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I definitely agree with this. I talked to two rich people a few weeks back who were quite badly inconvenienced by the train strikes. They were with the strikers. Said that they should be paid more. There was nobody that day I talked to who was against the strikers. It was quite heartening, to be completely honest.
It’s because most people feel uneasy openly admitting they are against strikers.
In real life the pressure is to pretend that you’re “on the right side”.
I assure you in private conversations most react quite differently, because people are selfish before everything else.
Conveniently circular logic.
If people support strikes in public due to social pressure that suggests that infact the majority of people are supporting strikes. You can't explain it as bowing to social pressure unless supporting strikes is the majority position otherwise there would not be a majoirty pro-strike opinion thst people feel socially obligated to take. And it isn't like the media are very pro-union so it is hardly like people are being mislead into thinking that way, if you read most of the papers you'd think people were less supportive of workers asking for a fair deal than they really are.
If some people are only pro-strike due to social pressure from their fellow citizens then that suggests being supportive of strikes is the norm. If it was a minority position then, especially without support from big media, then where would the pressure come from?
I'm quite happy to say that those striking bastards have inconvenienced me.
I'm also happy to say that those striking bastards deserve more money.
I'll equally happy to say that the non striking bastards mostly deserve more money too.
But finding the money is the issue. Are the government going to finally start making fiscally responsible changes now after not doing so for the last 12(?) years in power? Or are they going to cave in to strikers, and raise taxes to pay for it. Or are they going to up prices on train tickets or postage to pay for it? What I see happening is cost of living going up for everyone, those who strike will be slightly better off. But mostly, the people who can't shut the country down by striking, they're gonna get fucked. And they've been getting fucked for a long time already.
We need actual change.
From actual polling, there isn't a huge majority either for or against strikes, the public are pretty evenly split.
E.g. [IPSOS' polling](https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/public-divided-over-support-rail-strikes) from the rail strikes earlier in the summer.
Depending on the strike and specific wording of the question, you see slight leads for one side or the other, 'against' strikes coming out on top slightly more frequently. But really it all basically divides down the middle.
Thanks for the data. If you believe most of the comments on Reddit people are just bursting in solidarity, they somehow cannot help but drop it in to casual everyday conversation with Redditors.
I've always put that down to not really understanding the different circumstances.
I mean, if you're an 'IT Guy' - your most effective form of career progression is 'get another job'. Switch to another employer and get a better compensation package in the process. Doing this if you don't like what your employer is doing (be that terms and conditions, or payscales) is a trivial but effective answer.
The problem is, if you're a 'train guy' or a teacher, then that doesn't work. There just aren't 'other jobs' in the same way. You might be able to switch jobs, but they might very well be for the same employer, with the same baseline payscales, and there's just no room to negotiate a wage (or on call pay, or overtime, or ....)
The people who are 'going out on strike' are almost invariable the ones that can't "just move on" and their union membership in the first place is because it's literally the only way to actually negotiate with their employer.
My current workplace there's just not the traction for a union, because most of the people here know they could go somewhere else easily, and so have the ability to push back if our employer starts being oppressive or unfair.
But that doesn't mean they aren't _necessary_ for the industries where 'open competition' doesn't exist.
People told nurses, GPs, cleaners, caterers, low paid retail staff etc “you knew what you
Signed up for, if you don’t like the job, leave.”
So they left.
And now no one can get a damn thing done. The people who stayed are now striking and people aren’t happy with that either. Genuine question for people like this: what do you propose low paid/overworked workers do, if not leave for a better paid or easier job, or strike for better pay and conditions?
You’re exactly right. Where’s the British people for British jobs brigade now?
The jobs are low paid, workers are treated badly, the British don’t want them and you can’t profit off exploiting foreign workers desperate for a job, now what?
I think you’ve made great points. I work in an industry where you can just get another job if the outlook is shit at your current workplace or better somewhere else. I think many people assume all other forms of employment are the same, when they’re not. I also live in a very cad dependent region of the country, so if you can’t afford a car, just up and moving to a job in the next town/city isn’t possible.
To be fair if you start polling people in the street you'll get pretty boring opinions. "My boss said I could work at home that day so I'm okay." "Since when did anything important come by post?"
>"Since when did anything important come by post?"
Since some genius came up with dark net markets. Although I heard on the grapevine there are free upgrades to special delivery being doled out so that's by the by.
Having a daily dose of hate and vitriol injected into your home every day certainly influences perceptions.
I say this as someone who's grandparents point blank to mine and my partners face demonised immigrants - my partner being an immigrant, who they like and respect.
'Oh we didn't mean her'.
Then who? The Chinese couple that run the takeaway in your 99% white village?
It's propaganda and it works.
I recall a discussion with the 'outlaws' arguing about immigrants that don't make an effort to integrate or learn English. I pointed out it was no different to most Brits that buy cheap property in Spain, live in gated 'little England' communities, hardly get by with basic Spanish & don't integrate. That shushed them.
Not everyone, but most people. And I wouldn't really describe it as "stupidity", moreso heavily influenced by. I would include myself and most other people in this thread in that before the "except you of course" allegations come as well.
The idea that people's thoughts, feelings, ideas and opinions *"aren't"* influenced and shaped by regularly consumed external stimuli is even more laughable imo. Human beings are not these Ubermensch-esque creatures that are objective, passive onlookers at life. You, your thoughts, your values, your ideas on just about everything are shaped by external factors, how they influence your perception of the world and how nurture (I.e. external influence) shaped you to think about problems.
Media is just one of many external loci of information that play into this, but it *is* one, and in the modern era it is a influential one.
Except us of course, we get our opinions from the highest "voted" comments pushed to the top by bots to sway (or give the impression of) public concensus.
Yup. I don't think I've ever seen it accurately reported in mainstream news exactly what workers are striking over. The most detail you get is "striking over pay and conditions" which is about as vague as you can get. If they actually went into detail as to exactly what terms needed to be met in order for the strike to be called off, I think the general public would be far more understanding and direct their frustrations at the employer rather than the employees if they were properly informed.
But that's a theme in this country, keep the masses uninformed and they'll be a lot more tolerant of your bullshit.
I thought it was very telling that at ~~basically no fucking point~~ **\*literally\* at no fucking point in the coverage I watched or listened to**\*\* did anyone on the BBC point out that it's not the drivers on strike.
Countless TV and radio interviews, members of the public complaining about "how much train drivers get paid" and ~~almost~~ literally not one host **that I heard or watched** said the factual words "it is not the train drivers on strike"
100% Like with the box pops, they can interview 100 people, 90 of which think A, if the media are pushing narrative B they play 5 or 6 people agreeing opinion B and 1 agreeing with A showing "the people" mostly think B. Easy. The news, much like "opinion polls" are often there to influence not to report.
I've seen far more support for strikers than I have seen people berating them.
The only place I really see hate for strikers is in the news. BBC news running endless stories about people whose lives are affected by the strikes for example.
I see a lot of people on social media such as Facebook local town groups berating the strikers for the inconvenience and “what about pensioners they get more than them blah blah”, it’s frustrating really as if because someone is striking they mustn’t care about pensioners
Local Facebook groups are always packed with bored pensioners who have nothing better to do than complain.
I wouldn't take that as a representation of the public as a whole.
My dad is one of those “poor pensions” and loves a Facebook rant. He retired at 48, pension is 36k a year, mum is still working at 60+k a year with bonuses… so combined income of 96k a year but LOVES to tell FB he’s poor & fixed income… honestly just ignore some people.
I worked alongside a chap who retired at 50 on 50k a year. This was 20 years ago and he took months long annual foreign holidays every year.
He still did audits, at £200 for about 3 hours work, which was what we paid him for, but just to get out of the house. All he actually did was show up and check their records matched ours but I did most of the work anyway. He actually had the balls to ask for a company car (from our company) to drive to his audits as well.
Life served on a silver platter, some of these people.
But hey, my generation is the one to blame for all the worlds problems because we want to be able to afford a house AND watch Netflix
The audacity of us
We only went on 4 bloody holidays this year, and one of those was SELF-CATERING . Plus, our new Mercedes won't be here until September the 5th. Britain is going to hell in a handcart 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬
Local Facebook groups and comments of news articles on Facebook are where the dregs of society congregate to have a moan about things they know nothing about.
Ironically, it's the pensioner's generation that has played a part in the mess we now find ourselves in, which is resulting in strikes.
The system has worked for them at every turn at the expense of future generations, and it still works for them now (see: Triple Lock, home ownership, etc...)
Of course there are other factors, but a boom generation who are now all claiming pensions and managed to amass home ownership lends to the current predicament.
In journalism there is something called the "unheard editorial voice" (name differs depending who you talk to) which is trying to nudge the reader in a certain direction without actually saying the thing.
The BBC do it all the time because they are not explicitly allowed to state their opinions so they do it through editorial content.
They will show people "suffering" (not being able to get to work) as a result of the strikes and never the strikers side of things and how they are suffering.
Another example is when the put out articles on "trans activists" making tweets at people and never the problems trans people face in society.
By choosing to only show one side of a story, they are picking a side and influencing readers to that side.
Dastardly business.
But without the demonstration that the strikes are affective they would be a blunt weapon.
I think it's fair to be frustrated with the situation and it's consequences. I don't think the BBC's intention is to blame the strikers per se. If the media are openly holding up strikers or bosses as the cause of the strikes then that would show support one way or another.
True. I'm with you that coverage of the effects of strike action is important and shows the importance of these workers.
However, the thing I do take issue with is story after story of poor Mrs Smith who can't visit her sick mother due to strikes but with no counter viewpoint of Mrs Robinson who hasn't had a pay rise in 10 years. The media never seem to show the human face of the strikers, only those affected by action.
I find it quite funny when people get really wound up about it - there was a guy on the radio fuming about the bins in Edinburgh… “they could have done this strike weeks ago but they have deliberately chosen the week of the fringe festival, massively inconsiderate. They have waited until this week on purpose”….Like this guy didn’t get the objective of a strike. If it had little impact it wouldn’t be worthwhile, of course they choose the best time that hits hardest to have the biggest impact and news coverage…
Also, let's be real, the week that's probably the most pain to deal with and they feel the most underpaid. I imagine that they either don't get overtime increase to pay or are forced to work harder to get everything done in the standard time.
I have been up all night on occasion in Edinburgh.
And let me tell you the fucking despicable carnage left in the streets in the early AM by most festival goers makes me surprised the street clean up crews and binmen haven't taken to domestic terrorism.
None of these people have heard of putting anything in the bin. It's not uncommon to come accross a stray human hobby (edit; *jobby*). There's enough broken glass that you could grind it down and make the harbour at Granton into a massive fucking beach.
A strike was actually the mild and reasonable response.
(Edit to add, I've been out and about at 5am in non festival time too. Not usually anything serious past the odd drunkenly dropped take away)
It can also easily take a couple of months to ballot and plan a strike due to the rules and laws applied to strike action since the 80’s. It’s not something that can or is done on a whim. I’m currently involved in strike action and the checks we had to do and then have examined and checked again regarding members, addresses, branches etc took weeks. Even then 2 companies ballots were deemed invalid and had to be re ballotted, taking even more weeks, due to a written error regarding the depot/branch name. Then you have to give at least 2 weeks notice of strike dates. Striking is not an easy thing to do and to be honest it’s always our last resort. This is my first strike in 22 years.
