Browse Cases

Showing 1-17 of 17 results

United Kingdom doctors strike against changes to pension plan, 2012

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
14 May, 2012 to 19 July, 2012
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
3 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Matt Koucky 29/05/2019

In 2012, the United Kingdom (UK) National Health Service (NHS)—the country’s public healthcare provider—proposed changes to healthcare policy in the UK. These changes would raise the retirement age for medical doctors from 60 years of age to 68 years of age, and increase fees on retirement funds above the normal level for public workers. The changes also made it easier for the NHS to subcontract care to private firms. Medical doctors in the public system, led by the British Medical Association (BMA)—their union—proposed a strike.

Fired Visteon Automotive Workers Occupy United Kingdom Factories, 2009.

Country
United Kingdom
Northern Ireland
Time period
31 March, 2009 to 18 May, 2009
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
8 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Yin Xiao and Hayden Dahm, 16/04/2017

Visteon is a global automotive company that spun off from Ford Motor Company in June 2000. In the U.K., during this transition period, Ford and the trade union Unite made a deal to guarantee that all former Ford employees – now Visteon workers – would keep the same wage and pension conditions. However, Visteon placed all newly hired employees under inferior contracts.

United Kingdom Public and Commercial Services Union strikes against cuts to Civil Service Compensation Scheme 2010

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
8 March, 2010 to 24 April, 2010
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
4 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Guido Girgenti 27/04/2014 and Shayla Smith 15/03/2017

In March 2009, British Prime Minister (PM) Gordon Brown of the Labor Government proposed to reform the Civil Service Compensation Scheme (CSCS). The Superannuation Act of 1972 governed the CSCS and provided cash compensation for civil servants who lost their jobs and established early retirement terms.

University of Nottingham students occupy to end University support of Israel, UK 2009

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
28 January, 2009 to 6 February, 2009
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Human Rights
Total points
3 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Emily Kluver 17/04/2014

In January of 2009, protests broke out worldwide to condemn Israel’s military actions in Gaza. The weekend of the 10th and 11th of January, crowds gathered in cities worldwide for demonstrations of up to 250,000 people. In London, 100,000 people gathered to protest the war in Gaza. A couple of days following these demonstrations, student occupations at universities in the United Kingdom (UK) began to break out, starting with the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) on 13 January.

Oxford students occupy historic building, gain University support for Gaza 2009

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
22 January, 2009 to 22 January, 2009
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Human Rights
Peace
Total points
7 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Emily Kluver 20/03/2014

In January of 2009, protests broke out worldwide to condemn Israel’s military actions in Gaza. The weekend of the 10th and 11th of January, crowds gathered in cities worldwide for demonstrations of up to 250,000 people. In London, 100,000 people gathered to protest the war in Gaza.

British Students Gain London School of Economics Stand Against Israeli Military Action in Gaza

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
15 January, 2009 to 22 January, 2009
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Human Rights
Peace
Total points
8 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Emily Kluver, 15/02/2014

In January of 2009, protests broke out worldwide to condemn Israel’s military actions in Gaza. The weekend of the 10th and 11th of January, crowds gathered in cities worldwide for demonstrations of up to 250,000 people. In London, 100,000 people gathered to protest the war in Gaza. 

A couple of days following these demonstrations, student occupations at universities in the United Kingdom (UK) began to break out, starting with the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) on 13 January. 

British students force end of Barclays Bank’s investments in South African Apartheid 1969-1987

Country
United Kingdom
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Human Rights
National/Ethnic Identity
Total points
10 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Ryan Leitner 08/02/2014

Apartheid was a legal and political system of racial segregation in South Africa in which the National Party used violence to uphold political and economic control by the white minority. Apartheid began under colonial Dutch rule and was officially introduced as an official policy in 1948.

British win repeal of Poll Tax (flat tax), 1989-1990

Country
Scotland
England
Wales
United Kingdom
Time period
Spring, 1989 to November, 1990
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
10 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Ojas Chinchwadkar 9/22/13

Margaret Thatcher was reelected for her third term in 1987. One of the changes she promised to implement was to levy a flat tax that she called a “Community Charge,” although it became popularly known as the poll tax. A flat tax means that everybody, regardless of wealth, has to pay the same amount. The tax was to be set in the 1989-1990 financial year in Scotland, and in the 1990-1991 financial year in England. However, it was unpopular from the moment she proposed it, and she met resistance from both the people and her party.

