Right to strike?
 

Just saw this on BBC
And of course I laughed. Who's going to arrest 20,000 police?

But it raises a more important question about industrial relations. Should certain job(-types) be excluded from industrial action?

Re: Right to strike?
 

I think everyone should be allowed to "strike" within reasonable bounds, such as the police refusing to appear at a soccer match, forcing it to be canceled. Such things where people do not get hurt.. everyone should be allowed to do it.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Every employee should have a right to strike. However there should be restrictions on employees working at police, health care, border guard etc, meaning that they have to maintain certain service level even during a strike. Thus I guess the first option comes closest to my view.

Re: Right to strike?
 

I think if they don't have a right to strike, then the buisness leaders would take full advantage of the situation, and lower wages

Re: Right to strike?
 

Military police, or the army. The army serves as the fire brigade in certain areas last time they were striking, IIRC.

They ought to be able to strike, although perhaps there ought to be restrictions on the number allowed to be on strike at a time.

EDIT - Nanobot, the are already not allowed to strike.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Good poll Marsoe, but I think you need to define it a bit better. What do you mean by "right" to strike?

Now I view, in the context you're presenting it, as a legal right. But in some cases, the legality is pointless. Like you said, if the police goes on strike, what are we going to do? Tell them to arrest themselves?

Re: Right to strike?
 

Heh, it was a 2am poll. I do think I meant legal right, but if you want to discuss the ethics of it (especially, say, doctors striking) go right ahead.

On that note, things like a doctors strike is going to be notified well in advance, giving hospitals time to prepare. We recently had a nation-wide junior doctors strike, and they made sure emergency departments were kept open, while the hospitals paid senior doctors up to $500 an hour to cover shifts.

Re: Right to strike?
 

In the case of doctors, even then, I think the morality would be a bit dubious. All that money spent to pamper their strike could have been used to improve conditions and service in the facilities, or hire more employees.

What if one of those senior doctors working overtime makes a mistake due to fatigue? Then that patient's blood would be indirectly on the strikers' hands.

Re: Right to strike?
 

The same argument can be made concerning the revenue lost in any strike.

Re: Right to strike?
 

In that case though, it's the fault of the hospital (or in our case District Health Boards), the doctors don't get to decide their own wages.

Re: Right to strike?
 

True, but truckers or Walmart employees going on to harm anyone.

Yes, but the doctors have the choice of how to respond.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Indeed, and a strike is never a first resort.

Re: Right to strike?
 

You oculd hold a stike to lets say geting a holiday or 40 hour workweeks (not 60,80 100), but since they go off and want $35 bucks an hour, and every benifet known, then NO !!!!!

picked B

I can't see ANY reason a doctor would EVER go on strike, don't make sense at all, or are you talking about gov run healthcare.

Re: Right to strike?
 

In the US, there are labor laws in place to discourage union strikes over wage related disputes. However, those same laws protect workers from lockouts and other such corporate retaliations when the labor dispute is non-monetary in nature.

I'd have to agree with Relander and Tas. While no person or union should be barred from striking altogether, essential service workers should have restrictions in place; most responsible unions would agree with this. That said, it is rare (at least in the states) to see doctors strike, while it is far more common to see nurses and other healthcare support staff do so.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Unions are voted in by the employees, I don't think other countries do that, not sure.But my moms last boss said "if there is any talk of a union I will close the place down.

My dad worked for a place, tool and die, he was there for about 3 months, they voted in a union, BOOM they just closed and left my dad looking for another job.

but nowdays, all they do is move the factory to China, yay unions.
One plant here went on strike for 2 , 3 months now, it forced GM to close a pile of places, they made a bargain, if they pay the union 200,000,000$ they would agree to go back to work.But in the meantime piles of other people had to collect union paychecks or find another job.
ONE factory caused the problem and affected thousands of people.

They also have a new thing nowdays too.Since the company can't afford to pay all these high wages they are offering buyouts, like 100,000$ for the workers to retire, or just leave.

Hell ya nothing like strong arming your boss and exspect them to be nice, the unions go way too far and now we pay the price.It's not all corperate greed, a lot of people have the exact same greed, and money don't grow on trees.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Money may not grow on trees but the slave labor still being used is just as abundant then as it is now. Business screwed your Dad over (that and a lack of protectionism in the third world), not his union.

Re: Right to strike?
 

I would laugh so hard, if all of Americas military forces went on strike, just as World War 3 initiates. That would be... pretty bad. Everyone but essential i think.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Well he started before the union was voted in, but another place he worked at he said you can take your union dues, but I will not be a part of the union.

