On Strike?

No, I'm not. I have sympathy with the feelings behind the strike and share the strikers' frustrations at the way the country is being run, but the only union that I could join at the moment isn't striking and if they were it wouldn't help our pensions.

I am torn about the strike. Should nurses and teachers be allowed to withdraw their labour? Yes. Of course they should. Will it harm vulnerable patients and children? No. I really don't think that they will let it. Will some parents and other family carers be inconvenienced? Yes. Sadly it won't be the bankers who can afford nannies and granny sitters who lose out but the working mums with no pension rights and the carer struggling to look after auntie and still hold down a low-paid job. Will the strike further alienate public and private sector workers who have much more in common than they have difference from each other thus making it even more difficult for labour to organise and social justice for all to be achieved? Probably. Had I been in the position I was in 10 years ago being asked to do something by professionals with little practical support and had they then withdrawn even that for a day would I have been hopping mad? Abso- f&*(ing-lutely. Is my family currently enjoying the very benefits being withdrawn from people who just happen to be a bit younger but have still paid in as long? Um, yes.

I really don't know what I would do if I had the right and the opportunity to strike.

The fact is that I don't - so I don't have to worry about it too much. Tomorrow I won't be posting but that won't be because I've withdrawn my labour it will be because it will be December and NaNoBloMo will finally be over!