The Civil Service Unions
Officers of the Trades Union Congress and of the Union Of Post Office Workers are. now considering means of getting round the consequences of the false step taken in seeking affiliation of a Civil Service Union to the T.U.C. The formal application for affiliation is on the agenda of the T.U.C. Conference in September. The question for decision now is not whether the Civil Service unions ought to have all the rights of other unions, but whether they should break the law as laid down in the Trades Disputes Act. To that question there is only one possible answer. Whatever demands they may have to make for an alteration in their position, there is no conceivable justification for an attempt to coerce the Government by defying the law. The Government has stated the position firmly and clearly. If affiliation to the T.U.C. took place, it would not be the T.U.C. nor even the Union of Post Office Workers which would bear the consequences ; the members of the latter would be the sufferers. Each would at once pay the penalty by ceasing to be a member of the permanent Civil Service, and would forfeit his accumulated rights to pension. The Government has quite properly insisted that if' there is to be any change in the law it should result from negotiation, not from the threat of illegal uni- lateral action. The best thing that the Civil Service Union and the T.U.C. can do is to get out of the false position in which they were putting themselves as soon as possible. The whole matter has been very disquieting to the Labour Party, and has become an embarrassment for the T.U.C. itself, whose relations with the Government have hitherto been excellent. If anything is to be done, the application for affiliation should first be withdrhwn, and then the Post Office Workers and the other Civil ,Service unions might seek a remedy through negotiation. The National Executive of the Labour Party have suggested a compromise solution, under which the Civil Service unions would not have the right of the political levy or of association with a political party, but would be allowed affiliation with other industrial unions. That is a very reasonable proposition, and one which the unions concerned might well put up for discussion with the Government.
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