OK Neil received and understood.
I think it is a great pity that the flow of info into public channels is so badly skewed in these situations, but I suppose some will claim "commercial confidentiality" etc etc etc blah blah blah. Not good.
I think this stuff gets tricky because (I imagine) in many ways, strikers
need the public whom they are going to impact, to get on their side to help get a point home to their employers. But this tends to be paradoxical doesn't it.
Also, different strikes affect different cross-sections I imagine. If we had the time, we could analyse:
- The Miners
- The car workers
- The Teachers
- The petrochemicalheads
- The BA cabin crew
- The Civil Servants
...and others which I've missed, and I bet we'd see some really interesting results as to how much the affected customers, end-users, general public groups etc, were on-board or against the strikers.
We could also look at what was actually giving rise to the dispute in the first place, and as Robin says, what amount of negotiation (if any) had occurred (or at least been attempted!).
Bottom line for me is, I absolutely don't hold Public Sector responsible for "the current mess", but while my employer was taking a hatchet to jobs
in advance of the recession, the Public Sector was riding high. That is just not sustainable. I have some experience working with that sector as my client, and I shall share some of my observations in the bar in November. But not here.
Right, shall we get back to the fun stuff in this thread now?!
Campbell
Dom, it would be great to see you there!
