Catherwood LibraryILR School

The simmering dispute between Prime Minister Tony Blair's "New Labour" government and Britain's labor movement over the risk of creating a bifurcated workforce in public sector services privatized posed Mr. Blair's Private Finance Initiative (PFI) (see WIT's for Sep. 9 and 27, 2002), seems headed for a new boil over. Hopes of a compromise between the government and unions representing public employees on the protections afforded new workers hired by private sector contractors providing public services have been quashed by strong pressure from business interests against a compromise. While some union officials had indicated a willingness to compromise by allowing new private/public workers to be hired on comparatively "favorable" terms instead of terms "no less" favorable than those enjoyed by workers hired prior to privatization of their jobs, the government has raised the possibility of a showdown by insisting on even less protective language.