The man shortly to be the next prime minister of Britain doesn’t hang around, does he? Even before taking up the top job, Gordon Brown - pictured left - made some kind of half-arsed attempt to institute a Lib-Lab coalition nobody voted for. Now it appears he wants further to downgrade the role of unions in the Labour Party:
New Labour leader Gordon Brown wants to reduce the influence of trade unions within the party, the BBC has learned.
His proposals would stop unions shaping policy at Labour's annual conference and give individual members more say.
He has recommended to Labour's National Executive that union-backed motions be replaced by debates on general issues.
This is, apparently, necessary in order to avoid ‘embarassing defeats’ for the leadership when union-backed resolutions occasionally carry the day at this increasingly state-managed event.
The reality is that no ‘damage’ greater than the odd adverse inside page headline results. New Labour governments habitually ignore Labour Party policy if they don’t like it, and usually brief friendly journalists to that effect within minutes of a vote going the wrong way.
Expect one or two trade unions leaders and the usual suspects on the Labour left to denounce this latest outrage. And then do nothing whatsoever to stop the scheme.
UPDATE: Press release from John McDonnell:
"This is the first step by the new Leader towards breaking the link between the party and the trade unions. This is a real kick in the teeth for all those trade unions who loyally nominated Brown to the leadership of the party. Many will now be wondering what hope there is of exercising any influence on the key issues of privatisation, public sector pay cuts, and trade union rights.
"We are launching a campaign within the Party and the trade unions to save the rights of trade unions within the Labour Party."
Comments (18)
According to online sources Brown will also implement the recommendations in the Freud Review and continue the benefits cuts and harrassment that claimants face almost continually.
'Anyone expecting Gordon Brown to steer New Labour a little more to the left - once the arch-Thatcherite Tony Blair leaves No. 10 - will be sorely disappointed.
According to the Work and Pensions Secretary, John Hutton, the incumbent PM will go ahead with plans to put private companies and voluntary groups in charge of getting people off sickness benefits and back to work.
In a leaked copy of a speech to be given in Birmingham, Hutton will say: "I know there are some who hope the coming political transition will mean the Government goes cool on the prospect of further radical welfare reform to benefit the hardest to help. They will be disappointed.”
The Government is also pondering whether or not to allow private firms and the voluntary sector to run the ‘Pathways To Work’ scheme which offers incapacity benefit claimants help and advice on getting a job.
Not surprisingly, New Labour’s few remaining left-wing MPs aren’t happy. Nottingham South’s Alan Simpson says: “Simply shoveling public services into private pockets will not deliver any improvements to the public. Sooner or later, ministers will have to face the reality that they cannot run the welfare system like a car boot sale.”
http://www.kerching.tv/2007/06/gordo..._war_on_b.html
Just on the union link did anyone else have problems getting a voting slip at all for the Deputy leadership?
Are we really surprised? My own feeling is that the Left must embrace PR tout suite!
Not looking great, is it? Our job now is to build a broad-based campaign uniting trade unionists and party activists to fight this campaign. To be perfectly honest, I would imagine that even staunch rightwingers such as Luke Akehurst will be up in arms over this proposal.
By the way, has anyone noticed that, now safely bedded in, Harman has quickly abandoned all her leftish rhetoric?: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6236412.stm
Didn't see that one coming. Cough...
According to my sources here:
http://petergkenyon.typepad.com/peterkenyon/
the Beeb got the story wrong. This is not about the bloc vote. It is about any vote.
According to my sources here
http://petergkenyon.typepad.com/peterkenyon/
the Beeb got the story wrong.
This was not about the bloc vote, but any vote.
I could go on.....but I won't. Absolutely inexcusable and indefensible.
According to the New Labour project of turning Britain into a third world country, it's necessary to smash any vestiges of workers' collective strength and bargaining. After all, if we want to achieve Chinese or Indonesian level wages, we have to do some pretty hard battering.
But what can a few trade union leaders and the "usual suspects" on the Labour left actually do to stop this scheme?
made some kind of half-arsed attempt to institute a Lib-Lab coalition nobody voted for.
I agree, but equally only a small minority voted for the Labour govt that has, oddly, such a large majority in parliament. What is needed is proportional representation and then proper coalition politics. Certainly the current situation cannot be much worse for the left.
What we can do:
Campaign for a Living Wage, not NMR
Recruit TU Levy Payers as Full members
Develop TULO and partnerships on campaigns
Enjoy Brown bishing Lib Dems and Tories
(he has locked in both Ming and DC with his cleverness)
Resist Brown using our MPs and councils and channels as necessary but not on every move
How will he remove Union input? How is he going to do it? Turkeys voting for Christmas?
Work that out and act accordingly. Or at very least get the right quid pro quo for his reforms.
(The Beeb is getting a lot of stories wrong at the moment)
Even if the Labour conference is "democratised" Brown will be encouraged to ignore votes that go against the neo-liberal agenda. Rather than sink with Brown, the unions need to abandon ship...
How will he remove Union input? How is he going to do it? Turkeys voting for Christmas?
Work that out and act accordingly. Or at very least get the right quid pro quo for his reforms.
What do you suggest? The Warwick agreement was a quid pro quo in the first place, so refusing to accept another tranche of anti-union 'reforms' unless Brown implements Warwick would be pretty feeble. On the other hand, Brown isn't likely to implement Warwick without a lot of pressure - and going beyond Warwick would send all the 'wrong' signals to his friends at the FT and the CBI. All a bit of a mess, really.
Some of us are old enough to remmber when CLPDers and the like came to our GCs and huffed and puffed about how outrageous it was that the votes of CLPs did not determine what happened at conference.
Oh well. To be honest I don't know why Gordon is doing this. It's like his internal political clock stopped in May 1994 and he's just woken up, but the idea that it is some outrage is ridiculous.
Because the general secretaries of the four biggest unions vote for the left the hard left are against it - when it Bassett and Duffy you were all in favour of the unions being chopped down to size.
Circumstances alter cases, LotB. If there were thriving CLPs up and down the country, giving them a bigger say in policy-making would be a step forward. But if there were thriving CLPs up and down the country, Gordon wouldn't be giving them a bigger say in policy-making.
I think you are wrong to dismiss this LOTB.
I think Brown is being brilliant - he is picking a battlefield of his own choosing to take on the left, and it is a trap for the Labour left to campaign over a constitutional rule book issue instead of over policy. The number of union votes at a conference that has no power anyway!
I think he is picking this fight as a Clause IV moment to smash any confidence the left may have gained during the McDonnell campaign, and deputy leader votes.
BTW - you can see from Susan press's outrage that Brown is on the money about what reaction he would get.
I'm with Chris Paul. The BBC story is not that accurate. A consultation is being launched which proposes ending with contemporary resolutions at conference. More power would go to the National Policy Forum it seems. That would go down just as badly with CLP's as with unions, perhaps more so. I have my doubts that Brown will go to war on this, the proposal could well get watered down.
Part of Brown's proposal means getting rid of any meaningful votes at confeence.
I can't see it winning support in the constituencies or - judging by the report of the mood at today's General Council - fromn the unions either.
However, there is another layer to his strategy: the use of OMOV balloting on the party programme to effectively sideline conference.
The danger is that all the focus will be on the proposal about contemporary resolutions, a deal could be done to drop that, and in return Brown will get the greenlight for more use of plebiscites.
I will believe the leadership are genuine about OMOV when they have a ballot to determine government policy on Iraq.