When we chaired the fantastic solidarity rally at TUC congress in September, staff working for University and College Union (UCU) had just secured a commitment from management to address issues they were taking strike action over, namely toxic workplace management practices and racism.
This meant the planned industrial action was called off. At the time, we were pleased the employer had given this commitment and felt that progress could be made.
However, two months later, no investigation has been carried out, UCU management are refusing to engage staff on their annual pay review process and in a provocative move, have announced a far ranging re-structuring exercise affecting a quarter of the staff, whilst a ballot for industrial action is taking place. In addition, serious health and safety breaches have not been addressed, despite the involvement of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).
Read more from the Unite UCU branch: Employer ignores dispute resolution in order to rush through restructure
Trade union leaders would rightly call this type of behaviour out if this was happening to their own members, but what about when trade union senior managers and leaders commit these anti union, bad management practices themselves?
We really do need to scrutinise what’s going on here. Ultimately it’s members who pay for this through their subs. The staffing resources of the union is a significant proportion of that. So it follows, there is an impact on our wider structures as a result.
This year we’ve seen staff at GMB Yorkshire region ballot for strike action, TSSA workers take multiple days of strike action in their union and two workers, Darren and Greg, win an Employment Tribunal claim after being unfairly dismissed by the TUC for failing to follow their own processes.
Darren and Greg had to wait over two years for this vindication, with little support from their fellow colleagues, a shocking lack of basic solidarity. This year we also saw the new phenomenon of elected officials being suspended or expelled from their unions for challenging bullying and sexism.
We send solidarity and our best wishes to all these trade union workers and reps who’ve been taking collective and individual action for their rights at work and to challenge toxic practices this year and we know this hasn’t been easy.
We also extend our solidarity to workers in Unite employed in the National Bargaining and Disputes Support Unit (BDSU) who’ve recently announced they are also balloting over toxic workplace practices. Earlier this year, the #meTU campaign wrote to Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham on behalf of these workers about concerns around the employment of an official attached to this unit.
Why is this allowed to happen? What are the national executive committees (NEC’s), elected to oversee the rules of a union and ensure good governance takes place, doing to address these problems? The common denominator here is the word toxic.
Trade union staff work under extremely stressful and intense conditions. All throughout the covid period, trade union workers adapted to the many changes to working patterns and processes and the challenges and stress that entailed. It’s a slap in the face to take trade union workers for granted like this when we know that often it’s those creative policy, bargaining and campaigning officers, passionate about delivering for members, who keep the unions afloat.
But it’s also the effect on health and wellbeing, the majority of UWU members report stress, burnout and ill health as their number one issues at work.
Many of our official public and political institutions are failing us. We live in a period of intense destabilisation and violence around the world, and under a capitalist system intent on making our lives harder and destroying our planet. We need stability in our trade unions, not a replication of bad internal management practices and power games, for short term gain and prestige.
It diverts attention away from its core role, to build solidarity, union visibility and effectiveness in the workplace to improve pay, conditions and the standards of living for everyone, and that an injury to one, is an injury to all. It would be naive for anyone to believe that our ability to do this is not severely weakened when our apparatuses are failing us and not abiding by basic trade union principles themselves.
Work intensification and toxic workplaces are on the rise. The continuing increase in the cost of living is squeezing workers to breaking point. It’s an insult to those hard working union members when their subs are being spent on abusing the staff.
Despite the #meTU campaign highlighting the issue around the use of Non Disclosure Agreements (NDA’s) to pay off staff who report bullying and sexual harassment nearly three years ago, we have not seen any commitments from unions to scrap this practice, which costs unions thousands on legal fees and payouts.
Know that your struggle is not yours alone. We stand with you, ready to offer support, amplify your message, and challenge these injustices at every opportunity. Together, we will continue to advocate for workplaces where fairness, respect, health and wellbeing, enjoyable careers and genuine dialogue prevail.
In solidarity and strength.