President's Address to UNISON Conference 1998
John McFadden
Can I start by thanking the stewards for letting me into this conference.
Earlier this year I was chairing the Health Group Conference and was refused
entry to the hall on the first day because I didn't have thie right badge.
While I was away getting things sorted out, Anne Picking, one of the Vice-Presidents,
was also refused entry Anne was a bit taken aback and said, ‘but I
am the Vice President", to which the steward replied I don't care
I've turned away better than you this morning.'
Probably the most important development this year was the agreement
reached by the politicians in Northern Ireland and the referendum result
In that regard. can I say how very proud I am of the role our union played
in the Irish peace process, most directly through the work of our Northern
Ireland region, through the tenacity and courage of our members and staff
who day in and day out worked for a settlement in which dignity, equality
and inclusiveness were honoured. I want to pay tribute to them today But
we can also be proud, as a union across the British Isles, of the consistent
support we have given and the way we turned what might have been a divisive,
sectarian issue to one of solidarity and unity
Conference, this is the moment every President looks forward to but
also dreads. Behind is a year full of activity, visiting regions and branches
in all our countries, talking to members and representing the union in
many forums here and abroad
Ahead lies four days of intensive debate about our future policies and
programmes of work with the knowledge that the role of the President can
help or hinder us in reaching clear decisions. For me it is important that
everyone here feels relaxed and at ease with the process. So if you have
a problem understanding what's happening, please ask someone to help you.
After all we are all comrades with the one goal - to make sure we take
the best decisions we can for our members. If I am to set the tone I want
to have an easy, relaxed atmosphere - passionate debate yes - but with
respect for one another. And let us enjoy these few days together with
a bit of humour and fun as well as the serious parts.
We are an important organisation and sometimes I feel we don't fully
appreciate the status we have and that outsiders are looking to and at
us. The way we conduct ourselves is important in the impression we give
to other people Remember, we claim to represent our members and our behaviour
is taken as a reflection of them.
In these few minutes I am given a chance to say something about myself,
to reflect on what has happened during my year in office and to look to
the future.
Let me start with myself.
I am a Town Planning Technician with Glasgow City Council I've been
in the union for 31 years. My parents were Irish immigrants from Donegal
and my upbringing and that of my brothers and sisters was as part of a
large extended Irish family in the Gorbals of Glasgow.
My father. who was killed in a building site accident in 1965, was a
member or the National Union of Seamen during and after the war and was
later a member of the Transport and General Workers' Union. I joined NALGO
in 1966 when I started work with Glasgow Corporation in the Education Department
School Meals Section and I became active in the union around 1968/69.
As I became mere politically aware, I was recruited into the Communist
Party of Great Britain, by one of my greatest friends, Andy Sweeney, who
sadly died earlier this year, and to this day, it's the only political
party I've been a member of. My view is it had a humane tradition in which
you learned to respect the intellectual arguments of people against you
but never lost sight of the common purpose that united you, which was to
change the world and to change it for the better. It never prevented me
having a good working relationship with members of other political parties
but it also never became an excuse for factional organisation.
My upbringing and political involvement formed and shaped my thinking.
I was greatly influenced by this pamphlet 'Labour, Nationality and Religion',
written by a fellow Scotsman, James Connolly, who became a trade union
leader in America and Ireland and who was executed for his part in the
1916 uprising in Dublin.
Although not a member of any political party, I am still a communist
at heart. I still believe there is an ongoing battle between capital and
labour. The power relationships change from time to time, but the battle
is still there to be won.
There are so many people I could mention who have influenced me and
to whom I owe a great deal. Norrie Steele, my mentor in so many things,
a former President of NALGO, unfortunately unable to be here today due
to his wife's illness. Also Andy Sweeney, whom I mentioned earlier, a dear
friend who died in March this year. Also my family. It's a fact that most
good trade unionists live in other people's time, at their beck and call
when needs arise. And it is often our families who bear the cost. In welcoming
my family to the Conference I would like to pay tribute to all of yours.
My wife Mary, who is a UNISON rnember is here as is my mother, my mother-in-law,
my sister, who works in the Scottish Regional Offce, my daughter and grandson
and one of my cousins who is here for her first conference as a delegate
from a Northem Ireland branch, and if you don't mind I'd like to welcome
them and thank them for all their support over the years.
