As the TUC conference starts today, there are increasing calls for militant action to stop any job cuts in the public sector.
Compare this to what happened during the last Labour Government under Gordon Brown.
As a paper from the Office for National Statistics recently demonstrated, over a million jobs were lost in the private sector across the UK between the first quarter of 2008 and the first quarter of 2010.
Given this massive blow to employment within the engine of the UK economy, were there motions for co-ordinated industrial action to stop job losses in the private sector during the TUC Congresses of 2008 and 2009?
Were there calls for days of protest and national demonstrations against the failure of the UK Government to stop the loss of over 4 per cent of all jobs in the private sector during the last two years?
Of course there weren't.
Rather than lobbying Government to implement policies that will benefit people at work regardless of whether that work is in government or in business, the TUC is in danger of becoming a political movement that focuses only on defending the public sector across the UK.
Indeed, it is one that could alienate the millions of private sector trade unionists who did not receive the same levels of support during the recession and who have seen working conditions, such as pay and pensions, remain relatively unaffected for their counterparts working for government
Given that only 21 per cent of the UK workforce is based within the public sector, that is an exceptionally risky strategy for the TUC to take, one which the vast majority of those working in the UK within the private sector, unionised or not, may have little sympathy with.
