November 30 was pretty much an unqualified success. But the looming question as soon as the clock struck midnight on that day was – so, what comes next? A bit of blue sky thinking helps lay out the likely scenarios.

A)   The Government caves in and withdraws its pension reform proposals in toto

Not likely, given the economic and political costs of doing so, especially because such a massive volte face brings the Coalition’s continuation into doubt. Thus, move to Scenario B.

B)    The Government offers some significant but selective concessions

If the government is wise to its ineptitude of uniting some 30 unions and 2m strikers together in one alliance, it will seek to now ‘divide and rule’ by offering concessions to some unions rather than to all or others. This would be to recall the ‘Ridley plan’ of the 1980s by which Thatcher successfully operated. The most likely scenario is to offer some of the more moderate teaching unions something they can accept in order to isolate the NUT. Similarly, but on a broader scale, the government offers concessions in the Local Government Pension Scheme (which is funded through investments and not the government directly) to split Unison away from the PCS. This would also cause ructions with Unison, Unite and the GMB given their memberships in local government as well as in the health service.

Here the question becomes: can the unions – or enough of the major unions – agree on a common position in order to maintain unity, strength and dignity?

C)    The Government offers no further concessions

It doesn’t seem the government is minded to make any further and significant concessions to those that it already has. So, the ball is back in the unions’ court as the government plays hard ball and in effect issues a challenge to the unions – ‘If you think you’re hard enough, come on and have a go!’ If the unions do want to force further concessions, what are the options?

i)      Smart strikes – selective and rolling strikes through to D-day of 1 April 2012 when the reforms to pensions go live. Continuation of hostilities and disruption but at a lower level of intensity.  It has the advantage of less of a sacrifice by members (unless unions are prepared to pay strike pay), but disadvantage of less of an impact and political storm so that the government can weather this easily enough. Catch-22 situation? Probably the key factor in the susceptibility to smart striking is government weakness, i.e., a weak challenge is enough to overcome a weak government.

ii)    Mass strikes – more of the same as N30 in a series of similar-sized strikes each month until April 2012 (i.e., one per month). Tension of will it be enough to hole the government below the waterline versus have members got the stomach for more of the same? This will really test not just the unions which are equally professional associations as they are unions but also the behemoths of Unison, Unite and GMB which have weak memberships spots in a number of areas.

iii)    Up the ante – not just more N30s but a lot more and in quick succession like the 1989 NALGO strike of one day one week, two days the next, three days the following and so on until surrender. Victory comes but at a relatively heavy cost. Is both the leadership and grassroots determination and confidence there to see this through?

In all of this, what we do not know is ‘What are the bottom lines of all the unions?’ Are there some that will settle for a slightly less onerous ‘pay more, work longer, get less’ deal? Are there some that flatly say the equivalent off ‘not a penny off the pay, not an hour on the day’? Where will the Labour Party stand in all this? Logically, it will have difficulty continuing its line of neither condemn nor support.

The coming weeks will test all this, especially as N30 was the relatively easy task to achieve and when the ballot turnouts and proportion of members voting for action varied quite significantly. This puts an even greater importance on the TUC and its Public Service Liaison Group being able to hold affiliates (and influence non-affiliates) to the line of something which is ambitious enough to satisfy the majority of members bit is also realisable if there is insufficient willpower for upping the ante.

Whatever this is, it must be a vindication of the action of millions on N30 and not a betrayal of it.

Testing times indeed, especially as this dispute has the possibility of being a fork in the road for unions in Britain overall.

Gregor Gall is Research Professor of Industrial Relations at the University of Hertfordshire