For most politicians anything beyond the next election comes under the heading of blue skies strategic thinking. It is a common complaint in Britain that boardrooms fail to think long term. But it cannot be said that many politicians set a better example.
Trade unions are rather different. While the political context we operate in is of huge importance to us, we are not governed by a four to five year cycle. Many of our campaigns end up being far more long term.
Take the minimum wage. I can remember when it was a minority pursuit even among trade unionists, with the majority taking the view that it would undermine union bargaining. Now it has such wide consensus support that even the Conservatives have signed up to it, and it is almost as taken for granted in Britain as it has been for years in every other modern economy.
I suspect our support for rights for information and consultation at the workplace is on a similar trajectory. Indeed, some of the parallels with the minimum wage are surprisingly close. There was a time when universal rights to consultation were highly controversial among unions, on the grounds that this would give rights by law to non-union members that unions should negotiate.
Just as other countries could not understand the fuss about the minimum wage in Britain, they now cannot understand why modest European proposals for medium and large businesses to inform and consult with their workforces are so unpopular here. Yet it is clear that we lose out from having fewer rights than elsewhere.
BMW would certainly not have been able to get away with what they were threatening at Longbridge in their own country. Nor would it have taken everyone by surprise, as they would have had to give national and local government, as well as the workforce, good notice of their plans.
We are still at the stage where employers are opposed to consultation rights as they once were to the minimum wage. The CBI, who are normally as careful with their language as we are at the TUC, have recently gone over the top at the suggestion that the next Labour Government would introduce limited rights at the national level for consultation when there is a takeover or merger. The CBI say they will fight ‘tooth and nail’ against European proposals and, in a move that is unlikely to be welcomed by a Government hoping their more limited proposal will lower the temperature, declared: ‘no compromise.’
But all the time we are being told that we are now part of a knowledge economy. If this does not mean that knowledge must be shared in any modern successful organisation, then it is hard to see that it is anything more than a new management buzzword.
Indeed, TUC analysis of the exhaustive Government-sponsored Workplace Employee Relations Survey confirms what should be obvious for anyone left-of-centre. Companies that recognise unions and practice partnership industrial relations are more successful, both financially and in productivity terms, than other companies. Too many managers prefer the easy route of command and control. But a modern economy needs better leaders who can really get the best from their staff. Information and consultation rights will help spread the partnership message.