My Day as a Union Activist

On the 30^th November 2011, I began the process to Unionise my workforce. The process was started in the morning of that day. I arrived into work to the sound of colleagues discussing the strikes by public sector workers. Like many in the private sector, the perception of the public sector was negative.

After listening to their concerns I suggested that perhaps the reason why the public sector had better working conditions was because it was unionised. Having listened to my arguments about the positive effects of trade unionism, and specifying the negative ones too, I had a willing recruitment pool. Over the course of the day, I had got three of my colleagues to join a trade union. The goal is to have a fully unionised workforce by the end of the year.

“Why unionise a workforce?” I hear you ask. Well, as someone with a fairly important remit in a SME unionising the workforce would appear on surface to be self-defeating. On the contrary, a unionisation of the workforce has lots of benefits. Many trade unions provide members with healthcare schemes, death in service benefits etc. We provide all those benefits too. Membership of a trade union also provides access to extra training, yet necessary training, such as first aid certificates. These services either cost SMEs or the individual lots of money. Money saved can then be ploughed back into remuneration for employees, either in increased wages or better employer contributions to pensions.

Industrial action is incredibly unlikely as the ownership is not divorced from the management and management is not divorced from the workforce. The (re-)unionisation of the private sector is often overlooked for reasons I am ignorant of, but it has benefits for everyone including employers.