Pay disputes Tory fury over union deals at odds with public mood

Labour caves in to unions. Fears of a wageprice spiral. Back to the 1970s and a new winter of discontent.

- Larry Elliott

The Conservative party and their friends in the media have been in full cry since the government made an offer to train drivers last week aimed at ending two years of disruption on the railways.

The rightwing press needed little prompting to claim that Britain was taking a step back into the "industrial anarchy" of the past and was eager to contrast the deal for the Aslef union with Rachel Reeves's decision to means test the winter fuel allowance for pensioners.

The level of outrage was further ratcheted up on Friday when Aslef announced plans for 22 days of strikes at weekends from late August to November on LNER trains.

Although the two disputes were entirely separate, the timing could hardly have been better as far as a badly beaten and demoralised Tory party was concerned. "Labour has been played by its union paymasters," was the verdict of James Cleverly, the shadow home secretary and a contender to replace Rishi Sunak as party leader.