Too easy to please?

In some circumstances it is good to find someone who is easy to please.

Whether trade union members should find this characteristic attractive in their own leaders is another matter…

UNISON welcomes the Government’s legislative programme.

Does it include the repeal of the anti-union laws? No

Does it include a programme of Council house building? No

Does it promise an end to the public sector pay freeze? No

Does it reverse the policies of privatisation? No

Should UNISON’s leadership welcome this programme?

Update on Thursday morning – having looked back over the decisions taken by UNISON’s National Executive Council in relation to NEC policy on motions before the forthcoming National Delegate Conference I am even more perplexed at our publicising such an unqualified welcome for a legislative programme which meets so few of our aspirations and ignores so many of our priorities.

I wonder if my NEC colleagues on the Policy Committee would approve of this unstinting praise for the Government, or whether they would agree with today’s Morning Star that “the role of trade unions at present must be to make the government listen to the labour movement rather than to act as cheerleaders for an administration that cannot conceal its contempt for them and their members”?