Ljs: Labour and the unions: wise to be wary

Monday, June 20, 2011

Labour and the unions: wise to be wary

Party's wish to see government and unions negotiate a fair deal on public sector pensions is in the national interest

Financially, the Labour party is these days an almost wholly owned subsidiary of the trade unions. Its leader Ed Miliband also owes his position substantially to union backing. Yet the Labour leadership yesterday revealed the extent of its wariness at being too closely identified with the unions in their dispute with the government over public sector pensions ? particularly if the 30 June strikes go ahead.

The shadow chancellor, Ed Balls, and the shadow education secretary, Andy Burnham, have both, in their time, seemed readier to tack close to the unions than would have happened under New Labour. Yet in interviews yesterday, both men carefully kept their distance from any outright rejection of the government's proposals and from endorsing the planned strikes. Mr Balls in particular was notably careful both to endorse the need for public pensions reform and to warn the unions against walking into a trap by strikes which would divert attention from the failing economy. The shadow chancellor was a long way from giving outright backing to the government's goals and tactics in the dispute, but he could also hardly have been clearer that Labour wants to see a negotiated settlement. Such a settlement is in the national interest, as this newspaper argued last week; but it is also very much in Labour's interest too.

Some Labour activists will look at yesterday's YouGov opinion poll in the Sunday Times and conclude ? along the same lines that Unison's Dave Prentis did last week ? that the unions can win this dispute. After all, in spite of the best efforts of the rightwing press to persuade the public that public sector workers enjoy gold-plated pensions, the voters are evenly divided on whether public sector pensions are actually too generous, on the one hand, and about right or not generous enough, on the other. What is more, a narrow majority also opposes Lord Hutton's proposals for pension reform (as characterised to them by the pollsters), which form the basis of the coalition government's approach and to which Mr Balls also gave a hedged approval yesterday.

Yet Labour would risk an immense amount of credibility if it threw itself behind outright rejection, and backed the strikes. The deeper message from the polls is, in fact, that the government should not overplay its hand and that negotiations should resume, as Vince Cable urged again yesterday. There is no public appetite for an anti-public-sector crusade on pensions. Public opinion and the national interest require the government and the unions to talk seriously and make a fair, affordable deal. This is an achievable goal. Labour is right to want talks to be resumed and right that confrontationists on both sides must be thwarted.