I was moved to blog after reading Jeff's post about USDAW's generous donation in kind of campaign telephones for Glasgow North East. This is a very useful resource to be offered, so it's unfortunate that Labour will be the only party to benefit from it, despite the offer accidentally going out to all MSPs. Nosiness led me to check out USDAW's website, whereupon I got a bit annoyed.
Of the four news stories featured on their website, three mention Labour very favourably in their first paragraph. Ach, I thought, maybe that's to be expected. However, under Support our Campaigns, the second article reads "Winning with Labour... Join Labour today... It's FREE for USDAW members!". It's beyond me why this is ranked more important than USDAW's campaigns for respect for shop workers and support for the minimum wage. If I was being represented by USDAW, I'd be pretty disappointed.
I've only scratched the surface of their website so I apologise if I'm now speaking out of turn. I'm deeply unimpressed by their watery support for increasing the wages of 16 and 17 year olds and in particular the equalisation of the minimum wage. Their most recent article seems to be a survey, behind that, articles from a few years ago. This is a really important issue for me, and I'm surprised that this particular union falls short of the YSI and SNP's position.
I worked for a high street retailer for six years, from sixth year at school until the year after I left uni. This retailer didn't recognise trade unions, and there were several instances where their input would have been useful (shift changes for the Christmas sales, health and safety, conditions). I see from my work in the Council on the Personnel Appeals Committee the commitment and work of Trade Unions in representing their members, and would have appreciated that during my time in retail.
I don't see from USDAW's website however that they're actually achieving anything very much for their members by paying money and giving positive coverage to Labour; it seems unfair that the hard earned money of their members should be blindly funding Labour. If it's a considered democratic and strategic decision, I could give it some respect; more often than not, unions just seem to pay out over and over again with no guarantee of anything in return.
What frustrates me the most about Trade Unions is their seemingly undying commitment to the Labour Party. This isn't just about loyalty to a cause, it's about money too; from 1st July 2008 to 30th June 2009, Trade Unions donated £9,773,918.25 from their coffers to the Labour Party. Of that, USDAW gave £1,895,997.41. In that same period, the only other political party who registered donations from a trade union was No2EU:Yes to Democracy, who were backed by the RMT.
I can understand where the trade unions are coming from, and why the bonds with Labour might be hard to break. What I don't get is the tactical significance of continuing to spend the money of their members on a government which doesn't always take their side.
The CWU are considering legal action to prevent Royal Mail bringing in agency staff, and are getting very little time or support from the Goverment. Gordon Brown says "get back round the table", the CWU say it's "vindictive" Mandleson's fault. Funnily enough, the CWU gave the party of government a very generous £663,177.90 in the period mentioned above. What has this achieved? Clearly, in terms of influence over Government policy for the benefit of their members, this has been money down the drain. There are significant gaps between the CWU and the party they fund.
If you're not getting anything much for your money, why continue to fund the Labour Party? Perhaps this is something the world out there might like to explain to me.
Of the four news stories featured on their website, three mention Labour very favourably in their first paragraph. Ach, I thought, maybe that's to be expected. However, under Support our Campaigns, the second article reads "Winning with Labour... Join Labour today... It's FREE for USDAW members!". It's beyond me why this is ranked more important than USDAW's campaigns for respect for shop workers and support for the minimum wage. If I was being represented by USDAW, I'd be pretty disappointed.
I've only scratched the surface of their website so I apologise if I'm now speaking out of turn. I'm deeply unimpressed by their watery support for increasing the wages of 16 and 17 year olds and in particular the equalisation of the minimum wage. Their most recent article seems to be a survey, behind that, articles from a few years ago. This is a really important issue for me, and I'm surprised that this particular union falls short of the YSI and SNP's position.
I worked for a high street retailer for six years, from sixth year at school until the year after I left uni. This retailer didn't recognise trade unions, and there were several instances where their input would have been useful (shift changes for the Christmas sales, health and safety, conditions). I see from my work in the Council on the Personnel Appeals Committee the commitment and work of Trade Unions in representing their members, and would have appreciated that during my time in retail.
