Remember the Falkirk controversy, people? If not, you can refresh your memory here. Well, the Labour Party has announced that Unite the Union and its associates are all absolutely innocent of the supposed selection vote-rigging that most observers viewed as fact (I’d like to say was one of few who were sceptical of the claims throughout). Labour’s internal inquiry has found that the main evidence was two letters sent by Labour members ‘but written by a third party’. Now that these letters have been withdrawn as evidence, only an email to the party to a rival of Unite’s preferred candidate, Karie Murphy, implicates her and Unite. And so both Karie Murphy and Stephen Deans, the former Chair of Falkirk CLP (Constituency Labour Party), have had their Labour membership reinstated, although Murphy has withdrawn from the selection process.
I said at the time that Labour’s reaction to the Falkirk affair was just as damaging to ourselves than the allegations. The anti-union tendency in the Party seemed delighted at this opportunity to dilute the link between the political and industrial arms of the labor movement yet further, and successfully whipped up anti-uinion feeling in the media and in Westminster. Len McCluskey, who had enjoyed a constructive relationship with the Miliband regime, became highly unpopular as he tried to defend his union against the “smear campaign” operated by figures in Labour. However, Miliband managed to defuse the situation with proposals for reforms to Labour affiliate membership rules.
As I said in my previous article, we are going to almost bankrupt our Party if we press ahead with these changes. And what for? The current system is working, and has in fact encouraged no wrongdoing by any trade unionists. Every trade union member is perfectly able to opt-out of Labour membership, and millions do. We can’t afford the luxury of losing the majority of our members when the Tories can still sell their policies for funding. We don’t improve our political system by making our election much less likely. Nevertheless, I think Miliband will proceed with the changes, even though there is little reason to do so.
But what is more painful than the financial cost of Falkirk is the internal friction it has exposed. How could so many of us be so ready to point the finger at our comrades in Unite? Why is it that our leaders, who pay too little attention to the political wishes of trade union members, simply buckle in the face of media pressure to further distance themselves from union members, rather than defending this wonderful relationship? And above all, why do we care so little about the reputation of Unite that we’re ready to accuse it of terrible rule-breaking before checking our facts properly?
They’re all big question that Labour ought to ask itself, but I think it shall probably ignore them. Let’s see what Miliband has to say in his speech to the Trades Union Congress next week.
