The head of Britain's biggest union has urged a campaign of strikes and civil disobedience to fight government cuts. Speaking on the eve of the TUC congress, Unite leader Len McCluskey said no form of protest should be ruled out including "direct action".
He urged a "campaign of resistance so that the government will take stock and perhaps take a step back" from their "attack" on workers' jobs and pensions.
"I don't think we can rule anything out," he told the Andrew Marr Show.
The three-day TUC conference, which gets under way in London on Monday, is set to be the most highly-charged in recent years.
TUC general secretary Brendan Barber, who will address delegates on Monday, has already warned that Britain faced widespread strikes this autumn unless ministers changed direction on plans to raise public sector workers' contributions to their pensions.
Mr McCluskey said the 1.5 million public sector workers in his union were in a "very angry mood" at what he called the coalition government's "ideological" assault on their jobs and pensions. He told the Andrew Marr Show: "The actions that will be taken will be widespread and I don't think we can rule anything out.
"I noticed recently senior citizens protesting in Bristol by walking backwards and forwards across a zebra crossing and bringing things to a standstill."
He also praised UK Uncut, which has targeted companies over alleged tax avoidance and staged sit-ins at banks, saying that that kind of "direct action" was what his members wanted, as well as traditional industrial action.
"They expect their leaders to give that type of leadership and to stand shoulder to shoulder with them when their terms and conditions are being attacked."
Mr McCluskey also criticised Labour leader Ed Miliband over his decision not to back public sector strikes in June.
Mr Miliband said the 24-hour walkout by about 300,000 teachers and civil servants was "wrong" at a time when negotiations between the unions and government over pension changes was still ongoing.
But Mr McCluskey, whose union backed Mr Miliband for the Labour leadership and is one of the party's biggest donors, said: "I think he made a fundamental error by attacking the strikes on 30 June, but he's learning in his job.
"He's got to be given time to construct his, hopefully, radical alternative and I hope that that will mean he understands he has to be on the side of ordinary working people."
Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander said he expected to "hear a bit of sabre rattling" during the TUC conference but he urged union leaders to consider strike action as "very much the last resort".
The Lib Dem minister told Sky News reforming pensions was "in the long term interests of the country" and further walkouts would be "irresponsible at a time when talks are still going on".
"These are tough discussions we are having but we have been making progress in these negotiations," said Mr Alexander. "I'm fully committed to these discussions... to try and make sure we can get to a position where we reach reforms everyone agrees are necessary."
Conservative Party deputy chairman Michael Fallon urged Mr Miliband to "stand up to the union barons and show he is on the side of hard-working families".
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More than half of all officers and 43 per cent of other ranks, believe the armed forces is suffering from low morale following a year of pay freezes, cuts and redundancies.
Satisfaction with life in the services has fallen, along with levels of pride and feelings of being valued.
In the RAF, only two per cent of officers many of whom are taking part in operations in Afghanistan and over Libya believe morale is high and 70 per cent state it is low.
The figures are the worst since the Armed Forces Continuous Attitudes Survey began four years ago.
Both officers and other ranks felt dissatisfied with pay, allowances, feeling valued and with the impact service life was having on their families.
The annual report looks at all aspects of military life from pay and allowances, to accommodation, personal life, leave, deployments, separation, fairness and leadership.
Just under 27,000 surveys were distributed to the armed services between February and May this year. Of those, 12,600 were returned completed, providing a response rate of 45 per cent.
The report stated that there was "prevalent dissatisfaction" with the effect of service life on spouses and partners, with 47 per cent dissatisfied and the effect of service life on children's education which had a finding 35 per cent dissatisfied.
There was also "prevailing dissatisfaction" with the amount of separation from family and friends, with 26 per cent satisfied and 37 per cent dissatisfied, a not unsurprising condition given that the armed services have been on continuous operations for the past eight years, three years longer that the Second World War.
But of all the findings contained within the 300 page report, it will be the poor levels of morale amongst both officer and men which will worry senior commanders.
#1
Conducting a written survey to gauge morale in the ranks is something akin to exiting the door of an airplane without a parachute. You've waited a bit too long remedy the problem.
#2
Oh, I suspect the leadership within the Forces knew the state of morale. But this makes it public, for the public to see and hold MOD and Parliament responsible for their choice to dismantle what is left of Britain's military capability.
#4
Britain has demilitarized so much that it is becoming reliant on companies like Xe to defend itself. Which is not terribly bad if you plan for it, but if you wait until the last minute to try and contract with somebody to forfeit their lives to save your pasty ass, there will be few takers.
Being conquered will be their final reward for listening too much to the chorus of guilt for their having been an empire. The purpose of conscience is to let you know you have been a brute, not to run your life into the ground as punishment because you had once been brutish.
#5
Britain has to decide whether it is a regional power or a world power. It has the military of the former and the political beliefs and aspirations of the latter.
But you can't be a world leader if your military is sized to be a regional power only.
Britain's military today would be hard-pressed to defend the homeland from an invader.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/11/2011 10:19 Comments ||
Top||
#6
..because a Euro military will be as effective as the Euro banking/economic system.
Heaven is where the police are British, the cooks are French, the mechanics are German, the lovers are Italian and it is all organised by the Swiss. Hell is where the police are German, the cooks are English, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, and it is all organised by the Italians
#7
"Britain's military today would be hard-pressed to defend the homeland from an invader."
I'm afraid it's too late for even that, Steve. Their immigration department has been assisting and welcoming the invader into their country. For years.
Posted by: Barbara ||
09/11/2011 12:25 Comments ||
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The Archbishop of Canterbury is planning to resign next year, nearly a decade before he is due to step down, it can be revealed.
Oh thank goodness. Any chance the next one will actually believe in God? Hoping that he is a Christian, and even an Anglican, is probably too much to ask for the chief prelate of the Church of England.
Dr Rowan Williams is understood to have told friends he is ready to quit the highest office in the Church of England to pursue a life in academia.
The news will trigger intense plotting behind the scenes over who should succeed the 61-year-old archbishop, who is not required to retire until he is 70.
Bishops have privately been arguing for Dr Williams to stand down, with the Rt Rev Richard Chartres, the Bishop of London, telling clergy he should give someone else a chance after nearly ten years in the post.
Lambeth Palace would not be drawn into confirming or denying whether the archbishop will be leaving next year.
Sources close to the archbishop say he will leave after the Queen's Diamond Jubilee next June and having seen the Church finally pass legislation to allow women to become bishops.
It is understood that Trinity College, Cambridge, is preparing to create a professorship for Dr Williams, who studied theology and was a chaplain at the university.
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The Archbishop of Canterbury is planning to resign next year, nearly a decade before he is due to step down, it can be revealed. 
