Mums were left angry at having to find childcare for their youngsters who have been given an extra day off school, commuters were stuck behind go-slow taxi drivers in the middle of Preston city centre and letters were left languishing in postal boxes as Royal Mail workers manned the picket lines.

Thousands of disgruntled workers say they have been left with no option but to walk out en masse in rows over pay, pensions and bitter contract wrangles.

But beyond the picket lines and empty classrooms, another war appears to be breaking out.

Public opinion raged on lep.co.uk – most of it negative - when taxi drivers in Preston refused to pick up fares and carried out go-slows in protest over a lack of rank spaces at the railway station.

Only last month, parents were up in arms over a national teachers strike which shut schools and left them frantically trying to arrange childcare.

This fact was the focus of much of the national media, with the very reason for the strike pushed into the shadows as a mere sideshow from the disruption.

So are we becoming a nation – so used to the convenience of 24-hour shops, high-speed Internet shopping and up-to-the minute news bulletins – that only cares about how strikes may affect us?

Les Parker is the Lancashire representative for UNITE which represents public service workers.

He pulls no punches and says the growing anti-reaction from the public is an "illness" which must be cured.

"There has been a sea of change in our society," he says. "People have lost concern for their fellow human being.

"They want to know how it will affect them rather than why, where and what someone else is fighting for.

"If they are upset by it they are therefore against it – and if it doesn't affect them, they are not interested."

For more on this story, see Wednesday's Lancashire Evening Post.