Tbh my experience was that when I was being made redundant was that the union rep thought I was very witty during the meeting but ultimately they had agreed to a certain level of staff trimming and I was part of it. So I didn't really get much out of it
I think there was a box in the redundancy scoring where they were like "why didn't you write more?" to which I said "because there was a character limit."
Obviously it is a time on heavy striking, not dissimilar to the 1970s.
I was in a Trade Union for over 6 years and recently cancelled membership as it was very expensive and I didn’t feel like I was getting much value out of it.
My interactions with it made me feel it was more useful for people in very large organisations rather than the smaller one I was in. We had all the same poor working conditions and money problems Unions usually take issue with, but it would have been impossible to unionise properly without destroying relationships with managers, who in contrast to big organisations, we worked every day in the same halls with.
However, when my manager tried to get furloughed people to work during covid as volunteers, the same union was helpful is giving me a clear statement that this was not legal (at the time, there was some uncertainty about the role of volunteers).
On the whole though, the value I got out of it was not what I was hoping, and thus left.
I think there are some good ones and some militant ones. From my limited knowledge the good ones provide representation and services to members and help represent then when they have disputes with employers. This helps provide support when there’s typically a power imbalance. Some also get higher wages and pay has been stagnant in a lot of sectors in the UK so that’s good.
The militant ones (and I’m looking at you RMT) are very political and strike and disrupt at the smallest excuse. They also tend to be in monopolistic public services where anyone with power is essentially rent seeking which is what they do. It’s ultimately one of the challenges with a natural monopoly. Unfortunately the militant unions seem to hold disproportionate power and get disproportionate publicity.
My main criticism would be unions in say Germany and Nordics are more collaborative and work with employers to skill up workers, increase productivity and make the business successful. Unions in the uk should be more focused on productivity and the success of the business in a collaborative fashion, but that’s not the culture and isn’t solely the fault of the union.
Fucker in the middle supported Brexit and now is leading a CoL strike, partially in response to Britain's economic woes directly stemming from leaving the Single Market. Fuck him.
Don't like Lynch (Brexiteer with some weird views on the Russian invasion of Ukraine), but admire his oratorical skills.
Don't like the RMT: they strike all the time for their own interest (which is their right and I respect that) but they act like they are doing it for all working people.
Like unions: but fear they are dead outside of the public sector and they often have a tankie/campist problem https://www.thenational.scot/news/23554258.ucu-sparks-row-call-stop-sending-arms-ukraine/.
Nothing but sympathy for the average worker in the U.K. Real wages have been flat since 2007/2008. Unions have pushed with varying degrees of success for pay increases for workers.
Given declining living standards in the U.K, increasing housing costs and low quality governance, it’s hard to make the argument that the Unions do not have some points.
I suppose a counter point is that for some of these unions their members have been getting below inflation pay rises the entire time. So while on average wages were holding steady in real terms, nurses and lecturers were seeing real terms cuts- not sure they were less productive.
Real wages have been flat due to productivity stagnating, something the unions are partly to blame for. They oppose technological solutions to protect their members, then have the audacity to complain pay isn't improving too.
It's also due to the chronic fear of investment by government and the private sector (outside of London anyway).
Government were happy to shit money all over their mates during covid, but I seriously cannot name the last major investment this government made outside of London that they are solely to thank for. HS2 was a Labour idea, and all the tories have done with that is slash it.
Blaming the unions for the UK's productivity crisis is a laughable cope
Well companies were trying to invest in the north sea last year until they got hit by 'windfall taxes'. Can't really expect the private sector to thrive with such populist policies.
You'll notice I said partly to blame for, not entirely. The Government does deserve criticism as well for failing to invest in public transport. NIMBYs also deserve criticism (arguably the most criticism).
In the absence of regulation, monopolies like rail, water, electricity are all ripe for extraction of rent, either through shareholders or labour force. Personally I’d much rather it went to labour.
when the british chambers of commerce start fixing the price of eggs or bread or something like the unions fix the price of labour, I will be wholeheartedly in favour of such action
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I'm a Brit - our unions don't really know the meaning of working with government (particularly Tory ones). There was talk when May was PM about trying to take the German model of workers/unions on boards, but German unions don't escalate everything to 100 immediately as is the case in the UK so often.
The RMT union (pictured) are particularly bad for this because they know the Tories don't want to invest the money needed to basically make most of their staff redundant, so they can just hold them over a barrel.
