When a trade union body is unable to hold its AGM because of disorderly conduct, you might ordinarily suspect that organisations like the BNP are to blame.
Persistent heckling, the chanting of animal noises, refusal to respect the chair, the intimidatory unapproved filming of unions delegates is indeed behaviour usually of fascists.
You might not expect that the government-supporting, right wing of the trade union movement were to blame. But that is precisely what happened at the Derby Area TUC AGM meeting of March 11th.
Derby Trades Council has been the scene of very sharp exchanges ever since its Silk Mill march of last year, the equivalent of many other Trades Union Councils May Day marches. Labour councillors in particular were bitter that the Trades Council had the affront to organise an event along the theme of opposing privatisation and had speakers, such as NUT President Bill Greenshields speaking at the event of his union's opposition to academies.
The Trades Council was expected to be a fiercely fought contest with unions such as UNITE being quite open in its desire to replace the President and NASUWT official Dave Wilkinson and put the Trades Council back to what it had been before 2008, a tame Labour-loyal organisation politically and organisationally dominated by Labour councillors.
For these reasons the President and Assistant Sec (standing-in for the recently deceased Secretary) were at pains to convene an AGM where there could be no arguments or doubts about proper delegacies.
At the AGM meeting on March 11th duly-appointed delegates were astonished to see approx 40 new people turn up. Many of these people had never been seen before although they appear to have been organised by UNITE.
Because of the bitter arguments in previous months, the Chair and Assistant Secretary of the Trades Council had frequently made clear the need for all affiliations and notifications of delegates to be registered the day before. Many if not most of the new UNITE people who turned up, had not so notified the officers. Some of those claiming to be UNITE delegates refused to give the numbers in the branches they were demanding affiliation of. It is thought that they may have refused to even co-operate in identifying what their names were! These people nevertheless demanded the right to vote.
The Chair, Dave Wilkinson, ruled that they could not have been accepted as delegates. There then followed a long abusive argument from these UNITE people from the floor of the meeting. This involved chanting at the meeting, making animal noises and persistent heckling.
One AMICUS/ UNITE official, Elizabeth Donnelly, meanwhile took out her mobile phone and without requesting permission filmed the opposition to them.
Many of the hoodlum and wreckers were known Labour councillors; some were CLP officials including one from Margaret Beckett’s constituency. A number were retired and had never worked in a UNITE organised establishment.
Their actions so hampered the business of the meeting that it was unable to get through its agenda and elect new officers.
The assistant secretary, a female UNISON delegate not politically hardline in any way, left the meeting in tears.
The TUC Regional Secretary, Roger McKenzie, who has worked with the Labour right wing on Derby’s TUC over the last 6 months was absent from the meeting although he had indicated earlier he would attend. UNITE Regional Secretary, Adrian Axtell, was also absent.
2 or 3 SWP delegates turned up but had not got themselves properly delegated. One prominent SWPer had indicated earlier that she saw no difference between the left nominees for officers and the right wing!! This may have been just incompetence or stupidity in the latter case. More likely however it is that the SWP didn’t want to vote against regional UNITE which UAF has appointed as organisers of their anti-fascist work in the area.
It is possible that the aim of the disruption was to get Derby Trades Council closed down after the right failed to get sufficient delegates to take over the Trades Council.
The Derby area is one where the BNP are very active. An active trades council is desperately important to the town to co-ordinate and unite trade union opposition to the economic chaos managed by the Labour government. Without that, the BNP, which is very strong in the area, would be better able to exploit such working class dissent.
All trade unions in the area are being asked to support the Derby Trades Union Council officers convene and stop any future acts of intimidation by the government-supporting right wing unions.