Apathy from the public sector unions

Ed Miliband’s election as Labour leader this week has put the public sector unions at the heart of the political battleground.
Examination of the first preference votes cast by union members shows almost twice as many GMB members voting for Ed Miliband against David, Unison members half as much again for Ed over David, and more than twice as many Unite members voting for Ed over his brother.
Does this, therefore, mean that public sector unions are mobilising for a bitter autumn and winter of discontent against spending cuts and that Ed Miliband will be a helpless pawn in union hands as they take to the streets?
It is unlikely judging from the turnout. Despite the importance of the election and the union leaders’ preferences, turnout was low with both GMB and Unison registering single figures at 7.8% and 6.7% respectively. Of the 419,000 ballot papers distributed by Unison, only 28,142 were cast. Of the 554,130 ballot papers from the GMB, 43,106 were cast. This compares to railway union ASLEF, which had the highest union turnout at 25%, dividing its votes evenly between Ed and David.
So, the turnout suggests that public sector union members were generally apathetic about the leadership elections and that those who did bother to vote were the activists who backed Ed for his tougher stance against spending cuts. In their lack of interest, the rest of the membership is either resigned to cuts or not interested in politics, or both. Either way, it does not suggest that union members will be storming the barricades come October.
One reason may be that on the ground, union branches are more flexible about how they deal with the downturn as they recognise that hard-pressed councils are trying to avoid redundancies, if only on cost grounds. There has been a spate of recent notices to staff consulting on changing – ie, making worse – often generous terms and conditions as a means of reducing the pay bill without lay-offs. Faced with the prospect of either keeping their jobs on less favourable terms or accepting redundancies, members are likely to accept the lesser of the two evils.
Michael Burton, Editor, The MJ