Solidarity action

Solidarity action (also known as secondary action, a boycott or a sympathy strike) is industrial action by a trade union in support of a strike initiated by workers in another, separate enterprise. The term "secondary action" is often used with the intention of distinguishing different types of trade dispute with a worker's direct employer, and so may be used to refer to a dispute with the employer's parent company, its suppliers, financiers, contracting parties, or any other employer in another industry.

In most countries there are limits on the purposes for which people may go on strike, and in many English-speaking nations restrictions have been placed on which organizations trade unions may strike against. In the US and UK workers can typically strike against their direct employer only. In continental Europe, solidarity action is generally lawful and the right to strike is seen as a part of broader political freedom.

Australia

See also: Australian labour law

In Australia, secondary boycotts are prohibited by the Competition and Consumer Act 2010. In the 1910s, sympathy strikes were sometimes called in order to extend a strike beyond the bounds of any one Australian state, thus making it eligible for handling by the Federal Arbitration Court.

United Kingdom

See also: UK labour law

In the United Kingdom, sympathy strikes were outlawed by the Trade Disputes and Trade Union Act of 1927 in the aftermath of the general strike. This was repealed by the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act 1946, passed by the post-war Labour Government.

Solidarity action remained legal until 1980, when the Conservative Government of Margaret Thatcher passed the Employment Act 1980 which restricted it. This was followed a decade later by the Employment Act 1990, which outlawed solidarity action entirely. The laws outlawing solidarity strikes remain to this day. In 2005, union leaders in the U.K. called for the legalisation of solidarity strikes in the aftermath of the strike action against the catering company Gate Gourmet but Labour ministers stated that they had no intention of repealing the law.

• National Sailors’ and Firemen's Union v Reed [1926] Ch 536
• Express Newspapers ltd v MacShane [1980] ICR 42
• Duport Steel Ltd v Sirs [1980] ICR 161

United States

See also: US labor law

Because farm labourers in the United States are not covered by the Wagner Act, the United Farm Workers union has been able to legally use solidarity boycotting of grocery store chains as an aid to their strikes against California agribusinesses and to their primary boycotts of California grapes, lettuce and wine. The UFW's secondary boycotts involved asking consumers to stop shopping at a grocery store chain until such time as the chain stopped carrying the boycotted grapes or lettuce or wine.

Secondary boycotting is frequently confused with secondary striking, which is also a prohibited tactic for those labour unions covered by the Taft-Hartley Act. Some legal definitions for secondary boycotting divide it into two different kinds, secondary consumer boycotts as per the above definition of secondary boycotts, and secondary employee boycotts, also defined as a secondary strike.

See also

• Boycott, for the related consumer concept

References

• M Kite and T Freinberg, 'Unions to Challenge Blair Over Ban on Secondary Strikes' (Daily Telegraph, 27 August 2005).