CHRISTMAS, the season of goodwill to all, might arrive a tad late this year – if at all for some.

The plethora of strikes, estimated to involve more than one million people, covers nurses, teachers, paramedics, postal and rail workers, bus drivers, and, the latest to join the ranks of the disgruntled, Border Force staff.

Trains won’t arrive, air flights will be cancelled, presents might turn up after Christmas, and people needing medical care won’t know if the ambulance they have called will turn up.

The trade body UKHospitality has warned that the strikes are leading to a surge in cancelled bookings with an estimated bill for the industry of around £1.5 billion. Pubs and restaurants are expecting up to 40 per cent of bookings on strike days next week to be cancelled as Christmas party celebrations are disrupted by the rail strikes.

Underpinning the industrial strife is the political rhetoric with verbal punches being thrown by Labour and the Conservatives, both with an eye to the run-in to the next General Election.

At Prime Minister's Questions, Sir Keir Starmer branded Rishi Sunak the “blancmange Prime Minister”, wobbling in the face of Tory rebels after U-turning on housing targets and onshore wind farms, while the PM, seeking to portray himself as strong and stable, promised “tough laws” to curb the actions of those “unreasonable” strikers, who were holding the hard-working majority to ransom for double-digit pay rises the country couldn’t afford.

Yesterday, Cabinet Office Minister Jeremy Quin, told MPs the Government would “do our utmost to mitigate…and protect the people from the impact of those strikes”.

As many as 2,000 armed forces personnel are on standby to drive ambulances and provide cover for Border Force staff.

As Mr Sunak faces increasing calls from the Conservative-supporting commentariat to “get a grip”, UK ministers have met to see how they can strengthen legislation to stop unions bringing parts of the country’s key infrastructure to a halt.

Strikes are already banned for the police and the armed forces but now the PM is looking at outlawing them for firefighters and ambulance workers as well as raising the threshold needed in strike ballots.

Gillian Keegan, England’s Education Secretary, supports widening the list of workers in “critical infrastructure” jobs banned from striking, given the “disproportionate” disruption and threat to public safety caused by such industrial action.

One UK minister told the FT bluntly: “If the Christmas Eve[rail] strike goes ahead, we need to crack on with the anti-strike laws early in the New Year.”

The Government plan to introduce minimum public service levels during strikes – which has been lingering in ministerial heads for years – is likely to arrive in the Commons in January, but there will be an almighty battle about it, particularly in the House of Lords, where Mr Sunak doesn’t have a majority.

Sharon Graham, General Secretary of the Unite union, threw down the gauntlet, making clear her union was “ready industrially and financially” to challenge any new Government measures.

And one rail union accused the Government of “blocking” a pay deal to end the dispute, claiming the strikes “come gift-wrapped from Rishi Sunak” but a minister insisted this was simply not true and the offer made to rail workers was “good” and “fair”.

But, of course, any newly-strengthened legislation won’t come in time for this Christmas. When it does arrive, it will create an almighty political ding-dong: Whose side are you on? The strikers or the strivers? Mr Sunak sees a political opportunity that could help in his ultimate quest: to stay in power. That is, he will seek to portray the Tory Government as being on the side of ordinary folk, faced at every turn by militant, Labour-supported and Labour-supporting unions. The damage to many people’s Christmases might be seen as a great help to the PM’s argument.

However, Mr Sunak has to be careful who he targets.

Those taking industrial action are a disparate group. It’s one thing to criticise rail workers for causing continuing misery to travellers, which has a knock-on effect on local businesses, it’s another to take on nurses, who are rightly held in very high regard because of their heroic efforts during and after the worst of the pandemic.

While Sir Keir’s main attack is to constantly brand the PM a weakling, the industrial action has also to a degree put Labour on the defensive given its historical relationship with the trade unions, which continue to be major benefactors. While the Opposition defends a worker’s right to strike, its front bench has rigorously shied away from openly supporting the current wave of industrial action.

But one party source told the Politico website the Shadow Cabinet “need some serious lines on this now we’ve got strikes across so many sectors; we can’t escape this”.

Mark Serwotka, General Secretary of the PCS union, warned the Government that if it didn’t make concessions then unions “will work together far closer to ensure we are co-operating and co-ordinating our action”.

Yet if the strikes do intensify and rumble on for months and months, there will be large sections of the public who will begin to become weary of them and, worse still, angry about the never-ending industrial action.

In England, Sir Keir called for Mr Sunak to “stop grandstanding” and get around the negotiating table with public sector unions while in Scotland teaching unions urged Nicola Sturgeon to intervene as a “peacemaker” to facilitate an improved pay offer and stop further strike action in schools.

Unfortunately, strikes won’t just be for Christmas but are set to go well into 2023 as the country, in its bid for recovery, trudges through the longest recession anyone can remember.

Who will pay the highest political price? The odds are heavily in favour of the Conservatives doing so, because they are in government, and as the next year progresses that reliable old slogan “time for change” will begin to ricochet around the country.

As Mr Sunak and his colleagues munch on their mince pies, they will certainly know they have their work cut out.

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