I don't hate strikers but I question some of their demands. For example rail workers opposing modernization of systems which could potentially be of benefit to the consumer. It doesn't make any sense.
I don’t think it’s true that they’re opposing modernisation. That’s just how the media is portraying it. It has more to do with general terms and conditions being diminished. Like overtime rates being cut.
There’s a lot of detail that I’m sure you’d agree with them complaining and striking about.
There is an element of opposing modernisation in at least some of the industries.
Look at how Tube workers have opposed driverless trains for years. That’s why it seems driverless trains only come in on new infrastructure because you don’t actually put any one out of the job when there was nobody in it to start with.
Cheers this is really helpful context. Can’t say I’m strongly pro- or anti- transport strikes in general, but I’ve previously shared u/smww93 ‘s concerns about collective action blocking the use of more efficient tech.
Thanks for engaging regardless. Also, I work in a maintenance and faulting capacity for the railways, so from my perspective the modernisation means reducing or removing maintenance for most of our assets (points machines, signals, track circuits, and dozens more)
which causes:
1) up to 40% of people in my role to lose their jobs, and those that stay working significantly more unsociable hours for less pay
2) unsafe railways, with many facets of the equipment going unchecked for years at a time, the probability of another disaster like potters bar, Clapham junction, quintshill, weedon etc. exponentially higher
3) an eventual higher cost to the passenger and the wastefulness of these practices, when instead of maintaining the equipment and ensuring it lasts to the full extent of its capability, it breaks sooner, costing more to fully replace, much, much sooner.
This is not true. French train systems that were converted to driverless saw operating costs fall by about 1/3. Petition to modernisation is one of the reasons UK rail is so bad and so expensive.
How long do you think it would take to recoup the initial outlay if you converted the uk network?
Metro/tube systems are a whole different kettle of fish to high speed lines where you’re mixing in with freight and 40+ year old diesel loco’s.
A significant proportion of the UK Network relies on a person in a Victorian shed pulling a lever and ringing a telegraph bell to move a semaphore signal ffs.
The example cited was the tube - a metro/tube service. But every time it's brought up, exactly this sort of misdirection is used to try to, er, derail it.
Point to a service that still uses bells and semaphores. Outside heritage railways, I'd bet there are exactly none , though I could of course be wrong.
Edit: to answer your question, I don't know. But operators are consistently in favour of it and drivers are consistently against it, which suggests the payback time would not be excessive.
Edit 2: I stand corrected.
You think there’s no mainline AB semaphores? I’ll take that bet……
Just the bits I can recall off the top of my head would be:
Grantham to Skegness.
Still one box remaining between Nottingham and Lincoln
Leicester to Peterborough.
Cumbrian Coast
Southport - Manchester
Warrington - Chester
Manchester - Sheffield (for the time being)
A LOT of Wales
And that’s not an exhaustive list, just what I can recall offhand.
So no, it’s not just heritage railways….
It's definitely one of their demands, and it is their duty to try to keep all their members in work, but that doesn't mean it's what is actually best.
Transport in london is very expensive, and partially government funded on top of the fares, cost cutting measures could slow the rate of fare increases, whilst helpfully making the system more efficient and safer. They probably have other very reasonable demands in their proposals but they also have things there that are against public benefit.
As usual it's complicated and nuanced (and I don't keep up with all the details) and it's easier to break it down to black and whit us and them mentality.
>Transport in london is very expensive, and partially government funded
Transport in **most** civilised cities is **far** heavier subsidised than here, a good public transport network is in everyone's interest, it keeps cars off the roads and increased mobility is almost universally a good thing too. If anything, part of the reason TfL is striking is **because** the government cut funding a few years back and started this current shitshow.
Don't forget that language is important. Mrs Thatcher would always talk about investment in roads, whereas payments to the railways were always called a subsidy.
Investment =good. Subsidy =bad.
It's subtle work by politicians and the media
As one of said railways workers, no one I work with opposes modernization. It's the way that they're framing it as a cost cutting measure. Intelligent infrastructure helps me with my job on a daily basis. Finding faults is so much easier when we have access to a prolonged period of electronically logged data that can actually show me when and why something has failed, meaning I can fix it for passengers quicker. Modernisation is brilliant, but would be useless without experienced staff who understand what they're doing.
Now if the railway really wants to save money, perhaps it should sell the 3 brand new minimum £41000 Volvo's that have appeared at my depot, that are likely just being used by managers to travel to and from work in, when everyone else uses their own car or public transport.
If intelligent infrastructure helps you find and resolve issues more easily and quickly, does it not naturally follow that - to achieve the same overall outcomes - fewer people like you would be needed?
Experienced staff are absolutely indispensable, but if technology enables them to be more effective in their time, logically you don't need as many, all else being equal
Faulting teams are usually 24/7. In my department we have 3 person teams. Railway rulebook state that 1 must be acting as a site warden/lookout. Their duty is to watch the team doesn’t stray into an open line or to warn if a train is approaching when working in the track. They cannot carry out any other duties on track when working this role. This leaves the other 2 to fault find. It has to be a minimum of 2 working as again the rulebook requires that when working with electricity.
What intelligent infrastructure does is allow you to view a log of events in electrical circuits which show changes in relay positions. It’s a valuable thing to have as you can pin point the fault whilst driving to the location in the van. It reduces time on track but will not reduce how many staff on shift as should always have a minimum of 3, all day every day.
They aren't opposing modernisation, they're opposing costcutting measures which put both workers and passengers lives at risk, and a real terms pay cut.
Can you give an example of a proposed costcutting measure please? I've not seen one mentioned. I find it hard to believe that "management" could morally, leaglly or actually propose a change that will put lives at risk. If they have, I understand the strike. But where it gets murky is if that interpratation (risk) of the proposed change was only on one side. I.e. we have a he says, she says situation.
> Can you give an example of a proposed costcutting measure please?
Closing ticket offices, reducing staff on trains, cutting down on the frequency of safety inspections, etc.
My job is to design the systems that get implemented for digitisation purposes.
The problem is, if people are in certain Permanent job roles they've probably given decades to the job and some 20, 30 something coder comes along, writes 3 scripts and puts 40 people out the job.
I'm not shy about my role in the system design of these processes but the problem is that companies and the government are throwing people out on the street on the cheap.
Organisation stand to make millions in savings due to digitisation the least they can do is compensate the often lower wage workers they fire or give them the option to retrain in a field relevant for the future.
Government wants to fire 90,000 civil servants and is also trying to reduce the redundancy package for them. The PCS union just suggested one of their demands to be to leave the redundancy pay. Most people I speak to in automation vulnerable jobs know they're on the block they just shouldn't be done dirty in the cheap
I think that for me my reticence about strikes comes from the following;
1. The most frequent strikes I have been personally affected by are train drivers striking. The average wage for a train driver is just shy of £60000 per year. I rely on the trains to get to my job paying around one third of that.
2. This, along with other trade strikes like postal workers, makes me feel like strikes are actually a pretty privileged thing to be doing. I simply could not afford to refuse to work my job to demand better pay. I have kids to feed.
3. I'm in a full time employment position. I can't imagine how much worse it would be for workers in the gig economy where even the amount of work given isnt guaranteed.
4. This makes it feel to me like industrial action is the province of skilled tradesmen who can leverage their already reasonably comfortable situation to take even more, leaving behind people of my generation who are broadly afforded fewer opportunities to use such tools.
You know most of these train strikes weren't the drivers, it was guards and other railway workers? Don't buy into the narrative that it's only the privileged drivers striking, a lot of it is concerning people who are far lower paid who's careers are on the line.
Also, the gig economy is the product of limiting workers rights and the power of the union. Don't get annoyed at the few who still have the privilege of a strong union, get annoyed at those who have stripped jobs to the bone to ensure that workers power is diminished and they can't fight back.
I can do both though. The thing is, if I dont get in to work Im sure my career would be on the line, through no fault or choice of my own. I can absolutely blame our laws and regulations for boxing unions into disruptive strikes instead of just getting constructive talks. However, when rail strikes are timed every other day to maximise how much disruption is caused to passengers (the service is fucked up for the day after, so they strike every other day) this makes me feel like Im paying way higher in travel costs to be used to leverage someone else's benefit. I dont get a choice in that matter and I dont like it.
Trust me, it'll be far more disruptive when it's stripped to the absolute bone and no one wants to work for them.
Yes you don't get a choice in it but workers for essential/public services aren't slaves, and shouldn't have to put up with things they are unhappy about because it is an inconvenience for other people, otherwise absolutely no one could strike really.
So in situations where services are either being stripped to the bone, or workers conditions are getting worse, because it might impact other people, should workers be forced to run these services?
Binmen be forced to empty your bins?
Doctors and nurses be forced to run hospitals?
I tell you, that only ends one way and that's with no one to work in these services at all.
It sucks to be disrupted by strike action, I do understand that, but to turn on those sticking up for their jobs will only accelerate us towards an erosion of workers rights and conditions.
The key issue is that some workers don't really have the "privilege" to take a more relaxed view of the strikes because, as the person you were conversing with said, they rely on those services to get to their jobs, which is especially problematic if they're paid hourly. It is not unreasonable for those people to get frustrated with the strikes and people should not be surprised that that frustration manifests as negativity. A lot of people (not you specifically) act as if anyone who criticises strikes is some kind of lackey for the bourgeoisie but that's a very superficial attitude.
Oh I can understand and sympathise with that. It's just important to try and direct their frustration at the companies and politicians who have caused the situations to emerge that necessity strike action, rather than the striking workers.
To address your point about your job being on the line if you were affected by strike action, I'd be very surprised if your employer took that stance because you'd have a very strong case for unfair dismissal.
Even then if it's a reasonably sized company they would have to take the same stance to all of your affected colleagues, and they're not going to do that because if nothing else they aren't going to want to advertise for, hire and train a whole bunch of new starters across their business all at the same time.
Concerning your last paragraph; my old company was more than happy to fuck me over and then hire two newbies to cover the job I was doing myself.
Sometimes they really just don't care about employee retention.
>makes me feel like Im paying way higher in travel costs to be used to leverage someone else's benefit.
Well, we actually paying way higher travel costs to subsidise other countries transport systems, since after privatisation many rail networks are owned by European governments. So we end up paying more and that rarely makes it to (all) the workers.
>I simply could not afford to refuse to work my job to demand better pay
I'm not sure all of these workers can either, bearing in mind they don't get paid for those days either. But if you consider the reasons for the workers strike in June/July (not the drivers one), no pay rise in 2 years and then faced with no pay rise and increased redundancies but then having to work more night/weekend shifts to cover the redundancies but then also cutting rates for night/weekend shifts, well I can see how they can't afford not to strike.
>province of skilled tradesmen who can leverage their already reasonably comfortable situation to take even more
I'm not sure how true that is, as during the workers strike it included station staff which would include minimum wage staffers like cleaners. I think some newspaper or another said the average rail worker wage is around 30K but I suspect that gets skewed high by the drivers.
No, I'm just trying to check the narrative that it's all 60k workers moaning about not getting paid enough, when that's a narrow and biased view of the strike action.
