UK Strikes: What Can Starmer Learn from Blair and Callaghan?

With a number of public sector unions pledging renewed strike action going into this year, the wave of strikes which have effected the UK since 2022 show no sign of stopping in this new government. What can the Government learn from previous strikes?

Last week the government successfully struck a deal with ASLEF, a rail union whose strike action over pay has significantly disrupted service over the last few months. The Department of Transport agreed to a 15% pay rise, an increase that drew derision from Conservative politicians.

Less than 48 hours later, ASLEF announced new strike action on a separate dispute relating to working conditions.

The reaction from the opposition was swift, with leadership hopeful James Cleverly describing the government as having been “played by its union paymasters”. This event has led to some characterising the government as unable to deal effectively with industrial action.

Even those within public sector unions fear that by agreeing to pay demands in certain sectors, others may strike for parity as well as under the belief that the government are too weak to stand up to their demands.

What is the Government’s Policy Towards Unions?

The Government has so far been broadly supportive of union rights.

Most centrally, they have pledged the repeal of the 2016 Trade Union act which require 40% of members to vote in favour of a strike and 50% turnout for public sector strike action to be recognised. Strike Ballots would require only a simple majority to achieve recognition.

With the Government easing ballot requirements, Labour is likely to receive scrutiny as strike action continues into the year.

The Prime Minister’s willingness to negotiate with unions is likely inspired by the perceived failure of the previous government’s hardline approach which ended up costing the government more than it would than if they gave in to pay demands.

With the scale of public sector unrest, should the government compromise with unions, or should it take a more hardline stance?

How Tony Blair Stopped Industrial Action

Blair was far less accommodating of public sector strikes than Starmer has been and this made sense.

Blair’s leadership was deeply fearful of being seen by unions or the public as being willing to give in to pressure. It was this perception that caused a twenty year string of defeats for the party in the aftermath of the Winter of Discontent.

In 1998, Blair gave his first speech to the TUC as Prime Minister with a clear message: “You run the unions. We run the government. We will never confuse the two again”.

Still, despite drawing clear red lines, Blair was keen to emphasise that the government would hand down working improvements from above. In his speech to the TUC he drew attention to the introduction of the minimum wage and greater investment in public services.

According to ONS figures, Blair oversaw the lowest numbers of strikes since records began in 1891.

Comparisons from between Tony Blair and Keir Starmer have practically become cliché. However, Starmer has not been as lucky as Blair.

Blair came to power at a time of relatively low inflation and weak public sector unions. In his first five years of office, public sector disputes were small and localised. When Labour faced its first major public sector strike action, when the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) voted for strike action a month after Blair’s election, it was localised entirely in Essex, due to the county council’s decision to cut Firefighter jobs and pay.

However, Blair’s record shows the downsides of just ignoring strikers. The Government’s disregard of the strike led to deteriorating relations with the FBU. When the union balloted for a national strike in 2002, it received an unprecedented 95% in favour. The strike was the first major national public sector strike of Blair’s leadership.

With strikes being such a minor occurrence and with the Government’s perceived deafness to their demands, the strike was popular with the country as a whole. It was hoped by some FBU members that this popularity would translate into solidarity strikes. However, with a generally well-paid public sector, none did.

The government eventually commissioned the Bain Review later that year, which concluded that the pay-rise would be paid over the course of a number of years, but that the FBU would have to “modernise” by improving what the report considered to be unequal and discriminatory practices.

The FBU accused Blair of making an example out of the FBU, but they eventually gave in to the demands of the review. Although the FBU achieved their goals, the controlled and conditional response from the government presented Blair as maintaining control over the situation.

Starmer faces far greater public sector unrest. In addition to train drivers,

The predicted strike action among council employees will not be isolated to individual local authorities like they were under Blair. Financial problems are hitting local governments across the country with no sign of stopping.

The Winter of Discontent

The lessons of the Labour government are well-remembered in British politics. In the background of rampant inflation, unions believed that the government would give in to pay concessions. Every new success emboldened future strikes

Many have made comparisons from the current round strikes and that of 1970s.

Just like in the 1970s, the government faces significant fiscal problems. The Government have frequently emphasised the “dire inheritance” of public finances.

In the 1976 Labour Party conference, Chancellor Dennis Healey told affiliated unions that the present state of public finances was unsustainable, effectively begging public sector unions not to strike in favour of pay rises in line with inflation.

Needless to say, this didn’t work. The government’s pleas were taken as weakness by unions. trike action would escalate in the following years. This time around it’s worked slightly better.

Leaked WhatsApp messages from one of the leaders of the junior doctors strike advised doctors to take the government’s deal and to avoid strike action for the following year. It stated that with the government repeatedly describing the poor state of the government’s finances, it would be unlikely that they would budge.

Additionally, the hard-line taken on rebels against the two-child benefit cap, previously covered by Chamber UK, was cited by the message as a reason why striking would be difficult.

Rather than coming across as flailing as it did under Callaghan, Labour’s rhetoric on austere public finances comes across as strong.

The failure of unions is likely to renew unfavourable comparisons with the 1970s.

However, this is one crucial difference with the 1970s. Unions are far weaker.

Despite the TUC celebrating a 0.2% increase in union membership in 2023, the 2020s have seen the lowest union membership in absolute terms since the 1930s. Unions also have significantly less influence over the party itself than they did under Callaghan.

The balance between the state and unions has shifted dramatically over the last fifty years.

Final Thought

Despite comparisons to the winter of discontent, Starmer is dealing with public sector unrest that has no clear historical parallel.

There aren’t clear parallels with Tony Blair’s ministry either. A Blairist strategy of simply ignoring strikers will be difficult.

The Government will have to navigate a Labour climate that no Labour government has yet faced. It’s because of this that the government’s approach has been more accommodating than Blair.

However, Callaghan’s failures show the difficulty in charting a course that simultaneously doesn’t anger workers to the point of striking, but doesn’t convince unions that the government will always give in.

History shows how difficult such a balance is.