-i-support-the-right-to-strike-unequivocally/">support the right to strike</a>. </p>
<p>It seems that ongoing – and largely successful – strike action in both the UK and the US has forced political leaders to take trade unions more seriously than they have for decades. </p>
<p>There is a shifting balance of power towards the unions, with employers increasingly agreeing settlements in the strikers’ favour. In the UK, key workers in sectors such as <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-66822398">education</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/18/doctors-strike-to-disrupt-care-unlike-anything-seen-before-warn-nhs-officials">healthcare</a> and <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/train-strikes-full-list-of-dates-and-lines-affected-as-rail-and-tube-action-announced-12969794">transport</a> continue to strike in pursuit of better pay and conditions – no doubt encouraged by the successes they have seen elsewhere. </p>
<p>For example, in October last year, striking barristers <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63198892">received a 15% pay rise</a>, while London bus drivers ended their industrial action after accepting a pay deal <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/long-running-london-bus-drivers-dispute-ends-after-18-pay-deal-12810250">worth 18%</a> in February 2023. Then in July, Royal Mail workers concluded a three-year dispute <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-66170432">after receiving a 10% rise </a>.</p>
<p>In the US, a well-publicised strike which stopped production of popular TV shows and films <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/25/business/wga-writers-strike-deal-explained.html">ended in success</a> for the Writers Guild of America, bolstering <a href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/2023-11-06/actors-strike-sag-aftra-amptp-negotiations">action</a> by striking actors who have now agreed a <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67364587">“tentative” deal</a> with Hollywood studios. </p>
<h2>Low numbers and high barriers</h2>
<p>That successful strike action is taking place at such a size and scale is remarkable considering the various hurdles still being faced by unions in both countries. </p>
<p>UK unions, once powerful enough to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/13619468808580954">bring down a government</a> (as when Edward Heath succumbed to the National Union of Mineworkers in 1974), have faced an <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/irj.12349">increasingly restrictive environment</a>. This culminated in <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-consecutive-conservative-governments-destroyed-union-rights-a-timeline-of-the-uks-anti-strike-laws-since-the-1970s-198178">2016 legislation</a> which established high legal barriers for strike action, such as requiring a 50% turnout, or placing tight restrictions on where and how pickets can be conducted. </p>
<p>In the US, striking rights are weaker still, with the balance of power overwhelmingly favouring employers. Every single state (except for Montana) is an “at will” state, meaning that an employer can effectively dismiss an employee at any time, for any reason (if the decision is not illegal, such as being discriminatory). </p>
<p>Membership levels also paint a depressing picture for trade unions. In the UK, just <a href="https://www.cipd.org/uk/knowledge/factsheets/trade-unions-factsheet/#membershiplevels">22.3% of workers</a> were part of a union in 2022. In the US, the proportion is 10.1%, and <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/398303/approval-labor-unions-highest-point-1965.aspx">84% of households</a> do not include a single union member. </p>
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<p>For younger workers, with no memory or experience of what unions have achieved in the past, the numbers are even lower. Only <a href="https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/union2.pdf">4.4%</a> of US workers aged 16 to 24 are members of a union, and in the UK it’s just <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1158789/Trade_Union_Membership_UK_1995-2022_Statistical_Bulletin.pdf">3.7%</a>. </p>
<p>Lower levels of union membership results in <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1024258916673533">less bargaining power</a>, and therefore a weakening of employment rights and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/000368499324615">job security</a> – which again makes the recent levels of industrial action a surprise. </p>
<h2>Striking a blow</h2>
<p>Falling membership also has a direct impact on the number of working days lost to industrial action, with substantial declines in recent decades. The US saw a peak of 52.8 million <a href="https://www.bls.gov/web/wkstp/annual-listing.htm">lost working days</a> in 1970, and a low of 200,000 in 2014. </p>
<p>In the UK, 29.5 million <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/timeseries/bbfw/lms">working days lost</a> in 1979 went down to as little as 170,000 in 2015. </p>
<p>But this vital metric of successful unionisation is also changing, with the number of days lost rising to <a href="https://www.bls.gov/web/wkstp/annual-listing.htm">2.2 million</a> in the US, and <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/timeseries/bbfw/lms">2.5 million</a> in the UK in 2022. </p>
<p>This suggests unions are becoming much more effective at galvanising the members they do have. An increase in the number of lost working days implies that workers’ feel like they can take industrial action, and that such action will actually make a difference. </p>
<p>This snowball effect will only embolden unions further, and aggrieved workers will feel more confident about standing up to their employers. </p>
<p>The fact that workers seem to be feeling empowered despite low numbers and an increase in the barriers to strike action, begs an important question about what is behind the current resurgence.</p>
<p>It may be down to the cost-of-living crisis spurring strained workers to demand <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/focus/20230201-uk-workers-on-strike-to-demand-higher-pay-amid-cost-of-living-crisis">above-inflation pay rises</a>. Or it may be thanks to unemployment levels being at their <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/08/03/strikes-2023-summer-unions/">lowest in nearly 50 years</a>, providing substantial bargaining power and leverage. </p>
<p>Many employers would struggle to find replacement workers at the moment, especially highly skilled ones, like those in the car industry. Unions know this, and therefore feel more comfortable agitating for better terms and conditions. </p>
<p>Responding to the unions’ apparent new levels of confidence, the UK government recently <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/strike-laws-to-be-passed-to-protect-vital-public-services-over-christmas">introduced legislation</a> designed to force some strikers back to work. Meanwhile Labour, which receives substantial funding from unions, is seeking to walk a tightrope of pleasing both workers and employers as it seeks a broad electoral coalition. </p>
<p>Both parties need to accept that trade unionism is experiencing a revival few thought possible – and one that shows no signs of stopping.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215842/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Daniels is a member of the University and College Union (UCU).</span></em></p>The picket lines have brought surprising levels of success.Steven Daniels, Lecturer in Law and Politics, Edge Hill UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2130222023-10-11T13:42:31Z2023-10-11T13:42:31ZMale domestic workers in South Africa – study sheds light on the experiences of Malawian and Zimbabwean migrants<p>An estimated <a href="https://journals.uj.ac.za/index.php/The_Thinker/article/view/2672/1644">800,000 people work as domestic workers</a> in South Africa. Most are black women from marginalised backgrounds. It’s therefore not surprising that the bulk of the literature about domestic work focuses on females performing cleaning, cooking and care work. What’s missing in debates about domestic workers’ job-related experiences and relationships with their employers is the experiences of men performing domestic work, a job traditionally linked to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24713312">femininity</a>. </p>
<p>However, paid domestic work in South Africa hasn’t always been dominated by women. In the 1880s when the <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/New_Babylon_New_Nineveh.html?id=DiDtAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">mining industry</a> was being established in Johannesburg, black men, rather than women, were the preferred servants in white households. Known as <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/From_Servants_to_Workers.html?id=ha_3GUYK6FwC&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button&hl=en&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=houseboy&f=false">houseboys</a>, they cooked, cleaned, nursed and cared for white colonial families.</p>
<p>But over the next decade the landscape of domestic work underwent significant changes. This was due to a few factors, among them:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>a scarcity of labour in the mines, which drew black men away from domestic roles to join the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/brief-history-domestic-service-south-africa">mining sector</a> </p></li>
<li><p>the increasing <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/brief-history-domestic-service-south-africa">urbanisation of black women</a> </p></li>
<li><p>racial stereotypes about black men as <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2637313">sexually aggressive or promiscuous</a>.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>A small proportion of men still work as domestic workers, however. Some are <a href="https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---africa/---ro-abidjan/---ilo-pretoria/documents/vacancynotice/wcms_789648.pdf">migrants</a>. Due to South Africa’s relative stability and economic opportunities, there has been <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/south-africa-immigration-destination-history">an increase in migration</a> from countries like Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Mozambique since apartheid ended in 1994. The migrants come seeking education, employment and improved livelihoods. They rely on friends and family already in South Africa <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-92114-9_2">to find jobs</a>. </p>
<p>While African migrant women from poor backgrounds often find work in <a href="https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/edar2018_BP1_en.pdf">domestic service or the hospitality sectors</a>, most migrant men work as <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/2019-05/20767_mangezvo_xenophobic_2015.pdf">gardeners, painters or security guards</a>. Some Malawian and Zimbabwean male migrants work as <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/2019-05/20767_mangezvo_xenophobic_2015.pdf">waiters or domestic workers</a>, jobs that are traditionally associated with women. </p>
<h2>Exploring unfamiliar territory</h2>
<p>As a researcher of domestic work in South Africa, I noticed that few studies had focused on male migrants performing domestic work in South Africa. Consequently, such work is commonly viewed as an employment arrangement involving affluent female employers and black female domestic workers from marginalised backgrounds. The intersections of race, class and gender between employers and domestic workers often lead to <a href="https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/74795/Masterson_Domestic_2019.pdf?sequence=1">unequal power relations and economic exploitation</a> entrenched within the employment relationship. </p>
<p>In my study, I examined <a href="https://journals.uj.ac.za/index.php/The_Thinker/article/view/2677">the experiences of migrant male domestic workers in Johannesburg</a>, with the aim of shedding some light on their duties and working conditions. </p>
<p>A male Malawian domestic worker employed by an acquaintance referred me to other male domestic workers in Johannesburg. Interviews were conducted with six male Malawian and four male Zimbabwean domestic workers employed by affluent white employers in Johannesburg. All had been employed for more than five years. </p>
<p>Migrant men’s experiences add a new layer of complexity to the study of domestic work, where complex intersections of class, race and gender occur. </p>
<h2>Migrant male domestic workers in South Africa</h2>
<p>My study showed that domestic work offered a viable employment path for men. </p>
<p>They faced similar challenges to their <a href="https://www.academia.edu/13215366/_Help_somebody_who_help_you_The_Effect_of_the_Domestic_Labour_Relationship_on_South_African_Domestic_Workers_Ability_to_Exercise_their_Rights">female counterparts</a>. These included long working hours, a paternalistic employer-employee dynamic, and a marginalised job status.</p>
<p>The respondents said they had an array of indoor and outdoor responsibilities. Indoors, their tasks encompassed cleaning and tidying their employers’ residences. They also handled laundry and ironing, alongside duties such as grocery shopping and meal preparation.</p>
<p>Outdoors, their responsibilities extended to garden maintenance, swimming pool upkeep, pet waste disposal, cleaning outdoor grilling areas (braais), and sweeping driveways. They were also entrusted with securing the homes and taking care of pets when their employers were away. </p>
<p>The daily life of male live-in domestic workers was much the same as <a href="https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---ed_protect/---protrav/---travail/documents/publication/wcms_230837.pdf">live-in female domestic workers</a>. The working day started at 06:30, preparing breakfast for employers. Once employers had left for work, they cleaned the house, prepared lunch, did laundry and attended to the garden.</p>
<p>The long working day often ended at 20:00 after dinner was prepared for employers. Most weekends were spent on additional piece jobs, working as gardeners or painters for others.</p>
<p>While the homes of employers were opulent, male domestic workers, just like their female counterparts, lived in small rooms in the back yard, hidden away from the employers’ gaze, as other researchers have <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3514408?seq=1">also found</a>. The one-room accommodation was often equipped with basic furniture, differing little from the <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?hl=en&lr=&id=c89wfLEahEIC&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=living+quarters+of+domestic+workers+apartheid&ots=oumA3GgaGq&sig=Cjco7oSLcK6vGAgKpM_kgF0HTzQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=living%20quarters&f=false">squalid living quarters of domestic workers during apartheid</a>.</p>
<p>The men said they considered their wages reasonable. They earned on average between R5,000 (US$260) and R8,000 (US$416) a month. This was much higher than <a href="https://personal.nedbank.co.za/learn/blog/domestic-workers-minimum-wage.html#:%7E:text=The%20minimum%20wage%20for%20domestic%20workers%20in%202023&text=Employing%20someone%20for%20more%20than,with%20the%20Department%20of%20Labour.">the minimum wage of R4,067</a> (US$216) for a domestic worker working eight hours a day, five days a week in South Africa. Most said they could engage in wage negotiations, which enabled them to improve their wellbeing and that of their families.</p>
<p>None of the male domestic workers in this study had written employment contracts with their employers, or were members of a trade union, such as the <a href="http://www.sadsawu.com/">South African Domestic Service and Allied Workers Union</a>. Work contracts need to be renewed every few years, which is costly and time consuming. Job security is precarious. </p>
<h2>The recurring issues of domestic work</h2>
<p>In South Africa, domestic work continues to be associated with <a href="https://journals.uj.ac.za/index.php/The_Thinker/article/view/2672/1644">marginalised black individuals</a>, perpetuating a historical and societal imbalance. </p>
<p>Paid domestic work continues to occupy a low-status position. No formal qualifications and little specialised expertise are required. Domestic workers’ contributions to the functioning of households are essential but frequently taken for granted, as other studies have <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/book/42905/">also confirmed</a>. </p>
<p>Despite the <a href="https://www.pulp.up.ac.za/edited-collections/exploited-undervalued-and-essential-domestic-workers-and-the-realisation-of-their-rights">legislation</a>, domestic workers work long hours and perform physically demanding work. While male domestic workers in this study could negotiate better working conditions and pay, others might not be successful, and might remain in a precarious working environment. </p>
<p>Job security is not assured, a vulnerability most <a href="https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---ed_protect/---protrav/---migrant/documents/publication/wcms_535598.pdf">migrant domestic workers</a> experience. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---africa/---ro-abidjan/---ilo-pretoria/documents/vacancynotice/wcms_789648.pdf">Practical protection remains constrained</a>. For instance, migrant domestic workers often encounter difficulties when seeking healthcare.</p>
<p>To safeguard this group from exploitation and elevate their overall livelihoods, regulators, enforcement agencies and trade unions must protect and recognise all domestic workers, including migrants, in South Africa.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213022/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David du Toit does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Paid domestic work has a low status in South Africa. The labour of domestic workers is often undervalued and unrecognised.David du Toit, Sociology Lecturer, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2145092023-10-01T09:57:46Z2023-10-01T09:57:46ZTrade unions and the new economy: 3 African case studies show how workers are recasting their power in the digital age<p>From US <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-trump-woo-union-workers-michigan-auto-strikes-grow-2023-09-26/">car factories</a> to public sector workers <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/5/nigerian-unions-strike-again-to-protest-soaring-costs-after-subsidy-removal">in Nigeria</a> and <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2023/09/08/city-of-tshwane-samwu-strike-a-deliberate-effort-to-turn-the-city-into-a-dumpsite">South Africa</a>, strikes by trade unions continue unabated among the established sectors of the working class. In Detroit in the US, workers are resisting contract employment. In Nigeria they are angry over the rising cost of living and in South Africa, municipal workers are striking for better wages.</p>
<p>But it’s becoming increasingly difficult to build sustainable worker organisations as companies employ more people on a casual basis in the digital age. Work has become more precarious and workers are easily replaceable. </p>
<p>In our <a href="https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/Recasting-Workers%EF%BF%BD-Power/?k=9781776148820">new book</a>, Recasting Workers’ Power: Work and Inequality in the Shadow of the Digital Age, we focus on workers’ power. The classic example of workers’ power is the strike: the collective withdrawal of labour to force an employer to do what they would otherwise not have done. </p>
<p>In this book we challenge the dominant narrative that new technology has destroyed workers’ power. We focus on the new jobs that are being created – food couriers, e-hailing drivers, street traders and the growing numbers of casual workers at the core of the economy.</p>
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<p>We show how these precarious workers are organising in new ways that go beyond the traditional methods of union formation. For example, they are forming coalitions with other organisations, such as NGOs. In some cases they are combining these new approaches with traditional ways of bringing workers’ collective power to bear, for example by making use of laws that support workers’ rights.</p>
<h2>Three case studies</h2>
<p>We focus on three sectors: factory workers in Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg in South Africa; food couriers in Johannesburg; and transport workers in Kampala, Uganda. </p>
<p>We examined their ways of organising by applying, in addition to the strike weapon, the lens of three other ways of exercising power: associational power (collective organisation), coalitions (societal power) and institutional power (laws that entrench labour rights). </p>
<p>We found the factory workers were using a range of tools – old and new – to organise. Factory committees were formed at some workplaces. This involved working with a labour supportive NGO. But they also drew on old practices (institutional power) by taking up cases through the <a href="https://www.ccma.org.za/">Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration</a> and the amended <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/labour-relations-act">Labour Relations Act</a>. Both offer the possibility of workers being able to get permanent jobs in the company at which they work.</p>
<p>The food carriers were using different tactics. In Johannesburg they had created worker-driven messaging apps and chat groups where they shared information, developed a shared identity and announced local direct action. </p>
<p>Being self-employed weakens their organising power. But the potential for collective power was increased when they met face-to-face at work zones and began to form a collective identity. Some have engaged in collective action, but with limited impact to date. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/has-south-africas-labour-movement-become-a-middle-class-movement-82629">Has South Africa’s labour movement become a middle class movement?</a>
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<p>They achieved some success when they worked with a supportive NGO (an international organisation) to put forward demands to regulate their work.</p>
<p>In Kampala, we found that the Amalgamated Transport and General Workers’ Union was also using new approaches to organise workers. In the 1980s the union faced a near collapse of membership when privatisation undermined the public transport sector. This eliminated the position of the traditional public transport bus driver. Informal mini-taxi drivers and motorcycle taxi riders (known locally as boda boda) became the dominant mode of transport.</p>
<p>By classifying the growing number of boda boda riders as workers and therefore potential union members, the union expanded from a declining 5,000 members to over 100,000. In spite of the fragmented and isolated nature of their work these new workers were already organised – not into a trade union but into informal associations. </p>
<p>These associations formed an alliance with the established union. By doing this they gained concrete support from the International Transport Federation, a global union of transport workers. This led to the dramatic growth of the union, a decline in police harassment and growing recognition as a collective bargaining partner.</p>
<p>Importantly, where trade unions have taken up the issues of informal workers, unions have also undergone fundamental changes. They often become “hybrid” organisations, blurring the distinction between traditional unionism, informal workers’ associations and cooperatives.</p>
<h2>What next?</h2>
<p>Our <a href="https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/recasting-labours-power">research</a> clearly articulates the challenges workers face. But it also suggests some grounds for optimism in the new and hybrid forms of organisation and the coalitions that are emerging. </p>
<p>The question raised by these findings is whether these embryonic forms of worker organisation are sustainable. Could they become the foundations for a new cycle of worker solidarity and union growth?</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-formal-employment-is-not-a-guaranteed-path-to-social-equality-177251">Why formal employment is not a guaranteed path to social equality</a>
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<p>We conclude that this is possible if they innovate and experiment with new forms of association, use digital tools, and broaden unions’ reach through coalition-building with other civil society organisations. In sum, we are suggesting that workers’ power is being recast as precarious workers in Africa experiment with new ways of organising in the digital age.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214509/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Edward Webster receives funding from organisation.Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. I am a Distinguished Research Professor at the Southern Centre of Inequality Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand </span></em></p>Workers’ power is being recast as precarious workers in Africa experiment with new ways of organising in the digital ageEdward Webster, Distinguished Reserach Professor, Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2053092023-05-09T16:27:30Z2023-05-09T16:27:30ZI’ve worked in precarious jobs for more than 10 years – here’s what unions should do to support migrant workers<p>As I rush to clean everything before the sink overfills with plates and pans, I am confronted, yet again, with the brutality of my working conditions. My feet and legs throb and ache from sole to calf; I can feel the onset of cramps. But the chef won’t be able to work unless I clean these pans.</p>
<p>The clatter of plates and screaming of orders around me have become a constant, thumping backdrop. The only noise I pay attention to is the “beep” of the service elevator next to me – its door opens to reveal an explosion of leftovers, hastily thrown in by the upstairs waiters amid dirty napkins and cutlery.</p>
<p>To me, the beep has come to resemble a form of torture: every new sound signals more pressure, less space, more to catch up on. I haven’t taken a break since I started working 11 hours ago. There are at least three more hours to go.</p>
<p>The cost of the uneaten food is more than I make each day. I wonder if the customers have considered the pain that goes into the food they enjoy upstairs, just above our heads.</p>
<h2>Intensely precarious working conditions</h2>
<p>As a migrant worker since my arrival to the UK in 2011 and as a trade union organiser since 2013, I was already aware of the difficulties facing migrant workers who seek to challenge exploitation, both individually and collectively. To further understand <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/wusa.12346">these barriers</a>, I took on (and <a href="https://theses.gla.ac.uk/82275/">analysed</a>) jobs in a number of different precarious workplaces in Glasgow between 2017 and 2021, including as a kitchen porter in the Mediterranean restaurant in central Glasgow described above.</p>
