POLITICS
How Mr Fred Jarvis won the Great Insult Handicap
FERDINAND MOUNT
y favourite amendment at this year's TUC came from the Union of Communication Workers, or as we used to call it, in the old days of that chap with the vast whiskers, the postmen's union. Mr Alan Tuffin (what a good name for a postman, with what pleasure would one bestow a Christmas box upon such an amiable fellow) had studied the crucial resolution on Promoting Trade Unionism and brooded on the assertion in para 1 line 3 that 'trade unions and trade union activity are often misrepresented as bully- ing, threatening and undemocratic'. To you or me, that might seem to sum up the situation pretty well in a succinct no- nonsense fashion. But Mr Tuffin and his colleagues found it somehow lacking. And so, with that indefatigable pursuit of the mot juste which distinguishes communica- tion workers the world over, they added the immortal words: 'in paragraph 1, line 4, after "as" insert "selfish, sectionalist"'.
That may sound like enough rude adjec- tives for one afternoon. But not to be outdone, Mr Rodney Bickerstaffe of the National Union of Public Employees both by surname and aggrieved foghorn voice the antithesis of everything the stur- dy Tuffin stands for — threw in that they also had a media image of being `irrelevant', 'prehistoric' and 'out of date'. Mr Tuffin hit back by declaring that the media had accused them of being 'anti- social'; Mr Norman Willis, the General Secretary, plumped for 'irrelevant'. I think Mr Fred Jarvis of the NUT, this year's Congress president, narrowly won this Great Insult Handicap when he alleged that 'certain sections of the press variously describe us as "Twisted Demagogues", "Hooligans and Wreckers", "Trade Union Heavies" and "Bully Boys'".
In theory, Mr John Lyons of the power workers went one better by claiming that the trade unions actually were arrogant and it was not just the misrepresentations of the media. 'The British people do understand us, and they do not greatly like what they see.' On the surface, he is disagreeing with other trade union leaders in arguing that such, accusations have a good deal of truth in them. But in fact, to mention the accusations at all using the words that are used by the abusers — that is the crucial first stage.
The retention of power often depends on keeping certain things unsayable. What one's enemies actually say — their jokes, their insults, their arguments — must be referred to only in the vaguest possible terms and in tones of hushed horror. When Len Murray's New Realism became the order of the day after Mrs Thatcher's second election win, TUC delegates used to talk in the most roundabout and evasive way of what it was they were to be realistic about.
But the Tories' third election victory has shattered these genteel solaces. Plain words have to be used about the scale of the defeat and the irretrievable changes that are happening in people's working lives. Even Mr Norman Willis's fudge that prevented a vote on anything at all and shovelled all the unanswered questions into the lap of the TUC review was itself a piece of the Newest Realism, or what Mr Clive Jenkins calls the New Pessimism. For Mr Willis, crisper this year since he has taken to reading his speeches, knows that no-strike agreements are here to stay. And so does almost everyone else. In the General Council, the vote not to have a vote was carried by 40-2 (Arthur Scargill and one other).
Mr Eric Hammond is insufferably right again. The electricians' leader was not chucked out of the TUC for taking govern- ment money for union ballots. He was not chucked out of the TUC for supplying or supporting Mr Rupert Murdoch's work- force. And he will not be chucked out for signing deals which bind his members not to strike and to accept the results of arbitration.
Poor Ron Todd of the TGWU was pitiably on the defensive when he proposed the notorious Resolution 6 which was supposed to pave the way for Mr Ham- mond's expulsion. Responding to Mr Hammond's taunt that the T and G had also signed dozens of no-strike deals, he whimpered that this was forgivable when workers had their backs to the wall, but that, if such deals had been signed, 'they have not been condoned by my executive and they have not been a deliberate act of policy'.
Mr Hammond gleefully retorted that 'I could do it too, I could have officials doing it without my knowledge.' In fact, my impression is that something of that kind did happen in the early stages of the Wapping dispute and that Mr Hammond was turning several blind eyes to the activities of his officials.
People who join firms under no-strike deals expect their working lives to be strike-free. The histrionic protestations on Monday from Messrs Todd and Bicker- staffe that they would never give up the right to strike are humbug too. Everyone knows that, in extremis, nobody can pre- vent a group of workers from downing tools and walking out. But we move into a new world when the strike ceases to be a weapon of normal resort and becomes not so much illegal as eccentric.
This is a fundamental change to British trade unionism. The Scargills and the Todds are entirely right to regard it as threatening their traditions and values. It is not a natural evolution of long-standing principles and practice. It is a sharp break. `Union is strength' means and has always meant 'strength to defeat the employer by collective action'; it does not ' mean strength to negotiate car insurance on cheaper terms.
Mr Hammond's 'user-friendly' unionism is not just a trendy gloss to arrest falling membership. It represents a turning away from the preoccupation with force and political power which has prevented British trade unions from noticing the multiplicity of consumer services which they could offer their members. The new unionism has nothing at all to do with any supposed historic mission of the working class, or indeed with party politics.
Because there were no dramatic votes or huddled caucuses in the foyer of the Opera House, by traditional conference standards this year's TUC was the dampest of squibs. Some old hands consoled themselves with the thought that the postponement of all decisions might be building up a decent firework display for next year. But perhaps fireworks have been cancelled for the foreseeable future. The pressure exerted by the forces of which Mr Hammond is the irrepressibly chirpy spokesman is relentless and mounting. If the TUC tries to impose its traditional disciplines, it will split, and membership fall still further.
As Bill Jordan of the engineers pointed out, non-unionism is the greatest threat of all. Arthur Scargill, who has lost a higher proportion of his members by his own actions than any other trade union leader in British history, berated this supineness. But for the TUC the supine position is the only hope of survival.
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