Letters From A Tory Daily views on British politics and the Conservative Party from a centre-right thinker who writes letters on his blog to politicians, journalists and many others.

Dear Boris,
As the Unite/Labour/Charlie Whelan ’axis of evil’ continues to dominate the headlines, I was rather surprised to see you getting stuck into this incredibly delicate situation.  While David Cameron is certainly enjoying poking fun at Gordon Brown for being at the mercy of Unite, I thought it would be prudent for you to keep a [...]

“The Government has been massively subsidising trade unions with taxpayers’ money for years, now it’s coming back to haunt them with Unite’s strike hitting ordinary British travellers.”
- Conservative MP Greg Hands, after it emerged that the trade union behind the British Airways strike has received almost £400,000 in taxpayers’ money in three years.  Unite is accused [...]

First came ‘Change That Works For You. Building A Fairer Britain’ – without doubt one of the worst election slogans I have ever heard.  It means nothing, it tells me nothing, it will inspire no-one and it’s basically the same as the other two parties.
Now we have Nick Clegg calling for a 10% tax on [...]

“Many workers – particularly in the public sector – are facing pay freezes, compulsory redundancies and even, in the case of Unite members at British Airways, the prospect of pay cuts.  We feel that the proposed deal for our Royal Mail members compares extremely well.”
- a spokesman from the Communication Workers Union, after it was announced [...]

Dear Mark Serwotka,
As general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services union, you have obviously decided to fire the starting gun on the hotly anticipated battle between public sector unions and the government.  Your members have voted for industrial action next month over changes to compensation scheme for staff who are made redundant. More than a quarter [...]

Poor Derek Simpson.  As head of Unite, I bet he thought that he had British Airways on the run…..
From the BBC:
British Airways has threatened that cabin crew who go on strike will lose their travel perks permanently. Staff with the airline can book flights for themselves and nominated friends or family at a 90% discount [...]

Dear John Denham,
For a Labour minister to talk common sense is such a momentous occasion that I was in no doubt that I should be writing a letter to you this morning.  Yesterday you declared that being black or Asian no longer means you will be automatically disadvantaged.  Incredible stuff, really.  Unfortunately, your eureka moment falls [...]

Dear British Airways cabin crew,
Obviously festive spirit is in short supply amongst you lot at the moment.  Yesterday it was announced that Unite union members have voted for a 12-day strike over Christmas and the New Year, throwing the holiday plans of nearly 1 million British Airways passengers into chaos.  It appears that common sense among [...]

“Unless there is sufficient evidence of a change in management’s attitude, local agreements being reached and significant progress towards a full and final agreement, then we will have no alternative other than to return to strike action before Christmas.”
- Billy Hayes, the Communication Workers Union general secretary, written to his members as the postal workers [...]

“We don’t apologise for having influence and power. But that power is exercised quite sparingly.”
- Billy Hayes, leader of the Communication Workers Union that represents Post Office workers. The first 24-hour national strike on Thursday, which comes after a series of regional walkouts, will involve mail centre staff and drivers. In Hayes’s interview with the [...]

“We want to be clear that the BBC should not be handing the BNP this invitation to political respectability.”
- a spokesman for Unite Against Fascism, who will be holding a day-long protest at Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time.  The programme’s producers are to push ahead with next week’s show, despite UAF’s plans to protest outside [...]

“Short of a grassroots campaign among the turkey community calling for all our Christmases to come early it’s hard to think of a more wilfully self-destructive act than the decision by postal workers to go on strike and thus ensure that all our presents actually come sometime in February. I wonder if the guys at [...]

Dear trade unions,
No sooner had you heard Alistair Darling’s announcement about a one-year pay freeze for senior civil servants, members of the judiciary, senior NHS managers, GPs and chief executives of quangos then you were up in arms about it.  Your collective reactions were, however, self-centred and short sighted.  Furthermore, George Osborne’s announcement yesterday that the [...]

Dear Ed Miliband,
Having achieved the sum total of sod all as Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, you have now been passed the mantle of Labour’s election manifesto coordinator.  Oh dear.  To suggest that your political inexperience is wholly unsuitable for such a role is an understatement of epic proportions.
In your interview with [...]

“I Googled postal strikes yesterday and what do you think came up straight away? An advert for DHL with the strapline ‘We are not on strike’.”
- Andrew Hawkins, chief executive of ComRes, a Westminster-based market research organisation.  Some firms have begun turning to the Royal Mail’s private sector rivals as the regional action has spread [...]

Dear trade unions,
The current postal strikes have clarified yet again what a desperately poor understanding you all have of political and economic realities.  Yesterday, you made fools of yourselves yet again by calling for BNP members to be banned from working in the entire public sector as you apparently vowed to mobilise against the threat [...]

“Charlie just said to him he was not wanted any more and so he was sent away and told to do nothing. But they couldn’t find a reason to get rid of him so he is still on full pay with car and expenses.”
- a friend of Mike Griffiths, Unite’s former national political officer, after it [...]

Dear readers,
When it comes to postal strikes, there are some things that I can just about put up with:
1. The Communication Workers Union (CWU) claims to be happy with modernisation of the postal service, even though it is dragging this country back to the dark ages through strike action.
2. The CWU complains about cuts to [...]

Dear Mark Serwotka,
Very few people in the public sector are likely to escape totally unscathed from post-2010 election cuts in spending.  Pensions are likely to be hit seeing as the total public sector pensions liability has already topped £1 trillion and is still rising fast.  In addition, other measures are likely to be put in [...]

1. The Communication Workers Union’s (CWU) national leadership offered Royal Mail a three-month moratorium on industrial action in return for a suspension of imposed changes.  How very generous of them.  Royal Mail rejected this suggestion, only for the CWU’s London divisional rep Mark Palfrey to later say: “Our members are not going to allow Royal Mail to keep [...]

“My message to union leaders who think they can take me on is simple: don’t do it.  An elected government will have a mandate and I would say to union leaders that I want to have good relations with these people. They have an important part to play. They know themselves that Britain has been [...]

“We, the workers have nothing to eat, we had to seek some sort of alternative food and I gave them an example.”
- Zoran Bulatovic, a Serbian union official, who chopped off his finger and ate it in a protest over wages to show how desperate he and other workers are. “It hurt like hell”, he added.  [...]

“We take no lessons in morality from Government ministers, who fit out their homes with stone sinks from Habitat on their expenses, who pay their husbands more than a teacher earns to be their personal assistants, and who don’t appear to engage in even a hint of performance management of what they get up to.”
- [...]

Dear Gerry Morrissey,
As with every other general secretary of a union at the moment, you are just waiting for that phonecall from a journalist asking for your two cents worth on the latest job cuts in your sector.  Seeing as you front the broadcasting workers’ union Bectu, the job cuts at ITV were just what [...]

“The latest proposed version of the blouse did not receive negative feedback during the wearer trials.”
- a spokesman for National Express, discussing the trials of the new uniforms being given to staff after the company took over the East Coast Main Line from GNER in December 2007. Female staff on National Express trains between London [...]