As the TUC conference opens today, more Brits would condemn strike action against public sector job cuts than condone it, our survey for the Sunday Times reveals.
45% of the public would oppose trade unions taking strike action against job cuts in the public sector, compared to the 35% who would support strike action, and a further 20% who are undecided.
The results come in light of research by the GMB union, which revealed that 150,000 public sector jobs have already been axed or are in danger of being axed due to Government spending cuts. Several unions have threatened co-ordinated strike action in response. Union giants Public and Commercial Services Union and Unison, who have 1.7 million members between them, are said to be signing a deal this week to co-ordinate strike action, while another union, Unite, has promised to form a coalition with other unions to fight the spending cuts.
Les Bayliss, who hopes to become General Secretary of union Unite, has pointed out that strike action would only deprive vulnerable people of the same services the Government cuts would reduce, saying that ‘strikes change the victims, our members, into the villains of the piece.’
Notwithstanding, union leaders will be meeting at the TUC conference today, doubtless to discuss plans to prevent the Government’s proposed spending cuts – of which strike action is one possible, but perhaps not the most publicly popular, option.
