industrial action

American

noun

Chiefly British.

job action.

industrial action British

noun

any action, such as a strike or go-slow, taken by employees in industry to protest against working conditions, redundancies, etc

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

The breaking of parity for some jobs in recent years had led to strikes and other industrial action.

From BBC • Apr. 21, 2026

The industrial action caused severe disruption across the capital's transport network, with many Londoners getting around by e-bike instead.

From BBC • Apr. 20, 2026

This follows lessons learned from deployments on days with industrial action.

From BBC • Apr. 13, 2026

"The financial costs of industrial action in the NHS are fairly opaque," said Sally Gainsbury of the Nuffield Trust.

From BBC • Apr. 13, 2026

The existence of such a system of taxation, with the machinery for collecting money in this way, allows the government more freedom of industrial action than any private individual can command.

From Practical Argumentation by Pattee, George K.

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023