WEAK UNIONS ARE EASIER TO SCREW:
In the motor industry the question of team working has been absolutely central; despite its name, it in effect tries to increase responsibility on each worker, and attempt to force her/him to identify with the interests of the company.
But in the public sector team working is not so central. What is central is the whole set of ideas to do with "quality, 'customers' and 'flexibility. This revolves round the idea that workers are the 'customers" of other workers, and those 'customers' have the right and the duty to criticise the quality of ganisation.
This links with the ideology of the NMTs which revolves round ideas of quality. flexibility and choice-plus a whole set of ideas about management, including total quality management and so-called 'human resource management.
You now have thousands of managers up and down the country who are being schooled in these techniques, including many people who never thought of themselves as managers. Thousands of people in the health service, education, local government and other sectors are being taught they have to think of themselves as managers
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No.47, July-August 1993. Page 9