This morning Ed Miliband will make a speech in which he will lay out his support for changes to the trade union link including the limited use of primaries, but possibly more crucially forcing trade unions to get their members to “opt in” for Labour party affiliation rather than “opt out”. This proposal will not only damage party funding and hurt our chances in 2015, but it will also amounts to the Labour Party unfairly dictating to trade unions how they run their own affairs and weaken the Labour Party’s important basis in the democratic structures of Britain’s workers.

For a start this “opt in” endangers the labour Party’s funding, so endangering the Party’s chances in 2015. Furthermore it is not worth bringing in this change in the run up to a general election when all focus should be on attacking the Tories.

Furthermore the idea of an “opt-in” system being preferable to the current system is nonsense. Billy Hayes is right to critique the principle of the “opt in” as trade union members already needn’t support the Labour Party if they do not want to. Continue reading →