About 250,000 British civil servants walked out of work today, starting a two-day strike over redundancy pay reflecting frayed union relations with the Labour government just weeks away from an election.
Labour, which relies on union funding and counts on union activists to hit the streets during election campaigns, is facing the prospect of defeat to the opposition Conservatives at a poll expected on May 6th after 13 years in power.
Opinion polls have shown the Conservatives' once considerable lead dwindling this year, raising the possibility of a hung parliament where no one party has control and even giving Labour a glimmer of hope of staying in charge.
The fallout from an 18-month recession and anger over taxpayer-funded bank bailouts and forthcoming spending cuts to rein in a record budget deficit have combined to wear public sector union patience thin at just the wrong time for Labour.
"Loyal civil and public servants won't stand by and allow the government to cut jobs on the cheap," said Mark Serwotka, general secretary of Britain's fifth biggest union, the Public and Commercial Services Union.
"Those on strike today deliver services that touch our everyday lives from the cradle to the grave."
More strikes could follow as the union hopes the proximity of an election will force the government to scale back changes to redundancy pay.
The PCS union, which is not affiliated to any political party, says it fears "the government wants to make it easier for whoever wins the general election to cut low-paid civil and public servants on the cheap".
The dispute, involving workers from courts, tax offices, parliament and border controls, centres on changes to the civil service compensation scheme which would mean workers get less money if made redundant.
It is if the first time security staff in parliament have gone on strike in more than 25 years, the PCS said.
Whoever wins the election will have to make big cuts to some government department budgets - perhaps as much as 17 per cent - in order to bring down a budget deficit forecast to soar above 12 percent of gross domestic product this year.
The Conservatives, regarded as less union-friendly than Labour, have indicated they will focus most of the necessary fiscal tightening on spending cuts rather than tax hikes and plans to freeze public sector pay for most workers in 2011.
Reuters