UK
Restore Our Right to Strike – Steve Gillan, POA
By Steve Gillan, POA
Although the POA are not affiliated to any political party, as General Secretary I was relieved to see the back of the Tories at the general election and I am looking forward to the first Labour conference under a Labour government in 15 years.
The past decade and a half have seen billions of pounds robbed from the prison service under the guise of Tory austerity – and the consequences are clear for all to see. Overcrowded, ultra-violent, vermin-ridden – our prisons are completely unfit for purpose. People leave prison more criminalised, more traumatised, more drug-addicted than when they arrive. We simply cannot continue like this.
Many of the problems in our prisons will take major investment to fix but there is one urgently needed change that won’t cost a penny – ending the 30-year ban on prison officers taking any form of industrial action, leaving my members at the mercy of management and ministers to exploit them with impunity, knowing there is no way for their union to fight back apart from costly court action.
This draconian restriction on my members’ basic human rights was introduced via Section 127 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, which made it illegal to “induce” a prison officer “to take (or continue to take) any industrial action”. This led to the High Court fining the POA £210,000 in 2019, with the national chair and me threatened by Tory government lawyers with imprisonment, simply for protecting my members from danger.
In opposition, Tony Blair promised to scrap this pernicious legislation – but in a bitter betrayal he reneged on this promise as Prime Minister. So, now is the time for this new Labour government to put right past wrongs as part of its pledge to repeal Tory anti-trade-union laws. Give prison officers back their industrial muscle and we will be able to help rebuild our shattered and demoralised service and drive down reoffending!
Ministers must trust their committed and brave public servants, who risk their lives every day to protect the public, as the Scottish government did in 2015 – sparking not strikes but dramatically improved industrial relations. Prison officers are a disciplined service, they sign the Official Secrets Act and they are loyal to the crown. In other words, they are the last people to engage in industrial conflict, except as a last resort.
At TUC earlier this month, delegates unanimously approved POA’s two motions on restoring the right to strike and the urgent need to build more secure hospitals, because so many prisoners have serious mental health problems that are simply made worse by the prison environment.
This new Labour government may have inherited a ticking time-bomb in our prisons by the Tories but they also inherited as £4 billion prison-build budget, which they have pledged to use. But there is no reason they have to follow the last government’s plan to spend this money on a new generation of privately run mega-prisons – little more than human warehouses, in my opinion. Instead, they could build smaller-scale public prisons and secure hospitals, which are widely recognised to be more effective at promoting rehabilitation.
And more importantly, they should use some of these billions to invest in and improve the prisons we already have. Privatising prison maintenance has proved to be an utter disaster, and procurement is a bad joke, as any governor trying to replace kit can tell you. Same with the canteen of goods prisoners can buy – private companies charging well over the odds to literally a captive audience. Tear up the contracts, bring it all in-house or at least under public control, and end the privatised rip-off in our prisons that is doing so much damage at the heart of our criminal justice system.
A decade-and-a-half of Tory failure has led us to the brink of disaster in our prisons. The POA stands ready to play its part in fixing this but, if Labour is serious about treating workers and their trade unions as part of the solution, not part of the problem, it must give our members back their basic industrial rights and listen to us about urgent priorities across the prison estate. Restoring our right to strike – and the dignity at work that comes with this – is a vital step towards achieving justice, boosting morale and taking back control of our prisons before it’s too late.
I will be speaking about the many prison crises at the Conference fringe meeting at Revolución de Cuba on Monday at 11am, alongside fellow union leaders Mick Lynch, Fran Heathcote and Matt Wrack, Employment Rights Minister Justin Madders and Lord John Hendy from the Institute of Employment Rights, on the subject of how this new government will deliver its New Deal for Working People.
And for the first time, this year the POA will have a stand at Labour Conference (location C10). Please come and say hello and pick up some of conference’s hottest merch, including the new POA bucket hat! More seriously, we have copies of our new briefing on the right to strike, with plenty of ideas on how to support prison officers win back their basic human rights. See you there!
- EVENT: How will the Labour Government Deliver a New Deal for Working People?
- Trade Union Coordinating Group, Labour List and the Institute for Employment Rights. Supported by Arise – a Festival of Left Ideas.
- Monday 23 September, 11 am,
- Revolución De Cuba (Casa bar, upstairs)
- Dr Jo Grady (UCU), Justin Madders (Minister, invited,) Matt Wrack (FBU) Mick Lynch (RMT) Lord Hendy, Steve Gillian (POA), Fran Heathcote (PCS)
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