UNISON dinosaurs will not stop the BNP

The local Government union UNISON is "advising" its members within Sandwell Council not to work with two BNP councillors elected to the authority. Three weeks ago the electorate of Sandwell in the West Midlands decided that using the due democratic process, they would vote for candidates that offered a viable alternative to the corrupt and failed policies of the Old Gang parties. Two candidates standing on behalf of the BNP were duly elected into council office. In addition, one candidate came second achieving 30.2% of the votes cast and another came third after receiving 22.3% of the votes cast.

John Salvage was elected as the councillor for Princes End in Tipton and David Watkins for the Great Bridge ward (also in Tipton).

The idea that the process of democracy might actually achieve such results has unnerved the leadership of UNISON which has not only issued "advice" to its members, but also, yesterday arranged a demonstration outside the Sandwell Council Offices where Clr. Salvage attended his first meeting on behalf of the people of Princes End. About 70 people demonstrated outside the Council Offices and the local union spokesman, Tony Barnsley has promised "more protests"! So much for democracy!

However, it has to be highlighted that UNISON is no stranger to such charges of being opposed to democracy. Three years ago it expelled two of its so-called "left wing" members in London who dared to challenge the PFI take-over of several hospitals in the capital. Those two members dared to challenge the union's cosy relationship with the likes of Blair; a man who has little in common with the working people of Britain. The label of "left-wing" means very little when the individuals concerned have far more in common with the supposedly "right-wing" working class voters in places like Tipton, who voted for a credible alternative to the cosy and corrupt "status quo". The BNP presence on local councils acts as a whistle-blower; to alert the electorate and the local media about the unfathomable depths of corruption, nepotism and sleaze that exist and also acts as a balance to the extremes of New Labour policy on issues such as privatisation which face little or no opposition by the effete and corrupt Tories and Lib Dems.

Union leader Dave Prentis is a staunch Blairite who even resisted the general union membership's disaffection with the huge donations made by the union to the Labour Party. Overturning a democratic decision undertaken at its annual conference in 2001, the pro-Blair Prentis dismissed the vote saying "The vote does not change in any way whatsoever our arrangements with either the Labour Party or our general political campaigning work."

The really telling fact about UNISON in Sandwell is that it was actually scores of card carrying members of UNISON, who work in derisory low paid jobs in the public sector, that voted for John Salvage and David Watkins! A new era has begun in terms of worker/employee relations and it might mean the end of the huge salary of £84,170 that is being paid to the anti-British and anti-British worker Prentis. That single fact is enough to send shudders along Mr. Prentis' spine!