Nurses are among those to have taken industrial action over pay
(Picture: REUTERS)The number of working days lost to strikes hit the highest level for over three decades last year, official statistics revealed on Tuesday.
Britain has suffered a wave of industrial action over the past 12 months with rail workers, postal workers and nurses walking out in disputes over pay fuelled by inflation and the cost of living crisis.
In its latest snapshot of the UK labour market, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said nearly 2.5 million working days were lost to industrial action last year, the highest since 1989 when 4.1 million days were lost due to walkouts by rail workers and coal miners. The figure for December alone saw a near doubling from 467,000 to 843,000 days driven by striking transport, health and postal workers.
Darren Morgan, ONS director of economic statistics, said: “The number of working days lost to strikes rose again sharply in December. Transport and communications remained the most heavily affected areas, but this month there was also a large contribution from the health sector.”
Up to half a million teachers, civil servants and train drivers walked out earlier this month in the largest co-ordinated strike action for a decade.
Last week the RMT transport workers union rejected the latest offer from rail operators, dashing hopes that one of the longest-running disputes could be close to being settled.
Many unions have further days of strike action scheduled and have threatened to ballot members for more walkouts. The Government has so far refused to budge on public sector pay, insisting big rises will further fuel inflation.
The ONS also said that while growth in regular pay was 6.7 per cent between October and December last year, real pay fell by 2.5 per cent once adjusted for CPI inflation, which hit 10.5 per cent in December. The Resolution Foundation think-tank blamed the squeeze on wages for the wave of industrial action, highlighting the large gap between pay growth in the private and public sectors.
It said: “With the UK experiencing double digit inflation in the last three months of the year, strong nominal pay growth has not prevented real wages falling sharply.
“This pay squeeze is the primary driver of rising industrial action which saw the number of days lost to strike action almost double between November and December — a figure that is set to rise again in early 2023.”
The ONS said average regular pay growth for the private sector was 7.3 per cent between October and December 2022, and 4.2 per cent for the public sector. At 3.7 per cent, the UK’s unemployment rate remained unchanged in December.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said: “In tough times unemployment remaining close to record lows is an encouraging sign of resilience in our labour market.”
But Labour’s shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “Britain has huge potential — but 13 years of the Tories has left real wages down, families worse off, and our economy lagging behind on the global stage.”
Ford has announced it will be scrapping 3,800 jobs across Europe, including 1,300 in the UK, over the next three years amid plans to reinvent the brand and focus on a smaller range of electric vehicles.
The global carmaker said 2,800 engineering roles will be axed by 2025, and around 1,000 jobs in its administrative, marketing, sales and distribution teams across Europe are set to go. Ford said the cuts were needed to enable it to have a profitable future.
