It is a tried and tested technique. When I was a Southwark Councillor there were workers who clearly took sickies in an organised pattern. Why? It created a need for staff to cover. Bingo! Overtime for all. How did we deal with it? Firm management. When the unions are having a laugh you have to beat them - and, if necessary, break their stranglehold. It's not pleasant - confrontation never is. But it is necessary.

To be fair to them, the Southern Rail management are taking the fight to the unions. Govia Thameslink have no intention of backing off. Why should they? They are in the right. But they are being betrayed by this pathetic Tory government. This should be a no-brainer for ministers. Who do they support in a struggle between the mindless militants of the RMT and the voters of commuter land? Hmm, let me think for a minute...

It's not as if the pathetic inaction of the Government has no cost. Rail strikes are the new black. A week of action is threatened on Eurostar. And there may be action on Virgin Trains on the East Coast Main Line.

The Government cannot be neutral in this struggle. They urgently need to back the rail companies in any ways that they can. Having a Labour Leader whose politics are throwback to the seventies is bad enough, having trade union battles that are an homage to the era of the Heath Government is taking it too far.