UNISON NEC Elections - vote for the candidates of the UNISON Action Broad Left

Ballot papers are now hitting doormats in the biennial elections for UNISON’s National Executive Council (NEC) upon which your blogger has served for the past seven terms (fourteen years) but to which I am not seeking re-election.

I have done my time – but I am very glad that good comrades are seeking election to carry on the work of promoting the interests of UNISON members on our Union’s ruling body (a job which is as necessary as it is sometimes difficult).

In particular, I will be proud to vote for Sean Fox (Secretary of our Haringey Branch) to hold the seat which I have held since 2003. Sean outclasses his opponent and would have my support even if he had not had the good sense to align himself with the candidates supporting necessary change in our trade union.

However, Sean does have that good sense, and along with my NEC comrades Sonya Howard (Kensington and Chelsea Branch Secretary) and Helen Davies (Barnet Branch Chair), for whom I shall also be proud to vote, to have stood alongside the other good comrades who have gathered under the banner of the UNISON Action Broad Left.

These candidates have a diversity of opinions, but are united in a desire to see UNISON punch our weight on behalf of members whom we have been letting down in recent years. Candidates standing against my UNISON Action Broad Left comrades support the failing leadership of the Union and are content for UNISON to continue its current drift.

A trade union should be a strong voice for working people, and that means that it should be led by courageous troublemakers. If the leadership of a trade union falls under the sway of people concerned for their career, or those who believe that loyalty must be uncritical, then that trade union is neutralised as an effective force.

UNISON members deserve better – but only if we get out and vote for it. If you are a UNISON member then vote for the Left – and if you are a UNISON activist make sure that you mobilise your members to do so (without of course misusing UNISON resources in the way that some people have in the past!)