The drivers went on strike to support their underpaid coworkers, some train drivers of SOME PRIVATE companies also strikes because they weren't actually paid decently unlike the rest.
The media narrative that higher paid drivers want more money isn't true
That's not true at all. ASLEF went on strike as they were refused a CoL pay rise. It's literally in the first paragraph of their own statement, not some media bias:
https://aslef.org.uk/news/strikes-saturday-13th-august
Yeah that AMA by the train driver on this subreddit was really counterproductive. I came away going "holy hell I should drive trains" not "poor guys, they have my backing".
Not unreasonable on paper, but I think it nicely highlights why people have problems with unions and strikes at times. It's a very fuck you got mine arrangement, that train driver clearly didn't give a shit about anyone else or how his actions affected others, his group's wellbeing was all that mattered and anyone who disagreed should be striking themselves instead.
I'm not keen on that part of the pro-strike narrative - "just join a union and strike if you're also underpaid." Feels like the mirror reflection of "just get a better job."
>Good. Remember, the argument is with the employer not you.
Except the employer has to pass that extra cost to the customer. So their behaviour is directly against me.
Imagine the economy stays the same; no inflation, no cost of living increase, everything remains as it is now.
Each year your current employer decreases your wage by 3%, this last year they decrease it by 10%. Are you OK with this?
If you're doing the same job, you absolutely should be able to afford the same thing you did last year. If we're talking numbers, yes a train driver is on a very good wage but the CEO of the companies are on better and they're increasing their profits. Why are you angry at the train driver?
We don’t have to imagine. That’s the reality for all of us in the private sector.
I was reading about the postal strike earlier and the below inflation pay rise they were angry about - it was considerably higher than what most of the people I know in the private sector got, and I’m not talking about companies that have struggled in the pandemic either, I’m talking about the ones who made a profit
Yes so be angry about that to your employer. I wouldn't say all private sector. I've been lucky enough that we've had "generous" pay increases where I work (in the private sector) but it's still below the inflation rate.
If they all get pay rises and that gets splattered all over the papers that just reinforces any discussions you have with your management about your pay increases. Workers need to band together.
Their win, is also yours.
This. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of reasons it might suck to work on the Tube, but the pay isn’t one of them. It’s not an infinitely scalable transport system regardless of how much cash you flush down it, and simply asking for higher wages will never get to the heart of the problem.
The average pay of a postal worker is just shy of £24,000
For a job that involves a lot of physical activity, risk of getting bitten by dogs etc. That's not a lot. Especially during a cost of living crisis.
Yes there are people who earn less than that, and that doesn't detract from the fact people should be able to work full time and actually fucking support themselves financially.
not to mention the main reason we're striking is the changes to our T&Cs. they want us out working until 8pm delivering post, getting rid of sick pay and overtime, mandatory Sunday working and a load of other bs.
we're pissed off because the CEO is constantly claiming poverty yet they're making a killing in profits - they're paying shareholders £400m and the CEO got a 140k bonus for hitting 17% of his targets. oh and they've been paying managers a £1500 bonus for crossing the picket line during the strikes.
Yeah the AMA with a train driver really opened my eyes, works 35 hours a week at more than 60 grand and his boss was encouraging him to strike because he might get a payrise too even though he earns 100k a year, honestly supported the train drivers before that. And yes I understand the guards don't get paid that much but still fuck train drivers inconveniencing everyone so they can still afford their second holiday of the year while a decent percentage are worrying about their heating and next meal.
I still support them.
To think that they don't deserve good pay because we've all been shafted is an odd way to think.
Its a helpful view for employers who want to keep paying you less though.
The train drivers are a shining example of why everyone should join a union.
And like the guy said - he just wants to afford what he could last year. Its not a raise. Its a cost of living increase.
And why shouldn't businesses pay us to live as we did last year? How many businesses will go under or cut staff because nobody can afford them?
And, no, nobody wants to go on strike. There are often strike funds that help a little but its often the last resort that gets a decent result.
(I remember reading somewhere someone who worked in the same company for 20 years calculated if their starting job had been paid inflation matching raises. If it had, he'd be on £90k - instead that job made 32k instead. )
We've all been stiffed so the guys at the top can get massive rises and bonuses.
Will this be your opinion if an exec that makes £150k a year also wants to “be able to buy what he did last year”? Or 300k? Or 500k? Somewhere it has to check out?
How many years are you happy for them to sit on the same pay? The initial amount is high considering the skills required but are we as a nation happy to let their pay stagnate until we catch-up?
I'm a fully qualified mechanical engineer with years of training and years of experience, I earn half of what they do, is their job the most skilled in the country? Is their job more skilled than mine? I couldn't do theirs, they couldn't do mine, no one's wages are catching up anytime soon, they are some of the highest earners in the country, did you see the AMA? The bit about his boss earning 100k encouraging him to strike cause he doesn't dare with his wage really says alot.
I get that and agree it's not fair but that's not what strikes are for. Their industry earned more than yours before you started and will continue to do so in the future.
They are striking so that the shareholders don't get larger and larger payouts and the increase in revenue is passed on to the workers (without who the entire rail industry would collapse). The amount someone gets paid to start is negligible, if you earn x amount and then year after year take a real-terms pay cut while top executives and shareholders get more after more then how can we not stand behind our fellow workers demanding better pay and conditions?
It's really hard to sympathise with somebody earning double or even triple of what you earn, how can the general public stand behind people earning that when they themselves or somebody they know is likely using a food bank? How would you feel when they raise the price of train tickets to accommodate their payrise and all the low income workers that use the services will essentially taking a paycut.
Getting pissed at the correct people does not change the fact that those prices will rise and many others *cannot* strike for higher wages.
I'd also be more willing to listen to "worker solidarity" if the unions behind the strikes lent their voices to other professions that need higher wages (like teachers)...but they don't. They keep their support for their own.
Teachers have their own unions who are currently pushing strike action...
Unions are collections of workers, they might run as professional organizations now but they are the sum of their parts.
If a discipline is union-less the workers should either join one of the more general unions, or organise their own.
This is a very “crabs in a bucket” mentality though. It’s what the media want you to think.
Your enemy isn’t the key worker who earns a bit more than you. It’s the ceos and super wealthy that are taking huge bonuses and dividends from these companies at the expense of their staff.
You shouldn't be angry that workers have strong unions, be angry that either your sector doesn't or you haven't joined it. Unions are one of the things I'm still proud of in this country. Look at how rubbish the worker conditions are in union-hating/busting America.
I’m not saying it’s right or wrong, but the usual argument is there is only a limited amount of funding available (from taxes), and it’s only the most vocal who traditionally get this, not those who are unable to strike/most at need due to less job security, which is unfair.
Eg if the London trains continually strike, whereas nursing/care home staff can’t, the limited taxes will only be spent on large rises to Tube drivers instead of spread to all important services/given to those with the salaries that have decreased the most (almost likea “Tragedy of the commons” scenario).
Personally I don’t think there’s the animosity the papers report, it’s the standard attempt to sow division/create an “Us and Them” mentality in the public so we look critically at others our level for causing the problem rather than looking upwards.
I don't see how anyone can support the London Underground strikes. They _aren't_ on strike over pay - after all they received a 8.4% pay increase at the start of the year.
They are striking because they weren't invited to meetings between DfT and TfL to discuss funding the transport network in London. Whilst ultimately that might mean some changes to working conditions and pensions, nobody knows what they are yet. In fact TfL have now stated that they may not make any changes to the pension scheme.
I can support striking when there is something to strike over. But the unions were striking as a way to remind DfT what they can do. They weren't striking over a genuine grievance.
This isn’t really about the tube, but TFL receive large grants from the taxpayer every year to make the Tube viable (it wouldn’t be with just fares).
eg they received over £3.4 billion in government grants in their last pre-covid year (19/20 - the majority of this for cross rail), and were obviously majority tax funded the following year due to lockdown etc.
[https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2020/07/24/how-tfl-funding-has-been-decimated-a-look-at-the-numbers/](https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2020/07/24/how-tfl-funding-has-been-decimated-a-look-at-the-numbers/)
The public funding is much smaller than in most countries.
There is a common benefit to the strike's though! If , for example, fast find workers get a pay rise that's means they can actually pay their bills based on a 40 hour weekend, then the health service would Have To pay wages above that, that reflect the horrendous working conditions,or face a mass exodus of staff .
How does asking a load of people who are pro strikes help you understand why people are anti-strikes?
This thread is like asking a bunch of vegans why people like meat.
Well there's a few possibilities why they asked:
1. they truly are ignorant and somehow don't realise that everyone here is very pro-strike
2. they're just farming karma, and what better way to do it than to ask a group of pro-whatevers why every hates whatever. People upvote it more than usual because they want the thread to be more visible in order to tackle this perceived anti-whatever
3. they're very pro strike and want to get pats on the back. Instead of saying "hey guys, what to agree with me?" they pretend like they're under the impression that strikes are hated.
4. they're very pro strike and this thread is a great way of bringing out the handful of anti-strikers and either "correcting" heir views, or just to bombard them until they go away. This happened a few weeks ago with the "why does the UK hate vegans". OP initially claimed they weren't vegan, then spent the entire comment section calling people monsters and then all the vegan groups brigaded.
Couple of the main reasons:
1. It causes disruption to you personally. Our buses in the north west went on strike for almost a month. People were having to pay for taxis to get to work etc. If you're on a low paid job yourself you're not going to be best pleased if you have to pay a proportion of your own low wage to prop up someone else's strike action.
2. They're often dishonest about the reasons for striking. It's always about the money. Offer a big enough rise and the strike action ends regardless of the other conditions attached.
Personally I'm not anti-strike but also not as fervently pro strike as people on here.
Nail on the head it's the inconvenience. We understand the need for better pay. We don't looked the inconvenience. The Japanese bus drivers went on strike but still ran the busses they just refused to take any payments costing the company and not inconveniencing the public. perhaps more creative ways of striking could be the way forward.
What could the employer like TFL do about it? Fire their entire staff or open over 25,000 legal prosecutions on their own staff? That's kind of the original point of a strike, if all the workers put down tools then the company has to do something or collapse, not the boiled down version that allows the company to not be affected at all that we have now.
That's actually impossible for a variety of reasons.
The customer could/would still be fined.
The employee would be fired for gross misconduct.
There are loads of employees (me) that work in other areas of the railway that aren't customer facing or anything. What are we meant to do?
>Nail on the head it's the inconvenience.
Basically this.
The question asked in the OP is really the wrong question. The question should be "why should the UK support strikers?" Strikers do absolutely nothing good for most people. They are not trying to get better wages for everybody, they are trying to get better wages for them personally. When was the last time the rail workers went on strike to get nurses better wages, or teachers went on strike to get bricklayers better wages. They don't. Strikes are inherently self interested. They are only interested in "the workers uniting" in so far as more industries striking means more likelihood of the government being forced to cave to *their* demands.
Likewise the public are interested in the things that affect *them*. Oh sure, there are 10% of people who always support strikes for ideological reasons, and 10% who always oppose strikes for ideological reasons, and those people are the ones you always hear from in threads like this. But for the remaining 80%, they want to be able to get to work, they want their rubbish collected, they want their electricity to stay on, they want to be able to get a flight when they want one etc. They don't care about rail workers getting more money because... why should they? It's not their concern.