Isle of Wight Vestas workers sit-in against plant closure, 2009

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
20 July, 2009 to 12 August, 2009
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Environment
Total points
4 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Laura Rigell, 25/02/2013

In April 2009, Vestas Wind Systems announced the planned closure of two of its factories, which together employed 625 people.  The larger of the two, located in Newport, Isle of White, was the UK’s only major wind turbine production site.  Despite the UK environment secretary Ed Miliband’s discourse about green energy, the company claimed that there was not sufficient demand in the UK for wind turbines.  Vestas relocated these facilities to Colorado, where the market was better.

Liverpool, England, dockers win strike with major international support, 1995-1998

Country
United Kingdom
International
Time period
28 September, 1995 to 27 January, 1998
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
9 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
John Pontillo, 16/02/2013

On 28 September 1995 the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company fired 329 port workers in Liverpool, England, for joining a picket line in solidarity with fellow port workers in Torside. The Torside workers were fired for protesting against the “free-market” style of labor, in which there was no job security, no wage security, and a constant change of working hours. In this format, workers could be phoned at any time and asked to come in to work.

Scots and peace activists protest US Navy Base at Holy Loch, Scotland, 1960-61

Country
United Kingdom
Scotland
Time period
December, 1960 to September, 1961
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Peace
Total points
3 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Susana Medeiros, 16/12/2012

In November of 1960, the United States and British governments reached an agreement on the use of the Holy Loch in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland as an overseas base for the US Navy. The governments believed the U.S. military required an overseas nuclear base for refit and crew overturn for its new Polaris missile submarines, built to serve as a deterrent to Soviet military might. 

British printers strike for their jobs, unions (Wapping Dispute), 1986-1987

Country
United Kingdom
England
Time period
January, 1986 to February, 1987
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
3 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Kate Aronoff, 04/12/2011

By 1986, Australian Rupert Murdoch was already well on his way to becoming the head of what would be the world’s largest news conglomerate, News International. His meteoric rise to the top, however, clashed with a centuries-old printing tradition in the United Kingdom, where he owned four of the company’s largest papers. The Fleet Street area of London, England had served as the iconic home to the nation’s printmaking industry since as far back as the 15th century. As Murdoch saw it, however, this history represented a method of printmaking that had long since passed its peak.

Manchester workers campaign for economic equality and political representation (Peterloo Massacre), 1817-1820

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
March, 1817 to Spring, 1820
Classification
Change
Cluster
Democracy
Economic Justice
Total points
3 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Nicholas V. Dirago, 04/11//2011

The economic plight of the people of Manchester in the early eighteenth century was rooted in three major historical developments: the Industrial Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, and the Corn Laws of 1804. The first solidified an enormous and conspicuous gap between rich and poor, leaving Manchester’s lower classes—mostly spinners and weavers of cotton—to grapple with unemployment, poverty, hunger, and heavy reliance on social welfare. It also contributed to an unprecedented boom in population (Manchester’s quintupled in four decades).

British workers general strike to support mine workers, 1926

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
May 1, 1926 to May 12, 1926
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Human Rights
Total points
2 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Matthew Heck, 26/09/2010

The general strike of 1926 in Britain was one of the largest strikes Britain has ever experienced and, simultaneously, perhaps the least successful.  Previous strikes in the wake of World War I (such as 1919, 1920, and 1921) were precursors to the strike of 1926 and suggest the extreme volatility of the British economy in the post-World War I time period.  Although this strike was a general strike comprised of almost every industry in Britain, the mineworkers’ standard of living was the sole concern of the strike.

Prison officers strike in England and Wales, 2007

Country
England
Wales
United Kingdom
Time period
August 16, 2007 to August 30, 2007
Classification
Change
Cluster
Economic Justice
Human Rights
Total points
3 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Julio Alicea, 05/12/2010

In 1996, there were 204 reported attacks on prison staff in English prisons. Ten years later, the number of attacks soared to 1,050 attacks. After a 400% increase in attacks, prison officers were more than outraged with their apparently dangerous working conditions.

UK students campaign against tuition raises, 2010

Country
United Kingdom
Time period
10 November, 2010 to 9 December, 2010
Classification
Defense
Cluster
Economic Justice
Total points
4 out of 10 points
Name of researcher, and date dd/mm/yyyy
Ashley Banks, 29/04/2011

In May of 2010, the United Kingdom held its general elections. The Conservative Party formed the new government by making an alliance with a smaller party, the Liberal Democrats.