The attention of the Labour party might be focused on the general election campaign, but in the background, changes that will fundamentally restructure the Labour movement are in motion. Uncut has learned from PCS sources that the stalled merger with Unite is very much back on the agenda, and with it, Unite’s ultimate disaffiliation from Labour.
The merger ran into the sand following PCS’ conference last year when delegates rejected the leadership motion to continue unconditional negotiations with Unite. However, recent manoeuvres by the PCS leadership suggest that merger wheels are once again rolling.
PCS has been wracked by well documented financial problems. The sale of the union HQ, which was agreed at the union’s national executive meeting at the start of December, was meant to have placed PCS on a more sustainable financial footing. But just days later, an emergency executive meeting was called for the 18th December.
With one hour’s notice before the meeting, executive members were given papers that included a proposal to suspend next year’s internal election. The reasoning was that the £600,000 cost would sink the union and delaying it by upto year would help enable PCS’ survival. The motion was passed but with no wider debate across the membership.
PCS insiders have taken this as the clearest sign that merger plans are being revived.
Few believe their leadership’s explanation that this is about cost. Why wasn’t suspending the election discussed as an option along side sale of the HQ? What changed in the week following the scheduled NEC meeting in early December? Many view the emergency meeting as a means to railroad the suspension of internal democracy, which in turn allows the core leadership to fast-track negotiations with Unite, unencumbered by the accountability of elections in 2015.
The power of the Socialist Party cabal at the top of PCS, and their desire to link up with their party comrades in Unite is viewed as the primary driver for merger. The financial crisis merely provides a convenient rationale.
Post-merger, the unified PCS and Unite contingent from the Socialist Party (SP) would take control of the left of the new union, building SP support, much in the same way that its predecessor – Militant – once dreamed of building out its support from the left of the Labour party, if and when the Bennites took over the leadership.
The expectation is that a merger proposal will be put to PCS’ annual conference in May, just days after the general election. The motion will likely be wreathed in warnings of imminent financial disaster (unmet pensions obligations, redundancies and insolvency) if it isn’t supported and, in an atmosphere of panic, passed.
For Labour this would have profound implications. The Socialist Party would need Unite to disaffiliate from the Labour if it is to achieve its goal of growing on the left of Unite.
The ground is already being prepared within Unite by SP operatives for disaffiliation. It has been informally discussed regularly at executive level and the increasingly tenuous nature of Unite’s link to Labour was evident today with union insiders briefing the Scottish Daily Mail on the prospect of the union backing some SNP candidates at the Holyrood elections in 2016.
To be clear: any support for SNP candidates by Unite in an official capacity would require disaffiliation from Labour.
In Alan Roden’s Mail piece, the official Unite spokesperson’s stance is that supporting SNP candidates would require a change in union rules, which could only be passed at their conference and that is not until after the election. Hardly a resounding denial.
The result for Labour of Unite’s exit would be twofold.
First, Labour’s biggest donor would be gone, and a financial hole of several million pounds would have to be filled. In the aftermath of a costly general election, with the party likely to be deep in debt, this would potentially cripple the effectiveness of Labour in the next parliament.
Second, for the first time since the early 1900s, less than half of the TUC will be affiliated to the Labour party. No longer would Labour be the political voice of the majority of trade unionists.
Debates about the Collins reforms and the relationship with the unions would be largely moot. Labour would need to re-examine its identity and redefine itself as a party independent of the bulk of the union movement.
In terms of Labour’s long term future, the Unite-PCS merger, rather than the general election, could be the most consequential act of 2015.
