Britain's trade union movement put itself on a collision course with the Conservative-Liberal government Monday by threatening a prolonged national campaign of strikes and mass protests over austerity plans. At their annual congress in Manchester, delegates at the Trades Union Congress (TUC) voted unanimously on a motion proposing "coordinated campaigns and industrial action" that would begin next month and could last well into 2011, dpa reported. TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said the unions in Britain were facing "stark realities" from the government's determination to drive through spending cuts that would "devastate" the public services and "damage our economic prospects." The "reckless" cuts would lead to over 200,000 job losses among public sector workers, the unions maintain. They also reject the government's views on both the origin of the economic crisis and the proposed remedies. The recession was made in the "boardrooms of the world's banks," said Barber, who also suggested that the drastic cuts planned by the government bore the risk of a so-called double-dip recession. The coalition government, led by Prime Minister David Cameron, is set to reveal details of its proposed spending cuts to tackle the massive budget deficit of more than 150 billion pounds (230 billion dollars) on October 20. The government Monday offered the unions "genuine partnership," saying it wished to enter into a dialogue with trade union leaders. However, there was little sign of compromise at the TUC gathering, where militant leaders called for a "campaign of civil disobedience" that would rival the scale of the protests against the government of Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. "Maybe we need Batman climbing up 10 Downing Street, Spider-Man on Buckingham Palace as part of peaceful demonstrations of civil disobedience," Bob Crow, the leader of the radical rail and transport union said. However, TUC leader Brendan Barber dismissed the idea of radical action. "I've certainly not called for civil disobedience. I don't find the idea attractive and I think it is counter-productive," he said in a BBC interview. Speakers at the congress blamed alleged bankers' "greed and arrogance" for the current crisis and said the government was "in denial" if it regarded deficit reduction as the only means of ending it. Matt Wrack, of the Fire Brigades Union, said it was "lunacy" to cut ministerial budgets by between 25 and 40 per cent. "We have a cabinet of millionaires who don't use public services...This is a war on the entire population in the interests of a tiny minority of big business, bankers and the super rich," he said. But despite the radical rethoric, analysts stressed that surveys had shown widespread support by the public for the need to cut the excessive spending of the Labour government era and to consolidate state finances. They also point to the decline in power of the trade union movement since its heyday in the 1970s and 1980s, even though union membership in the public sector remains high, with 57 per cent of employees signed up as members.