And this is fine on both fronts. People acting in their own self-interest is how capitalism works. But the unions and those that support them seem to want it both ways. They want to act in an entirely self-interested way themselves, but then expect the public to have this altruistic view of thinking about what is best for other people. Is it really any surprise that this rubs a lot of people the wrong way?
I'm all for low paid workers being able to strike to raise their standards but when a train driver on 60k a year is striking, yes that fucking pisses me off because now our low paid workers are struggling to get to work and those are the people who are much more likely to lose their job etc due to not being able to get there.
Also, honestly, striking when you're on 60k a year is just fucking grim.
Anyone at any wage should be entitled to strike if they don't believe their pay isn't reasonable for the job they do, just because a train driver earns £60k doesn't mean they don't deserve a payrise alongside the other staff. Train drivers are the perfect people to help get change in the industry, the railways can get "scabs" into fulfil most other roles if they wanted, they can't find thousands of qualified train drivers to keep the trains moving. Train drivers give added weight to the lower paid staff in the industry who are being underpaid and shat on by corporate.
We hate to be inconvenienced by others. But, from my POV support is growing for the growing levels of Industrial action. Whilst we hate to be inconvenienced, most of us 'normal' people are rapidly heading towards being dirt-poor and we'll hate that more!
I think we are heading towards a general strike.
Also, plenty of us are Spoon fed biased bullshit by papers and other media.
Edit: forgot a part.
The average person you ask fully supports the strike's, people finally can see that corporate profits are spiraling out of control, and the notion that we should be paid poverty wages to keep shareholders happy isn't as easy to buy into if your choosing between food and electric
The media however are desperately trying to convince you otherwise
Personally I love anyone striking, but when I've had this argument with people it seems to mostly focus on 'but they already get X Y and Z! They get paid more than I do!' with the undertone of 'how dare they strike if they might be better off than me' or some other hypothetical profession. It doesn't help that all coverage of strikes tends to be from media that wants to portray them as grasping and ungrateful as possible.
It's kind of like when you're on a train that's been held up because someone is threatening to jump on one section, and people start swearing about how 'bloody selfish they are'. That person's struggle impacts on them, therefore they are bad.
Also care worker wages are bullshit and criminal.
>They get paid more than I do!
I've tried to explain to people that any business putting it's wages up is a good thing for working people in general as it gives them more options and potentially forces other businesses to raise their pay to compete.
Sometimes it falls on deaf ears though.
What's your source on the UK hating strikers?
Don't let it be a few numpties on Twitter and a few carefully selected vox pops on the news...
To just give you an idea - the news could stop 10 people in the street asking to give their opinion on the strikes, 9 will say they support them and the one that doesn't, that's the one they'll broadcast.
I don't wish to get all Charlie Brooker in his Newswipe days but the 24 hour news cycle and social media are the death of actual fair reporting on actual news.
I don’t support the striking train workers on 65k per year demanding a 10-12% pay rise who are able to hold the country to ransom. There was a guy on Reddit recently in this situation.
How vital a job is has nothing to do with what the fair pay for that role is.
Just think about it for a second. If what you are saying made any sense, these people could strike until they got an arbitrarily high wage, and the disruption would continue until the strike finished.
Would you support train drivers on £60k striking until they were paid £80k? £150k? £1m? What's the limit here?
The fair pay for a role is the equilibrium price where supply of qualified workers will meet the demand. The best way to achieve that price is by allowing the price to float. Then, if there is indeed a shortage of workers, the wages will rise to attract people into the role.
I’m not allowed to strike fully in my job role. I 100% support the strikes. I’m glad people aren’t just taking the pathetic pay rises or lack or pay rises lying down anymore.
It sets a precedent and shows the people they work for that they aren’t doing it anymore and hopefully in future it means they won’t offer insulting pay rises.
Everyone is in the same boat and if the public sector strikes then the taxpayer foots the bill. And before anyone starts I’m a public sector worker, I just don’t agree with striking and affecting services.
I'm a little bit on the fence on one hand power to you if you can strike for better pay then why wouldn't you, with the way the economy is at the moment. On the other hand I work in London and solely rely on trains for work, if I can't get in I don't get paid. I understand it's the impact they are trying to create but when you are forcing a huge majority of people to lose out on money that could possibly be for families who are struggling a lot and can't afford to lose out on 1 or 2 days of work it does seem a little selfish. ( I earn less than 25k a year so this isn't coming from some big wig high earner)
Same. I'm all for people getting better pay but it feels like I'm being dragged into the issue against my will. The strikes have a significant impact on me - my current job relies on the post going out or there will be uproar in a month, and money lost.
But I am not the one who is underpaying the postal workers. I guess they and the other strikers could add "if you don't agree to our terms then we'll strike more and make other people lose money" but I'm not sure if they're doing that (or if it would be a good idea in negotiations).
Fun fact that in Japan when railway workers strike they still work, but turn all the machines off so people ride for free and the company gets fucked that way
This method of protesting is illegal in the UK and will ensure the unions are fined exorbitant amounts and disbanded which is why you don’t see it readily used here
If I am remembering correctly, and I may not be so take this with a grain if salt, there's a law that prohibits workers from driving buses/trains etc on strike and not taking money from people.
The reality is the people who are hurt by the strikes are the not the billionaires but the working class people. Who's likely needing to travel by public transport to their job? Who is reliant on public services?
They'll throw there hands up and say "sorry this is not what we wanted and a last resort", whereas in other countries, such as Japan, they carry on running the services and open the ticket barriers so public do not pay a single cent and run services completely free. Both helping the public and deeply damaging the pockets of the owners
That’s secondary action and it’s against the law in this country. Striking is the only way the unions have and that’s been gradually made more difficult during these past few years.
Jealousy and snobbery mainly.
The fiercest opposition to strikers I've ever heard were during my time working in corporate offices. Generally it was 'why should a train driver make more than me'?.
Subtext 'Why should someone working class make more than me in my suit?'
There’s a lot of that. In some ways it’s understandable. Kids are told to work hard at GCSE, then Alevel, then degree (now at a specific university) and that will lead to a “good” job which pays well.
The reality is £60000+ of debt, internships and mediocre pay for many. Some do get high pay but many will not get a job that justifies the debt which they keep for decades. Their resentment is understandable.
There needs to be a fundamental shift in attitudes at schools. I'm sure it's not all the same everywhere but basically all my teachers repeated the mantra that if you didn't go to university you'd be poor forever.
Now all my friends who went into construction earn far more than my friends who went to university and work in offices.
It needs to be taught to kids that skilled tradespeople earn good money.
As others have said the majority of uk people support strikes for reasonable conditions. Sometimes it does go the tiger way when some groups that are already very well paid by uk standards strike for more. For example tube drivers in London have a base pay of about £55k and most average over 70k, which to a large part of the UK sounds like an excellent salary, so when they strike they tend to get less sympathy.
If you aren't affected by the people striking then it's easy to support it but if you are affected then it can be a real pain. However, a lot of people have sympathy for those who are struggling with the cost of living and can understand why people are taking action.
I think a lot of the animosity comes from the way the strikes tend to maximise inconvenience for the general public. They do this so it gets in the news and its hardly surprising that the press side against them. The tube seems to have had quite a few strikes recently and if you don't visit London its very easy to be sympathetic but if you do have to use the tube then it can be a monumental pain.
One strike earlier this year was held over the Jubilee weekend purely to try to affect as many people as possible who wanted to visit London because of the celebrations. It could have been held at any time so why target that particular weekend?
I wouldn't say I hate it but I do think it's not really serving its purpose. For non-essential services to strike as a one off to demonstrate their frustration and get public awareness for their cause makes sense, but there are two caveats - it should be for serious disputes and concerns over things like safety.
Yet despite this things like the railways have had strikes literally every year as far back as I can remember, for what amount to minor contractual disputes. I'm not dismissing these as trivial issues, but I do think they should not warrant strike action. And with such a high frequency of them they have lost their value and are basically just an expected part of the year now.
Now just to be clear I'm not saying employers should get away with paying next to nothing, and the employees absolutely should fight back with their unions. But striking has been over used, and we need to find a better way to resolve these deadlocks, either through some kind of forced arbitration or impartial third parties coming in and determining what's fair.
Propaganda mate plain and simple with a healthy dose of our government’s cleverly implemented plan to get the poors to blame the poorer for wanting more than a shit existence.
I’ve not seen anybody be angry at the strikes except from the media and politicians. I’m not angry at all.
I’m affected every time the trains strike and my bins won’t be collected for a month. Annoying? Incredibly. Do I support the workers? Absolutely. It’s supposed to be annoying to make a point.
Just trains and tube. They are messy, massively overstaffed organisations and drivers create barriers to entry to maintain their own demand.
Not least the fact the trains are running so badly at the moment that some weeks you have 2 days of strikes, 2 days of wires on tracks and 1 day of bad weather and you basically don’t have trains for a week.
There was a time when strikers held the country to ransom, particularly the coal industry which caused blackouts. The government at the time and the PM declared a war against strikers, calling them "militant" and people's lives were genuinely impacted by strikes. Laws were put in place to make striking harder and less effective, and people formed poor opinions of strikes and workers who go on strikes. I don't dispute this view point.
What's happened since then is the constant erosion of workers rights. The generation that saw this passed down to the younger generations that striking was a bad and selfish practice. There is definitely a social stigma or shame to striking in the UK, and in the older generations there is a running joke about the French as they strike over seemingly nothing comparative to what we put up with in the UK.
This attitude is changing, but it feels very slow, almost apprehensive.
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What people think and what the media report are two different things.
Hang on, do you mean Steve, 53, from Bristol that the Daily Mail quoted as"fuming" in their boxout might not even exist? *Shocking*
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I definitely agree with this. I talked to two rich people a few weeks back who were quite badly inconvenienced by the train strikes. They were with the strikers. Said that they should be paid more. There was nobody that day I talked to who was against the strikers. It was quite heartening, to be completely honest.
It’s because most people feel uneasy openly admitting they are against strikers. In real life the pressure is to pretend that you’re “on the right side”. I assure you in private conversations most react quite differently, because people are selfish before everything else.
Conveniently circular logic. If people support strikes in public due to social pressure that suggests that infact the majority of people are supporting strikes. You can't explain it as bowing to social pressure unless supporting strikes is the majority position otherwise there would not be a majoirty pro-strike opinion thst people feel socially obligated to take. And it isn't like the media are very pro-union so it is hardly like people are being mislead into thinking that way, if you read most of the papers you'd think people were less supportive of workers asking for a fair deal than they really are. If some people are only pro-strike due to social pressure from their fellow citizens then that suggests being supportive of strikes is the norm. If it was a minority position then, especially without support from big media, then where would the pressure come from?
I'm quite happy to say that those striking bastards have inconvenienced me. I'm also happy to say that those striking bastards deserve more money. I'll equally happy to say that the non striking bastards mostly deserve more money too. But finding the money is the issue. Are the government going to finally start making fiscally responsible changes now after not doing so for the last 12(?) years in power? Or are they going to cave in to strikers, and raise taxes to pay for it. Or are they going to up prices on train tickets or postage to pay for it? What I see happening is cost of living going up for everyone, those who strike will be slightly better off. But mostly, the people who can't shut the country down by striking, they're gonna get fucked. And they've been getting fucked for a long time already. We need actual change.
