Now -read the book!

Here is a link to my memoirs which, if you are a glutton for punishment, you can purchase online at https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/an-obscure-footnote-in-trade-union-history.
Men fight and lose the battle, and the thing that they fought for comes about in spite of their defeat, and when it comes turns out not to be what they meant, and other men have to fight for what they meant under another name. (William Morris - A Dream of John Ball)

Wednesday, June 15, 2022

UNISON moving forward after a difficult and damaging afternoon


After a
positive start to UNISON National Delegate Conference yesterday morning, I'm not sorry that my health precluded my hanging around to watching person the bear garden that was Tuesday afternoon.

I have, however, had the benefit of detailed reports of the contributions made in debate on the ill informed motions 10 and 11, which attacked our left-wing NEC. The movers were fortunate that their motions had made it past the standing orders committee (SOC), though perhaps they were entitled to expect such good fortune from an SOC which is now more openly partisan against the left than at any time in my membership of UNISON.


Whereas the directly elected NEC has shifted to the left, reflecting the anger and disillusionment of our most active members at the failure of our trade union effectively to resist austerity, the indirectly elected SOC has not experienced any such change. Motions of questionable propriety attacking the NEC have therefore found an easy passage onto the conference agenda, whilst an entirely reasonable proposal from the NEC to invite the conference to consider the need for a review of their arrangements for legal representation was ruled out of order by SOC, on the bizarre grounds that the NEC should carry out this review itself without asking Conference.


Therefore according to our SOC Rule K precludes Conference instructing or even debating how the NEC should use its power in relation to legal assistance, but a motion which attacks the NEC for trying to exercise its power to seek legal advice independently of the UNISON machine is absolutely in order. 


UNISON’s NEC obviously cannot criticise our SOC, but a retired member with a Blog can observe that SOC are absolutely failing in their duty under Rule P.2.3 and are allowing themselves, quite transparently, to be a tool of reactionary elements in the UNISON machine who are fighting a ferocious rearguard action to try to reverse the results of last year's NEC elections.


With the slight advantage over our elected NEC of having 1000 paid staff at their disposal, those who are offended that our members have elected a leadership that does not want to get in their way when they want to fight clearly did a good job of organising in the run-up to conference.


First they told and repeated the lie that decisions taken by NEC in October of last year somehow breached or amended our rules. A lie can, of course, get halfway round the world before the truth has got its boots on, and, in this case, the lie had carried the day very swiftly in many branches and a number of Regional Councils. 


Obviously this was always nonsense. If the General Secretary had for one moment thought that the NEC had taken an action which was genuinely ultra vires she would've acted in ways which she obviously did not. That was never the point. This issue was seized upon by supporters of UNISON's Ancien Regime as a stick with which to beat a new, and relatively inexperienced, NEC at its first annual Conference.


The bludgeons to be used were speeches written, in large part, by paid officials and handed out to delegates, some of whom genuinely believed they were righting a wrong but many of whom knew full well the dishonesty of their actions. Vicious redbaiting reminiscent of the worst of past UNISON witchhunts was accompanied by a toxic undercurrent of personal attacks on the President in particular.


In order to understand the particular venom directed at Paul Holmes from the right wing within UNISON it is necessary to understand a little history. Only the most naive would believe for a moment that these attacks are motivated by any genuine concern for alleged “victims" in Kirklees, whose testimony has been sought out and organised by a hostile employer.


In the old days in UNISON a troublesome left-wing activist could expect to find themselves caught in a pincer movement between UNISON disciplinary action and an attack from their employer. The case of Yunus Bakhsh springs to mind for example.  The former leadership of our trade union thought nothing of the appearance of collusion with a hostile employer as long as the individual being dismissed, and eliminated from UNISON, was one of their left-wing critics.


The fact that the new NEC used a power which has been held by every UNISON NEC since the 1st of July 1993 to allow Paul Holmes to retain his UNISON positions, to which he had been elected by UNISON members, in spite of his unfair dismissal by Kirklees Council, has outraged the old right wing in UNISON. They presumably see it as "cheating" thereby to frustrate their time honoured tactic of getting their opponents sacked by the bosses in order to get them out of their way in UNISON.


This alone is quite enough to explain the ratcheting up of the campaign of character assassination and personal vilification against Paul which has been a feature of UNISON for at least the past decade.


Speakers against Motions 10 and 11 generally adopted a reasoned and restrained approach, relying upon persuasion and expressed in a comradely fashion. This simply could not compete with the venom of a prearranged assault upon the NEC organised by those for whom it is more important that they should win an internal battle at the cost of great damage to UNISON than that UNISON should be able to focus its energy and attention on the issues of concern to our members.


As well as preparing to field candidates in every single constituency in the next NEC elections, comrades on the left will also need to pay attention to organising ahead of Regional Councils and forthcoming Conferences in order to avoid such ambushes in future. The right wing and elements within the the machine are at war with us, and we must respond in an organised, effective and robust fashion.


