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Policy and Rules Conference 2005 - Brief Report
The conference finished yesterday with a rousing speech by Gordon Brown. At least he and the 6 out of 650 delegates who gave him a standing ovation thought so. His rather long monologue included a emotional bit, where Gordon reminisced about meeting a brother and sister in a war torn poverty stricken part of the planet. The brother was dying of AIDS and the sister would never receive the education she needed for her dream of becoming a doctor. Brown castigated the West for denying them medicine and assistance. Maybe we'd blown the resources on depleted uranium for the children of Iraq.

Conference began badly on Saturday; in a move that the previous General Secretary (and nuclear waste expert) Sir Ken Jackson would have been proud of, a statement supporting nuclear power was cleverly inserted, almost completely out of context, into one on rebuilding manufacturing. Not enough delegates spotted it and it was passed. amicus is now formally in favour of nuclear power.

On Sunday the conference narrowly voted to dis-affiliate from Stop the War coalition. General Secretary Simpson had by this stage perfected a habit of personal interventions between delegate's speeches, on one occasion having the strict 3 minute timing light switched off. He intervened to say that people don't know enough about Stop the War (the most popular movement in Britain ever) and that the union shouldn't affiliate. This leaves Stop the War with just the T&G, GMB, ASLEF, CWU, FBU, NAPO, NATFHE, NUJ, PCS, RMT, TSSA and UNISON unions. Note that we are supposed to be merging with the first two in 4 month time.

So that's where we are now, the official conference theme is 'Changing the World' but we're pro nuclear power and we're refusing to engage in the anti-war movement. Just the thing to encourage young members, hopefully they will tell Derek Simpson so when he next helicopters in to Glastonbury.

Undoubtedly the star of conference this year was Executive member and veteran right winger Judy Box. On Monday Conference was stuck into a debate on the removal of the ageist ban on older members holding office, introduced in the Jackson rule book. Derek Simpson had just made one of his personal interventions to keep the ban, and he did it very well: calm, reasonable, classic stuff. Unfortunately for him up stepped Judy Box in support. The content and argument of her speech was almost identical to Derek's. Luckily but insultingly for retired members her delivery and the words she used were not. To gasps of outrage from delegates she castigated the older members of amicus, called them white and middle class (pots and kettles come to mind here - caucasian school governor Box was on the MSF Arts National Advisory Committee) and topped it off by calling them 'bed blockers', an extremely offensive term which many delegates took to mean the longest serving members of amicus should piss off and die. She was forced to apologise and withdraw the remark.

Simpson and Box narrowly lost the vote and amicus can no longer discriminate against older members. Delegates broke for lunch and to a member they left discussing Box's speech. Simpson's fury was evident and he carried it over to a fringe meeting where he chastised delegates' behaviour as if they were little children. He also used the word 'stupid' in reference to some elected people in amicus, we have to say it was not clear to whom he was referring.

The Executive-imposed chair Steve Davison, after a slow start on Saturday, developed himself into one of the most competent and amiable chairs seen at such a conference. He was assisted by the electronic voting system which speeded up everything and eliminated disputes and calls for tellers. However pressing buttons rather than raising arms does take away some of the spirit of conference. In the glossy literature on the electronic system no assurances whatsoever were given on security and data protection. Only the total votes 'for', 'against' and 'abstaining' were displayed on a large screen along with their percentages.

At times when an otherwise 100% vote was spoilt by 1 or 2 abstentions, Chair Davison made a point of jokingly asking those odd one or two delegates to identify themselves. The message was clear - 'I have no record of how people voted, honest'. On delegates wishing to speak though, things were different. Normally the whole conference can see who has their hand up to speak and the Chair has to take care to keep a balance and to call speakers he may not agree with. With the electronic button pressing only Davison had this information. He let slip a couple of times that his personal screen also identified to him the delegates' sections. Really that information should be on the big screen for all delegates to see. Electronic systems have the potential to replicate the old AEEU tradition of officials standing over delegates to force compliance, and in a much more efficient way. On balance it was an effective yet disturbing system and it is amazing that no assurances were given or asked for, e.g. an audit by elected delegates or trustees.

The best and the narrowest result of conference was the election of full time officials in the union. This is clearly a pet subject of Derek Simpson's and he spoke in favour of it, albeit not in the conference hall but at a fringe meeting. Credit to him for getting it through, no doubt the official web site will tell you more. The vote was 49%-51%. Once implemented, all new officials of the union will be elected. Sadly Simpson did indicate at a fringe meeting that he would sacrifice this if needed to fulfil his ultimate pet project, 'Merger Merger Merger'.

Another good result was the executive's capitualtion on a motion against privatisation. Just prior to the vote Simpson was persuaded by a vociferous Health Sector to support it. This win was marred only by the left 'Gazette' group's leadership's bizarre decision the night before to oppose it.