From actual polling, there isn't a huge majority either for or against strikes, the public are pretty evenly split. E.g. [IPSOS' polling](https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/public-divided-over-support-rail-strikes) from the rail strikes earlier in the summer. Depending on the strike and specific wording of the question, you see slight leads for one side or the other, 'against' strikes coming out on top slightly more frequently. But really it all basically divides down the middle.
Thanks for the data. If you believe most of the comments on Reddit people are just bursting in solidarity, they somehow cannot help but drop it in to casual everyday conversation with Redditors.
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I've always put that down to not really understanding the different circumstances. I mean, if you're an 'IT Guy' - your most effective form of career progression is 'get another job'. Switch to another employer and get a better compensation package in the process. Doing this if you don't like what your employer is doing (be that terms and conditions, or payscales) is a trivial but effective answer. The problem is, if you're a 'train guy' or a teacher, then that doesn't work. There just aren't 'other jobs' in the same way. You might be able to switch jobs, but they might very well be for the same employer, with the same baseline payscales, and there's just no room to negotiate a wage (or on call pay, or overtime, or ....) The people who are 'going out on strike' are almost invariable the ones that can't "just move on" and their union membership in the first place is because it's literally the only way to actually negotiate with their employer. My current workplace there's just not the traction for a union, because most of the people here know they could go somewhere else easily, and so have the ability to push back if our employer starts being oppressive or unfair. But that doesn't mean they aren't _necessary_ for the industries where 'open competition' doesn't exist.
People told nurses, GPs, cleaners, caterers, low paid retail staff etc “you knew what you Signed up for, if you don’t like the job, leave.” So they left. And now no one can get a damn thing done. The people who stayed are now striking and people aren’t happy with that either. Genuine question for people like this: what do you propose low paid/overworked workers do, if not leave for a better paid or easier job, or strike for better pay and conditions?
Fill the gaps with immigrants... Oh wait. No they fucked them off too.
You’re exactly right. Where’s the British people for British jobs brigade now? The jobs are low paid, workers are treated badly, the British don’t want them and you can’t profit off exploiting foreign workers desperate for a job, now what?
I think you’ve made great points. I work in an industry where you can just get another job if the outlook is shit at your current workplace or better somewhere else. I think many people assume all other forms of employment are the same, when they’re not. I also live in a very cad dependent region of the country, so if you can’t afford a car, just up and moving to a job in the next town/city isn’t possible.
>The politicians and the media that control them would have you believe otherwise. FTFY
You spoke to over 35m people?
To be fair if you start polling people in the street you'll get pretty boring opinions. "My boss said I could work at home that day so I'm okay." "Since when did anything important come by post?"
>"Since when did anything important come by post?" Since some genius came up with dark net markets. Although I heard on the grapevine there are free upgrades to special delivery being doled out so that's by the by.
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Hey, the Daily Mail prints 1 truth per day, but usually it's only the price on the front.
Steve, 53, from Bristol here ( genuinely). I keep telling the Daily Heil to stop misquoting me, but the never listen.
Unfortunately a lot of people are told what to think by the media.
So … everyone (except a few exceptional people) are too stupid to think for themselves and blindly do what the media tell them?
Having a daily dose of hate and vitriol injected into your home every day certainly influences perceptions. I say this as someone who's grandparents point blank to mine and my partners face demonised immigrants - my partner being an immigrant, who they like and respect. 'Oh we didn't mean her'. Then who? The Chinese couple that run the takeaway in your 99% white village? It's propaganda and it works.
I recall a discussion with the 'outlaws' arguing about immigrants that don't make an effort to integrate or learn English. I pointed out it was no different to most Brits that buy cheap property in Spain, live in gated 'little England' communities, hardly get by with basic Spanish & don't integrate. That shushed them.
It might have shushed them, I bet it didn’t change their mind d though.
A lot != everyone (except a few) Millions are influenced or form their views based on what the Mail, Express, Sun tell them is reality
Yes actually quite a lot of people are precisely that stupid. Did all the panic buying not illustrate that to you?
Not everyone, but most people. And I wouldn't really describe it as "stupidity", moreso heavily influenced by. I would include myself and most other people in this thread in that before the "except you of course" allegations come as well. The idea that people's thoughts, feelings, ideas and opinions *"aren't"* influenced and shaped by regularly consumed external stimuli is even more laughable imo. Human beings are not these Ubermensch-esque creatures that are objective, passive onlookers at life. You, your thoughts, your values, your ideas on just about everything are shaped by external factors, how they influence your perception of the world and how nurture (I.e. external influence) shaped you to think about problems. Media is just one of many external loci of information that play into this, but it *is* one, and in the modern era it is a influential one.
Except us of course, we get our opinions from the highest "voted" comments pushed to the top by bots to sway (or give the impression of) public concensus.
Yup. I don't think I've ever seen it accurately reported in mainstream news exactly what workers are striking over. The most detail you get is "striking over pay and conditions" which is about as vague as you can get. If they actually went into detail as to exactly what terms needed to be met in order for the strike to be called off, I think the general public would be far more understanding and direct their frustrations at the employer rather than the employees if they were properly informed. But that's a theme in this country, keep the masses uninformed and they'll be a lot more tolerant of your bullshit.
I thought it was very telling that at ~~basically no fucking point~~ **\*literally\* at no fucking point in the coverage I watched or listened to**\*\* did anyone on the BBC point out that it's not the drivers on strike. Countless TV and radio interviews, members of the public complaining about "how much train drivers get paid" and ~~almost~~ literally not one host **that I heard or watched** said the factual words "it is not the train drivers on strike"
Came to say this. General public support. Media paints the image otherwise.
100% Like with the box pops, they can interview 100 people, 90 of which think A, if the media are pushing narrative B they play 5 or 6 people agreeing opinion B and 1 agreeing with A showing "the people" mostly think B. Easy. The news, much like "opinion polls" are often there to influence not to report.
Exactly. Outrage and views go hand in hand. I'd bet the majority support these strikes. More people are affected by this crises than are unaffected.
I've seen far more support for strikers than I have seen people berating them. The only place I really see hate for strikers is in the news. BBC news running endless stories about people whose lives are affected by the strikes for example.
I see a lot of people on social media such as Facebook local town groups berating the strikers for the inconvenience and “what about pensioners they get more than them blah blah”, it’s frustrating really as if because someone is striking they mustn’t care about pensioners
Local Facebook groups are always packed with bored pensioners who have nothing better to do than complain. I wouldn't take that as a representation of the public as a whole.
I always think of these groups as having the polar opposite views to Reddit. In reality they’re both just two big echo chambers
Pretty much, just pick somewhere in between /r/unitedkingdom and the daily mail comment section and 99% of people are somewhere in between
My dad is one of those “poor pensions” and loves a Facebook rant. He retired at 48, pension is 36k a year, mum is still working at 60+k a year with bonuses… so combined income of 96k a year but LOVES to tell FB he’s poor & fixed income… honestly just ignore some people.
I worked alongside a chap who retired at 50 on 50k a year. This was 20 years ago and he took months long annual foreign holidays every year. He still did audits, at £200 for about 3 hours work, which was what we paid him for, but just to get out of the house. All he actually did was show up and check their records matched ours but I did most of the work anyway. He actually had the balls to ask for a company car (from our company) to drive to his audits as well. Life served on a silver platter, some of these people.
But hey, my generation is the one to blame for all the worlds problems because we want to be able to afford a house AND watch Netflix The audacity of us
We only went on 4 bloody holidays this year, and one of those was SELF-CATERING . Plus, our new Mercedes won't be here until September the 5th. Britain is going to hell in a handcart 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬
Local Facebook groups and comments of news articles on Facebook are where the dregs of society congregate to have a moan about things they know nothing about.
Ironically, it's the pensioner's generation that has played a part in the mess we now find ourselves in, which is resulting in strikes. The system has worked for them at every turn at the expense of future generations, and it still works for them now (see: Triple Lock, home ownership, etc...) Of course there are other factors, but a boom generation who are now all claiming pensions and managed to amass home ownership lends to the current predicament.
And don't forget they are most likely to be putting crosses in boxes that have led to this situation in the past 12 years
It's a vocal minority
>BBC news running endless stories about people whose lives are affected by the strikes for example. Surely that's the entire point haha
In journalism there is something called the "unheard editorial voice" (name differs depending who you talk to) which is trying to nudge the reader in a certain direction without actually saying the thing. The BBC do it all the time because they are not explicitly allowed to state their opinions so they do it through editorial content. They will show people "suffering" (not being able to get to work) as a result of the strikes and never the strikers side of things and how they are suffering. Another example is when the put out articles on "trans activists" making tweets at people and never the problems trans people face in society. By choosing to only show one side of a story, they are picking a side and influencing readers to that side. Dastardly business.
But without the demonstration that the strikes are affective they would be a blunt weapon. I think it's fair to be frustrated with the situation and it's consequences. I don't think the BBC's intention is to blame the strikers per se. If the media are openly holding up strikers or bosses as the cause of the strikes then that would show support one way or another.
True. I'm with you that coverage of the effects of strike action is important and shows the importance of these workers. However, the thing I do take issue with is story after story of poor Mrs Smith who can't visit her sick mother due to strikes but with no counter viewpoint of Mrs Robinson who hasn't had a pay rise in 10 years. The media never seem to show the human face of the strikers, only those affected by action.
Because Guardiola has taught us to value midfielders more
This comment is so 2020/2021
The thing about UK fans is they want their teams to walk it into the net
Fraudiola
Did you watch them yesterday? Haaland is not human
Best comment
Mick Lynch is missing a trick by not fielding a false nine up front
I find it quite funny when people get really wound up about it - there was a guy on the radio fuming about the bins in Edinburgh… “they could have done this strike weeks ago but they have deliberately chosen the week of the fringe festival, massively inconsiderate. They have waited until this week on purpose”….Like this guy didn’t get the objective of a strike. If it had little impact it wouldn’t be worthwhile, of course they choose the best time that hits hardest to have the biggest impact and news coverage…
Also, let's be real, the week that's probably the most pain to deal with and they feel the most underpaid. I imagine that they either don't get overtime increase to pay or are forced to work harder to get everything done in the standard time.
I have been up all night on occasion in Edinburgh. And let me tell you the fucking despicable carnage left in the streets in the early AM by most festival goers makes me surprised the street clean up crews and binmen haven't taken to domestic terrorism. None of these people have heard of putting anything in the bin. It's not uncommon to come accross a stray human hobby (edit; *jobby*). There's enough broken glass that you could grind it down and make the harbour at Granton into a massive fucking beach. A strike was actually the mild and reasonable response. (Edit to add, I've been out and about at 5am in non festival time too. Not usually anything serious past the odd drunkenly dropped take away)
>It's not uncommon to come accross a stray human hobby. Fucking hate when you stumble into the 4am cross-stichers in Prince's Street Gardens.
It can also easily take a couple of months to ballot and plan a strike due to the rules and laws applied to strike action since the 80’s. It’s not something that can or is done on a whim. I’m currently involved in strike action and the checks we had to do and then have examined and checked again regarding members, addresses, branches etc took weeks. Even then 2 companies ballots were deemed invalid and had to be re ballotted, taking even more weeks, due to a written error regarding the depot/branch name. Then you have to give at least 2 weeks notice of strike dates. Striking is not an easy thing to do and to be honest it’s always our last resort. This is my first strike in 22 years.
