STOPPING THE NONSENSE
Men go on strike in the hope of getting- more money for their labour as a result. There are some union leaders, and many shop stewards and agitators, whose motives are in part political and doctrinal and who seek to destroy the mixed economy by the constant fostering of industrial strife. Such people wish to bank- rupt the country's industry, and incident- ally to impoverish the workers they represent and lead, as a necessary step in the process of bringing about revolutionary change. But they can only operate by per- suading the workers that strikes, go-slows and other industrial action will provide material benefit that would otherwise not be obtained; and almost invariably nowa- days the material benefit sought through strikes and the threat of strikes is more cash reward for labour. The withdrawal of his labour is a worker's chief sanction. Since employers left to themselves do not normally go out of their way to pay increased wages, and since a worker on his own is in no strong position to bargain, workers join together and prepare to go on strike in order to bargain effectively. No better way of increasing wages has yet been devised. Totalitarian countries, dis- liking bargains freely arrived at, invariably ban strikes. Free countries, however much they may affect to dislike them, neverthe- less tolerate them. The net effect of strikes conducted for cash benefits is probably generally beneficial, increasing wages and compelling greater efficiency in the use of labour. Few would argue that the charac- teristic American strike—a prolonged struggle for a very considerable increase conducted between a single powerful union and a single powerful firm, concluded by an agreement designed to last for a couple of years or so—has not made a valuable contribution towards the wealth of that wealthiest country. The right to strike is a necessity in a. free society; and strikes themselves may well be necessary for a healthy economy. But a strike should be a genuine' two- sided affair, between trade unionists and employers who stand to lose as well as to gain. Governments are entitled to express views on the terms of settlement, and are also entitled to endeavour to persuade one side or the other to hold out or to concede: they are, that is, entitled to express their view of the public interest as they see it. Also, in suitable circumstances, they can provide conciliation services and the like. There would, however, be a general out- cry if a government were to use public funds as a subsidy to an employer to assist him to defeat a strike. More through administrative ineptitude than by political intent, public money has been used to sub- sidise trade unionists in carrying on strikes; and Sir Keith Joseph and the government are quite right in seeking to put an end to a misuse of public funds which, if the cash went to the employers rather than to the employees, would quite rightly be declared by one and all to be scandalous.
The debate in the House of Commons on the Government's proposals—which many will think are nowhere near radical enough, but which nevertheless represent some further faltering steps in the right direction—produced a good deal of tradi- tional twaddle. The simple reform con- tained in the Social Security Bill removes the abuse whereby more and more strikers, in Sir Keith Joseph's words, 'realised that whereas a sub from an employer was repayable and came within taxed income, supplementary benefit was neither repay- able nor taxable. At a steadily accelerating rate groups of men and women had been discouraging employers from paying subs during the two weeks after the return to work at the end of a trade dispute, and had been turning to the Supplementary Benefits Commission.' The Bill is designed to stop this nonsense. Yet the normally intelligent and quite sensible Miss Shirley Williams found herself saving. `The most marked feature of the Bill is its discrim- inating desire to penalise those involved in strikes. It is marked by a de,gree of dis- crimination which cannot be justified.' The removal of an abuse is scarcely to be called an act of discrimination; and if a man or a group of men have found a way of obtaining public funds which had not been intended for them, to prevent them from continuing to do so is hardly to show a desire to penalise. Mr Jock Bruce- Gardyne was right in his rebuttal : We.are getting to an intolerable situation when my constituents know they are obliged through the tax system to contribute towards the cost of supplementary benefits to facilitate a minority of trade union militants who are engaged in fermenting industrial unrest and propelling strikes which are going to drive those same constituents out of employment'. But this sort of argument counts for nothing so far as Mrs like Mr Prentice and Mr Helfer are concerned who assert that 'the Government is trying to make a mean little attempt to hit at the -strike situation through the children of strikers' (Prentice) and 'the proposals in the Bill are mean, vicious and part of the government's overall strategy in fighting the workers in their unions' (Heifer).
The question is whether the Bill is sufficient. Mr Curran argued : 'If tax- payers decided, as they should, to support a man's wife and family while he was on strike, there was no reason why that sup- port should not be granted by way of loan instead of by gift. No state could provide money ad lib for people on strike.' It is most unlikely that taxpayers, if asked the question, would as a matter of fact decide to support the family of a man on strike. And should they anyway? Since such a question is unlikely ever to form the basis of a general election campaign, it is govern- ments which must reach for an answer. A man's wife and children will benefit from wage increases won through strikes and the threats of strikes. There seems no good reason why a union. in calling its members out on strike, should not first have col- lected enough funds to sustain its strike; nor why a man who answers a call to strike should not first have put money aside for this contingency. Is there any good reason why those who do not go on strike, and who may well suffer rather than gain through strikes, should be compelled through taxation to assist strikers either by gifts or by loans? The state should no more intervene by using public money to prop up strikers than it should to prop up companies. The economic costs of striking should be borne by those who expect to benefit from their voluntary activity. The state has no more business feather-bedding strikers than it has feather-bedding any- body else except the weak.
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