It was a finger-wagging moment worthy of Margaret Thatcher. The target of this particular Prime Minister’s ire was not moaning minnies, or the enemy within, but “wreckers”, the people who Tony Blair claims stand in the way of reform of our public services. Internal links
Leading article: Mr Blair should stop posturing and do his job The wreckersJohn Edmonds, general secretary of the GMB Says Government “privatising” NHS: opposes private finance initiative for hospitals and public-private partnership for the Tube. Threatened to withdraw union support for Labour council candidatesBob Crow, assistant general secretary, RMT Leading guards’ strikes to get SouthWest Trains and other rail companies to match pay rises for drivers.

Openly hostile to New Labour, backed Socialist Alliance at general electionMark Serwotka, general secretary, public and civil service union PCS Left-winger hostile to New Labour, backed Socialist Alliance. Called strike of staff at Jobcentres in protest at lack of screens against violent claimantsDave Prentis, general secretary, Unison Leader of 1.3 million members, one of the Labour Party’s big paymasters. Forced ministers at autumn Labour conference to concede same conditions for NHS staff taken over by private operatorsAndy Darken, chairman, Prison Officers’ Association Elected as militant candidate to fight for more pay and resist privatisation of Prison Service regime. Singled out by Home Secretary for opposing reforms It was a finger-wagging moment worthy of Margaret Thatcher.

“Just as we must take on and defeat the ‘big C’ Conservatives who want to undermine public services,” he said, “so we must defeat in argument the ’small c’ conservatives who believe the old ways will do and who resist reform.”So perhaps he meant the Conservative opposition? Or Iain Duncan Smith, who has made headway against the Government in his attacks on the health service? But could it be striking railworkers? Postal workers threatening industrial action? Mr Blair went claimed he meant the Tories, but privately he is relaxed about union leaders believing their organisations were seen as the real culprits And those unions reckon they were the ones being fingered. The scene was set for a confrontation between the unions – the org- anisations on which Labour relies for financial and political support – and No 10.By Monday, the Prime Minister appeared to be in retreat, leaving ministers and advisers to clear up the mess. Lady Morgan, No 10’s director of government relations, had to contact the TUC general secretary John Monks, a moderniser, to “clear the air”.Bill Morris, leader of the transport and general, fumed: “There are plenty of wreckers but they’re not in the union movement.” No wonder the unions were confused and hurt by Mr Blair. Only a fortnight before, he had told a conference in Newcastle that public-sector workers “deserve our praise and respect” – remarks that prompted Peter Mandelson, a member of the GMB, to warn in an article for this newspaper that the left could twist his words to signal a slowdown in the drive for reform of the public services.Union leaders suspected the attack was devised by Mr Blair’s press secretary, Alastair Campbell, to show the Government is on the long-suffering public’s side.

The speech came, after all, on the eve of major unrest affecting all manner of service from railways to social-security offices and the post office. Then there is growing concern about the NHS and staff resistance to reform, as well as possible action by London teachers and gas workers.The first sign of Labour/union confrontation came with Stephen Byers, the Transport Secretary; he was first publicly to use the “wreckers versus reformers” phrase in a speech two days before Mr Blair’s. When it was uttered by the Prime Minister it looked as if the attack had been co-ordinated. In fact, the phrase had been lifted from a No 10 policy document setting out a defence of the public-private strategy on public services, which had been circulating around the Cabinet for two weeks. The term “wreckers” was aimed at the Tories.A Cabinet source said: “I wish we could be as co-ordinated as that, but it was cock-up in so far as John Monks thought we were attacking him.” Another Cabinet minister said: “Blair would hardly want Byers to get the whole of the union leadership on the warpath before he spoke.”However, while party briefers insisted that Mr Blair was referring to the Tories, he explicitly directed his attack at the “conservatives with a small c”. Few doubt that he meant to include union leaders who have claimed that the Blairites in Downing Street, Mr Byers and Alan Milburn at Health, are intent on “privatising” the Tube and the NHS.So how has the cosy relationship between Labour and the unions come to this? Some observers are in no doubt that this is a battle of great importance and the stakes could not be higher. As Mr Mandelson puts it, one of the central principles of the New Labour project – that the party’s duty is to the consumers of public services, not the providers – is being jeopardised by unions resisting change.