Regular readers of this blog
(Sid and Doris Conference-Anorak) may have anticipated a plethora of
self-indulgent posting in the week of my twenty-sixth (and last) annual
Conference. I would not want to disappoint regular readers.
Today I popped up twice,
once this morning to laud the history of Lambeth’s opposition to local
government spending cuts in support of the lengthy Composite C and then, more
controversially, in the afternoon to offer some very particular support to a
laudable motion (Motion 23) from West Sussex on Trade Union Facility Time.
The motion pointed out, with
the admirable restraint which one expects from West Sussex branch, that each of
the last three annual Local Government Conferences has called for action to
support branches losing facility time, but that precious little seems to have
resulted from these repeated calls.
Since the Senior
Vice-President did (briefly) turn my microphone off, believing that I was
inappropriately referring to staffing matters in my speech, I thought I should
share the outline of what I had to say here. (Just in case anyone was recording
my remarks, or tampering with a recording of those remarks, or considering
threatening litigation, or for any other reason…)
Speaking to the hundreds of
delegates, I noted that, having spent almost of all of the past twenty five
years on full time release to UNISON I know the value of facility time and that
activists (like the delegates present at Conference and the mover of the
motion) are the lifeblood of our trade union.
I made a point of
congratulating the mover, West Sussex Branch Secretary and my friend and
comrade Dan Sartin for his election to our NEC (though I appreciate he may not
really thank me for my having expressed the opinion that he will “sort them out”…)
I then said that I wanted to go on to comment on one of the challenges which
will face Dan and the new NEC.
At this point, I will quote
verbatim from what I said at Conference this afternoon;
“There is not at present in UNISON ‘a healthy
and vibrant culture of responsiveness to lay activist concerns’ as described in
this motion.
On the contrary, in the Region which I have had the
honour to represent on our NEC for fourteen years, the culture is such that the
conduct of a senior manager has recently been described as ‘not just confident
and swaggering in so openly breaking the rules, but chilling in its brazenness
and demonstration of unchecked power.’ It has also been said, online and in the
public domain that the Regional Management Team ‘were also directly involved in
breach of the rules and have sought to collude in the cover up’.”
Just as I was going on to
say that the culture of our Union is also such that, if you try to blow the
whistle on such disrespect for lay activists you won’t be thanked, the Senior
Vice-President turned the microphone off and chastised me for having made
reference to staffing matters when I should have known this to be
inappropriate.
(Having in any case
concluded all such remarks I had intended to make) I assured the Senior
Vice-President that I would not do so again and she turned my microphone back
on. This enabled me to make the point that it was not UNISON staff, but rather
the Presidential Team and Trustees of the Union who had circulated an email
throughout the Union trying to discredit a whistleblower (I was just too modest
to point out that I was that whistleblower, but since it’s just you and me here
I shall mention it now).
I then said that the motion
rightly drew attention the need for cultural change in our trade union – that we
need a culture of respect for lay activists. I went on to remark that, when the
Conference passed the motion (as indeed it did) there would be some at the
UNISON Centre who would want to shrug and do nothing.
Since the question had
previously arisen in the course of today’s Conference about who had previously
performed in the Conference Centre in which we were meeting, I informed delegates
that Bob Dylan had played there and (without giving the thanks I ought to have
given to Paul Holmes for his advice on lyrics) I finished with a message to
those UNISON officials;
“Come gather round officials wherever you roam,
Admit that the waters around you have grown,
Accept it that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone,
If your time to you is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a
stone,
For the times they are a-changin’”
I didn’t sing it.
But I don’t promise not to
before the week is out.
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