Unison was of course conceived in the early 90s and since then a number of rules and regulations have been agreed and implemented at national level. These rules were debated extensively by national conference. So we have the principles of proportionality and fair representation, which includes ring fencing seats for low paid women, imported in the national rule book.
We then have the same principles transferred into the regional rule book and of course this means that regional AGM elections are conducted within that framework of rules.
What shocks and amazes me is that a 'progressive' trades union with such good Equality driven rules has failed totally to make local branches adopt the same rules. So you have for example a situation where a branch can have the majority of male branch officers which is in direct contrast to national and regional principles and rules This is of course not right at all! I am not saying that a branch should have identical rules and local variations need to be taken into account but we must have a mechanism where branches are told they have a certain time to bring their local rule book in line with national. I can't see how anyone can argue with this otherwise we will continue to have local parts of unison being at variance with national and regional and this cannot be right or good for our Equalities agenda!
No comments:
Post a Comment