The future of trade unions

Text of Brendan Barber's (TUC General Secretary) City University Vice Chancellor's Lecture

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Managements are not all wise, and the strike weapon - although one of last resort - can win important gains.

In the last year both the strike by Carparo's workers against cuts to their pensions and by local government workers against poverty pay were clear victories, and had widespread public support. However strikes always represent a failure to resolve issues in other ways, and few union members want to rush to strike action. It takes a lot before people give up their pay.

And oddly enough, it is precisely because strikes are uncommon, that they make news. They are still in the 'man bites dog' category, just as the 'union strikes sensible deal with employer' is about as newsy as 'dog doesn't bite man'.

I am not sure that the caricature of the 1970s union activist always looking for the opportunity to strike ever had that much basis in reality. But if there was an ideology of adversarialism around then, the dominant union objective today can best be summed up as partnership.

Partnership is one of those words whose meaning is contested, and is therefore always in danger of losing any precision. I know that many - including some in the trade unions - now attack something called partnership, that I would not dignify with that term.

So let me try and define what the TUC means by partnership.

By partnership we do not mean an acquiescent workforce ready to take anything from management. Nor does it flow from a mirror image of adversarialism - replacing the idea that workers and employers are always opposed, with the equally mistaken view that they always have the same interest.

Instead we mean high trust industrial relations based on the recognition that employees and their employer have both much in common and inevitable differences. And that it is best to try and resolve those differences through consultation and negotiation as that way can, and should, deliver gains for both sides.

The classic partnership bargain is security for flexibility. Employees who feel their jobs are secure are far more likely to agree to the flexibility that modern organisations need to respond to rapidly changing customer demand. And there is mounting evidence that high commitment workplace relationships do make companies more successful, and little evidence that unions hold today's companies back.

Through the work of the TUC's Partnership Institute, which offers training and consultancy services to unions and employers, we are seeing more and more organisations in both the public and private sectors taking initiatives to put their relationships on a partnership footing.

The gains for employers can include better workplace morale and commitment, reduced absenteeism and labour turnover, and the opportunity to tap into the ideas for change and innovation that their workers bring to the organisation. For workers there can be real gains, not only in job security but in the opportunity to genuinely participate in shaping their jobs away from command and control management styles.

A key issue in partnership organisations is the increasing role that unions play in delivering skills and training and this is perhaps the biggest and least recognised development in modern trade unionism.

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