<p>While some politicians and commentators rage against UK immigration levels, the fact that its economy does not simply rely on migrant labour but is, in my view, <a href="https://interregnum.live/2018/01/22/the-crack-in-the-edifice-modern-capitalism-migrant-workers-and-social-movements/">purposely designed to attract and exploit it</a>, is rarely mentioned. Ever since the days of empire, the UK has recruited migrant workers to staff the most precarious and labour-intensive occupations, in line with the demands of the economy. Regardless of whether they are from former colonies, European, documented or undocumented, migrants form an inseparable part of the nation’s economic infrastructure.</p>
<p>Making up about <a href="https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/migrants-in-the-uk-labour-market-an-overview/">18% of the UK’s total labour force</a>, migrant workers are overrepresented in sectors such as factories, food manufacturing, hospitality and logistics. These are also the occupations that are the most likely to be characterised by intensely precarious working conditions, such as agency work or zero-hours contracts, punitive reductions of hours, unsociable shifts, and a lack of trade union representation.</p>
<p>On top of precarious employment, migrant workers face other barriers that are connected to the UK’s <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0261018320980653">hostile environment policies</a>, such as a lack of access to benefits. This means that the lives of many migrant workers in the UK are in a state of constant insecurity with regard to employment, income, accommodation and even food.</p>
<p>Whether their job is underpinned by a zero-hours contract, an online platform, an employment agency, or more “informal” and unregulated working arrangements, the overarching experience is one of intense insecurity and individualisation.</p>
<p>In these precarious workplaces, the pressure to perform is omnipresent. Watching colleagues being arbitrarily dismissed due to a lack of (over)exertion or for making trivial mistakes makes you realise that you are alone, exposed and vulnerable to the demands of your employer. Your relationships with your superiors and your personal abilities to push yourself are the only substitutes for contractual safety.</p>
<h2>‘I’ve only seen a union once’</h2>
<p>This isolation is worsened by the near-total non-existence of unions in precarious workplaces, despite <a href="https://www.tuc.org.uk/standing-migrant-workers-everywhere">official pronouncements</a> that claim to support migrant workers. Since 2011, I have worked in more than 20 different locations in the hospitality, manufacturing and logistics sectors – I have only seen a union once, and it was oriented towards the permanent staff.</p>
<p>Many migrants I met weren’t even sure whether they could join unions as foreigners. And in every workplace I entered, the word “strike” was only uttered as a joke. Then, they dismissed the prospect. In a life saturated by insecurity, thinking of change is a luxury.</p>
<p>This is not to say that <a href="https://www.gmb.org.uk/news/gmb-pressure-forces-home-office-u-turn-migrant-indefinite-leave">unions haven’t made attempts</a>. But, due to the transient and insecure nature of precarious employment, the stability and trust between colleagues and between workers and union organisers that is required to build meaningful campaigns are simply not there.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/covid-heroes-left-behind-the-invisible-women-struggling-to-make-ends-meet-198210">COVID heroes left behind: the 'invisible' women struggling to make ends meet</a>
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<p>Instead, a vicious cycle is created where precarious conditions breed precarious mindsets – an acceptance of insecure and low pay, poor working conditions and abuse. Indeed, <a href="https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/91404/3/forde_mackenzie_ciupijus_and_alberti.pdf">it has been argued</a> that such working conditions act as forces of socialisation: they teach migrant workers what to expect and how to conduct themselves.</p>
<p>This, when combined with <a href="https://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/2010/anderson_work_employment_society_2010/">migration controls</a> such as being dependent on an employer to remain in the country, lack of access to information and language barriers, renders migrant workers even more vulnerable and exploitable.</p>
<h2>A new breed of social centre</h2>
<p>I believe a crucial element of how unions and social movements can counteract the debilitating effects of precarity is to encourage and materially support the creation of new <a href="https://roarmag.org/essays/amazon-neoliberal-worker/">social centres</a> within neighbourhoods. This is already happening, both formally and informally, in <a href="https://iwc-cti.ca/about-us/">North America</a> and <a href="https://en.squat.net/2021/04/06/athens-zizania-new-squatted-social-center-in-victoria/">parts of Europe</a>, where social movements have set up physical community spaces that allow migrant and other precarious populations to congregate and organise.</p>
<p>These are not top-down initiatives but horizontal structures managed by workers with an understanding of the particularities associated with being an immigrant. But they need to be connected to cross-workplace organising structures, such as the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain’s <a href="https://iwgb.org.uk/en/page/clb/">Couriers and Logistics Branch</a>.</p>
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<p>The value of such spaces is to allow workers who experience high degrees of transience (such as couriers or agency workers) to connect with each other, and with unions, in order to collectively organise to challenge their labour conditions.</p>
<p>This new breed of social centre could also address the interrelated factors that maintain migrant precarity, such as migration restrictions and housing. They would allow migrant workers to access a safe, supportive space outside of the workplace in their own time. Above all, they would be physical examples that grassroots support is there – and that they are not alone.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205309/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Panos Theodoropoulos does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Since 2011, I’ve worked in more than 20 precarious workplaces in hospitality, manufacturing and logistics – and I have only seen a union once.Panos Theodoropoulos, Teaching Fellow of Work, Employment, Management and Organisation, University of LeicesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2016802023-04-13T12:31:00Z2023-04-13T12:31:00ZFairtrade: study finds premium label does not always benefit workers on South African wine farms<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518701/original/file-20230331-24-bbmx2i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">shutterstock</span> </figcaption></figure><p>Wine was first produced in South Africa <a href="https://www.wosa.us/wines/history/">as far back as the mid-1600s</a> by Dutch colonisers who sold it to passing ships. The industry developed further during the colonial and apartheid eras and wine became an important part of the South African economy.</p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14616688.2017.1298152">recent study</a> reports that the industry now employs close to 300,000 people. A <a href="https://news.wine.co.za/news.aspx?NEWSID=38772">2021 report</a> indicates that it generates R10 billion (more than US$550 million) in export value annually. While wine does not rank as one of South Africa’s biggest industries, it <a href="http://www.sawis.co.za/info/download/Macro-economic_Impact_of_the_Wine_Industry_2019_Final_(2).pdf#page=7">contributes 1.1% to South Africa’s GDP and 1.6% of the country’s total employment</a>, making it significant to the economy.</p>
<p>During the colonial and apartheid eras, the country’s wine industry was characterised by the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03057070.2016.1234120">use of enslaved workers</a> and the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2637348">exploitation and paternalistic control of black and coloured labourers by white farmers</a>. The <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Coloured">black and coloured</a> labourers lived and worked on the farms under the control of the white farmers. </p>
<p>With the formal end of apartheid in 1994, such relations were expected to change. <a href="https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---africa/documents/publication/wcms_385959.pdf">New labour laws</a> to protect workers from exploitation were introduced. However, many observers <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14747730802057753">continued to have concerns</a> about the living and working conditions of workers on the wine farms.</p>
<h2>Fairtrade certification</h2>
<p>In response to these concerns, some South African wine farms applied for and were granted Fairtrade certification. <a href="https://www.fairtrade.net/">The Fairtrade label</a> assures consumers that the product they buy has been ethically sourced and traded. <a href="https://www.fairtrade.net/about/certification">Fairtrade certification</a> is supposed to be given only after an audit to determine that the social, economic and environmental conditions on the farm meet certain minimum requirements. </p>
<p>Fairtrade products, such as Fairtrade coffee, chocolate or wine, are sold at a higher price, with a percentage of the sale value going towards a <a href="https://www.fairtrade.net/impact/fairtrade-premium-overview">Fairtrade premium</a>. This premium is supposed to be spent on projects that will improve farmworkers’ lives, such as creches, literacy programmes or medical centres.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-efforts-by-cote-divoire-and-ghana-to-help-cocoa-farmers-havent-worked-162845">Why efforts by Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana to help cocoa farmers haven’t worked</a>
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<p>If Fairtrade certification worked as intended for the South African wine industry, it could offer local producers improved entry into new markets while also supporting farmworkers’ developmental needs. </p>
<p>But what is the reality? </p>
<p>That’s what we set out to establish in a <a href="http://vital.seals.ac.za:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/vital:61086?site_name=GlobalView">doctoral study</a>. What makes this study important is that it focuses on the experiences of farmworkers on commercial wine farms. Most Fairtrade products are produced by small-scale producers who are organised into cooperatives. However, in the case of South African Fairtrade wine, it is mostly commercial farms which have been certified. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Fair-Trade-The-Challenges-of-Transforming-Globalization/Raynolds-Murray-Wilkinson/p/book/9780415772037">other researchers have pointed out</a>, the decision to extend Fairtrade certification to South African commercial wine farmers has been a controversial one. Such farmers, who are mostly wealthy and white, are not the typical producers associated with Fairtrade certification. </p>
<p>Our study can help in reviewing whether the inclusion of such farmers is justified.</p>
<p>As part of the study, interviews were conducted in 2020 with representatives of the <a href="https://saftu.org.za/csaawu/">Commercial, Stevedoring, Agricultural and Allied Workers Union</a>, other key stakeholders in the wine industry, and workers on five Fairtrade farms. </p>
<p>The five farms are all commercial farms and all hold Fairtrade certification. But the experiences of the farmworkers suggest that while the wine bottles leaving the farm might bear the Fairtrade label, the workers on these farms do not feel they are fairly treated. These findings cast doubt on the efficacy and legitimacy of extending Fairtrade certification to South African commercial wine farmers. </p>
<p>Fairtrade’s <a href="https://www.fairtrade.net/about/mission">stated mission</a> is</p>
<blockquote>
<p>is to connect disadvantaged producers and consumers, promote fairer trading conditions and empower producers to combat poverty, strengthen their position and take more control over their lives. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Our study suggests that this mission is not being realised on South African Fairtrade wine farms. Workers on these farms are not being empowered to combat poverty and have more control over their lives. </p>
<h2>What farmworkers said</h2>
<p>Most of the 30 farmworkers interviewed were not even aware that the farm they worked on was Fairtrade certified. Only one had a good understanding of what the Fairtrade certification and audit process entails, but her account suggests that the process did not function as it should: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>{W}hen they do audits, the employer will clean. … {P}eople are forced to clean so that if the auditor comes, they will find everything in good standard. What happens when the auditor comes is that the employer chooses who must talk to the auditor because, for example, me, I will never be called to an auditor because they know that I will tell the honest truth.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Regular audits are meant to be conducted as part of the certification process to ensure that farmworkers on Fairtrade farms are fairly treated and adequately paid.</p>
<p>Farmworkers reported poor and unsafe living and working conditions. One woman complained:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>What happens in the vineyards is that there is no toilet for us as women. We have to relieve ourselves in the vineyards. The toilets you will see when there is an audit.</p>
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<p>Others described inadequate housing:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We were promised that these houses would be temporary. It is cold and when it rains the rain comes in. … We have reported this, and nothing happens. I have to constantly move my bed when it rains because the water comes through. I have been here since 1979. They [farm management] have ignored me. They don’t care.</p>
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<p>Farmworkers also spoke about increased labour casualisation, especially for women. They further reported being intimidated for taking part in trade union activities, or for speaking out about their conditions. It was clear that, contrary to the <a href="https://www.fairtrade.net/about/mission">stated goals of Fairtrade International</a>, farmworkers on these farms did not feel empowered.</p>
<h2>What needs to happen</h2>
<p>Fairtrade certification may be helping farmers gain entry to international markets, but our study suggests it is not bringing the anticipated benefits to farmworkers. </p>
<p>Significant changes to the auditing and certification processes need to be made if the certification is to benefit workers on South African wine farms. More transparent and rigorous auditing needs to occur if certification is to be meaningful.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201680/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joshua Bell received funding from the NRF-DAAD for the purposes of this study. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sally Matthews does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Most farmworkers were not even aware that the farm they worked on was Fairtrade certified.Sally Matthews, Associate Professor of Political and International Studies, Rhodes UniversityJoshua Bell, PhD Candidate in the Department of Political and International Studies, Rhodes University, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2012292023-03-16T18:00:18Z2023-03-16T18:00:18ZDebate: The forward march of labour restarts with historic strikes in France and the UK<p>Wednesday 15 March was a historic day of strikes in both the United Kingdom and France. For France it was the <a href="https://theconversation.com/debate-french-pension-reforms-what-future-do-the-countrys-trade-unions-hold-201713">eighth day of protests</a> against reforms that would raise the retirement age from 62 to 64. Although the movement is losing traction, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/mar/14/france-unions-president-macron-pension-reform">protests are large even by French standards and are the biggest since 1995</a>. And in yet perhaps the most dramatic twist of two months of unrest, on Thursday 16 March, Emmanuel Macron’s government resorted to passing the reform without a vote – a procedure enabled by article 49, paragraph 3 of the French constitution, often referred to as “49.3”. MPs opposed to the move have until Friday afternoon to submit no-confidence votes.</p>
<p>In the UK, a series of ongoing disputes on pay across a number of sectors including local government, education and railways culminated in strikes coordinated to coincide with the spring budget announcement on 15 March. The scale of the industrial action makes the British strikes historic, particularly when taking account of the highly restrictive legal framework.</p>
<p>How do the two countries’ movements measure up against each other? What are the “sticking points” that bring workers out on strike in both countries, and how are their governments reacting?</p>
<h2>How significant are the strikes?</h2>
<p>In both France and the UK, the strikes of 2022-23 are considered historic moments of industrial conflict, with references to record-strike years framing each movement.</p>
<p>In the UK, the <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/f89e0153-5fb9-499f-a7c9-0e0847300a0c">main reference is 2011</a>, which represented the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/nov/30/strikes-public-sector-pensions-impact">“biggest outbreak of industrial unrest in three decades”</a>. At the time, 2 million public-sector workers walked out, and over 60% of schools shut down. As in 2011, the disputes in 2022-23 are mostly over pay, with unions calling for wage rises to keep up with inflation. The action escalated in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/feb/02/uk-strike-days-calendar-public-service-when-planned-february-march">February and March 2023</a> and now includes more than <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64951613">400,000 public sector workers</a>, from sectors spanning education, health care, the civil service and the railway network.</p>
<p>But Wednesday’s spring budget brought a new impetus to the movement. Spanning 154 government departments, the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, which represents civil servants, called for a 10% pay rise, better pensions, job security and no cuts to redundancy terms. Junior doctors also <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/health-64758661">walked out over pay</a>, which the British Medical Association says has shrunk by 26% since 2008 once inflation is taken into account. Meanwhile, teachers striking on 15 and 16 March rejected a government offer of an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/feb/15/further-strike-action-in-england-looks-inevitable-education-union-leaders-say">extra 1.5% pay rise, plus 1.5% as a one-off payment</a>.</p>
<p>In France, comparisons are made between the current strikes and <a href="https://www.lejdd.fr/Politique/retraites-lannee-1995-reste-t-elle-la-reference-des-syndicats-en-matiere-de-greves-et-de-manifestations-4161865">those in 1995</a>, when the country was brought to a standstill with strikes against the so-called Juppé reforms, an austerity package including measures to restrict pensions. At the movement’s peak, more than 2 million people took to the streets and public support was high, forcing the government to withdraw the project. The failure in 1995 meant that subsequent governments viewed pension reforms as being politically risky.</p>
<p>In 2022-23, as in 1995, the change in retirement age is the main grievance. There have been eight days of national strikes and demonstrations so far against the reforms, with calls to <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/article/2023/02/13/french-pension-reform-unions-promise-black-day-on-march-7_6015615_5.html">bring France to a standstill on 7 March</a>, and the eighth strike on 15 March. As in the UK, the French government has used broader economic arguments about public spending to push forward with the reforms, which <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/12/macrons-pension-reforms-pass-french-senate-vote">passed the Senate</a> on 11 March.</p>
<h2>Does the public back the strikes?</h2>
<p>In the UK, public support has been high for the strikes, particularly for workers such as nurses and paramedics. For the <a href="https://theconversation.com/nurses-strike-is-about-more-than-pay-its-about-ensuring-good-care-194937">first time its 106-year history</a>, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), the UK’s largest nursing union, voted to take strike action in 2022. Ambulance drivers and paramedics have also walked out. While pay is a sticking point, the grievances also included issues linked to staffing levels and working conditions.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, there is also sympathy for the strikes in France. <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/article/2023/02/16/new-pensions-strike-in-france-as-mps-battle-over-reform_6016045_5.html">Polling has shown around 70% of the public reject</a> Macron’s pension reform plans and a petition opposing the reforms has gathered over 1 million signatures.</p>
<p>Strike action in the UK is subject to complex <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1992/52/contents">legislation</a>. While there is no legal right to strike, it’s legal if organised by a trade union according to conditions laid out in the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. A union must first be recognised by the workplace it is active in, and have raised a dispute on behalf of its members. It may then ask its members weigh in by post – called a “ballot to strike”.</p>
<p>The 2016 <a href="https://www.ier.org.uk/resources/trade-union-act-2016-what-says-what-it-means/">Trade Union Act</a> introduced new restrictions. As of 2017, industrial ballots must attract a 50% turnout for their results to be considered legally valid. Workers whose role mostly concerns the delivery of “essential” public services (including some workers outsourced to private companies) have to reach a 40% support threshold among all workers eligible to vote, as well as the 50% turnout threshold, in order to take action.</p>
<h2>In France, striking as a civil right</h2>
<p>In contrast, in France, withholding labour is an <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/les-decodeurs/article/2023/02/07/who-can-strike-in-france-and-how_6014737_8.html">individual civil right, whether one is a union member or not</a> – indeed, the right to strike is guaranteed by the Constitution. It is an individual right that is to be exercised collectively. In other words, it is necessary for several employees of a company to decide, together, that they will stop work as a means of furthering work-related demands.</p>
<p>There are certain rules that need to be respected, particularly in the public sector (i.e., giving 48 hours’ notice of intention to strike, minimum service provisions for sectors like transport and health), but there are few restrictions in the private sector.</p>
<p>Even though the strikes have been well supported, the French government is looking set to force through the reforms. Given the legal restrictions on strikes in the UK, the level of participation and attempts at coordinated action across sectors is impressive, and proof of a belief in British society that collective action is a viable solution. And strikes are starting to yield their fruits, as evidenced by the government’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/mar/16/nhs-strikes-steve-barclay-expected-to-announce-formal-pay-offer">recent pay increase offers in the health sector</a>.</p>
<p>Yet, to what extent are governments willing to push toward anti-liberal restrictions to quell strike movements? In France, extending the minimum service legislation, <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/france-interior-minister-gerald-darmanin-force-paris-garbage-collectors-work/">for refuse workers, for example</a>, might lead to tougher conditions for strikers. In the UK, the Conservative government’s proposed legislation to implement minimum service arguably moves the right to strike in the UK <a href="https://academic.oup.com/ilj/article-abstract/45/3/299/1750051?login=false">“beyond neoliberalism” toward a more authoritarian state</a>. The government has justified the implementation of minimum service levels <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/cbill/58-03/0222/ECHRMemoStrikes(MinimumServiceLevels)Bill2023.pdf">using France as an example</a> of where this legislation exists. This comparison does not take into account the very different legislative frameworks on the right to strike.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201229/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Heather Connolly ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>While the scale of the strikes in both countries is historic, a scholar in employer relations notes the legislative conditions framing industrial action in the UK are much more restrictive.Heather Connolly, Associate Professor of Employment Relations, Grenoble École de Management (GEM)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2017132023-03-16T09:27:38Z2023-03-16T09:27:38ZAfter Macron’s move to force through pension reform, all eyes are now on France’s trade unions<p>It was the nuclear option Emmanuel Macron’s government was hoping not to have to resort to. Speaking at the National Assembly over boos and chants of the national anthem, on the afternoon of Thursday 17 March, France’s prime minister, Elisabeth Borne, announced that the government would force through its controversial pension reform plans without a vote, a procedure enabled by <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2022/10/19/france-how-does-article-49-3-allow-a-bill-to-be-passed-without-a-vote_6001019_7.html">article 49, paragraph 3 of the French constitution</a>. </p>
<p>The latest scenes of turmoil follow two months of unrest in response to proposed pension reforms, which would raise the age of retirement from 62 to 64. At the time of writing, oppositions are scrambling to file no-confidence votes, which need to be submitted within 24 hours of article 49.3 having been triggered. Throughout France, tens of thousands poured into the streets on Thursday evening, defying riot police, as protesters took to <a href="https://twitter.com/bernathoustra/status/1636487528470523910">lighting up the garbage</a> that had accumulated over the past weeks as a result of striking refuse collectors. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2023/03/17/reforme-des-retraites-le-49-3-relance-la-mobilisation-et-la-crainte-d-une-explosion-sociale_6165822_823448.html">Speaking on Thursday evening</a>, the heads of the country’s eight main trade unions called on their members to protest over the weekend of 18 and 19 March and for “another big day of strikes and protests” on Thursday 23 March. While moderate unions had vowed to respect the vote at the National Assembly if the bill had passed on Thursday, the government’s move to bypass parliament appears to have galvanised strikers into unity. </p>
