Big win for left in Unite the Union elections

Rob Williams, Socialist Party Executive Committee and Unite member

As we go to press, it has been announced that the left ‘Workers Unite/Back to the Workplace’ slate of candidates has won an overwhelming victory in the election for the Unite Executive Council (EC), the leading lay member body of the union. They have defeated the candidates supported by the Members United/United Left group by 41 to 18 seats, with 2 independents.

Those elected include Socialist Party members and fellow Unite Broad Left supporters, as part of this slate that supported the manifesto that Sharon Graham stood on when she won the union’s general secretary election in 2021.

We will produce a fuller analysis of the election, but the margin of victory shows that Unite reps and activists do not want a retreat from the militant industrial record under Sharon Graham’s leadership. This would have been posed if the Members United/United Left group had won.

This result will have a major impact on Unite’s EC, which has been hamstrung by the machinations and spoiling tactics of the United Left over the last three-year term, with no clear majority.

Mandate for militant strategy

This victory gives a clear mandate for the union to drive its militant industrial strategy and face up to the political challenge posed by Starmer’s Labour government.

This has come into sharp focus during the heroic 15-month long Birmingham bin strike, indefinite since March last year. Starmer has stood full-square behind brutal fire and rehire by the cutting Labour council. This titanic struggle was the catalyst for an emergency motion at last year’s Unite policy conference, initiated by Socialist Party members who were delegates, to support the binworkers and suspend any of the councillors who were Unite members from membership of the union, along with the then Labour deputy prime minister Angela Rayner. It passed virtually unanimously, with only a handful of United Left delegates not supporting it.      

But the motion also agreed to open a discussion in Unite about its relationship with Labour. This must now take place at all levels of the union.

The Executive Council election leads on to the general secretary election, which will take place over the next few months, where Sharon Graham will be seeking re-election. A strike by a layer of Unite officers who have joined the Community union took place on Monday 27 April, the day that the election closed. It was a clear attempt at de-stabilising the union and is a warning that the fight for Unite is still on.

But this Monday was also the day that Birmingham binworkers forced a new offer that could end the bin dispute. One of the lead bin reps, Danny Taylor, was elected to the EC from the Workers Unite slate. This is the basis of the clash in Unite, and the EC election result opens up the opportunity to move the union forward industrially and politically.