By email

Dear Mr Greenshields,

 

I have recently joined the NUT and I was wondering (as a socialist) whether there is a broad left organisation in the union I could contact?

 

 

Regards

 

 

Dear ……..

Firstly, call me Bill.

Secondly, welcome to the Union!

I have to give you my personal opinion in answer - though it was the opinion I expressed as forcefully as I could when I ran for Vice-President a couple of years ago.

The Union is more internally united and determined now than it has been for many years. We are doing everything we can to leave behind internal divisions and factions - and this ambition is supported across the spectrum of radical political opinion in the Union.

We've had more "left" groupings than you could find useful. There is a group which calls itself "Broad Left" sometimes - at other times "Broadly Speaking". There's another called "Socialist Teacher Alliance" and another called "Campaign For A Democratic & Fighting Union", and another called "Classroom Teacher" which I believe is made up of people who recently left the "Socialist Teacher Alliance"

Until realtively recently the Union, in my opinion, was plagued by factional infighting between these groups, which alienated members, put members off attending their Association meetings, often divided the Executive down the middle, too frequently divided the Union as a whole and turned our Conferences into unnecessarily adversarial conflicts. The factions sought to pre-empt  policy debates, pre-arrange elections to leadership positions, and score points off each other.

You'll guess from this that I'm not a fan of this type of factionalism, and we have made huge progress in overcoming such divisions.

I think a Union needs to properly represent and give leadership to its section of the working class - in our case, teachers - and socialists should be at the forefront of this. This means our priority should not be to building a faction within the Union, trying to maintain control, or wrest control from another - but rather to developing a real radical organising culture in the Union as a whole, finding new ways to involve members in the work of the Union, building strength in the workplace, re-invigorating Associations and Divisions. Top down factional "fixes" are in my view incompatible with this.

Recently - and particularly with Steve Sinnott as General Secretary, the old factionalism has been broken down and the Union is operating in a very much more united fashion, at all levels, including the Executive, recognising the necessity of membership control. I stood on this basis when I went for Vice-President, and I'm still convinced it's the right way. Our recent Conference, and our effective campaigns reflect this new internal unity.

If you have a look at my website you'll find something on the contents page called "What's The Union Doing About It", which is my election statement, and deals with some of these issues

However, I do think we need an informal structure in the Union where people can meet locally and nationally who want to be involved in discussion of development of policy, strategy and tactics, that goes beyond what can be achieved just in Association meetings etc, and tries to explore contexts of our struggle, and ways forward. Such an informal organisation should welcome differences of 'left opinion', rather than orthodoxy and conformity to a factional "line". Socialists need to be open and clear about their views, as I try to be, but not exclusive of other teachers who disagree with us... and certainly not engaged in any manipulation of the policy and election processes.

I think this informal process will develop and bring together all the most positive people from the current groupings, and many from outside them. Maybe the Morning Star (recognised by the Executive as central to our publicity and communications strategy), which in my view is working as a genuine forum for debate on the Left, will provide a focus for this - we'll see. I'm involved - not as President, but in a personal capacity, with a magazine called "Education For Tomorrow" which also attempts to stimulate wide debate amongst socialists in education. There's a link to this at the top of the homepage of my website.

If you are under 35, you might be particularly interested in helping to build our  Union's relatively newly established Young Teacher organisation. If your local Association has set up a structure, get involved in it... and if not, why not offer to get one going? You'll get plenty of assistance from local Officers and NUT HQ in this. We have a Young Teacher Conference coming up - 4th-6th June.

I hope this rather longwinded answer to your very genuine question is useful - and not a rather heavy handed "rant" as it may appear! It will come as no surprise to the organisers of the groups - all of whom I regard as Union brothers and sisters and comrades.

Unity really IS strength - both internal union unity, and unity across the teaching profession.

I'd be very pleased to discuss this with you further, and I hope it will be alright with you if I include these thoughts on my website, in the hope of developing the discussion in the Union on a wider basis. I would of course not include your name in this!

Thanks for your question... it's got me thinking again!

All the very best - and again welcome to our great Union!

Bill

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