I’ll target Amazon on rights
Sharon Graham’s Unite leader bid
UNITE firebrand Sharon Graham aims to be the union’s first female general secretary, vowing to tackle Amazon and bosses exploiting workers in the pandemic.
Her bid comes a year after we revealed the executive officer, who has overseen industrial disputes, was planning to throw her hat in the ring when Len McCluskey stands down in 2022.
Graham has now announced her move for the top post in a battle with union heavyweights Gerard Coyne and Steve Turner. Her Workers Unite faction is backing her bid with a website and social media campaign.
It says she has “proven herself to be the real candidate for the workplace” by “producing a credible plan to tackle Amazon and a clear strategy to unionise the major employers in each of Unite’s sectors”.
Graham warns firms have got away with exploitation during the virus crisis, saying: “Employers are doing things they’d never have done outside Covid. They believe if they put it under the banner of Covid, everyone will think that’s OK.”
In December,
Graham said
employers who had made profits in 2020 were trying to “push down and suppress wages” and added that Amazon’s use of “casual labour” must not become the norm.
Graham’s leadership bid comes as McCluskey, 70, faces controversy over a £74million hotel and offices built with Unite funds. Rival Coyne has called for “transparency”.
The Birmingham scheme’s cost is said to have more than doubled from £35million.
After a meeting about the project on Friday, McCluskey said the executive council had reiterated it was an “investment” and that “Unite takes the management of members’ money and assets extremely
seriously”.
Reliance on casual labour must not become the norm SHARON GRAHAM ON BATTLE WITH AMAZON