I was describing to a colleague at the weekend the growing disquiet around the activity of public sector unions & he told me about his first experience with GMB as a young man.Employed in a large & successful - but non-unionised - manufacturing facility in North London he was invited to a GMB recruitment meeting one evening where a group of strident GMB organisers advised the assembled workforce that they were under paid & over worked & that the GMB could improve their pay & conditions, provided they joined up of course.Impressed by the promises, large numbers signed up & the GMB duly went about their business of demanding pay increases.Within 5 years the entire operation was closed down because it had become uneconomic to run. A lesson perhaps the current leadership of GMB might well remember when it considers how to respond to the current economic situation.In Central Beds we are seeking a 2% reduction in salaries above £21.5k - it appears that the unions would prefer to see the loss of around 65 jobs rather than a modest pay cut for all.There are a few union leaders who clearly have a closer connection to the Jurassic period than to a modern 21st century economy.
