Democratic Double-Standards
In a sign of things to come, whatever the result of the next General Election, Ken Clarke has announced Tory plans to sell off the Royal Mail. The democratic choice facing the electorate will be a Tory full-blooded privatisation or a Labour part-privatisation, with the Liberal Democrats also supporting the latter option. Such a democratic political system we have when a recent ComRes poll for BBC Newsnight indicated that 68% of the public think Royal Mail should not be privatised.
Another proposal from Clarke was a further extension of the anti-union laws. If the Tories get their way, they wish to impose a minimum turnout thresholds for strike ballots. Under the proposed new system, only strikes for which the majority of the total workforce (not just the total turnout for the ballot) have voted will be regarded as lawful. In other words, non-votes are counted as votes against strike action. This is clearly linked to ensuring privatisation will go unchallenged by the CWU and a clear recognition that privatisation will be deeply unpopular.
Britain already has some of the most restrictive anti-union laws in the developed world. The International Labour Organisation has frequently expressed concern at UK violations of ILO Convention 87 on the autonomy of trades unions, to the extent that it found the ban on solidarity action to be in contravention of its provisions. Under Convention 98 the ILO raised concerns about the union recognition procedure laid down in the Employment Relations Act 1999, especially its exclusion of small businesses. This latest proposal, in other words, builds on existing restrictions of trade union rights inherited from Thatcher/Major governments and not relieved under the so-called Labour governments of Blair and Brown.
The last point to make about Clarke’s plan is the sheer hypocrisy of the political class in their attitude to trade unions. Postal workers voted by a massive 76% percent to go on strike last month on a 67% turnout. Let us recall the turnout in the last two General Elections: 59.4% in 2001 and 61.4% in 2005. Nowadays, it seems, politicians would be glad of a turnout of 67%. Moreover, Labour were returned to power with a percentage share of 35.2% of the vote. If political elections required a party to attain an absolute majority of the popular vote then the UK would not have had a government after one ballot since the National Government of 1935, itself a undemocratic stitch-up by a political class caught in the headlights of the Great Depression. Moreover, twice since the Second World War a government has been formed by a party which did not even win the largest share of the popular vote. This is the clincher: if Clarke’s criteria applied to General Elections and governments required an absolute majority of all potential voters, I cannot think of an example in history that any party could have formed a government. Such is the absurdity of Clarke’s proposal!
I only hope come the next General Election, therefore, Ken Clarke’s democratic spirit will urge him to recommend to the leader of the Tory Party that he only asks the Queen to form a government upon receipt of the sort of overwhelming support that he requires of trades unions wishing to go on strike. Sadly, I do not think this to be a likely prospect.
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