Lisbon Treaty (No. 3)

Does my right hon. Friend accept that the German constitution forbids some 1.5 to 2 million civil servants and public sector employees from even going on strike? It is the Germans who insisted on many of the safeguards—the so-called lateral or horizontal safeguards—being put into the charter before the protocol question arose, to preserve their ban on strikes, which is far more draconian than anything in the UK.