On neglect and unions

I am ashamed at how long it has been since my last post. And even more ashamed at the fact that I only realised I had neglected my blog for so long when an acquaintance emailed me with his thoughts on reading one of my posts. So apologies for those of you who are genuinely interested in what I have to say in this space.

It is March (just) and grey and rainy here in Kansas. Baby is due in four weeks time and I don't think I have got my head around the fact that I will shortly be responsible for a life in a way I have never been before. However, life is good. I recently took a flying visit back to the UK, for my goddaughter's christening, and was surprised at how eager I felt to get back to the midwest. Perhaps it was with the baby imminent that I realised that my place was here, with the Major, in the country where my baby will be born, but I felt genuinely relieved to be back. And since being back I have appreciated being out here in ways that I have never felt before. Suddenly the slow pace of life is relaxing, rather than frustrating. The Army Wife community no longer seems stifling, but supportive, and my teaching at KU genuinely fulfilling, rather than just filling a two-year gap on my CV. Perhaps I am softening at last, because despite the rain, Kansas feels like home - and those are words I never thought I would write.

I had meant to post a week or so ago, after listening to a story on the radio about the question of 'union-busting' in Wisconsin. Democratic leaders had 'gone into hiding' rather than vote on a bill which would have disabled unions further than they would have liked, and everyone was in uproar. But one comment really struck me. It was on the issue of whether unions should be allowed to deduct money directly from a person's wages, if that person had previously ok'd it. The person with an opinion was saying that he thought that public money - i.e. taxpayers money, which goes to pay the wages of public sector workers, should not go to unions in this way. But it got me thinking about the whole issue of public sector pay generally. At the moment, I am essentially living on taxpayers' money. My husband is paid by the British government. He is not a member of a union, because the Army doesn't have a union, but my mental question was, at what point does taxpayers' money stop being taxpayers' money and start becoming an individual's income, to dispose of as he or she pleases? I wouldn't dream of allowing any old random stranger to 'audit' our daily expenses, because as far as I'm concerned, that money is money my husband has earned and has every right to do as he pleases with. So if we agree that someone's salary becomes his own when it enters his bank account, is there then a problem with a deduction coming out to a union that person has decided to join? Or is the problem that the money comes out at the same time as the money comes in, so to speak?

It is a confusing issue, this question of accountability. I am in no doubt that the expenses which we are legally entitled to claim, such as help with utilities and rent, which the government allows us to claim as my husband is a public sector employee, should be open to scrutiny. But the rest - the sum which comes into our account as money well earned? I think at that point, it's our money, to do with as we will.

Perhaps the issue is whether you believe unions should be allowed within the public sector. Perhaps, as within the Army, they should not. I read or heard somewhere recently that the only employees who should be allowed unions should be private sector workers, to protect them from the greed of corporate employers. But I'm not sure I agree with this. Sure, if you sign up to work a government paid job, you know what you're signing on for, perhaps more so than with a big corporation. But I don't see why we shouldn't be protected from the excesses of government too, within a certain remit. Or, if not protected, at least allowed to have our say. After all, public sector workers are individuals too - just because you've signed on to work for the government means you automatically lose your voice.