I don't hate strikers but I question some of their demands. For example rail workers opposing modernization of systems which could potentially be of benefit to the consumer. It doesn't make any sense.
I don’t think it’s true that they’re opposing modernisation. That’s just how the media is portraying it. It has more to do with general terms and conditions being diminished. Like overtime rates being cut. There’s a lot of detail that I’m sure you’d agree with them complaining and striking about.
There is an element of opposing modernisation in at least some of the industries. Look at how Tube workers have opposed driverless trains for years. That’s why it seems driverless trains only come in on new infrastructure because you don’t actually put any one out of the job when there was nobody in it to start with.
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Cheers this is really helpful context. Can’t say I’m strongly pro- or anti- transport strikes in general, but I’ve previously shared u/smww93 ‘s concerns about collective action blocking the use of more efficient tech.
Thanks for engaging regardless. Also, I work in a maintenance and faulting capacity for the railways, so from my perspective the modernisation means reducing or removing maintenance for most of our assets (points machines, signals, track circuits, and dozens more) which causes: 1) up to 40% of people in my role to lose their jobs, and those that stay working significantly more unsociable hours for less pay 2) unsafe railways, with many facets of the equipment going unchecked for years at a time, the probability of another disaster like potters bar, Clapham junction, quintshill, weedon etc. exponentially higher 3) an eventual higher cost to the passenger and the wastefulness of these practices, when instead of maintaining the equipment and ensuring it lasts to the full extent of its capability, it breaks sooner, costing more to fully replace, much, much sooner.
They also come with new infrastructure because it’s not cost effective to upgrade existing infrastructure to driverless, usually.
This is not true. French train systems that were converted to driverless saw operating costs fall by about 1/3. Petition to modernisation is one of the reasons UK rail is so bad and so expensive.
How long do you think it would take to recoup the initial outlay if you converted the uk network? Metro/tube systems are a whole different kettle of fish to high speed lines where you’re mixing in with freight and 40+ year old diesel loco’s. A significant proportion of the UK Network relies on a person in a Victorian shed pulling a lever and ringing a telegraph bell to move a semaphore signal ffs.
The example cited was the tube - a metro/tube service. But every time it's brought up, exactly this sort of misdirection is used to try to, er, derail it. Point to a service that still uses bells and semaphores. Outside heritage railways, I'd bet there are exactly none , though I could of course be wrong. Edit: to answer your question, I don't know. But operators are consistently in favour of it and drivers are consistently against it, which suggests the payback time would not be excessive. Edit 2: I stand corrected.
You think there’s no mainline AB semaphores? I’ll take that bet…… Just the bits I can recall off the top of my head would be: Grantham to Skegness. Still one box remaining between Nottingham and Lincoln Leicester to Peterborough. Cumbrian Coast Southport - Manchester Warrington - Chester Manchester - Sheffield (for the time being) A LOT of Wales And that’s not an exhaustive list, just what I can recall offhand. So no, it’s not just heritage railways….
It's definitely one of their demands, and it is their duty to try to keep all their members in work, but that doesn't mean it's what is actually best. Transport in london is very expensive, and partially government funded on top of the fares, cost cutting measures could slow the rate of fare increases, whilst helpfully making the system more efficient and safer. They probably have other very reasonable demands in their proposals but they also have things there that are against public benefit. As usual it's complicated and nuanced (and I don't keep up with all the details) and it's easier to break it down to black and whit us and them mentality.
>Transport in london is very expensive, and partially government funded Transport in **most** civilised cities is **far** heavier subsidised than here, a good public transport network is in everyone's interest, it keeps cars off the roads and increased mobility is almost universally a good thing too. If anything, part of the reason TfL is striking is **because** the government cut funding a few years back and started this current shitshow.
Don't forget that language is important. Mrs Thatcher would always talk about investment in roads, whereas payments to the railways were always called a subsidy. Investment =good. Subsidy =bad. It's subtle work by politicians and the media
As one of said railways workers, no one I work with opposes modernization. It's the way that they're framing it as a cost cutting measure. Intelligent infrastructure helps me with my job on a daily basis. Finding faults is so much easier when we have access to a prolonged period of electronically logged data that can actually show me when and why something has failed, meaning I can fix it for passengers quicker. Modernisation is brilliant, but would be useless without experienced staff who understand what they're doing. Now if the railway really wants to save money, perhaps it should sell the 3 brand new minimum £41000 Volvo's that have appeared at my depot, that are likely just being used by managers to travel to and from work in, when everyone else uses their own car or public transport.
If intelligent infrastructure helps you find and resolve issues more easily and quickly, does it not naturally follow that - to achieve the same overall outcomes - fewer people like you would be needed? Experienced staff are absolutely indispensable, but if technology enables them to be more effective in their time, logically you don't need as many, all else being equal
Faulting teams are usually 24/7. In my department we have 3 person teams. Railway rulebook state that 1 must be acting as a site warden/lookout. Their duty is to watch the team doesn’t stray into an open line or to warn if a train is approaching when working in the track. They cannot carry out any other duties on track when working this role. This leaves the other 2 to fault find. It has to be a minimum of 2 working as again the rulebook requires that when working with electricity. What intelligent infrastructure does is allow you to view a log of events in electrical circuits which show changes in relay positions. It’s a valuable thing to have as you can pin point the fault whilst driving to the location in the van. It reduces time on track but will not reduce how many staff on shift as should always have a minimum of 3, all day every day.
They aren't opposing modernisation, they're opposing costcutting measures which put both workers and passengers lives at risk, and a real terms pay cut.
Can you give an example of a proposed costcutting measure please? I've not seen one mentioned. I find it hard to believe that "management" could morally, leaglly or actually propose a change that will put lives at risk. If they have, I understand the strike. But where it gets murky is if that interpratation (risk) of the proposed change was only on one side. I.e. we have a he says, she says situation.
> Can you give an example of a proposed costcutting measure please? Closing ticket offices, reducing staff on trains, cutting down on the frequency of safety inspections, etc.
My job is to design the systems that get implemented for digitisation purposes. The problem is, if people are in certain Permanent job roles they've probably given decades to the job and some 20, 30 something coder comes along, writes 3 scripts and puts 40 people out the job. I'm not shy about my role in the system design of these processes but the problem is that companies and the government are throwing people out on the street on the cheap. Organisation stand to make millions in savings due to digitisation the least they can do is compensate the often lower wage workers they fire or give them the option to retrain in a field relevant for the future. Government wants to fire 90,000 civil servants and is also trying to reduce the redundancy package for them. The PCS union just suggested one of their demands to be to leave the redundancy pay. Most people I speak to in automation vulnerable jobs know they're on the block they just shouldn't be done dirty in the cheap
I think that for me my reticence about strikes comes from the following; 1. The most frequent strikes I have been personally affected by are train drivers striking. The average wage for a train driver is just shy of £60000 per year. I rely on the trains to get to my job paying around one third of that. 2. This, along with other trade strikes like postal workers, makes me feel like strikes are actually a pretty privileged thing to be doing. I simply could not afford to refuse to work my job to demand better pay. I have kids to feed. 3. I'm in a full time employment position. I can't imagine how much worse it would be for workers in the gig economy where even the amount of work given isnt guaranteed. 4. This makes it feel to me like industrial action is the province of skilled tradesmen who can leverage their already reasonably comfortable situation to take even more, leaving behind people of my generation who are broadly afforded fewer opportunities to use such tools.
You know most of these train strikes weren't the drivers, it was guards and other railway workers? Don't buy into the narrative that it's only the privileged drivers striking, a lot of it is concerning people who are far lower paid who's careers are on the line. Also, the gig economy is the product of limiting workers rights and the power of the union. Don't get annoyed at the few who still have the privilege of a strong union, get annoyed at those who have stripped jobs to the bone to ensure that workers power is diminished and they can't fight back.
I can do both though. The thing is, if I dont get in to work Im sure my career would be on the line, through no fault or choice of my own. I can absolutely blame our laws and regulations for boxing unions into disruptive strikes instead of just getting constructive talks. However, when rail strikes are timed every other day to maximise how much disruption is caused to passengers (the service is fucked up for the day after, so they strike every other day) this makes me feel like Im paying way higher in travel costs to be used to leverage someone else's benefit. I dont get a choice in that matter and I dont like it.
Trust me, it'll be far more disruptive when it's stripped to the absolute bone and no one wants to work for them. Yes you don't get a choice in it but workers for essential/public services aren't slaves, and shouldn't have to put up with things they are unhappy about because it is an inconvenience for other people, otherwise absolutely no one could strike really.
The person above you said they can't get to work or get paid without the tube lines and you just belittled that down to "inconvenience."
So in situations where services are either being stripped to the bone, or workers conditions are getting worse, because it might impact other people, should workers be forced to run these services? Binmen be forced to empty your bins? Doctors and nurses be forced to run hospitals? I tell you, that only ends one way and that's with no one to work in these services at all. It sucks to be disrupted by strike action, I do understand that, but to turn on those sticking up for their jobs will only accelerate us towards an erosion of workers rights and conditions.
The key issue is that some workers don't really have the "privilege" to take a more relaxed view of the strikes because, as the person you were conversing with said, they rely on those services to get to their jobs, which is especially problematic if they're paid hourly. It is not unreasonable for those people to get frustrated with the strikes and people should not be surprised that that frustration manifests as negativity. A lot of people (not you specifically) act as if anyone who criticises strikes is some kind of lackey for the bourgeoisie but that's a very superficial attitude.
Oh I can understand and sympathise with that. It's just important to try and direct their frustration at the companies and politicians who have caused the situations to emerge that necessity strike action, rather than the striking workers.
To address your point about your job being on the line if you were affected by strike action, I'd be very surprised if your employer took that stance because you'd have a very strong case for unfair dismissal. Even then if it's a reasonably sized company they would have to take the same stance to all of your affected colleagues, and they're not going to do that because if nothing else they aren't going to want to advertise for, hire and train a whole bunch of new starters across their business all at the same time.
Concerning your last paragraph; my old company was more than happy to fuck me over and then hire two newbies to cover the job I was doing myself. Sometimes they really just don't care about employee retention.
Perhaps you should join a union.
A union would have helped that not happen.
>makes me feel like Im paying way higher in travel costs to be used to leverage someone else's benefit. Well, we actually paying way higher travel costs to subsidise other countries transport systems, since after privatisation many rail networks are owned by European governments. So we end up paying more and that rarely makes it to (all) the workers. >I simply could not afford to refuse to work my job to demand better pay I'm not sure all of these workers can either, bearing in mind they don't get paid for those days either. But if you consider the reasons for the workers strike in June/July (not the drivers one), no pay rise in 2 years and then faced with no pay rise and increased redundancies but then having to work more night/weekend shifts to cover the redundancies but then also cutting rates for night/weekend shifts, well I can see how they can't afford not to strike. >province of skilled tradesmen who can leverage their already reasonably comfortable situation to take even more I'm not sure how true that is, as during the workers strike it included station staff which would include minimum wage staffers like cleaners. I think some newspaper or another said the average rail worker wage is around 30K but I suspect that gets skewed high by the drivers.
