Restoration 10:10

Priminister Gordon Brown refused to bow down to a police strike threat in December 2007. Two months previously the government handled a two day strike by postal workers. Now six months later the nation can debate the rights and wrongs of the teachers strike. A lot of parents must already be making plans to throw a sicky at work on the 24th of April. They will be absent because they have to stay home and look after their kids. Bosses, be warned! But hey, who are we going to blame for this strike. Should we blame the Government? Or Thatcherism? Or the Unions? We could blame the teachers but that might be a bit unfair. Some teachers work 14 hours a day and will lay down their lives for the school kids. One teacher has said that she will not let her class suffer on the 24th. She’s going to give them plenty of home work for the day she’s on strike. I’m sure the kids will appreciate that; not. The total number of strike days in Britain in 2006 rose to 754,500 which was a massive increase on 154,700 recorded in 2005. Some of those strikes will have been justified; like the strikes in which we have endorsed and been sympathetic too. Other strikes have been unnecessary and come about through mischievous intent, like the strikes we have criticised and opposed. Some of the disputes have been productive others have been pointless. If you asked the UK’s 1.7 million unemployed their opinion they probably wouldn’t give a damn. That is unless the benefits office went on strike again like they did in 2002.