Delegate attendance at the sessions was good, even on the morning after the night of the free drinks social at the Grand Hotel (home of the Executive for the duration). Only about 20 delegates entirely failed to turn up at Brighton, including right wingers Bob Braddock (NEC serial expense claimer) and Michelle Evans (ex vice president). No doubt they will be returning the £125 subsistence cheques sent to delegates the week before.
[www.amicustheunion.org.uk] The official conference web page
New! [amicus.cc] Report in detail
Posted by www.rogerlyons.com on 19th May 2005

Conference Staff Contracts Breached
At least 10 amicus staff have refused to work this weekend at the biennial conference in Brighton, in response to this email:

"To all Staff Reps

For staff attending the Amicus Conference, the following allowances/provisions will apply:

* £13 (non-taxable) for each day of attendance between 14th and 18th May
* in addition, £30 (taxable) for each of Saturday 14th and Sunday 15th May if worked
* a day off in lieu for weekend days worked (excluding Directors and Heads of Department).
No other allowances or additional pay will apply. All accommodation and meal costs will be covered and travel expenses can be reclaimed in the usual way.

This notice overrides any previous contractual arrangements. If any of your members planning to attend Conference are likely to have issues with regard to the above, they should talk to their Regional Secretary/Head of Department/appropriate manager immediately.

Tony Ayres"

The email tears up the existing more generous arrangements MSF employees had. Apparently during the harmonisation of AEEU and MSF contracts, amicus are consistently imposing the least beneficial clauses. Luckily there are no plans for a picket of conference which would have been very embarrassing. However the fat cat senior officials of the union are going to have to watch carefully what they claim this weekend.

The employee's reps (from the GMB union) issued a bulletin in response, including the comment:

"We understand management is seeking to get staff attending conference to sign a disclaimer regarding their contractual rights. We expect such tactics from a bad employer but not from a trade union employer."

In fact even a bad employer would have sorted it out well before conference, not with just a few days to spare.
[GMB] Expenses for attending conference
Posted by www.rogerlyons.com on 13th May 2005

Simpson Tells Blair to Go
The amicus General Secretary is the first Labour-affiliated union leader to break the pre-election vow of silence and call for Blair to go. Quoted in today's Guardian and Independent he said of Blair:

"comments from him like 'I will serve a full term' are not helpful."

Simpson also revealed that amicus gave Labour £2 million for the election campaign. As an aside Simpson revealed that a ballot for amicus to merge with the T&G and GMB unions could be held as early as September.
[Guardian] Union leader tells Blair to prepare for successor
[Independent] A full term would be ludicrous, says union
Posted by www.rogerlyons.com on 13th May 2005

True amicus Membership Figures Revealed
The union's internal membership figures for April 2005 have been passed to amicus.cc. Union statistics on this subject have always been a joke, the old MSF union in particular had tens of thousands of homeless non-paying members. Despite promises to clean up the figures it is apparent that the abuse continues. The official amicus website proclaims:

"Amicus is the UK's largest manufacturing, technical & skilled persons' union. With over 1.2m members in the private & public sectors, we are a major industrial force."

Prior to the acquisition of the GPMU and UNIFI, it was regularly claimed we had 1 million members. If fact amicus.cc can now reveal we had 637,659 then. As of April, including the 2 unions' membership, we have 880,090. A minor discrepancy of over 320,000.
[amicus.cc] Membership by region
[amicus.cc] Membership by sector
Posted by www.rogerlyons.com on 12th May 2005

NEC indemnify themselves, CMA executive threatened with costs
amicus General Secretary Simpson has written to all CMA members to explain the current dispute. Of the CMA executive and their High Court case he says "they may come to regret that the costs fall on themselves as individuals". Legal costs involved may well run into 6 figures.

At the amicus National Executive meeting in February, Simpson had informed members that the CMA was planning to sue them personally; the NEC members promptly voted for the union to indemnify them against any such claims. This means of course that if the CMA succeed in holding NEC members personally liable, amicus members will stump up the cash. However if the CMA lose, their executive members will likely be made personally bankrupt.
[amicus] Letter to members
[amicus] February minutes
[amicus.cc] Previous Story: CMA Goes to Court
Posted by www.rogerlyons.com on 14th April 2005

CMA Goes to Court
The CMA (Communication Managers Association) yesterday issued legal proceedings in the High Court against amicus, of which the CMA is a section. The CMA is attempting to recover approximately £ 3.4 million of members funds which they claim amicus unlawfully removed from its bank accounts.
[CMA2005] CMA Sues amicus
[amicus.cc] Previous Story: CMA Executive Stages Lock-in
Posted by www.rogerlyons.com on 17th March 2005

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