Unite(d) we stand?

Is the long fractious relationship between Unite and Labour finally falling apart? And what does that mean for both?

Back in 2021, I was pretty confident early in the race that Sharon Graham was going to win the fight to be General Secretary of Unite. There was good evidence in the nomination patterns that showed that she was drawing support from some of the larger branches. So while she had fewer on paper than United Left candidate Steve Turner, she was a dark horse worth watching, as these represented more actual voters.

Few did watch.

The coverage was nearly all focused on the battle between Turner and centrist candidate Gerard Coyne, who had previously stood against Len McCluskey (and was subsequently sacked). The political commentariat obsessed about what either man winning would mean for the union’s relationship with the Labour Party. The left faction of Unite - United Left - had split over who to support, with Turner getting the official backing of the group, but his rival, Howard Beckett, initially continued to run and gained significant numbers of nominations. Beckett eventually backed out to back Turner, and Graham was under significant pressure to do the same as the faction worried that a split left would lead to a Coyne victory. She resisted, organised and won.

Graham, who is on the left within the union, never sought the faction’s backing, pitching herself as the candidate for the members. Meanwhile, Turner and Coyne played into the media narrative leading on the union’s relationship with Labour. In what was a low turnout election (12 per cent of ballots were cast), this message - and Graham’s years of building credibility on the ground - worked.

Graham has spent much of her leadership focused on being a more traditional, member-focused union leader and trying to deal with the union’s significant internal problems. It was Graham who ordered the probe into the Birmingham hotel, which was highly critical of the previous leadership.

But with an affiliated union, questions about the relationship with the Labour Party are never far from the surface. And these have come to the fore again with news that Unite has suspended the membership of Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner (Rayner says that she actually cancelled her membership months before) and “re-examine” its affiliation to the party.

Disagreements between the union and Labour range widely and echo much of the internal turmoil within the Party itself. The union launched a judicial review over the winter fuel cuts and criticised the welfare cuts.

I think probably more telling are two areas of difference - as Graham has raised concerns about Labour’s Net Zero programme and the impact it could have on workers in the oil and gas industry. And the principal reason for the targeting of Rayner is the handling of the Birmingham bins strike (As well as being DPM, Rayner also holds the Local Government brief).

Relationships between Labour governments and their affiliated unions have always been tricky. For example, Barbara Castle’s seminal, sensible and ultimately defeated ‘In Place of Strife’ strategy was published 56 years ago.

In part, this is because in Government, Labour cannot give unions carte blanche over policy and unions cannot be seen to give the government an easy ride over decisions that affect their members. So what had been a partnership against a previous government dissolves and becomes an endless round of negotiations - often bitter, often public and often with neither side ending up particularly happy.

There are many reasons Unite should be reasonably happy with a lot of what this government is doing. Huge pay increases in a number of sectors (some of which Unite organise in) at the start of their tenure saw pay disputes settled. The Employment Rights Bill might not be everything the unions want, but it goes further towards reinstating both their rights as representatives and workers’ rights more generally than anything since the 1970s. And while climate change obsessives like me are more delighted about the government’s tenacity on Net Zero than the unions who organise in the oil and gas sectors, the government is quite clear that it is not insensitive to the needs of existing workforces to have a role in the transition.

There are some in the Labour Party who would welcome the disaffiliation of Unite (if not the loss of around £1.4 million of donations). The union has long been a highly critical voice of the leadership, and that criticism coming from inside the ‘family’ means more - both to Labour members and to the media. The phrase ‘who will rid me of this turbulent priest’ springs to mind. Unite has long enjoyed its status as a thorn in the side of moderate Labour members and leaderships. Some would not be so very sorry to see that thorn remove itself from the Labour body.

Unite criticising the Labour Party and government means more than a disaffiliated union both in communication terms and because Unite hold formal positions on Labour’s NEC, National Policy Forum and at Conference. They would lose these levers of influence in the party - probably to more moderate union voices - should they choose to disaffiliate. There are those frustrated with Unite who might see that as worth paying that £1.4 million for - though I doubt those voices are strong in Scotland and Wales, where Labour faces difficult elections next year and needs as much funding as possible to help see off threats from Reform and the nationalist parties.

The Labour right itself has long been split between New Labour, who were - at best - deeply disinterested in the union movement and the old Labour right (largely represented by Labour First), who did more organising within the movement to try to bring it further away from the left and towards what they see as the Labour mainstream.

However, for most Labour members this would be a historic and heart-rending split. And one that could reignite the worst instincts of the Labour leadership who need to do more to bring the party together than to continue to punch old factional bruises. There is more to the affiliation than money. It is part of Labour’s historic link with working people that is felt deeply by Labour members across the party and the class spectrum. Losing a major union like Unite would be a blow to Labour’s public image as the party of the workers at a time when burnishing those credentials is a key plank in their battle against Reform.

Those who think this would be an easy choice for Unite are also missing a lot of the nuances. Unite’s links with the party do give them sway over both the policy and operation of the Party, even if not as much as they would like. That would be a lot to give up on when the party is in government (and even when it isn’t). As always, Hamilton has a lot to offer on this point - being in ‘the room where it happens’ matters. And few will know this as well as a union organiser of the kind that Graham is to her core. So, as tired as Graham clearly is of the Labour/Unite psychodrama, she must be aware that leaving the room is not the same as leaving the fight. Instead it is giving up leverage.

While it is also true that Unite members are not as animated by party politics as coverage of the union would tend to assume - nor are they as left wing as their leadership and general positioning would suggest, though they do skew that way. I don’t know that the average Unite member (say the 88 per cent who didn’t vote in the General Secretary race) would be that animated about the raw politics of Unite disaffiliating as those who would comment on their behalf from either side. But that long term loss of influence might well be felt - if not directly attributed to the move.

The timing of the announcements has led to widespread speculation that this is paving the way to Unite backing whatever ends up being the new vehicle for the Zara Sultana and Jeremy Corbyn project that spluttered into semi-being this month. I don’t think that’s completely right. This new potential threat to Labour’s left may play a part in the negotiating thinking, but Graham’s stance has largely been one of wanting to be less like her predecessor Len McCluskey, who was pretty much permanently rumoured to be - and hinting at being - just about to set up a breakaway party of the left.

I think the inclination to say ‘sod it’ reflects Graham’s frustration with the endless coverage of Unite as solely a part of the Labour Party and not as, first and foremost, a traditional member-focused union. And I think this timing had more to do with the ‘big meeting’ (the Durham Miner’s Gala) where union passions are invoked and stoked, and this year, Angela Rayner was booed.

Rayner is, in some ways, an odd target of Unite’s opprobrium. She is a working class woman who made her career on the left through union activity (though Unison, not Unite - and fighting between these unions has been known to get both fierce and petty). Rayner is steering the Employment Rights Bill through parliament and has also announced the largest investment in social housing for a generation. The optics of singling her out are poor. This seems to be a misapplication of the classic left tactic of attacking those who are closer to you more than your more hardcore opponents. This can work on the more insecure, woolly among us (it’s worked on me in the past - until it didn’t), but here it feels like a misreading of Rayner’s own steel and ambition. I can’t see it being the way to get to Rayner who can give as good as she gets.

I think in the end, both Unite and Labour would be poorer without the affiliation and it would be a shame for both sides to sunder than link. The forces pushing it are strong but can be resisted - if there is the political and diplomatic will on both sides to put the energy into making that happen.

So the big question is whether that will exists?

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