Conflict of Powers in Britain - Case Study Example

148924 In 2003, perhaps the most reliable service section in Britain, the Fire Fighters, went on strike, in an unprecedented way. It was unexpectedand unbelievable. They looked as though they were above money matters and this attitude had made governments to forget them as too noble to strike. People looked at them as a service organisation that was too happy to be in that exalted position. They proved otherwise by forwarding many more demands and people as well as Government were in for a major shock. Strike forced 19,000 British troops to be on standby to cover industrial action while 'a war was being fought' and Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott announced it 'extraordinary and unacceptable'. Labour Government was forced to summon local authority employers and union leaders for discussions and when it ended, there was an audible sigh of relief. "The Firefighters' decision yesterday to call off their long-running dispute marks a signal victory for ministers. The government has secured the guts of what it wanted: changes in working practices tied to a one-off bumper pay increase" (Financial Times 13/6/03) http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/2003/305/index.htmlid=pp4.htm The ten-month long dispute was rather an unpleasant shock to the complacency of the nation, and resulted in a certain weariness of fire-fighters too and some of them looked forward to a honourable solution. After all, fire-fighters are a conscientious, duty-bound clan and could not go on agitating beyond a certain point. In spite of that, when the solution took place and industrial action was withdrawn, there were allegations of 'sell out' against union leaders, especially Andy Gilchrist, but eventually things cooled down. Compared to the unruly 13 week dispute of 1997, which ran into fisticuffs in the end, this was a better conducted industrial action, though not in a single delegate spoke in favour of leadership, and anger took a long time to heal. Media opined that FBU leaders could not win against the firm determination of the labour cabinet. Another interpretation of the settlement implied that any future industrial action would be centred at local level and not at national level. At one stage, fire fighters were defending their already existing rights of overtime, staffing levels and 'the sitting of fire stations themselves.' The issue of solidarity had not been very far away from all these and was effectively raised many times. "The London tube workers during the first two-day strike refused to work in their hundreds because of the safety issue. When they were threatened with disciplinary action if they did the same thing again, the RMT were too slow to back their members up." http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/2003/305/index.htmlid=pp4.htm It shaped up as a test to left union leaders, who could not rise to the occasion. Even though union leaders thought this was the best possible settlement, media thought that strings were tightly attached to pay and conditions. For example: the pay raise was 16%, but anything above 4% was dependent on cuts and working condition changes and obviously is conditional, whereas the second raise of average 7% was connected with the new pay structure and lacks certainty. No doubt, they come under 'professional and technical classification'; but this again is a hazy matter. It is unclear how this settlement will affect the senior grade workers. Integrated Risk Management (IRMP) will enable the fire authorities to decide on crewing levels arbitrarily and this would be out of unions' negotiating powers and the overtime issue could be prearranged. Many of the terms of pay and conditions were unclear at the time of agreement. One of the fire-fighters reacted to the settlement by saying, it was a case of "Lions being led by Donkeys". It was also cursed as the "blueprint of for industrial unrest over the next five year." But it averted continuation of ugly strike. In the meantime, as all parties were in favour of modernisation, first modernised fire station was being readied in Hammersmith with 7.7 million expenses, "The argument was about more than just pay - it was about modernising the fire service and changing the way people work to reflect a modern society" http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2982478.stm Initially there was no meeting line in the on the question of money for both the parties. Firefighters' dispute costed 18.5 million to Scotland alone. The origin of the dispute started in 2002 itself when FBU voted to take strike action, an unprecedented national action of fire fighters, in an attempt for an increased salary of extra 40% which would have brought the average pay of a fire-fighter to around 30,000. Professor Sir George Bain had led an enquiry into the pay and conditions of fire fighters and many issues were discussed in his Independent Review of Fire Services. After some delay when the strike started, it really put lives at risk. Many negotiations continued, and at the end of it all, dispute ended on June 12, 2003, when they accepted a pay deal of 16% overall increase. There was widespread resentment amongst fire fighters that while being ready to squander billions on some far fetched, wrongly judged Middle East adventure, government was unwilling to make a legitimate increase in the pay of public servants, who are risking their lives throughout their careers. To a very large extent, there was public support to their demands. Many trade unions like National Union of Mail, Maritime and Transport workers expressed their support to the ongoing dispute. But right wing newspaper and tabloids continuously pointed out that in spite of the exalted position fire fighters held in the minds of British public, they never hesitated to put British lives into jeopardy for monitory gain and many politicians and local leaders joined in this claim. Fire fighters claimed that their pay did not