The co-ordinated one-day public sector strike last Thursday gave a real boost to the over one million workers involved. Firefighters, council workers, teachers and civil servants from every government section, even galleries and museums, came out! Power workers from London Underground also co-ordinated their strike to join the action. Because everyone needs their pay to catch up - and a decent pension to retire on, at an acceptable age!
And since there were marches and rallies in almost every big town across the country, it allowed strikers to feel reinforced and count their numbers. Not only that, but the bosses suddenly discovered that they are helpless without the workforce: in Havering, the Town Hall remained in darkness the whole day, because nobody knew how to switch the lights on!
But it is not all good news. This was the first time in 3 years that the union leaderships have called workers out together. Yet the biggest public sector battalion - the NHS, despite on-going cuts and privatisation which are destroying both workers' conditions and patient care, was left out.
And what about the private sector? Why do the union leaders consider that private sector workers have no stake in the fight of public sector workers - or that they haven't exactly the same problems, with falling wages, deteriorating conditions of work - and lousy provision for retirement?
Strike is the only legal weapon
Predictably, teachers got the most flack, despite the fact it's only their second strike day in 4 months. As if teachers - and all other public sector workers - aren't fighting to retain better education and public services, against a sustained government onslaught!
And the criticism of teachers was a little hypocritical too, when, for instance, a borough like Newham in London gave all its pupils a day off to watch the Tour de France earlier in the week! Yes, the strike caused the usual barrage of anti-worker rhetoric. But even though the media almost fully blanked it out, and played down the numbers demonstrating, it nevertheless had a big impact.
Immediately, Tory ministers dusted off their plans for banning public sector strikes altogether, or at least demanding a 50% mandate from all union members before a strike could be called. Never mind that no councillor, MP, let alone Tory cabinet minister, has ever been elected on anything near 50% of the vote! Which means, as the leader of the union Unite rightly replied, that ministers certainly don't have a mandate to rule on trade union affairs in the first place.
Shuffling for the blues
Then came this week's "reshuffle" by Cameron and the demotion of Education Secretary Michael Gove, founder of the Free Schools' dog's breakfast and who has further decentralised schools, giving governors and private sponsors even more autonomy. And of course he proposed the disguised teachers' pay cut, "performance related pay". He has so alienated new teachers that 2 out of 5 resign before 5 years.
Of course, Cameron will never admit that he has demoted Gove because of his "unpopularity" (an understatement) among ordinary teachers, parents and pupils, but why else? That said, he obviously needed a new set of faces for his front bench to try to recoup the electoral support he lost in May, when Ukip took such a big chunk. And that is obviously what this is all about.
Is this a turning point?
So what now? The wage rises workers need still have to be won. The improvements in conditions and the regaining of ground lost, still have to be fought for. And the best way to achieve these objectives has to be to fight with the most force - bringing as many sections of the workforce together as possible.
Can workers rely on the union leaders to do what is necessary in this regard? Certainly not. This is abundantly clear from our own experience. Since 2010, no concerted action has been organised by union leaders despite the huge attacks against workers and the unemployed by the ConDems. And before that, union leaders were reluctant to call strikes because a Labour government was in power.
So, there is an enormous amount of ground to win back. The TUC, which last organised a national demonstration against austerity 2 years ago has now announced another for Saturday 18 October, under the banner "Britain needs a pay rise". Apparently it is preparing for the next election and will use this as a platform to support Labour.
But never mind, this is going in the right direction. The 10 July was a start. The public sector union leaders are talking about more days of action during September. It will be up to the workforce on the ground, to invite every other worker to support, if not join them - and to organise the fight accordingly!