Despite the barrage of propaganda from the government, an opinion poll by the BBC shows that there is overwhelming support for the November 30 pensions strike by public sector workers. Of those polled, 61% vs 36% say say the strike is justified, rising to 67% vs 30% for women, 79% vs 17% amongst 18-24 years old and 71% vs 28% in Scotland.

Although its own poll shows this massive support for the strike, the BBC titled its news item about it: "Strike: BBC poll suggests strong support." You can see the full results of the poll broken down by age, region, gender and socio-economic group in this PDF file.

These results show that the anger felt by public sector workers is shared by the public in general and underlines the point that the strike is not just about pensions but reflects a deeper and much more widespread opposition to the austerity cuts. The results of the ballots for the strike of the different unions involved were on average 77% in favour. The TUC, in an analysis of the ballots, points out that "only one union has got a less than 60 per cent yes vote and that is the (non-TUC affiliate) Ulster Teachers’ Union. They just missed -with 59.3 per cent." The same TUC analysis points out that some of the results were extraordinary, "the NUT got a 92 per cent yes vote. 14 of the 28 unions whose votes we know got yes votes in excess of 80 per cent, and 24 of the 28 got support of more than 70 per cent."

The Con-Dem coalition government has responded by threatening to use the Army to replace strikers at passport controls and to introduce even harsher anti-trade union legislation.

The same BBC poll shows that only 28% of the population think that the government is handling the economy well. This morning, the OECD has predicted that the UK economy will fall back into recession in 2012. The Guardian reports:

"In its half-yearly report, the OECD predicted that the UK economy will shrink in the current quarter, and again in the first three months of 2012. It cut its forecasts for UK growth during 2012 as a whole to just +0.5%, from +2% before."

For more information on the November 30 strike read: