Christmas time is here, and the nation is feeling the strain of strike action across the public sector. This month the UK has seen strikes from a plethora of sectors; National Rail, Royal Mail, and the NHS. The public attitude toward these strikes has been less than favourable, with the tabloids marking clear disdain towards strikers, particularly for doing so at this busy and festive time of year. National Rail has taken a significant beating from the tabloids with the emergence of the Mick Grinch rhetoric that subdues rail workers and the strikers that stole Christmas. Our previously nicknamed NHS Heroes were given the side-eye from tabloids and the Prime Minister with the argument that strikers are dishonouring their Hippocratic oath and withholding care from patients. These narratives are quite poisonous to the cultural memory of strikers in British history; the government has capitalised on the festive connotations of December and driven a hard rhetoric around strikers as the Grinches' of Christmas.
So, what have trade unions done for us?
British trade unions have held the torch for workers’ rights across the U.K.; they steered the working classes away from the exploitative working conditions of the Victorian age and spared future generations from a treacherous work lifestyle. Trade Unions have given us:
The right to safe working conditions
The five-day working week
Maternity and Paternity rights
Holiday and Sickness pay
Minimum wage
Maximum working hours
Equal pay for work of equal value
Pension rights
The ethos of the strikers is embedded within the victories of the trade union. When people decide to strike, they are putting out the political message that their working conditions no longer reflect the resolutions and expectations of the trade union that ensure safe work.
The government must stop using the pay review body as cover for its own inaction. This year’s pay rise simply wasn’t enough to halt the exodus of staff from the NHS.” – UNISON General Secretary.
NHS staff bodies have been announcing its slow but unavoidable collapse over the last decade due to public spending cuts. Christmas time brings with it an increased demand for healthcare services. Nurses were given a £1 pay this year, which has proven to be a feeble effort to encourage worker morale amongst staff as they continue to work in volatile conditions. The strikes in December reflect the impossibility for our NHS to exercise full and complete care to existing patients and manage the increased demand for beds and provisions that are in very limited supply. For many NHS workers, the right to a five-day working week is often violated by the expectation for staff to work over 40-hour weeks.
The timing of the strikes has been convenient for tabloid giants. Our national newspapers have fleshed out the narrative of public sector strikes with superfluous accusations that strikers are selfish and devoid of festive spirit. We can expect civic action to carry on into the new year, ambulance workers belonging to UNISON, for example, will strike again on the 11th and 23rd of January. What narrative will tabloids adopt once the crisis continues? That is something that will be revealed in the new year. The British press has an infamous reputation for tactical journalism, mastering the art of click-bait and encouraging public outrage via calculated headlines. The Grinchification of strikers has been yet another example of this. Our public sector is the beating heart of our country, and our national services are what give us a chance of civil equity. Their decision to strike is a sign of dire times for the systems we lean on at crucial points throughout our lives.
Image courtesy of the BBC
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