People think the union is for the worker, but people don't understand how exspensive and time consuming hiring an employee is.The way it is done is you get cash they get service, the more they sell the more each makes.

but since unions strong arm a company what happens is special groups of people get paid more than what they should.Then everybody suffers from high prices all because some greedy people are getting more than they are worth.
Then the company rather than just selling stuff and creating work, it becomes an ,us against them.Then the employer becomes gun shy and yes a union has to strong arm them to FORCE what they want.

It's not the day of the sweatshops, which was a good reason to form unions, nowdays it just screws up everything for the employers, employees, and the customers.

Re: Right to strike?
 

In the days America wrote the Capitalist Manifesto (great book by the way, go read it! ^_^ ) working conditions were better than they are today and the working week was much shorter.
We've walked forwards with companies taking more and more and what reward have we been allowed for it? The dollar now is worth to the average middle class man in America around 4 cents of the worth of the old dollar when congress created the Federal Reserve. You speak of unions strong arming companies but unions have allowed companies an awful lot of slack in the things they have taken and the common man sees awful little in return for this other than the value of his savings ever degrading as government creates more money out of nowhere dilluting the power of his currency and grants this money into the pockets of big business displacing his profits into the hands of a few elite.
It's time the unions grew some balls and stopped letting themselves be pushed around more than anything else.

Re: Right to strike?
 

But would it be moral to risk physical harm to innocent people because you have a pay problem?

Re: Right to strike?
 

Every employee has the right to strike though it must never endanger other people. This means that certain sectors can have a more radical strike then others. There are various level of striking, workers can go on a full strike, offer the service they provide for free (for example: bus drivers allowing people to board without ticket) or by minimizing capicity (most townhall staff on strike except for the few desks that have to be open such as the desk to report the birth of a child, which has to be done in a day or so by law).

So yes, the police can strike by not handing out tickets, not providing officers for an event such as a football match and so on.
Same with the militairy, if they aren't in a combat situation or something simular important they can just strike.
Same with docters, they can refuse general support (though they should be available if immidiate healthcare is required, but emergency services generally take care of this).

Strikes are a last resort though, one sould first try to find a solution by having the unions talk, writing letters of complaints and such, then one can treaten to go on a strike and only after that one can strike. The severity of the strike should be justifable and depends on the exact circumstances.

Re: Right to strike?
 

That was an issue in Finland at last Autumn. A large number of nurses threatened to resign en mass if their wages wouldn't be raised by some 20%: by resigning they would circumvent the legislation ordering them to maintain minimum service level while in strike.

The people's sympathies were on nurses' side. The government was blamed instead when it didn't support the wage raise and it quickly prepared legislation for the parliament which would force the resigned nurses to work. Eventually the nurses and employer union reached an agreement: 16% raise in four years agreement period. No nurse resigned and no compulsion legislation was taken to the parliament.

It's a tricky question. On the other hand it's also a question what is really appreciated and what should be appreciated. People don't live with sayings "you're doing important job" and if there aren't competitive wages compared to education the job requires, who will stay in the job?

By all means I think that even doctors, nurses, police, border guard, military etc. should have the right to strike but only if the minimum service level can be guaranteed. For example there are enough doctors and nurses at work to take care of acute cases & surgeries, emergency section etc.

Re: Right to strike?
 

The level of competent policing in England has taken a big hit over the last ten to fifteen years, it's not surprising. The police get screwed over in terms of job satisfaction, in that the people they arrest even for serious things like assault tend to get rather pathetic sentences, in the equipment they're given (their radio system is now so inefficient that it tends to interfere with large quantities of traffic and actually has of all things a transmission delay, on top of which it actually costs so much since the government sold the airwaves off to private enterprise that many areas are in danger of running out of money) in the support they're given by the CPS and other government services including the moves they're taught for self defence being somewhat pathetic these days. Some areas have had to get rid of real policemen in order to hire the community support wardens that the government now says they must have.

Frankly the government in England is a company that will keep screwing people and services over until something gives or it runs it into the dirt. We need our police to be able to strike, the alternative is to go even further down this road our government has embarked upon.

Re: Right to strike?
 

Exactly.

Normally the hospital/health board/government will find an agreement with the doctors. If that can't be found, doctors have tried rolling strikes (one hospital per day/one city per day/50% of doctors per day) and so on.

In the case of the doctors strike, the Minister of Health intervened (as well as sacked a District Heath Board, and ordered and investigation on another), and muscled the DHBs into an agreement. Popular support tends to swing really heavily behind the doctors (and likewise for police etc) for better conditions and pay, becuase of the nature of the job.

Re: Right to strike?
 

In Canada, some institutions cannot go on strike, like EMS, Public transport...

Re: Right to strike?
 

Really, here in Belgium the public transport strikes about 10 times a year creating massive traffic jams and general nuiscance.

I think everyone has a right to strike, in the case of doctors or police there are ways provided to strike by means of "minimal service" meaning they can strike if they can supply the minimal of services to the public.