Yingluck and labour: business as usual

Abstract

Yingluck Shinawatra and her Phua Thai Party are dead unlucky. Following their decisive election victory in early July 2011, the new administration barely had time to settle into their parliamentary and cabinet seats before being confronted with the task of dealing with a flood of truly biblical proportions. The monumental scale of the disaster, and the logistics involved in attempting to develop a coordinated and effective national response, would have tested the mettle of even the best-prepared and most experienced government. As the death toll rose, and the projected cost of the floods was expected to run into the tens of billions of dollars, it was unclear what impact the floods would have on forcing alterations to the Phua Thai policy agenda, which Yingluck presented to parliament in early last August. However, even before the floods hit there were indications that, at least as far as organised labour was concerned, the government had begun to backtrack on some its pre-election promises and formal policy commitments.