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Speaker 1: So one hundred thousand workers went on strike. Now what

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Speaker 1: the cost to settle these claims will surely run into

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Speaker 1: the billions of dollars, easily run into the billions of

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Speaker 1: dollars for all these workers. Nineteen seventy nine, that was

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Speaker 1: the last time we had to strike this big. That

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Speaker 1: was a general strike, three hundred thousand people. This was

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Speaker 1: Muldoon days. It was over a dispute with the driver

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Speaker 1: unions and Transport went to arbitration. The unions one well,

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Speaker 1: Muldoon lost. The deal went through this time senior doctors

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Speaker 1: refused binding arbitration. Simeon Brown offered it. They said, nap

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Speaker 1: secondary teachers they've got a few more strikes in them

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Speaker 1: before Christmas, though they're lower level. And the primary teachers

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Speaker 1: they say they've now got more dates set down to

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Speaker 1: talk pay conditions etc. Next month. You'd have to say,

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Speaker 1: based purely on a little bit of polling and a

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Speaker 1: little bit of vibes, that the workers win the week

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Speaker 1: they've won the pr battle. I mean, personally, I'm already

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Speaker 1: sick of hearing about how much senior doctors get Paid'll

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Speaker 1: be sick of their kids missing school any more. Delayed

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Speaker 1: hip operations and they'll be hell to pay. If the

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Speaker 1: unions expect strikes to kick off again next year, they

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Speaker 1: might just find themselves falling out of favor worth workers

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Speaker 1: in the private sector. Remember the median wage median salary

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Speaker 1: seventy thousand dollars a year. Private sector workers haven't been

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Speaker 1: getting the same increases as the public ones. And the

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Speaker 1: offer of these teachers are rejecting right now would have

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Speaker 1: almost eighty percent of them earning more than one hundred

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Speaker 1: k a year base salary base salary. Arguing for more

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Speaker 1: and dragging out industrial action for too long, you risk

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Speaker 1: looking well political what the government said you were, or

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Speaker 1: greedy or both. Given the state of the books and

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Speaker 1: the enormous deficit blowout that this current lot inherited, you

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Speaker 1: have to be careful, don't you. So the unions, I

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Speaker 1: think have won the battle. The question really is they

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Speaker 1: win the war? For more from Early edition with Ryan Bridge.

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Speaker 1: Listen live to News Talks it be from five am weekdays,

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Speaker 1: or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.