Unions and the Convention

Christina Zaba, 27 February 2009

The nice people at the TUC website have
posted notices about the Convention and it’s on the NUJ website too.
Time to think about trade unions.

Not long ago the media was saying very little about this key
democratic movement, though there are 6.5M trade union members in
Britain and many millions more worldwide.

Cometh the hour. With recession, unions have come back into the news.

The brothers and sisters on the Unite picket lines outshone
Westminster with the integrity and democracy of their politics. British
Jobs for British Workers, opined the PM, but British workers weren’t
fooled. They called for justice for all workers, and fair labour
practices.

Tomorrow it’s the turn of CWU, aiming to save the Post Office for
public ownership with rallies across the country. And don’t forget
embattled NUJ journalists struggling for jobs, decent wages and a free
and independent media. www.nuj.org.uk

The TUC is well up to the challenge of taking on the rise of the
database state, surveillance and authoritarianism. At Congress 2008
they voted to oppose the National Identity Scheme - enshrined in an Act
which also threatens up to 10 years in prison for any worker on the
Scheme who goes on strike.

We are not going to stand for this. Come to the ‘Freedom and Working People’ sessions in London or Bristol to find out more.

This article is published by Christina Zaba, and openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence. You may republish it without needing further permission, with attribution for non-commercial purposes following these guidelines. These rules apply to one-off or infrequent use. For all re-print, syndication and educational use please see read our republishing guidelines or contact us. Some articles on this site are published under different terms. No images on the site or in articles may be re-used without permission unless specifically licensed under Creative Commons.

Comments

Wyrdtimes

27 February 2009 - 10:40pm

Yes we're going to hear much more about the Trade Unions. 6.5 million members and falling rapidly. Sooner or later attention is going to turn to the ineffectual fat-cats at the top of the Union structure.

As I understand it the unions didn't have much to do about the recent protests - and from what I hear the trade unionists at the peugeot redundancies handled it so badly they were nearly lynched.

The postal union seems to be virtually luddite in it's view of technology - refusing to allow sorting to be mechanised. There can't be many other industrialised nations where letters are still sorted by hand.

Hello 21st century calling!

The TUC is indeed well placed to stop the "database state, surveillance and authoritarianism" - might I suggest stop funding Labour?