‘Nothing gets done and no one knows why’: PCS and workplace control of Lean in HM Revenue and Customs

an article by Bob Carter (De Montfort University), Andy Danford (University West of England), Debra Howcroft (Manchester Business School and Social Informatics, Luleå University of Technology, Luleå, Sweden), Helen Richardson (Salford University), Andrew Smith (Bradford University) and Phil Taylor (University of Strathclyde) published in Industrial Relations Journal Volume 43 Issue 5 (September 2012)

Abstract

This article examines the willingness and capacity of public sector unions to mobilise action against changes in the labour process in order to maintain some measure of control at the point of production.

Taking as an instance an extended dispute in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs over the introduction and impact of Lean processes, it marshals evidence gathered from documentary sources, branch representatives and national lay full-time officers to engage with the notion of a trade union bureaucracy.

In taking a union with a left-wing leadership and a section with 80 per cent membership with an expressed willingness to escalate industrial action, the article tests Hyman’s 1979 contention that, rather than a concentration on a bureaucratic caste, a much better explanation for conservatism centres on the nature of social relations within the union that encompass a wider layer of representatives.

Hazel’s comment:
’Twas ever thus!

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Developments in industrial action 2005–2009

This overview examines developments in industrial action across the European Union and Norway over 2005–2009. The most ‘strike-prone’ countries during the period were Denmark, France and Belgium, while Austria, Estonia and Latvia were essentially strike-free, and the level of industrial action in the new Member States was only about a quarter of that in the EU15. Manufacturing was the sector most prone to conflict, followed by the broad public sector and transport and communications. Pay disputes were the most common cause of industrial action.

PDF 34pp

Press alert from Eurofound

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