Collective Bargaining in the Workplace Britain has one of the most developed systems of collective bargaining in the world, especially amongst manual workers. Its sophistication is one of the main reasons why British workers traditionally pressed less for the statutory provision of basic rights in the work place than their Continental colleagues. Most trade unionists prefer to put a grievance ‘through procedure' rather than go to an industrial tribunal. Dubin has described collective bargaining as ‘the great social invention that has institutionalised industrial conflict' and by the Donovan Commission