<p>As the country braces for no confidence vote and France’s lower chamber is further put to the test, the spotlight is now firmly on trade unions. In fact, many in France had begun to favour them over parliamentary representatives in recent weeks as the debate over pension reform descended into insults and lies. Among the debate’s low points, opposition MPs have called the labour minister, Olivier Dussopt, <a href="https://www.capital.fr/economie-politique/assemblee-nationale-un-depute-lfi-traite-le-ministre-du-travail-dassassin-au-sein-de-lhemicycle-1460126">“assassin”</a> and posted images of themselves <a href="https://www.tf1info.fr/player/3b43bc55-3bdb-41f8-a266-350a00264e5e/">stamping on his photograph</a>, while the government has <a href="https://www.europe1.fr/politique/une-pension-minimale-a-1200-euros-pour-tous-la-promesse-du-gouvernement-est-un-mensonge-selon-jerome-guedj-4170806">inflated</a> the figure of the minimum pension income citizens would receive under the law. </p>
<p>By contrast, French trade unions have proved themselves to be organised and resolute, yet nonviolent. They have also shown unity for the first time since their opposition to proposed pension reforms in 2010. This is a sign of democratic and political vitality, the fragility of which should not be underestimated. However, what will remain of trade union unity once the reform is passed, or on the contrary abandoned? And above all, can trade unions be decisive players in the long term without stronger roots in the places where it represents workers most closely?</p>
<h2>From the street to companies</h2>
<p>Although protests are organised by trade unions, there is no automatic relationship between industrial action on the “street” and that which unfolds in the workplace.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.lesechos.fr/economie-france/social/le-nombre-de-salaries-syndiques-a-nettement-baisse-1903186">rate of union membership in France is low</a>, and in half a century, the presence of unions on the ground has generally <a href="https://ruedeseine.fr/livre/les-syndicats-peuvent-ils-mourir/">declined</a>. While France made unions compulsory within companies of 50 employees or more in 1968, this has failed to translate into stronger organisations in <a href="https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/jorf/id/JORFTEXT000000317291">the workplace</a>.</p>
<p>The most effective strikes are being played out across a few strategic sectors, most notably public transport. Until now, the main site of protest has been the street rather than the workplace. However, the demographic of the protesters is not the same as that of the strikers, or even workers. During the protests, entire families have been seen marching and shop owners often lower metal curtains in solidarity with the protests.</p>
<h2>The return of the “strike by proxy”?</h2>
<p>From November to December 1995, France saw <a href="https://theconversation.com/pension-reform-in-france-macron-and-demonstrators-resume-epic-tussle-begun-over-30-years-ago-198354">massive demonstrations</a> against the Juppé reforms – an austerity package known by the name of the then prime minister, Alain Juppé. During this period, the notion of <a href="https://www.fayard.fr/documents-temoignages/le-grand-refus-9782213596990">“strike by proxy”</a> appeared. Even though the number of strikers wasn’t particularly high, the public felt affinity for those on strike and gave its blessing to action that gridlocked the country’s infrastructure. But times have changed.</p>
<p>Questions of mobility is perceived by some as less important, especially because of telecommuting, while for others it is a vital issue, especially in areas outside of major city centres, when jobs, schools, hospitals, other public services, or even shops require travel by car. Targeting it can alienate those who must travel or aspire to do so, even if it’s only for leisure. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvWYc8r7Nhk">Philippe Martinez</a> has understood this well and accepted the railway unions’ choice to withdraw a strike called in early March when people set off on holiday.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Rubbish piles up in strike-bound Paris (France 24).</span></figcaption>
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<p><a href="https://www.rtl.fr/actu/politique/invite-rtl-reforme-des-retraites-plus-de-7-000-adhesions-a-la-cfdt-depuis-la-semaine-derniere-annonce-berger-7900230967">Laurent Berger</a>, the national secretary of the France’s second largest trade-union, the CFDT, confirmed that opposition to the reform have boosted the organisation’s membership. While this is not negligible, a fundamental problem remains: can trade unionism put itself forward as the main representative of discontent – “the street” – without serving as a conduit for the demands that rise up from the shop floor and in the office, and bringing bargaining power at the local, company, branch, and possibly national and interprofessional level?</p>
<h2>Toward a new trade union spirit in companies?</h2>
<p>There certainly needs to be a new breath of fresh air, like the one provided by the current protests, but visible internally, in companies and administrations or at school. We also need measures that are favourable to it. However, <a href="https://ruedeseine.fr/livre/alors-monsieur-macron-heureux/">President Macron</a> has always shown great reservations, even contempt, toward trade unionism, including reformist ones like the CFDT.</p>
<p>By portraying himself as the heir of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Ren%C3%A9_Guy_le_Chapelier">Isaac René Le Chapelier</a>, a jury of the revolutionary period who prohibited guilds and trade unions in 1791, the president will certainly not help to revitalise trade union action from the bottom up.</p>
<p>Time and again, Macron has <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2023/02/10/face-aux-difficultes-emmanuel-macron-reactive-sa-critique-des-rentes-et-des-corporatismes_6161240_823448.html">referred to “corporatism”</a> - a political ideology whereby professional bodies seek to exclusively defend their interests - as “the French disease, the thing that reappeared the quickest following the 1789 Revolution”. In February, the Labour Minister <a href="https://www.vie-publique.fr/discours/288085-olivier-dussopt-gabriel-attal-06022023-plfrss">Dussopt has employed similar language in the National Assembly</a>:</p>
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<p>“We were elected to rid the French of corporatism, to make society more fluid, to drain the rents […] There is a great deal of conservatism on the part of the social partners”.</p>
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<p>As for the big employers, they have in no way conveyed any openness to compromise during the current conflict. Standing by reforms that do not require any particular effort from them, they have missed their chance to reinvent social dialogue at company level.</p>
<p>The unions can emerge stronger from the January-February 2023 protests. Indeed, trade unionism has once again proved itself as a political force, but beyond the confines of parliament. It is the rediscovered pride of the people of the left, but outside the political parties, and it is not serious to consider transforming <a href="https://rmc.bfmtv.com/actualites/politique/laurent-berger-candidat-a-la-presidentielle-a-gauche-certains-y-croient_AV-202302080335.html">Laurent Berger</a> into a future candidate for the presidency of the Republic.</p>
<p>Whatever the outcome of the current strikes, the next stage is already taking shape: forcing the government to recognise what work represents today, renounce its top-down way of exercising authority, and learn to accept and even encourage the role of trade unions in mediation, be it within companies, public administration, the national education or health sectors.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201713/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michel Wieviorka ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>France’s trade unions have managed to galvanise the largest movement in decades in opposition to pension reform. What will happen to them once the bill has been passed or abandoned?Michel Wieviorka, Sociologue, membre Centre d'analyse et d'intervention sociologiques (CADIS, EHSS-CNRS), Auteurs historiques The Conversation FranceLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1981782023-01-23T17:16:00Z2023-01-23T17:16:00ZHow consecutive Conservative governments destroyed union rights – a timeline of the UK’s anti-strike laws since the 1970s<p>Rishi Sunak’s government is attempting to introduce tough new laws that would further limit the right to take industrial action amid continuing strikes in the UK. </p>
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<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/audio-narrated-99682">here</a>.</em></p>
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<p>This is just the latest in a long line of legislation brought in over the past 50 years that has almost completely eroded such rights. Trade unions were once a major force in British society, but that is no longer the case. Here, a timeline of key events explains how the UK got to where it is today. </p>
<h2>1970s</h2>
<p>In the post-war period, unions were seen as a <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9780429445279/fifth-estate-robert-taylor">vital institution in society</a>, much like the free press. Their power reached its disruptive peak in February 1974, when, during a miners’ strike, Conservative prime minister Edward Heath <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-53673-2_15">called an early election</a> on a platform promising to break the power of unions. The public rejected his offering and he lost. Industrial action had effectively brought down a democratically elected government. </p>
<p>The winter of discontent of 1978-79 ushered in the government of Margaret Thatcher, who vowed to bring trade unions under control. Thatcher believed she had a mandate to end unions’ disruptive influence. Rather than defeat them through direct confrontation as Heath had tried, Thatcher aimed to do it through legislation. </p>
<h2>1980</h2>
<p>The 1980s saw the anti-union legislative drive begin apace. Laws were introduced gradually, with each new act indicative of the growing confidence of governments in their ability to limit union power.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1980/42/enacted">Employment Act 1980</a> was the first of these. It required unions to replace in-person ballots with postal votes. Thatcher believed the change would protect “moderate” trade unionists from being pressured to vote (or vote a certain way) but it also made running a ballot more complicated and expensive. The change doubled as a de facto “cooling off” period on industrial disputes, giving employers time to undermine union action.</p>
<h2>1982</h2>
<p>A second <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1982/46/contents/enacted">Employment Act</a> restricted what counts as a “trade dispute”, effectively outlawing secondary, or “sympathy” strike action. Unions could no longer ballot in support of each other – a key part of their ideals of solidarity and collective pressure. Whereas teachers might once have gone on strike in support of nurses, the 1982 act made this illegal. Instead, a “trade dispute” was narrowly defined as relating to issues such as pay and working conditions only.</p>
<h2>1984</h2>
<p>In 1984, the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1984/49/introduction/enacted">Trade Union Act</a> made secret ballots a legal requirement for any strike to be legal. Fans of the 1984 act note that it returned control of the union to its members, although critics suggested it vilified union leaders, portraying them as “barons” taking advantage of their members.</p>
<p>The Thatcherite position on this was justified when, during the 1984-85 miners’ strike, National Union of Mineworkers leader Arthur Scargill refused to hold a ballot according to the new rules. This triggered a bitter dispute that split his union. With the most powerful trade union now broken, further legislation could be used to ensure the movement’s decline.</p>
<h2>1988</h2>
<p>Retaining the theme of protecting “moderate” trade unionists from “barons”, the Thatcher government introduced the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/19/contents">Employment Act 1988</a>. This protected workers who refused to strike from being punished. This could further be used as propaganda by employers and the government to portray unions as villains, and those trying to go to work as heroes.</p>
<h2>1990</h2>
<p>Changes to the <a href="https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/3-100-5514?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)&firstPage=true">Employment Act</a> in 1990 granted employers the ability to dismiss workers who took part in unofficial strike action. Any subsequent strike action relating to that dismissal would also be unlawful, further entrenching the power of employers over unions.</p>
<h2>1992</h2>
<p>John Major’s government introduced the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1992/52/contents">Trade Unions and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act</a>, which states that a union must be recognised by an employer before legal industrial action can happen. A large group of employees could belong to a union, but if the employer did not recognise it, then no industrial relations could occur.</p>
<h2>1993</h2>
<p>A minimum of seven days’ notice before strike action was required by the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1993/19/contents">1993 Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Act</a>, giving employers time to undermine or otherwise minimise the consequences of strike action. With the disruption caused by strike action reduced, it became harder for unions to make their case heard, reducing the visibility of disputes to the benefit of an employer. </p>
<h2>2016</h2>
<p>New Labour’s 1997 election victory brought hope that trade union influence would be restored. However, this did not occur. Workers were instead supported indirectly through mechanisms such as <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/39/contents">minimum wage</a>, which had a secondary effect of reducing union power, by reducing the need for collective bargaining. The Conservatives returned to power in 2010 but their coalition with the Liberal Democrats meant there was no further reduction in union power.</p>
<p>This changed with the Conservative majority victory in 2015 and the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2016/15/contents/enacted">Trade Union Act 2016</a> – the most restrictive act yet. The notice period for strike action was raised to two weeks and a rule brought in saying 50% of union members had to vote for strike action to be legal. Even then the action would be strictly regulated.</p>
<h2>2022</h2>
<p>In July, the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2003/3319/contents/made">Conduct of Employment Agencies and Employment Business Regulations Act</a> was <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukdsi/2022/9780348236675">repealed</a> to allow employers to hire temporary agency workers to undercut strike action. The maximum penalty a union could face for conducting an unlawful strike was raised to £1 million.</p>
<p>Now, the government is proposing a law that would mean that employers in five key sectors – including the NHS – could name staff who would have to work <a href="https://theconversation.com/rishi-sunaks-new-law-could-force-workers-to-break-strikes-197482">even during strikes</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/rishi-sunaks-new-law-could-force-workers-to-break-strikes-197482">Rishi Sunak's new law could force workers to break strikes</a>
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<h2>Decades of destruction</h2>
<p>As a result of a clear pattern of legislation from Conservative governments over decades, unions find themselves with fewer ways of making employers listen. </p>
<p>Labour has its own difficulties. Leaders since Neil Kinnock in the 1980s have struggled with whether to support unions (and industrial action) or take a more moderate line attractive to middle-class voters. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown chose the latter while Jeremy Corbyn chose the former. His election manifestos promised greater roles for unions in day-to-day governance.</p>
<p>Keir Starmer has so far attempted a middle ground: while promising to repeal Sunak’s proposed new bill, and even the Trade Union Act 2016, he has not been as forthcoming in supporting those taking industrial action. He may soon find he will have to choose a side.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198178/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Daniels is a member of the University and College Union (UCU). </span></em></p>Workers have gradually lost all powers to take industrial action when they feel conditions are unfair.Steven Daniels, Lecturer in Law and Politics, Edge Hill UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1979922023-01-22T19:02:36Z2023-01-22T19:02:36ZIf you haven’t joined a union, it’s time you paid to benefit from union deals<p>A long overdue public debate has started in Australia about “free riding” in industrial relations – when non-union members benefit from collective agreements negotiated by union members without contributing (through membership dues or other payments) to their negotiation and administration.</p>
<p>Several union leaders <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/unions-push-for-a-wage-deal-levy-for-non-members-20230109-p5cbbv.html">want</a> rules to stop free riding. Without this, they argue, union membership will keep falling, imperilling collective bargaining.</p>
<p>The issue has been given impetus by the <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour/earnings-and-working-conditions/trade-union-membership/latest-release">latest data</a> on union membership rates. The proportion of employees belonging to a union is now a record low 12.5%. In the private sector it’s <a href="https://www.afr.com/work-and-careers/workplace/union-membership-in-private-sector-shrinks-to-8-per-cent-20230112-p5cc42">just 8%</a>.</p>
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<p>In the 1980s more than half of the Australian workforce was unionised. Since then Australia has experienced the most dramatic deunionisation of any major industrial country.</p>
<p>That, at least in part, is by design. The Howard government passed laws in the late 1990s and 2000s prohibiting union preferences in hiring, bargaining fees or <a href="https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/billsdgs/AEG86/upload_binary/aeg8610.pdf;fileType=application/pdf#search=%22O%E2%80%99Neill,%20S.%202002.%20Bills%20%20Workplace%20Relations%20Amendment%20(Prohibition%20of%20Compulsory%20Union%20Fees)Bill%202002%22">other structured supports</a> for union membership.</p>
<p>But the idea workers can get something for nothing – enjoying the benefits of collective bargaining, without contributing to its costs – ignores both economic theory and reality.</p>
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<h2>The economics of free riding</h2>
<p>Economists have <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-0-306-47828-4_214">long grappled with</a> the problem of free riders in many areas of economic life. </p>
<p>The textbook case involves “<a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/1925895">public goods</a>” – things to which access cannot be limited to paying customers. Examples are clean air and water, infrastructure, policing and national defence.</p>
<p>With public goods, conventional market mechanisms (based on “rational” individual choice) do not work. If something is “free to all”, there will be some people prepared to voluntarily contribute to its cost, and others that won’t. </p>
<p>To address this market failure, economists endorse policy interventions that deliberately interfere with individual “choice”. For government-provided public goods, this usually relies on compulsory contributions (taxes). </p>
<h2>Why pay when you get it for free?</h2>
<p>Other industries and ventures also encounter free rider problems, and laws have evolved to address them.</p>
<p>For example, unit owners in a residential strata don’t have “free choice” to refuse monthly strata fees. They are required to contribute to the collective costs of running their shared building. The power of the strata to set and collect monthly fees is provided for in Australian law. If strata fees were voluntary, the whole system of strata ownership would collapse.</p>
<p>Nor can individual shareholders in a corporation choose to withhold their share of payments approved by the corporation’s duly elected directors. These provisions are recognised and protected in law. </p>
<p>When it comes to collective bargaining, however, Australian law not only tolerates but effectively encourages free riding. </p>
<p>Under the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2021C00421">Fair Work Act</a>, any benefit or entitlement (from higher wages, to working conditions, to rostering systems) negotiated through enterprise bargaining must be equally available to all workers covered by an agreement. </p>
<p>A narrowly “rational” individual might understandably ask why they should join the union when they can get all the benefits of a union-negotiated contract anyway. </p>
<p>Left to individual “choice” in this context, it’s not surprising union membership has fallen.</p>
<h2>How other nations deal with the problem</h2>
<p>I have catalogued <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10301763.2021.1987052?journalCode=rlab20">six distinct approaches</a> used by other nations to address this market failure and establish a viable foundation for collective bargaining. All are founded on the presumption that collective bargaining is socially beneficial and should be encouraged. </p>
<p>One approach, informed by traditional conceptions of property rights, is to “close off” access to union-negotiated wages and benefits to dues-paying members only. Varieties of this strategy have been tried <a href="https://tcf.org/content/report/members-only-unions-can-they-help-revitalize-workplace-democracy/">in the United States</a> and in New Zealand.</p>
<p>This has generally not worked, however, because employers can still undermine unions by voluntarily offering equal improvements to non-members. It also damages worker solidarity, critical to any collective organisation.</p>
<p>Britain, <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/rand-formula#:%7E:text=The%20Rand%20Formula%20is%20a,those%20workers%20are%20union%20members.">Canada</a>, India and Japan (among others) allow “closed shop” or “agency shop” arrangements. In any workplace that has been unionised (through some kind of majority decision, like a ballot or petition), all covered workers pay dues to reflect the benefits they receive from the collective agreement. In a closed shop they must join the union. In an agency shop they don’t have to join the union but do have to pay the same fees.</p>
<p>The Philippines, South Africa and the US are among those with a modified agency shop system called “bargaining fees”. Everyone covered by an enterprise agreement (which must be ratified by affected workers) contributes something (usually less than full union dues) to the direct costs of negotiating and administering that agreement.</p>
<p>France and Brazil are among several countries that directly support collective negotiations with public subsidies. Like paying taxes for public goods, this approach directly allocates resources to fund a service (collective bargaining) deemed to be essential for a healthy labour market. New Zealand is taking a similar approach with its new <a href="https://www.employment.govt.nz/starting-employment/unions-and-bargaining/fair-pay-agreements/">Fair Pay Agreements</a> (in effect since December 2022).</p>
<p>In Germany, Italy and many other European countries, collective bargaining is mandated by law, with employers above a certain size required to establish a workers council and cover the costs. Workers don’t have to join the union but, with such a well-funded infrastructure, collective bargaining <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10301763.2021.1901333">remains strong</a>.</p>
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<img alt="Workers gather on Place de la Republique, Paris, to demonstrate against proposed pension changes, Thursday, January 19, 2023." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505711/original/file-20230122-22-ir3pzc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">More than 90% of French workers are covered by collective agreements.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lewis Joly/AP</span></span>
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<p>In the Nordic countries and Belgium, extra support for collective bargaining is provided through <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10301763.2021.1953223">union sponsorship</a> of income support and social programs (like unemployment insurance and pensions). Workers are attracted to join their union to get better access to these services. This provides unions with resources and leverage for collective bargaining.</p>
<h2>Developing an Australian-made fix</h2>
<p>So there is a wide choice of specific ways to fix the free rider problem in industrial relations. </p>
<p>In Australia, however, the right to free ride is fully protected, even celebrated. The result (as intended) has been the steady erosion of union membership. Australia is now quickly <a href="https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=TUD">converging with the US</a> as one of the least unionised nations in the <a href="https://www.oecd.org/">OECD</a>. </p>
<p>In December, the Albanese government passed its <a href="https://ministers.dewr.gov.au/anthony-albanese/delivering-secure-jobs-and-better-pay#:%7E:text=The%20Albanese%20Labor%20Government%20has,deal%20and%20a%20better%20future.">Secure Jobs, Better Pay bill</a>, aimed at strengthening collective bargaining. If these reforms succeed in broadening collective bargaining coverage, <a href="https://futurework.org.au/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/11/Collective_Bargaining_and_Wage_Growth_in_Australia_FINAL.pdf">the evidence suggests</a> Australia’s abysmal wage growth will pick up. </p>
<p>That alone should enhance workers’ appreciation of the value of collective action, and indirectly strengthen the incentive for union membership.</p>
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<p>Eventually, however, it will need to be recognised that collective bargaining is not free, and is being undermined by a legal framework that pretends it is.
