Dave . . saying that what you wrote was crap is not a personal attack - sorry that you saw it that way, I stand by the judgement, but do regret any offence I caused you.

Funny, my position is the opposite of yours . . I was in a union for about 4 of the 18 years I spent teaching - for reasons not dissimilar to yours; to my mind the motivation of the unions in that profession were, and remain, self-centred, self-serving and anti-professional; the inter-union rivalries assisited various Governments in their distruction of much of the best in the UK education system . . . and I'd still call myself a Socialist . .

As for one or other of us being wrong - I don't see much disagreement between us in the details of what I wrote. However your piece offered two conclusions for which you provided no evidence; firstly that the unions "near ruined the economy" - I think that's wrong but at least arguable - and secondly that "we're still suffering the consequences of Union greed" - which I find so far wide of the mark as to be offensive, unless you refer to the long chain of cause and effect which led to the destruction of the UK trades unions and a far lower level of workers' protections than other leading European nations.

As for there being two sides to every argument . . well, it's a nice idea, but some things are plain right or plain wrong . . .

But, as I said earlier, I do sincerly apologise for any offence my robust reply caused.

G.