UNISON, the public services union, meets today for the first national delegate conference since 2019.

Much has happened in the intervening period. Hundreds of thousands of Unison members worked throughout the pandemic to provide front-line services in the NHS, social care, education, police, utilities and many other sectors.  

A substantial number of working members paid the ultimate price and succumbed to the virus. Their sacrifice will be acknowledged as the conference opens on the Brighton seafront.  

The union has seen radical internal change with a new general secretary, Christina McAnea, elected to succeed Dave Prentis who had held the post since 2001. 

Not long after McAnea took up office in January 2021 there was an unprecedented political shift in composition of the union’s national executive council (NEC), with a longstanding oppositional faction securing a clear majority.

The past year has led to internal convulsions at national level, bordering on organisational paralysis, as the new NEC majority sought to assert its authority on the internal business of the union. Little has changed in terms of campaigning, collective action and the union’s external profile.

Some undercurrents of the destructive internal faction fights have reached the conference agenda but the main focus will be on the external challenge facing the union — how to secure pay rises which maintain and improve the standard of living of the union’s 1.3 million members.

In a pre-conference interview in Friday’s Financial Times (June 10) the Unison leader warned of potential strikes in the NHS and local government if inflation-proofed pay rises were not secured, declaring her opposition to the government’s pay policy of 3 per cent and in some sectors 2 per cent: “For the government to say you need to show pay restraint is completely inappropriate.”

This message was well received when the new general secretary addressed the union’s local government group conference on Sunday. 

But translating tough talk on pay into effective industrial action has been a perennial problem for Unison, with national ballots in health and local government returning turnouts of below 30 per cent and in the latter case a woeful 14 per cent in a recent national joint council strike ballot.

A motion from North West region sets out a detailed strategy for overcoming the restraints imposed by the 2016 Trade Union Act and will be soon put to the test in coming weeks as Unison rolls out a national strike ballot in the universities sector.

Unsurprisingly in a union with over 80 per cent female membership the imperative of improving representation of low-paid women and combating misogyny is a recurring theme on the conference agenda. 

The whole of the trade union movement is facing up to the challenge of eradicating sexual harassment and Unison is no exception.

A national care service is a long-term objective of Unison and has been prominent in recent Labour general election manifestos. 

The NEC proposes that the union’s campaign be intensified building on public policy changes in Scotland and Wales. 

The overhaul of social care requires a massive injection of funding, investment in the workforce and measures to rein in the predatory role of private equity companies. 

The rapid escalation in prices, notably fuel and energy, is decimating the living standards of workers. 

The debate on pay and the cost of living will be centre stage on Wednesday morning with the Scottish and Welsh regions calling for co-ordinated action on pay and industrial action within Unison and across the movement.

While it would be a mistake to view the coronavirus pandemic solely as a matter for retrospective debate there is much to be done to deliver justice for bereaved families of public service workers and the many suffering from long Covid. 

Conference will provide Unison with a strong mandate to intervene in the upcoming public inquiry and press the case of front-line workers who were left at the mercy of government and employer negligence. 

The question of global vaccine inequality will be debated, with demands for low-income and middle-income countries to secure access to Covid-19 vaccines. 

International solidarity is a traditional feature of Unison’s conference and this year is no exception with a lively fringe debating Colombia, Cuba, Palestine and the war in Ukraine. 

In the main hall female union leaders from Ireland and South Africa will address delegates. 

Unison has a strong equalities culture and lively debates will be held on trans equality, combatting discrimination, migrant workers and immigration advice.

Despite a large spike in new joiners during the pandemic, like most unions, Unison is experiencing a downturn in membership levels as the cost-of-living crisis bites on household incomes and unprecedented numbers of staff retire early from employment in public services. 

A motion from the NEC on building the union and organising for the future is perhaps the most important debate of the week. 

The call to support and encourage internal solidarity between all parts of the union around the common goal of revitalising workplace activism might seem ambitious in the heady atmosphere of conference. But that is precisely what is needed.

Andy Chaffer is an NHS worker and member of Unison West Midlands region.