We need to develop a made-in-Australia solution to fix it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197992/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jim Stanford is a member of the Australian Services Union.</span></em></p>Australia’s protection, even celebration, of ‘free riders’ in industrial relations is driving union membership down to US levels.Jim Stanford, Economist and Director, Centre for Future Work, Australia Institute; Honorary Professor of Political Economy, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1959952023-01-05T13:25:49Z2023-01-05T13:25:49ZWorker strikes and union elections surged in 2022 – could it mark a turning point for organized labor?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502684/original/file-20221227-105766-jpnmtd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=131%2C74%2C5351%2C3581&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Workers such as these Starbucks employees in St. Anthony, Minn., increasingly went on strike in 2022.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/st-anthony-minnesota-starbucks-workers-across-the-country-news-photo/1450371794?phrase=union%20strike">Michael Siluk/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Workers organized and took to the picket line in increased numbers in 2022 to demand better pay and working conditions, leading to <a href="https://www.virginiamercury.com/2022/09/05/america-is-in-the-middle-of-a-labor-mobilization-moment/">optimism</a> among <a href="https://www.afscme.org/blog/cause-for-optimism-on-labor-day">labor leaders</a> and <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-06-30/labor-strikes-in-uk-us-workers-unite-against-inflation-cost-of-living-crisis">advocates</a> that they’re <a href="https://theconversation.com/amazon-starbucks-and-the-sparking-of-a-new-american-union-movement-180293">witnessing a turnaround</a> in labor’s sagging fortunes. </p>
<p><a href="https://gothamist.com/news/new-school-teachers-strike-ends-as-nyc-university-agrees-to-first-pay-raises-in-4-years">Teachers</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/07/business/media/new-york-times-union-walkout.html">journalists</a> and <a href="https://www.arlnow.com/2022/11/17/newly-unionized-starbucks-baristas-are-on-strike-in-courthouse/">baristas</a> were among the tens of thousands of workers who went on strike – and <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/12/01/1140123647/rail-strike-bill-senate">it took an act of Congress</a> to prevent 115,000 railroad employees from walking out as well. In total, <a href="https://www.bls.gov/wsp/publications/monthly-details/XLSX/work-stoppages-2022.xlsx">there have been at least 20 major work stoppages</a> involving at least 1,000 workers each in 2022, <a href="https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2022/16-major-work-stoppages-in-2021.htm">up from 16 in 2021</a>, and <a href="https://striketracker.ilr.cornell.edu/">hundreds more that were smaller</a>.</p>
<p>At the same time, workers at Starbucks, Amazon, Apple and dozens of other companies <a href="https://www.nlrb.gov/reports/nlrb-case-activity-reports/representation-cases/intake/representation-petitions-rc/">filed over 2,000 petitions</a> to form unions during the year – the most since 2015. Workers won 76% of the 1,363 elections that were held.</p>
<p>Historically, however, these figures are pretty tepid. The number of major work stoppages <a href="https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2022/16-major-work-stoppages-in-2021.htm">has been plunging for decades</a>, from nearly 200 as recently as 1980, while union elections typically exceeded 5,000 a year before the 1980s. As of 2021, union membership was at about the lowest level on record, <a href="https://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm">at 10.3%</a>. In the 1950s, over 1 in 3 workers belonged to a union. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://ilitchbusiness.wayne.edu/profile/eb9543">labor scholar</a>, I agree that the evidence shows a surge in union activism. The obvious question is: Do these developments manifest a tipping point? </p>
<h2>Signs of increased union activism</h2>
<p>First, let’s take a closer look at 2022.</p>
<p>The most noteworthy sign of labor’s revival has been the rise in the number of petitions filed with the National Labor Relations Board. In fiscal year 2022, which ended in September, <a href="https://www.nlrb.gov/reports/nlrb-case-activity-reports/representation-cases/intake/representation-petitions-rc">workers filed 2,072 petitions</a>, up 63% from the previous year. Starbucks workers alone <a href="https://www.nlrb.gov/reports/agency-performance-report/election-reports/election-reports-fy-2022">filed 354 of these petitions</a>, winning the vast majority of the elections held. In addition, employees at companies <a href="https://prospect.org/labor/labors-john-l-lewis-moment/https://www.eventbrite.com/e/what-can-labor-do-to-build-on-this-unusually-promising-moment-tickets-380700223617">historically deemed untouchable</a> by unions, including Apple, Microsoft and Wells Fargo, also scored wins.</p>
<p>The increase in strike activity is also important. And while the major strikes that involve 1,000 or more employees and are tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics arouse the greatest attention, they represent only the tip of the iceberg. </p>
<p>The bureau recorded <a href="https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2022/16-major-work-stoppages-in-2021.htm">20 major strikes in 2022</a>, which is about 25% more than the average of 16 a year over the past two decades. Examples of these major strikes include the recent one-day New York Times walkout, two strikes in California involving more than <a href="https://www.dailynews.com/2022/08/19/frontier-communications-workers-strike-over-subcontracting/">3,000 workers at health care company Kaiser Permanente</a>, <a href="https://www.dailynews.com/2022/08/19/frontier-communications-workers-strike-over-subcontracting/">2,100 workers at Frontier Communications</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/dec/27/university-of-california-strike-settlement">48,000 workers at the University of California</a>.</p>
<p><iframe id="RdENa" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/RdENa/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Since 2021, <a href="https://striketracker.ilr.cornell.edu">Cornell University has been keeping track</a> of any labor action, however small, and found that there were a total of 385 strikes in calendar year 2022, up from 270 in the previous year. In total, these reported strikes have occurred in nearly 600 locations in 19 states., signifying the geographic breadth of activism. </p>
<h2>Historical parallels</h2>
<p>Of course, these figures are still quite low by historical standards.</p>
<p>I believe two previous spikes in the early 20th century offer some clues as to whether recent events could lead to sustained gains in union membership. </p>
<p>From 1934 to 1939, <a href="https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/RL32553.pdf">union membership soared</a> from 7.6% to 19.2%. A few years later, from 1941 to 1945, membership climbed from 20% to 27%.</p>
<p>Both spikes occurred during periods of national and global upheaval. The first spike came in the latter half of the Great Depression, when unemployment in the U.S. <a href="https://www.fdrlibrary.org/great-depression-facts">reached as high as a quarter</a> of the workforce. Economic deprivation and a lack of workplace protections led to widespread political and social activism and sweeping efforts to organize workers in response. It also <a href="https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/who-we-are/our-history/1935-passage-of-the-wagner-act">contributed to the enactment</a> of the National Labor Relations Act in 1935, which stimulated organizing in the industrial sector. </p>
<p>The second jump came as the U.S. mobilized the economy to fight a two-front war in Europe and Asia. National economic mobilization to support the war led to growth in manufacturing employment, where unions had been making substantial gains. Government wartime policy encouraged unionization as part of a bargain for industrial peace during the war. </p>
<h2>Inequality and pandemic heroes</h2>
<p>Today’s situation is a far cry from the economic misery of the Great Depression or the social upheaval of a global war, but there are some parallels worth exploring. </p>
<p>Overall unemployment may be near record lows, but economic inequality is higher than it was during the Depression. The <a href="https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/dataviz/dfa/distribute/table/#quarter:129;series:Net%20worth;demographic:networth;population:all;units:shares;">top 10% of households hold over 68%</a> of the wealth in the U.S. In 1936, <a href="https://eml.berkeley.edu/%7Esaez/saez-UStopincomes-2012.pdf">this was about 47%</a>.</p>
<p>In addition, the top 0.1% of wage earners <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation">experienced a nearly 390% increase</a> in real wages from 1979 to 2020, versus a meager 28.2% pay hike for the bottom 90%. And employment in manufacturing, where unions had gained a stronghold in the 1940s and 1950s, slipped over 33% from 1979 to 2022.</p>
<p>Another parallel to the two historical precedents concerns national mobilization. The pandemic required a massive response in early 2020, as workers in industries deemed essential, such as health care, public safety and food and agriculture, <a href="https://www.wral.com/coronavirus/essential-workers-are-bearing-the-brunt-of-covid-19/19731074/">bore the brunt of its impact</a>, <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/interactives/meet-the-covid-19-frontline-heroes/">earning them the label “heroes”</a> for their efforts. In such an environment, workers began to appreciate more the <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/why-unions-are-good-for-workers-especially-in-a-crisis-like-covid-19-12-policies-that-would-boost-worker-rights-safety-and-wages/">protections they derived from unions</a> for occupational safety and health, eventually helping birth much-hyped recent labor trends like the “great resignation” and “quiet quitting.” </p>
<h2>A stacked deck</h2>
<p>Ultimately, however, the deck is still heavily stacked against unions, with <a href="https://prospect.org/labor/labors-john-l-lewis-moment">unsupportive labor laws</a> and <a href="https://www.eventbrite.com/e/what-can-labor-do-to-build-on-this-unusually-promising-moment-tickets-380700223617">very few employers showing</a> real receptivity to having a unionized workforce. </p>
<p>And <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674725119">unions are limited</a> in how much they can change public policy or the structure of the U.S. economy that makes unionization difficult. Reforming labor law through legislation has remained elusive, and the results of the 2022 midterms are not likely to make it any easier. </p>
<p>This makes me unconvinced that recent signs of progress represent a turning point. </p>
<p>An ace up labor’s sleeve may be public sentiment. Support for labor <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/354455/approval-labor-unions-highest-point-1965.aspx">is at its highest since 1965</a>, with 71% saying they approve of unions, according to a Gallup poll in August. And workers themselves are increasingly showing an interest in joining them. In 2017, <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/working-people-want-a-voice/">48% of workers polled</a> said they would vote for union representation, up from 32% in 1995, the last time this question was asked. </p>
<p>Future success may depend on unions’ ability to tap into their growing popularity and emulate the recent wins at Starbucks and Amazon, as well as the successful “Fight for $15” campaign, which since 2012 <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/nov/23/fight-for-15-movement-10-years-old">has helped pass $15 minimum wage laws</a> in a dozen states and Washington, D.C. </p>
<p>The odds may be steep, but the seeds of opportunity are there if labor is able to exploit them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/195995/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marick Masters does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Workers have filed the most union petitions since 2015 and the number of strikes have surged, but whether this turns into a sustained increase in membership rates is still unclear.Marick Masters, Professor of Business and Adjunct Professor of Political Science, Wayne State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1958382022-12-02T14:51:40Z2022-12-02T14:51:40ZWinter of discontent: how similar is today’s situation?<p>The UK government is battening down the hatches for a wave of strikes in December and January. <a href="https://inews.co.uk/news/when-train-strikes-december-date-2022-rail-action-lines-affected-1997749">Railway workers</a>, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/british-nurses-stage-first-strikes-dec-15-20-2022-11-25/">nurses</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/nov/30/ambulance-workers-vote-strike-england-wales">ambulance workers</a>, <a href="https://www.theweek.co.uk/business/economy/958523/which-winter-strikes-are-taking-place-and-when-they-are-happening">civil servants</a> and <a href="https://www.cwu.org/rmgstrikeinfo">postal staff</a> are all set to take industrial action in the coming weeks in protest at wages not keeping up with inflation, with <a href="https://www.theweek.co.uk/business/economy/958523/which-winter-strikes-are-taking-place-and-when-they-are-happening">teachers’</a> and <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11489695/Rishi-Sunak-creates-Winter-Discontent-unit-tackle-strikes.html">firefighters’ unions</a> also balloting their members. </p>
<p>Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has put close ally Oliver Dowden in charge of a <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11489695/Rishi-Sunak-creates-Winter-Discontent-unit-tackle-strikes.html">new task force</a> to coordinate the government’s response to so many groups of workers. With <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jul/14/train-drivers-at-eight-uk-operators-to-strike-on-30-july-aslef">rail staff</a>, university lecturers, <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/biggest-strike-of-the-summer-more-than-100-000-postal-workers-walk-off-the-job-12681413">postal workers</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/criminal-barrister-strike-is-no-surprise-their-pay-can-start-at-less-than-minimum-wage-189193">criminal barristers</a> having already taken to the picket lines, the government is trying to avoid another winter of discontent.</p>
<p>Jim Callaghan’s Labour administration never recovered from the crisis of winter 1978-79. He lost the general election a few months later and his party spent 18 years in opposition. </p>
<p>So how similar is the current situation to that debacle, and what are the government’s chances of preventing history repeating itself?</p>
<h2>The social contract</h2>
<p>Like today, the UK was facing an energy supply crisis and high inflation when Labour came to power in the mid-1970s. It responded with an IMF loan, public spending cuts and a “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Contract_(Britain)#:%7E:text=The%20Social%20Contract%20was%20a,programme%20of%20voluntary%20wage%20restraint.">social contract</a>”, where the trade unions restrained wage demands in return for policies like rent freezes and food subsidies. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Jim Callaghan looking awkward" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=595&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=595&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=595&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498708/original/file-20221202-20-prg2gh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jim Callaghan, prime minister 1976-79.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Callaghan#/media/File:President_Jimmy_Carter_and_Prime_Minister_James_Callaghan.jpg">Wikimedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This kept pay rises minimal until 1978, helping to <a href="https://theconversation.com/liz-truss-this-is-what-happens-when-governments-pursue-growth-at-all-costs-191716">reduce inflation</a> from over 20% to around 8%-10% by the time Labour left office. However, workers got poorer as a result: <a href="https://tidesofhistory.com/2021/02/16/back-to-the-future-a-defence-of-the-social-contract/">wages fell 13%</a> in real terms (meaning relative to prices) between 1975 and 1980. </p>
<p>Likewise in recent months, <a href="https://www.ucea.ac.uk/our-work/collective-pay-negotiations-landing/2022-23-new-jnches-pay-round/">many workers</a> have been <a href="https://www.nurses.co.uk/blog/nhs-nurses-1400-pay-rise-2022/">offered deals</a> in <a href="https://www.tssa.org.uk/find-your-company/network-rail/news/network-rail-general-grades-pay-offer-2022">the region</a> of <a href="https://www.cwu.org/news/pol-raise-pay-offer-to-5-better-but-not-enough-says-cwu/">3% to 5%</a> – far short of today’s <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/consumerpriceinflation/october2022">11% annual inflation</a>. Workers in sectors taking industrial action have seen real wages <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/averageweeklyearningsingreatbritain/november2022">reduced by 3%</a> in both the second and third quarters.</p>
<p>In 1978, when Callaghan tried to cap wage increases at 5% for the year ahead, the trade unions had had enough. The Trades Union Congress (TUC) publicly opposed the cap that July. </p>
<p>The cap was then tested by Ford workers at the Halewood plant near Liverpool <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/winter-of-discontent/floodgates-open-the-strike-at-ford/3E6B7CBBC32E4480D3E10A14B92E5023">in the September</a>. Backed by the Transport and General Workers Union, they took part in eight weeks of industrial action to force a better deal. The car manufacturer eventually gave them 17%. </p>
<p>The government tried to sanction Ford, but in December the Conservatives successfully <a href="https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1978-12-13/debates/8245b10c-ffa9-4856-aeb1-cbaed91a3d5d/Counter-InflationPolicy">passed a parliamentary motion</a> revoking the move. Though the government narrowly survived a vote of no confidence, it abandoned the cap. </p>
<p>This was the moment the flood gates opened. Between November 1978 and February 1979, during a freezing cold winter, <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-do-strikes-work-history-shows-the-conditions-need-to-be-right-187890">4.6 million workers</a> went on strike including in rail, water, bakeries, haulage, nursing, ambulances, grave digging and refuse collection. </p>
<h2>Labour wasn’t working</h2>
<p>The government endured humiliation after humiliation. In response to industrial action by oil tanker drivers, it threatened to mobilise the army to keep tankers moving. Yet drivers still eventually got a 15% pay rise. </p>
<p>Road haulage workers went one better, declining a 15% pay increase to secure 20% after a protracted strike. On seeing these private sector successes, public sector workers upped the ante. On January 22, a national “day of action” saw 1.5 million of them walk out.</p>
<p>Throughout this period, Margaret Thatcher’s Conservatives <a href="https://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/103926">criticised the strikes</a> while also refusing to support the government’s pay cap. In March, Thatcher managed to persuade a majority of MPs to vote <a href="https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1979/mar/28/her-majestys-government-opposition-motion">no confidence</a> in Callaghan’s government. After winning power, she later <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk-strikes-how-margaret-thatcher-and-other-leaders-cut-trade-union-powers-over-centuries-186270">limited trade union activities</a>, taking advantage of the fact that <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/307570360_Institutional_Adaption_The_Trades_Union_Congress">84% of people</a> thought they had grown too powerful. </p>
<h2>The present day</h2>
<p>The 2022 Conservatives face the same mix of widespread strikes, high inflation and falling popularity that Labour faced in 1978. They also have the additional difficulty of <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/grossdomesticproductgdp/bulletins/gdpmonthlyestimateuk/september2022">a recession</a>, making it even harder to resolve wage disputes. </p>
<p>Labour also faces an additional complication in its historic links with the trade unions. To reassure the public that he is not in their pockets, party leader Keir Starmer <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/28/why-has-keir-starmer-picked-battle-over-shadow-ministers-on-picket-lines">banned his shadow cabinet</a> from visiting picket lines in the summer, <a href="https://keirstarmer.com/plans/10-pledges/">despite pledging</a> to work “shoulder to shoulder with trade unions” during his 2020 leadership campaign. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/27/sam-tarry-sacked-labour-frontbench-rail-strike-picket-line-keir-starmer">He then sacked</a> a junior minister, Sam Tarry, in July for disobeying the rules. Yet <a href="https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/20668541.anas-sarwar-urges-labour-msps-join-picket-lines/">senior party figures</a> have since challenged the policy and got away with it. Starmer clearly has to tread an awkward line between appealing to his rank and file and appealing to the country. </p>
<p>Over the winter, Starmer’s approach is likely to be informed by public opinion. One critical feature of the winter of discontent was the trade unions overplaying their hand and ultimately losing the support of the public. </p>
<p>So far in 2022, the public have been torn. A <a href="https://docs.cdn.yougov.com/vpycppmapj/YouGov%20Results%20-%20Support%20for%20Various%20Strikes.pdf">YouGov poll</a> in June suggested they supported doctors, nurses, firefighters and teachers potentially taking action, but opposed strikes by bus drivers, university staff, civil servants and barristers. </p>
<p>More recently the public have sympathised with public-sector workers receiving below-inflation pay offers, <a href="https://www.unitetheunion.org/campaigns/unite-for-a-workers-economy-campaign/latest-campaign-news/seven-out-of-10-people-support-cost-of-living-pay-increase-for-nhs-workers/">particularly</a> within <a href="https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/3-in-5-support-planned-nurses-strikes-almost-half-say-pay-rise-they-are-asking-too-high">the NHS</a>. <a href="https://www.survation.com/majority-of-public-believe-postal-workers-strike-is-justified/">Postal workers</a> have also recently enjoyed strong support, though <a href="https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2022/11/29/britons-tend-oppose-planned-rmt-rail-strikes-winte">rail workers</a> have not. </p>
<p>In an echo of Ford’s 17% settlement in 1978, the unions will be looking at recent wage agreements for <a href="https://www.lawsociety.org.uk/topics/legal-aid/bar-strike-what-you-need-to-know">criminal barristers (15%)</a> and BT (<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63785421">up to 16%</a>) as potential benchmarks. Public sector workers – having largely staffed Britain’s pandemic response - look unlikely to settle for sub-inflation wage increases given their overwhelming support for action in recent strike ballots. Equally, however, I question whether the government will be able to offer such deals given the state of the country’s finances.</p>
<p>It’s therefore difficult to see this resolving easily. The government’s new task force looks unlikely to solve the problem: it’s only trying to mitigate the impact of industrial action, rather than negotiating better deals.</p>
<p>Faced with <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/world/uk-news/2022/11/27/tory-mps-head-for-exit-as-sunak-struggles-in-polls/">dismal polling ratings</a>, Rishi Sunak is facing a crisis with numerous parallels to the winter of discontent. As the next wave of strikes gets underway, it seems a near insurmountable task to avoid a repeat of the 1978/79 unrest. To say the least, the government is in a very difficult position.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/195838/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Massey is a Labour Party Councillor for Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council.</span></em></p>With everyone from rail workers to civil servants going on strike over the winter, it’s hard to see this ending well.Christopher Massey, Principal Lecturer (Programmes) - Humanities and Social Sciences, Teesside UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1949372022-11-30T14:54:59Z2022-11-30T14:54:59ZNurses’ strike is about more than pay – it’s about ensuring good care<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497616/original/file-20221128-26-hqyika.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C26%2C6000%2C3961&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-29th-july-2020-nhs-workers-1786152290">BradleyStearn/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>For the first time its 106-year history, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), the UK’s largest nursing union, has voted to take strike action. Nurses in the UK have been on strike before and achieved change, but the scale of this strike is extraordinary.</p>
<p>This dispute, like many forms of industrial action, centres on pay. The salaries of registered nurses and nursing support workers have fallen in real terms <a href="https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/resource/chart-of-the-week-what-has-happened-to-nhs-staff-pay-since-2010">by almost 20% in the past ten years</a>. But this dispute is about more than just pay.</p>
<p>The nursing workforce in the UK is under extreme pressure. Over the past few years, the UK has seen a loss of experienced nurses and a population with an increased need for nursing. People are living longer with more multiple conditions and frailty. This has meant workloads have increased and have now become unsustainable. Nurses are compromising on patient care and patient safety, and they find that intolerable.</p>
<p>Nurses are <a href="https://www.nmc.org.uk/news/news-and-updates/increasing-number-nurses-midwives-leaving-profession-major-challenges/">leaving the nursing register</a> at a faster rate than ever before and the English health service has over 40,000 vacancies unfilled. To add more workers to the nursing workforce, employers and policymakers have chosen to take on more and more people without registered nurse qualifications to make up the numbers for the least amount of money. This group has many different job titles but is mainly a support workforce.</p>
<p>Although the support workforce is a valuable addition, it has become clear that in recent years this workforce is being used to substitute for registered nurses. This is not only exploitative, but it also means registered nurses are put under more pressure to supervise their work. Although the support workers deliver care, the registered nurse is still responsible. The evidence shows that it is registered nurses that make a difference to patient outcomes, such as survival – <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30039531/">adding more support workers</a> does not have the same effect.</p>
<p>Unlike many other industrial disputes, the media and government ministers are employing moral arguments around the nurses’ strike. These arguments range from questioning the morals of nurses who strike to asking if nurses are deserving of a pay rise. Moral arguments are irrelevant but probably based on the fact that nursing is a majority female profession that has relied on describing its worth in <a href="https://qni.org.uk/voice-and-value/from-silence-to-voice-presentation/">terms of its virtue rather than its expertise</a>. Striking does not fit in with the image of women who serve the needs of others.</p>
<p>Nursing is a competitive labour market, its workers are highly skilled and in short supply globally. This means nurses can choose alternative employment both in the UK (in the private sector) and abroad. </p>
