Still doing us proud

FARE PLAY AT LAST BY MINISTERS Times change but TUC at 150 is a gold asset

BY the time you read this I’ll be in Manchester for the 150th gathering of the Trades Union Congress.

This fantastic event is even more special this year as the TUC comes home to celebrate its anniversary.

I grew up with unions. My family were members of the NUT, Nupe, Aslef and lots of other collections of letters.

In my first job, the first thing they gave me after they showed me where to sit was a form for the NUJ.

I grew up with stories of the TUC, the legendary annual get-together of the unions.

Although I never saw it first-hand, I can tell you that a lot of the cliches – the hard-drinking, the smoky back rooms, late night deals – are true.

Vital

Especially the hard drinking. I heard a lot of tales that ended: “So they threw us out” or “We settled it arm-wrestling” or, on one occasion, “It was the right hotel but the wrong city.”

But those days are gone, for better or for worse.

There will be a pint or two, no doubt, but things are a lot more sensible these days. Much more than that has changed.

Membership has fallen over the years but that’s only to be expected. Traditionally, the public sector has been the home of the majority of union membership.

And as Tory austerity has shrunk the public sector so too has the number of people involved in trade unions.

In the late 70s half the FINALLY the Government has made a sacrifice like the rest of us and now, truly, know what life is like in Austerity Britain.

That’s right. They’ve reduced their first-class travel bills.

I know, I know. But to be fair they have made a pretty good job of it. Since the introduction workforce was in a trade union. Now it’s around 20 per cent. But membership numbers have always fluctuated, so there is no reason they won’t grow again. And there are still more than six million people in unions. This is probably one of the most important times to be a member, what with zero-hours contracts and the like. So this is a good time to praise the work unions are doing. On an national level it’s

A CORBYN victory. No. Not that one. This one is shadow employment minister Mike Amesbury’s dog, who won People’s Choice at the Westminster Dog of the Year Awards.

He’s called Corbyn after Mike’s eight-year-old son named him. Mike says Corbyn has a “wonderful temperament” is “brilliant with people and is “very, very loving”.

Weirdly, no dog called Theresa or Boris was entered this year. Probably off somewhere biting people. of their brutal cost-cutting in financial year 2009/10, the Home Office has significantly reduced spend on first-class rail by 99 per cent.

In real terms the Home Office’s first-class rail travel bill for 2009/10 was £1.9million.

In 20016/17 this expenditure easy to spot. But locally there is vital work that slips under the radar.

There are hundreds of examples but here are a few.

Unison is fighting for the lowest-paid workers at Bolton Royal Infirmary to be paid fairly.

The West Midlands branch of the Fire Brigades Union joined an antiracist demonstrators last week to oppose an EDL rally.

The Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union are campaigning for the rights of people who have been was £19,000. Spend on business class flights made by the Home Office Group has decreased from £650,000 in financial year 2010/11 to £240,000 in the latest full financial year, 2016/17, a decrease of 63 per cent.

There you go. We are, after all, in this together. burned while working at Mcdonalds. And the CWU just sorted out free flu jabs for Royal Mail staff.

The next few days will be a celebration of all this great work. And rightly so.

John Mcdonnell summed it up when we chatted about the upcoming TUC event: “What a trade union does is make sure people are treated fairly, that their workplace is safe.

“The principle is simple – we stand together and we look after one other.

“Who wouldn’t want to be part of that?” FORMER government adviser Prof David Nutt says members should be breathalysed before they are allowed to vote. This has not gone down well at all. One backbencher told me: “If everyone who’s had a pint is banned you’d end up with about six people deciding everything. And they’re the sort of people that never get invited to the pub.”