UNISON General Secretary election 2020

Today I received my first bulk email as a Retired member of UNISON, and that reminded me that later this year UNISON members (including us Retired members) will get to vote in an election for General Secretary. It’s not as big a deal as a Labour leadership election, but it matters to those of us who care about UNISON and, as befits a retired activist, this has led me to reminisce.

We didn’t actually elect our first UNISON General Secretary, the last General Secretary of NALGO, Alan Jinkinson, whose name I still have on a t-shirt from the last NALGO Conference, at which I unsuccessfully moved a motion of censure of the General Secretary because he had repudiated Lambeth branch for taking unofficial strike action in solidarity with the Miners.

Jinkinson served as General Secretary from vesting day (when NALGO, NUPE and COHSE merged to form UNISON on 1 July 1993) until 31 December 1995. In UNISON’s first General Secretary election in 1995, former NUPE General Secretary, the late Rodney Bickerstaffe was elected, defeating Roger Bannister and Yunus Bakhsh from the left and right-winger Peter Hunter.

Rodney’s term of office was due to expire on 31 December 2000, but he announced in the summer of 1999 that he would not seek re-election, giving time for the Union to look for a replacement. Deputy General Secretary, Dave Prentis emerged as the candidate supported by the leadership and obvious frontrunner.

Once the then London Regional Convenor, Geoff Martin, had indicated that he would not be a candidate, the “organised” left united behind Roger Bannister, who came second to Prentis, ahead of Malkiat Bilku, leader of the 1996/7 Hillingdon hospital strike. Prentis got a majority of the votes cast and took office for the next five years.

Your humble blogger has particular cause to remember the next election, nominations for which opened in 2004, with voting in the spring of 2005 ahead of the end of that term of office on 31 December 2005, because I was the candidate who came third, with 7.5% of the vote, behind hardy perennial challenger Roger Bannister, and the successful incumbent, Dave Prentis, who had his best ever result, winning with three in four of the votes cast.

Five years later, in 2010, the UNISON National Executive Council (NEC) were called to an unprecedented additional meeting in January to agree a timetable for a further General Secretary election, although – as supporters of Mr Prentis were then eager to point out – the incumbent General Secretary could have remained in office at that time without a further election, as he was then within five years of his retirement age.

Dave Prentis won once again, and again defeated Roger Bannister and also Paul Holmes (who managed, in spite of my support, to improve somewhat on my showing five years previously). Having won once more, the General Secretary led on the creation of five posts of Assistant General Secretary, which was widely seen as an attempt to create a field of potential successors.

In the following year the concept of a retirement age was itself retired and so, in the run up to UNISON Conference 2015, the Union therefore anticipated a further election without knowing whether the incumbent would seek re-election. As an NEC member I made something of a nuisance of myself chasing up when the General Secretary election would take place. Eventually it did.

Dave Prentis did seek re-election in 2015 and was successful, in spite of opposition from Heather Wakefield (who came second), Roger Bannister and John Burgess. More information about this election is in the public domain than previous elections because of the decision of the Assistant Certification Officer arising from the gross misconduct of the former London Regional Secretary.

UNISON needs to reconsider the recommendations of the Assistant Certification Officer ahead of the forthcoming General Secretary election, which could be quite a different election if it doesn’t include an incumbent candidate (though I don’t necessarily make that assumption).

The largest trade union in the country could be vital to the resistance to Johnson’s Government but recent experience doesn’t really give much cause for optimism that it will. The General Secretary election might be an opportunity for UNISON members to make a meaningful choice.