<p>As a workforce and patient safety researcher, I have seen only too clearly how the <a href="https://evidence.nihr.ac.uk/themedreview/staffing-on-wards-making-decisions-about-healthcare-staffing/">evidence for safe levels of staffing</a> has not been recognised by governments and policymakers. In Scotland and Wales, there is now “safe staffing” legislation, but this applies only to hospitals in those countries. The evidence for safe staffing and contemporary workforce planning remains robustly ignored.</p>
<h2>More expensive in the long run</h2>
<p>Poor staffing means poor care – and poor care costs taxpayers more. There has been an increase in the cost of medical negligence in England which <a href="https://www.nationalworld.com/health/nhs-in-england-faces-record-medical-negligence-bill-hospitals-with-most-claims-3921007">reached record levels in 2022</a> and outstrips the cost of any pay award. Add to this the cost of temporary workers <a href="https://workforcealliance.nhs.uk/supporting-the-nhs-off-framework/">of around £6 billion</a> and <a href="https://londoneconomics.co.uk/blog/publication/the-net-exchequer-impact-of-increasing-pay-for-agenda-for-change-staff/">the return of investment back into the UK economy</a> (nurses are also taxpayers and consumers) increasing nursing pay doesn’t seem like a bad option.</p>
<p>I support the nurses’ strike if it means their work becomes more valued and hospitals and community services retain experienced nurses. As a taxpayer, a carer and potentially a patient, I can’t afford not to.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194937/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alison Leary is a Fellow and member of the RCN </span></em></p>Poor staffing means poor care, and poor care costs taxpayers more.Alison Leary, Professor of Healthcare Modelling, London South Bank UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1945982022-11-22T11:46:18Z2022-11-22T11:46:18ZStrikes: how do they work?<p>The UK has seen an autumn of strikes. Workers on the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jul/27/uk-railways-disrupted-again-as-workers-strike-over-pay-and-conditions">railways</a>, at <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/nov/09/london-underground-strike-will-halt-nearly-all-tube-services-on-thursday">London Underground</a> and at <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63055394">Royal Mail</a> have been among those taking action. This looks set to continue through the winter, with <a href="https://www.bma.org.uk/bma-media-centre/junior-doctors-to-ballot-in-early-january-for-industrial-action">doctors</a>, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-63561317">nurses</a>, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-63254720">teachers</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/education/2022/nov/08/university-staff-to-strike-across-uk-in-pay-and-conditions-dispute">university staff</a> planning strike action. </p>
<p>Workers who opt into a strike collectively decide to refuse to do their jobs in an attempt to gain concessions from their employer. Industrial action can also include action short of a strike, such as refusing to <a href="https://www.scotsman.com/health/overtime-ban-and-work-to-rule-as-scottish-ambulance-staff-reveal-industrial-action-3915863">work overtime</a>.</p>
<p>Strikes are typically conducted by workers organised into a trade union – voluntary, democratic, membership-based organisations that can negotiate with employers on their members’ behalf to defend or improve terms and conditions and enforce or enhance workplace rights. </p>
<p>Unions are a way for workers to address the <a href="https://www.hrmagazine.co.uk/content/news/nowak-power-imbalances-the-root-cause-of-workplace-conflict">power imbalance</a> between employers and workers, and they believe that doing this collectively is more effective than on an individual basis. But strikes can happen among non-unionised workers, such as the recent action by Amazon <a href="https://www.wired.co.uk/article/amazon-uk-pay-protests">warehouse workers</a>.</p>
<h2>Why do people go on strike?</h2>
<p>Most disputes are resolved without strike action, but sometimes negotiations between the union and the employer break down. This is why strikes are often referred to as a
“<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-63026682">last resort</a>”.</p>
<p>Common reasons for disputes between employers and workers include <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/oct/23/liverpool-dock-workers-to-begin-two-week-strike-after-talks-end-in-chaos">pay</a>, <a href="https://www.unitetheunion.org/news-events/news/2022/june/royal-mail-depending-on-1-800-unpaid-jobs-as-unite-prepares-to-strike-to-save-542-posts/">job losses</a> and <a href="https://uk.fashionnetwork.com/news/Asos-workers-walk-out-over-lack-of-covid-19-protection-firm-denies-it-s-unsafe,1202851.html">health and safety</a> issues. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/nov/01/on-your-way-pinochet-factory-workers-fought-fascism-from-glasgow-chile-coup-nae-pasaran">Political strikes</a>, when workers might protest a government policy or action unrelated to their workplace, and <a href="https://my.ucu.org.uk/app/answers/detail/a_id/51/%7E/what-is-secondary-%28or-sympathy%29-industrial-action-and-is-it-unlawful%3F">sympathy</a> strikes, where workers take strike action in support of another group of workers at a different employer, are now both unlawful in the UK due to <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk-strikes-how-margaret-thatcher-and-other-leaders-cut-trade-union-powers-over-centuries-186270">legislation</a> imposed and maintained by successive governments.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1591813956997451782"}"></div></p>
<p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/oct/09/royal-society-of-arts-staff-union-hypocrisy-iwgb">Some employers</a> refuse to recognise unions, but others negotiate with them in a process known as “<a href="https://www.tuc.org.uk/workplace-guidance/organising-and-bargaining/collective-bargaining">collective bargaining</a>”. During strike talks, HR departments or senior managers of an employer may be present, as well as representatives of the union from the workplace or union officers. </p>
<p>Sometimes an independent dispute resolution service such as the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (<a href="https://www.acas.org.uk/dispute-resolution">ACAS</a>) may be used. Unions have various committees who discuss and vote on the dispute process. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/why-workers-go-on-strike-93815">Trade-offs</a> may take place, such as an employer granting a pay rise in exchange for employees working more flexible hours. Unions may put a final offer to a vote of members. If workers are still unsatisfied further strikes may be called or if they vote to accept the terms an agreement will be made and striking will cease.</p>
<h2>How is a strike called?</h2>
<p>Union members will be sent a confidential ballot paper through the post and vote on whether they are willing to strike. The votes are counted by an independent scrutineer. </p>
<p>Strike action in the UK is subject to complex <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1992/52/contents">legislation</a>, and for a strike to be considered lawful at least half of the balloted workers must have voted and the majority must vote yes. Unions have to provide notice to the employer of when strike action will take place.</p>
<p>As strikes consist of people not going into work, this can result in workplaces being closed or services not running. Trains may not run during a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jul/29/rail-strike-to-cause-severe-disruption-great-britain-saturday">rail strike</a>, or there may be a build up of refuse when <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-58953236">bin collectors strike</a>. </p>
<p>People may also see workers holding picket lines or <a href="https://kingston.web.ucu.org.uk/ucu-strike-2021/what-is-a-teach-out/">other events</a> outside their place of work.</p>
<h2>What is a picket line?</h2>
<p>A picket line is when workers congregate outside their workplace to demonstrate that they are not working and raise awareness of their dispute. People <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/28/labour-mps-may-join-pickets-starmer-faces-test-party-unity">may visit</a> who wish to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/23/climate-justice-groups-join-british-rail-strike-picket-lines">show support</a> to striking workers. Pickets may try to discourage non-striking employees from going into work as they believe they are undermining the dispute and making the strike less effective by weakening the group’s collective power. </p>
<p>Strike-breaking – going into the workplace when a strike is taking place – is <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0730888413481481">socially taboo</a> to union members who have voted to strike and can still cause <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-47401859">social divisions</a> long after the strike has taken place. </p>
<p>Employers do not have to pay workers who are on strike. Some unions operate what is called a hardship or strike fund, which will issue strikers a small amount of money taken from membership subscriptions to help with their loss of earnings. Additionally, strikers may hold collections on picket lines, and supporters hold <a href="https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/people/edinburgh-bin-strike-fringe-stars-stage-gala-fundraiser-to-support-workers-strike-fund-3813831">fundraising events</a> to help strikers. Most unions also now accept donations through their websites.</p>
<h2>Can workers get sacked for going on strike?</h2>
<p>While there is <a href="https://ukandeu.ac.uk/the-facts/is-there-a-right-to-strike-in-the-uk/">no legal “right”</a> to strike in the UK, workers who engage in strike action organised by a trade union through the legal balloting procedure have <a href="https://www.thompsonstradeunion.law/media/1175/unfair-dismissal-a-summary-of-the-law-thompsons-solicitors.pdf">statutory protection</a> from dismissal.</p>
<p>Recent <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/287278/uk-trade-union-wage-premium/#:%7E:text=In%202021%20members%20of%20trade,more%20than%20the%20average%20worker.">figures</a> show that UK union members earn 4.8% more than the average worker, and high levels of trade union membership <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/chart-of-the-day/2022/06/countries-high-trade-union-membership-more-equal">are linked</a> with lower income inequality. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/10/increase-benefits-and-wages-line-inflation-or-lives-will-be-lost-un-poverty">Poverty experts</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-wages-should-keep-up-with-inflation-the-economic-case-for-getting-a-pay-rise-186851">economists</a> have called for wages to rise in line with inflation to help with the increasing cost of living, and throughout 2022 trade unions have achieved a <a href="https://leftfootforward.org/2022/06/10-massive-pay-rises-unite-has-won-for-workers-in-the-last-month/">raft</a> of substantial pay deals for their members.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194598/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Holly Smith is a member of The University and College Union (UCU) and currently works on an ESRC-funded research project. </span></em></p>From unions and ballots to picket-lines and sympathy strikes.Holly Smith, Research Associate at the Work and Equalities Institute, University of ManchesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1948182022-11-22T02:47:51Z2022-11-22T02:47:51ZChristmas may be safe, but three-year port dispute shows the IR system is full of holes<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/496042/original/file-20221118-25-iapl0i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3834%2C1942&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Australia’s industrial relations umpire has delayed industrial action that would have crippled Australia’s ports in the lead-up to Christmas. </p>
<p>But the dispute in which it has intervened – one that has dragged on since 2019 – shows the need for reform of Australia’s collective bargaining system. </p>
<p>The Fair Work Commission last week intervened in the protracted dispute between tugboat operator Svitzer Australia and three maritime unions after the company declared its intention to “lock out” staff in a bid to force a resolution – either by the unions caving or by the commission using its powers to arbitrate outstanding matters.</p>
<p>Svitzer, a subsidiary of Danish shipping giant Maersk, <a href="https://www.afr.com/work-and-careers/workplace/svitzer-lockout-threatens-port-supply-chain-shutdown-20221114-p5by0t">employs about 600 staff</a> at 17 Australian ports. Its tugboats guide the arrival and departure of container ships <a href="https://www.marineinsight.com/shipping-news/unions-urge-maersks-return-to-negotiating-table-as-australian-court-blocks-controversial-svitzer-tug-lockout/">carrying about 75%</a> of Australia’s trade. The lockout would have prevented ships entering or leaving port.</p>
<p>Last Friday the full bench of the Fair Work Commission <a href="https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/sites/svitzer-industrial-action/b2022-1726-decision-2022-fwcfb-209-2022-11-18.pdf">ordered a six-month suspension</a> on any industrial action by Svitzer or the three unions – the Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union (CFMMEU), the Australian Maritime Officers Union (AMOU), and the Australian Institute of Marine and Power Engineers (AIMPE).</p>
<p>It did so using its powers to stop industrial action that threatens to cause significant damage to the economy or part of it.</p>
<p>However, the commission refused Svitzer’s application to terminate the notified lockout, an outcome that could have led to the commission arbitrating the outstanding matters in dispute. Arbitration appeared to be <a href="https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/sites/svitzer-industrial-action/b2022-1726-submissions-svitzer-2022-11-17.pdf">Svitzer’s aim</a> but was opposed <a href="https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/sites/svitzer-industrial-action/b2022-1726-outline-of-submissions-mua-2022-11-17.pdf">by the unions</a>.</p>
<h2>Background to the dispute</h2>
<p>Svitzer and the unions began negotiating a new enterprise agreement in late 2019. The company wanted changes to the agreement made in 2016 to give it greater flexibility in hiring staff. The unions opposed these changes on the basis they would lead to greater casualisation. </p>
<p>The process laid down by the Fair Work Act is to negotiate, with “protected industrial action” available to the parties to support their claims. </p>
<p>But the Act’s provisions make it particularly hard for port workers to take impactful industrial action, given the commission can suspend or terminate any action threatening to cause significant economic damage.</p>
<p>In February, the commission <a href="https://www.fwc.gov.au/document-search/view/aHR0cHM6Ly9zYXNyY2RhdGFwcmRhdWVhYS5ibG9iLmNvcmUud2luZG93cy5uZXQvZGVjaXNpb25zLzIwMjIvMDMvUFI3MzkwNTIyMDgwOTg3MWU5NTU4OTQ1LTc2N2ItNGZkNi1iNTAzLTBkMmViOGJmMWVkYjIwYzBlOTE5LWUwZDgtNDU1ZC05ZDk5LTAxOTIzZjJhYzg5MS5wZGY1/1/141fd88f-c80f-472f-b0ca-6280b2c4fd1a/Svitzer">blocked 48-hour strikes</a> slated for ten ports in Western Australia, Queensland and New South Wales.</p>
<p>As a result, the unions have taken more low-level industrial action, such as work bans and limited stoppages, which are unlikely to attract the attention of the commission. </p>
<p>Svitzer’s decision to lock out workers recalls that of Qantas’s strategy in 2011, when the airline shut down its fleet to push the commission to arbitrate its dispute with unions over a new enterprise agreement. Qantas was widely considered the winner in the subsequent arbitration.</p>
<p>Svitzer’s motivation is to get rid of the 2016 enterprise agreement. Indeed in January it applied to have the commission terminate <a href="https://www.fwc.gov.au/document-search/view/aHR0cHM6Ly9zYXNyY2RhdGFwcmRhdWVhYS5ibG9iLmNvcmUud2luZG93cy5uZXQvZGVjaXNpb25zLzIwMjIvMDYvUFI3NDI0MjEyMzU3NzU4MjhkMDRhOTMyLTFkYTktNDE3YS04Yzc1LTlkZTQ2ZjMyOTY3ZWVmMGI2NmI2LWI5YWItNGRlMy04OGQ2LWZjNTJiNGRlNGZjNS5wZGY1/1/5ca199c2-eff1-4671-8600-d80788e49e52/2022%24%24FWC%24%241438">the agreement</a>, which remains in force until replaced. </p>
<p>Termination would mean Svitzer’s employees would be covered only by award provisions and individual contracts – an effective win for the company. (This application remains before the commission.)</p>
<h2>Will the government’s IR reforms help?</h2>
<p>With a settlement not really any closer, the Svitzer dispute demonstrates the failure of the Fair Work Act to provide a safety valve to resolve intractable disputes. </p>
<p>Employment and workplace relations minister Tony Burke has argued the Albanese government’s industrial relations reforms – yet to pass the Senate – will assist in a dispute like Svitzer. </p>
<p>They will help, but on their own will not be enough.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/employers-say-labors-new-industrial-relations-bill-threatens-the-economy-denmark-tells-a-different-story-193311">Employers say Labor's new industrial relations bill threatens the economy. Denmark tells a different story</a>
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<p>The amendments will remove the ability to seek termination of an existing agreement while bargaining for a new agreement. This provision was not intended to be used as leverage during a dispute, as Svitzer has done. </p>
<p>The amendments also propose a new “intractable dispute mechanism”. This is different from current provisions because it does not require anyone to threaten or take potentially damaging industrial action before a party can seek arbitration by the commission.</p>
<h2>More fixes needed</h2>
<p>However, the bill does nothing to improve the Fair Work Act’s weak requirements for parties to bargain in “good faith”. This will continue to enable surface bargaining, leading to protracted disputes. </p>
<p>The provisions policing industrial action will still be among the most complex and costly in the developed world.</p>
<p>To ensure the Fair Work Commission is seen a fair and reasonable arbitrator, its members (appointed by the federal government) must also better reflect society, to restore faith in the institution for all parties concerned. Otherwise, unions may continue to resist arbitration, fearing the outcome will favour employers.</p>
<p>Moreover, despite the proposed expansion of multi-employer bargaining, the Albanese government has committed to maintaining the primacy of enterprise-level bargaining. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-mandate-for-multi-employer-bargaining-without-it-wages-for-the-low-paid-wont-rise-193829">A mandate for multi-employer bargaining? Without it, wages for the low paid won't rise</a>
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<p>So suppressing workers’ pay and conditions will continue to be strategy to obtain a competitive advantage over other businesses. (Svitzer has argued its 2016 agreement means it cannot compete for port contracts.) </p>
<p>While the focus of our system remains the single enterprise, and workers’ pay and conditions can be used to undercut competitors, disputes like the one at Svitzer will continue to feature in the industrial landscape.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194818/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shae McCrystal receives funding from the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p>The Albanese government’s industrial relations reforms will help avoid protracted industrial conflict, but more is needed.Shae McCrystal, Professor of Labour Law, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1916052022-11-01T16:22:21Z2022-11-01T16:22:21ZHow coal miners and factory workers helped found the environmental movement<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490060/original/file-20221017-16-bvqw75.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2738%2C1823&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A striking worker at a Fridays for Future march during COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dc/Bystanders_%2851663123624%29.jpg">Fraser Hamilton</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Rachel Carson, a scientist and writer from rural Pennsylvania, published <a href="http://www.rachelcarson.org/SilentSpring.aspx">Silent Spring</a> 60 years ago. Many credit this book, which meticulously documented the damage that DDT pesticides were inflicting on wildlife, farm animals and people as early as the 1950s, with launching the modern environmental movement. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.rachelcarson.org/Bio.aspx">Carson</a> gathered stories from across the US to illuminate the dangers of indiscriminate pesticide use and the threats contaminated land posed to life. She would battle the chemical industry’s accusations of alarmism for the rest of her life. But Silent Spring struck a chord with a public increasingly sceptical of the ethics and efficacy of industrial society. </p>
<p>Carson’s criticism of the cosy relations between businesses and governments echoed the concept of <a href="https://www.marxists.org/subject/humanism/mills-c-wright/power-elite.htm">the power elite</a>, popularised by the New Left intellectual C. Wright Mills a few years earlier. In Mills’ assessment, American society was dominated by bureaucracies that included both big business but also organised labour. </p>
<p>Environmentalists who were inspired by Carson railed against these vested interests. They were dropouts and opponents of the established system, or at least outsiders to it. By 1990, Richard White, an American environmental historian, would <a href="https://faculty.washington.edu/stevehar/sust-white.pdf">pose the question</a> “are you an environmentalist or do you work for a living?” White’s essay took aim at the environmental pretensions of white-collar professionals who pitted themselves against manual workers employed in polluting industries.</p>
<p>More recent scholarship has built on White’s insights, revealing the knowledge and respect for nature among such workers. Researchers have emphasised that it is these communities which have typically suffered most from pollution and industrial accidents. In <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520291348/the-myth-of-silent-spring">The Myth of Silent Spring</a>, social historian Chad Montrie told a story of the far more diverse coalitions which shaped American environmentalism.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="An early edition of Silent Spring alongside a written endoresement." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490593/original/file-20221019-11-srn6a2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Silent Spring enjoyed immediate commercial success upon publication in September 1962.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring#/media/File:Silent_Spring_Book-of-the-Month-Club_edition.JPG">Wikipedia</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Working-class environmentalism</h2>
<p>Montrie underlined the role of automotive, oil, chemical and mining trade unions in campaigning for environmental improvements from the beginning of the 1960s, when Carson’s book was making waves. The United Auto Workers supported campaigns for fresh air and clean water in American cities such as Detroit, Michigan while the United Farm Workers shared Carson’s opposition to the pesticides poisoning their members in the fields of California.</p>
<p>Montrie also highlighted the role of civil rights activists in shaping demands for environmental justice among poor and working-class black Americans. This inspired campaigns against lead poisoning in cities such as St Louis, Missouri and for cleaner air quality in Gary, Indiana. These groups worked with those who more closely resembled the received image of Carson-inspired environmentalists.</p>
<p>My ongoing research about community and workplace experiences of energy transitions in the UK has exposed something similar. I have recorded testimonies from middle-class environmentalists who joined protests such as Friends of the Earth’s 1971 <a href="https://friendsoftheearth.uk/who-we-are/our-history">campaign</a> against Schweppes’ policy of non-returnable bottles. Many of these people found their fellow campaigners on university campuses, in left-wing bookshops and wholefoods stores. These places became important recruiting grounds for the anti-nuclear movement too. Activists from this milieu organised demonstrations against the building of the <a href="https://www.robedwards.com/1994/03/when-scram-bega.html">Torness</a> nuclear power station in East Lothian, Scotland, during the late 1970s and early 1980s.</p>
<p>These were rarely concerns held by university graduates alone. The <a href="https://nvdatabase.swarthmore.edu/content/scottish-anti-nuclear-power-campaign-torness-1977">Torness</a> campaign enjoyed support from farmers who aided activists occupying the power station site. They also provided the spectacle of a cavalcade of tractors driving through the centre of Edinburgh in support of the protest.</p>
<p>One example of working-class agitation for environmental action can be found in the records of the Scottish Trades Union Congress. At the union confederation’s 1972 annual meeting, W.B. Blairford of the electricians’ union moved an anti-pollution resolution which set an agenda for class-conscious environmentalism. He said that while environmentalism was seen as a “largely academic and middle-class trend”, it was “vital that the interests of the workers were fully represented in this important debate”. </p>
<p>He highlighted smelter workers suffering industrial illnesses, asbestos exposure among factory workers and the dangerous conditions coal miners endured, as well as contemporary studies on pollution near steelworks in Durham and cement factories in Hampshire to argue that “it was the workers who suffered most from pollution at home”. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A black-and-white photo of coal miners in a queue." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/490598/original/file-20221019-24-hsh8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Workers in polluting industries have led environmental reforms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/birmingham-alabama-coal-miners-were-unionized-242300698">Everett Collection/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These sentiments were not confined to conference resolutions either. In one instance of industrial action that would affect the UK’s policy for nuclear waste storage, the National Union of Seamen <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-jim-slater-2316176.html">refused</a> to cooperate with dumping radioactive material at sea during the early 1980s.</p>
<h2>Extractors against extractivism</h2>
<p>These are formative trends in the modern environmentalism of anglophone societies and deindustrialisng economies. This makes sense in understanding a movement shaped by the popularity of Silent Spring. But it overlooks many of the <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/uk/climate-change-and-disasters.html">communities</a> bearing the brunt of environmental crises like climate change. </p>
<p>A more <a href="https://thenewinquiry.com/gentle-protests-an-interview-with-andreas-malm/">combative</a> activism emerged in the activities of trade unionists and indigenous groups in Latin America. <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2021/03/31/book-review-resource-radicals-from-petro-nationalism-to-post-extractivism-in-ecuador-by-thea-riofrancos/">Ecuador</a> saw movements opposed to the oil industry develop broader criticisms of <em>extractivismo</em>: a rejection of any economic model predicated on extracting resources wrongfully acquired through colonialism. </p>
<p>This rejects the older socialist case for economic development through national ownership of oil and minerals, and finds common cause with campaigners in more recently formed groups like Extinction Rebellion. The fruitfulness of any potential collaboration is unknown. Extinction Rebellion has <a href="https://theconversation.com/extinction-rebellion-why-disavowing-politics-is-a-dead-end-for-climate-action-145479">rejected political alignments</a> before.</p>