reflect the risk and hardship of their day-to-day working life. But their detractors claimed that according to a study in Lancet, due to recent safety measures and equipments, fire fighting has slid down to 23rd position of risk takers and as more than 40 people apply for a single advertised position of fire fighter, the salary could not be negligible, compared to the demand and supply curve. Death of Evan Davies discredited the strike to some extent. More than 30,000 troops were given training to step in if needed. "With thousands of British soldiers deployed on fire fighting training from the end of this month, the Army's ability to undertake operations elsewhere would be crippled, one commanding officer told The Telegraph" http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VUSYMKJ0V3YKNQFIQMGCFFWAVCBQUIV0xml=/news/2002/08/04/nfire04.xml The strike was the first in 25 years and all 50,000 fire-fighters took part in it. Facing the most difficult industrial action he had ever faced, the Prime Minister said the demand of fire fighters of a pay increase of 40% was unrealistic. "Mr Blair said the pay demand, which would take the basic pay of a qualified fireman to 30,000 a year, would have a "terrible" effect on the economy and lead to similar demands from other public sector workers" http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VUSYMKJ0V3YKNQFIQMGCFFWAVCBQUIV0xml=/news/2002/09/04/nfire04.xml According to a research, fire fighting has undergone enormous change, from the highly risky position, to prevention of fire and educating the general public not to indulge in fire provoking actions. "The Fire Service of today operates under a much stronger fire prevention ethos, with a shift from heavy involvement in fire fighting towards fire prevention, through education and enforcement activities" Part Time Fire Fighters, Scottish Executive Research, 2003. There was another resentment that was connected with the pensions that are considered to be rather meagre. Many fire fighters do not get well paid jobs after retirement. Recommending a two tier approach in the matter, Office of Deputy Prime Minister, in The Proposals for Amendments to the Firefighter's Pension Scheme, (October 2004), says: "The first providing an immediate unenhanced pension and payable to those who can take alternative regular employment. Such persons may not be able to earn at the same level as in the Fire and Rescue Service and the pension would serve as a cushion between what was earned as a fire-fighter and the potentially lower paid job outside the Service." Nothing much came out of the recommendations for sometime and this enhanced the already existing grievances. Firefighters of UK are a very important and historical organisation. In a country where fire is the most dangerous risk (even now an average of 700 people die of fire every year) fire fighters have remained absolutely indispensable and over the years, they have made themselves useful in thousand other ways. They have become an integral part of society and it is important that their services are recognised in monitory terms too. They are part of the trend in which large-scale organisations emerged by the beginning of 20th century, due to change in work processes, advantages of being organised under the same banner, and the necessity of public services sectors catering to the various needs of general public and these organisations are historical and contextual. As mentioned by Littler, 1980, 157), "Organisational theory and practise can only be understood as something in process, otherwise the search for general propositions and instant prescriptions becomes disconnected from reality, as it has done in conventional ahistorical approaches" (jeer taken from Thomson (1995, p.18). It has become a matter of academic interest to study organisations like Fire-fighters. There had been extensive arguments if the leadership had failed or succeeded in the above industrial action. Leadership, especially Andy Gilchrist were attacked and praised in turn by people and the clan itself. While general public thought that the bargain the fire fighters had achieved was quite laudable, whereas the clan members thought it was nowhere near what they needed. While agreeing that it is usually impossible to please every follower, it brings out questions of leadership, if the leadership is a specialized role or shared influence process. "One view is that all groups have role specialization that includes a leadership role with some responsibilities and functions that cannot be shared too widely without jeopardizing the effectiveness of the group," (Yukl, 2002, p. 3). This will also bring out questions about the leaders' purpose and intentions. Andy Gilchrist was still a Labour Party member and some of the members thought he would not like to displease the Party or its leadership and had to succumb to governmental pressure. This need not be true, but there were ample grounds for assumptions. It is always easy to allege wrong purpose judging from the outcome, because purpose and outcome are very important in leadership. "One viewpoint is that leadership occurs only when people are influenced to do what is ethical and beneficial for the organisation and themselves. This definition of leadership does not include influence attempts that are irrelevant or detrimental to followers, such as a leader's attempts to gain personal benefits at the follower's expenses," (Yukl, p.4). As times and requirements change, modes of control keeps undergoing constant transition giving way to more entrepreneurial control than the earlier simple control focussed on one person or a small group of people. This leads to the decay and decline of tradition control methods that were more rooted in a particular craft than in a perpetually evolving system. This eventually has led to various principles towards systematic work and control like developing each element of work, developing human resources through training, establishing co-operation between