8th UNITE POLICY CONFERENCE 2025
Monday 7 July – Friday 11 July 2025
Brighton Centre, Kings Road, Brighton.
LET US KNOW IF YOU ARE A DELEGATE TO UNITE’S POLICY CONFERENCE
Please send us your mobile phone number and your region to nationalunitedleft@gmail.com if you are a delegate to the Policy Conference and we will add you to our WhatsApp communications groups.
Conference Bulletin 1
RECLAIM OUR UNION!!
Unite’s eighth Policy Conference takes place at a turning point for our union.
Will we continue to be a lay member led organisation, operating on socialist principles – or a union dominated by a centralised top-down structure and a narrowly focused concept of workers’ issues?
There are many motions/ composites at Brighton next week where some of the above will be discussed either directly or within the topics of the motions.
It might be worth recalling the obvious fact that Unite is not a single industry union, we are a general union comprising 19 differing industrial sectors born out of a merger of two powerful unions- TGWU & AMICUS. Since Unite was formed we have also merged with UCATT, which itself had its own culture, traditions, and Rule Book.
In a vast general union of around a million members, with such differing industrial and political backgrounds, ensuring the union stays united and works through differences in a comradely fashion is key.
The biennial Policy Conference has a crucial role in keeping Unite united, and, as importantly, lay member led. It is often viewed as the parliament of the union. Motions agreed next week will go before the Executive Council and then priorities will be agreed, with many successful motions going out to sectors, equality committees, regions and nations to implement.
It is worrying that Unite’s objective is a narrow focus solely on the workplace. This ignores important issues affecting members, regardless of their workplace, such as Palestine.
Unite has always taken its obligations on international and political issues, as well as reaching out to organise the unorganised very seriously. Unite had a vision when it was founded of a union that didn’t stop when members left their workplaces, but understood the link between stronger workplaces, a political voice, organising the unorganised and international solidarity. All these reinforce each other and build towards power in the workplace.
Previous Policy Conferences have recognised that winning in the workplace in the UK and Ireland would be easier if the anti-trade union laws were scrapped in the UK and a wealth tax was implemented to ensure our members get a bigger slice of the social pie, in non-workplace areas like healthcare, housing and public transport.
Employers operate globally, and we need to defend our members interests we must be global facing too. Unite has a history of practical support to trade unionists, social activists and peoples being oppressed, in places like Colombia, Palestine and Kurdistan.
This internationalism strengthens us and our fighting spirit when opposing bad employers and bad government in the UK and Ireland.
The above important areas of Unite work are reflected in the four clauses in Rule 2 Objects (2.1.3, 2.1.4,2.1.6 and 2.1.8) of our Rule Book mentioned above they are of importance and positively impact the fight in our workplaces.
That is why we must reject any attempts to stifle democratic debates at conference particularly around Palestine. Unite’s national leadership needs to be clear that it is unacceptable to supply military equipment to the IDF. Unite is big enough and strong enough to support our members either individually or collectively, especially in any of our sectors building or transporting military equipment to the IDF, if members decide not to work on any such equipment being used to slaughter defenseless Palestinians.
The current EC Chair has ruled out over 20 motions on Gaza to the Executive Council from regions, NISCs and Equality committees over the past two years, although current Unite policy is to support BDS.
The Chair must not be allowed to stifle debate at conference next week in a similar fashion.
At the conference United Left delegates will be challenging the current administration on crucial issues such as:
PALESTINE
The union’s national leadership has signally failed to take effective action on Palestine (our union’s support for the Palestinian people having been determined by our Policy Conference). The leadership has failed to carry out the BDS policy agreed at the 2023 Policy Conference – in the face of the Israeli state’s openly prosecuted policies of ethnic cleansing and genocide.
There are 17 motions supporting action on Palestine coming to the conference, some of which are being composited. At least one composite contains a wrecking amendment and Motion 2 on the conference agenda if passed could be used to stop or limit members action against ethnic cleansing and genocide.
- We need to be very clear what we are voting on early in conference, and how any result could influence other debates.
- Check your branch/ committee motions and do not agree to any composite that attempts to put caveats on our support for Gaza.
THE UNION’S ANNUAL ACCOUNTS
No independently audited annual accounts have been presented to Unite’s Executive Council since the current General Secretary took office.
One EC member (who also happens to be one of the majority 31 EC members who recently voted to remove the union Chair for what many believe to be his undemocratic behaviour) exercised his right to report the General Secretary to the Certification Officer for this failure to make financial information available to members as required under rule.
If no accounts for 2023 and 2024 are presented to this year’s conference it would mean that no independent audited accounts for the prior year have been made available to either the 2023 or 2025 policy conferences.
The United Left is hopeful that a fully audited up to date set of Unite accounts will be available in good time for the start of conference. This has always been the norm and is a Rule Book requirement to allow conference the opportunity to interrogate the previous two year’s annual expenditure and raise questions from the floor.
At the 2023 Policy conference, where no accounts were available to delegates the GS stated that accounts would be prepared “shortly”. Clearly Covid and the (overlong) investigation into the Birmingham Hotel affair impacted accounts in 2021, but this is 2025, is there any reason, four years later, not to have independently audited accounts available?
Why must an EC member have to take the union to the Certification Officer to obtain their (and every member’s) right to scrutinise the union’s accounts? Why does it need the Certification Officer to find against the union and fine Unite to get any movement on this issue?
LET US KNOW IF YOU ARE A DELEGATE TO POLICY CONFERENCE
Please send us your mobile phone number and your region to nationalunitedleft@gmail.com if you are a delegate to the Policy Conference and we will add you to our WhatsApp communications groups.