Unison - Going to go the same way as Unite?

Some debate on other sites about our initial post, in particular here but it's not clear what deals have been done with SEIU by Unison on the 3 companies project.

No mention of the project so I hope UNISON don't go down the same road of taking the SEIU money as Unite.

SEIU have been running the UNITE organising department for a few years now and look at at the results: December 2007 - Unite membership 1.9 million; December 2008 Unite membership 1.6 million; June 2009 Unite membership 1.3 million members.

You can say SEIU's done a good job - 600,000 members lost since you started advising UNITE!

Mind the Gap

It seems that UK unions are finally getting around to calling the question on SEIU.

Are you really in favour of building working people’s power on the job? – or is that just the old rhetoric of the 1990’s SEIU – lost now in one too many corporate deals, inter union battles and divisive raids.

The truth is few workers on the ground have even heard of SEIU, Sectoral Organising or global unions in the companies like Sodexho and Compass where SEIU claim to be building power and creating a “new paradigm of corporate partnership”.

Often the first these workers hear of the SEIU is from their boss.

“We must not be anchors on our employers” say SEIU. “We must focus on increasing shareholder value”. Tell that to the worn out Hospital porter finishing another 12 hour shift on the minimum wage – or the Janitor who is forced to clean an entire office block ina 4-hour shift.

And what's the answer of SEIU and their client unions to this massive gap between their talk and their walk?

Short cut fixes cooked up in the boardrooms over dinner with the bosses aimed at delivering workers into their hands:

• 'Fair Share' deals that put the boss in control of the unions dues;
• demands that employers publish names and addresses of all workers;
• demands that recognition and bargaining is awarded over the heads of workers and behind their backs – so bureaucrats can control the agenda.

With their great, but empty speeches, obsessive intolerance of dissent and paranoid control freakery of their own people - what they can’t or won’t see is what they are becoming – the corporate worlds favourite union – helping Sodexho, Compass, Aramark, Accor, G4S and so many others police their workforce, keep them in line and manage their expectations downwards.

While these companies get to parade their new ethical credentials – and have their own pet attack dog to set on any union that looks like it might cause them trouble – AFL-CIO, UNITE HERE ….. the list of unions to feel the heat of the SEIU witch hunt gets bigger every day.

That is whay the Tribune report of the fringe meeting on SEIU sounds so interesting. Especially the close involvement of UNISON and UNITE with SEIU that was reported. UNISON/SEIU people seem to confirm our worst fears by their response over on UnisonActive website .Talk about protesting too much!

We all know that there are no shortcuts to union power or even just to recruiting new members. And certainly not through deals done with the bosses – who, shall we say… ahem…. are not really our friends.

As a bloke called Andy Stern once told the TUC in a lecture on organising he gave the UK in 1998: “The power our members seek over their daily lives at work cant be bought from politicians, borrowed from the media or begged from the bosses. It has to be built.”

I wonder if this Andy Stern would get an 'Organiser in Training' job with SEIU these days?