RMT's Mick Lynch discusses a possible resolution to rail strikes

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The Defence Secretary said ministers will not cave in to militant unionists demanding huge pay rises when inflation is rife. Mr Wallace urged striking public sector workers to consider their private sector colleagues who are often paid less, have worse pensions and less job security.

Paul Nowak, the new top trade union baron, said striking workers could begin coordinating walkouts in January because they have a “responsibility” to support each other.

He suggested strikes could drag on into the summer unless ministers back down, saying public sector workers cannot tolerate another pay rise below inflation.

But Mr Nowak said the Royal College of Nursing will have to drop demands for a 19 per cent pay rise.

And in a glimmer of hope the winter of discontent can be ended, the incoming TUC boss said there has “got to be a landing zone”, adding unions would be willing to lower their demands if ministers agreed to direct talks.

But Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, speaking on a visit to Manchester Airport to speak to troops covering striking Border Force personnel, rejected Nowak’s call for ministers to join talks.

He said the Government could not overrule the recommendations of independent pay review bodies.

Mr Wallace declared: “We’re not going back to the 1970s where the trade union barons thought that they ran the government.

“They used to meet in Downing Street and tell the Labour government of the day what they’re going to do. We’re not going to go back to that. We’re not going to be held to ransom.

“The trade unions can negotiate, they can negotiate with their employers and try and come to a resolution. That’s the most important thing. There’s no magic wand here to come up with money that the country doesn’t have.

“Ultimately we’re in a position where we’re trying to listen to the independent advice, through the independent pay bodies, offer a settlement to the workforces and then try and bring that to a resolution. But if the trade union leadership think we’re all just going to ignore these independent bodies to suit their agenda then they’ll be mistaken.”

A Whitehall source told the Daily Express: “It’s clear that some of the unions are getting more militant”.

They added: “We’ve known that they have been trying to coordinate for some time. They’re openly sort of saying what we all knew all along.

“It’s clear that some of the unions are getting more militant and being more open about the fact that they are coordinating to maximise public pain as much as possible.

“There is also a question about how long the unions can sustain this because we should be in no doubt that this is an act of real self harm for those unions as well.

“For example, on rail, the more the rail workers strike, the more customers they are losing because people are working from home or they’re taking other means to transport. And ultimately, those people may not come back to the railways.”

A Government source hinted there is growing discontent within the unions, with some hellbent on causing as much disruption as possible while others are hoping to reach a deal.

They said: “Even in senior echelons of unions there’s a lot of disagreement on where they should go next, and I think that is coming because the members are pretty unhappy about the level of losses that they are sustaining.

“They can’t sustain long-term action without inflicting real damage on their own people as well.”

Mr Nowak said that unions were “looking very seriously at the pay review bodies and particularly the way that the government has used them almost effectively as a human shield”.

He said that “the government is hiding behind the pay review bodies, refusing to negotiate on pay”.

Mr Nowak told BBC Radio 4’s Today that “it’s really important that if the pay review board is going to continue that they have real credibility and they are seen to be genuinely independent”.

Agreeing with the suggestion that they should be free to make recommendations beyond the budgets specified by ministers, he argued: “Starting off the conversation about NHS pay by just saying, ‘we’ve got this limited amount of money, that’s all it is, it doesn’t matter what evidence the unions bring to the table, it doesn’t matter what the pressures are on the workforce’, I don’t think is a reasonable starting point for a conversation about public sector pay.”

Mr Nowak said that the unions would be willing to lower their pay demands if ministers would agree to direct negotiations and accepted that unions such as the Royal College of Nursing were unlikely to succeed in requests for a 19 per cent pay rise.

“I would hope that there would be a compromise reachable — in order to get to a compromise you need to sit down and negotiate and that’s what the government is point blank refusing to do,” he said.

“There’s got to be, hasn’t there, a landing zone somewhere between the 4-5 per cent that the governments have offered, and then 19 per cent that some unions have claimed. But what’s crucially important is the government actually sits down and negotiate”.

Professor Len Shackleton, our Editorial and Research Fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs, said: “The continuing rail strikes are undermining the future of the industry.

“Leisure travel, the only growing part of the passenger business pre-strikes, is going to be discouraged for a long time while customers remain apprehensive about delay and disruption.”

UK borders are ”safe and secure”

Ben Wallace on Thursday slammed “propaganda” claims that those arriving in the UK are simply “waved through” by the military.

The Defence Secretary rubbished allegations that around 625 military personnel are not making vital passport checks.

Mr Wallace insisted Britain’s borders are “safe and secure”, adding: “That claim is pure propaganda put out by the unions.”

Speaking during a visit to Manchester Airport, the Defence Secretary said public sector staff wanted to “muddy the waters”, adding: “Our borders are safe and secure. These Armed Forces members are carrying out very straightforward functions and are backed up by computer systems and scans that allow us to identify people of worry coming into the country.”

He confirmed that military personnel covering the Christmas period will receive £20 daily bonus payments, after an outcry over their use as “spare capacity”.

It came after the PCS union’s Mark Serwotka said travellers were being “waved through”, adding: “The work our members do is highly skilled and that cannot be replicated.”

Who is new TUC boss warning of strikes till the summer?

The man destined to become the new leader of the TUC has been an active trade unionist all his working life, writes Steph Spyro.

Paul Nowak, 50, first joined a union at 17 – when he started out as a part-time shelf stacker.

In 2000 he joined the TUC’s staff and rose through the ranks to become deputy general secretary in 2016.

He will take over as general secretary in January from Frances O’Grady.

In 2020 she received £167,229 in total remuneration. Her gross salary was £112,395, figures show.

In a statement on Thursday, Mr Nowak said: “I started my working career stacking the warehouse shelves in Asda. Later on, I worked as a hotel porter, and in a call centre. I know the difference being in a union can make and that’s why…my focus will always be on making sure the UK’s trade unions are growing.”

The dad-of-three lives on the Wirral in Merseyside. Both of his grandfathers emigrated to the UK – one from Poland, one from China.

Mr Nowak says his priority will be to build a “bigger, stronger and more diverse” trade union movement.

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