Rebecca Anderson says the tanker drivers’ dispute could win and destabilise the Tories still further…but why have Unite guaranteed not to strike over Easter?
Over 2000 petrol tank drivers from seven companies are threatening to strike over pay and conditions, health and safety, training and pensions. The strike is aimed at creating industry standards that all companies would have to comply with – it would mean that they couldn’t undercut wages or ignore safety rules in order to make more profit. These issues have been bubbling away under the surface for years and now finally culminated in a huge vote for strike action by members of the union Unite.
Strike action was voted for in all but one of the seven companies, and all saw unusually high turnouts for postal ballots. Ninety per cent of forecourts receive deliveries from these drivers and an effective strike would mean petrol supplies would dry up quickly.
The government has attacked the tanker drivers and said it would use RAF crew to run a scab service. In a bid to undermine the effectiveness of such a strike, the government urged people to “top up” on fuel – advice that has already led to panic buying, petrol stations closing up and down the country, and today the report that one woman was terribly burned trying to transfer petrol using a jerry can in her kitchen – following the advice of Cabinet minister Francis Maude to prepare for the strike by storing up a “bit of extra fuel in a jerry can”. Ed Miliband has criticised the government for “presiding over a shambles” and called on Francis Maude and David Cameron to apologise to the country.
The tanker drivers have real power as the panic and shortages already arising show – before any strike has even started! Striking hard and escalating to all out if necessary would mean a crisis for the government and provide a rallying point to the trade union movement and the tens of thousands who demonstrated or struck last year and hate the Tories. If the government’s scab force threatens the strike the whole trade union and anti-cuts movement must mobilise in defence of the tanker drivers’ right to strike.
Panic buying has cleaned many petrol stations out of supplies and now talks aimed at resolving the dispute have been delayed. Unite officials have held the strike back, instead appealing to the government to see sense and focussing on trying to launch talks at ACAS. These were expected to begin this week and the delay means that the union cannot legally take strike action over Easter. This delay actually plays into the government’s hands – why give them time to organise to undermine the strike, in favour of talks dragging out and sapping the resolve of the tanker drivers to act?
If tanker drivers follow the example their fellow Unite members among the Sparks and organise a rank and file committee, they can control the strike, set the pace of the action and reach out to other sections of workers who could provide material support, such as the construction workers at the various refineries who have gone on strike over the last couple of years against attacks on their conditions.
Victory to the tanker drivers!
