THE POPULAR FRONT FOR THE LIBERATION OF CPSA
FIGHTING ON IN OUR 45th YEAR BUT A BIT RETIRED NOW
FREEDOM! UNITY! SOCIALISM!
ONE CIVIL SERVICE UNION,
ONE GLORIOUS DESTINY!
REVOLUTION UNTIL VICTORY!
THE IRMF VIEW 12/07/02
Text of speech to PCS Democracy meeting by Jake Wilde
LINK TO BLADDERGATE
Good evening colleagues. Thanks to Steve for inviting me to speak at this meeting. I'll try not to be as pompous as Barry Reamsbottom is being at the moment. His latest efforts in the form of Members' Briefing 7 and editorial in PCS View are misguided to say the least. But I'm also not going to beat around the bush about the Campaign for PCS Democracy, Mark Serwotka or Left Unity. But more of that later.
First of all, a little bit of background about me. I've worked for the Revenue here in Hull for ten years. I was first elected to the NEC this year, having previously represented members at regional and local level. So the meeting of 23 May was my first NEC meeting and I expect that few are likely to top it, whatever else happens to me in my union career. I'm still a regional negotiator, and am now also on our Group Executive Committee. I am very proud to have been elected to the NEC and I take the job very seriously.
I'm also a member of Inland Revenue Membership First, a loose alliance of individuals committed to representing ordinary members' views and protecting the union from the political extremism of Left Unity. We also have no interest in maintaining the cult of personality that keeps the Moderates together. We're not the Moderates in the Inland Revenue Group as Left Unity accuse us of being, nor are we the Trotskyite sympathisers that the Moderates often label us as. I know that every representative, be they in a faction or a so-called "independent", believes that they truly represent members' interests. The difference with us is that we are neither politically motivated nor driven by self-aggrandisement.
A lot of rubbish has been written and said about the events of 23 May and I don't really want to add my version of events to the heap. I didn't feel particularly intimidated, though all the shouting did give me a bit of a headache. My BEC were also amused to read in one of the Left Unity leaflets that I had voted enthusiastically with the Right wing. My Branch Secretary said that it called into question the validity of the whole article, since, in her experience, I'd never done anything enthusiastically.
But I must stress that I, and my IRMF colleagues, came to the meeting expecting the Moderates to do something, but with no prior knowledge of exactly how Barry Reamsbottom would attempt to stay on. At Conference there were various discussions, including with Left Unity people, of the possible scenarios. One thing was for sure; we knew that there would be an NEC before 31 May, the date Barry was supposed to go. That was not a surprise. I found out the actual date on the evening of 21 May, about 40 hours before it was due to start. We found out how Barry proposed to stay on a minute before the meeting. That is not collaboration.
We in IRMF issued a statement recently describing our view on the General Secretary issue. In that we said:
The IRMF members of the NEC at the time (Les Priestley, Gwenda Binks, Ted Euers, Cath Coldbeck, Judi Bastow, Claudette Herbert) believe that in 2000, the Agreement with Barry Reamsbottom, and the subsequent General Secretary election that was won by Mark Serwotka, was lawful. This belief is based on the legal advice that was in front of the NEC at the time.
Obviously there has now been contrary legal advice produced. Because Left Unity prevented a debate at the NEC on 23rd May, Ted Euers and Jake Wilde decided that they had no alternative but to accept the advice that was presented to the NEC. Cath Coldbeck didn't, Les Priestley was absent, and Gwenda Binks, Judi Bastow, and Claudette Herbert couldn't hear sufficiently to be able to cast a vote.
We do not believe that members would wish us to support something that is deemed to be unlawful: therefore we have no alternative but to await the decision of the High Court.
We go on to say:
We deplore the detrimental effect this issue is having on the proper business of protecting and promoting members' interests. The operation of PCS HQ is being disrupted, and an enormous amount of time and energy is being wasted. Some of the NEC, and a lot of full time staff have had to spend more time responding to these events than being able to work on behalf of members.
However, we are proud of the efforts of IR Group Officers, staff, and Group Executive Committee members, who have been able to minimise the impact on IR Group issues. The legitimate business of prosecuting the members' agenda with the Inland Revenue continues unabated, and with some success.
An example of that success is that the PCS Inland Revenue Group GEC have agreed a suspension of the link between performance and pay for a year, giving us time to negotiate a new system that satisfies our longstanding aims of breaking the link permanently and a new performance management system that doesn't discriminate against black, disabled, part-time and female members.
As you all know, the case is due in the High Court next week so that a judge can determine what the correct legal position is. It is a shame that our union has to spend our money on this, but when an NEC starts to mess around with its employees' contracts there is always a danger that it will end up in court. I refer, of course, to the NEC of 2000 to 2002. It seemed that this would go to court two years ago until it became clear that Barry would have to pay for it himself. People ask why he waited until now. The only reason that I can see is that a Moderate majority on the NEC means that he can get us to pay for it.
