Collective voice call

Collective bargaining’s massive decline in the UK must be reversed, Unite delegate Mahf Kahn told the TUC conference on Monday (September 10).

He called the reduction of collective bargaining along with “the silencing of the voice of workers” is a “crisis which defines our times.”

He blamed this dismantling of collective bargaining, which has come about under the decline of traditional work and the political ideology of recent governments, as “the root cause of inequality unseen since the 70s”.

“It’s about the balance of power, in the workplace and in society,” he added.

He highlighted that the fall in UK collective bargaining is among the fastest in the developed world and that even in manufacturing , which he said was once a “fortress of collective bargaining”, only about 22 per cent of manufacturing workers had their pay determined through a union agreement last year.

He called this an urgent issued and explained how in his own company, Rolls-Royce, a large manufacturing organisation, the union there stops the collective bargaining decline by organising white collar staff, apprentices, and even agency workers.

“As a result we are able to secure UK infrastructure investment, no redundancy clauses and improvements to final salary pensions against recent trends,” Mahf noted.

“But we cannot reverse the decline in collective bargaining by organising alone,” he warned. “We need collective bargaining legislation which throws out the most restrictive anti-trade union laws in Western Europe.

“We need to re-establish sectorial collective bargaining, backed up by the right to access trade unions for each and every workplace,” Mahf added.

Urging conference to support the motion, he said, “the law must become an aid to organising, not a barrier.”

The motion was carried.