workers and management, establishing solidarity between leaders and followers, division of work and responsibility, etc. This does not mean that all systems work well at all times, as it shows in Fire Fighters' case, that an unprecedented industrial action became necessary after a gap of 25 long years and an unbroken record of working selflessly and fearlessly. Systems break down mainly due to the difference between ideology and practice. The employment relationship, work structures and intervening relations, sometimes lead to the rise of bureaucratic control and consolidation of bureaucracy in public sector has never been a rare occurrence. Managing the human factor had always been difficult in every big organisation, even though this does not fully apply to Fire-fighters, because of the training and discipline and the lofty ideals they have inherited would not allow them to be one of the troublesome factors in their organisation. Again, this does not mean that they should never have any legitimate claims of their own and unfortunately, their grievances were allowed to boil over in one way or other. Industrial psychology has been at work in this organisation in a highly positive way and consolidation of human relations had never been a problem till then. Actually it was not a problem even during the industrial action, though there were a few moments when the relations were stretched beyond endurance. As the society evolves, it is no wonder that the organisations and their environments evolve too. Fire fighters being a organisation that is in constant touch with society and human contacts, it was voicelessly undergoing continuous evolution, which nobody took interest, or cared to notice. It was perhaps the most reliable public service and it always existed; hence, government assumed that everything is well within the organisation, while a storm had been brewing up for a long time, the fraction of which had been noticed during a short industrial action in 1978. As Salaman, 1979, 32) points out "The society in which these organizations occur and its relation with these organisations, has been very little studied. To the extent that the outside world does impinge on the structure and functioning of organisations, it is conceptualised not in terms of interests, values, class loyalties, ideologies, market developments etc. but as the organisations 'environment'" (taken from Thompson, p.54). These changes within and out of organisations can either lead to a closed or open system, depending on the circumstances, where population ecology will be one of the main external factors that would influence such an organisation. Another factor is the economy of the society in which the organisations exists, because economy is a very strong external factor that would have a grave effect on the lives of organisation members, leading either to satisfaction or cynical dissatisfaction that would eventually lead to conflicts, if not watched closely and reaction on time. Adaptation to the environment would be the prime need under these circumstances and the adaptation should take place in every level. Fire-fighters definitely fought for their legitimate rights effected by the change in society and economic environment. It is imperative that government too had to meet them halfway, because the environment needs management adaptation as well. In the globalising era, capital, State and Labour have changed beyond recognition. Homely atmosphere of organisations have disappeared. Even though they are based inside Britain, and have no connection with outside world, fire fighters have changed in an unprecedented manner. Another event that changed organisations like fire-fighters is the recent necessity of cultural explanations and adaptations. This awareness has necessitated many adjustments and sometimes resulted in various disasters, in which fire-fighters are directly involved more than any other organisation in Britain. Their role had been visible, evaluated, appreciated and sometimes, especially by minorities, questioned and resented. They are in the thick of it all and this had been a major factor in resent issues. "People from different cultural backgrounds can have very different ways of relating to one another and to the community and this is likely to affect the development of global communities," Wenger et al, (2002, p.118). There had been one more underlying issue, though not as important as the cultural one. Still Britain has only 2% women in Fire fighting, and this makes it one of the most mono-gendered organisations. This could be due to women not opting for a risky and difficult work environment, where demands were made at all times, according to accidents and compulsions. It also could be, to some extent, true that a slight traditionalism prevails in the organisation, a face of which was shown by fire fighters when a few members refused to interact with homosexuals. This shows that society might change at a very fast pace, but taking all the minds along with it cannot be so easy. Also one perhaps should honour the individual mindsets, as long as it does not hinder the work or capability of rendering service to humanity. Comparative influences like political economy, individual convictions, national institutions, personal mindsets, global forces, conventional territories will definitely continue to exist in the minds of organisation members and either they would conflict, or they would cooperate and allow members to adapt themselves to the changing environments inside and outside the organisation. There is no denial that global or not, one's own state and society and beliefs still matter and every state has its own way of dealing with these issues depending on their own circumstances and there need not be uniformity "The need to legitimise power is one reason why there will always be choices and different trajectories within and between states about how to manage the political economy. There is no evidence to show that there is any permanent or