Let me turn now to the past year. It has been a very full year After
18 years of a Government who would not listen, who denied our legitimacy
and derided the value of public service, we have a Government under which
we might yet have a chance to put into practice so many of the things that
we could only talk about before.
We have a Scottish Parliament, a Welsh Assembly and an Assembly for
the people of Northem Ireland.
A far reaching difficult debate has been launched with the publication
of the Government Green Paper on social welfare reform.
Trade union rights have been restored at CCHQ. There is a programime
for trade union reform. I know there are some serious difficulties over
the rights to recognition but overall the White Paper is a step in the
right direction.
I am also delighted that the deportation orders on Prakash and Prem
Chavrimooto have been lifted and that Abdul and Ade Onibyo have been reunited
with their family in Britain. I would like to thank you for all that you
did in support of those anti-deportation campaigns.
And we have for the first time in our country's history a national minimum
wage law for which our union campaigned for so long. It was often a lonely
road and if there is one person associated with that history it is our
General Secretary, Rodney Bickerstaffe. Clearly, the level is too low,
it is not what we argued for, but this is the start of our campaign for
a a minimum wage that is a decent living wage, and our formula of half
male median earnings rising over time to two thirds male median earnings
must he pushed at every opportunity.
Whilst giving the New Labour Government credit for a different approach
to trade unions and at least listening to what we have to say, I am still
really concerned that little has changed so far on the ground for the public
service workers we represent and voted Labour at the election last year.
PFI is still with us locking our services into long term contracts and
penalising our members with low pay and worse hours and conditions. Competitive
tendering has merely been modified and so called best value regimes have
been brought in. Public service pay is still being eroded and the Chancellor's
statement on 11 June on public spending plans for the rest of the current
parliament, whilst they are an improvement on he existing position, does
not provide any real hope for change in the threats to our members' job
security and conditions.
And the annoying thing about all this is it need not happen As we keep
on saying and I'll repeat here we are one of the richest nations in the
world. The Chancellor paid off £10bn of our national debt in January
of this year alone. A fraction of that annount would have been enough to
put most of our services on a sound footing.
Why is the Chancellor refusing to fund our services properly? It can
only be for two reasons. One, to have a pot of gold for the next election
campaign and secondly to meet the fiscal critena for European Monetary
Union, which I don't believe will help European workers one bit, but will
only be an advantage to international capitalists.
Our policies are not always in accord with those of the government and
we are finding ways of arguing for clear rational alternatives, justifying
them in the public interest as well as our own, persuading not only our
members, employers and government but also the general public of the sense
of our case.
We are a proud. independent trade union. and let nobody make the mistake
of thinking we are in the pockets of the government. UNlSON's voice must
continue to be heard loud and clear in defence of our members. To do this
we need to be united. As you will know I have made unity in UNISON and
the wider trade union movement, incIuding internationally, the main theme
of any speeches I have given this year. It's sornething I believe in passionately
and I hope we can develop further, maybe after this conference. Maybe we
can ask Mo Mowlam to stay for a while longer today to help us out.
It is the government's first anniversary it's our union's fifth. There
is much of which we can be proud. The formation of UNISON itself was a
remarkable achievement and owed a great deal to the personal generosity
and commitment of hundreds of thousands of our members. Few thought that
we would have managed to get all branches merged within the timescale we
set ourselves. I think the benefits are beginning to come through.
We have pioneered innovative equal opportunities policies, drawing directly
on our members' experience of discrimination. We were the advocates of
life long learning before it became today's buzzwords.
We are respected by employers and other unions as a formidable presence
within not only the British, but the wider European and international trade
union movements. We may live on islands but we are not isolated. Within
the European trade union movement we have been instrumental in arguing
for a clearer profile of public services, for rights of black citizens
within Europe, the rights of part time workers, new rights for disabled
workers,
In this 50th anniversary year of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, the scourge of racism and other forms of discrimination are still
with us. It was sickening to learn of the case of a black man being dragged
through the streets of an American town recently by white supremacists
and to hear of the fanatical movements in America trying to reverse the
years of work on the emancipation of women. The unfortunate thing for us
is that too many trends set in the USA end up being followed by people
here. So we need to be on our guard and challenge these ideas wherever
they emerge. So called civilised countries can produce the most brutal
acts of inhumanity, just look at the recent history of Bosnia and what
is now happening in Kosovo and look at the worrying war of words only at
the moment between Lndia arid Pakistan over nuclear weapons.