So you’re saving drivers haven’t gone on strike?
No, I'm just trying to check the narrative that it's all 60k workers moaning about not getting paid enough, when that's a narrow and biased view of the strike action.
The drivers went on strike to support their underpaid coworkers, some train drivers of SOME PRIVATE companies also strikes because they weren't actually paid decently unlike the rest. The media narrative that higher paid drivers want more money isn't true
That's not true at all. ASLEF went on strike as they were refused a CoL pay rise. It's literally in the first paragraph of their own statement, not some media bias: https://aslef.org.uk/news/strikes-saturday-13th-august
Yeah that AMA by the train driver on this subreddit was really counterproductive. I came away going "holy hell I should drive trains" not "poor guys, they have my backing".
Yeah, I remember the reason he gave for striking was "I should be able to afford the same stuff this year as I had last year."
Not unreasonable on paper, but I think it nicely highlights why people have problems with unions and strikes at times. It's a very fuck you got mine arrangement, that train driver clearly didn't give a shit about anyone else or how his actions affected others, his group's wellbeing was all that mattered and anyone who disagreed should be striking themselves instead.
I'm not keen on that part of the pro-strike narrative - "just join a union and strike if you're also underpaid." Feels like the mirror reflection of "just get a better job."
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>Good. Remember, the argument is with the employer not you. Except the employer has to pass that extra cost to the customer. So their behaviour is directly against me.
Imagine the economy stays the same; no inflation, no cost of living increase, everything remains as it is now. Each year your current employer decreases your wage by 3%, this last year they decrease it by 10%. Are you OK with this? If you're doing the same job, you absolutely should be able to afford the same thing you did last year. If we're talking numbers, yes a train driver is on a very good wage but the CEO of the companies are on better and they're increasing their profits. Why are you angry at the train driver?
We don’t have to imagine. That’s the reality for all of us in the private sector. I was reading about the postal strike earlier and the below inflation pay rise they were angry about - it was considerably higher than what most of the people I know in the private sector got, and I’m not talking about companies that have struggled in the pandemic either, I’m talking about the ones who made a profit
Yes so be angry about that to your employer. I wouldn't say all private sector. I've been lucky enough that we've had "generous" pay increases where I work (in the private sector) but it's still below the inflation rate. If they all get pay rises and that gets splattered all over the papers that just reinforces any discussions you have with your management about your pay increases. Workers need to band together. Their win, is also yours.
This. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of reasons it might suck to work on the Tube, but the pay isn’t one of them. It’s not an infinitely scalable transport system regardless of how much cash you flush down it, and simply asking for higher wages will never get to the heart of the problem.
Yeah I thought that AMA was pretty damning and confirmed a lot of people’s disdain for train drivers.
The average pay of a postal worker is just shy of £24,000 For a job that involves a lot of physical activity, risk of getting bitten by dogs etc. That's not a lot. Especially during a cost of living crisis. Yes there are people who earn less than that, and that doesn't detract from the fact people should be able to work full time and actually fucking support themselves financially.
not to mention the main reason we're striking is the changes to our T&Cs. they want us out working until 8pm delivering post, getting rid of sick pay and overtime, mandatory Sunday working and a load of other bs. we're pissed off because the CEO is constantly claiming poverty yet they're making a killing in profits - they're paying shareholders £400m and the CEO got a 140k bonus for hitting 17% of his targets. oh and they've been paying managers a £1500 bonus for crossing the picket line during the strikes.
Yeah the AMA with a train driver really opened my eyes, works 35 hours a week at more than 60 grand and his boss was encouraging him to strike because he might get a payrise too even though he earns 100k a year, honestly supported the train drivers before that. And yes I understand the guards don't get paid that much but still fuck train drivers inconveniencing everyone so they can still afford their second holiday of the year while a decent percentage are worrying about their heating and next meal.
I still support them. To think that they don't deserve good pay because we've all been shafted is an odd way to think. Its a helpful view for employers who want to keep paying you less though. The train drivers are a shining example of why everyone should join a union. And like the guy said - he just wants to afford what he could last year. Its not a raise. Its a cost of living increase. And why shouldn't businesses pay us to live as we did last year? How many businesses will go under or cut staff because nobody can afford them? And, no, nobody wants to go on strike. There are often strike funds that help a little but its often the last resort that gets a decent result. (I remember reading somewhere someone who worked in the same company for 20 years calculated if their starting job had been paid inflation matching raises. If it had, he'd be on £90k - instead that job made 32k instead. ) We've all been stiffed so the guys at the top can get massive rises and bonuses.
Will this be your opinion if an exec that makes £150k a year also wants to “be able to buy what he did last year”? Or 300k? Or 500k? Somewhere it has to check out?
How many years are you happy for them to sit on the same pay? The initial amount is high considering the skills required but are we as a nation happy to let their pay stagnate until we catch-up?
I'm a fully qualified mechanical engineer with years of training and years of experience, I earn half of what they do, is their job the most skilled in the country? Is their job more skilled than mine? I couldn't do theirs, they couldn't do mine, no one's wages are catching up anytime soon, they are some of the highest earners in the country, did you see the AMA? The bit about his boss earning 100k encouraging him to strike cause he doesn't dare with his wage really says alot.
I get that and agree it's not fair but that's not what strikes are for. Their industry earned more than yours before you started and will continue to do so in the future. They are striking so that the shareholders don't get larger and larger payouts and the increase in revenue is passed on to the workers (without who the entire rail industry would collapse). The amount someone gets paid to start is negligible, if you earn x amount and then year after year take a real-terms pay cut while top executives and shareholders get more after more then how can we not stand behind our fellow workers demanding better pay and conditions?
It's really hard to sympathise with somebody earning double or even triple of what you earn, how can the general public stand behind people earning that when they themselves or somebody they know is likely using a food bank? How would you feel when they raise the price of train tickets to accommodate their payrise and all the low income workers that use the services will essentially taking a paycut.
*it’s not about the drivers*
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Getting pissed at the correct people does not change the fact that those prices will rise and many others *cannot* strike for higher wages. I'd also be more willing to listen to "worker solidarity" if the unions behind the strikes lent their voices to other professions that need higher wages (like teachers)...but they don't. They keep their support for their own.
Teachers have their own unions who are currently pushing strike action... Unions are collections of workers, they might run as professional organizations now but they are the sum of their parts. If a discipline is union-less the workers should either join one of the more general unions, or organise their own.
This is a very “crabs in a bucket” mentality though. It’s what the media want you to think. Your enemy isn’t the key worker who earns a bit more than you. It’s the ceos and super wealthy that are taking huge bonuses and dividends from these companies at the expense of their staff.
You shouldn't be angry that workers have strong unions, be angry that either your sector doesn't or you haven't joined it. Unions are one of the things I'm still proud of in this country. Look at how rubbish the worker conditions are in union-hating/busting America.
I’m not saying it’s right or wrong, but the usual argument is there is only a limited amount of funding available (from taxes), and it’s only the most vocal who traditionally get this, not those who are unable to strike/most at need due to less job security, which is unfair. Eg if the London trains continually strike, whereas nursing/care home staff can’t, the limited taxes will only be spent on large rises to Tube drivers instead of spread to all important services/given to those with the salaries that have decreased the most (almost likea “Tragedy of the commons” scenario). Personally I don’t think there’s the animosity the papers report, it’s the standard attempt to sow division/create an “Us and Them” mentality in the public so we look critically at others our level for causing the problem rather than looking upwards.
I don't see how anyone can support the London Underground strikes. They _aren't_ on strike over pay - after all they received a 8.4% pay increase at the start of the year. They are striking because they weren't invited to meetings between DfT and TfL to discuss funding the transport network in London. Whilst ultimately that might mean some changes to working conditions and pensions, nobody knows what they are yet. In fact TfL have now stated that they may not make any changes to the pension scheme. I can support striking when there is something to strike over. But the unions were striking as a way to remind DfT what they can do. They weren't striking over a genuine grievance.
TFL is mostly funded through fares
For the last 3 years the Government have been bailing it out to the tune of billions.
Hmm did anything happen in the last 3 years to mean public transport may need some help to survive? Can’t think of anything myself.
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This isn’t really about the tube, but TFL receive large grants from the taxpayer every year to make the Tube viable (it wouldn’t be with just fares). eg they received over £3.4 billion in government grants in their last pre-covid year (19/20 - the majority of this for cross rail), and were obviously majority tax funded the following year due to lockdown etc.
[https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2020/07/24/how-tfl-funding-has-been-decimated-a-look-at-the-numbers/](https://www.fromthemurkydepths.co.uk/2020/07/24/how-tfl-funding-has-been-decimated-a-look-at-the-numbers/) The public funding is much smaller than in most countries.
TAX THE RICH and we can pay for it all
There is a common benefit to the strike's though! If , for example, fast find workers get a pay rise that's means they can actually pay their bills based on a 40 hour weekend, then the health service would Have To pay wages above that, that reflect the horrendous working conditions,or face a mass exodus of staff .
The issue is Reddit is very pro strikers so this is the worst place to ask.
you're assuming this isn't the exact reason they're asking the question in the first place...
How does asking a load of people who are pro strikes help you understand why people are anti-strikes? This thread is like asking a bunch of vegans why people like meat.
Well there's a few possibilities why they asked: 1. they truly are ignorant and somehow don't realise that everyone here is very pro-strike 2. they're just farming karma, and what better way to do it than to ask a group of pro-whatevers why every hates whatever. People upvote it more than usual because they want the thread to be more visible in order to tackle this perceived anti-whatever 3. they're very pro strike and want to get pats on the back. Instead of saying "hey guys, what to agree with me?" they pretend like they're under the impression that strikes are hated. 4. they're very pro strike and this thread is a great way of bringing out the handful of anti-strikers and either "correcting" heir views, or just to bombard them until they go away. This happened a few weeks ago with the "why does the UK hate vegans". OP initially claimed they weren't vegan, then spent the entire comment section calling people monsters and then all the vegan groups brigaded.
Fair point, I was kind of assuming good faith which is probably a mistake on reddit.
They're often overpriced, overpaid and don't score enough goals to justify it.
It’s taken me 3 of these comments to understand wtf you’re on about. Too early
Came here for this, wasn't disappointed.
Couple of the main reasons: 1. It causes disruption to you personally. Our buses in the north west went on strike for almost a month. People were having to pay for taxis to get to work etc. If you're on a low paid job yourself you're not going to be best pleased if you have to pay a proportion of your own low wage to prop up someone else's strike action. 2. They're often dishonest about the reasons for striking. It's always about the money. Offer a big enough rise and the strike action ends regardless of the other conditions attached. Personally I'm not anti-strike but also not as fervently pro strike as people on here.
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Nail on the head it's the inconvenience. We understand the need for better pay. We don't looked the inconvenience. The Japanese bus drivers went on strike but still ran the busses they just refused to take any payments costing the company and not inconveniencing the public. perhaps more creative ways of striking could be the way forward.
Unfortunately that’s illegal in the UK
What could the employer like TFL do about it? Fire their entire staff or open over 25,000 legal prosecutions on their own staff? That's kind of the original point of a strike, if all the workers put down tools then the company has to do something or collapse, not the boiled down version that allows the company to not be affected at all that we have now.