essential relation between capital, labour and the state, or between the political and economic environments business organisations operate in," (Thompson , 2002, p.86). Government had to face a new reality and adapt its managerial functions as the figurehead and leader of organisational unit, here the Fire Fighters, and create a liaison between workers through their union leaders, maintain the dialogue by monitoring and sifting through the enormous information corroborating the demands, handling and minimising disturbances so that the workflow need not be disturbed more than absolutely necessary, by negotiating, innovating, planning and controlling the situation. Government had not been particularly successful in bringing the unions to negotiation table and retaining them there, because initial negotiations were unsubstantial and resulted in walkouts, resentments, angry retorts and noisy marching of workforce, while army had to stand by for eventualities. Bringing the threads together, especially the long-neglected or taken-for-granted ones is never easy. Government has to start from the scratch while blame-game raged on from both the sides. For some time, a kind of infectious lunacy took control of the situation. Ultimately, the power of the government prevailed along with its ownership function combined with administrative and innovative capabilities. Neither party could afford to lengthen the unpleasant situation beyond a certain point nor could they avoid a settlement for too long and both were very much aware of it. All concepts and strategies were used to solve misunderstandings and bring normalcy. Government tried to make use of the situation and also tried to tighten the management control over fire fighters. It also learnt that harmonisation, interpretation and decision making under a potentially explosive condition are not easy. "Hyman notes that 'there is no "one best way" of managing these contradictions, only different routes to partial failure' (1987:20). Management of large organisations is therefore likely to try combinations of control strains and practices, appropriate to particular environments or sections of the workforce," Thompson (p.108). Like other public sectors and industrial organisations, Fire fighters are not prone to internal conflicts, which deeply affect the organisational behaviour. In some cases internal and external conflicts are taken as growth-oriented and healthy for the organisational change. This may not be always the case. Conflicts could result when needs, perceptions, values, feelings and emotions, and most of all power equations change. Power can influence change in many ways, conventional, predictable, non-predictable and blatant. External conflict happens when the organisational goals are at odds with the external environment. This did not happen in the case of fire fighters. What happened was the questioning of power after external elements brought in a certain conflict. This conflict did not shake the internal solidarity of the organisation. Instead it became a threat to the controlling power. Resolution of such conflict can become a route to progress as happened in this case, because it led to modernisation and rethinking of the organisation, with new plans, processes, safety measures, and tackling of many more issues through fire fighters for public help. "The conflict helix is a process of conflict which originates in the sociocultural space of meanings, values, norms, status, and class. It is at one time a structure, the opposition of attitudes, at another a situation, the opposition and awareness of different interests. It may be latent until the will initiates action, or resolved through abnegation or resignation of interests. Or it may be manifest as opposing interests strive to overcome and balance each other" http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/TCH.CHAP32.HTM Power has the capability of conflict management and it has to weigh the repercussions, goals, aims and affects on the organisation, as well as the customers, here the people. Conflict management is never more effective than done by Government with power and strength on its side, because power always affects the negotiations and tips the balance. In the case of fire fighters the knowledge of army standing by itself was demoralising, not only because it was a threatening knowledge, but also because it was a kind of insult that they were completely being disregarded. Also was the knowledge that their services were dispensable. Here power rules. Conflict is specific to a particular organisation whereas power could be all-enveloping and has the capability of bending the will of conflict, as seen in this case study to a large extent. BIBLIOGRAPHY: 1. Fincham, Robin and Rhodes, Peter S. (1999), Principles of Organizational Behaviour, 3rd edition, Oxford University Press. 2. Part Time Fire Fighters, Scottish Executive Research, 2003. 3. The Proposals for Amendments to the Firefighter's Pension Scheme, (October 2004), Office of Deputy Prime Minister. 4. Thompson, Paul and McHugh, David (1995), Work Organisations, 2nd edn., MacMillan Business, Hampshire. 5. Thompson, Paul and McHugh, David (2002), Work Organisations, A Critical Introduction, Palgrave, Hampshire. 6. Wenger, Etienne, Richard McDermott and William M. Snyder ((2002), Cultivating Communities of Practice, Harvard Business School Press, Boston. 7. Yukl, Gary (2002), Leadership in organisations, 5th edn., Prentice Hall International Inc., New Jersey. ONLINE RESOURCES: 1. http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/2003/305/index.htmlid=pp4.htm 2. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2982478.stm 3. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VUSYMKJ0V3YKNQFIQMGCFFWAVCBQUIV0xml=/news/2002/08/04/nfire04.xml 4. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VUSYMKJ0V3YKNQFIQMGCFFWAVCBQUIV0xml=/news/2002/09/04/nfire04.xml 5. http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/TCH.CHAP32.HTM 6. Read More