When I arrived at County Hall, I was welcomed by the sight of a large crowd of men in reflective jackets, who were Hertfordshire County Councils hired muscle for the day. Once everyone had arrived, we started to put up the promotional material and the pickets took their places on the strike lines,  By 6am, HCC employees started arriving for work,  I was the lead steward for the entrance to the Council Chamber were the County Councillors were holding a meeting that day.  All the County Councillors crossed the picket line, some of them did accept the literture we were handing out but most of them drove through as if we didn't exist!

One of the biggest problems of the day was the heavy police presence.  I was told by one PC that we could not block a t-junction, I soon told him that we had every right to stand on the public highway.  Word soon came to us of other issues with the Police on other picket lines.  This confirmed that Hertfordshire County Council and the Police wanted to play hard ball.  We acted within the law and made sure that employees and members of the public were spoken to and understood why we had to go on strike as a last resort.

At 10.15am, we left the picket lines and stood with our friends the FBU, they where at County Hall too, to protest about devasting cuts and closures of Fire Stations that will affect the Fire Service.  This issue was being discusseed by the County Councillors in the Council Chamber.

After a crowd pleasing speech from the leader of the FBU, our Regional Officer Nalin Cooke spoke to all our members, confirming UNISON's and the other unions position on the pension issue, that we will not accept the proposals on the table and there may well be a need for further action.

Once the Council meeting started, we put into place operation "Noise".  All UNISON members were given a whistle to blow and the Assistant Branch Secretary and myself had mega phones, we unleashed 10 minutes of the most deafening noise to disrupt the Council Meeting and to prove that even though they were behind closed doors, we could still be heard and get our message across.

The day went really well and we made sure that the elected County Councillors now need to take our message to their colleagues in Westminster, that we will not except their proposals.

Mark Deacon