Union democracy

The UK’s anti-strike legislation, introduced by Thatcher and Major in the 1980s, and continued by Cameron with the Trade Union Act of 2016, means that this country has some of the most restrictive strike controls in the democratic world. Yet in this political climate, where it is already hard enough...

Janine Booth speaks at NEU annual conference 2026, proposing Motion 40: Equality and sector conferences and replying to the debate. The issues addressed in the debate are outlined here.

By James Willis In the 1970s in Australia, a series of worker-led actions opposed corporate development in New South Wales and Victoria, organised by the New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation (NSW BLF). The workers joined with community groups to put green bans on developments that harmed...

After an uprising in East Germany in 1953, Bertold Brecht penned his poem, The Solution. It included a memorable parody of the reaction of the Stalinist regime to the revolt. “The people”, they said, “had forfeited the confidence of the government and could win it back only by redoubled efforts...

NEU's Conference Committee made a decision to have an additional guest speaker at Conference. This was set to go ahead at the start of Tuesday afternoon's session - until delegates found out about it and objected. It is undemocratic and wrong for Conference Committee to add a speaker to the agenda -...

Welcome to the first in what we fear will be a series of 'Stop the Shenanigans' posts from NEU annual conference. Quite rightly, conferencs has procedures in place to debate urgent issues that arise too late to have motions or amendments submitted about them. When 300 delegates submit such a motion...

On Monday, NEU annual conference will debate rule changes proposed by the Executive. These come under Motion 4.4. It is one of the very first things on the agenda, so there is a danger that it will seem like a formality to be voted through. But these rule change are very important - some important...

NEU members may be surprised to know that the union's Rule Book allows non-members to stand for the post of General Secretary. Although NEU - unlike NASUWT - is unlikely to elect a non-member, we think that it is important to change the rules so that this is not possible. The basis of trade unionism...

Educators' Fightback is suggesting that Districts submit this motion to NEU annual conference. Read the background to the issue here. Conference notes the Executive’s decision [1] to: 1. restrict members to attending one equality and one sector conference per academic year 2. deprioritise members...

This is an opinion post. What do you think? Article update: The union has clarified since the Executive took this decision that Equality and Sector Conferences are treated as two distinct types of conferences that one person can attend. You can therefore attend one sector conference and one equality...