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There are rather too many candidates for ‘the bravest trade unionist I know’ – frankly I wish our brothers and sisters had less opportunity to bid for the title. But one of them is Mansour Osanloo, the jailed leader of the bus workers union in Tehran, Iran, and he needs your help.
Mansour has been in jail for over two years now (he was seized shortly after visiting the TUC, ITF and ITUC), and his health is deteriorating – in particular he needs urgent medical attention to his eye to save his sight. Amnesty International, who consider him a prisoner of conscience, have put out an Urgent Action cdall so that you can take action on line. See more about the general situation facing Iranian workers at the Justice for Iranian workers website.
Please do. Not just because an injruy to one of us is an injury to all of us, or out of common human decency. But also because if we protest when one of our own is in trouble, our opponents will think twice before doing it again, and if we can stop them doing what they are doing, we are building stronger unions.
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The results are in for the TUC ‘60 Second Ad’ Contest. The judging panel, which included Frances O’Grady and Nigel Stanley of the TUC and English television and film director Pete Travis, selected the following winners. These are listed below and in no particular order.
Paul Rey-Burns, musician, songwriter and filmmaker, with the film ‘Photo-booth’, ‘funny, smart and subverted the idea of what a union is about and what trade unions should be, it appealed to people’s sense of humour’
James, Sean, Bridie and Ruby of Chesterfield High School in Crosby, with the film, ‘Why Should I Join a Union’, a ‘Sparky, down-to-earth film with a quirky sense of humour, not too serious with an important message….the young people were really engaging and great characters’
Thomas Weaver of Malta General Workers Union with the film, ‘I have my union’. ‘This was an aspirational film, and reflects the aspirations of many trade union members. The message that trade unions make you feel good about your life is an excellent one’
Andy Belfield and colleagues of Unison West Midlands with, ‘You deserve better – join a union’. ‘This was a Barack Obama inspired film
that really picked up on the zeitgeist of its time. We all need to see inspirational politicians that people connect with.’Two other films that were not winners but highly commended were:Diana Veitch and Louise Chinnery of Unison with the film, ‘We work better together’, which was ‘Witty and entertaining, showing a real situation at work..highly commended’
Gary Williams with the animation ‘Join a union’. ‘Cute, and shows the difference between exterminate and negotiate…highly commended’
Frances O’Grady, TUC Deputy General Secretary, said: “The TUC 60 Second Advert Challenge has been a fantastic success, with entries across all age groups from as far afield as Malta and Thailand.
“Everybody who took part should be commended. Lots of different people had a go and really showed how passionate people are about trade unions and being trade unionists.”
The awards will be given and the winning entries shown at TUC Congress on Monday 14th September at the Fringe, ‘Reaching Out – Organising Young Workers’.
All of the winning entries can be viewed at
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Union membership in California (a labout market roughly half the size of the UK) has risen by over 100,000 in the last year. This is recession-busting stuff, given that unemployment in the state hit 11.9% in July.
In fact, California unions gained 131,206 new members from July 2008 to June 2009 (up from 2.7 million according to the US Bureau of Labour Statistics – a climb of 5%). The proportion of Californian workers belonging to unions has also risen, according to a study by UCLA’s Institute for Research on Labor and Employment. In fact over the last two years, union density in California has increased by an eighth, from 16.1% to 18.3%.
Interestingly, California has a public sector density rate now of 57.4% -basically the same as in the UK, and way ahead of the US average of 37%. But private sector unionisation is only 10.6% compared with 7.5% across the USA (and 16.6% in the UK – using UK government statistics for 2006 which is all I have to hand – it hasn’t changed dramatically since then).
Source: Union membership climbs in California, by Carolyn Jones, San Francisco Chronicle, 7 September – hat tip to John Logan, UC Berkeley for alerting me.
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Photos from the celebrations earlier this week are available here, courtesy of Rod Leon. The evening was hosted by the National Organising and Recruitment Team and presentations were made by Frances O’Grady, TUC (Deputy General Secretary) and Tony Burke, UNITE (Chair, Organising Academy Governing Board). Over 60 people attended the event and although not all graduates were able to join us, the team are delighted at everyone’s success.
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I’ve blogged before about the campaign to free the leaders of the Gambia Press Union – their NUJ – and on Friday we got the good news that they had been freed by Presidential pardon. This was the result of a worldwide campaign in support of the GPU, led by the International Federation of Journalists, the International Trade Union Confederation, and Amnesty International. Several Governments also assisted, with the UK and US Ambassadors in the Gambia attending the trials. The EU was on the point of sending a senior Swedish ex-Minister to the Gambia to use the leverage given by the EU’s Cotonou Agreement to press the authoritarian Gambian Government. Here in the UK, the TUC, NUJ and Amnesty International UK demonstrated outside the Gambian High Commission, met with the FCO and the NUJ established a fighting fund to pay for legal costs. You can still donate, but safe in the knowledge that this has been one campaign that we won!
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