The engineering construction strikes in Britain, 2009

Abstract

The militant, unofficial grassroots-led engineering construction strikes of 2009 dominated the news in Britain for many months, attaining international prominence because of their alleged xenophobia. To mainstream commentators, they appeared to be a throwback to a distant past, and inexplicable given that only a very few groups of workers are now seen as having the capability to undertake such action. Indeed, conventional explanations relied on using the alleged xenophobia as the motivating and organising rationale. This article examines the strikes, explaining their genesis, dynamics and achievements as well as their limitations. A key finding concerns how an industry class consciousness played a critical role in facilitating the workers' ability to mount militant and successful collective action.

The Power Resources Approach: Developments and Challenges

“…For instance, in the case of Europe after the 2008 financial crisis, one can observe the (re)emergence of struggles characterised by actors disregarding institutional procedures and by their "repertoire of contention" (Tilly, 1986: 4) being different from traditional forms of industrial action. The economic crisis led to rising unemployment and plant closures and was followed by a wave of "boss-napping", wildcat strikes and plant occupations in France, Great Britain and Southern Europe, pointing to representation gaps and inefficient institutions at the plant level (Gall, 2012;Hayes, 2012).…”

Stepping up to strike: a union mobilization case study of Polish migrant workers in the Netherlands

“…The Eemshaven case exhibits similar industrial relations dynamics and worker representation problems to other large construction/engineering project case studies, such as the Olkiluoto 3 nuclear power plant construction in Finland , the construction of the European Central Bank towers in Frankfurt, Germany , the Lindsey oil refinery construction in the UK (Gall 2012), and the Cottam power plant in the UK (Fitzgerald 2011). In comparison with these sites, the Eemshaven case exhibits a wider range of union tactics and coherent union planning, but also a high degree of reliance on the Dutch legal and collective bargaining framework.…”

“…The fact that several subcontractors active on the Eemshaven sites were involved in similar disputes at comparable sites in other countries (e.g. Olkiluoto 3 in Finland, see or the Lindsey oil refinery in the UK, see Gall 2012), shows that the violations at the Eemshaven were not aberrations, but reflective of systematic pan-European practices.…”

“…The German RWE employed 70 direct contractors, who subcontracted to numerous construction firms and TWAs, most of them foreign. At the Eemshaven sites there were too few Dutch union members employed to help the unions locate foreign workers (this in contrast to, for example, the massive UK engineering construction sector mobilisation at the Lindsey oil refinery, see Gall 2012). The few Dutch members that were present only worked there for short periods and the ones that managed to gather information about employment conditions had to tread carefully:…”

“…The kind of multinational workforce present at the Eemshaven sites is typical of similar construction sites around Europe (Felini et al 2007;Gall 2012). From the literature as well as from the unions' experiences, it is known that on larger construction sites in different legal and industrial context, employment conditions of migrant workers are often not legally in order (Cremers 2011;Wagner and Lillie 2014).…”