It is totally inappropriate for a union to represent state employees and to take money from the state in order to further ends ordained by the state. There is a clear conflict of interest there. Why unions should feel they have to work with government in such a way is an issue.

More importantly, as far as I can see these funds were restricted to unions (the name of several certainly confirms this) and therefore the state was giving money to particular bodies which are associated with the governing party without allowing other bodies to compete for it. Even if the money is not being chanelled back to the Labour party, I suggest that this still smacks of corporatism, with state and union working together to the exclusion of other companies or charities, or state agencies. It is gifting a particular power to favoured organisations at the expense of others.

Whilst this might not be outright corruption, I’d hate to argue this was a good thing – unions having split loyalties between members and paymasters, and being promoted by state patronage. And the more informed (i.e. not Mail or Telegraph) criticism of this arrangement is exactly this – it is the state and unions being merged together and encroaching in areas where other organisations could work.

Incidentally, the title and Dave’s post don’t really agree, as this is hardly a defence but rather a more balanced view.

Labour policies have also allowed very wealthy individuals to become “non-doms” and avoid paying tax in the country in which they live.

Michael Ashcroft is one such individual. Government policy has channelled hundreds of millions of pounds to him.

Ashcroft has used some of this money for increasing donations for a political party.

Is anyone going to investigate this “money laundering” by Labour?

It stinks badly.

But then there is little this government and its acolytes have done that does not stink. Just wait for the PFI corruption scandals to be exposed in the future.

The problem is that we all know, deep down, that the future government, of whatever composition, will be just as dissolute.

That’s what’s really depressing.

The amount gathered from each member for a political fund must be stipulated, only money from the political fund may be used for political activities and money from other accounts may not be used.

It’s all money in a pot though isn’t it? Let’s say you want to create training schemes, modernise your union and donate to a political party. It’s going to be easier to find money to donate to a political party and create training schemes if you’re receiving money to spend on modernising the union, isn’t it?

Ongoing links between unions and the State like the Partnership at Work system of grants entrenches the concept of ‘social partnership’ between bosses and workers.

The role of trade unions as an independence voice for the labour movement and working people in general is directly threatened by this backdoor funnelling of money to the union bureaucracies: governments fund these programmes to ‘improve’ industrial relations, creating institutional and financial incentives for unions to help improve ‘productivity’, maintain dialogue and co-operation with employers regardless of members’ interests etc.

If you see trade unionism as one part of a corporate lash-up between a privileged sector of workers and a progressive capitalist class, the Union Modernisation Fund etc. are fantastic. But they will weaken the ability of unions to take on the business community by ideologically disarming workers and stewards and getting them used to seeing disputes from the ‘objective’ perspective of their exploiters.

Money is fungible. Any extra money for spending in other areas which allows more cash to be given to the Labour party when it otherwise would not have been is equivalent to that cash being given to the Labour Party, no matter the systems of laundering used to screen it. The fact that the amount given to the unions by the state because of Labour almost exactly equals the amount given by the unions to Labour stinks, and that is before you get to the obvious conflict of interest when the principal employer of unionised labour starts throwing large chunks of money at the unions.

@Kwame – this type of corporatism is something to keep an eye on. I’m all for workers’ educational associations, run by unions, as these are central pillars to organising millions of people. But funding by the state is where things get dodgy. On the other hand, should we simply forego money from the state when subsidies for business are written into just about every contract the state signs these days? I haven’t resolved on an answer myself, as I say above.

@Chris Strange – the amount given by the unions to the Labour Party exceeds the amount that they have received under the programmes in question. By a fair margin too – for Unite alone, the amount received is £18 million; the amount donated is £29 million over roughly the same period (though I’m writing this on the fly, I’m pretty sure these figures were contained within the original Telegraph article – feel free to double check me).

In any case, money is not fungible and this is a silly position to take when the revenue stream from members for political purposes is clearly delineated from origin to end point.

Dave @ 7, do you believe the union would have spent £18m on union modernisation etc and donated £29m to Labour if the union hadn’t received £18m from the government? I am not talking in terms of bribes but affordability.

@ukliberty – I understand what you were getting at. The union has two pools; a political levy and the general membership fees. One going up does not necessarily mean the other changes at all.

The money from the political levy couldn’t be spent on modernisation.

Theoretically, it’s possible that a cash-strapped union might have lowered the political levy and hiked its general membership fees, but that seems a roundabout way to raise money and highly speculative.

It also ignores the point that the UMF (some £300,000 per year in the case of Unite) is a relatively small sum compared to the budget of the biggest unions in the country – and the other funds were about using unions as an easy means of providing additional services to the workforce which unions wouldn’t have otherwise provided.

As someone who has worked on several projects funded by the Union Learning Fund (ULF) it was a total shock to see the hysterical views of the past few days.

I’ve worked with the people who’ve benefited from such projects. Cleaners, call centre staff, manual workers, health care assistants etc. Society has failed a great number of people who have reached adulthood unable to read and write or who lack the skills and confidence to find better paid jobs or were just written off. For many it’s just been about having the skills to find a new job after being made redundant. It’s been a delight to see so many people get another chance.

It wouldn’t have happened without the ULF. The government and funding bodies have been willing to give this money for one reason: it works. Yesterday the Financial Times reported that the Tories may even keep this funding (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c939656c-3551-11df-9cfb-00144feabdc0.html) Why would they do this? Because it works. Sector Skills Councils, Learning & Skills Councils and other bodies who were perhaps previously unwilling to work with Unions are desperate to work with them because they can help them deliver on their targets.

Blue chip companies are lining up to work with Trade Unions delighted by the benefits which partnership working with the Unions bring them. Digby Jones himself said it was time for Unions to face up to the challenge of tackling Britain’s skills shortage.

One interesting story I heard from a former rail company manager. One of the rail unions came to them wanting to promote learning after getting funding from the ULF. The meeting with management was very stormy (as all meetings were) until somebody pointed out that they were actually agreeing. The funding received from Government led to the two sides working together for the first time.

As noted above there’s a whole host of Unions who don’t pay into the Labour Party who’ve received large amounts too. There are even unions who don’t belong to the TUC.

Most depressing in all of this has been the fact that nobody has even bothered to do any research. Nobody has asked any of the thousands of workers who’ve benefited greatly from this fund.