At the Communication Worker's Union (CWU) Annual Conference at the beginning of June, an emergency resolution from the NEC was endorsed that welcomed the government's Fairness at Work White Paper.
The bureaucracy of the union manipulated the debate and pressurised delegations, and managed to overturn the union's previous policy of opposition to all anti-union laws.
They rationalised that although the white paper did not live up to Paul Wozny A FEW short weeks after the union movement in a number of key areas, such as the proposed 40% threshold for recognition ballots, it did have positive features.
General Secretary Derek Hodgson went to great lengths to justify the climb down, arguing that the previous policy had left them isolated from other unions. This was a very passionate debate, and one of the best speakers was sacked Critchley striker, Wendy Williams. She criticised the failure of the white paper to enforce the right to reinstatement SON's leadership. At the Conferbeen sacked for taking part in legal industrial action.
Vicious
In summing for the NEC the General Secretary made the most hostile, and disgraceful witch hunting speech I have heard in a long time, viciously attacking the United Campaign to oppose the anti-union laws.
The new policy will greatly weaken the ability of the Critchley workers and others in similar disputes to win. The Broad Left must before Labour's step up the campaign to re-establish the union's previous position of opposing all the Tory anti-trade union laws. If we were not hamstrung by these laws the Critchley strike would not have lasted a week, let alone over 12 months.
Tony Blair and the New Labour government need the anti-trade union laws so that they can keep the so called "fexible" workforce in place, to enable them enforce their strategy of cutting wages and condition. We need to oppose them for the same reason. their behalf with the new employLondon Region at the behest of Ashton, or Ashton wrote his letter at the request of Lyons - who would like nothing better than to discipline a regional body which has challenged him for years.
Whichever it is, this episode shows the symbiotic relationship between the trade union and Labour Party bureaucracies and the path they would like to go down if this is not challenged.
London Region Council of MSF is outraged, and is asking activists in the unions and Labour Party to take up this issue. If Ashton and Lyons succeed in this witchhunt it would make it easier for them and their ilk to repeat it elsewhere. policy's aim was to stop branches