1.1.3 – Pressure Groups
1.2.2 – Established parties
1.4 – Voting patterns and behaviour
Last week The Times newspaper reported that a new poll indicated that members of the largest trade unions – Unite and GMB – were now as likely to back Reform as they were Labour.
The importance of the trade union movement to the Labour Party cannot be overstated. Labour was founded by the concerted efforts of the trade union movement at the turn of the twentieth century and has remained the party’s financial lifeline ever since. However, as the number of union members backing Labour declines, this may lead to growing pressure within unions to disaffiliate from the party, and with it cease their funding.
The poll also raises questions about who Labour’s voters are if they are not trade unionists. This will add to the stereotype that Labour has become the party of the urban intelligentsia (sometimes disparagingly described as ‘lefty Islington lawyers’) rather than being the party of the working class which it claims to be (a point that Boris Johnson was keen to make after the 2019 General Election, and Nigel Farage is making today).
Labour are repeatedly at pains to highlight areas of Reform policy which they argue would put the working class at a disadvantage, which they liken to Thatcherism (and seek to play up Nigel Farage’s membership of the Conservatives under her leadership). Similar sentiments have also been echoed by some trade union leaders when asked to comment on the poll’s findings. However, polling repeatedly puts Reform out ahead, as they have been in virtually every poll for over a year. In the most recent YouGov poll published last week, the party were on 27%, 9pp ahead of both Labour and the Conservatives on 18%.
The longer-term relationship between Labour the unions – especially Unite – will likely not be settled until after any anticipated leadership struggle. However, the poll of trade union voting patterns will trouble some within Labour, as they continue to portray themselves as the party of ordinary working people.