Ten Years of New Labour: Workplace Learning, Social Partnership and Union Revitalization in Britain
Date | 01 June 2008 |
Published date | 01 June 2008 |
DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2008.00678.x |
Author | John McIlroy |
Ten Years of New Labour: Workplace
Learning, Social Partnership and Union
Revitalization in Britain
John McIlroy
Abstract
The establishment of a role in workplace learning has been perceived as one of
the achievements of trade unions under New Labour. This article analyses the
part the Trades Union Congress (TUC) has played in public policy since 1997.
It examines its attempts to influence government and develop social partnership
and statutory backing for vocational training. It assesses its degree of success
and considers whether the TUC’s role is best characterized in terms of social
partnership or as a rediscovery of the unions’ public administration function. It
reviews the literature which suggests that involvement in learning stimulates
union revitalization. The article concludes that the TUC has failed to attain
significant influence over public policy. Rather it has delivered policy deter-
mined by government with priority accorded to employer predilections. A public
administration role focused on the Union Learning Fund has provided the TUC
with a new, secondary function, which provides some compensation for the
failure of its primary agenda. Nonetheless, on the evidence, involvement in
workplace learning appears an implausible path to union revitalization.
1. Introduction
The role of trade unions in stimulating workplace learning and skills training
preceded New Labour (McIlroy 2000: 302–04). It has developed qualitatively
since 1997 and has been widely commended. Declaring that ‘the core of the
strategy is effective partnership between government, trade unions and
employers’ (Clarke 2004: 111), ministers have applauded union efforts as ‘the
most successful movement for change in this country’ (Brown 2004). The
Trades Union Congress (TUC) claims that its partnership with government
and employers to animate workplace learning constitutes ‘a quiet revolu-
tion that can change all our lives’ (TUC 2001a: 2). Its general secretary
pronounces skills training, ‘a core union activity which contributes not only
John McIlroy is at Keele University.
British Journal of Industrial Relations doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8543.2008.00678.x
46:2 June 2008 0007–1080 pp. 283–313
© Blackwell Publishing Ltd/London School of Economics 2008. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd,
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to economic efficiency but social justice’ (Barber 2004). Its staff believe
workplace learning combats social exclusion and empowers women and
minority ethnic workers (Smith 2006).1
Enthusiasm is endorsed by commentators who judge the TUC ‘central’ to
creating a culture of learning at work (Beckett 2002; Mann 2006). Employers
have been less vocal but welcoming (Engineering Employers’ Federation
(EEF), 2006), while maintaining hostility to statutory support (Confedera-
tion of British Industry (CBI) 2001). Academics have not taken fundamental
issue with the TUC. Some claim employability programmes possess ‘poten-
tial to create a new cadre of activists’ (Munro and Rainbird 2004a: 424).
Statutory support for union learning representatives (ULRs) ‘represents a
significant gain for the British trade union movement’ (Wallis et al. 2005:
284). Far from undermining collectivism, a charge levelled against partner-
ship (Kelly 2004), learning partnerships can strengthen trade unionism.
Indeed, they ‘may have important implications for the renewal and redefini-
tion of workplace activism’ (Munro and Rainbird 2000a: 234).
More emphatically: ‘the provision of workplace learning opportunities has
enhanced the attractiveness of the union to potential members, increased
existing members’ identification with the union and strengthened collective
organisation’ (Williams and Adam-Smith 2006: 195–96). Learning is not only
bound up with partnership (Wallis and Stuart 2007: 3); it is at the cutting
edge of the unions’ organizing agenda, particularly useful in organizing
women (Unionlearn 2006a: 2; Waddington 2003: 242).
Union revitalization has attracted the attention of scholars in Britain and
beyond (Behrens et al. 2004; Turner 2004). Some of the literature insists that
‘the learning agenda has been intimately connected to the issue of trade union
revitalisation’ (Wallis et al. 2005: 284). Revitalization has been perceived as a
contested arena in which partnership (Stuart and Martinez Lucio 2005),
organizing (Gall 2006) and sometimes servicing approaches (Bassett and Cave
1993) jostle for preference. They have been considered as competing and
contradictory strategies (Heery 2002), but some find them compatible. In
Britain’s second largest union, Unison, learning is simultaneously ‘a tool for
building union organisation...aservice to members...asubject on which
partnerships with employers can be established’ (Munro and Rainbird 2000b:
186). More generally, ‘the appeal of learning opportunities...has been
shown to contribute to the organising agenda while at the same time facilitat-
ing benefits for membership in line with the servicing agenda’ (Wallis et al.
2005: 284).
The literature on which these estimations are based has focused on specific
programmes (Munro and Rainbird 2000a,b; 2004a,b) and on the develop-
ment of ULRs (Wallis et al. 2005). Our purpose here is to evaluate the part
that the TUC has played in the development of public policy over the last
decade. The article scrutinizes claims that workplace learning provides a
potential route to success in realizing social partnership, and in taking
forward the organizing and servicing agendas, thus providing a significant
vehicle for union revitalization.
284 British Journal of Industrial Relations
© Blackwell Publishing Ltd/London School of Economics 2008.
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