<p>These debates and others like them will determine the future of environmentalism. Already, there are glimmers of what is possible. Visitors to Glasgow during the most recent UN climate change summit may have seen <a href="https://news.stv.tv/west-central/cleansing-workers-welcome-support-from-inspirational-greta-thunberg">Greta Thunberg</a> marching with striking refuse workers and campaigners from islands threatened with sea-level rise and landscapes scarred by oil and mineral extraction.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/191605/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ewan Gibbs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The green movement has more to thank workers in polluting industries than you might expect.Ewan Gibbs, Lecturer in Global Inequalities, University of GlasgowLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1887512022-08-22T15:46:17Z2022-08-22T15:46:17ZZambia’s copper mines hard-baked racism into the workplace by labelling whites ‘expats’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479156/original/file-20220815-19-b8qdl5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Expatriates and locals faced similar risks and hazards but for different pay</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Zambia’s Copperbelt has been a centre of the world copper industry <a href="http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?pid=S2225-62532016000600003&script=sci_arttext&tlng=es">for almost a century</a>. When mining began on an industrial scale in the 1920s, the mines employed both migrant white and African workers. By the time of Zambia’s independence <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/zambia-gains-independence-britain">in 1964</a>, around 7,500 white workers and 38,000 African workers were <a href="https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004467347_010">employed on the mines</a>.</p>
<p>Although they worked alongside each other, white and African mineworkers did not do the same jobs. There was a clear racial division in the workplace during the colonial period. The best-paid skilled jobs were reserved for white workers, who had organised themselves into a trade union and enforced a “colour bar”. The average white mineworker was paid almost ten times the average African mineworker in 1960.</p>
<p>What is puzzling is that this continued after Zambian independence, when there were hopes that it would disappear. Blatantly racist organisation of workplaces had become increasingly unacceptable in the 1950s and the colour bar had been dismantled in the early 1960s under heavy pressure from the African mineworkers’ union.</p>
<p>This presented the Copperbelt mining companies with a problem. White mineworkers were paid very high wages and the dismantling of racial divisions meant these wages and benefits could be extended to Africans, with frightening implications for operating costs.</p>
<p>The solution was the creation of an “expatriate” category for white employees. This was explicitly a racial category. All African employees were designated as “local”, even if they had been born in Malawi or Tanzania. All white employees were designated “expatriates”, even if they had been born on the Copperbelt. The companies’ definition of expatriate was “skilled, white”.</p>
<p>Expatriates are common in the extractive industries and many other sectors on the African continent. Usually, “expats” are seen as skilled professionals who take up a short-term job in another country, frequently move around the world and are paid much better than anyone recruited locally.</p>
<p>In the Copperbelt’s case, the category of expatriate recreated a dual wage structure, and one that persists. Expatriates received wages and benefits that no African employee could receive regardless of skill or experience. The companies hoped this would get around “aspirations” among African mineworkers for higher wages.</p>
<p>Even the term “expatriate” was chosen to emphasise that wages received by white workers were unattainable for African workers. </p>
<h2>Racial divides</h2>
<p>I have been <a href="https://www.ascleiden.nl/organization/people/duncan-money">researching the mining industry</a> and, in particular, the Zambian Copperbelt. My main interests are in labour, race, the ways in which the mining industry connected seemingly disparate and distant places across the globe and the consequences that emanated from this. </p>
<p>One consequence was the spread of militant trade unions to the mines. Until independence, all white mineworkers were union members as their union ran a closed shop: you had to be a union member to get a job on the mines. This inadvertently provided a good example to African workers of how to improve their position, and they too formed a trade union that soon established a combative reputation.</p>
<p>Both unions fought tenaciously and successfully for better pay and conditions, but separately. Workplace segregation was replicated in the trade unions and there was never a union representing both African and white workers on the mines.</p>
<p>I also became interested in how “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004467347_008">expatriate</a>”, a term that has become a normal part of the industry, developed.</p>
<p>On the mines of Zambia’s Copperbelt it developed from deliberate corporate policy. Designating white employees as expatriates was the proposed solution to the spectre of rapidly rising wages.</p>
<p>Paradoxically, this meant that racial divisions were strengthened in some ways after Zambia became an independent country in 1964.</p>
<p>Zambian independence was seen as a major opportunity by the mining companies to reorganise the industry. As one executive put it, it was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>the time when the industry has an opportunity to set the pattern and get matters the way they would like them. Large scale industry rarely gets this sort of opportunity and it is not likely to be repeated.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Politically, the companies thought this would be a hard pill for the government to swallow. The <a href="https://eap.bl.uk/project/EAP121">United National Independence Party</a> was officially multiracial and white Zambians had played a prominent role in the independence struggle.</p>
<p>There was a policy of “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/03057070.2019.1658406">Zambianisation</a>” to replace white workers with Zambian nationals, but there were other policies to limit wage growth for mineworkers, which were already much higher than wages for African workers in other economic sectors.</p>
<p>Shrewdly, company executives suggested they emphasise to government “that a local person, unskilled” should not earn as much as a cabinet minister. Zambia’s new independent government accepted the plan to create categories of “expatriate” and “local” employment.</p>
<p>The outcome was that African workers promoted into skilled jobs received a fraction of the wage that white workers got. African artisans (a job category that included carpenters, electricians and mechanics) were paid around 50% of the wage of white artisans.</p>
<p>Other benefits were also reduced. At one mine, promoted African employees who moved into mine houses previously occupied by whites even found that the appliances that were provided for white employees had been removed.</p>
<p>African mineworkers did not accept this willingly. Shop stewards at one mine argued forcibly that “they saw no reason why any differential should be established between themselves and the expatriate”. Major strikes took place after independence and mineworkers secured significant pay increases. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6443.2005.00260.x">This provoked conflict</a> with the government, which cracked down on the Mineworkers’ Union of Zambia and brought the country’s labour movement under tighter state control.</p>
<h2>Corporate legacies</h2>
<p>The category of expatriate is rooted both in the colonial-era racial divisions and corporate decisions about how to resolve these divisions after independence. Expatriate was deliberately created as a racial category on Zambia’s mines.</p>
<p>The creation of very different wage scales was a solution to control costs. Two separate wage scales with no way to bridge them placed a limit on the wages that could be paid to “local” workers. </p>
<p>Expatriates and locals were in the same workplaces, facing similar risks and hazards, but with a very different experience of work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/188751/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Duncan Money does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In the Copperbelt the category of ‘expatriate’ recreated a dual wage structure that still persists.Duncan Money, Researcher, Leiden UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1862702022-08-17T16:28:17Z2022-08-17T16:28:17ZUK strikes: how Margaret Thatcher and other leaders cut trade union powers over centuries<p>Strikes are often demonised in the UK as <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1636685/railway-chaos-strike-threat-outdated-rule-unions-politics-ont">outdated</a> and even <a href="https://www.gbnews.uk/gb-views/by-threatening-to-inflict-more-economic-damage-with-strikes-next-week-unions-are-threatening-human-damage-too-says-mark-dolan/320697#:%7E:text=They%20are%20deeply-,unethical,-.%20Any%20strikes%2C%20during">unethical</a>, but this summer has seen <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/19058945/full-list-of-strikes-this-summer/">more workers</a> considering and embarking on industrial action. Railway workers from the RMT (Rail Maritime and Transport) union have been among the most visible strikers, but barristers, airline staff and council workers have also taken or considered action, alongside ongoing activity from the likes of <a href="https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/11830/University-staff-pay-cut-by-20-new-figures-show">university lecturers</a>.</p>
<p>Even as widespread pay discontent builds, British strikers take a great risk by invoking <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/transport-secretary-grant-shapps-speaking-ahead-of-wednesdays-rail-strikes">opposition from the government</a>, the media and the public, not to mention the loss of pay they could face during any action. Strikers may be seen as inconveniencing consumers, regardless of whether the workers are taking strike action or have been “locked out”. The latter is when employers impose conditions that workers reject, leaving them unable to perform their duties. </p>
<p>Success is not guaranteed. The strength of British trade unions has risen and fallen in line with membership levels and the introduction and repeal of many pieces of legislation since the late 1700s. British trade union membership is currently around 6.5 million, but was more than double that in the late 1970s, when unions worked together to bring the UK to a standstill. </p>
<p>On the other hand, this period also resulted in the election of Margaret Thatcher who brought in a spate of anti-union laws. These laws continue to make strike action difficult to this day, often ensuring action is either illegal or unsuccessful. </p>
<h2>The rise and fall of British industrial action</h2>
<p>There have been strikes in Britain since at least the <a href="http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/3042/">late 17th century</a> when skilled workers often briefly took industrial action to get better conditions of work and pay. But strikes were made illegal in the 18th century through various laws covering different trades that were eventually brought under the Combination Acts in 1799 and 1800. </p>
<p>These acts were removed by 1825, but even then legislation continued to control the extent and type of picketing. This made it difficult to effectively strike again until the late 19th century, when the 1871 Trade Union Act allowed unions to become legal bodies. </p>
<p>While this act saw an increase in union formation and industrial action, this activity understandably fell again during the first world war from 1914-1918. After the war, employers attempted to reduce wages, causing workers to start striking again. </p>
<p>By the time of the 1926 General Strike, 2.8 million workers were on strike, costing the nation 162 million days in lost work, compared to just under 8 million days in 1925 and a little over 1 million days in 1927.</p>
<p>An increase in strike activity after the second world war eventually led to the most successful period of strikes in British history. Faced with a high level of inflation in the late 1970s, trade unions began to demand substantial wage rises to help members cope with the cost of living. This led to the 1978-1979 winter of discontent.</p>
<p>Strikes in multiple industries during this period often produced substantial pay rises. But the strikers were pilloried by the press and <a href="https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/really-bad-what-really-like-21725414">negative public sentiment</a> led to the election of Margaret Thatcher in May 1979. </p>
<p>Her Conservative government introduced major restrictions on trade union power that were extremely effective. The number of working days lost to strikes fell from nearly 29.5 million in 1979 to a little over 4.3 million in 1981.</p>
<h2>Strength in numbers</h2>
<p>The impact of strikes – and perhaps even public support for them – is highly dependent on trade union membership. This has also seen <a href="http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/3042/">peaks and troughs</a> throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, and into this one (see graph below). </p>
<p>After a peak of about 13.5 million in 1979, new controls imposed after the Winter of Discontent forced <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/trade-union-statistics-2021">union membership numbers</a> downwards to a little over 6 million people by the end of the 20th century. It has since remained stable until a slight increase to about 6.5 million in 2021.</p>
<p><strong>UK trade union membership levels</strong></p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Line graph showing UK trade union membership numbers 1892-2017" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479169/original/file-20220815-19-bn2etn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">UK trade union membership levels peaked in the late 1970s and are currently about 6.5 million people.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/trade-union-statistics-2021">Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The five employment acts and one <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1984/49/enacted">trade union act</a> introduced by the Thatcher and John Major Conservative governments of 1979 to 1997 severely reduced the powers of trade unionism in Britain. </p>
<p>They restricted the right to picket and prevented unions bringing their members out in support of other unions. They also required ballots for strike action (later enhanced to require 50% of members to vote), the failure of which would invoke a fine and seizure of assets. </p>
<p>While the miners’ strikes of 1984-1985 tested some of this legislation, subsequent Tory laws survived. Neither of the Labour governments that came after withdrew any of the restrictions on union activity resulting from this legislation.</p>
<p>Alongside the rapid decline in trade union membership since 1979, unions have also been less likely to call industrial action. Apart from the 26 million working days lost during the miners’ strike of 1984-1985, the number of <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/timeseries/bbfw/lms">days lost</a> annually has only breached 2 million once, in 1989. </p>
<p>More recently, however, the return of <a href="https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy-report/2022/august-2022">high inflation</a>, the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-62206733">failure to match</a> public sector wages to cost of living increases and the impact of the COVID pandemic has seen a rise in strike activity. The summer’s rail strikes and the threat of more to come this autumn and winter have led to some discussion of the potential for another winter of discontent.</p>
<p>But strike activity now depends on ballots and trade unions organise only about a fifth of the UK labour force – 6.5 million people out of a <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/timeseries/mgrz/lms">total workforce</a> of around 33 million. Undoubtedly, there will be some successes. </p>
<p>Earlier this year, for example, Unite the union said it secured 20% pay rises for around <a href="https://www.unitetheunion.org/news-events/news/2022/may/unite-secures-massive-pay-rise-of-over-20-for-mcpherson-hgv-drivers/">300 HGV divers</a> and 21% for a similar number of <a href="https://www.unitetheunion.org/news-events/news/2022/june/unite-gatwick-workers-win-21-pay-increase/">Gatwick airport</a> workers. A more recent <a href="https://www.unitetheunion.org/news-events/news/2022/august/unite-secures-thousands-of-british-airways-staff-average-13-pay-rise/">13% deal</a> for British Airways employees “goes some way” to restoring pre-pandemic pay levels, Unite says.</p>
<p>Indeed, it’s more likely that the majority of workers will settle for much less from the sluggish British economy. But this could store up frustration among public sector workers for further action in the future, particularly as the UK faces <a href="https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/knowledgebank/will-inflation-in-the-uk-keep-rising">ongoing price inflation</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/186270/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith Laybourn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The rise and fall of UK trade union membership numbers can impact the instances and success of industrial action.Keith Laybourn, Professor Emeritus of History, University of HuddersfieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1871792022-08-09T15:23:29Z2022-08-09T15:23:29ZMozambican unions hit snooze on a national strike: why it’s a bad thing for workers<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475889/original/file-20220725-22-1soso3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Trade unions in Mozambique have been weakened due to their proximity to the ruling party, Frelimo.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Gianluigi Guercia/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The surge in food and fuel prices has <a href="https://www.sabcnews.com/sabcnews/saftu-plans-national-shutdown-against-rising-cost-of-living/">led to calls</a> for national shutdowns across southern Africa. In Mozambique, trade unions issued a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002392595040">statement</a> denouncing the rising cost of living, inadequate public services, generalised corruption, political patronage in the public sector and lack of compliance with labour protections. </p>
<p>The statement, which encapsulated popular demands, was undersigned by union federations historically tied to the ruling party, Frelimo. Its seemingly militant tone took much of Mozambican civil society aback. It read:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The trade union movement reserves the right to mobilise a strike on a national scale … if nothing is done to alleviate the suffocation of workers and their families, and the general population.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="https://cartamz.com/index.php/politica/item/11234-movimento-sindical-em-mocambique-uma-no-cravo-outra-na-ferradura-escreve-marcelo-mosse">Some</a> saw the statement as a ray of hope that unions were finally awakening from their slumber. Others, however, <a href="https://cartamz.com/index.php/politica/item/11234-movimento-sindical-em-mocambique-uma-no-cravo-outra-na-ferradura-escreve-marcelo-mosse">argued</a> that it was merely a political ploy by a co-opted union leadership desperate for a few crumbs from the ruling party. </p>
<p>The wording of the statement was characteristically ambiguous. While it highlighted the right to strike it also sought to dissuade strike action. </p>
<p>Ultimately, Mozambican unions “hit snooze” on a national strike. <a href="https://cartamz.com/index.php/politica/item/11242-grande-maputo-volta-a-parar-pela-segunda-vez-em-menos-de-15-dias">Social media filled the void</a>. The ad hoc group “Upset and Desperate with the Country’s Crisis” called for a national stay-away. </p>
<p>Trade unions make up the largest mass-based organisation in the country. But their failure to represent the interests of Mozambique’s working classes has created the space for authoritarian populist movements to thrive. </p>
<h2>A lion without teeth</h2>
<p>The origins of Mozambique’s trade union movement lie in worker-run committees, known as <a href="https://roape.net/2016/02/11/mozambican-workers-and-communities-in-resistance/"><em>conselhos de produção</em></a>. These were established during the transition to independence to safeguard production, as settlers fled en masse, many sabotaging factories as they left.</p>
<p>In 1983, the committees were consolidated into the <a href="https://ukzn-dspace.ukzn.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10413/9306/Castel-Branco_Ruth_Kelia_2012.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">Organisation of Mozambican Workers</a>, a mass-based organisation of Frelimo. Conceived of as sites of popular democracy, worker organisations became a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/247731263_Residual_Unionism_and_Renewal_Organized_Labour_in_Mozambique">conveyor belt</a> for party decisions, centred on increasing production and productivity.</p>
<p>The power of the trade union movement was further undermined by economic policies agreed to as part of successive structural adjustment programmes put in place by the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. These included the liberalisation of the economy, the privatisation of public services and enterprises and the deregulation of the labour market. </p>
<p>With little state support, newly privatised firms struggled to compete in global markets. Widespread retrenchments followed. Between 1988 and 2003 – the period of mass privatisations – membership of the Organisation of Mozambican Workers dropped from <a href="https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/bueros/mosambik/09527.pdf">300,000 to 90,000</a>.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the transition to a multi-party democracy weakened the organisation’s claims on the ruling party and its ability to respond to the repressive actions of newly privatised firms. In 1992, <a href="https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/bueros/mosambik/09527.pdf">three unions split</a> to form the rival National Council for Free and Independent Trade Unions. The new federation claimed to be independent of the ruling party. However, some of its leaders were co-opted into official positions or <a href="https://roape.net/2016/03/18/mozambican-workers-and-communities-in-resistance-part-2/">embroiled in alliances</a> with big money.</p>
<h2>A mass-based organisation</h2>
<p>Despite its limitations, the trade union movement constitutes the largest mass-based organisation in Mozambique, followed by the <a href="https://www.unac.org.mz/nossos-membros/">National Union of Peasants</a>. Over the last two decades its membership has grown to just over <a href="https://www.ulandssekretariatet.dk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Mozambique_lmp_2017.pdf">350,000</a>. This reflects the expansion of private sector employment, the extension of unions to the public sector, and efforts to unionise domestic workers and informal workers. </p>
<p>Indeed, nearly a third of union members are <a href="https://www.ulandssekretariatet.dk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Mozambique_lmp_2017.pdf">in the informal economy</a>.</p>
<p>Union membership nevertheless still represents a small sliver of the working classes. Only <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/dech.12665">12% of the economically active population are salaried workers</a>. The vast majority of the economically active population cobble together a livelihood from a multiplicity of informal activities on and off the farm. They are <em>camponeses</em> or peasant farmers, petty traders and artisans. </p>
<p>Union density corresponds to about <a href="https://www.ulandssekretariatet.dk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Mozambique_lmp_2017.pdf">30% of the formal private sector</a>. This is not bad by <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2021-03-02-labour-pains-trade-union-membership-has-declined-badly-and-bosses-are-calling-the-shots/">regional standards</a>. But its representation of the working classes is constrained by widespread informality.</p>
<h2>Constraints</h2>
<p>The Mozambique trade union movement recognises the need to become a more relevant force in society, lest it wither away altogether. But several factors have limited its ability to do so. </p>
<p>Firstly, there’s the country’s <a href="https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/119/476/468/5848670?redirectedFrom=fulltext">authoritarian</a> political culture, characterised by the suppression of debate and contentious politics. The <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/news/the-big-read-five-years-on-cabo-delgado-in-mozambique-still-a-hotbed-of-insurgency-20220630">insurgency</a> in Mozambique has only strengthened the power of the state to restrict democracy. </p>
<p>Indeed, the trade union statement calling for a national strike began by repudiating any internal or external forces which support “the actions of terrorists in the province of Cabo Delgado”.</p>
<p>Secondly, the proliferation of civil society organisations, dependent on donor funds and averse to class-based politics, has undermined alliance-building. Alliances around a progressive political agenda have been further fragmented by the trade union movement’s perceived acquiescence to political power and its inability to adequately represent the interests of Mozambique’s working classes. This includes its own members.</p>
<h2>National strike as dress rehearsal?</h2>
<p>This month’s statement, which was undersigned by the Organisation of Mozambican Workers, the National Council for Free and Independent Trade Unions, the Association of Mozambican Physicians and the National Organisation of Journalists, points to the potential power of the trade union movement. </p>
<p>But the union movement struggled to get off the fence, preferring to issue a follow-up statement dissuading vandalism. As in the <a href="https://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/bitstream/handle/20.500.12413/4918/Food_Riots_Mozambique_Report.pdf?sequence=5">general strikes of 2008 and 2010</a>, it was the multitudes of un(der)employed rather than trade unions who paralysed the city.</p>
<p>It is unlikely that material conditions for a national strike will disappear. The question is what role the trade union movement will play. There is the potential for alliance between progressive national unions and other sectors of civil society, including the peasant movement. After all, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03056244.2022.1990624">workers rely</a> on peasant production to subsidise their low wages and peasants on casual work to sustain production.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187179/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Mozambique’s trade unions have not been a strong force in society – which has left a space for others to fill.Ruth Castel-Branco, Research Manager, University of the WitwatersrandBoaventura Monjane, Post-Doctoral Researcher, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape & AIDC Campaign Coordinator, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1777932022-08-02T17:01:52Z2022-08-02T17:01:52ZHong Kong’s 1922 general strike: when the British empire struck back<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/448256/original/file-20220224-19-zlktij.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1198%2C797&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">International trade hub: Hong Kong Harbour in 1922</span> </figcaption></figure><p>Following last year’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/chinas-communist-party-at-100-revolution-forever-163665">centenary of the foundation</a> of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), 2022 marks the 100th anniversary of the <a href="https://libcom.org/article/1922-hong-kong-strike">first general strike</a> to shut down a British colonial territory – Hong Kong. </p>
