UK plans to curb unions’ right to organize strike

The British government is planning tougher legislation to curb the rights of public unions to organize strikes, amid a looming mass walkout of public sector workers.

British Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude said new laws are being drawn up to limit the public unions’ rights to take industrial action.

Maude added that the move is intended to stop unions from going ahead with strikes with a weak or old mandate.

According to Tory sources, the plan would force union leaders to prove that half of their members supported a strike and that a large proportion has voted or the walkout could be deemed illegal.

A spokesman for the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) rejected the plans to force unions to prove they have a majority support to call a strike.

The development comes ahead of a walkout by up to two million public sector workers, scheduled for July 10. The industrial action by teachers and council workers is against low pay, pension cuts and bad working conditions.

Union leaders say the walkout could be the biggest since the general strike of 1926. The unions that are planned to join the walkout include the UK’s largest union, Unite, as well as the Fire Brigades Union (FBU), the National Union of Teachers (NUT) and Britain’s biggest trade union, Unison.

The current UK government led by Prime Minister David Cameron launched austerity measures when it came to power in 2010 in a bid to tackle the country’s mounting debt and sluggish growth, but the policies have sparked public protests in recent years.