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The decision of the Dept for Work and Pensions Group Executive Committee of the PCS union to suspend for two weeks the strike action planned for 29-30 January, and the work to rule due to follow, in order to allow discussions on the "improved" offer and the new PDS appraisal system beggars belief, especially when you look at the fine detail of the improved offer.
The reality is that most members will be better off to the tune of £60 per year. The GEC have squandered a golden opportunity to try and take some of the ground back from management. As with the safety dispute, this dispute was bigger than the actual issue and encompassed a whole range of grievances members, and the Union, had against the bully-boy managers of DWP.
There has been a great deal of anger generated by the GEC's decision. The momentum that has been built up needs to be sustained. This can be done by explaining to members how poor the offer is, by carrying motions condemning the actions of the GEC and demanding they call action straight away. We need to put as much pressure as possible on the GEC in order to prevent a sell out.
We also need to explain to members that may be demoralised that we have already made gains. Management have already dropped, for this year anyway, the discriminatory five-day qualification rule for performance related pay. After months of saying there is no extra money they managed to find £13.5 million to add to the £122 million pay bill, days before we were due to strike. These are, of course, not enough, and a demonstration of the breadth of support we have amongst the membership could have yielded much more significant gains.
Then there is the impact of the DWP GEC's actions on the other, smaller, areas. These areas came on board with the strike because they could see they were not acting alone in isolation. The DWP GEC decided to unilaterally suspend the action without any consultation with PCSU in the Department for Constitutional Affairs, the Home Office, the Prison Service and the Treasury Solicitors. As we go to press the DCA and Home Office have decided to go ahead irrespective. Many of those who sit on the DWP GEC are the staunchest advocates of the campaign for the return to national pay bargaining. It's a case of do as I say not as I do. We should urge the National Executive to ensure this situation doesn't happen again. There is one caveat with this - the NEC has the same politics as the GEC, i.e. the Socialist Party is the dominant faction. All militants in the Union should join Left Unity in an attempt to drive this cabal from office.
Why then have the GEC decided, at this stage, to call off the action. Do they not have the stomach for a fight? Are they trying to get an entry in the Guinness book of records for the largest collection of dry gunpowder in the world? If they came out of Union headquarters and meetings with management and met more members maybe then they would be able to more accurately judge the mood.
It is unbelievable that these people would be so naïve. In a tense week for Blair the last thing the government would want is the biggest strike in the civil service for 17 years. Buy off the biggest department and you have one less bad news story to deal with. The spin-doctors must be laughing up their sleeves.
This is a dispute we can win, although it has been made all the harder by the suspension of action. We must learn the lessons from the firefighters dispute. You can't turn the membership on and off like some stage army. The key task in the next couple of weeks is to keep up the pressure on the GEC.
Charlie McDonald
PCSU DWP London regional secretary
(In a personal capacity)
