I agree, someone had to reform them. What Thatcher did was destroy them and their industries,
They wouldnt/couldnt be reformed.
They were out of control....for fucks sake at one NUM meeting they voted for a 40% pay rise.
I can imagine the look on my employer's face if i went and asked for a 40% raise this week!....the unions had lost touch with reality, not helped by those at the helm.
The union leaders stopped working for their members and instead saw it as an ideological fight.....what chance did the British car industry have when the union leader was a committed communist (Derek Robinson by the way, who after his union tenure at British Leyland went on to become the national chair for the Communist Party of Great Britain)....
"between 1978 and 1979 Mr Robinson was credited with causing 523 walk-outs at Longbridge, costing an estimated £200m in lost production".Source:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4294709.stm200 million was a vast sum of money in the 70s....did these pillocks in charge of the unions just think the industry could shrug that loss off and carry on?!....523 walk-outs in two years, they were on strike more than they were at work!....how do you reason with cretins like that?
Maggie stomped them into the ground, good riddance.