International criticism of the right to strike in the UK



The UK’s approach to industrial action infringes several international laws and conventions, including ILO Convention 87 on Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise, ratified by the UK in 1949. The ILO’s Committee of Experts spoke out against the TUA 16even before it became law for undermining key ILO Conventions (see Chapter 5). UK strike laws have also been criticised by the European Committee on Social Rights (ECSR). In January 2015, the ESCR, issued recommendations through its basic reporting procedure on UK strike law, which it judged unsatisfactory. 



The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has confirmed that the human right to freedom of association under Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the Convention) includes the right to bargain collectively (Demir and Baykara v Turkey [2009] IRLR 766) and the right to strike (RMT v UK [2014] ECHR 366 and Tymoshenko v Ukraine [2014] ECHR 1016). 



However, the ECHR has refused to outlaw the UK ban on secondary action, concluding instead that national courts have a wide “margin of appreciation” (i.e. significant freedom) to make laws to limit secondary action.