Tagged with Mergers

PCS conference defeats its executive motion on merger with Unite

Dave Owens from DWP Liverpool moving motion A463 setting out conditions on any merger talksThe annual conference of civil service union PCS, after a lengthy debate described both as ‘heated‘ and ‘balanced‘, voted this morning to reject the motion from its executive on a merger between PCS and Unite, by 109,326 to 73,212 on a card vote. The conference did pass an emergency motion which, based on reports on Left Futures and elsewhere, criticised the apparent inconsistencies between information provided to PCS members and that to the Unite executive about the talks which have taken place, but approved continuing talks. These would, however, be subject to explicit conditions, including “ensuring a political fund independent of the Labour Party.”

The PCS leadership insists that the talks will go on but since the Unite EC agreed only that “the transfer of engagements will be on the basis of our existing rule book“, and the PCS motion proposing initial talks with Unite passed only by a slim margin at last year’s conference, today’s decision must surely make the Unite takeover less likely. Continue reading →

Is a Unite takeover of PCS desirable? Not if it divides the Labour movement

TUC day of actionDiscussions are, we hear, proceeding apace between Unite and civil service union, PCS, about what has until now been described within PCS as a merger but at the recent Unite executive (at which Len McCluskey got its backing for formal talks) was described as a “transfer of engagements“, aka “a takeover“. Many details remain to be discussed, but what has already been agreed is that, if it happens, PCS would in January 2015 become part of Unite, under the existing Unite rulebook, with its current Labour Party affiliation arrangements.

It is clear that both Len McCluskey and Mark Serwotka are personally very committed to it. As an active Unite member, I’ve been a strong supporter of Len McCluskey in both elections he has fought for General Secretary. I also admire Mark Serwotka, who is an excellent communicator, with progressive and non-sectarian politics, and who is clearly popular with a very large section of his members. But I’m unconvinced of the case for bringing the two unions together, for which there seems to be little industrial logic. Continue reading →

Glencore-Xstrata shenanigans show corporate managerial power out of control

The joint stock company, the foundation unit of modern capitalism, is dead. But corporate managerial capitalism is alive and kicking. Whatever the constitutional theory that shareholders are in ultimate control, this myth is daily confounded by repeated evidence of management takeover from the inside.

Shareholdings have become so remote and so fragmented, and the tentacles of the leviathan they purport to oversee so dissipated, that effective power has now long since settled firmly on the top management. But the extremes to which this is now being taken are starkly illustrated by the most recent goings-on at the Glencore-Xstrata tie-up. Continue reading →