<p>The strike began with the grievances of the British territory’s seamen, but rapidly spread to other sectors, effectively shutting Hong Kong down. It represents the first major episode of industrial unrest in the territory, to which the colonial authorities responded with emergency anti-strike legislation. The law introduced by the colonial authorities, which allowed the governer to pass “any regulations whatsoever which he may consider desirable in the public interest”, was <a href="https://qz.com/1721951/anti-mask-law-the-1922-origins-of-hong-kongs-emergency-powers/">used in 2019</a> to ban the use of face masks by protesters.</p>
<p>The CCP was founded only a few months before the strike began, but there is little evidence that the strike was led by the party. But many militants later joined the CCP and were very influential in much larger strikes in 1925 and 1926. It was the militancy of the strikes of 1920 to 1925 in China that shaped the formative years of Chinese communism rather than the party being in the vanguard of revolutionary activism.</p>
<p>The General Industrial Federation of Chinese Seamen (<em>Zhonghua Haiyuan Gongye Lianhe Zonghui</em>) had been established in March 1921 and its grievances were largely about payment. Inequity in payment between Chinese and non-Chinese seamen was stark – there was clearly an anti-imperialist dimension to the strike. The wage workers of Hong Kong were taking direct action against colonial businesses supported by the colonial government.</p>
<h2>Gathering unrest</h2>
<p>In 1921, demands for wage rises were generally ignored by shipping companies. The seamen’s union became increasingly determined. On January 12 1922 it again pressed the case for wage increases, setting a 24-hour limit for a response. The following day, 1,500 deck hands and stokers went on a 52-day strike. During the second half of January the number on strike grew to about 30,000. By early February, 167 steamers were moored and disabled causing serious losses to shipping companies.</p>
<p>Solidarity strikes had been planned from the start, with agreements to support the seamen. About 50,000 workers of all kinds were involved by the middle of February, including office workers, cooks, bakers, rickshaw pullers and even the Chinese staff of Government House. Transport services were halted. </p>
<p>By the end of the strike there was a complete paralysis of economic life in Hong Kong. It was estimated by the main English-language paper in Hong Kong, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) – whose archives are unfortunately not available online – that 120,000 workers went on strike.</p>
<p>More than 50% of the strikers were not part of the shipping industry. So this this movement represented a “general strike”, rather than just a seamen’s strike. </p>
<h2>Violent reaction</h2>
<p>Britain’s colonial administration – with support from the Westminster government – declared the strike illegal on February 1 and the government tried to repress industrial action by introducing emergency regulations. Hong Kong’s governor was given power to make “any regulations whatsoever which he may consider desirable in the public interest”. </p>
<p>According to the Government Gazette from February 28 1922, departures from Hong Kong without travel passes were forbidden. This was a critical issue. The union had moved its organisation to nearby Canton (now Guangzhou) on the Chinese mainland, where the local government gave support to strikers, including strike pay.</p>
<p>On March 3, according to a subsequent report in the SCMP of proceedings at the coroner’s court, more than 2,000 strikers decided to walk to Canton. When they tried to break through a cordon, an order to fire was given to troops. Four people were seriously injured and died at the scene.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Tearout from HK Telegraph" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=526&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=526&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/474923/original/file-20220719-12-1u3bal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=526&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">HOw the Hong Kong Telegraph reported the strike.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Hong Kong Telegraph</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>The SCMP maintained good coverage. Only at the end of the strike was its own printing press closed temporarily. After being unable to publish on the previous day, the March 7 edition was a single page with the headline “Peace Celebrations”.</p>
<h2>Temporary truce</h2>
<p>The chairman of the Shipowners’ Committee wrote to the Hong Kong governor on March 15 with details of the settlement. At least on paper, the strikers were victorious. Wage rises of 15% to 30% were promised. Restrictions on the seamen’s union were lifted. There were to be no reprisals and imprisoned strikers would be released.</p>
<p>There may have been some temporary material improvement, but labour was engaged through contractors who took a big “top slice” known as the “squeeze”. Formal wage rises would have been notional because workers were paid indirectly using a “labour gang” system. </p>
<p>Management rarely had any reliable record of its workers. Companies agreed a fixed sum with an intermediary who would do the hiring, pay the workers, and often found their accommodation when not at sea. </p>
<p>Similar systems persisted throughout China until 1949, because there were large numbers willing to migrate from the impoverished agrarian sector. An economic strike was turned into a major political confrontation by government repression and inept response. </p>
<p>Union militancy drove CCP development rather more than the party leading the strikers. The CCP in Hong Kong only became an organised group during the next three years.</p>
<p>The Hong Kong general strike demonstrated to the recently created CCP that union militancy could be very powerful. Connected with other outbreaks of strike action – and at a time of optimism that the Russian example would be followed in other countries – CCP leaders became increasingly confident that revolution would soon sweep though the cities of China. </p>
<p>But after urban uprisings of 1927 were crushed, a new view – Mao’s advocacy of rural insurgency – began to take root. By 1949 the CCP took control across China. Hong Kong itself returned to Chinese rule in 1997, where – 22 years later – the government of the special administrative region themselves used the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-10-04/hong-kong-bans-masks-for-protesters-explainer/11573842">1922 Colonial Emergency Laws</a> to deal with unrest and activism.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/177793/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Law does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Strikes in the British colony 100 years ago were to provide the first flourishing of militancy that would bloom into full-scale revolution in China.David Law, Academic Director: Global Partnerships, Keele UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1854502022-06-23T15:04:28Z2022-06-23T15:04:28ZWhat trade unions do and what joining one means<p>Union membership among young workers today is incredibly low. Industrial action scholars speak of a worldwide trend towards the so-called <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/277515552_Young_Workers_and_Trade_Unions_A_Global_View">de-unionisation of the young</a>. </p>
<p>In 1980 <a href="http://www.ilera-directory.org/15thworldcongress/files/papers/Track_4/Thur_W4_DICKENS.pdf">80% of the British workforce</a> was covered by collective bargaining between employers and unions. By the 2000s, that figure had fallen to around 30%. And the numbers have kept falling, in particular for young people. UK government statistics show that in 2021, only <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1077904/Trade_Union_Membership_UK_1995-2021_statistical_bulletin.pdf">4.3%</a> of 16 to 24-year-old workers were members of a union. This figure rose to 19.8% for the 25 to 34 category. </p>
<p>In their introduction to the 2015 compendium, <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/277515552_Young_Workers_and_Trade_Unions_A_Global_View">Young Workers and Trade Unions: A Global View</a>, scholars Andy Hodder and Lefteris Kretsos explain that it’s not so much that young professionals view unions more negatively than their older counterparts. Rather, they tend to work in jobs and industries where union representation doesn’t exist. Crucially, for the most part, they <a href="https://www.academia.edu/8961890/Young_Workers_and_Trade_Unions_The_case_of_the_UK?auto=download">do not know</a> what unions are, what they do – and what they have done to change the world of work.</p>
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<img alt="Quarter life, a series by The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><strong><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/quarter-life-117947?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">This article is part of Quarter Life</a></strong>, a series about issues affecting those of us in our twenties and thirties. From the challenges of beginning a career and taking care of our mental health, to the excitement of starting a family, adopting a pet or just making friends as an adult. The articles in this series explore the questions and bring answers as we navigate this turbulent period of life.</em></p>
<p><em>You may be interested in:</em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/the-last-two-recessions-hit-young-people-hardest-heres-how-you-can-protect-yourself-for-the-next-one-184783">The last two recessions hit young people hardest – here’s how you can protect yourself for the next one</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/four-ways-pensions-still-fail-to-support-staff-who-are-young-low-paid-and-part-time-176289?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Four ways pensions still fail to support staff who are young, low paid and part time</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/hybrid-working-post-covid-how-young-professionals-can-optimise-their-time-in-the-office-and-why-they-should-184025">Hybrid working post-COVID: how young professionals can optimise their time in the office (and why they should)</a></em></p>
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<h2>What unions do</h2>
<p>Unions give employees a voice – both as individuals and as a collective – that is independent of their employer. Employers are more likely to engage through consultation and negotiations with the views of their workers where workers can speak as one. This is simply because it is more efficient and provides legitimacy to the result of these negotiations. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A factory worker in protective gear looks at the camera." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470597/original/file-20220623-13-nn7sbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Unionised workplaces have been shown to be safer and healthier for workers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/factory-woman-worker-technician-hygienic-mask-1681854001">SritanaN | Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>For the workers, there is strength in numbers. They can club together to provide the resources to allow their union to negotiate on their behalf. The vast majority of collective disputes are settled without any industrial action. But having the ability to engage in such collective action, if necessary, can be vital, as many groups of workers this summer are finding out. </p>
<p>Quite what is negotiated has resulted in a number of procedural and substantive benefits to workers. First, unionised workplaces have been shown to be <a href="https://www.napier.ac.uk/%7E/media/worktribe/output-2659451/trade-unions-and-career-services-potential-partners-for-promoting-social-justice-at-work.pdf">fairer</a> than non-union workplaces. There is less wage disparity between different employees. </p>
<p>Unionised workplaces are also <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4880255/">healthier</a> places to work. Workers are subjected to less stress and more attention is paid to keeping working hours within healthy limits. </p>
<p>Similarly, unions have also been shown to make workplaces <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0950017006061275?casa_token=uz5Tzt7zLzgAAAAA:iIMk8P7S5AkhMFmgwbWoG4AyDwobTwZq-jqlx7poSvWAr3_RYvljxIGLiEBm3az2OEYTWgbxgSDv">safer</a>. There are fewer accidents and fatalities because workers in unionised workplaces are more likely to be given the equipment they need to work safely, whether ergonomically assessed workstations, or clothing to protect themselves from noxious substances. </p>
<p>And then there’s the question of pay. Union members <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/287278/uk-trade-union-wage-premium/#:%7E:text=In%202021%20members%20of%20trade,more%20than%20the%20average%20worker.">still earn more</a> than non-union members. Some recent pay deals negotiated by unions, such as those led by the Unite union on behalf of airport staff, dockers and carmakers <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jun/17/profiteering-bosses-workers-inflation-unite-sharon-graham-labour">have outstripped</a> the current rate of inflation.</p>
<p>Lastly, unions are able to lobby governments to push for greater employment rights for workers. They also work to stop any existing rights being withdrawn.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.bostonherald.com/2021/09/06/unionized-workers-becoming-more-satisfied-than-non-union/">Research indicates</a> that these benefits lead to happier, more satisfying and more productive workplaces as well as more <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/unions-and-well-being/">democratic and fairer societal outcomes</a>. This in turn is a benefit for employers. </p>
<h2>How unions assert employees’ rights</h2>
<p>Some experts, including US economist Diana Furchtgott-Roth <a href="https://www.city-journal.org/amazon-employees-do-not-need-a-union">have argued</a> that unions are no longer needed. “Workers don’t need unions because the economy is booming, and workers face a sellers’ market for their skills. They also don’t want to pay substantial union dues,” Furchtgott-Roth wrote in March 2022. </p>
<p>While it is true that workers now have more individual rights in law covering minimum wages, discrimination, holidays and working hours, many of these things we now take for granted were achieved by union members acting collectively.</p>
<p>And still today, most workers <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0143831X07073031">do not know</a> what their rights are or how to enforce them, with some afraid to for fear of retribution. This is particularly true of people just starting out in their careers, who, research shows, increasingly find themselves in the <a href="https://www.etuc.org/en/young-people-and-precarious-work">most precarious</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/unions-rally-to-support-young-people-in-precarious-jobs-46657">insecure</a> jobs. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A delivery cyclist on his bike with a delivery box on his back." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470598/original/file-20220623-51579-21t9k0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Young people are increasingly employed in insecure jobs and non-unionised sectors.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/courier-on-bicycle-delivering-food-city-674369497">Daisy Daisy | Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>In 2009, industrial relations scholar Linda Dickens <a href="http://www.ilera-directory.org/15thworldcongress/files/papers/Track_4/Thur_W4_DICKENS.pdf">pointed out</a> that trade unions remained “effective positive mediators” for ensuring that the rights of workers that are enshrined in our laws can be translated into changes in the workplace. In other words, collective action is still the best way by which to ensure that individual employees’ rights are respected and upheld. </p>
<p>Non-union bodies like the UK’s Citizens’ Advice Bureaux – which many people go to for <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237440551_Under-funded_Overstretched_and_Overwhelmed_the_Experience_of_Citizens_Advice_Bureaux_and_Law_Centre_Advisers_in_Supporting_Vulnerable_Workers">help at work</a> – are so under-resourced that they recommend union membership as the most effective way to resolve workplace grievances.</p>
<p>While union membership has fallen significantly over the last 20 to 30 years, this does not mean that <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9780801444456/what-workers-say/#bookTabs=1">non-union workers</a> do not want to be in unions. It is often the case that they have no access to unions. <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9781137319067">Some employers</a> have also made it known that they are anti-union. </p>
<p>The average union member is no longer a male, blue-collar manual worker but a female white-collar worker. Indeed, <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1077904/Trade_Union_Membership_UK_1995-2021_statistical_bulletin.pdf">the highest levels of union membership</a> are among teachers, health workers, social workers and civil servants. </p>
<p>People from across the contemporary employment spectrum – including journalists, actors (like <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2010/oct/19/spending-cuts-union-protest-westminster">Benedict Cumberbatch</a>), writers, lawyers, doctors and musicians (like <a href="https://musiciansunion.org.uk/news/scots-folk-singer-and-mu-member-iona-fyfe-wins-stuc-equality-award">folk singer Iona Fyfe</a>) are union members. They see no conflict between unions representing their rights and their ability to be successful in their careers.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185450/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gregor Gall is the director of the Jimmy Reid Foundation, the editor of Scottish Left Review, co-editor of Scottish Labour History and a member of the UCU union. He is not a member of any political party.</span></em></p>Workers, particularly at the beginning of their careers, don’t know their rights in the workplace, and often fear asserting them.Gregor Gall, Visiting Scholar, School of Law, University of GlasgowLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1787472022-04-06T01:31:47Z2022-04-06T01:31:47ZVoiceless and vulnerable, NZ’s gig workers faced more risk with fewer protections during the pandemic<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/455974/original/file-20220404-21-b2i471.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C6%2C4083%2C2722&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Largely overlooked in the recent <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300547908/covid19-nz-government-removes-vaccine-pass-most-vaccine-mandates-and-outdoor-gathering-limit">easing of COVID restrictions</a> has been the unequal impact on marginalised groups such as <a href="https://www.gigeconomydata.org/basics/what-gig-worker">gig workers</a>. </p>
<p>While for much of the past two years there was a sense of collective risk mitigation by the “team of five million”, the government has since shifted that burden more towards individuals and personal responsibility.</p>
<p>But this avoids the fact that not all individuals have to negotiate the same amount of risk. And research shows gig work is one of the riskiest types of employment during a pandemic. </p>
<p>Furthermore, gig workers lack a public voice with which to communicate these risks to the general public and decision makers. But as our recent report – <a href="https://carecca.nz/research/white-papers/">Experiences with COVID-19 Among Gig Workers</a> – shows, these workers have been at a high risk of both contracting and transmitting the COVID-19 virus. </p>
<h2>No way to speak out</h2>
<p>We interviewed 25 rideshare and delivery drivers about their experiences during the pandemic. We found the structural features of their employment not only exposed them to increased risk from the virus, but also offered minimal protection should they be too ill to work.</p>
<p>While conventional businesses have established infrastructures for voicing dissatisfaction with COVID policy – through organisations such as <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/03/23/covid-19-businesses-say-eased-restrictions-fall-short/">Hospitality NZ</a>, for example – gig workers lack equivalent communication channels. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/gig-workers-arent-self-employed-theyre-modern-day-feudal-serfs-179152">Gig workers aren't self-employed – they're modern-day feudal serfs</a>
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<p>This inequality also extends to gig workers’ access to culturally appropriate preventive health information. Not unlike the <a href="https://www.newsroom.co.nz/ideasroom/eliminating-maori-inequities-in-covid-19-outcomes">inequities faced by Māori</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/22041451.2021.1994686?casa_token=NmXFzjoA1msAAAAA%3Ag8e26I5W1xQgYt66kHMRzu-p0gkp0iw65tNMDHop9KgmtamPP7837nroe2fJK2BxwsTmUtDPrK1PyA">migrant communities</a>, this leaves gig workers (many of whom are also migrants who don’t speak English as their first language) more vulnerable to the negative health effects of COVID-19.</p>
<p>Such risk is compounded by the structural features of gig work. Our report is grounded in the voices of workers themselves and argues that seven structural features influence their experiences: the work is piecemeal, precarious, individualised, gamified, dehumanised, automated and hyper-competitive. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/455970/original/file-20220404-23-wxhz3g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Up against it: rideshare drivers in New York protested for fair pay in late March.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span>
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<h2>Algorithm as manager</h2>
<p>By its nature, the work is driven by immediate supply and demand – drivers are paid for each micro-transaction, rather than a wage, meaning time spent waiting for jobs goes unpaid:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Sometimes it’s really quiet. It’s not even worth … turning your car on for. Yeah, it’s basically just waiting until … you know there’s going to be demand.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This in turn means no job security. If demand decreases, so does income – exactly what happened to rideshare drivers in the pandemic, with some reporting their incomes had halved or worse.</p>
<p>Rideshare workers’ only communication with their “employer” (their status as contractors is being disputed globally) is through a phone app, meaning interactions take the form of a game, with both parties trying to extract the most money. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/from-covid-anxiety-to-harassment-more-needs-to-be-done-on-safety-in-taxis-and-rideshare-services-149911">From COVID anxiety to harassment, more needs to be done on safety in taxis and rideshare services</a>
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<p>There is a built-in power asymmetry, however. For example, Uber withholds information about a passenger’s destination and the length of the proposed trip, which could help a driver gauge whether to accept a job.</p>
<p>With no human manager and effectively managed by an algorithm, many interviewees commented on the dehumanised nature of their interactions with Uber and their isolation from other drivers. Classified as independent contractors, they function as individual micro-businesses with no colleagues and no voice or influence in their organisation:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If you’re part of it, then you’re part of it. You know this is how things are going to be. So there’s no point questioning it because there is no human component to it, so there’s no one to question.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>On the COVID front line</h2>
<p>Because of their status as independent contractors, however, risk mitigation such as masks, sanitiser or plastic screens has been their own responsibility.</p>
<p>While Uber offered a $20 rebate for sanitiser in 2020, drivers reported a difficult application process, with many giving up. Drivers also felt they lacked preventive health education.</p>
<p>On top of increased precariousness and health risks, drivers also faced the consequences of COVID’s polarising effects. They reported picking up anti-mask, unvaccinated passengers, under pressure to accept the rides due to financial anxiety and the threat of poor ratings.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Especially at the beginning of the first COVID happening, a lot of customers didn’t really want to wear a mask … and I was wearing a mask obviously. But there’s some of them tried to reach for my mask and trying to make me take it off and being abusive and all this kind of thing.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>If drivers become infected with COVID-19, they often lack the financial resources to cover their household expenses. Their need to keep working then puts the wider community at risk, too.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The ‘Experiences with COVID-19 Among Gig Workers’ report was launched on March 24.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Risk but few rewards</h2>
<p>There have been trade union efforts to organise rideshare and delivery drivers, including an ongoing <a href="https://etu.nz/new-zealand-unions-take-on-uber/">Employment Court claim</a> seeking employment rights. As contractors, however, drivers are legally barred from full union membership – again denying drivers the means to communicate their grievances.</p>
<p>All of these structural features mean rideshare and delivery workers have been isolated, voiceless and highly vulnerable during the pandemic. Without protections such as sick pay or annual leave, gig workers also cannot choose to work from home. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/uncertainty-money-worries-and-stress-gig-workers-need-support-and-effective-ways-to-cope-177910">Uncertainty, money worries and stress – gig workers need support and effective ways to cope</a>
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<p>But, as some have argued, they are providing what can be regarded as an essential service, putting themselves at risk while delivering food and other goods to customers in isolation. </p>
<p>One of the many lessons of the pandemic is the urgent need for workers in the gig economy to have their voices heard. We all need to be more aware of the precarious and risky working conditions of the person who delivers our takeaways or takes us to a party. And we need to support worker-led collectivisation efforts.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178747/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Leon Salter receives funding from an MBIE Science Whitinga Fellowship. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mohan Jyoti Dutta receives funding from the Ministry of Justice and the Lottery Grants Board.</span></em></p>A recent study highlights the precarious world of rideshare and delivery drivers during the pandemic, and their struggle to be heard as non-unionised contractors.Leon Salter, Postdoctoral Fellow, Massey UniversityMohan Jyoti Dutta, Dean's Chair Professor, Massey UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1800542022-03-25T17:56:52Z2022-03-25T17:56:52ZP&O Ferries: how some companies can afford to break the law<p>A week after 800 P&O Ferries workers lost their jobs without notice, the CEO of the company is now <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60872294">facing calls</a> to lose his. Peter Hebblethwaite is under pressure from the UK government to resign after he <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/mar/24/po-ferries-boss-says-800-staff-were-sacked-because-no-union-would-accepts-its-plans">admitted</a> the company had broken the law. </p>
