Issue 73:

January 2018

the bulletin of
theActivist members in

AMY MURPHY FOR USDAW PRESIDENT - VOTE

FOR A FIGHTING AND DEMOCRATIC UNION

E
lections for the new president of programme of capaigning Amy says: “As a shop worker, listening
Usdaw, the shop and distribution for a £10 an hour to members, I am aware of the
workers’ union, take place from
15 January with Socialist Party member
minimum wage for
all immediately,
Ballot unacceptable pressure being
applied to staff of all grades
Amy Murphy running to give the union a
fighting leadership. That the union needs
an end to the
erosion of terms
papers to deliver, while still being
expected to raise a smile!
one is clear - the major supermarkets that and conditions, arrive Mond I strongly believe that the
Usdaw organises in have attacked terms an end to zero- ay 15 time has come to stand
and conditions and cut jobs in recent hour contracts,
Januar y, put up to the companies you
years, while the problems of zero-hour
contracts and low pay are endemic in
supporting
members when
an X by and I work for. Usdaw
cannot carry on as it is,
retail. they want to take Amy Murphy punching below its weight,
Amy previously ran for the position in industrial action, ! while members live daily with
2015 and received 45% of the vote and and fighting to make the threat of cuts to pay and
goes into this election after 46 branches Usdaw a democratic, conditions.”
nominated her. She has been on the member-led union. Amy is running as „„ Ballot papers go out from 15 January.
Usdaw executive council for six years and part of a Broad Left slate in the executive See ‘Vote Amy Murphy for Usdaw
a rep in Tesco for 24 years. council elections which are also taking President’ on Facebook for Amy’s leaflet
Amy is fighting the election on a place. and updates on the campaign.

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theActivist
Retail sector crunch:
nationalise to save jobs
Toys R Us plans to close a third of
its stores. Asda wants to downgrade
hundreds of shopfloor supervisors.
Britain’s largest tobacco distributor
Palmer & Harvey has gone into
administration.
These recent announcements will
ring alarm bells for retail workers
worried for their futures amid signs
that consumer spending in general is
slowing down.
The closure of at least 26 Toys R Us
outlets threatens 800 jobs. Asda’s
pay cut would affect 842 ‘section
leaders’. And the administrators
have already made 2,500 Palmer
& Harvey staff redundant, with a
further 900 threatened.
The Toys R Us closures are partly due
to large store sizes becoming less
competitive after the rise of online
shopping. But both Toys R Us and
Palmer & Harvey have had problems
with suppliers.
The tobacco distributor struggled
to receive payments in time to pay
down debt obligations. And some of
the toy shop’s suppliers were unable
to get ‘credit insurance’ for providing
goods on account.
Consumer spending fell 2% this
October compared to last, according
to Visa. That’s the fifth monthly drop
in the last six months, and included
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the bulletin of
a 5% drop in high street spending.
This reduced income will affect most
those companies which are heavily
indebted.
Like the run-up to last year’s
collapse of department store BHS,
a management buyout of Palmer
& Harvey left a wake of suspicious
dealings. The 2008 takeover was
leveraged with debt which reached a
net amount of £48.6 million in April
2016.
Yet since the buyout, the Guardian
estimates there has been around
£70 million in shareholder payouts.
Former chairman Christoper
Etherington and his wife will have
received about £2.5 million in
dividends since 2009 alone.
The BHS collapse meant the loss
of a high street icon, and the jobs
of many members of retail and
distribution union Usdaw. So the
2017 Usdaw conference passed a
resolution to call on the government
to bring companies in a similar
situation into public ownership.
The union has made two statements
on Palmer & Harvey on its website
so far. But nowhere in either does
it call for nationalisation. Instead
the administrator, financial services
giant PwC, has been allowed to sack
2,500 workers unanswered.
members in
Usdaw general
secretary coronation
Most active members of Usdaw will be unsurprised
to see the announcement that Paddy Lillis will
be Usdaw’s next general secretary. With a high
nominations threshold of 25 - raised after a
grassroots challenger, the late Socialist Party
member Robbie Segal, won 40% of the vote in the
last election in 2008 - it was unlikely anyone would
be able to challenge Lillis, who is the current deputy
general secretary.
This election highlights a democratic deficit in the
union - as ordinary members have been denied a
debate since 2008 around the policies put forward
by the person in the most powerful position in
Usdaw.
Not only that, but as Lillis was elected by a branch
vote for deputy general secretary, he has never
faced a national vote by the full membership.
High nomination thresholds are a tool of the right
wing to subvert members’ democratic rights.
The right wing in Usdaw opposed the recent rule
change moved by an Usdaw Activist supporter at
this year’s conference, which attracted the support
of around 20% of delegates. It would have opened
up the possibility of a contested election instead of
a coronation.
The Activist believes that the nominations threshold
for general secretary should be reduced to five,
which would allow Usdaw members to debate the
direction they want the leading figures of the union
to take us in.
Many members will be glad to see the impending
retirement of John Hannett, whose leadership was
closely linked with support for the Blairite wing
of the Labour Party against those around Jeremy
Corbyn. For example he spoke on the platforms of
right-wing Labour organisations such as Progress
and Labour Friends of Israel. Industrially, members
have seen pay decline in real terms, increasingly
insecure hours of work and terms and conditions
surrendered without a real fight.
It is welcome that at speeches at Usdaw divisional
conferences Paddy Lillis has been much more
positive towards Jeremy Corbyn and the radical
policies that were in the most recent Labour
election manifesto - many of which have been
passed as policy at Usdaw conferences.
However, Lillis was also chair of the Labour national
executive committee during the 2016 leadership
election that went to court to deny many Labour
Party members a vote in that election. Therefore
many Usdaw members will be waiting to see how
much he distances himself from Hannett’s legacy
once this election period is over.