Back in September, as his party launched a charm offensive to coincide with 2009 TUC Congress, Tory Chairman Eric Pickles MP was fulsome in his praise of trade unions. Barely 6 months on and in the last few days of a general election campaign the same Tory politician reverts to type.
At the TUC he said unions “...are absolutely massively important. They might not have the enormous strength they had at one time, but in terms of the ability to further workers’ rights and to work with management to further good practice are considerable. And certainly we have been having lots of meetings with top trade union officials over the last few months. I think we recognise that we will be looking for goodwill and mutual co-operation. I think the old antagonisms have long gone.”
http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/north-east-news/2009/09/13/conservatives-cosy-up-to-trade-union-congress-79310-24673833/
Barely 6 months on and in the last few days of a general election campaign the same Tory politician reverts to type with an anti-union smear story ‘the only people backing Labour are the unions.’
http://www.conservatives.com/News/News_stories/2010/05/The_only_people_backing_Labour_are_the_unions.aspx
Pickles seizes upon the latest Electoral Commission report which confirms that over 70 per cent of Labour Party funding in the last quarter came from the trade unions. He notes that since 2001, trade unions have donated nearly £90 million to the Labour Party and states "how can Gordon Brown stand up for British business and British passengers when his election campaign takes millions from striking unions?"
Pickles is on the record as supporting a cap on union donations to the Labour Party. How long before legislation on party funding is back on the political agenda?
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1af095e8-3164-11df-9741-00144feabdc0.html