UNISON members who wonder what it means that National Delegate Conference has passed Motions 10 and 11 should know that there is an established process for the NEC to consider and act upon decisions of National Delegate Conference. Having served seven terms on the NEC I am very familiar with this process.


A report should be presented to the next full NEC meeting after Conference listing all Conference decisions and making preliminary recommendations as to which NEC Committee each decision should be referred to.


The relevant committees should then consider the decisions at their next meeting and make recommendations for action back to the NEC.


This has been the approach for many years. Indeed it was explained to me five years before I was ever elected to the NEC by our illustrious former president, Rita Donaghy, after Conference instructed the NEC immediately to cancel the contract signed with Capita for the pilot project of what became UNISON Direct in 1998.


No doubt the NEC will adopt this approach to the decisions taken by conference in passing motions 10 and 11, alongside all the other decisions which conference will hopefully take during the week relating to the cost of living crisis and the other major issues confronting our members in their workplaces and communities.


Leading members of our NEC cannot and will not climb into the gutter from which they are being attacked. However, supporters of the left-wing within the rank and file of UNISON, or even a retired member with a Blog, need not be so fastidious. 


Right-wing members of the NEC who supported attempted disruption of our Conference yesterday morning, and those who led the charge against the NEC yesterday afternoon although they knew it was based on lies, should remember that people who live in glasshouses ought not to throw stones.

9 comments:

Lost Tango said...

What do motions 10 & 11 actually say?

Anonymous said...

A good summary

Anonymous said...

Like the pieces you’ve published but if Socialist Appeal is right we’re in a very weak place!

See https://www.socialist.net/unison-conference-right-wing-smells-blood-as-left-runs-for-the-hills.htm

Brian Smith said...

Tuesday afternoon and Thursday afternoon were the most depressing moments in the history of UNISON since 1993. I compute that two-thirds of delegates are swallowing the crap - just as two-thirds of delegates to my regional council swallowed it in December.

Anonymous said...

I especially like the likening to the former NEC as the Ancien Regime.

Jon Rogers said...

Socialist Appeal are wrong

Angela Hamilton said...

Paid officers didn't write any speeches for motion 10 or organise in support of it. I know this for a fact because I wrote most of the speech and did most of the organising. So if you want to criticise anyone it should be me not paid officers. I also wrote the original emergency motion for National Disabled Members Conference that became motion 10. That Conference supported it almost unanimously with only 6 delegates voting against it. That Conference also voted for it to go to NDC so it didn't come from just the Disabled Members Committee as you stated in another blog. And it's timing on the agenda at NDC was because it received more points in the prioritisation process than any motion in the history of UNISON. This was democracy in action, ordinary Members taking back control and not some right wing plot. You on the other hand should be ashamed of yourself for supporting at least two men who have bullied and harassed women in our union. Feel free to attend the next Disabled Members Conference if you believe we aren't capable of making our own decisions. I'm sure your opinions will go down like a lead balloon.

Jon Rogers said...

Angela, you are clearly determined to take UNISON backwards - https://jonrogers1963.blogspot.com/2022/07/who-are-opponents-of-real-change-in.html

Anonymous said...

I don't want to take UNISON backwards. I want a united and unified union where members of the NEC work together for the benefit of all members rather than trying to score political points over each other.

You may or may not know this but following the NEC elections in 2019 when I stood alone and not.on any slate or ticket I voted for Sian Stockholm to be President with Andrea Egan as Vice-President in an attempt to encourage the two sides of the NEC to work together for the greater good. Unfortunately this wasn't to be.

The previous NEC didn't always behave well. The way committees were allocated, the way Chairs were elected and decisions on who would represent UNISON at various different events and activities was often unfair and those on the so-called left often lost out.

When TFRC took over they should, in my opinion, have understood the consequences of past behaviours and behaved in a different and better way.

They didn't do that. Instead they decided to behave in the exact same way as the previous majority that they had complained about so vociferously. They took all the positions and treated members who didn't support them with contempt.

For one NEC meeting we didn't receive any paperwork until 1pm the day before the meeting because the Presidential Team hadn't signed them off. The second mailing didn't arrive until 7.30pm the evening before the meeting with the final papers arriving less than an hour before the meeting was due to start. As a member of 14 years standing on the NEC did you ever receive over 300 pages of paperwork less than 24hrs before a meeting? Do you think this is in anyway acceptable? When I raised concerns about access these were brushed aside as irrelevant.

The previous majority may not have always been fair but this lot are just as bad if not worse.

Two wrongs never make a right or to quote my late friend, the fabulous Sue Forster who advised me from the day I was elected onto the NEC despite having unceremoniously removed herself, "It doesn't matter which side they're on, they're all a pack of bastards."

Now you might not like that language but you knew Sue and she always told it like it is and when she asked me before her death to pass that message on I made sure I did. And strangely enough the only ones offended or upset are those who are in charge now. Perhaps the message hit home or perhaps they just can't see that behaving in the same way as those they ousted really isn't going to help them win friends or influence members.