Janet Street-Porter: 'Strikes could bring back class war'

Janet Street-Porter has given her opinion on the ongoing public sector strikes in the UK today (November 30).

Many thousands of workers took industrial action today in protest at planned changes to their pensions.

Street-Porter discussed the strikes with her fellow Loose Women panellists, saying that similar protests in the past have influenced changes in legislation.

"Two thirds of people on strike today earn less than £21,000 a year and that's where my sympathy lies," she explained. "I don't support everyone that's on strike but there's a small group, the women and the lowly-paid that earn under £21,000 and I think they have a point.

"If I look back historically, strikes are the ultimate weapon if it gets to crunch time. Strikes have forced governments to change legislation. If you go right back to the Dagenham strike when the women walked out, which was made into an entertaining film, that made the government of the day form the foundation of equal pay for women.

"Without that strike that wouldn't have happened, alright we haven't got quite equal pay yet. In extreme cases, there's a reason for strikes. The jury is out on how deserving all these strikers are."

She added that Britain is in danger of entering into another 'class war', saying: "The most important thing about this strike is that we are in danger, in a Britain which is becoming in all sorts of ways a more equal society.

"This strike, the government will think this is great, it's like back to the class war. One class the public sector workers, versus another, the private sector workers. I would not like to go back to a Britain like that and this strike is the start of that."

Sally Lindsay added: "I do believe that it's everyone's human right to strike. If you relate it to human nature, if you're terribly unhappy in a job or a relationship, the last power you have is to take yourself out of the equation, take yourself out of the situation, that's what strikes are."

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