I don't see from USDAW's website however that they're actually achieving anything very much for their members by paying money and giving positive coverage to Labour; it seems unfair that the hard earned money of their members should be blindly funding Labour. If it's a considered democratic and strategic decision, I could give it some respect; more often than not, unions just seem to pay out over and over again with no guarantee of anything in return.
What frustrates me the most about Trade Unions is their seemingly undying commitment to the Labour Party. This isn't just about loyalty to a cause, it's about money too; from 1st July 2008 to 30th June 2009, Trade Unions donated £9,773,918.25 from their coffers to the Labour Party. Of that, USDAW gave £1,895,997.41. In that same period, the only other political party who registered donations from a trade union was No2EU:Yes to Democracy, who were backed by the RMT.
I can understand where the trade unions are coming from, and why the bonds with Labour might be hard to break. What I don't get is the tactical significance of continuing to spend the money of their members on a government which doesn't always take their side.
The CWU are considering legal action to prevent Royal Mail bringing in agency staff, and are getting very little time or support from the Goverment. Gordon Brown says "get back round the table", the CWU say it's "vindictive" Mandleson's fault. Funnily enough, the CWU gave the party of government a very generous £663,177.90 in the period mentioned above. What has this achieved? Clearly, in terms of influence over Government policy for the benefit of their members, this has been money down the drain. There are significant gaps between the CWU and the party they fund.
If you're not getting anything much for your money, why continue to fund the Labour Party? Perhaps this is something the world out there might like to explain to me.
10 comments:
I understand the CWU are thinking of cancelling their donations to the Labour Party.
As you say, there is a clear historical link between the trade union movement and the Labour Party. You have to say that anything worthwhile for the working people of this country, from the NHS to the Minimum Wage, was introduced by the Labour Party.
Clearly, the Labour Party is not what it was in some respects but I think it still represents the 'best bet' for workers and that's why it still retains a lot of trade union support. The Tories and Lib Dems aren't going to do anything for you, let's be honest.
My own union, Unite, supports, well, a United Kingdom so it would be very difficult for the SNP to secure any donations from them. I get the impression that all trade unions, even those that don't donate to Labour, believe independence would be bad for their members. I'm certainly not aware of any that support it.
It would seem to me most Union officials are against independence as it wouldn't let them get their jobs as Labour MP's or useless officials in London.
I am confident if they represented their members views they would be in favour.
It is not simply the case that there is a link or a bond between Labour and the Trade Unions, Labour is the party of the Unions.
Labour was created as the political wing of the industrial movement to improve the living standards of working people.
Some Unions feel that Labour don't represent their interests but many understand that simply organising in the workplace isn't enough; you need the political movement to really deliver changes for your members.
It was Unions that pushed for the introduction of the minimum wage and the continued increase of it and who have played such a large part in working to eradicate child poverty in a generation.
The Labour Party isn't just a mechanism for Government it's a movement with rich traditions within the trade union and co-operative movement designed to create a more egalitarian society.
I would of course argue that Union members have got a great deal out of affiliation with Labour but no member has to pay the political levy and you will be represented in a Union regardless of your personal political beliefs; that's how collectivism works.
Labour is the party of the Unions.
- Ho-hum.
Like New Labour's neoliberal attacks on public services and public service unions perhaps?
How is Mandelson's attempts to destroy the Royal Mail coming along, as we speak?
The Labour Party isn't just a mechanism for Government it's a movement with rich traditions within the trade union and co-operative movement designed to create a more egalitarian society.
- Spreading the wealth of the public more evenly amongst the rich you mean.
How much has the gap increased, between rich and poor, under 3 Labour neoliberal governments for instance?
Is this why New Labour loves PPP-PFI, for instance, with its secretive private contract culture which isn't open to democratic public scrutiny or accountability?
Labour is the party of the Unions.
- But not the party of 'socialism' seemingly as you fail to mention it even once in your New Labour-speak blather.
Like the forthcoming destruction of Royal Mail, it's all part of New Labour 'modernisation' where even the word 'New' is modernised out of existence from Labour's old name for itself 'New Labour'. A title invented by international war criminal, Tony Blair.
I would of course argue that Union members have got a great deal out of affiliation with Labour but no member has to pay the political levy and you will be represented in a Union regardless of your personal political beliefs; that's how collectivism works.