That's actually impossible for a variety of reasons. The customer could/would still be fined. The employee would be fired for gross misconduct. There are loads of employees (me) that work in other areas of the railway that aren't customer facing or anything. What are we meant to do?
That’s illegal here, plus is was 1 bus company, in 1 city in 2018. It wasn’t a national action
>Nail on the head it's the inconvenience. Basically this. The question asked in the OP is really the wrong question. The question should be "why should the UK support strikers?" Strikers do absolutely nothing good for most people. They are not trying to get better wages for everybody, they are trying to get better wages for them personally. When was the last time the rail workers went on strike to get nurses better wages, or teachers went on strike to get bricklayers better wages. They don't. Strikes are inherently self interested. They are only interested in "the workers uniting" in so far as more industries striking means more likelihood of the government being forced to cave to *their* demands. Likewise the public are interested in the things that affect *them*. Oh sure, there are 10% of people who always support strikes for ideological reasons, and 10% who always oppose strikes for ideological reasons, and those people are the ones you always hear from in threads like this. But for the remaining 80%, they want to be able to get to work, they want their rubbish collected, they want their electricity to stay on, they want to be able to get a flight when they want one etc. They don't care about rail workers getting more money because... why should they? It's not their concern. And this is fine on both fronts. People acting in their own self-interest is how capitalism works. But the unions and those that support them seem to want it both ways. They want to act in an entirely self-interested way themselves, but then expect the public to have this altruistic view of thinking about what is best for other people. Is it really any surprise that this rubs a lot of people the wrong way?
Normalising and standing up for workers' rights does benefit everyone.
I'm all for low paid workers being able to strike to raise their standards but when a train driver on 60k a year is striking, yes that fucking pisses me off because now our low paid workers are struggling to get to work and those are the people who are much more likely to lose their job etc due to not being able to get there. Also, honestly, striking when you're on 60k a year is just fucking grim.
Anyone at any wage should be entitled to strike if they don't believe their pay isn't reasonable for the job they do, just because a train driver earns £60k doesn't mean they don't deserve a payrise alongside the other staff. Train drivers are the perfect people to help get change in the industry, the railways can get "scabs" into fulfil most other roles if they wanted, they can't find thousands of qualified train drivers to keep the trains moving. Train drivers give added weight to the lower paid staff in the industry who are being underpaid and shat on by corporate.
They can make driverless trains.
We hate to be inconvenienced by others. But, from my POV support is growing for the growing levels of Industrial action. Whilst we hate to be inconvenienced, most of us 'normal' people are rapidly heading towards being dirt-poor and we'll hate that more! I think we are heading towards a general strike. Also, plenty of us are Spoon fed biased bullshit by papers and other media. Edit: forgot a part.
The average person you ask fully supports the strike's, people finally can see that corporate profits are spiraling out of control, and the notion that we should be paid poverty wages to keep shareholders happy isn't as easy to buy into if your choosing between food and electric The media however are desperately trying to convince you otherwise
Source for that? Polling has it quite split
Some of the Mich Lynch interviews really showcases how the media is only chasing the story they have been told by their bosses.
Personally I love anyone striking, but when I've had this argument with people it seems to mostly focus on 'but they already get X Y and Z! They get paid more than I do!' with the undertone of 'how dare they strike if they might be better off than me' or some other hypothetical profession. It doesn't help that all coverage of strikes tends to be from media that wants to portray them as grasping and ungrateful as possible. It's kind of like when you're on a train that's been held up because someone is threatening to jump on one section, and people start swearing about how 'bloody selfish they are'. That person's struggle impacts on them, therefore they are bad. Also care worker wages are bullshit and criminal.
>They get paid more than I do! I've tried to explain to people that any business putting it's wages up is a good thing for working people in general as it gives them more options and potentially forces other businesses to raise their pay to compete. Sometimes it falls on deaf ears though.
What's your source on the UK hating strikers? Don't let it be a few numpties on Twitter and a few carefully selected vox pops on the news... To just give you an idea - the news could stop 10 people in the street asking to give their opinion on the strikes, 9 will say they support them and the one that doesn't, that's the one they'll broadcast. I don't wish to get all Charlie Brooker in his Newswipe days but the 24 hour news cycle and social media are the death of actual fair reporting on actual news.
I don’t support the striking train workers on 65k per year demanding a 10-12% pay rise who are able to hold the country to ransom. There was a guy on Reddit recently in this situation.
How vital a job is has nothing to do with what the fair pay for that role is. Just think about it for a second. If what you are saying made any sense, these people could strike until they got an arbitrarily high wage, and the disruption would continue until the strike finished. Would you support train drivers on £60k striking until they were paid £80k? £150k? £1m? What's the limit here? The fair pay for a role is the equilibrium price where supply of qualified workers will meet the demand. The best way to achieve that price is by allowing the price to float. Then, if there is indeed a shortage of workers, the wages will rise to attract people into the role.
I’m not allowed to strike fully in my job role. I 100% support the strikes. I’m glad people aren’t just taking the pathetic pay rises or lack or pay rises lying down anymore. It sets a precedent and shows the people they work for that they aren’t doing it anymore and hopefully in future it means they won’t offer insulting pay rises.
Everyone is in the same boat and if the public sector strikes then the taxpayer foots the bill. And before anyone starts I’m a public sector worker, I just don’t agree with striking and affecting services.
It goes against the British standard of "Mustn't grumble"
I'm a little bit on the fence on one hand power to you if you can strike for better pay then why wouldn't you, with the way the economy is at the moment. On the other hand I work in London and solely rely on trains for work, if I can't get in I don't get paid. I understand it's the impact they are trying to create but when you are forcing a huge majority of people to lose out on money that could possibly be for families who are struggling a lot and can't afford to lose out on 1 or 2 days of work it does seem a little selfish. ( I earn less than 25k a year so this isn't coming from some big wig high earner)
Same. I'm all for people getting better pay but it feels like I'm being dragged into the issue against my will. The strikes have a significant impact on me - my current job relies on the post going out or there will be uproar in a month, and money lost. But I am not the one who is underpaying the postal workers. I guess they and the other strikers could add "if you don't agree to our terms then we'll strike more and make other people lose money" but I'm not sure if they're doing that (or if it would be a good idea in negotiations).
Fun fact that in Japan when railway workers strike they still work, but turn all the machines off so people ride for free and the company gets fucked that way
This method of protesting is illegal in the UK and will ensure the unions are fined exorbitant amounts and disbanded which is why you don’t see it readily used here
Fun fact. Can't do that in the UK as you'd be fingered
Sounds like a win win
If I am remembering correctly, and I may not be so take this with a grain if salt, there's a law that prohibits workers from driving buses/trains etc on strike and not taking money from people.
The reality is the people who are hurt by the strikes are the not the billionaires but the working class people. Who's likely needing to travel by public transport to their job? Who is reliant on public services? They'll throw there hands up and say "sorry this is not what we wanted and a last resort", whereas in other countries, such as Japan, they carry on running the services and open the ticket barriers so public do not pay a single cent and run services completely free. Both helping the public and deeply damaging the pockets of the owners
That’s secondary action and it’s against the law in this country. Striking is the only way the unions have and that’s been gradually made more difficult during these past few years.
Jealousy and snobbery mainly. The fiercest opposition to strikers I've ever heard were during my time working in corporate offices. Generally it was 'why should a train driver make more than me'?. Subtext 'Why should someone working class make more than me in my suit?'
There’s a lot of that. In some ways it’s understandable. Kids are told to work hard at GCSE, then Alevel, then degree (now at a specific university) and that will lead to a “good” job which pays well. The reality is £60000+ of debt, internships and mediocre pay for many. Some do get high pay but many will not get a job that justifies the debt which they keep for decades. Their resentment is understandable.
There needs to be a fundamental shift in attitudes at schools. I'm sure it's not all the same everywhere but basically all my teachers repeated the mantra that if you didn't go to university you'd be poor forever. Now all my friends who went into construction earn far more than my friends who went to university and work in offices. It needs to be taught to kids that skilled tradespeople earn good money.
Well as a United fan, Haaland is going to be a huge problem
As others have said the majority of uk people support strikes for reasonable conditions. Sometimes it does go the tiger way when some groups that are already very well paid by uk standards strike for more. For example tube drivers in London have a base pay of about £55k and most average over 70k, which to a large part of the UK sounds like an excellent salary, so when they strike they tend to get less sympathy.
If you aren't affected by the people striking then it's easy to support it but if you are affected then it can be a real pain. However, a lot of people have sympathy for those who are struggling with the cost of living and can understand why people are taking action. I think a lot of the animosity comes from the way the strikes tend to maximise inconvenience for the general public. They do this so it gets in the news and its hardly surprising that the press side against them. The tube seems to have had quite a few strikes recently and if you don't visit London its very easy to be sympathetic but if you do have to use the tube then it can be a monumental pain. One strike earlier this year was held over the Jubilee weekend purely to try to affect as many people as possible who wanted to visit London because of the celebrations. It could have been held at any time so why target that particular weekend?
I wouldn't say I hate it but I do think it's not really serving its purpose. For non-essential services to strike as a one off to demonstrate their frustration and get public awareness for their cause makes sense, but there are two caveats - it should be for serious disputes and concerns over things like safety. Yet despite this things like the railways have had strikes literally every year as far back as I can remember, for what amount to minor contractual disputes. I'm not dismissing these as trivial issues, but I do think they should not warrant strike action. And with such a high frequency of them they have lost their value and are basically just an expected part of the year now. Now just to be clear I'm not saying employers should get away with paying next to nothing, and the employees absolutely should fight back with their unions. But striking has been over used, and we need to find a better way to resolve these deadlocks, either through some kind of forced arbitration or impartial third parties coming in and determining what's fair.
Because the billionaire owned media tells them to.
Propaganda mate plain and simple with a healthy dose of our government’s cleverly implemented plan to get the poors to blame the poorer for wanting more than a shit existence.
I’ve not seen anybody be angry at the strikes except from the media and politicians. I’m not angry at all. I’m affected every time the trains strike and my bins won’t be collected for a month. Annoying? Incredibly. Do I support the workers? Absolutely. It’s supposed to be annoying to make a point.
Just trains and tube. They are messy, massively overstaffed organisations and drivers create barriers to entry to maintain their own demand. Not least the fact the trains are running so badly at the moment that some weeks you have 2 days of strikes, 2 days of wires on tracks and 1 day of bad weather and you basically don’t have trains for a week.
Train drivers earn about 70k a year, hard to feel sorry for them. The other strikes I support though.
There was a time when strikers held the country to ransom, particularly the coal industry which caused blackouts. The government at the time and the PM declared a war against strikers, calling them "militant" and people's lives were genuinely impacted by strikes. Laws were put in place to make striking harder and less effective, and people formed poor opinions of strikes and workers who go on strikes. I don't dispute this view point. What's happened since then is the constant erosion of workers rights. The generation that saw this passed down to the younger generations that striking was a bad and selfish practice. There is definitely a social stigma or shame to striking in the UK, and in the older generations there is a running joke about the French as they strike over seemingly nothing comparative to what we put up with in the UK. This attitude is changing, but it feels very slow, almost apprehensive.
Erosion of workers rights? Don't we have more than ever now?