But they were not!

Closed shops still exist to this day.
Lobbying and "buying" of politicians is still rife.
Leaders of Unions still have influence on government policy.
Only the people who keep the establishment in power by being the buffer are not legally allowed to strike.

When governments can be brought to their collective knees by unelected, unaccountable people in global businesses then democracy has been shown up

I think Grangemouth demonstrated exactly who holds the whip hand here - outside of the public sector it isn't the unions.

Im just wondering when the greedy b'stard Bob Crowe will get his backside handed to him.

Just out of curiosity.

Why?

Do you live in London?

David Jones and Joe Green.

We still remember.

what about David Wilkie then?
Is he still remembered by that scum Scargill!!!

Do you usually answer questions with totally meaningless and superfluous questions instead of actually answering the question?

Well if he lived in London and possibly relied on public transport I thought it would be obvious as to why Bob Crowe isn't popular.

Is he related to Bob Crow?

So Crow is personally responsible for all the problems on London Underground?

Nothing whatsoever to do with Boris Johnson and his trained chimps at TfL?

Hello from the capital, where I use public transport.

Did you want to discuss BoJo hiking bus fares by vast amounts in the last couple of years?

I'm not the biggest fan of Crow – I think he's rather lumpen (and I know people who know him). However, to believe that all those in London who use public transport simply hate Crow is facile, as would be pretending that occasional Tube strikes are the biggest problem facing Londoners on public transport (massively-rising fares would be one of those).

Crow is elected by his members – so presumably they're happy with his performance. He has maintained their pay levels and jobs while pay levels and jobs have been hammered in other industries apart from those at the top – this being something that is now generally seen as problematic for the wider economy.

Whether as a happy side effect or otherwise, the RMT's actions have also reduced the plans for reductions in staffing levels at stations etc – something else that those using the system are concerned about (unstaffed stations, lack of proper ticket offices etc) are not popular ideas.

I just looked this Crow fella up. He's a Millwall fan. Interesting. I don't care that he earns so much and still lives in a council flat. His place would have been turned over a few times by now. Though it did state he got a 12% pay rise in 2009. As a former union member myself that would have peeved me right off. Mintball tell me about fares in London, because I bought an Oyster Card which was delivered to Oz and found transport in London with it all really cheap. Transport in London got better when Ken got back in I'd heard. Now this link will probably not tell the full story as it's from the company selling something, but how much have things gone up in real terms. Give us your example as everyone's journeys will differ. www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/26385.aspx

I just looked this Crow fella up. He's a Millwall fan. Interesting. I don't care that he earns so much and still lives in a council flat. His place would have been turned over a few times by now. Though it did state he got a 12% pay rise in 2009. As a former union member myself that would have peeved me right off. Mintball tell me about fares in London, because I bought an Oyster Card which was delivered to Oz and found transport in London with it all really cheap. Transport in London got better when Ken got back in I'd heard. Now this link will probably not tell the full story as it's from the company selling something, but how much have things gone up in real terms. Give us your example as everyone's journeys will differ. www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/26385.aspx

Lobbying is part of the democratic process - I occassionally lobby my MP on matters of personal importance to me, these days often via campaigning websites. Bribery and corruption though must be stamped out.

The issue in the Scargill era was unions believing they could bring down a government they did not like, even if democratically elected. There was a real threat to democracy.

Who were these global businesses that brought down governments? Was there deliberate acts?

You don't seem to know the difference between you asking your MP to look into a matter of personal importance and what lobbying by vested interests has become.




Nonsense.

Please explain where you get the notion that Unions believed they could bring down governments. You are implying the Unions would strike or whatever for political ends rather than to protect their members interests.

Scargill might have been very happy had the miners strike resulted in an election being called but the only way that would have happened was if something like the information in those papers had come out i.e. that they really did want to close 75 pits not 20 as Scargill said was the agenda. Now [i that [/iwould have sunk the government, not the union telling everyone what they believed to be the true agenda or going on strike.

Had that happened and had the government been exposed and an election resulted, how would that be anti-democratic? Being forced to the country having been exposed as bare faced liars would have been democracy in action would it not?

Instead they lied. Very democratic!



He said "When governments can be brought to their collective knees by unelected, unaccountable people in global businesses then democracy has been shown up"

Not "brought down". You are misquoting the poster here.

As you well know the global banking industry has brought many governments to their collective knees.