- Union members can either subsidise New Labour directly or indirectly, isn't much of a choice.
Why doesn't New Labour modernise this obvious undemocratic state of affairs?
What's wrong with New Labour going private or even privatising itself?
Yousuf's post is clear evidence that all labour has left is an appeal based on emotion and sentiment.
Yousuf is correct; the Labour Party is the political atom of the Trade Union movement in combination with the supporting electrons of Cooperatives and various self identifying intellectual socialist societies.
If in some bizarre parallel universe, they really so wished, the TULO unions could de-invent the Labour Party. But in reality that would be a Very Stupid Thing To Do and would hurt the people they campaign to protect. Trade unionists and the people they protect and support would really suffer from a Tory Government - and in that is the real alternative power which is considered in making these affiliation judgements, not the vague, jam tomorrow SNP question or other dubious fringe pressure groups.
From a trade union point of view, there would be no advantage to disenfranchising and destroying the Labour movement's own party - its basic political bulwark against Tory and Liberal governments. But I'm not surprised that that macro issue isn’t on the parish pump focussed radar of Nationalism. People know that nationalists care about borders and flags and prestige and the past, and not truly about real things, like wages and prices and who owns what capital and why they do – people do know that these real political issues are correctly the domain and interest of the trade unions and socialists, and that the weapons to solve these injustices can only be found in their intellectual armoury.
It is no coincidence that those on the right wing of the Labour Party have sought to bring rich donors in to undermine the working class trade unionist stake in the party. But as we see that has been widely acknowledged as a failure - the party is actually deeply in debt as a result - and the only reason there is funding for a Labour Party at all is because it is the party, literally, of the Trade Unions.
It is hardly surprising that Trade Unions support their own Labour Party. The real outrage is that wealthy people have been undemocratically buying slices of it for the past 10 years.
"People know that nationalists care about borders and flags and prestige and the past, and not truly about real things"
Come on, that's utter nonsense. It's clear you don't understand our movement or the background of people within it. I believe independence for Scotland would better serve our people, and I work for that goal.
If Trade Unions were truly lobbying organisations seeking the best deal for their members, they would not belong to one single party. Existing as a "political bulwark against Tory and Liberal governments" is a narrow political cause, not the cause of the working population.
"It's clear you don't understand our movement or the background of people within it."
I understand enough its theory that good magic occurs when we cease to be part of the UK and that this should dominate the minds of those who sell their labour and struggle with the cost of living. I'm afraid that this faith is a simple diversion from reality and the facts the trade unions have to challenge remain constant.
The question you were actually asking was not a narcissistic one about your faith in your ideology, but a sensible one; *why do the TULO trade unions make the analysis and the conclusion that they do?*. The trade unions take a sensible strategical political analysis for the strategic reasons of protecting the people the represent and support.
They are working class people who do have and will have an extremely bad experience under a Tory government. Why, other than out of malice, would anyone intelligent conspire to ignore that fact?
It would genuinely harm those people in very tangible ways to break their only united political defence against that - their trade union's own democratic political party. I have experienced the pain of the alternative once too often. As I was hinting in my previous note: For the Trade Unions, it is too big a fight with the forces of injustice, there are too many lives at stake, to lose it to a diversion into something titillating and curious but ultimately irrelevant to the real needs of people.
"If Trade Unions were truly lobbying organisations seeking the best deal for their members, they would not belong to one single party."
The case I made, was that they are not merely Lobbying organisations, they are part of a political movement ( the Labour movement) set up specifically to use the only truly democratic mandate that exists in any party, that of trade union support, to represent the interests in parliament of those who sell their labour.
"Existing as a "political bulwark against Tory and Liberal governments" is a narrow political cause, not the cause of the working population."
On the contrary, that is not a narrow cause it is actually a broad and useful one! "Who precisely do the Liberal/Tory default represent?", you should ask.
Intelligent people should see that securing things isn't done by platitudes, it is done about by changing the facts.
Intelligent people should see that securing things isn't done by platitudes, it is done about by changing the facts.
- Like the fact New Labour aren't socialist and the fact James Burns is unable, like his fellow New Labour apparatchik, to even mention the word.
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