In September 2014, Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner (then a UNISON official, not yet an MP) spoke at a Manchester Trades Council public meeting about the need to repeal the anti-trade union laws introduced by the Tories in the 1980s and 90s. She wrote a summary of her speech for Unison North West, expressing the case brieflyContinue reading “Angela Rayner was right about the anti-union laws”
Category Archives: Labour Party
Labour conference commits to “abolishing anti-union laws” (again)
Published on The Clarion website, on 27th September 2018. Following the policy on repealing the anti-union laws and re-establishing the right to strike passed at Labour Party conference in 2015 and 2017, this year’s conference again resolved (in the Brexit composite!) that: “Labour will form a radical government; taxing the rich to fund better public services, expanding commonContinue reading “Labour conference commits to “abolishing anti-union laws” (again)”
Scottish FBU’s Denise Christie: Respect Labour conference policy on union rights!
Scottish FBU Secretary Denise Christie gave this speech at Labour Party conference on 24 September 2018.
Matt Wrack: Labour must vow to scrap all anti-union laws
This article, by FBU General Secretary Matt Wrack, was orginally published on Labour List, in September 2018. Find it here. Our Tory anti-union laws represent one of the foremost constraints preventing working-class people from winning better conditions at work and making gains in wider politics. That’s why at this year’s Labour Party conference I’ll beContinue reading “Matt Wrack: Labour must vow to scrap all anti-union laws”
Labour must get the anti-union laws off workers’ backs!
By Mark Osborn, NEU rep at City of London Academy (Southwark). Published on 23rd October 2018. The National Education Union at CoLA took three days of strike action in March. We took one day of action on the first week, two days the next week and the union told our Head we would be outContinue reading “Labour must get the anti-union laws off workers’ backs!”
John McDonnell’s TUC speech and the right to strike
Published on 11th September 2018 John McDonnell’s speech to the TUC on workers’ rights comes in the context of new figures showing falling unemployment and rising real earnings. But higher employment does not automatically mean better conditions and rights for workers; and the marginal increase in real wages comes after a decade of the most severe fallContinue reading “John McDonnell’s TUC speech and the right to strike”
Trade union rights – back John McDonnell’s call
By Sam Greenwood, Wakefield Local Government UNISON activist Speaking at a meeting on the first hundred days of a Labour government at Unison conference this week, Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said that a Corbyn government will repeal all the Tories’ anti-union laws and enact positive legislation for workers’ rights. He also said Labour would back all strikes,Continue reading “Trade union rights – back John McDonnell’s call”
Young Labour national policy on repealing the anti-union laws/workers’ rights
The following two motions were passed at Young Labour policy conference in October 2017, building on the policy passed by Labour Party conference in September.
The anti-union laws: acid test for a Corbyn government
“[Since 1980, trade unions have been] regulated, harried, battered, fined and sequestrated, step by step by step, in Act after Act in pursuit of aim of decollectivising the workplace.” – Labour peer Bill Wedderburn on the last of nine Tory anti-union Acts, 1993
If Jeremy Corbyn wants a mass movement, he must radically revive the unions
By Michael Chessum, orginally published in The New Statesman, 5th January 2018 The world, especially the political world, is a volatile place these days, and one ought to be wary of omens. But when McDonalds announced this week that it would award its employees their biggest pay rise in a decade, you could be forgiven for havingContinue reading “If Jeremy Corbyn wants a mass movement, he must radically revive the unions”
Free Our Unions 