And union brothers vow to strike and ‘stick the boot in’

BRITAIN is facing a new winter of discontent after unions yesterday promised a campaign of strikes and civil disobedience.

They have voted unanimously for co-ordinated industrial action to try to halt government cuts and ‘stick the boot in’ to the Coalition. They also called for schools and hospitals to be occupied by local residents.

At the TuC’s annual conference in Brighton, unions agreed to ‘give full support to all groups of workers in the private or public sector who take industrial action against cuts or attacks on pay, jobs, pensions or conditions of service and co-ordinating unions taking strike action’.

Bob Crow, the militant leader of the RMT transport union, said: ‘If you spit on your own, you can’t do anything. But if you all spit together, you can drown the b******s.’

Matt Wrack, of the Fire Brigades union, said: ‘In the early years of the Thatcher government we occupied the hospitals. That’s the sort of thing we should be demanding.

‘When they want to close down a youth centre, when they want to close down a school or a hospital, if communities want to occupy them, we are going to support them.’

To add to the chaos, a pensioners’ group leader, who was speaking at a TuC fringe meeting, offered support for the campaign of civil disobedience.

Dot Gibson, of the National Pensioners’ Convention, said: ‘I am in favour of direct action, sit in the road, things like that, go into the lobby of the town hall, mob handed, and say we are not going to move.’

The TuC is expected to debate today whether or not to agree to investigate the

‘Boarded-up streets

and food banks’

‘practicalities’ of organising a general strike, the first national stoppage since 1926.

Steve Gillan, of the Prison Officers Association, which proposed the motion, said: ‘There are real cracks in the Coalition at this time and I think we should stick the boot in and finish them off.

‘The Tories aren’t embarrassed to threaten us so we shouldn’t be embarrassed to use the ultimate weapon in our armoury.’ Busi- ness leaders said strikes were a mistake in the midst of the longest and deepest downturn for more than a century.

Simon Walker, of the Institute of Directors, said: ‘The taxpayer cannot afford to provide public sector unions with the seemingly limitless cash they demand. It is vital that the Government, as their employer, stands firm.’

And David Cameron’s official spokesman warned strike threats would not persuade ministers to change their minds over the two-year public sector pay freeze.

Ed Miliband sought to distance himself from militant union barons at the TuC annual dinner last night, saying: ‘It’s what’s happening in our economy that makes so many people angry with the Government. The public doesn’t want to see strikes. Nor do your members. Nor do you.’

In a conference speech, TuC leader Brendan Barber warned of rising inequality. ‘Beyond the boutiques of Notting Hill and the mansions of Kensington, there is another country,’ he said.

‘A Britain of boarded-up high streets, pawnbrokers and food banks. A Britain of stratospheric inequality.’