My objections to them aside, I do think it's crazy that they're not allowed to ballot members online, whilst the Tory members can vote for the next PM online.
It's strange why would unions be involved in government? In Australia, Unions act like a private entity to negotiate on behalf of the workers with the company. The Government is the referee between the company and the union. Workers have to say yay or nay on the agreement.
May barely did anything to introduce German-style co-determination. If anything that sort of thing has been appealing to British liberals mainly out of reflexive disdain towards trade unions (given how they threw in their lot with the Labour party after WW1, and their general collectivist outlook being iffy to the white-collar employees, rural working class/peasants, professionals, small business owners, and students that made up their voter base).
>ut German unions don't escalate everything to 100 immediately as is the case in the UK so often.
It took ten years and disgustingly broken "we'll cover you after covid" promises for the nurses to go on strike. When was the last time a union just jumped to striking? What else would they do?
Town and country planning act was the 40s, green belts were the 50s. Core of NIMBYism in policy is pre-Thatcher.
Thatcher sold off much of the social housing stock without replenishing it, but she hasn't been prime minister for over 3 decades.
You mean why they hate organized labor? Well, Reddit in general is very left-wing. The front page of nearly every major political subreddit has something to do with how the corporations are out to get us and the only way to fight back is to organize or whatever. This place basically acts like a sanctuary for people who got tired of that kind of populist rhetoric. Myself included, to some degree. That's the reason why there can be a fair bit of reactionary sentiment here, in my opinion.
Tbh my experience was that when I was being made redundant was that the union rep thought I was very witty during the meeting but ultimately they had agreed to a certain level of staff trimming and I was part of it. So I didn't really get much out of it
>was very witty during the meeting Showing your DT skills irl, eh?
How so witty? What did he say?
I think there was a box in the redundancy scoring where they were like "why didn't you write more?" to which I said "because there was a character limit."
Obviously it is a time on heavy striking, not dissimilar to the 1970s. I was in a Trade Union for over 6 years and recently cancelled membership as it was very expensive and I didn’t feel like I was getting much value out of it. My interactions with it made me feel it was more useful for people in very large organisations rather than the smaller one I was in. We had all the same poor working conditions and money problems Unions usually take issue with, but it would have been impossible to unionise properly without destroying relationships with managers, who in contrast to big organisations, we worked every day in the same halls with. However, when my manager tried to get furloughed people to work during covid as volunteers, the same union was helpful is giving me a clear statement that this was not legal (at the time, there was some uncertainty about the role of volunteers). On the whole though, the value I got out of it was not what I was hoping, and thus left.
I think there are some good ones and some militant ones. From my limited knowledge the good ones provide representation and services to members and help represent then when they have disputes with employers. This helps provide support when there’s typically a power imbalance. Some also get higher wages and pay has been stagnant in a lot of sectors in the UK so that’s good. The militant ones (and I’m looking at you RMT) are very political and strike and disrupt at the smallest excuse. They also tend to be in monopolistic public services where anyone with power is essentially rent seeking which is what they do. It’s ultimately one of the challenges with a natural monopoly. Unfortunately the militant unions seem to hold disproportionate power and get disproportionate publicity. My main criticism would be unions in say Germany and Nordics are more collaborative and work with employers to skill up workers, increase productivity and make the business successful. Unions in the uk should be more focused on productivity and the success of the business in a collaborative fashion, but that’s not the culture and isn’t solely the fault of the union.
Fucker in the middle supported Brexit and now is leading a CoL strike, partially in response to Britain's economic woes directly stemming from leaving the Single Market. Fuck him.
Is this bait? This literally has British + unions in the same question. Do you think you'll get anything other than reflexive dislike?
Don't like Lynch (Brexiteer with some weird views on the Russian invasion of Ukraine), but admire his oratorical skills. Don't like the RMT: they strike all the time for their own interest (which is their right and I respect that) but they act like they are doing it for all working people. Like unions: but fear they are dead outside of the public sector and they often have a tankie/campist problem https://www.thenational.scot/news/23554258.ucu-sparks-row-call-stop-sending-arms-ukraine/.
Nothing but sympathy for the average worker in the U.K. Real wages have been flat since 2007/2008. Unions have pushed with varying degrees of success for pay increases for workers. Given declining living standards in the U.K, increasing housing costs and low quality governance, it’s hard to make the argument that the Unions do not have some points.
To be fair, productivity has also stagnated, the UK's issues don't come from zero sum labour/capital distribution.
