Sign the Petition!
I've been speaking to some nice people in the Scottish Parliament about my petition to make big union bureaucracies more accountable to individual union members.
The upshot is that I've decided to direct my petition towards the UK Government since the regulation of trade unions is a matter that is reserved to the Westminster Parliament.
To get things off the ground I require five other people (who must be UK citizens) to sign the petition before it will go 'live' on the UK Government's web site.
Here's the link I've been sent by the Petitions Team at Westminster, so if you are in favour of levelling this terribly uneven playing field, then fire away - and once the petition is 'alive and kicking', so to speak, I can think about how to generate more support.
I’ve made a petition – will you sign it? Click this link to sign the petition:
My petition:
Government should introduce an independent complaints process for trade unions.
In 1999 Scotland's council employers and the trade unions (GMB, Unison and Unite) agreed to end widespread pay discrimination against low paid predominantly female jobs including carers, catering workers, cleaners, clerical workers and classroom assistants - but this commitment was never delivered.
In 2005 thousands of equal pay claims were lodged in employment tribunals after a campaign led by Action 4 Equality Scotland. Many individual members lost out because of poor advice from their unions. For example, in North Lanarkshire where the GMB restricted members' claims to only 3 years and South Lanarkshire where members were advised not to pursue claims against their local Labour-run council. An independent complaints process would bring unions into line with other areas of public life.