Trade union international work has always been important to me and I
am proud to be a member of a union which takes this work seriously and
backs it up with substantial resources. As have seen for myself we are
respected in every part of the world for the work we do. This work is becoming
more important. I'd like to pay tribute to our international comrnittee
and department, and I will be welcoming our international guests later
after I've finished this address. We must continue to support and strengthen
our relations throughout the world.
We live in a highly interdependent world. Economies of countries affect
each other. And our vision has to go beyond Britain and even Europe if
we are to successfully challenge these new global transnational corporations.
UNISON understands this global interaction and the need to work with other
unions internationally.
This. year is also the 50th anniversary of the National Health Service.
If there is a defining philosophy that expresses our approach to public
services it is the National Health Service - that service should be based
on need not on wealth nor on influence, freely availabe and funded through
general taxation Although some of the founding principles have been undermined
and those who provide that service too often undervalued, yet it remains
the single most important act of social policy this century and a benchmark
against which all future reforms will be judged.
1998 is the year of some other imponant anniversaries. It's the 150th
anniversary of the publication of the Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels.
It's the 110th anniversary of the founding of Celtic football club, which
they marked by winning the Scottish Premier League. Sorry to upset at least
half of the Scottish delegation Bill Gilby has reminded me its also the
three and two thirds years since Raith Rovers beat Celtic in the Scottish
Coca Cola Cup final. It is also Rodney and Pat's 25th wedding anniversary
this year. I am sure you would want to join with me in offering our congratulations
and wishing them well for the future. Can I just say it has been a pleasure
to work with Rodney during the year and have had a really good working
relationship, which I'm sure will continue with future presidents.
There have been some humorous moments during the past year. For example,
I never realised how old I'm getting until a young guy on a tram took pity
on me and offered me his seat. For his cheek he lost his seat.
Or when I was having dinner with the branch officers of a branch I was
visiting recently and we were looking at the sweet menu. We ordered and
the waitress went away and returned a few minutes later to tell the branch
secretary, ‘I'm sorry sir. There's no more Hanky Panky tonight'.
My grandson, Brendan. was at nursery school and was asked by the teacher
what he'd like to be when he grows up. He totally Bemused the teacher when
he replied, ‘A President like my Pappy'.
The next few years will determine the kind of organisation we want to
become. Our roots lie in our past and none of us should forget their proud
histories and traditions. But our future is UNISON. After the difficult
early years of amalgamation we are now building a new future
Two years ago we initiated a strategic review with a determination to
move the services of the union as close to our members as possible. The
key level of organisation is the workplace and the branch and the union
must organise itself in such away that our members can call on its resources
when and where they need thern. Whatever the changes in communication and
the new technologies that are changing the way all of us live, the most
valued form of communication will be through personal contact. In an increasingly
impersonal world unions are well placed through their network of thousands
of stewards to be influential, responsive and powerful representatives
for working people.
Our service groups provide a focus for the diverse occupational identities
of our members - whether in local government the health Service, higher
education, energy, water or transport. The regions are an increasingly
important level at which our members lives are being shaped. The self organised
groups tap the energy of members whose interests have been too long neglected.
The challenge in all of his is how we create out of this diversity a strong
sense of common purpose and commitment
Much more could be said - and I am sure will be in the course of this
week- I have many more people to thank. The thousands of you I've met in
the course of my Presidential year.
I want to thank all the staff I have worked with during the year; Your
support has been fantastic. I want to thank in particular Bill Gilby, the
Head of the General Secretary's Office and his staff. I want to thank my
branch and regional colleagues and the staff of the regional and branch
offices for all their help and patience during the year.
I've had a great year as your President, an honour I'll always cherish.
I hope I have managed to keep to the high standards set by previous Presidents
of UNISON and our former partner unions We are a great union, but we can
be even better. Thanks for all your support and hard work. Now lets have
a great conference.
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