Elaine’s blog

I heard a statistic on Radio 4 this morning that 47% of British citizens are completely disinterested in politics. That’s quite a scary feature of our democracy, and reflects an extraordinary confidence of the people in the system that they take for granted. By contrast, the US presidential election has triggered an astonishing display of active democracy - it has engaged the emotion and imagination of a vast nation, and the result, whichever way it goes, must be as good an example of democracy in action as we might ever see in a lifetime.

Sadly, the apathy of the Brits shows itself in the workplace too. I work largely in the public sector, where trade union membership is traditionally much stronger and better organised than in the private sector, yet even there, few turn up to routine union meetings, and only a minority show at meetings called to address specific topics or organisational crises. Redundancy threats have generally aroused interest in union membership, but  at these times, people draw on the insurance policy aspect of trade union organisation rather than any real sense of political loyalty or comradeship.

Some commentators say that Brits have become so obsessed with their celebrity culture that they have no sense any more of the less than trivial. This is clearly nonsense: Brits still worry about their mortgages, their jobs and their children, so why wouldn’t they be as engaged in political or social activity in exactly the same way as the meritocratic Americans are ?  

I don’t know why it is that workers no longer feel any empathy with their trade union activist colleagues, nor display any engagement with collective workplace causes. I do regret that there is something important being lost in a context where the employers have to consult  formally with a small group of, at worst dysfunctional non-representative representatives, or at best struggling representatives isolated from a non-communicative constituency. Good employers will find a way of consulting the wider workforce directly about proposals for change or potential job losses: this means twice the work for managers, not to mention the predictable tension between workforce and trade union feedback.

There’s nothing much that the legislature can do about this - trade union rights and obligations are essential in a rational democratic social structure, and increasingly, individual rights and opinions and preferences are valued and recognised. If only people would engage to make their opinion preferences known either through their trade unions, directly to management or at least through the ballot box. To fail to do this compromises our democratic system and forfeits our democratic control. Then we may get the government and  workplaces we deserve, but we can’t claim to have acted as responsible adults.