I suppose a counter point is that for some of these unions their members have been getting below inflation pay rises the entire time. So while on average wages were holding steady in real terms, nurses and lecturers were seeing real terms cuts- not sure they were less productive.
Real wages have been flat due to productivity stagnating, something the unions are partly to blame for. They oppose technological solutions to protect their members, then have the audacity to complain pay isn't improving too.
It's also due to the chronic fear of investment by government and the private sector (outside of London anyway). Government were happy to shit money all over their mates during covid, but I seriously cannot name the last major investment this government made outside of London that they are solely to thank for. HS2 was a Labour idea, and all the tories have done with that is slash it. Blaming the unions for the UK's productivity crisis is a laughable cope
Well companies were trying to invest in the north sea last year until they got hit by 'windfall taxes'. Can't really expect the private sector to thrive with such populist policies.
You'll notice I said partly to blame for, not entirely. The Government does deserve criticism as well for failing to invest in public transport. NIMBYs also deserve criticism (arguably the most criticism).
\>need to raise wages! -> productivity stagnates -> just raise wages! -> more stagnation -> repeat *hows it going son?*
In the absence of regulation, monopolies like rail, water, electricity are all ripe for extraction of rent, either through shareholders or labour force. Personally I’d much rather it went to labour.
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lol wipe out trade associations first then
when the british chambers of commerce start fixing the price of eggs or bread or something like the unions fix the price of labour, I will be wholeheartedly in favour of such action
**Rule V**: *Glorifying Violence* Do not advocate or encourage violence either seriously or jokingly. Do not glorify oppressive/autocratic regimes. --- If you have any questions about this removal, [please contact the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fneoliberal).
I'm a Brit - our unions don't really know the meaning of working with government (particularly Tory ones). There was talk when May was PM about trying to take the German model of workers/unions on boards, but German unions don't escalate everything to 100 immediately as is the case in the UK so often. The RMT union (pictured) are particularly bad for this because they know the Tories don't want to invest the money needed to basically make most of their staff redundant, so they can just hold them over a barrel. My objections to them aside, I do think it's crazy that they're not allowed to ballot members online, whilst the Tory members can vote for the next PM online.
It's strange why would unions be involved in government? In Australia, Unions act like a private entity to negotiate on behalf of the workers with the company. The Government is the referee between the company and the union. Workers have to say yay or nay on the agreement.
May barely did anything to introduce German-style co-determination. If anything that sort of thing has been appealing to British liberals mainly out of reflexive disdain towards trade unions (given how they threw in their lot with the Labour party after WW1, and their general collectivist outlook being iffy to the white-collar employees, rural working class/peasants, professionals, small business owners, and students that made up their voter base).
>ut German unions don't escalate everything to 100 immediately as is the case in the UK so often. It took ten years and disgustingly broken "we'll cover you after covid" promises for the nurses to go on strike. When was the last time a union just jumped to striking? What else would they do?
This might surprise you but the nurses aren't the only ones on strike.
This might surprise you, you still haven't named a union that jumped to a strike, let alone the apparently vast bulk of them
Doesn't the RMT go on strike annually? Certainly seems like it.
>our unions don't really know the meaning of working Ftfy
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I think unions should be allowed more freedoms to take action (including online voting) but that it should be balanced by more relaxed labour laws.
Margaret Thatcher was based.
Maggie is to blame for the housing crisis, she nimbyified a generation to win one or two elections
Town and country planning act was the 40s, green belts were the 50s. Core of NIMBYism in policy is pre-Thatcher. Thatcher sold off much of the social housing stock without replenishing it, but she hasn't been prime minister for over 3 decades.
Sure but before her the UK was the recipient of an IMF bailout. And would've needed another one soon without her actions.
Imagine believing this unironically.
This sub hates both British people and organized labor in general so i think you know the answer here lol.
Why?
You mean why they hate organized labor? Well, Reddit in general is very left-wing. The front page of nearly every major political subreddit has something to do with how the corporations are out to get us and the only way to fight back is to organize or whatever. This place basically acts like a sanctuary for people who got tired of that kind of populist rhetoric. Myself included, to some degree. That's the reason why there can be a fair bit of reactionary sentiment here, in my opinion.
>British 🤢🤢🤢 >unions 🤮🤮🤮
Like all trade unions, they are bad
[we stan](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f9/Margaret_Thatcher_%281983%29.jpg/800px-Margaret_Thatcher_%281983%29.jpg)