Post Office, 3 lots of air transport workers. Manchester Airport could be badly hit just before Christmas.

More nails in Corbyn's electoral coffin if he supports the strikers??

Err, no. More nails in Grayling and the rest of his Tory chums hopefully.

The Christmas of discontent? Will Theresa May become known as the PM when the country ground to a halt for Xmas?

Hardly.

Older voters will be reminded of 1979 and we know what that resulted in.

Corbyn only preaches to the converted.

Tory support will go even higher.

It resulted in 18 years of disasterous Tory rule.

The 1979 government was blamed for that, why won't the present government be blamed for this mess?

Agreed, we are no where near (thankfully) the mess of the late 70's.

In fact, the current strikes won't bother most people at all.

The Tories wont support the strikers.

Manchester being the main airport for the northern Labour heartlands..

Can you explain?

The Tories are in government.
It's Tory policies of selling off the public sector on the cheap to money grabbers which has caused the issues.

It's the public defending their rights who are striking to prevent further cutbacks in pay, the removal of safeguards which could put the public in danger, and the protection of the public from future Tory policies.

Why is Corbyn "to blame" for defending the people of Britain, their rights and fair pay?

Because they have a partnership with the media and even have bot accounts online to shift opinion.

But, but, surely cos of Brexit no one can afford to go abroad so these strikes will only impact the rich.

It may seem the public are on the side of the government from the press but according to the press we were going to stay in the EU and Hillary Clinton was going to win the US election.
In reality i'm yet to meet someone who would still work for a company who were withholding from them a months pay.

Yes, as we all know, millions of voters backed the strikers in 1979 and Labour were voted back into power with a huge majority.

I assume this is meant to be sarcasm, but doesn't really work. What you are saying is that the government was blamed in 1979, but the opposition will be blamed in 2016. You really do live in a post-fact world, don't you?

I am saying supporting strikers is a nail in a coffin.


I was a voter in 1979 as were many friends, family and work colleagues. Many were Labour voters who voted Tory for the first time.

Personally I couldn't bring myself to vote Tory. Think I voted Liberal.

Before any strike can take place the union involved must comply with some very strict legal rules and regulations,
(certainly the strictest and most represive trades union regulations of any Country in Europe and possibly any western democracy)
culmInating with a legal and democratic ballot of which all members must be informed and allowed to participate in.

So why would supporting a perfectly legal industrial action by workers, the very people that the Labour party was created to defend against those who would remove all of their rights if they could get away with it, be a nail in his political coffin?

For far too long we have had leaders of the 'Labour' party who have been afraid to stand with the working-class during legal industrial actions, too terrified of the right wing establishment controlled anti trades union media to stand up for those they are supposed to represent,
I am more determined than ever to support the current Labour leadership because of their clear determination to support the British workers right to LEGALLY withdraw their labour,
Those who support the Tories (in the main) will never support any industrial action no matter if it's legal or otherwise, and would, I'm certain prefer the good old days when we 'knew our place, tugged our forelocks and called the boss 'master'

Tory politicians appear on TV news channels with their mealy-mouthed lies of "of course we support the right of workers to withdraw their labour....but"
Really? well I certainly can't recall a Tory politician ever supporting any industrial action by anyone ever, and I'm 63 years old.

The unions do themselves no favours when they strike and xmas or the bank holidays.

All they do is damage the business which employees them, and then cry when jobs are lost.

Er, really? People not being able to get to work or go away for Christmas seems a bit more serious than rubbish piling up in the streets.

Labour need to decide who they want to be and stick with it. Having a strong position on something, anything, would at least let voters know where Labour fit in the politics of late-stage capitalism.

What are they striking for? More money?

There are situations where I think strikes are legitimate and important. Such as for people who work for exploitative big businesses where workers can be exploited to Victorian workhouse conditions. Names such as Amazon and JD Sports spring to mind as companies who have been reported as treating their workers very badly.
But you hardly ever hear about strikes representing those people. It always tends to be nationalised or semi-nationalised businesses such as the NHS, public transport or the Post Office. Why don't we see more strikes against big multinational companies? It just doesn't seem to happen, or we hardly hear about it.

Rot! Downtrodden workers are protesting about the disgraceful abuse of their rights by their employers and the indifference of the government. Good luck to them, their action is long overdue. The mealy-mouthed deviousness of the May government is a disgrace but typically Tory. They are only concerned about lining their own pockets and those of their cronies. It's very sad for the public but people are entitled to fight for their rights.

I suppose this is where the argument against importing in immigrant workers to perform cheap labour might come into play. If somebody isn't prepared to work under certain conditions they know that they can replace them with somebody who is, and may even think terrible working conditions are normal.

Actually they do do themselves a favour because its often companies with higher union representation that get better terms and conditions for their staff.

You don't seem to understand modern pay negotiations. In the 1970s it was indeed about union barons showing power and holding the country to ransom. These days however the modern business method of employee relations is to offer a 1% pay rise tied to cuts in things like shift allowances, overtime and sick pay, in reality a pay cut for each and every employee. They then play hardball and push the workers and the union to a strike ballot to "test" morale in the hope of breaking the union and the workforce for good knowing that the media and internet morons will condemn the staff for being greedy and unreasonable and before you know it the strike collapses and each and every "British" company adopts the Sports Direct model of employee management.

The the same media and establishment act bewildered that 17.5 million people say a massive "**** you" to them when given the opportunity.

Er, yes, really.

How many people are currently directly impacted by the strikes, compared to the countrywide strikes in the late 70's.