<p>Facing questions over the video call sacking of his employees, Hebblethwaite said P&O had decided not to engage with trade unions in advance of the move, in breach of UK employment law. He told a parliamentary hearing: “There’s absolutely no doubt we were required to consult with the unions. We chose not to do that.” </p>
<p>He added: “It was our assessment that […] no union could accept our proposals.”</p>
<p>The hearing looked uncomfortable for the CEO, who said he was trying to save the business and would make the same decision again. MPs did not hold back, with the the business committee chair, Darren Jones, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-60862883?at_campaign=KARANGA&at_medium=RSS">asking him</a>: “Are you in this mess because you don’t know what you’re doing, or are you just a shameless criminal?”</p>
<p>Another MP described recent events as a “tale of corporate thuggery where a huge company thinks it can break the law with impunity”.</p>
<p>For its part, P&O claims the company could not continue without the mass redundancies and says workers are receiving generous settlement packages – at least £15,000 – to compensate for the breaching of regulations.</p>
<p>Currently, individual workers sacked without notice would be able to use employment law to claim for up to <a href="https://ukandeu.ac.uk/po-ferries-and-employment-law/">90 days’ pay</a>. This cap allowed P&O to calculate in advance the amount it might be liable to pay – and then offer higher compensation settlements instead, making it hard for sacked employees to refuse the offer.</p>
<p>Effectively then, the company apparently chose to engage in what is known as an “<a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/efficient_breach">efficient breach</a>” of the rules. It worked out that adhering to its legal obligations to employees to engage in a consultation process was more costly than paying out settlements. The danger is that without statutory reform – as called for by one of the hearing witnesses – rich companies can simply choose to buy themselves out of the legal system in the same way. </p>
<p>Another danger lies in the fact that <a href="https://www.acas.org.uk/non-disclosure-agreements">non-disclosure agreements</a> (NDAs) are included in the severance agreements being offered to sacked P&O employees. These agreements prevent them from taking further legal action against their former employer or sharing sensitive information. </p>
<p>The use of NDAs in the UK, also knows as “confidentiality clauses” or “gagging orders”, has previously been criticised in relation to <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/crack-down-on-misuse-of-non-disclosure-agreements-in-the-workplace">various issues</a> including sexual harassment, racial discrimination and assault. </p>
<h2>Sinking wages</h2>
<p>The international workers replacing sacked British staff, performing demanding jobs looking after the safety of passengers, are expected to be paid an average of £5.50 to £6 per hour. P&O argue that these rates match international maritime standards, but they are far lower than the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/minimum-wage-rates-for-2022">UK national minimum wage,</a> which from April 1 2022 will be £9.50 per hour for those aged 23 and over. </p>
<p>Calls for an end to nationality-based pay discrimination – where companies pay non-UK workers less than their British colleagues – in the shipping industry <a href="https://www.hrmagazine.co.uk/content/other/call-for-an-end-to-nationality-based-pay-discrimination-in-the-shipping-industry">are nothing new</a>. But the P&O case shows that any attempts to resolve the issue have had little impact. </p>
<p>P&O estimate that using agency workers will cost around half what they used to spend on employees. They also argue it replicates the model adopted by competitors, highlighting the serious implications of a global downward wage spiral. </p>
<p>The 800 who lost their jobs last week meanwhile, may take some comfort in the backlash that has been launched against P&O. There has been calls for the government to ban their ships from sailing, and even seize the vessels. Transport secretary Grant Shapps accused Hebblethwaite of <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60872294">“breathtaking arrogance”</a> and said measures will be put forward in parliament next week which will seek to force P&O to either reinstate staff or pay new workers the national minimum wage.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pando-sacking-of-800-staff-shows-just-how-precarious-uk-jobs-can-be-179589">P&O: sacking of 800 staff shows just how precarious UK jobs can be</a>
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<p>P&O should also be wary of that other essential element of a successful business model – customers. In recent years many companies have been desperately trying to convince consumers that they are moving away from focusing on profits and shareholders towards an approach which prioritises social responsibility. </p>
<p>Sacking 800 workers, many via video link, could easily lead <a href="https://www.connexionfrance.com/article/French-news/P-O-Dover-Calais-line-still-cancelled-readers-plan-to-boycott-service">to a boycott</a> and serious reputational damage. P&O may have avoided financial bankruptcy for now, but if passengers consider the company to be morally bankrupt, stormy waters lie ahead.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/180054/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emma Sara Hughes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Employment law is all at sea.Emma Sara Hughes, Lecturer in Human Resource Management, University of LiverpoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1785512022-03-09T19:10:12Z2022-03-09T19:10:12ZWhat impact have Macron’s 2017 labour reforms had on social dialogue and employee representation?<p>In the context of the upcoming French presidential elections in 2022, what has been the impact of Emmanuel Macron’s controversial labour reforms introduced in 2017?</p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.strategie.gouv.fr/sites/strategie.gouv.fr/files/atoms/files/fs-2021-ordonnances-travail-rapport2021-_decembre.pdf">2021 report</a> by France Stratégie evaluating Macron’s 2017 labour reforms concludes that after four years, the implementation of measures to reform social dialogue and employee representation have been effective overall. <a href="https://www.strategie.gouv.fr/sites/strategie.gouv.fr/files/atoms/files/rapport_effet_de_la_mise_en_place_des_cse_sur_le_dialogue_social_etude_longitudinale_de_7_grandes_entreprises._universite_paris_est_0.pdf">Our study</a> of seven large companies contributed to the report’s analysis, concluding that the ambition to strengthen social dialogue is yet to be realised.</p>
<h2>In-depth study</h2>
<p>In 2017, unions contested the reforms, pushed through by decree, viewing them as part of a pro-business agenda to weaken the role of unions and employee representation. Part of the <a href="https://www.cse-guide.fr/guide-reforme-code-travail/ordonnances-macron/">wide-ranging reforms</a> aimed to strengthen social dialogue by simplifying the structures of employee representation.</p>
<p>The reforms required French companies to set up a new employee representative body, the <a href="https://www.cse-guide.fr/guide-reforme-code-travail/ordonnances-macron/#t-1601995246114">Comité social et économique</a> (social and economic committee, CSE) for firms with over 11 employees by December 2019. This new body merged three separate bodies, <em>délégués du personnel</em> (employee delegates, DP), <em>comité d'entreprise</em> (works council, CE) and the <em>comité d'hygiène, de santé et des conditions de travail</em> (health, safety and working conditions committee, CHSCT). Prior to the reforms, each of these bodies had a high degree of autonomy and access to institutional resources, in the form of time off for representative duties, budgets and regular meetings with management.</p>
<p>Our observations are based on an in-depth study assessing the implementation of this new representative body in seven large companies over an 18-month period during 2020-2021. The findings draw on over 150 interviews with managers and employee representatives in companies across retail, finance, energy and pharmaceuticals. <a href="https://www.strategie.gouv.fr/sites/strategie.gouv.fr/files/atoms/files/rapport_effet_de_la_mise_en_place_des_cse_sur_le_dialogue_social_etude_longitudinale_de_7_grandes_entreprises._universite_paris_est_0.pdf">Our research study</a> fed into the official France Stratégie evaluation committee’s <a href="https://www.strategie.gouv.fr/sites/strategie.gouv.fr/files/atoms/files/fs-2021-ordonnances-travail-rapport2021-_decembre.pdf">report published in December 2021</a>.</p>
<p>In our analysis, we focus on three structural tensions relating to the efficiency of social dialogue, either initially sought by the reforms or expected by company management. They are organised around three key terms: centralisation, simplification, and integration.</p>
<h2>Selective centralisation</h2>
<p>The centralisation of workplace representation was a consequence, either hoped by management, or feared by unions, of the merging of representative institutions. Overall, there was a desire on the part of management to break with what they saw <a href="https://www.strategie.gouv.fr/sites/strategie.gouv.fr/files/atoms/files/rapport_effet_de_la_mise_en_place_des_cse_sur_le_dialogue_social_etude_longitudinale_de_7_grandes_entreprises._universite_paris_est.pdf">as burdensome representative structures</a>. Eliminating the role of the DP, a role sanctioned to raise individual questions from employees with management, has meant that individual issues are more likely to be dealt with informally, and without record, with line managers or raised as collective ‘themes’ in CSE meetings.</p>
<p>Under the legislation there is provision for local representatives (<em>représentants de proximité</em>), <a href="https://www.cse-guide.fr/representant-proximite/#:%7E:text=%2C%20page%2021">to maintain links with employees</a>. However, the rights and responsibilities attributed to this role are negotiated at company level. There was uncertainty on both sides about the role of local representatives and we observed a variety of different responses in our case study companies. Union representatives in one company said they decided not to introduce local representatives, as they had no legal rights, but the majority of companies implemented some form of local representatives. In another company, an ad hoc committee was set up within the CSE to replicate the DP function, and to deal with and bring up individual questions from employees.</p>
<p>While some companies’ management used the reforms to restructure and centralise onerous employee representation, in others, managers and unions tried to find ways to maintain existing forms of local dialogue and representation.</p>
<h2>Unrealised simplification</h2>
<p>Our research shows that for both management and unions the organisation of employee representation has been significantly disrupted by the introduction of the new body and has introduced a level of complexity that runs counter to <a href="https://www.strategie.gouv.fr/sites/strategie.gouv.fr/files/atoms/files/rapport_effet_de_la_mise_en_place_des_cse_sur_le_dialogue_social_etude_longitudinale_de_7_grandes_entreprises._universite_paris_est.pdf">the reform’s aim of simplifying employee representation</a>. </p>
<p>The merging of the representative bodies shifted large parts of the debate to the peripheral committees that come under the CSE. Our findings suggest that having one representative body did not lead to a more efficient dialogue in plenary meetings, one reason being that there was a greater number of representatives in the CSE. In addition, from both management and union sides, there was a need for greater levels of preparation and coordination between committees prior to the meetings, which they considered time-consuming and far from simple.</p>
<p>From management’s perspective, the potential to block management decisions by the health and safety committee (CHSCT) or block management time with meetings dealing with individual questions (DP) is weaker and therefore employer discretion is greater. On the flipside, the union representatives felt a sense of loss from the disappearance of these bodies and, in some cases, there was resistance to the transfer to the new structures.</p>
<h2>Incomplete integration</h2>
<p>For some companies’ management, union pluralism was viewed as hampering dialogue and decision-making within representative bodies. This is potentially a greater issue in large companies where there are often multiple unions competing in elections for representative positions. Management expressed the wish for the CSE to be less of a deliberative forum for unions’ competing views but centred on discussion geared toward decision-making, with the CSE speaking as a collective actor.</p>
<p>In this ongoing transitionary phase, unions have been largely concerned with making sense of the new structures, adapting, and gaining and/or maintaining a fair representation. It remains to be seen over the longer term if a greater level of integration, in both form and content of the new representative structures can be achieved.</p>
<h2>Reform ambitions and realities</h2>
<p>The period during which our study was conducted needs to be taken into account, as the health crisis, still ongoing at the time of finalising the research, has also disrupted social dialogue by putting critical issues on the social agenda and changing the conditions under which the bodies meet. The actors involved in social dialogue have had to learn how to maintain dialogue at a distance and deal with issues at an accelerated pace.</p>
<p>Even so, our research <a href="https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---dgreports/---dcomm/---publ/documents/publication/wcms_833561.pdf">supports existing arguments</a> that show a gap between the ambitions of the reform and the perceptions of the social partners. While the government emphasised new dynamics for social dialogue and more flexibility at firm and sector levels, unions have felt weakened by the reform process and by the manner in which social dialogue has been conducted over recent years.</p>
<p>The year 2022-23 is a crucial period for unions to renegotiate existing CSE agreement, as this will be the second round of workplace elections under the new structure. Unions have made <a href="https://www.cfdt.fr/portail/debats/reflexions-/-contributions/contribution-de-la-cfdt-au-rapport-du-comite-d-evaluation-des-ordonnances-de-decembre-2021-srv1_1206144">claims</a> for revisions to the existing provisions, including <a href="https://www.cgt.fr/actualites/france/interprofessionnel/dialogue-social/ordonnances-macron-bilan-dun-dialogue-social-degrade">making local representatives mandatory</a>.</p>
<p>With the primacy given to company bargaining, the loosening of restrictions on redundancies in combination with the disruption and weakened institutional power of representative bodies, the 2017 reforms are part of a longer-term trend in France of <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0959680119852268">state-led decentralisation</a> and <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/trajectories-of-neoliberal-transformation/stateled-liberalization-and-the-transformation-of-worker-representation-in-france/DB8ACF4B0A4C88A3D8310728C25B22C4">neoliberal transformation</a> of employment relations.</p>
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<p><em>Authors who contributed to this article : <a href="https://irg.univ-paris-est.fr/titre-par-defaut-1/titre-par-defaut-23">Rémi Bourguignon</a> (Université Paris Est Créteil, IRG, scientific coordinator), <a href="http://idhes.ens-paris-saclay.fr/version-francaise/haut-de-page/annuaire/de-becdelievre-pauline-401118.kjsp">Pauline de Becdelièvre</a> (ENS Paris-Saclay, IDHES), <a href="https://www.printemps.uvsq.fr/mme-elodie-bethoux">Élodie Béthoux</a> (UVSQ, Université Paris-Saclay, Printemps), <a href="https://www.grenoble-em.com/annuaire/heather-connolly">Heather Connolly</a> (Grenoble Ecole de Management), <a href="https://irisso.dauphine.fr/fr/membres/detail-cv/profile/arnaud-mias.html">Arnaud Mias</a> (Université Paris Dauphine-PSL, IRISSO), Paul Tainturier (IAE Paris Sorbonne, GREGOR)</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178551/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Heather Connolly a reçu des financements de France Stratégie. </span></em></p>A study shows that the ambition to strengthen social dialogue is yet to be realised in France.Heather Connolly, Associate Professor of Employment Relations, Grenoble École de Management (GEM)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1772512022-02-18T08:34:36Z2022-02-18T08:34:36ZWhy formal employment is not a guaranteed path to social equality<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/446770/original/file-20220216-15-15se0i3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">House painter Emanuel Chisiya and other jobseekers wait for casual jobs work offers on the side of a road in Cape Town. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The theme of this year’s World Day of Social Justice is “<a href="https://www.un.org/en/observances/social-justice-day">Achieving Social Justice through Formal Employment</a>”. Gaining access to formal employment can greatly reduce poverty. As it is, <a href="https://www.un.org/en/observances/social-justice-day">more than 60% of the working population in the world</a> – 2 billion people globally – eke out a living in the informal economy. In theory, formal employment provides a more stable income, social protection and employment-related benefits.</p>
<p>However, the reality is that many formal sector jobs are increasingly precarious and do not provide any of these benefits, meaning that formal work is not a guaranteed path to greater social equality. </p>
<p>Internationally, there has been a rise in so-called <a href="https://www.workrightscentre.org/what-is-precarious-work">precarious work</a>. While there is no single definition of precarious work, it is generally used to refer to insecure, poorly-paid work and work without access to benefits, such as medical aid. Examples of these forms of work include seasonal work, casual work, <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/05/what-gig-economy-workers/">gig work</a> and agency work, what is most often called <a href="https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/za/Documents/process-and-operations/ZA_Labour%20broking%20and%20outsourcing%20-%20FP.pdf">labour broking</a> in South Africa.</p>
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Read more:
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<p>In South Africa, these various forms of precarious work have increased substantially. Between 2004 and 2017 the number of people employed in the ‘non-core’ segment, another term for precarious work, <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/338546087_Challenging_workplace_inequality_precarious_workers'_institutional_and_associational_power_in_Gauteng_South_Africa?_sg%5B0%5D=PFQYPwslD7Eyxxxhw7dqOjoV_mNWkOTcdhDd01CeNwYKEDtPH2gILIfOU6ujYSZW9zrTXsDBWHujwQi9DNZzbCJJo9GCGnE6MoFRVair.soYdW0Ll4ra_pChwfPlOujVbvRqs96zoKBu3c57Ppe5XXGIOarRuwkgVmB2ubXZnilOegXRIu6mHpbVz8FYTfg">increased by 71%,</a> two times faster than in the formal or informal sectors of the labour market. As a result, it is estimated that four out of ten workers in the formal sector may be in some form of precarious work.</p>
<p>These workers are likely <a href="https://www.wider.unu.edu/publication/how-large-wage-penalty-labour-broker-sector">to earn, on average, half of what a permanent worker</a> makes and they are more likely to suffer violations of their basic labour rights, such as not receiving paid sick leave. Such forms of precarious work entrench inequality and poverty rather than achieving the goal of social justice.</p>
<h2>Decent work for all?</h2>
<p>The UN Sustainable Development Goals include the creation of so-called <a href="https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal8">decent work</a>. Decent work is defined as work that provides a fair income, security, social protection, the prospects for personal development and the right to organise at work.</p>
<p>Decent work is, therefore, about more than simply getting more people into work. The challenge is to create socially transformative labour markets that can create employment for inclusive, prosperous and equitable societies.</p>
<p>However, South Africa’s record in this regard is patchy.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201811/42060gon1303act9of2018.pdf">national minimum wage</a>, which was introduced in 2019, was and continues to be set at a level that does not cover basic needs.</p>
<p>In October 2021, the NGO the <a href="https://pmbejd.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/PMBEJD_Media-Statement_October-2021_27102021.pdf">Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice and Dignity Group</a>, found that the cost of the average household food basket was R4,317.56 a month. </p>
<p>Yet a worker earning the national minimum wage and fortunate enough to be in full-time employment (45 hours a week) would only have earned R3,904 in a month. Not enough to cover just basic food items, never mind costs for transport, electricity and a range of other essential items.</p>
<p>The data provided by the NGO is based on tracking food prices on the most commonly bought food items, such as maize meal, rice and bread, in 44 supermarkets in working class areas of the country. This provides the real cost of basic items rather than estimates based on rates of inflation. And, therefore, provides real insight to the extent to which many of those working in the formal sector are ‘<a href="http://nationalminimumwage.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/NMW-RI-Fact-Sheet-2.pdf">working poor</a>’. </p>
<p>For the range of precarious workers who may not even work 45 hours a week due to the increasing use of variable hour or <a href="https://www.newframe.com/zero-hours-contracts-are-a-poverty-sentence/#:%7E:text=Under%20zero%20hours%20contracts%20%E2%80%93%20which,South%20African%20economy%20are%20rubbish">zero hours</a> contracts, their situation is even worse.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-young-people-in-the-niger-delta-are-being-left-out-of-development-143642">How young people in the Niger Delta are being left out of development</a>
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<p>Achieving greater social justice through formal employment is only a realistic possibility if such work provides, at least, a living wage and protection of labour rights.</p>
<p>But it is estimated that <a href="https://www.africaportal.org/publications/measuring-multidimensional-labour-law-violation-application-south-africa/">60 per cent of the workforce</a> in South Africa experience some violation of their labour rights. Yet most of these violations go unreported. In the context of <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/?p=14957">high unemployment</a>, workers fear reporting these labour violations for fear of dismissal.</p>
<p>Even when workers do report their employers <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/09500170211015081">the road to justice can be long</a>, as I have been documenting for a number of years following labour broker workers seeking to access their rights to permanent employment.</p>
<h2>Tackling precarious employment</h2>
<p>One positive intervention that the state has made in attempting to address precarious employment has been its attempt to regulate the use of labour broking. </p>
<p>Labour broking is when a company provides workers to client companies, supposedly on a temporary basis. However, very often labour broker workers work for years at the same company, performing the same work as permanent workers for inferior wages and no benefits. </p>
<p>In 2014 the Labour Relations Act was <a href="https://www.gov.za/sites/default/files/gcis_document/201501/37921gon629.pdf">amended</a> to restrict labour broking to work of a genuinely temporary nature. It requires that labour broker workers become permanent employees of the client company after three months. While this was not the ban on labour broking that the labour federation Congress of South African Trade Unions <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/business-report/opinion/cosatu-demands-ban-on-labour-brokers-1961638">called for</a> it was, in theory, a significant step forward in the rights for labour broker workers.</p>
<p>However, the path to gaining these rights has been arduous for many workers.</p>
<p>When workers open cases against their employers, either at the <a href="https://www.ccma.org.za/">Commission for Conciliation, Mediation & Arbitration</a> or at <a href="https://www.gov.za/services/trade-unions/register-bargaining-council">bargaining councils</a> – which solve labour disputes – employers often victimise workers and continually delay proceedings in the hope that the workers will give up their case.</p>
<p>Furthermore, many of these workers take up these cases themselves as most precarious workers do not belong to unions. Indeed, only just over a quarter (27%) of the total formally employed workforce is <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/publications/P0211/P02113rdQuarter2021.pdf">unionised</a>, the majority of whom are workers in skilled and supervisory positions. Yet the rules of representation at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation & Arbitration and bargaining councils only permit representatives of registered trade unions or lawyers to represent workers in these forums.</p>
<p>This puts non-unionised workers in a David versus Goliath situation where they must follow the rules of the Commission and argue their case while facing, at least, trained human resources professionals or, at worst, several lawyers from some of the most prestigious law firms in the country.</p>
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Read more:
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<p>Workers complain that they often feel pressured by Commission for Conciliation, Mediation & Arbitration commissioners, who are themselves <a href="http://www.dpru.uct.ac.za/sites/default/files/image_tool/images/36/DPRU%20WP09-137.pdf">performance managed</a> on how many cases a day they settle, into accepting settlements that do not resolve the injustice that they seek to address.</p>
<p>Thus, it has been estimated that as much as <a href="https://www.news24.com/fin24/economy/80-of-labour-broker-workers-should-be-deemed-permanent-20180826-2">80% of labour broker</a> workers have not been deemed permanent and continue to work in precarious conditions.</p>
<h2>Achieving social justice</h2>
<p>Getting a formal sector job is not on its own going to create greater social equality. Workers need a living wage and an environment in which rights are protected and enforced.</p>
<p>This requires both strong state enforcement and the organisation of workers.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2021-03-02-labour-pains-trade-union-membership-has-declined-badly-and-bosses-are-calling-the-shots/">Declining rates of unionistation</a> among workers is a result of the increasing precarious nature of work, and the limited responses that unions have had to this.</p>
<p>However, workers are not waiting for unions to come and organise them and have taken the initiative to organise themselves in a variety of sectors and, in many cases, are successfully winning their demands.</p>
<p>Yet, such workers formations are excluded from the labour institutions. One advance that could be made in promoting social justice through formal employment would be to recognise all forms of worker organisation, and afford them greater rights in protecting and advancing worker rights.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/177251/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Carin Runciman receives funding from the National Research Foundation. Between 2016 and 2021 she was a management committee member of the Casual Workers Advice Office, a NGO dedicated towards the rights of precarious workers. </span></em></p>Many formal sector jobs are increasingly precarious and poorly paid, meaning that formal work is not an avenue to greater social equality for many people.Carin Runciman, Director, Centre for Social Change, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.