Of course that all depends on whether we actually get to court. This week Barry Reamsbottom wrote to Mark Serwotka and Janice Godrich to offer a deal. Barry has proposed a withdrawal of Court proceedings ('thereby saving £250,000 of members' money') under the following conditions:
1. that Barry and Mark continue as joint General Secretaries for 18 months;
2. that an election is held after 18 months between the two;
and
3. that NEC business commences on the basis of the Standing Orders put before the NEC held on 23rd May.
This offer doesn't appear to be public knowledge yet, so I don't know what Mark and Janice's response is. Perhaps we'll find out tonight. I'm in the privileged position of not having to choose what to do about it, yet I can still pontificate about what everyone else should do, so here goes.
I voted the way I did on 23rd May because if Barry did have a case then it would stand up to scrutiny in court. I want to see if it does or we'll end up back there in the future, quite possibly in 18 months time if he loses the election. I want an end to all doubt. We must explain to members the necessity of settling this, even if it costs money to do so.
So what might be the outcomes if we are going to court? One of my major concerns is what might happen if Barry's case is thrown out. Does that means that an NEC can legitimately change the union's rules relating to the terms and conditions of the General Secretary, just so long as we pay off his or her contract? What chance that Mark will survive until 2005 then? I believe that if the NEC of 2000 to 2002 acted unlawfully then we will have to accept that. But equally I believe the court must give some consideration to our collective view that we wanted an early General Secretary election. I voted for that in 2000, and if you were a member then you probably did.
Consequently I believe that Mark Serwotka is the democratically elected General Secretary, and has a democratic right to the post. However it may be that Barry Reamsbottom has a legal right to the post. The High Court will decide that and I will respect the decision. I can assure you that IRMF will respect the decision. I expect that most ordinary members will respect the decision. Will Left Unity? Will the Moderates? Let me make this clear - if the court rules against Barry Reamsbottom I expect him to depart immediately.
Equally the court might decide to continue with what it sees as the status quo; that is that Barry and Mark become Joint General Secretaries until Barry goes in 2004, leaving Mark as sole General Secretary until 2005. If this is the outcome then the court will have to make it very clear that the next election is in 2005 when Mark's term comes to an end. If not then we'll be back where we started from when 2004 rolls around.
Let's not fool ourselves about the far Left's response to these events. I don't blame Left Unity for using this issue as a recruitment campaign, for trying to sweep up other issues within it, such as privatisation and national pay bargaining, and using the whole thing as a public litmus test of left wing credentials. I've been accused of being a fascist and a Stalinist - on one occasion even in the same sentence - just because of the way I voted on 23 May. I've even been vilified by the self-appointed leaders of the non-Revenue part of Membership First. They've quit our grouping now and good riddance. Let's get one thing clear. I am a democrat. I am such a democrat that I actually stand in elections, unlike some of the people who call me names. I also have a mandate; a clear direction from members to prevent the far left from controlling this union. The far left only believe in democracy when it suits them, just as they only reckon the law matters when it suits them. On this occasion we have a genuine conflict between the law of the land and our members' democratic will. But both Left Unity and the Moderates would have you believe that one takes precedence over the other.
The extreme left Socialist Alliance is the political party most of the leadership of Left Unity support or are members of. These are the jokers that get a handful of votes at general elections where they stand, or tell working people to vote Tory to keep Labour out. The latest leaflet from the Socialist Alliance reckons that the court will back Barry out of class loyalty. It says:
"We believe that judges, from their class position, can not trusted…" To these people this is a class war issue, further evidence of the "New Labour/Tory consensus to push privatisation, crippling legal curbs on trade union action and to put profit before people."
The Moderates have behaved little better throughout this whole sorry episode. At our last NEC meeting, called by Barry Reamsbottom to push through the disputed Standing Orders and Sub-Committee papers, as well as some other nonsense about appointing two more Deputy General Secretaries, the Moderates walked out because they couldn't get their way, leaving the meeting inquorate. Barry actually had a bat and ball under his arm. I'd gone down to London to try and do some work, progress the members' business and push forward some of the ideas I have about the kind of work we ought to be doing. What did I end up doing? Twiddling my thumbs as we spent the two days adjourned. Guess how many items we concluded? One - Apologies. Well, we might have concluded item 2, the Standing Orders but both sides have issued different minutes so it's hard to tell. It's pathetic. Credit to Janice though, she did very well to keep order, and, although I didn't agree with her ruling on the Standing Orders, she actually wanted to get on with business.
So, whatever the outcome of the court case I will be making sure that the General Secretary, whoever he is, or the Joint General Secretaries if that is what the court decides, does what members want. Let's get next week out of the way and get on with things. On that at least, I'm sure we can all agree.