Defending workers rights and civil liberties

This rather depressing story about an over zealous approach to preventing people with criminal records even training for work in public service jumped out at me because I have been working with an even more diligent colleague at branch level to try to get our employer to reconsider a similarly mechanical approach to requesting Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) checks.

UNISON’s guidance on this is as helpful as it was when it was produced four years ago. To quote from the guidance “it is estimated that at least 20% of the working population has a criminal record. Many of them have difficulty finding work if their past convictions become known, even if their past record has no bearing on the job they are applying for.”

I imagine many public sector employers think that it is best to “err on the side of caution” by requesting more and more detailed CRB checks than they really need – but this approach discourages job applicants with criminal records from even applying for roles for which they may be perfectly well suited (and undermines the objective of promoting the rehabilitation of ex-offenders).

We are thereby in danger of excluding from employment in public services millions of individuals who may once have done something wrong. Since most of the Parliamentary Labour Party voted for the Iraq war (a more serious crime than those committed by most of the fifth of working people who have a criminal record) perhaps we should apply the same principles in the Palace of Westminster?

Meanwhile in the private sector the controversial National Dismissal Register may deny employment to staff who are merely suspected of wrongdoing and then placed on a register by their former employer.

The Government are refusing to get involved and denying responsibility yet the website of the outfit behind the register has the Home Office logo on it! The press release launching this dubious initiative is online and includes contact information for those promoting this sinister scheme.

At the risk of being accused of being old fashioned I could point out that the profits made by private sector employers are all of them stolen from the labour of the workers in the first place. So if we really wanted a database of the biggest thieves in the country it would be a list of the largest private sector employers…

Of course if we allow this sort of approach to take root it will lead back to the practices of the Economic League and to trade union activists being denied work.

Socialists defend the interests of working people and particularly those groups who face particular oppression or discrimination. That means sticking up for minorities whether or not they are popular – and the (large) minority of workers with criminal records are entitled to expect our support.

All of which goes to show (in my fairly predictable opinion) why we need Labour MPs who actually believe in Labour principles and will stick up for the interests of workers. (As opposed to grandstanding Tories...)

Support the MPs who really deserve it

Rather than pay too much attention to some Tory with apparently genuine libertarian leanings, trade unionists should be supporting and congratulating those Labour MPs who stood up for what was right on Wednesday, rather than what was expedient.

Labour MPs who stood by the best traditions of our movement and did not vote to increase the powers of the state to deny people their liberty faced considerable pressure from the whips. While some serial rebels are pretty much immune to this pressure (or are ignored by the whips now!) others deserve our particular respect for sticking to their guns – and speaking up.

I sent the following message yesterday to members of the UNISON group of MPs who voted against the Government on Wednesday;

“Dear comrades,

I am writing to those members of the UNISON group of Labour MPs who voted last night to oppose the extension of detention without trial to thank you for your courage and determination in doing the right thing for the country, the Party and the labour and trade union movement.

UNISON and the other trade unions have clear policies in support of civil liberties. It is shameful that our Government has acted as it has.

It is only because we can point to principled Parliamentary representatives such as yourselves that those of us within UNISON who believe that the trade unions should continue fighting for our policies within the Party can hold our heads up.

Thank you.”

If you agree that the business of the labour movement should not be to empower the state to restrict our freedoms, why not send a message of support to those of our Parliamentary representatives who stood by us?

If it were not for people prepared to stand up and speak truth to power we would not have a trade union movement – and then all the UNISON delegates on our way to Bournemouth would be going for no more than the beach.

(Although of course if we did not have a trade union movement we wouldn’t have enough time off to go to the beach in the first place…)

And as for those UNISON-linked MPs who thought it more important to try to breath life into the political corpse that is Gordon Brown rather than defend the rights of ordinary people, well perhaps they should be detained in the Conference Centre after we all leave – for 42 days perhaps?