The first national strike by the Fire Brigades Union since 1977 is creating a political crisis within the British Labour Party. The firefighters are currently on their second of a series of four planned eight-day strike actions – with firefighters returning to work November 30, 2002.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government has already vetoed a settlement of 16% negotiated between the union and employers by refusing to provide budgeting for anything more than a 4 % increase. The government’s most recent offer was 11% over three years – but only if the union agreed to "modernization". By modernization, the Blair government means the reduction of the force by 11,000 firefighters, with staffing shortages supplied by forced overtime.

The army has been providing emergency firefighting during the strike, with 19,000 troops assigned to firefighting duties. However, the Chief of the Defense Staff has already said that his troops should not be used to cross picket lines or to help break the strike. He claimed that the soldiers were demoralized by the duty and "overstretched".

The union, which has the strength of an 87% strike vote behind it, has two more eight-day strikes planned; one beginning December 4th and the second on December 16th.

The strike is becoming a major crisis for Blair’s "new labour". On the one hand, the Labour Party is millions of pounds in debt and desperately in need of the continued financial support of the labour movement – who provide 80 % of Labour Party funding.

On the other hand is Blair’s vaunted independence from trade unions, typified by a distant, formal relationship with labour and a marked departure from traditional Labour Party policies and values.

The total cost of the settlement that the government vetoed was only about 250 million pounds, an insignificant amount in terms of the British government’s budget. However, with other public sector negotiations upcoming, Blair seems to be sending a message to unions that his government is willing to take a hard line.

Andy Gilchrist, general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, may have summed up the current crisis for the Blair government when he suggested that Sir George Bain (the man Blair put in charge of the issue) "belongs to a previous age – to the Thatcher era, with its master and servant attitude to union rights. The key question is whether the labour movement will allow this approach to become the hallmark of New Labour in government as well."