As Community’s membership becomes increasingly diverse, including workers from many backgrounds and sectors, two new members tell us why they joined and their future hopes for the union’s equality agenda
Community has long been proud of its history as a union that welcomes members from all backgrounds. And recent changes, such as the developing relationship with the British Union of Social Work Employees
(BUSWE), have highlighted the union’s drive to ensure that its equalities agenda is truly fit for the 21st century.
A recent organising initiative with voluntary organisation UKC (the UK Coalition for People Living with HIV and AIDS) has highlighted the union’s concern to ensure that our gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) members are welcomed and listened to.
Two Community members, who recently joined the union following outreach work at UKC, explain the difference Community has made to them and their hopes for the future of the union’s equalities agenda.
When Andy Harvey changed careers and became a freelance, part-time worker at UKC, he found it difficult to find a union to represent him. ‘I’ve been a trade unionist all my working life and wanted to remain in a union,’ he explains. ‘I wanted to build a relationship between UKC and a trade union. I felt that Community had the right profile for me and that’s essentially why I joined.
‘Community has a real community base as a focus. It’s not just about organising in the workplace, it’s about getting out into the community to work with people on the ground. It’s a small union, but one with a powerful voice. I’m also passionate about education and training – and that really fitted in well with Community’s tradition of providing training for its members and the community,’ he adds. ‘Also Community’s Joe
Mann has been a good friend and a long-time supporter of equalities issues.’ Andy is delighted at the support Joe and Community have shown for HIVSport, his new initiative that encourages people living with HIV and AIDS to take part in sport.
‘I am also aware, as a gay man, that it’s very difficult for a smaller union, such as Community, to organise and reach out to LGBT people as a group as they work across all sectors. We need to make a real effort to reach out to new groups, but in these days of 24-hour news and an increasingly crowded media it’s hard for a smaller union to raise its profile so that minority groups are aware of what it can offer.’
Andy’s views are supported by fellow former UKC worker and Community member, Trevor Skingle. With a branch of the family being miners from a Derbyshire mining village, Community, with its history in the iron and steel industries, seemed a natural choice for Trevor when UKC staff were looking for a union to support them through workplace problems.
‘We were busy trying to sort things out at work and needed to organise quickly,’ Trevor explains, ‘Community really stood out as being a union offering much more that a sympathetic voice at the end of a phone. Branch officials visited us in the workplace and helped us organise a framework so that we could take things forward. The union was incredibly helpful through a very tough time.’
Andy Harvey agrees; ‘Community was there for us in the workplace when we needed them and not just on paper, they followed through for us.
It’s unfortunate that just as UKC was about to get a union it went under. Community fought for those members 100% and gave us fantastic support.
‘In terms of equalities I think we’re making real progress, although it’s not always plain sailing. As someone who has worked in adult education for a long time, it’s been my experience that once we can get people thinking about LGBT rights as part of a broader human rights’ agenda it becomes much easier to understand. The idea of solidarity is at the heart of the trade union movement, along with the conviction that everyone has the right to be treated fairly.’
Looking to the future, Trevor is convinced that Community will continue to develop its equalities agenda; ‘One really important step forward has been, that for the first time in its history, Community has sent a representative to sit on the TUC’s LGBT committee. I think there has been a real impetus within the
union to drive this agenda forward and to organise the LGBT membership.
We’re now looking to ensure we have a representative permanently on the TUC LGBT committee. And, of course, we’re not just looking at LGBT issues, we’re also involved as a union in the TUC’s anti-racism drive, which kicks off in January.’
Joe Mann, Community’s National Secretary responsible for equalities sums up the union’s commitment to LGBT rights. ‘Community is proud to be the union of choice for new members who come from the UK Coalition of People Living with HIV and AIDS. We engage, and Community sees a huge future, in the
voluntary sector, and this agenda is an important part of that.’
For more information, contact:
Joe Mann at jmann@community-tu.org
Andy Harvey at www.andyharveyetc.co.uk and
www.hivsport.org.uk
Trevor Skingle at trevor.skingle@hotmail.com