Review of UNISON Conference 2007

Yesterday's meeting of the UNISON NEC considered the arrangements for next year's Annual Conference.

The NEC agreed to recommend to the Standing Orders Committee (SOC) the following points for consideration in their review of Conference;
Organising the agenda around “themed” debates was welcome and should continue;
The facility to organise briefings in Conference time, as had been done on equal pay this year, should continue;
Conference should close at 4pm on Friday.

I objected to the last two recommendations as I believe they tend to reduce the amount of time taken up by policy discussion and decision making at the sovereign body of our trade union. I was therefore part of the minority who opposed these recommendations.

Branches can contact their Region to ensure their views are fed into the SOC review of Conference - the price of democracy is of course eternal vigilance...