Room 828, Institute of Education, Bedford Way, WC1H 0AL
Speakers (pc): John Moloney (PCS AGS candidate), Kelly Rogers (victimised Picturehouse worker/ union activist), Daniel Randall (RMT activist)
Even our most "left-wing" unions are run by full time officials on huge salaries with little connection to the workplace. Officials who start off as workplace reps are soon sucked up into the circles of the boss class. Their salaries afford them comfortable middle-class lifestyles and they spend more and more time with bosses both inside and outside work. They act as mediators between workers and bosses rather than working-class leaders.
The same leadership faction have run the PCS for 15 years. It has been 15 years of unimaginative failure in delivering for the membership. Left Unity (the dominant left-wing bloc in the union, historically led by the Socialist Party) has become a conveyor belt for taking good activists out of the workplace and giving them cushy jobs in the union. They never attempted to change the top-down TUC culture. They became full-time officials, defended all the old bureaucratic privileges and enriched themselves on union funds.
For unions to start winning disputes and become truly member-led, we need to change this bureaucratic culture. We fight for unions run by workers, with no special privileges for union officials. Officials should be elected, accountable and on the same wages as the workers they represent.
Workers’ Liberty supporter, John Moloney, is standing for Assistant General Secretary (AGS) of the PCS, along with other candidates of the Independent Left in the union’s elections (https://m.facebook.com/PCSindependentleft/) If elected John will only take a workers’ wage, donating the rest of the inflated AGS salary back to his cash-strapped union. This is a vital step in transforming the culture of the trade union movement so we can start winning.
If elected, John will argue for: • National pay: those on the same grade should have the same pay, instead of the current cross-departmental inequality • Rank-and-file control: the union should support all groups of workers willing to take action, not set up barriers to them doing so • Accountable full time officials: all full time officials for the union should be elected by and answer to the members, not to the internal staff hierarchy • Organising all government workers: PCS should take the lead from unions like United Voices of the World and our own activists in BEIS, the Culture Sector and HMRC Bootle to fight privatisation by helping outsourced workers fight for a living wage and conditions in line with civil servants.
Come and hear John and other trade union militants discuss perspectives for the trade union movement.