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The Rhodesian Herald, 3 February 1979
STRIKERS threatened to tighten their stranglehold on British hospitals yesterday, making sick children the target of their big pay revolt.
The development prompted an outcry in Parliament and dramatic appeal for restraint by the Prime Minister, Mr James Callaghan. Half the hospitals in England and Wales were only accepting emergencies because of action by ancillary workers whose National Union of Public Employees called lightning all-out strikes at two big children’s hospitals.
As 1,5 million low-paid state employees stepped up their disruptive campaign for pay rises of up to 40 percent Britain’s Labour Government took a tougher line against the tactics of trade union extremists pressing for huge pay rises. Ministers and members of the Labour Party hit out at wildcat pickets blockading hospitals, stopping burials and closing down schools.
After denouncing what he called free collective vandalism in Parliament, Mr Callaghan called in four union leaders to tell them the way in which strikes had been conducted was shocking the nation and ruining his re-election hopes.
Bongani Ndlovu