There is a time and place for everything as my Granny used to say. Who would have imagined that the question of the Labour Leadership would have been reawakened by Siobhain McDonagh? Avid followers of the Save the Labour Party website will have spotted the exchange of correspondence between the new Labour Party General Secretary Ray Collins and myself on the subject of Leader/Deputy Leader nomination papers.

The words of a union insider to me this week, reacting to Tory suggestions that next week's National Policy Forum will involve a 'dodgy deal' as part of the second Warwick Agreement. I report for Tribune magazine, and on my blog I've posted some thoughts on the atmosphere I've encountered this week. Comments welcome.

The culmination of a fantastic campaign by trade unions saw 147 MPs, almost entirely Labour, turn out two weeks ago to back a Bill designed to give more than one million agency workers equal pay and equal treatment alongside their directly-employed counterparts.

Click on youtube - excellent typically Aussie take on the age old question of “What have the Unions ever done for us?” Hat tip to Ian at IANSREDLOG

The public sector sister trade union to UNISON in France, the CGT and others are in battle with right wing French President Nicolas Sarkozy over pensions. He declared yesterday "We shall not give way, we shall not retreat". Is he having his Maggie Thatcher moment?

While on paper at least, the unions seem up against it, a newly elected President who had reform of public sector pensions in his manifesto and it appears marginal public support for taking a “tough line”.

Or Harrogate's Bettys? For the last week or so I have had a constructive on-line debate with T&G Unite Steward (and “Bewildered LP member of Southampton Itchen CLP”) Iansredblog on trade unions, possible good practice elsewhere in the world and in particular the role of shop stewards.

It was good to see Tony Woodley (T&G Unite Joint General Secretary) take a well deserved swipe at George Monbiot in yesterday’s Guardian. Monbiot, otherwise known as “Moonbat”, is the Stowe public school educated son of a deputy Chair of the Tory Party, who had the cheek in an article on Tuesday, to lecture trade unions on “Class” and affiliation to the Labour Party.

He called trade unions “Turkeys led by chickens, they will never stop voting for Christmas”. He also offensively claims that the unions would still support the Labour Party even if it turned itself into a neo-fascist party!

Well New Labour seems alive and well from what I am seeing. With Harman spending most of her day backtracking on her earlier views and now this. The plans put forward seem reasonable however, as it means individual members will get more of a say.

From BBC News:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6236018.stm

The Socialist Youth Network is launching the COalition Fighting Unfair Pay - a campaign to fight for a real Living Wage for all workers.

Why are the Unions trying to come up with variations on the same word as their (meaningless) title all of a sudden?

We're now going to have Unison, Unity, Unite and Unify: is this going to be more or less helpful in getting workers to join unions given that you can't tell from their new names what sectors or trades they represent?  I think not.

So I'm today proposing one union: the UUUUU; which has the advantage of being able to be further abbreviated to just U.  Think of the opportunities: "U, U and U can join U, today!".

Are there any remaining variations on the word "union" that haven't been utilised yet, given that we've still got a handful of TUs with very old Labour acronyms like USDAW and CWU...they've clearly got to go. 

Have to say I much prefer the more traditional names that actually mean something to this new meaningless PR makeover - the Unions need so much more than this sort of stunt to turn themselves around.

Unbelievable but true, Bernie Matthews, he of the anti-union fame who has imported 1,000 workers which  keeps down the wage rates of UK people and has allegedly acted in various anti-union ways, has been made a "commander of the Royal Victorian Order,"

At the risk of kicking the whole party funding debate off once again, I have further considered the issue of opting in or out of the trade union political levy.

In light of the Hayden Phillips furore, yesterday Alan Johnson confirmed that he believed in the trade union link.  But a Tribune article from last year suggests that he is opposed to the electoral college he is fighting the Deputy Leadership through.  

Can Johnson be trusted ensuring trade union involvement, or does he have an agenda to reduce their long-term role in the party?  

Two articles in the press today report that the Hayden Phillips enquiry into political party funding is reaching dangerous ground for many in the Labour Party.  

I read today that Hazel Blears is warning that immigration is going to become the biggest issue that Labour must address.

Well at last the warnings from Frank Field and others have been listened to.   Other Labour MPs have spoken about builders daily pay rates being halved.

There is a crisis at the moment. Nobody can deny it. Membership is plumetting and there are loads of tiny left wing splinters...

In promoting the London 2012 Olympic Games (the `Games') Lord Coe, Tessa Jowell and Ken Livingstone have widely courted the general public, local East London communities and the British trade union movement with commitments regarding the social and environmental legacies that will be delivered by the Games.

This is from jonrogers1963.blogspot.com;

There is growing support for an amnesty for so-called "illegal" migrant workers in order to support the organising work being done by trade unions among this exploited group - Labour Party members should be backing this call.

Democratic reform is needed to preserve the historic Labour-Union Link.